{"id":123,"date":"2011-08-23T18:05:47","date_gmt":"2011-08-23T18:05:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/?p=123"},"modified":"2012-03-15T19:51:05","modified_gmt":"2012-03-15T19:51:05","slug":"6-reasons-to-get-online-or-get-left-behind-during-difficult-financial-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/6-reasons-to-get-online-or-get-left-behind-during-difficult-financial-times\/","title":{"rendered":"6 REASONS TO GET ONLINE OR GET LEFT BEHIND DURING DIFFICULT FINANCIAL TIMES"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pittsburgh, PA<\/strong> (PittsburghNewsWire.com) —\u00a0\u00a0When times are tough, the last thing you want to cut is your marketing budget.\u00a0 If you stop promoting your business or brand, once things start to financially improve for you, you may find it hard to regain your momentum. \u00a0Even worse, your competitors have managed to pass you up as they continued to market themselves while you were waiting for the economy to improve.\u00a0 This can in turn make it very difficult to get back to where you were.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s time to get creative with your sales and marketing process so that you can continue to grow your business when you don\u2019t have the budget,\u201d says Donna Baxter, Internet Entrepreneur and CEO of Soul Pitt Media. \u201cI\u2019ve been doing this for 10 years and have seen the power of the internet and how it can really grow your customer base.\u201d<\/div>\n
Even though many small businesses have tighter budgets during these difficult financial times, that doesn\u2019t mean they have to stop marketing their brand all together.\u00a0 Internet marketing has proven to be effective and gives many surefire reasons to get more aggressive than ever when it comes to promoting your product or services online.\u00a0 Here are 6 reasons that should assure you that you can still fulfill your marketing and advertising needs using the internet without breaking your budget:<\/div>\n
    \n
  1. It\u2019s where your customers are.<\/strong> Most people with online access use the Internet as their first and preferred method of researching product information.\u00a0 From reading online reviews to comparing products and services, consumers are empowering themselves through the internet.<\/li>\n
  2. It\u2019s cost effective. <\/strong> Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube are the most widely used social media platforms that have helped many small businesses promote what they do to the masses and they are all free to use.\u00a0 You don\u2019t have to use all of them, but use at least two of them and use them regularly.<\/li>\n
  3. It\u2019s where your competitors are.<\/strong> You can\u2019t afford not to be online.\u00a0 And the good news is that many businesses are still doing a mediocre job at marketing themselves online that you can still beat them just by applying extra effort and expertise.<\/li>\n
  4. One of the best uses of your time.<\/strong> Time is money and spending time online each day to promote your business helps to make money in the long run.\u00a0 If you use your time wisely and don\u2019t get caught up in web surfing, you will find that this will be one of the best uses of your time each day.<\/li>\n
  5. It establishes you as an expert in your field.<\/strong> When you are online you should always give advice or educate clients about your product or service.\u00a0 This will help position you as the go to person in that field and establish yourself as an expert in your niche.<\/li>\n
  6. It works for you 24\/7\/365. <\/strong> Make sure you are sending out the right message because your message will now be a permanent footprint in the World Wide Web working for you day and night.\u00a0 At 2am, someone may come across your message and engage\u2026You\u2019ve just made money in your sleep!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
    Donna also states, \u201cThe bottom line is you have to get online or get left behind and set aside the time to work at it on a consistent basis. It\u2019s not too late to get started, but the longer you wait you just give your competitors that are already online more time to get ahead.\u201d<\/div>\n

    About Donna M. Baxter<\/strong>
    \nDonna M. Baxter is the CEO of Soul Pitt Media, a Minority media company based in Pittsburgh, PA. Founded in 2000, this award-winning company helps individuals, businesses and corporations reach African American consumers through online advertising, print and radio.\u00a0 Former rap artist turned internet Tech Diva, Donna Baxter has gone from \u201cRhymer to Digital Designer\u201d. This \u201cCool Nerd\u201d explains technology in ways you\u2019ve never heard all while making it easy to understand, funny, and entertaining and leaving audiences motivated to \u201cGet Online or Get Left Behind!\u201d\u00a0 Find out more about her at www.donnambaxter.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Pittsburgh, PA (PittsburghNewsWire.com) —\u00a0\u00a0When times are tough, the last thing you want to cut is your marketing budget.\u00a0 If you stop promoting your business or brand, once things start to financially improve for you, you may find it hard to regain your momentum. \u00a0Even worse, your competitors have managed to pass you up as they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":159,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions\/159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesoulpitt.com\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}