If you run a small internet business and are struggling to attract cheap traffic, I've got a bit of a plan for you. One of the best ways to fix your problem is to get one or two pages ranked in the top 3 spots of Google. This is actually easier than you think if you find the right keywords you want to rank for in seach engine results. So here is a step-by-step guide to finding a good keyword and getting ranked for it quickly.
Overview
In this guide I'll show you how to:
- find a good keyword to rank for;
- create a keyword targeted landing page; and
- get a range of inbound links to the keyword targeted page.
Step 1: Researching Non-competitive Keywords
While it woul be great to rank in the top 3 positions of a search results page for keywords that have 10,000 of searches per month, it is unrealistic that this will happen without working at it for 12 months. Instead, I'm going to suggest that you optimise for lots of "longtail keywords" (keyword phrases with 3 or more words) with less traffic. You will have much more success this way. Then when you add up the traffic from lots of longtail keywords, you will still have a lot of traffic.
Let's use a pet store business as an example. Instead of trying to rank for "pet store" which has 63,000,000 results and is very competitive, it is better to add a few words the increase relevancy and decrease compeition. One of the simple ways to do this is to use a product name along with location information. For example the product could be "dog food" and the location could be "New York". Hence the longtail keyword becomes "dog food new york". Using Google's Keyword Tool, we can check the search volume for this new keyword. There are 590 searches for this phrase each month in the USA.
Step 2: Create a Keyword Targetted Landing Page
Many people think that all their traffic should go to the homepage of their website. However if you want to target lots of keywords, then the homepage is going to become too densly packed with keywords which will look strange to human users. It is much better to create single purpose landing pages. We have an example here for Melbourne Web Design. A keyword optimised landing page should have a strong call to action, such as "sign up" or "enquire". It also needs around about 300 words of unique high quality content. In the pet store example, this should be a dedicated product page. When it comes to building the page itself, we recommend getting a professional designer to design a "landing page". You will need to spend a bit of time planning the purpose of this page with the designer. A simple landign page design will cost between $300 - $600.
Step 3: Generate Inbound Links
Why do you need inbound links? This is still the #1 factor that determines the position of a search result. If you have a page that contains a keyword phrase like "dog food new york" and a bunch of links that point to this page using "dog food new york" as the anchor text, you will very quickly get a high position in a search result.
This is often the hardest part which is why I suggest outsourcing this step. While you could spend days on end submitting your new landing page URL to hundreds of directories, then is an excellent company that can do this for you cery cheaply.
First I recommend submitting the URL to some directories and waiting 2 - 3 weeks. If you do not see your page rank, then I suggest buying a keyword promoter package. This package will bring in a whole range of link types which Google and other search engines will look at very favourably.
To outsource the link building step head over to WL Marketing.
Good luck with you new rankings. Feel free to leave a comment and let us know how you go!
Name: Daniel
Email:
Web Site: http://au.linkedin.com/in/danielduckworth
Bio: Daniel is a co-founder of Design Quotes and specialises in internet business marketing. Daniel consults on search engine optimsation, internet marketing, web design and graphic design.
Small Business Victoria Workshops / Seminars
Places are still available in the following low-cost workshops and seminars:
Business Planning Basics: Werribee (14 Apr), Echuca (14 Apr), Shepparton (28 Apr)
Business Planning: St Kilda (20, 27 Apr & 4, 11 May)
Cashflow Management: Narre Warren (21 Apr), Morwell (22 Apr)
Get Your Business Organised: Omeo (12 Apr)
Green Business, Lean Business: Nunawading (20 Apr)
How to Handle Your Bank: Moonee Ponds (15 Apr)
Managing Stock, Suppliers & Debtors: Warragul (20 Apr), Ballarat (21 Apr)
Marketing Basics: Pakenham (15 Apr), Skipton (27 Apr), Yarrawonga (28 Apr), Eltham (28 Apr)
Marketing for Growth: St Kilda (14 Apr), Wodonga (15 Apr), Warrnambool (21 Apr), Bright (22 Apr)
Starting Your Bus! iness: Brunswick (14 Apr), Lilydale (15 Apr), Doncaster (21 Apr)
For information about these and other events and to book, visit their Workshops and Events Calendar and search by the name of the seminar or workshop.
Name: Daniel
Email:
Web Site: http://au.linkedin.com/in/danielduckworth
Bio: Daniel is a co-founder of Design Quotes and specialises in internet business marketing. Daniel consults on search engine optimsation, internet marketing, web design and graphic design.
In an excellent interview by BigThink.com, Jason Fried of 37Signals discusses the value of being self-funded vs being funded by venture capital, why ad supported software works for Google but not others, the culture of 'interruptions' in the workplace, advice on developing a product or service, and the irrational fear of security in cloud based products and services.
Internet Business Ideas Introduction
The Design Quotes "Internet Business Ideas" is an ongoing regular series of articles highlighting untapped niche internet business ideas. We believe the internet is a great place to start a business and to help budding entrepreneurs, we bring you this series. Included is an overview of the business idea and a step by step plan on how to get started.
If you are interested in this idea, please let us know in the comments and feel free to request a design quote from our designers to help get you started.
You can also subsribe to our Internet Business Ideas RSS feed.
Overview
One of the easiest internet business ideas to get up and running with is to become a Virtual Assistant. A virtual assistant is someone who offers remote administrative support to other businesses.
Skills Needed
- Desktop Publishing: You will need to have at least an intermediate knowledge of wordprocessing and spreadsheet usage.
- Writing Skills: You will need to be able to write clearly and concisely. Much of this will be used writing emails.
- Customer Service: It is likely that you will need to make and receive phone calls on behalf of the business that employs you.
Equipment Needed
- A computer: You don't need an especially powerful computer, since most of the work you performed will be wordprocessing and emailing.
- Internet connection: This is a no brainer. You will need to send files back and forth to your clients as well as regular emailing.
- VOIP phone: This can be software or hardware. We recommend using Skype since the initial outlay is much lower.
Best Practice Guidelines
To be a successful virtual assistant (VA), you will need to be highly independent. Most of the people hiring you are hiring you because they do not have the time to complete the tasks themselves. As such, it is very common for them to provide you with only basic instructions. It's imporant to understand that this does not mean that the work you submit to them should also be basic. It should be thorough, detailed and clear. For example, a client might ask you to "provide a list of all flower shops in Melbourne". Firstly, ask as many questions as you can before starting. In this example useful questions to ask would be:
- Do you want the list in a spreadsheet or a word document?
- What information needs to be collected? I am thinking that Business Name, Address, City, Website URL, Email Address and Phone Number would be useful. Is there anything else that needs to be collected?
- When do you need to work completed by?
Top 10 Tasks Required by Virtual Assistants
Research: Research is a broad area and can include anything from collecting mailing addresses to finding the latest trendy technology topics. Research definitely requires strong analytics skills.
Data Entry: This usually requires you to source a certain type of information and store it in a standardised format.
Transcription: Listen to recorded audio/video and type everything said.
Writing and Editing: You may be required to write/edit short articles, letters or even press releases.
Customer Service and Sales: Receiving and making phone calls to business contacts and customers.
Step by Step Plan
- Set up a personal profile / portfolio website. This website promotes you personally and should include a CV and a history of any related work. We recommend using a free service called Magnetize: http://magntize.com/. This nifty site gives you a free online business card which you can use to link to all of your online profiles such as Twitter, Facebook and any online marketplaces you use to source work like oDesk.
- Register yourself on at least one online job marketplace like oDesk. Create a profile and list your skills and experiences. oDesk is a hub that connects providers with jobs. They also handle all of the billing which is very handy.
- Get yourself an invoicing system so you can bill clients you acquire outside of oDesk. We highly recommend using Freshbooks. Freshbooks is free to register and has the most professional and easy to use interface we have seen which is important from your client's perspective.
- Register an account with PayPal so you can accept payments electronically. Freshbooks and PayPal integrate nicely together. When you invoice your clients with Freshbooks, they will be able to pay with their credit card or PayPal account.
- Download and register a free Skype account. If your clients needs to you to accept calls, you can buy a dedicated local phone number in the client's place of business.
- Finally, once you have had a few clients set up a dedicate website of your own and expand the business by hiring your own virtual assistants. Of course we recommend using Design Quotes to find the best web designer to build a professional website.
If you are considering starting a virtual assistant business, let us know in the comments. Feel free to link to your magntize and oDesk profiles.
Resources Mentioned
- Design Quotes
- oDesk
- PayPal
- Skype
- Magntize
Once you get a list of web design quotes, choosing the best quote is easy if you understand what you want. If you want a simple informational website, perhaps with basic e-commerce and no tricky interactive features, you should look for a web site design company that specialises in small business website packages.
If you want a web site that addresses complicated business problems, connects to your existing databases or customer service systems, or offers e-commerce that's more than point, click, and buy, you will want to find a website design company who work with your business as a consultant.
There are many aspects of a web design project. When asking for and comparing web design quotes, it is best to be specific about what you want. This way, there are no surprise costs half-way through the project.
A web design quote might address any of the following:
- Billing and Payments
- Blogs
- Booking Systems (Rooms, appointments etc)
- Donations
- Dynamic Photo Galleries
- eCommerce
- Forums
- Help Desk / Bug Reporting
- Interactive Map
- Member/User Management
- Newsletter Subscriptions
- Polls
- Ratings and Reviews
- Social Networking Profiles
- Video Player
- Website Monitoring and Analytics
- Interface Design
- Form Design
- Database Design
- Web Hosting
- Domain Names
The first step in choosing a web site design company is conducting a phone interview. Here are some questions to ask. (If you're looking for a freelancer, almost all of these still apply.)
- What are your strengths as a site development company?
- Do you understand my business and customers? (It's not the end of the world if they're unfamiliar with your industry, but they should be eager to learn.)
- Do you handle design, development, hosting, and e-commerce? (Ask only about those you're interested in, of course.)
- Will you do the work, or outsource it to others?
- Can you help us with content creation or ideas?
- Will you test the site in various browsers? Which? (A site that works fine in one browser may break in another.)
- Can your developers connect the site to our customer database/inventory tracking software/sales software?
- Will we be able to update the site content ourselves?
- Do you do site hosting? What kind of guarantees do you offer?
- How long have you been in business? Can you provide some sample sites for me to look at? (Be wary if you may hear the answer that "most of the sites we've worked on are intranets, not available to the public." Any company deserving of your business should have at least a few sites to show you.)
- What kind of support do you offer if our site breaks or needs emergency updates?
In addition to looking at sample web sites, you should also check a design company's references. Talking to their other clients can give you the good picture of what it's like to work with a particular web site design company. Get at least three, and ask them specific questions:
- Did the firm meet deadlines?
- Were they flexible?
- What aspects of their work were particularly strong?
- What areas were not quite up to your expectations?
- Did they help you plan and organize the web site?
- Did they set and meet realistic goals for your company?
- Would you work with this company again?
Armed with the right questions not only will you get the information you need when evaluating design quotes, you will also appear savvy which will mean the designers will respect you. Mutual respect and with lots of communication will lead to good prices and smooth projects.
