“If you build it, he will come.”
What a great line from the movie Field of Dreams.
It started with a whisper and continued until Costner took action.
It’s up there with Evan Almighty! Building a modern day ark.
Though both seemed extremely quirky, at least in Hollywood, they worked well.
There’s Gold in them hills
Concerning though, is why is the same thinking taking over in the online world?
If you build it, they will come!
Build a website … and just try stopping the hordes of browsers, hits, and enormous business success achieved by your online foray.
I don’t mean to be skeptical, but if this were in any other industry it would be called a scam. Set up a website and your business could go Global! (Or ad campaign go viral)
It’s like setting up a five star luxury hotel out the back of Bourke and expecting to book out the opening night.
Your online strategy needs to be thought out like you would for your operations strategy or your sales strategy. Why is it that we’ll spend hours, weeks coming up with a mission statement – but chuck up any old website and think we’ve achieved our web strategy?
Before you embark on an online strategy how about consider the following:
- What’s your purpose?
- What’s your expectations?
- What’s your budget?
Having a well thought out purpose will go a long way to actually gaining an outcome
Not every business warrants a Facebook page, or a Twitter feed, requires a multimedia channel. Coupons, scoopons and Groupons don’t suit all businesses, nor do blogs or Vlogs.
What does make sense for business is to understand the minefield of Internet terms, various factors that will help to achieve your purpose.
Food for Thought
Don’t expect to put up a website and generate immediate traffic. If it were that easy to be at the top of search results wouldn’t we all be there!
Good results in search engines are not achieved by a static website that lies dormant for the next few months, even years. No advantage is permanent – gaining rank in major search engines requires constant attention, updates, fresh content. Understanding this may help temper your expectations – how many hours a week do you really want to spend online?
Backlinks. If you don’t know what they are Google it. Lots of them, even better if they are relevant.
Treat your own strategy like a spiders web – everything needs to be interlinked: from your Facebook page, to Twitter feed, to your LinkedIn profile. All roads should lead to Rome (your Website) but also intersect each other.
A Successful Online Web Strategy
To succeed on the web relies on being active, not only on your own website but that of others.
Keeping active in LinkedIn groups, Facebook page updates, Tweets, joining related forums, blog entries, comments on others blogs.
Like business in the “physical world” gaining relationships and networking with key people online makes sense in the virtual world too!
