The world of the online merchant is identical to the brick and mortar shop owner in one important way. You can rearrange the racks and get exciting new inventory, but if nobody comes through the door to notice then it's all for naught. The analogous online shop can rearrange categories and have the highest quality product images around, but if your website address is lost in the vast sea of competitors then it was hardly worth all of that time and money spent setting it up.

This is why online marketing, although still in its infancy as a profession, has become a critical component of competing in the digital age. The advertising component of marketing was once strongly rooted in print ads and direct mail. Today email campaigns, Google Adwords and social networking are a full time job for marketing professionals like me. Online marketing is becoming standard across industries. It has also become a great equalizer. Tiny companies can now compete with the giants just by nurturing and promoting their online presence.

The first place most start is Google Adwords. It's a real beast to master, but incredibly important. In 2001 Google was added to the English dictionary as a verb. We must accept that the majority of the world is now Googling. Undoubtedly, you want to be there if a customer is looking for you, your product or your service online. So let's look at how Google Adwords can make that happen. Companies use keywords, text ads and graphic ads to advertise both in the standard Google search listings and in the Google network. The Google network is an enormous group of websites that allow advertisements to appear on their pages. These website owners have signed up for Google AdSense in hopes of making a small percentage. They are paid each time one of their visitors clicks on an ad that's shown on their page. Ads are chosen for their site based on how well its content matches the keywords associated with your ad. Let’s say you own a jewelry store. Your ads would be placed on sites associated with jewelry in some way.

Let's break it down further. We’ve determined that you own a jewelry store. You decide to bid on the keyword phrase humboldt jewelry. First thing to realize is that if you choose to bid on the words humboldt jewelry without quotation marks it's considered a broad search. It will match searches done for your keywords in any order and any context (ie. jewelry store robbed in humboldt). If you put it in quotation marks, "humboldt jewelry", it will look for a phrase match. The search must contain those specific words, like in the broad search, but must be in the order you've specified (ie. who wears humboldt jewelry?). If you put it in brackets, [humboldt jewelry], it will match searches for your keywords only and in the order specified (ie. humboldt jewelry).

It can all seem a bit overwhelming, but when you consider that there are millions of searches done through Google every month it becomes clear why you would want to try to match your customer's search as closely as possible. As an exercise, I googled humboldt jewelry. Guess what. Nobody is bidding on that combination of keywords. The only sponsored link was for HSN because their enormous budget allows them to bid high dollar amounts on anything containing the word jewelry. This means that if you were to bid a tiny amount your ad would show up higher than HSN! Why? You are bidding on something specific or targeted that nobody else has yet. If someone is coming into Humboldt from out of town and wants to know where to get some great humboldt jewelry they would find yours right on top in the pretty beige box. Google yourself, your business and words associated with your business. I guarantee there is a lot to be learned and much opportunity to be had.

After spending nine of the best years of my life in Humboldt I fondly recall living behind the redwood curtain. At the time, I would not have even thought to jump into the world of Google Adwords. Now that I am on the other side of the treeline I look for my Humboldt breathren out in the virtual world and I do not see you. The more your business can grow, the more that can be put back into the community. By taking the time to explore a powerful advertising tool such as Google Adwords you may find some new and exciting ways to let people know you’re out there.

For a more indepth look into Google Adwords I would strongly recommend the ‘Ultimate Guide to Google Adwords’ an Entrepreneur Magazine book by Perry Marshall and Bryan Todd. I also recommend membership in the Redwood Technology Consortium (www.redwoodtech.org); it’s a great way to meet other Northcoast technology professionals (whether you live there or not)!

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Theresa (Teri) Corley is the Sr. Marketing Director for TubeTape.com, Inc., an online distributor of photo & video equipment in El Dorado Hills, CA. She is also a member of the Redwood Technology Consortium.

Copyright 2010, Eureka Times-Standard Newspaper. The print version of this article first appeared in the 6/17/10 edition of the Times Standard.