A Simple Yet Effective Website Strategy

Failing to plan is planning to fail.
Alan Lakein, author and time management expert

A simple and clear strategy is the foundation of a successful website. Unfortunately, creating an effective strategy is the most difficult part of building your site. You need to do a bit of research and give the matter some deep thought. Perhaps that’s why so many business owners skip this crucial step.

But rest assured, the difference between success and failure often comes down to website strategy. It’s far better to have a solid strategy with mediocre execution, than a poor strategy that’s brilliantly executed.

Strategy is about aligning your website with the needs of your target market. Developing a strategy forces you to consider what result you want and how you’ll get it. It guides the design and content of your website, without hampering creativity. And it ensures the site meets your most important business objectives.

So how do you develop a strategy? By answering the following five questions:

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7 Website Myths That Stop You Attracting More Customers

How do you avoid having one of the 90% of business websites that don’t bring in more business? By understanding and avoiding these seven common website myths that stop your website being profitable:

Myth 1: If you build it, they will come

The idea that “if you build it, they will come” worked for Kevin Costner in the movie “Field of Dreams”, but it doesn’t work for websites. Yet this is the most persistent and dangerous website myth.

Many people assume that if they put a site up on the web they’ll be swamped with customer enquiries and new business. They won’t.

Customers don’t just magically appear at your site. You must have cost-effective ways of generating targeted traffic. And you have to use proven strategies and techniques to convert browsers into customer enquiries and sales.

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Step One to a Profitable Website: Set Your Goals

Set Your Website GoalsMy first job after uni was working at a small publishing company. One of my boss’s favourite sayings was, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” It was a reminder to his staff that the first step in any project is to establish what you want to achieve i.e. setting goals or targets.

In my experience few websites have any goals. Often they’re built on the reasoning, “We’ve gotta have a website because everyone else has one.” Even now, many people think a website is a kind of marketing panacea. They think that by simply putting a website up they’ll be deluged with sales enquiries. Unfortunately it ain’t so.

Realistic and achievable goals for a website fall into the following categories:

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Traffic + Conversion = Profitable Website

Building a website without a traffic strategy is like printng a stack of brochures and then leaving them in a box in your storeroom.

But the end goal is not more traffic… it’s more profit. So once you have a stream of visitors to your site you must convert them into sales leads or customers.

Meet One of Australia’s Great Online Marketing Brains

In the nine years I’ve been working as a website copywriter I’ve met many people who sell their services as online marketers: web designers and developers, copywriters, online marketing consultants and strategists, interactive agency bosses and creative directors, etc.

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of meeting someone who I rate as one of Australia’s great online marketing brains.

His name is William Swayne. Some time ago I found his website and I was greatly impressed by how spot on his online marketing philosophies are.

Will’s company, Marketing Results, specialises in online lead generation. His website offers a ton of free information on how to increase the ROI on your website. And if you’d like to transform your website into a lead generating machine I would definitely give Will a call.

Mobile Internet – First Impressions

I got hold of a 3G mobile phone last week. While I’m excited about the potential of mobile internet, the technology isn’t quite there yet. My main gripe is speed. It’s just too slow. I felt like I was back in 1995 with my 9K modem.

The content that has been created specifically for the medium is generally useable and useful. The provider I was using has a restaurant and bar guide with pithy reviews and tabulated contact details. You can click the phone number and your mobile speed-dials the restaurant or bar.

Website content that had been adapted for mobile wasn’t as user-friendly. Browsing through search results on eBay or dating sites is nigh impossible. It’s very hard to orientate yourself on such a small screen. Also, without a QWERTY keyboard entering text into forms is painfully laborious.

One thing is for sure – on mobile, copywriters must make every word count. They need to be absolutely ruthless with their copy editing.

Charles CuninghameAbout the author: Charles Cuninghame is an expert copywriter and marketing trouble shooter who helps business owners and marketing managers attract more clients.