If you read medical news, or happen to have high cholesterol, then you may have already seen that new tests show that the popular drug Lipitor doesn’t just improve heart health, but may also prevent other kinds of diseases, too. In other words, it doesn’t just do what it’s supposed to, but brings other positive side effects along for the ride.

Within the medical industry, these other good things that happen are called “legacy effects.” They are great if you or someone you know takes Lipitor… but what does it have to do with online marketing?

Probably more than you realize. That’s because anything you do online – from search engine optimization to social media marketing and online newsletters – tends to help everything else you do as well. In other words, if you do something that helps you attract visitors or convert customers well enough in one area, it’s likely to help you in another, too.

Here are a few quick examples, and how you can put them to use in your business:

A good SEO plan can make PPC advertising cheaper. That’s because the major search engines like Google place “quality scores” on your pages. So, the higher they rank naturally, the less you are likely to pay for sponsored traffic to your site.

Social media marketing helps SEO. With the return of real-time search results, Google and the other engines are factoring social content more heavily into their search results. So, the more you post to Facebook and Twitter, the more traffic you can receive from other sources.

Maintaining a high-quality online newsletter makes the rest of your site more profitable. That’s because you don’t just get traffic from people clicking through from your newsletter; you also get exposure from others who have been forwarded your articles, or search engines that have indexed some of your content.

The point is that a good online marketing plan is like a strong medicine. Even if you’ve instituted it to achieve one specific goal, if you handle things well enough, you’re likely to get other side benefits, as well. So, the sooner you get started, the sooner you can watch the rest of your website and company grow.

A lot of web designers and business owners aren’t quite sure what to make of Facebook advertising just yet. On the one hand, it’s incredibly targeted and relatively cost-efficient; and on the other, it doesn’t yet offer the same kind of scope and exposure as some of the more-established programs like Google ad words do.

As a result, a lot of people are deciding to jump in headfirst or avoid it altogether. Those might both be mistakes.

Here’s why: There is definitely an opportunity to grow your company by advertising on Facebook. But, until some of the more prevalent strategies have been tried and tested, it’s probably better to start slowly and build up your Facebook advertising campaign from there. And besides, there might be a more efficient use that lots of people are overlooking – using Facebook ads to test markets and messages.

The one thing Facebook advertising is great for, and the one true advantage it has over the pay per click systems offered by Google, Yahoo, and Bing, is that it allows you to locate a market not just by the keywords they have entered into a search box, but demographic information they have supplied about themselves.

That means you can target a specific offer to a specific group of people in a way that simply isn’t possible elsewhere. Want to know how men in their 20s respond to a special price? Put up an ad and you’ll know within a couple of weeks. Need to see whether the language you’re using resonates with seniors? Put it on a Facebook ad and find out.

The real value of this kind of testing isn’t just that it could be profitable, but also that the lessons you learn could help you tighten up your marketing and advertising in other areas, like print ads, the landing page copy on your product pages, or even your other pay per click ads. In other words, using your Facebook marketing in the right way could help make every other dollar you spend on marketing – online or off – earn a higher return.
Online marketing via Facebook advertising is still growing and taking shape, but if you are looking for a great way to use it, why not try testing different markets and messages and seeing where they take you?

One of the great tragedies in life, and business online, is that nothing lasts forever… and that very few things even last for very long. Get a fantastic haircut, and you’ll quickly find your hair hasn’t stopped growing; buy a wonderful suit, and you’ll notice that it’s only a matter of time before it has to be taken in or out because you’ve either gone on a diet, or need to.

In some ways, it’s the same with your small Calgary business website. Even if you invest in a high-quality design that fits your company perfectly, impresses visitors, loads correctly across all kinds of browsers, and helps your company to make more money, it’s probably going to need to be tweaked or updated eventually.

The good news is that great websites don’t have to be completely replaced very often. In fact, it’s often a matter of just making a few small changes when you need them. Here are a few things you should definitely add or review on your business website, even if you aren’t ready for a major redesign:

Social media links and integration. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you already know that social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are big business. It’s important that you have links to your profiles and content on these sites, since they can make it easier for people to find you outside of your business website, and vice versa.

Search engine optimized pages and content. Moving onto the first or second page of the results for your most important keywords on Google, Yahoo, and Bing can be an enormous boost to your business, but it’s getting harder to improve your search engine rankings all the time. For that reason, it makes sense to review your pages from time to time, to ensure that they’re optimized, and that you are still emphasizing the right keywords and phrases.

Product descriptions and prices. It goes without saying that accuracy, especially in product descriptions and prices, is an important part of the upkeep on your business website. Still, there are a surprising number of companies that regularly fail to keep this kind of data current. Whether you’re using a content management system or not, be sure that your site is up to date.

FAQs, contact information, privacy policies, and other details. More and more, people are basing their online buying decisions on how certain they feel that you’re going to do what you say you will, how quickly they can expect their order, and what they think you’ll do with their personal information. Make it easier for them to buy with clear, customer-friendly details on your business website.