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Once you build a website, your job is only half done. Now,
you must market it to your prospects so they visit—often.
Here are some of the most common ways to market your website:
Offer freebies
The web was actually created to enable the free exchange
of information. Only in the past 15 years, has it given rise
to commerce. To honor that spirit of free information, make
sure your site gives people the information they need, for
free. Offer free white papers, articles, free
downloads, research findings or blogs. Once you do this,
the viral nature of the web will take over and visitors will
refer your site to others.
Drive traffic to your site with traditional media
Every one of these traditional marketing vehicles should
feature your web address: Business cards, letterhead, envelopes,
invoices, fax cover sheets, trade show materials, company
vehicles, signs, voicemails, press releases, media kits, advertisements
and direct mail pieces.
Submit to the top search engines
Google dominates today’s search engine market, but
don’t overlook others such as MSN and Yahoo. At my site,
www.emergemarketing.com, these three engines account for 93%
of all visitors. If you’re unfamiliar with search engine
submission, consult an expert like Ed
Kohler.
Build links to your site
To increase your site’s visibility, first increase
the number of links it has to other sites. Find appropriate
sites to link with to first checking out your competitors’
sites. Who do they link to? Then, visit Google
and type in keywords that you feel are relevant to your site.
Which sites come up? Chances are good that these same sites
would be good link sites for yours. The more links you create
with high traffic sites, the higher your search rankings will
be.
Add your address to a signature file
Your signature file is the several lines of text that appear
automatically at the end of each email message you send. Adding
a link to your website (along with your phone number and email
address) in your signature is equivalent to attaching a business
card to each email you send. If I’m your prospect and
you’ve just emailed me, I can now click on the link
to your site and take the next step to learn more about your
company.
Encourage sign-ups
At your site you can encourage visitors to sign up to receive
regular communications from your company. Whether these are
email newsletters, promotional emails or product updates is
up to you. Use your site as a guest register to capture email
addresses for future marketing use.
Author Bio
Jay Lipe, aka the “Plan Man”, is the CEO of
Emerge
Marketing; a firm that helps growing companies improve
their marketing. He is the author of the book The
Marketing Toolkit for Growing Businesses (Chammerson
Press) which is available at major bookstores and online
at www.amazon.com.
He is also a sought after speaker and seminar leader, and
can be reached at (612) 824-4833 or lipe@emergemarketing.com
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