Top 10 Internet Marketing Strategies That Work
Carefully planning your internet marketing strategies is the key to website success and online riches any way you cut it. Everyone and their mother today is trying to come up with shortcuts to a solid marketing strategy, but all they ever come up with are world-class ways to waste time and money. As they say in Tallahassee, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. The following 10 marketing strategies should be part of almost any internet marketing plan.
1. Web Design
A winning web design is the foundation to your online success. Championship teams are champions because of the preparatory training they did off the field and the same is true for your website. One of the best ways to bolster your online marketing strategy is to use a content management system like WordPress to build your website. WordPress saves you time and offers thousands of free themes for your website building pleasure. Themes are pre-loaded templates for your website that are easy to manipulate to your liking and make unique. Once you master WordPress, you can move on to other, more advanced internet marketing strategies.
2. Keyword Research
You can build the most aesthetically pleasing site on the internet but all your efforts will be wasted if no one sees it. To drive traffic, you must include keyword research as one of your primary internet marketing strategies. Start with the Google Keyword Tool, a free service that should be inside every internet marketer’s toolbox. The Google Keyword Tool is such an important part of your internet marketing plan because it will help you optimize for underexploited keywords in your niche.
3. Write Blogs
Hand in hand with keyword research is blogging. These days, every online business should include a blog as part of their marketing strategy. Use keyword research to see what people are searching and then author a blog about that topic. To rank well in Google, make sure to use those exact keywords people are searching for.
4. Dominate Your Niche
You can earn pennies every month or you can shoot for the stars and turn your online business into an internet empire. I prefer the latter. Your internet marketing plan should aim to make your site a leader in your niche. By offering quality content and ranking well, your content will begin to become syndicated by others in your niche, which is a great marketing strategy in itself.
5. Set Up Proper Tracking
If your internet marketing plan does not include proper tracking, you are driving without headlights. You can only improve that which you can measure, and if you are not measuring, you are certainly going to lose to your hungry competitors who want to eat your lunch. The thing is, not all traffic is equal. Traffic coming from one source may be much more valuable than traffic from another source. If you do not include tracking in your online marketing strategy, you will be squandering your valuable time and money on obtaining traffic from sources that do not convert!
6. Publish Press Releases
Press releases can be an important marketing strategy if you know how to use them. Press releases are not free to submit but the links they provide can be valuable. They are often picked up by Google News and other news aggregators and can be an important source of traffic to your site. Sometimes, if your press release actually features useful information, it might be picked up by journalists and news sources who may contact you for more information. This is one of my favorite internet marketing strategies for gaining authority and becoming a niche leader.
7. Use Paid Search
One of the tried and true internet marketing strategies is paid search. Paid search, or PPC, is when you place an advertisement for your website on a search result page (on Google, Bing, or Yahoo!) or as a banner on a webpage. Every time someone clicks on one of these advertisements, you pay a certain amount of money depending on the competition for that term. One online marketing strategy is to place advertisements on sites related to your niche because the traffic will be more targeted. Also, try to bid on less competitive keywords so that you pay less per click. Paying less for traffic is an obvious staple of any online marketing plan.
8. Use E-Mail Marketing
Most of the people that visit your site will never come back to your site! Don’t waste the opportunity to re-engage this lost audience by using e-mail marketing, a critical part of your online marketing strategy. To do this, include an opt-in form on your site and make it very visible. You can collect and send your potential clients newsletters using low-cost services like Aweber and Mailchimp. Some businesses forgo all other internet marketing strategies for this one and base their entire online marketing plan on e-mail marketing alone.
9. Run Contests and Giveaways
It’s no secret, people like free stuff. Your target market is no different. A great way to collect e-mail addresses and engage your audience is by running contests and giving away prizes. One marketing strategy is to give away a special report that you write that might help your customers with their problem. Another online marketing strategy might be to hold a contest where you give away a highly coveted item such as an iPod. Many people will sign up for a chance to win one.
10. You Are Not Alone
Internet marketing has become an exceedingly competitive field with players entering every possible niche from every corner. There are dozens of internet marketing strategies and you are not going to become an expert in every one. Don’t be afraid to enlist the help of an established company with a history of coming up with good online marketing plans. They are easy to find.
There are many online marketing strategies and tools you can, and should, use in order to be a successful marketer. The main thing to remember is not to give up – keep trying different approaches and you are sure to find the strategy that works best for you.