Think of Successful Small Business Marketing as a Three Legged Stool

If you do these three things effectively, your small business internet marketing efforts will be successful.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
2. Pay per Click Marketing (PPC, Google AdWords)
3. CRM Marketing

I have the privilege of working with many small business owners across several industries.  And rarely do I come across a company that is doing all three of these “legs” effectively.  More often, a small business does one or two of them, and provides explanations as to why they don’t do the others.
Granted, each of these items are entire industries, so all the details can’t possibly be captured in one article.  But the basic premise applies.
If you have a website for your business, and your website generates leads, then this is for you.

Search Engine Optimization – SEO

SEO gives your website visibility in search engines.  And search engines, Google in particular, are the yellow pages of 20 years ago.  It is where potential consumers start to find a product or service.
Do not spend $10,000 developing a great looking website without giving serious consideration to SEO – I’ve seen this too often.
Essentially, SEO is the process of increasing your rankings in search engines for targeted keywords.  Keywords you have strategically selected to generate qualified traffic and ultimately sales from your website.
The upside – SEO has momentum.  Once your website starts ranking and gaining authority, it is easier to rank for other terms, more people link to your site, and it continues.
The downside – SEO is not a quick process.  It is not a magic bullet or “get rich quick” scheme.  It is, frankly, a lot of work.  So don’t expect overnight results from SEO.  Consider it a long term strategy.

Google AdWords and Pay per Click Marketing – PPC

Pay per Click Marketing, commonly called PPC, however can produce results overnight.
Google AdWords is the most common platform for PPC marketing.  You can set up a Google AdWords account in a day and start generating clicks.  With Google AdWords, you can appear on the “first page” of Google in a day.  This can be a powerful tool.
The upside – PPC Marketing is quick and targeted.  The major search engines offer robust PPC marketing tools to help you better target your campaigns, improve response and save money.
The downside – The cost.  These placements do not come free.  You set a daily budget and your ads will be served as long as the daily budget allows.

CRM Marketing

CRM Marketing ties in your marketing efforts to your sales efforts – and your sales results.  So you can identify not only which advertising mediums are producing the most leads (and what that costs you) but you also see which leads are producing the most sales – now you can track ROI and truly optimize your marketing mix.
The upside – CRM systems can be incredibly powerful tools for your small business marketing efforts.  Not only do they integrate marketing and sales – but most integrate customer service and several can tie in to your ERP or financial software.  It all depends on your needs.
The downside – I suppose one could say the cost, but I believe CRM systems more than pay for themselves if used properly.  The biggest downside I’ve encountered is people.  More specifically, getting people to buy in to a new way of doing things and getting the most out of these incredibly powerful tools.

Successful Small Business Internet Marketing

The trick is finding the time and resources to make sure all legs of the “stool” are done well.  Otherwise the stool gets a bit wobbly, or worse, it falls down.
But having witnessed many companies and how their internal marketing operates – the businesses that effectively use seo, pay per click marketing and crm marketing have successful small business internet marketing programs.