IndiaMART.com Offers ‘Get Free Website’ via Facebook

Do you take social networking seriously? Now, you can take advantage of social marketing with IndiaMART.com, which has launched a great new page on Facebook to help you promote your business online… only as you surf. As social media marketing becomes an innovative, new and cost effective way to market your business, IndiaMART.com has taken it a notch further with an easy to use page. This page is available to you via Facebook that allows you to register yourself for a free website with IndiaMART.com. You can do it in 2 easy steps from Facebook itself:

1. Submit your Contact Info & Business Profile

2. Add Products to your Website

Easy to understand form on Facebook

Register At a Click

IndiaMART.com has always been at the forefront of partnering with SMEs to help them grow their business. We are doing it again with this facility of helping you develop your own website for free. It can’t get easier than this because you don’t have to access IndiaMART.com or go through a lengthy registration process to register yourself. You can do it easily via this Facebook page provided to you only by IndiaMART.com. At IndiaMART.com, we believe in building and nurturing the businesses of SMEs through a continuous focus on creating a world class marketing experience for you. This one’s a proof of that. 

 

With the Get Free Website facility from IndiaMART.com, you can now publish your own website simply by filling in some basic details about yourself, your business and the products you offer. It’s so easy and sure to yield tremendous marketing results because the website will give you the opportunity to market your products and services for free. It will take your business to all parts of the world. The website will also give you free space for advertising and your customers will have access to these advertisements for a longer period of time. You will also have the advantage of changing the content and graphics anytime you want, suiting your needs.

Fill in details about the company

Take Your Marketing Global

IndiaMART.com wants you to reach a wider clientele with your own free website. With this option of creating your own website for free, it’ll be easier for you to make your presence felt in the world market. This means you can expect your business to flourish like never before. So, if a person sitting in Europe wants your service, he would just need to browse through your website and get in contact with you. How simple is that! 

 

What advantages does this facility entail?

1. Make your business accessible to customers who are on Facebook and make your business more interactive.
2. There are no lengthy procedures involved, so registering for your own new website on Facebook is as easy as A-B-C.
3. Do business while you chat on facebook. It's 'Fun-biz' with IndiaMART.com.

Facebook has more than 800 million active users and more than 50% of their active users log on to Facebook in any given day. It’s a market that must be tapped. With this IndiaMART.com website, it will be convenient for customers on Facebook to browse through everything you have to offer—anywhere, anytime. So, you don’t have to turn down your potential customer when it’s time to close your shop. Once you publish your free website, it’ll be easier to deliver convenience to your customer. They will get personalized customer attention, which will add value to your offering. It will also be easier for you to update clients about your business. Another great advantage will be that you will get an IndiaMART.com Intermesh seal website that will win you the trust and confidence of your potential customer. 

 

Just submit your contact information and business profile in the form given to create a website that will open the doors of your business to the world. Add your products and services for people to avail them with you just sitting at home. You can sell products or services and get feedback from potential customers. You can also use various features such as visitor’s poll and surveys to understand the consumer’s psyche and tap the needs of your customer. So, now you don’t have to go to people’s doorstep to sell your products and services. With IndiaMART.com you will have people coming to you. 

 

Get, set and go to become the proud owner of your website with us @ IndiaMART.com.

Targeted Marketing with Internet

Companies are increasingly using internet to promote products online. Social media has become a primary tool and internet marketing is increasingly being harnessed to curtail expenses besides saving precious time and energy. If you own a SME then you must discover the secret of saving your money through targeted marketing. Market research is its twin strategy that is again indispensable for a firm that wants to be successful.

Specifying Customers and Analysing Behaviour Pattern
The first step before creating a searchable site is to know who you are targeting. You must bring to your customers what they really want. Critically examine your customers’ behaviour and then plan your marketing campaign accordingly. Targeted internet marketing allows the web-master to design a marketing program to draw the attention of the predetermined group of people. Your target market is your ideal customer in the specific segment of the population you attempt to reach. This might mean pin-pointing their gender, income, education level, geographic location, interests, dreams and desires, problems they want to overcome and so on, as these affect the decision to purchase. The more specific you get, the easier it is to find and market to your target visitor. You can develop stronger customer relationships by targeting the needs of a specialized group. You need to define your target market so that you can immediately capture the attention of customers.

You must let your customers know that you understand their lifestyle – this gives a unique dimension to your site. Through this, you can give a personalised touch to your website and excel in the market. So if you are selling a product then you must smartly target your customers keeping in mind the purchasing power as well as the kind of mindset people have. Targeted marketing is all about how people think because it helps to know the market. Therefore, it is important to analyze this phenomenon to become a successful entrepreneur.

Strategies for Targeting Customers
There are many innovative internet marketing strategies to track potential customers. You can opt for the banner advertising option on the internet to target customers. The advancing technology makes it possible for advertisers to make your ads appear on specific sites which contain content that is similar or related to that of your site. For instance, if you have a clothes firm then your advertisement would appear on the sites dealing with the clothes industry.

The next big revolution in this stream is geo-targeting where, by tracking the IP addresses of the user, you can have ads appear before them. Another powerful force in internet marketing is the Pay-Per-Click option. It allows you to create a small text ad and then it appears on the screen when the user is searching on keywords relating to your product or services. It provides you with an edge as your ad appears in the Sponsored Links section of the search result page. You can also dwell upon organic search where the listing is generated based on the HTML tags and the relevant content found in a website.

Behavioural targeting is another popular medium as it delivers ads to consumers based on their past search behaviour. This reveals their interest and it is easy to convert them into customers. You can also target users with paid search ads on landing pages after they leave a search site.

Not taking things for granted, it is better to research the probable behaviour of the customer and choose the keywords accordingly. You must analyse the behaviour pattern of the customers which manifests in a better response in the market. You can create a SEO (Search Engine Optimization) program to attract the targeted traffic. You can link with the sites which provide information that deals with your product. Keywords should be popular and relevant; you should not assume them but research them. You can also make use of the keyword research tool, to be more precise.

Local Market
You can also target the local market customers through internet marketing as you can publish the latest events; for example, winter sales or festive season discounts can appear in the local newspaper website. You can also send emails to potential customers.

Undeniably, the internet promises to replace blanket marketing with targeted marketing. It is popularly stated that 'time is money' and target marketing is a less time consuming and a less expensive method.

Expert Speak: Mr. Nandan Sharma, TATA Communications

MPLS - The Gen-Next Intelligent Networking Solution for SMEs

Small and medium enterprises (SME)s today leverage the power of technology to ‘go global’ and stay connected with associates and clients ‘24x7’. In this age of globalization and localization or as we say “glocalization”, small enterprises need to conduct bulk of their business over the internet and in a secured manner.

There are multiple options, but the best suited is the Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS), the networking system that is reliable and secure for national and global connectivity. What makes MPLS the most sought after technology to deliver voice and data services for small enterprises? It is mature, sophisticated and delivers voice and data services faster. MPLS provides faster packet forwarding for IP routers and supports Virtual Private Network (VPN) services with traffic engineering and network convergence.

In addition, by virtue of its performance and versatility, MPLS offers lower network total cost of ownership (TCO) than any other solution.

Now, as a SME business, would you not want a fully managed solution that helps you streamline your business operations more efficient? MPLS not only provides you with cutting edge technology with ample capacity for future expansion but also offers cost-effective scalability across multiple locations. After all, you do not want to spend a fortune on your network infrastructure.

But it is not just costs, in this age of cut-throat competition among businesses in all domains, SMEs always need to improvise and enhance product or service in order to carve a niche in the market.  We understand that you need to concentrate on your core competencies instead of struggling with high-end technologies and networking system. 

MPLS networking service provides you with a fully managed solution for all network and connectivity requirements along with supporting business critical applications. MPLS service thus is the key for you to get an edge over your competitors.

The contributor for this blog is Mr. Nandan Sharma, Product Head, Network Services, Tata Communications-SME (http://www.tatacommunications.com/sme/mpls.asp)

Techno- Savvy Age

Internet marketing is also known as web marketing, online marketing or e-marketing. It is a broad term and cannot be confined to just marketing through the internet but also through other mediums such as the wireless or email. The world, as postulated by Marshal McLuhan, can be regarded as a global village. McLuhan envisaged the world as interconnected by an electronic nervous system; this is popularly regarded as the internet. We live in the world of cloud computing where everyone is connected. No one can escape technology seeing that, everyone from a rickshaw puller to a billionaire, carries a mobile.

Web Presence
Technology is the pulse of life of the present generation. When a company establishes itself, it is extremely important for it to have a web presence. This acquaints the customers not just with the product but also with the company. Nowadays, the consumers are intelligent and the internet is the best medium to lure them. The media has a strong impact on the mindset of the people, who live in the world of virtual reality. Due to its nature, the internet medium allows consumers to research and to purchase products and services conveniently. So the internet has become a must in order to make a positive utilization of internet marketing.

Age of Information
It is essential for SMEs to realize that we live in the age of information. The way information is conveyed plays a very important role in boosting the sales of the product. This is the world of mediacracy and there could be nothing better than the internet to attract customers. Marcus Sheridan, the owner of ‘The Sales Lion’, says that effective content leads to winning the trust of the customer which further helps to get a lead in the market and thereby increase sales. So embrace internet marketing if you want to remain ahead in the promotion of the sales of your company.
 

Fast and cost effective mode
The best part is that with a small amount of investment just about anyone can have a web page on the Internet. In this manner, almost any business can reach a large market, directly, fast and economically. It is irrespective of the size or location of the business. This medium is cost effective as any SME can save its funds through internet marketing. This is because, anyone who can read and write can have access to the World Wide Web. According to the Internet World Stats, India has a large number of internet users which has gone up to about 100,000,000 till December 31, 2010.

Interactive medium
The internet has consolidated itself as a very powerful platform with an impact on the working culture and the manner in which people communicate. It has changed the working environment and affected the way businesses operate. It is about interaction — interaction creates relationships and those relationships open up the opportunities for you to share information about your products and services. Good personal relations can actually boost your sales.

Thus it is important to ensure that your website is user friendly, concise and up to date. In this way you can inform the world about the latest developments in your firm. Make good use of the innovative method of marketing through the internet to generate a more positive responses towards your business.

Domain name goes Hindi...

There is good news for SMEs! The dot-Bharat domain name in Hindi is set to be launched in India by May next year, with the aim of bridging the digital divide in the country. This will enable organizations and individuals to register their website addresses in Hindi and later in more Indian local languages like Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu, Tamil, Telugu and Gujarati. This is a great opportunity for SMEs to draw a large proportion of Indians who use content on Internet but aren’t familiar with English.

Now days even if content are in local language still user need to type the URL in English. This is a large step towards developing a multi-lingual computing environment in India i.e. already proved to be a great use in countries like Japan and South Korea.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which governs domain names internationally, has allowed India to register domain names in above mentioned Indian languages.

What's in it for SMEs?

Internet is a low cost medium for SMEs to reach out to new potential markets and engage their existing customer base. The advent of e-commerce has opened up a whole new set of opportunities for SMEs. Still there are few hurdles on the way. According to 2001 Census, about 11% of the India’s population understands English, while 40% are well-versed in some form of Hindi. Also there are close to 100 million Internet users in India, in which74% are literate, according to Census 2011. Clearly there is a huge opportunity for SMEs to engage customers in a language which they are more familiar with.

Although there are other aspects too to achieve complete multi-lingual computing environment in India, like operating system, language keyboards, script sets and browser in local language. Once in place, Internet in local language will available in India over the next 10-15 years. 

 

How it will affect your business?

The domain name helps users find their way around the Internet. Every computer on the Internet has a unique address, just like a telephone number, which is a rather complicated string of numbers. It is called “IP address” (IP stands for “Internet Protocol”). IP Addresses are hard to remember. Here the domain name comes for rescue and helps user to easily remember a familiar set of alphabet (i.e. “domain name”) to be used instead of the IP address. If this domain name is available in language like Hindi which is commonly understands by a large chunk of population then it will be much easier to target them. Now SMEs can innovate and offers specific product and services which are well customized as per the requirement of regional customers, and this will help them to move from common to niche approach.

Expert Speak: Mr. Mehul Kapadia, Tata Communications

InstaCompute: Building tomorrow’s IT business models today

In a rapidly expanding market like India, the rise of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) is clearly no surprise. However, SMEs often face the challenge of fast-changing IT business processes and seasonal spikes, coupled with tight budget constraints. In such a scenario, can there be a single solution for such a business challenge? The answer lies in solutions like InstaCompute, which are based on Cloud computing model.

All businesses undergo a transition at various points. Whether you run a full-fledged enterprise, a medium-sized business venture or even a smaller, relatively newer business, updating business IT processes is a critical step in your enterprise life cycle. In fact, some businesses even have to undergo multiple transformation phases. Large enterprises have the capability and the resources to execute such transformations smoothly, but SMEs face a significant challenge in doing so, given their limited resources and capital.

Overcoming the challenges of transitional change

The major transition that SMEs need to address right away is from a local, traditional setup to a more global and more economic solution such as Cloud Computing. These solutions help Small and Medium Enterprises convert a typical Capex-driven business IT model into an Opex-driven model.

Advantages of IaaS for SMEs

By choosing a IT model that provides Infrastructure as a Service, SMEs can significantly reduce Capex and enable greater network control, scalable processing and storage capabilities and faster product delivery over the Internet. Few more advantages of IaaS for SMEs, apart from ones already listed, include:

• On-demand deployment for whenever a solution is needed
• Instant scalability to match business’ growth potential
• Pay-per-use pricing so that you spend for just as much as you use

Every bit of capital investment is crucial for an SME. Seasonal peaks are one of the greatest reasons for companies under-provisioning or over-provisioning. This can later result in a heavy loss and idle resources. With IaaS, your business can gain immediate computing resources, on-demand, when you need them.

Tata Communications’ InstaCompute

InstaCompute is a flexible, cost-effective and on-demand IaaS solution that with strong Service Level Agreement (SLA). Signing up online is quick and easy; hence you save time and do not require dedicated resources to utilize the service.

With their best-in-class technology partnerships, your business also gets the best infrastructure solutions. 

Gain the InstaCompute advantage

• Quick time to market with best in class Infrastructure assuring High Reliability and scalability
• Anticipate customer demands by preventing under-provisioning and over-provisioning
• Limited IT personnel and infrastructure required, thus saving costs
• Pay-per-use pricing structure
• Real time addition and removal of virtual servers, storage capacity and metered Internet connectivity
• Best-in-class security features such as business grade firewalls, secure MPLS on-ramp, data centers with highest security standards and Master User controls for overseeing and permission granting
  

For more information on InstaCompute, visit: http://goo.gl/xREBW 

The contributor for this blog is Mr Mehul Kapadia, VP Marketing and Strategy, Tata Communications-SME (http://www.tatacommunications.com/sme/)