Writing for the Web isn’t like writing for print. You have about 3 seconds to grab visitors’ attention, warm them up and entice them to stay. Follow these steps to get them to read what you have to say and hunger for more.

• Be Relevant. Take off your comfy shoes and put on those of your visitors. What do they want to know about? Write less about what you want to say and more about what will be valuable to your audience. When your readers connect with your content, they will come back for more.
• Clean House. “K”onsistency is King, so if you choose black Arial font for your main body text, keep it that way throughout. Bulleted list can be your friend, but keep them to a maximum of 7 points. The idea is to make items easy to read, not look like a grocery list. Also, try to write in the same tone throughout, so the transition from one page to the next is seamless.
• Give Up the Grapes. Don’t make your audience climb the tree. Tell visitors what they want to know in the first few lines so they don’t need to mine for what they are looking for. Remember, 3 seconds.
• Link, Baby, Link. Have a lot to say but limited on space? Include a short and sweet teaser for each topic and a link to more information, whether inside or outside of your website. Even when the writing turf is wide open, embed links within body content to make it more lively, credible, and interesting.
• For Goodness Sake, PROOFREAD! What’s worse than having the integrity of your great message negated by the typo you didn’t catch?? Nothing! Read, re-read, backward, forward, up, down and all around. Pass it around for others to read. Post it on the walls. Do whatever you need to do to ensure mistakes are found. Then, when you’re done, read it again.

So you’ve heard this all before – is your business on Facebook? Do you tweet? Are you connected on LinkedIn? We often hear a resounding YES to some or all of the above. But almost as often, it’s followed by the statement “I don’t really know what to do with it.”

Today, more than ever, businesses are challenged with improving overall performance, usually with fewer resources and utilizing less traditional methods. This brings us to the topic of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Social Media. The clear benefit to combining these efforts – increased awareness through the social networking channels and attracting links, otherwise known as link building – has a positive impact on SEO.

Simply put, optimized content gets you ‘discovered’ by the search engines. Social media creates more visibility for your brand and encourages sharing across communities. This activity can result in a substantial number of inbound links to your website.

How do you make it all work? A few key steps to get started:

• Identify your audience – What are they doing online and where are they hanging out?
• Set objectives – What do you want to achieve and how will you measure its’ effectiveness?
• Outline a plan – Give them something to talk about.
• Execute the plan – Create the content and get it out there.
• Measure and learn – Monitor and analyze the analytics

Blending SEO and social media marketing efforts assist you in attracting new prospects through search engines and can facilitate links back to your website. The potential is there – you can’t ignore it. Just take note the next time you perform a search on Google … you’ll see they’re incorporating Tweets and shares from other networks in the search results!

We had the pleasure of presenting “Adding New Life to Your Online Marketing” on Thursday night for the Darien Chamber of Commerce and Fairfield County SCORE. The turnout was terrific with nearly 70 people from a wide range of industries all across Fairfield County and slightly beyond.

To give you a visual, it was standing room only with people lined up outside throughout the 2 hour presentation. We were so excited with the buzz, interaction and enthusiasm from the attendees and could have continued the session beyond the allotted time.

The packed agenda included topics important to businesses:

• The importance of creating a Consistent Brand Image
• Understanding the key elements to Marketing Effective Websites
• Being Found Online with Search Engine Optimization, Social Media and Search Engine Marketing
• The benefits in Understanding Your Customers’ Online Behavior

Having received such positive feedback and interest, we have decided to post the presentation on our site this week.

This was a great success and as a result we plan to launch a series of educational sessions. Stay tuned for more information!

“We can make you #1 in search results” – this is a claim that is made regularly by Search Engine Optimization (SEO) companies. Sounds too good to be true? That’s because it is.

SEO is the process of creating online awareness in your industry so that when people search for certain phrases in search engines such as Google, Bing, etc., your website appears at the beginning of the search results.

I’m often asked about how companies can appear on the first page in the first few listings of the SEO search results. There are several methods, but mostly it includes having other relevant sites linking to your site, having relevant information on your site and keeping the information on your site updated regularly. It requires you to create a website that will keep your visitors coming back again and again.

My advice… Don’t be sold on a quick solution. A “true” SEO company will explain that SEO is only one ingredient in a fully integrated marketing strategy.

…Name that is. So, here we are – a boutique marketing company with big plans, ideas and potential. When I launched JumarDirect, I had a vision of building a firm that would shake things up by removing the smoke and mirrors of online marketing and ultimately raise the bar. I wanted to build honest, long term relationships with my clients and exceed their expectations every time. Sounds simple, right?

When you live and breathe our Mission as we do, it is.

But make no mistake about it. I owe Jumar’s success to our amazing clients.

We are evolving, growing and with that comes change – Now JumarMarketing, I am so excited to introduce our new Name, Website and Blog – all accompanied by the same exceptional talent, drive and energy you have grown to know at Jumar.

This is a very exciting time and I invite you to stay tuned as we continue our ascent – trust me, this is just the beginning.