You don’t have to limit your marketing and promotional efforts to content creation, though. Here are a few other ideas to help you get the word out about your business.

1. Create and maintain a high-quality, easy-to-use, self-explanatory web site.

Your web site works for you 24/7/365, so it’s important that it does a good job. It doesn’t need to be beautiful or showy. As a web designer, I would actually recommend clean and easy-to-use over pretty, fun or cute.

When thinking about your web site’s design and functionality, focus on answering these questions for your ideal visitor:

• What is this site about?
• What does this person/company do?
• How much does the service/product cost? How does the service/product work? What else do I need to know about this service/product?
• How can I sign up or purchase this service/product? How can I contact this person/company?
• Should I keep up with this person/company (through a blog, newsletter, regular email coupons/discounts, etc.)? If so, how do I sign up or follow the person/company?

Your site should quickly and obviously answer these questions so that visitors can find their way around your site easily and so that they take action as quickly and painlessly as possible.

2. Use a short and effective email signature.

Every time you send an email, it’s a chance to remind your followers and new contacts what you do. Take advantage of the opportunity. Don’t be spammy. Don’t overdo it. Just provide a concise message to jog their memory and get them to click over to your site every once in a while.

Here’s my signature.

Amber Singleton Riviere
http://www.ambersingleton.com/

I also like my friend Betsy’s.

Betsy Talbot | www.marriedwithluggage.com | Twitter @marriedwluggage

3. Be a guest on other video blogs, podcasts and radio shows.

Monitor places like Twitter, Blogger Linkup, and HARO for opportunities to be interviewed for video blogs, podcasts and radio shows. It’s a great way to expand your reach and get known for your expertise.

4. Invite others to be guests on your blog, video cast or podcast.

One of my best methods for networking actually revolves around guest posts, whether I’m inviting people to contribute to my site or offering content for their sites. It’s been a very effective way to generate interest around my business. It takes a lot of effort to keep up, but it’s worth every minute of it.

I offer guest posts regularly on my site (usually ten or more per month), and what’s great about it is that you usually get the added benefit of promotion to the person’s followers and audience.

5. Participate in online networking.

Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn are great places to meet new people and get the word out about you and your company or site. Also, be sure to follow and comment on other blogs that target your ideal customer or client. By participating in conversations surrounding your niche, you’ll become known as an expert and a valued source of information.

6. Run promotions and discounts on your services periodically.

Getting potential customers and clients to take action and actually purchase your products or services can be tricky, but if you run occasional discounts, you’ll find customers coming out of the woodwork, and it’s a good way to get new prospects to test the waters with you and your company.

I offer a discount in each of my newsletter issues, as well as occasional discounts on Facebook and Twitter. On that note, running contests can also be a good way to get attention for you and your business, especially on Twitter.

Promoting a business doesn’t always have to be difficult. The key, though, is consistency.  Select the methods that work best for you and then stick with them. Do them on a regular basis, even if you’re not seeing immediate results. It takes some time to gain traction, but if you’re persistent, you’ll eventually hit the tipping point and business will start to snowball.

What other easy ways do you promote your business?

Image from Flickr by Slack pics

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One of my most effective marketing and promotional strategies involves regularly creating content for my sites and on the web. Here are some of the ways you can promote your business using content.

1. Create and maintain a high quality blog.

Writing is my single greatest lead generation strategy. It’s how I get known around the web, and while it’s not the easiest tactic, I definitely believe it’s the most effective. Why? It communicates for me in several ways.

• It tells readers what I do and about my expertise.
• It tells search engines about me.
• It helps filter and screen potential clients by letting them see more of my personality and learn about my working style.

As a web worker, I can’t imagine being able to build an online business without writing and publishing content on a regular basis.

I would recommend posting to your blog at least three times per week, depending on the length and quality of the posts. If you write longer posts, you can decrease your frequency to twice per week, if you’d like.

2. Create and maintain a high quality video blog or podcast.

I’ve heard it said that when it comes to learning and absorbing content online a third of people prefer reading, a third prefer watching, and a third prefer listening. Do the math, and if you’re only producing one type of media, you’re missing out on a large group of potential customers and clients.

Although it can seem intimidating at first, audio and video content can actually be easier to produce than written content. Start off slowly by committing to one podcast or video blog per month. If you’re able to keep up that schedule with ease, slowly increase your frequency.

(Tip: Create a production checklist to streamline the process of creating audio or video content. It can be easy to forget steps, making it much more labor-intensive to do each time.)

3. Create and maintain a high-quality newsletter.

Some probably consider newsletters a thing of the past, but for me, they’ve proven to be a very successful way to communicate with my followers and encourage them to do business with me.

I post one newsletter per month, and it contains five articles and recurring sections. Very often, when I post promotions and discounts to the newsletters, I get immediate sign-ups, and I also get a lot of positive feedback and comments on articles, so I know the subscribers are actually reading them.

4. Write guest posts for other blogs.

One good strategy for getting the word out about your site while making friends along the way (as content is hard to produce!) is to offer guest posts for other bloggers. Make sure they’re high quality posts. If you do, they’re likely to invite you back again and again. Try to write one guest post per week. Maintain that frequency, and that’s four new audiences you’ll be introduced to each month.

There are many ways to promote a company, but content creation has proven to be the most effective for me in my business. The most important thing is to be consistent, both with your posting schedule and with your topics. This will help you become known as an expert in your industry or niche. Just remember, it will take a little time to see results with content creation. Fortunately, though, with the advent of sites like Twitter, it’s becoming a lot easier for the word to spread about the content you create. Happy posting!

How do you use content to effectively promote your business?

Image from Flickr by Pretty/Ugly Design

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Apple MacBook

I’ve been asked to live blog an event for a client and their members. Actually, I’ll be live blogging, podcasting, Twittering, Uttering, and live streaming an event.

I am putting together my equipment, securing accounts with all the online tools and services I need, and reviewing the schedule so I’m prepared. This will be a major undertaking that will include two 12 hour days as well as pre- and post-blogging.

Normally, live blogging a conference is done with a team, but this is a proof-of-concept so I’m on my own.

While I’ve live blogged and live tweeted conferences before, this is the first time I’ll be doing it formally for a client. The conference is not my usual fare – it is about philanthropy instead of Internet or technology. I’ve worked with many nonprofits over the last 15 years – including running a nonprofit in New York City in the mid-90s – so the issues aren’t foreign to me. Still, I’ll have to be on top of my game – with a healthy dose of caffeine – to keep up.

Here’s what I’ve put together so far for my Live Blogging Gear.

Keen Oswago Bag

The Bag
I almost attempted to make a bag that could handle my MacBook, assorted digital devices and a variety of accessories and that would keep everything at my hip, fairly ergonomically balanced, and extremely accessible. Luckily, I found something close to what I needed at REI. The Oswago Keen bag sits neatly on my hip, and I can quickly access my MacBook, a notebook and pen, my digital camera, my video camera, my iPod Touch, extra batteries, and all of my power cords and accessories.

The Computer
Black MacBook. Perfect size, weight, capabilities, sleek and good looking. Why use anything else?

The Digital Camera
I’m using a Nikon Coolpix L5 – 7.2 Megapixels, 5x Zoom. An older model but still going strong. I’m still on the fence about upgrading to a slimmer, lighter model. I’ve been using a variety of Nikon Coolpix for many years after graduating from an old digital Olympus. Any recommendations? Keep in mind I am not a professional photographer, and these photos are mostly for the Web.

Flip Mino

The Video Camera
I’ve got The Flip and love its self-contained utility. I’m upgrading from the original model to either an Ultra or a Mino. I should go for the Mino because in addition to the sleekness, it is rechargeable via USB port as well as power adapter. I’m planning to try live video streaming from Flip to Web.

The Digital Recorder
While I’d love to get the Marantz 660 because I also do radio (you remember radio, right?) in addition to audio podcasting, I’ve decided to be a little more frugal at the moment and get the Edirol / Roland R-09HR Portable High-Resolution Audio Recorder. Both were recommended to me by radio producers, although the latter choice was focused more on podcasting so that definitely works for the live blogging. I’ll be interviewing panelists and speakers before or after their sessions.

The Blog
At the moment, the client is setting up the blog. I’ll be consulting to make sure it is “social media ready.”

Ustream.tv

Ustream.tv
I’m planning on using Ustream.tv to live stream parts of the conference. I’m still checking with the client about whether to keep all of this private (for their members only) or public.

Utterz
In a pinch, I’ll post some Utterz when I don’t want to mess with the digital recorder and want to have some audio up on the organization’s blog quickly.

Flickr
There will be a private collection of photos uploaded each day from the event on Flickr. These will also be posted on the blog along with additional cross-posting.

Twitter
But of course I’ll do a little live Twittering on Twitter. It will be private though, only accessible by my client’s members.

Other Miscellany
I’m packing all the powercords and chargers including a slew of rechargeable batteries and a multi-battery recharger. Rule of live blogging: Never run out of power. And of course I am packing a notebook and pens to give my wrists a break. I’m pretty sure there is no way I can type notes on that many sessions without some repetitive stress injury.

As I look over my list, I wonder about overkill. However, even though there is some crossover of functionality, every device can serve a backup function in one way or another so I feel like I’m covered for everything.

What am I forgetting? What do YOU use when you live blog an event?

[photos from Apple.com, REI.com, TheFlip.com, Ustream.tv]

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Do you work from home but miss the office atmosphere? Then simply hire a group of people you don’t really like and would never otherwise spend time with, to mill around your living room for nine hours a day.

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