The Best Advertising Ideas for a Local Business

Google Adsense

Using appropriate keywords and advertising entities such as Google Adsense, you can set your advertising to appear only when local customers search for products and services in your city, state or region. Google Adsense offers pay-per-click advertising that can be used in conjunction with these searches to target those customers who are local to your business.

Yahoo Local Listings

Yahoo Local Listings has three plans, including a free plan, designed to help you target consumers in your area only. Yahoo Local Listings is similar to using newspaper or Yellow Pages listings. Depending on the plan you choose, you can control the visibility of your advertising efforts and put your company in the forefront of the offerings when local customers search for your product or service.

Yellow Pages and AOL CityGuide

YellowPages.com offers city guides and business listings. While you can purchase advertising packages, basic listings are free and give your company high visibility to local customers searching for your product or service. Similar to the Yahoo Local Listings is the AOL CityGuide, which offers the same basic local listing package, with the option of more extensive ad placement.

Craigslist

Craigslist follows an advertising format similar to classifieds, broken down into regions and cities. As of 2011, Craigslist has an estimated 10 million unique visitors and connects sellers and buyers in more than 300 communities. While Craigslist is aimed more toward individuals, it can be used by companies and represents an affordable way for businesses with minimal advertising budgets to advertise to a local market.

Traditional Media

Traditional media can still be leveraged for effective local advertising. This includes newspaper advertising, local magazines and making use of public radio and TV time. These media outlets are so effective for local advertisers because the market is targeted, as opposed to a nationwide campaign. Local TV and radio spots are often more affordable for small-business owners as well, making it a viable option for local advertising.

CPM Rates Vs. Traffic

CPM Ad Networks

CPM ad networks typically deal with large publishers whose websites receive thousands of visits each month. Casale Media, CPX Interactive and Tribal Fusion are three networks that serve CPM ads. Casale Media requires a minimum of 50,000 unique monthly visitors, while Tribal Fusion requires a minimum of 500,000 unique monthly visitors. CPX Interactive requires a minimum of 10,000 monthly pageviews.

Increasing CPM Earnings

Because CPM ad networks pay according to the number of people who see an advertisement, the primary way to increase your CPM earnings is to increase the amount of traffic your website receives. However, because a CPM ad network typically pays according to the number of unique individuals who view an advertisement in a given time frame, it is vital that your website generates many first-time visitors. Optimize the content of your website for maximum search engine visibility to encourage new visits.

CPM Advertising Formats

Although many online advertising formats are optimized for standard text- and image-based websites, you can use a CPM ad network to monetize other types of content as well. CPM ads exist for mobile applications, streaming videos and Flash games, for example. CPM ad formats for standard websites include banner ads, pop-up ads and pop-under ads.

Alternatives to CPM Advertising

Because many CPM ad networks are available only to large publishers, many smaller publishers seek alternative forms of advertising to monetize their content. The other two common forms of online advertising are 'cost per click' and 'cost per action.' CPC ad networks such as Google AdSense pay the publisher each time a visitor clicks an advertisement, while CPA networks such as ShareASale and LinkShare pay the publisher each time a visitor clicks an advertisement and purchases a product.

How to Make Money With Hobbies

1. 1. Start a website/blog based around a favorite hobby.

Use your experience collecting baseball cards, coins, or stamps.

Download a few dozen articles from article directories

online and place them on your website along with other relevant information collectors are eager to know about. Update your website or blog regularly to keep continual web traffic. Join Adsense and place

ads throughout the blog/site with relevant products. Each time a visitor clicks the ads you will make money.

2. 2.Suppose your hobby is gardening. Most know the cost of vegetable is soaring. And many worry about pesticides and other chemicals in vegetables. Why not offer organically grown vegetables at a discount to neighbor, friends, other family members. Of course with a reasonable enough markup to make a profit.

3. 3. Are you crafty? Getting crafty could fill your pockets

with green. That's right! Use your talents sewing, knitting,

crocheting, even making jewelry to earn money. Sell your

crafts on eBay or another online auction site.

4. 4.Are you a high tech genius? Building computers is your

hobby? Or designing new software is a hobby. Why

not offer to tutor people in your community on using

computers and their software program. Many elder people

would like this service because they lack technical

skills prevalent among younger crowd.

5. 5. Are you into online gaming. Play games for several

hours a day? Know every cheat code in the book. Why not

write a tip sheet on playing xbox 360 games and sell online

and offline to other interested gamers.

How to Customize Your Blog Template on Blogger.com

Create a User Account and Start Your Own Blog

1. Start by going to the Blogger.com home page (see the Resources section below).

2. Register if you are a new user by providing an email address, username and password to create an account.

3. Choose a title and address for your blog. Remember that your address is part of the URL that readers have to type in the address bar to get to your blog.

4. Select an initial template design to start a blog. Blogger.com offers numerous templates so you can start blogging right away. You can choose from simple patterns and colors, as well as more elaborate designs.

Change the Settings and Format of your Blog

5. Choose the 'Customize' link on your blog home page.

6. Change the page elements, fonts and colors or pick a new template.

7. Selecting the 'Page Elements' option allows you to edit your blog template using Blogger.com's drag-and-drop editing tools. Change the look of your blog template by moving headers and editing virtually every aspect of your blog's appearance.

8. Add a page element to your blog. You can add a list, ads, a logo, pictures or any Java or HTML script with pre-designed elements toyour template.

Customize Your Blog with More Advanced Techniques

9. Use your own knowledge of HTML to customize your blog. Advanced users can download a template to their own files or can use HTML codes to edit their blog template directly.

10. Consider selecting add-ons from third-party sites. There are many services you can use to add a hit counter or quiz to your blog.

11. Create widgets for your blog. Blogger.com also allows users to create original widgets to add to their blog home pages.

How to Make Money Online by Advertising

1. Google Adsense. This is just one example of the many ways you can advertise online. Google adsense allows you to put code in your website, blog, etc and start making money. The way google adsense works is whatever topic you are talking about, the ad that is placed on your website compliments it. For example, if you have a website that has lots of details about a fishing excursion you have recently went on, then the ads will probably be for boat websites, fishing gear, and things of that nature.

2. Also if you run a very established website, or even if you do not, some companies will pay you to place their link on your website. Many websites can make hundreds, or even thousands a month, just for having a link to another website on their webpage. So even if you have google adsense and no one is clicking, you are still guaranteed the money that the other websites are offering you. A good idea is to check with local businesses or there are many great places to find people wanting to rent space on your website online.

3. Even the emails you send out to your subscribers can make you money, and lots of it. This is another place to place ads and if you have a large amount of people on your mailing list, you can really receive a large amount a money for merely sending an email. That is why it is a good idea to start adding more and more people to your mailing list. The more you add people, the more amount of money you will make. By making money from ads online, one might not even have to have a job besides running their website.

How to Create a Free Blog and Make Money With It

1. Select a platform for your blog. Blogger, WordPress and Tumblr are free websites that provide the Web hosting and software needed to start a blog. Alternatively, Drupal, Joomla and WordPress.org are platforms that you can use to start a blog on your own Web server. Although usage of these platforms is free, you will need to pay to register a domain name and start an account with a Web hosting provider.

2. Choose an advertising provider or an affiliate partner to monetize your blog. For example, you can add Google AdSense to a blog and begin earning money with little effort. Some free blog providers may have limitations that you must abide by when displaying advertisements. WordPress.com does not allow AdSense advertisements in free blogs. To display the advertisements of your choice on WordPress.com, you must upgrade your account or sign up for Ad Control. Ad Control gives you half of the revenue earned from advertisements, with the other half going to WordPress.

3. Establish a niche or theme for your blog. If your goal is for readers to click advertisements or buy products, select a theme that a person interested in buying products may search for. For example, someone interested in buying a new video card may search for a blog about computer hardware reviews. You can potentially earn money from a blog with any theme, but you may find it difficult to earn money from a blog that is not product-focused.

4. Add content to your blog to begin building a reader base. Readers look for content that can't be found elsewhere. Avoid reposting content that you find on other sites and create posts that are fresh and original. Original content results from conducting extensive research or selecting article topics that you have extensive knowledge about.

5. Optimize your content to help people find it in search engines. It helps to think of one main keyword phrase for each article that you write. For example, 'make money online' is a keyword phrase that may be relevant for an article about earning money from blogging. The most important keyword phrase in your article should be in the article's title and within the content. Search engines will use the text of your article to determine its topic. Your text must contain the words that people use when searching for that type of article.

How to Insert Adsense PHP Code Into the Wordpress Advertising Manager

1. Log in to your Wordpress admin control panel. Click 'Plugins,' then 'Add New.' If you are using Wordpress version 2.5 or earlier, enter 'AdSense Manager' into the search box and click 'Search Plugins.' If you are using a later version of Wordpress, search for 'Advertising Manager,' which is an updated version, although Adsense Manager may also work on your version should Advertising Manager not install correctly for some reason.

2. Locate the plugin you searched for in the results list, then click 'Install Now.' Wait a few seconds as the plugin installs, then click 'Activate Plugin.'

3. Click 'Settings' from the main menu bar, then click 'Advertising Manager.' Click 'Manage Ad Units,' then 'Create New Ad.' Paste your Google Adsense code for the ad unit you want to insert into the box titled 'AdSense Slots & Other Networks,' then click the 'Import to New Ad Unit.'

4. Edit the settings for this ad unit. On the left, you can choose where you want the ad unit to appear, and on which sections of the site, such as the main index page, single posts or archive pages. On the right, you can add HTML code before and after the unit -- for example, to give the ad unit a colored border, float it to the left or right, or place it in its own paragraph.

5. Click 'Save changes' when you're done. Repeat this process for all your Adsense units.