Small business image is vital. It is the image your business portrays to the world. The old saying “You never get a second chance to make a first impression”, is never more true than with the image a small business creates for itself.

Remember you may often be competing against much larger organisations with huge budgets. So getting your image right can make a huge difference to your success.

First Impressions Count

Image matters all the time, but never more so than the very first time someone comes into contact with you. That first contact may be a letter, a chance meeting in the street, someone walking past your sign-written vehicle in a car park, a potential new customer walking into your premises, or perhaps someone stumbling across your website online.

In all of these cases, your image creates a first impression for that person, which affects how they will perceive you in the future. If that first impression is bad, poor, unprofessional, messy, or anything else negative, you should make it a priority to correct it straight away.

A Bad Impression

The damage a bad image can do to a small business is potentially fatal.

We can all think of several instances in the past where at least one small business created a bad impression in our minds. Think about an example where it happened to you… did you come away with a lasting bad impression? If you did, why was that and if you didn’t, what happened to change your mind?

Your image can sometimes be repaired if enough care is taken to do so, but it’s much easier to just get it right from the start.

Simple Steps

There a several simple steps you can take to improve your image, and most of them are not expensive.

The really simple ones include:

• Friendly staff attitude
• Tidying up
• Vacuuming
• Cleaning surfaces
• Washing vehicles regularly
• Keeping vehicle interiors tidy
• Suitable staff clothing
• Being polite to everyone (and yes that means everyone)
• Considering the needs of the general public – not blocking their access, or making their lives difficult in any way

These things may seem minor, but they are never minor to someone who is trying to decide which local supplier to use for their new purchase or project. These simple things can have a huge impact upon the way people perceive your business.

More Steps

Less simple, but equally important ways of affecting the image your small business creates include:

• Stationery
• Signage
• Vehicle livery
• Fixtures and fittings in your premises
• The condition of your tools and equipment
• Flyers, brochures, posters and leaflets
• Website
• Blog
• Directory listings
• Advertising materials
• Search engine listings
• E-mails
• Presenting a uniform, corporate image

Get any of these wrong and you’re just making things hard for yourself unnecessarily. The key to getting your image right is concentrating on the areas which will make the biggest impact on your image whilst making the least impact on your profits and then focusing on gradual improvements.

Avoid this Simple Mistake

However, this is often mistakenly interpreted as making the biggest impact for the least cost. Think about it; there is a big difference. Focusing solely on cost is a mistake because whilst two options may be similar in cost, one may produce much higher sales revenue than the other. Costs should always be balanced against the increase (or decrease) in profits that they may provide, i.e. the return on investment or ROI.

Smart, savvy entrepreneurs know this and make their decisions accordingly. They invest wisely in the areas that will have the biggest impact on ROI; remember, the better your small business image is, the better your return on investment will be.

SEO or search engine optimisation is a really important part of a small business website.

Let me explain why…

Anyone who uses Google, Yahoo! or Bing (formerly MSN) regularly, knows that they usually provide two types of results (see diagram above):

1. Sponsored links

Sponsored Links (highlighted in red above), are paid for by bidding on specific keywords. Anyone can buy them and they are a huge source of revenue for Google in particular. They are located at the very top of the search engine results pages (SERPs) and down the right-hand side of the pages too. They also appear on various websites as advertisements.

2. Organic listings

Organic listings (highlighted in green above), are on the left-hand side of the SERPs below the top sponsored links. Doing well in these “natural” listings can only really be achieved by SEO.

Why the organic listings are better

Experienced internet users know that the web pages sponsored links point to are frequently of lower quality than the ones organic listings point to. Or to put it another way, clicking on organic listings is more likely to provide the searcher with what they are looking for. This is because for the organic listings only, the search engines return a list of web pages that provide (in their opinion) the best matches for the words you have typed into their search box.

This is especially true with Google because that’s what their whole business model is based upon – high quality results for users from unpaid, natural, organic listings.

By contrast, any website can appear in the sponsored links, just by paying enough money to be there – website content is not a factor for sponsored listings.

So in a nutshell organic listings save users both time and money. No prizes then for guessing why Google’s growth has been so dynamic, or why search engine optimisation has become so important.

So what is SEO?

SEO is a whole host of related tasks, which when carried out effectively, will maximise the position a web page has in the search engine results pages. In other words, better SEO = better search engine listings. This whole host of related SEO tasks falls into 2 distinct areas:

1. On-page SEO

On-page search engine optimisation is about the structure and content of a website and the individual pages it contains. Important on-page factors include domain name, page names, use of meta tags, site structure and navigation, the selection and use of specifically targeted keywords, placement of page elements, use of multimedia elements such as pictures and videos, and even the time it takes a page to load.

2. Off-page SEO

Off-page search engine optimisation is about inbound links to the pages within a website from other websites. Google in particular considers both the quality and quantity of these inbound links a very important factor when deciding which pages should be at the top of their organic search results. It also considers the anchor text (the text that actually appears as a hyperlink) to be very important too. As a general rule of thumb, Google considers off-page SEO to be more important than on-page SEO because they surmise that what others say about you is a better recommendation than what you say about yourself.

What can search engine optimisation do for your website?

Quite simply, the higher your website appears in organic listings, the greater both the quantity and quality of your website traffic will be. Usually, a website needs to appear on the first page to see any real gain and the higher up that page the more dramatic that gain will be. Also, generally speaking, the website listed at number one will get exponentially more traffic than the one listed at number ten. For more about this, read What is a Top Ten Listing on Google Worth to Your Business?

SEO and small business websites

Sadly in my experience, most small business owners still rate the visual presentation of their website above having it search engine optimised. This is perhaps partly because they have always been guided by web designers who have little or no knowledge of SEO, (or worse still, outdated or flawed perceptions of SEO), and partly because they themselves fail to grasp the fact that without effective SEO, their website will never really get more than a handful of new visitors.

Remember that with over 90% of the UK search engine market and millions of searches every day, Google is a potentially huge source of income for small businesses, so to maximise the effectiveness of your website and cash in on this vast market, you should always aim for a balance between looks and SEO.

Looking for free advertising ideas?

How simple is this…

Put your website address on the back of your vehicle.

This vehicle lettering cost just £10 from my local print shop, (Magiprint in Rugby – telephone 01788 334499).

OK, so it’s not entirely free – it cost £10, but there are no ongoing costs at all and if it produces one sale, it has paid for itself.

The idea is really simple – it will generate new visitors to your website from people who see your vehicle while you’re out and about.

Try it for yourself, for the sake of £10, this one really is a no-brainer.

For more free advertising ideas read my blog regularly or subscribe to my RSS feed. You can even have my latest blog articles, including those about free advertising ideas delivered straight to your inbox each week by email.

Everyone knows that the best place to be listed in the search engines is the number one spot on Google, but what is that number one spot actually worth to your business and how does that compare to the number two spot or the number three spot?

The list below explains the average percentage of search engine traffic (or clicks) distributed to each of the listings on Google.

• The number 1 ranked website on Google gets 42% of clicks
• The number 2 ranked website on Google gets 12% of clicks
• The number 3 ranked website on Google gets 8% of clicks
• The number 4 ranked website on Google gets 6% of clicks
• The number 5 ranked website on Google gets 5% of clicks
• The number 6 ranked website on Google gets 4% of clicks
• The number 7 ranked website on Google gets 3% of clicks
• The remaining clicks are shared between all the other sites listed on Google

Data Source: Market Samurai

Each and every keyword or key phrase will generate a specific amount of traffic and the above percentages are the percentages of that traffic each of those top ten listings can reasonably expect to attract.

The keywords and key phrases that will generate the most traffic are very frequently not the ones you might expect, so be sure to do your keyword research BEFORE writing your web pages or blog posts. The best tool I have ever found for keyword research is currently offering a free trial to all new users and unlike some others, their free trial is the full working version of the software. So if you write web pages or blog posts it can make choosing the right keywords for your pages and posts an informed choice rather than guesswork. Even better, unlike most other keyword tools, this amazing software focuses on which keywords are likely to be most profitable for your business, not just those that generate the most traffic.

What is this software? Market Samurai.

Market Samurai comes with a full video training course and contains all sorts of invaluable information. So, if you’re serious about writing pages that generate high volumes of traffic from the search engines including Google, Yahoo! and Bing, I thoroughly recommend it.

Download your free trial of the full working version of Market Samurai today.

Remember that in the UK, Google currently has about 90 percent of all search engine traffic (and this figure is still growing), so combined, the top ten listings on Google mentioned above account for approximately 90 percent of all internet searches in the UK.

Now you can work out for yourself exactly what a top ten listing on Google is worth to your business.

“What is a blog?” is a question I hear a lot from small business owners.

My answer is in five parts as follows:

Description of a Blog

A blog is an online journal; a place to write your thoughts, feelings, ideas, comments and viewpoints on any subject you choose. It is like having your own online newspaper column, where you can talk about anything you like. Each article your write is like an article in your own online newspaper column. Over time, these articles grow into a collection of your thoughts, feeling, ideas and so on.

The Difference Between Personal Blogs and Business Blogs

In terms of subject matter, a personal blog can be about anything you like and so doesn’t necessarily need to follow a theme. By contrast, a business blog is usually about subjects which are relevant to your business and as such they normally follow a theme – for example, this blog is all about marketing a small business.

Why a Blog is Useful to Small Businesses

A blog is a great tool for small business for several reasons:

• Search engines (especially Google) love regular, new and unique content: A blog gives them exactly that
• Blogs are often linked to by other websites and blogs: this can bring you more visitors and better listings in the search engines
• If you write regularly about a particular subject, people will begin to see you as an authority in your field
• A blog article is a great way to give something back to your customers; tips, insider knowledge, latest news, reviews and so on
• A small business blog is a great way to promote what you do to potential customers in an indirect way
• A blog is a great way to increase your email marketing list by simply adding a sign up to our newsletter form on your pages (perhaps with a free giveaway for signing up)

How a Business Blog Differs from a Business Website

A business website is usually a collection of pages about the products and services you offer. Individual pages are usually accessed by a menu of some sort. It is a one-way communication from you to the reader.

A business blog is a collection of articles around a central theme. They can be accessed from the blog’s home page (example: Small Business Marketing Blog), and also from categories and tags. This makes finding related articles very simple for the reader. A business blog is also about giving away information freely, it is not usually about selling anything (although it can be through links to affiliate programmes and the like).  Unlike a website, a blog gives the reader the opportunity to communicate directly with the author by leaving comments about the articles. This can create really interesting discussions and feedback; it is a two-way communication and the author can choose whether to publish the comments or not.

Different Ways of Starting Your Own Blog

There are lots of ways to start your own blog. Many of them are free, but it is worth noting that free or ‘hosted’ blogs often come with strict restrictions about advertising, affiliate programmes and selling. Free (hosted) blogging platforms included:

• Blogger
• WordPress.com
• LiveJournal
• Xanga
• Blog

If you want to use your blog for commercial purposes it is usually much better to use paid hosting, your own domain and free blogging software. The blogging software of choice for many small businesses is open source and available free, from WordPress.org. It is the number one blogging software because it is so versatile with literally thousands of free themes and plug-ins to help you.

For more help and advice about starting your own small business blog, just leave a reply below, or fill in the Contact Us form.