How To Market Your Business

Workplace Buzz on June 6, 2007 1:12 PM

Susan G. Hauser, for Fortune Small Business, offers tips how to market your business online.

When Mark Bitterman, who calls himself a "selmelier," was trying to pump up sales at his gourmet salt shop, he knew standard marketing techniques such as radio ads and direct mail wouldn't be enough.

Seeking to capture the imagination of educated, adventurous gourmand prospective customers, he instead set out to draw more people to his Web site and his Portland, Ore., shop by writing an informative, entertaining and provocative blog, "Salt News."

Bitterman knows that people, including reporters, visit both the site and the blog, and many eventually come through the doors to see the 60 or so varieties of salt.

"You can't tell if it gets you new traffic or if it just shapes the expectations of those who come to the shop," he adds.

There are probably as many varieties of marketing a business and increasing sales as there are versions of high-end salt. But you can't expect to compete as a small business today without choosing from a growing arsenal of online marketing tools.

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