The Web as a Marketing Tool
In today’s world, who doesn’t have a website, myspace page or some form of internet presence? But just putting up a page in the depths of cyberspace doesn’t equal success. Everyday 30 000 new names are added to the already infinite community of approximately 12.5 million cyberspace entrepreneurs.
The wonderful thing about the internet is that it levels the playing field between tiny companies and multi-national corporations. Essentially you can provide the same on-line service as any one of your huge competitors.
The set up costs are approximately the same, the exposure or shop front positioning is the same and depending on how you go about attracting traffic, the potential clientele you attract could be the same, reaching an international audience (it always gives me a little buzz to see someone from Austria or Indonesia logged on to my site). Perhaps you can do an even better job on-line, as many large companies don’t see the advantage of maintaining their sites or adding attention grabbing features.
There is a massive online audience ready to woo, all you need are the tools to make it happen. Here are a few tips:
- Be focused – really define why you have a web site in the first place. Is it to generate funds? Or is it simply for exposure? Is it to build credibility? Or provide a 24/7, 365 day shop front?
- Who will log in – define your on-line audience. Who are they? When are they likely to log on, during office hours? After work? What are they looking for?
- Offer something. Whether it’s in the form of advice, experience, discounts or special offers, give your audience a reason to seek you out. A good example is a site for Gluten-free food products. I logged on trying to find out more information out Celiac Disease and as well as providing their merchandise they had an advice and expert section with the information I needed. While there, I couldn’t help but browse the food section. It could really be as simple as that.
- Combine on-line and mainstream advertising. Editorials are always the best form of advertising in my opinion, unless of course you’ve got a decent advertising budget. So, send out a press release with some unique angle to your site. There was a great story in Time Out, New York not so long ago about a guy who had a daily blog. To entice readers he had a ‘Where’s Wally’ type promotion. He would walk around the city and anyone who recognized him received a prize. At first the prizes weren’t very elaborate but then he met up with the folks from aol who, sponsored the competition giving him Dell Computers, Ipods and various other merchandise to give away as prizes.
- Track your visitors. Statcounter is a free internet tracking system. It can tell you how many visitors you had, when. And also how they found you, where they are from and how often they returned. It’s a great feature and it’s free.
These are just a couple of things to keep in mind when building your site or re-evaluating its purpose on the web. We live in an information age and we all actively seek information, make sure you’re the person people are turning to for that information.
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