An Internet marketing strategy is not only a good idea, it is vital to business marketing – particularly small business marketing. Having, maintaining, updating, and promoting a website is now a major factor in the success of any business, regardless of size.
Creating a website, and then sitting back and waiting for people to find it is not enough. Because of the billions of web pages, you must promote your website every chance you have. This is a critical part of not only your Internet marketing strategy, but also your overall marketing strategy. Customers are very willing to visit websites and learn about new products and services, but they need a little help getting there.
Most online articles, ebooks, webinars, and online courses about promoting a website rely on the web itself. While this is necessary, it isn’t enough, because your business may have many people who are not enthusiastic web surfers, but who would, nonetheless be interested in either shopping online, or learning more about your business there.
These people, the ones who are only lukewarm in their enthusiasm for the Internet, need to be reached in other ways. They may well “convert” to online shopping, or at least comparison shopping online, but they need a little push to try new things online. This is particularly true for very localized businesses, such as farmers’ markets or day care services. There are inexpensive and effective ways for you to reach these people online.
The problem with newspapers, aside from rapidly declining circulation levels, is that newspapers are large, and not neat, and if your ad is buried on an inside page, it may not get much notice. Radio ads must spell out the address of your website, and that is not a very accurate way of promoting it. On the other hand, direct mail postcards are small, convenient, and portable.
Ways in which you can use offline strategies to market your business and build enthusiasm for your website include: television and print advertising; business cards and business stationery; billboards, fliers, and catalogs; direct mail; telemarketing with website info included in the scripts; and news releases to all forms of local media.
Direct mail postcards should feature your website prominently. That way interested people can easily visit your website when they see your web address prominently displayed on the postcard.
Internet marketing strategy cannot depend solely on the Internet. Your Internet marketing strategy should include every means of promoting your website and building traffic from targeted customers. Television, radio, and classified advertising can be expensive, but if you do invest in these forms of media, make sure that your website is mentioned everywhere, and ask if those media can link to your site from theirs.
While every little bit does help, some advertising media are more cost effective and efficient than others. While your billboard ads should feature the address of your website, a person would most likely have to see the billboard many times before finally deciding to look up the website.
Trade journals are another good way to get the name of your website known while at the same time making it easier for interested parties to copy your URL and visit your site. If a trade journal offers to put a link to your website on theirs, this would help even more. Other methods do work and should be at least considered, but in many cases, people will have to see your newspaper or billboard ad multiple times before remembering your address.
Direct mail postcards are small enough to hang onto and perhaps place in a shirt pocket, making it easier to have your website address handy. It is more likely that potential customers will still have a direct mail postcard handy when he or she is on a computer. While many forms of offline advertising can help promote your website, direct mail postcards are an often overlooked advertising medium that is very easy for customers to use to find out about and visit your website.