Unfortunately, the local link building market is harder to get into. That is why so many people choose to go with the first process instead of spending more time and effort on the second. Which inevitably reduces the efficiency of their overall marketing campaign.

What you need are some proven strategies for targeting a local market in your link building. Here are a few ways you can better achieve that.

Foster Relationships With Local Bloggers

Everyone says this, and yet few people really utilize the tool. Getting links from local bloggers, especially those who have a large audience in your city or state, is one of the easiest ways to build useful backlinks.

The reason so many people ignore this is that they don’t know how to find enough bloggers to get more than one or two links. Or they might feel like they are stuck with sites that hardly have any traffic and no social media presence.

But there are some sites that have large directories of local bloggers. For example, Bloglines is a beta site that has a huge following already. They have all US states, and include most major cities and even a fair amount of small ones.

You can also try Blogdigger or Globe of Blogs, both of which use a basic search feature.

Use The Right Search Engine

While running a search for links isn’t really a great way to go long term, it will give you a fair start. Especially when you have some time to dedicate to the process. But you need to have a specific search engine to use, and you have to know how to use it to find local opportunities.

First of all, Open Site Explorer is going to be your best bet for a tool. While you can use any search engine, this one is made specifically for links.

Now comes the leg work: manually begin to search local business categories. I know this is a massive pain, but it is a highly effective way to find links. Which, at the very least, gives you a genuine chance at analyzing the local market and finding some chances at your own links.

To check a link’s popularity directly from the website, check out this cool little tool from SEO Centro.

Turn To Official Sources

If you are running a business (which you probably are), you can take advantage of the endless resources at your disposal from local agencies. This is one of the strongest means of generating a local link that there is, though it can cost money and take some time and effort to get it done.

For example, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) is one place, or the local Chamber of Commerce. You can also check out any local business group that is membership only and join up. Or try a local community group for small businesses, or join a local business directory.

Bonus Tip – Local Networking

Of course, you can also organize meet ups. Meetup.com is an obvious choice, or put an ad on Craigslist. You can also get to know local bloggers or small businesses and create an affiliate meet up. Not only will this improve relationships that could be massively beneficial, but you could gain some mention to those readers or customers and get your name out there.

Conclusion

Targeting a local market is always a better idea than casting too wide a net for a national audience right away. Building links following a local strategy takes more time, but it yields stronger results than just aimlessly wandering the web attempting to gain a couple of strong links in random places.

Once you have dominated than local market – or just established a firm foothold – you can start expanding. Let the above tips help you get there.

Tom Peters is the search and social blogger for Quantum SEO Labs, the premiere link building service company preaching the high-quality approach to gaining backlinks.

Identifying potential reviewers

Before you start recruiting, you should decide on the kind of blogs you want to review your products. You should always target blogs relevant to your business. You should also set a minimum requirement for the authority of the blog (measured by metrics such as Page Rank and AC rank). Your decision on the quality of blog you approach will depend on the value of the items you are sending out. For example, if your products are low value (e.g. soft toys) you may be happy to send out lots, however if they are expensive (e.g. electronics) you will need to be more picky. The following sources can be used to identify potential reviewers:

Blog communities

Bloggers who cover the same subject will frequently create their own communities using services such as Ning and you can use these communities to draw up lists of potential targets. There is also a specific community for bloggers who like to review products called Pitch It To Me.

Blog rolls and top blog lists

Many bloggers list their favourite blogs in a blog roll and you can check though these to find the cream. You may also be lucky and find someone has compiled a list of top blogs in your field.

Post on forums

Many niche forums include topics related to PR, commercial opportunities and product reviews.

Network!

Bloggers will know other bloggers so always ask your reviewers if they know anyone else who would be interested in writing reviews.

Approaching bloggers

Your initial contact should be a short polite email covering the following:

• Introduction. Introduce your company and products and ask if they would be interested in reviewing one of your products for their blog
• Specify a list of products. Offering options instead of letting the blogger decide enables you to get your preferred products reviewed and cuts down on email traffic.Conditions. State whether or not the reviewer can keep the item when the review is done. Most bloggers will expect the keep the item.

Ask for links.

Don’t expect that reviewers will automatically write the format of review you would expect. The perfect review would have the following features:

• Positive review of the product
• Multiple deep links with specified anchor text
• Optimised title tag and metadata
• Profile of company

The best way to get a review in this format is to ask for it! With every product you send out include a letter (and an email so they have the text to cut and paste) which specifies the text you wish to be included in a review. Here is an example:

Thanks for agreeing to review one of our product on your site!

What you write in the review is entirely up to you and you can of course keep the product when you have finished.  All we ask is that you link back to our site from the review.  We would really appreciate if you could add the following text with links to your review:

“The Brother Max 3 Combi Bibs is available from the online nursery shop Hello Baby.  Hello Baby also sells a wide range of other baby and nursery stuff including Baby Toys, nursery furniture, baby travel and baby safety products.“

Where the bolded words link to:

Brother Max 3 Combi Bibs – http://www.hellobabydirect.co.uk/products/65010-brother-max-3-combi-bibs.html

Online nursery shop: http://www.hellobabydirect.co.uk/

Etc

From a search engine point of view it would also be good if you include the product name in the post’s heading, <title> tag and URL. 

Regards etc etc

Finally – Keep track of your reviewers and follow up

In my experience most reviewers are pretty conscientious and will write their reviews promptly. Unfortunately some people will think this is a free gift and won’t do a review unless chased. Products are expensive and so it pays to keep track of your reviewers.

• Create a spreadsheet of to whom you have sent products
• Make it clear from the start that you would like your reviews written within a 2 week period
• Send a gentle reminder email after the initial period to ask when the review will be done

In my experience about 80% of products we send out result in a review, though sometimes we have to chase several times.

About Trevor Ginn

Trevor Ginn is an entrepreneur and blogger based in London, UK. He runs the online baby and nursery shop Hello Baby and is also a consultant specialising in online retail at vendlab.com. You can follow him @trevorginn

However ‘numbers going up’ isn’t necessarily always a good thing, and it’s not just about the number of people you attract to your website or blog, but also the quality of those visitors. Ultimately though it may sound counterintuitive there are visitors that you don’t want to come to your website. Here we will look at how this can be.

A Drain on Resources

Business schools teach that not all clients are necessarily good clients. Let’s say you provide advertising for businesses and your customers pay a monthly fee in order for you to design adverts for them and then place them in your magazine. Now good clients will pay you that monthly fee and be happy with the results. Great clients will maybe increase their orders over time, and fantastic clients will be happy with what you do so much so that they encourage other people to sign up to your services.

However you’ll also get bad clients, and these will be the people who complain and find fault in all your adverts. Or even like them but just want too tight a control over how they look and when they appear. You’ll find they send you hundreds of e-mails and this will mean that your ‘communications overhead’ increases. In other words you’ll spend so long communicating with this client and keeping them happy, and so long tweaking and redesigning their advert (even though you likely know best seeing as its your field) that you won’t be able to serve as many others. In short they are a drain on resources and they aren’t earning their keep. Now the very smart businesses will even use a ‘filter’ to deflect those customers away from their services, and the even smarter ones will recommend those clients to their competition. Crafty.

Obviously if your website is a business site that you are using to promote a product or service then such people will still exist and you will want to direct them away from your page lest they want to do business with you However even if your blog is just a blog, you can still get analogous situations.

Un-Targeted Traffic

You may for instance have heard of ‘quality’ traffic. The quality of your traffic basically refers to the amount of time that your visitors stay on your page, and the number of adverts they click/products they buy. If they are coming to your site and spending two seconds there before leaving then they don’t want to be there and as such you don’t want them there. They are a drain on resources in so much as you will have  more of a toll on your bandwidth, but they will also likely be wasted links if you are only getting that kind of traffic from there.

If ever you have tricked someone into coming to your website -by misleading them in your link for example – then you don’t need or want that traffic. Likewise if you redirected them, brought them there through an unrelated image search etc. Avoid this by posting links only on relevant sites and with relevant and informative anchor text.

And then of course is the other unwanted traffic – spam bots which take a toll not only on your bandwidth but also on your time spent moderating comments and forum posts.

So next time you post a ink in a desperate bid to get someone to your site, think: do you really want the kind of traffic that link will bring you? (And remember… Google is watching!)

Jeet is an internet marketer and blogger. He writes about blogging, seo, Google and other internet related topics.

Key findings

Using the Google AdWords keyword tool, we have verified the popularity of selected searches among people using desktop devices, WAP-based mobile phones and high-end mobile devices with browsers of full functionality.

The amount of mobile searches for general keywords (non-branded, not in classifieds sector), in European countries vary from 16,4% (United Kingdom) to 2,1% (Bulgaria). Having analyzed 195 general phrases we calculated, that the mobile part of search grew for about 3,1% last year, 0,5% out of which is a growth of search on WAP mobile devices, and 2,6% remains a growth on smartphones.

Taking into account brand keywords containing the names of classifieds portals, mobile search varies from 15,2% in Ireland, 14,1% in Denmark, 12,4% in United Kingdom, to 2,6% in Finland, 2,5% in Slovenia, and 2,1% in Belgium. More data can be found on graphics below.

Growth of mobile search

The growth of mobile search popularity for classifieds websites vary across Europe. Popularity growth of mobile search is most rapid in Ireland (9.4%), Denmark (8.7%), United Kingdom (5.5%), Switzerland (5.1%), and Austria (5%). There are also countries, in which mobile search growth during last year was less than 1%. Those countries include i.e. Lithuania (0.9%), Slovakia (0.6%) and Croatia (0.0%). The phenomenon of mobile search in Croatia falls into a separate category. In 2011 WAP mobile-search there constituted 2.4%, and during last year it dropped to 1.4%. On the other hand, smartphones mobile-search grew from 1.4% to 2.4%, which indicates growing popularity of high-end mobile devices.

In 2011 the most mobile countries (where more than 5% of all classifieds-related searches are generated by the users via mobile devices) were Denmark, Ireland, Switzerland and United Kingdom. In 2012 ten more countries reached the 5% level of mobile-search. Those countries include Austria, Czech Republic, France, Spain, Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Italy and Latvia.

Webmasters and online marketers noticed the growing popularity of mobile search, but their reactions weren’t spectacular. In 2011 only 13% of researched classifieds portals had a mobile version. Currently, 19% of classifieds websites have mobile users oriented versions. In countries, where more mobile versions of classifieds websites were created, the average growth of mobile search has reached 3,5%. In countries where there were no mobile websites, the mobile search grew only for 2,6%. It’s a proof that users appreciate mobile versions of classifieds websites and enjoy using them.

In Europe, there is still a virtual border, which divides a continent into two parts. The first part has been dominated by smartphone users, while in the second WAP mobile phones are still in the lead. The “WAP part” of Europe is the central-east (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic and so on). Eight European countries have observed greater number of searches via WAP than smartphones. Those countries are Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Latvia. However, only three of those countries tend to have greater growth of WAP, than smartphones mobile-search (Poland, Hungary and Latvia). Smartphones have become more and more popular, and after some time, they will have the overwhelming majority in mobile-search industry. This virtual border is gradually moving east, and it will take some time to include the whole Europe in the smartphone group.

There is an improvement in mobile-website optimization. In 2011 only one website was fully optimized for mobile search. Currently, sixteen lightweight versions were optimized properly for mobile search. This tendency is promising, however it can’t be called a success yet. It seems that website owners aren’t aware of the huge potential of mobile search.

The growth of mobile search is a fact. People are using their mobile devices more and more often. The growing trend is noticeable in general search, but also in classifieds sector. Mobile search is becoming a significant part of search and website owners should take proper actions to catch up. If classifieds website owners want to keep mobile traffic on their websites, they should put greater emphasis on creating a lightweight versions, which will be optimized for mobile search.

Methodology

The research has been done on 186 phrases – names of classifieds websites from selected countries and the translations of the word “classifieds”. The websites were selected so as to choose the most popular portals from each country, on the basis of the number of users reported in Google AdPlanner tool.

The second part of the research was done on 15 general, extremely popular keywords (i.e. books, sports, insurance) for each of selected countries.

During the analysis we used the data presented by Google AdWords keyword tool: https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal with broad match filter, appropriate country and the language selected.

About Bluerank

Bluerank is a Polish search engine marketing agency providing SEO and PPC services, including mobile SEO services, monetizing search, usability of search, research and analytical projects as well as comprehensive SEM strategies for the companies from all over the world.

Contact

Roman Bebenista [Junior SEO Specialist at Bluerank] 90-613 Lodz, ul. Gdanska 80 e-mail: r.bebenista@bluerank.pl | www.bluerank.com

Right.

But, that’s not the only reason we should be adding pretty pictures to our blogs, oh no. Well optimized images can give a huge boost to a page’s search engine ranking, and what’s more they can even drive traffic directly to the page in their own right – through Google Images, for instance.

Therefore, as a blogger, whether it’s for a real estate website, a travel website or whatever, learning how to correctly optimize images is an absolute must. The good thing is, there’s not actually that much to it.

WordPress Image Optimization #1

First things first. Before we even go uploading an image to our WordPress blog, we need to be aware of just how big a file it is we’re uploading.

Why?

Because page load times have a big impact on a site’s SEO ranking, that’s why.

To make sure that our images are not scuppering our site’s SEO, it’s important to make image file sizes as small as we can get away with, without sacrificing the quality of the image.

With quick, easy to use, and more importantly, free tools like Quick JPEG Resize and Crop at your fingertips, there’s really no excuse for not doing so.

One word of warning here. WordPress offers the convenient feature of being able to resize images for you. Do not let it, because this does nothing to improve page load times – instead, it’s the browser that resizes the image, after it has been loaded up.

WordPress Image Optimization #2

The next all-important step is the Alt Text. Search engines are not human. While we can look at a picture of an Upper West Side apartment and immediately appreciate it for what it is, a search engine cannot do so, because it doesn’t have any eyes.

But what it does have is the ability to read the Alt Text, and it’s this that tells the search engine exactly what the image is. Make sure that the Alt Text is relevant and accurate, and relates to the content on the page.  

WordPress Image Optimization #3

Because we are using WordPress for our blog, we can change the file name before or after uploading the image. In either case, it’s necessary to choose a file name that accurately describes the image – ideally in as few words as possible, using the keyword or keywords we want to rank for.

The importance of renaming the image file name cannot be understated – a quick check on Google Images will reveal that just about any image that pops up will contain the keyword used to discover it in its file name.

WordPress Image Optimization #4

According to most SEO sources, there is absolutely no SEO benefit to be gained whatsoever from adding an image caption.

So this needs we don’t need to bother, right?

Wrong. Just because the caption doesn’t have a direct impact, it doesn’t mean it won’t have an effect. One of the critical factors in any site’s SEO is its bounce rate.

Bounce rate refers to the number of people who visit a site, decide they don’t like what they are seeing, hit the ‘back’ button and go somewhere else. The more people who do that, the higher the bounce rate gets. And Google doesn’t like high bounce rates. At all.

This is where adding a nice image caption can help.

Getting back to the initial reason as to why we add images. We do so because we want to grab the attention of readers. One of the curios things about website readers is that once they spot an image, their eyes automatically drift down to see if there’s a caption there – and it needs to be there.

According to Drew Eric Whitman of Ca$hvertising, it’s a proven fact that images with captions under them get 200% greater readership than regular copy does. Simply put, not having a caption means that half the readers will be gone without reading a single word! So not only does the caption have to be there, but it had better be a damn good one.

Image credit: ra2 studio – Fotolia.com

When news of the over optimization penalty broke, a few of my clients wanted to know if their sites were at risk. Every time Google comes out with a major update, most site owners get a little nervous that their site is going to get caught in Google’s penalty net. It can take a long time to recover from a penalty, especially if you aren’t 100% sure where you went wrong, and losing massive amounts of traffic and search engine trust can quickly destroy an online business.

So what did I tell my SEO clients? Since I only engage in white hat SEO tactics (both onsite and for link building), these quality updates shouldn’t negatively impact their site. In theory they should actually help my clients! As low-quality sites (or even quality sites that were trying to cheat the system) are uncovered and penalized by Google, all the quality sites left should get a bump in the SERPS, increased online brand exposure and maybe even more new visitors!

I am constantly reminding my clients that as long as they stick with white hat SEO they have nothing to fear from Google’s updates. Since white hat SEO follows the best practice guidelines outlined by the search engines (it’s Google’s world and we have to play by their rules), white hat sites never engage in any kind of activities that might put their site at risk further down the road. At the end of the day, most of Google’s algorithm updates are about cleaning up the search results. They want to provide the best and most useful results to their users, so Google is committed to weeding out sites that can negatively impact the Google user experience. That’s why Google provides site owners with so much free information about white hat SEO – your good SEO efforts help them deliver a better product!

I know that black hat and grey hat SEO tactics can be very tempting for some site owners. It’s a much faster road to results, and since many businesses are currently focused on the short game most don’t want to wait the 6-9 months it might take for a white hat SEO campaign to start producing results. There are plenty of black hat sites out there that have managed to escape undetected by the quality updates thus far, which might make new site owners think they can sneak around Google as well. In my opinion it’s not worth the risk. Even if your site manages to escape penalty for a year or two, you have to live in constant fear that the next update could spell disaster for your online brand. When you stick to white hat SEO you know that each update is only going to ultimately help your site.

About the Author – Nick Stamoulis

Nick Stamoulis is the President of Brick Marketing (http://www.brickmarketing.com), a Boston SEO and white hat link building company. With nearly 13 years of SEO experience, Nick Stamoulis shares his knowledge by posting to the Brick Marketing Blog and publishing the Brick Marketing SEO Newsletter, read by over 150,000 opt-in subscribers.

Contact Nick Stamoulis at 781-999-1222 or nick@brickmarketing.com

What many bloggers and webmasters do not realise is how much they are selling themselves short and how advertising impacts visitors to the site, depending on the intensity of the visible advertising.  I have outlined several reasons why you may want to consider downsizing the advertisements on your blog – even if you are making money – along with ways to approach the idea of revenue generation from a different angle.

Opt for Impressions, Not Clicks

Many bloggers who advertise decide to take what would seem to be the more sensible route and advertise using affiliate programs that pay by the click as opposed to by the impression.  The amount earned through a click or purchase is substantially more than any amount earned through the average impression, but let me lay out the facts for you.  Advertisers understand that they are getting a better deal than the blogger; even when an individual does not click on the ad or is not currently interested in the product; the visibility of the advertisement creates brand recognition, which is statistically proven to augment sales and revenue for the company in question.

This is why I advocate using advertisement strategies that pay by the impression as opposed to a click or purchase; I want to make sure that I am earning something for every impression that I give any certain company.

Consider Eliminating Ads

While it is understandable that a blog that has no direct source of revenue may want to keep the banner ads featured on their site, if your blog or site is generating revenue outside of banner ads, it may be a good idea to eliminate them altogether.  A study conducted by Endai Worldwide shows that for each 125 x 125 banner featured on your site, the likelihood of an average visitor returning to your blog decreases by 4%.

I have experimented with ratios of banner advertisements on my various sites and have found that no more than three banner ads should be visible at any one time.  While again, if you are generating revenue successfully through banner ads and have not had the chance to monetise your blog in any other fashion, it’s understandable to keep your existing revenue source.

Branch Out, Hire SEO Strategists

If you have been totally reliant on banner ads to generate the needed revenue to keep your blog a sustainable venture, then you may want to consider using some of those funds to hire individuals who have greater experience at diversifying a website’s profitability through search engine optimisation.  I can’t believe how many blogs I come across that have banner ads and content but have not been properly optimised or monetised.  I wonder to myself, how are they making money?

If you haven’t already diversified your site’s ability to make money and reach visitors, then you could see both the profitability and traffic of your blog or site increase several fold by bringing a SEO expert on board.  Of course, you could just spend some spare time learning how to optimise your site through search engines and other platforms, but if you are busy like me, then hiring an expert at SEO may be your best bet.

There are better ways to monetise your website than through banner ads but you will need to optimise your website properly.  If you want to get your website optimised correctly contact the copywriters at Apple Copywriting and see how they can help you.

Below I have outlined the key factors that Google are likely to analyse when assessing website over optimisation.

Spammy Title Tags

If your title tags are a list of keywords it’s time to change them to something a little more readable, for example if you’re a UK SEO Company and your title tag reads “UK SEO Agency | UK SEO Company | SEO UK Services” chances are you are going to get slapped by Google. Now I know what you are thinking “But if I change my title tag now I will end up on page 3 or worse?” it’s possible that you will lose rank for some key phrases once the tag is changed, but stuffing all those keywords in your title tag looks spammy as hell and is going to give you poor CTR. A much nicer page title would be “BrandName a UK SEO Company / Agency” and then build a separate page for SEO Services instead of trying to include all your content on the home page.

Meta Description

The same applies to your Meta Description make sure it’s readable by a human. Google no longer uses the Meta Description in it’s ranking algorithm however it’s going to throw a switch if it’s stuffed with keywords and again, if it looks spammy it’s going to affect your CTR.

Back Link Profile

If your backlink profile is made up of scummy bought links, comment spam, spun articles, link networks and other evils then you are in trouble. If possible I suggest you go back through and try to remove the poor quality links, if it’s not possible your best option would be to build some good quality links to even our the % of bad quality links.

Here are the key areas to avoid:

• Links from sites that have been penalised
• Link networks / Building link networks
• Comment spam (especially automated
• Forum signature links from bad forums / don’t use exact match links
• Reciprocal links (swapping links with people)

Excessive Exact match Internal Anchor Text

If your site is using multiple occurrences of the exact match anchor text from a WordPress plugin or similar then you are better off linking manually and varying your anchor text slightly. It also does not help when you have several instances of the same anchor text linking to the same or different pages on your site. Typically Google will only count the first anchor text link to that URL and linking to multiple pages using the same anchor will help confuse the engines as it will send mixed signals on which page to rank for the chosen keyword.

Link Filled Footers

If the footer of your website is filled with anchor text links to your internal pages then it’s probably time to rip them out. Not only does this look spammy it’s almost like saying to the engines you are ramming a load of SEO internal anchor text links to your content in the footer. A much better option would be to place the links in the content of your sites pages this will show the engines you care more about the content on those pages than simply placing them at the bottom of the page.

Excessive Pages Targeting Similar Ccontent

If you have pages targeting almost the same keywords that virtually mean the same thing then you should work on consolidating these pages. An example would be a page targeting “Mobile Phone Shop” and another page called “Cell Phone Shop” both meaning the same thing to the user but two pages have been created to capture search traffic on both phrases, probably with targeted anchor text pointing at them. My advice would be to 301 the similar pages and combine the content, not only will this help get you off Google’s radar it most likely increase rank & traffic.

Blocks of Keyword-Heavy Text

When writing keywords into your content don’t write out the page and then slap a paragraph at the top full of keywords you are targeting. Spread out your keywords and phrases throughout the page so it provides the user with quality content and does not look like spam that no one wants to read.

Focus on User Experience

Don’t write content specifically for search engines always make sure it’s going to benefit the user and does not look like a keyword spammy / manipulative site, the last thing a user wants to see is a bunch of text that hardly makes sense placed on your page in an effort to trick the engines into ranking you for those keywords.

When in doubt always read things over in your head or even out loud to a friend or work colleague. If you can’t read it without it sounding stupid, drop it.

Keith Sudbury

Consultant at Lion SEO UK – If I am not doing SEO I can be found drinking Tea! Other interests are Linux, Programming & Blogging.

Why Should I Add Local Real Estate Listings, If I Am a Plumber?!

The question is absolutely correct. If you are a plumber, or a service technician, or a grocery store, you definitely don’t need a real estate section on your site. Even if you add such a section, it will hardly help you a lot because now you will be ranking better for “real estate New Jersey” for example than for “plumber New Jersey” and this is not what you need.

But if you are a local portal or a community site, or in a business that has anything to do with real estate (moving, home repairs, etc.) then a real estate section on your site could help you in many ways. This section will not only help you rank better locally because the name of the city will be present in each ad, but it will also be of interest to your readers.

After all, when almost half of the population rents, there must be demand for such ads. Selling/buying homes is also a steady business, so it won’t be very hard to get such ads as well. If you charge for these ads, this is additional money for you.

How Do I Include Real Estate Listings to My Site?

There are many ways to include real estate listings on your site. You can publish real estate ads even as plain text but when you use a more powerful technology, you can offer more. For instance, if you are using WordPress as the platform for your site, you can get a real estate plugin (or even better, get a WordPress real estate theme that offers integrated capabilities for publishing ads) and use it to publish ads.

With a more powerful ad publishing technology you can offer more than with simple lists of ads. For instance, you can include pictures or videos of the property, map directions, or feature important ads to make them more noticeable.

By running real estate ads on your site, you might not become a Craigslist competitor in your area but you will be providing a valuable service to your community. What is more, if there is no Craigslist section for your location, your modest site might easily become the leader on the local real estate ads market.

This is not only prestigious but it also can bring you money. If you charge moderate fees for publishing ads, local agencies and individuals will use your services, which is new business for you. And who knows, it might turn out that the new section you started as a joke is making you more money than your core business! This isn’t something to be unhappy about for sure.

Ada is the Blogger Relations Manager at WinkPress – a web resource where you can read about WordPress, its themes, and plugins. Check the site to read more about what WordPress real estate themes are available.

As such, there are not a lot of mistakes that are concrete and set in stone. What works for one business owner might not work for another and what might be a mistake for a blogger or a video maker might not be for a web cartoonist or a baker.

Every small business owner has to gauge every unique situation and make a decision for themselves, but there are some general guidelines that you can follow to make the process a little easier on yourself:

1. Failing to Push Through the Dip

The Dip is a business and marketing concept that refers to that long period of relative inactivity between starting a project and finding some real success with it. At the start of any project you’re going to be very excited. Friends will be encouraging you and you’ll be getting investors interested and you’re going to be putting everything together and having a lot of fun with it.

Unfortunately, between that first high point and the next, there is a long period where nobody’s paying attention to what you’re doing, and you’re being forced to essentially sell every single unit personally. This is the point where you’re putting in a ton of effort for very little reward.

However, if you push through the dip, then there’s a chance that you’re going to be seeing a shift at the other end where you’re getting big rewards for little effort. This is what you get when a marketing campaign pans out and you have people spreading your product or service by word of mouth and sharing with one another. Quit early and you’ll never get there.

2. Mistaking a Flop for a Dip

Sometimes a marketing plan just isn’t going to pan out. Sometimes a great idea just isn’t going to work out. There’s really no telling when and how to identify a plan that isn’t going to work or knowing for certain that you’re going to see great returns if you stick it out for just a little bit longer.

This is the real challenge in marketing and business, knowing when to quit and knowing when to stick. The two biggest mistakes really do boil down to something so simple: Quitting when you should stick it out and sticking it out when you should quit.

The more experience you gain the easier this decision will be for you to make, but one rule to follow until then is this: Never be afraid to fail. If you don’t mind failing then, at the very least, you’ll be having fun whether or not your marketing plans pan out.

Harry Marks is a small business owner and experienced online marketing specialist. He is famous for being a guest blogger on various online marketing journals and magazines. He currently blogs for IronMonk, a company providing SEO services and Social Media Marketing solutions to small businesses worldwide.