Establishing Paths to Your Web Site

I hope all is well since my last newsletter. Today's edition
focuses on providing your prospects with paths to your web site.

Many companies spend a large amount of money on their web sites
and then magically expect prospects, leads and revenue to appear.

The truth is that your web site is like a tree growing in the
forest with a lot of other trees. Your job is to help people find
your tree.

Let me give you some real world examples as I have been promoting
my side business as a magician at SophisticatedSorcery.com.

Within a few days of spidering the site, Google had me listed on
page one along with my top competitors through Google Local
Search. If you do not presently have your web site listed through
this free directory service, then you are missing the boat. To
see this in play, search for "Tulsa magician" in Google and then
click on the links at the top of the page for my site.

Google Local Search is like a Yellow Page listing. If you take
care to use the appropriate and competitive keywords and phrases
in your listing as you did on your web site (you did do that,
right?), then you should show up in a place of prominence on page one
like me.

There are many other paths you can choose to lead people to your
web site. For instance, merchantcircle.com and decidio.com are
very popular commercial directories. You can get a basic listing
for free which is fine in most cases. These typically show up on
page one or two of most search results. Usually, for a few
dollars, you can purchase credits to buy leads. Decidio charges a
buck a lead which is a steal.

I should be clear here -- these directory listings are not full
featured web sites. They are merely additional paths to your web
site. You need to include your web site URL in your listing.

Another path that many people fail to use are alternate domain
names. These could be hyphenated versions of your company or
product name. They could be names of your products or generic
categories for your services. In any case, secure a handful of
these domains and redirect them to your web site's home page.

This morning I secured AmazingSteven.com as well as
StevetheSleeve.com -- both are alternate stage names I have been
using in local venues. Some people may never remember my real
name, but they might remember a stage name and search for me by
that name. Just another series of paths to my main web site.

There are many other ways to lead a horse to water. Next time,
we'll look at a few more.

All my best,

Steven

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