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Seven Marketing Questions You should ask before you get a 10
Year Old to build Your Website
by Greg Chapman
Published on this site: June 29th, 2005 - See
more articles from this month...
Google tells us there are 4 billion websites- almost one for everyone
on the planet. And today you have decided to make it 4 billion and
1. So, do you think- “If I build it, they will come?”
seriously? It ain’t going to happen, unless you stand out.
So do you think your 10 year old nephew who can code html (which
I believe they now learn in pre-school, just after they have done the alphabet) is going to
make your site the next eBay? Let me give you a few questions to
ask yourself before you double his pocket money.
- What is the purpose of your website? In business, there
are three main types of websites:
• the brochure site
• the lead generator site
• the online shop
The brochure site is an online support to your offline marketing.
You will refer to it in your ads, because you pay for ads by the
square inch, and acres are cheap on the internet. You will refer
to it in your Yellow Pages ads, your business cards and your brochures.
An online presence will give you a credibility that your competitors
without a website (getting fewer every day) don’t have. But
in the end it is just an online version of a tri-fold a printer
might do for you. There is nothing wrong with a brochure site,
if this is all you want in your marketing plan.
The next step up is a lead generator site. Unlike a brochure site,
you want it to generate business on its own. You want people to
find your site while browsing on the internet, and having seen
your site, feel compelled to call or email you. After that contact
is made, hopefully a sale will follow.
The last option is that your website is a storefront where visitors
to your site can actually purchase products and services. In other
words, after finding your site, and viewing your content, they
are compelled to “click here” to make a purchase.
There is a fourth type of website- the vanity site. But financial
rewards are rarely connected to this type of site.
Of course a website may be a mixture of these three (or four)
types, but unless you have defined your business model, the purpose
of your site, it will be a waste of electrons.
- How will people find your site?
You already know there are 4 billion sites, so the likelihood
that a buyer will find it by chance are somewhat remote. And if
you calculated the cost per lead on that basis, you would never
build such a site. Your business website exists only for one purpose,
to make you money- irrespective of the business model. It must
pay its way. So if no-one visited your site, why would you pay
for it to exist?
Therefore, you must have a strategy to ensure people know your
site exists and that there is a reason they should visit it. How
can you do that? There are two basic strategies, offline and online.
An offline strategy is based on all your offline marketing- ie
advertising, public relations, networking and cold calling. In
every case you would refer leads to your website where they can
find out more about what you can do for them, and why they should
choose you. Your website would build on your offline promotions
giving further details of your service, educating your customer
and creating credibility for your business.
An online strategy will be built around visibility. The key
elements of this are:
• Search Engine Optimisation
• A strategy to get links to your website
• Online advertising
- What are you going to do to make visitors linger at your
site?
The average website visit is 68 seconds. How many widgets do you
expect to sell in that time? You must have a strategy to make
people linger at your site, get to know you and see the value
you can give them.
The three secrets for making people linger are CONTENT, CONTENT,
CONTENT.
To get visitors to stay, you need to give them information that
they want. This will not be information about you (at least not
on the home page). Your goal should be to educate your visitor.
Give them information they will not get elsewhere on how to solve
the problem that caused them to search for you in the first place.
If you website is just sales hype, your visitors will be gone
in a lot less than 68 seconds.
- What do you want visitors to do once they are at your site?
Many would say- “Buy lots of stuff from me.” Well, in
your dreams! Most people will not buy from you, or call you on
the first visit to your site. They don’t know you (unless
an offline relationship has been established). And unless you
are selling a commodity, that is the same on every site- eg CD’s,
and you are competing on price, you need to be able to establish
a relationship. To do this, you need to give visitors a reason
to give you a way to stay in contact. This could be by way of
a newsletter, or through a free download of information requiring
their email details. When you do this, it is essential you provide
an unsubscribe option, because otherwise you will be spamming.
And there are no rich spammers (although I believe thereh are rich people selling spam technology).
- How are you going to get people to come back to your site?
On average, four out of five website visitors will never come
to a website. And if they only stay 68 seconds, it’s going
to take you several lifetimes to become an internet millionaire.
To get people to come back you need to do several things:
• Have sufficient quantity and quality of content, that the
visitor will bookmark your site to come back for more
• Continually add to and change the content to make visitors
want to come back
• Provide special offers to your subscribers that will encourage
them to revisit your website
If your website never changes, why would anyone want to come back?
- How are you monitoring going to monitor the results of your
website?
No-one can guarantee what is going to work for you. Therefore
you have to measure your statistics. A good webhost will provide
you with a statistics package that will tell you how many visitors
you have had, when they visited, how they found you and what they
did at your site. When you make an offer, make a change to your
site, or undertake some marketing campaign, whether online or
offline, check the response on your statistics, and the conversions
that you have achieved on your site. Do controlled experiments.
Don’t change too many things at one time, because you will
never know what caused the change. Find out what works, and what
doesn’t. And when you find a good thing, stick to it!
- Are you really going to trust your 10 year old nephew to
do all this?
You may not be using your 10 year old nephew, you may be using
a graphics design company instead. But don’t confuse determining
your website business model and marketing strategy with the colour
and movement of your website graphics. As a general rule of thumb,
the flashier the website, the worse it is commercially. (Check
out eBay and Amazon- how flashy are their sites? But is there
a clear business strategy?) You will need someone to do the html
programming, but almost certainly, someone who is good at that
will not be good at everything else. A website is just another
marketing tool. Like a brochure. Would you get your printer to
write your advertising copy?
I don’t suggest that you should not use a great website design
company (or even your precocious nephew) to build your website,
but don’t let them be in charge of your marketing!
Dr Greg Chapman assists small to medium sized businesses
with business planning, business systems and marketing strategy.
To find out how you can Multiply Your Profits & Make Your Business
Run without You, and to find out How Good Your Business Really Is
with a Free Online Business Medical, go to Empower Business Solutions
website at: http://www.empowersolutions.com.au
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