Local Ads merging with your Website
15.10.07Filed Under: Marketing Strategies
I am always shocked to see full-page ads in local papers without a website link and more, incentive to go to the site. A full-page, glossy COLOR ad in a local paper for ONE WEE costs a lot of money - usually more than a website you can use for years.And of course it shows about 1/100th of what a website can show a prospective client. It is pretty obvious that taking an ad anywhere is an attempt to increase business.
A website, if constructed properly, sends a direct, and powerful message about who you are, and gives the viewer of your website a visceral experience. One great photo can capture someone’s attention, but then they will want more - and you have to give them more - more content, that relates to what you do, and also, that speaks to that prospect so they become excited by your work and business. If they don’t, they’re not going to call you. They’ll call someone that does that for them. To take an ad and not have a website is really limiting the power of advertising today. If you have the ad bucks - well great - but you have to synergize how your ads work to get people to call you.And that’s the real crux of the issue - getting someone to call you - or in the biz that’s called “call to action” or “closing the deal” - your website can do that - or, it can become laden with too much information that just make someone start to snore. So, if you are going to pay for ads offline or on - GET A WEBSITE - for the price of a week or so of ads you can have a great website that can last you years.Learning to tie it all together however, is another story. Using your website for your business means just that - finding how you will use it to help find new customers, increase productivity and save you time. Having a site up, not thinking through what it’s purpose is, and how the newest and latest technologies can be incorporated into them so you can really make it work for you - is all part of your website.In Summary:Your website, not ads, should be the center of your advertising and sales system. Everything should point people to your website. Remember, you are not THE ONLY AD in the paper - and today people use the Internet everyday - if they see you have a site and they’re shopping around - they will look. If you don’t have a site - you look like an amateur and they will see your competition’s site from that same page of ads. That is usually the end of that customer for you. That’s not a sales pitch for me - well maybe just a little - but tell me that is not the truth.
A website is not just something to throw up online - and leave. It’s a tool, it’s the foundation of your communication process, and it can be the bridge between someone not taking you seriously and them taking you very seriously. On every level, a quality, clean, easy to navigate and properly conceived website can only add to your overall reach and day-to-day productivity.
If you are to advertise in papers, and magazines, on radio and with business cards, you should have a website that brands with all your other ads (look the same, same logo etc.) and use common sense in those ads to drive people to your website. Even if you want them to call - pitch for the call first, then back it up with a website address.
A FEW TIPS ABOUT YOUR ADDRESS
Short
Simple
.com (not .net or .us)
Purchase all the other extensions you can afford so no one else can. They cost $15 the first year, and $9.00 to renew - YES THERE ARE CHEAPER prices. More on this in another article.
NO hyphens (-)
Don’t use the # instead of the word unless you also buy the word:
homes4u.com
buy also
homesforyou.com
If you tell someone the name of your site, they will go home and type it out as it is spelled, and usually use a .com. So if your domain is .net you are going to send a prospective customer to someone else’s site if the .net is owned.
You can have your website open with 1000’s of domain names - you may have to pay for that but any web hosting company can create aliases for you - some even provide you with a control panel where you can add them. An alias is simply another domain name that when typed into a browser opens your site. Simple.
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Written by
John Monteleone
www.HamptonsWebDesign.com
www.HamptonsDirectory.com
631-725-5251
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[…] Original post by Web Tips - Hamptons Web Design Newsletter […]
October 15th, 2007 at 9:16 am