Web Traffic, Websites, and Postcards
An Internet marketing guru gives his insights on how to increase web traffic, get more Internet sales, and get higher rankings on search engines like Google. Internet marketing guru Thomas Faulkner explanation of why postcards are an excellent way to increase web traffic to your website.
New Era Public Relations & Marketing 4845 Fountain Ave #73 Hollywood, Ca. 90027 phone:818-9224733 http://www.marketshareservices.com/
(found at OPENPRESS June 29 2008) — It is said that he who knows how to get a website to the top of the Google Rankings could be very rich indeed. Certainly such a person would have the ability to make businesses that achieved the #1 ranking money—lots of money. The truth of the matter is that Google currently controls the fate of countless enterprises across the country and around the world. And as we continue to move forward towards an ever-increasing high tech environment, the amount of control and power that Google has is going to grow exponentially.
But, this isn’t an article about Google, per se. Rather, when any discussion turns to subjects like “web traffic” and making money through the Internet, Google is invariably going to be involved in that discussion. Why? Because it is Google (as well as the other search engines like Yahoo!, MSN, etc.) that are responsible for so much of the web traffic that is generated for websites. And websites that are in the top 10, and particularly the top 5, get a lion’s share of the web traffic for any particular search.
The big question on most business owner’s minds is how in the world can they get to the top of the Google Rankings?
“That’s one of the most frequently asked questions that I get from business owners and companies,” says Thomas Faulkner, resident Internet marketing guru for MarketShareServices.com (www.marketshareservices.com). “Oftentimes they would like a quick fix to the question of how to get to the top of the rankings and increasing their web traffic,” he says. “Increasing web traffic and climbing the Google Rankings can definitely be done and there are several way to go about it.”
One of the most successful ways of increasing web traffic is to plaster the URL on every potential promotional item that the company or business has available, says Faulkner. Pens, caps, cups, shirts, letterhead, etc should all have the URL of the website prominently displayed for all to see. And hopefully, the URL is going to match the name of the company or at least be memorable and easy to remember and spell.
“Finding a good URL for your website isn’t always easy,” says Faulkner, “especially nowadays. A lot of the more common names are already taken, but an effort still should be made to connect the name of the business with the name of the website. If the name of the company is the same as the name of the website, then the public is going to have a lot easier time remembering what to plug into their browser. If you can’t do that, there are a lot of tricks of the trade that can be done to get it close or make it easy to remember.”
Some of those, he says, are as simple as adding the word “The” or “A” or some other minor change to the company name that opens the door to being able to capture and registered the URL. The rule of thumb, however, is that the further away you get from the actual name of the company, the greater the chances that the public is going to forget how to access your site—even when the url is very creative and catchy.
“Finding the right URL for a new website is a science unto itself and that one little detail can make or break a site. But, even if you are basically “stuck” with a web address for an already established site, the name of the game is branding, branding, branding that name in the minds of the public,” he says.
Remarkably, Faulkner says that one of the best ways to brand the name of your website address into the minds of the public is through a much more traditional method: Postcards.
“People often think I’m kidding when I tell them that they should immediately begin a postcard campaign to drive traffic to their websites,” says Faulkner with a smile. “But I’m not joking, but some of the biggest players on the Net have turned to postcards to drive web traffic and make sales,” he explains. “The bottom line is that postcards work, and as simple as that seems, it is probably one of the cheapest ways to drive web traffic and increase Internet sales. There are a few key elements that are involved, however, to make for a successful direct marketing campaign.”
There are several keys to a successful postcard direct marketing campaign. One of the most important factors is the creation of a highly targeted mailing list.
“Certainly there are times when saturating a particular zip code or geographic area is the best postcard direct marketing strategy,” says Faulkner. “But for the most part, your rate-of-response and advertising success will greatly improve if you can create a highly targeted mailing list.”
There are many ways to create a targeted mailing list. Every profession or industry usually has a pretty good idea of what kinds of customers they are looking for. What is not always realized, however, is just how targeted a mailing list can get nowadays.
“In today’s era of high-tech data gathering, it is amazing just how specific some mailing list can get,” says Faulkner. “In the B2B or business-to-business marketing world, you can get just about any kind of mailing list that you like. Postcards and direct mail sent to the general public are a little different, but many times businesses have untapped resources that they may not be aware of.”
What Faulkner is referring to is the wealth of information that is often contained in the sales and invoices of a particular business or profession.
“In marketing and advertising, one of the main objectives is to take out the “guesswork” when it comes to promoting to your client-base,” states Faulkner. “All of us have our own particular reasons for going to a particular store, doctor, car mechanic, etc,” he says. “A wise marketer will work with his client to isolate those reasons and turn them into a successful advertising campaign. It’s an old marketing maxim that what has given you business in the past is going to give you business in the future.”
So, what is the “wealth” of information contained within most businesses? Depending on the type of business, information such as age, sex, location, and profession can be found somewhere in the files.
“Not everyone has data mining software, but even for those who do, using the information that is available in the files or databases is something that is not done enough,” explains Faulkner. “At MarketShareServices.com we do marketing analysis, and the vast majority of clients have never fully explored the marketing data that they have to hand. Conversely, when we use the information and start marketing to similar customers, the business starts rolling in.”
Those interested in MarketShareServices.com marketing analysis can click here or go to www.marketshareservices.com/analysis.html. It’s a free service and just might get the wheels turning as to what can be done to get more business.
An even more pro-active approach can be taken with clients or customers in order to make future marketing campaigns more effective: asking them.
“A lot of professions wind up having a lot of “downtime” with their customers or patients having to wait around to get serviced,” Faulkner observes. “The dental office, the doctor’s, getting your car serviced—there’s a lot of times where your customers are just there killing time. Well, while they’re waiting, it is a good time to get into their heads and find out the various reasons why they are at your particular business. In other words, ask them. Talk to them. You might be surprised at what you find out.”
Faulkner recommends that you use one of your very personable staff and politely ask customers or clients a few questions about how and why they choose to use your business. The questions can be relatively simple. “What made you pick our store or office?” for example. Or, “What is it about our business that appeals to you most?” The variations are endless, but the objective is to isolate those qualities that your customers find appealing about you or your company. The reason? So you can then take that information and turn it into an effective marketing campaign.
“The next step of an effective postcard direct mailing campaign is the messaging you have on your postcard,” says Faulkner. “There are usually several reasons why you have the customers that you have. Maybe it’s your friendly staff or great bedside manner. Maybe it’s your convenient location. Or, perhaps it’s your service and price. The main thing is to pro-actively find out what those reasons are, and then find a creative and attractive way to put those messages into your advertising. Correctly done, it works like a charm.”
Creating a highly targeted mailing list and a message that is appealing makes for a powerful combination. Add to that great graphics, and you are going to have an advertising winner.
One of the most effective aspects of postcards as an advertising medium is the “staying power” that they have. In other words, postcards tend to stay around far longer than most any other advertising medium.
“We recently had a customer contact us from a postcard advertising campaign that we had launched more than a year ago,” says Faulkner. “The funny thing was that it had nothing at all to do with the customer. It turns out that he found our postcard lying on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. He say that we were a marketing and advertising company and he had an event coming up, so he had us a call. And it was our eye-catching graphics that caused him to pick it up. That’s an extreme example, but stories of customers holding on to postcards for months and months before using them are not unusual.”
As an added benefit, it is very easy to see how effective a postcard campaign is. Hits to the website will increase date coincident with the direct mailings. Special codes can be added to the postcards so that you know exactly who is responding. Some industries, like the Dry Cleaning industry for example, will put barcodes on the postcards so that customers will bring them in and use them as coupons that can be scanned over and over again.
“And it is very easy to test different messages to see what kind of postcard works best,” says Faulkner. “Most importantly, this can be done very inexpensively. Many business owners are surprised by the results, but for most types of industries, postcards are extremely effective.”
But Faulkner does not believe in the power of the postcard alone.
“There is no way that you can put your entire advertising message on a small little postcard,” he says. “A postcard is really an enticement. It’s a promotional and advertising device that leads the potential customer, old or new, to take some kind of action. Ideally they will just call or come in. But, increasingly, they are going to go to your website.”
And the website is where you are going to have the opportunity to make the best impression on the customer.
“There is one great, fundamental rule when it comes to website design,” states Faulkner. “It is the rule that many great websites follow, and one which can dramatically increase website traffic.”
“There is one great, fundamental rule when it comes to website design,” states Faulkner. “It is the rule that many great websites follow, and one which can dramatically increase web traffic,” he states. “That one great fundamental rule in designing websites is “Don’t make me think.” Follow that one principle, and you greatly increase the odds of creating a great website.”
What Faulkner means by this is that your website should be so well designed that visitors to the site can find everything that they are looking for quickly and with absolute and total ease. He says that virtually any user should be able to come to the site, know instantly what it is about, find what they want, and buy or purchase the product being sold without hassle or inconvenience. Any point of hesitation is a potential pitfall when it comes to the design and construction of websites.
“One of the easiest and most effective ways of testing out your website is to give someone not familiar with the site a piece of paper with your web address written on it,” says Faulkner. “Give them the address and put them on a computer and then watch what they do and don’t say anything. Right away you will begin to see the flaws if they are there. Watch for confusions or hesitations. Tell them to purchase something or find something else on the site and see if they can do it. It is really quite revealing. Ideally you would do this with a fair number of people and also do it with persons not so web savvy. Do that, make your changes accordingly and then re-test, over and over again if necessary.”
The “Don’t make me think” philosophy of web design works because the more a person uses the Internet, the less patient they become when surfing the Net. Users not only want a site that is cool and nice to look at, they also want a website that they can navigate at light speed.
“You don’t have minutes or seconds when it comes to website navigation,” says Faulkner, “you have fractions of seconds. For the most part users don’t want to sit and study a site,” he says, “they want to comprehend and move as fast as they can. Making a user hunt for information can be about the worst mistake you can make.”
Which leads to another aspect of website design: Don’t try to put everything at once on your home page.
“Generally, you do not want to try and put tons of content on your home page. I know it can be tempting, but don’t overload the front page,” states Faulkner. “The rule of thumb is to go from the simple to the complex. In other words, you want to have the links to other pages be fairly simple and let the user “drill down” into more detailed and complex information if they choose to do that.”
What Faulkner is referring to is to make the home page clear and concise, without an overwhelming amount of text and with clear text links or graphics that will lead the user to other pages within the site. As a prime example of the simple to complex concept, Faulkner cites one of the most used and most familiar websites on the Internet: Google.
“Google is, perhaps the ultimate example of going from the simple to the complex,” says Faulkner. “It is also one of the ultimate examples of “Don’t make me think”. What do you see when you go to Google? Basically a blank page with a name and an empty text box,” he says. “The “results page” is a little more complex, with the headings and the descriptions. Click onto one of those and you go up another level of complexity. Google is perhaps the ultimate example of these two web philosophies. Certainly no one could argue with the success they’ve had in following this formula.”
But that doesn’t mean that Faulkner advocates a “Google-like” design. He feels that is much too Spartan for most websites.
“No, don’t design your site like Google,” says Faulkner. “Actually, I usually advocate making the website as attractive as possible without violating the “Don’t make me think” rule. More and more, customers are judging businesses by their websites. A beautiful, attractive website that is at the same time informative and easy to navigate is what I want to see if I’m supervising the design.”
As a final point, Faulkner points out that you must make it very obvious and easy for a customer to purchase your product or service once they’ve made their decision that they want what you are providing.
“If you want to upset a potential customer, just make it hard to get in touch with you in order to buy,” he says. “Once that decision to buy is made, you do not want that customer searching all over the site trying to find out how to make the purchase,” Faulkner states emphatically. “This applies to the home page as well. I recommend you have some kind of “Buy Now” button on each and every page, and also a phone number. Sometimes a visitor will visit your website just to check it out, make the decision to buy, and then spent a lot of time trying to find out how. A lot of times, you’re going to lose that sale.”
Faulkner says that despite the growing popularity of buying through the Internet, a lot of users don’t trust putting their personal information on a website. Although they may find you via the Internet, they often would much rather talk to a live person to complete the transaction. Hence the advice to make a contact phone number prominent of your webpages. Others may simply find it confusing to do an Internet transaction. The bottom line is “Don’t make me think” when it comes to actually buying your product.
The above points about websites, web traffic, and postcards will serve as a reliable guide for almost any business in terms of the ability to increase their Internet sales. It is a basic approach to what is unquestionably a highly complex subject.
“Internet marketing is inherently complex,” says Faulkner. “There are companies that spend millions and millions of dollars in an effort to find the magic formula that will dramatically increase their web traffic and Internet sales,” he says. “Regardless of your marketing budget, however, if any company, large or small, follows the above concepts, they are going to greatly increase their odds of success.”
For more information on Internet Marketing, contact Thomas Faulkner at info@marketshareservicescom or call him at 800-771-0460.
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