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Internet Marketing Montreal allows local Montreal-based small businesses to boost their online marketing presence. So how does it all come together? With all the clutter out there, how do you determine which marketing channels to use? Should you incorporate radio ads into your marketing mix, or should you even opt for radio? Should you print flyers or invest more heavily in the internet marketing component of your website? Here is how you know whether you need an internet marketing company to help you with your internet marketing strategy, or whether your traditional direct marketing campaign is more effective. Talk to a local web advertising agency for a free consultation.
It is one thing to have a website, and another, to have a profitable internet marketing strategy. If you are more inclined to learn how to turn your website into a valuable and profitable marketing tool, you must first realize that your website is an investment. You are already investing time in designing, developing, and maintaining your website. So, you may as well make the following additional investments to maximize your return, and essentially, maximize your ROI.
If you do not already have a website, or if you have an existing website, you should evaluate what platform your website is in, and whether you require something more flexible, and effective. In other words, ensure that your website is free of coding errors, and appears the same across all web browsers. This is particularly important with the invention of Google Chrome, and the increasing popularity of Safari due to the i-pad, and other apple products. If you need to re-code your website, make sure to use the most up-to-date website standards, in this case, currently HTML5, and CSS3.
Decide on which Content Management System (CMS) to use. If you aren’t using one, and your website consists mainly of static HTML pages, and need to be manually updated, you may want to consider a CMS if you are frequently updating your website and/or are not comfortable using Dreamweaver or HTML/CSS. Some of the most popular CMS’ include Joomla and Wordpress. Joomla boasts more advanced technical features, while Wordpress prides itself on its ease of use, user-friendliness, and search engine friendliness. Google loves Wordpress. Proper website standards (W3C) should be implemented regardless of whether a CMS is used.
Now, before transforming your website into a lean, mean, search engine optimization machine, you have to ensure that you have some direction in relation to which keywords you are using. Proper keyword research and competitor analysis are an essential part of the process of optimizing websites, for both onsite (on-site) and offsite (off-site) website optimization..Once you have reached this stage, you should ensure that your site, once it is being developed, is search engine friendly. What this means, is that all the META tags, including the Title, Description, H1-H6 tags, file names, images, and videos are optimized for search engines, frequently referred to as video marketing or video optimization. This is sometimes referred to as META tag optimization. However, this phenomenon is known as onsite optimization (on-site) or onpage optimization (on-page), and is a critical part of your website’s success. Having quality, relevant content is also extremely critical.
Now, you should also consider which additional elements your site may require for optimal website performance. For instance, having a blog, onsite, is critical, and will allow you to quickly, easily and most importantly, frequently update your website. In fact, search engines tend to favour websites that contain blogs, over those that do not. If you do not like the idea of having a blog on your website because it is more corporate, or for whatever reason, call it a news section. You can even setup an external blog pointing to your website, or multiple blogs. Both of these tactics have a great effect search engine results pages (SERPs).
Of course, what good is having a website that doesn’t sell something? Whether you are promoting a product, a service, or simply gathering data about visitors, you require the right tools. Magento, is a more high-end open-source ecommerce platform. Although there are no costs relating to the software itself, setting up a Magento website requires a very high level of expertise. However, there are numerous more affordable off-the-shelf ecommerce solutions for small businesses. Paypal will only get you so far, so make sure you have an option to pay by VISA and MASTERCARD (credit card).
Now, suppose most of your visitors do not buy upon their first visit. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to capture email addresses so you can update them on news items, promotions, perhaps a monthly newsletter, and provide them with special offers? In most circumstances, email marketing is more than just an asset. So, get an email capture or opt-in box, and allow users to provide you with their contact details. Remember, sometimes less is more, and in this case, asking for less information will get you more email addresses. Asking for first name and email address is generally sufficient, and effective.
Now that you are capturing all of these emails, you must find out a way to manage them. There are many different kinds of email management solutions that are available to you on the market. If you are just starting out, choose a provider that only starts to charge you after you have acquired a certain number of people on your email list. And, remember to use your list ASAP as people sometimes change email providers. Once your list has really grown, you can even charge other companies to promote complimentary products or services to your list. Never give away your list to anyone, unless they make you an incredible offer, as it is a true asset. Make sure you choose the right list management software for your small business.
In the same way building an email list is effective, social media can also be applied in a similar manner, and is a whole other topic in itself. You may also want to consider video marketing as part of your marketing mix, as people are generally impatient, and do not read as much as they used to. Quality videos embedded in your website may constitute link bait, which is a great way to get users to link to your website. In addition, social media and blogging help contribute to search engine success. In fact, you will certainly require link-building services to increase link popularity, the number of external websites with links pointing to your website, as part of your offsite (off-site) SEO campaign, and your overall internet marketing strategy.
Aside from the internet marketing pointers, tips and tricks above, the rest is just shear common sense. However, the foundation to a good online marketing strategy lies within traditional marketing basics, applied to the internet, including brand-awareness (make sure your logo design is prominently displayed throughout the site), ensure that your contact details are easily available, or that visitors are prompted to complete a desirable action, known as a call-to-action, and create a professional-looking and user-friendly interface. If you wish to further optimize your website, consider conversion optimization or affiliate marketing programs.
One may also ask how PPC comes into play. Concerning Google Adwords, it is a great tool for testing different markets and determining conversion rates prior to launching a full blown SEO campaign. In addition, Yahoo Search Marketing (YSM) also has a PPC option. However, what seems to be becoming more popular, is Facebook pay-per-click campaigns. Also, for Facebook fan pages, there are pay-per-fan campaigns available that will allow you to gather many leads quickly, in contrast with an email capture device and email management system, which typically take a while to see results.