The ABCs of Online PromotionsThe key to any site’s success is traffic. No company can make sales, advertise, offer customer service, or charge advertisers unless people visit the Web site -- and they don’t necessarily come just because you build it. Your site has to be promoted so that Web users can find it among the increasing number of sites. This doesn’t mean launching a high-powered and expensive ad campaign. One of the great advantages of the Web for small businesses is that it’s inexpensive -- often free -- to let people know that a site is open and where it is. Here are the best ways to get the word out after opening a Web site:
Most e-mail programs allow users to create small files of text that automatically append to the bottom of every e-mail message they send. For example, at the end of each e-mail message, you can say something like, “XYZ Company, meeting your real estate needs since 1944.” The file is called a signature file, and any company with a Web site should include the URL and a brief description of the site in key employees’ signature files. Thus, every e-mail sent could also include a brief ad like, “Visit our Web site at www.newproperty.com to play Land on Boardwalk!” The key to an effective signature file is to keep it short, ideally four lines or fewer. Some people create very elaborate signature files, drawing little pictures or quoting long passages from books or poems. This type of file just takes up space, and nobody bothers to read the whole thing after the first time. But a short file usually gets at least glanced at every time, prompting them to remember the message.
If your company’s site is set up to collect e-mail addresses of visitors, add a question next to that section asking if they’d mind receiving e-mail notifying them of changes to your Web site, or changes in the industry, or changes and updates to whatever key information your site offers. Once armed with a list of users willing to receive e-mail, start sending it to them. Don’t abuse their trust by overwhelming them with press releases every time a minor change is made to the site, but do put together a regular mailer, perhaps once a month, pointing out a few new products available on the site or key issues discussed there. The mailer shouldn’t steal the site’s thunder. It should be more of a teaser designed to make readers want to visit the site. Keep it very short and current.
A collection of Internet discussion groups, known as newsgroups, works like bulletin boards -- people can post messages on certain topics. Anyone who visits the newsgroup can read all of the past messages and also post messages themselves. There are more than 20,000 newsgroups, each focusing on a specific topic, such as pet health care, foreign car repair, Web-page development, computers for sale, or fan clubs for rock musicians. This area of the Internet is notoriously noncommercial, and users hate posted advertisements. Despite this, some companies do market to newsgroups successfully. Here are four basic approaches:
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