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Web Based Tech Tools to Enhance Business Productivity

December 14, 2009 by Frank Goley, Business Consultant

Business Success Strategies Blog is sponsored by ABC Business Consulting

There are so many great tools out there to make you and your business more productive, profitable and efficient.  Small Businesses need to work smart, and Technology is one big area where working tech smart can really payoff.

The Web

The possibilities of the World Wide Web, and the Tools available on it and through it, are endless.  Let’s concentrate on some that will put extra profits in the bank and help you build a sound Internet Presence.

Ø  CMS:  Content Management System

You don’t have to know much anymore about web design to put together a sharp, effective, easy to navigate and search, website.  CMS makes it much simpler.  Some to consider:

ü  One-on-One Internet:  This is the platform we use to build our websites:

www.businessconsultingabc.com

www.businessplansabc.com

ü  Web Yep

ü  Word Press

ü  Movable Type

ü  Joomla

ü  Drupal

Business Success Resource:  Go to the ABC How to Article on Cost Effective Online Marketing Strategies to learn more about building and marketing a profitable website.

Ø  Blogging

Blogging is a must as it drives excellent, targeted traffic to your website, while providing valuable resources to your audience / customers.  Blogging is also great for keeping in touch with your customers, as well as, gaining new ones through the viral marketing affect blogging can generate.  A lot of CMS, like 1-on-1, have blogging platforms already to go to include and integrate into your website.  Some Blogging Platforms for Free:

ü  Blogger

ü  Vox

ü  Live Journal

ü  Word Press:  Free & Premium platforms. 

Ø  Tracking Website Traffic

When you are set up with a Content Based Website and start actively Blogging, your site will start coming up in the search engine rankings.  To track the success of your Blog and web pages is important and advantageous, as the results will help you tailor your content and sales pitch to concentrate on the market niche customers who are most interested and relevant to your biz.  Some tracking tools:

ü  Google Analytics:  An excellent, free web tracking tool.

ü  Demand base:  Let’s you know when companies are viewing your site.  The Free real time tracker analyzes your web visitor’s IP addresses and compares that info with Company Data Bases, such as Dun & Bradstreet or LexisNexus, providing you with names of the companies.  For an average cost of $1.80 per lead, you can buy a name and contact information for a company.  What a great way to follow up with an already “hot” and interested potential customer (and a potentially Large Company / Customer). 

Ø  Learn to Tweet

Twitter is a micro blog – a blog which can be transmitted and read on a cell phone (as well as any internet connected computer).  This is an excellent platform to market your products and services, as well as, keep customers informed of important articles, updates, news, specials, discounts, etc.  Twitter by the end of the year is going to launch a directory of biz users.  Some Twitter Resources:

ü  Twitter Tracking Tools

·         Tweet Beep:  sends you updates when someone has tweeted about your company.

Tweet Beep & Qwitter helps you learn what is effective and not effective concerning your marketing, products, services, customer service and so forth.  These tools also give you the opportunity to converse with dissatisfied customers.

·         Bit.ly:  can track your Twitter links, for example articles you have written, to see which links are most popular and see information on the Twitter user who clicked the links.  Wow, what a great marketing tool to drive viral traffic to your site and gain instant relevancy and interest, which will bring up your website’s search engine results.

ü  Auto Posting

Use Betaworks to automatically tweet your readers when you have  a new posting to your Blog.  Saves time and generates automatic, relevant traffic.  Tweet-Later lets you create Tweet posts and sends them on a schedule you set.  This gives your Tweet audience a consistent connection to your company, at the times best suited to your audience.

ü  Managing Tweets

Co Tweet manages different users in the same Tweet account.  You can assign different employees and Tweet functions as needed throughout your company.  Also tracks answering Tweets. 

Ø  Virtual Trade Shows

So, you have a Relevant Content, resource Rich, CMS Website, a good Blog going and increasing your Viral Marketing Presence with Twittering.  How about sell your services & products virtually to a large, niche market, without the heavy expense and logistics of a Traditional Trade Show.  Also, Virtual Trade Shows help you increase word of mouth advertising in a web viral way.

ü  InXpo:  your virtual booth links to your Twitter, Linked In, Facebook and You Tube profiles.  A great viral marketing generator!

ü  Unisfair:  supports 16 languages, including Chinese.  What a fantastic way to expose your products and services to the world’s biggest market!

ü  On 24:  Searches attendees’ profiles to suggest relevant exhibitors – a highly targeted, niche marketing platform.

The next blog will focus on more Tech Tools to power up your Business, without high costs, many for free, so you can very effectively compete in the global market and have that big, smart market imprint, without all the overhead and employee costs of a big business.  Work smart!

Let us know your Opinion & Experience on these productivity tools and other tools you are using successfully to establish competitive edge.

Date: Dec. 13, 2009

Author:  Frank Goley, Chief Business Consultant,  ABC Business Consulting

Subject:  Web Based Tech Tools to Enhance Business Productivity

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