Internet marketing is a huge business opportunity. The ways to make money, the number of things to sell and the number of people to deal with are almost without limit. The problem with the size and number of things to sell is that it’s easy to become unfocused and try to make money with too many things at the same time. You must stay focused and operate in a small area or soon you can be overwhelmed with all the different directions you’ll be going and your business will likely go upside down. This is where strategic internet marketing can come to the rescue.
Trying to come up with a solid internet marketing plan is probably the hardest thing about making money online. There are a lot of thing you need to think about, such as building a website, how the website will be developed, how it will marketed plus many other things. The website is just a small part of your overall business plan. You still have to think about what the market is doing, how you can fit into the market, how to work with your customers, who and where are your potential buyers, how you are going to attract visitors and literally dozens of other considerations. All of these things will be a part of your internet marketing strategy. With so many things to think about what should your priority be?
Now is when you need to start putting a strategic internet marketing plan into motion. The strategy is to figure out your potential market and where your business is going to come from. You must study your potential buyers and determine what they want to buy. You will need to study your competition to see where you will fit into the business that already established. How will you attract your customers and what you’ll need to do to make them repeat buyers?. Its a fairly well known fact that if you don’t have a well thought out internet marketing strategy you are setting yourself up for failure.
Why is strategic internet marketing important? Because it helps you outline your business goals distinctly and enables you to make your objectives clear. Although you need a solid plan it needs to be flexible enough to be able to change it if there is a drastic change in the market or your circumstances.
In order to start your internet marketing strategy there are a number of points you need to think about. Here are 6 of what are probably the most important ones. These will help you outline your plan and help you keep you internet marketing business on the right path to success.
1. You need to start by figuring out what your target market is. There are a number of questions you need to find the answers to. These include: what type of people are going to supply most of your income, where will these people come from, how much extra money will they have to spend, what will be their age group, etc. The answers to these questions will help you decide who you customers will be.
2. Strategic internet marketing doesn’t stop with just figuring out who your customers are. You must also define who your competitors will be and what their weakness and strengths are in the marketplace. Once you know these things you can plan a strategy to set your business apart from them. Give your potential customers a choice of you or your competition. Make sure you look better than your competitor in some way or it won’t be good for you.
3. For your internet business to succeed your target buyer must be willing to shop online. Although shopping online is very safe there are still people who are afraid to make purchase on the internet. You will need to reassure your customers that their transaction will be without problems and that it will be very secure. Make sure you have enough payment options so that they will have a choice that will help convince them to shop with you.
4. Even though you will have already started your business before you can determine the marketability of your product, you study sellers offering the same or a similar product. If your product is known to most people but no one is selling it there is probably a reason. By going to chat rooms and forums you can get a pretty good idea of where you product stands. Do enough research to make sure you have something that will sell.
5. Your internet marketing strategy must have the ability to turn your customers into repeat buyers. Make sure you can spin off your product or create improvements to you original product to get them to buy again. A list of 100 buyers is probably worth more than a list of 1,000 people who have shown interest in your product but haven’t purchased it.
6. You will need to have a money back guarantee. Most people won’t purchase in today’s market without one. Even though it’s true that you can’t please everyone be ready to give an unhappy customer their money back immediately. You should try to offer them something free just for trying your product. Most of them will appreciate it and may even become a customer later on. If nothing else it may create a positive instead of a negative to your business.
Strategic internet marketing is like hunting with a guide who knows the area and the game you’re hunting like the back of his hand. Without the guide you may get lost or if you don’t you will probably never see any game because you’re looking in the wrong place.
One thing you have to keep in mind is that your customers won’t come looking for you. This is the reason you need to be looking for them with a strategic internet marketing plan as your guide.