Netalot

Participation is a key element of most successful online ventures. In fact this is the same as in the offline world. Businesses do far better if they build relationships with their customers by listening to their feed-back whether positive or negative and showing that they care.

The online world is very much the same playing field. It is always slightly surprising to see the so called internet marketing gurus discuss the basic principles of business for internet marketing businesses as if they are totally new and have never been used before.

On the contrary, business methods are the same or at the least similar whether your business is operating in the ‘real’ world or if it is online. Participation, building relationships with your customers, listening and acting on feedback are all excellent business principles where ever you might be operating.

For the online business, making contact with your readers and buyers of your products is as important as knowing the names of your regular customers if you own a pub or restaurant.

As with customers who have enjoyed your service, think your product is great and tell their friends about you, in the same way your visitors that actively participate with you are just as important.

What active visitors do is comment on your blog or Facebook page, have conversations with you on Twitter, leave remarks on your hub pages and in general show interest in what you are up to.

These people link to your blog, they write about something you might have written, they spread the word about you and even link their sites to you which is of real value if their pagerank is higher than yours.

In other words you have an entire army of people who spread the word about you online. This brings you more traffic and search engines will take note of the links and reward you with higher search listings.

This is no different to the happy customers you have in the real world if you look after your customers well and make them the focus of your business. In the same way, making sure that your online presence is focused on your public, or your following, will ensure that you have a strong tribe of interested people who continue to come back for more.

There are several ways of getting this network of people to write for you and participate in marketing you and your products. You can post some controversial content to encourage discussion. You can consistently present well thought out points that are of interest to your visitors.

You may also provide content that educates and informs your visitors so that they find real value with every visit they make to your site.

Each one of these efforts can contribute to the buzz around your content and your online presence. In this way it helps to spread the word about you and your products or services that you are offering. Harness the power of other interested people to create more exposure for yourself.