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T h e C o m p u t e r M a s t e r s . c o m |
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You have decided that you need a web site. What next? There are some decisions you need to make, and this Web Site Primer can help you make them. It's not everything you need to know, but we cover a lot of ground in a very little space!
How do I get people to come to my site? You need to decide the purpose of your site, and how it fits into your overall marketing program. Is the web site the end result of your marketing, or is it another tool that supplements other marketing efforts? Do you want your existing marketing to drive people to the web site where they will find additional information, or place an order? Will the web site be used to make the phone ring in the sales office, or replace your sales force? Do you want existing customers to go there for customer service or prospects to go there for product information? There are many ways to market a web site. One is to register with search engines. This traditionally free and easy method of marketing has pros and cons. First, when a prospect does a search for what you offer, they may or may not find you using the search criteria. Second, they will surely find all of your competition that did a better job registering with the engines. Search engines are no longer easy to register with, and the big 10, which account for 96% of all searches, are no longer free for high placement. Luck of the draw may take you to the top of the list, but it really takes $200-300 per search engine just to get noticed, and considerably more if you want great placement. A key to free placement on the search engines is having a good "title" (what appears on the blue bar at the top of a web browser), and having good "key words." Keywords are embedded into the html (hypertext markup language) code that makes up your web site. A good web site developer can place your keywords on your site, and place a different set of keywords on each page of the site. This doesn't guarantee top placement, but will get you further than having no keywords at all. Driving traffic to your web site is like any other marketing program. Just as you put your phone number on everything you send out or on all of your display or media advertising, you must put your web site address on it, too. Using direct mail, for instance, you can add a line that says: "For more information log onto our web site..." Or, your advertisement may be entirely web centric: "www.mycompany.com is the only place to get these products at prices you can afford..." An e-mail campaign can be used effectively to drive prospects to your web site. E-mail lists are available for sale, or you can subscribe to a mailing list service (call a ListServ) to reach thousands of people at once. You can do a low-key e-mail campaign to existing clients and prospects with a questionnaire that requests information, including e-mail addresses, or asks them to log onto your website to fill out the questionnaire. How about putting your web site address on the rear window of your car? Or, as one client does, his advertising is designed to make the phone ring. He asks prospects to log onto his website while they are talking on the phone together. There he makes his sales presentation, and asks them to fill out an application for a mortgage. One easy stop. Be as creative in marketing your web site as you are for all of the rest of your marketing needs.
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Computer Masters "The Only Computer Service You Will Ever Need!"
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