Posts Tagged ‘internet marketing’

Surveys

A survey is a means of collecting quantitative information about a group. It can be used to collect opinions or quantitative data. Surveys can be used in several ways.

Tips:

• Ask questions of your customers to engage them and start a dialog.
• Gather information on what your customers want.
• Identify the demographic you want to be talking with.
• Quantify feedback from your customers.
• Collect the opinion of your customer.

Resources: Surveys

• Zoomerang – The Leader in Online Surveys with Over 1 Million Satisfied Customers. Quickly and easily create online surveys to get the insights you need. You can build a survey in minutes with free access to over 100 professionally-designed online survey templates. Then, analyze and share your results by creating customized charts, posting them to your blog or website or just exporting your data to Excel, PowerPoint or a PDF.
• SurveyMonkey – Using just your web browser, create your survey with our intuitive survey editor.  Select from over a dozen types of questions (multiple choice, rating scales, drop-down menus, and more…).  Powerful options allow you to require answers to any question, control the flow with custom skip logic, and even randomize answer choices to eliminate bias.
• QuestionPro – QuestionPro is web based software for creating and distributing surveys. It consists of an intuitive wizard interface for creating survey questions, tools for distributing your survey via email or your website, and tools for analyzing and viewing your results. You simply build your survey and email it to a list of potential respondents. QuestionPro will take care collecting and recording the responses. Results are available in real time.
• PollDaddy – With your free account from PollDaddy you can create online surveys and polls for your website, blog and social network. Find out what your visitors are thinking today. Create your surveys and polls using our custom templates or create your own. Use our in-depth reporting engine to aggregate, print and export your results.
• Snap Surveys – With 27 years survey experience and thousands of users, Snap Surveys can supply survey software and research services for your specific market sector. Snap 9 is our user-friendly survey software for market research. Snap provides the tools you need to get your research done. Professional IT and research services for survey management and data processing from our in-house SurveyShop division.

Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a way to exchanging messages between people. It can be used to send an ezine (an online magazine in which editorial content is controlled) or newsletter. This is a tool most people are used to using as a means to communicate with one another. But how do we use it to effectively market our business?

Tips:

Here are some suggestions for how to use email as a marketing tool to grow your business.

• Author your own ezine or newsletter
• Submit content to leading ezines.
• Create a joint venture with leaders in field to cross promote your ezines.
• Sell ad space in your ezine.
• Set up auto responders which are messages that are automatically sent to your customer when they perform an action such as signing up for your list.
• Use email to communicate with your customers about upcoming opportunities, activities, news and events.
• Set up a separate email address for sales or services issues.

Resources: Email

Here are some free ways to get an email account.

• Hotmail – owned by Microsoft MSN
• Gmail – owned by Google
• Yahoo Mail – owner by Yahoo

Resources: ezine publishing services (NOT Free!)

For a small number of subscribers you can send out the email from your email provider. As the quantity of subscribers grows, you will need a more sophisticated tool.

• Awebber – Whether you’re looking to get your first email campaign off the ground, or you’re a seasoned veteran who wants to dig into advanced tools like detailed email web analytics, activity based segmentation, geo-targeting and broadcast split-testing, we’ve got just what you need to make email marketing work for you.
• iContact – iContact allows businesses, non-profit organizations, and associations to easily create, send, and track email newsletters, surveys, and autoresponders.
• Constant Contact – Email Marketing and Online Surveys from Constant Contact make it easy and affordable for you to connect with your customers or members.

Do you have other favorites tips or resources that you’d like to share?

(For more tips and resources such as this, download the Free Report, “187 Free Ways to Explode Your Business”.)

Web conferencing has become a popular means of commuincating with customers and potential customers over the internet. It reduces the need for travel and saves everyone time. There are a number of companies that provide these services. Some are free and many involve a fee. Here we define the terms used and includes a resource list for web conferencing, webinars, webcasts, and podcasts.

Web conferencing is when you conduct a LIVE meeting or presentation using the Internet (many to many interaction). In a web conference, you sit at your computer and are connected to others in the meeting via the internet.

A webinar is a one-way web conference (speaker to audience) but can include questions & answer sessions.

A webcast is the transmission of non-interactive audio or video content over the internet (speaker to audience).

A podcast is a series of audio or video files that are downloadable from the web. It is an acronym for Portable On-Demand Broadcast.

A teleconference or teleseminar is the live exchange of information among many remote people via a telecommunications system.

Tips for Web Conferencing:

• Hold a live webinar.
• Record your webinar and make available as a webcast or podcast.
• Record your webinar and post the audio or slideshow to share with customers or potential customers.

Resources: Web Conferencing (most of these are fee based)

• Vyew – FREE! With Vyew you can conduct meetings in real time using a shared workspace, webcam, voice over IP (VoIP), free teleconferencing, text chat and desktop sharing. In addition to uploading, sharing and presenting content you can invite participants to annotate and collaborate on content during the meeting. Participants can be allowed to navigate the workspace independently to collaborate on different portions of the content. You can also record the meeting for playback.
• Glance – up to 100 guests see your screen…you can share your mouse and keyboard with guests, or even see and control their screens!  Inviting a guest is as easy as a phone call, email or IM.  There’s even free Glance phone conferencing available with every account.
• Adobe Acrobat Connect – With Adobe® Acrobat® Connect™ Pro software, you can create instant, collaborative meetings with just a web browser and the Adobe Flash® Player.
• InterCall – InterCall, the world’s largest conferencing provider,. Our integrated web, audio and video conferencing makes web meetings, webinars, audio conferencing, online training seminars and multi-point video conferencing easier and more productive.
• Microsoft Office Live Meeting – Office Live Meeting is a conferencing solution that you can use to engage audiences in online meetings, training, and events. Learn how you can schedule, join, or present a Live Meeting by using newly available features, including audio, video conferencing, and uploading handouts for distribution.
• WebEx Communications – WebEx is an easy way to share ideas with anyone, anywhere. It combines real-time desktop sharing with phone conferencing so everyone sees the same thing while you talk.
• GoToMeeting – Easy Online Meetings – Anytime, Anywhere. Use GoToMeeting to present, demonstrate and meet all you want – for one low flat fee.

Resources: Webinars

• Dimdim – Display your presentations to anyone remotely with Dimdim, a challenger to Webex. Has a free version.
• SlideRocket – SlideRocket is the leader in online presentation software. With SlideRocket you quickly make stunning presentations, manage a library of slides and assets, share them securely with colleagues, and measure how they’re used. It has some web conferencing capabilities.
• ON24 Inc. – Global Provider of Webcasting and Virtual Events Solutions

Resources: Podcasts

• Apple iTunes – post your webcast to the iTunes store and make your content available to all iPod users.
• Podcast.com – Podcast.com is the premier podcast destination that provides access to a growing list of over 60,000 curated and constantly updated podcast feeds representing more than 1 million episodes of audio and video content.
• Podcast Alley – Podcast Alley is the podcast lovers portal. Featuring the best Podcast Directory and the Top 10 podcasts, as voted on by the listeners. Has forums covering how to make a podcast, podcast software, podcast directories, music for podcasts, etc.

For more resource lists like this, please request our FREE REPORT: “187 Free Ways to Explode Your Business” available from the right sidebar.

Another tool to grow your business using online or internet marketing is to create Online Presentations: A slideshow is a series of pictures used for artistic or instructional purposes. It allows you to add visuals to an oral presentation for greater impact.

Tips for using presentations for online marketing:

• Create an online presentation to share with your customers or prospective customers. Educate, inform or inspire them about your products and services. Create excitement.
• Use an online presentation creation and posting service and embed it on your website and share it with other sites. This is a way to drive traffic and increase links back to your site.

6 Online Presentation/Slideshow Sites:

• SlideShare – Upload and share your PowerPoint presentations and Word documents on SlideShare. Share publicly or privately. Add audio to make a webinar.
• Zoho – Zoho.com is a comprehensive suite of award-winning on-line business applications. Customers use Zoho to run their business processes, manage their information and be more productive while at the office or on the go, without having to worry about expensive or outdated hardware or software. To date, Zoho.com has launched 19 different applications.
• SlideRocket – SlideRocket is the leader in online presentation software. With SlideRocket you quickly make stunning presentations, manage a library of slides and assets, share them securely with colleagues, and measure how they’re used. Has some web conferencing capabilities.
• 280slides.com – You can download to PowerPoint or share at SlideShare. Create beautiful presentations, access them from anywhere, and share them with the world. With 280 Slides, there’s no software to download and nothing to pay for. 280slides.com
• Myplick – Upload your slides, sync with audio, and share with friends.
• Google Presentations – part of Google docs.

Do you have any tips you’d like to share? What’s worked for you?

You can get more lists like this by downloading my FREE REPORT: “187 Free Ways to Explode Your Business”.