The Silent Avatar Speaks

Evening all,

This post I want to bring you up to speed on what you should be doing when your website is finished,

I’ve always said that a website is nothing more than html code stuck in cyberspace unless you dive traffic to your site.

Given that there are over five and a half billion websites on the Internet and growing at an exponential rate, this figure is enough to scare the pants off any would be Internet merchant, or home entrepreneur.

There’s good reason that Alexa does not rank website unless they are in the top 1000,000 as below this you really aren’t getting enough traffic to warrant being part of their statistics. So unless you are considering throwing a LOT of money at advertising and branding, don’t worry about having a high ranking,

Your goal is to drive a steady stream of people to your website to give you an income, or increase your “authority status”, through your blog, articles and  comments posted back to your website.

To produce a website and not consider how it is to be marketed is just plain stupid.

The time money and effort to produce a website is for naught unless you promote your website.

So how do you promote your website?

This will depend on the type of website (which I will discuss later) but at the least all website owners should be doing the following:

1. Using their web address in all of their emails, along with their tag line.  I wrote about it using email signature sometime back. Review the post “Quick Tip – Using Email Signatures“.
2. Using their web address on all stationary – including business cards, letterheads, with compliment slips, invoices, brochures… In fact anywhere you can put your web address – put it! This includes all electronic stationary as well.
3. If you have a motor vehicle have a magnetic sign made to put on the side of your car (or if you’re really committed get the car sign-written with your website details. Driving around as much as we do this is a great way to advertise your website. Just think of how many people can see your mobile advertisement!
4. If you have a shopfront your web address should be clearly visible from the street.
5. If you have a product tag, your website address should be on the tags, labels, stickers (whatever)

It takes time for something new to sink into people’s consciousness. Repetition is the key. Whether you website name is reinforced through a variety of means doesn’t matter.

Let’s now look at specifics…

If you have a shopfront and your goal is to transfer more of your business to the Internet, with the view to be completely online, you are going to have to make what is an invisible “shop” visible.

The best place to start is with your current customers. My first line of attack would be to get their email addresses. Have something in your shop that they can fill in (and keep this as a record in case you get a spam complaint).  marketing to existing customers is one of the easiest ways to transfer shop front business to online business. And train your staff to ask!

Of course once you have their email addresses make good use of them!

If you are fully online and your goal is to bring traffic to your site (and really it is THE goal), you have a few options as to where to invest your energy (and money).

1. You can invest your time in posting content to your site. By content I mean articles, information, advice, blog posts, discussion boards. Adding content to your site will definitely increase it’s standing in the search results.  Increasing content of your site is not a once in a while thing. This needs to be done daily. DAILY. If you are not going to invest your time in doing this DAILY then you will have to partner it with another method as well. Someone out there in your genre is doing this and if you are not, you will fall behind them (and who knows how many others). Only those who are committed to doing this will succeed. In effect you become an “authority” site. By virtue of the amount of content on your site (which is “unique” – meaning you haven’t plagiarise it from someone else), you are adding information relative to your site keywords.
2. Undertake PPC Advertising. This can be an effective way for getting people to your site, however it soes require monitoring DAILY. The reason I say daily is that until you have some statistical data to analyse and see which days/times/keywords/geographical areas/times (Phew!) are being pulled to your website, you really are flying by the seat of your pants as to how to configure your campaign.By monitoring daily you will start to see trends emerge very quickly and can refine accordingly. It’s your money on the line and you need to keep an eye in it as it can get chewed up very quickly if your keywords are not targeted enough (or your landing page sucks!). I find the information which Google Analytics gathers from the small piece of code embedded in your site quite astonishing! The data is so comprehensive you would swear they knew what the site visitor had for breakfast!I would recommend “split testing” landing pages. That is half of your ads go to one landing page, and the other half of the clicks go to the alternate landing page. Sometimes simple adjustments in sales copy, or even colours, can me the difference between whether a “click” stays and buys, or exits.
3. Tell- A-Friend
   This script is a must on all websites no matter what they are. Viral marketing through site visitors inputting their friends email addresses just makes sense. Why wouldn’t you want your site visitors to tell others?  Once you have those “friends” email addresses, you can market to them. How easy is that?
4. Print Media is another effective way of getting your name out there, though my experience is is frightfully expensive. If you are in a “niche” where you specialise in a particular product or service, then go for the “specialist” publications relative to your website customer. To put advertisements in major newspapers or publications is like scattering seed to the wind. Your target site visitor is most likely only a fraction of the distribution of ther newspaper (and that’s if they all respond. Advertisements in small “niche” publications which already cater to your target customer are a far better bet statistically.
5. Newsletters always increase business. If you take some effort to prepare your newsletters and speak to your “customers/site visitors”, you will prepare your newsletters just like you would if you wre speaking to them.  Newsletters allow you to personalise the newsletter specifically to create a “bond” between the reader and the website.  Think about it… every time you get a personalised email it makes you feel as though the sender actually knows you and is writing tio you personally. Using first names is very powerful draw in newsletters and emails.If you are going to do a Newsletter, then work out your first 20 newsletters are going to be about. Depending n how much you can brainstorm out, you will get a fair idea how many newsletters you can put together. This will also determine the spacing of your newsletter. Try to offer no less than monthly newsletter. With emails sprinkled in between, the name will be in front of them at least once a week. This is helping establish repetition. Even glancing at the “from” and deleting it , their subconscious has been imprinted with the name.  And so builds repetition.But you don’t want them to delete the emails so you have to come up with a REALLY good subject heading with enough intrigue to get them to open it.One trick a lot of Internet marketers use is to include in the subject line …

   This open ended sentence naturally provokes curiosity and the email is opened.

   Of course the Newsletter has to have some compelling headlines, and eye catching pictures, maybe even a video. But essentially, a newsletter needs to engage the reader. Even a link from the newsletter to your website to complete a “Poll” will invoke additional traffic.  Always be thinking of ways to get people going back to your site.

   Polls always work because people like to give their opinion, and then see how it measures  up against the others who have also polled.  I guess it’s to see what is the “norm?

Look.. there is a ton of ways to promote your website. All require money, time and energy. Whatever you decide to do, be the best at it. Don’t dabble in this or that. Stay focused on what you have chosen to do to get your site to a position where you can effectively write your own paycheck. Advertisers will flock to you!

But above all remember why your website is there.

For your customers or readers. Everything you do should be with this in mind. Take care of the customers (or readers) and they will take care of you.

Please leave your comments,  or you may have tips of your own to share.

I’m the silent avatar.. and I have spoken
Sphinn

Tags: Advertising, Blogging, Business Tips, Internet Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Newsletters, Online Business, Promotion and Marketing, Traffic Generation, Web Development // Add Comment »