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Interactive_Content_ _Blogs_Forums_and_Feedback_ _what_does_your_web_site_need
| Interactive Content - Blogs, Forums and Feedback - what does your web site need?
Both search engines and customers love fresh, updated
information. Nothing promotes a business online better than
staying in touch with prospects. The more interactive the
continued contact, the better the relationship that is built
with a potential client. But there’s no need to groan at the
thought of having to work hard at adding new content to your web
site, it's not as complicated as you might think.
For more information about how to get interactive with your
customers, take a look at our guide “Building Online
Relationships” available here:
http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
The business principle of continued contact and online
relationship building has given rise to the popularity of online
business blogs, forums and feedback opportunities. Interactive
online communication define the web site owners as experts in
the eyes of visitors, and serve as a promotional vehicle for
other products and services that the business seeks to sell.
Continued, interactive contact can bring many benefits, such as:
·You'll find out what type of content visitors want to see at
your web site. This will attract your visitors to revisit and
read the content.
·You'll find out how to improve existing products or services.
This will attract new customers to buy from your business.
·You'll find out which products or services your customers would
like to see you sell in the future. This will increase your back
end product sales.
·You'll find out how to improve your customer service. This will
cut down on customer complaints and how to better resolve
problems.
·You'll find out how to improve your sales letters or adverts.
This will increase your sales, traffic or subscribers.
·You'll find out how to design your web site to fit your
visitors’ needs and wants. This will increase the time your
visitors spend on your web site.
·You'll find out what kind of non-related products or services
your customers would buy. This will help your business easily
move into a different market.
·You'll find out how to better price your products. This will
help you sell your products or services at a price that will
pull the most orders.
·You'll find out the interests of your potential customers. This
will inform you where to market and promote your products.
Getting Started So where do you start? Do you need a blog, a
forum, or a feedback form? All have different uses and your
selection will depend on the needs of your particular business
and your limitation with regard to time and/or budget. Below are
some of the options and some ideas for adding interactive and
fresh content to your web site.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online
relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our
guide “Building Online Relationships” available here:
http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Weblogs or Blogs A blog is basically a series of posts that
appear by the date posted like an online journal. Setup is
minimal and the interface is easy to learn- if you can use a
word processing package, you can write a blog! Services like
Moveable Type and Blogger make it incredibly easy for anyone to
publish on the web.
Blogs can be integrated seamlessly into your site so that they
have the same look and feel. You can use a blog to publish an
events calendar or comment on developments and news from your
industry. A blog can be strictly professional, announcing
special offers or new product info or it can be casual and
create a "personality" for your company.
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your
customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a
"comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create
an account and post their comments to your blog. This is
something to be careful of as you can get negative comments
along with the positive.
Forums While online forums are popular and the perfect method of
relationship building, starting a forum and maintaining one can
be challenging, especially in the beginning when members can be
few and far between. The challenge for most new forum owners is
to get beyond the initial start up phase and move onto a phase
where the forum members themselves promote the forum simply by
posting.
Forums have become a common feature in many websites. With good
free scripts available, and paid scripts being relatively cheap,
it seems that every new website has its own forum(s).
But is it wise to add forums to your website?
On the pro side, large, active forums generate content for your
website. They add a "sticky" element as most people come back,
at least to monitor developments on their threads. Some forum
software allows members to opt to receive an email whenever
someone replies to their thread. Most people use it and that
automated email sends them right back to the forum and
therefore, your web site.
However, forums can take a long time to pick up and an empty
forum can actually drive new visitors away. You need to
constantly monitor your forums to make sure that they are clean
of spam, troll posts, and just keep everything in order. In
addition, forums are database-type applications that generate
web pages on the fly. Every time a user views a page, it's being
created from scratch. As the forums become more active, this can
take a heavy load on the web server's resources and ultimately
increase your hosting costs.
A forum is an incredible tool for building content and a
community but it's not a task to be undertaken lightly; it
requires a lot of time and energy and some technical knowledge
(or a tech budget!)
If your industry has a need, or your product has a loyal
following, a forum is a great tool to build content while
drawing like-minded individuals together. A forum is great for
market research, technical support, building a fan base, trading
ideas and knowledge, and many, many other benefits. Try to get a
base of people from similar business or industry experts to post
at your forum. It's exposure for them and helps to build a solid
foundation for your information.
If you decide to start a forum, be sure to use one that is
search-friendly, such as www.InvisionBoard.com or www.phpbb.com,
and set aside a good chunk of time to promote it and administer
it.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online
relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our
guide “Building Online Relationships” available here:
http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Feedback Unsolicited feedback is a powerful and convincing tool!
Let your customers tell other customers why they love you. It's
much more compelling than your own claims. Unfortunately,
customers normally need to be asked for their opinion. You can
ask for feedback on any area of your business, your web site,
your ordering process, your levels of customer service, your
delivery service, etc.
The easiest way is to simply set up a form to allow customers to
submit their feedback. Keep it fairly brief and allow a space
for comments. You can then use the information provided to
improve your customer experience, and with permission, publish
the ones you choose.
Often other web site owners that are also customers of users of
your web site can be enticed to write a review or testimonial
for your site in return for a link back to theirs. This helps
them with link popularity but it helps your site as well it
shows a real person wrote that review.
Ask The Expert This is a great way of not only interacting with
potential customers but also establishing your business as an
expert in its field. Using a simple question form or forum
software, users submit questions and someone at your company
answers them. The Q&A are both published on the site for users
to read once they are answered in a "knowledge database" or
“FAQ” section. This is less time-intensive than a full-blown
forum but a great way to keep a finger on the pulse of what
customers want to know while still adding content on a regular
basis.
Summary If you are interested in building loyalty and interest
in your company as well as repeat business and you want to get
increased traffic from the editorial or free listings in search
engines, you have to offer more than just sales information to
your users. If you create a plan for content that offers value
and interest to your customers, you can have a site that is
built to sell AND drive repeat business.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online
relationships with your viewers and customers, download a copy
of our guide “Building Online Relationships” available here:
http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
About the author:
Is your web site driving high quality, targeted customers to
your business? Our proven Internet Marketing solutions make your
web site work harder for you. For a complete range of Internet
marketing and advertising resources to improve search engine
positions visit Enable UK. Stop losing customers to your
competitors and make more money from your web site TODAY.
www.enable-uk.co.uk
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