Many visitors to your website will arrive via a search engine. Making your website more visible on search engines will hook potential customers, so follow our simple steps to improve your ranking.
Things to do today…
• Make a list of keywords and phrases that best describe your products and services. Run keywords through a keyword tool to identify any additional possibilities and find out how frequently they are searched for
• Go online and find appropriate businesses that might be able to provide reciprocal links to your website
Short term actions
Use search engine optimisation There are certain things you can do to improve your website’s search engine ranking.
• Make your site accessible. Well- written, easy to navigate pages will attract repeat visitors and may
help push your website up the search engine rankings (see chapter one).
• Use keywords and phrases.
Decide which keywords and phrases are unique to your industry products and services. Be fairly specific, eg ‘organic local apples’ will generate more qualified search engine leads than ‘apples’. Run these through a keyword tool to identify additional possibilities. Target these key phrases in web content, page titles, headings, sub-headings and any metadata included in the page code.
• Include an HTML link to a basic site map on every page of your website. Search engines will then be able to index pages of your site, increasing the chance of your site appearing in searches.
• Include reciprocal links. Use search engines to find websites that have high rankings for appropriate key terms and phrases. Contact them and ask if they will include a link to your website in return for a reciprocal link.
• Make sure your website is useful. This will encourage others to link to your site of their own accord. These one way links are often more effective than reciprocal links.
Top tip
• Don’t compromise the quality of your web copy in an effort to fill it with keywords. Search engines could penalise you for this and your rating will drop.
Start a pay per click campaign
A pay per click (PPC) campaign will further improve your web presence.
A PPC campaign involves posting sponsored links or adverts on search engine websites. When users search for keywords related to your business,
2. Search engine marketing
your sponsored link appears in a column often to the right or above the natural or organic search results.
A PPC campaign is cost-effective as you only pay for click-through to your site. The results can be easily tracked allowing you to optimise your campaigns. Set a daily budget and your advert will be switched off once your allowance is spent.
Plan your pay per click campaign Careful planning will help you maximise the success of your
PPC campaign.
Consider the following:
• Which visitors you want to attract.
• Whether you want to target local or regional customers, a particular age-group or
particular-interest customers.
• How many unique adverts you want to create for each advert group. These will need to be tested against each other to find the most effective.
• When you want adverts to be activated and for how long.
• Which keyword searches will generate your sponsored link.
A broad match will trigger your advert more frequently than an exact match and could mean your advert is shown inappropriately.
• How much you are willing to bid initially for each click.
For more information about running a successful online advertising campaign contact Scream Media today for a FREE no obligation quote.
Showing posts with label scream media marketing tool. Show all posts
Showing posts with label scream media marketing tool. Show all posts
25 May 2010
07 May 2010
Starting an Online Business
If you are thinking about starting an online business the first step you should take is to find a niche product or service. A niche is a product or service that serves a highly targeted audience with specific needs. Why is this important? Because with all of the different businesses establishing a presence online it is important to choose something that caters to an underserved audience with a demand for a specific product or service.
Many people who are new to online business make the mistake of choosing a product or service that is currently considered “hot” without thinking about the high rate of competition and the fact that the market may already be saturated. In addition to that, you can end up paying a fortune in advertising with nothing to show for it in the end.
If you choose a niche that serves a highly targeted audience with specific needs you will stand a much better chance of succeeding with your online business. Here are a few tips on choosing a niche that will help to improve your chances of success.
What Are You Passionate About?
Sit down and make a list of things you are passionate and knowledgeable about. The list should include interests, hobbies, professional skills, and any other topics that you would be happy working with on a daily basis. At first, you may find this a challenge if you have been caught up in the 9 to 5 grind and forgotten what you are passionate about. Be patient and enlist the help of some friends if you wish.
It is important that you are passionate about what you do because this will show through when you build a client base. If you are enthusiastic about what you do this will reflect on others and they will return to do business with you time and again. Additionally, if you enjoy what you do it will never feel like work.
Research Your Market
Once you have decided on a topic the next step is to start researching the topic on the Internet. You can begin to find your audience and where your position will be in your market by participating in forums related to your topic, social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and any other sites where you can find people discussing your topic.
As you visit these sites listen carefully and take some notes on what people are discussing. This will help you to discover exactly what they are looking for when it comes to your product or service. Listening to the needs of your audience will help you to determine a niche for your online business.
For example, if your topic of interest is landscaping it is important to find out what people are looking for with regard to landscaping. Landscaping is very broad topic with a lot of competition. What about landscaping? What are people specifically looking for? Are they looking for landscaping professionals? Are they looking for landscaping tools? Perhaps they are looking for tips on how to do landscaping.
The key here is to drill down into the term “landscaping” and find a specific niche related to this topic the serves a highly targeted audience with specific needs. Landscaping plans for small backyards would be an example of a niche that serves a specific audience.
Keywords
Once you find your audience and what they are looking for the keywords you choose will help your targeted audience to find you online. Once you get to know your audience you can brainstorm keywords they might use to search for your product or service. You can use one of the many keyword tools that are available online for accomplishing this task. Google has a fantastic free keyword suggestion tool
Just like you had to drill down to find a niche you must find keywords that relate to the niche. Let’s go back to the landscaping example. If you simply choose the keyword “landscaping” you may get a lot of visitors to your website but they will be untargeted. If you are selling landscaping plans and they are looking for tools they will leave your site. If you choose the keywords “landscaping plans for small backyards” you know exactly what the people are searching for and it makes it easy to deliver the solution when they arrive at your website.
Take the time in the beginning to choose your niche and get to know your market and what they are looking for. The time you invest will help you to build a solid foundation for building a business that will last over the long term.
Our marketing team has over 25 years experience in both on and off line marketing. For a professional analysis of your online business plan, contact us today to set up a no obligation meeting.
Many people who are new to online business make the mistake of choosing a product or service that is currently considered “hot” without thinking about the high rate of competition and the fact that the market may already be saturated. In addition to that, you can end up paying a fortune in advertising with nothing to show for it in the end.
If you choose a niche that serves a highly targeted audience with specific needs you will stand a much better chance of succeeding with your online business. Here are a few tips on choosing a niche that will help to improve your chances of success.
What Are You Passionate About?
Sit down and make a list of things you are passionate and knowledgeable about. The list should include interests, hobbies, professional skills, and any other topics that you would be happy working with on a daily basis. At first, you may find this a challenge if you have been caught up in the 9 to 5 grind and forgotten what you are passionate about. Be patient and enlist the help of some friends if you wish.
It is important that you are passionate about what you do because this will show through when you build a client base. If you are enthusiastic about what you do this will reflect on others and they will return to do business with you time and again. Additionally, if you enjoy what you do it will never feel like work.
Research Your Market
Once you have decided on a topic the next step is to start researching the topic on the Internet. You can begin to find your audience and where your position will be in your market by participating in forums related to your topic, social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and any other sites where you can find people discussing your topic.
As you visit these sites listen carefully and take some notes on what people are discussing. This will help you to discover exactly what they are looking for when it comes to your product or service. Listening to the needs of your audience will help you to determine a niche for your online business.
For example, if your topic of interest is landscaping it is important to find out what people are looking for with regard to landscaping. Landscaping is very broad topic with a lot of competition. What about landscaping? What are people specifically looking for? Are they looking for landscaping professionals? Are they looking for landscaping tools? Perhaps they are looking for tips on how to do landscaping.
The key here is to drill down into the term “landscaping” and find a specific niche related to this topic the serves a highly targeted audience with specific needs. Landscaping plans for small backyards would be an example of a niche that serves a specific audience.
Keywords
Once you find your audience and what they are looking for the keywords you choose will help your targeted audience to find you online. Once you get to know your audience you can brainstorm keywords they might use to search for your product or service. You can use one of the many keyword tools that are available online for accomplishing this task. Google has a fantastic free keyword suggestion tool
Just like you had to drill down to find a niche you must find keywords that relate to the niche. Let’s go back to the landscaping example. If you simply choose the keyword “landscaping” you may get a lot of visitors to your website but they will be untargeted. If you are selling landscaping plans and they are looking for tools they will leave your site. If you choose the keywords “landscaping plans for small backyards” you know exactly what the people are searching for and it makes it easy to deliver the solution when they arrive at your website.
Take the time in the beginning to choose your niche and get to know your market and what they are looking for. The time you invest will help you to build a solid foundation for building a business that will last over the long term.
Our marketing team has over 25 years experience in both on and off line marketing. For a professional analysis of your online business plan, contact us today to set up a no obligation meeting.
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