Internet Marketing Tips

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone reading this article is off to a great start with their New Year’s goals and strategies underway. 

My Sales Training and Consulting business grew substantially in 2005 and far exceeded my expectations.  Reflecting on the “why” of that growth, I attribute it to two things-marketing and referrals.

The most significant action I took in 2005 for marketing was to update my website working with local internet marketing expert Eric Grimstead (www.parthenonpublishing.com). We introduced video clips that provide the viewer a “live show” of my work in the classroom and as a keynote speaker. In addition the viewer can listen to “live testimonials” from satisfied clients along with reading short comments. By making my website interactive it has evolved into my number one marketing tool.  What a convenience it is to refer a potential client to my site www.progressionsinc.net  and know they will enjoy the show!

Here are a few tips for making your website an effective marketing tool.

1.  Focus on TOT. With your Web site, you must focus on “T.O.T.” T.O.T stands for “the one thing.” What’s the one thing that you want visitors to do when they come to your site? Your home page may have several bits of information, but your “sales” pages should be much more focused. Every element of your Web site should support that “one thing.”

2. Know your numbers. On the most basic level you need to know how many unique visitors your site attracts each month.  And for every 100 unique visitors you attract, how many do "The One Thing" that you want visitors to do? That percentage is your "Conversion Rate". Your goal is to tweak your website on a regular basis to see how high you can get that conversion rate.

3. Test Everything.  The great thing about the web is that you can test marketing ideas in minutes and have real-time feedback flowing to you 24/7. You can test headlines on your landing pages, you can test prices on product offers, you can test different colors of text or where certain elements are displayed on your page. It's not uncommon for small tests to increase the conversion rate of a page by hundreds or even thousands of percentage points.

4.  Focus on Building Great Content.  Keep in mind that most web searches are done for information on how to solve a particular problem.  That’s why I post every article I write on my website. There you’ll find articles on topics including sales, customer service, and employee training and marketing that just about any business with a staff or sales function could benefit from. A plumber could post a "how-to" article on how to stop a leaking faucet that would score well in the search engines or make for a great landing page for a pay-per-click campaign.

5. Use Local Search.  It is now possible to target web visitors by geographic location with Pay-Per-Click and Pay-Per-Action advertising programs.  Goggle and Overture (now Yahoo! Search) are the biggest players in this arena but there are hundreds of options to consider when trying reaching your local market place.  Just keep this statistic in mind; estimates are that 30-40% of search queries represent local people looking for local solutions.

6. Monitor Your Site. Look at your website on other people’s computers. You may be in for a surprise. If you use a PC, in addition to checking out your site on other PCs, make sure that you look at your site on a Mac too! (And vice versa.)

7. Make sure that your site is “moron proof”! One problem with many Web designers is that they tend to make Web sites do too many things. For a novice, like myself, you can “lose” me very easily. Make sure that your Web site is easy to understand – and navigate.

8. Make Navigation Easy and Intuitive. Your site should have plenty of navigation bars. No matter where a visitor is on your site, they should not be far from a navigation bar. There must also be no “dead ends.” Every part of your Web site should be “clickable.”

It’s easy for a successful business owner to bury themselves in the day to day flurry of business.  Marketing activities and initiatives can easily fall to the bottom of the priority list.  Think of your website as your business showcase, accessible 24 hours a day.

Put your best foot forward and make it easy for customers to choose YOU!