Rule #3 is "Get Exposure." Build it and they will come does not work on the Internet. With millions of sites in existence and many more being added daily, having a Web site is not enough. People have to be able to find it. Here are some key ways to accomplish this.
Blow your horn. This doesn't mean that you should spam people. But when you email someone that you have reason to email, make sure your signature line contains a link to your web site and a short description of what you sell.
List on popular auction sites such as eBay (which does allow you to include an email link). Your goal is not just to sell one item at a time. You should also have an About Me page where you can link to your own Web site.
Build up a customer list. Often, someone will correspond with you but not make a purchase immediately. Answer every email and be patient with people, even if you feel their questions are silly. Create a contact list of every person who has emailed you. This list will come in handy when you are ready to contact them later. I have made many sales to buyers months after they initially emailed me. Sales are your ultimate goal.
Incidentally, I am NOT advocating using eBay to attract buyers and then encouraging them to buy off eBay. This is a violation of eBay policy and grounds for getting permanently suspended. When I sell on eBay, I start the item off well below the selling price on my site. I also set the BIN (buy it now) price to the selling price on my site. There is no incentive for a bidder to want to make a deal with me off eBay.
Visit discussion sites, such as ones on AuctionBytes, eBay, AuctionWatch and OTWA. Begin contributing to the posts, particularly those in your area of expertise. Make sure your signature line contains a link to your Web site.
Attract folks to your Web site. People will only visit if there is something in it for them. Start creating pages that provide valuable information to your visitors. Offer to answer questions. As folks begin to see you as an expert in your field, they will turn to you for advice. Often the person they trust for information is also the person they trust to handle the deal. I get hundreds of hits each day from people who found my site looking for information on payment services. When I first posted this information, getting hits was not my intended result. Now, having seen how well it worked, I have expanded my site to cover many other topics.
Take the pages that you create and write them as articles. Submit them to E-zines that cover related topics. Many E-zines do not pay for articles, but the "hits" they generate are well worth it.
Create an E-zine of your own. You should send it only when you have something to say, maybe once a month - you don't want to overwhelm or annoy your readers. Invite them to visit your site and email you with questions. Sponsor a contest and offer prizes. Specific items that you are selling should only appear sporadically in the body of the letter and compose no more than 10% of your material so that customers don't feel they are getting just another Spam sales letter. Invite your readers to encourage their friends to subscribe. Remember to state that anyone who wishes to be removed from your list can simply reply with REMOVE.
Get listed in the search engines. How do you go about getting listed in the top ten results on search engines? There are services that can do this for you. I am not talking about the phony services that spam you with their offers and claim to know tricks. Yes, there are tricks to improve your position, but these change constantly. The search engines realized long ago that folks were using tricks and began changing their algorithms to keep the ratings more honest. Some search engines will permanently bar a site that they catch using a trick. So it is very important that the service you use is managed by someone honest and knowledgeable. I use Searchenginesmarts. Within two months of using the service, I saw a significant increase in traffic, and now well over 50% of my new orders are coming in from folks who found me through search engines. You can reach Irving Weiss at searchenginesmarts@hotmail.com. He wrote a series of articles for my newsletter, which you can read at http://www.ygoodman.com/writing.html.
By actively marketing your Web site, you will attract customers and build a reputation. Next time, I will talk more about becoming an expert in your field.
About the author:
Yisroel (Izzy) Goodman owns Complete Computer Services Inc. and sells electronics and ink cartridges online. His Web site http://www.ccs-digital.com contains articles about creating web sites, using HTML and ASP, obtaining a merchant account, payment service ratings, and avoiding fraud. His informed opinions are based on his own experience and from reading about others' experiences with payment services as well as discussions with users, representatives of the services and experts in the field. (Note: He is not affiliated in any way, directly or indirectly, with any payment service.) He can be reached by email at izzy @ ccs-digital. com.
