Marketing your website:
You are done with designing your website. Ok! Now what do you do? How do people find your website or how do they know there exists one? First and foremost, register your website in directories like DMOZ it helps place your business in a relevant category. Then imagine what keywords or key phrases customers would search for your business—be specific--for instance, you have a furniture business in Nebraska, Arizona, and then the probable search keyword would be ‘Furniture store Nebraska, Arizona.’ Rather than giving a narrow keyword like ‘Furniture store’ or Furniture store in U.S.’ which actually leads to a much broader search results, a search result-- not directly helping to point out your hometown business, its not precise and moreover, the problem is, shorter the keywords; the more expensive they are, in a paid search. Ask your close associates or friends as to what key search terms or key search phrases they would use to search for your business and make a list of it, it helps! Use them to the best of your advantage. It doesn’t mean you should overuse keywords or key phrases—‘stuffing keywords’ (Google considers it ‘spamming.’)
Take a look at your website, at some point of time; you’ll feel ‘there’s scope for improvement.’ Or may be few things should have been fixed, be it the navigation feature, tone, usability, or maybe the overall look and feel of your website. It is an ongoing process, a constant pursuit for perfection, a process of continuous refinement to see your website reach up to a certain level, or be it simply that you’re just trying to weather the change— technically speaking its called ‘Website Optimization.’
First study your competitor’s website (it is the easy way!), do a research as to what factors or features made your competitor so popular. Pick those best features/ideas from your competitors’ website. While you can always ‘copy and improvise’ those features to your advantage and trust me sometimes the best of ideas come from cross-industry; may not come from your relevant industry. But on the converse, Online business reputation, credibility, and customer trust can only be built over a period of time—there’s no duplicating/ mimicking your competitor in this matter, especially when he is on top. There’s no short cut to success when it comes to earning trust or building reputation, but it has to be done through hard work, and proper customer-oriented approach.
Most important question one needs to ask when thinking of having a website-- why do I need a website? Who is my audience? What is that I want to communicate through my website? -- Have your answers figured out for those above questions. It gives you a great relief, like ‘clear clouds appearing’, ‘landscape will start looking better and promising for you.’ It may look silly but at least it’ll leave you with a satisfaction of having a clear goal and you’re fulfilled that you’re heading in a right direction after having those basing questions answered and the best part you really don’t have to look back at your past.
