Web Marketing Strategies

Are You Diversifying Your Web
Marketing Portfolio?

Wall Street diversifies stock portfolios. Corporations diversify products
and sevices. Smart internet entrepreneurs diversify income streams.

Reason? The business world is constantly changing and by diversifying,
poor performance in some areas may be offset by good performance in
others.

The history of web marketing indicates that a similar strategy would be wise
when it comes to your marketing methods.

'Hot' web marketing methods come and go. There was a time when
Classified and FFA sites were quite effective. But everyone and their pet
monkeys jumped all over them, almost totally eliminating their value.

The same thing happened with 'banners'. Once a hot area, banners now
are largely 'tuned out' by surfers and response rates have plummeted.

Is The Ezine The Next Casualty?

Today's hottest web marketing vehicle is clearly the ezine. While I'd still
rank ezines as the most powerful and important marketing tool on the web,
the water here is becoming more muddied with each passing month.

Along with the enormous growth in the number of ezines clamoring to stake
their internet claim, 'deletes' and 'quick scans' are on the rise due to fuller
mailboxes and a 'tuning out' of newsletter ads by readers.

Add spam filters as an additional obstacle (yes, even to permission-based
email) and it raises the question as to just how often your newsletter is
actually being read, and to what extent. The same goes for the ads you are
placing in other ezines.

Some Troubling Signs

To see a fascinating study of just what is taking place, take a look at
DoubleClick's Q2 Email Trend Report. Since the first quarter of 2001,
email clickthroughs have declined from 8.4% to 4.9%.

In addition, the average open rate is only 37.6%. In other words, slightly
better than 1 out of 3 subscribers will even open your mail. And an
average of 13.6% of your list will bounce.

For a more detailed look at this report, including breakdowns by industry
type. Here's the link (it's a PDF file that will load on your screen):

http://www.doubleclick.com/us/knowledge/documents/trend_reports/dc_Q
2emailtrends_0209.pdf

Again, I am not dismissing the ezine as a 'has been'. Far from it. It is still
vitally important and effective. As the report suggests,

"Marketers who efficiently manage their lists, target campaigns,
and develop compelling offers will continue to achieve strong
results."

At the same time, however, the numbers suggest that it makes good
business sense to make sure you don't have too many of your eggs in your
ezine basket.

It's Time For A Stronger Emphasis On Multiple Web

Marketing Methods

If you haven't already, it's a good time to get started with, or put renewed
emphasis on, some additional marketing activities. Here's several good
ones that are definitely worth your time and effort:

* Search Engines:

Yes, this takes time and yes, it is very competitive as well, but it will
become more and more important that you achieve at least some level of
success here. An excellent resource for search engine information can be
found at:

http://www.searchengines.com

I'm far from a search engine expert, but I've been getting some decent
results from Google, the most important search engine, by targeting more
obscure, multiple word, search terms. By using the term as the file name,
page title and then again several times early in the content, I've been able to
get a number of page 1 to 3 rankings.

Granted, these are not heavy traffic terms, but by creating worthwhile
content over many search terms, it starts to add up nicely. You can do this
by either writing articles or using those of others.

* Free Ebooks:

If you haven't gotten around to it yet, create your own ebook including your
links. Again, this can be original content or a compilation of articles and
tips from others. And strongly encourage others to give it away, perhaps
by making it brandible with their own link.

To give your free ebook, web marketing plan more firepower, create a
separate page on your site promoting your ebook and submit it to the
search engines.

For tons of helpful info on creating your own ebook, you can download,

"How To Write, Create, Promote And Sell E-Books On The Internet"

It's free, and very good.

* Free Reports:

Many people are more attracted to free reports than they are to
newsletters. They see the report as being very targeted in terms of the
information they are seeking. So, the more valuable reports you put
together, the better.

Again, just as with your ebook, create a web page promoting each report
and submit it to the search engines. Also, create a web page for each
installment of your report and submit them as well. When a surfer finds
one, have a sign-up link to receive the addresses of the other installments.

And when you are emailing your reports, you have a better chance of
getting past the spam filters by sending only a link where they can read the
next segment online. (Many ezine editors are now moving to this method in
delivering their ezines as well.)

Bear in mind, however, some won't take the time to click your link who
would have read your emailed report. I don't have definitive data for you
on this. Some experimentation is likely in order.

* Participate At Forums:

You may be surprised by the traffic pulling power of helpful posts. Yes,
they are more time consuming than placing ezine ads. But they are also
very targeted, have 'preselling' advantages and develop name branding.

* Pay-Per-Click Search Engines:

You will get traffic from the PPC's. Analyze your site statistics to
determine your sales conversion ratios. Then look at your profit per sale to
determine appropriate bid prices. Look for more obscure, but related,
search terms to lower your costs. Again, this would be a good place to
promote your free reports and ebooks.

An excellent resource to learn all about the Pay Per Clicks can be found at:

http://www.payperclicksearchengines.com

The message here is not to abandon your newsletter building efforts (you'll
still get good results from a STRONG ezine), but to point out the business
wisdom of supplementing them by well diversifying your web marketing
activities.