Blueprint For A Better Mousetrap - Marketing On The Internet
By: T Reyes
Marketing on the Internet won't be the same for any two businesses because all businesses have their own set of unique goals to achieve. With this understanding you can appreciate why detailed planning and design is a vital first step to launching a successful online campaign.
Crafting a detailed plan and monitoring the results will allow you to develop a strategy that fits your company's needs and budget, chart the progress and measure the return on investment (ROI). Having a strategy in place will also moderate risk and the lessen cost over time.
While developing the strategy, you'll want to consider the following important points:
· Demographic
Who is your audience?
Once you identify your audience you can establish the best way to reach them online.
· Budget
How much do you have to spend?
Your budget will largely depend on how important the Internet is to your service or product's success. Prioritize your budget always looking forward and continue to expand your marketing plan as your revenue increases.
· Execution
What if your marketing plan is bigger than your budget?
Consider executing a few strategies at a time. If your budget does not allow for you to follow through with the entire plan at this time follow through with only one or two objectives. This will allow you to stay within your budget while taking a few steps toward your ultimate goal.
Search Engine Detection
Launching your website is only one step in several that it will take to make your business visible on the World Wide Web. There are billions of websites on the Internet, so you can see why it's crucial to determine how people can specifically find your business.
The majority of website traffic comes from search engines and directories and this is why you will want to focus your initial marketing strategies on search engine optimization. Google and Yahoo index billions of web pages and rank them according to complex algorithms. For this reason it is vitally important to create a content rich website. Make your content relevant based on the specific search terms you believe best describe your service or product. Search engine optimization (SEO) consists of a series of techniques woven into the coding of the website. SEO is not an exact science. SEO specialists typically employ numerous and assorted methods to attain search engine recognition to achieve the best possible ranking for your business.
Below are a few simple tips to keep in mind before you start.
Use "search engine friendly" coding methods such as adding descriptive search terms to your images.
Research search terms and search term phrases that is appropriate for your service or products.
Implement search term-rich content into your website.
The website title and description should reflect your most relevant search terms.
Submit your website to the search engines.
Incorporate inbound links.
Encourage interaction by including "share this" buttons.
Social Media - What It Means To You
Social media lets you communicate in a more casual environment. You can use this opportunity to alert clients and prospective clients to new products and services and even offer special discounts if they take action by a specific date. Participating in social mediums also allows you the opportunity to network and establish yourself as an expert in your industry. Now I can go on giving you examples and continue to show you the advantages of using social media in your daily marketing however, it really just boils down to this: This is where everyone is at and you have to decide if you're going to wait at your house for the party to show up or walk down the street and join the one already in progress. That said include your company in as many interactive and social opportunities as possible.
The Boomerang Effect
The boomerang effect stated simply means that anything you do should draw people back to your website. A blog can serve as an excellent boomerang. Once you write your post you can drop headlines on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg, etc with a call to finish the article, see the product in action, get an instant quote or consultation. Your daily emails should include a call to action just under your signature pointing the reader back to your website. Be creative and think about all the places you've overlooked where you can place a call to action and draw people back to your website.
Blogging with Wordpress
Once you have your blog set up and you're ready to post you'll want to make sure your new blog posts get recognized immediately each time you add new content to your blog. For this to happen you'll need to setup a ping list. Adding a ping list to Wordpress is probably the single best way to optimize your blog so you'll want to build a lengthy ping directory to ensure you're alerting as many ping lists as possible who in turn will notify Google, Yahoo, the news sites, many global sites and numerous other directories. Now by default Wordpress includes a handful of sites to ping every time you add a new post but I recommend performing periodic searches to find the most extensive set of ping directories you can. Then add your new ping list by logging into Wordpress through admin and on the left side click on "settings" then go to "writing" once you've clicked "writing" go to the bottom of the page and under "update services" you'll find the box where you can add your new ping list and save the changes. Once that's done you should be on your way to sharing your blog with the world.
About the Author:
About the company
SEOKATZ.com is a proactive marketing and search engine optimization consulting firm that applies a guerrilla marketing approach to help small and medium sized businesses maximize their presence on the web.
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