THINKING OF SHUTTING DOWN YOUR WEBSITE OR BLOG? DON'T!

About to Give Up On Your

Web Site OR Blog?

Don't Stop Now!

Let’s say that you built a great looking website, you hung out at webmaster sites and blogs like this one, and you did everything you read. You followed the “Five Tips to Web Success” and even paid $395 for a book on how to optimize your site. And, after a year, your digital doorway is covered in cobwebs.

Is it time to quit, cut your losses, throw in the towel? Well, if you’re selling the Ebola virus, probably. It wasn’t a good business model in the first place.

But, if you think your business model is sound, it hasn’t been replicated 1,200,000 times and you’ve already invested the time (and money?) to give this online dream a chance, don’t quit.

First, you’ve already put in the time – the most expensive component. Second, if you’re like most new businesses, you’re using a shared hosting service – less than $7.00 a month – so that’s not going to break the bank. No, instead of pulling the plug, rethink your business and marketing strategies and start employing some guerrilla marketing tactics.

Analyze the Site’s Problems

There are like a billion site metrics programs you can buy or get free (OSS) but trying to make sense of this jumble of numbers is like trying to read a foreign language. One way to simplify metrics analysis and actually make them useful is to buy software that provides GUIs – (that’s gooies) – graphical user interfaces.

Some produce heat maps that show site page hot spots, some offer percentage overlays showing how many visitors went here or there, and some provide numerical listings that don’t require a Harvard MBA to analyze and put to good use. Forget the number crunchers. Go gooey. Check out Crazy Egg for an example.

Two important points about metrics analysis. Metrics show you what’s already happened. It’s old news as soon as you get it. It doesn’t tell you what’s happening now or what will happen. It’s an important point to remember when planning your comeback assault.

The second point is this: metrics are very easy to misinterpret. You make a change, see an improvement (or decline) and assume the change was the cause. Post hoc ergo propter hoc: After this, therefore because of this. Simply because you see a specific result doesn’t mean it was caused by any changes you made. Heck, Goggle might have hiccupped.

Simplify, simplify, simplify. – Henry David Thoreau

The man had the right idea. Go through each page of your site and find ways to simplify – simplify the text, graphics, animations, navigation, objective – anything and everything. Most site owners optimize for search engines. Optimize for humans, who by the way, look for very different things than search engines look for.

Cut All Unnecessary Costs

If you’re paying a drop shipper to ship three units a week, do it yourself until you can justify the cost of the shipper. You don’t need a bookkeeper (though you should have an accountant for tax purposes), you don’t need fancy office furniture and you can store inventory in the spare room (unless it’s that Ebola; store that in the garage).

If your site is up and running (as in fully functional and secure) your only cost should be hosting costs and that’s loose change. Cut it to the bone, even if you really do want that new Blackberry. (“But honey, I need it for business!”)

BY THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE

The online gurus want you to believe that there’s some magical, mystical formula that you can follow to build your site to success. If there were one formula, we’d all be driving Ferraris.

Ecommerce is no different than any other commerce going back to when cave clans swapped shiny rocks. The same principles apply.

For example, the ‘experts” like to toss around the term “viral marketing” like it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. Well, viral marketing has been around since the hula hoop craze. It’s just a digi-geek term for word of mouth (WOM) marketing. A single video on You Tube got over 1 million hits in less than 24 hours. Why? Word of mouth. Media exposure. It was everywhere and everyone wanted to see it for themselves.

Conversion ratios? Nothing more than how many visitors turn into buyers (and hopefully you can figure out why).

Your marketing, on site and through remote or PPC marketing, should appeal to basic human emotions – love, fear, belonging and so on. Humans haven’t changed. Just the way they access marketing.

Conventional Wisdom is… Conventional

Hey, do those flashing links telling you (and a million other visitors) that “You’re the 10,000^th Visitor and You Win a FREE iPod” make you want to click on the link? Maybe once to see what the catch is, and there’s always a catch. But once you’ve seen it, it’s not an effective marketing tool.

Come-ons, bogus promises, the hard sell – this stuff works on the lowest common denominator and that’s it. The only people who are going to click on your “Win an iPod” link are six-year-olds who like the blinking lights.

If you want to get noticed, think outside of the box – the computer box. Some very smart guy registered the domain name www.perezhilton, built a celeb-gossip website and is now a regular on the talk show circuit. From unknown to self-appointed celeb commentator in 12 months. That’s thinking outside the box, though there are probably better ways to spend your time than chasing Brangelina around the globe.

If you’ve seen it, we’ve all seen it. Time for a new idea. A national treasure hunt with a big prize, a buried treasure chest or a dream date with Perez. Who knows what the next big thing will be, but it could be yours.

So, the heavy lifting has been done. Play with your toy. It’s not costing much, so try something out of the ordinary – even controversial. Controversy sells. Just ask Perez Hilton.