Online marketing is no longer an optional effort, no matter what your business does, sells, or provides. In today's world, online marketing should command a substantial portion of your marketing budget. Fortunately, there are a number of ways to increase your online marketing efforts.
First and foremost, begin with your website's content. The internet is the clearest, most obvious example of the information age, so get information up there! Search engines, especially Google respond positively to regularly updated content. Add updated content on a regular basis, daily if possible, but even once or twice a week will help. Add a blog to your site and a page for news and set a goal for yourself to add content on a regular basis. This is perhaps the best way to increase your online marketing efforts.
Because the internet thrives on content, get some articles out there! If you manufacture cloths for cleaning engine parts, write articles on engine cleaning procedures and post them on some of the many directories online. Even posting one or two articles on a weekly basis will drive traffic to your site as you increase your online marketing efforts.
Find the directories your customers are using. Ask your next customer where he looks online when he's trying to find a business like yours. Look up trade directories and get listed in them with a link back to your website. In most cases, these listings are free or extraordinarily inexpensive ways to increase your marketing efforts. In the same manner, participate in industry discussion boards and online groups. Remember to conduct yourself professionally as you represent your business, and remember to link to your site.
Post press releases on your site and then use one of the many free press release distribution outlets to get them out there. In your industry, there are probably hundreds or even thousands of websites that search for new content on an ongoing basis. Any of them that pick up your press release will be helping you to increase your online marketing efforts and drive traffic to your site.
Start a newsletter and invite your website visitors to sign up. Every new article or press release deserves an email. While you're at it, use your own email address book to increase your online marketing efforts with an announcement about your website and a link to it.
So far, we've only looked at the ways to increase your web presence that have little or no cost. If you spend a little money on banner ads or pay-per-click advertising, you can also see very positive results. Be sure to optimize the expense by putting those ads where they make sense. It's better to get fifty qualified leads from a pay-per-click or banner campaign than five hundred who will never buy from you.
It's too easy to believe increasing your online marketing efforts is too daunting a task to undertake. Don't fall into that trap! Begin your incremental and regular efforts today, and watch the traffic increase.
