by Wendy on January 22, 2010
Aside from establishing an online prescence, one of the main business goals of anyone launching a website should be to build a database or email list of potential customers and clients. To be successful in business, you need to attract customers who are interested in your products and services. A website is an extremely easy and cost effective way to do this - provided you get a few key points right.
Your website should serve one of two purposes: 1. to make a sale or 2. to secure a visitor’s contact details. Your website purpose will determine the nature and content of your website.
Statistics show a potential customer usually needs to get to know, like and trust you before they will make a purchasing decision. Securing a way to keep in contact with them will allow you to build that relationship over time. It will also provide you with a way to share great information and establish yourself as an expert in your business niche.
Opt-In Options
One of the most effecitve ways to gather the contact details for a visitor to your website is to use an opt-in box. An opt-in box is another term for a website registration form. As its name suggests, it’s a box you place somewhere on your website with blank fields that usually asks a visitor to enter certain details, such as their name and email address.
You’ll find an example of an opt in box on the Savvy Web Women website here.
Many email programs will provide you with a form to use to create an Opt-in box for your website. If you are not technically inclined, your website support person should be able to set this up for you.
Personalise it
An opt-in box is customisable. This means that you can choose what template you’d like to use, the size of the box, what information to ask for from your website visitors and even the words to use if you’d like to customise the submit button.
It’s up to you what information you ask your visitors to give you. Anything from just their name and email address to their age, preferences or country where they live. If the registration form is for a newsletter subscription, for instance, you may also want to know where the person learned about your site and business. Keep in mind, however, your aim is to make the whole process as quick and easy as possible. Too many boxes and questions and people will quickly lose interest and click away.
What to offer
If you’re like me, your email inbox is overflowing with newsletters or the latest offers. We’re all suffering from information overload, so why would a visitor to your website choose to receive yet more information? You need to offer something of value to them.
Your information packed newsletter for f.ree is not enough. Whilst a great newsletter may keep them on your list, it unlikely to get them to JOIN your list. Instead, offer your visitors a f.ree downloadable product such as an audio in mp3 format, an ebook, special reports in PDF format or widgets. Don’t forget to put a value on your offer - if you were to sell this product, what price would you put on it?
Think carefully about your target market before deciding on what to offer on your website or blog via the opt-in box. Something hard to resist that meets the needs of your target market will help increase your opt in rate.
By Wendy Moore
Copyright 2010 Savvy Web Women Pty Ltd
by Wendy on January 7, 2010
An Online link basically refers to a connection or clickable link online. On the internet, online links are a vital component of websites and can even help you improve your search engine ranking. Links are a great way to build relationships and help business owners establish trust among their visitors and customers.
There are many ways to use links for business success. First, start with the content you are already providnig on your site. All the information you’ve provided on your site about yourself, your business, testimonials and other relevant things that you know will be useful to your website visitors. Each of these sections can be reached by the use of an online link.
Remember, quality is one thing web users look for when researching information online. Another is ease of navigation. Links help ensure your site is easy to move around on in an ordered fashion. If your site is confusing or has no obvious roadmap, your visitors will find this confusing and soon leave. Hence, you need to keep this in mind anytime you update your website.
Broken links are another website no-no. When visitors click a link on your site and the page does not exist or they get an error, their attention span will rapidly dwindle. Ensure you do an audit of the links contained in your website at least every 6 months, more frequently if you have the resources.
One way of building links back to your own site is by submitting articles to directories. Savvy Web Women has written quite a few articles to date on the power of using articles in your business. Articles are your chance to show your readers that you are an expert and are capable of giving them valuable information. At the end of your article, include a link back to your website. Your author resource box should also have a link back to your site or blog. These links are called back links and can really help push your website or blog up the page with search engine rankings.
If you’re a member of a networking group which allows you to post articles on their site or the site’s blog, make the time to utilise these golden opportunities and make use of these links. The purpose of providing links in the articles you write is to give your target readers easy access to your website. It is literally just a mouse click for them to be directed back to your site. Many readers will do this if they have enjoyed your article and wish to learn more about you or to find other articles you may have written. Members of our Web Secrets Success Club enjoy an exclusive opportunity to post articles on the Savvy Web Women website. It’s a great way for them to establish their credibility in their field of expertise.
Listing your website and a link to it on an online business directory is also highly recommended. This will ensure your site gets easily searched. Some networking sites also make this directory feature available to members so make sure you take advantage of this as well.
Now might be a good time to do a stock take of any networking sites to which you belong and see what benefits they offer to members. If posting articles or offering a business directory listing is available to you, make a note and add it to your To Do list. The benefits can be enormous for often, little or no cost.
Exchanging links is also a very common practice among Internet users. This is done either one-way or two-way. A one-way type of link is when a particular website links to another site with relevant content. In other words, the site you link to is complimentary to yours or it may contain relevant and interesting articles there that you’d like to share with your readers. A two-way or reciprocal link, on the other hand, means website A links to website B and vice versa. This can be arranged between the two websites involved.
To make your site easy to link to and attractive to other business people and publishers, you need to establish your authority in your specific field. How do you this? Again we go back to providing quality and useful content. Writing articles that find solutions to problems such as the “how to” type or those that share tips and strategies will secure the best results for you.
When you write, use simple and conversational language so that people will easily understand your message. Edit and proofread your articles more than once to make sure there are no grammatical or spelling errors.
By Wendy Moore
Copyright 2009 Savvy Web Women Pty Ltd
