"Once you build your web site
you got to go out there and get it noticed so that targeted ready-to-buy
visitors arrive"
| So you have built your website using your favourite html software.
You think it is a class act and the visitors will be flocking to your
site to order your services or buy your products!
|
 |
Ha Ha think again..
There is a long long way to go and in many cases it may
not happen...
Your web site better be good
or it might even turn people away from your offline business and it better be offering visitors
something of value otherwise they will be off to the next site as quick
as they can click a mouse..
Think about the way you surf the net. If
you hit one of those brochure sites that says. "My name is Joe
Bloggs Company and here are some nice pictures of what we do. You can
contact us by sending an email" Do YOU stick around? Do YOU
bookmark their site? Do YOU make a note of their contact numbers?
Do YOU order anything from them?
Of
course not.
Why should you
there is absolutely nothing in it for you.
The site does not offer you anything.
On the other hand.
If the site tells you
that they will send out special offers or if they give you some free
information about something you are searching for.. then sure you might
stick around. Even buy something..
For example a carpet company could give a report on 20
ways to clean your carpet or a tax company can give you a report on 10
ways to save on tax. An electrician could have a prize raffle every
month etc. That's a lot different than "This is ME and this is what
I do"
I hope you see the difference and it goes back to our
motto. Most small business must give their visitors quality information BEFORE
they attempt to sell them goods or services. The big household
named companies might get off with "Click here to buy"
buttons on their front page but unknown small companies will
not.
In other words people are searching
the net for information on the products and services you may offer. In
general they are not likely to buy from you (an unknown entity) if they
can get the product from a brand name company.
But..
Offer
your visitors free quality information about your products or services..
- Let them see that
they can trust you.
-
Show them you care.
-
Solve their problems.
-
Show them the benefits of shopping with you.
Then and only then gently bring
them round to selling them your products.
Search Engines
85% of all web site
traffic comes from search engines. Sure there are a few other ways
for people to find you but they require a ton of work.
There are things
like posting in newsgroups, advertising in ezines, writing articles for
ezines, posting in classifieds etc. Yip they all bring traffic but I
find the best and easiest way is to try and get listed for certain
keywords in the search engines.
It's hard to do but for for most sites that
sell a product or service globally the search engines is where the traffic
and therefore the money will come from. You will need to work your
butt of studying and learning how to do this.
However there is a piece of software that
can do all the search engine work for you. It's called the Site Build It Online
Web Site Builder which we will discuss below.
All this search engine
stuff is fine and dandy for people
that have hotels, bed and breakfast, international goods and services
etc
But what if you have got a small local business ie say you were a
plumber, carpenter, painter, local tax consultant, financial planner,
carpet salesman, electrician and your products are only available to your
local market. Is there any
point in having a web site?
You bet there is..
Get your web
site address plastered on everything you do. On your van, on your
invoices, on your shop window, on your tee shirt. One your forehead. In
fact everyplace that people will see.
Remember though when
you design your web site make sure the people are actually going to get some value
when they visit you.
Also
make damn sure that when visitors come to your
site you have a way of capturing their email address so you can follow
up with them and make them your lifetime customer.
This
is where most businesses fail.
They never ever ask for an email address
and so they never have any idea of who their visitors are and have no
way of contacting them or following up with them.
On EVERY site you build
make sure you ask your visitor for THAT EMAIL ADDRESS..
Just imagine you were a cleaner and your site
was getting some
"hits" and consequently some business.
But think.
If you had
a follow up email system on your site and offered your customers a free report in return for their email address.
The free report could be 20 ways to clean your
carpet or clever tricks to clean your windows or how to look after your furniture
- you get the idea. It means that you are building a
database of interested people that might one day use your services.
So anytime you have a quite month you could put
out a little newsletter to your database offering them a cleaning
discount for this week only! Chances
are a few people will take you up on the offer.
If you are a tax
advisor, landscaper, carpenter, electrician, bed and breakfast etc you can easily
think up ways to do the same thing.
Heck I will put my name into
your database if you are in my local community and are going to send me
discount offers from time to time!
You have probably heard on the Web
some people saying that..
THE LIST IS GOLD!
In fact I have even heard it
being said that Web Sites don't actually sell. It is the email follow up
that makes the sale.
The other thing is that email
follow up is cheap compared to any other form of advertising.
You can read all about email follow up software
and what it does by clicking
here. In fact you can even get a free autoresponder system. This
is the software that successful companies use and it just plugs into
your existing web site in 10 mins.
Back
to Search Engines..
If you are a global business Search engine
positioning is one hell of a job and if you can afford the time to spend
years fiddling and learning then you will reap the benefits. BUT.
You
have to be really smart to do it. Target the wrong keyword or build your
site around the wrong keyword and the hits that come to your site will
be a waste of time because your visitors have come looking for something
else..
For example if you sell Scottish Clan goods
and you have "scotland golf" as one of your keywords (you
might think that golfers would buy your products) you could find that
you are getting lots of hits but no sales. Why? Because people are
coming looking for information on golf!
TIP: When designing your site pay very close attention to the
keywords that you use in your domain, title tag and throughout your web
copy.
Notice
the address of this web site design-a-web-site.co.uk That's done on
purpose I could use emackintosh.com but that does not tell a search
engine what I do.
So
work hard on deciding your domain name. If your company is called Joe
Bloggs Carpets it is much better to get a domain tayside-carpets.com
than joebloggscarpets.com. People will find you easier.
Oh and if your company has a
real difficult to remember name ie ATFG Engineers - don't even think on
getting atfgengineers.com. Heck you want people to remember your
site name don't you!
Getting listed at the top..
It's not so bad if you are a small local company to try and get
your website listed at the top.
Take me for example I live in a town
called Blairgowrie and I can fairly easily get "blairgowrie web
design" on the first page of google search engine. That's easy
there is no competition
for that keyphrase .. there are virtually no searches done for
that phrase. So realistically if no one is searching for it then it is
a waste of time targeting it.
If
I try get the keyphrase "web
design" on the top of google I would be at it forever because
the competition is so fierce. I would be competing with 20 million web
sites! Even if I did get it on the top I would spend forever trying to
keep it there. So the keyphrase "web design" is
too general and it needs to be narrowed down.
So I need to look at
something like "scotland web design" for my target market to
find me.
Always keep that in mind
when designing your site. Look for niche keywords that describe your
business and if you live in a high population area ALWAYS
include your district in the keywords.
eg. If someone is searching for web design in London. My
main keyphrase for my site should be "London Web Design"
It would take me
too long to go into search engine
optimisation details here. It's a science on it's own but you do you need to
know a little bit about it if designing your own site.
So here is a tip...
Even better.
Everyone
is going ballistic about this software.
Get yourself over to Ken
Envoy's Online Site Builder and have a long look at the
program he has
got.
This online web builder costs
$299 per year
but if you want
to get on top of the search engines without spending years learning
consider buying it and building a site around it.
Video
Tour: Click
here to see the video Tour of Site Build It Software
This software can
actually tell you what keywords or keyphrases to design your pages
around.
In fact even if you have got a brochure type site..
You would be NUTS to ignore this..
Take a long look because this software will help you drive
traffic to your existing site. It really is in a class of it's own
and will save you years of research and probably make you a lot
of money at the
same time.
Click
here to see what the Online Site Builder can offer you.
Site Build It! Online
Web Site Builder, is the perfect super tool
(suite of tools, actually) for service sellers and local businesses
anywhere, whether their customers come from "around the block"
(ex., a catering service), or from across the globe (ex.,a programmer).
Bottom
line is...
SBI! Online Web Site Builder offers cheap, far less than the
cost of a Yellow Pages ad, business building power ideal for.
o lawyers
o carpenters
o house cleaners
o caterers
o plumbers
o electricians
o network marketers (MLM marketers)
o contractors
o electronic repair technicians
o graphic artists
o mechanics
o accountants
o programmers
SBI! Online Site Builder can build a site with 1,000 times the
return of investment of any other kind of
local promotion you could dream of.
Video Tour:
Click here
to see the video Tour of Site Build It Software
E-Commerce ..
If selling products online is your game you need to set up an
e-commerce site and the
online web builder above may not be the best choice. It is more for
the service type industry people in the list.
Secure e-commerce is a specialised area and
it is not easy for novice web masters to set up
We at Clova
Design have many
e-commerce options. You can set up a shopping cart to accept credit
cards for a very fair price. We can design you a custom database driven
website or flash website.
I hope you are beginning to
understand that building and designing a web site is not for the faint
hearted. It's not just a case of throwing up a brochure and hoping for
the best.
To do it well and to reap the benefits it does require a lot of
time, a lot of effort and in some cases a lot of expense.. That's why I totally recommend
Site Build It
for any do it yourselfer web designer - even those with an existing
site.
When
I see people with good businesses trying to do web design all by themselves or
paying £50 to get a site built I have to shudder. As I said earlier a
shoddy web site can reflect badly on your business and can actually
turn people away from you altogether.
Those shoddy web site owners will say the web is a waste of time because they never get
any hits or sales.
Of course they won't.
If you do your own web design and you don't
sit on the web every day do yourself a big favour and get over to Site Build It Take a
close look. It has got a money back guarantee
Or better still if you don't have the time to
build a site spend a
few more bucks and let the professionals that are working on the web
every day advise you. Work together with these professionals and you are
guaranteed to have a much better chance showing your company in a good
light and bring in a lot of new business.
Remember
the Internet is not going to go away and more and more people are coming
online. A lot more business will be done at local level in the future.
Let's
have a look at where the real money is for most very small businesses.
Local Marketing...
