The answer to this question is almost rhetorical, largely because the answer is obvious. If YOU aren't the expert in your marketplace, then you're nowhere. It's YOU that needs to be the one potential customers come to, and the only way to do this is to position yourself as the authority on the subject.
So how do we do that?
When we talk about the marketplace, we're largely referring to the online landscape, however, the more you are dominant online, the more you can become dominant offline.
More and more we are looking online when we want to research the credibility of a business. For instance, your car is in need of a service - how easy is it now to logon to the internet, and read 3 or 4 user reviews of local garages? The Yellow Pages has never offered this level of detail - you assumed that whoever had the largest advert on the page was the best. Now we no longer have to settle for those half-hearted assumptions.
So the key for our small business is to ensure we are represented accurately and positively online. A lot of this we can have some control over, however the majority we do not. The main areas we refer to here are social media and review sites i.e. any site that allows a user to set up their own account and basically write what they like (as long as it's not slanderous of course).
Twitter is a great example of this, and given it's real-time nature, it's crucial that you are a part of what's going on on the site, and you know what's being said about your brand. A simple search on http://search.twitter.com will help here, and enable you to nail the local landscape. With some creativity using a notification service such as Google Alerts, you can be the first at the scene anytime your brand or market is mentioned.
For more information on SEO and online marketing techniques, check out the 3dubs online marketing blog.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rob_T
