In the previous article “7 MORE Deadly Website Sins that KILL Online Success” we examined seven things that could reduce the performance of your website.  But it’s also important to consider merely having a website won’t guarantee your prospects will find it!

Don’t rely on Search Engines either because they won’t always display links to your webpages in their search results, especially if your website is small and new.  There are strategies to specifically improve your Search Engine Ranking but they will be covered in a future article.

You must take proactive measures to ensure the world is aware your website exists and this lesson will provide you with some helpful strategies for achieving this.

1. Put Your Website Address on ALL Your Marketing Material
   This should be fairly obvious.  The more places you display your website’s address, the higher probability your prospects have of finding it.

   Here are some suggestions:

   • Letterheads and stationary
   • Business cards
   • Email signature
   • Flyers and posters
   • Memos and bulletins
   • Print advertising like in newspapers and magazine
   • Yellow Pages advertisements
   • Direct mail
   • Radio ads
   • TV commercials
2. Take Advantage of Social Media Profiles
   Social Networking websites like Facebook and Twitter have exploded in popularity over the past few years and if you don’t have a profile for your organisation on these websites you’re missing out on a huge chunk of free advertising.

   What’s more you can even synchronize website with your Social Profiles, so every time you post a blog entry, the title of that entry will appears as a status update on Facebook and MySpace or a tweet on Twitter.  It’s a great way to let all your followers know you’ve added new content to your website.

   Services like Twitterfeed, Ping.fm, HelloTXT and OnlyWire are designed especially for this purpose and enable you to post updates to over a dozen Social Media websites at once.

   Your Web Design Expert can help you setup on of these services to synchronise your website with your Social Profiles.

3. Establish a Mailing List
   When a prospect visits your website it’s a very good idea to obtain their contact details, this way you can follow up with them later.  Due to the amount of spam online people are often reluctant to hand over their personal details, so  to overcome this, incorporate a mailing list into your website which offers bonuses and incentives for doing so.  This way people will be inclined to share their Email address and you’ll be able to build a list of interested prospects.

   Best of all, Mailing Lists can be completely automated. The subscription process is handled and Emails can be scheduled well into the future without you having to do a thing!

   Your Web Design Expert can setup an automated Mailing List, integrate subscription forms into your website and design Email templates to match your website.  All you need to do is mail your prospects when you have something of value to share with them.

4. Purchase Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertisements
   PPC advertisements appear on many websites and above or to the right of Search Engine Result Pages.

   The way these advertisements work is you bid for keywords relevant to your website and get charged this amount every time a user clicks on one of your ads.  You can set a budget and parameters to ensure your advertisements are only displayed to certain demographics.

   Your ranking (whether your ad gets displayed first, last or somewhere in between) is determined by how much you have bid for a particular search word compared to other businesses, the Click Through Rate of your ad (how many times it gets clicked upon), and your Quality Score, which reflects the relevancy and quality of your ad and the landing page it points to

   Google AdWords  and Yahoo Advertising are two examples of PPC Advertising Network.  Google AdWords is perhaps the largest and most popular.

5. Submit your website to classifieds and directories
   
   Not only do people search through classified and directories, but a link from these websites helps boost your website’s ranking and get more traffic. A directory is different to a search engine, as it’s usually a hierarchical listing of sites sorted according to category and subcategory.

   List your site in the free Open Directory Project, overseen by overworked volunteer editors. Don’t get impatient if you don’t get listed immediately.  If you and resubmit you’ll go to the end of the queue.
   Yahoo! Directory is another important directory because humans read each submission, so be careful to follow the instruction given. Tips: Use less than the maximum number of characters permitted otherwise this tempts the Yahoo! editor to begin editing your submission down.

   Yahoo! Directory Submit incurs an annual fee of $299 to have your website considered for inclusion within seven business days. Other paid business directories are About.com and Business.com.

There are plenty more advanced ways of promoting your website but this should be enough to get you started.

Next time we’ll be delving into ways to add value to your website.  After all, your prospects aren’t going there for the sake of  it so make sure you have something useful to offer them.

If you have any questions, need help with the strategies in this article, or would like a FREE, no obligation consultation, don’t hesitate to contact us using the form below.