Hello readers and welcome to another entry for the Silentblast blog. Today I am going to discuss the merits of having a blog for your business if a blog is suitable to your business model as a business web strategy.

Like many aspects of business there are some facets and tools that are suitable to employ in your overall business strategy and some that are not. In keeping with the topic if your business for example is to provide end user products or services for government in the national security or intelligence field than in all likelihood it would not be in your best interests to have a blog; let alone being allowed corporately or by your current or future client base.

However if your business model is for example a high end furniture retail outlet; then there is definitely strategic possibilities in using a blog to supplement your current business website strategy and bringing products, services and information to your client base.

But before we continue; what is a blog? Well before that is answered it is prudent to illustrate that there are essentially two key types of blogs. One is personal, the other is more business related. A personal blog is really someone’s effort and personal opinion on a myriad of topics. Some personal blogs follow a specific theme such as a hobby, passion or cause. The articles or posts tend to follow two unique trends. The posts are either short or extensive depending on what that person wants to express that given day.

The other type of blog is business focused and usually in the form of hopeful or realized revenue generating income streams by providing relevant information on products or services offered by said company. In some cases a blog for a business is the sole internet presence as a cost effective method of establishing a footprint on the web. Ideally and this is my personal opinion if a blog is the cornerstone of your web presence eventually you should migrate to and certainly incorporate a blog in your future business web development strategy of a website presence beyond the blog.

However a blog as another item in your business toolbox can bring in definitive benefits if your business is prepared and focused to use it. As stated earlier, it can provide a connection to your current customer base, potential customers, and drive web based traffic to your site and probably the most critical, showcase your companies expertise in its product and service offerings. Coincidentally those aspects are also important if you currently have a website.

Today blogs are becoming highly accepted by end users and businesses alike as an effective means of not only drawing in potential new customers but also continually informing the customers after the cash register has rung in a sale. It is no secret that you as a business owner want that customer to come back and not only that, tell others so they in turn will walk through the door either in a brick and mortar business or virtually on the web and become clients.

I have read in magazines and periodicals that on average a business in a year can lose 20% and higher of its current customer base for a myriad of reasons. I would guess there may be several reasons for that loss but I believe at least part of the loss is the result of lack of communications with your current customers, let alone potential customers.

So sit back a moment and reflect on your current business and its potential loss of customers realistically. Examine what one single customer can bring in financially to the bottom line in a given month as an example; that you could have retained had you communicated product and service offerings in a cost effective manner to that individual. If it’s significant enough to raise an eyebrow than as a responsible business you should be concerned. Considering today’s economic climate a business cannot afford to have the mentality of it being acceptable that you “win some, lose some.�

By incorporating a blog to your current web development and business strategy the goal is “win/win� and in a cost effective manner that employs your subject matter expertise on your products and services.

So if you’re current customers of Silentblast consider and examine the possibility of a business blog as part of your customer development and retention strategy. If you are considering placing a business footprint on the internet consider as well a business blog either as the first phase of development or part of an overall strategy to both bolster and increase your business potential.

Either aforementioned method can be effective in getting your business on the internet as a cost effective interim solution or as a supplement to your current internet business strategy.

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Web Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

Now, unless you’ve been on Mars for a period of time you know the economy news is not great. Most of us read the news, or hear about it on TV or radio. The question is how does this affect the web?  We know all about the real estate market, and of course the so called “automotive crises” Yeah right, give me a break. Here’s an idea…How about GM, FORD and Chrysler go ask Exxon or Shell for money instead of our governments? I mean why not? Well, don’t get me started. Back to the web. The thing to remember most about the web and the internet market is results tend to come in rather quickly unlike other strategies that will take more money and the return on investment is not so great.

Now the fact that yes people are spending less, does not mean they are spending less on necessities or things that bring value or are considered functional. I mean business can not stand still right?  Depending on your product or service offerings you will most likely see some form of slow down. The Good news is your competitors will most likely want to hold back on marketing or spending themselves, this will ultimately give you an opportunity to gain market share or open up new grounds.

Take this opportunity to capitalize on the downturn. A well designed site, that is targeted to the right audience can only mean one thing. MORE BUSINESS.

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Website Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

We all know the importance of a powerful headline. However, writing a great headline isn’t as easy as it sounds.
An effective headline will literally force your potential customers to learn more. It will instantly ignite a certain emotion and intrigue them to read on.

In order to write an effective headline, you must learn how to use specific words to achieve a specific reaction.

Before writing your headline, you must first learn a little bit about the basic human motivators. According to psychologist Abraham Maslow, human behavior is always the result of one or more of five basic needs. He listed these needs in a sequence that he refers to as “the hierarchy of human needs.”

He believes that until a less important need is met there won’t be any desire to pursue a more important need. Below are the five human motivators, beginning with the basic needs and continuing to the most important needs.

Physiological – Basic human needs include hunger, thirst, shelter, clothing and sex.
Safety (Security) – Human need for physical, emotional and financial security.
Social (Affiliation) – Human need for love, affection, companionship and acceptance.
Esteem (Self Esteem) – Human need for achievement, recognition, attention and respect.
Self-actualization – Human need to reach their full potential.

When you are aware of the basic human needs, you can incorporate these needs into your writing. A great headline will appeal to your potential customers’ emotions. You must feel their needs, wants and desires and write your headlines with passion and emotion.

When writing your headlines, keep in mind, you only have a few seconds to grab your potential customers’ attention. If your headline doesn’t immediately catch their attention, they’ll simply move on and never return. Below are several different formulas used by professional copywriters to write compelling headlines.

How to

“How to Increase Your Sales Up to 500% by Using This One Simple Strategy”

Headlines beginning with ‘how to’ are very successful, as the Internet is all about information. Internet users have a strong desire to learn. A headline beginning with ‘how to’ immediately grabs your potential customers’ attention and forces them to read on.

Question

“Are You Sick and Tired of Working For Someone Else?”

Headlines written in the form of a question are very effective, as they appeal to your potential customers’ emotions. When they read a headline written as a question, they’ll answer the question in their mind. If the question identifies a specific need, want or desire, they’ll read on.

Command

“Double Your Income Within the Next 12 months –Guaranteed!”

A command headline focuses on the most important benefit your product or service has to offer. It instantly demands your potential customers’ attention and intrigues them to read on.

News

“Announcing a Brand New Breakthrough in E-Publishing”

News headlines are very effective and used to announce new products and services. They are written in the form of an announcement or introduction and create curiosity.

Testimonials

“Internet Marketing Exclusive is Pure Genius — Our Sales Have Increased by 40%!”

Headlines written in the form of a testimonial are very effective, as they instantly begin building trust.

When writing your headlines, certain words, when combined together, will literally draw your readers’ attention to your ad. Below are of few of these “Power Words” that consistently work.

Breakthrough
Discover
Discovery
Easy
Free
Guaranteed
Hidden
Incredible
Love
Master
Money
New
Powerful
Profits
Proven
Results
Revealed
Scientific
Secret
Shocked
Shocking
Ultimate
Uncovered
You
Your

According to a Yale University study, the following words are the most powerful words in the English language.

Money
Discovery
Save
Easy
New
Love
Health
Proven
You
Results
Guaranteed
Safety

Just as certain words ignite different emotions, certain subjects have a broader interest than others do. Some of the most popular subjects include wealth, love, health and safety.

Take your time and try the different formulas according to your needs. Use a combination of the power words and write a headline that sells. By learning the art of writing headlines that focus on the basic human needs and emotions, you can increase your sales considerably.

Copyright © Shelley Lowery

About the Author:

Shelley Lowery is the author of the acclaimed web design course, Web Design Mastery. http://www.webdesignmastery.com And, Ebook Starter – Give Your Ebooks the look and feel of a REAL book. http://www.ebookstarter.com

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Website Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

It used to be that the idea of a website was to somehow impress our clients and give them the big “song and dance” show. I’m sure you all remember and some of you actually still think that Flash intros are awesome. Ya, ok. SKIP… We then somehow turned to this chaotic world of “over the top” information overload called way too much content. You see, we still have to somehow empower our brand, capture our audience and ultimately do one thing. We need to get client/prospect to contact us right? I’m sure that most of you readers are either selling widgets or services and the idea of selling clients across your product line, cross sell and up sell sounds great right? Well, this sounds more like an assembly line than a branding strategy. Your customers are people not widgets.

Your customers are real people, with real problems and your proposed product or solution is going to help them, stop thinking like an assembly line and perhaps the customer will stop rebelling. People have stopped paying attention to ads. I think if the stage is set right, you can get people to tune back in. It has to do with a little magic called strategic branding and innovative customer experiences. If you can make people’s lives easier, better or richer. You win. They win.

Your website should not be just another channel for polished messages, but rather a place to engage people. We see everyday sites that go on forever about this and that, and really the end user is just skimming and looking for those valuable key points. More….to come….

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Web Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

The anti-IE6 squad seems to have been gathering some momentum lately; 37Signals announced that they are phasing out support of the aged web browser, as well as Facebook and MobileMe. Even a website has been constructed, IE Death March, to revolt against the web browser and highlight websites that no longer support it.

Of course from a developers point of view, IE6 has been nothing more than a sheer nightmare for coding. While most of us are using modern day browsers like Firefox and even IE7 and I mean why shouldn’t we? These new browsers are in my opinion faster, have more features and for the most part safer than this old clunker called ie6. There lots of problems with ie6, too many to mention in this post, although I think users should have a choice. However I do encourage everyone I speak too about the modern day browsers to at least give them a chance.  People must know that there are coders, designers and web developers out there having to deal with issues that these so called browsers have and the limitations and threats they have.

Microsoft will soon release the beast called IE8 to the masses soon, what will it bring? What new issues or what new problems will it solve? Who knows, all I know is at least they are all at least have some form of understanding for web standards and that is good. As for me, well it’s still IE7, but Firefox is growing on me.

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Web Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

Yes, it’s true the new Google Browser is here and available as a BETA download to the public. My first impression…Not bad, I see a bright future for this thing. Watch out Microsoft, Google is on the war path now. As far as comments go, not much for now. I’d like to play with it and see how using it feels like. You can download it here: http://www.google.com/chrome

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Web Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast

As a website owner, I’m sure by now you must know whether or not your website is doing it’s job. Make no mistake here, it has a job. Now, either you’re in business or simply have something to say and really want people or customers to get to this website of yours right? Let’s face it folks, you need to impress and capture your market. I really don’t think a template will cut it. Of course if your budget is not there, well I suppose you have no choice, but do you? We believe that a website just like anything is an investment. Treat it well, invest in it and it will reward you. Simply put it’s unreal how many websites are over 10 years old now.

Today’s internet users are savier, smarter and still want to enjoy themselves on your site. I don’t want to get started on the fact that Search engine optimization is important here, but let’s be real for a moment, it’s people that will make the decision to call you and as people, you need to still impress and capture their attention. So, bottom line, if your site is not generating any leads there’s something wrong, either the site is not designed properly to capture the audience, or it’s not getting the right traffic. It may be time for a makeover.

Silentblast Interactive - Toronto Web Design and Development

Canadian owned and operated, Silentblast is a professional web design and development company in Toronto serving small and mid-sized companies in the GTA, Brampton, Vaughan, North York, Markham, Mississauga, Oakville, Richmond Hill, Scarborough and Barrie, Ontario, Canada. Silentblast also develops mobile web site design and development and mobile applications for the iPhone and other mobile phone platforms.

Website – www.silentblast.com

Silentblast Blog – www.silentblast.com/blog

Twitter – http://twitter.com/silentblast