Online Marketing requires you to be perceived as an expert in your field. And to achieve that here are 7 Basic Rules you can follow…BUT FIRST I want to make you aware of the one thing I’ve learned that will almost always get in the way. Yourself.

Through my experience in community education and business training I was fortunate to have met some very passionate people; people who were experts, meaning they knew far greater than the average person on a particular subject. Now I knew they were experts, but the problem was they didn’t – to which I can totally relate. Who hasn’t had those dark days when your confidence is wavering right? And because I can relate I knew they needed someone to help them believe they were an expert. It’s almost like you need someone else’s permission to be an expert. Well, over time I’ve learned that you don’t need anyone’s permission and that you have the power to OWN YOUR EXPERTISE! There’s always someone else that knows more than you. As a business consultant I have a master coach, but that doesn’t mean that I am no less of an expert to the masses.

For example I’ll tell you a story about Toni Healey. She came to me as a recent non-traditional college student (mom in college) wanting to teach a community sewing class. I could tell that she was nervous about teaching because she felt that there were so many other people that were better or knew more than she did about sewing. So I simply asked her about her experience and how she started and came up with this amazing bio:

About the Instructor
Toni comes from a long line of seasoned homemakers. At the very young age of 8 Toni’s mother instilled the love of creating and sewing deep into her heart. She has 4-years experience as a sewing instructor for 4-H in Hurricane, Utah. Toni also recently graduated from Snow College with her AS degree where she couldn’t resist taking sewing classes as an elective. She loves kids, math, cooking, gardening, scrap-booking, crocheting.

She’s awesome right? Well, so are you. If you are passionate and always willing to learn or re-learn like Toni, chances are you’re an expert. Toni went on to teach several classes after that with greater confidence and now humbly accepts herself as an expert. Her passion on the subject comes through in every class and students leave Toni raving reviews and leave with cute little mittens, skirts, pants or tote bags.

ABC Summary
Just accept that a) if you know way more than the average person on a particular subject YOU ARE AN EXPERT!, b) just because someone is an expert to you doesn’t mean you’re not an expert to the masses, c) and you have something to give back as an expert no one else can give. Own it. Love it. Share it!

Now that you’ve accepted that you’re an expert, here are the 7 Basic Rules for Having an Online Presence….

1. Own your domain (e.g. www.yourdomain.com)
2. Have an SEO optimized website (which basically means your word content needs to include the most relevant keywords that people use to search your product or service online)
3. Post regular blog articles to your website (minimum 2 articles per/mo and 3 quality information articles for every article selling something)
4. Have a Landing Page (see www.leadpages.net. LeadPages™ Is The Easiest Way To Create Mobile Responsive Landing Pages, Launch Pages, Sales Pages, and Other “Conversion Pages”)
5. Open a Facebook account and start running traffic through their power editor to get more likes and leads (follow Social Media etiquette)
6. Use Facebook and your Landing Page to generate an e-mail list (offer something of value for free to potential customers in exchange for their e-mail address)
7. Claim you businesses physical location on Google Maps, Yelp!, Foursquare, Yahoo! etc… (see 16 Stats That Prove the Importance of Local SEO )

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Thanks for reading!

Graysen Fox