Planning Part 2

So you determined what you want your website to do and made a determination that you could make it achieve that objective. But the planning and thinking is not over. A real goal at this time is to get your ideas into a planning environment that features marketing techiques with measurable results. I see many website clients that have a single snapshot focus as the primary marketing technique, that is, they put the products on the site with pricing and want to get on with it. Below are a few items that should be examined for a good plan:

• Viability of Amazon Stores, Ebay, Yahoo Stores, Froogle, Craigslist
• Using directories-Yahoo, Technorati, DMOZ
• Web host-capabilities, bandwidth
• Blogging
• Getting visitors-PPC, SEO, traditional media, mailings, promotions, banner ads
• Techniques of capturing email addresses-inducements
• Email marketing campaigns-developing the relationship
• Effective calls to action-buy now!
• Landing pages that convert-two clicks to action
• Easy check out-credit cards, pay pal, Google check out
• Increasing per unit check out dollars-other purchase options, upsell, special packaging
• Merchandising programs-holidays, gift cards, coupons, discounts, contests, free shipping
• Content updates
• Security and website professionalism
• Shipping and return policies
• Warranty programs
• Affiliate programs-pay others to sell
• Measuring the results-Analytics (Google Analytics)
• Figuring out if it will make money

The list is not all inclusive. A plan may include some of these, all of these or even other items. Going through this process will allow the potential marketer to determine the course of action, and determine the budget that may be required to accomplish the goals. It will also save some time down the road as most marketers will come back to one or all of these when they find their website marketing hopes fall short of their expectations.