Lets look at Website Marketing in more detail

[ctabuk]

I have been reading the threads on Viral Marketing and Affiliate Systems etc - But how do you really get your site or sites 'talked about'?

The very first thing to look at is

Who are my customers?

And second

Who are my competitors?

You can spend hundreds of dollars or pounds on creating a great looking site but for one reason or other the actual sales income does not live up to your expectations. And that is annoying and can become very frustrating.

The first rule of any site should be 'Think Searcher' - what keywords are they likely to use. And second to make sure that those keywords are set up as a page title with the 'long tail html codes' in place.

Let's just for a minute look at one of my little tricks.

I have set up Google Alerts for dozens and dozens of keywords. Everyday of the week I receive an e-mail from Google with either a blog that is on my topics or a newspaper article. With the blogs that's easy I reply using the longtail URL link as my 'link too'. That gains me lots of 'site relevant links' and the fact that Google has already used that blog as a reference point tells me that there is an excellent chance of gaining a quality link.

With the newspapers, well that takes a wee bit more time, but I always reply to the author and politely ask if they will print my thoughts. And if they do, would they mind adding either my forum username as 'source' or to print my URL.

Never forget that Google reads not only websites but 'anything' on the net.

I am also a firm believer (though crankydave and I do not alays agree on this) that forum usernames can be viewed by Google as being 'seen and heard' and can in theory add a little extra zipp to your linking system. At the last count I personally have over 12,000.

Competitors - Oh those little sods!

I always do a very basic "theirsite" or I use SiteReportCard: Web Site Optimization and Promotion Tools and see where they are gaining their links. Dead easy after that - do likewise.
Next with competitors - look at their pricing - see if you can afford to undercut them or provide a service that they have not thought of.

You might wish to consider a 'loss leader' that simply means sell something dirt cheap to create interest. And then, once more seeing your competitors sites and their pricing set about a rigourous price war.
Do a Wallmart on your competition.

OK - Now we will have a questions and answer session.

You ask - I'll do my best to answer.

Cheers David

[bj]

One of the problems when I had just built my site was I had no clue who it was who would really need my service, no clue who my customer really was, just vague ideas. This is where a blog comes in handy. You just blog about your industry, your talent, your service, and/or your product and be religious about doing it a minimum of twice a week. Then you keep a watch on the keyphrases people are coming in on, and work from there.

I really don't have a question, per se. I just thought that the above added a dimension to the discussion. The whole thing was a happy accident for me, actually, since when I started I didn't know much about web promo, and was tired of submitting to directories, which seemed the easiest, but is tedious work. I'd much rather just blog.

[TrafficProducer]

I've been putting together Advertising Methods FREE TIPS,

I believe it cover most Marketing stuff, (as honestly as I can), unless this post find other issues.

[georgeruch]

You might think this is crazy but take a look at my site Truck Jobs - Trucking Jobs - Truck Driving Jobs - Trucker Jobs - Ttruck Driving - we do some advertising in the air. Many of our clients are avad NASCAR fans - we fly our banner over the crowds gathered at the track - usually in the neighborhood of 2,00,000 to 300,000 fans - they don't all attend the race but they do hang out in thier campers and watch the trails etc.-Good luck! George

[websoftgroup]

Originally Posted by ctabuk

I have been reading the threads on Viral Marketing and Affiliate Systems etc - But how do you really get your site or sites 'talked about'?

The very first thing to look at is

Who are my customers?

And second

Who are my competitors?

You can spend hundreds of dollars or pounds on creating a great looking site but for one reason or other the actual sales income does not live up to your expectations. And that is annoying and can become very frustrating.

The first rule of any site should be 'Think Searcher' - what keywords are they likely to use. And second to make sure that those keywords are set up as a page title with the 'long tail html codes' in place.

Let's just for a minute look at one of my little tricks.

I have set up Google Alerts for dozens and dozens of keywords. Everyday of the week I receive an e-mail from Google with either a blog that is on my topics or a newspaper article. With the blogs that's easy I reply using the longtail URL link as my 'link too'. That gains me lots of 'site relevant links' and the fact that Google has already used that blog as a reference point tells me that there is an excellent chance of gaining a quality link.

With the newspapers, well that takes a wee bit more time, but I always reply to the author and politely ask if they will print my thoughts. And if they do, would they mind adding either my forum username as 'source' or to print my URL.

Never forget that Google reads not only websites but 'anything' on the net.

I am also a firm believer (though crankydave and I do not alays agree on this) that forum usernames can be viewed by Google as being 'seen and heard' and can in theory add a little extra zipp to your linking system. At the last count I personally have over 12,000.

Competitors - Oh those little sods!

I always do a very basic "theirsite" or I use SiteReportCard: Web Site Optimization and Promotion Tools and see where they are gaining their links. Dead easy after that - do likewise.
Next with competitors - look at their pricing - see if you can afford to undercut them or provide a service that they have not thought of.

You might wish to consider a 'loss leader' that simply means sell something dirt cheap to create interest. And then, once more seeing your competitors sites and their pricing set about a rigourous price war.
Do a Wallmart on your competition.

OK - Now we will have a questions and answer session.

You ask - I'll do my best to answer.

Cheers David

Thanks David, I started using the google alerts

[craigmn3]

Okay I have a question.

I recently put a competitor to bed who was trying to intercede in my business but I had trademark law on my side. Now this fellow is a persistant fellow so I know he's going to come back at me from a different direction. Is their anyway to get a look at "New" websites so I can see him coming from a far off before he gets back into my business?

[chrisJumbo]

How do you get .gov or .edu links? One of our competitors has a quite few. I wonder if they hired college interns who can make a personal page on the schools site and then convinced them to give them a link.

Anyway, the blog commenting has been working well and I mentioned this elsewhere on WPW, but the site co.mments - Track your conversations is also useful for tracking those blog comments.

[davidmg]

The first rule of any site should be 'Think Searcher' - what keywords are they likely to use. And second to make sure that those keywords are set up as a page title with the 'long tail html codes' in place.


I use both header and page title which are both different. How important is having keywords in the url html?

This url ends in toolsets.html
toolset
The header reads Fireplace Tool Sets Wrought Iron Wood Stove Polished Brass
Fireplace Tool Sets Wrought Iron Wood Stove Polished Brass
The page title reads Fireplace Toolsets Pokers Tongs Fire Tools On Sale Free Shipping
Fireplace Tool Sets Pokers Tongs Fire Tools on Sale Free Shipping

Should I change it to read fireplace_toolsets.html as it is catagorized
Home > Fireplace > Tool Sets
Wouldn't it penalize me if it read?
home> fireplace> fireplace toolsets

[bj]

The first rule of any site should be 'Think Searcher' - what keywords are they likely to use. And second to make sure that those keywords are set up as a page title with the 'long tail html codes' in place.

Though keeping keywords/phrases in mind for navigation and in the url structure (I think this is very important) may be good, once you start in writing text for the content I think you have to concentrate on writing for people and not spiders. Yes, do tweak a bit after you're done writing, but keep the text readable. It's the biggest mistake that those just learning to do SEO make.

Should I change it to read fireplace_toolsets.html as it is catagorized

Wordpress purposely changes the url structure of imported movable type blogs to hyphen separated words from MT's underline separated word url structure, if my memory serves, since having underlines in the url structure is not read as well by the spiders as hyphens separating keywords. And if you look at the urls on this forum, they also go by that convention, probably for very good reason. I know that WordPress sites kick butt in the SEs so I think it's wise to follow the WP url convention.

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by craigmn3

Okay I have a question.

I recently put a competitor to bed who was trying to intercede in my business but I had trademark law on my side. Now this fellow is a persistant fellow so I know he's going to come back at me from a different direction. Is their anyway to get a look at "New" websites so I can see him coming from a far off before he gets back into my business?

No Craig I don't think there is. The only thing to do is to spend a little money and buy up a few URL's on your topic - just leave them dormant.

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by davidmg

The first rule of any site should be 'Think Searcher' - what keywords are they likely to use. And second to make sure that those keywords are set up as a page title with the 'long tail html codes' in place.


I use both header and page title which are both different. How important is having keywords in the url html?

This url ends in toolsets.html
toolset
The header reads Fireplace Tool Sets Wrought Iron Wood Stove Polished Brass
Fireplace Tool Sets Wrought Iron Wood Stove Polished Brass
The page title reads Fireplace Toolsets Pokers Tongs Fire Tools On Sale Free Shipping
Fireplace Tool Sets Pokers Tongs Fire Tools on Sale Free Shipping

Should I change it to read fireplace_toolsets.html as it is catagorized
Home > Fireplace > Tool Sets
Wouldn't it penalize me if it read?
home> fireplace> fireplace toolsets

Oh extremely - go to any Google and search Mortgages for High Rise Flats - you will see CTAB sitting on top.
It also pays to have both your internal linking spot on. Link outs too -they are very important especially to sites that your clients will find of interest. Sort of killing two birds -(And there's me in the RSPB)

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by TrafficProducer

I've been putting together Advertising Methods FREE TIPS,

I believe it cover most Marketing stuff, (as honestly as I can), unless this post find other issues.

There is some very good things in there - but just another little tip

Flats to rent London, jobs in London, flatshare, free classified ads UK

I believe that it's in the USA as well now - use it - great advertising and topic related backlinks. Just don't over do it or Google will think you are spamming. Once a month is just about perfect.

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by bj

Though keeping keywords/phrases in mind for navigation and in the url structure (I think this is very important) may be good, once you start in writing text for the content I think you have to concentrate on writing for people and not spiders. Yes, do tweak a bit after you're done writing, but keep the text readable. It's the biggest mistake that those just learning to do SEO make.



Wordpress purposely changes the url structure of imported movable type blogs to hyphen separated words from MT's underline separated word url structure, if my memory serves, since having underlines in the url structure is not read as well by the spiders as hyphens separating keywords. And if you look at the urls on this forum, they also go by that convention, probably for very good reason. I know that WordPress sites kick butt in the SEs so I think it's wise to follow the WP url convention.

As always (Oh and a big thank you to BJ) BJ is spot on - but always remember that you can add as many new headings to a wordpress blog as you want. Just don't fall into the duplicate content trap - if you see something you need go for the 'printable' version. If there is not one. Alter and add.

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by georgeruch

You might think this is crazy but take a look at my site Truck Jobs - Trucking Jobs - Truck Driving Jobs - Trucker Jobs - Ttruck Driving - we do some advertising in the air. Many of our clients are avad NASCAR fans - we fly our banner over the crowds gathered at the track - usually in the neighborhood of 2,00,000 to 300,000 fans - they don't all attend the race but they do hang out in thier campers and watch the trails etc.-Good luck! George

Thanks - now this is what I call a great URL Title.

BUT --http://www.jobtarget.com/c/search_results.cfm?site_id=1613

A redirect - fast sure - but the titles wrong. It needs to be Truckingjobs-inTexas. html - Don't repeat the truckingjobs heading but list every State alpahabetically.

People who know me in WPW will tell you (hopefully or the little sods will get no more rep points from me) That I love Branding - I simply adore a site that when you search the Brand name you get 'mega links' It shows people what the search engines think of you.

So over the years I have worked my little butt off on mine.
CTAB Mortgage Desk

I'll leave you to see the results

[ctabuk]

Originally Posted by chrisJumbo

How do you get .gov or .edu links? One of our competitors has a quite few. I wonder if they hired college interns who can make a personal page on the schools site and then convinced them to give them a link.

Anyway, the blog commenting has been working well and I mentioned this elsewhere on WPW, but the site co.mments - Track your conversations is also useful for tracking those blog comments.

How do you get .govs etc - easy as pie - here's what I do

Right to Buy Linklist - Information by CTAB

I create a links out page. Simply search for 'Government Departments' and find links that are relative to your site.

An outbound link system is equally important as good quality relevant inbound

[chrisJumbo]

As far as outbound and inbound .gov and .edu, isn't an inbound going to give you much more weight?

cd :O)

[Tony_V]

You make mention of slashing your prices way down. I don't agree with this. I think if you monitor your competitors and at least remain competitive price wise, you will be the one making the sales, at least to those who do price comparison. For the most part I have found that if a website is set up right, ie, easy and proficient menu structure, and you subscribe to the impulse buy mentality, due to the online ease of purchase and convenience, you are bound to do just as well if not better then your competitors. That is provided all other traffic glue is put into place, search engine ranking, site seo, off site seo etc.