The Sounding Board

Here it is - the single most important thing I’ve learned about running a business over the Internet (or using the Internet to help promote your business) - networking. Yup. That’s it. Networking. That word we all love to hate. When you ask people what’s the single most important thing they’ve done to promote their business, all you hear anymore is ‘network, network, network.” But what does that mean? What are you suppose to do to ‘network’ when you aren’t even sure where to start?

It used to drive me crazy when people I looked to for advice about my business would tell me “you need to network to find clients.” Okay. And how do I do that? Where do I start? This was often the point at which I got left hanging. When pressed to give me some specifics, often times the answers given were even more vague and unhelpful than just simply saying ‘network.’ I was kind of left with the feeling that maybe they didn’t really know any more about where or how to start than I did.

So where do you start? Here’s the short list:

1) Change the way you’re thinking right NOW. Just stop it. Whatever thoughts are going through your mind as you read this…no matter what they are…just stop. Stop and take a second to breathe. Empty your mind of everything you’ve been telling yourself or that you’ve heard from all these ‘experts.’ Listen to your heart beat and nothing else. Do you hear that little thump, thump, thump? Pretty faint, isn’t it? But think about it…that little thump, thump, thump, that tiny little sound…what does it do? When you think about it, that little thump is just the beginning. It’s the beginning of everything your body does in order to keep you going throughout the day…the oxygen your body needs to process and carry throughout your body, the food you eat, the millions of little cells fighting off a constant barage of viruses and bacteria…all of those processes start with just that little thump, thump, thump.

Your ‘networking’ starts the same way. It’s not a huge skyscraper building that will just appear overnight. It’s something that has to be built over time, with attention and care. It starts out as a little thump, thump, thump, but over time it will grow to encompass an entire body of connections. Remember that. Keep that thought with you at all times. Every connection you make is one more thump of the heart of your network.

2) Use your friends. Yes, you heard me. I said use your friends. Do you know how Jim Morrison and the Doors got their big start in music? Back in the day, The Whiskey was the biggest club on the scene back in the early 60s. They didn’t stand a chance of getting a gig there as an unknown. So instead, they managed an audition for London Fog, a club just down the street from the Whiskey. In order to show the club managers they could pull in the crowds, they put together a huge group of their friends and had them show up for the audition. Management was so impressed with the turn out of people in the club buying drinks & otherwise spending money that they hired the band on the spot. Granted, once they got the job, the crowds weren’t as big the next few times they played the club…but management knew they had alot of people interested in the band and willing to support them. They knew it was just a matter of time before more people learned about the band and the crowds would grow. The rest, as they say, is history. Who doesn’t know who The Doors are now?

Don’t be afraid to ask your friends to help you build your network. They’re already your biggest advocates - they already care about you. What better basis could you start with to build your network? That doesn’t mean you call and beg them to introduce you to anyone and make yourself a pest. However, it never hurts to ask a friend to write a review of your blog, or to write a short intro/testimonial about you for your website, or ask their advice on where to meet someone in your niche.

3) Get active in social media. Look into things like StumbleUpon, Digg, online forums for your industry and your niche market, social networking sites like LinkedIn, MySpace, etc. These places are free, can help you build traffic to your site, can help you meet like-minded people, etc. Start getting profiles built, connecting with friends via social media sites like Digg, StumbleUpon, Facebook, MySpace, etc. You can do these things even before you have a website or blog. Even if all you’re doing is making connections on a social level, it’s a good thing.

When you’re ready to go ‘live’ with your business’ online presence, you already have a network of Internet-savvy friends and colleagues who can help you spread the word about you, your business, and your website or blog. You just never know who might know someone who knows someone. And if you already have a site (traditional or blog site) using social media to expand your online presence is a great way to increase your site traffic, bump up your organic page ranking, create linkbacks, and bring more and more people to your little home in cyberspace.

Seriously, this is the single most important thing I’ve learned about bringing a business into the world of the Web. All the SEO work, all the countless hours of web design and writing copy, all the painstaking effort to plan out your business won’t mean a thing if no one knows you’re there. And the single best way to let people know you’re there and how to find you to learn more is by getting other people to help you spread the word. You can start doing that long before you’re site is ready to be seen. You can do it long after your site’s gone live and traffic just isn’t coming. It’s never to early. It’s never too late.

Stay tuned tomorrow…there’s more to come. We still have to talk about the tools you really need to build an online presence & a host of other topics coming later in the week! See you there!

As we get a little closer to the target launch date for the Virtually Yours Business 101 Series, I thought it was time to share just a little bit with everyone. The Business 101 Series is intended for die-hard DIYer solo professionals. As I’ve mentioned before here on the Sounding Board, there are lots of us out there who either by choice or necessity, fall into the DIY category of online businesses. Whether you just want to learn a little more about building your own web presence, or simply don’t have the budget to turn those tasks over just yet, being a DIYer definitely means you have your work cut out for you. (Unless, of course, you have knowledge of html, xhtml, css, php, etc. But if you had all that, you probably wouldn’t be here reading this, would you?)

This week I’ll be featuring a daily overview of the Business 101 Series. Each day we’ll lightly touch on the topics and tasks to be covered in the Series. I’ll devote one entire day of blog posting to specifically address each aspect of getting started on building your web presence. Never fear though - this isn’t high school. You won’t be graded. You won’t be judged. And I’ll try not to put you to sleep. We’ll just talk about what you’ll need in order to stumble through the DIY process. No geek-speak translation required. I promise!

Are you ready? Stay tuned…tomorrow I’ll post probably the most important thing I’ve learned about getting your business out there in cyberspace…where and how to start so you can make sure all your hard work doesn’t go unnoticed.

There’s a great little site tool I thought I’d share with you Sounding Board readers. As most of us know, site statistics are quite useful for site owners/webmasters. Site statistics help you gather demographics about your site visitors. What use is that you might ask? Simple. By monitoring site statistics & visitor demographics, you can better gauge what marketing efforts are or are not working. Most site statistic software will give you information such as what OS or browser visitors are using so that you can be sure your site design works well in those applications. Additionally, visitor location, time of visit, referring URL, pages viewed, how long visitors viewed pages, search terms used, and other statistical information is also available. This helps you determine where visitors are learning about your site, what pages interested them, and where they went when they left your site.

Let’s look a little case study to better illustrate my points:

Let’s say Jane, owner of a specialty pet item website, pays for ad space on the ABC Pet Supply website. She hasn’t seen a huge increase in business since placing the ad, but there is some increase in traffic to her site. Could it be from the online networking she’s been doing, or is it from the ad space she purchased? By using site statistic software installed on her site, Jane can pull up information on site visitors to see where her visitors/customers found her. If visitors clicked on her ad at ABC Pet Supply, the corresponding URL will show in her site statistics. From there she can determine if the slight increase in business is a result of her ad or possibly some other avenue. This helps her determine if the ad expense was worthwhile. It can also help her determine what search terms visitors are using in search engines in order to find her site. If you’re using services such as pay-per-click advertising, this information can prove of vital importance in ensuring you get the biggest bang for your buck.

Additionally, site statistics can give you information such as the IP address used by site visitors. Unfortunately in today’s tech-driven world, spammers are an inconvenience all online businesses have to address. By tracking the IP addresses of site visitors, webmasters and site owners can report spam and other abusive access directly to the ISP who owns that particular IP address. (Keep in mind, however, that advanced spammers can and do ’steal’ IP addresses of legitimate service providers in order to mask their true identities.)

If you’re interested in using site statistics on your website, I strongly recommend Site Meter. While many web hosts provide site stat software built in to their hosting packages, they are not always novice-friendly. Site Meter is a free site stat service that offers easy to understand statistical and demographic information on site visitors. By simply placing a small script in the code of each page you wish to monitor, you can have Site Meter automatically collect this information for you.

In my case, we inserted the script in the footer of my site pages, as well as my blog pages. (If you scroll down the bottom of any page on my site or blog, you’ll see the Site Meter logo.) Once a week, Site Meter emails me a summary of the activity on my site for that week. I can also access my Site Meter dashboard at any time to review information about my site visitors. While it doesn’t give me sensitive personal information about visitors, it does tell me what link they used to get to me (including search term used if they accessed my site via Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc.), the IP address assigned to them by their ISP, who their ISP is, what OS they use, what browser, the screen resolution they viewed my site in, and their general location (city, state, and country.) This has provided me with a wealth of information, especially since I market both on a local level as well as nationally.

Do you use a different site stat software or service? Drop me an email with your information. As always, if we use what you send, we’ll post about it with credit given to you and your site. It’s a great way to share useful information and get a little link love in the process!