Hire professionals
Avoid the "do it yourself" software for something as important as your storefront unless you are an expert in design. Your Web site is a reflection of your professionalism, so don't be tempted to toss a Web site together just because Microsoft says you can. Always choose high product value by selecting a designer who will enhance and strengthen your image by creating a sharp-looking site with intelligent design and brilliant functionality A comfortable buying environment is key to repeat traffic....and orders!

Site Submission Programs
Use an automatic site submission program for the hundreds of smaller search engines and directories other than the big seven (Lycos, Excite, InfoSeek, WebCrawler, HotBot, AltaVista, and Yahoo). It would take you weeks to list your site on the hundreds of listing services that are not as popular as the larger search engines, but it still pays to be listed in as many

Position Technologies
Traffic Boost
Search Engine Watch
Web Position Gold

Keywords
Brainstorm with friends and family to come up with a list of 50-80 keywords. Think like your target audience and remember that 65% of all Web surfers use phrases when searching. Take into consideration plurals and misspelled words. As silly as it may sound, many potential customers are bad spellers, or simply in a hurry when searching for products. When entering a product like tomatoes, create additional words like tomato, tomatos, tomotoe, vine ripe tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, etc. Separate keywords with commas and don't repeat a word more than 3 times; search engines have been known to punish you for this.

• Diversify your word selection
• Use varying forms of the word
• Use word combinations
• Use plurals
• Intentionally misspell words

Note: When compiling your keyword list, you might be tempted to use competitors names, for example, specialty coffee stores might use "Starbucks" as a keyword in hopes of attracting shoppers. Be very careful with this, as large companies have been known to sue on a few occasions.

Use META tags
If your site is being developed by Salsgiver Inc. they will take care of this for you. This is where the key words are listed inside the HTML code so that the search engines can index you web site. Some search engines use the META tags in conjunction with your page titles when indexing. If you don't know what a META tag is, look it up in an HTML reference book. META tags allow you to specify keywords and a site description. The keywords you brainstormed for earlier will be used within the META tag for keyword reporting. META tags also allow you to create a description of your Web site which will be used in your search engine listing. It's important to create something that is similar, but not identical to your page title. Limit it to 200-250 characters.

Note: Some search engines look for consistency between your META tags, the page title, site description, and the text throughout the pages

Directories and Guides
Don't forget to list your site with the telephone directories and city guides on the Internet. Many telephone directories will give you a free text based listing, while the city guides may charge a small fee.

Big Yellow - http://www.bigyellow.com
Big Book - http://www.bigbook.com
InfoSpace - http://www.infospace.com
DigitalCity - http://www.digitalcity.com
Microsoft's Sidewalk - http://www.sidewalk.com
CitySearch - http://www.citysearch.com

Purchase Banner Ads
Where do your customers hang-out? Banner ads are offered by thousands of Web sites as an accepted form of Internet advertising. While sites like Yahoo offer banner advertising for thousands of dollars, you can always find other sites within your industry that are a little easier on the bank account. Search for popular magazine sites within your industry or city guides if you're only targeting a local audience. Banner ads are usually sold by impressions, click-throughs, or a period of time.

Traditional Promotions
While the Internet is a terrific marketing tool, it isn't a catch-all. You should always have a healthy mix of marketing methods, utilizing older methods such as direct mail, display advertising, classified ads, and possibly radio and television. Remember to post your Web site address EVERYWHERE when running ads in a different medium.

Keep Your Site Current
Don't have dated material on your site! Having dynamic content will not only be useful to your customers but the search engines will often rank your page higher.Try some feed back forms and

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