While it's true that many entrepreneurs have used the Internet to build lucrative businesses and better lifestyles, for every successful marketer, there are hundreds who never even make enough money to break even. We can all avoid being a part of this unfortunate majority by learning from the mistakes and strategies of successful marketers. This posting outlines a few of the worse online marketing mistakes that are considered the leading leading causes of failure in the online industry.........
Developing a Product without Finding an Audience: This is a mistake which can cost you hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars and cause your business to fail before it even gets off the ground. No matter how creative or interesting you believe that your product is, you can still end up wasting your time and money creating it if no one wants to buy it. Remember Borders (Book store)? The owner spent $375 million on developing the first nationwide redelivery service called "Webvan". Great idea on paper, but the service completely flopped because there was not enough customer interest to support it. Mistakes like this can be easily avoided with the right research and advertisement testing.
Since most small business owners don't have tons of money to throw away, it's imperative that you conduct proper keyword research and even some ad testing for your product before you invest your time and money in creating it. If this process is handled correctly, you could have plenty of qualified customers ready to buy your product before it even goes on the market.
Chasing Opportunity Instead of Passion. Success in the online marketplace takes a lot more hard work, diligence and persistence than most people think. No matter how much research and study you do before starting your business, there is always going to be a degree of trial and error involved when which will test the patience and persistence of even the most die-hard entrepreneur. There also are hundreds of tedious details which go into building and optimizing a website, creating a product and running an effective marketing campaign.
When this happens, it is only your passion for the business that you are starting which is going to provide the fuel to keep you going. The online marketplace is also very competitive and requires you to be constantly learning about your niche and understanding your customers. This kind of commitment is difficult to keep if you are not building the type of business that really interests you. As you are choosing your online business, be sure to take these things into consideration. By doing so, you'll give yourself the best opportunity possible to achieve success.
Failure to Control Advertising Costs. The most valuable investment you'll ever make in your online business is in smart advertising. No matter how spectacular your product is or how interesting your website is, no one is going to care if they never get the chance to hear about what you are doing. The problem is that the most effective online marketing strategies such as pay per click marketing, search engine optimization, article marketing and e-mail marketing are also the most potentially costly when it comes to time and dollars spent. The only way to make sure that these methods are cost-effective for both time and money is to practice consistent and strategic testing for your marketing campaigns and your ad copy.
Tools, such as the Google website Optimizer, Google analytics and other various applications for split testing and visitor behavior tracking, are a must if you want to make sure that your time and money are spent wisely.
Expecting a Sale on the First Visit. According to online marketing expert Mitch Meyerson’s book “Mastering Online Marketing” 37% of prospects take anywhere from 0 to 3 months to become customers, 28% Takes 3 to 6 months, 18% 6 to 12 months and 17% take more than one year. In addition to this, general advertising research consistently reveals that it takes anywhere from seven to twelve times of a prospect seeing a message before they become a purchasing customer. This is why an effective list building strategy is regarded by many online marketing experts to be the most important part of building a successful online business.
Even if you have a website which is converting well and a good traffic strategy, you’re likely (according to the above statistics) to miss out on 50% of your potential customers if you don’t have a good email marketing strategy to stay in touch after their first visit. These are customers that will end up buying from your competition and likely becoming their loyal customers when they could have been yours. This is why it's so important to create a good marketing funnel that includes a system for viral marketing and relationship building with your prospects.
Lack of Focus. Lack of focus is a common cause for failure in any undertaking because it keeps you from using your resources of time and money wisely. It also makes it difficult for you to consistently track your progress and make the improvements necessary to increase your successes. If you are attempting to market your website by dabbling in social media marketing one day, and then switching sporadically to article marketing then to PPC marketing or being inconsistent with your e-mail marketing, you’ll probably end up getting taken down by your competition.
If you feel that you don’t have enough energy and attention to pursue all of the marketing strategies which you want to use such as: social media marketing, Adwords advertising, e-mail marketing, article marketing, video marketing, search engine optimization, finding joint ventures and ezine advertising, it might be time to seek the help of an online marketing firm. This will allow you to focus on aspects of marketing your business which you are most interested in and have the best knack for.
The more focused you are, the quicker you will learn and the better edge you will have on your competition. So if you've gotten into the habit of being all over the place with your online marketing, it might be time to find your most effective method and to focus only on that until you develop a solid foundation upon which you can build your other methods.
The bottom line is that no matter where you are in your process of starting your own online business, it’s important to remember that there is always room for improvement. Check yourself on each of the common errors, find your weak points and get to work on a plan for correcting them. It might just be THE decision that will make the difference between failure and success.
~Manifest your Business Solutions and build a better business. The original post is on Manifest Business Solutions © copyright, 2012. Share it freely, but you must link back to this source. Regards, Admin
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