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11 Ways to Promote Your Website
by Harry Hoover
Published on this site: March 31st, 2007 - See
more articles from this month
- Headers, Tags, and Titles – Search engines
continue to evolve but there are a few things you still can do to give
them a clue about
what's on your website. One is to include your keywords in header
tags. Additionally, craft a one or two sentence description that
explains the content of each page, including some keywords from the
page. This should go between the tags. Finally, you should write
short, descriptive titles for each page. Don't use the same one for
each.
- Keywords – Look at your website copy. Are
your keywords in the
first paragraph? They should be because that is where the search
engines expect to find them. But don't go overboard with keywords.
- SEO – The
above tips actually are fairly basic SEO activities,
but there are some higher level SEO tactics that will help raise you
site above the crowd. Hyperlink your keywords to make them stand out
for both search engines and for carbon-based web visitors. Make the
linked keyword more noticeable to search engines by linking it to
a
page that uses the keyword in its address. For example, if you
hyperlink the phrase "ad agency" the page to which it is
linked would
have "ad agency" in its address to raise its profile. While
we're
linking, let's make these linked pages truly focused on information
about specific keywords. If you really want to place your SEO program
on steroids, purchase one of the software packages that helps you
analyze each page on your site for its appeal to search engines.
- Submit – There
are both search engines and directories where
you will want to submit your site. Key search engines for url
submission include: Google, Yahoo, Msn Live Search, Aol and Ask. More
than 95 percent of search volume happens at these engines. So, don't
bother too much with all the small fries. And it is not hard to
complete free registration for these engines. Typically, they will
have a link that says something like "add your URL." There
are a
number of directories like DMOZ.com where you will want to submit your
site, too. And, i think it is worthwhile to pay the $299 at the Yahoo
directory. There may also be directories specifically for your industry.
- Link – Develop
a linking program where you solicit links from
sites that cover the same topics as you. This directs traffic from
those sites. Additionally, it tells search engines that you must have
something worthwhile on your site if others are linking to you.
- Write – Articles,
blogs, news releases - All of these can help
you increase your exposure and drive traffic to your primary website.
Craft your "About The Author" box to include your web address.
Once
your article is picked up by other publishers, this will become a
one-way link to your site, possibly helping boost your search engine
ranking. Submit your press releases to PRWeb. I get a ton of traffic
for myself and clients using this service.
- Go Email – Develop
your own e-newsletter, like Think, to help
drive repeat traffic to your site. I use nTarget for my email
marketing. Then, archive the newsletter on your site. This solid
content tells search engines that there is a reason to visit you. Try
to get other enewsletter publishers to mention you, consider trading
ads with other publishers, or just buying ads outright. Finally, don't
underestimate the power of a good email signature to drive site traffic.
- Give
Yourself a Promotion – Sponsor contests or develop your
own promotions and then submit them to contest directories like
Contest Hound. You could give away copies of your book, e-book, or
white papers for people who sign up for your newsletter. Give away
your product or service to randomly selected registrants. This is a
good way to build your list of contacts so you can then drive them
back to your site.
- Pay the Man – ReachLocal.com is my pay-per-click
ad engine of
choice. If you are truly local, this is a cost-efficient way to reach
people in a specific market only. However, you also can launch
nationwide campaigns, too. You deal only with ReachLocal and it
handles placing and paying for the ads with multiple publishers. It
works for budgets of all sizes.
- Speak Up – All right, let's go
analog. There is no better way
to make a good impression on a large number of people at one time than
to deliver a good speech. Be sure to have business cards or some type
handout that lists your website. Every time i do a presentation i
see
a spike in web visits and enewsletter sign-up.
- Go Offline – Look
at every printed piece that you have. Is your
web address featured prominently? Is it in small type or - horrors– not
even there! Businesses with fleets of cars and trucks should have
the web address on their vehicles. Think about other physical places
you can promote your site.
Those are my 11 ways. Get to it.
Harry Hoover is a partner in Charlotte, NC-area ad agency
My Creative
Team - http://www.my-creativeteam.com. He has 30 years of experience
in crafting and delivering bottom line messages that ensure success
for serious businesses like Bank of Commerce, The Bray Law Firm,
CruisingTheICW.com, Duke Energy, Focus Four, Jacobsen,
Jenkins-Peer Architects, Levolor, North Carolina Tourism, Rubbermaid,
TeamHeidi, Ty Boyd Executive Learning Systems, Velux, and Verbatim.
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