How to use Images Online and How to find Free Images

As a contractor you know how important it is to make your work visually appealing. This is true about all your online marketing, from your website to your blog and your email newsletters and more.

The internet is a very visual medium that is becoming more and more visual with the advent of broadband and mobile web apps. The web is becoming more like your TV.

So if your websites lacks pizazz you can actually make it spiffier FOR FREE - just grab some videos from YouTube.com and photos from Flickr.com or similar sites. 

How to Use Images for your Online Marketing:
1) Each page on your website should have at least ONE IMAGE (photo, graphic, or video)
2) Each blog entry should have at least ONE IMAGE (photo, graphic, or video)
3) Each email newsletter entry should have at least ONE IMAGE (photo or graphic).

So you may be a hobby photographer and you have lots of your own photos. Use them!

If not, where do you get the right images? Do NOT copy them from other websites, unless you have permission and then be sure to include the copyright information.

Or you can use the list below to find images that you can use at no cost.

How and Where to find FREE IMAGES


Free Stock Photo Websites:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://www.nrel.gov/data/pix/
http://images.fws.gov/
http://www.flickr.com/commons/



Image Search Tools:
http://images.google.com/
http://www.google.com/advanced_image_search
http://pixsy.com/
http://www.picsearch.com/
http://www.sxc.hu/

If you know of any other great collections of free images please let us know.

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Do I need SEO?

Do I need Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

Do you already have a website? Did you know that nobody cares how slick your website is? What really matters is how your customers find your website!

A good ranking in the big search engines which brings more traffic to your website can be achieved through SEO.

The ways that you can optimize your website for search engines depend on the rules of the search engines. And these are constantly being rewritten.

What are these search engine rules? Lets just boil it down. There are only two things you really need to understand about search engine rules: content and popularity:

Content:
The text you write on your website. This text should be unique and relevant to your visitors. Write as much as you can about your goods and services, making sure your copy is easy to read. A blog can help you do this.

Popularity:
Search engines define your popularity based on the number of BACKLINKS you get. A backlink is a link from some other website to your website. Backlinks are weighted, so a backlink from a popular website is worth more than one from an less popular site. Whatever you do, get more backlinks!

It is a good investment to talk to an SEO Expert such as Kahl Consultants. They can help you to understand what SEO does and they can help optimize your site and improve your ranking.

Three Contractor Marketing Tips

Attention plumbers! Attention electricians! Attention HVAC pros...

You get the idea. Here are three marketing tips that are good for ALL contractors!


There are Many Marketing Avenues

Do not rely on only one avenue of marketing.

Market conditions keep changing, so you cannot rely solely on traditional marketing avenues such as the good old Yellow Pages or word of mouth networking anymore.


The Yellow Pages

Print Yellow Pages are not what they used to be. They have been taken over by internet search engines. But this can be good news for you!

Do you still run expensive yellow page ads? Be sure to stick only with the most popular yellow pages.

RENEGOTIATE! Call them up, tell them you are considering dropping your ad, and ask them to cut the price by at least 50%. If they don't do it then cancel your ad, and invest this money in online advertising.

Avoid online yellow pages! They are expensive and not very effective. Think about it... when was the last time you looked for something in a yellow page website? Most of us use search engines to find something online.


Repeat Customers

Find customers that will give you repeat business. For example, try to call on property managers or neighborhood associations. Give your customers a discount coupon that they can use the next time they call you.

Marketing Advice blog for Contractors by Kahl Consultants

Welcome contractors! We at Kahl Consultants want to show you valuable marketing information and give contractors tips on marketing both on the internet and in your local communities.

Our focus will be on the many small contractor firms who we have already assisted to market their services.

Kahl Consultants is a web services and internet consulting company based in San Rafael, California. Our clients are small business establishments, individual professionals and nonprofit organizations found in the San Francisco Bay Area and around the world.