Archive for the ‘Online Marketing’ Category

Most of us have a website for our business. They range from simple websites with a little bit of information about our company to full blown ecommerce sites selling our products.

Having a website is all well and good. But unless you get visitors to your site and get them to become customers then nothing else matters. We have talked about driving traffic to your site. It requires a coordinated effort and a multi prong strategy. This could include Pay Per Click advertising, article writing, posting videos, forum posting, link building as well as using offline tactics to direct your customers to your website.

But the biggest part of having a profitable Internet Marketing Strategy is to get them to convert. Everything up to this is just preparation and anticipation. I know of many people that get a great amount of traffic to their site but they don’t make effective use of the traffic once it is there.

There are many tweaks that you can make on your website that can assist with conversions. Did you know that adding a signature under your main testimonial above the fold will increase conversion 11%? Also according to Ryan Deiss if the background of your website is robin’s egg blue, this will increase the trust factor and conversions by 31%.

It does not take many of these types of tweaks to really help you make even the most mediocre website convert profitably. I took 11 of his suggested modifications to heart and made changes on one of my product websites. I added all 11 and tested it against the previous conversion ratios. I was able to get my opt-ins to increase over 41% and my sales conversions to increase by 19% over what they had been.

All in all it really helped me make a small website / product go from barely breaking even to profitable. Once I completed all of those tweaks it now makes sense for me to buy PPC traffic and sell more products.

Any small business can make these changes or additions to their website and increase conversions. I made these 11 changes in 15 minutes. And it really made a difference. I don’t know what your results will be but if test them against what you have right now; you can then compare your results and go with the one that works better.

Imagine before I made these changes to this site I would get 21 opt-ins and 7 sales for every 100 visitors. After making 11 simple changes I now get an average of 51 opt-ins and 9 sales for every 100 visitors. That allows me now drive traffic to this site using PPC and break even on the front-end. I am then able to follow up with those that opted in and sell my product to them and get my profit from them.

If I can make just 1 sale to those additional 30 people I will be able to put more money in my pocket. And that is what it is all about. So at December’s Seattle Chapter meeting I will be showing everyone those 11 simple “Must Haves” that will help you put more money in your pocket. Hope to see you there.

#5 – People don’t use the internet to find “my” kind of business
#4 – My customers know where I am and how to find me
#3 – I don’t sell anything online, I don’t need a website
#2 – I’m listed in the Yellow Pages so people will find me online through their site

#1 – What is Local Search Optimization anyway?

Unfortunately about 85% of small business think this way when they have a typical business. I’m afraid that even internet savvy business don’t use half of the optimization techniques that anyone with a passing familiarity with local searches use.

The overriding reason for  understanding and implementing local search tactics for your business is to be found when people go to Google and type in a search for something that you carry. I was talking to a new friend Richard Geasey the other day about speaking for the Seattle Chapter on September 2^nd and was really excited because of his expertise.

I started thinking when we hung up about the last time I picked up a phone book to look up a local business. Then I tried to remember where there was one in my house. After 15 minutes searching I realized that Jennifer, my old marketing assistant, used it to raise the height of her monitor. All the rest I recycle almost immediately after they are dropped off at our house or office.

Everyone goes online to find businesses now. They type in “Widget” and “Seattle” to find where the closest widget company is located. As a matter of fact with iPhones and Blackberries people are one click away from your shop or store right now. It is more important than ever to use some form of local search optimization.

Richard is going to cover a ton of good useful information that we can all use in our business. Even if your business is a national company. Imagine the power of being the top of your category in all of the main markets all because you make it a priority. Imagine all the new customers you will obtain and how good it will be for your business to be on the front page of Google without needing to pay for a #1 slot on Google Adwords.

You need to attend the September Seattle Chapter Meeting so you can look at your website with fresh eyes and get some professional opinions from our Speaker Richard Geasey and the rest of the members of the Seattle Chapter. Remember, the meetings are now free so come check us out on our 3^rd Anniversary.

Article Marketing is something that every small business owner needs to do as the mainstay of traffic generation for their websites. We have talked over the course of the last several weeks about driving traffic to your websites.

Most of these techniques are great for a quick hit or burst of traffic. Meaning that you get traffic quickly but once you stop the traffic dries up. Article Marketing is different. It is persistent and can actually grow with use. You see the key to high search engine rankings are good quality links from authority sites back to your website, and lots of them.

So let’s get on with it…

Building Links

Your articles are the best ways to get links back. You can control the number of links and the keywords that you use to drive traffic. Using your keywords judiciously throughout your article and making them relevant to your traffic strategy is important.

If your site is about Water Gardens then you would write articles about things that interest people that enjoy water gardens. Different features, types of water treatments, typical plants, anything that would be relevant to your topic. Inserting hyperlinks in the text from your keywords back to pages on your site that is appropriate to the discussion.

Don’t Make It Complicated

Writing articles does not have to be time intensive, hard work or intimidating. When I write and article for distribution I first take a look at my keywords for my site. I will then pick out 2 or 3 keywords that are closely related and then pick a topic that I can easily write about and use those keyword phrases throughout.

My articles are typically 450 words or so in length and I will try to repeat my keyword phrase four or five times. That will give me a keyword density of around 3-5%, which is perfect. Any more than that and the search engines will look at the article poorly and it can count against me in their scoring model.

Establishing Your Authority on the Topic

You need to let your expertise show in your articles. This is accomplished by writing a good article about a topic that is concise, to the point and giving good helpful tips. You need to let your readers know that you are an expert on the topic and give them a reason why they should listen to you.

Put a good solid biography at the bottom of your articles in what is known as the “Resource Box”, including a link back to your website with a reason to visit your site and give you their information is absolutely required.

Target Your Article

Be specific with your intentions. If you are looking for traffic from people who are dog lovers because you sell everything that a dog lover needs on your website then don’t write an article about pets in general. Stay with what you know… dogs. A person that owns a hedgehog will not be interested in the latest Frisbees designed for dogs.

Don’t Like to Write? Hire Someone!

Every week I am told by at least one person that they are not writers. They don’t like it, they are not good at it and they don’t want to do it. Well at least they are adamant about something.

You do not have to do article marketing yourself. You can hire someone to do it for you. I have used Elance and s few other resources to find writers to create articles for me. I have paid as much as $50 per article and as little as $5. It depends on the topic and the person you find.

What I have been doing lately is creating a short 3-5 minute video where I talking about a specific topic. I will then have my writer watch it and create a synopsis of the video. I will then have them edit into an article and use that to post to article repository sites.

All you have to do is proofread and then include your resource box at the bottom. Then post it to your favorite article sites.

Bonus Tip…

Never Stop. If you wrote and posted 5 articles per week you would have 260 articles posted on the internet in one year. If you posted those same articles on just 10 different article directories to be distributed you would then have 2600 websites driving traffic back to your website.

The best thing about posting to article directories is that other website owners visit and then post your articles including back links on their site. If just 10 people posted each article on their site then it would create 23,400 more back links to your website. It really adds up quickly.