Website Promotion Strategy

Would you like to figure out what you can do to help a marketing business that’s in a slump? There are many different things that can be looked at and optimized. These different ideas are what could be the direction that you have been looking for in terms of some kind of hope for the future.

One of the first things you should do is some in depth research of your business. This type of research will provide you with facts to look at, so that you can compare your performance to others. The second thing you should look at is your successful competitors. You should try to find out what your competition is ranking for in the search engines. You should also attempt to find out what the customers all have in common and focus in on their annual income earnings as a way to help focus in on who you should be accepting.

On Friday, we talked about the importance of finding the right balance between finding keywords that are popular and those that will allow you to gain traction in a competitive marketplace. Once you have found the right keywords for your business, you need to implement strategies that will use your keywords to their best advantage. The first step to take is to make sure that you incorporate those keywords into your website.

The use of keywords is crucial in search engine optimization. Although keywords aren’t the only criteria that search engines use to rank websites, they are an important component. Today, we’ll discuss the use of keywords in your site’s title tags.

The title tag is what you see at the very top of your browser window. This is premium real estate, and search engines look for these tags. Make liberal use of your keywords in title tags, keeping these two caveats in mind: a) make sure the keywords in your title are relevant to the content of the web page; and b) use a unique title tag for each web page. Resist the temptation to simply duplicate page titles throughout your site; instead, use your creativity to think up relevant keywords and keyword phrase variations for each page.

You can, however, utilize more than one keyword in each title tag. Keep the tag to 70 characters, and use “pipes” (the | symbol above the backslash on your keyboard) to separate the keywords. For example, if you have an Internet marketing site, your title tag might look something like this: Internet marketing | Search Engine Marketing | Website Promotion. You’ve managed to squeeze three keyword phrases into your page title.

Keywords are an important part of any Internet marketing strategy. Tomorrow, we’ll discuss the use of keywords in your domain name.

When it comes to building traffic to your website the best approach can be described as “all hands on deck.” In other words, you have to use a variety of Internet marketing strategies. Although working with an Internet marketing company and using their tools is important, there are also steps you can take to organically move your site up in search engine rankings. Blogging is one of them.

Although it seems as though the media talks nonstop about blogging, many ecommerce sites are slow to embrace blogging as a means to increase traffic. However, writing regular blog entries and including an RSS feed so that readers can subscribe to your blog can help increase traffic to your site, increase the number of one-way backlinks, and thus improve your search engine rankings.

The phrase, “content is king,” is often bandied about when it comes to site content, but it’s also true when it comes to blog entries. Write interesting – and sometimes provocative – blog entries, and you’ll pique the interest of your readers.

Using a blogroll, or a list of blogs that you like or that you think would be useful to your readers, is also a way to gain traction. You can also write a favorable blog entry about a tangentially related blog, and then drop that blogger a note letting him or her know that you like their work. You can even offer to be a guest blogger for their blog and cross-promote your site.

In Web 2.0, blogs are the currency of the land. Let your blog help build your website traffic – write on!

Writing a great press release is a good start, but unless you get your press release into the right hands, it will never see the light of day. That’s why press release distribution is key.

Web-based press release distribution services have a wide reach, but little depth. It’s analogous to scattering seeds across the soil and hoping one will take root. Highly target press release distribution has a narrower reach, but puts your release in the hands of the journalists most likely to take your story and run with it. Instead of scattering seeds, you’re taking care to plant each and every one, increasing the likelihood that many will sprout and grow.

It’s best to select a distribution company that has an up-to-date database of hundreds of thousands of media contacts, and that will target and personalize your press release for maximum effectiveness. For example, if you’re promoting your new line of office furniture, it doesn’t do any good to send your press release to sports reporters or those covering automobile trends. A good distribution company will target those reporters who cover business, office furnishings, and so forth, and deliver your release directly to their current email address. This way, your release gets to the proper person every time. Plus, the journalist doesn’t have to go hunting through releases generated by an online newswire to find one that fits his or her beat. The easier you make the journalist’s job, the more likely you’ll get coverage.

A sound media strategy is more common sense than rocket science. When you meet the needs of journalists while promoting your company, products, and services, you have a winning combination.

Once you’ve selected a newsworthy topic for your press release, it’s time to start writing. Keep in mind that press releases are read by writers and editors, so it should go without saying that your press release must be well written. If you’re not a writer, don’t be shy about contracting with a writer or a marketing services company to write your release for you.

Press releases are written according to a formula. The placement of various elements depends on the distribution outlet (which we’ll discuss tomorrow), but the key elements are:

Contact information – The name, phone number, and email address of the person who will be handling media inquiries.
Headline – A clear and catchy headline that conveys the essence of the release topic.
Place and dateline – The city, state, and date where the release originated.
First paragraph – The Who, What, When, Where, and Why of the release.

One way to think of a press release is as a pyramid, with the most important information at the top, and the supporting information below. Theoretically, a press release should be able to be reprinted as is, with the length cut to fit the space available without sacrificing important information. In practice, of course, that rarely happens, but it’s a good strategy to keep in mind while writing.

A press release often includes quotes from someone in the company, but these quotes are almost always manufactured. Essentially, you write the quote as you’d like it to appear, and then get the approval of the person to whom you’re attributing the quote.

As was the case when you decided upon the topic of your press release, write the release from the perspective of the audience of your recipient. What information would they like to know? What will be helpful to them? Avoid both stating the obvious and being too abstract. A good balance will ensure that your release is both interesting and informative.