However, there is one solid prediction I can make about the new year.

Some Detroit businesses are about to experience their breakthrough year due to online marketing. I can make this prediction with complete confidence because it has happened every year since the rise of the digital economy, and I am going to be out there with you making it happen again in 2012.

More people come online every month, and the digital economy keeps rising to support all their activity. Whatever your business, you have the potential to use Internet marketing techniques to increase your revenue and reach.

Playing By the Numbers

Internet marketing is often a numbers game. A few minor tweaks can trigger a snowball that grows into an avalanche of new business.

A website might optimize its opt-in page and double email subscriptions. A month later, its online revenue may be up 75 percent. As its email team learns more about reselling to these customers, revenues over the next few months might double or treble from the email list.

Each improvement adds to those in the past when you are reading the numbers and making the right adjustments.

Internet Marketing Checkup 2012

Here are some ideas for upping your game in 2012 and achieving your breakthrough success.

Website

• Plan a design makeover
• Update your blog 
• Be sure you are collecting emails. 
• Improve the page that gets the most search engine traffic 

Email Opt In

• Run a split test to improve your opt ins. 
• Ask subscribers to forward your emails  
• Conduct a survey  
• Plan a new series 

Blog 

• Show office/family photos from the holidays 
• State your plans for the new year 
• Study your analytics to learn what resonates with visitors 

Social Media

• Review your strategy. Is it working?
• Commit to regular updates
• Make sure you are present where customers are
• Plan a contest 

Where to Start

Of course, there are dozens of directions you can go online, but you are dealing with limited resources, and it is challenging to pick the right paths without guidance. Many businesses fail to achieve their breakthrough goals because they keep rushing down a new path before the old one has had a chance of success.

Sign up for our FREE website consultation, and we can break it all down for you. We'll show you where your Internet marketing succeeds and where your efforts would be best applied for game changing results.

Best SEO Practices 2012

Speaking of game changers, Google shook up the rules last year in an effort to correct for link farms and content mills that were promoting poor content to the top of the results pages. You may be feeling the pinch too if your site is still using the outdated SEO strategies that Google now punishes.

Sign up for our FREE Newsletter and Download Best SEO Practices 2012 to get the latest information and be sure your site is not in danger of future reprisals.

Here's to your breakthrough success in 2012. Let's send a message from Detroit to the world that we are going to win online this year.