Why should I market my business online?

Some business owners may ask themselves why they should be marketing online. They may feel that having a good location and putting up a Yellow Page ad might be enough to bring in customers. If they’re feeling ambitious, maybe running a commercial on radio or TV might get them more business. Those are decent strategies, but they are really an outdated method of driving traffic. According to this report by iCrossing, Inc., 88% of people who buy online do a web search before purchasing. Clearly, by not having a presence online and a strategy to attract people looking for your product leaves a LOT of money on the table.

I want to use a story I heard from film director Robert Rodriguez on one of his DVD extras about how using traditional methods can become outdated as time passes. The story goes like this:

A young couple is in their kitchen preparing a ham for dinner. The husband asks his wife, “Why do you cut the ends of the ham off before you cook it? It seems like a waste.”

The wife replies, “I don’t know, that’s the way my mom always did it.”

They go to the mother and ask her why she always cuts the ends off of the ham. She says, “I don’t know. That’s how your grandmother always did it.”

All three then go to ask Grandmother about it. Grandmother replies, “That was the only way I could get it in the pan.”

Only using the traditional methods of advertising is similar to this. It works, but it can be expensive both in the cost of advertising (filming a commercial isn’t cheap) and in the loss of revenue from people who just don’t find you. Using the internet to market your business enables you to get in front of more people’s eyes and bring them to your place of business, whether it is a brick-and-mortar store or an online order page.

It is not hard to market yourself online, but you do need to have some knowledge of the best methods. The easiest way to acquire that knowledge is to learn from people who have already had success and know what works. By studying at their feet, you can have a head start on effectively finding your customers online. That’s what I did, and it can work for you as well.

All about me!

Well, I have started a blog. Since this is my first blog post I suppose I should use this to tell you about myself.

I am 36 years old, not married, no kids. I have been just cruising along in my life accepting the things that happen and just generally going with the flow. I graduated high school in 1992 and went to work. By that time I was pretty much done with school, and I just wanted to get a paycheck and get my own apartment. I worked for Target as a stocker for almost two years until one day I went to lunch and never went back. There were extenuating circumstances, but it mostly amounts to just being young and dumb. After a while of being unemployed, a friend of mine got me a job with a company that sold nuts and bolts to the construction industry.

I worked in that industry for about 15 years or so, working my way up from a warehouse flunky, to managing the warehouse, and then moving into sales. That followed a pretty standard progression and I was able to survive, but I was never quite where I wanted to be. I always wanted to be making more money, live in a better place, have all the toys, etc., but I just never seemed to manage it. Then in January 2010, the day after my birthday, I was laid off. The construction industry was horrible in general and the company had been struggling for some time. My one consolation was that the company itself closed its doors the following month. I felt bad for the few people that left, but at least it wasn’t a situation where the company could plug along (or worse, get better) without me.

So now I was unemployed in an industry that was in survival mode. None of the other bolt houses around were hiring and it seemed everywhere else I went required a Bachelor’s degree. I decided to give college a try and landed on a Bachelor’s in Business Administration as my goal. I figured, I would be able to get a better job with higher pay and maybe have some of those things I wanted. I enrolled with an online college and am currently working through my classes. I’m doing pretty well too, I must say! I was still collecting unemployment and relying on a family member to help me out with my bills, but I was going to be better off in the long run. I was even inspired by one of my first classes (a health and wellness class) to go out, start exercising, eat better, and lose some of the excess weight I had gained. I was on a roll toward self-improvement that I had never really bothered with! Then… I hit another challenge.

I came to the end of my unemployment benefits. I could file for an extension, but Congress was still arguing about whether to allocate funds for the program and no payments were being made. I was sitting around at my computer on a Saturday night, thinking about what I was going to do now. I figured my options were to either go live on the streets and lose everything I had, or go get a job flipping burgers which would just about cover what I lost in unemployment. In desperation, I started looking around online and discovered internet marketing. Most of the programs were about making x amount of dollars in two hours a week, automatically! Yeah. But I found a group that was more interested in building me up. They wanted to teach me HOW to be successful, not only in business, but in life as well. They did not promise it would easy, did not promise it would be automatic. But they did offer me the chance to learn from people who are already successful, and to learn how to create my own success.

The key concept is changing your mindset. I had the same mindset as most people. I wanted to have-do-be. If only I had the money, I could do what I wanted, and be who I want to be. This is completely backwards from where I needed to be. It should go be-do-have. Be the leader, do what a leader does, and you will have what a leader has. When I thought about it, I found that while I had the have-do-be mindset, I had already started to change that. I wanted to be better educated, so I did what I had to do to accomplish that. I wanted to be in better shape, so I did what needed to be done. And I proved to myself that with a little determination, I could start down that path.

Now I know I have written a complete wall of text here, but I thought it was important for you to know who I am, where I came from, and where I want to go. I wanted to share my experience with you to give you some context about where I am coming from in my future posts. I intend to write about how we can all better ourselves and improve our situation just by overcoming our obstacles, changing our mindset, and reaching out to become who we want to be. I had to start from within first. It requires you to challenge yourself and really examine your way of thinking. I am only a step or two down this long road, but I can already look back and see just how far I have come. I had the worst entitlement complex of anyone I have ever known. When I changed my way of thinking, I changed my life.

I made that change. Will you?

The importance of perseverance

I am a huge fan of cycling. The Tour de France is over for this year, but it still has lessons to teach us. The athletes that compete in the biggest cycling race in the world did not get there by accident. They all had challenges to overcome, and they all triumphed to become better than they were.

How does this relate to online marketing? Well, it all comes down to your mindset. Some people think that building an online marketing business just means setting up a website and watching the dough roll in. When they find that they aren’t getting enough leads, they decide it’s too hard and give up. To become an online millionaire requires discipline, patience, and the confidence in yourself to know you can do it.

When it comes to your own abilities, you are always right. If you believe that you cannot do something, then you can’t. However, if you dedicate yourself to truly putting forth the effort required, you can succeed.

Now, I’m not suggesting that you can simply wish your way to a successful online business. You need to know what needs to be done and what steps to take to get where you want to be. You don’t have to only rely on yourself. There is a community that is dedicated to helping you build the best online marketing business out there. We will teach you the step-by-step methods to generate your leads and convert them to sales. All you need is the belief that you can do it too! Join me in the fun and financial freedom that comes from owning your successful marketing business!