If you can't be found on the web, you don't exist.

Doing business today requires an online presence. Like it or not, your brand is judged by your participation on the web with an invisible sliding scale. Not every industry is being judged exactly the same, but everyone is being held accountable. In online marketing, the following credo holds true:

More Visibility = Opportunity. If your prospective customer can't find you on the web, it's like you don't exist. Disagree at your own peril.

For a majority of industries, there are four basic areas in which an online presence is critical: Web, email, Facebook and Twitter. We discuss why they are important and provide a checklist for best practices below.

1. Website or Blog
Entire companies have been built around the internet and many giant corporations survive solely online. Too doubt the validity of a website presence at this point seems quite naive. The problem rather is not understanding a website's potential and not having an objective or strategy behind your web presence. An effective website must have an objective. Plain and simple. Even better, a measurable objective. That can be as straightforward as selling widgets, or as complex as a community building, client qualifying, or an informational resource rich with conversion goals that sell, motivate and drive business.

It is also important to be realistic about your web budget, level of knowledge, abilities and whether you need help realizing your goals. By all means, seek help. Too often we see rationalizations for marketing spending that just don't work. For example, spending an inordinate amount of the marketing budget on one ad – for one day, then rationalizing that it's OK to slap up any old website for as little money as possible with the hopes of walking away from it for 3-5 years. There just isn't a comparison between a 24-hour shelf-life and a 24-7-365 presence with limitless information that can make sales, build communities, engage, and serve your customers automatically.

Website Checklist
• Have an objective, measurable if possible
• Create a position
• Integrate strategies that create conversions
• Let your website work for you

2. Email
We love, love, love email here at The Image Shoppe. There are many great features to email that you should get to know but the very best part about email is the difference between "interruptions" and "permission." Television commercials, print ads, and even online ads are interruptions. In the world of email, you have been given "permission" to send someone your email. A customer, prospect or colleague has "allowed" you into their mailbox and with your promotion, knowledge, insights, events, etc. What could be better than the opportunity to spend your marketing dollars on people who are interested in hearing from you? Now, there is no guarantee that you're going to make a sale, but at least you're getting to a qualified audience, meaning they have expressed interest in what you are offering. If you only paid for the people who drove by your billboard that were actually interested in your product, renting billboards would likely be a lot more inexpensive.

Email Checklist
• Build a quality, pre-qualified list of interested members
• Create a consistent template email program rich with auto-responders and list segmentation, if necessary
• Consistently send information, news, promotions and events to your list
• Survey and cull your list routinely to ensure the best quality list

3. Facebook
It's big... really big. And from the latest buzz, Facebook is trying nothing less than a web takeover. Scary? Yes and no. We'll leave that to the conspiracy theorists and doomsayers. Just remember, for now, that Facebooks' members in total would add up to the fourth largest country in the world. With numbers like this, some of your customers are there too. Business, Group, Community and Profile Pages are free to use which is nice, but your time isn't. As important as Facebook is to your total mix (and it is) don't forget that without a plan, you may be wasting your time. Yes, your kids, your wife and your friend from high school are on Facebook; but so are your clients, customers, colleagues and vendors. They are there trying the new features that FB has to offer and all those people are itching to be the person to "share" with their friends about the next big thing... is it you, or is it your competitor?

Facebook Checklist
• New business enhancements
• Great new flexibility with the Facebook Markup Language (FBML)
• Empower evangelists online in a population of members that could be the fourth largest country in the world

4. Twitter
Don't dismiss Twitter. Twitter can be an important tool for a business. And don't get hung up on all the reasons that you don't want to tweet because you actually can use Twitter without tweeting. You can just listen to the tweeting. If we've learned anything about doing business in a post-recession "new economy," then it is simply that we must listen to what is happening in our markets and to what our customers want. Twitter is a great tool to listen in on conversations, view comments and ideas related to your business, and maybe even see tweets about your own business.

Twitter Checklist
• Search and listen at www.search.twitter.com
• Follow first, then build a quality following
• Participate in conversations when you're ready

Easier Said Than Done, Right?
To be perfectly clear, an online presence is the right thing to do. On the flip side, launching out on any endeavor without objectives, strategy, process and the ability to follow through can be just as dangerous as not doing anything at all. We know these are the tools needed, now it's time to use the tools together to build something great. Call us or email us today to get started.