| HOW
TO MARKET YOUR SITE IN INTERNET
Creating a successful Internet presence involves
much more than designing a great web site or having
good product. Listing your web site with the Search
Engines is your first step; however, you must
not solely rely on the Search Engines to bring
you traffic. You must design a complete marketing
strategy and work it every day.
Developing Your Marketing Strategies
Your marketing strategy is essential part of
your success. Your plan
must include both short-term and long-term strategies
in order to
succeed.
Short term marketing strategies are those that
bring you a temporary
boost in traffic. Although these techniques are
very important to your
over-all plan, they are only a temporary traffic
source and must not be
solely relied upon.
Short-term marketing strategies include
mainly:
- online promotions
- offline promotions
- cross promoting
- purchasing advertising
- your own affiliate program
Long-term marketing strategies include:
- increase sales by building credibility
- create a mailing list
- quality content
- up-graduate your education
By creating and implementing a balanced marketing
strategy, using
both short-term and long-term strategies, you
will drive a steady
stream of targeted traffic to your website. If
you use this simple formula when creating your
Internet marketing strategy, you can literally
guarantee your
success.
Once you've implemented your promotional strategy
and continuously work it each day, you'll be amazed
with the results of your efforts. Consistency
will be the key to driving massive traffic to
your site.
Online Promotions
If you're launching a new web site, your first
step will be to submit your site to the Search
Engines and Directories. No matter how wonderful
your site may be, or how good of a domain name
you may have, if you do not promote your site,
it will fail. Submitting your site to search engines
is the best way to promote it without spending
a lot of money on advertising.
Although there are many auto-submission software
programs available on the Internet, make sure
you manually submit your site to the main Search
Engines and Directories: Yahoo, Google,
DMOZ, Alta Vista, Lycos, Hotbot
Note that:
1. Just submitting your web site to the major
search engines is not sufficient to get a good
ranking. Make sure your web site is correctly
optimized before you do your submissions.
2. Getting massive amounts of traffic doesn't
guarantee sales. Your web site copy must pull
your visitors through the page for them to take
action. Get others to read your copy and ask for
their opinions.
3. To achieve higher rankings (and therefore more
traffic) in the search engines, you need to continually
refine your web site. Monitor your web site rankings
and if necessary, adjust the keywords in your
meta tags and web site copy.
4. Search engines should be only one of your marketing
strategies. One week you could be at the top of
a search engine, the next week your site may disappear.
Therefore don't just rely on traffic from the
search engines, but use other methods to drive
traffic to your site.
Offline Promotions
Promoting your web site offline is another great
way to increase your traffic.
Place ads in newspapers, magazines, on the radio,
or on TV.
Promotional Exchanges
Cross promoting is a powerful technique used
by many Internet marketers to increase the exposure
of their products, services or publications. You
simply decide what type of promotional exchange
you would be interested in and contact fellow
marketers to discuss an exchange.
The most effective technique used in cross promotions
is recommendations. By providing each other with
a personal recommendation you can increase your
response rates tremendously.
Purchasing Advertising
If you really want to build your business online,
you must be willing to
invest a portion of your profits back into your
business. There are
several advertising opportunities available on
the Internet that will
enable you to purchase targeted advertising very
reasonably.
-Paying For Traffic
If you've been struggling with your website traffic
and your sales
aren't what you had hoped for, then maybe it's
time to start paying for
traffic.
Pay-per-click Search Engines provide an extremely
effective means of
obtaining highly targeted traffic to your website.
The concept is simple.
You bid on targeted keywords for as little as
.001 per click and receive
targeted traffic to your website.
Goto.com
The most popular and probably most effective pay-per-click
Search
Engine is Goto.com. Although the minimum bid at
Goto.com is now 5
cents per click, if you have strategically designed
your website to sell,
then paying only a nickel per visitor will be
well worth the investment.
The key to using this technique effectively is
to focus on one specific
product and select highly targeted keywords. This
will help you to
weed out all of the window shoppers and attract
your specific target
audience.
Viewing Search Terms
Most pay-per-click Search Engines will enable
you to view exact
"search terms" that have been used to
perform searches. Use this to
your advantage. You can find out exactly what
"search terms" are being used for your
target market and place your bids accordingly.
Try
to create a list of as many relevant keywords
as possible. The more
keywords you bid on, the more traffic you'll receive.
When bidding on keywords, keep in mind that in
order to be
successful, you don't have to be listed at the
top. Although receiving a
listing in the top three positions will produce
major traffic through
Goto.com, most of the time, you must have a large
advertising budget
to compete.
Reviewing Your Reports
Once your campaign begins, make sure you take
the time to review
the reports provided by the pay-per-click services.
These reports will
provide you with information in regard to how
well each of your
keywords are performing and enable you to adjust
your keywords or
change your bids accordin
To increase your traffic even further, don't just
stop with one pay-perclick
Search Engine -- try several at time. The more
streams of traffic
flowing to your site, the better.
Here is a list of some of the top pay-per-click
Search Engines:
http://www.Goto.com
http://www.Bay9.com
http://www.Win4win.com
http://www.Findwhat.com
If you're serious about your business and you're
ready to drive a
stampede of targeted traffic to your website,
then give the pay-perclick Search Engines a try.
They're well worth the small investment.
Your Own Affiliate Program
If you're marketing your own product on the Internet,
you can
dramatically increase your sales with an affiliate
program.
An Affiliate program will enable you to recruit
an unlimited number of
individuals to sell your products. The key to
obtaining affiliates is to
offer a nice commission for each sale. The higher
the commissions, the
more affiliates you'll recruit.
There are thousands of affiliate programs on the
Internet. In order to
be successful you must sell your affiliate program
just like your
product. In other words, your affiliate letter
should be written like a
sales letter. You must persuade your visitors
to join your affiliate
program by packing your affiliate sales letter
with benefits. Tell them
exactly what your affiliate program will do for
them, how much
commission they will receive and make the sign-up
process simple.
One Tier Verses Two Tier
One tier affiliate programs pay commissions on
one level. For each
sale an affiliate makes, they will receive a commission.
For example, if
you offer your affiliates 30% commission and your
product sells for
$39.99, for every sale your affiliate makes, they
will receive a $12
commission.
Two tier affiliate programs pay commissions on
two levels. Affiliates
will receive a commission for each sale they make
and for each sale
their recruits make. Two tier affiliate programs
usually divide the
commissions over the two levels. For example,
if you want to give your
affiliates a total of 30% commission for each
sale, you would offer
20% commission on their first level sales and
an extra 10%
commission for second level sales. If your affiliate
makes a $39.99
sale, they would receive a $8 commission. If one
of their recruits
makes a sale, they would receive an additional
$4 commission.
Increasing Affiliate Sales
Nobody knows more about your product than you
do. Provide your
affiliates with banners, sample ads, articles
or anything that will assist
them in making sales.
To further increase sales, create an ebook that
is directed towards
your target audience and allow it to be freely
distributed. This ebook
should be packed with valuable information and,
at the same time,
used as a sales tool for your product. Customize
a copy of your ebook
for each of your affiliates and allow them to
freely distribute it. You
can customize the ebooks yourself or purchase
an ebook compiler that
enables your affiliates to customize your ebook
themselves. Not all compilers will allow customizations.
To keep your affiliates motivated, set up an
opt-in list to enable them
to subscribe and receive new promotional methods,
sales letters and
articles to assist them in making more sales.
This will not only increase
their sales, but it will also enable you to keep
in contact with your
affiliates and introduce new products.
Take your time and select the best affiliate
option for your business. If
you're just starting out, you may want to use
one of the third party
affiliate companies, as this is the easiest route.
You won't have to
worry about anything, as everything is taken care
of for you. This will enable you to concentrate
on making more sales and developing new
products.
Increase Sales by Building Credibility
The Internet has opened a whole New World of
information and
opportunity for all of us. However, it has also
created a breeding
ground for scam artists. For this reason, many
Internet users are very
reluctant to share their personal information
and order products
online.
As an Internet entrepreneur, it is your personal
responsibility to
ensure that your visitors feel very comfortable
with you and your
website. In order to gain your visitor's trust
and confidence, you must
build your credibility.
Domain Name
In order to establish credibility, you must be
willing to invest in your
own domain name and professional web hosting.
Websites hosted on
free servers are not taken seriously and will
suffer a serious loss of
business. Your visitors may feel that if you don't
have your own
domain, you may not be a credible company. They'll
simply take their
business elsewhere.
Contact Information
Provide your visitors with your complete contact
information. This
information should include your "real"
postal address and not a Post
Office box number. A business that hides behind
a PO box loses
credibility. It's perfectly acceptable to use
a PO box as long as you also
include your postal address.
Create a page to add to your website called "about"
and include all of
the following:
-A personal or professional biography
-A photograph of yourself -A complete description
of you and/or your company
-Your website and/or company objectives
-Your name, address, phone number and email address
It is very important that you include an "about"
page, especially if
you're selling a product or service. You must
do everything in your
power to put your visitor's mind at ease.
Privacy Statement
Internet users are becoming more and more concerned
with their
privacy. Create a page on your website called
"privacy" and let your
visitors know exactly how you will be using the
information you collect.Testimonials
Another great way to build your credibility is
to display your customer
testimonials. Include your customer's name, email
address and web
address with each unsolicited testimonial to increase
believability.
Feedback
Many times, potential customers will have questions
in regard to your
products and services. Create a page on your website
called
"feedback" and place a form on this
page to enable your visitors to
contact you. It is very important that you answer
these questions as
quickly as possible. Your personal response to
your potential customers can literally determine
whether or not you're going to make
a sale.
A feedback form will also enable you to gather
testimonials and
receive suggestions to assist you in improving
your website, products
or services.
Secure Server
If you're processing your customer's orders online,
you must place
your order form on a secure server. This will
protect your customer's
personal information, while at the same time,
provides your customers
with added confidence in placing an order with
you. In addition, make sure you
let your visitors know that their information
will be processed
on a secure server.
By taking the time to build your credibility with
your visitors, you will
increase your Internet sales considerably.
Customer Follow Up
Following up with your customer, once you've made
a sale, is an
important part of providing good customer service.
Not only is it an
important part of developing a good relationship
with your customer,
but it will also enable you to introduce
your new products. Although sending out a personal
message to each of your ustomers
may not be possible, you can provide your customers
with the illusion
that your message was personally sent. By using
autoresponders, you
can eliminate the need to manually respond, each
time you make a
sale.
Autoresponders
Autoresponders are one of the best promotional
tools on the Internet.
They were designed to automatically respond to
any email message
sent to it with an automatic response. The more
advanced
autoresponders will enable you to set up a series
of autoresponse messages to besent out at a specified
time.
You can use autoresponders to send all of the
following:
-Thank you messages
-Welcome letters
-Order confirmations
Autoresponders can eliminate many of your routine
follow-ups.
However, they cannot eliminate your customer's
support requests and
your future mailings.
Customer Service
In order to develop a good relationship with your
customers, you must providethem with quality customer
service. Let them know that,
should they have any questions or problems, they
are free to contact
you. Provide them with all of your contact information
to make the
process simple. Even if you can't personally assist
them, make sure
that you have a good customer support group ready
to help. Reply to
their support requests as quickly as possible
and assist them until the
problem is resolved.
Your customer service is one of the most important
factors in
determining your customer's satisfaction. Even
if you have a great
product or service, if your customer support isn't
good, your sales will suffer. For every dissatisfied
customer, you can expect to lose one hundred
new customers. Why? When one customer has a bad
experience with
your company, you can be certain that they'll
tell everyone they know
about their bad experience. It will travel through
the grapevine and
ultimately cost you sales.
Follow-up with your customers and ask them how
they like your
product or if they have any questions. This is
a great way to not only
provide good customer service, but to also obtain
feedback about your
product. By listening to your customers, you will
know exactly what they want,what they're having
problems with and how you can
develop a better product.
Mailing List
The best way to follow-up with your customers
is to set up a mailing
list. No matter what mailing program you use,
make sure that it will
allow you to send personalized messages. Your
customers need that
personal touch. They don't want to feel as if
the message they
received was sent to an entire list. They want
to feel as if it was
personally sent to them.
By following up with your customers and providing
great customer service, you are creating a life-long
relationship. Satisfied customers
are more apt to purchase your new products in
the future. Treat them
with the utmost respect and go above and beyond
the expected.
Building Your Subscriber Base
There are many powerful ways to build your subscriber
base. However,
for this article, we will only focus on the "best"
ways.
Your Website
1. Place a subscription box on every page of your
website. Make sure you
don't overlook this powerful means of gaining
new subscribers. Your
visitors will enter your website from many other
pages other than your main page. They may never
even visit your main page, so make sure
your subscription box is visible on every page
of your website.
Incentive Subscriptions
2.This powerful means of obtaining subscribers
entails offering your
visitors a free gift in return for their subscription.
This free gift may be
a free ebook, software, or report. This method
of obtaining new
subscribers will increase your subscription rate
immensely.
Download free ebooks that you may use as incentives
here:
3. Writing Articles
Write informative articles and allow them to be
freely published. Bywriting articles, you can
significantly increase your subscriptions. The
key to using this method effectively is to include
your subscription
information within your bylines.
Quality Content
In order to create a steady stream of traffic
to your website, you must
give your visitors a reason to visit and continue
to visit in the future.
That’s why you must provide your visitors with
fresh content on a continual basis.
And don’t forget that your attitude is the MOST
important factor in determining your
Success
Up-graduate your education
One of the main factors determinating your success
is the time you spend on your education. Internet
users are starving for information, as that is
what the Internetis all about. They have a sincere
desire to learn and want the information they
desire right now. Do not look on up-grading your
education with “easy hart”, because it can literarily
signify the difference between your success and
failure.
*By publications of Shelley Lowery.
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