• Online Newsgroups have a broad reach — over 10 million internet users read newsgroups
• Reach prospective customers
• Communicate with existing customers
• Conduct market research
• Can help build your image as an expert
• Increase traffic to your website
• Get feedback on marketing materials or product ideas
• Get answers to your questions

RESOURCES
Tile.net Reference Guide: http://www.tile.net
Interbulletin: http://news.interbulletin.com/
Newzbot: http://www.newzbot.com/

Mailing lists, newsgroups, and forums are online places where people meet, exchange information, disccus topics and disseminate knowledge.

These communities can be an effective way to get the word out about your product or service or just build business relationships that can help support you in growing your business.

1. Think about your purpose or goal: is it to inform people of changes to your site or sell them a product? Maybe you just want to make them think or laugh.

2. Know your audience. If you are using the newsletter to promote your products or services, what other information can you add to keep your readers interested?

3. Decide on your main topic—write it down.

• Keeps you in touch with past customers
• Reminds prospects and clients that you exist and have the ability to solve problems for them
• Let’s you advertise products/services you offer
• Builds your image as an expert
• Adds professionalism to a web site
• Implies longevity
• Builds a database of targeted customers
• Gets repeat visits to your site: Lets you tell subscribers about new updates to the site.
• Boosts repeat business
• Gives you the ability to show clients everything you can really do for them
• Builds a loyal base of "fans" who are ready to refer people to you or buy from you
• Builds brand image
• Saves you hundreds or thousands of dollars in design, printing and postage by producing your newsletter online instead of printing it or sending postcard reminders, etc.

With or without a web site, an email newsletter is a great way to keep in touch with prospects and improve on your web presence. Most email newsletters are often in a personal voice and are filled with customer-centered content. They also build credibility and trust. Generally, good etiquette requires an "Opt-In" policy for a newsletter—that is, no one is added to the mailing list unless they explicitly request it. An "Opt-Out" option should also be available for subscribers who find your services or information are not a good fit for them.

Once you select your keywords, make them truly effective by using them in more than the keyword META tag. Include your keywords in these places to improve your search engine positioning:

• Always include keywords in your content, preferably your first text paragraph as well as the Header (H1, H2) tags.
• Include your main keywords in your description meta as well as the TITLE tag of your page.
• Register a domain with your keyword phrase.
• Name your directories after your key phrases.
• Name page and graphic files after keywords (i.e. keyword.htm, keyword.gif)
• Use keywords in your image Alt text

• Brainstorm! Sit down for several minutes and write down whatever keywords or phrases come to mind. Ask family and friends or even clients what words and phrases they would use to find a product or service like yours.
• Use the long and short form of words, e.g. consult, consulting, and consultants.
• Look in the keywords META tags and page titles of other web sites. See what keywords your competitors use.
• Look at newsgroups, mailing lists, and discussion groups on similar subjects to make sure you haven’t missed any keywords.
• Do not forget misspelled words. People often misspell words when they enter their search terms.
• If you cater to a particular geographic area, remember to include that in your keyword list. Use your city, area code and zip codes to drive targetted traffic to your site.
• Research! Look at what people are actually searching for on the various engines and get more phrases for your list. Check the Keyword Popularity tools to help you do this. Remember that people often misspell words, use different word forms, and may be looking for a whole lot of different stuff all related to your products.