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Marketing Objectives for Your Web Site
by Bobette Kyle © 2004
http://www.WebSiteMarketingPlan.com
Do
you have marketing objectives for your Web site? With
objectives to help
overcome your main online challenges you
can work smarter, not
harder.
Think of your Web site objective as the "big picture". It
is the basis for a marketing plan and, in general terms, answers the
questions:
"How can I use the site to overcome my business's
main
Internet related challenge?" and/or "What is the purpose of my site?"
When setting marketing objectives, keep your site's business model and
customers' decision-making stages
in mind.
Business Models
The
business model defines how your Web site fits into your
business - how it
will help your company grow. Direct revenue is a popular Web site business
model, but it is not the only one. Some business models include:
-
Direct Revenue / e-Commerce
Some of the most known Web site objectives
relate to e-
commerce or other types of direct revenue from the site.
That
is, the objective is to establish a direct source of revenue from orders or
advertising space.
- Build Brand Image
A long-term marketing
objective for your site could be to
improve sales by building an image for
your product, brand,
and/or company. Increasingly, this is an explicit goal
for large companies with ample budgets.
Small-budget companies can
follow suit on a more affordable
scale by building an image during the
natural course of marketing. You can do this by consistently
presenting similar design elements and "personality" at each point
of contact with the world - whether that contact be virtual
or physical.
- Enhance Customer Service
Your site can increase
revenue indirectly by improving
customer service. When customers are more
satisfied, they
tend to spread the word about your products as well as
buy
more often themselves.
Customers often do product research on a
Web site then later
place orders via catalogue, telephone,
sales representatives, a physical retail store, mail, and/or fax. In all
of these cases, a Web site indirectly contributes to building the
business.
- Lower Operating Costs
A Web site can help your
business by lowering costs.
Automated customer service functions - Web-based
FAQ, order status reports, product specifications, etc. - can lower
the
number of customer service calls, reducing customer service
labor
costs.
A Web presence can also lower operating costs by
streamlining
communication with your business partners.
Business-to-business companies can
create secure Web space
to communicate and collaborate with
customers.
It is even possible to have individual, private sites
for
major clients. A central "meeting place" that archives
communications
and other customer-specific information can
cut down on administrative costs
related to "phone tag", inquiries, and/or the need to consciously keep all
players "in the loop".
On the supply side, you could reduce costly
business
disruptions by giving key vendors Web-based access to
your
inventory or other real-time information.
Customer Stages:
Awareness, Interest, Trial, and Repeat
When setting your marketing
objectives, it may help to think
in terms of awareness, interest, trial, and
repeat. These
concepts are often used in marketing to explain the stages
a
new customer (or site visitor, in this case) goes through on
the path to
becoming loyal to your business.
The potential visitor must first become
aware of your site.
Once aware, you must spark an interest with the
potential
visitor, motivating her/him to trial, or respond to a call to
action on your site. After (s)he visits your site, that person becomes loyal
by revisiting in the future.
You may be able to most effectively build
your business by
focusing on one or two of awareness, interest, trial,
or repeat visits, then changing your focus over time. If your site is
brand new or known to very few people, for example, your plan is likely to
concentrate on ways to increase awareness and interest.
A focus on
interest and trial may be in order, however, if you get an above-average
number of "window shoppers" - visitors who never purchase (or do not respond
to some other call to action).
Additionally, if you sell multiple
products or a product that needs replenishing from your site, focus on
repeat purchases may be more effective.
Setting Your Marketing
Objectives
While there are different approaches to setting
objectives, my preference is to develop a single objective for a site that
may encompass more than one approach to business building.
In the
marketing plan, I include separate strategies and tactics to address each
approach suggested in the site objective. I also like to note in the
objective both the customer stage(s) and business model(s) I will focus on
in the marketing plan. This makes it easier to decide upon the most
effective marketing strategies.
Another approach is to address the
customer stages separately, in a summary or write-up. With either
approach, you should view your marketing plan as evolving over time. As
the business environment and situations change, your focus should change as
well.
Once you get past the launch stage of a new site, for example,
you are in a better position to evaluate site traffic, so your plan may shift
from focusing on awareness and interest to building trial and loyalty.
Similarly, a better understanding of site visitors may lead you to
adjust your business model to more closely address your company's and Web
customers' needs.
About the Author
Bobette Kyle draws upon 10+
years of Marketing/Executive experience, Marketing MBA, and online marketing
research in her writing. She is publisher of the ecommerce
information site http://www.Take-Payments-Online.com
. Bobette is also
proprietor of The WebSiteMarketingPlan.com Network,
http://www.WebSiteMarketingPlan.com
Copyright
2004 Bobette Kyle. All rights reserved.
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