Your small business needs an
appealing and professional website but that is
just the beginning. If no one visits your website
and -- more importantly -- if it does not bring in
new customers and allows you to sell more to your
current customers, then your site is not
effective. What do you need to improve your online
marketing efforts?
The first step is to decide on a primary goal
for your website. Is it to directly sell products
or services through e-commerce? Or is the goal to
capture leads so you can follow-up and make the
sale by email and phone?
For e-commerce you need a website design with a
shopping cart system, that encourages people to
purchase products using the shopping cart. Both
the design and written content should maintain
this focus.
If your goal is to capture leads, the key is to
have the content that provides initial information
about your products and services that interests
prospective customers. It should be easy for the
prospective customer to fill out a contact form
and hit the submit button or call your 800-number.
The form should be submitted to a contact
management system such as Salesforce or SugarCRM.
Getting it Done
Your business needs a professional website,
which can cost between $2,000 -- $15,000 to
design. This is not only more than most small
businesses want to spend but also unnecessary to
succeed on the Web.
For small business there is usually little need
for an elaborate, expensive website. You can get
an appealing and professional website design for
as little as $250.
The key to a professional website design is to
work with a good designer who takes the time to
listen to you and translate your vision into an
effective website. Your designer must be as
skilled in listening as in design.
Once the site is completed there must be an
easy way for you - or someone on your behalf -- to
maintain the website. The designer should provide
you with an easy-to-use content management system
(CMS), enabling you to edit your website without
having to contact your designer. This saves you
money.
Once you have a professional website you have
the foundation for marketing online. You can build
on that foundation and use the Internet as an
effective marketing tool.
Search Engine Marketing
Search engine marketing can be divided into two
main categories: Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
and Pay Per Click (PPC).
Please do a search right now for
something pretty popular (e.g., coffee). The
results on the left side of the browser window
that reach down to the bottom of the page are the
organic search results. The top results are
generally the more popular sites. The highest
ranking sites are those sites that have the most
links from other websites (especially other high
ranking sites). In a sense, other people have
voted for the high ranking sites by linking to
them. Often, the high ranking sites are the most
popular but there is also a lot of gaming of the
system. You cannot, however, pay to
increase your site's ranking.
On the right side of your search results and,
sometimes, up at the top of the page are the
"Sponsored Links." These links are paid
advertising through a system called Adwords.
Look for the "Sponsored Links" heading and compare
how these links look with the non-sponsored
organic links.
Search Engine Optimization
To increase your search rankings in (and
other search engines), you can do a number of
things. We will focus on because of its
dominant position as a search engine.
The truth is that it is a crowded field out
there for most keywords. Your best bet is to find
some niche keywords and work on those. It would be
very difficult to achieve a high ranking for the
keyword "coffee" but if you have a more specific
niche you have a better chance of succeeding.
For example - and this is just an example for
illustration, not necessarily a good keyword
combination - "Guatemalan shade grown coffee"
would be an easier space in which to compete. You
would have a chance of rising to the top or at
least getting on the first page of results.
The primary way to increase your ranking is to
have other high ranking sites establish links to
your site and have those links associated with
specific keywords - such as "Guatemalan shade
grown coffee" as in our example. What follows is a
few ideas on how to do that in an ethically and
effective way. Don't be tempted by gimmicks
because and other search engines are
becoming more savvy, and can penalize sites that
try to game the system too much.
First, submit your site to as many directories
and other clearinghouse type sites in your
industry as you can. That should probably be your
first step in SEO. Again, use the keywords that
you are most interested in associating with your
site.
Submit your site to general directories that
are organized by topic. Some sites charge money
for fast consideration of your submission, and are
probably worth it. For example, Yahoo Directory
charges $300/year for expedited consideration of
your submission. For other highly prized
directories -- such as the Open Directory Project
-- you just have to submit your site and hope it
will be considered reasonably soon.
Next, talk to your vendors and people in
related industries and see about arranging for
link exchanges or perhaps even success stories
that include a link. They link to you and, in
exchange, you link to them.
Then start writing articles. The key to
articles is to write about something you know and
that has information that is genuinely interesting
to your audience. Publish your article in
publications that are related to your industry. If
your article is published in web publications, you
will not only get direct sales leads from your
article but your article will also help your
search engine position.
For example, our fictional coffee vendor could
write an article on exactly why shade grown coffee
is superior to non-shade grown coffee. Or, better
yet, why "Guatemalan Shade Grown Coffee" is truly
the best. The article would have to include facts
to support this claim and not just fluff. Maybe
the next article could be on how to make the
perfect cup of coffee. I would be first in line to
read that one.
The key thing to remember is that SEO is a long
process. You rarely get instant results. It can
take 8-12 months to see any significant progress.
You have to keep at it.
Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising
There are a number of PPC providers but we will
focus on Adwords as they are currently the
dominant PPC system.
First, you decide on the goal (called a
conversion) of your Adwords campaign. Is it a
direct sign-up? Is it capturing sales leads?
A conversion when the goal is achieved and
Adwords keeps a running tally of your
conversions and the cost per conversion. You can
see the cost of obtaining a lead or the cost of
getting a customer. You can determine if Adwords
is working for you, and whether you should make
adjustments or discontinue it completely.
Generally, it takes a bit of experimentation to
get it right but it can be a steady source of
business for you. It is worth some effort as once
it is set up well it runs and can bring in a
steady stream of business.
You set a daily budget (say $35) and a maximum
bid on specific keywords (say $2.75). You only pay
when someone clicks on your ad click. So if you
are bidding $2.75 you might only pay an average of
say $2.60 per click. It depends on the keywords
and how much you want to bid. Spend some time
choosing good keywords. Adwords has tools
to help you choose the most powerful keywords. You
will also need to embed some special code in your
website to enable to track conversions.
Adwords really works. Try it and see if
it will work for you. It does not require a big
investment to get started. In fact, some web
hosting and design companies offer a coupon so you
can get started with Adwords for free.
Adwords is easier to use than you might think.
Permission-Based E-mail Marketing
Spammers have given Email marketing a bad name
in much the same way that unethical salespeople
have given sales a bad name. This is unfortunate
as a knowledgeable salesperson can be an essential
part of making good buying decisions. The same is
true of good email marketing.
With permission-based email marketing - as
opposed to spam - the receiver of the email has
expressed interest. Think of spam as the wily
salesman in the polyester suit -- and think of
permission-based email as the knowledgeable
salesperson we respect.
For example, I am on an email list at a
bookstore that I frequent. I look forward to the
e-newsletters as they often have interesting
content and good discounts. I enjoy receiving this
e-newsletter and the bookstore gets more business
from me as a result. I rarely go anywhere else to
buy books. They have retained me as a customer and
I buy more often at least in part because of their
e-newsletter.
Email marketing can help you increase customer
retention and help you earn more revenue from each
customer by cross-selling and up-selling to your
current customer base. It can also help you expand
your client base.
Email marketing is becoming crucial to online
marketing and - when done ethically and well --
can be extremely effective. Sign up for a free
trial with an email marketing service and see if
it works for you. If not, try another service.
Find a service that meets your needs.
You can grow your own email newsletter list
with a sign up form on your website, and by asking
for opt-in in your sign-up and lead capture forms.
What to look for in an Email Marketing Provider
At a minimum an email marketing service should
make it easy for you to create eye-catching
emails, manage multiple email lists, and place
newsletter sign-up forms on your website. There
should be powerful list management, robust
reporting, and reliability. Your provider must
also have excellent customer service.
Your email marketing service should include an
easy way to track the results of your email
campaigns. Who opened your email, how many times,
and when? Did they click on the link you provided?
Did they purchase anything or submit a lead? The
service should enable you to track message reads
in real time, and read detailed reports online or
export them to a spreadsheet.
In addition, your email marketing service
should give you the ability to manage multiple
lists and divide lists into multiple segments.
Conclusion
Obtaining a website and marketing your products
or services online does not have to be expensive.
An economical way to accomplish these goals is to
hire a company to design your website and provide
you with bundled web hosting and permission-based
email marketing services. It would be an added
bonus if they can get you started using
Adwords with a free coupon.
