It is absolutely crucial to have a detailed and informed marketing plan for any website connected to a business. Online business is still a brand-new concept that has brand new rules. Some site are connected to real-space businesses, some have no presence except what you see on the net, but all need to have strong and achievable goals motivated by marketing keys. These foundational concepts follow directly from 'old' media ideas, and while they need to be implemented differently, the constructs of attention, interest, desire and action still need to be incorporated into your plan. This article will break down each of these terms and connect them to the future of your business.

In whatever venue you market, it is necessary to draw in prospective customers or the net effect is zero. For any business of any kind, marketing means visibility. Online, businesses ordinarily assess the success of being visible by the amount of traffic flow to the website, visitor "click" counts demonstrating who sees the wares. But actual content in a given website is only a small part of what really draws traffic. To maximize the number of hits on your website, you have two potential means to grab the attention of possible customer, and these are simple. You can work to put yourself out there by website strategies, or you can buy attention by paying for advertising and promotion.

On the internet earning your traffic results in you being found in what are called the 'free' or 'organic' search results on the major search engines such as Google, MSN, and Yahoo. When your prospective customers do a search on terms of interest to them using one of the major search engines they will be presented with a list of web pages found that the search engine believes is the most relevant to them. These are the 'free' or 'organic' results. They will also see ads, but that will be discussed below. Many people are under the assumption that the highest raking results they get on a search engine are the 'best' in some way. In this game it really is winners take all! If you are not on the first page of results the attention you attract is greatly diminished. In fact, if you don't make it to the second page of results, then you often might as well not even be in the listings at all because folks usually won't search past the second page at most. This type of web site marketing is often referred to as 'search engine optimization.' You can hire a search engine marketing firm or learn how to do it yourself. Winning at this game is not rocket science, but it is part science and part art that requires a constant work and attention to maintain your success.

Usually, buying net traffic is a little like networking. You have to find a site that already has high traffic (and perhaps is somehow connected to what you are trying to advertise) and purchase advertising from them. While there are lots of ways to do this, two specific types are the most common. First is the banner ad. This is the most common type of advertising on the net, but it may be a dying ad form. People have gotten so used to them that they can visually block out the banner and not even register the information in it. If you are willing to spend serious time and effort tracking your return on investment, this is still a viable option. Google has popularized the second most common type of visual marketing, which is the text ad. It is more expensive, but also more efficacious. These ads put your information right into the body of the web page (usually a search result page). Google is the biggest company in this market, but Yahoo and MSN are decent places to spend your money as well.

A proper strategy for marketing your web sit must rely primarily upon attracting someone's attention. This requires making sure that the end user sees your message. You can either earn or buy this type of exposure, and some businesses do both. Earning the attention can be a long-term goal which needs a constant level of effort. But it can pay off almost forever, and will probably be cheaper in the long run. Buying the attention can work more quickly, and permit you to test new ideas and concepts cheaply. A well run web site marketing strategy should employ both methods.