In This Issue:

• An Easy Way to Grow Your Business
• Search Engines, Part I
• Featured Business
• In Closing

This is the first edition of our newsletter.  We intend to send it out regularly as a useful resource to help you and our other clients grow your businesses.  

While the newsletter will, naturally, include tips for getting the most from your website, we intend also to focus heavily on new business building ideas we find in our readings AND good ideas that our clients are using to combat this economic downturn.

Here is our first idea that we think will help all of us grow our business more this year.

An Easy Way to Grow Your Business:

In this current economic environment, we are all looking for business.  It dawned on me that a powerrful network of potential customers and leads already exists for us - the network of Caskie Web Solutions customers.

If you have ever belonged to a networking group, you know they can help your business.  On our website, I have posted a list of our current clients for you to review.  Check them out.  If you find a company listed that you can support - either by doing business with them yourself or refering business to them, please do so.  With each of us helping the other a bit, we can all benefit.

Please do not try to sell your services to anyone on the list. That will backfire on you.  Networking only works only when you try to help someone else's business. If everyone contributes, it works out great for all parties. What goes around does come around.

Click here to see the companies in our network

Search Engines, Part 1

This is a huge topic that befuddles nearly everyone.  In this series, we will clear up some of the mystery and show you how to improve your business via the search engines.

It all starts with KEYWORDS.  Whether you are working to improve your postion in the search results or you are running a PPC (pay per click) campaign, the keywords and keyword phrases you target are critical.

Here are some tips on choosing the keywords for your website:

• Consider what your customers would type in to find your business. These phrases will be most effective.
• Avoid stuffing your website with lots of keywords. More is defnitely not better as the search engines only read the first half dozen.
• Avoid broad generalizations such as "tools" or "repairs". Be specific; "carpentry tools" or "hardwood floor repairs".
• If you service a local area, include it in your keywords; "hardwood floor repairs Walnut Creek".
• Reinforce your keywords by repeating them often on your web page. This counts heavily with Google.
  

Featured Business

This month's Featured Business is The Grout Specialist owned by Thomas Sanchez and his son, Gaspar.

The Sanchez family emigrated here from near Machu Pichu, high in the Andes mountains of Peru. Thomas has over 25 years experience in restoring and repairing grout in natural stone surfaces and manufactured tiles as well.  He can restore your tub or shower to look like new in just one day.  Please visit his website and give him a call if you can provide him with a good business lead.

Each month we will be featuring another business as part of our Network. If you would like to have your business featured, please email me with a brief description that you would like to be included with your webiste picute.

In Closing

Since November, we have been seeing strong signs that 2010 is going to be a better business year.  Traffic to our website is definitely growing and we have seen a real uptick in new customers and new projects.  Let's hope this is a trend we will all be seeing shortly.

And finally, the little darlings in the photo are my grandaughter, Kayla, and my grandson, Jake.