You even have a marketing plan ready to go and you - savvy you! - have included within it something along the lines of : "web marketing." Or, "check out what this 'SEO' stuff is."
Website Marketing: Cost Effective with a Terrific ROI
Well, you have yourself a nifty website, and now you're wondering what to do with it. How do you get people to come to your place in cyberspace? Advertise in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette? Purchase some air time on WTAE-TV Channel 4? Hardly - you'd be spending hundreds - perhaps thousands - of dollars with little to see for it.
No, spend your advertising dollars where it can really have an impact on your business ? spend your money and time on web marketing.
Newspaper, magazine, radio and television advertising is seen or heard by people once ? and then it's gone. Yes, you may ? and probably should ? run your advertisement several times for best results. But that will cost you thousands of dollars.
Web Marketing Lives Forever
Spend $500 on a press release properly optimized for the search engines, submit it to a few news release distribution sites and don't be surprised if people in the market for what you have to offer continue to find that one release for years to come. And we're talking hundreds or thousands of people for years to come.
Let's say a family new to the Pittsburgh area is looking for an insurance agent ? and you're an agent. They type into Google the keywords ?Pittsburgh insurance agent? and up pops a link to the news release about you ? written three years ago. You spent your money three years ago, but the release continues to work for you.
Can a newspaper ad do that for you? No, the paper that carried your ad lined a bird cage long ago. Can a radio spot do that for you? Not unless you continue to advertise on the station, to the tune of $2-3000 per year.
And that web marketing news release didn't reach just the new family in town - it's been found by hundreds of people over the years.
Additional Web Marketing Tips
Make sure you get listed in local web directories by searching in Google for phrases like "Pittsburgh business directory" or "Pittsburgh (your industry) business listings"
Ask other Pittsburgh website owners for cross marketing. You give them free "real estate" on your site and they give some to you.One hand washes the other!
Try to come up with a domain name as close as possible to the keywords you wish to target. Using as an example with the keywords "Pittsburgh SEO Company," try to get the domain name "www.Pittsburgh-SEO-Company.com" or something close to it.
Visit online forums your target market frequents, offer solid advice or insight to others' posts and always add your website's address to your signature line.
