Bricks in the Wall - Make your website work like an employee you've already paid!
Make your employee work!
You have an employee to whom you have assigned a task and paid them to do it, but you're not keeping an eye on them so they are slacking. I'm not talking about Joe or Bob or JoeBob. I'm talking about your website.
For this post the following applies: “web address”, “URL” & “domain name” are all the same thing…they all refer to what is in the address bar of your web browser when you go to a given website.
Here are 5 tips on how to "Make your employee/website work harder":
1) Use your website in your advertising but remember that it is 2014. Everyone knows a website starts with "http://www" ...So there is NO NEED to include them when incorporating your website url into an ad. Which of the following reads better?
http://www.signdesigwooster.com
www.signdesignwooster.com
signdesignwooster.com
2) Website URL's are NOT case sensitive, so use UPPER and lower case letters in your ads so prospective customers can easily read your site address. Which of the following reads better?
signdesignwooster.com
SignDesignWooster.com
3) Buy multiple URL's. It is possible to purchase multiple domain names and point them to the same site. Here is an example directly from our shop! We've owned SignDesignWooster.com for years, however we've recently acquired WoosterSigns.com. This URL points to the exact same site, but now I can track traffic that comes through the two different addresses. The benefits of this tactic are that you can add simpler URL's for different advertising and marketing needs. You can point those URL's to specific pages or subpages within a given site. If your company name or your web address is commonly misspelled, then you should seriously consider purchasing misspelled URL's. Why let prospective customers get away? Get them to your site!
Here is an example, I was working with Nickel City Recycling and as I jotted down their name I misspelled Nickle. The gal corrected me, then the light went on over my melon…if I misspelled it, I bet others do too, so why not acquire those “misspelled” web addresses and capture just a little more traffic? The cost of a web address is pretty reasonable, so much so that one sale would likely pay for annual cost of the extra domain name.
4) Track your traffic! Where does your website traffic come from? How can you tell which ads or which publications are working if you don't track the traffic? You can't, so get your Google Analytics set up and incorporated (follow the instructions, Google does a nice job of walking users through the set up process).
5) Targeted URL's & Landing Pages - Landing Pages are intermediate or intermodal pages that a user lands on before they get to a websites main or home page. These pages are often used to promote dated events, specific products or specific promotions. In number four I said to buy multiple domain names but one other use for this is to market a specific web URL that goes to a landing page.
Why make your website work harder and smarter? It is a powerful pre-qualifier of customers. If a person is not actually a potential customer, but they call your phone and consume your valuable time then they are a liability. Thus your employee (website) can pre-qualify visitors through information.
