Internet Marketing - Essential Reading?

Mighty_Mouse

Hi,
I'm a small business owner and completely new to internet marketing.
Is there essential reading people here could direct me towards please?

Thank you in advance.
MM

dgerryd

These are two pretty solid places to start http://www.quicksprout.com/blog/ and http://blog.kissmetrics.com/ if you need anything else just shout

rankingelite

Checkout inbound.org, it curates the best blog posts about seo, conversion optimization etc

louiseak

For SEO : Moz.com or searchengineland.com
For Social Media: Social Media Examiner
For conversion optimization: As mentioned above quicksprout or kissmetrics. Dereck Halpern is also an excellent source!

For keeping up to date with everything in marketing: Who's blogging what.com

gheghici

searchengineland and searchenginemarketing -follow them on Facebook, and you'll get almost all the news you need re. Online Marketing. And follow Mashable.
Also, all the links provided by omniwebseo & louiseak are verry good.

dgerryd

If your a small business forget about Moz.com or searchengineland.com while their good for info, but for a small bizz they will put you into the ground wondering what you did wrong, the only thing you would have done wrong is listen to them.

Moz.com are what everyone follows like sheep, it's this new "content marketing" buzz which is BS as that's basically article marketing,video,image,or infographs, along with audio which is 100% exactly the same as before with just a shiny new word called "content marketing" which you have to pay for.

In the real world where some can think for themselves depending on your business it's business as usual. I'm not trying to promote myself by commenting so I'd love for one of the bigger outfits/seo/agency/freelancer or other SEOs think of the return their adding to any startup/local/business/outfit.

In other words if you are an SEO this is the time to get your opinion across so others can learn and not be mislead by false propaganda, all slander welcome.

dgerryd

sad robots.

Fluxfan

Don't forget the google analytics and adwords blogs. Updates straight from the horses mouth that you can form your own opinion on!

Mr Slow

Mighty_Mouse wrote: »

Hi,
I'm a small business owner and completely new to internet marketing.
Is there essential reading people here could direct me towards please?

Thank you in advance.
MM

Hi Mighty Mouse, what type of business are you trying to promote? There's lots of generic crap out there to get lost in.

Ah_Yeah

Hi there

If you are totally new to internet marketing, then the resources outlined might not be what you want to read JUST yet. Those would be more for people wanting to keep up to date, rather than learn about internet marketing.

There are a couple of areas you can learn about, but as a small business owner, the key areas you will want to learn are PPC, SEO and Analytics. PPC is Pay Per Click marketing, and for the most part is run through Google Adwords in Ireland. You can run activity on Google Search, and on the Google Display Network (which will serve your ads on other websites). SEO is Search Engine Optimisation, and requires more technical know-how than Adwords, and is very focused on your website. Analytics focuses on what users do when they get to your website, how they browse and behave. The primary product used is Google Analytics, which is a free platform and used by 90%+ of websites.

For Google Adwords, I would start here - there's a lot in there, but if you just focus on the 'Fundamentals' section then you will be well on your way to knowing the basics of PPC.

For SEO, I would look at the Google SEO Starter Guide or the Moz SEO Beginner's Guide - there has been a lot of movement in the SEO space recently, so once you get up to speed on the basics, then you can use the sources outlined above (e.g. search engine watch) to keep up to date on all changes.

Finally, for Analytics, the Analytics Academy is absolutely fantastic. By far the best training modules that Google have released, if you can get past the cheesy American style of the video.

There's plenty in there to get you started, but if you have any questions just PM me.

RedFly

Ah_Yeah wrote: »

Hi there

If you are totally new to internet marketing, then the resources outlined might not be what you want to read JUST yet. Those would be more for people wanting to keep up to date, rather than learn about internet marketing.

There are a couple of areas you can learn about, but as a small business owner, the key areas you will want to learn are PPC, SEO and Analytics. PPC is Pay Per Click marketing, and for the most part is run through Google Adwords in Ireland. You can run activity on Google Search, and on the Google Display Network (which will serve your ads on other websites). SEO is Search Engine Optimisation, and requires more technical know-how than Adwords, and is very focused on your website. Analytics focuses on what users do when they get to your website, how they browse and behave. The primary product used is Google Analytics, which is a free platform and used by 90%+ of websites.

For Google Adwords, I would start here - there's a lot in there, but if you just focus on the 'Fundamentals' section then you will be well on your way to knowing the basics of PPC.

For SEO, I would look at the Google SEO Starter Guide or the Moz SEO Beginner's Guide - there has been a lot of movement in the SEO space recently, so once you get up to speed on the basics, then you can use the sources outlined above (e.g. search engine watch) to keep up to date on all changes.

Finally, for Analytics, the Analytics Academy is absolutely fantastic. By far the best training modules that Google have released, if you can get past the cheesy American style of the video.

There's plenty in there to get you started, but if you have any questions just PM me.

As someone who's been doing this for 14 years, this is exactly the advice I came here to give. OP, you'd be wise to read this post very carefully and follow Ah_Yeah's advice.