The first step to Internet marketing is the creation of your website. This will be your base of operations for all of your online marketing.
From your website you will attain your name recognition, your database of customers for email marketing, and your advertisement revenue.
Your website can be geared for e-commerce, a showcase for product, or an online service. These are the most successful internet ventures.
Initially, while your website is still in the idea stage, you must decide exactly what your website will do for you.
While it is true that the first outline of most websites will be similar, the steps taken to customize your website must mirror the steps you took when designing your business plan.
Better still, if you can create a plan for your website/online marketing concurrently with the plan for you business you are putting yourself in a prime position to succeed.
If you decide to gear your website for online purchases of your physical product then you will need to both showcase your product and provide a means to purchase directly from your website.
Personally I suggest creating a separate bank account for any business transactions, regardless the size of your current enterprise.
Once that is taken care of you must create your e-commerce system.
Here are some easy steps to setting up your e-commerce system
STEP 1: Identify Your Products
You will have to determine what you are going to sell online. The more products you have, the more your shopping cart will cost. You may only have one item, you may want to sell hundreds of items, or you may only wish to place your best selling items online.
STEP 2: Organize Your Products
If applicable, you should group your products into logical categories so customers can easily find what they are looking for. For example, if you were selling music you may wish to group titles in the following groups: country, rock, rap, pop, classical and jazz.
STEP 3: Photograph Your Products
The most effective way to share your products with clients is through pictures. If you want to sell, you’ll need a digital image (preferably .jpg, .gif or .tif) of each product.
If your photographs are sharp and clear, your website will look professional and customers will want to buy from you.
STEP 4: Receive Payment
You will need to decide how you wish to accept payment from customers. I suggest using PayPal, as it is the easiest to set up, and it does not require a fancy shopping cart program (which is usually pricey).
An online Marketing Service website can be many different things, from a blog to a multi-level marketing venture to a social networking website like Facebook.
The creation of this style of website can be tricky. Your website will need suitable explanation, and more importantly publicity.
Your online service can either be free or have a cover charge, but do not assume that because you offer your service for free that you will make less money.
Just the word “Free” will increase your traffic immensely, which will allow you to increase your ad revenue comparatively. Most commonly your advertisements will be your largest source of income for your online service website.
Your next step, now that you know what your website will be is going through the construction process. You have several choices when you are building your site.
Typically business owners will contract both of the construction and maintenance to a web design company, but that is NOT the only option available to you.
Taking a course and building your own website is a viable (and financially cheap) option. A third option is to hire a content management website company, and have them build your website.
A content management website is a streamlined website with an easy to edit interface, which allows you to forgo the individual costs of each edit you may want to make to your spiffy new website.
All of these methods are simple enough to put into motion, and if you follow these easy Online Marketing Strategies you will be well on your way.
