How can you avoid making the 10 biggest marketing mistakes
online? Fraser Hay explains and tells you ways to make
sure your site is visited time and again.
1. 1. Test, re-test and analyze
You must let the "net" tell you which banners, prices,
graphics, headlines, subject lines, keywords and emails
are working for you. By testing one technique against
another, You will be able to increase your results by
as much as 100 per cent to 1000 per cent.
You must test each and every aspect of your online
marketing and then run with the best approach that
yields the best result in terms of hits, clicks,
visitors and sales.
2. Don't use name, rank and serial number advertising
Many companies and businesses run advertisements with
their company name at the top of the advert, email,
brochure, mailing or sales letter. Your site visitors
are not interested in you, they're interested in what
you can do for them.
The headline should be answering a question in the mind
of the prospect or satisfying one of their needs.
Advertisements, emails and sales letters with just
the company name address and telephone number will not
work. The only purpose of all your online advertising
is to generate traffic and sales.
3. Sell, sell, sell
Online advertisements don't need to look stunning. When
creating emails, banners, adverts, buttons and
PowerPoint presentations, seek sales not applause.
Webmasters and graphic designers love 'Flash'
technology and animation. However, they are not
salesmen. Remember AIDA-Attention, Interest, Desire,
Action. Nothing else.
Most companies are graphics oriented and more than
often at the expense of qualified click throughs,
enquiries, sales and profits.
4. Monitor your website's performance
There are a number of website tracking and analysis
products to evaluate banner advertising, online
marketing and website performance.
Every aspect of online marketing should be evaluated.
You want the best results from your best efforts.
To evaluate your website, try:
http://www.siteconfidence.co.uk and
5. Offer more than your competitors
Find out what your competitors' websites are lacking
and build the entire online strategy around that.
Tell site visitors about free trials, free downloads,
unique pricing, guarantees, excellent site and product
performance, outstanding testimonials, press articles
and awards. You could also offer comparisons with your
site, products or services to that of your competition.
6. Read every junk mail that comes into your inbox
Make sure you read every email that pops in to your
private mailbox on your email account.
Look closely at each component of their offer - look
at their email address, web address, subject line, headline,
font, graphics, the offer itself, the guarantee, if
they have one, early reply incentives and testimonials.
Ask yourself "why do they keep sending them?"
Simple - they work!
They have been tested, analyzed, re-tested and improved.
7. Ask for reciprocal links
It's possible to create qualified traffic to your web site
in numbers you have always thought to be impossible, very
quickly.
Believe it or not, just one good reciprocal link can give
you the same amount of traffic as a major search engine
and you can have hundreds, if not thousands of reciprocal
links with other web sites throughout the web.
Reciprocal linking is a never-ending project that can
bring rewards many times over in increased website traffic.
All you have to do is target websites that you feel could
drive traffic to you and ask them to link to your website,
in return for a link to them from your website.
You'll be amazed how many sites will say "yes" to this win,
win proposition.
8. Make it easy to navigate your site, transact business
and contact you
Have you ever visited a web site and wondered what it was
they actually were selling? Make your site easy to
navigate, easy for visitors to contact you and make it
very simple for people to place an order on your site.
Include your phone, fax, email and URL in all your marketing
material. If you have got a mobile number include that too.
Ensure all your contact details stand out. Emphasize that
you accept orders 24 hrs a day, 365 days a year.
9. Use traffic magnet key words in your search engine
submissions
Nearly 93 per cent of all businesses promoting their
sites on the search engines will fail by not adopting
the mindset of their clients, members, subscribers or
prospects.
Choosing the correct targeted keyword for your website
is one of the most difficult and important problems
you will face. Your webmaster can't do it for you -
you have to do it yourself.
Choosing keywords is not about finding words to describe
your website. It's about finding words that people can
and will use to find your website.
Most website owners in the UK adopt "the name, rank
and serial no" approach and register keywords such
as their company name, product name and manager’s name.
However the prospects you are trying to reach might not
even have heard of your product, company name or location.
Adopt the mindset of your visitors and prospects, think
carefully about what words they would type in.
10. Be 100% confident of your products and services
Offer a money back guarantee or a no risk free trial.
This can increase response conversions to emails and
banner advertising by several hundred per cent.
The Internet is still in its infancy. Most companies,
businesses, web sites and entrepreneurs de-emphasize
the guarantee.
Offer a free trial or a download report, article, e-book
or bonus gift that your site visitors or online customer
can keep, even if they cancel.
You must know:
• Where your site visitors are coming from
• How they are finding you
• Which pages on your site interest them
• How long they are staying on your site
• Whether they are referring other people to the site
• The cost of acquiring their email address
• Their first purchase
• How much they are worth during their lifetime with you
The Top 10 Ways to Brand Yourself
In the 21st century, everyone's a freelancer. Your value in the marketplace is going to be based entirely on what a prospective employer or client perceives as the value you bring to the table.
The coolest and most fun way to bring perceived value to the table is to brand yourself. Be as distinct and as memorable as Coca Cola or Oprah Winfrey, and watch your income rise along with a demand for your services.
1. Have a really fabulous website.
This one's mandatory. At the very least, you need a personal page where you post your resume and interests.
Show the world you're with the program.
And here's a way to make your website extra cool--have a message board and/or a discussion list that keeps cool people coming back to the website to discuss cool stuff.
2. Have a strong network.
It doesn't matter how distinctive you are as a person or a professional if no one knows you. Meet new people every chance you get. Become known for something. Read "Power Networking" by Sandy Vilas, and do the homework.
3. Have a "You, Inc." Mindset.
Starting today, think of yourself as the CEO of your own personal services company. If you're employed, think of your employer as your biggest client (for now).
And read "Die Broke" by Stephen M. Pollan and Mark Levine, especially the section entitled "Quit Your Job."
And run your professional life like it's a business you own--because it is.
4. Know what you stand for.
Make a list of what you stand for personally and professionally. Spend lots of time on it. Fill a couple of pages in your journal.
Then narrow it down to between two and four items that you're 125% excited about standing for. Make a sign or a bumper sticker to remind yourself.
5. Master your craft.
Don't just be competent; the world is full of unemployed and unemployable competent people. As the white-collar revolution rages on around us, it will soon have many more of them.
Instead of being competent, be a master. Invent something new in your field. Do something no one else does. Start a new field.
Masters always make more money, and masters never lack work.
6. Have work that matters.
If the work you're doing now doesn't matter to you, quit.
Or change your mindset about what you do so that it does matter.
Or make dramatic, drastic changes in what you do and how you do it until it does matter.
7. Be someone who can afford to be unbelievably picky about who you work for.
Your brand is only as cool/innovative/exciting as your clients are. Get cool/innovative/exciting clients or employers.
8. Under promise; over deliver.
You'll never stand out if you over promise and under deliver--everyone else is already doing that.
Why not make it easy on yourself to impress others? If you always deliver twice what you promised you would, then your reputation will gleam.
9. Read "The Brand You 50" by Tom Peters.
Study it. Do the homework.
10. Get out of your rut.
No one's interested in a stale, tired brand.
Read 40 magazines this month that you never would have considered reading before. Go somewhere on vacation that you've never been before. Learn to dance, or sing, or juggle.
Do anything and everything to break out of that rut.