How easy would it be if after hiring a brilliant web designer to create the site you’ve been dreaming of, you were then able to stand outside and wave people in to buy? Ideally, that’s what we would all do once we’ve got this great site that advertises our services or products. Eventually, you’ll run out of friends and relatives to beg his or her opinion of your site. It’s time to get your name out there.

And so your work begins. Assuming that your web builder has done his or her job and built a site that is as aesthetically pleasing as it is content-rich, it’s now up to you to bring traffic to it. If this were an easy thing to do, there wouldn’t be as many websites struggling to get “hits” to it, right? A great site and page views don’t always get to ride off in the sunset together. As such, really the only way to get traffic is by utilizing Search Engine Optimization, a.k.a. SEO.

In the past, the bigger the marketing budget, the better your sales. Larger than life ads in appropriate trade magazines usually meant your phone would ring off the hook or a gander at your website. Today, it’s all about getting people to visit your website, get them to stay a while, even enjoy their morning coffee while doing so. Here are a few suggestions to consider to get people clicking away.

Articles

Having now realized that you need traffic to sell whatever it is you that you have, having articles written is a tool that many companies use to achieve this. There are several places, once these articles are written, to place them.

Keyword Density – Content Rich

Constructing articles that are as informative as they are “SEO rich”, it’s a generally accepted principle to use a 3-7% keyword density. An example of a keyword is the following. Your company sells bracelets made of porcelain. Simply using the term “porcelain bracelets” with a sentence that is poorly written or makes no sense is tantamount to not having bothered to submit a piece about your wares. However, discussing the virtues of a porcelain bracelet or how elegant one looks when paired with an evening gown will be fun to read and bring you traffic.

Something to Avoid

If you opt to employ the services of either a writer or a web designer who claims his or her SEO Company to be SEO experts, run in the other direction! They’ll assert that for a rather hefty price he or she can all but guarantee you’ll be number one in all the search engines.

Given that the criteria used by search engines changes frequently, attempting to circumvent the system, so to speak, isn’t possible. Your best option is to stay current with the most recent rules, as it were, and watch your company’s name “climb the charts”.

Directory submission is the submission of a website, or a webpage, to an online directory. Examples of popular online directories are Google directory and the yellow pages. Directory submissions are made to improve the website’s or the webpage’s visibility. This is important because from the laws of probability, it follows that the greater the visibility, the greater your chances of getting clients or customers. The more you submit to online directories, the greater the visibility.

You can do SEO manual submission or automatic submission. Each option has pros and cons, but the manual option has more pros.

Manual Directory Submission

With manual directory submission, you visit every directory you are interested in and submit the website or service manually. This is usually done several times for the best effect – there is no penalty for this. The greatest advantage of manual directory submission is that the quality of the submission will be better. This is because you get to decide on where to submit and on how many submissions to make.

The fact that you get to choose where you want to submit is advantageous in that you can target a niche market. This way, you will not waste your time and effort on people who will not make a purchase. Another advantage is that the chances of rejection are lower. The high quality of submissions means you are more likely to be indexed. This has the direct effect of bringing more visitors to your website.

Automatic Directory Submission

Automatic directory submission just gives you quantity, but quality is more important in directory submissions. Automatic directory submission saves you time and effort, but this argument is countered by the fact that you can get professionals to do the manual submission for you if you do not have the time. It is not easy to come across reliable automatic directory submission software. This means there is a risk of problems such as some important directories being skipped.

Go for quality rather than quantity – go for manual directory submission.

Having the right features in your website might be the difference between success and failure.

Search Engine Optimization

Your website should be search engine optimized. This way, it will rank highly with search engines. A high ranking is important because many web surfers only consider what is on the first page of the results list. The high ranking increases visibility and consequently increases hits and sales.

Links

The links should be suitable and they should be easily visible. This way, the surfer will navigate to your landing page and other pages to get more information on what you have on offer. You should be particularly keen on links if you have more than one service or product on offer. If you only have one service or product, you do not really need links. You should also consider back links to respected websites – these will increase your site’s credibility.

Good Content

The content should encourage potential customers to buy. The information should be clear, to the point, and unambiguous. Note that if you have too much text, potential clients or customers will get bored and they will navigate without reading your call to action.

Customer-friendly Service or Product

The product or service should be customer friendly. You should therefore do surveys to determine what customers want.

Contact Information

A large number of website owners forget to give their contact information. Contact information is not only important to potential clients who want to learn more about what you have on offer, it is also important to other website owners who want to do link exchanges. The contact information should preferably be on every page of the website. When you provide contact information, surfers will be able to inform you if there is any problem with your website such as a technical problem.

Buying Option

Provide your clients or customers with different buying options. These may include PayPal, credit cards, and other payment service. This way, potential clients or customers will not be put off by a paying option they are not comfortable with.