What are the foundational principles of Web Marketing? I've come up with five. Only five.
This is embarrassing. Al Ries and Jack Trout have their "22 Immutable Laws of Marketing" (HarperBusiness, 1994), and what do I offer? Five measly laws, and mine are mutable, flexible, still growing and changing. But they form the backbone of present-day Web marketing lore, so I'll share them with you. And when they become immutable, you'll be the first to know. Trust me.They are:
The Law of the Dead End Street
The Law of Giving and Selling
The Law of Trust
The Law of Pull and Push
The Law of the Niche.
1. The Law of the Dead End Street:
The first law goes like this: Setting up a website is like building a storefront on a dead-end street. If you want any shoppers, you must give them a reason to come.
You've heard too many times "If you build it, they will come." We know that doesn't work on the Internet. But why do novices again and again build websites without the least thought to a viable marketing plan? Maybe it's because FrontPage promises you a "professional looking site" and Microsoft hasn't yet offered WebMarket 2000. (Don't worry, they probably will pretty soon. Hi, Bill!)
The most wonderful site in the world is wasted unless people stop by to admire and purchase. It's the same reason that most great craftsmen aren't millionaires; they've learned to make a great product, but don't have a clue about marketing.
So the first question you need to ask yourself, even before you build your company's site, is: How will we get people to visit? Perhaps your marketing plan will look like this:
Banner ads for two months to boost name recognition.
Search engine positioning on HotBot and Excite in the first quarter, to include Infoseek, Lycos, and AltaVista in the second quarter.
Reciprocal links with our industry organization and a paid listing in their directory.
A newsworthy contest in the third quarter, for which we'll try to get full media coverage through press releases and calls from a PR agency.
A company newsletter that carries industry news rather than just company drivel, to begin in the fourth quarter (though you should start collecting e-mail addresses now).
Then decide which of these activities to carry out in-house and which to outsource, attach a dollar value to each, and provide for them in your marketing budget. Your marketing plan may look much different than this, but you must give visitors a reason to come.
Many sites I visit are pretty slim. Yes, they give information about the company and its services, but nothing you'd want to bookmark. What compelling content can you put on your site that will make someone want to return? Content is primary.
With excellent content, when you ask for a reciprocal link, you don't have to plead, "Link to us because we're the greatest." You can say, "Link to us because we offer everything a buyer needs to know to select the right lighting fixture." When you offer a public service, you suddenly become newsworthy. Trade journals and magazines begin to mention you, and traffic follows. Give visitors a reason to come, and they will.
2. The Law of Giving and Selling:
An important element of Web culture is "free stuff." The Law of Giving and Selling says: Attract visitors to your site by giving away something free, and then try to sell something additional to those who visit.
You've seen this scenario played out in countless brick-and-mortar stores. "Free wool scarves to the first 50 people who visit our store for our annual One-Day Ski Sale on December 1." Give them something free, then try to sell them something.
Here's how we used this strategy. In mid-1995 Wilson Internet Services launched our website design business with a goal of attracting business nationally via the Web. At that time even local website designers were considered oddities. How could we succeed at a national level? First, I identified our most likely customers: small to medium size businesses. Second, I asked: What do they want to know? Of course, they wondered how to construct a website. But that's what I wanted to sell them. They also wanted to know how to market their business on the Web, I reasoned.
So I scoured the rather sparse offering of articles on Web marketing available at that time, and began a link list of about 20 articles and resources. Then every month, without fail, I would scour the Web again looking for more materials. The
Web Marketing Info Center (http://www.wilsonweb.com/webmarket/) has grown into a resource containing links to 2,000+ articles and resources, the largest collection of information of its kind on the Web. In addition, I began to write articles explaining to small businesspeople how to market their site. Some of those articles were linked to by major sites and brought many visitors. We have become a Destination Site -- on my more heady days, I like to consider us a Portal Site to the literature on Web marketing -- and our business has prospered.
Here's the simple strategy: (1) Attract people to your site by giving away lots of free information. Then (2) let people know about your products and services. Learn this rhythm of giving something away, and selling something. The strategy works. But to sell, you need to master a third law.
3. The Law of Trust:
Assuming your products or services are priced competitively and are of good quality, your most significant sales barrier is trust. Trust is the essential lubricant of Web business; without trust, business grinds to a halt.
An established store brand name comes from hundreds of positive impressions built by expensive advertising campaigns. These ads purchase brand trust. But if you're a small business you can't afford such advertising. Nevertheless, you can build trust by means of your website in multiple ways. First, anchor your business in time and space by giving a full address and phone number. If you have an office or brick-and-mortar store, show a photograph. Better yet, show photos of yourself or your staff. Now your customers view you as real people rather than some faceless entity who-knows-where.
You build trust by selling well-known brand name products, by displaying clear shipping and return policies, by joining nationally-respected organizations, and by offering guarantees. You build trust with a customer-friendly navigation system and intuitive interface, and an SSL secure server for credit card transactions. You gain credibility by having a professionally designed site, rather than something your teenage son cooked up on the weekends.
Once you've established trust, sales result. You also build trust by repeated contact with your visitors. We describe this in a fourth law.
4. The Law of Pull and Push:
The Fourth Mutable Law of Web marketing is: Pull people to your site by your attractive content, then push quality information to them regularly via e-mail.
Websites, by their very nature are passive creatures, like fireside dogs. They just lie there wagging their tail listlessly and smiling wanly until someone enters the door. (Then the best website dogs come alive and propel you to the desired destination and action.)
E-mail messages, on the other hand, are active animals like St. Bernard Rescue Dogs, always ready to go where you send them and deliver a refreshing cask of information, and an invitation to return to your website to see the newest thing you have to offer.
A website tries to attract you by pulling you in with the promise of content, while e-mail pushes its message into your previous visitors' mailboxes. Most businesses can't survive on one-time sales only. The cost of customer acquisition is too high for just a single sale. They need to draw satisfied customers back again and again for repeat sales. The Law of Pull and Push accomplishes this vital task.
Getting an invitation to send e-mail to your visitors is key to this strategy. Include a form that will collect their e-mail address. To convince your visitor to give you his e-mail address, however, you need to promise two things: (1) that you'll e-mail him something of value, and (2) that you won't sell or rent his address to another company, hence the need for a clear privacy policy. But once the visitor has given you permission to e-mail additional information, you have wonderful marketing leverage.
How do you use it? If someone in your company has writing skills, you might develop a monthly newsletter (see our article
"How to Develop an E-Mail Newsletter" http://www.wilsonweb.com/articles/newsletter.htm). Beware. It takes real commitment and self-discipline to send out the newsletter regularly. But a regular newsletter will give a tremendous boost to your business, and will build your trust level with customers as well as bring them back to your site again and again. All of a sudden your company has top-of-mind position. Do this month after month and your brand recognition grows. If you're not a writer, you can send out monthly specials, or news blurbs you garner (with permission) from other sites. Whatever you do, do it with excellence. Anything less than that will cause your business to lose the confidence you've already gained.
This law, too, has its own rhythm. Pull the customer to your website by attractive power, then push good content and offers to the customer via e-mail to draw them back to your site.
5. The Law of the Niche:
The Law of the Niche is last but not least. Let me state it this way: Big businesses like Amazon.com and Wal-Mart have the money and clout to "own" whole segments of the marketplace. Small businesses succeed by finding niches that are either unfilled or only partially filled, and filling them with excellence.
For example, JustBalls.com saw an unfilled niche in selling sports equipment. Instead of trying to bite off more than they could chew selling the whole range of sports equipment, they looked for a single slice -- balls -- and set up "The Biggest Ball Store on the Net." They sell sports balls, fitness balls, toy balls, and ball stuff. You'll find baseballs, softballs, footballs, volleyballs. If it's a ball they have it. When you think "balls," they want you to remember them, "JustBalls.com" and come to their site. They also own the URLs for Justbaseball, Justfootball, Justbasketball, Justlacrosse -- 27 different sports in all -- in case they want to expand their marketing by sport by sport. (Unfortunately, they're no longer online.)
Unique Selling Proposition
The key to this kind of savvy niche marketing is to carefully write a business plan that defines your Unique Selling Proposition (USP). This is best stated in a sentence or two. It defines what makes your business unique from every other competitor in your field. It spells out the precise niche you seek to fill, and how you aim to fill it.
I haven't talked personally to Jim Medalia, the owner of JustBalls.com, but their USP is probably something like this: "Justballs is committed to being the absolute best and most comprehensive source for balls on the Web. We provide excellent customer service by purchasing, warehousing, and shipping the products ourselves, rather than relying on a distributor to drop-ship for us."
Contrast that to a phone call I received last month from a wannabe Web proprietor, who asked how much it cost to set up an online store.
"What kind of products do you plan to sell in your store?" I ask.
"Some books and electronic consumer goods," he says.
"Oh!" I reply. In my mind's eye I am trying to visualize this Internet newbie going toe-to-toe with Amazon.com and Wal-Mart.com
I explain the Law of the Niche. "Those niches are pretty well filled already," I say, as gently as I can. "Perhaps you need to define your niche more precisely. What kind of books would you like to offer?"
"Books on building high quality audio systems for maximum performance." (That's what I wish the caller had said. Actually, he answered, "Ah...." and we didn't talk much longer.)
You see, it is conceivable to build an information center on high quality audio systems that would attract many people in this niche market. You'd offer every book in print. You'd link to articles. You'd host an e-mail discussion list. Perhaps you'd even sell a line or two of components that match this carefully defined clientele. If you developed it with real excellence, the chances are good that you could carve out a profitable business.
But something as nebulous as books and electronic consumer goods? Not going to happen. It lacks a carefully crafted USP.
To succeed in any business -- on the Web, on the street, by mail order, in an office building, any business -- you need to spell out your precise USP. With a USP you can succeed. Without a USP you don't have a prayer -- and that from someone who believes strongly in the power of prayer!
The Law of the Niche isn't any more or less important than the other Immutable Laws of Web Marketing. They're all important. Together they offer you a path towards creating a successful business on the Web.
