E-commerce
Marketing Your Web Site
So you've got your web site up and running. Feels wonderful, doesn't it?
The masses should be arriving any moment now.
Well, don't hold your breath. As of April 2007, there are now more than 113,658,000 sites on the Internet! Google crossed the 8 billion pages indexed level in 2005. The masses aren't coming because they can't find you.
You need to market your website and market continously. This page contains numerous methods for marketing a website. You need to discover the methods that work best for you.
E-mail Marketing Techniques
Although commonly overlooked and discounted by most individuals and businesses, e-mail is the most effective and cost efficient way to drive traffic to a website.
E-mail Address - First and foremeost, your e-mail address should include your product, industry, or company name. Personal names and intials are for personal e-mail from friends and family.
Signature Files - Configure your e-mail software to use a signature file or tagline. Create a 4-5 line ad for your site which gets attention, gives a reason to visit and provides the web address.
Mailing Lists - Locate and join 1-2 two large e-mail discussion lists that your target market also subscribes to. You can locate lists at CataList.
Autoresponders - Automate customer inqueries. Use autoresponders to instantly mail out catalogs, price lists, sales materials to visitors.
Bulk E-mail - Use your customer database to email all your customers with email addresses monthly. Products like Campaign make the process easy. Check with your e-mail service first as they may have a policy or limitations against bulk e-mail.
World Wide Web Marketing Techniques
In addition to e-mail, there are several web marketing techniques that are highly effective. While time consuming, take the time to register with search engines and develop recipricol links.
Content - Put some real content on your site. Most commercial sites are "brochureware." Give visitors value-added information and lots of it! They'll come back and refer their friends.
Meta Tags - Ensure that all webpages include two <META> tags and a descriptive <TITLE> tag. One meta tag should include a list of keywords. The second meta tag should contain a keyword-loaded page description. Include keywords in the webpage title. The Arkansas SBDC offers a free Internet Marketing / Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tool. The SEO Tool performa a detailed analysis and reports both the results and recommendations.
Search Engines - Register your site with the major search engines and directories, such as Google and Open Directory. Don't forget MSN. Visit each site personally. Don't rely on submission websites.
Recipricol Links - Contact the webmaster at sites that you would like to link to yours. Offer to put a link to their site on your pages in exchange for a link from them to your pages.
Banner Exchanges - Join a banner exchange. Click4Click is one of the largest. You must agree to display other peoples banners on your website; in exchange, they agree to display your banners. Most exchanges will let you purchase additional banner displays.
Webrings - Join or create a WebRing. Webrings unite sites by a common theme and refer visitor traffic between member sites.
Post Cards - Add a virtual post card feature to your website. Your visitors will market your website for you everytime the send a friend a card from your site!
Web Logs (Blogs) - Add a blog feature to your website. each short blog entry generates an new page for inclusion in search engines. Some businesses have managed to get their customers to generate content for their blogs. The Arkansas SBDC offers a 3-hour Business Blogging seminar.
Off-line Marketing Techniques
Lastly, use every opportunity to market your website in your day-to-day operations.
Stationery - Put your e-mail and web addresses on all your printed materials: business cards, brochures, envelopes, boxes, bags, etc.
Fax cover sheets - Put your e-mail and web addresses on your fax cover sheets. In fact, put an offer to buy your product or service on your fax cover sheet with the web address of your order page!
Answering machines - Don't forget to mention your website and/or email address in your answering machine or voicemail welcome message. Let your customer know that while you are unavailable, the information they are seeking is on your website.
Paid Advertising - You paid good money for those newspaper and magazine ads. Put your web site in them. The same goes for Yellow Pages, radio, and television.
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