Among the more challenging obstacles I face converting the doe-eyed into social media disciples is their willful and often arbitrary belief that building a Web site has nothing to do with marketing their businesses online. Even worse, many believe that the only way to raise and influence brand awareness and sentiment respectively, is to pay for banner ads and pay-per-click (PPC) programs. In the eyes of many small business owners, the exercise in building a Web site is the objective itself – ultimately just ambiguous, inert and quickly forgotten. Read the rest of this entry »