We will work with you to assist you in determining the course of your corporate web strategy. With the support of Interact2Day's in-depth knowledge and experience, you'll set off on the road to a corporate web presence you can be proud of and your customers will love you for it.

One of the most essential elements to the success of your corporate website will be your dedication to successfully marketing your website to your customer base. We have fielded numerous calls and conferences with clients who have been genuinely convinced that simply having a website will insure boundless success. Contrary to much of the hype you may have read in various publications, the Internet is still very much like the traditional brick-and-mortar model. You can have the world's greatest product, the best customer service, the best prices, and the best website money can buy, but if you don't advertise the existence of your website and your business, you can rest assured your business will fail.

Search engines can be a helpful tool, but don't count on significant traffic originating as a result of such queries. As the Internet continues to grow, search engines become more and more overwhelmed, leading to terribly bloated query results. The typical search engine user -- even a very determined user -- will seldom delve more than 200-300 results inward from the top. Sadly, there is relatively little you can do to gain a top listing, despite numerous businesses which advertise to the contrary. Whatever tricks you may attempt to gain such a position, you can count on hundreds, if not thousands, of competing webmasters to duplicate in short order. Ironically, the more you try to "trick" search engines into giving your site top listing, the more likely the search engine's algorithm is to drop your site to the bottom of the list. The simple reality is everyone wants a top placement, but only an infinitesimal percentage can ever succeed. Take, for instance, the search term "widget" on Altavista.com's search engine. There are over 176,000 web pages on widgets so only 0.00057% of them can have a #1 listing and a mere 0.11% can have a top 200 listing!

So how do you go about advertising  your website to the rest of the world? Well, first you go ahead and register your site with the various major search engines. You probably won't get a lot of traffic from the search engines, but that's no excuse to turn away the occasional freebie! You will need to reregister your website with these search engines regularly as it is very common for them to drop your site after some number of months for varying reasons. Beyond search engines there are a combination of traditional and Internet based marketing strategies. As a quick word of warning, however, do not, under any circumstances, ever get into the game of sending mass unsolicited emails. Such mass emailing is known as spam and is no different than sending regular mail postage due. Doing so is guaranteed to tarnish your corporate image and will invariably lead to your ISP and web hosting provider terminating your service contracts and if you have a dedicated internet connection and you can also add a dozen or so hacking attacks and electronic bombings. On the Internet based marketing fronts are two popular choices: 1) banner advertising and 2) reciprocal links (where a third-party website links to your site in exchange for you linking your site to theirs). You can also create your own electronic newsletter email campaigns with established customers who have specifically requested such a newsletter (but do not sign people up without their explicit permission to do so). Such newsletters can be a great way to keep your customers abreast of your latest product offerings and sales. On the traditional front are such things as including your website on your letterhead, business cards, magazine and newspaper ads, billboards, flyers, radio and television ads, and anywhere else you can think to prominently place your website address!

Now that you have the advertising taken care of, you need to focus on providing the products and services your customer base wants. Just as important as good quality and low-priced merchandise and/or service offerings is good customer service. Your online customers expect to be treated with every bit the same respect as you would show the customer who just stepped in your front door. They also expect such service to be very prompt. In the online world, anything over 24-hours is often unacceptable and frequently the expectation is near instantaneous turn around! Don't forget that on the Internet, the dissatisfied customer may not only tell his friends and family about his experience, but may very well tell the entire online community. Similarly, the very satisfied customer may do likewise. No matter your line of business, there is no better advertising than word of mouth advertising!

So you have  your website up, you've successfully marketed your website and offerings and you are providing excellent customer service, so what else could be left? In a word, don't stagnate! Update your website frequently with new product or service offerings. Add new features and technical support information to your website whenever possible. Add your press releases and update your prices. Post your discount sales and giveaways on your site. Don't get into the habit of neglecting your site or your customer's will quickly get into the habit of neglecting your site and your business as well. Plan from day one to update your site at least every 3-6 months if your business has relatively stable offerings and prices, and as often as every few days to weeks if  your offerings and prices change regularly. We recommend that your initial development budget reflect 1/2 to 1/3 of your total annual website development budget. Use the remaining 50-70% of the budget to make those regular updates to your site throughout the year and, when necessary, budget to entirely redesign the site every couple years to reflect changing technologies, new customer expectations and to grow with your company.

We at Interact2Day look forward to helping your business get off on the right foot so you can make your fortune on the Internet today!

Sincerely,

Ethan H. Poole
President, Interact2Day, Inc.