To win in e-commerce you must promote. But don't just dive in. Try out several promotional methods before you decide on the best combination for your products or services. There are no rules; the best combination will differ greatly from site to site. So you must test.

Test as many promotion methods as you can. Here are seven of the best for small to medium sites:

PR
PR is about getting magazines, newspapers, and e-zines to tell their readers about your site. This is hard. The editors demand interesting stories. To get ink, you need a twist. If you think you might make a good read, work hard on the PR. Ink is gold.

Referrals
If you have a great site, your visitors want to tell their friends about it. Make it easy for them and provide incentives to do so. Send email to invite the friend to your site. Include the name and email of the friend who referred you. These will be some of the best leads you generate.

Print Ads
Your potential customer reads magazines. Go there. Run small ads in publications targeted at your customer. Keep the message minimal - just tell us what you sell and list your URL. Start with the cheapest classified ads in the best publications you can afford.

Banner Ads
Create a nice banner, buy lots of impressions, then watch the orders roll in. Simple, right? Not always. Find out if banners work for you. Create high quality banners. Run the banners on several well-targeted sites and buy enough impressions to determine how well they perform.

Affiliate Programs
You should get other sites to send their visitors to your site. But how? Give them something. Provide a reciprocal link or give them a cut of the revenues generated from their referrals. Do not affiliate with mediocre sites.

Contests
Hold a drawing. You need a compelling prize, a recurring drawing, a database, and most importantly, a well-crafted email campaign as an adjunct to the contest. Manufacturers of unique and interesting items have the best chance of winning with a contest promotion.

Search Engines
All web businesses must implement an effective search engine strategy. Follow the basics - submit to search engines, insert meta tags, and use well-crafted titles, but don't obsess. Very few businesses thrive from search engine traffic alone. It is only one of the seven promotional methods you should try.

Internet business is tough. If you already have a great site and a compelling value proposition, you stand a chance. But if you are really serious, you must attend to promotion. Don?t waste money. Test to see what works first. Then go for it - spend big money on promotion. Winners do! .

On the World Wide Web is experienced in all facets of promoting your website, contact us today to discuss your needs.

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