5 Google Tools Every Small Business Can Use
Written by Nathaniel Deal
Let's face it, your business needs tools for tracking, interacting and documenting your customers online.
And there are hundreds of tools available you right now, but its too easy to become overwhelmed with all of the functionalities and methods that are available.
So instead of trying out new tools everyday, getting scammed by sub par devolopers or spending a ton of money; I suggest you start with this list of great online tools provided by Google.
Over the years Google has developed some ultra-cool tools to help you understand your customer's interactions, lower advertising costs and increase sales.
These awesome tools are free to use and all you need is a Gmail account. If you don't have one, get a Gmail account here.
1. Google Alerts
Go sign up with Google Alerts at http://www.google.com/alerts.
Setup alerts for your business name, your products or services, your real name and any other words or phrases that relate to your business. (Use quotations around any phrases used, ie "Joe's barber shop")
In the future, if Google finds any of your specified keywords on a website (including your own), it will email you with a link to the page containing your alerted term.
This is very helpful for local business owners that want to know anytime their name or products are mentioned on the web.
It will also give the chance to find out what customers are saying about your business and allows you to join the conversation about your company.
Earn funding for your business or project with Invested.in
Written by Nathaniel Deal
What's the hardest part about starting a small business or income generating project?
It's not the idea, marketing plan or target audience. It's finding the start-up funding...
So the good people over at Invested.in created a website to help you collect the initial funding needed for a startup project or business idea.
If you are an entrepenuer, business or non-profit organization this website can boost your startup capital and get you closer to your finacial goals even faster.
This new funding platform lets you promote your new ideas to friends and connections via twitter, facebook and other social medias.
And it's really simple to do! First create a new project, describe your business plans, set a funding goal and offer some reasonable perks to any investors.
Then promote your new investment to your friends and followers, and wait for the funds to come in!
If people find your investment worth while, they can come to your profile and pay into your fund via credit card. Once the goal is reached, you "the investee" can withdrawal the funds and begin your project!
Don't forget to compliment your investors, you should pay them back with free products, services or specials. Oh and thank them too!
Get Started Today - Click Here
Is Your Local Business On Foursquare?
Written by Nathaniel Deal
Myspace, Facebook, Twitter... What's next?
Geolocation Social Media... This means is that people can tweet or facebook their exact location to their friends and followers. Creepy right?
This technology has been around for some years now, and finally people are starting to take notice.
Earlier this year, Google launched a new product called Google Latitude but it never really took off.
Boost mobile promoted this feature on their phones to gain new customers but that didn't work right either.
So who's leading the pack with this new technology? It's called Four Square.
Foursquare.com is a simple yet entertaining way to "check in" to local places and explore your community.
So how does this help a local business owner?
What if you could track valuable customer stats everytime someone comes to your venue in real time?
Stats like: Most recent visitors, most frequent visitors, number of unique visitors or even a gender breakdown of your customers.
Wouldn't this infomation be valuable to increasing your revenue and boosting your marketing efforts?
Yes! But wait theres more. What if everytime a customer comes to your business, they instantly told everyone of their friends about it.
That's free advertising!
With Foursquare you can do all of this, and best of all it can be fun for you and your customer.
Read about Four Square for business - http://foursquare.com/businesses/
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