Strategic Marketing for Driving Traffic to Your Online Business
by Kris Kiler
A recent study, which used web searches in 75 different languages to sample the Web, determined that there were over 11.5 billion web pages in the publicly indexable web as of the end of January 2005.* And you thought writing your marketing copy was tough? The competition to bring people to your site can seem incredibly daunting. Consider the fact that Google posted record advertising incomes of almost ten and a half billion dollars in 2006.**
So what is a consistently effective way to drive traffic to your website for the longterm?
The answer: backlinks.
Generating backlinks to your website is a highly effective way to build traffic. Backlinks are inbound links to your website. Search engines use the number of backlinks to a web page as one of the indicators for how popular that page is on the Internet. In this article, I’ll review five ways to generate backlinks to your website. The first category of backlinks—Pointers—are the type of backlink I consider superficial, but necessary, in the longterm battle for web traffic. These pointers are usually simple hyperlinks with your domain name or company name associated with them. The second type—Positioners—are links associated with unique content specifically focused on positioning you or your business as the expert in a specific area of expertise.
Quick note: I do not include blogs in this article because while they do generate backlinks—they should be included in the domain of customer relationship management and corporate communications and is a platform of communication of its own. Blogs will be a vehicle for distributing your press-releases and articles as well as other corporate communications and will generate backlinks. But seeing blogs for the purpose of backlinks is missing out on the larger picture.
5 Strategies to Generate Backlinks to Your Website
Type 1: Pointers
1. Viral Marketing
Promote your website by placing ideas or content within online communities with the hope that they will spread virally. This includes the use of video on websites such as YouTube, community sites such as MySpace, blogging using tools such as Blogger.com, news websites with emphasis on user votes for relevance on sites such as Digg, or discussion groups specific to your target prospect. You can find potential discussion groups on Yahoo Groups or Orkut.
2. Link Exchange
A Link Exchange can either be a large group that is organized to provide its members with backlinks (often called a web ring) or simply you searching for sites that have complimentary service offerings and asking them to place a link to your website in exchange for you placing a link on your site to their site.
3. Social Bookmarking
Social Bookmarking is a way for Internet users to store, classify, share, and search Internet bookmarks. This is a great way to build backlinks to your website that can increase the popularity and importance of your page resulting in higher search rankings. I recommend integrating AddThis to your website.
Type 2: Positioners
4. Free Press Release Distribution
Press Release Distribution can be a very quick and easy way to generate links to your website. There are many sites that offer free service as a means to collect ad revenue and you should take advantage of them. You can use a service such as Guru.com to hire a professional to create your press release or you can try writing it yourself. If you choose to write the press release yourself, I recommend going to PRWeb and finding a press release that is similar to what you’ll need. This doesn’t necessarily mean a competing product but if you are selling a sports energy drink then you may want to research press releases for new commercial offerings for beverages.
Here is a list of free press release sites:
Recommended
• www.Free-Press-Release.com
• www.1888PressRelease.com
• www.TheOpenPress.com
Other Free Press Release Sites
• www.PR.com
• www.PRLeap.com
• www.OpenPR.com
• www.I-Newswire.com
• www.AddPR.com
• www.PressReleaseSpider.com
• www.PRLog.com
• www.Pressbox.co.uk
5. Distributing Articles
Distributing an article written by you and on a topic related directly to your website can both help generate backlinks to your site and help you become an established expert in that particular topic. Most article directories that you will submit your article to will only require a minimum of 500 words. I suggest trying to take the time to write your own articles. Creating your own piece of work only fuels the desire to make the efforts necessary to get people to your website.
As stated previously, you can hire a professional through Guru.com to write your article costing you somewhere between $50 and $150 depending on the quality of professional you hire. If you choose this route, make sure you go through the article to make sure that article conveys your unique identity. There’s nothing wrong with hiring someone to write your article but make sure that it has “you” embedded within the content and it conveys the concepts according to your unique perspective.
Either way, whether you hire someone to write your article or write one yourself, I highly recommend hiring an editor to review your article for errors.
Here is a list of article directories you can submit your article to:
Recommended paid services:
• www.ArticleMarketer.com
• www.ArticleTrader.com
Free do-it-yourself sites
• www.EzineArticles.com
• www.GoArticles.com
• www.ArticleAlley.com
• www.ArticleDashboard.com
• www.ArticleCity.com
• www.Amazines.com
• www.ArticleIntelligence.com
• www.ArticleInternet.com
• www.FreeFindArticles.com
• www.1888Articles.com
• www.ArticleBlotter.com
• www.ArticleBaseCamp.com
You can also submit your articles to SpeakProfit™ (business-related) or SpeakGoodness™ for free. Both of these sites offer free accounts for you to write your articles and blog.
Use the five strategies for longterm results. Don’t get caught up in worrying about overnight success. Keep writing content and continue to build your network. In the marketing game, slow and steady wins the race. As long as you keep moving and taking actions—no matter how small they may seem—you will see results.
Action Item: Review your social media optimization strategy. How often can you distribute articles, press releases, and blog entries? Create your strategy and start executing today.
Notes
* http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~asignori/web-size/
** http://investor.google.com/fin_data.html (the actual figure was $10,492,628,000)
©2008 Kris Kiler. All Rights Reserved.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Building An Effective Landing Page: Marketing for Your Online Business
Building An Effective Landing Page: Marketing for Your Online Business
by Kris Kiler
As an online marketer, you need to develop a system for short-term gains and long-term opportunities to provide for future sales and marketing. You can envision your landing page as a hub—like an airport. Your goal is to have traffic sent to a single hub and when people arrive, there can be a variety of new opportunities presented to them.
If your landing page is successful and gets the prospect to complete the offer, they can be rerouted to another page that presents them with yet another compelling value proposition. This new hub may be a list of affiliate offers, another product, or a newsletter opt-in form.
EXPLORATION OF THE 8 ESSENTIAL LANDING PAGE ELEMENTS
Let’s review the essential elements you will need for your landing page:
1. Value proposition / offer—in the form of a sales prompt or opt-in form
2. Conversion process—process prospect will go through in order to complete the purchase or subscription
3. Marketing copy—either short or long form using psychological triggers
4. Web page design—the design of your landing page (i.e.; website)
5. Product imagery—3d images of product or headshot of author or service provider
6. Transaction utilities—auto responder, shopping cart software
7. Elements to reduce anxiety—testimonials, satisfaction guarantee, third party credibility indicators
8. Analytics—data gathering script
1. Value Proposition / Offer
What will you be offering your prospects? A newsletter? A report? A training seminar? You will want to define clearly what you are offering. Complete the following statement. It will be your guiding statement as you move through this report.
I am offering a/an _____________________ on the topic of ________________________
in order to help ___________________with their problem of ________________________
Examples:
1. I am offering a report on the topic of creating and marketing landing pages in order to help marketers with their problem of achieving sales for their offering over the Internet.
2. I am offering an online software product on the topic of tracking advertising profits in order to help Internet marketers with their problem of making money with online advertising.
3. I am offering an employee training on the topic of leadership development in order to help organizations with their problem of managing talent development through the leadership pipeline.
NOTE: The goal of any landing page is to complete a successful transaction between you and your prospect.
2. Conversion Process
This is the process the prospect will go through in order to complete the buying process or subscription. Where are they coming from? When they get to your landing page, are they going to click “buy now” and go to a shopping cart? Are they going to click “subscribe now” and be taken to a form that requires them to enter their email and other personal information? Will you then require them to check their email in order to double opt-in by reconfirming their requested subscription? This means that you need to think holistically about your value proposition. Thinking holistically about your Value Proposition involves two key elements: continuity and congruence.* Continuity means that each step in the conversion process either states or supports the Value Proposition.** Congruence means that every element of your page either states or supports the Value Proposition (Design, Copy, Images, Colors, Logo, Price).*** Section 4 will provide more detail and concrete suggestions on how to enhance your conversion process.
3 & 4. Marketing Copy / Web Page Design
Creating effective marketing copy and web page design, can be difficult hurdle to overcome if your natural talents or skills don’t support them. You should be able to find a professional to write your copy and a professional to design your page in the same place. They require different skill-sets and should be treated as such.
There are many places on the Internet where you can find a marketing professional and website designer to get the work done. Guru.com and Elance Online are the two leading providers of project submission sites to receive bids on your project from freelance professionals. Make sure you leave your project budget confidential and communicate with the professional so you can find the person who you will be able to collaborate with the best. Often times, the lowest bidder will end up costing you time and possibly more money if they don’t perform to your expectations.
5. Product Imagery
Proverbs to the contrary, everyone does judge a book by its cover. This is why you will want to invest in having a professional create a three-dimensional image of your product or a logo for your newsletter or something visual that is associated with your offer. As with selling anything, you are selling yourself. It would be wise to take a good picture of yourself or again consider hiring a professional to take one and add it to your landing page.
6. Transaction Utilities
An auto responder can be an important tool to your customer relationship building. The old adage is true, “The fortune is in the follow-up.” If you use an auto responder, following-up with customers that purchase your product or sign-up for your newsletter can be automated and make your follow-up emails more time-efficient. AWeber is a very popular service for setting up auto responders that you will want to research.
If you’re offering a product for sale, you will need to sign-up for a shopping cart service so your customers have a way to check out securely. There are a handful of popular shopping cart services and some use PayPal as a means to process payment so you’ll want to have your PayPal account created and verified before you start researching the others. TradeBit, ClickBank, 1ShoppingCart, and 2CheckOut will all allow you to make your transactions quick and secure.
7. Elements to Reduce Anxiety
Reducing the anxiety your prospect feels when they visit your site is critical to completing a successful transaction between you and your prospect. There are three simple ways you can reduce anxiety and reassure your prospects that it is safe to conduct business with you; testimonials, providing a satisfaction guarantee, and posting third-party credibility indicators such as BBB Online or HackerSafe.
8. Analytics
If you are part of a large corporation, your website will likely already have an analytic tool. If you are a smaller marketer, visit Google Analytics to sign-up for a free account. Google Analytics offers a wide array of features including; integration with your Google AdWords account; multiple-users; visitor trending and loyalty; detailed traffic reporting (referring sites, search engines, and keywords); and more. It’s an invaluable tool to making decisions to alter your landing page marketing strategy.
ADAPT YOUR APPROACH
It is important to experiment with the design of your landing page and the execution of your marketing strategy. Don’t hesitate to test out different tactics until you find the right mix that matches your approach with your prospect. Some marketers have success with short copy and an opt-in system that provides free information in exchange for personal information and others have success with long copy and the sale of a product ranging in price from $7 to $700. It is critical to understand that whatever approach you decide to use, your landing page will need to be focused with a single goal in mind—getting the prospect to respond positively to your offer. This requires you to focus your efforts on creating a system for a targeted audience and adapting your approach until your success exceeds your expectations.
ACTION ITEMS
1. Use Guru.com or Elance to find a marketing copywriter (or try yourself).
2. Use Guru.com or Elance to find a web designer that has experience in landing page design. http://www.kriskiler.com
3. Research transaction utilities—online delivery systems, auto-responders, and shopping carts.
Notes
*, **, *** Marketing Experiments Journal: Landing Page Optimization Monday, 05 November 2007
©2008 Kris Kiler. All Rights Reserved.
by Kris Kiler
As an online marketer, you need to develop a system for short-term gains and long-term opportunities to provide for future sales and marketing. You can envision your landing page as a hub—like an airport. Your goal is to have traffic sent to a single hub and when people arrive, there can be a variety of new opportunities presented to them.
If your landing page is successful and gets the prospect to complete the offer, they can be rerouted to another page that presents them with yet another compelling value proposition. This new hub may be a list of affiliate offers, another product, or a newsletter opt-in form.
EXPLORATION OF THE 8 ESSENTIAL LANDING PAGE ELEMENTS
Let’s review the essential elements you will need for your landing page:
1. Value proposition / offer—in the form of a sales prompt or opt-in form
2. Conversion process—process prospect will go through in order to complete the purchase or subscription
3. Marketing copy—either short or long form using psychological triggers
4. Web page design—the design of your landing page (i.e.; website)
5. Product imagery—3d images of product or headshot of author or service provider
6. Transaction utilities—auto responder, shopping cart software
7. Elements to reduce anxiety—testimonials, satisfaction guarantee, third party credibility indicators
8. Analytics—data gathering script
1. Value Proposition / Offer
What will you be offering your prospects? A newsletter? A report? A training seminar? You will want to define clearly what you are offering. Complete the following statement. It will be your guiding statement as you move through this report.
I am offering a/an _____________________ on the topic of ________________________
in order to help ___________________with their problem of ________________________
Examples:
1. I am offering a report on the topic of creating and marketing landing pages in order to help marketers with their problem of achieving sales for their offering over the Internet.
2. I am offering an online software product on the topic of tracking advertising profits in order to help Internet marketers with their problem of making money with online advertising.
3. I am offering an employee training on the topic of leadership development in order to help organizations with their problem of managing talent development through the leadership pipeline.
NOTE: The goal of any landing page is to complete a successful transaction between you and your prospect.
2. Conversion Process
This is the process the prospect will go through in order to complete the buying process or subscription. Where are they coming from? When they get to your landing page, are they going to click “buy now” and go to a shopping cart? Are they going to click “subscribe now” and be taken to a form that requires them to enter their email and other personal information? Will you then require them to check their email in order to double opt-in by reconfirming their requested subscription? This means that you need to think holistically about your value proposition. Thinking holistically about your Value Proposition involves two key elements: continuity and congruence.* Continuity means that each step in the conversion process either states or supports the Value Proposition.** Congruence means that every element of your page either states or supports the Value Proposition (Design, Copy, Images, Colors, Logo, Price).*** Section 4 will provide more detail and concrete suggestions on how to enhance your conversion process.
3 & 4. Marketing Copy / Web Page Design
Creating effective marketing copy and web page design, can be difficult hurdle to overcome if your natural talents or skills don’t support them. You should be able to find a professional to write your copy and a professional to design your page in the same place. They require different skill-sets and should be treated as such.
There are many places on the Internet where you can find a marketing professional and website designer to get the work done. Guru.com and Elance Online are the two leading providers of project submission sites to receive bids on your project from freelance professionals. Make sure you leave your project budget confidential and communicate with the professional so you can find the person who you will be able to collaborate with the best. Often times, the lowest bidder will end up costing you time and possibly more money if they don’t perform to your expectations.
5. Product Imagery
Proverbs to the contrary, everyone does judge a book by its cover. This is why you will want to invest in having a professional create a three-dimensional image of your product or a logo for your newsletter or something visual that is associated with your offer. As with selling anything, you are selling yourself. It would be wise to take a good picture of yourself or again consider hiring a professional to take one and add it to your landing page.
6. Transaction Utilities
An auto responder can be an important tool to your customer relationship building. The old adage is true, “The fortune is in the follow-up.” If you use an auto responder, following-up with customers that purchase your product or sign-up for your newsletter can be automated and make your follow-up emails more time-efficient. AWeber is a very popular service for setting up auto responders that you will want to research.
If you’re offering a product for sale, you will need to sign-up for a shopping cart service so your customers have a way to check out securely. There are a handful of popular shopping cart services and some use PayPal as a means to process payment so you’ll want to have your PayPal account created and verified before you start researching the others. TradeBit, ClickBank, 1ShoppingCart, and 2CheckOut will all allow you to make your transactions quick and secure.
7. Elements to Reduce Anxiety
Reducing the anxiety your prospect feels when they visit your site is critical to completing a successful transaction between you and your prospect. There are three simple ways you can reduce anxiety and reassure your prospects that it is safe to conduct business with you; testimonials, providing a satisfaction guarantee, and posting third-party credibility indicators such as BBB Online or HackerSafe.
8. Analytics
If you are part of a large corporation, your website will likely already have an analytic tool. If you are a smaller marketer, visit Google Analytics to sign-up for a free account. Google Analytics offers a wide array of features including; integration with your Google AdWords account; multiple-users; visitor trending and loyalty; detailed traffic reporting (referring sites, search engines, and keywords); and more. It’s an invaluable tool to making decisions to alter your landing page marketing strategy.
ADAPT YOUR APPROACH
It is important to experiment with the design of your landing page and the execution of your marketing strategy. Don’t hesitate to test out different tactics until you find the right mix that matches your approach with your prospect. Some marketers have success with short copy and an opt-in system that provides free information in exchange for personal information and others have success with long copy and the sale of a product ranging in price from $7 to $700. It is critical to understand that whatever approach you decide to use, your landing page will need to be focused with a single goal in mind—getting the prospect to respond positively to your offer. This requires you to focus your efforts on creating a system for a targeted audience and adapting your approach until your success exceeds your expectations.
ACTION ITEMS
1. Use Guru.com or Elance to find a marketing copywriter (or try yourself).
2. Use Guru.com or Elance to find a web designer that has experience in landing page design. http://www.kriskiler.com
3. Research transaction utilities—online delivery systems, auto-responders, and shopping carts.
Notes
*, **, *** Marketing Experiments Journal: Landing Page Optimization Monday, 05 November 2007
©2008 Kris Kiler. All Rights Reserved.
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