Ten Reasons to Switch to Google Apps
Google Apps Logo
At DBS we’re pretty excited about the Google Apps productivity suite. In fact, we use it every single day. Here are ten reasons to join the three million other businesses running Google Apps.
- Gain the productivity, collaboration, and communication capabilities of a large enterprise at a small business price.
- No hardware to buy, maintain, or upgrade. Ever.
- No complicated or expensive software licensing. $50 per user per year.
- Provide employees secure remote access to corporate email, calendar, documents, and software.
- Mandatory SSL connections and additional security safeguards keep your data safe.
- Enable users to collaborate on project documents in real-time from anywhere in the world.
- Free up your IT staff to work on other strategic projects.
- Rely on Google’s geographical data center redundancy and 99.9% uptime SLA.
- Gain free access to 24x7x365 live technical support.
- Preserve your current technology investments with integration tools like Google Cloud Connect.
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Putting your Business on the Map with Google Places
A study by Pew Internet reported last year that fifty-eight percent of Americans research products and services online before buying. That means it’s more important than ever to increase your business’ online visibility and the chance that local consumers can find it. One simple way to do this is by maintaining a free Google Places page for your business.
Google Places is like a super-charged version of the Yellow Pages. Integrated into Google Maps (and by extension regular Google search results), it not only contains a business’ name, address, and phone number but also its location on a map, pictures, hours of operation, user reviews, and more.
Where does all this information come from? The reviews are pulled from all over the internet, including popular sites like Yelp.com, UrbanSpoon.com, and CitySearch.com. Some basic information can be filled in by the public but most of the details should come from you – the business owner!
To begin, search Google Maps for your business. Once you find it, click on the the light blue “More Info” link to arrive at your Google Places page. To begin editing, click the “Business Owner” link, follow the prompts, and you’ll be able to begin work on your business’ profile. For maximum visibility, make sure you fill out every section possible, including business hours, payment methods, and the types of services your business offers. Also, don’t forget to upload some pictures related to the products or services you offer.
Once you’ve completed your business’ profile and saved all the changes, Google will mail you a postcard with the steps required to validate the information. But what to do after you’ve setup and validated your site? Here are some ideas to get you started:
- Send your happiest customers a link to your Places page and ask them to review you.
- Run a special promotion on your Places page using the “offer” feature.
- Purchase Google Tags to highlight your business and make it stand out over the competition.
- Monitor your page to see what people are saying about your business.
- Print a QR code to display at your business to help your customers find and rate you online.
- Check your page’s interaction statistics to see how many people have seen and acted on your Places page and offers.
Have we left anything out? Have you found another way to use Google Places to add value to your business? If so, leave a comment here and tell us about it! Otherwise, check out this article by the Google SMB Blog for some more tips on creating an effective presence on Google Places!
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How to monetize your website with Google AdSense
What is Google AdSense?
Have you ever noticed those tiny little ads all over Google products? As we briefly explained in “Stretching your Advertising Dollar“, Google’s paid advertising (called “Google AdWords”) is not only how Google makes most of its money, but it’s also one of the most efficient advertising programs in the world. It pre-qualifies a consumer before showing him your ad, the tracking analytics that come with it are first class, but… I digress.
Example of Inline Google AdSense Ad
We’re here to talk about making money with AdSense, not spending money on AdWords. Google AdSense is the global advertising network through which Google displays the paid advertisements of Google AdWords customers. Google’s advertising network includes all of Google’s own “properties”, search sites such as EarthLink, Netscape, and Compuserve, affiliate advertising networks in the Double-Click Exchange, and last but certainly not least, you.
That’s right – you can become a part of Google’s global advertising network. But the question is… should you? If you recall from the AdWords article, Google displays ads relevant to what the viewer is already looking for. That means that if you run a website about microwavable organic pet treats, you can be reasonably sure Google will serve ads on your site that are also related to pet food. If you’re a blogger devoted to sharing “Petcake” consumption with the world this could be a great way to make some extra cash from your site, but if you’re running an e-commerce site you could end up displaying ads for your competition!
You’ve decided AdSense is right for you… now what?
If you’ve decided Google AdSense would benefit you, head to http://www.google.com/adsense to begin the account setup process. After applying, a Google employee will review your site to make sure it is complete, easily navigable, and has some substance to it. If everything looks good and your site conforms to the AdSense Terms of Service you will be welcomed to the Google AdSense program via e-mail two or three days after your submission.
Once your account has been approved, you can start placing ads on your site. Just login to your AdSense account and you’ll be able to copy the HTML code required to display all sorts of different ads – text-based ads, graphical ads, and more. Then just paste the code onto your site where you want the ads to display and you’re off and running.
In summary, Google AdSense can be a great revenue generator for a popular website, but unless you already have a sizable readership you won’t see overnight results. Keep working at building great content and eventually you will start seeing some paychecks.
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Stretching your Advertising Dollar with Google AdWords
How are you marketing your company today? How much are you paying for advertising? Is it performing to your expectations? How much does your marketing cost for each new customer gained?
Consider a new way to advertise. A way that allows you to control exactly how much you spend every day on ads. A way that allows you to market your products only to people who live in your target geography. A way that pre-qualifies customers and will only show your advertisements to people who want what you’re offering. Does this sound too good to be true? Fortunately it’s not too good to be true. It’s Google AdWords. Watch the video below for a brief introduction then read on.
As the video explains, Google AdWords allows a company to place text-based online ads within Google search results. But that’s just the beginning. When an advertiser partners with Google AdWords, they also gain access to the Google Display Network, which allows ads based on rich media, images, or video rather than a “plain” text ad. This network contains over one million websites of every flavor imaginable, including every site running Google AdSense (See “How to Monetize your site with AdSense“), YouTube, Google Maps, Google Finance, and the rest of the Google family; as well as the entire DoubleClick network and more. Within Google AdWords advertisers can even buy a TV spot… for as little as twenty dollars!
But how does it work? Basically, when you place an ad you enter a bid for how much you’re willing to pay for that ad to be displayed a single time. When a user searches for something related to your ad, Google compiles a list of all the relevant ads and displays the ones that have a combination of the highest cost-per-click (CPC) bid and the highest relevance to what the user is looking for. Google always strives to improve the end user experience so rather than dispalying only the highest paying CPC bids Google will reward advertisers with more advantageous ad placement for writing accurate ads and providing users with the content they’re actually looking for once they “click through” to your site.
And how much does it cost? Merely a one-time activation fee of $5 USD and whatever you would like to budget for ads. There is a minimum cost-per-click bid of $0.01 USD and a minimum cost-per-(thousand)-impression bid of $0.25 USD. Aside from those pricing guidelines the cost is completely up to you. Raising your bid will raise your ad’s visibility and lowering it will decrease visibility. Google actually does try to keep advertising costs reasonable though – as the Google Adwords support pags describe, “the AdWords discounter will automatically reduce your actual CPC so that your winning ad is charged only what is necessary to maintain its ranking above the next-highest ad.” And don’t worry, you’re not on your own in determining how much you should bid – Google offers serveral free tools to help you.
And that’s really just the beginning of Google AdWords. Doesn’t that seem much more economical than more traditional advertising? We certainly think so. Do you have a success story or a question about Google AdWords? If so just leave a comment below!
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OpenOffice vs. Google Apps as a free Office Productivity Suite
If you’ve ever bought a Microsoft product before you know they’re far from free. A quick search online reveals most versions of Microsoft Office cost between $200 and $500. Obviously this puts the world’s most popular productivity suite out of reach for most small businesses. How then is a small business owner to create professional documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and more? Luckily there are a couple great options available, and both of them are FREE.
A screenshot of OpenOffice's word processor
The first is OpenOffice, an open source software package available for download at the OpenOffice website. Compared to Microsoft Office’s estimated 500 million users, OpenOffice recently celebrated its 100 millionth download. It includes a word processor, spreadsheet program, presentation software, desktop publishing, and more. By default all files are stored in OpenOffice’s own proprietary formats, but they can easily be saved as Microsoft documents instead. OpenOffice is laid out very similarly to Microsoft products so the learning curve for current Microsoft users is virtually non-existent. Additionally, there are a plethora of support options available, including FREE community-based (peer) support, and a directory of local OpenOffice consultants.
Screenshot of GoogleDocs' word processor
The second option is Google Docs, which offers the same four basic software programs (word processor, spreadsheet, desktop publishing, and presentation) as the other suites, and also a “Form” tool that creates custom web surveys that one could embed into a website or blog. All Google documents are stored on Google’s servers and accessed and edited in the owner’s web browser. Thanks to its internet-based application delivery, Google Docs allows users to share documents with any other person with an e-mail address with just a couple clicks of the mouse. Unfortunately, the overall feature set is very light compared to more full-featured suites like Office or OpenOffice. Casual Google Docs users may not take notice of anything missing but more routine or power users will probably be unable to use Google Docs for anything other than minor edits.
While Google Docs is a great light-weight office productivity suite that can perform quick edits of a document from anywhere with an internet connection, it is lacking too many features to be considered a true desktop replacement. On the plus side, Google Docs offers secure sharing and collaboration, which OpenOffice does not. What OpenOffice DOES provide is a full-featured office productivity suite for FREE. Until Google beefs up the features of its Documents suite, OpenOffice will remain Denton Business Solutions’ productivity suite of choice.
For an in-depth comparison of Microsoft Office 2010 and OpenOffice 3.1, look here.
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Google enhances Analytics tracking code
Google announced yesterday that it has finally released Asynchronous Tracking for its Analytics product. Asynchronous tracking has been in beta testing/development for almost six months now so Denton Business Solutions is pretty excited that it’s finally out of beta testing and approved for general use.
According to Google the new code offers the following benefits:
- Faster tracking code load times for your web pages due to improved browser execution
- Enhanced data collection and accuracy
- Elimination of tracking errors from dependencies when the JavaScript hasn’t fully loaded
Essentially, this “Google Analytics 2.0″ will give your business a more accurate depiction of its website’s actual statistics, as well as increase tracking code stability and page load times. Ever since Google announced that it now includes website load times into its page rank algorithms, every little bit of speed one can squeeze out of a page load helps. If you have any questions about Analytics or how to upgrade to its new tracking code drop us a line!
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