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Web Marketing

Is online marketing something I should try and learn?

If you have recently set up a website then you most probably will have thought about online marketing. You may have the best website out there, but if no one knows about it or can find it then it becomes pretty useless.

There are a number of ways in which you can market your business online and a website is often a popular choice. It may be that you want to try and keep costs down and wonder if you can do the marketing yourself? Although there are definitely certain elements of marketing which can be done quite easily, there are other parts that should be left to the experts. Much of web marketing and especially SEO is not something you can learn overnight and also not something you can learn just from a college course. Much of it takes practice and you often need to do a few experiments to find out exactly what works and what does not work. If you are serious about your web marketing, then invest your money in a company that has proven results and that can show you what they have done for previous clients. No one can guarantee you a permanent number one spot on Google, but some companies can achieve great things with SEO.

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Web Marketing

Should I allow reviews to be posted onto my website?

Whether selling a product or providing a service your business is constantly subject to judgement from customers, be it existing customers or potential new customers. There are many independent review sites such as Trip Advisor and Trustpilot that allow people to post company reviews and add a score (usually out of 5) for products and/or services. These websites are quite popular however the issue is that anyone can post a review, whether they are a verified customer or not. This means that you open yourself up to the possibility of negative feedback from false customers, these could be left by your competitors to purposefully reduce your score.

Reviews can, however, be very useful. With the way of the modern world most of us take time to read and compare product and service reviews prior to any purchases to make sure we avoid any negative experiences.

One option would be to allow customers to submit a review but have your website set up to have to manually approve any reviews, that way you can check that the review is genuine and that it is suitable to be published.

Many websites publish testimonies, these are positive customer quotes and are designed to promote your business through positive reviews from past customers.

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Web Marketing

Is your website advertising your business in a professional way?

So many businesses think carefully about their logo, their business premises and staff uniform and make sure that it is professional, but neglect to put the same thought in to their website. If you are a business owner then try to put aside some time to evaluate your website and make sure that it is looks as it should. If you have had the website live for sometime then you need to check if all the information is still correct. Having out of date opening hours, stock or even contact details can be very detrimental to your business. You may find if you lose a customer because the information on your website is not right then they do not come back again.

As browsers get updated you may find that your website doesn’t display the way you want it to. IT may be that some of the content is hidden or that elements are over lapping each other. This may only require a simple change to the code but can make a huge difference to the overall appearance of your website and how professional it looks. If it has been a long time since you have your website developed you may find that your previous designer is no longer available to work on your site. If this is the case you will need to try and find someone else to work on it for you.

 

 

 

 

 

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Web Marketing

Finding the right person to outsource your marketing to

If you are looking to outsource your marketing to a third party then you need to ensure that you find a company or an individual that you can trust and reply upon. Often the best way to do this is to go off recommendations, but this may not always be possible.

You may find that there is quite a difference in the prices charged by marketing agencies, individuals and agencies abroad. You may be approached by several companies that are based in places such as India that are willing to do your marketing for a fraction of the cost that you would pay in the UK, but you do need to be careful as you may find that due to the time difference there is quite a delay in being able to get in touch with them or getting work to and from them.

The best way to find good marketing people is to see their results. You should never feel bad to ask to see what work they have done previously and what results they have achieved. You can sometimes also ask for if you are able to speak to another one of their customers to get feedback as to what they are like to work with.

 

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Web Marketing

How to add new and useful information to your site

Content is key when it comes to websites. Not only is content important in terms of what your visitors are looking for but also in terms of what the search engines are looking for.

When a visitor lands on your site they need to be able to find the information they are looking for quickly. If they can’t then they are likely to leave.

The more relevant, unique and fresh content you have on your site the better. Some people think that they can just copy and paste articles or blog posts from other sites to add to their own, but this is not the way to do it and is certainly not good practice. Google says that any content added to your site must give the reader some benefit and some unique value.

Adding a news section or a blog is a great way to get new content on your website as this should be unique to your business and will not clutter up the main pages of the website. Adding a couple of articles a few times a week may be enough to give you a helping hand when it comes to search engine optimisation and website rankings.

 

 

 

 

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Web Marketing

How to get emails past spam filters

If you are looking to send out advertising emails then you will want to ensure that as many of them as possible get through to the relevant people’s email inboxes. It is very easy for emails to be marked as spam and there are a number of reasons why this may happen. It could be that there is an issue at the server end and either the server IP has been blacklisted or the email address hasn’t been configured correctly. In the first instance ask your hosting company to check their end to see if everything is ok. If it is, then you should look at the information that is contained in your email.

Somw words are set up to automatically trigger spam filters and if you use these words or use them too often you may find that your emails do not get through.

If you are sending out mass emails then you should send them using a specialist email marketing company. Sending emails from your own hosting account could cause your IP to get black listed and this could then take your site offline too. Specialist companies will be able to advise you on what to include and what to exclude in your marketing email.