Trouble promoting our business site

West · #1 (**permalink**) 06-07-2007, 06:44 AM

My boyfriend is self employed and we recently started a website for his business. He designs/personalizes hats using fabric paints and Swarvoski rhinestones. He has been in business for about 10 years now, and he's very successful. But the website is not that reputable yet. We launched it about 4 months ago, and we haven't even reached 200 visitors yet!

He sells his product by vending at various conventions and seminars, and does mail orders. We've changed his business cards to add the website on it, and of course we're using word of mouth. What else can we do to promote this site??

Also, am I getting ahead of myself? I really thought the website was going to be an instant hit! Everyone was always asking him why he never started a website. Now that he has one, people don't seem interested.

lisa · #2 (**permalink**) 06-07-2007, 09:34 AM

Hi West

One of the things you have to understand is that people don't just stumble upon a website. The first thing you should try to shoot for is the free search engine traffic. Nothing better than free and targeted right?

What keyword phrases would you like to be found for? For example are you targeting "fabric paints?" Then you need to develop content-rich pages talking about fabric paints or whatever keyword phrase you're targeting.

Go to Google.com and search for some of the keywords you'd like to be found for and look at the sites in the top results. Notice most of them probably have a good amount of content about the topic.

It's very difficult to promote a store-based site with no content because it's difficult for people to find it. Try to build 20-30 pages of additional content pages that your audience will find useful.

Submit a Google sitemap and continue building your content. Then the visitors will start coming in.

webber · #3 (**permalink**) 06-07-2007, 07:34 PM

Have you seen this site www.selfpromotion.com ? I learned about it from lisa and it has great advice on do-it-yourself search engine optimization and submitting.

webmaster · #4 (**permalink**) 06-08-2007, 08:20 AM

Lisa is right!

The best way to get traffic, and not just any traffic, we are talking about targeted traffic, about people who will actually buy a hat, is to get it from search engines. Yes it takes time, but it is worth it. Here are some tips you can use to make the whole process faster.

Firstly: I don`t know if you have a domain name and a website yet, but lets suppose you have your own branded domain name and a decent website, optimized for keyword you want to target. Then you need to make sure people can reach you ANY WAY POSSIBLE - phone, email, instant messengers. And,...at least 20 pages of HIGH QUALITY CONTENT. Not just some blah, blah stuff, you need really good content to pull the thing i am about to tell you.

I suggest you use the power of media to expose and launch your website. But wait, press will only use your site as news if its newsworthy. But how to make it newsworthy?

Here is a quick lesson:
1. News has to be different, special, not everyday news - you need to be biggest, first, inovator, or something that has not be seen yet
2. News has to have some kind of affect on other people
3. News has to be interesting/provide amusement/sympathy/fear/...

Since your boyfriend sounds creative and successful in what he does, why not use this creativity to achieve something that has never done before?

Give away, yes, give away some of the works as promotion through your website. It can be organized as a contest on your website.

Than put this news to your local press and online press and social bookmarking sites.

Next, why doesn`t your boyfriend create a special collection of hats - he can create something that is fresh, new, modern, themed by a movie, a famous star or sth. Than you can put those things on ebay and set a high price that will attract people. In the description, put a link back to your site.

Try to find websites that are your competition and find out what they do. Maybe even invest some money and buy a link on their website.

What you can also do is look for Clothing stores that might want sell your products or later open your own store.

There is many options, but the one that is rock solid and most reliable is still high quality content. Make your strategy, and do whatever you feel it will work, even if it looks to good to be true, dare to do it!

Good luck with your site and business!

ssmorgan · #5 (**permalink**) 06-12-2007, 01:05 AM

I am more raising a question than providing a suggestion... For the experienced web marketers here, have you had/observed others success by creating "online-word-of-mouth", i.e. web 2.0... Squidoo, Delicious, Facebook, etc?

If so, this may be another way to create a buzz/excitement about your new website. Next time you contact your existing customers, invite them to join your Facebook/MySpace/Squidoo/LinkedIn (etc) network(s).

What does everyone think about this? Can this provide a good ROI?

Of course I agree with all the previous posts... content is the best long-term option, but this takes a little bit of time.

Best of Luck!

lisa · #6 (**permalink**) 06-12-2007, 10:18 AM

Hi Sherif

I've had limited success with the social networking sites but then again I haven't put much effort into promoting them. I've heard of some great success stories from some of those sites but usually they are from people who have some very creative ways of marketing and spend a lot of time on these sites.

I personally have not invested much energy into them. As you saw I barely logged on to FaceBook to check my messages but at the same time I have gotten a few responses from joining the Internet Marketing Group in Facebook. It seems to be a much more productive forum than anything I've found on MySpace.

Ralph · #7 (**permalink**) 07-05-2007, 12:00 PM

Thank you for the self promotion site link. Every time I come to this site I come away with a great deal of useful information.

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