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Black Friday Deals from Markomm on Internet Marketing Services Leads to More Sales.

November 10, 2010 in Markomm In The News, Press Releases | No comments

Businesses can take part in Black Friday Deals. Markomm, an Internet Marketing Firm, is offering Businesses Black Friday Deals by waiving Setup Fees On Internet Marketing Services on Black Friday saving businesses hundreds of dollars.

For years Black Friday deals have only been available for retail product. This year’s Black Friday (November 26, 2010) is different. Markomm, an internet marketing firm with offices in Denver and Virginia Beach, is breaking the mold and offering their own Black Friday specials.

On November 26, 2010, Markomm will waive any and all setup fees for its core offerings of Pay-per-click, Search Engine Optimization and Local Listings. Waiving the setup fees will save businesses anywhere from $199 to $500 or more.

“Over the past few years we’ve seen businesses struggle due to the economy; however, businesses that are actively involved with internet marketing are thriving. As an example, one of our clients is seeing a 300% return on their internet marketing.” Said Jeff Hensiek, Vice President of Sales & Marketing.

While retail giants (Target, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, etc.) are going to be offering specials on toys, clothing, electronics, tools and much more, Markomm will be offering Black Friday specials on their Internet Marketing services; PPC (pay-per-click), SEO (Search Engine Optimization), and Local Listings.

The three major search engines, Google, Bing, and Yahoo use complex algorithms to rank websites and display relevant search results to their users. PPC, SEO and Local Listings are three tools that can be used to get a business’s website to the first page of the search results.

A recent report from Google stated that 89% of consumers consider themselves a shop online, buy offline type of consumer. The report stated, “of consumers making in store purchases…89% have conducted online research prior to a purchase. (Google Adwords Certification Training Program, Chapter 14)” Therefore, it is becoming more important for businesses to have their website listed on the first page of the search engines.

On Black Friday (November 26, 2010) Markomm will waive the standard setup fees for its core services (PPC, SEO, Local Listings). This will save businesses anywhere from $199 to $500 or more depending on the service.

We asked Mr. Hensiek, “Why such a bold move?”

“We want to help stimulate businesses by getting them (a business) on the first page of the search engines. We know that being on the first page will drive traffic and sales to their business. To survive in today’s changing economy you need have your website listed on the first page.” Hensiek Commented.

In order to be eligible for these Black Friday saving, interested businesses need to call or email Markomm on November 26th. Over the next several days, each eligible business will receive a personal consultation to help determine the best online marketing approach for that particular business. Businesses interested in moving forward will have up to January 1st, 2011 to complete necessary paperwork.

For more information and details about Markomm’s Black Friday Internet Marketing offer, contact Markomm at 1-866-503-7673, email Jeff Hensiek at jhensiek@markomm.com or view Markomm’s web page at http://www.markomm.com/blackfriday.php

Tags: Internet Marketing, Markomm Making Headlines, Pay Per Click, Search Engine Optimization

SEO For Branding

October 11, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles | No comments

Pay-per-click advertising in search engines is a veritable money machine for some companies. They put money in, turn some wrenches, and money comes out the other end.

However, PPC is not a miracle worker. Turning those wrenches can take a lot of work. And there are several marketing goals PPC achieves less effectively than SEO.

Comparing data from MarketingSherpa’s 2011 Search Marketing Benchmark Reports: SEO and PPC Editions, more marketers reported SEO as “very effective” at achieving the following objectives:

o Increasing brand or product awareness: SEO: 42%; PPC: 34%

o Improving brand or product reputation: SEO: 29%; PPC: 19%

o Improving public relations: SEO: 27%; PPC: 6%

Clearly, more marketers believe SEO is more effective than PPC at changing people’s opinions about their products and brands.

However, when it comes to conversion-related objectives such as increasing lead generation and online sales revenue, more marketers report PPC as “very effective” than SEO. (Put a feather in the PPC hat!)

The data lead me to believe that people searching to learn more about a company or industry are more interested in natural search results than paid results. Ads take on a larger role as searchers make purchase decisions or consider other conversions (such as reaching out for more information).

If your team is hoping to lift brand awareness and reputation, you’re better off working to improve your natural search performance than increasing your PPC budget. PPC is not necessarily ineffective, but it’s likely to have a smaller return than time invested elsewhere.

For more information about PPC (pay-per-click) contact Markomm at 1-866-503-7673, download your free Internet Marketing PDF “3 Keys to a Successful Internet Marketing Plan: PPC | Local Listings | SEO | Social Media” or buy the full 100+ page ebook “Internet Marketing Plan: PPC | Local Listings | SEO | Social Media”.

Tags: Internet Marketing, Pay Per Click

Google Changes First Page Again

September 20, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles, Internet Marketing Tips | No comments

Most people have already noticed that Google has made some additional changes to their searching feature. We’ve been researching the changes and identifying how it impacts our clients and we’ve found it will do pretty much 3 things to the internet marketing world:

(and obviously, this is all speculation….we need to get some stats hammered down first before we know the TRUE effect)

1) the Top Spot in the Natural Rankings is going to be even more important. The way Google’s new release operates is by giving you ’suggestions’ based on the keywords you are typing in. Therefore, you’ll want to make sure you are optimizing your website for more and more terms.

With Google’s new search feature, A lot of times what you’ll see is the sponsored links coming up in the top slots and only one natural listing. This is all you may see ‘above the fold’. Therefore it is becoming more and more important to be on the first page of the search engines.

This means you need to include SEO (search engine optimization) as part of your internet marketing plan. You’ll need to have good content on your website, good navigation on your site, a completed site map and also have good off site optimization as well (lots of links coming to your site to show credibility).

See picture for an example

Natural Rankings are becoming more important (SEO)

The 2nd thing that we’ve learned is that you’ll want to be actively using a very solid PPC strategy. PPC (pay-per-click) allows you the maximum amount of speed and flexibility. For starters, you can have your website listed on the first page of search results in about 24-48 hours. In addition to that, when you look at the picture above, you’ll see that the ’sponsored links’ area shows up and takes up most of the first page.

With this information, we could basically draw the conclusion that PPC is going to become a staple with every internet marketing plan.

In the short term, we see the overall cost of the broad / generic search terms rising because of competition. However, with 90% of affluent homes on the internet and with over 95% of people clicking on the first page, you need to make sure your website is listed on the first page.

3) the third thing we are seeing is how Google is rolling out the new launch. They’ve selected a handful of internet browsers to utilize this feature. So not everyone is going to be exposed to this new search tool right away. Rest assured, the remaining browsers are probably under development right now and will most likely be completed in the near future.

For more information about developing your Internet Marketing plan so you can land on the first page of search results, contact Markomm at 866-503-7673, email them here or complete the request form.

Markomm – the Internet Marketing Experts (http://www.markomm.com) is a Denver, Colorado based online marketing firm. They focus on SEM (search engine marketing) which includes, PPC (pay-per-click), website conversion, SEO (search engine optimization) as well as other online marketing tactics focused at getting qualified clients to come to your website…and once there, become customers!

Tags: Internet Marketing

PPC is a Lead Generation Tool

September 14, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles | No comments

PPC can require a significant investment of both time and money, but when executed effectively, the rewards are well worth it. PPC has been rated as a very effective tactic in achieving increased lead generation, website traffic, increased online sales revenue and increased brand or product awareness, making this an important tactic for B2B and B2C organizations alike.

It’s possible that the perception of PPC’s effectiveness for increasing offline sales revenue is a result of difficulties in tracking the original source(s) of offline sales. Additionally, the improvements PPC has on website traffic and increased brand or product awareness will lead to an increase in offline sales revenue.

The effectiveness of PPC in improving brand and product reputation or public relations is undervalued, with only 19% and 6% of organizations indicating that PPC was a very effective tactic in achieving these objectives, respectively. PPC can be used to improve brand or product reputation and improve public relations. Having a PPC ad appear above a direct competitor’s ad conveys authority on the paid side of search. Additionally, PPC can be utilized to address any negative press that may appear on search results pages. These are just a couple of examples of how PPC can be used to improve reputation and PR.

The Effectiveness of Pay-Per-Click

This is an article written by Marketing Sherpa. Marketing Sherpa is an online statistical analysis firm.

Tags: Internet Marketing, Pay Per Click

5 Best Blogging Platforms

August 24, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles | No comments

It’s not difficult to argue that blogging has done more to spread knowledge and ideas than any other publishing innovation since the printing press. Here’s a look at the most popular blogging platforms to help you get your ideas out there.

Printer and photocopier salesmen of the late 20th century frequently peddled their wares with the pitch that a personal printing device could turn anyone—schools, neighborhood associations, churches, individuals with a message to get out—into small time publishers. The revolution they hinted at didn’t come about on their watch, however. The personal printer simply didn’t have the volume and the reach that a later innovation, the internet—and more specifically, blogging—would have. Blogs give anyone an inexpensive platform to promote their ideas to a potential audience of the entire world, not just a county in Idaho or a street corner in Manhattan.

Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite blogging platform. We tallied the votes, and now we’re back to highlight the five most popular blogging platforms for your perusal.

Blogger (Web-Based, Free)

Screen shot of Blogger Platform

Blogger is a popular and free blogging service owned by Google. Blogger’s big draw is ease of use and nearly instant setup. You can go from blog-less to publishing your first post in under 15 minutes thanks to its extremely easy setup process. Blogger supports drag-and-drop template editing, dynamic updating, geo-tagging for location-based blogging, and easy publication from editing tools like Google Docs, Microsoft Word, and Windows Live Writer. Blogger supports up to 100 users, so if you grow your blog beyond single editorship you can expand without any hassle.

Tumblr (Web-Based, Free)

Screen Shot of Tumblr Blogging Platform

While Blogger is an easy way to set up a full-fledged blog, Tumblr is an interesting fusion between a full-fledged blog and a Twitter feed. Known as short-form or micro blogging, the style of blogging on a Tumblr blog is focused on short and frequent posts that are normally longer (or more focused on media like images or video) than Twitter updates but not as involved and formal as a regular blog post. It’s a style that appeals to a lot of people and the ease of setup coupled with the informality of Tumblr is a winning combination for people who aren’t looking to commit to a blog as an involved and time-consuming project. If this is the first time you’ve come across the concept of micro blogging, make sure to check out Tumblr’s About Us which provides an interesting picture of micro blogging.

WordPress (Web-Based, Free)

Screen Shot of Wordpress Bloggin Platform

WordPress is a popular open source blogging platform along the lines of the venerable Swiss Army knife. As a WordPress user, you have the option of setting up a WordPress blog on your own server (for free) or creating a WordPress-hosted blog at WordPress.com. Thanks to an absolutely enormous community of followers and developers, WordPress has themes, plug-ins, and gadgets of all stripes. It isn’t as simple to set up and configure as some of the other entries in this week’s Hive, but once you get it up and running you’re rewarded with a nearly limitless array of options, configurations, and plug-ins. Finding a customization tool or trick for WordPress is almost never more effort than a cursory Google search. WordPress is a scalable solution that allows you to do everything from maintain a single blog with a single user to an entire stable of blogs with multiple users all overseen by a primary administrator.

SquareSpace (Web-Based, From $8 per month)

Screen Shot of Squar Space Blogging Platform

SquareSpace is a commercial blogging platform with packages ranging from $8-50 per month. One of the nice things about their pricing schedule is that it’s based almost entirely on volume and not on the idea that the lower tier members don’t deserve all the cool toys the premium members get. Aside from a few features, mostly focused on volume and big site management, the user experience from the smallest users to the biggest power users is consistent. SquareSpace’s strongest focus is on making good blog design easy for design/coding newbies. They’ve built their system around a modular design so building a brand new blog is as easy as snapping the pieces you want together.

Posterous (Web-Based, Free)

Screen Shot of Posterous Blogging Platform

Posterous aims to be an absolutely no-fuss and zero-stress way to blog. You don’t need to sign up, you don’t need to know any code, you don’t need to know how to do anything but send an email to set up your own Posterous blog and start sharing your ideas and media. Simply email post@posterous.com from any email account and Posterous will create a YourName.Posterous.com blog for you. They’re quick to point out that they aren’t a short-form or micro blogging service because there isn’t anything short or micro about your Posterous blog. You can write posts and long as you want, attaching photos and media files. (You can use the site’s rich text editor to create or edit posts, but its by-email updating is what its best known for.) The only micro part about Posterous is the amount of time you’ll spend setting it up. While email-based blogging might not be for everyone, it’s impressive how much you can do through the Posterous system with a single email. Check out their FAQ file to see how you can do everything from multimedia posts to tagging your entries right from your email subject line.

Now that you’ve had a chance to look over the five most popular blogging platforms as voted on by Lifehacker readers, it’s time to cast a vote for your favorite:

Which Blogging Platform Is Best?

top 5 Blogging Platforms Compared

Can You Really Get On The First Page? 3 Things You Need To Know When Creating Your Online Marketing Plan!

July 19, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles, Internet Marketing Tips | No comments

There have been a lot of new innovations on the internet over the past year and many of them are going to change the way you and other businesses conduct your Internet Marketing Plan.

Below, we uncover three (actually 4 – three just sounds better) new search innovations that are changing the way searchers search, what results they will see when they search and how you need to change your Online Marketing Strategy to make sure you (and your business) show up on the first page of.

These Four search avenues are going to majorly impact your business over the next 12-24 months and you need to be prepared to adapt or be trampled on by your competition:

Video search
Personalized Search
Real-time Search
Mobile Search.

Video Search: We all have seen and understand the popularity that video has on today’s consumers. We’ve seen YouTube grow from something that was a fad to something that is highly regarded….and now, search engines are also taking notice.

Search engines are starting to index the videos, the content around the videos, the video descriptions and more. What this means is that now, videos are starting to show up on the first page of search engine results.

How do you tap into Video Search? Pretty simple, as part of your Internet Marketing Plan you need to make sure you/your business has some quality videos online. These videos need to have quality content surrounding them. And similar to website optimization, the descriptions need to be very keyword related.

Mobile Search: 10 years ago, many people didn’t have a cell phone. Fast Forward to today and almost everyone has them. And to go further…many of them are web enabled (meaning people can surf the web on their mobile device). This is fast becoming the wave of the future for search.

How do you tap into Mobile Search? The best approach is just like the old marketing saying…KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid). Mobile devices are not able yet to download complex CSS or Flash videos. If your site has a lot of complex CSS coding or if you have a lot of Flash on your site, chances are that the consumer will have a difficult time viewing your site.

So, keep it simple.

Straight HTML is GREAT.
Know the mobile device aps and optimize for those.
Keep keyword phrases short
have a well displayed location – mobile devices are based off of location and this a great way to get noticed
And above all….make sure you employ it as part of your online marketing strategy

Real Time Search: This style of search ties in very closely with social media. Algorithms are getting ’smarter’ and ’smarter’. Even to the point where they are displaying new blog posts, Twitter updates, and more on the search results page. Don’t be surprised if you are surfing on a hot topic and you see a twitter feed scrolling buy.

What this mean is that is is becoming more and more important to be involved with Social Media and to effectively USE social media as part of your online marketing plan. The business of today needs to have a LinkedIn profile, a Facebook page, a Twitter Feed and much more.

Personalized Search: Start the earthquake and hold on tight. Personalized Search is causing the most waves of them all.

Personalized Search looks at your computer search history over the past 180 days and displays search results based on that history. This means is will become more and more difficult for new businesses to rank on the first page of search engines.

However, don’t get all glum in the mouth and throw your hands up in the air and say that you are done and that business as we know it will fail…there are ways you can still be on the first page.

The biggest thing you can do is DRIVE TRAFFIC TO YOUR SITE NOW! Here is a list of suggestions for your Internet Marketing Plan:

Pay-Per-Click…get people to your site NOW so your site is ‘indexed’ in the last 180 days.
Email marketing…get current clients back to your site as often as you can
Encourage Bookmarking….this will ‘index’ your site as a favorite
Use social media as part of your online marketing plan
New/Fresh/meaningfull content.
etc.

In the future, rank reports will become less and less effective and meaningful.

When you tap into these different tools of the trade and employ them as part of an effective Internet Marketing Plan, you will find your business growing and succeeding.

Below is an article from Marketing Sherpa that supports this blog post. Marketing Sherpa is an online statistical analysis firm.

The Expected Future Impact of Search Innovations

With a number of search engine innovations being released, it’s only natural for marketers to speculate on what role these new additions will play in the future of SEO. It’s not surprising that personalized search tops the list. Because personalized search causes different search engine users to receive different results, it’s possible that personalized search may have a negative impact on some organizations’ SEO efforts by decreasing exposure. This has caused considerable speculation among the SEO community.

Another recent addition — real time search — is also expected to have a significant impact. As the popularity of using social media for marketing purposes grows, so will expectations of this search innovation’s impact.

Of all the segments surveyed, organizations that integrate social media into search campaigns had the greatest expectations regarding the impact of all the above innovations. This could be due to the fact that this group is generally more well-educated in the most recent developments in both search and social media.

Tags: Internet Marketing, Online Marketing Tips

Yahoo and Bing Merger – update

July 15, 2010 in Internet Marketing Articles | No comments

Hey Everyone, here is an email we received regarding the upcoming Yahoo & Bing Merger.

Looks like Bing has won out and will be the dominate tool to be using. To go further…Bing will be the ones that will be powering the organic search results. This can play a lot of havoc for your natural rankings.

See the full email here so you can keep updated.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Yahoo! & Bing Merger

Google – Changing The Rules of Internet Marketing For “Local Business” ads.

June 30, 2010 in Uncategorized | No comments

Keeping up on top of the Internet Marketing world is difficult and Google is now making it even harder for small businesses.

For years, businesses have been able to go online and create an online profile through Google Maps (or what ever they are calling it today – Google Local, Google Places, Google ????). Typically, when someone would search for a business in the ‘Google Maps’ area, you would also see PPC ads. This has always been a great way for Internet Marketers (through Local PPC Ads) to get the word out that their client is a competitor and that they have a unique USP (Unique Selling Proposition) using “The Billboard Approach”.

However, Google is taking that opportunity away.

For those of you who have local ads currently running and are wondering what is going to happen to them?

What we’ve seen in Adwords Editor is that we can still modify them (not sure how long that will last) and we receive a note telling us they will become standard text ads.

Google, in an email we received on June 18th, stated, “Future versions of AdWords Editor will support location extensions, not local business ads, and your current version of AdWords Editor will no longer show local business ads after the transition. However, you’ll be able to manage your converted local business ads by signing in to your AdWords account at https://adwords.google.com.”

So, basically the specific ad is going away.

Some of you may be up in arms about that move, however, I applaud this approach.

We work with a lot of national franchises…these franchises have several different locations that are usually close to one another.

What this transition means is that we can now streamline our business for franchises that are in close proximity.

In the past, if we wanted to specifically advertise each client’s address (advertising them separately), we would need to create unique account/campaigns and manage each location individually.

Now, we’ll be able to put together one account, list each business separately and the user will see an ad that lists the location closest to where they are. And we can still send all of the traffic to the same landing page.

The biggest advantage is that local businesses no longer need to fight over marketing space or marketing boundaries.

This is such a great move by Google. It will really help out the internet advertising firms a ton.

for more information about the local business ads, watch this video.

Tags: Google Making Headlines, Internet Marketing

Franchise Locations No Longer Need to Compete for Internet Marketing

June 18, 2010 in Free Trainings, Internet Marketing Articles, Internet Marketing Tips | No comments

As a Franchise Internet Marketing Firm, we handle a lot of different franchise locations that are in very close proximity to one another.

On June 18th, we received an email from Google that made the bells of heaven ring loud and clear.

For years, we’ve been playing referee for local businesses who are in the same market space. They are trying to tap into the same market of people and are feuding between one another over the marketing space. It is a real day ‘Hatfields vs. McCoys”.

However, with the announcement from Google about Local Extension Listings, our problems are solved.

With Local Extension Listings, we are now able to:

create one account,
list all of our clients address in that one account and
drive clients to a Mutual landing page

The beauty of this approach is that each user (searcher) will have a very unique searching experience based on where they are located.

For example, if they are located close to client A, then the ad will show with client A’s address. If the searcher is closer to client C, then the address for client C will show up.

We will no longer need to create multiple accounts/campaigns, tag each account with an address, and ‘fight’ for space. Sure, we had to in the past and what we usually did was have one client do a DNS redirect so the ads could show up at the same time or use the scheduling feature to set up windows for when the ads would show (i.e. Rotate who’s ads could show every 15 minutes…yes, that gets very complicated).

The video below (from Google) shows exactly how this process will work using multiple location extensions.

Thank you Google for helping to make our lives as internet marketers a better place to live. We can finally help the ‘Hatfields and McCoys” to get along together.

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Tags: Google Making Headlines, Internet Marketing, Online Marketing Tips, ONline Marketing Training, Pay Per Click

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Markomm - The Internet Marketing Experts

Black Friday Deals from Markomm on Internet Marketing Services Leads to More Sales.

SEO For Branding

Google Changes First Page Again

PPC is a Lead Generation Tool