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Four Types of Web sites
By admin | April 15, 2008
Welcome to the Tuesday Marketing Insight.
On Tuesday, Every Tuesday I’ll be sharing with you my marketing insight for the week. I’ve done so much reading and study on marketing and internet marketing, and I see so many mistakes being made all the time when people start internet marketing for the first time.
At first, we all think that we need a web site. We also try and make that web site DO everything - it has to have all the information about your company, about your products, about what services you provide, and it has to sell something too!
What people often don’t understand about the internet is that you need various TYPES of websites to do certain jobs. There are four basic types of websites, as I see it:
They are: Company Branding Sites, Landing Pages, Sales Letters and Blogs.
What are they all?
Web site type #1 - Company Branding Site
The Company branding site is simply the means by which the users can find a little bit more about you and your company, and they can most importantly CONTACT you for customer service, advertising opportunities, and possible joint ventures. It has to be relatively simple, and yet put forward a company image that cares and is genuine about what you are doing in life.
Our example is www.funmusicco.com
The company branding site can of course have links to your products, but its job is NOT to actually sell the products - that job needs to be done by the sales letters and/or squeeze pages.
Web Site Type #2 - Landing Pages
The Landing page (or “squeeze” page as it can be known) is simply a page where visitors are asked to give some information (usually the first name and email address) in return for some valuable information and an ‘ethical bribe’. It might be a special white paper or report, or some other kind of valuable information.
In return for this valuable free information the user is asked to sign up to an email list, and is then sent a carefully structured program of email communications, timed after the visit. The visitor of course has the option of “opting out” of the mailings at any time, so that you are complying with SPAM laws.
An example of one of my landing pages can be found at www.djembesecrets.net
After the user has put in their information, usually they are redirected to a sales letter page, to get more information about the product or service.
Web Site Type #3 -Sales Letters
It has been proven many times over, by copywriters old and new that long copy sells better than short copy. The more you tell, the more you sell!
Single Long scrolling pages are often hated by some internet users, however remember that they are often not the customers!
The idea of a long scrolling sales letter is that you are giving the visitor reasons why they need your product or service - and quite simply the letter needs to be as long as it needs to be!
The sales letters job is to sell - if you do it well the sales letter will be your best sales person!
Crafting well written sales letters is a job that copywriters get paid many thousands of dollars for - and the reason is that without good copy you’ll be unlikely to sell anything at all!
Very often you can write the sales letter yourself, and then get a copywriter to critique it and give you advice. This is because YOU know your product, YOU understand the benefits that someone gets from buying it.. so you are still the best person to write it. However copywriters can certainly help you craft it in such a way that it more clearly demonstrates the benefits to the reader, which is what will help you.
The example I have is www.djembesecrets.com
(Notice how I’ve used two extensions from the same domain name for the squeeze page and the sales letter! - this means that I can either direct traffic to the sales letter directly or through the squeeze page if I wish, depending on the type of promotion I’m doing)
We’ll have loads more insights about copywriting in the Tuesday marketing insight!
Web Site Type 4 - The Blog Site
The page you are reading is a blog! or you are viewing a “feed” from the blog!
Blog is short for Web-log. It was origionally intended as an “online diary” of sorts where people could share random thoughts on a continually updated basis.
As it has developed blogs have turned into websites where valuable information is shared, and where you can search and find incredible amounts of information on virtually any topic.
Your blog is essential for driving traffic to your site. Why? because people don’t bookmark or re-visit company branding pages, sales letters or landing pages. They want quality information and will return time and time again if you provide it.
An RSS feed is also a mechanism whereby the user can subscribe to the content and have it delivered directly to their computer. This means they don’t have to actually visit the website - they’ll just have it in their computer on a regular basis.
You’ll find an invitation to subscribe at the end of this article!
Blog content also needs to be consistent, and thats why I’m doing the Tuesday Marketing insight every tuesday! Blogging software such as wordpress (which I’m doing this one with) has the ability to pre-shedule posts, so even if I’m doing other things on a Tuesday, I’ll still be able to get it published every Tuesday!
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Topics: Tuesday Marketing Insight |
April 15th, 2008 at 7:47 am
Nice writing style. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Chris Moran
April 15th, 2008 at 8:30 am
Been reading for a while now. Just wanted to say good job.
Chris Tackett