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SO_IVE_GOT_A_WEB_SITE_ _NOW_WHAT
| SO IVE GOT A WEB SITE - NOW WHAT?
SO I'VE GOT A WEB SITE - NOW WHAT?
by P J Chandler
Yesterday I was talking to the owner/editor of a local magazine
that has just ceased publication. When I asked what caused her
to pull the plug, she told me that advertising revenue had
fallen off lately. The commonest excuse given by local
businesses when she approached them for advertising space was,
"We don't need to advertise because we have a web site!"
Setting up a web site is a lot like opening a shop in an
unfashionable suburb of a small town in the middle of a desert.
Unless you tell people about it and give them a good reason to
call by, nobody is going to find you except by accident. If you
operate a business that has anything less than a worldwide
reach, one thing you almost certainly need to do it to advertise
in appropriate paper media - if only to let people know where to
find your web site.
How else will people find you? Search engine results are only as
good as the search terms entered: typically, they return
thousands of pages, many irrelevant and few surfers follow up on
any beyond the first 20 or so. Despite the claims of some site
promotion agencies, it is often impossible to position your site
anywhere near the top of the list unless you are dealing in a
product or service so obscure that you have little competition.
Small businesses are often persuaded by web design companies to
put up a site that merely gives contact details and a rough idea
of what the company does. This is fine if all you want is the
equivalent of a Yellow Pages listing, but can you be sure that
real live potential customers will find your site among the
proliferation of others that inhabit the darker corners of the
web?
So what can you do to carve out your niche on the web without
expending huge amounts of time or money?
1. Focus your site on a tightly-defined subject area: don't try
to be all things to all surfers (unless you run Yahoo!).
2. Use relevant keywords: you will not get more traffic by
slipping words like 'sex' or 'money' into your keyword list
unless the rest of your site really does deal with these
subjects.
3. Provide worthwhile content: give your visitors something to
read that will grab their attention and make them want to buy -
or at least call back.
4. Do some homework: read up on how to promote your site
creatively using free and low-cost methods.
5. Take action: allocate some time every week to publicising
your web presence.
6. Don't stop advertising in paper media: if it worked before,
chances are it will go on working. Seeing your URL on paper
helps people remember it and adds to your business credibility -
and it may be the only way they get to see your wonderful web
site!
Much has been written about web site promotion, but how many
site owners actually take the time to do even the basic search
engine submissions, let alone any serious promotion? Unless you
allocate some time to telling the world about your site, what it
does and why people should visit, you can be sure of one thing:
they won't!
(((((((((((c)P J Chandler))))))))))))))
P J Chandler writes about online marketing and other topics. His
web site, with excellent web site promotion, submission and
marketing resources is at http://www.domainomania.com
(((((((((((c)P J Chandler))))))))))))))
About the author:
Writer, marketeer and webmaster.
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