So why is there more buzz about online marketing than anything else?

Two reasons:

The first is that anyone can do online marketing.

You pick up a book or read someone else's blog post (like this one) and you get started.

The second is the key one for your business: every other type of marketing generally leads to a person going online to find you.

Think about it: you give someone your business card then what? They go online. The less tech savvy contact proceeds to type in your web site address into the Google search box and comes up in the search engine results page with you at the top and perhaps some other pages from your site but also pages that link to your site and possibly good and bad reviews. They will probably click on your paid ad that so many businesses put on Google Adwords for their company name. It is inevitable that they will glean some sort of first impression.

The results of your online marketing strategy will have a major influence on your contacts' first impressions.

It is the same for all other offline marketing techniques - fliers, TV, radio, word of mouth or face to face networking. Apart from rare occurances all of these marketing strategies simply get someone to look online.

Many clients I have done work for have had an old, error filled or incomplete web site that has caused repulsion of potential new business. What can often happen is that a number of people hear of a good reputation and do a lot of brand specific searching online. This can be put the potential client off at the final hurdle before turning into an enquiry. One client was getting 300 searches a day for his company but his web site was not even in the top 10 results when people searched specifically for the company name!

In this day and age this is a much less common affliction as we are all becoming more tech savvy.

A common question I get asked when I explain this to clients is "Shall I stop my normal forms of marketing?" to which I say "No!"

Many potential clients still respond to fliers, networking and of course word of mouth. However other forms such as Television and Radio are losing their appeal as they are very expensive compared to online marketing and can often have a subtle effect where there is no verifiable direct response. It is also a good idea to come up with a very efficient way of getting fliers out, networking happening and building word of mouth locally.

Our company is based in Birmingham City Centre and we have found efficient means to distribute business to business fliers around the city centre, ensure our happy customers spread the word to their contacts and offer mutual networking opportunities to any suppliers of client suppliers we come across. That is it for offline marketing. Printing costs are kept to a minimum with 10,000 fliers and 2,000 business cards. Distribution costs are less than the printing costs. Time taken up on offline marketing - nothing. It is all done on the fly. Designs and printing are done in-house. Distribution is outsourced. Offline marketing costs are 0 hours and £1,200 per year.

For the price of less than 3,000 stamps we reach thousands upon thousands of potential clients.

What does this change of operation mean for you? Does it mean cutting your marketing budget? No not at all. It just means you move your marketing budget online and learn about efficient online marketing or contract an online marketing company.

Online marketing is so much cheaper than offline marketing and work done can be built upon forever.

It also works as a qualifier for potential business. The potential business clients come looking for you. You just need to make yourself able to be found and provide a good enough impression between the point of initial contact and the sale and delivery of your company service or product.

There are so many things to consider that it is normally worthwhile to meet with a consultant and find out what they can offer.

If they just say they do "SEO" or search engine optimisation be wary. There is Pay per click management, online public relations, online reach and reputation management, social media marketing, conversion rate optimisation and of course building web sites with these subjects in mind and creating a site that can be fully analysed for how many visitors you are getting and what each one is doing when they get there.

Pick a company that does everything in regards to online marketing services. Why pay double for a web site designer to make the changes the SEO says need doing after you have bought the web site in the first place?

The online image industry is new but very valuable. In history, there has never been such an opportunity for exponential company growth from initial start-up to established enterprise. Billions of people are online and, out of the billions some percentage are looking for what your business provides.

It is worth working with a consultant or doing it yourself for at least 30 minutes every day so there is some new, valuable contribution to your online image made every single day.