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Internet marketing involves more
than getting traffic to your site. Sometimes the smallest
things can have the biggest impact. The following five
actions you can take to improve your Internet marketing
and Web site are simple and often over looked when creating
or marketing a site.
1) Create a unique 404 error page.
What is a 404 error page? It’s the page you see
when someone clicks on a broken link or a page that
has been renamed. When that happens the site visitor
will see a standard page that simply tells you the page
is no longer available. It has no thrills, no other
links, no branding and above all, very little helpful
information.
The page usually starts off with these words:
The page cannot be found
The page you are looking for might have been removed,
had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.
Your unique 404 error page should look like a regular
page of your site. It should include your site’s
header, footer and navigation bar so that the site visitor
can easily click on another area of your site. The content
of this unique 404 error page gives you an opportunity
to market your site to your visit. Add text explaining
that the page selected is no longer available along
with contact information so the site visitor has the
option of emailing or calling your company.
An example of our 404 error page can be found at:
http://www.eplusm.com/404.html
2) We value your privacy. This simple
four word sentence can have a tremendous effect on your
email or form conversion ratios. Be sure to have the
sentence, or at least the word “privacy”
linked to your privacy statement.
Use this sentence next to any email form on your site
or on your contact page. Clearly and simply stating
your privacy policy assures the site visitor that you
will not sell, give or trade their email or personal
information to a third party.
While a privacy page is standard practice for most professional
site builders, lawyers usually have their hand in writing
a company’s privacy policy. That results in having
the privacy policy looking like a long legal document.
Using the simple sentence with a link to the privacy
policy gives the site visitor assurance that you care
about their privacy without having a long explanation.
3) We vs You. Re-read your home
page copy and make sure it is customer focused text.
Customer focused text is text that focuses on the customer
and not YOU. When you re-read your home page content
see how often you use the term “we, us, or our”
rather than “You”. If your text reads something
like: “We offer bla, bla, bla,” or “Our
services includes, bla, bla, bla,” then it is
focusing on you rather than the customer.
4) Email Signatures. Create standard
email signatures for ALL your employees. Anyone that
uses the Internet in your company should have a company
standard email signature.
What’s an email signature? Did you ever notice
that at the end of some emails you will see not only
the email creator’s name, but their phone number,
fax, number, company name, logo, Web site address, etc.
It’s amazing how easy this is to do and how many
companies simply over look it. Or they let everyone
do their own thing.
Having the company’s contact and Web site information
makes it easy for the recipient to contact you or visit
your site. Making it standard email signature improves
your overall branding strategy.
5) Call to Action. A call to action
is a statement that asks the site visitor to do something.
Two of the biggest mistakes made on a Website is not
using call to actions or using the wrong call to actions.
You have probably been on sites that do not give you
a clue as to what to do next. They have text and links
but nothing that tells you to learn more, buy, compare,
read, or call now. Look over your site and see what
call to actions are on your site. Try to view it as
a first time visitor and create a scenario or action
you want your site visitor to take.
The most common and most boring call to action is “Click
Here”. Sometimes it’s unavoidable or it’s
the only phrase that makes sense, but consider using
other statements. Instead of “Click here”
use words like learn, save, read, compare, etc.
Call to actions are usually linked to another page on
your site. This is a great opportunity to use a keyword
in a link on your site, which helps with search engine
optimization. Use the keyword in the link for your call
to action.
These five suggestion are basically simple things to
do that can help improve your site overall. They are
often over looked but can prove to have a tremendous
effect on your site.
For one of our client’s Web sites we suggested
item number 2, adding “We
value your privacy” just above their email
form. The sentence was linked to their privacy policy.
The link was hardly used, but having that simple statement
was all that was needed. The added statement increased
their form’s conversion ratio by over 250%
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