We're Moving to a New (Blog) Home

Good news!

We're moving our blog location to a new home:

All my past blog entries have been moved to the new blog home, re-categorized for easy reading, and I've also included a "search" feature so you can find the information you need.

A few months ago, I decided to move my blog from Blogger to a WordPress blog hosted on my own website. Part of the reason was because I can backup a blog on my own website (it hard to do this when your blog is hosted on the blog software's site). Also, Blogger's Terms of Service sometimes conflict with what you want on your blog and you can't take the risk of having Blogger canceling your blog.

I'll be discontinuing posting on this blog, so go to the new blog today!

http://www.passionforbusiness.com/blog/

Craiglist, OLX and More!

When marketing your business part of your strategy has got to be getting the word out to the general public.

Online classified ads are a great way to market your products and services, including events. There are several to choose from, including Craig's List, OLX, and Bernardo's List to name a few. Yahoo has it's own version of classifed ads, and don't forget your local newspaper may run their classified ads online as well.

You can post products and services for sale, as well as events on most classified ad sites, and many times these ads are free.

Typically the ad will run in one category or town only, and it will run for a certain number of days. If you're posting for a "virtual" event like a teleclass or webinar, I recommend posting in the largest city categories like New York or Los Angeles.

I also suggest you compose your ad copy in your own word processor so that you can simply cut and paste the text into the ad when you're renewing it.

Is Your Website Giving You the Results You Want?

Creating Small Business Websites That Grab Attention

begins July 17

Is your website giving you the results you want?

Your website can be a wonderful marketing and educational tool. But what makes a small business owner’s website great?

Whether you design your own site -- or hire someone to do it for you -- this information-packed class is for all small business owners!

In this six-week teleclass, you will learn:

• What makes a good web site design that’s both appealing and usable, while accomplishing your marketing goals at the same time.
• What visitors really want to find when they visit your website
• How to choose effective page layouts and colors for your site.
• The keys to powerful website text that sells your products and services.
• How to critique websites (including your own!) in order to apply this knowledge to your own website.
• How to effectively market your website to get more traffic to it.
• Which website statistics are important to track for the success of your business.
• What to look for in a website designer.

This six-week class begins July 17.

http://www.passionforbusinesslearning.com/websiteplan


What Students Say...



"This is the best class I have ever taken for helping you get started with your website! It really taught me the basics and essentials and was easy to understand and implement...A MUST if you have a website or are thinking about one. Karyn is a wonderful teacher....very personable, energetic, helpful and extremely knowledgeable...I can't recommend this class enough!"


--Roxanne Hunt
Intuitive Life Coach



"I found Karyn's website design course extremely helpful. I was in the process of re-designing my course and had actually settled on a homepage design. After the first session, I told my designer to hold everything until I finished the course, as we had already made some poor design choices! Since the course, I have re-thought my objectives and design choices and am much more confident that my website will truly work for me in the future."

--Susan Smith
Raising Canine, LLP



Schedule

This six-week teleclass begins July 17, 2008

• July 17
• July 24
• July 31
• Aug 7
• Aug 14
• Aug 21

All teleclasses are 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM eastern

Classes will be recorded, so if you miss a session, you will be able to download the audio recording of the live class and listen to it at your leisure.

Registration

Registration Fee: $179

Instructor: Karyn Greenstreet


Registration Information and Details:

http://www.passionforbusinesslearning.com/websiteplan

I'm a Social Networking Newbie

Okay, I admit it. I'm a social networking newbie. LinkedIn, Facebook...totally new territory to me. I have a profile on LinkedIn and have lots of contacts there, but I didn't know what my options were for really using this service.

Enter my friend Julie. She has over 500 contacts on LinkedIn (amazing!). She says she gets a lot of business leads from LinkedIn, so naturally she's the perfect person for me to learn from.

I'm having lunch with her on Friday...I can't wait learn all about the mysteries of LinkedIn!

Websites and Supermarkets: How We Hunt for What We Want

Imagine that you enter an unfamiliar supermarket or hardware store. Typically you're not going in these types of stores to browse around for fun: you know what you want before you walk in the door. How do you tackle the task of finding the specific item you want?

For most people, they'll do one of two things: they'll grab the first employee they see and ask, "Where do I find the hot dog rolls?" or they'll walk past the end of each aisle, glancing at the aisle signs that tell them the aisle contents looking for a fairly good match, then walk down that aisle to see if their item is in that aisle.

Visitors to your website have the same "hunting" mentality. They come to your website looking for a specific answer to a question they have in their head. They scan your home page, looking for a clue about what's in each section of your website, and grab the first "closest" link that seems to match their question. Or, they'll go right to your Site Map or Search Box to get some help. Only when they reach the page that really does answer their question will them begin to read in any great depth.

If you keep in mind that people are in hunting mode (not reading mode) when they arrive at your website, you'll save yourself and your visitors a lot of hassle. Here are some tips:

1. List all the questions that a typical visitor might have when they arrive at your site. What are they looking for when they come to your site? Create your home page to lead them to these answers.

2. Create navigation and in-paragraph hyperlinks that include the text that visitors are looking for. Use text labels that are intuitive and the type of phrasing a typical visitor might use.

3. Keep paragraph text to a minimum until they reach a page that will convert them from "hunter" mode to "information gatherer" mode.

4. Make it easy for them to get back to the home page. If their initial "hunt" doesn't unearth the answers they seek, they may be willing to try again, but only if you make it easy for them.

Planning your website is one of the most important things you can do. If your site is difficult to use or doesn't reflect the real way that visitors use websites, your revenues will suffer. If you're not getting the results you need from your website, maybe now is the time to consider a website re-design.