PromoteYourBusiness

You've got to get the word out, and if you are like most of us, you don't want to spend a fortune doing it. Don't worry, we can help! Here are a few good places to start, many of them are FREE or inexpensive. The options range from very simple (let us do the work for you! Check out Join Mommerce for details) to complex. You decide how much work you want to put into it and how in-depth you want to be. Remember, a little business will bring in more business when you treat your customers well and have a good product.

Getting Started: Go Online!

One of the best ways to reach lots of people for the least amount of money is through the Internet. You may be worried about the cost of designing, maintaining, and promoting a site. Yes, it can be very expensive to hire someone to design your site, but there are other options. You don't need a complex website with all the latest bells and whistles to sell your stuff, you can do it on a few simple pages. Effective websites are well designed to showcase your products, provide your customes with useful, detailed information, and are easy to navigate. Mommerce specializes in highly effective, very affordable web design for small business. For information about our web design services, visit Mommerce Internet Services. Also, go right now and bookmark our WebMom Resource Page. You'll find tons of useful online resources for successfully marketing on the Internet

Drive Up Traffic

Once you have a website, you will need to do a little work to ensure that people are visiting it. This can be done in several ways. If you have a page on Mommerce, you will automatically get increased traffic because we make it our business to build yours! We use a wide variety of advertising methods to increase traffic to our site and draw customers to our Member's businesses. Whether or not your business is part of the Mommerce group, you can increase your site's traffic by lisiting it with search engines, carefully adding meta tags and page descriptions, and joining webrings. You can learn more about these methods in Get With the Web. You can also join a banner exchange program. Your graphical advertising banner will be displayed on other participating sites in exchage for advertising 'real estate' on your site. This is a great way to expose your business to thousands of people. Search the Internet and you'll find plenty of free banner and link exchange programs. There are also many companies that, for a small fee, will submit your site to search engines and listing services. Although its not free, paying a fee may get you more exposure, higher rankings in search results, and by eliminating time consuming leg work, free up your valuable time.

Spread The Word!

Even in today's high-tech world, word-of-mouth is a very powerful advertising tool. It has a cascade effect: You tell three friends, they each tell three friends who pass it on to three more friends. Before you know it, word-of-mouth can draw quite a bit of attention to your business. There are ways to increase word-of-mouth and make it more effective. One big boost is to always have business cards on hand. No matter where you are, standing in line at the grocery store, at your child's school play, during a holiday party, someone always inquires about your line of work. Hand them a business card! If that card looks professional, has your name, your business's name, your phone number, and the address to a well-built website, you've done a lot towards gaining a customer. If you give your card to a friend, hand her a few extra and ask her to pass them on! Close friends may even be willing to pass several extra cards on to each of their friends to help you get your business going. The cards serve as a tangible reminder for your potential customes, they can't forget the site address if it's right there on the card, and it makes your business look professional. Here's the best part, we know of a company who'll print your first 250 business cards for FREE!

Another good way to get the word out is through flyers. Post a professional looking flyer on a church bulletin board, at your children's school, a local university, or a related business. Make sure that your site address and/or phone number is easy to see, so people can reach you. Some fun ways to drum up business are wear-able advertising! Get a T Shirt printed with a logo to peak interest in your business. When they ask you what the shirt's all about, you can hand them a card! Mommerce Members: You can find free printable Flyers in Members Centrals, and T-shirts, Sweat Shirts and more in the Mommerce Logo Shop.

Online advertising can be very effective, as well. You can advertise your products and services in newsletters distributed to thousands of email addresses. Many popular websites will display your ad to their visitors for weekly or monthly fees. Or, if you have your own website, you can join a banner exchange program and share free advertising with other website owners. Try an Ad Swap. If you have available advertising space in your newsletter or on your website, swap with other business owners for free advertising. For more online advertising resources, including links to free banner exchanges and advertising design, visit WebMom Resources.