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 Issue #4 - August 19th, 2002 Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses
Brought to you by idesignbusiness.com http://www.idesignbusiness.com Issue #4 Monday, August 19th, 2002 In this Issue: ARTICLES: FREE RESOURCES: As always, we welcome reader input and want to know what is on your mind. Let us know about topics that you would like to read about in this newsletter and we will do our best to accommodate everyone. Send topic ideas to newsletters@idesignbusiness.com Neal St. Clair idesignbusiness ARTICLE Pay-for-Performance: Can it work for you? Like all Internet-based companies, Search Engines had to find a way to make money to survive. Their solution, pay-for-performance (PFP) search results. The concept is simple, websites must pay to be listed for specific search terms and are charged each time someone clicks through to their website from that search term. The higher a website owner is willing to pay for a specific search term, the higher their website is listed. Thousands of search terms only cost pennies per click, but more popular search phrases can cost several dollars per click! So how do you know if pay-for-performance marketing is right for your website? There is no question that this type of marketing will drive traffic to any website. All of the major Search Engines including AltaVista, AOL Search, Netscape, MSN, etc utilize PFP search results. Before you embark on a PFP campaign, ask yourself two questions - how much is targeted traffic worth to me, and am I ready to handle a surge in web traffic? Do you know the average cost and average revenue you generate from a website visitor? What is your conversion rate from website visitors to paying customers? If you don't know the answer to these types of questions, that's ok, there's an inexpensive way to test PFP marketing and get a good sense of how much a visitor to your website is really worth. Overture (http://www.overture.com) is the leading provider of PFP search on the Internet. Spending as little as $50.00 you can setup an account with Overture and bid on as many search terms as you want. Overture powers the search results for the majority of Search Engines. (The term "Bed & Breakfast" was searched for 147,179 times in the Overture network in the month of July) If your not sure how much you can afford to pay for each click you receive, I recommend investing $50.00 and testing Overture for yourself. Select 5-10 search terms that you want to appear in and are reasonably priced. With your $50.00 investment you could receive an additional 200 visitors to your website if you select search terms with an average cost-per-click of $.25. The key to testing any marketing or promotion campaign is tracking the results. Overture provides great resources to help you keep track of your visitors as well as comprehensive reporting capabilities. So are you ready to give it a try? Before you start, there is one very important thing to remember, you are about to get a surge of targeted traffic to your website and you need to be ready! When you are paying for website traffic it is more important than ever to have a way to capture your web visitor's contact information and preferences. Think about this, it's great to pay $.25 and have someone visit your website right? Now, what if your website was equipped to interact with your visitors and capture their email address, phone #, mailing address, etc...For the same $.25 you have the opportunity to build a targeted database of prospects that you can communicate via email, snail mail, or phone. Repeat communications with your website visitors drastically increases your chances of turning a website visitor into a paying customer. Equipping your website to interact with your visitors and collect valuable contact information is easier and cheaper than you think. If you would like more information on how to create online forms and databases to make your website interactive and more useful, click here. idesignbusiness provides free website consultations to provide website owners with specific ways to make their sites interactive. Free Website Review FREE RESOURCES: Each issue of the Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses will include helpful free resources to promote your website. I realize many small business owners where many hats in their business and website maintenance may be one of them. WebMonkey (http://www.webmonkey.com) is a great resource for any programming questions you may have. Whether you need help on HTML, JavaScript, ASP, or any other programming language, WebMonkey can help. Very easy to find what you need with step-by-step instructions for all pieces of code. Happy Programming! ABOUT idesignbusiness idesignbusiness provides Web marketing and technology solutions for small businesses. We utilize a combination of consulting and technology expertise to create customized and flexible solutions. Please visit http://www.idesignbusiness.com for more information. SUBSCRIPTION NOTICE This newsletter is only sent to opt-in subscribers. If at anytime you would like to be removed from this list, please send an email to newsletters@idesignbusiness.com with REMOVE in the subject line. Spread the word - Please forward to friends and colleagues. Copyright 2002 - idesignbusiness.com http://www.idesignbusiness.com |
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