Questions. Instead of constantly speaking about your products or services, ask your fans what they think.

Polls. You can get great feedback from your community with polls. This is a perfect fit for restaurants and menu items.

Fill-in the blank. It’s always fun to let your fans finish a statement. The best thing about Winter is____________________.

Go Behind the Curtain. Let your fans know about something going on behind the scenes. For example, post photos or a video of a project in progress.

Pictures. Twitter is all about text and links, but Facebook is much more visual. Try to include a picture in as many posts as you can. And try to crop your photos. Remember most people are checking Facebook from their
smart phones. So eliminate the negative space and focus on the best part
of the picture.

Video. If a picture is worth 1,000 words, a video is worth 1 million! Videos continue to be one of the most shared types of posts.

Quotes. People love a quick inspiring or motivational quote. You’ll be surprised how much a good one gets shared.

Milestones. Celebrate when you hit a certain number of fans. Or if you are close to a certain number, ask fans to recommend your page to their friends and help get you there.

Holidays & Seasons. It’s always great to tie your content in with the holidays and season’s. ie: New Year’s Resolutions. Valentine’s Day Gifts. Tips for Spring, etc.

These tips should go a long way for building trust and loyalty with your
brand over time. Give them a try and let us know what you think.
Your favorite tip in this article is ____________________ ?

WordPress is the industry leading CMS, and our favorite platform. So, here’s a few reasons why We Love WordPress:

Easy to Manage

Thoroughly non-technical, WordPress is incredibly intuitive and easy-to-use. It allows you and your team to work on your site anytime, with only a web browser and no additional software. It functions much like Microsoft Word, allowing you to easily change text and upload images, while leaving the structure of your website intact. Without the dependence on the schedules or availability of an outside programmer, your company’s time, money and energy are saved. In short, you control the process!

Themes

For smaller businesses, which don’t have the budget for a custom design, a theme is the way to go. Available in a variety of styles, these ready-made templates are designed for every type of business or organization. Choose a layout from categories like: blog, corporate, news, portfolio, and many more. Most themes are available for less than the price of good programmer’s hourly rate.

SEO Friendly

Search engine optimization with WordPress is almost foolproof. The built-in SEO features allow you to place keywords in the most important areas – such as page titles, headers and meta descriptions. Additional plug-ins can simplify advanced tasks, such as the Google Sitemap Generator, a plug-in that creates an industry standard site map. Google also just announced their “freshness update” which rewards websites that publish fresh content on a hot topic by ranking them higher, and in some cases indexes them within minutes. Another reason why WordPress is your new best friend!/p>

Plug-Ins & Widgets

WordPress also allows for the expansion of functionality through the installation of plug-ins and widgets. These marvelous creations can provide contact forms, social media functions, calendars, photo galleries and a host of other features. There are hundreds available on dozens of sites – most notably the WordPress plug-in directory.

Blogs and Commenting

The WordPress CMS was conceived and designed as a tool to simplify the continual updating of information – specifically for blogging. Many marketers have realized the benefits of blogging for business and made it part of their content marketing strategy and WordPress makes that process simple. Beyond blogs, WordPress can also be used to easily update any other regularly changing content such as newsletters, videos or press releases. Yet, another plug-in allows for commenting – great for getting feedback on posts.

WordPress offers a tremendous opportunity for any business that wishes to control its website and manage content. It combines the best of template-based web development with a robust engine that can easily update text and photos and provide tremendous SEO value. In addition, developers are constantly improving WordPress, creating new plug-ins and widgets and adding ever more functionality. Give it a try, and much like your cell phone, you’ll wonder how you ever survived without it!

Here are a few samples of WordPress sites designed by Brainstorm: Blackstone Steakhouse , Allegheny Contract , Gisonni & Harms, LLP

For more information about WordPress sites, contact Brainstorm Studio.

There are many benefits to content marketing – increased brand awareness, thought leadership and lead generation. In addition, your search engine rankings will soar from more indexed pages, inbound links and an increased social media reach.

Although, Content is the buzz marketing term of the moment, it’s been practiced for hundreds of years. Some early examples include, The Michelin Guide, which was published by the famous tire manufacturer in 1904, providing tips for car maintenance and lodging. And, other brands like John Deere and Lego publish their own magazines, which guide consumers to purchase their products through informative and entertaining content.

The popularity of content marketing is exploding, due to factors such as: increased competition, the increased focus on SEO and social media and the drop in traditional marketing. Check out these statistics: In 2004, a Google search for content marketing yielded 25,600 results. In 2011, the same search returned 4.6 million results.* Smart companies are embracing content, and continue to make it a larger part of their marketing plan. In a recent B-to-B survey by HiveFire, 82% of B-to-B marketers are using content marketing as a part of their marketing strategy.*

Of course, there are challenges to content marketing – such as having the time or resources to create engaging content. And some businesses lack the ability to produce the volume of content needed to get significant results.

Here are some tips to help you produce better content:

1. Be in the Know. If you can’t make it to tradeshows or industry events, be sure to follow the thought leaders. It’s important to stay on top of new  developments, so you can provide insightful and up-to-date information.
2. Speak to Your Target Audience. Define the audience you’d like to attract and tailor your content specifically to them. Visit their social media sites to see what they are talking about or, think about the common questions that customers ask you and produce content around those topics.
3. Optimize Your Content. Cash in on the SEO benefits of your content by optimizing your blog and video titles. By using the Google Keyword Tool, you can search for the most popular terms in any category and identify the level of competition. Look for a long tail phrase (3 words or more), which is highly relevant, but has low competition. You’ll be surprised at how high your articles will rank in the search engines!
4. Stay on Schedule. It’s important that your content becomes part of your daily or weekly ritual. Come up with a list of topics for your content and create an editorial calendar. This way when its time to write, you can immediately focus on a topic. Finally, have certain days and times dedicated to creating content and stick to it. I write my blog articles on Sundays – while my kids are napping!
5. Be Visual. Use pictures and graphics in your articles, case studies and white papers. A creative photograph, or a hand drawn stick figure can go a long way. So have some fun with your images. And, if you don’t have the budget to buy stock images, you can get free images from flickr.com, as long as the artist has agreed to the creative commons license and you credit them.
6. Be Results Driven. Content needs to be designed around an objective, and have a clear call-to-action. If you want a prospect to try a free demo of your software, make sure there is a nice, colorful button along side your content, directing them to a landing page with a sign-up form.
7. Measure Your Success. Be invested in the success of your content. Be sure you are using software such as Google analytics or Salesforce to track your pageviews, downloads, and leads. This allows you to strategize future content based on your past results.

Content is king, and a content marketing strategy is a real game-changer when it’s done right. It allows companies to connect with audiences in a more personal way, and increase their search engine rankings and website traffic! Consumers are out there right now searching for information and answers to problems, and the companies that provide the answers and guide prospects through the buying cycle, will get the sale!

If you’d like to learn more about a content marketing strategy for your business, contact Brainstorm Studio today!
*Source: Hivefire, 2011 Marketing Trends Survey

Take, for instance, Google’s recent “Your World” initiative. Your World represents Google’s push into personalized search, with search results that include data from social networks in addition to the standard fare of primarily HTML-based websites. The problem is that the only major social network that currently stands to benefit from the new initiative is Google +, since results from Facebook and Twitter will not appear on the Google search home page. Both Facebook and Twitter, it should be noted, don’t allow Google’s spiders to crawl them deeply and store information from their networks.

The dilemma for Google is that it represents the gold-standard when it comes to quality search results. And quality, for most Google users, has a lot to do with objectivity: we want comprehensive, accurate and unbiased results to our search queries; otherwise, we might as well use Bing or Yahoo. But with Google scrambling to compete with both Facebook and Twitter in the social arena, its Your World initiative strikes many as a bit self-serving, if not downright monopolistic.

In the past, Google had every reason to be fair and impartial in its search findings. But now it’s got a dog in the fight, so to speak, and it will be interesting to see if the company’s foundational motto, “Don’t Do Evil,” can remain intact.

For more information on search engine optimization, contact Brainstorm Studio today.

Here’s a list of tips to improve your Facebook page to get better results:

Build a Custom Landing Page

Facebook was always known for its uniformity. You could post all sorts of content, but your page design will essentially look just like everyone else’s. However, now Facebook lets you develop custom branded landing pages, which let you personalize your restaurant’s page with photos, videos, contest forms and much more. Landing pages are often used to promote deals, special events or simply welcome visitors in a creative way. A good example would be promoting a contest with a sign-up form, or a big call-out to like the page with an arrow pointing to the Like button. Try using some of these ideas to personalize your page, and before you know it you’ll have a have a lot more likes!

Contests are a Winner

Giving away a little something is a surefire way to generate buzz, get people engaged, and increase your likes. And since your fans are already hanging out on Facebook doing something else, filling out the online contest form really isn’t a big deal. Best of all, Facebook contests are a great way to capture data, including email and physical addresses for re-marketing. Make sure to mention your contest in your ad. An example would be: “Like us for a chance to win a $100 Gift Card”

Use Applications

Polls, quizzes and other types of applications are available in the Admin section for page owners, and they take just a few clicks to install. Facebook offers some generic ones, like a discussion board, but you can also add other apps from Facebook’s app directory. A great example would be – the Open Table app – If you use this popular reservation system in your restaurant, you can also offer online reservations right from your Facebook page! Plus, if you know how to develop in HTML, or know a web programmer then the sky is the limit. Programmers can create customized tabs using Facebook’s HTML-style FBML markup language, which can do virtually anything a website can do.

Facebook ads are Smart

Facebook ads are the epitome of targeted marketing, and if handled correctly, can bring you a great return on your investment. Ads can be targeted by city,
age, gender, interests, and other demographic criteria. You can even target your
audience by the pages they like. So for example, if your restaurant is hosting a
wine dinner, run a targeted ad to Facebook users located within 10 miles of your
restaurant, who are fans of Wine Spectator and Wine Enthusiast magazines. You
can’t get any more targeted than that! Facebook ads are one of the fastest ways
to build likes and to locate a prime audience for your restaurant.

The goal of any restaurant is to build customer loyalty, and get your patrons
to recommend your restaurant to their friends. A simple thing like designing a
custom Facebook page and interacting with your guests can work wonders for
your brand. Post regularly and let your fans feel like they are involved in the
experience. All of these practices will engage your fans in what you have to offer,
lengthen the experience, and keep customers coming back for more.

For more information on social media for restaurants contact, Brainstorm Studio today.

Content

When it comes to marketing strategies, content remains king and it continues to be the preferred marketing tool for today’s B-to-B marketers. Creating great content can establish you as a thought leader in your industry, shoot your website to the top of the search engines and help generate qualified leads.

HiveFire, Inc., a content marketing technology company, recently released the results of their B2B Marketing Trends 2011 Survey, which showed that B2B marketers are moving away from traditional marketing strategies and toward content marketing. In fact, 82 percent of respondents now use content marketing in their programs, which makes it more popular than search marketing, events and public relations and over two times more popular than print, TV or radio advertising.

Social Media

It’s very rare these days to have any marketing meeting without discussing social media. That’s because it’s helping us reach new audiences, speak to customers and prospects and get valuable feedback. According to a recent study by BtoB Magazine, 93% of all B2B marketers are engaged in some form of social media marketing, focusing mostly on the three major platforms (LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter).

This year, there were several major updates to the top social media sites, and I am sure many more will follow in 2012. Twitter just released their new brand pages, which allows companies to have a banner and featured video at the top of their page. Linked-in released their advertising product, allowing users to generate more connections and leads. Google Plus was launched this year as well and it continues to gain momentum with their recently added business pages. In the past year, we’ve also seen social media integrated into search results in Google & Bing. And social media is now officially part of the ranking algorithm – being a strong indicator of authority, trust and trends.

Local

The Internet lets you find products and services all over the world, but if you’re like most people, you’d prefer to work with a local business. According to comScore, approximately 3 billion web searches contain local terms every month. And 70% of online searchers will use local search to find offline businesses. (Source:Kelsey Group). With services such as Google Places or Bing Local, now even the smallest businesses can get page 1 rankings within a specific geographic area. If you haven’t done it already… make sure your business is represented on all of the local search services.

Mobile

The mobile world is expanding at an increasingly rapid pace. Smartphones are gaining functionality every year and the wildly popular iPads and tablets are gaining momentum. Consumers are becoming more dependent on mobile sites and apps for instant access to information, deals, and product reviews, causing mobile commerce to also increase. In fact, the latest comScore numbers say that 38% of consumers have purchased a product on their phone. That’s pretty impressive, considering most websites aren’t even optimized for mobile devices. Forrester Research projects by 2014, the U.S. mobile advertising market will more than double in size, reaching $2.5 billion! So whether you are selling products or not, make sure, your website is optimized for mobile use in 2012!

Longtail Search

Long Tail refers to a very targeted search phrase of 3 words or more. And if you’ve tried SEO you probably already know that getting placement for a competitive keyword phrase could take months or even years. But the search landscape is changing, and more searchers are typing in long tail search terms to find what they’re looking for. Not surprisingly, marketers are responding by implementing long tail search optimization strategies. According to SEOmoz, long tail search comprises a staggering 70% of all search traffic. This strategy works because long tail keywords are less competitive and will yield you better quality traffic and higher conversion rates. Don’t be greedy and go for the most highly trafficked term, long-tail is the way to go!

Graphics

Content is still King, but graphics are a great compliment to your writing. They are also a refreshing way to deliver a message and get more traffic to your website. As social media usage grows, the competition for attention keeps increasing. Facebook recently released heat maps showing where users eyes focused the most and the photo banner was one of the most viewed areas. Infographics are becoming very popular and are an amazing way to get links to your site. With all of this content to take-in people are always looking for a quicker way to get information. Delivering a compelling image is a great new way to capture peoples’ attention. So start spicing up that content with a killer graphic and you will be rewarded!

2012 is the year to become more innovative and agile with your online marketing.
For help planning your online marketing strategy, contact Brainstorm Studio.

Here are some best practices to make your email marketing efforts more effective:

1) Use Trusted Email Marketing Software

Don’t try to manage your lists and send messages through an email program, such as: Outlook or Entourage. If you want to get results, need to send your email campaigns through a trusted provider such as: Constant Contact. There are many benefits, such as a higher deliverability, ready-made templates and tools that will check your e-mail messages against spam filters. They also provide valuable reporting, with figures such as: how many people opened your email, what they clicked on and how many were bounced back.

2) Write an Effective Subject Line

If you can’t get a user past a subject line, then nothing else matters. All of the hard work designing and writing the email will have gone to waste, if your prospect hits delete. Avoid long subject lines that will get cut-off – stay under 60 characters. Use a clear call-to-action: such as: Great Tips, Special Event or New Blog Article from “your company name”. And, try to use your company name in the subject line. Next, stay away from words like: free, offer and act now. Those words will make your message look like spam. Finally, try to stick to the same format every time you send a message – so your emails will be come recognizable.

3) Keep the Message Short and Simple

The message needs to be clear and consistent with the subject line, and should be a quick read. If you stuff your email with too much information or try to offer the reader multiple sales or promotions, you could overwhelm them and get no response. A good formula for an offer email would be a headline, an eye-catching graphic, followed by a 3-4 of lines of text and a call-to-action button – it’s as simple as that! If your sending a newsletter, go with a headline and 1 line of text for each article, followed by a “read more button”.

4) Include Clear Calls-to-Action

After your subscribers open your email, what do you want them to do? Make sure the call-to-action stands out, such as an orange or red text link or button. Directing that link to a custom landing page with more information can be very effective, allowing you to capture valuable information from your prospect – such as the size of a company, or where they are in the buying process.

5) Provide Value in Your E-mails

It’s easy to use your emails as a medium for selling your products or services. It’s harder to offer a value to your subscribers whether they make a purchase or not. So be sure to offer links to helpful information. If you’re a restaurant, throw in a recipe or wine-pairing tip. It takes a little more effort, but it will go a long way!

6) Build A Quality List

It’s not always about the amount of subscribers, but the quality of your list that matters. Be sure to keep it Opt-in. Don’t rent or buy lists. Those people don’t want your emails! In fact, they could end up getting you blacklisted as a spammer. Do encourage customers to sign up from your website, blog, Facebook and Twitter page. And don’t forget face-to-face networking! If you attend industry events and collect business cards, ask people if they want to receive your newsletter. If they do, put a check mark on the back of the card, so you’ll remember who opted-in.

7) Do What Works for You

What works for one company may not work for another. We’ve all heard the “send Tuesday at 10am” strategy. And for the last 5 years, that’s what everyone has been doing. So guess what? Tuesday at 10 is probably not the optimum time to send anymore. A stay-at-home Mom, has a far different schedule than a small business owner, and they likely check their email at different times. Also, your clients’ and customers’ responses could change over time. So, test the time of day and days of the week you send email. Eventually, you’ll find what works best for your subscribers.

Email marketing is part creativity and part science, but when done right, it can yield great returns. Start with these tips, you’ll be on your way to more effective email campaigns.

If you’d like to discuss your email strategy with an email marketing specialist at Brainstorm Studio, Contact Us for a Free Evaluation – We’d love to help design a strategy for your organization!

With these concerns in mind, companies with older websites may want to consider an upgrade for 2012. If you’re not sure whether or not this applies to your you, the following considerations may be of help:

1) Website Upgrades Are Surprisingly Cost-Effective

The price of rebuilding your website varies based on a number of factors. But in the vast majority of cases, building an attractive, up-to-date website is far less expensive than the annual cost of maintaining an ad spot or a mid-sized Google Adwords campaign. Don’t overlook the fact that re-building your website is a one-time cost that multiplies the ROI and profitability of your other marketing endeavors. As mentioned in our lead-in, both clients and prospects judge companies by the quality of their websites. Committing significant resources to ad campaigns without first maximizing your website’s potential is a surefire path to diminishing ROI.

2) Mules Don’t Belong on the Highway

During a recent trip to a third world country, I was amused to see a number of mules lumbering down the highway with carts in tow. In light of the traffic snafus that ensued, I wondered how long such a practice could persist in light of society’s ever-increasing need for speed and efficiency. The answer: not long. An analogous situation exists on the world wide web, where thousand of outdated websites share bandwidth with newer, sleeker, and more efficiently built ones. As the web’s infrastructure evolves, these older technologies simply can’t keep up. Outfitting them with up-to-date features is a time-consuming, cumbersome procedure, and one that web designers are increasingly discouraged from undertaking. If you suspect that your company website is like a lonely mule on an increasingly high-tech super highway, the best way to resolve the issue is by upgrading to a car with an actual engine, and preferably a little pick-up and energy efficiency as well.

3) Some Websites Just Aren’t Friendly

Nowadays, serious website owners continually modify there websites to insure that they are as search engine friendly as possible. Some websites, however, would fare better with a fresh rebuild rather than a quick fix or series of fixes. This applies to many Flash-based websites and table-based HTML websites as well.

Websites built within a Flash framework (as opposed to HTML-based sites containing Flash animations) may never cut it if search engine friendliness is a key goal of your web marketing campaign. Flash technology, though amazingly versatile and powerful, is a closed system that search engines have trouble indexing. Techniques can be employed to circumvent this limitation, but the vast majority of web developers agree that Flash is not a search engine friendly technology. If your website is Flash-based, you will very likely find yourself spending more time and money optimizing it than you would with HTML-based technologies.

Table-based HTML websites present a host of other issues that threaten to interfere with a site’s search engine friendliness. If you aren’t trained in HTML, you may not know what a table-heavy website looks like. Suffice it to say, these sites often contain excessive lines of code and, in many cases, a host of errors and redundancies that result from poorly managed updates and improper maintenance. In many cases, these sites would benefit greatly from a rebuild that employs a more efficient coding strategy and a greater reliance on cascading style sheets (CSS).

4) Some Websites Are Out of Control

Here’s an issue a lot of website owners can identify with: you want to make a minor revision to your website but you can’t do it without the assistance of your web developer. And if that person is no longer around, things really get complicated…

Once again, rebuilding your website – this time within a proper content management system (or CMS) – is the way to go. Popular CMS frameworks include WordPress, Joomla, Drupal an others. Which framework to employ is a subject of debate among professions, but to make the decision simpler, focus on solutions that are open source, widely deployed, and well-supported by a community of developers. If you are happy with the design and architecture of your site, you can most likely build it into a CMS framework at a cost that is far lower than developing from scratch.

5) Some Websites Get Smaller Every Year

Desktop computer screens keep getting bigger. And as screens get bigger, websites expand to take advantage of the increased real estate. In light of this trend, many older sites looked dwarfed on today’s screens, leaving great swaths of empty space to the left, right and even below, the page. In some cases, retrofitting these sites to appear larger may be a fairly easy task. But not always. Old-school page layouts along with table-heavy HTML code could make your a site a poor candidate for resizing, and a fresh rebuild may actually save you money in the long run.

It is worth noting that while desktop screens are getting larger, tablets and smart phones counter this trend with smaller screen profiles. If you’re wondering how to keep pace with both of these opposing trends, tune in to next week’s article: Website Strategies for Tablets and Smart Phones

For more web marketing tips, follow our blog at New York web design company, Brainstorm Studio, or follow us on twitter.

1) Interact

Don’t make it all about you! If a fan posts a comment to either something you wrote or posts something directly to your wall, respond back. After all, a “fan” is just a Facebook term for a customer or potential customer. If your goal is to get their business, you’ll need to convince them that you are prepared to support your product and provide decent customer service. Responding to their posts, asking for their feedback, and imparting friendly advice can go a long way towards doing that.

2) Post Regularly

If your page isn’t fresh and compelling, chances are your customers won’t come back to it. There are many competing Facebook pages, websites, and blogs out there, and the ones that have that “stickiness” factor are those that offer up-to-date information and timely feedback. When it comes to interacting with fans, make it a daily habit: taking a minutes to offer a timely response or to comment on a fan’s recently posted video is a great way of letting them know you are genuinely interested in who they are.

3) Contests Are A Winner

Giving away a little something is a surefire way to generate buzz, get people engaged, and increase your fan count. And since your fans are already there doing something else, filling out the online contest form really isn’t a big deal. Best of all, Facebook contests are a great way to capture data, including email and physical addresses for re-marketing.

4) Facebook Ads Are Smart, Real Smart

Facebook ads are the epitome of targeted marketing. As a result, your Facebook ad campaign (if handled correctly) can bring you a great return on your investment. Ads can be targeted by city, age, gender, interests, and other minute demographic criteria. You can even target your audience by the pages they like. Facebook ads are one of the fastest ways to build likes and to locate a prime audience for your products and services.

5) Encourage Reviews

If you have a customer who is very pleased with your product or service ask them to post a review for you. Reviews establish credibility with your audience, helping them to realize that the benefits you are offering them go beyond mere marketing speak. If you happen to get a bad review, don’t delete it. Instead, contact the customer and try to rectify the problem. Ask them what you can do to satisfy them, and inform them promptly of your efforts to do so. This will go a long way towards improving your reputation while helping to make yours a better company in the long run.

6) Trick Your Site Out with Cool Apps

Facebook ain’t what it used to be! Back in the day, Facebook pages were all very similar, complete with the same basic features and functionality. But nowadays, Facebook’s framework incorporates multimedia, live feeds, outside applications and more. Don’t let it go to waste! If you have a Twitter or Youtube page, for example, use their apps on your Facebook page. Give your customers engaging content in a variety of formats that best suits your own unique content. Before you know it you’ll have a mini-website on your Facebook page.

7) Measure Your Success

Now that you are following our recommendations, you’ll want to see how valuable they are to your business. To do that, one of the best places to turn is Facebook’s own Insights utility. Facebook Insights helps you measure campaign success by providing very detailed information about follower counts, Likes, comments on posts and more. And best of all, its Free and easy to to use!

For more web marketing tips, follow our blog at New York web design company, Brainstorm Studio, or follow us on twitter.

1) Join Member Associations

Some member associations, such as your local chamber of commerce or other trade organizations, list businesses in their online directories as a benefit of membership. Evaluate membership fees and estimated distribution of the directory to make sure benefits outweigh costs. Keep in mind as well that member associations can connect you with highly targeted audiences – a benefit that goes beyond the link they provide to your website.

2) Submit to Directories

One of the best places to begin getting links to your website is through online directories. DMOZ, webworldindex, Gimpsy, and other popular directories accept submissions and provide searchable links to your site once it is approved. We recommend submitting only to directories with a Google page rank of 3 or better, and doing it slowly over a period of months (too many too fast might set off alarm bells at Google). And keep an eye out for directories geared towards your specific industry, as these may be even more valuable from the search engines’ perspective. Here’s a good list of quality free directories along with their Google page ranks: www.greatdirectories.org

3) Pay for a Listing

Many directories require payment in exchange for a listing. That’s OK as long as the directory is popular, highly ranked, and relevant. Yahoo, BOTW, and Business.com all rank highly and can bring benefits to your site through paid listings. Before signing on with any paid directory, do a little research to make sure it isn’t a link farm, which is essentially a form of search engine spamming. Here’s a good list of quality paid directories along with their Google page ranks: www.greatdirectories.org

4) Submit a Tip

Submitting tips is an easy, fun, and effective way to build links back to your site. Keep an eye out for websites with blogs that allow users to post comments or responses to other articles. Make it a habit to offer advice, information, or other meaningful content with a link back to your own website. Not all sites will allow you to add a link, but many will.

5) Attend a Tradeshow

Attending a tradeshow can be costly, so why not take full advantage of the services they offer. Many tradeshows nowadays have websites with links to attendees. In some cases, you they may even provide a company description and detailed contact information. Due to the popularity of these websites, the links they provide can be very valuable from the search engines’ perspective.

6) Publish videos on YouTube

It’s great if your videos go viral, but that’s the exception. Just create great content your customers will love. You’ll see plenty of examples on YouTube of videos for cooking, fitness, home improvement, and more. And while you are there, consider posting a video response to other YouTube videos that target your intended audience.

7) Offer a Discount

Everybody loves a discount! That’s why discount sites like Groupon, Living Social and Gilt are getting tons of traffic and generating sales for businesses. Post a discount on your site, on Facebook, and on your Twitter feed and watch the offer spread. Many portal websites such as Citysearch or Yelp will also let local businesses post special offers.

For more web marketing tips, follow our blog at New York web design company, Brainstorm Studio, or follow us on twitter.