“So You Have A Website, Now What?”

1. “So You Have A Website, Now What?” A presentation by Joshua Sloan, Online Traffic Coordinator, IT Dept. of UAT Josh@uat.edu

2. An Introduction to Web Marketing

3. Introduction Although some trends are changing there are established practices and excellent resources that will help get you started. I will be giving you an overview of some of these practices and various tips and tools you can use to begin the process of online marketing for your website. Each of these techniques and strategies have books written about them, my intention tonight is simply to inspire you and help you get off on the right foot whether you are hiring a marketing firm or trying the DIY approach.

4. Introduction cont. Keep in mind, that marketing is simply what you do to attract and keep customers/visitors. More generally, it is about building relationships - online and offline. In addition to giving you some free marketing advice, based upon my experience, I will also be pointing you toward some incredibly useful online resources and tools you can start using immediately.

5. Introduction cont. Though it is somewhat beyond this scope of this presentation to teach you basic HTML, included will be hints and suggestions you can use or give to your web designer, that will help to increase your chances of being listed by search engines and which will increase your site’s popularity and visibility. Online marketing should be an ongoing practice for all Internet businesses. Some of it you can do yourself, for some of it you may need help. If you decide to use a professional service, the knowledge you gain tonight could save you thousands of dollars!

6. Before You Start…

7. Six ‘Must Know’ Concepts Even if you are a web programmer, designer, copywriter, or trained, and seasoned business person there are SIX main general marketing concepts you should be aware of before you begin to explore online marketing campaigns for your website. Know them…Live them…Love them… They will help see even a struggling business or website, through tough times.

8. Know Your Market • Don’t try to be everything to everyone. • Knowing the demographics of your prospective visitors will help make sure that you are offering the right product, service, or site to the right person. • After all, this will play a big role in how you target your online advertising.

9. Make Your Advantages Easy to Understand • If you don’t know what makes your site/company/product different from the competition - how will the visitor, and why should they stay? • This is sometimes called finding your ‘Unique Selling Position’(USP). It is what sets you apart from your competition. Though not always easy to find in a crowded niche’, when you find it, it will be the underpinning of all you marketing efforts

10. Integrate and Align Your Marketing • Try to present a consistent image or message online and off. • Whether you purchase radio or TV ads, banner ads, search engine ads, t-shirts, CD-business cards, or posters… • All should work together to promote your website address in a consistent fashion. Remember - consistency.

11. Work Towards Referrals • Turning visitors into repeat visitors can create good word of mouth advertising. (Think Relationship Marketing or Customer Relationship Marketing.) In the long run, word of mouth is the least expensive, MOST effective way to get new business. Always try to exceed the expectations of your customers/clients. • Remember, on the Internet, bad news travels 1000x faster than good news, and good news always sells more!

12. Be Persistent, Be Real • Only rarely will you see dramatic results in a short time, but most good marketing takes sustained, persistent effort. Don’t give up too early on any one strategy. • Be persistent in your marketing efforts, but always remember the golden rule of marketing- don’t sell people, help them convince themselves to buy/return/join instead. (benefits-benefits-benefits) This process should build up a trust that makes a visitor more likely to return, or give referrals, etc. Your marketing should be comfortable for both you and your site’s visitor – BE REAL.

13. Tests and Measures • Find ways to measure and track the success or failure of your marketing efforts. This is true for both online and off line advertising. This will help you make better decisions regarding your marketing time and money. • This might include, but is not limited to: tools such as server log file analysis tools, ROI ad tracking tools, link popularity, and search engine ranking tools, conversion analysis.

14. Why Market Online? How effective is it? What Works?

15. Effective Marketing Methods A recent Media Metrix survey rated the over-all effectiveness of the following marketing methods on a scale of 1-5, with 5 being the most effective. • Search Engines 3.35 • Solicited or Opt-In Email 3.34 • Offline Advertising 3.04 • Press Release 3.00 • Banner Advertising 2.85 • Discussion Forums 2.83 • Sponsorships 2.61 • Newsgroups 2.46 • Strategic Linking 2.44 • Spam 1.83

16. SE Audience Reach Digital Media Audience ReachMarch 2002KEY: MSN=MSN, YH=Yahoo, GG=Google, AOL=AOL, AJ=Ask Jeeves, LS=LookSmart,ISP=InfoSpace, NS=Netscape, OVR=Overture (GoTo).

17. Short Words of Wisdom Now I am not suggesting you become obsessed with any single one of the strategies mentioned above. Rapidly changing online advertising trends would make it foolish to put all of your eggs in one basket. At least not until you’ve tested each one out several times! Although you can often measure short-term success, only by repeating the techniques over time will you get a better picture of what works for you. Search engines can take weeks to months to list you once your URL is submitted. (Unless you pay for rank.) You should try each of the strategies mentioned above (EXCEPT Spam!) for maximum success.

18. Search Engines, Directories, and Bears, Oh My!

19. The road to success… There is no yellow brick road to the Internet, but if there were, it would be Search Engines. They are the way most everyone learns how to surf the net. They are also one of the more successful, yet mysterious, subjects of online promotions. They are sources of categorized websites; built using automated bots, and crawlers to sniff out new sites to list. These bots and crawlers operate using ever-changing algorithms to determine a site’s content, relevancy, and rank. Search Engines will list many more of your sites pages than will a Directory. How many bots are trolling the net? I believe the number is up to 8000! Only a few hundred come from major engines though. But there are thousands of Smaller Engines developing all the time. Examples of larger Search Engines are: Google, Lycos, and Inktomi.

20. Directories are somewhat similar to Search Engines except they rely on human editors to review any of the sites they collect. The best example is Yahoo! And DMOZ.org (ODP) Directories typically will only give a site a primary, and secondary listing. Choose your category carefully (here’s where some good keyword research will come in handy.) Some portal sites act as directories of special topics. Other sites which you can submit your sight to include, What’s New/Cool sites, Classified Sites, Free-For-Alls, and Special topic Bulletin Boards.

21. Search Engine and Submission Readiness

22. 4 Biggest Obstacles to Marketing Your Website • Coding problems: your text is wrapping this way and that, or your images are stretched or distorted, missing or incorrect meta tags, dynamic pages, heavy use of JavaScript • Copy problems: awkward, confusing sentences; spelling, grammar or punctuation errors. Lack of sufficient content. • Design problems: too many images, blinking fonts, too much text crammed on one page, poor page load time, poor color choice, poor logo or "branding” • Organizational problems: users can't figure out how to get to the relevant information, or even worse, can't even figure out what the topic of the page is supposed to be. Missing Pages, pages too deep, lack of Sitemap. Why do sites and pages fail to get listed by search engines? Why they fail to turn a visitor into a client? And why don’t your existing visitors don't return.

23. Web Promotion Readiness Checklist

24. Always make sure your site works, spell-checked, good load time, browser friendly, spider friendly. Do not submit web sites with "Under-Construction" signs; all good web sites are always under construction. Just make sure everything works! • Your web site content includes your keywords or phrases. I recommend min. 4% Keyword density. Too dense falls into the category of “spam-dexing” • Put the words which best describe your site at the top of the page (in the first few paragraphs of your text). You do not want a search engine to return a description of your web site that reads "Welcome to my home page. This site best viewed with Internet Explorer." • You have used a descriptive HTML Title . Should include one or two keywords. 40-100 characters. • Well developed Keyword Meta Tags Recommend no more than 6 Keywords or phrases. • Your website keyword Description Meta Tags have been developed with high search engine placement in mind. I recommend no more than 200 characters, and should contain your Keywords or phrases. There is some variability among Engines. • Your image tags have specific height and width and an ALT tag. • You have used keywords or phrases when naming your hyperlinks. And ‘outgoing’ hyperlinks to other sites are relevant to your page content

25. You have avoided using Meta Refresh. (This is considered to be spoofing by some SE, especially if less than 30 seconds.) • If you have used Server-Side Image maps, you have provided regular links as well. Bots can’t see pictures, only code, content, and links. • Your web site does not include anything that could be considered spamming by the search engines. • You have your own domain name. (Not required, but helpful) Some domain names also contain keywords. • Your web page loads quickly. 30 seconds or less! • If your web site is in frames, you have made good use of the <NOFRAMES> tag on your index page. Keep in mind that a site done in frames will RARELY place well in the search engines. • Your index page is more than just a splash screen. • Content, content, content

26. Duplicate Pages – Duplicate pages with different names. Machine generated or improperly constructed doorway pages are also considered “Bloat” by Search Engines. Some ignored duplicate pages, but it is not worth the risk. Invisible Text – Text that has the same color as the background. Definitely considered spamdexing. Don’t do it. Meta Refresh Tags – If less than 30 seconds it is considered spam/spoofing. The use of Java Script redirectors id preferred. Too Many Commented Keywords – Also called keyword stuffing, generally not useful as bots look for visible text. Pages with no Content – Image maps, site maps w/ links only. Tiny text – anything smaller than font size 2. Unreadable text. Repeating keywords - more than 2-3 times in each Meta Tag, and don’t use keywords unrelated to your page. Code swapping/Spoofing - Do not optimize a page for top ranking, then swap another page in its place once a top ranking is achieved. Over Submitting - Do not submit more than the allowed number of pages per engine per day or week. Each engine has a limit on how many pages you can manually submit to it using its online forms. Please note that this is not the total number of pages that can be indexed, it is just the total number that can be submitted. If you can only submit 25 pages to Excite, for example, and you have a 1000 page site, that's no problem. The search engine will come crawling your site and index all pages, including those that you did not submit. Questionable Search Engine Optimization Techniques

27. Good Code and Good Content –It all starts here!

28. No Secrets… There are no "secrets" to high rankings, but there are a few steps you or your web designer can take while designing your web pages to to help get favorable rankings. Fact is every SE is different -- but it all starts with good code and good content. For tips on good copywriting I suggest you try: http://pandecta.com/copy.html http://www.marketingsurvivalkit.com/webcopy.htm Web designers often use ‘validators’ to check their web page's HTML code. You can validated you own page or pages by visiting: http://validator.w3.org/ http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator/ Validation should always be done BEFORE a site goes live and each time changes are made to the page. Broken pages will hinder their promotion.

29. A Quick Word About Content You have a much better chance of getting a page noticed if it has at least 250-500, words of copy on the page more is even better. Remember two things about content. • Search Engines like people, value sites with good content, even if the site is less than 20 pages! • Internet surfers SCAN first, then read, use heading tags. • Sales copy should be carefully constructed to make your visitor feel informed and comfortable enough to continue reading, exploring, or purchasing from your site.

30. Basic Content Components • THE PAGE TITLE should contain Keyword or Phrase, 40-100 char. (see meta tags), e.g. ‘Marketing and Promotion Services from Sloan Computing’ • THE HEADLINE grabs the reader's attention. • THE SUBHEAD reinforces the main heading. Subheadings are useful to dive content, and are good spots for keywords • ILLUSTRATION or PHOTO only if it emphasizes the headline benefit. • THE BODY COPY starts with a compelling paragraph that leads the reader into the next section, or action (click/join/buy). • FURTHER PARAGRAPHS support and reinforce the benefits of the offer. These may contain supporting hyperlinks. • PENULTIMATE PARAGRAPH warns the reader of the consequences of missing out on the offer. • FINAL PARAGRAPH stimulates response. (Order now/Join/Click) • PS gives a further reason to respond and reinforces the offer. • COMPANY LOGO is essential to branding, and memory stimulus. • TAG LINE or Slogan should makes the reader feel comfortable about the company, e.g. ‘Teaching YOU to Unlock the Power of your Website’

31. Meta Tags Basics and Meta Data Mythconceptions

32. Meta tags are hidden code seen by Search Engine bots, and crawlers. They are used in part to tell the bot what it is about to crawl through. All Search Engine Gurus agree, They do deserve proper attention, none-the-less. There are literally dozens of accepted meta tags, two main meta tags that we will be concerned with for this presentation are keywords and description. Keywords are the words and phrases that people might type in to a search engine in order to find you. The description is the description that the search engines search and display to people who query the engine. Meta tags are part of the HEAD of your document and should be placed between the <HEAD></HEAD> pair. Meta Data are Not Magic Bullets!

33. Meta Data Syntax An Example of meta data syntax is: <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="keyword1,keyword2,kyeword3, etc."> <META NAME="description: CONTENT="your description"> <META NAME ="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/HTML; CHARSET=iso-8859-1"></meta> <META NAME ="robots" content="index,follow"></meta> <META NAME ="rating" content="General"></meta> <LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON" HREF="http://www.uat.edu/favicon.ico"> Note: Anytime you use a parameter that requires quotation marks, you need to be sure that the line does not wrap. In other words, make sure all information between quotation marks is on one line. The closing of the meta tag </meta> is not yet an accepted standard, but may be used in the near future as XML standards become more solidified.

34. Search Engines and Meta Tags Support,the REAL deal. Danny Sullivan, search engine guru from SearchEngineWatch.com, has the following analysis of Search Engines…

35. Search Engine Detail Sheet

36. Keyword and Meta Tag Tools • Keyword and Key Phrase Finder Overture Search Tem Suggestion Tool -http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ This is a handy tool to see what keywords and key phrases to choose. The tool is actually designed to find search terms to bid on for overture.com's search engine but you can use it for several functions: • See what key phrases people are typing in with your keyword. • See if your keyword or key phrase is viable • See how many people approximately typed in a keyword or phrase last month. • Type your keyword or phrase into the tool. • Take the number it gives you and divide it by .013 (% of Overall Searches) • This should give you an approximation of how many times your keyword or phrase was typed in (across all engines) last month. The reason this works is because currently overture.com feeds approximately 1.3 % of the search results through its partnerships with the major Search Engines. Current bids for Overture’s PPC traffic can be found at: http://www.overture.com/d/search/tools/bidtool/ • Keyword Spy http://www.freewebmastertips.com/php/content.php3?aid=11

37. Keyword and Meta Tag Tools • Keyword Density Analyzer: http://www.webjectives.com/keyword.htm • Meta Tag Builder: Vancouver Tag Builder http://vancouver-webpages.com/META/about-mk-metas2.html • For More on Meta Tags: Dictionary of HTML META Tags http://vancouver-webpages.com/META/metatags.detail.html

38. Link Popularity/Visibility and Site Submissions

39. Be SEEN. • Link Popularity or Visibility is the number of incoming links to your site. Some Engines use this in part to determine your ranking for a particular search term or phrase. • Check your page’s Link Popularity for FREE at: SeachMaster http://www.searchmaster1.co.uk/linkpop.html • The process of obtain increased link popularity is a combination of regular site submissions to Newsgroups, Discussion Lists, BBS, and to a lesser extent smaller Classified Ads. • QUALITY is Better than Quantity when it comes to picking link partners.

40. Reciprocal Linking Requesting an exchange of links, called ‘Reciprocal Linking’, is an excellent way to increasing link visibility, but is somewhat painstaking. BUT incredibly valuable. It just takes time to identify quality, non-competitive sites which are somewhat related to your own. Email the webmaster with a personalized link request. It is best to make the personal request for link placement on other sites only after you have placed a link on a topic specific page on your site.

41. Down on the Link Farms Avoid using Link Farms to boost link visibility, more and more search engines consider link farms as having little or no value, and may lower your ranking if you are listed on too many. Unlike perfectly valid links to sites with related information, sites that participate in link farming contain links to totally unrelated sites. This practice is also referred to as link stuffing. Most Search Engine hate link farms. (Remember the tip about not trying to be everything to everyone?)

42. Submission Schedule * Netiquette and acceptance of commercial postings varies. **Re-submitting a page already listed is of little or no value unless something on the page has changed or been updated. Although the time it takes to be list varies from 6-8 weeks to 6-12 months, constant “hammering” using online or offline submission tools may be considered spam.

43. Top Internet Promotion and Marketing Websites • SearchEngineWatch – www.searchenginewatch.com • HighRankings – www.highrankings.com • MarketingTerms - www.marketingterms.com • SitePoint – www.sitepoint.com • PromotionWorld – www.promotionworld.com • Internet Marketing Wizards - www.theinternetmarketingwizards.com • SearchEnigine Forums www.serchengineforums.com

44. Free Online Promotion and Marketing Tools Link Popularity Checker – http://www.searchmaster1.co.uk/linkpop.html SE Rank Check – http://www.searchmaster1.co.uk/cgi/hostorder.pl?duration=trial Keyword Density Analyzer - http://www.keyworddensity.com/ Easy Online Free Mega Submitter – http://www.dreamsubmit.net/stack/

45. Commercial Web Marketing Software and Tools Domain Name Analyzer SearchMaster – Web based SE Utilities & Reporting Submission Mgrs. – AddWeb, Dynamic Submission, WebPosition Gold Traffic Analysis – WebTrends, Funnel Web Log, Axis, etc. Keyword/phrase tools – WordTracker, Good Keyword Professional, Dynamic Keyword Bid Maximizer Pay Per Click Engines - Overture.com, AhHa, FindWhat, Espotting

46. Conclusion Tonight we have looked at : • What online marketing techniques are currently being used successfully. • How to avoid common pitfalls prior to promoting your site • Proper ways to increase link visibility • Some frequently used tools and free utilities of web marketers

47. Farewell and much success! I have seen some great successes with even these basic techniques. I hope this has inspired you to learn even more about website promotion and marketing. Advanced pay strategies may be introduced further in subsequent presentations. I welcome your feedback, and hope you will join my own Email List to learn even more about getting your site noticed. Much Success and Prosperity, Joshua Sloan Josh@uat.edu