Modify Your Company Description to Add Rich Text & Formatting

A complete company description on Tradeloop increases your credibility with other dealers and your visibility to search engines. With the new Rich Text Formatting (RTF) option, you can now make your company decription more visually appealing as well.

The RTF options let you format your description using:

• Bold text
• Italics
• Underlining
• Ordered and unordered lists
• Text colors
• And more....

Here's how the new Company Description text box appears when you edit/update your Member Profile:

The RTF options let you format your description using:

• Bold text
• Italics
• Underlining
• Ordered and unordered lists
• Text colors
• And more....

Consider the display differences between these two profiles:

JJ Smith & Associates is a leading global supplier of refurbished equipment, off-lease IT hardware, and technical services. We're headquartered in Nashville, TN and specialize in products from leading OEMs including Sun, Cisco, HP, Nortel, Lucent, and EMC. We maintain an in-stock inventory averaging more than $20 million and offer same-day shipping on most orders. Contact us today for pricing and information or visit our Web site at JJSmithAndAssociatesEquipmentSales.com

This version is much easier to read with formatting added:

JJ Smith & Associates is a leading global supplier of refurbished equipment, off-lease IT hardware, and technical services. We're headquartered in Nashville, TN and specialize in products from leading OEMs including:

• Sun
• Cisco
• HP
• Nortel
• Lucent
• EMC.
  

We maintain an in-stock inventory averaging more than $20 million and offer free, same-day shipping on most orders. Contact us today for pricing and information or visit our Web site at JJSmithAndAssociatesEquipmentSales.com

Read more tips on how to create a good company description and then consider updating your company description information to make it more useful to other dealers and search engines. Edit your account information at your Edit Profiles page.

Have you tried the new formatting options? What do you think? Share your opinion here at the member blog.

Let Search Engines Index Your Retail Inventory Listings

Use Tradeloop's End User program to expand your retail customer base and increase your company's visibility to online searchers. The program gives our wholesale dealers a way to market their products to end users at retail prices. With the End User program, you can post your retail stock lists for sale to end users and receive sales leads from public users.

As an added benefit, Google and other search engines index your retail inventory listings so they display in search results. This helps you promote your products to anyone searching the Internet - not just those searching at Tradeloop.

The End User program is available to all Tradeloop wholesale members and set-up is free. You only pay when a searcher clicks on your listing and visits your profile. Learn more about the End User program's options, features, and benefits:

• Program Details
• Frequently Asked Questions
  
• End User Setup Options
  

Remember: end users can only search inventory that's listed as part of Tradeloop's End User program; they never see wholesale prices. The End User program is a way to market your products to end users and retail prices without eroding the value of your wholesale pricing. At the same time, it increases your company's online presence. What a deal!

Use Tradeloop's Features & Options To Increase Search Engine Visibility

The online marketplace gets bigger and more complex every day, making it more difficult for companies to stand out from the competition in search rank and search results in Google and other popular search engines. Many companies pay thousands of dollars to search engine specialists to gain better visibility among searchers.

But, consider this: your Tradeloop membership already includes many excellent opportunities to boost your search engine rank. You just have to take advantage of them.

• Display your inventory to the public. Allow your parts lists to be indexed by search engines. When you participate in Tradeloop's End User program, your parts lists are available to searchers on Google and other search sites.
  
  
• Write a good company profile. In many cases, carefully-written, keyword-rich Tradeloop company profiles appear in the top ten of Google search results. There's a limit of 4,000 characters, but that's more than enough to accurately describe your company and its products and services.
  
  A complete, descriptive company profile helps boost your credibility on Tradeloop as well. That's often the only information a prospective buyer or seller has about a new company. Making a good first impression is important because customers have a lot of options: give them an incentive to call your first!
  
  
• Select the "Public" option for Broadcast messages. "Public" Broadcasts get indexed by search engine spiders and display in search results pages. So the information in your Broadcast appears in the search results when a prospective buyer searches on a particular part number or product name you've listed in a public Broadcast.
  
  Of course, there are times when you want to keep Broadcast information private, and we offer that option as well. You can choose either option when you create a Broadcast message.
  
  
• Add a custom signature to your Broadcast messages. If you're sending a public Broadcast, the signature information will get indexed as well. Naturally, your signature should include your name and contact information, but there's also room to include a pithy, keyword-rich description of your company.
  
  It shouldn't be as complete as your Tradeloop company profile description. However, a sentence or two that includes your company name and a brief description of your products and services is a good way to attract buyers. It also gives you a little boost in search engine ranking algorithms.
  
  
• Sign up for Tradeloop's Ethics Seal Program. Our Ethics Seal program helps improve conversions. Studies of online behavior have shown that buyers look for third-party trust marks and tend to buy more from companies that display them.
  
  When you join Tradeloop's Ethics Seal program, you get to display Tradeloop's Ethics Seal. When a visitor clicks on that seal, he's taken to a customized Ethics Seal verification page that talks about your company (not Tradeloop) and includes a link to your Web site. That external link from Tradeloop to your Web site helps boost your site's relevance in many search engine ranking algorithms.
  
  
• Let us write about your company for the Tradeloop blog. We profile one member company per month and feature a quote from that profile article on the Tradeloop home page, along with a link to your company profile. The information you provide for the article appears on the Tradeloop blog and is indexed by search engines. It increases both your online visibility and credibility.
  
  A company profile article is a free, fun, and great way to introduce your company to the Tradeloop community. Just contact Customer Service and ask to be put on the waiting list.
  

The best thing about these options is that there's no technical expertise required! You just have to take a little extra time to make sure you include important information in your Broadcasts, member profile, etc. Like most good search engine positioning strategies, these techniques help you appeal to both search engines and human buyers and sellers.

And every single one is available to you at no extra charge because they're already part of your Tradeloop membership.

Tradeloop Protects Wholesale Pricing Information and Offers Flexible Marketing Options to Members

When Google crawls through Tradeloop's site, how much information does it find about your company? That's up to you. We let Tradeloop members decide how much of their part and Broadcast information gets indexed.

And, no matter what option you choose, your wholesale prices are always hidden from non-members and end users.

Only Tradeloop members can view parts lists with wholesale prices, and membership is limited to dealers whose company information has been validated by Tradeloop. You have to be logged in to view wholesale prices and dealer contact information. That requirement protects wholesale pricing data because the search engine spiders that index the site can't log in.

But, while you want to keep wholesale prices hidden from the general public, it doesn't make sense to hide retail information from search engines.

That's why we introduced the End User program. You can sell to end users at retail prices without them ever seeing your wholesale prices. Retail part and price information is always available to search engines because it helps bring new retail customers to your company.

You can also decide whether to hide your Broadcast messages from non-members by choosing either the private or public option for Broadcasts. The "Public" option, makes Broadcasts available to search engines and the general public. Keep Broadcasts "Private," and only members see the information. The Public and Private options are on the "Create a Broadcast" page in the "Select a Style" section.

Both the End User program and Broadcast options give you control over how much information is publicly available. However, there are other ways that Tradeloop membership increases your online visibility – and they have nothing to do with pricing.

· Company profile information is indexed by search engines and often appears near the top of Google search results. Learn more about creating a good, search engine-friendly company profile.
· Tradeloop's Trust Seal tells buyers that your company is actively involved in the industry and trustworthy to do business with. When a buyer clicks on the Trust Seal, the information on the certification page is about your company, not Tradeloop.

These features and options help protect the value of the wholesale market and give our members the flexibility they need to offer their products and services to a wide variety of markets and buyers.

How A Good Company Profile Can Boost Your Search Engine Visibility

Tradeloop membership is limited to dealers, and wholesale prices are hidden from the public. However, Tradeloop members can make some information available to the public by choosing to make their Broadcasts public. Another option is to participate in the End User program that displays retail pricing to public users.

One benefit of the End User program is that it increases your company visibility on search engines by making your company information available to search engine spiders. The spiders index your company description and display it to Web searchers. In many cases, carefully-written, keyword-rich Tradeloop company profiles appear in the top ten of Google search results.

A good company description answers three questions:

1. Who are you? Briefly describe your company and its business focus.
2. What do you sell? Explain what products and/or services you specialize in. Be complete and use manufacturer names and your targeted keywords. For instances, if you sell "used disk drives" and specialize in certain OEMs, be sure to mention it. Those are terms that Web searchers will use to find you.
3. Why should I buy from you? Emphasize the qualities that make your company stand out from the crowd. Maybe you offer 24-hour phone support, extended warranties, or free shipping.

Also, check to make sure you've selected the most accurate Business Type in the Company Information section. That, along with your company's name and location appears in the title section of the browser. See how yours looks by going to your Company Profile page and looking at the very top bar of your browser window.

A complete company profile gives you added credibility with fellow Tradeloop members too. It's often the first impression members have of your company, so write carefully and put your best foot forward.

There's a limit of 4,000 characters, but that should be plenty. This entire blog post is only about half that!

New Privacy Option on Broadcast Messages

We've added a new message privacy option to the Broadcast page. Now, you can choose whether to keep your Broadcast "Private," (only dealers can see it) or you can select the "Public" option to make the Broadcast message contents available to search engines and to public users.

Previously, only "Premium Broadcasts" displayed to the public, while "Regular Broadcasts" were member-only messages.Now, members have the option to make either type of message public or private.Now, there's no extra fee required if you'd like your broadcast message to display to public and search engine users. Note: the "Public" option doesn't display wholesale pricing information. Only Tradeloop members can view prices - unless you're part of Tradeloop's End User program that displays retail prices to end users.

We made this change for two reasons: to give more options to Tradeloop members and to protect members' privacy.

Even though public users could only see the first 100 characters of Premium messages, sometimes the member's name or company name showed up in that content. We added the search engine privacy option to protect members' privacy by letting them to completely hide the broadcast body from the public.

Of course, many Tradeloop members are anxious to have their Broadcast messages picked up and indexed by search engines.This helps increase your overall company visibility and credibility on the Web. Previously, the only way to do this was with a Premium Broadcast message – which meant paying a nominal fee to send your message.

The Public and Private options are on the "Create a Broadcast" page in the "Select a Style" section.