WOMENSAVENUE.com

No one has ever found success by doing nothing.

1. Put your website on notepads, pens, newsletters, bumper stickers, coffee cups.

2. Flyers – When you buy your morning newspaper, slip some flyers into the rest of the newspapers.

3. Business cards (You can make up your own or get them free through VistaPrint)

4. Article marketing is one of my favorite method of advertising. If you write articles and then use a service to publish them, your articles become viral.Your articles will spread like a virus and could have the potential to be viewed by hundreds of thousands of people.

5. Participating in online discussion forums is an excellent way to get the word out about your business – and it is free. Build relationships first and use your signature file to let everyone know what you do and who you are.

6. Free classifieds

7. Targeted ezine advertising is one of the most cost effective ways to advertise your business.

8. Paid ads – such as solo ads. Test, test, test. Your success depends on your ad and your heading!

9. Mail out postcards.

10. Purchase leads that are targeted and related to your business. If possible get their phone number and followup.

11. Bookmarks for libraries, don’t forget to talk to your librarian first.

12. Purchase cheap seed packets, put a tag on them with your website as well as a saying like, I am in the business of helping people grow.

13. Use your knowledge and publish a newsletter or ezine. One your build up your list you can offer paid subscriptions or ads.

14. Word of mouth (friends and family)

15. Forwarded emails – Add your testimony to your signature line.

16. Buttons

17. Pens to hand out with a short advertisement and your URL.

18. Welcome baby cards for hospitals.

19. If your domain name is a string words, try capitalizing each. This helps people who just take a quick glance remember it.

20. Create an information type handout that briefly explains your business.

21. When you go to a garage or yard sale, ask if you can leave a few of your flyers there.

22. Community Colleges. Every student needs a part time job.

23. Put a business card in all outgoing mail including anything that has a postage paid envelope.

24. Visit establishments you do business with (doctor offices, health food stores, karate/dance studios, etc) and ask if you can leave flyers.

25. Car magnets – You can put magnets all over your car.

26. Promote your business for free in local magazines, newspapers, community newsletters, etc. Many rely on voluntary writing contributions. Translate your knowledge into an article. It is free advertising and an effective way to establish yourself as an expert in your field.

27. Leave your business card in restrooms at restaurants or on cork boards around grocery stores.

28. Get a booth at school events and share what you offer.

29. Look into putting an ad in school sponsored publications (directories, PTA booklets, etc). Usually not to expensive.

30. Set up a free giveaway box in any store that will give you permission.

31. Post flyers at apartment complexes if they will allow it.

32. Place flyers under windshield wipers of cars.

33. Newspaper classified ads are cheap and effective. Ask about having your ad appear with a color background to make it stand out even more.

34. Buy a pre-inked, personalized stamp and put your ad on it. Stamp the back of any envelopes that you mail out.

35. When it comes to advertising and marketing, repetition plays an important part in your campaigns success.

36. We all get junk mail with the postage paid envelopes. Just send a flyer back to the company and use their return envelope.

37. Personalized T-shirts

38. Make up Gift basket raffles for Church bazaars, concerts held during summer, at your local community hall, or any town function. Do not forget to put your business card or some other advertisement in the basket.

39. Put flyers on car windshields at your kids sporting events.

40. Leave a business card with your tip for your waiter/waitress.

41. Reply to spam email with your own business advertisement.

42. Give your business cards to friends and family and ask them to give them out to people they know who would be interested in part time income.

43. Put up flyers at the local colleges, libraries and grocery stores.

44. Ask your local chinese takeout if you can post a flyer in their window.

45. Create a post it stack of your business cards with a glue stick and then post them at pay phones, etc.

46. Business cards with a magnetic back really stick in people’s minds as well as on their refrigerator.

47. Leave business cards by the change machine in the mall arcade or at the ATM machine.

48. Put your website address on your sun visor using vinyl letters.

49. Find an old metal tin (or new), put a magnet on the back, put your business cards in them and then just attach this to your car when you go into a store.

50. Be different and get noticed. When you are unique then you are one step ahead of your competition.

There are many ways to promote your business without spending a fortune. Think outside the box. Most people notice things that are different, something that draws their attention or even makes them laugh.

Keep it simple, keep it cheap and before you know it your success will be achieved without going broke.

Copyright 2007 Joe Rispoli

Once you’ve targeted your market, and
know exactly who and where your prospects are,
it’s important to clearly identify what you
want your advertising to accomplish. Speci-
fic advertising objectives include:

* Creating new customers.
* Increasing usage.
* Increasing order size.
* Promoting replacement of functional but out-
dated products with technologically superior
ones.
* Improving brand name recognition.
* Generating customer inquiries.
* Creating sales leads through the use of re-
sponse ads, coupons or toll-free “800″ numbers.
* Promoting special events such as sales, busi-
ness openings or the introduction of new pro-
ducts or services.
* Enhancing the overall image of the business.

Generally, the most effective ads focus on
customer needs or wants, and emphasize the most
desirable benefits of the product or service,
such as convenience, style or durability. Other
tactics include comparisons with competitive
products, two-for-one sales, special one-day
discounts, and offers of free information.

The tactics you choose in your advertising
will help determine the media you select and the
exact message you communicate. One of the best
ways to become familiar with the tactics in your
field is to collect your competitors’ advertis-
ing materials and use them to stimulate your
thinking.

The most important things to take into con-
sideration in any ad are the audience and the
offer. Who is the ad trying to reach? If the
ad isn’t presented to the right audience and ad-
dressed to them in their own language, then it
isn’t going to get noticed. And if the offer
isn’t something that interests them and gets them
excited, then they’re not going to take any ac-
tion even if they do notice it.

Finally, make it easy for customers to re-
spond to your ad. Tell them what action to take
and include (depending on the advertising medium)
coupons, an “800″ number or business reply en-
velopes. And be sure to stand behind what you
sell.

Deciding Where to Advertise

The mediums in which you choose to advertise
will depend on the audience you’re trying to
reach, the geographical range of your busi-
ness, where your product or service can be
most effectively presented, and your budget.
In deciding where to advertise, keep the fol-
lowing considerations in mind:

* When and how often your message needs to be
sent.
* How effectively the medium communicates your
main selling points. Make sure any medium
you choose allows you to present all the in-
formation customers need to make a buying de-
cision or to request additional information.
* How much a particular medium costs, relative
to the number of people it reaches.
* How many of the people seeing the ad fall
within your target customer group. Getting
your message in front of those who are in-
terested in what you have to sell is pivotal
to advertising success.

A final point is that advertising does not
need to be brilliant or highly creative to be
effective. The secret of successful advertising
lies in its continuity – sending an informative,
consistent message over time that motivates ex-
isting customers and prospects to turn to you
when they are ready to buy.

AUNT KIZZY’S BACK PORCH IS NOW INTERNATIONALLY
KNOWN

By Terry Williams

Every online marketer who has a web site is always looking for ways to
increase traffic to their web site. There are many ways to do this,
however, one of the most powerful ways is to offer a Free Contest! Why?
Because it’s human nature to want something for free.

Web site contests have been around as long as the Internet has been used
for online commerce. They come in many shapes and forms but they all
have one thing in common. “They are designed to drive traffic to their
web sites!” These contests can work if you take the time to understand
and utilize them to reach your goals.

So how do you go about running a contest on your web site effectively?
Here are four tips you’ll want to consider before deciding to offer a
contest on your web site.

What Do I Want The Contest To Achieve?

Before you decide to run a web site contest, determine exactly what you
want the contest to do for you. Like the old saying goes “Nothing is
ever really free!” Whenever you’re offered something for free you’re
also asked to do something to get it. Now it’s up to you to determine if
what you have to do is worth it, to receive the reward. If it’s too
difficult or the reward is not perceived to be worth the effort, you
decline. So when you offer a contest, you need to be looking at what you
want to accomplish from it.

For example, you might want to get feedback about your product or
service, about your web site, build an in house mailing list, build a
customer base for new product offerings, produce a link to your web
site, build a reputation or whatever reason you may have, you’ll need to
have a clearly defined goal in mind when offering a free contest on your
site.

Once you’ve decided on your agenda for the contest, you’ll have to
decide how to go about producing the desired result. If you’re looking
for feedback then make the feedback form simple and easy for the entrant
to complete. If you’re looking for a link to your site then give them
everything they’ll need and make it simple to accomplish. Simplicity is
the key if you want your contest to be a success.

What Kind Of Prizes Should I Offer?

This is determined by the business you’re involved in and the goal of
your contest. Your prizes should be related to your business and what
you’re trying to accomplish by having the contest in the first place. It
makes no sense to offer a prize that has nothing to do with your
business or the goals of your contest. If your goal is to create a
customer base, then you want to offer one of your products as the prize.
When you make the prize related to your business, you’ll be attracting
the entrants you’re looking for, your target market! You also want to
make sure that the prize is worth the entry requirements. Too difficult
of an entry process or a prize that isn’t of value to your target market
can doom your contest to a small number of entrants.

How Long Should I Run The Contest?

Usually the best time frame is a monthly, bi-monthly or quarterly basis.
The time period depends on the type and cost of prizes you’re offering.
A simple rule of thumb is: The higher the cost of the prizes, the longer
period of time between drawings.

How Do I Let People Know I Have A Contest?

This is a promotion you’re running so advertise it just as you would any
other promotion. If no one knows about your contest then how do you
expect to get the traffic to you’re web site? Advertise your contest in
newsletters, bulletin boards, classified advertising sites, newsgroups,
digests, forums and any other place online that allows advertising. Add
it into your e-mail signature. Get the word out so you can accomplish
the goal of your contest.

A web site contest can be an incredible marketing success if you take
the time to figure out your goals, develop an easy method of entry so
that both parties win, control the cost of your prizes and promote the
contest for maximum exposure. HBM

Terry Williams, the publisher of “Internet Marketing Issues”, publishes
a Free Weekly E-zine that provides online marketing tips, techniques and
secrets that will explode your online profits. You’re invited to learn
all about the latest in online marketing and see why over 1000
subscribers in 10 countries around the world rely on the information
provided in IMI for their online business marketing needs. For a free
subscription, Sub-IMI@intersuccess.com or check out his current issue at
http://www.intersuccess.com/imi/

Every successful company uses some sort of pro-
motion to influence certain audiences – usually
customers or prospects – by informing or per-
suading them. Reasons for promoting a business
include: increasing visibility; adding credibil-
ity to you or your company; enhancing or improv-
ing your image; and bringing in new business.
The following cost-effective, easy-to-execute
ideas have the power to increase sales in a way
conventional advertising cannot. The key is to
find the methods that are appropriate for your
business, marketplace and professional style.

1. CONTESTS. As one example, a cookware store
decided to sponsor cooking contests. After send-
ing out a press release announcing a competition
for the best cookie or chocolate cake, a mailing
went out to the store+s customers soliciting en-
tries. Food editors, professional chefs and cook-
ing teachers were invited to be judges. Both the
winners and the winning recipes were publicized.
Essay and design contests are also possibilities,
such as a furniture store establishing a prize
for student furniture design. Pie eating, pan-
cake flipping, oyster shucking and grape stomp-
ing contests make sense for restaurants. Den-
tists can hold smile contests, while video ren-
tal stores can stage movie trivia quizzes.

2. NEWSLETTERS. Another good way to promote, par-
ticularly for brokers, banks and business consul-
tants, is through newsletters. They demonstrate
how much you know about your field, and do it in
a low-key, informative way. They help keep your
company high in the consciousness of your pro-
spects.

3. DEMONSTRATIONS. Demonstrations are an option
to attract people to your place of business, show
them how to best use your product, and establish
your credibility. A retail-wholesale fish outlet
holds cooking demonstrations twice a week, fea-
turing a different restaurant chef each time and
attracting substantial crowds. Recipe cards are
even given out. Wallpaper demonstrations, fa-
shion shows, gift wrapping, refinishing and com-
puter demonstrations have all worked well for re-
tailers selling products associated with them.

4. SEMINARS. Often more appropriate for business-
to-business marketing, seminars are the commercial
side of demonstrations. If you hold a seminar,
follow these rules for success:

* Schedule the event at a time convenient to most
attendees.
* Be specific in the invitation about when the
event begins and ends, who will be there, and
what the agenda is.
* Follow up the invitations with personal phone
calls.
* Charge for the seminar to give it a higher
perceived value.
* Follow up after the event to get people’s re-
actions.

5. PREMIUMS. Also called an advertising special-
ty, a premium is a gift of some kind that reminds
your customer of you and your service. There are
thousands from which to choose: key chains, cof-
fee mugs, refrigerator magnets, baseball caps,
paperweights – just about anything that can be
engraved, imprinted, silk-screened or embroidered
with your company name and phone number.

6. SPEECHES. Depending on your topic and your mar-
ket, you might want to speak before chambers of
commerce, trade associations, parent groups, sen-
ior citizens or other local organizations.

7. ARTICLES. Another possibility is to write an
article for a trade journal, reprint it, and mail
it off to your friends, customers and prospects.
This positions you as an expert, and is a partic-
ularly good way to promote a consulting business.

8. BONUSES. If you have a restaurant, give away a
glass of wine with dinner to introduce a new menu.
If you sell to retailers, give them a display fix-
ture with the order of a gross. If you sell of-
fice supplies, give away a new pen with a size-
able purchase. If you+re in the cosmetics busi-
ness, offer customers a free sample blusher when
they buy mascara and lipstick.

9. COUPONS. For best results, the price break
should be significant – at least 15 percent.
This is one of the least expensive ways to de-
velop new trade, and an excellent tool for eval-
uating advertising. However, one theory holds
that coupons draw people who only buy discount
and never become regular customers. So be sure
to monitor the results.

10. DONATIONS. Donating your product or service
to a charitable cause often results in positive
exposure to community leaders, charity board mem-
bers, PTAs and civic groups. While consumer pro-
ducts are desired most, many organizations also
look for donations of professional service time.
If you have a restaurant or a large meeting facil-
ity, consider hosting an event for a charitable
organization. This works best if volunteers for
that charity are potential customers.

11. SAMPLES. No matter what you do to promote
your business, giving potential customers a sam-
ple is an excellent way to attract attention and
make a positive impression. In many cases, it
makes just as much sense to spend your marketing
and advertising dollars on giving out your own
products instead of buying advertisements -
especially if cash is tight. The key is to give
samples to the audience you want to reach, i.e.,
software packages to computer user groups, or
nutritious snacks to health-oriented consumers.
In the food arena, where one taste is worth a
thousand words, firms now exist that test market
new products for large and small companies alike
through in-store demonstrations. A good demon-
stration company not only keeps track of how much
of your product was given away, but also submits
detailed reports on what people said about the
product and how much of it was purchased.

12. FREE TRIALS. If your product is too big or
expensive to give away outright, why not offer
a free trial to qualified customers? Try ship-
ping it out to prospects with no strings at-
tached. Most people will appreciate the oppor-
tunity to try the product, and hopefully many
will like it enough to buy it.

13. FREE SERVICES. If you can+t afford to give
away products, offering your services as a way
of generating new business can also pay off.
For example, if you own a retail clothing busi-
ness, send out a flyer offering customers a
free fashion consultation to draw them into the
store.

14. SPECIAL BENEFITS, RATES OR NOTICES. Smart
organizations go out of their way to make cus-
tomers feel important and appreciated. Frequent
flyer clubs are the most pervasive example of
loyalty-building benefits for customers only,
now adapted by many kinds of businesses. Most
software companies sell program updates to cus-
tomers at discounted prices. And advance notices
about sales or other changes or opportunities can
help cement customer ties.

© 2002 By Linda Elizabeth Alexander

On the Back

1. Print a team’s sports schedule on the back. Fans will keep them handy and keep your name in front of them.

2. Print a special discount offer or coupon on the back. People will keep it because they intend to use the coupon.

3. If you do seminars, print key principals on the back. Your attendees will refer to them later and think of you.

4. Hand write on the back your “unlisted” 800 number. This adds value to your card, making people keep it longer because they don’t want to lose the special number.

Ad Specialties

5. Make the business card the ad specialty: Print your company information on letter openers, CD openers, magnets, pens, highlighters, keychains, mousepads, mugs, luggage tags, and other items that people will keep because they are useful.

6. Attach a business card to an ad specialty: For example, give business card holders as a thank you gift and place your business card in as the first one. Or, have your card designed as a Rolodex card.

7. If you routinely give out seasonal gifts or specialties, attach your business card. Examples: candy canes at Christmas, heart shaped containers filled with candy for Valentine’s Day, or even a sandwich bag of candy with a card stapled to it.

Unique Places to Put Them

8. Tuck them into the product before delivery: If you are a florist, cut a hole in it and tie a ribbon around the flowers and through the business card. If you sell gift baskets, Tuck one inside the basket before delivering it to your customer. The same goes for Mary Kay or Avon Cosmetics – place your card in the bag. You’ve seen how some restaurants staple a menu to their bags for takeout; if you use bags, staple your card to the outside of the bag.

9. Send a business card in every piece of correspondence – letters, invoices, even your electric bill. Sooner or later, those cards will be used.

10. If you are crafty, incorporate them into your designs: embellish them with rubber stamps, or blend them with other art projects. You can also mount them to greeting cards you create and send to customers and prospects.

11.When mailing out information: Take a number 10 envelope, facing you and upside down. Fold the envelope in thirds. When you turn it around, there is a little pocket to tuck your card in. Include it in the mailing. Using a colored envelope makes the presentation even more dramatic.

12. Scan your card in and use it as a graphic for when you exchange links with other websites. The other site can use your graphic as the link.

13. Place them in library books as if you used them as bookmarks. Visit bookstores place them in books related to your business.

Keeping Them Handy:

14. Use them as bookmarks so you’ll always have some readily available if you meet someone at school, in the library, on the bus, or at the park where you like to read.

15. Have your spouse, family, and friends carry some of your cards with them in case they meet someone who might be interested in your product or service.

16. Wear them! Use them as nametags at meetings and conferences instead of the “Hello, my name is …” type of tags.

17. Keep a stack of cards everywhere you might need them – in your car, your jacket pocket, your briefcase, your purse or wallet, in your planner, at home, anywhere you can think of. Then you’ll always have some on hand when you meet a prospect.

When to Use Them:

18. Give them out during your personal meetings when you meet someone new: at your church, your children’s soccer games, at lunch with your friends when someone brings a guest. To be more polite, you could have a personal “calling card” printed up with your information to use in these situations.

19. If you do seminars, have your participants exchange cards with each other. Have them write a compliment about the person on the back before they hand them out. Everyone will have a wealth of contacts; they will remember each other and it will also give participants a boost of confidence.

20. Ask neighborhood businesses if you may display your cards near their registers.

21. Tack them to bulletin boards at supermarkets, restaurants, retail stores and the library – anyplace that has a bulletin board.

22. Give out two cards at a time – one for your prospect or client, and one for her/him to give away.

23. Place some on the table when you leave a restaurant.

24. Agree to mail the cards of other businesspeople in the mailings you do, if they will do the same for you. Your networking circle will grow as your cards are passed around.

How Not to Use Business Cards:

25. Don’t give them to a member of the opposite sex in the hopes that s/he will call you. I have a friend who was told this wouldn’t work. He did an experiment for six months to prove it, and his friend was right! Sadly, not one woman called him. Although he does have a girlfriend now!

26. Some people don’t give out business cards when they meet a prospective client. Instead, they send a follow- up note later with their card enclosed.

Other Types of Business Cards to Have

27. Business card CD-ROM. If you haven’t seen these yet, they are a mini-sized CD that plays in any CD player and has your contact information on it, as well as an introduction to your business.

28. Email Signature. Put your contact information into a signature file for email, along with a link to your website (be sure to include the “http” in order to make it “clickable.”)

29. Vcard. These are electronic business cards that recipients can click on and automatically add to their address books. Do a web search for “vcard” to find software that supports this technology. Then use it in all your emails!

30. One consulting company, which works with designers of products for people with disabilities, prints their cards in Braille. It reminds their clients how they can help them comply with disability laws. It also gets people asking for information.

******************************

Linda Elizabeth Alexander is a business writer and marketing consultant specializing in web content and sales copy. Be heard and understood! Subscribe to Write to the Point, a FREE ezine for business people who want to learn how to write better.

http://www.write2thepointcom.com

Reasons, why you should take offline promotion of your website
seriously include:

Internet is increasingly becoming a part of our daily life.
However, still a big segment of the society – especially, the
elderly – don’t spend that much of time online. Traditional
media is a good method of getting their attention.

If a person sees your printed advertisement with your URL in
a year-old magazine and gets interested in what you have to
offer, he will still be able to check out your website.
Research shows that at least four people browse through
a printed magazine in its life time.

With planned media promotion, you can tap into particular
target market, which otherwise might not be that easy to do.
For example: if you sell car accessories through your website,
a good promotional channel would be a specific radio station
that commuters like to tune in.

Your offline promotion endeavor should combine advertisement,
publicity and promotional items.

Advertising

Once you identified the potential target market that you would
like to reach, you can try to communicate with them using
various advertising methods. Advertising is a paid form of
delivering message to broad range of prospective customers
through billboards, posters, print, broadcast media, etc.

Each of your advertising campaign should have a clear goal
and carefully crafted plan. Since advertising in some media
forms is quite expensive, without a well-defined plan you
might waste your money for nothing.

Your advertising goal might include the followings:

- Bring targeted traffic to your website
- Stimulate sales
- Build brand recognition of your website
- Increase public awareness of your product and services
- Promote seasonal sales, clearance, etc. conducted through
your site.

Once you established your advertising goal, you need to clarify
advertising budget, timing and media. You should set your
advertising budget based on your objective. In general,
companies set aside a percentage of their gross sales as
promotional budget. A new online business might choose to
spend on advertising, amount allocated in its business plan.
Timing and scheduling are also crucial factors in advertising.

Where should you advertise is a difficult decision, which should
base on a number of factors:

Market reach
What is the market segment you would like to cover with your
present campaign?

Message
Depending on your goal, you have to choose the right message to
communicate with your prospective customers. The advertising
media has to conform to the selected message.

Product and service that you offer through your site
B2B and B2C products and services are usually different in
nature and require different media to reach targeted market.

Budget
The choice of media depends vastly on your budget consideration.

Major offline advertising mediums

Newspapers

Newspapers are very popular media forms of advertising. If you
are not planning to reach out to the mass, classified sections
of local newspapers should be your first choice.

Magazines

Specialized magazines are good for targeting particular interest
group. If you sell golf accessories through your site, you
should definitely consider advertising in one of the local golf
magazines. However, ad spaces in magazines are often quite
expensive.

Radio

Radio advertising is a good option, if your business is aimed at
certain social group like teenagers, housewives, drivers, etc.
This is also a relatively inexpensive way of delivering your
message to a certain community or locality.

Television

If the products or services that you offer have mass appeal,
television is an excellent media of advertising. As the audience
of a TV station changes depending on the show aired there is
a limited possibility of target marketing. The ability to use
audio visual scenes helps delivering certain types of message
to the audience more clearly than any other media, which makes
TV advertising highly effective but quite costly.

Yellow pages and other directories

You should definitely add your business along with your website
URL to as many printed directories as you can. Industry
specific directories are good advertising media for B2B
businesses.

Outdoor Advertising

Outdoor advertising with billboards, posters, etc. are effective
way of reaching out to a certain neighborhood. Since the
exposure rate of billboards is very high – people often take
the same route to work, it is a great medium to create brand
recognition.

Transit advertising

Advertising on various transports, terminals, subway are known
as transit advertising. Like billboards with this type of
advertising you can target a specific route or area. This can
be a very effective way to get your message to blue-collar
workers, if that is your market segment.

Direct Mail

Excellent way of delivering you message in the form of
promotional letters, catalogs, flyers, circulars, coupons, etc.
to your prospective customers. If you choose your mailing list
correct, the exposure rate and the response rate can be very
high.

Publicity

Publicity is any form of presentation of ideas, products, or
services delivered by the media themselves rather than as a paid
advertisement.
If your website carries a really new message or unique and
innovative products or services, for you publicity will be
definitely more effective than advertising. People, often, trust
news stories and articles much more than they trust paid
advertisements.

Press release

Newspapers, magazines, TV and Radio are the main publicity
conduits. Press releases are the tool to get into these media.
Whenever, you do something with your online business, which you
think is newsworthy you should write a press release and send it
off.

The main idea of a press release is to grab attention from a
news editor so that he writes a story on the subject.

That’s why follow the following rules while writing a press
release:

- Keep it simple, clear and precise
- Be accurate in facts and figures
- The news highlights should be expressed in the first two
paragraphs
- The press release should have an eye-catching headline
- Tell your story from different perspective
- The press release should have less than 200 words
- Mention your website URL at least in two different places

Business material and stationery

All your business literatures, materials and stationery should
have similar consistent logotype and URL address. This is an
extremely effective brand creation method within the group of
people those, who one way or another, interact with your
business.

Promotional Items

Give away items such as Pens, coffee mugs, key chains, coasters,
calendars, sticky notes, etc. should have your company logo and
web address. Apart from building brand this also work as a daily
reminder for users of these items.

One extremely effective method is brand marketing through merchandise. Think about it—before the web existed, how did businesses like real estate companies market their brands? One way they did it was to give stuff away—a marketing trick that is still being applied effectively today. How many pens, pencils, and magnets do you have lying around the house, stuck to the refrigerator, placed behind your ear—wherever—that bear some company’s logo or name? If you have ever worked in an office environment doubtless you would have noticed several different slogans on a hodgepodge collection of pens (some that might even still work) and pencils collected over time from seminars, informational fairs, trade events, etc. Brick and mortar businesses are doing it, so why aren’t you?

If you don’t want to market your website on writing utensils or magnets you have several alternatives. Other products that work well for marketing include coffee mugs, travel-and-go cups, mouse pads, bumper stickers, key tags, and stress balls. Let’s not forget another great place to show off your website—on your body! No, I’m not talking about taking drastic measures like tattooing your company URL on your forehead. Clothing advertisements are the name of the game. Clothing is a wonderful way to advertise your website, especially if you have a funny slogan or eye-catching logo. You can have your website address printed on hats, shirts, umbrellas, tote bags, and all sorts of wearable accessories. The best thing about advertising on clothing is that the advertisement is mobile—it goes wherever you go. The next time you get dressed to go out why not wear something that promotes your business? Don’t forget that you can give away things as well—imagine a hundred walking billboards for your website!

There are plenty of companies that will apply your brands to products. The cost is cheap and the rewards can be high, so what are you waiting for? Look through your local phonebook or do an internet search for companies that print to merchandise and then go get branding!

Copyright 2005 Jon Castle

This article can be reprinted freely as long as the author bylines are included.

About the Author
We are each a single drop of rain strafed by the wind to merge with other droplets and thereby form an ocean. For more unconventional home business wisdom, home business opportunities, and more please visit Jon Castle’s website www.AmericanHouseDad.com.