November, 2008

Welcome to the Effective Websites Newsletter

I'm David Salahi, the owner of Artistic Web Design, and this is the first issue of our monthly newsletter, Effective Websites. In this newsletter, I'll be providing articles and resources that will help you to make sure your website is getting as much traffic as possible and is working as effectively as possible at turning your website visitors into customers.

In this issue, there's a review of the book 101 Ways to Promote Your Web Site. Website promotion is something we all have to do to make our sites work for us and this book contains lots of great ideas about how to do that both online and offline. Read the review immediately below.

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Book Review: 101 Ways to Promote Your Web Site

In order to get the most from your website you need to promote it. People have to find your site before it can work for you and the more you do to publicize it the more traffic you'll get. If you're wondering how to publicize your site, this book has lots of suggestions. In fact, from the title, you might expect to find a checklist of 101 suggestions and there might actually be 101 in this book or there might even be more. It's hard to tell since they're not numbered but that's OK as there's lots of good information here!

Author Susan Sweeney covers a wide range of ideas for promoting your website and your business. Her range of topics includes planning your site, viral marketing, email marketing, search engines, online advertising, getting links from other sites, affiliate programs and lots more. Not all of these techniques make sense for every website or business but many will make sense for yours and if you apply a number of these ideas you'll surely increase the traffic to your site.

Planning Your Site

In the area of site planning Sweeney discusses setting objectives for your site, carefully targeting your market, and even how to mine your competitors' sites for information. Some of this information is Marketing 101 and some is basic website planning info like that available in my free white papers.  But it's good advice for those planning a new website and those who may be considering a redesign or a tune-up to improve their site's effectiveness.

After a general look at high-level planning, the author provides some advice on how to storyboard your website and how to build your site so that visitors keep coming back. Most visitors don't buy on their first visit to a site so it's important to make your site “sticky” so that your business remains in your customers' awareness. The "Keep ‘Em Comin' Back" chapter includes advice about free info you can post on your site, giveaways, coupons, specials, podcasts, contests, surveys and other ways to engage your visitors.

Search Engines

We all want our websites to place well in search engines and the book devotes 60 pages to this essential topic. In these two chapters Sweeney discusses:

• the critical question of how to choose keywords,
• the details of how to structure your web pages for search engine optimization (SEO) and
• how to submit your site to search engines.

Some of this information is covered in my SEO Primer white paper but author Susan Sweeney goes into more depth here than I can in my 7-page white paper. A good web designer should handle all the technical details for you and should advise you in the question of choosing your keywords but it's good to have some understanding of what's involved so you can work more effectively with your web designer. In fact, it's essential for those writing the copy to be aware of some of this information because the specific text and headings on your website need to be carefully chosen in order to maximize your visibility in search engines. Beyond SEO, the author also discusses the basics of online pay-per-click advertising.

Email Newsletters

The book also has good information on creating an effective email newsletter. An email newsletter can be very inexpensive but there are some important rules to follow which the author discusses. Among these rules are the following:

• how to compose a subject line that will ensure that your newsletter gets read
• how to avoid getting your email caught in spam filters
• structuring your email to display well in a wide variety of email programs
• complying with anti-spam laws
• why it’s not a good idea to send your email newsletter directly from your regular email program

Web Metrics and Site Traffic Analysis

Once you’ve gotten some visitors to your website you need to find out what they’re doing there. If people are coming to your home page and leaving quickly, that tells you that you have a problem. Or if they are not visiting some of your key pages that tells you that you have a different kind of problem. Website metrics and traffic analysis allow you to examine which pages people are visiting on your site, where they are coming from, what keywords they are searching for, and lots of other vital statistics. Some of this information is available at no charge from your web hosting company while other info can be obtained by using one of the commercial services. If you’re not at least availing yourself of the free info you’re missing an important opportunity to increase your website’s effectiveness.

Conclusion

There’s lots more here including chapters on online forums, affiliate programs, developing a linking strategy, blogs, podcasting, landing pages, public relations and offline promotion. If you put into practice half of the ideas listed in this book, you can expect a substantial surge in your website traffic — which can be a boon to your sales.
101 Ways To Promote Your Web Site is available at the Orange County Public Library and at amazon.com among other outlets.

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What Are Your Questions?

What are your burning questions about internet marketing? Call me at 949-362-0842 or email me at dave@artistic-webdesign.com with your questions. Or fill out a survey on our website. Then watch for the answers in an upcoming issue of this newsletter!