Reading this article, I couldn’t help but think about how easily businesses and their website developers can fall into the same trap of this frustrated Zynga employee: putting in hours and hours of hard work only to see the product fail or not bring in as much traffic or business as they had hoped. While this account is pretty extreme, and does not mention how the game, in the end, was marketed, it still underlines the fact that companies and developers cannot fall back on the idea that “if you build it, they will come.“ The hard work these game developers put in to their product is not unlike the work it takes for many business owners and website developers to build their business websites, and many end up overlooking the fact that websites alone do not do all the work for themselves. In creating a website to promote a business, building it is only half the journey.
New websites must be promoted and marketed to build traffic and for it to succeed. When a new website owner invests ample amounts of time and money into building it, they must also invest in effectively promoting it too. Of course, a website is a promotional tool in itself, but how can it promote a product or service if no one ever sees or visits the website? Often companies get caught up with the website design and other components, and the expectations of what it will bring them. When all is said and done, they are left with disappointment and frustration because they fail to acknowledge the fact that they need to showcase their website to others, too.
Website owners must always mention their websites wherever possible – in all promotional materials, digital and print. Social media channels can also be used effectively to constantly drive traffic back to the website, and integrating Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques into your marketing plan for the website will help bring it to the forefront of web searches, so people find it easily when they search for the particular product or service offered.
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— Rommel C. Caibal (@rccgd) April 10, 2013
Only half of the entire project is complete when a website is built. Marketing and promotion of the website is the next step. That’s why, at RCC Graphic Designs, we offer management of these other options, like social media and SEO, and further marketing approaches for businesses that always work toward the goal of driving traffic to the website – which ends up promoting the business. Once your customer is on your website, it should do some key promotional work for you. But half the battle is getting them there.