I come to you, my BNL family, to hopefully shed some light on something that I recently feel forced to address. My objective with this post is to help you evaluate the people you pay to “design” your website. I am going to be super blunt because I am so passionate about empowering my followers and I am getting tired of seeing people get taken advantage of by those who have no idea what they are doing.

After hosting internet marketing trainings and consultations for the last few years I have come across numerous “web designers” and I feel this is the only quote to express my feelings adequately…

“I knew it. I’m surrounded by A$$#*!&$. Keep firing, A$$#*!&$!” -Dark Helmet, Spaceballs

I am by no means a website designer or a development expert nor do I want or claim to be, but there just seems to be too many companies out there toting their web design expertise and have no business doing so. I want to give you a few things to look for when choosing someone, and more importantly paying someone to develop an online marketing campaign, particularly your website.

These are 5 of the most important things you must evaluate when hiring someone to put together a website for you:

1. What platform are you going to set up my site on? (Content Management Systems (CMS) is a MUST, WordPress or Joomla are the best and the only competent options. If they don’t mention these, RUN!)
2. How are you going to design my site? If they say anything about “writing it,” “coding,” “custom style sheets” or anything other than creating a custom theme for you they are more than likely not operating efficiently and are going to set up something that will cost you more in the long run.
3. Look at other sites they have created and try to highlight the text in a few areas. If the text doesn’t highlight and you are able to drag it like an image, RUN! That site is TOTAL CRAP and they have no idea what internet marketing or SEO is.
4. How are we going to capture information? You must, must, must have a call to action on your site. Your list is your businesses equity. If you are not growing that list your business isn’t growing as fast as it could be and you have a stagnant, useless site with the hopes to sell to random people that may stumble upon it. Auto-responders like Aweber, Constant Contact, and iContact are the some of the best.
5. Your costs should be between $400-$10,000, depending on the desired functions of your site. I know that is a pretty big gap, but there many degrees of the complexity when designing a custom web presence. If you just need a simple site with a few pages, some custom images, a contact area, and the training to update it yourself $400-$1,200 is a fair price.

Again, I am not a website designer, but it costs significantly more to duplicate a site that was done by people who really have no business promoting themselves as a website developers. Sorry for the touch of negativity today, but 3 students of mine in the last week have been swindled out of a quality site that they deserved and paid for.

This post is a little bit of an over simplification, but if you get anything from it please just evaluate the people you pay to do web design for you. Just because a site “looks good” does not mean so!

I value and appreciate all of you. Have a spectacular day and I look forward to seeing you at the top!

WOW, is there ever a lot of confusion going on about Social Media and how to make sense of it all. I was talking to a business person the other day and his comments about not needing Social Media as a part of his marketing strategy shocked me. He didn’t understand the value to his business and actually saw it as a big time waster.

My response to him was that every business needs Social Media Marketing as a part of their overall marketing strategy. Social Media is no longer a “nice to have” marketing strategy, it’s a “must have” marketing strategy.

Everyone goes online to look for products or services and research companies before doing business with them. The days of looking in the Yellow Pages for what you want are almost gone. What makes you and your business any different?

The power of social media has no even begun to scratch the scratch of its potential. The unfortunate part of this all is many people choose not to educate themselves on the subject and are getting farther and farther behind. This is a facet of business which, without exaggeration, evolves on a daily basis.

There is always a new shiny object there to capture our attention, but what is important is having a strategy, a game plan. Not only a game plan for your marketing, but also a game plan for how to stay informed with new technology and trends.

As a Social Media Marketing Specialist, I decided to formalize a home study coaching program to help people on a tight budget with the What, Why and How of Social Media so they can put together a strategy that makes sense for their business. You can check it out at www.hubsocializer.com to see if it answers some of those big questions about Social Media you might have.

Happy New Year!

Kathy Perry, Social Media Marketing Specialist
www.kathyperry.com
www.hubsocializer.com

P.S. You can also download my free ebook at: www.52SocialMediaTips.com

Every day people look at the tremendous growth of the internet and wonder how they can get involved. With over 1.7 billion people worldwide now online, internet marketing is only getting bigger and bigger. If you want to learn how to generate income online with no product, no experience and no investment, you need to take a look at affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing – the marketing of other people’s products online – offers so many advantages.

1. Get into business yourself: There are lots of ways to get into business. But few, if any, offer the chance to do so from the comfort of your own home, on a schedule of your choice, without the need to commute or punch in on a time clock. You can be your own boss and run the show the way you choose.

2. No cost startup: Franchises are expensive to begin. Starting a brick and mortar business, like a gas station or a dry cleaner, requires a significant capital investment. Multi level marketing is inexpensive to get into, but may be uncomfortable for many since it requires selling to family and friends. Beginning a full time online retail or services business has significant up front development costs. Affiliate marketing, however, can be started up with no cost; all you need is an internet connection to get started.

3. Well known companies and brand names: As an affiliate marketer, you do not have to spend time promoting products or services which are not well known. In affiliate marketing it is possible to choose among some of the most successful big name companies and some of the hottest brand names. There’s no need for you to sell an off-brand cosmetics line. Instead you can market what most shoppers are buying.

4. Freedom of choice: Affiliate marketing allows you to choose the products and services you promote, the seasons in which to promote them and the audience you want to reach. You can take advantage of buying trends and shopping seasons, by rolling out special campaigns. There are no limits in affiliate marketing, other than the amount of effort and creativity you want to dedicate to developing your business.

5. Additional stream of income: If you’ve got a job, you can easily use affiliate marketing to generate more income. This is also a perfect opportunity for a stay-at-home parent, especially when you have a working spouse. Or if you are a student, you can be an affiliate marketer and generate funds for tuition when you are not in class. After all, few students these days are without a computer — which is all that is required to own and run an affiliate marketing business. If you are retired, then…what else have you got to do? Why not be a marketing expert working in association with some of the most prominent companies in the world? And if you are unemployed, affiliate marketing can earn you income while you are searching for your next opportunity.

Other perfect candidates for affiliate marketing include people who are injured and can’t perform their regular job; pregnant moms who want to stay home during and after their pregnancies; workers sick of the nine-to-five; and dads who decide they want to be stay at home dads and create wealth from home.

6. Learn to earn: This is not complicated work. Besides, there are many online resources that will take you by the hand and lead you step by step on your journey to becoming a wealthy affiliate marketer. With so much training available, the question is not whether you can learn or apply this information. Rather, the question, “Do you have the work ethic to get the job done?” Think about it: are you willing to use your imagination to create and grow an online affiliate marketing business?

7. The future of advertising: Perhaps the most compelling reason to be an affiliate marketer is the fact that online marketing is the new direction of choice by most businesses. As print media slowly dies and the electronic media becomes even more expensive, advertising on the web increases in viability. Utilizing affiliate marketers on a commission basis eliminates a whole range of salary and benefit expenses for companies. It just makes good business sense. You can be the marketer who brings the buyers to the seller. It is a process that is less costly to the seller and more convenient to the buyer. As the marketer, you provide the service and collect the commission. This the future of marketing, so take a look at this exciting business today!

Post By: Dan Sherman is the Internet Business Tutor at www.netbiztutor.com. He teaches seminars and offers info products on how to get started in internet marketing as an affiliate marketer. Next class January 23rd, go to www.netbiztutor.com for more details.

Here is a short networking tip from Chris Lontok with Business Local Listings, a local Tampa Bay business owner.

You must have a way for people to subscribe to your posts in order to help you build a quality marketing list. Follow Chris’s tips and you will be one step closer to having a marketing list to begin advertising to.

Good Luck and have a great day!