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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…)
Our Favorite Things: Tips from 2014 – A year’s end wrap up from Google’s Get Your Business Online Team
By Whitney Lemon
Can you believe it’s almost 2015? The final blog post for the year recaps our favorite lessons that can help businesses grow and succeed online.
#1: Start with the website
The majority of today’s consumers start their shopping process online, so a company’s website may be the first interaction with the business. For businesses just starting out, review this lesson about choosing a domain name (your website address, or URL) and determining the goals of your website.
When building a website or making improvements to an existing site, pay attention to the header and footer, the top and bottom of the page. These are valuable areas for communicating important information about the business. Check out the blog post here. (more…)
Success Story: Idaho
Energy Recruiting Services provides job placement services in the oil and energy industries in Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, Colorado and Texas. Energy companies can expand into new areas quickly, leaving them little time for finding quality job candidates. Energy Recruiting Services simplifies the process with quality pre-candidate screenings and placement. “We have an exceptional reputation to help fill the need for qualified employees,” co-owner Melissa McElfish said. “A lot of our new companies are referrals from companies that are happy with our services.”
Their success made sense, given the experience of Melissa and her husband, co-owner Tom McElfish. Melissa previously worked in management and client relations, while Tom spent years in construction management, including oil pad construction in North Dakota. (more…)