In today’s post I figured I would take a step back and get to the basics for those of you looking to create or redesign your company Web site and begin or improve your Online marketing. For the purposes of this post we will assume this is not an ecommerce Web site. I will follow up with another top 10 for ecommerce Web sites.

This post takes into account all of the latest advancements in Web and mobile development and Online marketing. While you may have read some articles, attended conferences or done some online research in the past, I would highly recommend that you read through each point and check out all of the helpful resources available in this article. To vet the information below I invite you to check out my Linkedin profile, there you will see my background and qualifications which includes 18+ years of extensive experience in digital product design, development and online marketing. Also feel free to review my portfolio

Online Marketing Top 10 Tips

1: Build A Responsive Design Web Site
It is imperative that your Web site be accessible on every major devise since your Online marketing will drive users to your Web site even when on a tablet and mobile phone. When I say accessible, I mean viewable AND usable. A responsive Web site template is designed to provide an optimal viewing experience-easy reading and navigation with a minimum of resizing, panning, and scrolling. Helpful Resource: Responsive Web Design: 50 Examples and Best Practices

2: Setup Social Networks
This may seem like a no-brainer but many people do not even consider all of the current networks and various ways to integrate their Online marketing in each network. At a minimum you should have a Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Reddit, and Linkedin. Other networks, which are dependent on your product or service, would be YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram, Pinterest, StumbleUpon. Helpful Resource: How to Use Social Media for Small Business

3: Use Hashtags
You should establish a hashtag and include this in every social media post you make. It is also helpful to include this in meta and OpenGraph page descriptions so that when your content is shared it will include the tag. You should also be using common hashtags related to your industry so that your posts are included in aggregated lists. Helpful Resource:
Small Business: Learn to use hashtags to extend reach

4: Use Google Analytics
The most important aspect of a developing and maintaining a business Web/mobile site is listening and learning from your customers. A key to this process is analytics, you’ll gather valuable information about how people are finding you, their path once on your site, time on site, etc. This is key to tracking and evaluating your Online marketing referrals. You should be spending at least 30min each day reviewing the previous days stats. Helpful Resource: Google Analytics

5: Write A Blog
Native advertising is the hot topic in Online marketing these days, but in reality native adverting has been done for many many years now. If you want to start doing native advertising start with a blog, post your blogs on social media and then promote those blog posts as paid posts. I suggest starting with Facebook. You blog posts can be short (300 words) and should be SEO friendly (I’ll be writing a post on SEO friendly posts later this week).
Resource: How to Write a Blog Post: A Simple Formula to Follow

6: Use SocialBakers
There is Google Analytics for Web tracking and there is SocialBakers for Facebook & Twitter tracking. I’ve been using SocialBakers for a few years now and they are by far one of the most useful services I have in my arsenal. The reason is that you can directly compare your social media with other similar companies. This is imperative when developing an audience and crafting your social messaging and Online marketing. Helpful Resource: SocialBakers

7: Implement Ad Tracking
It is extremely important to track your Online marketing campaigns, without tracking you have no way to gauge and adjust your marketing budget. Tracking all depends on which service you are using; I have provided Google and Facebook to help get you started. Helpful Resource: For Adwords you should implement conversion tracking for Facebook you should implement conversion pixels.

8: Include a Privacy Policy
This is a must have and is required when running certain Online marketing campaigns. This is often overlooked, forgotten or just ignored. When creating a privacy policy, be sure to consult with your Web developer to ensure you are highlighting everything that you collect from a user and how that data is stored. There are several free services out there to help you craft your privacy policy.
Helpful Resource: FreePrivacyPolicy.com

9: Create Landing Pages
There are times when you’ll want to drive users directly to your Web site from your Online marketing but in most cases you’ll want to create a landing page that addresses a specific topic that is directly related to your ad. This may be a special offer, sign up for a white paper, an announcement of a new product, etc. It has been proven many times that landing pages convert better than driving users to your Web site.
Helpful Resource: How to Make Great Landing Pages (With Crazy High Conversions)

10: Include Structured Data On You Web Site
Web pages have an underlying meaning that people understand when they read the web pages. But search engines have a limited understanding of what is being discussed on those pages. By adding additional tags to the HTML of your web pages you can help search engines better understand your content and display it in a useful, relevant way.
Helpful Resource: schema.org

I have given you many tools to create, distribute and track your Online marketing but if your are not evaluating your stats on a daily basis and testing messaging, call to action and conversion than you are missing out and will ultimately be throwing money away. So when you plan your online marketing be sure to budget time and money for testing and analysis. And most importantly take advantage of the many free resources available online, such as the links within the article.

What to learn more about Online marketing?
Contact Rob Rauffer