Email Marketing and Web Site Sponsorship

    Today's Web has a tremendous amount of information available at the click of a mouse. Web "surfers" can jump from page to page at their leisure gathering information, searching for romance, wasting time, etc. ...there are no limitations. Businesses are able to market and advertise their services and products on the Web. In other cases, businesses create websites in order to provide an advertising vehicle for businesses to use. In the past decade, Web advertising has evolved into a multi-million dollar industry with internationally recognized brand names such as Google, Monster.com, and Amazon.com.

    To effectively advertise a business on the Web is a complex task. Large corporations with entire departments dedicated to marketing and advertising easily create and execute profitable marketing campaigns. They do so with Web sites, banner ads, television commercials on major broadcasting stations and billboard advertising. The list of media goes on. They can do this because they have the financial resources available to establish significant budgets and support elaborate marketing plans.

    How can the small business owner utilize the Web to effectively market his/her business? A part of the answer is one of the most overlooked aspects of small business marketing and is the most critical to effective marketing. This is the marketing plan - a written document that addresses profit goals, metrics, objectives, contingency actions, etc.

    Are you blogging? Are you keeping track of the time you spend writing blogs? Is spending time reading blogs part of your marketing plan? Blogging is a great technique for generating exposure and sharing ideas. It should be part of a marketing plan. One publication that I found to be a great resource for industry information is Inman News. Their authors provide objective insight into the important issues of the day and generate two news broadcast emails per week. These broadcasts reach more than 33,000 opt-in subscribers. Here is a great resource to advertise your real estate blog. You can also leverage their marketing engine and execute your email marketing campaign with a reputable organization with a lot of exposure in the industry.