Imagination:

You’ve built a shiny new web site! You’ve spent the money. You’ve designed it to be functional, navigable, and marketing-oriented. You’re on a webhost’s server AND you’ve tested your site. You’re geared up and ready for the deluge of expected customers. It’s Grand Opening time.

You take the wrapping off, open the doors, and roll out a big, inviting welcome mat. But, no one’s there. You forgot to send out the invitations.

This is not going to let this happen to you. You built the web site as a marketing tool for your customers to use, so don’t forget to market your web site. You need to promote your new web site, so the world knows about it and sees reasons to choose to use it, just as you would need to announce any new venture your company engages in.

It’s time to put out the "Web-Welcome-Mat."

The Big Question: How will anyone know you're there! Well, they won't unless you shout it out. It takes marketing - registering, advertising and promoting your eCommerce site to get customers.

A few years ago it was commonly thought that about 80% or more of all business eCommerce sites were found through Internet searches; Now, in 2009, about 65% are found through traditional advertising channels. Research indicates that 63% of shoppers that search online actually buy local.

Visitors typically either:

1. Hear about you from advertising, write down or memorize your URL and type it into their browser's "Location box,"...
2. They follow a link from another site or online ad to your site,
3. A friend or acquaintance refers them,
4. They "hit" on your site through a search,
5. You generate Publicity.
   http://www.abcinternet.com/find.html

How to Find 1  | How to Find 2 | How New Customers Find You

The reality of the Internet today is you are one of millions to billions of Websites. It is unrealistic and even foolish to expect customers to find you through ONLY search engines and directories.

That means you must make and then implement a marketing plan that begins with identifying and targeting customers and includes  both Web and traditional marketing efforts to reach those customers with informative and persuasive messages.

You need a Marketing Plan and a promotional strategy to communicate and reach customers.

Marketing is - Plans and activities that facilitate an "Exchange of Values" between Producer and Consumer.

The parts of a Marketing Plan include:

• Product Concept
• Price Concept
• Place Concept
• Promotion Concept
  • Advertising
  • Sales Force (Personal selling)
  • Sales Promotions & Point Of Purchase (POP)
  • Publicity

Public Relations
http://www.cabrillo.edu/~dambrosini/50Web/classsessions/session1marketing.htm

We'll focus on the four highlighted areas above:

1. Product Concept = Your Store - the Website and optimizing it
2. Place = Domain Name(s), Llanding Pages; Hosting In Continental Search Zones
3. Advertising = both online ads and traditional advertising media
4. Publicity = both online and traditional media
   
5. Additionally, integrate your web efforts with traditional business materials and practices

In a traditional marketing campaign there are some things you absolutely must do to get off the ground. For instance, you put up a storefront sign, get in the Yellow Pages, print business cards. You should generate some pre-opening publicity in the media and distribute flyers to customers in your vicinity. You probably want to engage in some pre-opening advertising. Then you continue to market and promote your business.

A simple Website Marketing Plan can be developed from this outline:

1. Identify your broad markets and target market your efforts
2. Put Out The Welcome Mat - Domain Name, Site Optimization
3. Generate Pre-Opening Publicity
4. Develop an Internet Marketing Plan and develop your site to be search engine friendly (SEO).
5. Develop a "real world" Marketing and Advertising plan (you may want to take a Marketing or Advertising course or both.)
6. Integrate The Web Effort into Traditional Business Promotions, Marketing & Advertising Literature
7. Develop a partnering plan for "real world" referrals and an Affiliate Plan (links and swaps, etc.) with related  businesses and vendors online.
8. Develop customer service policies, good customer enticements, customer referrals, forums, review postings and other after sale service, feed back and marketing plans.

• Choose a domain name and Web host and get online
• Consider multiple domain names
• Consider additional Web Hosts for bandwidth and speed issues at other geographic locations using multiple domain names; consider different language version and overseas hosting International Search Engines
• Sell a product or two on as many auction sites as you can - you get promotion, brand awareness, additional Webspace, a link back to your site and a chance to communicate with customers via email.
• Consider multiple websites, home pages and site personalities for different target markets.
• Use Landing Pages and SEO
• Identify Special Interest Web sites (aficionado sites and your site) and subscribe, enter discussion groups, put up classified ads, make an inexpensive storefront, link back to your Website
• Use Web 2.0 Social Networking tools Japenese Gardens
• Solicit coop links and join link exchanges
• Submit repeatedly (every 3-6 months) to search engines and have your site search engine ready; submit to international search engines
• Use eMail for publicity releases, coupons to customers, offer good customer discounts and so on
• Create a newsletter, discussion group, chat room, sign ups for sales and specials, etc.; create consumer interaction.

The Internet/Web Marketing Plan

1. Pre-opening and Grand Opening 1.1
1. Pre-opening and Grand Opening 1.2
2. Paid Web Advertising
3. Specific Types of Paid Web Advertising
4. Linking Strategies
5. Name Identification Publicity
6. Self-Promotion on Your Own Site

7. Affiliate Marketing
8. eMail & Publicity
9. Controversial Marketing
10. Personalized Marketing and Other Promotions
11. Traditional Marketing and Integrating With Your Website
12. Social Networking aka Web 2.0

The following "S" phrases are similar in function and overlapping in strategies and misused in many written forums and publications. So, don't get too hung up over that and focus on the strategies.

• S.O. or Site Optimization refers to the strategies of optimizing the website and web pages for search engine indexing. In other words, getting into the search engines and getting into multiple index categories. You build a stronger presence in the search engine databases. This includes multiple domain names, misspellings, multiples sites or targeted sites versions, marketing presences at other sites like E-bay, Amazon or Craig's list, and and probably all of the following
  SO1 | SO2 | SO3 | SO4 | SO5 | SO6 | SO7 | SO8 | for fun
  
  An alternative definition refers to speeding up page loading, not search engines indexing your pages alt1 | alt 2

• SEO or Search Engine Optimization refers to optimizing your page content and site arrangement, by including hidden and overt content on your webpages planned to get you to rank high in response to a keyword query search AND to get indexed into multiple Search Zones. this includes meta tags, first hundred words and alt tags, user eye-tracking and hot spots, revealing the invisible/hidden web to the search engines, and so on.
• SERP or Search Engine Results Pages is an effort to score higher on the SERP that comes up when a user or customer types a keyword query. It is all the efforts to move your site up in the rankings. or to the
• SEM or Search Engine Marketing, refers to working the search engine algorithms to improve hits, rank higher and appear on the SERP in multiple ways, multiple times and in multiple search engines. SEM methods include: Landing Pages, double-listings, inclusion/registration, paid placement inclusion (ads & registration), and so on. Also, targeting other country search engines, hosting on other continents, reciprocal linking, linking to popular sites and linkbacks from popular sites, blogs and social sites, web 2.0. content like wikis.

A) A Landing Page is NOT a Home Page nor a Splash Page. It is a page at your eCommerce site that is created to appear as the result of:

1. Clicking on a hit link resulting from a Search Engine Query
2. Clicking on an Advertising link

Home Page
Splash Page
Landing Page - aka lead Capture page where a customer "lands" from 1) from an Ad or 2) link, often a page designed within your site for focused keyword searches, or 3) multiple domain names, or 4) reciprocol links from other sites, or 5) social networking sites.

B) Site Optimization (SO) or Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - First things first: Configure your Web page so search engines can find you, describe and categorize you and include you in directories and indexes.

The idea is to score high on the list returned for a search (SERP). This isn't easy to do but most people look at only the first 10 hits returned (first page). Also, eye tracking shows that certain parts of a page are more likely to be focused upon than other parts of the page.

http://blog.eyetools.net/eyetools_research/2005/03/eyetracking_goo.html
https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=17954
http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/internet/google-heatmap-2.htm

Once you have optimized your site try this tool to see how you and other sites are doing. Download the Google Toolbar (Firefox or I.E. add on). When you install it, it will give you a check box after you finish that says "do you want to enable Rankings?" Say yes and it will give you a tool that shows a 1-10 score and data (such as # of links from other sites to this page) about whatever page you are on. (toolbar.google.com)
http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/toolbar/FT3/intl/en/index.html

Search Engine Registration (aka Submitting your site) - search engine, metasearch engine, portal, Web directory

There are really five types of sites you can register with, commonly, but inaccurately, all referred to as "search engines."

1. Web Directories - they index sites into categories and allow focused searches by narrowing the search to appropriate categories. You can do searches or simply look for what you want in a category. http:/www.google.com ,
http://www.yahoo.com/

2. Search Engines - They index your pages and allow keyword searches. They do not categorize or set up a directory you can browse through.
http://www.excite.com/

3. Guides and Review Sites - These carefully pick a selection of sites and issue opinion reviews.http://www.gomez.com/
4. Metasearch Engines - a search engine that displays results from multiple search engines. (grouped by the source i.e. Dogpile), scrambled from all the sources (i.e. Mamma), or clustered and ranked (i.e. Ixquick).
5. Portals - A site featuring a suite of commonly used services, serving as a starting point and frequent gateway to the Web (Web portal) or a niche topic (vertical portal). Web portal services often include a search engine or directory, news, email, stock quotes, maps, forums, chat, shopping, and options for customization. These are only some of the most frequently offered services; large portals often include dozens or hundreds of bundled services.

   Portals are one-stop destinations for advertisers and marketers, too, offering a endless variety of choices. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_portal

   Directories of Portals
   Google : Internet : WWW : Web Portals
   Yahoo : Internet and World Wide Web : Portals
   dmoz : Internet : WWW : Web Portals

* You can register your site fairly simply. Go to the site and find the self register option and follow the directions. The following is a list of some search engines you can start with.
http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl
https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/submit

If you want more, you can search for directory sites of all the search engines or rankings.
http://www.silurian.com/sitepos/searchengine.htm
http://searchenginewatch.com/

56%+ 21 9 4 2 2 <2 <2 <2 <1 <1 <1 <1 <1

Most Popular Google http:/www.google.com Yahoo! http://yahoo.com/ MSN http://www.msn.com/ AOL http://www.aol.com/ Ask http://www.ask.com/ (Ask Jeeves, Teoma Live Search http://search.live.com/ Lycos http://www.lycos.com/ Alta Vista http://www.altavista.com/ Netscape http://search.netscape.com/search/webhome HotBot http://www.hotbot.com/ Webcrawler http://www.webcrawler.com/ Excite http://www.excite.com/ AllTheWeb http://www.alltheweb.com/ Owned by Overture-owned by Yahoo Go/Infoseek http://www.infoseek.com/ DogPile - http://www.dogpile.com metasearch engine located at

D) Paid Registration Services

There are really too many search engines for you to manually register at each...it does take time. The are thousands of search engines.

If you have any notion of time-is-money, then it pays to let a service do this for you. Some are even free, and most all get you going in only a few hours. Here are a few.

@submit (register at 50 sites for free) http://www.uswebsites.com/submit/

Submit It! (register 20 free, $60 for 300) http://www.submit-it.com/

Register-It! (register 100 sites for $20) http://www.register-it.com/

bCentral's Submit It http://www.bcentral.com/products/si/default.asp?lid=32672

Postmaster (register 395 for $500) http://www.netcreations.com/postmaster/

Four SEO Tips For Geo Targeting Countries

International Search Engines

How do I get my website or blog to rank high for certain countries search engines? This is a very good question, and the answers are quite simple.

1. The first method we will look at is the ccTLD (TLD = Top Level Domain & cc = country code). One of the items the search engine robots looks for is the ccTLD. If it comes across a .au, or .uk, then this website is going to get indexed in the country where the extension designates. So, if you are looking to register domains for other countries, this is one method of doing it.
   
2. Another method is where it is hosted at. The search engine robots will also pull the IP address of the hosting company, which in turn is your websites IP address. If you have a standard .com address, and it is hosted in the UK, then it will be ranked with the UK websites.
   
   Now, you should look carefully into this. Just because you live in the UK, have a .com address, and are using a UK hosting company, you could still not be ranked with the local UK search engines. If the hosting company is actually using servers outside of the UK, then you would not rank for the UK, but rather the hosting IP address’s country. Confusing yet?
   
   This is not to say that I can not have a .com address rank high in the UK, even with my sites hosted in the USA. But, if you want a sure thing, then you should have your sites hosted where you want them to rank.
   
3. When you register your domain name, get the .com, .net, .org, .info, and the .biz. Then, you can pick where you want each one hosted, and have them all be country specific. This might be a good way to dominate the listings internationally. Own all 5 of the Social SEO Guide domains.
   http://www.dotsauce.com/2008/11/12/google-seo-guide/
   http://www.seobook.com/bloggers#whyblog scroll to Domain Name Registration & Blog Hosting
4. One last method of doing this is to use the <address> code. Google recognizes this, and will interpret it as a physical address. Make sure it is on an “About Us” or “Contact Us” page. Google spiders are pretty smart, and by using the <address> tag it can help the spiders with Google local or regional rankings. Example of HTML Address Code

Those are the 4 SEO tips for Geo targeting countries. Try them out if you are looking to make a big impact internationally and want your websites to rank high in all of the local search engines as well.

References

http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/guide-to-geo-targeting-for-seo-and-usability/

http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/articles/Geo_Targeting_Countries_For_SEO.aspx

http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/3503064.htm

http://www.socialseoguide.com/social-bookmarking/2008/02/20/3-seo-tips-for-geo-targeting-countries/

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1. Pre-opening and Grand Opening 1.2

Hosting, Domain Names & Publicity/Press Release:

Hosting - Consider multiple options with domain names and hosts

• Choose a domain name and Web host and get online
• Consider multiple domain names that can lead to your site
• Consider additional Web Hosts for bandwidth and speed when you offer downloadable products (requires using multiple domain names)
• Use other geographic locations and overseas hosting (requires using multiple domain names) to get into popular search engines in other countries and continents
• consider different language versions
• consider multiple websites, home pages and site personalities for different target markets.

Publicity/Press Release - Put out the welcome mat in ways that give you legitimacy and through information and media sources that consumers find trustworthy

• Write Press Releases to local and national media about your website
• Issue E-mail press releases to online forums, eZines, etc.
• Use a paid service
  • Example Company: IMEDIAFAX (The Internet to Media Fax Service) Imediafax transmits news releases via fax or e-mail to custom targeted media lists. Prices start at 25 cents per fax page, 15 cents per e-mail. Quantity discounts available.
    www.imediafax.com
  • List of online media and a comparison chart: http://www.urlwire.com/email-releases.html

Establish local contacts in the media that you can use for press release and publicity purposes. The launch of your web site is news, if you coordinate the launch with your press release timing.

Traditionally, contacts are made by mail, fax, newswire, and Email.

Want to work up a weekly sweat? Start an Internet publicity campaign. Contact the traditional newspapers and magazines in your area and around the country, or even internationally by Email. Send out an Email press release telling people that you have an exciting new site or what’s new at your internet site as often as possible, once a week, once a month, or so. Here a a few eZine Lists and Directories:
http://www.e-zine-list.com/titles_by_first_letter/index.shtml
http://www.web-source.net/web/Ezines/

Don’t forget radio and television for press releases. After you have been around a while it may be difficult to think about what’s new with your business or site. But, do it.

If you’ve never issued a press release, there is an art to learn and a method to follow if you want to get past the immediately-into-the-trashcan sort by the media editor.

• First, you need the proper contact person.
• Use their name and proper title.
• Make sure what you write is newsworthy and meets the interest of the particular media's audience.
• Send it to this editor by the method he or she prefers. Most don’t want an in person visit but will have a preference for Email, mail, fax, or other.
• Present the written information in a proper format. Each Editor and media has a personal notion or preference regarding format. However, all should clearly identify the sender (you), a contact person at your business and a means of contact, the what/where/when/who and why information, clearly identified, and a date for when the information can and should be used (i.e. "for immediate release" or "for release in March.").

Click below for more info on generating Publicity and writing Press Releases:

• Publicity http://www.cabrillo.edu/~dambrosini/50Web/classsessions/session8publicity.htm
• Press Releases http://www.cabrillo.edu/~dambrosini/50Web/classsessions/session9pressreleases.htm

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Paid Ads cost you money. However, they are effective if well planned, targeted to your customers and scheduled well. A nice thing about paid Web ads is that the people seeing them are generally comfortable users with the Web and Internet. Another nice thing is that you can test your ads, monitor responses, track statistics and not pay a small fortune to do so.

Paid Web Ads include:

• Classified Ads - at targeted sites and in eZines
• eZine Ads - similar to display ads in print media
• Site Ads - banner, popups, etc.
• Paid Placements in Search Engines & Directories
• Pay per click (ppc) services

We will focus on Paid Placements, Pay per Click, and Site Ads in this section. The other are covered elsewhere on this page.

Paid Placements in Search Engines & Directories

There is a world of terminology and jargon developing in Web Advertising similar to and mimicking what we use in the real world of advertising for ad insertions, measures of effectiveness and buying and scheduling of ads. Click here to learn more.

Paid Placements in search engines either charge:

• a direct fee when your site or ad comes up as the result of a search, this is called a "hit" when you site or ad comes up in the listings that are returned as a result of the customers search. (Not to be confused with a "page hit" where you track statistics of requests of a file from a Web server.
• or a fee only when the customer "clicks through." This means the paid ad or link comes up as a hit AND the customer clicks on it to request the server to download and display the page.
  Example: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=hits&btnG=Google+Search

Google AdWords - You sign up for this service, determine your budget and get statistical tracking of the results.

• You make your text Ad
• You choose search words and terms
• You bid approximately 5 cents (more or less) to come up close to or at the top of the list of returns from a customer search
• The hits are listed on the right side of the screen
• You can adjust your bid up to come up at the top of the list
• Google tracks statistics and allows you to refine your word list and even suggests which words are working or not and other words to try.
• Google also suggest bid prices to try
• They only charge if the customer clicks through, but in the meantime the customer might read your text ad that came up on the right - this equals an impression or exposure
• You can scale the amount of responses and your budget to get the response

• Google>Business Solutions>AdWords>Get Keywords ideas
• Keyword Tool Tips
• Keyword Stats
• Example
• Google Traffic Estimator

Other Search Engines and Directories like Yahoo offer similar services using a software system called Overture. Yahoo now owns Overture. Yahoo calls it Adsales. From their homepage, click on "Yahoo! Search Marketing" just under the search box or try clicking here.

Google AdSense - This is a service whereby other web publishers (other websites) place ads through google and you allow their ads to display on any or all of your webpages...AND you get paid for accepting these ads. You can control the relevance of the ads that appear. You can also display Google's search box on your pages and share in the revenues of other companies that are using AdWords when the search originates from your page. It is also a banner ad service. (see below)

Google's Froogle - Froogle is Google's online shopping site and directory of products. You can list your products on Froogle for free. You can list your prices, products and brands so that they come up when customers ask for a product in the Froogle search box. You will be displayed with other merchants. You can add ad paid placements on the right with AdWords, display a text and graphic display that comes up when a customer clicks on your text link and you can link back to your website.

example: http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=music+cds&hl=en&btnG=Search+Froogle&lmode=unknown

In order for your products to be included in Froogle, you will need to send them a product feed, which is a simple text file listing your product information. You can include graphics. There's currently no limit to the number of products you can submit. Unlike other online shopping sites, Froogle costs nothing. There's no spending account to set up and maintain. No cost-per-click. No cost, period.

A product feed is a file containing information about the products listed on your site.

By sending us this product feed regularly (once a month, once a day, or somewhere in between), you can make sure Froogle is displaying the latest pricing, promotional, or other information for your products.

Pay Per Click Services - These services are intermediaries or facilitators that save you the trouble of going directly to Google or Yahoo and others.

http://www.payperranking.com/

http://www.websitepros.com/html/visibility_online.html

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Banner Ads - Usually appear at the top of a page. They can be static banners, animated banners and interactive in nature. HTML banner ads use HTML elements, often including interactive forms, instead of (or in addition to) standard graphical elements.All these forms are a type of Paid ad placement that can be arranged by:

1. Paying another site directly for the ad placement - negotiate the terms on your own - anything goes.
2. Using a service to get the banner ad placed.
   
   • Google AdSense Many services use Adsense and do the work for you for a fee
   • Extreme Marketing Program
   • Free Banner Ads
   • Flash Video Banners
   • Faskclick is an online service that buys and sells ad space
   • Elance brings advertisers and service firms together

Specifically, it's a graphical web advertising unit, typically measuring 468 pixels wide and 60 pixels tall (i.e. 468x60) and appearing at the top of a home page or deep placed at your site. It can be a vertical ad, usually on the right side of the page but possibly placed anywhere. For more information try "How Stuff Works" website.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau or IAB sets voluntary guidelines for website advertising.

Click Here for more info on Banner Ads

Button Ads - A graphical advertising unit called a button ad , smaller than a banner ad. They are often rectangular or occasionally round. Button ads come in a variety of sizes. There are standards such as 120x90, 120x60, 125x125 and 88x31 (micro-button), although nonstandard button ads are not uncommon. Whereas banners are often placed at the top or bottom of a page, buttons are often placed towards the middle of a page on the left or right sides.

Starter Template

Text Ads (aka text sponsorships) - Advertisement using text-based hyperlinks. Text-based ads, although common in email, have been dominated on the Web by their graphical-based counterparts like banner ads and button ads.

Google text advertising options, Premium Sponsorship & Adwords Program, claim a "click-through rate 4-5 times higher than industry standards for banner ads.

While lacking some of the advantages of graphical ads, text-based ads have some powerful advantages of their own. They download almost instantly and are not affected by ad blocking software.

Pop up Ads - An ad that displays in a new browser window.

Pop up windows come in many different shapes and sizes, typically in a scaled-down browser window with only the Close, Minimize and Maximize commands.

There is a strong resentment by some Web surfers towards pop-up ads. Marketers often do not realize the ill-will generated by pop-ups because it is easier to click the "close" button than send an email to complain. What can often be seen is an above-average click-through rate, although some of this can come from "false positives," unintentional clicks when the pop-up gets in the way of the desired target. Advertisers can get a better picture of the effectiveness of pop-up advertising by paying attention to conversion rates and return on investment (ROI).

Pop Under Ads - An ad that displays in a new browser window behind (beneath) the current browser window.

The pop-under ad is the sneakier relative of the pop-up ad. While pop-up ads are often shown (and closed) instantly, pop-under ads linger behind the current browser window, appearing only after other windows have been closed.

Vertical Banner and Skyscraper Ads - unusual sizes of ads guided by the IAB guidelines. A Vertical banner ad measures120 pixels wide and 240 pixels tall. Skyscraper ads are tall -- very tall -- with heights often ranging from 500 to 800 pixels (and widths often ranging from 120 to 160 pixels).

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Linking your site to others and others linking to you can help with search engine placement and the "quality" of you site. However, exchanging links and forming affiliate relationships through links is a powerful advertising method.

Reciprocal Links - Links between two sites, often based on an agreement by the site owners to exchange links. Reciprocal links are based on an agreement by two sites to link to each other. Reciprocal linking is often used by small/midsize sites as an inexpensive way to increase Web site traffic and link popularity.

Related terms:

• deep linking: linking to a web page other than a site's home page.
• inbound link: a link from a site outside of your site.
• outbound link: a link to a site outside of your site.

For more info about linking try:
Zimply
reciprocallink.com/
thelinkexchange business partner program

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Once you have registered your domain name, you will want to generate a brand name or business name identity through the use of that domain name. Make people aware of it and draw attention to it.

Register with Whois - whois is a domain name lookup utility that returns ownership information about second-level domains. Information often includes the name and address of the registrant, administrative contact, technical contact, billing contact, creation date, expiration date, and domain servers. Others include:

Network Solutions
dmoz a directory of registration directories

.sig file (aka SIG file) - A short block of text at the end of a message identifying the sender and providing additional information about them.

A .sig file is small text file (with a .sig extension) that can be automatically attached to the end of email messages. The phrase SIG file is also used to identify blocks of text used for similar purposes through different channels, such as discussion group messages.

For personal use, SIG files often include humorous sayings or signature art. These can be automatically rotated so frequent recipients do not see the same message every time.

For business use, SIG files often include a mix of contact information and business promotion. This may include the sender's name, job title, company name, phone #, fax #, email address, Web site address, tag line and brief benefits of your products or services.

There are netiquette issues concerning posting a sig in public forums. Some moderated forums discourage and disallow any form of self-promotional signature. As always, fully read the Terms & Conditions and get a feel for what is acceptable at a forum before posting.

favicon - A small icon that is used by some browsers to identify a bookmarked Web site.

The display size of a favicon in the Favorites list is 16x16. Files are recognized by the ".ico" extension. Special applications are available to create this type of file. (see below) Once created, the favicon.ico file is placed in the root folder of the Web site.

In your meta tags, in the Head between the <head> and </head> tags, insert:

<link rel="shortcut icon" href="../favicon.ico">

Internet Explorer is the most notable browser to use favicons. Without a favicon, Internet Explorer includes a default "IE" icon next to all bookmarked sites. With a favicon, IE5+ will display a site's unique icon next to a bookmark. The custom icon is also substituted for the standard IE icon in various places in the browser and on the desktop.

Favicons are most likely to be found at large, well-branded sites such as portals and media companies. When only a few sites in a long bookmark list are using a custom image, the exceptions are very prominent.

Currently, Netscape Navigator does not support favicons.

White Pages - online telephone directory of people and businesses. You can add to existing directory information, get paid sponsorships and to some degree control your listing.
http://www.whitepages.com/10001/faq

Yellow Pages - online telephone directory of people and businesses similar to the white pages
yellowpages.com

Yellow Pages Advertising

411.com - the search utility for the white and yellow pages
http://www.411.com/

Word of Mouth - word of mouth is customers and vendors talking about you to others on their own initiative, hopefully because you have impressed them and they like you. Think of someone coming home from a great vacation and anxious to tell you about it. It can be negative if the experience is bad.

It is possible to stimulate word of mouth:

• blogs
• FAQ pages
• ported testimonials
• discussion boards
• Review pages
• rating pages for products and services
• others?

Free Site Promotion- Get publicity through other peoples websites that have the same or similar clientele

• barter - to exchange goods or services directly without the use of money.
• free text link exchanging
• referrals and recommendations

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Promote at your own site to entice customers and to bring back customers

Promote onsite

• deliver coupons
• give "good customer" discount
• have a membership advantage
• give secondary reason to come to your site - webcams. calculators, information exchanges, etc.
• newsletters
• sponsor classified ads
• banner ads
• contests
• games
• join associations - trustee, National Association of Photoshop Professionals, etc.
• List awards and citations
• customer testimonials
• others?

Start your own usenet newsgroup (aka bulletin board) More info

A very effective alternative, but one that will require a large amount of maintenance and management time, is to start your own newsgroup or even include it in your web site. 

A similar venue to online bulletin boards is offered through the online services, Compuserv, Prodigy, America Online. They provide message forums (sometimes directly business related), file libraries with text and software, and graphics files uploaded by users (you in this case) and indexed by the service provider , and conference rooms where you can schedule, publicize and conduct online conferences.

Listservs vs Email more info

A listserv is a lot like a newsgroup. It uses Internet Email. All members receive all postings via their personal Email, unlike a newsgroup where the postings are indexed and must be accessed by the user to get the information. Consequently, posting to a listserv group requires even more caution than with newsgroups.

A listserv is more dynamic, immediate, and active. The postings tend to be shorter (what can be loaded into an Email message or typed in) and more conversational rather than narrative or literate.

Listservs may remind you of radio call-in shows, but without the host or deejay. There will be a systems administrator who may censor some material as inappropriate. It can be rather free form in information exchanged and in manner and netiquette observed (or violated). This is a good place to discuss experiences, give testimonials, offer endorsements, and give advice or feedback.

It is also very much like publicity in traditional media in that you can’t control the messages and the messages can be positive or negative in spin.

You may find existing listservs built around a topic related to your business such as Building and Construction or no useful connections at all. Again, avoid being blatantly commercial when posting messages and responding to replies. Also, if you have the time and inclination to maintain it, you can start your own listserv.

Newsletters

You can create and maintain online newsletters. This is an excellent way to disseminate valuable information, entice customers, offer preferred customer goodies, and alert customers of new offerings or site changes.

Newsletters can be given away or sold on a subscription basis. Again, this will be a lot of work but can be a publicity tool or an end product in itself. Try not to use a newsletter as a blatant selling tool, but use it to disseminate useful and interesting information.

Only send your newsletter to subscribers. You can offer the newsletter through your web site as a service, or you can gather Email addresses by asking customers to fill out a simple subscription form, then send it.

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Affiliate marketing - revenue sharing between online affiliate advertisers/merchants (the advertiser) and online affiliates publishers/salespeople (website promoter of your products) site, whereby compensation is based on performance measures, typically in the form of sales, clicks, registrations, or a hybrid model.

Affiliate marketing is one area where text ads have flourished.

Benefits of affiliate marketing include the potential for automating much of the advertising process (accepting & approving applications, generating unique sales links, tracking & reporting of results) and payment only for desired results (sales, registrations, clicks).

Paying only for performance shifts much of the advertising risk from the merchants to the affiliates, although merchants still assume some risk of fraud from partner sites.

Affiliate marketing has contributed to the rise of many leading online companies. Amazon.com, one of the first significant adopters, now has hundreds of thousands of affiliate relationships. It is not uncommon to see industries where the major players have affiliate programs--often structured in a similar manner and making similar competitive changes over time.

Affiliate networks - A value-added intermediary providing services, including aggregation, for affiliate merchants and affiliates. For affiliate merchants, services can include providing tracking technology, reporting tools, payment processing, and access to a large base of affiliates.

For affiliates, services can include providing one-click application to new merchants, reporting tools, and payment aggregation.
Sponsored Links

Affiliate Directories - A categorized listing of affiliate programs. Affiliate directories are a popular starting point for finding and comparing various merchant's programs. The individual networks also provide aggregated information for their programs, but lack the all-in-one overview of the directories.

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The transmission of computer-based messages over telecommunication technology. Email is a great way to communicate with customers and potential customers. However, it is only as good as your email list.

permission marketing - The best way to use it is to get volunteered email addresses from customers and visitors to you site by giving them something - a newsletter, email discount coupons, access to member pages and privileges, etc.

In the world of marketing, email can be a high-risk, high-reward medium. Response rates often run much higher than comparable Web advertisements, but there is also the risk of tarnishing a company's brand, or even landing on an email blacklist. Marketers are advised to obtain permission from recipients, and make an extra effort to understand email issues from the recipient's point of view.

email marketing - the promotion of products or services via email.

Email is a very versatile medium. Formats range from simple text to HTML & rich media. Content can be one-size-fits-all or highly customized. Frequency can consist of fixed, frequent intervals or sporadic intervals, with transmissions occurring only when something newsworthy comes along. Sophistication (and cost) can be very low or very high.

Along with the power of email comes the abuse of email, commonly known as spam. Is spam email considered marketing? Technically, the answer is probably yes, but it is certainly not responsible email marketing. While some users fail to distinguish between permission marketing and email spam, spam is actually a major threat to legitimate email marketers, as a glut of messages could make the entire email medium less effective.

ezine - an electronic magazine, whether delivered via a Web site or an email newsletter.

opt-in email - email that is explicitly requested by the recipient.

8b. Publicity
Write free articles and submit them to other sites. This works well if you have created a content rich side, add content that "gives" to the visitors, and therefore can benefit by becoming a "Trusted Advisor" through reputation building.
see pblicity guidelines above

• blogs and insert a link back (to your site) problogger.net ; dailyblogtips.com
• forums
• newsletters
• real world publications

Comment on other peoples blog or forum postings, articles, letters to the editor or posted comments. If people like what you say, they will want to click-back to see what else you have to say.

Write an eBook and self-publish and even sell as a hard copy through online services.
http://www.lulu.com/
Search for others.

Post Events on selected sites (online) and Social networking sites.
Santa Cruz Sentinel
Good Times Events Calendar
Santa Cruz Public Libraries "Community Information Database:
Metro Santa Cruz
Craigs List
FaceBook
MySpace

Letters to the Editor can often get published but also may be turned into articles or guest columns if you request that option.
Metro Santa Cruz

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The efforts to attract customers, in web jargon, are either "White Hat" (ethical, playing fair) or "Black Hat" (dirty tricks, gaming the search engines). However, the distinction sometimes it becomes blurred and thus controversial.

Controversial Marketing includes

• efforts that are very useful to the consumer
  • cookie - information stored on a user's computer by a Web site so preferences are remembered on future requests.
• efforts that consumers like but are leery of but may be glad to have
  • buzzword - a trendy word or phrase that is used more to impress than explain.
  • FFA - free-for-all links list, where there are no qualifications for adding a link.
  • incentivized traffic - visitors who have received some form of compensation for visiting a site. Incentives may come in the form of cash, points, or other means.
• efforts that are probably unethical
  • email spam - unwanted, unsolicited email.
  • mousetrapping - the use of browser tricks in an effort to keep a visitor captive at a site, often by disabling the "Back" button or generated repeated pop-up windows.
  • pagejacking - theft of a page from the original site and publication of a copy (or near-copy) at another site.
  • spam - inappropriate commercial message of extremely low value.
  • search engine spam - excessive manipulation to influence search engine rankings, often for pages which contain little or no relevant content.
  • trick banner - a banner ad that attempts to trick people into clicking, often by imitating an operating system message.
• actions consumers might take.
  • ad blocking - the blocking of Web advertisements, typically the image in graphical Web advertisements.
  • banner blindness - the tendency of web visitors to ignore banner ads, even when banners contain information visitors are actively looking for.
  • opt-out - (1) type of program that assumes inclusion unless stated otherwise. (2) to remove oneself from an opt-out program.

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Personalized marketing efforts are ways to reach more customers, expand your market and give customers more ways to find you.

Classified Ads - These can be paid or free text listing of items for sale by individuals, one item for a business (hopefully with a link to your seller site) or business classifieds.

Netscape classifieds
NetImages
BuySellBid
Yahoo! Classifieds
InetGiant

Many are for specific interests marketing like Trader Online for vehicles. Some are associated with newspapers like the Seatle Post Intelligencer. Some are free forums or directories.

Targeted and commercial sites for Special Interests - These offer classifieds but also product and site reviews, paid ads, link backs to your site, a marketplace for customers and vendors and more.

Audiogon.com consumer goods

Chemconnect Industrial Goods Market Exchanges

Personalized eCommerce - Personalized eCommerce sites let you take a logo, graphic or design and put it on items for sale ranging from t-shirts to mugs, mouse pads to postage stamps and promotional items in general. This allows your to promote your website and its products.

http://www.cafepress.com/cp/info/tour/index.aspx
http://www.zazzle.com/

Auction Selling - Auction Selling allows you to sell almost anything, one item at a time and may allow merchants to link back to the merchant's main website. This is a lot like a classified ad.

C2C: http://www.ebay.com/
B2B: http://www.business-auctions.com/
Reverse (C2B): http://www.liquidprice.com/

Item selling - Item selling requires that the website already sells that item or will allow you to add it within their product categories.

• Sell Your Items at Amazon Auction
• Sell Your Stuff at Amazon.com

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Traditional Marketing & Integrating the Internet site into your traditional marketing efforts - You most definitely want to include your Web site address wherever you include your regular address and phone numbers. Examples would be stationary letterheads, business cards, product and package labels, brochures, catalogs and such. Rather than printing all new materials you can prepare a stamp or a peel of label as a means of inexpensively and attractively including the new information on existing material.

Of course you will want to include site information in your advertising and publicity efforts as another way to contact or visit you.

Another consideration is incorporating this information into information sources that won’t easily change or be changed for some time. For instance location signage, Yellow pages advertising, the white pages telephone directory, and such.

Integrating the Internet site into your traditional marketing efforts.

Action 1. - Examine your current marketing literature (printed materials) and office stationary for opportunities to list your site URL and Email address.

The next opportunity you have to reprint or redo them, consider whether or not to include your new site information. Consider:

• brochures and catalogs
• business cards
• flyers and posters
• stationary, letterhead and memorandums
• fax cover sheets
• postcards or other direct mail pieces
• order forms, invoices, receipts, etc.
• other items like menus, coupons, promotional items, etc.

Action 2. - Make a stamp or make peel-off labels to stick on current copies of marketing literature and office stationary or other materials listed above until you do reprint them.

You may have a lot of money invested in these items and you wouldn't’t want to throw them out. So, make sure the stamp or labels look attractive and professional. If not, you will have to choose between waiting, looking less than professional, or biting the bullet and absorbing the cost in the interest of generating extra, new business.

Action 3. - Examine your advertising and make it a policy to include your Email address and URL.

This can be simple for print ads or television ads where there is a visual for the audience to read and keep or write down. It may be more difficult to communicate over the radio which is sound only. In this case consider memory devices or shortcuts to help the customer. An alternative is to refer the customer to a source they can remember to look up or acquire the site URL and Email address such as "call us, we’re in the phone book under Marketing Consultants."

Action 4. - Mention your site URL and/or Email address on your answering machine and voice-mail systems.

You can generate some excitement mentioning changes or updates to the site. Be careful not to irritate customers however by causing delays in the time it takes for them to wait to leave a message or talk to a real person when they call.

Action 5. - Take an inventory of your business’ signage and decide if you need to add your site URL or Email address to it in some manner.

Existing signs can include: door or window signs, roof top or exterior signs, detachable magnetic signs on your vehicles, office directories attached to walls, real estate property signs, and so on.

Action 6. - Consider your packaging and labeling for your products or the packaging and labeling for containers used to ship your products.

Again, you may have a lot of money invested in items that you wouldn't’t want to lose. So, make sure to consider the stamp or labels option mentioned above.

Action 7. - Examine your publicity system and make it a policy to include your Email address and URL on documents and in communications if appropriate.

• Include a flyer or announcement sheet, maybe a screen grab of your home page, in press kits.
• Include the site URL or Email address on your Press Release form.
• Offer the media Email communication as a means of issuing publicity materials to them. If you’ve never done much publicity, some media prefer real mail (also known as "snail mail"), fax, or Email as acceptable ways to send a press release. Very few want you to drop something by in person.
• Use your current publicity system to announce your new web site and to announce changes or additions to it.

Let's stop here for now!

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Social Networking is loosely defined as user created and user participatory content on Internet. It is often mis-called Web 2.0, but broadly includes a mix of both Web (e.g. websites like Facebook) and other types of Internet Content (e.g. personal blogs).

Example: Starbucks Community

One big issue with the Internet and advertising is that the audience is less likely to accept advertising in many digital arenas and is mixed and unpredictable about others, for example:

• Accepted - Search Engine Results Page ads, eZines
• Not Accepted - Bulletin Boards/Usenet Newsgroups, Chat
• Tolerated - eMail, newsletters
• Tolerated as Publicity - Facebook, blogs

Social Networking or Web 2.0 is user driven form and content as opposed to organizational and business driven content. From this point of view the internet information has four primary sharing patterns:

1. one-to-one,
2. one-to-many,
3. many-to-many,
4. and many-to-one.

Web 2.0 | Web2.0

Internet Technologies to meet all four of these design patterns, are evolving and include...

• UseNet Newsgroups & Bulletin Boards
• RSS blogs
• RSS Feeds
• wikis (not just Wikipedia)
• tagging and global bookmarking
• IM/Google Talk (Google Socnet products and services)
• Flickr
• Twitter
• MySpace
• Facebook
• Social Networking websites - Yelp and Found Magazine for example
• Shared bookmarking like delicious (formerly del.icio.us)
• chat
• Content & File Sharing (YouTube, Kazaa, Napster controversy, Index of)
• couponing
• Linkedin
• digg

...as examples of user developed content.

Businesses use these tools as well.
http://www.japanesegarden.com/

Three particular technologies and attendant device development (wireless, PDAs, iPods, etc) have made Web 2.0 aka Social Networking able to respond to the huge interest people have in participating in content development and sharing.

1. RSS - Rich Site Summary aka Really Simple Syndication - is a lightweight XML format designed for multipurpose extensible metadata description and syndication formatting:

for data feeds from a website content publisher (including the BBC, CNET, CNN, Disney, Forbes, Motley Fool, ESPN, Wired, Red Herring, Salon, Slashdot, ZDNet, and more) that syndicates its content through an RSS publisher.

for Blogs - A blog (a contraction of the term web log) is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual, with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as more personal online diaries. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many bogs

2. Wireless and satellite communications and the building of the cellular network towers

3. PDAs and touchscreens,cell phones (iPhone) and other portable devices

Web 2.0 | | Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us

• 1974 - On-line ATMs introduced – The newly connected machines soon led to the modern-day networks we’re all familiar with.
• 1984 Apple introduces the Desktop Computer in a single two-minute Super Bowl Ad
• 1986 telephony Internet telephone connections
• 1988 Commercial eMail available, usually through work site and educational institutions
• 1991, Al Gore "invents" the Internet wisely dubs it the “Information Superhighway” in December when Congress passes a bill to build the National Information Infrastructure
• 1991 Laptops developed - the look and feel of the laptop was defined by the Apple computers, (built in trackball, keyboard and Palm rest). Not to be outdone the IBM Thinkpad 700C introduced the TrackPoint a year later.
• 1992-1994 Starbucks opens in California
• 1993 Proprietary Online eMail service provides large scale adoption of Internet email as a global standard.
• 1993 Cell phones available to public in replaceable hand-held sizes (2nd Generation)
• 1995 the wwweb and the Internet becomes available to households with Netscape and the W3C
• 1995 Laptop batteries last more than 10 minutes and laptops, power cords are introduced to recharge them, hard drives big enough to hold data and run software...they become portable.
• OnStar satellite subscription service available in cars.
• 1996 MapQuest.com was launched on the Internet, changing the way people obtain street maps and directions forever.
• 1996 (Palm) Pilot was the name of the first generation of personal digital assistants (PDAs) manufactured by Palm Computing in 1996 (then a division of U.S. Robotics).
• 1997 IRC Chat and text messaging
• 1997 AOL Instant Messaging (IM)
• 1998 Cell Phones start to become mainstream
• 2000 Text messaging launched for cell phones (2nd Generation)
• 2000 eHarmony & Match.com online dating
• 2001 Streaming audio and video
• 2002 Blogging becomes available when MetaWeblog API merges RSS 0.92 with XML-RPC to provide a powerful blogging API. 3/14/02.
• 2003 T-Mobile Hotspot develop wireless access
• 2003 MySpace launched
• 2000 GPS systems In Your Car, and on your cell phone, dude! (1996 developed | 2004 in cars)
• 2004 Facebook launched
• 2004 Blackberry becomes popular
• 2004 Flickr is an image and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community platform. In addition to being a popular Web site for users to share personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers as a photo repository
• 2006 A Skype user can have local numbers for voice and video telephone; Skype Video conferencing was introduced in January 2006 for the Windows and Mac OS X platform clients.
• 2007 the iPod introduced and iPod Ads as well a the iPod nano Ads
• 2007 iPhone introduced and iPhone Ads (all Ads)
• 2007 - 2009 Twitter launched and takes over media and the Congress (see 4 Reception - 4.2 In the Media )