How Businesses Use X Posts For $5-a-Post

In support of my series, 99 Cent Articles, I have been exploring the quality and insight of the inexpensive content market, beginning with 99CentArticles.com — I dropped $100 on 20 articles (actually $92, but $100 sounds better) and I have been sharing them, over time, with you.  I would love to get your feedback on what you think about them and what you would use articles of this quality and consistency for.  This post is based on a series of articles I ordered with on the theme of How Businesses Use X where X is a topic:

How Businesses Use YouTube to Promote Their Brand

YouTube is a video sharing website where you can upload, view and share videos. YouTube has become one of the most important aspects of the internet culture. Because of this, businessmen have used it as an alternative medium to promote their goods or services. The visibility of YouTube in the online community is how businesses use YouTube to promote their brand.

If you are about to launch your business and is looking for a more cost efficient way of advertising, then you should look into having it promoted on YouTube. Millions of people visit YouTube everyday, and getting some part of that millions of viewers to get to check out your video is enough to generate buzz for your business. To help you get started, here is how businesses use YouTube to promote their brand:

• Create your own channel and upload your best videos. Upload only videos that you feel will standout from millions of uploaded videos similar to yours. An interesting video is enough to boost viewership.
• Start a conversation around your videos via YouTube’s Bulletin Board. The more response you get the better it will be for your business. Do not limit yourself to your own bulletin board, though. Being highly visible on this video-sharing community is how businesses use YouTube to promote their brand.
• YouTube is not only a video-sharing site but a social network as well. Add friends and mingle with them. This will generate loyal followers for your business. And if you leave a good impression on them, they will start telling their friends about your channel and your business.
• Search for videos that are related to yours and post one of your videos as a response. Take advantage of the views that other videos get. How businesses use YouTube to promote their brand is like how public relations practitioners would choose the right places to advertise.
• YouTube allows you to fill out a profile. Make your profile as informative as possible. Include a link to your website to generate traffic. In setting up your videos, be sure that all of them are linked to your profile. So when people click on your video, they will automatically go to your profile and from your profile they can click on the link to your website.
• Create playlists of related videos where you can include a lot of popular ones and your own. This will create a greater recall for your brand. Then join groups or start your own, and post both text and video comments. Encourage viewers to subscribe to your channel by asking viewers to subscribe at the end of each video. Reach out to as many audiences as possible.

Knowing how to take advantage of the technology available in YouTube and its popularity will greatly help you in promoting your brand. The possibility of getting your business known to millions of potential new clients is too great a chance to pass up. With a little work and internet savvy, you can save a lot on your advertising expenses.

How Businesses Use Search Engine Optimization to Promote their Brand

The internet has opened a whole new world out there. It is becoming less and less virtual every day. People use the internet to socialize and work. Because of these, search engine marketing has become an aggressive business. Directing quality traffic to their website is how businesses use search engine optimization to promote their brand.

Search Engine Optimization or SEO helps level the playing field for small businesses. Its affordability and accessibility has made it an excellent marketing strategy for them. SEO considers how search engines would rank your website and what users search for. The idea is to have your website appear on the first page of the search results list to lead more visitors to your site. This idea is how businesses use search engine optimization to promote their brand.

How businesses use search engine optimization to promote their brand is not as easy as it may sound. It may take up to six months before results can be seen and you may need to hire a professional to have successful search engine marketing for your product. Remember that you are competing against increasing numbers of documents from various media, blogs and websites along with more savvy search marketers. Therefore, effective SEO requires creative link building, creation of unique content, integration with other online/offline marketing, social media and optimization refinements.

There are still many ways on how businesses use search engine optimization to promote their brand, if hiring a professional search engine marketer is not in your budget. Register your site with directories like Yahoo and Google, this will have more high quality and high trafficked sites pointing to your site.

To help visitors and search engine spiders navigate your site easily, make sure that it is well-organized, utilize a site map if possible. Familiarize yourself with meta tags, these are hidden HTML directions for web browsers or search engines. Creating a meta tag that accurately describe your site content is essential in directing traffic to your website. Take into consideration likely words or phrases that users might type into search engines to find your site. Include these key words or phrases in the title portions of your site and in its relevant content.

To successfully use SEO to market your brand, you have to determine the ideals and goals that your company wants to pursue. Determine your market by searching volume across major engines for key terms associated with your brand. Find out what markets will return the highest result for your product and focus your optimization efforts towards those markets. Seek out non-reciprocal link relationships that are relevant to your site, make sure that it is high enough in influence to create a positive impact on your site. Most important factor in SEO marketing is your website content. It should contain unique and relevant information to sustain interests of customers.

SEO marketing is a great way to launch brand, product or services of small business owners. Considering the time people spend online and the how people have grown to rely on the internet for information, SEO marketing has changed advertising practices of today.

How Businesses Use Twitter to Promote Their Product

Since Twitter is a social networking site with micro blogging as its primary purpose, businesses can use Twitter to promote their products. Since it is a social networking site, it has the potential to bring in more clients. Here are a few tips on how businesses use Twitter to promote their product.

1. Use keywords when setting up an account. Use keywords in filling up the biography section. Use keywords that are broad enough to describe the product and is popular enough that users will use the keywords in their search.
2. Get into discussions. As an expert in your product you can offer advice and answer questions concerning topics involving what you are promoting. People will then notice you and gain confidence in you and eventually do business with you.
3. Keep track of your tweets. Use search engines to look for tweets that may involve you and may contain feedback on your product and address concerns anyone may have on you or your business.
4. Be diligent in making tweets. Set up a time when you are not busy and dedicate that time for the business. This is for people to get used when they can reach you regularly.
5. Add a personal element in your account and your tweets. This will create a more welcoming effect and not a robot like impression on you by potential clients.
6. Start discussions. Ask some of your concerns and receive feedback and criticism. This way, you can find out what is lacking in your business and what needs improvement or if there is anything that people want that you might be able to give a solution to.
7. Since tweets can only contain 140 characters, it is important that your message be concise and informative. The reader of your tweets should not be scratching their heads after they read your tweets. It is also important that you connect with them by making it a bit more personal.
8. Use retweet every possible time. Retweeting makes other people’s tweets to be posted again on your page. This shows that you’re not only concerned with your business but also with what anyone thinks about it.
9. Make multiple accounts. Since different people like different things, create tweeter accounts that will cater to those kinds of needs. Do not flood your tweeter account with different kinds of products. Group them and divide them so that interest would be concentrated to those products. Just make sure that you can keep up with the demands of having multiple tweeter accounts.
10. There are certain software or services that will allow you to search for specific keywords that will help you in looking for discussions where you can join and promote your product. Or even look for discussions that mentions your account name. This way you can track what people are talking about you.
11. Personalize your tweeter web page. Personalize your background add-ons. Make sure your site will be attractive to visitors and potential buyers.

These ideas on how businesses use Twitter to promote their product can help those who want to start a business or have already started a business and want to extend their network and clientele.

How Businesses Use Facebook to Promote Their Brand

Social networking has increasingly become part of our daily lives. Rarely a day goes by without checking in to see what’s happening to our friends, virtual or not. We now have to the tendency to announce on these social networking sites important things that are happening to us. Facebook is one of the most popular of these sites. And because of its popularity, people are using it to freely advertise their businesses. Creating their own Facebook account is how businesses use Facebook to promote their brand.

How businesses use Facebook to promote their brand is uncomplicated. Once you have created an account and worked on the content of your business profile, you simply click on the “Advertising” link. Then click on the “Pages” link and it will lead you to Facebook Pages page. Clink the button that says “Create a Page”. It will ask you to select the type of business, enter the name, and just follow whatever you’re prompted to do. Be sure to upload all necessary information that will identify your business, like the logo, contact information, other web address that you may have, etc. Lastly to activate your page, just clink on “Publish”. You may also need to post it on the wall of your personal profile for your friends to see or send invites to your friends to become a fan of your new business page. Eventually, a link named “Ads and Pages” will appear and this will allow you to have access on both areas.

Using Facebook or other social networking sites to promote your business is the cheapest way to advertise. All you need is to spare some time each day to update and manage your business page. How businesses use Facebook to promote their brand is a clever and cost efficient way of creating a market to the hundreds of millions of users that lurk on this site every day.

The best feature of your business page is that you can send “Updates” to your fans. If you have a new product to launch, simply compose an interesting write-up that you can send out to your fans. You can also post link that will directly lead them to a particular part of company website. This is how businesses use Facebook to promote their brand. And it costs comparatively lower than any other forms of online advertising.

Using Facebook as your advertising medium entails a different salesman skill on your part. There are millions of users out there who log in everyday to relax and connect with other people. The opportunity of reaching a multitude of audience for your sales pitch should be managed carefully. Make your business page as arresting as possible. It has to catch their attention. Join groups that are related to your business and mingle with its members. There are tools you can use to broadcast upcoming events or syndicate your blog. Utilize these tools to the fullest. Make your presence felt by being a fan of other business pages, write on their walls or send virtual gifts of appreciation.

Facebook is the leader in social networking. Take advantage of its popularity and ease of use to promote your business.

So, what do you think? (via Chris Abraham)

Share on Tumblr