The Truth About Marketing Your E-Commerce Website
As an Account Manager here at EonCode, Inc., I try to stay on top of the news and needs of people in this industry. There is a big misunderstanding of having an e-commerce website. Some business owners tend to think that when their site is live, it means that hundreds or thousands of prospective clients will flock to their site and start purchasing. Thats not what really happens.
It takes time and planning on your end. There are many tools and approaches to help you market your site effectively and start driving traffic to your online storefront, we will focus on the 4 most important.
Web Design
Direct Marketing
PPC
SEO
Email Marketing
When a prospect comes upon your site, the way it looks, navigates, and appeals to the client will be the major deciding factor on whether they will browse your site or actually follow through with a transaction. With EonWorkflow™ we have included a predesigned website for you but, at the same time we understand the necessity of being able to design and market your site so we left that capability open for you through the EonWorkflow™ Dashboard. Many clients look for a qualified designer that will assist them in their design of the website, which is highly encouraged unless you have a background in web design yourself. Others, may find it frustrating to do the research or lack time to do so. For those individuals, we do offer web design services as well and you can contact your Account Manager for more details.
Even though you have a wonderfully designed site, you will still need to drive traffic to that site. It doesn't help to have a car without any wheels, and so it wouldn't help to have a website without a driving force. A great way to start attracting traffic to your website is the age old art of driect marketing. Person to person contact is still the leader in proven marketing methods. You need to interact with the public. Go to marketing events, attend networking getherings, visit workshops, or attend social events put on by different industry associations. (Make Sure To Bring Plenty Of Business Cards)
Another great way to market online is Pay Per Click advertising or PPC. This tool works exactly as it sounds. Every time a prospect clicks on your link through a search engine you will be charged for it. Normally its very small amounts but it can range into the multiple dollar ranges. This is recommended if your looking for a quick turnaround on visible posted results. You will be able to be viewed in search engine results normally within minutes. Again, this should not be used as your primary operation of marketing but more as a compliment to what you already have in place. The difference between the rankings of PPC and SEO are what you call “Organic” search results. Those are usually the listed results in the center of a search engine page. The PPC results are the ones listed under “sponsored links”. Normally a company that is providing SEO service will also provide PPC services and can sometimes offer a package deal. Take a look at the links posted above for more info.
Search Engine Optimization or SEO is also a must when designing a proper e-commerce website. When doing SEO, this is one of the deciding factors of placement on search results when using a search engine such as google or bing. Many SEO specialists will say that they can get you on a #1 page ranking in a matter of a few days and explain to you that its all in the “metatags” and if you don’t have those then you will never succeed in total search engine optimization. The truth is that it takes time for the bots or crawlers to read through your site and publish it to relevance on a search term. The longer your site has been online, the higher “seniority” it gets. This can take months for your rankings to start appearing on page 1,2,3, or even 4. The truth about meta tags is that it is a dying science. Search Engines are relying more and more on the content and links of a page rather than what the meta tags are. Realistically speaking there are only 1 or 2 search engines that still utilize the meta tag in their results.
With todays markets moving towards having an online presence, the need to have SEO is growing more and more. The only problem is, who do you use? Many “specialists” have placed that title on them selves, yet know just as much as you do or slightly more. This can be a big problem for you. Listed below are just a few of the reputable SEO companies out there. Keep in mind that we do provide these services as well, but for those in the retail printing market, we have created www.printingamerica.com. This site was developed to help with the SEO and is full of blogs, links, advertisements, etc. that will assist you in your search engine results.
Webimax has been in the seo business since 2008 and is one of the leaders in todays market. Another great company is ThinkBigSites, they have been around since 2007 and have been very successful in their campaigns. The third company to come out as one of the leaders of this industry is SEOP and they have been around since 2000. There are many other companies out there that provide great service. To get further details, click HERE.
Finally, in order to bring these all together you will want to have a great email marketing campaign. Send out an email to all of your current and past clients, notifying them of your new site. There is no need to try and attract a national market at the moment of launch. Market locally first and as time goes by then you can start expanding, little by little.
icontact is a great email marketing program that has designed ease of use with powerful management tools.
benchmark email is also a great and trusted solution for those looking for a marketing campaign.
campaigner is also, a great solution which also provides a great set up wizard for your use.
These solutions were listed as the top three in the market, but you can get more details of leading email market campaign software by clicking HERE.
With all of this info, we hope that it helps you to understand the truth about having an
E-commerce website. Just because you have a site doesn't mean that business will automatically be driven to you. A simple yet proven form of marketing is your business card. Make sure your website is posted on there and you always have plenty to hand out.
