Rough times ahead for local business

Working with Local Businesses  Equals Big Profits Today, more and more people are doing everything from researching a great vacation, to paying their bills and even to buying their groceries on the Internet. In this day and age if you have a brick and mortar business and do not make use of the internet to market yourself, you are at a huge disadvantage. Surprisingly though, almost 95% of all off-line business owners are not on line, and most of those don't have a clue about the internet or how to use it to their advantage. This is great news for Internet Marketers. If you are in the Internet Marketing business or have wanted to break into it, now is the time. If you are ready to cash in on enormous profits, you need to look no further than the small business owners in your local community. Quite surprisingly this is an untapped market that is just starting to be discovered. There are a variety of ways that you can help the local business owner to become known on the Internet. First and foremost you will want to build them a website that will be SEO (Search Engine) optimized. It will be important for the business owner to have a high search ranking for those searching for local businesses. On the website you should make sure there is an opt in page to collect data from potential customers. Starting and maintaining a blog on the business's website can also be very beneficial, just make sure you keep the blog running with useful information. Blogging is the up and coming way to advertise and you will not want the small business owner to miss out on any opportunities. Having audio and video clips on the website can also attract new customers. Besides the website, there are also some other key things you can do to help the off line business owner. First, you will want to make sure that the business owner is listed on the internet yellow page websites. Second, you will want to get them registered with Google Local. Expose the web site to Search Engines. Third, you can also work with the business owner to come up with coupons to lure in new and returning customers. There are a variety of coupon sites that you can post these on. It is easy to see that the off line business owner could see a huge spike in their business if they were to tap into the internet market. Most brick and mortar business owners have no idea where to begin and yet they would love to have the edge on their competitors.  If you are an internet marketer or looking to become one, now is the time to take action. Your fortune could very well be waiting for you. Electronic Commerce to Expand the Smallest Business Setting up the web site for a business is really the easy task. The real work begins to make use of the web presence and deliver profitable business from the site. Getting prospects to the web site and making use of the Internet for extending business success is the next order of the day. The web page and the Internet has the unique ability to handle prospects not only 24 hours a day, seven days a week but can effectively sell and take orders from a mass number of customers at the same time. On the Internet prospects are all around the world. The United States, Canada, France, Great Britain and Australia all have ready access to the business as those who could drive up to a physical location and purchase from the store site. Over the years the cry for a business was, "location,  location, location". Now with the growth of the Internet the needs have changed. Joining location is the need for "traffic, traffic, traffic". Without viewers, people finding and getting the exposure to the web sites delivers no sales on its own. "No matter what your business is, without traffic  to your web site you might as well not exist on the Internet." A smart site on main street where the traffic was heavy and prospective customers had easy access to a merchant was demanded. The more people passing and convenient access was in high demand and commanded high property value. Over time as the towns grew every business couldn't afford the cost of a prime main street location and the development of strip malls provided for a lower location cost. Major shopping malls became in demand where they were anchored by large chain stores that could attract large numbers of buyers from expensive advertising. In the major shopping malls visibility became a large concern. The best locations where the most prospects passing by could command compensating rents and determined the choice of location placement for business managers. Today, with the advent of massive online shopping, location is now being replaced by the need for traffic clicking on merchant's web sites.  Location in search engines to drive traffic to web sites is important and better placements is to the web page's advantage for traffic. The need is for traffic and "clicks" to expose the products and services. Whether paid inclusion in search engines and directories or simply pay for click links to web sites the delivery of visitors takes huge effort. Visibility is Vital to your web site and E-Commerce success The business with a web site offers prestige and standing in the eyes of the customers.  A good impression of modern business practices  builds esteem.  A location on the Internet provides worldwide circulation of a businesses products and services. This expanded geographical presence extends the prospect base without any additional cost. The most important advertising or promotion of a business web site COSTS NOTHING. As soon as a business web site is published the inclusion of the URL right along side the phone number is mandatory. A business should not list a phone number  without listing a web site address right  along with the phone number.  Newspaper ads, telephone books, business cards, physical location signage, mailings, invoices, receipts every piece of paper listing the business name and phone number need the web site address prominently included. In fact special promotional efforts should be directed just to announcing the business web site and extra service available online as a new and unique feature of the business. Reviewing expectations for the new Internet presence we know that our purpose is to build brand recognition, announce special sales, present new offerings, acquire new costumers, retain existing customers and with the additional opportunity of reaching beyond just the local area build profits and make more money for a business. With all the tough times in today's economy, it can be difficult to get by. Debt can add up quickly, and expenses don't seem to be getting any smaller. But that doesn't have to affect you. There are so many opportunities around for you, and many of them are in marketing. But what if that edge was you? Did you know that statistically 90% of small businesses do not have a website? So anyone in the local market that searches for them will not be able to find them. Today that is the number one reason businesses lose customers. Why don't they have websites?  Mainly because they lack the time or expertise  to set them up. That is where you come in.  You offer them that service, at a cost of course. Permission e-mailing or optin safelists are the lifeline of E-commerce. Contacts are made, sales messages are communicated and sales jobs are done....harsh but true. Additional benefits...and maybe the MOST IMPORTANT, COST! Are you crying out for more business?   Read Building Your Income with Safelists  for Home and Small Business  click here