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You’ve probably heard the old saying “you
get what you pay for” thrown around once or twice in your
lifetime right? For whatever reason people seem to believe that
their website is the exception to the rule, taking every shortcut
imaginable in order to save a quick buck. If there is one area of
your marketing that deserves the proper financial attention it’s
your website. Try to avoid these common mistakes people make when
trying to do things the easy way…
Getting My Friend Or Neighbor To Build My
Website: Here we have the most common alternative to hiring
a reputable web design company, pretty much guaranteeing that things
won’t be done right the first time around. “My friend’s
nephew Billy is a computer whiz…and he will only charge you
a couple hundred dollars!” Sounds great at first but what
Billy doesn’t know is there is a big difference between simply
getting your website to work and having it actually DO SOMETHING
to help your business. Remember a website is essentially a marketing
tool so it’s important to hire someone who can not only build
your site but understands the fundamentals of promoting it properly.
Building The Website Yourself: If
you are seriously considering this option than this is the one time
I’d recommend giving Billy a call instead. Many people fall
in love with the “do it yourself option” because it
is cheaper and they don’t have to trust their online future
to somebody else. Once they get their site up and running they think
they’ve saved a lot of money not realizing their new masterpiece
may actually be sabotaging their business. Unfortunately most home
made websites LOOK homemade and will often portray your company
as low budget and unreliable. Remember first impressions are big
when it comes to the web so make sure yours isn’t doing more
harm than good.
Using A Pre-made Template: It can
be tempting to use a template when building your website as they
do offer certain advantages. You get to choose the design you want,
you know what it will look like in advance, and it is can be up
and running within hours. The problem with templates however is
they are often generic multi-purpose designs used for all types
of businesses, not yours specifically. A good website should give
your company it’s own sense of identity and atmosphere, something
more likely achieved through the help of a skilled designer. Templates
are also search engines headaches as you often have less control
over important SEO factors such as what you name your files and
images.
Making Your Website An Online Billboard: There
are many online services today that will actually pay you to put
their banner ads on your website. If someone clicks on one of these
ads you in turn receive a commission….sounds great right?
Truth be told unless your website is a large scale e-zine or blog
that generates large volumes of traffic any profits you make will
be minimal at best. All these ads will do is clutter up your web
page in an unattractive manner and take focus off the product or
service YOU are trying to sell. Make your own business the center
of attention, not your paid sponsors.
Using a Free Domain Or Hosting Service:
Why pay for a domain name or hosting service when this cool new
company you found online is offering one (or both) for free? Simply
put any company offering anything “free” has an agenda
which is the promote their own business first, even at your expense.
Most free hosting services will plaster their company logo and banner
ads all over your home page making your site look ugly and more
importantly cheap. Your first goal is to establish trust with your
audience, something that won’t be accomplished if you come
off as an online telemarketer for your hosting service.
Low Brow Or Un-ethical Search Engine Practices:
Since most amateur web builders know very little about search engine
optimization but still want high rankings their first instinct is
to try and “fool” or “trick” the search
engines. They do so by overstuffing their website with keywords,
building backdoor or gateway pages, or finding shady online services
that will provide them with an endless supply of backlinks. Little
do they know that search engines have gotten wise to these tricks
a long time ago and will penalize your site accordingly. There is
no quick way to the top in Google or Yahoo so don’t go looking
for one.
Frequently Submitting Your Website To Search
Engines: There is a popular online scam that goes something
like this. For a small fee a supposed “expert SEO company”
will submit your website to literally thousands of search engines
on a regular monthly basis .This leads people to believe that frequent
submissions lead to higher rankings, a theory that is far from true.
In reality you only need to submit your website once and doing so
repeatedly will often hurt your long-term ranking. Shift your focus
to constantly updating and optimizing your web pages instead as
your rank is determined by the quality of your content, not the
number of times you submit.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising: People
often shy away from hiring an SEO company due to the often hefty
price tag, prompting them to find a more affordable alternative.
Many will turn to pay-per-click advertising, a service that lets
you advertise on other company’s websites with similar or
complimentary subject matter. You only pay a fee when and if someone
clicks on one of your ads. Although appealing in theory where your
ads appear are often very random and don’t often result in
solid leads or sales conversions. PPC advertising can be an effective
extension of a properly planned SEO campaign but should never be
used as your only source of online advertising.
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