Marketing Blagger

How will you manage the site once it has been launched?Building your site is only the first step in successful website marketing. Once launched, you’ll need to maintain it to get the most value for your outlay. You should think about content updates, hosting, domain name registration, security updates, managing interactions with browsers (blogs, contact forms, forums) and more.

Do you have the skills and time internally to manage this, or will your agency be responsible? If you are going to manage this internally, do you need to train up a member of staff, if so what costs are associated with this. Can your design agency train your staff, or will they provide a maintenance pack / instruction manual to help.

Choose your designers carefully if you think this could be a problem for your business. If you choose a cheap agency they may not have the capacity to provide ongoing support.

Question 3

Have you reviewed the websites you like and dislike and listed the reasons why?

The best place to look for inspiration in web design is obviously the internet. There are millions upon millions of sites online, with more added each and every day. If you take the time to look closely you will easily be able to pick out the styles and functionality you like and importantly, what you don’t like. These ideas should form part of the brief you deliver to your design agency.

Which sites should you look at?

Think about your competitors first, then your industry / profession, followed by aspirational websites. Far example, if you’re an architects practice, look at other architects first, then consider design or construction company sites, before a general trawl of the internet.

Try to keep in mind that you’re only looking for ideas and not a template to copy.

A website is an essential part of any company marketing tool set. If you want to look credible and established in this day and age, a website is a must have, rather than simply a nice bolt on. But if you’ve ever had to design a website before, you’ll know there’s a confusing array of options and you can easily get this wrong, wasting a stack of cash.

I’ve put together 7 essential questions you must ask your self before you sign up with a web design company. There will be a fresh question posted every other day for the next 14 days, so make sure you come back to read the entire series. This will help you avoid expensive mistakes.

Question 1

1) What specific objectives do you have for your site? Do you want to sell products, generate sales leads, or simply create an online presence for your business and brand?

It is essential that you know exactly what you want to achieve with your site. The difference in functionality, design and cost between a brochure site and an e-commerce site can be enormous. Think carefully about what exactly your objectives are and how you will measure whether your website meets these goals. Your design agency will need your brief to be clear on this.

- link to
YouTube Directfantastic video

I love entertaining TV advertising. This one by Nike is a classic example of big brand advertising at its best - funny, carrying a message, memorable and so much more. But as a small business can you use brand advertising as a marketing tool?

Unfortunately the answer is almost certainly NO. The cost alone prohibits most companies from getting in on the action. But not only that, as a small company, it’s unlikely you will have a strong enough brand in the first place to reinforce through TV advertising. So what can you do to advertise your business?

There are lots of options, but my first suggestion is to consider direct response advertising. This is when your adverts are designed to promote a specific call to action from prospective customers. For example:

- Call now to save 50% on carpets!

- Log on to www.megaDVDdeals.com for cheap blockbuster DVDs!

This will encourage prospective customers to contact you and enter your sales process. Compare this to a brand advert like the Nike example - whilst you may come away thinking how great Nike is, have you actually gone a step closer to buying a pair of trainers?

The second, and final option for this post, is to consider which advertising is the correct medium for your target audience. For the carpet example above, your best choice might be a local newspaper, whereas for the DVD Mega deals an online search campaign might be better. This is what media planning is all about and there’s a whole industry dedicated to this.

Advertising is a massive subject, so please come back regularly for more posts. I’ll do my best to showcase some of the best advertising and viral marketing campaigns like the crazy Indian cricket Nike ad.