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| Website Advertising & Questions to Ask Yourself After Your LaunchYou’ve done your homework, researched your target market, researched your competitors, got a professionally designed website and just started promoting it. You’ve submitted your URL to Google (http://www.google.com/addurl/, set up an AdWords Campaign (http://www.google.com/intl/en/ads/), installed a blog, submitted your URL to relevant free directories, sent out a press release to newspaper and print magazines, and made sure to print your URL on all your business cards, letterhead, etc. So now you just sit back and wait for the business to start rolling in, right?
Not exactly…
Online advertising for your website is an on-going process that should be reviewed on a month-to-month basis. Don’t rely just on one avenue of promotion to skyrocket your site up the search engine rankings or dramatically increase your sales. A diversified plan monitored on a regular basis is your best bet for long-term success.
Blogs:
You’ve got your blog set up on your website but have you also submitted your blog to blog directory sites? Do you post regularly? Do you "ping" your blog every time you post? A previous article I wrote explains both submitting and pinging more thoroughly: http://ezinearticles.com/?So-You-Have-a-Blog,-Now-What-Do-You-Do-With-It?-Blog-Basics&id=49187
I must reiterate setting up your blog on your own website. Services like Blogger or Blogspot are nice and easy to use, but you get the most effective marketing use from a blog if it resides on your own website. Here's why: all the pages you add to your blog add to the content of your website. It also keeps your content fresh and up to date and increases the overall number of pages on your site, making it appear more favorable to engines like Google.
Also, you can double your marketing by submitting articles you write for your own blog with other sources such as http://www.ezinearticles.com and http://www.goarticles.com. It's free to sign up as an author and post articles. It's important at the bottom of your article to include a link back to your website (or page on your website that you would want people to land on). This gives you inbound links when others use your content on their website, another important factor the top search engines and directors take into account.
Press Releases:
If you’re not a writer, consider having a professional review your release before sending it out. Spelling and grammatical errors are a big no-no and a professional can rewrite or advise you on how to effectively promote your company, product, or service with a well-written release.
Don’t forget that there are now many online resources where you can submit your press releases. Prices range from free to $50+, depending on the additional services some sites offer with submission. One of my own favorites is http://www.webwire.com.
AdWords and More:
Setting up an AdWords campaign is the quickest way to get a listing in Google, so if you’ve taken that step, you’re on the right track. It’s important to continually evaluate how your key phrases are doing by analyzing the data in your AdWords account. For smaller campaigns it’s recommended to check this at least once a month and for larger ones, weekly to daily. This way you can determine which phrases are performing better than others so you can make the most out of your advertising dollars. It’s also a good idea to use Google’s Analytics program (placing small amounts of code on the website pages that you are directing visitors to in your advertisements).
Yahoo also has paid advertising you can check out: http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/as . Since Yahoo is a directory and not a search engine, they also have directory listings you can purchase to target your market worldwide, or just in your local area.
Sitemaps:
Have you made a Google Site Map for your site? You can check out Google's Webmaster tools at https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/docs/en/about.html or you can also use a free automated online sitemap generator such as: http://www.xml-sitemaps.com/ (and this site explains a lot more about the sitemaps http://www.auditmypc.com/free-sitemap-generator.asp). Then upload the file to your site, login to Google and submit the link to it. You can also do the same thing for Yahoo. These files help the crawler robots that visit your website by alerting them to all the pages on your site, the frequency that you update your site and other important information.
Banner Advertising:
I have found over time that banner advertising isn't as big of a bang for you buck for a small company as something like Google AdWords. The two positives of banner ads are that they may build brand recognition for you over time (people constantly seeing your company name/logo) and they can help direct potential customers right to a specific page on your site. The drawbacks are that a very small percentage of people actually click on the ads and they are usually costly (you can read a more in-depth article about that here: http://www.thomasclaburn.com/2002/06/the_banner_ad_is_dead_ok_not_r.html). If you do consider banner advertising, make sure the site you’re advertising on gives you a way to view statistical information about clicks from your banner and find out whether they charge per-click (and if they do, if they have any contingencies for click fraud), per month, or in some other manner.
Search Engine Optimization:
"SEO" or search engine optimization by a company that “specializes” in it is not something I usually recommend to our clients as simple and low-cost methods such as those mentioned here can be an effective marketing plan.
If you do consider a specialized company for this type of marketing I recommend you get a number of different quotes and exact details and costs of what services will be preformed. I do not recommend anyone re-write your website text for the sole purpose of loading it with key words and phrases. I do recommend you have a professional copywriter evaluate your text so that it is as effective as it possibly can be for your market and that key words and phrases are utilized in areas such as headline, page titles, images tags and your description tag (in your page code).
Google is still the top dog as far as engines go and Yahoo is the top directory site, so a simple focus on keyword campaigns is often much better use of your online advertising budget than paying a SEO company. Google's main qualifiers for ranking include: quality links (links to your site from other quality, well-ranked sites), quality content (it's important that your text is well-written for a human, not a robot), quality page coding (make sure each page has a title tag which can include your key words or phrases, every image has an "alt" tag which can also have descriptive keywords/phrases, and every page has a description tag - again with description words/phrases – your web designer/developer should be able to do this). Here is another good link to read to learn how the "Googlebot" works: http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/
Marketing is Not a One-Time Effort:
The last thing to remember is that marketing isn’t something you do once and forget about. It requires on-going effort and maintenance. You should be continually evaluating what works and what doesn’t while exploring even more new avenues. A few additional web resources you can check out to stay on top of your marketing efforts are:
http://www.jvmediadesign.com/blog/
http://www.wilsonweb.com
http://www.marketingpower.com
About the Author
Sherry Holub is the Creative Director at JV Media Deisgn. http://www.jvmediadesign.com
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| Your Old Website on the New Web or Why You May Need a RedesignThis summer, JV Media Design relocated from the bustling metropolis known as Southern California to the more rural and peaceful surroundings of Southern Oregon. I've spent the last couple months creating a marketing plan for our new local area and in so doing have met some wonderful business owners �" with some not-so-wonderful websites.
Seeing some of these "retro" sites on the web of today made me a little nostalgic but it also got me thinking that many businesses, no matter where they are located, have a, "build it once" attitude with their websites. Many believe they were innovators by having a website built in 1998 and have held on to that while the internet has evolved around them.
Of course, these are extreme examples; websites that have not changed in 10 years, but what about those websites that have not changed in 2 years? I find the large majority of clients who engage us to redesign their company website have not touched their old one in at least two years. Many factors go into the reasoning behind this but leaving a dated site on the web is like leaving a container of spoiled food in the fridge: sooner or later, you're going to have to deal with it and when you do, it may not be pretty.
Often, businesses are so busy with their day-to-day operations that their aging websites are put at the bottom of every corporate to-do list. What many companies fail to realize is how that moldy old website can actually be hurting the business rather than helping it.
First Impressions
Many viewers that find a business on the web may be getting their first impression of that company. If they are faced with cryptic navigation, out dated information or a dated design, like it or not they’re going to formulate an opinion about the business based on their initial reaction to the website.
First Considerations
It's important to think about the kind of initial look and message you want to convey when you start to tackle your redesign. A good design agency will help you in this process, but it's best to have a rough idea first.
Think about who your target market is. What is their age group? Have you previously done other successful marketing that can help guide you on redesigning the website? What sort of things would appeal to your market?
Remember who your market is when you consider things like animation, video, audio and other interactive, media-rich features. Don't be tempted into using something just because it's the new "hot thing". Make sure it works for your audience and within the new design.
Next you're going to want to think about what the goal(s) of your redesigned website is. Will it be to present updated information on the company or to sell more products? What is your call to action? A well designed website will lead the viewer to exactly what you want them to see.
Try to come up with a site map (an outline of the website pages) that will help you to focus in on the content and refine what information you want the viewers to see. Also be sure to include any specific features you want on the new site (for example, a shopping cart, a user forum, a blog ...)
Another thing you may want to consider is hiring a professional copywriter for your updated content. Many design agencies do not check copy for spelling or grammatical errors or even if it will make sense to your target audience. This is where a copywriter can make your site a standout and help you zero in on your viewers.
Knowing what you want out of your redesign in advance will really help the design team understand your needs.
The Final Wrap Up
Just because you've built it doesn't mean people will visit it. During the redesign think about how you will drive viewers to your site. Don't neglect traditional marketing in lieu of using only online marketing. Spread your marketing efforts around to see what works best.
Track how your redesigned website is doing. Most hosting companies provide statistical software that will help you determine how many visitors your site gets, which pages they are viewing most often and other helpful data. Additional resources such as Google Analytics can also give you valuable information on your viewer's behavior on your site.
Have a maintenance plan in place. Don't get sold on an expensive content management system if your site is small, or if you do not have a designated staff member who will be using that system to make updates. Many times I've seen elaborate content management systems on sites that were just as out of date as regular websites. Also, there are now many alternatives to a full system. Blogs, newsletters, and news software can be easy to learn and quick to manage.
Finally, remember that the internet is a constantly changing place. Be prepared to set aside time for your website so it stays consistent with your business goals and the needs of your target market.
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Sherry Holub received her degree in design from UCLA in 1995. She is
now the Creative Director and Lead Designer at Southern California
firm, JV Media Design (http://www.jvmediadesign.com). Sherry is also a
member of the NAPP and the International Academy of the Visual Arts.
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| JV Media Design Hits YouTube.com!We've just started to get out our new viral marketing campaign. We
consult for and plan out similar viral and grass roots campaigns for
our clients frequently, so we figured it was about time we did one of
our own!
The series will feature the offical JV Media Design cat, Isis (as a
kitten)! Isis was adopted by Sherry, the JVM Creative Director, when
she was 8 weeks old (she's now 7) and her YouTube.com debut is not her
first public appearance. She is in scene in the Los Angeles electronic
music documentary, "Concentric Beats", she's been PetCo.com's "Pet of
the Week", and she's even graced the pages of Cat Fancy (in the reader
submissions, but hey, that's still in there!).
Here is a direct link to the first video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsj0ygjoXks
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| The latest trend ... pirated websites.Yesterday we found another instance of someone out on the internet who has stolen our website and is calling it their own.
This seems to be a new, disturbing trend and more people need to know it's happening.
Read more through my post here:
http://www.digg.com/programming/Theft_of_Entire_Websites_Is_It_Happening_to_You
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| When Custom Isn’t Custom
I have seen a pattern forming over the
years where we will be contacted by a potential client with a story
such as, “I paid over $5000 four months ago to have my ecommerce site
built and it’s still up and the designers won’t fix it!”. I’m not a big
fan of stories like this. For one, this means that this potential
client has already spent their budget having something created that
didn’t actually meet their needs - meaning that they do not have the
budget to pay the going rate for having the site done properly. But the
more disturbing aspect is when I have a look at what has already been
built and find out that the ecommerce website is really nothing more
than OsCommerce.
For those of you who may be unfamiliar with OsCommerce, it is a FREE shopping cart solution built by many different programmers to be offered as “open-source“.
It’s fine if a client really has a bare-bones budget because hey, it’s
free. When we use a free solution such as OsCommerce, what we charge
the client for is simply installing, customizing the template, and
setting up initial categories, shipping, etc. Unless you are
programming or installing many additional complex modules to interact
with the base cart, I really can not fathom why a job using OsCommerce
would cost $5000 or more. To me, this screams of shady business
practices.
I’ve said this in a number of other articles, that I believe honesty
is always the best policy. If you are using any sort of pre-developed
software (whether it’s free or if you are paying for it), do not fool
your client into believing that they are receiving 100% custom work. I
find that even when using software, there are aspects that are custom
(usually the design), but we make clear in our estimates and contracts
which is which and what the client is actually paying for.
Designers and programmers are always on the look out for things that
can help them while doing a job, everything from free scripts to stock
photos to the latest software. As a designer or programmer, you have to
judge for yourself what works best for you and what would benefit your
client the most. I find the clients are much more comfortable working
with you when they know exactly what you are doing for them and what
they paying for and it’s simply more ethical to let a client know when
you are using a free or pre-built solution.
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