Sophie Wegat – Page 8

Why A Website Budget is a Good Idea

I receive a lot of enquiries from people wanting a website. Unfortunately in many instances the prospect has no idea of their budget, or they don’t want to tell me what it is. I understand that they feel that if they give out a budget that’s what they will be quoted but they are so off the mark.

Giving the web designer an idea of how much you want to spend helps us suggest a solution that fits your requirements and your budget. I always use the car analogy – if I’m looking at buying a new car I give the car salesman an idea of what I am looking for and my price range. That way he knows whether to direct me to the Mercedes or the used car lot down the road. Without giving him that information he’s not able to make any professional recommendations He’s just flying around in the dark.

You don’t have to give an absolute figure, consider a ballpark or a price range. And remember the web designer you choose must be within your budget but it is just as important, if not more, to make sure the web designer you work with is one that has a good understanding of your requirements, can deliver a successful solution and is someone you’d want to work with.

Are Your Contact Details Prominent on Your Website?

When I find a website I like one of the first things I look for are the contact details. I always do this when it’s a site I’m considering buying from, but I also often do it on information sites. If a site is purely informational I can understand they may not have this information but if you are selling products and services online your contact details are a must.

I want to know who I am buying from and if I can’t find any contact details or they are hidden and I have to hunt them out I wonder why. What are you trying to hide?

Make your contact details clear and easy to find. As well as helping convert visitors into customers they’ll help your rankings in local search queries.

Internet Marketing Essentials

Once your website is built it is important that you spend time and money on marketing it online to ensure that you are attracting targeted visitors who you can then convert into customers. There are many internet marketing strategies, in fact far to many to mention here. However the 5 strategies below are essential to any online marketing efforts.

Search Engine Rankings

One of the most important considerations when building a website is to make sure it is search engine friendly. The benefits of this is a website that not only looks good and provides information, but one that appears at the top of the search engine results for relevant keywords for your business. For example if you had a bed and breakfast in Daylesford Victoria wouldn’t it be great if your website was one of the top results for “bed and breakfast accommodation daylesford” in the search engines. With results like that you are guaranteed that prospective customers looking for your service will find your business.

The process of creating a search engine friendly website is called Search Engine Optimisation or SEO for short. It is usually done by an SEO professional, or your web designer, if they have experience with SEO. There are also plenty of online resources if you would like to give it a go yourself. I’ve listed some of the better ones in the resources section at the end of this article.

As well as optimising your website it is important that you get links from other websites to yours. Search engines, such as Google, partially rank websites by the number, and quality of links to have to your website.

It’s important to remember however, that high search engine rankings take some time to be achieved so it’s important that you focus on additional internet marketing strategies while you work on your SEO.

Pay Per Click Advertising

Pay Per Click (PPC) ads are the sponsored ads you see on search engines such as Google or Yahoo! With Pay Per Click advertising you pay only when a customer clicks on your ad, regardless of how many times it’s shown. You select your search terms and set an amount you are prepared to pay if someone clicks on your ad. When a user searches for, or is using, a search term you have bid for, your ad will appear on the right side of results pages under the heading Sponsored Links. If a user clicks on your ad you pay the amount you bid for that term.

Pay Per Click is a great way to target hundreds of niche keyword terms for a relatively low cost. In addition it is highly targeted and the results are highly quantifiable. The benefit of this is targeted traffic to your website – ie the people visiting are looking for your services!

Pay Per Click campaigns can be running within hours and is a great way to drive prospective customers to your website quickly. For this reason a PPC campaign can compliment your SEO efforts. It sends you targeted traffic quickly while you wait for your SEO efforts to kick in.

Online Newsletters

Online newsletters are a fabulous way to communicate with prospective customers. It’s an opportunity to showcase your knowledge, provide information about your products and services and promote special offers.

When deciding to start an online newsletter you’ll need to consider the following:

1. How often you want to send it out – you want to send it out regularly enough so that people look forward, and remember it, but not so often as to inundate your readership. With the amount of information overload doing on these days that can be a fine line to walk.
2. What sort of content you want to include. It’s always best to keep a few regular content types to help give it a consistency. The amount of regular, fresh and interesting content you can come up with will help you in determining how often you send it out.
3. How you will manage your newsletter and your subscriptions. There are numerous email newsletter management systems on the market so take the time to choose the best for your requirements. I’ve listed some of the more popular in the resources section at the end of this article.

Your should also make sure your newsletter is branded the same as your website. It helps make your business recognisable and memorable to your prospective customers. Your web designer should be able to help you with the branding and setting up the newsletter and subscription system.

Blogs and Forums

Additional ways to market your business and attract links from other websites include creating a blog and participating in internet forums.

Blogs

Blogging can bring your business many benefits:

Blogging is a great way to communicate with clients, customers and prospects. Whether it be talking about new products or services, company news or resolving an issue, you can communicate on a level not seen before.
A blog give you a voice which in turn gives readers an idea of who you and your business are. Your goal is to then engage them enough to want to do business with you.
Blogging can help position you as an expert in your industry.
Blogs attracts links and can help you in your search engine rankings.

Internet Forums

Internet forums are a way to communicate with others in your industry and potential customers. It can help you promote your business and show off your expertise and knowledge. It can also help you expand your knowledge and meet like minded people.

To find relevant forums try typing in your industry and “forums” at a search engine such as Google.

Website Analytics

Website analytics, the process of analysing your website’s visitors, is a powerful way to understand what is going on with your website. It enables you to see who is visiting your website, where they are coming from, what search terms they used (if applicable) to find your site, how long they stayed on your site, what pages they looked at and so on.

Website analytics can be handled in two ways:

1. By analysing your website log files with a software program.
2. Installing a small piece of code on your website.

There are many applications out there ranging from free to extremely expensive. I’ve listed some of the more popular in the resources section at the end of this article.

There you have it. The above internet marketing essentials are a great start in helping you to make the most of your website by attracting targeted, prospective customers to it.

Have You Checked Your Online Forms Lately?

This is just a quick post while I try to get back into the swing of things but it’s one I thought worth a mention.

When was the last time you filled out your own online forms? If you’re thinking you haven’t lately how do you know they are working?

I always recommend that my clients test their forms regularly. It’s a good way to ensure that they are working properly. It’s also a great way to find any usability issues. If you find them hard or annoying to complete I suspect your site visitors are too.

So if you haven’t – go test your forms. Now!

2007 Australian Web Analytics Survey

Bienalto, an online marketing consultancy, are running the 2007 Australian Web Analytics Survey. It doesn’t take long to complete and all participants will be emailed the full survey details.

Web analytics is still not widely adopted in Australia so this is a great way to contribute and get an idea of the current state of play. It’s running until the 19 October 2007 so hop on over there.

FreelanceSwitch’s 12 Breeds of Client and How to Work with Them

I’ve just discovered FreelanceSwitch and boy am I glad I did.

Their post: 12 Breeds of Client and How to Work with Them provides great insight. Rather than just bagging out clients they describe 12 common types of client and give advice on how to work with them. Types include:

The Low-Tech Client
The Hands-On Client
The Appreciative Client
The I-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client
The Always-Urgent Client
The Budget Client

I’ve worked with a lot of clients in my time and can tell you the list is pretty spot on. For some rare insight into client types and how to make sure you work well with them the post is a must read.

To .COM or .COM.AU?

One of the first decisions you’ll need to make when deciding to get a website is what your domain name will be. There’s lots of good advice on ensuring your domain is easy to spell, quick to type, memorable and brandable. But what about the domain extension? If you are outside of the US do you go with the ubiquitous .COM extension or do you add your country code – which in Australia is .AU?

In this instance I strongly recommend you go for a domain with the country code you are in. You should only go for a .COM domain if your website is focusing on an international market.

Why? There’s a number of reasons:

You will appeal to the community you are marketing too. If I’m looking for a local business I am far more likely to gravitate towards websites that are obviously within my locale. A .COM.AU in the domain name tells me they are Australian and therefore relevant to me.
People will often assume that your website address ends in a .COM.AU or equivalent country code. In these instances they will automatically type that in and wonder why your site isn’t where it should be. They also may not think to try the .COM version.
If you want traffic from the search engines, and who doesn’t, a domain within your country code will help you rank for search terms in local versions of the search engines, such as google.com.au. It can also be a lot less competitive than trying to rank against multitudes of .COM websites.
There is also a much better chance you’ll be able to snap up a great domain. There aint a lot of choice left in the .COM space.

If you’re able to pick up the .COM version of your domain I’d recommend it (I have thinkprospect.com) to make sure no one else gets it. But when it comes to marketing and promotion I’d use the one with the country code. Every time.

Keeping Your Target Audience In Mind

When designing a website one of the most fundamental rules is ensuring that you’re designing with your target audience in mind. If the site doesn’t appeal to them it’s less than useless. The most obvious example of this is the Bunurong Memorial Park. As someone who has recently lost a loved one I can assure you: “NEW GRAVES SITES AVAILABLE PHONE 9788 9488 NOW!” in huge letters ain’t gonna get my business.

If I Build It Will They Come?

I’ve been building websites for a long time. Over 12 years in fact. In the early days it was relatively easy to put up a site, let a few search engines know about it and voila – success! This was at a time when the web was new and the competition was lacking. It was a great time but not one I expected to last. And it didn’t.

These days having a website is no guarantee of success. It takes blood, sweat and… yep you guess it marketing to make your online venture a success. Unfortunately too many people still think if they put a site online the masses will flock to them. And then wonder why they don’t. It’s also a myth that people like to perpetuate. Put a site online and you’ll be making millions within days.

In reality your website needs to be carefully planned, built and marketed just like any other business venture. Start by defining your strategy and determining how you want to make money from your website. Make sure you choose a web designer who understands good design principles, usability, SEO and internet marketing. And last but not least develop your marketing strategy.

I’ll go over some of these strategies in future posts but for now at least consider:

Web Design – build a website that focuses on calls to action and conversions. Pretty ain’t enough.
SEO – make sure you build a search engine friendly website from the get go.
Pay Per Click Advertising – look at PPC advertising. It is a great way to drive traffic while you are waiting for your SEO results to kick in and long term can be a useful way to drive additional, targeted traffic to your website.
Online Newsletter – send out a regular newsletter.
Blog – start a blog.
Network.
Write articles for both online and offline publications.
Get links to your website.
Join online forums.
Write e-books.

This list is by no means exhaustive but it’s a good start. By creating a marketing strategy and working on it steadily you’ll achieve the online success you’ve been searching for. Good luck!