Last month, we told you about the importance of creating an in-house style guide to keep your brand, message, and any content you create consistent with your vision. This is important when hiring or contracting copy writers (or content creators) for your website, advertising efforts, or print collateral.

While keeping your in-house style guide up-to-date is important, it’s not always practical to include items outside of what directly applies to your branding efforts. For everything else, most web writers will follow standard style and usage guides, such as the AP Style guide or the Chicago Manual of Style (which is widely used for corporate communicators).

If you write the content for your website yourself, referencing a style guide can help you keep your website content clean and professional.

Now, however, there’s a new tool available: The Yahoo! Style Guide for writing, editing, and creating content for the digital world was just unveiled on Monday.

Unlike traditional guides that still place a focus on print writing, the Yahoo! Style Guide is specifically created for the web. It’s available now at http://styleguide.yahoo.com, and will also be available at your local bookstore early next month.

Write better, edit better, ask an Editor

Like other style and usage guides, the Yahoo! Style guide includes a comprehensive word list, which you can reference if you’re not sure how a certain word should be used or spelled (for example, Yahoo! suggests that your write the word “email” as a single word, without a hyphen). It also includes articles on how to improve your writing for the web, editing guidance, and even an Ask an Editor page where you can, well, ask an editor a question on style and usage.

So far, Yahoo! copy editors have been providing great responses to user questions:

Q: Is it ever OK to use colored text in a sentence for emphasis? I don’t like the look of italics, and I’ve heard that it’s hard to read onscreen

A: If you are the owner of the website, you may of course choose to color words to emphasize them. Doing so has one major drawback, however: People have been trained to regard colored words as links, so when they click the words and nothing happens, they may become frustrated and not click any links on the page, even the real ones.

One of the more useful features, especially if your building your own in-house style guide, is the ability to build your own word list. Download an XML, Microsoft Word, or Rich text format document, and then update it with your own usage notes that you can then provide to your web writers to follow.

So let us know what you think.  Is the Yahoo! Style guide something you find helpful?

Once you enter into the world of Internet marketing, there are two words that you will continue to run across over and over again: AdWords and AdSense. Like a lot of people, you might not be completely sure of what they even are, or how they can benefit you. So, to clear the air just a bit, check out three things you should know about each before you make that dive into the Google marketing Space.

Google AdSense

AdSense lets your site work for you

With Google AdSense, your site becomes your moneymaker. AdSense is set up so that when a customer visits your site, they will see a targeted banner ad either on the side or top of the web page. When a visitor clicks on that ad, you receive anywhere from $0.10 to $10, depending on the particular Cost Per Click (CPC) rate. AdSense is best suited for sites that have a large number of daily visits. So, if you’re not to that point yet, this might not be a viable revenue generating option for you.

Targeted Ads

Banner Ads placed on your site are related to, and targeted towards, the content on your site. For example, if your site is for a local pet store, then you might see ads for obedience training or local pet adoption locations. This ensures that your ads will receive the maximum amount of clicks possible.

Customization

As a business owner you’ve probably spent a lot of time and money on the look and feel that your site conveys, and the last thing you want to do is place a banner ad that clashes with your site design. A great feature in AdSense is the ability to allow customization of the banners that will appear on your site. From font choice, to over 200 color options, you are in control of the ads that are displayed on your site.

Google AdWords

You become the advertiser

With Google AdWords you are in the advertiser’s seat. You create an ad to be placed on Google’s search network, which will appear when the person doing the search enters certain keywords. You are responsible for the copy in the ad, the keyword choice, and the landing page that the ad will direct them to. Google has some great tools that will help you create your ad and choose your keywords.

Spend

With AdWords you are in complete control of your budget. You set the amount you want to pay on a daily basis and there is no minimum requirement for your spend. You are able to control your daily budget, bids, and ad quality. Your daily budget should be set to an amount that you feel comfortable spending each day. You can edit your daily spend as often as you like. Bids are most commonly set up on a Cost-Per-Click (CPC) basis. CPC determines the amount that you are willing to pay for each click on your ad when displayed by Google. The higher that you bid on a keyword or phrase the higher your position will be. Daily tracking on your keyword bids is crucial to the success of your campaign.

Keywords

Keyword choice can either make or break the success of your campaign. Make sure you take the time to pick the right keywords or phrases to drive traffic to each campaign. In order to help you choose your keywords you can use the AdWords keyword tool. Not only will it give you suggestions on keywords depending on the subject of your ad, it will also provide you with some other useful information like monthly search volume, estimated average CPC, and local search trends for each keyword it suggests. Remember your keywords or phrases can either be broad, like dance studio, or they can have a more narrow focus, like toddler ballet classes. If your ad is broad in its message, choose broad keywords, and for an ad that is very specific to a product or service, choose narrow keywords.

If you are engaging in email marketing but not seeing the results that you were hoping for, you probably need to change some aspect of your email.  But what could be the problem?  This is where Split Testing, aka A/B Testing, can help.  Split Testing is a fast, free and easy way of testing a single variable to help improve your open stats. Split testing simply put is testing two variables against each other to see which one receives better results.

How Should I Split My Distribution List?

The easiest and most common approach to split your list is to simply split your list in half. For example, if you have 500 people in your distribution list you will send the control email to the first 250 people and the test email to the other 250 people.  Then simply see which one performs better. The better performer will then be used as the control for the next test.  Keep split testing your campaign until you received the desired results.

Below are some key areas to focus on when conducting your A/B Test.

TIP: Email Service Providers like Mail Chimp allows you to segment your list based on location. This allows all of your recipients to receive your emails at 9am on Wednesday even if you are sending it to several different time zones.

It all comes down to lots and lots of trial and error. At some point you’ll find a formula that makes sense. What’s more, split testing is a free and easy way to help increase your open rates and something you can easily incorporate into your next marketing email campaign.  Does your business employ split testing for marketing email campaigns? If so, please share your results in the comments below. Which change(s) had the biggest effect on your results?

Related articles by Zemanta

• SMB Marketers Segment Emails by Preference, Behavior (marketingvox.com)
• 10 Tips for Successful Email Preheader Text (b2bemailmarketing.com)
• A/B testing the word webinar vs. online training (mailchimp.com)
• A/B Testing: A Simple But Effective Way To Improve Your Email Marketing Campaigns (sendblaster.com)

If you’re like me, every time you launch Tweetdeck (or whatever application you’ve chosen for managing your Twitter stream) you probably find at least one new resource per day to add to your bookmarks bar. And like me, you probably feel lucky to have stumbled upon such a treasure trove of professional goodness, but it’s becoming hard to manage and make use of it all.

I’d like to (with your help) build a list of bookmark-worthy websites that have the potential to carve a spot into your browser toolbar. And I’m not talking about things you find helpful, but rather those sites you can’t get through your day without – your daily nourishment if you will. The stuff that really inspires you and has truly earned a spot in your top bookmarks.

Without further ado, I’ll kick things off with my Top 10:

My Top 5 Social Media/Marketing/Web 2.0 Inspirations

Brian Solis.com – He’s hands down one of the most brilliant minds in all things new media. He’s regarded as one of the best thought leaders in this area and is always on the bleeding edge of industry trends.

ConvinceandConvert.com – I’m not even going to lie. Jay Baer is my social media hero. Bookmark him. He consistently shares great insights, and does an amazing job of tapping into some of the best minds. Be sure to check out his Twitter Interview series.

ReadWriteWeb.com , TechCrunch.com & Mashable.com – I’ve lumped all three together because they all share two commonalities: Their content is drafted by really smart people, and they tell me everything I need to know about emerging social networking, technology, tech news and tech trends. They’re my first clicks of the morning.

HelpAReporter.com – I posted all about this website/free service in an earlier blog post. If you’d like to build awareness for your organization, and you possess a website (guessing you answered yes to both), you simply must get on board with HARO.

ValleyPRblog.com – This one isn’t for you to bookmark (unless you live in Phoenix). From a PR perspective, if there’s one thing you need to do as a small business owner, it’s getting to know your local media. For the Phoenix market, this blog synthesizes everything I need to know, from changes in local media personnel to developing pitch ideas. Point is, find this resource in your own local community. It could really pay off when it comes to scoring a great media hit for your business.

My Top 5 Small Business Hubs

Entrepreneur.com – Specifically, the Entrepreneur.com Daily Dose. This is an aggregator site chock-full of great small business case studies, easy-to-implement ideas, trends and small business news that directly impacts the community.

HowardMann.com – Also known as “The Business Brickyard,” I like Howard’s blog because he reframes some really simple (though thought-provoking) concepts and illustrates how they should apply to your business. More of a big picture kind of guy. I think he’s absolutely brilliant.

SmallBizTrends.com – My second click of the day. Launched by an expert who knows her stuff, Anita Campbell provides this clever tagline to the site: “small business success…delivered daily.” I’ve never clicked a link on this site that hasn’t taught or reminded me of something vital to small business best practices. Totally bookmark-worthy.

DuctTapMarketing.com – Another aggregator of simple, easy-to-implement marketing tactics that can benefit any small business. Great examples here of how small businesses can utilize and integrate social media into their marketing efforts, while keeping a mindful eye on the marketing budget.

NYTimes.com – Specifically, the “You’re the Boss” small business blog. While this one provides small business news like many other blogs, the REAL reason I love this blog is because of the poignant glimpses it provides into the world of real-life small business owners dealing with real-life challenges. I love seeing what those on the front lines are doing to overcome obstacles many businesses face.

Feel free to add these to your bookmark bar, and of course, keep visiting us right here. If you would be so kind, please comment with one (or a few) of your essential internet pit stops below.

“E-commerce spending continues to grow faster compared to other retail categories, as more people become comfortable shopping online and also shopping online during the holidays,” Kamalesh Rao, director of economic research for MasterCard Advisors SpendingPulse, tells PaymentsSource.

This is great news for retailers who sell their products online. According to Master Card advisors, even during a recession, online sales were up 15% over last year. The largest increases were in electronics, jewelry, footwear, and men’s apparel. Many factors contributed to this figure, including the fact that some online stores offered free shipping during the holidays to sweeten the deal.

Given that more young people are becoming savvy online shoppers, coupled with an increased level of confidence in online security from the boomer demographic, the percentage of online sales should continue to grow. These indicators support the fact that retailers who sell online understand the value of ecommerce and return on investment.

Ecommerce is especially important in this market for the following reasons:

• Convenience. Customers may not have time to visit your physical store.
• Always open. Customers can order products at any time day or night.
• Branding. A good website store complements and enhances your positive brand experience.
• Credit Card Processing. Accepting credit card payments online makes transactions fast and returns easy.
• Marketing. Having a web presence is one of the least expensive ways to stay top-of-mind with your customer base.

There has never been a better time to sell your products and services online than now. In the past, depending on how many products you had to sell and the volume of traffic to your server, setting up an online store would cost anywhere from 5 to 20 thousand dollars. This is because you needed to hire a web developer and web designer to design web graphics and set up your hosting account, merchant account, shopping cart software, database, gateway, SSL, and upload all of your product descriptions and images.

Now you can do all of the above autonomously, essentially bypassing the web developer and web designer. Knowledge of HTML, CSS or any database languages to use our online storefront builder isn’t no longer necessary. Newtek Web Services even offers a FREE trial so you can see how easy it is to set up your store by yourself. PLUS, you get expert assistance 24/7/365. Newtek Web Services is the one-stop-shop for your online needs: websites, online shops, even credit card processing and merchant accounts!