Fireshot allows you to take screenshots with a click of a button and mark up notes or changes on the page before saving and emailing. We ask our clients to use this plugin when communicating website changes to us. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5648/

Jing is similar in concept to Fireshot (above) but a mini-movie is created and a link emailed. Perfect for FAQ’s or training courses. http://www.techsmith.com/jing/

Xobni links in with your emails through Outlook and helps you find attachments, message threads and people’s contact details quickly and easily. http://www.xobni.com Read Full Post

Interested in how social media is taking over the world wide web? Have a look at this cool counter. Read Full Post

It was exciting to be told by a client today that their website was listed as the top Australian Corporate Mentoring Company in Australia based on SEO - scoring 77/100. We have worked hard with www.sfbc.com.au to get them good rankings on Business Coaching Sydney and other search terms. Now they offer coaching all over Australia and the USA so plenty more work to be done. Even linking them here on a key search phrase will get them some added points!  Read Full Post

Another busy week at CIMarketing as we launched 4 new sites. Check out Equip Office Furniture, Robin Hood Photo Competition and Back to Church Sunday. We also launched the first stage of The Peninsula School in Melbourne.

 Read Full Post

This week I'll be in Perth training up on a new system that is going to revolutionise our business and take our levels of service up a couple of levels. It will have a dramatic affect on our ability to deliver online marketing and online businesses fast and to the highest standards. More to come on that shortly. Last month we also had some new staff join the CIMarketing team. We welcomed Kenn - a legendary programmer and Sue, an experienced set of hands to help out in the Administration of all our jobs!

 Read Full Post

Mark Barrett of CIMarketing Sydney discusses the current marketing environment with the world's foremost marketing author, the number 1 single-authored blog writer according to Technorati, and the multi-time New York Times best-selling Author Seth Godin.

MB: You are a prolific blog writer and your posts are always a great read. Where do you get your inspiration for posts from?

Seth Godin: I notice things. Most people don’t spend the time to ask ‘why’ or ‘what if’ when they encounter something that doesn’t require immediate action. That’s all I do. I notice things.

MB: If our Australian Small Business readers only had enough money to buy one of your books, which one would you recommend to read and why?

Seth Godin: Unleashing the Ideavirus is free. So is the Bootstrapper’s Bible. After those two, I guess I’d say the new one, Linchpin, because it’s about the why, not the what. Read Full Post

Covenant Christian School's website and blogsite has been awarded a Gold Award in the 2009 School Marketing Awards. Covenant's Storyteller Neil Pierson was attending the Centre for Marketing Schools Aforia in Adelaide when the announcement was made.

Neil was naturally excited. "I am thrilled to have the website recognised in this way. Especially as the website was only re-launched in May 2008. As a Christian school I am glad we can do something which makes our community take notice. The whole campaign since i arrived at the school in February 2008 has been to encourage people to simply 'Take a Closer Look at Covenant'.

The most important thing is the website and blogsite are working for our own school community. The site helps our community know more about the amazing variety of events and achievements at Covenant. We are also generating enquiries for School Tours and requests for our School Tour on DVD.  Read Full Post

Like to know how to keep one eye on your industry quickly and easily. Simple. visit www.google.com/alerts
This is a free media monitor for you and your staff to use - how great are Google? Seriously.

 Simply sign up your web address, company name or industry phrases and get emails sent to you as soon as relevant content hits Google. Cool hey! You can also set it up to send alerts for certain websites only eg type "kevin rudd" site:news.com.au and you will only receive pages that include the term Kevin Rudd from the site www.news.com.au. There are tons of possibilities - stay on top of your competition, get industry news sent to you, manage your online company profile... what else? Read Full Post

A blog is an online journal. A blogger (author) contributes a post (article) and this is published onto the internet. Others will read the post, and may comment, share or re-post it to their own blog. RSS feeds (clever web technology) allow subscribers (other readers who like your blog) to sign up and get updated of any new posts you may publish in the future. There are millions of bloggers around the world.

For business, there are great opportunities to use blogs to (a) gain high search engine ranking, (b) increase brand awareness and (c) ultimately attract new customers and increase sales.

We think www.wordpress.com is a great tool to get started on blogging. You can use a free template once you sign up or get a web company to help you modify the stylesheet so it looks unique. Blogs allow for others to link to your content on their own blog and this “New Marketing” technique can snowball into something quite substantial rather quickly.

So how do you make your blog a success?  Read Full Post

In the old days, websites were created and then left for 3 years until our clients just couldn't stand looking at them anymore as they became out-of-date and tired. These days are over. Technology changes daily. In today's climate, your marketing strategy should be refined monthly. How does this relate to your web presence?

CIMarketing believe that web maintenance agreements are the way forward. They allow you to keep your site relevant, in line with your marketing strategy and appealing to Google's index. Phone use on (02) 9984 8605 to discuss how this can work for you. Read Full Post

We've had a few discussions around the office and here are 6 marketing trends we think you'll see in 2009.

1. Social Network Marketing to Increase

What is social networking? According to Bob Baker, author of MySpace Music Marketing, social networking success stories have one thing in common: "They’re all about the ping-pong effect ― It’s you sharing yourself with and getting to know dozens, and then perhaps hundreds of people. In turn, those people mention you to their friends."
 Read Full Post

Well it's good to be all back on deck. The Christmas break saw Vanessa holiday in New Zealand and Brazil, Kenton explore Korea and Canada and Mark celebrate New Year's in Times Square!

Everyone is refreshed and ready to make 2009 a great year!
Despite the continual negative news reports, we are determined to stay positive!  Read Full Post

There are many theories going around as to why some people are better at selling than others. Some may have a natural flair for sales while others may have spent years learning all different kinds of selling techniques to give them the edge in a competitive environment.  Read Full Post

A common complaint we hear from business owners is that their margins are shrinking because they are constantly lowering their prices in order to stay competitive. Read Full Post

  Read Full Post

In a lot of businesses your accountant would be right. In these businesses, marketing and advertising not only cost money, they cost too much money.
All too often money is spent on marketing and advertising in the hope that it will attract customers. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.  Read Full Post

So you want to have number 1 position on Google? Read Full Post

We have all seen or heard the certain soft drink advertisements proclaiming to the world that “Image is everything.”

Recently Rap Superstar Snoop Dogg was barred entry into Australia. John Howard said it was due to character concerns. It is no secret that Snoop Dogg has had a history of drug and firearm charges including one as recent as April this month. Read Full Post

Too many businesses are under the impression that they have to compete on price. The two biggest problems with this is that there will always be someone willing to do the job for cheaper than you and this method eats into your margins.

Most successful businesses do not compete on price. Read Full Post

Do you have a clearly defined target market with specific campaigns to reach them effectively? Read Full Post

It is not at all uncommon for a lot of business owners to be under the impression that marketing is running an ad in the Yellow Pages or local paper and once that’s achieved, it’s over and done with. Read Full Post

This is an important concept that many business owners and sales people don’t fully grasp. I have made it bold to emphasise the point. Read Full Post

An advertising campaign can be regarded as successful if it more than pays for itself. That being said, some are obviously better than others.

All too often you see businesses spending relatively large amounts of advertising money on attracting “the general public.” This is the most common and the least effective method of advertising. Read Full Post