|
By David Gikandi, CEO, SearchPositioning.com
January 26th, 2000
Everyone is looking for that magic formula that will
propel his or her Web site to phenomenal success. Sooner
or later, most people give up their search for this
mythical online marketing secret and accept a mediocre
level of online business performance that they know deep
in their hearts is not what it should be. But a few
people discover the secret. As you now will.
The secret is that there is no super-duper secret method
of marketing that will get you all the success you dreamt
of. But there is a formula which when done in totality,
without taking any shortcuts, will multiply your online
business success many times over whatever it is now.
The
ingredients of that formula consist of very basic and
low-cost tasks that I am sure you have heard of before
but ignored or applied partially, as most people do. The
'secret' is that you have to apply all the methods
correctly and in totality. And you should spend 80% of
your daily work time doing this (or get someone to spend
80% of their time doing this for you).
This article might
disappoint you initially because it pretty much talks
about what you have heard before, but please read through
it and you will be glad you did. It shows you the right
way to use that 'old' knowledge for great results. These
results may not instantaneously come crashing through in
a few short days, but they will solidly build over a few
weeks and months to create a large stable and permanent
success base.
Before we look at the methods, let us briefly take a look
at some items or tools you need to gather for use. You
need a collection of:
- Signature files - these are simple text files, the
electronic equivalent of your business card and should be
no longer than 8 lines long. They carry your contact
details and a quick intro to your business. Make a few
different ones and append one at the end of your outgoing
emails and postings. You can also use them to track the
source of inquiries resulting from your postings and
emails.
- Blurbs - short one-paragraph text pieces about your
business or related topic that you can post or paste to
emails when required.
- Reports - these are the longer version of blurbs,
detailing your business or any other related topic. Post
these to selected places on the Internet and provide them
whenever required.
- Newsletters - for a wide variety of reasons, it is
very important that you start your own newsletter and
work at getting subscriptions. There is a lot of
information on the Internet about how you can start, grow
and manage a newsletter so I wont get into it. The only
idea I would like to give you is this: actively ask your
current subscribers to forward your newsletter to their
friends. Offer a free gift that has true value to those
who forward the newsletter to 20 friends. That will get
you amazing growth in newsletter subscriptions and sales!
You can start one free at ListBot.
- Banners - make sure you have professional quality
banners of different sizes. My favourite place to get
custom professional banners at an affordable price is
BuyaBanner.
- Press Releases - create professional press releases
for everything about your Web site, from new product
announcements to site changes. Post them in appropriate
places on the Internet and to press release services.
- FAQs - Frequently Asked Questions files. Create a few
of these about your industry or any other related topic.
Make them in a question-and-answer format and post them
in appropriate newsgroups and email them when necessary.
They should not be blatant advertising of your products
but they should have your signature file at the bottom
and maybe a 'Created By...' line at the top to get you
the recognition. A well done FAQ can find itself copied
all over the Web and referred to by thousands!
- Autoresponders - if appropriate for your business, it
can be a great idea to get a powerful autoresponder that
will be able to read incoming email and automatically and
instantly send out information files and answers that are
appropriate to the query. That way you can manage
thousands of email inquiries on time without any effort.
Find one at Web-source.
- Articles - write a few good articles every so often
that are related to your industry. Contribute these for
free publication in various ezines and Web sites (make a
list of a few hundred sites and newsletters that can take
your article). This is one of the most effective tools in
your arsenal as it reaches thousands at one go, grabbing
their attention for extended periods of time. The article
should not be blatantly marketing your business, but at
the end of it you should have your signature.
Now let us look at the methods that build success...
|
Build a Web business - not just a Web site - in a tenth of the time and at the tenth of the cost! CLICK NOW for details!
