Advertising through such means as Google Adwords use what is called keywords. Keywords are main words that, when inputed into a search engine such as Google, bring the person searching to site pages where the advertisements would be located. When those keywords are entered people are automatically sent to sites where they wish to be and are shown advertisements that match up with those keywords. ie keywords such as Scrapbooking bring up search listings on scrapbooking and advertising for sites such as www.makingmemorieswithwscrapbooking.com

An online presence is integral to all businesses, no matter what business they have. By advertising online it increases awareness of the business and therefore increases flow to their website. As 99% of businesses are online these days it makes sense for a business to want to get as much flow to their site as possible. Online advertising allows that to happen. So really, you should.

Recently I decided to use my network. I belong to a site through Facebook called the Sunshine Coast Buy & Sell. I have become quite addicted to it, searching through the posted items on an everyday basis, buying up items like crazy. I thought to myself, why aren’t I using this to my advantage? So I posted a couple of items and decided to start selling them. It was a relatively simple process: take pictures, post to the site, place comments on details of and how much it’s selling for, and then wait for bites. I waited patiently for a day or two without anything and then my posts started getting noticed. Of the 6 shirts that I posted I have sold 2 and am going to be meeting up to sell a 3rd tomorrow.

This networking example was to sell shirts but networks can be used for lots of things. What do you use your network for?

Facebook is for friends, to connect with people that you went to school with or grew up next to. It is very much a younger age group and a lot of people have pictures posted of them out at clubs drinking or other social events. Facebook has been classified as dangerous for some to have as it has more of a personal persona instead of perhaps a more professional image one would be trying to put across. I know some that have jobs in government positions that were informed that if they wanted a certain promotion they’d have to get rid of Facebook.

Twitter is somewhat better than Facebook. Twitter users can tweet up to 40 words on what they’re doing, how they’re doing, what’s going on with them. Businesses use Twitter to post tweets stating promotional events that they are hosting and offer a way for their Twitter followers to stay connected to them. To have a presence through Twitter you have to tweet and you have to tweet often about topics that will interest your followers. If not, they will stop following you and we don’t want that.

LinkedIn is more for the professionals. You can add where you work and then create a network of other professionals through it. This is the place to network professionally, to look for jobs and connect with others with the same professional goals as you.

So to reiterate, Facebook is personal networking, Twitter is mostly business advertising and random status updates, and LinkedIn is professional networking. Enjoy!

These are known as the 4 P’s of marketing:

1) Price

2) Product

3) Place

4) Promotion

When marketing, first off you have a product. You can either create it or purchase it or just be hired to work with the marketing of it. The first thing you need to take into consideration with the product is place, where are you going to market it? Place can be a country, a store, a portion of a shelf. Both macro and micro are taken into consideration here. Depending on where you market it will entail how much the price of the product will be. Various financial factors need to be taken into consideration, such as tariffs if going international, charges from the various outlets that may offer your product, even the cost of the product itself. From there you may decide to offer promotions, to help move the product along faster and create flow. These may be online or offline promotions, depending on the place to where you think best to market your product.

The 4 P’s are an integral part of marketing and must be taken into consideration. Not having all 4 results in disaster and is best to be avoided.

Teg Brar is a mentor in the Leaders of Tomorrow program through the International Board of Trade and is a speaker who talks about the importance of Personal Branding in today’s online society. We hosted him through CUBES and as part of the Business Week through Capilano University.

Teg talked about the importance of Personal Branding and how to give yourself a better online presence. Q: Have you ever Googled yourself? Go do it, right now. My name, Dana Skonberg, is quite original so all that comes up is about me. One of my classmates, Julian Bell, shares his name with a famous poet and a couple of other people. He doesn’t even show until about 6th place down the page. Teg talked about ways to make your name be #1 on that list, through the importance as blogs such as this one. Each one of us are in charge of our own personal presence. Knowing where we are listed online and what we can do to make ourselves #1 are key to creating our own personal brand.

A logo in most times speaks for the brand. You see a logo, you think of a brand. A logo doesn’t need to have the company’s name, though most times it does help to grab consumer’s attention and make it known that that product is theirs.

Logos need to be simple and clear to attract attention. Too much added stuff takes away from the product that the logo is on and suffocates the brand. Also for social media sites where images are small, simple is best. Logos need strong vibrant colors to atract attention and stand out from the crowd!

Brand’s are living and breathing things. They are born and grow from young to mature and die after time if they cannot survive. It is said that most brand’s have a chair in boardrooms and are talked about as real as you and me. A company’s entire business can be supported by their brand, if the brand fails then so do they.

Many things go into creating a brand. Color, font, style are some of the many considerations that are discussed. A brand represents that business, that product, that company. Who their brand is defines them. What their brand stands for shows the world what they stand for. The brand speaks for the business.

Individuals, as well as Corporations, have a brand. Personal branding is becoming much more important in today’s technologically advanced world. Who you are online can depict what job you get. Many businesses these days do a search for their potential employees long before they hire them. They like to get a feel for that individual before they offer them a high paying position, creating a sense of security for the business.

Have you ever done a search on yourself? Do it. What does your brand say about you?

Online a business can be much more than what they already are. Some businesses has a strict online presence, meaning that they do not have a physical store presence and do all their business online. This can be dangerous as I believe that a combination of both online presence and physical store presence is integral. Call me old school but when I have a problem with something I like to take it into someone and have them look at it with me. I like that personal approach that some businesses have lost somewhere along the way.

With technology we rely on our computers and our smart phones, and our w.p.m. is an asset when finding a decent job in today’s economy. This was unheard of 20 years ago and yet is common lingo today. I admit that I am addicted to my smart phone. Like many others I find an overwhelming need to stay connected to everyone at all times, even if they have no idea who I am… I wonder who’s following me? Gives the term stalker a whole other meaning…

My online presence is important to me as much as any businesses’ online presence should be. The need to connect with their target audience, the need to reach out to them and offer their product and service to those that require it. This is technology! No longer do we need to physically grab ahold of someone, we can do it online! The future? Of course it is! But how and to what extent is up to the business owner. They should be in control of their online presence and know that they have the ability to change when needed. After all, too much online is scary, right?