Business advertising and the internet

[Tom D]

More and more of my business now comes from the net, almost always from google. I have had the site a while now and it produces quite a bit of work. At first I was only on page 2 of google and I read up on optimising the site and played around with it and now I'm on page 1. The difference is amazing, it was well worth the effort.

The downside of internet advertising is that its very easy for the client to see other businesses a well as yours so an internet lead is not as good as one from a more direct form of marketing. Its interesting to note that on google page 1 there are only about 4 tree surgeons, the other listings are all for other directories, so when I quote for a job from the net I invariably come up againt the same few companies. This just goes to show however that the internet really works, if you're on page 1.

[Gregsie]

Hi,

 

Has anyone had any success with adding their business to Google maps ?

 

I think the advantages are that you appear at the top of the search page and its free. The downside is that any local competition that has registered appears there too.

 

Paul

[A_lopa]

My website has been pulling a fair few GOOD jobs lately.

[Log-ologist]

Its interesting to read of success from web based adverts. I have relied on bush telegraph and printed ads till now. The phone rarely stops ringing. I do think that i need to use the internet to advertise though to find new leads. Soon I have a job for an internet provider working in my town and I'll see them about getting a website.

[firewoodman]

i built, wrote, designed,set up, uploaded the whole lot for my web site and i am in full control and update as often as i can. http://www.firewoodman.co.uk

 

dont know how much work it genorates but it all helps.

 

quite often get good feedback about the site and customers are often impressed that i did it myself and am self tought in computers

 

i dont know much about optimising using the background html code, but do use adwords as it is very controlable and easy to optimise your keywords and price per click.

 

have also done others google adwords

 

used frontpage2000 + 2003 to do the site and have been running it for 8 years now.

 

after a while you will find that your site starts appearing in other places in other directories

 

yell.com also helps as you get more results on first page of search engines

 

i always google myself to see where i appear and to see what the other companies are doing

 

one thing i always try to do is not copy other companies web sites and have no comparisons.

 

dont put as much time into it as i should as it is so easy to change.

[mdvaden]

Over the coming months we will be looking at running discussions to go into print with essential arb magazine, this will hopefully prove mutally beneficial for both the magazine and arbtalk.

 

I'd like to start off the first topic regarding Advertising of your business, particularly how you feel the internet benefits your business. For website owners, how much effort do you put into running your website? have you had it designed and left to do its job or do you actively promote it and work on optomizing your site for google?

 

please stay on topic and sensible in this one guys

 

I've got feedback on this...

 

Holding a bird & typing one handed - will add more. For now...

 

Consider that to Google, landscape design & arborist are day and night - 2 different trades. And my one site must handle 3 aspects.

 

Google these keyword strings with and without quotes - look in the URL rather than the top titles for mdvaden / mdvaden.com

 

CHOP OREGON OUT TOO AND SEE THE CHANGE

 

Portland Oregon Certified Arborists

Tree Services Portland Oregon

Portland Oregon Landscape Designers

Portland Oregon Landscape Designer - SINGULAR

Portland Oregon Landscape

 

TRY THIS UNIVERSAL STRING AS WELL

 

Safe Woods for Parrots

 

Signs of hazard trees

 

MORE CENTRALIZED

 

Nehalem Bay state park

 

JUST MADE PAGE ONE ON THIS

 

Redwood photos

 

So, it's working for me and about enough for 30% of another outfit too. But ... I don't even think the decent results are even close to being the meat of discussion. That's the more relevant part that I'll comment on when I don't have these birds in my hand - maybe tonight. There is a good side this internet thing that anybody can benefit from and has total control over.

Edited November 3, 2008 by mdvaden

[mdvaden]

Birds gone to bed - time for part II

 

So, if I were to start from scratch all over again, I'd put all the search engine ranking stuff on the backburner, and begin with 3 aspects:

 

1. At least one decent looking page, even if just the home page.

 

2. It would have the essential vocabulary words on it for anyone searching exclusively for me, and me only.

 

3. I would MASTER displaying my website URL on anything and everything not plugged into the internet.

 

#3 is probably the most ignored aspect there is. I've got a folder at home that had about 150 business cards in it, and almost every card except 1, had the website URL in TEENSY WEENSY letters at the bottom.

 

What do they have a website for? Why put it on the card?

 

These days, if someone wants your phone number from a card, they are going to look until they find it. So it's the phone number that should be at the bottom in teensie weensie numbers, and the website address should probably be in the middle in some of the bigger text on the business card.

 

Likewise with Ads, Brochures, Flyers, etc.. If the printed piece is big enough, then more than once.

 

Here's the deal, and it partly depends on where you live...

 

If you are in a city like I'm in, the internet and website thing will just multiply. Eventually, if not already, it will just get flooded with websites of similar businesses.

 

So let's say that you and I, and 98 others of us all start from scratch. How about if we ALL hire the BEST and SAME website designer. The cream of the crop of SEO professionals. Supposedly, he will say that he can optimize all our sites for Google and Yahoo, etc..

 

So let's go for it hypothetically. All 100 of us all get a website designed to the max, by the best of the best. Grand ... Now, in 2 months, which one of us 100 companies is going to be #1, #2 and #3 on Google?

 

You tell me ... because ain't nobody going to know. It's a coin toss - a roll of the dice.

 

If you can rank good, fine, that's nice. But even with the best designer, you have no guarantee. But the one thing you can totally control is getting a decent looking site, and making sure you put it right under the nose of anybody who gets your business card or sees an ad.

 

Starting with at least one good page, then you can add to it. Personally, I'd rather people go to my site first, because it reduces the number of questions on the phone about what I do or don't do. If you have good references that you can add to your site, one glance at those can spare 10 minutes of selling services.

 

I got a call while hiking 400 miles away in California last summer from someone up here in Hillsboro. I told them that if they could decide in advance that they would hire me if my bid was reasonable for a design, I'd charge them $100 less if I did not have to drive back out while they thought about me as a service. I could take photos and measurements right then and there.

 

So I asked them to review the few testimonials or letters on my site and see if that helped. 2 hours later, I saw a text message from them saying they wanted to go with my service and would see me in 3 days when I was back north.

 

Sometimes it works that way, sometimes it does not. But the point is, it works that way with everyone it works that way with, and that's quite a few instances that have been streamlined via that one page alone.

 

Can add more later - will see what other's think.

 

This is my business card, with the URL in the middle. White foil was last version, gold foil is the latest version. I may add a phone later - chose not to this time. We live in internet land. Intel is in the next suburb over.

[Ian C]

More and more of my business now comes from the net, almost always from google. I have had the site a while now and it produces quite a bit of work. At first I was only on page 2 of google and I read up on optimising the site and played around with it and now I'm on page 1. The difference is amazing, it was well worth the effort.

The downside of internet advertising is that its very easy for the client to see other businesses a well as yours so an internet lead is not as good as one from a more direct form of marketing. Its interesting to note that on google page 1 there are only about 4 tree surgeons, the other listings are all for other directories, so when I quote for a job from the net I invariably come up againt the same few companies. This just goes to show however that the internet really works, if you're on page 1.

 

Don't know much about the google thing, i need pointing in the right direction. Have a web site but could do with going on google, is it google addwords i need to be on? any help will be useful...

[mdvaden]

Don't know much about the google thing, i need pointing in the right direction. Have a web site but could do with going on google, is it google addwords i need to be on? any help will be useful...

 

At one point, I found Google Adwords to be of use. But it can develop similarities to the flooding of the internet related to the other I wrote, if you read my prior replies.

 

Google Adsense provided me with plenty of work for miminal expenditure.

 

But when I used it several years ago, I was only bidding and paying about 6 cents to 25 cents per CLICK for the best keywords. I understand that several tree services are now paying up to $5 per click for the best keywords - thank goodness there is a feature to set a limit to daily spending.

 

And - only so many Google Ads can fit across and down the right side of a page.

 

Again, like search result rankings, Google Ads will depend on your area, and how flooded the use of it is. If you are just one of two companies in your town using AdWords, you will be in the top 2 ads whether you bid 10 cents per click or 10 dollars per click.

 

But if in a big city and 40 companies all have bids for clicks in between the $4 and $8 per click range - ain't no way on earth all 40 companies will show up on page one or two of search results in an ad.

 

But if it works - it works. I got a few thousand dollars worth of contract for every $5 to $10 I paid Google when the bids were in the 10 cent per click range. It was effective and affordable.

 

If you do those ads, be CERTAIN to put your city name in the ad keyword. If you don't, you will mess up results big time.

 

More details related to that angle will be in the FAQs at Google Adwords.

[skyhuck]

I don't have a website, but I am starting to think I should have one.

 

What should I expect to have to pay to get one up and running?

Edited November 3, 2008 by skyhuck