I’ve been an SEO. Having done the intensive SEO work I know the value of good SEO and why it comes at such a premium. SEO is labor-intensive and ever-evolving, but extremely effective when executed well.

Source: Business Insider

Getting started on your small business tax return
Do not look at the calendar and think, “I don’t need to start on my small business tax return yet. I have more than three months to do it.” That attitude is begging for last-minute panic and mistakes…
MiamiHerald.com

What to Know About Google’s New Update
Last week Google announced another algorithm update, called the “page layout algorithm update”, which will target sites that have too many ads above the fold.
Brick Marketing Blog

Why campaign spending rules hurt small business
A recent poll conducted by Lake Research found that 66% of a random sample of 500 small-business owners believe the Citizens United decision was “mostly bad” or “somewhat bad” for small business.
CNN

Small Business Owners, Nonprofit Execs: Don’t Make These Retirement Mistakes
13 mistakes small business owners and nonprofit execs make in retirement planning revealed in Ventureneer webinar.
PR.com (press release)

Effective Sales Techniques Regardless of Your Industry
If you want your business to excel in the market, you have to implement some great sales ideas that will ensure that you are at the top of your industry.
Expert Business Advice

Small business administrator on cabinet is good first step
President Barack Obama may finally have it right – about small business, that is, and its importance to our economy. Two weeks ago, he appointed the administrator of the Small Business Administration to his cabinet.
Biddeford Journal Tribune

HP updates small-business color printer line
New laser printers and multifunction devices are targeted at SMBs that produce their own marketing collateral or that require professional-quality color output.
ZDNet (blog)

Small Business Plan: A Template for Making Sales
“Nothing happens until something gets sold.” This statement, posted on the Web site of Sales Engine, is something any small business plan should adhere to.
International Business Times

The pricing formula (S&S)
Pricing your product is actually simple, as long as you consider it from the buyer’s point of view.
Seth’s Blog

Office of Advocacy Releases Small Business Profiles for All 50 States
Today the Office of Advocacy released the annual Small Business Profiles for the States and Territories. This is the 16th year Advocacy has published a state-by-state profile of American small business for the United States.
PR Newswire (press release)

Grow your business with resources in the “Cloud”
Could the “cloud” help you grow your business? Pat Sigmon joins Jim Blasingame to reveal innovative ways to use web-based tools – the “cloud” – to help you grow your business more efficiently.
The Small Business Advocate (audio)

Small-business pessimism hangs around
Three years of poor sales and a slow economy have conditioned small-business owners to think negatively. Or at least that’s how it seems in the latest round of reports on the small-business economic outlook.
OCRegister

Exporting to China just got easier for small business
How do you export to and distribute your products in China. Frank Lavin joins Jim Blasingame from Hong Kong to explain how ExportNow.com will help small businesses gain access to China’s consumers without prohibitive expense.
The Small Business Advocate (audio)

Small Business Tax Cheats: A $122 Billion Problem
But an increasingly tricky web of politics and logistics surrounding small business tax matters virtually eliminates any likelihood of a serious crackdown on these diverse entities.
The Fiscal Times

Office Depot Small Business Index Finds Organization is a Big Challenge
According to the survey, filing and organization are the top business tasks that small business owners least look forward to, as 27 percent loath putting their office in order.
MarketWatch (press release)

Verizon Wireless Amps Up Small Business Capabilities with Powerful New Devices at
This week, at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Verizon Wireless unveiled new devices, including tablets, smartphones and mobile hotspots,that are sure to capture the attention of SMB proprietors.  Here are a few great options…

Poll: Corporate political cash hurts small business
An opinion poll released Wednesday found that two-thirds of small business leaders believe the US Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision hurts them, and a whopping 88 percent view money as playing a negative role in politics.
Salt Lake Tribune

How to Become a Tech Guru in One Year
Last year, Ryan Bubinski, 22, and Zach Sims, 21, founded Codecademy, a New York City-based startup that provides online learning opportunities in the programming space. The company offers classes and videos on how to code, and this month launched Code Year, a free and interactive yearlong coding class.
American Express OPEN Forum

The ups and downs of small business employment
We’ll start by defining a small business as an enterprise with fewer than 500 employees. That’s the definition used by the Small Business Administration.
PolitiFact

Study: Three in Four Women Small Business Owners Predict More Tough Times in 2012
A new Nationwide Financial study shows three quarters (74 percent) of women small business owners expect their business to be negatively impacted in 2012 by the economy.
Insurance News Net (press release)

How to Make the Perfect Website

Sadly, many entrepreneurs have provided the public with websites that are faulty, unreadable, esthetically displeasing, or incompatible with mobile devices. If you’re cringing with guilt, you may want to read up on these tips to make a perfect website.
NewBizBlogger

5 Things Every Small Business Should Know about Email Marketing
Here are five aspects of email marketing that every small business owner should be aware of.
Everything PR

How The SBA Can Better Serve The Other 29353039 Small Businesses
The paperwork, the certifications, the bidding, the bureaucracy…for a small business who’s not familiar with the system it’s almost impossible. I’m not alone. Most of my clients hate working with the government.
Huffington Post

Ten Twitter tips and tricks
Two social media experts explain how small business owners can channel Twitter’s tiny might.
Sydney Morning Herald

Local Search: A Must for Small Business
For small business some of the most important search is local and optimising your site to be found in local search directories. Here are some of our top hints on how to optimise your site being found locally.
PRWire

SOPA Kills Small Business and Fangirls
It’s badly written and has far too great a possibility of hurting small business. Big and broad laws like this have been proven, time and again, to be very dangerous to the people.
FemPop

Last February was a very busy month for me. I had just started my new job as an SEO strategist at PCG Digital Marketing, and was beginning the quest to launch Get Busy Media. There was only one problem: I knew nothing about SEO or online marketing. I hit the books hard, and practiced the tools of the trade until I knew the ins and outs of SEO strategy.

I learned something very interesting through my research. Basic small business SEO is not rocket science. Sure, more advanced SEO techniques do take some technical experience and creativity, but getting started was much easier than I imagined.

Source/Read More: GetBusyMedia.com

If I could turn trade $1 for $5 in the space of a few years, I might not be interested. But if I could take a $100,000 investment and turn it into $500,000 worth of business growth in the space of a few years, I’d find a way to come up with the $100,000 to invest. The problem is, as with any investment, the results are unknown. We have no crystal balls in which to predict the future.

With SEO, and a good business model, a seemingly sizable cost will often multiply itself into a considerable profit in just a few years, if not sooner.

Source/Read More: E-Marketing Performance

When it comes to market a small business in the internet, it becomes very critical for a novice start-up founder to do proper internet marketing.

In general, novice start-up founders have little or no knowledge about search engine optimization and these small businesses can’t afford high skilled SEO firms to market their product online. As a result they struggle to market their quality product or business online and most of them failed not because they miss innovation or lack quality but they can’t reach the audience.

Source/Read More: Technorati

Being aware of what terms your competitors are going after can alert you to phrases you may not have considered or give you insight into their marketing strategy. However, that’s differently than blindly targeting all of their keywords you see. Just because someone in the same field is going after a particular term, doesn’t mean it will convert for you or that it makes sense to your business. It also doesn’t mean that term is working for them. Definitely do some competitive intelligence to see what they’re doing, but know why it is you’re targeting the terms you select. You can’t simply pick up someone’s SEO strategy just like you can’t copy their entire marketing plan.

Source/Read More: Small Business Trends

Click below to listen to the audio stream.

Source/Listen: The Small Business Advocate

Why Local Optimization?

Big-name national companies can spend into the high thousands to ensure that their websites appear at the top of national search-engine results (national branding helps quite a bit too); often, small businesses can’t afford the luxury of spending money to do so. Therefore, it becomes imperative to take advantage of the opportunities afforded by search engines and community-driven sites to list businesses in a way that ensure high visibility, especially among those of your locale, which should be the target and desired mainstay of your business. The local community will in turn help perpetuate your presence via online referrals and recommendations, creating your “buzz.”

Source/Read More: AddPR.com