Online sales accounts for 17.4% of GDP worth £56bn to the economy according to the Office for National Statistics. Running a successful internet business requires many traditional marketing techniques and knowledge to be ahead of branded competition.
Having a plan on how and where to market your online venture is vital and helps hone vision and strategies. The downloadable marketing plan has numerous tips to help promote and communicate to prospect and existing customers.
Tips for Managing Goals
Starting online now could still bring substantial rewards.
Clarify Your Overall Aims
Highlight and fully understand the reason your website exists. Is it purely to sell as an e-commerce platform, to generate leads to sell to third parties or perhaps a brochure site to encourage people to contact you?
Build for Users
Make the user experience and interface extremely easy to use. Have an obvious navigational structure, clear contact & delivery information together with a professional design.
Add Unique Information
Think about your venture for the longer term. What makes you unique could gain natural citations from other websites to gain additional traffic. Write unique in-depth articles and perspectives about your industry.
Watch Industry Trends
The online world moves very fast with innovations being launched on a regular basis. Ensure you subscribe to new social platforms and embrace new technology.
Work on Conversions
A company can easily double their profits by improving conversion ratios with the same traffic. Learn from industry best practices to improve basket value and reduce abandoned shopping carts.
Internet Promotional Ideas
Try the following to increase visitors to your site.
- Ensure your website is technically efficient with no errors to help the search engines index and rank your website. Include unique images, text, code and video where you own the full copyright.
- Explore online advertising opportunities that your competitors may have missed. You can pay for sponsored tweets on Twitter or sponsored posts on the Facebook timeline.
- Get featured on high traffic sites related to your industry. Choosing a site that has thousands of visitors a day can have a huge impact on your sales.
- Be active in forums and groups in your field. Be impartial and offer great advice and people will click through to your website.
- Promote your Twitter, Facebook and email newsletters to gain additional followers and subscribers. Offer helpful tips, guides and advice more than discounts on your products.
- Develop a company YouTube video channel and post company promotional and industry related media you have produced.
- Put effort into local citation marketing. Ensure the address & telephone number on your website is the same as every local directory you have an insertion.
- Consider attending marketing events to keep up to date with the latest trends. Meet with industry leaders to help you implement the methods that work to convert visitors into buyers.
