Summary: Small business owners have many ways to grow their business online. There are many advantages small business owners can enjoy by including online marketing in their overall marketing campaign. Horton Group gives you a few tips on how you can get started in marketing your small business on the Internet.

Small business owners can market their business in many ways, but some of the most popular marketing methods these days make use of the Internet. The Internet has made it easier and faster for small businesses to grow. If you’ve just started a small business or if you’re thinking of starting one, it’s a good idea to try to learn a few things about online marketing now so you’ll have a much better chance of enjoying success in your business in the future. What are some of the advantages you can enjoy by using online marketing to grow your business?

1. Wider target market

Traditional marketing strategies (e.g., print, radio, and TV advertising) only reach a limited number of potential customers. If you advertise in the newspaper, for instance, your ad is seen only by those who happen to pick up the newspaper, flip to the right page, and actually look at your ad. With online marketing, you can reach audiences from all parts of the world, and this can considerably increase the traffic to your small business website.

2. Lower advertising costs

Placing an ad in a newspaper can cost you a lot of money, and television commercials cost a lot more. With online marketing, however, you can enjoy very low advertising rates; sometimes you can even do it for free if you’re resourceful enough.

3. More advertising options

The Internet provides several different ways for business owners to market their small business. The traditional method of placing banner ads on popular websites still works but other online marketing methods are available. Your marketing plan and budget will dictate the online marketing methods you use to promote and grow your business.

Now that you’ve got a fairly good idea of what you can gain by using online marketing for your business, you may be quite eager to start the process right away. It involves certain steps, however, so you should take it all slowly but surely.

The first thing you can do to launch your online marketing campaign is to have a website created for your business if you don’t have one already. You should hire a professional website designer. Your business website needs to look professional. Customers should be able to navigate through the pages with ease. Also, customers should be able to get in touch with you quickly in case they have inquiries about your products or services. Make sure your business phone and email address are visible on every page. Better yet, have a “Contact Us” page on your site and list several ways for customers to reach you.

Once you have established an online presence through your business website, you can start actively advertising your business using various methods. Start posting on forums, joining banner exchange programs, writing SEO articles, maintaining a blog, marketing via email, exploring pay-per-click advertising, building your social networks, and even paying for online advertising space if you can afford it. The point is that you have many online marketing methods that you can use to grow a small business. When you’re just starting out, you may need to experiment a little and try several online marketing methods to find out which ones bring in the results you want.