We get email every day from newbies marketers which They all ask the same question:
What should we be doing to promote our business online? Beginners need
simple, quick, and easy ways to get started with web marketing. So
what are the best ways for a time and money saving for beginner to market a
business on the web? Is it even possible?
Many of the articles and forums about web marketing are targeted at
industry insiders and assume some degree of previous knowledge on web
marketing, so we’ve decided to write a detailed article on
web marketing tips for total beginners.
So here, the most marketing tips for beginners which more profitable for your business.
1. Choose Targeted Market Well.
So many beginners’ businesses flounder because they want to sell
everything to everyone. Many startups fail just by trying to sell one
thing to everyone. Marketing is easiest and most cost effective when you
narrow your target market because you can focus more dollars on
promoting key differentiators.
2. be Careful Research Keywords.
Think about the one phrase that visitors will use to search for and
find your site. In our experience, it is best for beginners to choose a
3-4 keyword phrase that specifically describes your product or
service like “california car insurance” or “mesothelioma law firm“.
Choosing a 3-4 keyword phrase will make it much easier to compete than
more general keywords like “insurance” and “law firm”.
Once you have chosen the single phrase that describes your entire
site, you can choose supporting phrases for each of the other pages on
your website. Focus on one keyword phrase or idea per page, and make
sure that it supports the overall phrase for the website.
3. Find the Perfect Domain Name.
Your domain name is your web address. There are a couple schools of
thought regarding domain names. You could pick a branding-related domain
name like ‘californiacarinsurance.com’ or ‘mesotheliomalawfirm.com“.
Or you could match your chosen keyword phrase as closely as possible. I only giving advice don't use this character(-), it will make more harder when you want to reach google top ten which will help you find more targeted visitor that need or interesting using or buy your service or product.
There are pros and cons to both approaches. Branding-related domains
can take longer to start ranking well, but they are usually more
memorable. Most of the good product-related domains are taken, and the
ones that are available tend to be longer and harder to remember. The ideal domain name would combine the best of these approaches – a
short, memorable domain name that contains your keywords and your
brand. But finding that perfect domain name can be really difficult.
4. Whip Your Website Into Shape.
Whether you are just starting a website or you are already running a
relatively successful online business, your website is the central
gathering place for your customers, and it should be a well-oiled
machine for churning out transactions and conversions. Here are some
tips for beginners to improve their websites -
- Install Google Analytics on your website! This is so important that we gave it it’s own section in this list. See below.
- If your website design is awful, get it redesigned. we can help you design a beautiful, functional website. Contact us about it today.
- There are a whole bunch of technical ‘behind the scenes’ things
that need to be in place in order for your site to rank well on Google –
collectively, this list of things is called Seach Engine Optimization
(SEO). the list of things deserves its own article, but in a nutshell,
each page of your site needs a few things -
- Focus on ONE keyword phrase per page. Don’t try to fit everything
and the kitchen sink in there. Each page really needs to revolve around
one central idea that can be congealed into a 3-word keyword phrase.
- Make that 3-word keyword phrase the title of your page. This
means your keyword phrase should be the html element as
well as the actual title in an <h1>
element at the top of the
page. If you just went ‘huh?’, <a href="http://einsel.com/contact">contact us</a>, and we can help.</li>
<li>Write a keyword-rich meta-description. Again, we can help with this.</li>
<li>The page should have quality, meaty text and contain your keyword
phrase in as many natural ways as you can fit it in. A blog is a really
easy way to accomplish this. More about blogs later.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>If you can’t make edits to your website yourself, we’d suggest
using a content management system (CMS) to help you. A CMS makes it
possible for you to easily edit text and images on your website so that
you don’t have to call your webmaster every time you need to make a
small change. our favorite content management systems are <a href="http://wordpress.org/" target="_blank" title="A really good blogging CMS">Wordpress</a> and <a href="http://drupal.org/" target="_blank" title="A really good CMS for communities">Drupal</a>, and they are both free. You just download them, then install them on your web host. <a href="http://einsel.com/contact">Contact us</a> if you’d like help setting them up. We also provide inexpensive hosting if you need it.</li>
<li>At a minimum, your website should have the following pages/sections:
<ul>
<li>Home Page – The home page (an most interior pages for that matter) should answer the following questions -
<ul>
<li>What is this?</li>
<li>What do they have here?</li>
<li>What can I do here?</li>
<li>Why should I be here and not somewhere else?</li>
<li>What do I do next?</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>About Us Page – About you and your business. You answer this question all day long.</li>
<li>Products/Services Page – What do you sell? Most of the time, each product or service should get its own page.</li>
<li>Contact Us Page – A contact form that also shows your phone and mailing address/map.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>A great book on making the best website in the whole world is “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0321344758/" target="_blank" title="Awesomest web usability book in the world">Don’t Make Me Think</a>“,
by Steve Krug. We highly recommend it, and it’s lessons have become
part of our central philosophy for building awesome websites.</li>
</ul>
<h2>
5. Install Google Analytics.</h2>
<p>
What gets measured gets improved. <a href="http://analytics.google.com/" target="_blank" title="DO IT. DO IT NAAAAUUGGHH!">Google Analytics</a> is
a free tool that will measure how much traffic your website gets, where
it is coming from, and what visitors on your site are doing.</p>
<p>
Install Google Analytics on your website TODAY, if you haven’t
already. This is not optional. It is free and really easy to do, but if
you need help, just <a href="http://einsel.com/contact">contact us</a> and we’ll help you out. Bookmark this page, then go do it now. we’ll wait…</p>
<p>
Once you’ve installed Google Analytics, you can feel better knowing
that you can measure areas where you are improving and where you still
need help. Trying to improve your web marketing without analytics is
like fighting blind. You need to know which marketing efforts are
working (driving traffic and sales) so that you can get maximum ROI for
your time and money. The online help for Google Analytics is decent, but
if you need more help identifying areas for improvement or with
anything else, we are Google Analytics gurus – <a href="http://einsel.com/contact">call us</a> with your questions.</p>
<h2>
6. Start a Blog.</h2>
<p>
A blog is simply a listing of self-published articles about your
product, service, or industry. Usually, blogs allow visitors to comment
on the articles that you have written, but most blogs will also allow
you to turn off comments if you feel the need to strictly control your
message. Writing blog entries about your industry, product, or service
accomplishes a few things -</p>
<ul>
<li>Well written blog entries establish you as an authority in your
industry. For example, based on what you’re reading right now, would you
be more likely to trust me to help you market your business online?</li>
<li>Blog articles are full of the kind of ‘meaty goodness’ that attract Google and other search engines.</li>
<li>Your blog can be a conversation starter for many of your other online marketing efforts.</li>
</ul>
<p>
Start by setting a realistic goal to write one 300 to 500 word blog
article per week. Stick with your goal, and don’t skip a week.
Regularity is more important than frequency. If you are feeling
particularly creative and gung-ho, you can write a bunch of articles
ahead of time and publish them on a regular schedule. You don’t want to
start strong and just fizzle – I’ve seen it happen too many times. Pick a
pace you can realistically keep up with and stick with it.</p>
<p>
If you need help setting up a blog (We suggest <a href="http://wordpress.org/" target="_blank" title="Swiss-army website builder">Wordpress</a> or <a href="http://blogger.com/" target="_blank" title="Super easy for newbies">Blogger</a>) or have more questions about blogging, just <a href="http://einsel.com/contact">let us know</a>.</p>
<h2>
7. promote using Email Marketing</h2>
<p>
Why do you get so much email spam? Believe it or not, it works! Email
marketing is consistently one of the most cost-effective ways for
beginners to market their businesses online. The good news is, you don’t
have to be a spammer to use email to your benefit, and setting it up is
actually pretty easy.</p>
<p>
For beginners, we recommend setting up an account with one of the ‘hosted’ email marketing providers like <a rel="nofollow" href="http://mailchimp.com/" target="_blank" title="I like monkeys.">Mailchimp</a> or <a rel="nofollow" href="http://icontact.com/" target="_blank" title="is pretty good">iContact</a>.
Mailchimp is our favorite because it is extremely easy to use, but also
gives you room to grow with a lot of options as you become an email
marketing ninja.</p>
<p>
“But where do we get an email list?” is the next question. If there
is one thing about email marketing that we could drill into beginners'
heads, it is this: <strong>GET PERMISSION</strong>. Always get someone’s
permission before you start sending them emails because you’ll see a
far better response from people that actually want to hear what you’re
preachin’. There are places where you can purchase email lists, but you
cannot simply trust that the emails on many lists were obtained by
permission. It can also be against the law to continually send
unsolicited emails.</p>
<p>
The easiest way for beginners to start gathering quality email
addresses on their own is to put an email signup form on their website.
Put the signup form in a place where people will see it – maybe at the
top of a sidebar – and then provide a ‘carrot on a stick’ that
encourages them to give you their email address. Your ‘carrot’ might be
some free information in the form of a whitepaper, or downloadable pdf
with free information about your product or industry. Or maybe it could
be an instructional video or a coupon. The point is, it should be
something that is valuable enough to the customer that they’ll give you
their email address to get it.</p>
<h2>
8. Promote using Pay-Per-Click Ads</h2>
<p>
Pay per click(PPC) ads are an easy way to get instant traffic (and
hopefully sales) to your website. Google AdWords is the most popular PPC
provider. It is easy to sign up and get started showing your ads today,
and best of all, you’ve probably already done the hard work by choosing
your targeted keyword phrases. Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing also offer
opportunities for PPC advertising. The keys to running a successful PPC
campaign are to choose targeted keywords, write effective ads, and match
those effective ads with effective ‘landing pages’ on your website.</p>
<p>
A ‘landing page’ is where a customer ‘lands’ on your site after
clicking on an ad. Ideally, you should have specially tailored landing
pages for each message, promotion, product, service, or offer.
Experience shows that the more specific and consistent your promotional
message is from the ad to the landing page, the more likely that
customer will convert. If you are simply sending all of your PPC traffic
to an ineffective homepage, you could be missing out on business.</p>
<h2>
9. Promote using Social Media network<br></h2>
<p>
What is the big deal about social media? You may already have a
Facebook account and wonder “How could I possibly use Facebook to
promote our business?” Or you might be thinking, “I just don’t have time
to spend on social media sites, I need to promote my business!”</p>
<p>
The good news is, promoting your business via social media can add
real dollars to your bottom line, and it doesn’t require a huge time
commitment. The biggest thing to remember with social media is to be
genuine. Here are some tips about how to get the most from social media
services without spending ridiculous amounts of time -</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Facebook – Gain Fans</strong>
<ul>
<li>Use Facebook to ‘gain fans’ by <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.facebook.com/advertising/?pages" target="_blank" title="Get your facebook business page">setting up a page for your business</a>.</li>
<li>Add a “Become a fan on Facebook” link to your email signature and on your website.</li>
<li>Every time you write a blog post, mention it on your Facebook page. This is free syndication.</li>
<li>Mention specials, discounts, and coupons on your Facebook page.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><strong>Twitter – Keep Them Updated</strong>
<ul>
<li><a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.twitter.com/" target="_blank">Set up a Twitter account</a> for your business</li>
<li>Whenever you write a blog post, mention it on twitter.</li>
<li>Twitter is great for posting timely discounts (Free car wash today when you mention twitter!)</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><strong>YouTube – Show Some Video</strong>
<ul>
<li>Create a video where you demonstrate your product or service.</li>
<li>You don’t need a professional video camera to do this, most digital still cameras have a video setting that will work fine.</li>
<li>Upload videos to Youtube regularly, and you'll soon start to gather a following.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><strong>Flickr – Show Pictures</strong>
<ul>
<li>Flickr is one of the best-known and busiest photo-sharing sites on the web.</li>
<li>Most businesses have pictures of their product or service that
they’d like to show off, so why not use Flickr to hold your photos
online?</li>
<li>Create a free Flickr account, and upload your photos.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<p>
As you can see, you can use social media to accomplish many of the
things you’d already be doing as a business – syndication, image and
video hosting, and keeping customers updated. And the great news is that
all of these services are free. You don’t have to spend hours on them,
just do what you can, and as long as you’re genuine, your customers will
feel closer to you because of the intimate, transparent relationship
you’ve created with social media tools.</p>
</div>