internet marketing for small businesses lilly buchwitz, mba, cec university of new brunswick october...
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Internet Marketingfor Small Businesses
Lilly Buchwitz, MBA, CECUniversity of New BrunswickOctober 1, 2001
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Overview
Part IIvisibility
Part Isearch engines
Part IVeverything else
Part IIIemail marketing
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
What you need to know about search engines
1. There are only nine search engines that matter.
2. Understanding how search engines work and how people use them will help you “get found” on them.
3. You must carefully prepare your Web site before you submit it to the search engines.
4. Submitting your pages to the search engines takes less than 10 minutes.
5. The only person who can submit your site to search engines – effectively – is you.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Search engines that matter
AltaVista Google
Inktomi Fast
Excite Hotbot
Lycos Northern Light
Direct Hit
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Directories that matter
Yahoo!
Looksmart
Open Directory
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Submitting to Yahoo!
If you’re a business you must pay to be included in the Yahoo! Directory
one-time fee of $299 (click here for link)
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
How search engines work
database
search resultskeyword
submit URL
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
How directories work
database
search resultskeyword
submit URL
$$$$
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
How people search
start with broad, general terms narrow it down by adding more specific
words not likely to search for your company name almost never search for the words
“welcome to”
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Preparing your site to get found(this is the hard part)
Choose 10 words that describe your business, service, or products.
Take your time.
Think like a searcher.
Let’s look at an example…
beer
wine
Toronto
brew your own
brew on
premises
make your own
wine from
grapes
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:html title
The html title of the page is what you see at the top of your browser when you are on that page.
It’s what displays as the link for your listing on a search engine. Keep it under 75 characters. Make each title relevant to the page it’s on. Spend the most time writing the title for your home page. Also, write a title for the starting page of each major section of
your site. For all other pages, either use the same title as the major section,
or use breadcrumbs.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:meta description
The meta description tag describes in a little more detail what’s on your page
It’s what displays below the title in your search engine listing
Keep it under 150 characters to be sure it doesn’t get cut off Make each description relevant to the page it’s on Try to entice potential visitors with clever copy, so they’ll
clickmore…
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:meta description
It’s not really about ranking, it’s about describing your page to potential visitors
Not all search engines use it Here’s how it works:
<meta name=“description” content=“This is a description of my site”>
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
The meta keywords tag can be the same for all the pages on your site
Not all search engines take this tag into consideration when they rank sites
Use a list of words and phrases with no commas in between (search engine spiders are programmed to read only a certain number of characters in the keyword tag if they read it at all)
Using your keywords:meta keywords
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Here’s how it works:
<meta name=“keywords” content=“beer wine toronto brew on premises brew your own beer make your own wine make wine from grapes”>
Using your keywords:meta keywords
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:ALT tags
every image on your Web site should have a carefully written ALT tag
the ALT text is what visitors see if they move their mouse over an image
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:file names
don’t use abbrv.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Using your keywords:on every page!
Work your keywords into the copy of every page on your Web site, as many times as you can without making it sound ridiculous.
This may seem obvious but it ain’t necessarily so. Focusing on your keywords when writing the copy
for your pages also helps reduce jargon.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
What NOT to do
Don’t load your meta tags with irrelevant keywords. Don’t repeat your keywords several times in a row. Don’t hide text on your pages by making it the same
colour as the background. Don’t use a string of keywords for the title of your
page. Don’t submit exact copies of pages with different file
names. Don’t send email to search engines.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Submitting your site(this is the easy part)
Bookmark the submission pages of the search engines that matter, or bookmark this page
Highlight the URL of your page, press CTRL/C, then go to each submission page and paste in your URL. You can submit one page to all the search engines in less than ten minutes.
If your site is small enough, submit all your pages this way. It will be an hour well spent. If your site is large, submit the first pages of the main sections of your site — the pages with titles and descriptions.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Wait…(this is also the hard part)
it can take from two weeks to four months for your site to be included in the database
it can take weeks after that before you see your site appear in the search results
every time the database is re-indexed, your ranking will change
re-submit every month and monitor your results
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Don’t pay someone else to do it for you
no one else understands your business as well as you
it will take more time for you to explain your business to a stranger than it will to do your search engine optimization yourself
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Paid placement andPaid inclusion
If you can afford it, pay to be included in Looksmart directory
Yahoo! = paid inclusionIt’s worth the investment
GoTo = paid placementSave your money!!
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Part II
visibility
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Link Popularity
a.k.a. “visibility” it’s what made Yahoo! the most popular
site AltaVista, Inktomi, Hotbot, Northern
Light, Excite, and Google all use it in their algorithms
quantity, quality, and relevance
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Determining your site’slink popularity
search for unique words/phrases on Google, AltaVista
use AV’s link search – typelink:http://www.mysite.com into search field
download and install Google’s toolbar
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
More about visibility
Your goal is to get as many sites as possible to link to you Make a list of every Web site that’s in your space but not a
direct competitor Find their email address and write a brief, friendly letter
suggesting a link exchange Get your partners, vendors, friends and relatives to link to
your site Submit those pages that link to you to every search engine
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Part III
email marketing
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
The information strategy
People come to your Web sitelooking for information
Make sure they get it!
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
The newsletter strategy
A newsletter is arguably the most powerful marketing tool there is.
People who subscribe to, or pick up, a newsletter usually read all of it.
Whatever your business, you are an expert. Give people information!
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
The education strategy
Present information about your product, your product category, your industry, in an objective, informational way.
Teach your prospective customers. Give them valuable information. They will appreciate it, and come back for
more.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Rules for email newsletters
1. get permission2. frequent3. regular4. brief5. include “why you’re receiving this”6. include options for unsubscribing7. suggest they pass it along to a friend
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Email marketing tools
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Part IV
everything else
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Specialty directories
Search for “directory” and “search engine” on Yahoo! for a list
Search for your keywords on all the search engines, and see what you find
When you find a directory specific to your business, check it out to make sure it’s appropriate
Then (and only then) submit your site You may have to pay for a listing — and it’s
probably worth it
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Banner advertising
Banner ads are the first thing people think of when someone says Internet marketing
Banner ads are actually online advertising. Like all forms of advertising, they’re expensive. Banner advertising doesn’t fit into the marketing
budget of most small businesses.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Banner advertising
What about link exchange programs? Well, you get what you pay for. Even if you can run your banner for free, you still have to
pay someone to design it for you. So, should you buy banner ads? Maybe. A short campaign to support a product launch might be
worth the investment. Especially if you can offer a free trial. People click on ads if they feel there’s something worthwhile at the end of the click.
If you’re going to run a banner campaign, make sure your ad has a strong call to action.
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Sponsored content
sponsorships are static ads relevant to content of page think: advertising Calloway golf clubs on a
golf news or golf info site
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Run a contest
best way to collect names and email addresses
give people something in return for subscribing
partner with another business; you both benefit
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Include your Web address on everything!
business cards brochures signs yellow pages ad t-shirts, hats, pens your car or truck
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Measure your success
How many people (unique visitors) come to your Web site
How many times (in a month) they come Where they are coming from (referring URLs) Whether they subscribe to your newsletter How many calls you get saying “I saw your Web
site, and…”
E-commerce: Impacting the Way We Do BusinessNashville, Tennessee, October 1, 2001
Lilly BuchwitzUniversity of New Brunswick
Resources
World Wide Web Marketing, 3rd ed., by Jim Sterne
Ecommerce: Critical Success Factors That Will Make or Break Your Online Businessby Nick Jones and Russell Field
Web Marketing Today
Internet.com
iMarketing News
Search Engine Watch