Marketing
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Give Twitter A Try: How to get started on Twitter even if you don’t really want to
By Andrea Rowland
I used to think I was allergic to Twitter. Whenever a friend or colleague asked for my “handle” (and it happened A LOT), I’d break out in a cold sweat and run for the nearest exit. I couldn’t bring myself to admit that I wasn’t on Twitter. I was too busy to learn ANOTHER new technology. I had a job. I had a family. I had a life.
And then I wrote a book.
Where could I connect with other authors to learn how they went about getting their books published? Stay on top of trends and trendsetters? Join conversations about landing a literary agent and writing a proposal and all the other stuff I didn’t yet know about the publishing industry? Twitter.
This time, I didn’t flee. I was reluctant but resolved to give Twitter a try. (more…)
How to Spy on Your Competition
By Eric Spellmann
How to Get the Most from Your Technology
By Cindy Bates
In my experience, the most successful small businesses are those that make the most out of their investment in technology.
They are the practitioners who are empowered to respond quickly and professionally to clients and the online entrepreneurs who can expand the capabilities of their websites. They’re often small companies reaching out to national and global audiences through email marketing. However they operate, those business people who best capitalize on technology consistently find a speedier and more productive route to their markets. Research from the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) found SMBs leveraging technology grow revenue and profitability at a much faster rate. According to BCG, if just 15 percent of low-tech SMBs and 25 percent of the mid-tech SMBs became high-tech SMBs, the result would be 2 million more jobs and an additional $357 billion into the U.S. economy. (more…)
gTLDs: What are these new domains, and why should you care?
By Isaac Irvine
If you own a business, choosing a great domain name is one of the most important steps you’ll take to build a strong online identity. A unique address that represents a website, your domain name is the part of the address that follows the “www.” in an address bar or after the @ symbol in an email address. Your domain is how people remember and revisit your site.
You’ll probably have lots of questions when you set out to choose a domain name for your online business presence. Questions like “What keywords should I use? Is this name too long? Should I pick a .com or what?” It’s a big decision.
Fortunately, the continuing rollout of hundreds of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) to the online marketplace makes it easier than ever before to pick the perfect domain name. These descriptive new domain extensions—such as .lawyer, .guru, .vegas and .dentist, just to name a few—give you a fresh opportunity to register domains that perfectly represent what you and your business are all about. (more…)