Web Site Promotion

Promoting and marketing a web site is an absolutely vital part any any online business operation. Too often, a company's budget and resources are blown on producing the web site, with little commitment or resources left over to maintain and promote it properly afterwards.

The big dot coms typically spend 65% or more of their funds on marketing, but traditional businesses often struggle to invest just one or two percent of their revenues on this vital task.

Result - many businesses are lost in cyberspace! The initial investment cost in producing the web site is thrown away, because nobody knows it's there.

Promoting your web site is an essentiall but often neglected activity. And like any good web site, it is never finished - promotion is an ongoing process. It need not be expensive though. All it takes is a little time and thought.

Before embarking on a serious promotional campaign make sure the site is up to scratch. Is it fully functional? Does it have the right content? It is a good idea to get a Web Site Health Check to identify any problems and see what can be improved, before telling the world about it.

The absolutely essential steps to take once you are satisfied with the site are:

 Tell your customers
 Tell your friends and colleagues
 Make sure every item of stationery has the web address on it - including all outgoing emails.
 Make sure the Title, Keyword and Description meta tags (in the HTML Head section) are correctly coded for every web page.
 Register with the Search Engines and Directories

There is more to be done to make any real impact - and that's where we can offer professional help and advice.

Site Promotion Tips

Here are just some of the other things you could be doing to drive traffic to your site:

 Search Engines - They're largely free and can make a big impact on your visitor statistics. See the Search Engine section for more details.
 Email Newsletters - The online version of a targeted mailshot to people who've agreed to receive such material.
 Cross Linking - Swap links with complementary web sites. Join web rings.
 Affiliate Schemes - Join a group which gets other people to sell your products and services for you.
 Newsgroups - Post informative messages to relevant newsgroups - without 'spamming'.
 Banner Ads - Either paid for on other popular sites, or 'free' through a banner exchange program.
 Viral Marketing - It's not catching, but can be highly effective! Derivative of word of mouth marketing but more controllable.
 Press Releases - Write snappy news items, and highlight your URL.
 Special Offers - Offer a special deal, competition, game or something of value to pull visitors to your site.
 Content - Ultimately, content is King! If you haven't got the content right, people will not want to visit anyway!