Having a website is only half the battle!

In today’s era of internet savviness, it is almost unheard of to operate a business without having a website. Consumers are apt to feel as though your company is more credible when you have a professional looking website to reference and/or direct them to. That being said, having a website is only half the battle. There are a few mission critical items to consider if your intention is to maintain a long-term presence online:

Search Engine Marketing (SEM). You now need to market your site and make it visible in the search engines. A Cost Per Click (CPC) campaign will help to promote your site in the various engines such as: Google, Yahoo, MSN, ASK, etc.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO). In conjunction with SEM, simultaneously incorporating SEO into the mix will help to supplement the cost of your paid efforts. Remember, all organic results equate to FREE traffic and who doesn’t want FREE traffic?

Return on Investment (ROI). Now that your site is visible and searchers are finding you through your SEM/SEO efforts, you need to determine how they are finding you and which specific keywords and search engines are giving you the best ROI. This is where a critical piece of the puzzle comes in place = Analytics. There are a number of analytic tools available today to measure online marketing performance. These tools will afford you the ability to make very educated decisions with your initiatives. Most tools will offer the functionality to ensure you are spending your advertising dollars wisely. Just a few variables an analytics tool can provide you with: bounce rate, conversion rate, shopping cart abandonment rate, percentage of new visitors versus returning, etc. Paying for clicks that do not convert into sales (or generate valuable leads) is a huge waste of money; especially given the state of the economy today.

Feel free to check out our Analytics Blog, which provides helpful tips and techniques to better understand web analytics: http://www.morevisibility.com/analyticsblog/index.php

A professional looking website + SEM +SEO + Analytics = $$$$$.