Marketing Your Website
The Internet is fast becoming the busiest business district the world has ever known. However, having a web site should be more than reproducing existing advertising. It should mean taking full advantage of the Internet's capability of interactive shopping and globally convenient access. Your web site can be the perfect showcase for people to obtain information about your company and products, an efficient way of communicating with your present clients, potential customers and an international marketplace to sell your products and services.
If you do not have an existing business, you should still look for ideas first in areas where you already have some expertise. If your current expertise does not seem to lend itself to an online business opportunity, your next plan should be to spend some significant time learning about the businesses already operating online. Once you have an understanding of what is available, look for ways to do the same things in a better way or look for a market niche that has not been serviced well. Keep in mind that there are almost always ways to improve upon existing services and products.
Your website is of little use to you if no one uses or visits it. Generally, your goal should be to generate traffic that will result in increased business. This means that using tricks to get more people to your site is probably not a good idea. It also means that paying for advertising that does not deliver targeted traffic is not an effective use of your advertising budget.
1. Use pay-per-click advertising rather than pay-per-impression advertising.
2. List your website in the top 10-20 search engines. The top search engines generate 90-95% of web searches, so paying for services that claim to add your site to thousands of search
engines is probably a waste of money.
3. Generate as much traffic as you can by trading links with companies whose content or products compliment those on your site.
4. One of the most important marketing tools for your website is located right on your own site. That is, the keywords and description you use on your site (in the Meta Tags) have a huge impact on your placement in search engines and the traffic you get from them.
5. Business cards and business literature - Every piece of literature, all print ads, business cards, yellow page ads, stationary and every email you write should contain your company's web address. It is now so common to do so that people will assume you do not have a web site, if they do not see it listed on your company literature.
6. Write articles for Internet newsletters - If you write well
you can get articles accepted in many online newsletters. When the article runs you will essentially be trading content (your article) for free advertising (your web address and email on the article).
In my opinion, the best aspects of marketing a product or service online are that start-up and operational costs are minimal and it is possible to access potential buyers at an unprecedented speed. What I mean by "speed" is that you can actually start earning income 24 hours after you launch your online business. And you can also test your advertising in a matter of days, whereas conventional media advertising takes months to conduct a single test.
If you do not have an existing business, you should still look for ideas first in areas where you already have some expertise. If your current expertise does not seem to lend itself to an online business opportunity, your next plan should be to spend some significant time learning about the businesses already operating online. Once you have an understanding of what is available, look for ways to do the same things in a better way or look for a market niche that has not been serviced well. Keep in mind that there are almost always ways to improve upon existing services and products.
Your website is of little use to you if no one uses or visits it. Generally, your goal should be to generate traffic that will result in increased business. This means that using tricks to get more people to your site is probably not a good idea. It also means that paying for advertising that does not deliver targeted traffic is not an effective use of your advertising budget.
1. Use pay-per-click advertising rather than pay-per-impression advertising.
2. List your website in the top 10-20 search engines. The top search engines generate 90-95% of web searches, so paying for services that claim to add your site to thousands of search
engines is probably a waste of money.
3. Generate as much traffic as you can by trading links with companies whose content or products compliment those on your site.
4. One of the most important marketing tools for your website is located right on your own site. That is, the keywords and description you use on your site (in the Meta Tags) have a huge impact on your placement in search engines and the traffic you get from them.
5. Business cards and business literature - Every piece of literature, all print ads, business cards, yellow page ads, stationary and every email you write should contain your company's web address. It is now so common to do so that people will assume you do not have a web site, if they do not see it listed on your company literature.
6. Write articles for Internet newsletters - If you write well
you can get articles accepted in many online newsletters. When the article runs you will essentially be trading content (your article) for free advertising (your web address and email on the article).
In my opinion, the best aspects of marketing a product or service online are that start-up and operational costs are minimal and it is possible to access potential buyers at an unprecedented speed. What I mean by "speed" is that you can actually start earning income 24 hours after you launch your online business. And you can also test your advertising in a matter of days, whereas conventional media advertising takes months to conduct a single test.
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