FOR WINNING WEB SITES

1. Do ADVERTISE, PROMOTE and use PUBLIC RELATIONS for your site
2. Provide superior customer service
3. Focus on Customer and Patient Retention, not just acquisition
4. Use auto responders to confirm receipt of the order/inquiry, etc.
5. Make sure you have a fast-loading site
6. Reduce the amount of graphics, etc.
7. Let the marketing department have a lot of input into the site's production
8. Let your customer know how much time it will take to download material
9. Provide the tools to download/upload at the touch of a button
10. KISS - Keep it simple s_______ (most of you already know the rest)
11. Integrate benefits to the reader throughout the site
12. Make your URL synonymous with your product/service/practice
13. Provide multiple "contact us" methods
14. Pro vide a 24 hour live person to speak with - if cost-effective
15. Post a FAQ (frequently asked questions) section
16. Provide a community forum for customers/patients to share ideas/stories
17. Contribute a portion of your revenue/sales to charitable causes
18. Integrate your collateral materials to match the look and feel of your site
19. Use coupons for your online merchandise or services
20. Add a "What's New" Section for repeat traffic
21. Provide links to other complementary sites
22. Add a Cool/Fun Things to Do section for repeat traffic
23. Provide a search engine for your site only
24. Use easy to remember URL's
25. Buy up the .com, .net versions and alternate spellings of your site
26. Respond to all inquiries within one day
27. Have links from other sites tied to a specific, relevant page on your site
28. Tie in Sweepstakes offers
29. Integrate traditional telesales, direct-mail, etc. to drive traffic to your site
30. Send out CD-ROMs with your site imbedded
31. Track all marketing method's effectiveness
32. Test your site for usability and functionality
33. Provide testimonials
34. Let customers/patients know how long it will take to receive their product/service
35. Personalize responses
36. Analyze the return on investment of every marketing campaign
37. Focus your time on what you do best
38. Ask for customer feedback
39. Personally call customers/patients to follow-up on complaints
40. Use secure servers for online financial or personal information data
41. Place contact information on every page
42. Give your customers a reason for going back to the site
43. Provide markers for "what's new" on your site
44. Offer incentives for upsale and repeat orders
45. Offer money-back guarantees and easy return policies
46. Offer alternative order methods- including telephone, mail and fax
47. Use a reliable hosting service
48. Check your competitor sites against yours
49. Check your position in the major search engines
50. Continuously improve and instill quality assurance philosophies

E-MAIL CAMPAIGN TIPS

1. TARGET! TARGET! TARGET!
2. Don't Spam
3. Protect your customers'/clients privacy and lists
4. Use opt-in/permission-based lists
5. Use benefits-oriented statements in the subject line
6. Offer incentives for "friends and family" - passaround
7. Respond within 1 day of inquiry
8. "Split test" offers
9. Vary pricing per offer
10. Analyze the response rate of each subject line
11. Analyze the response rate of each sweepstakes/incentive offer
12. Ask for customer's permission to provide ongoing information, specials, etc.
13. Make it easy for customer to "opt-out" of future e-mails
14. Starr your database with your current list of customers
15. Use reputable list brokers
16. Make "call to action" statements
17. Impose time limits on offers
18. Do not start campaigns at the beginning or end of the week
19. Keep the text for e-mails short
20. Don't bombard your customers with e-mail
21. Use HTML formatted File format
22. Send out newsletters - with permission, of course
23. Use an experienced Database Service to manage
24. TEST! TEST! TEST!

Affiliate Programs

1. Do affiliate your product with complementary sites/products
2. Don't sign long-term contracts
3. Assign the bookkeeping to an outside affiliate marketing company
4. Check quality of the sites where your company is affiliated
5. Don't pay on click - pay only on results
6. Don't pay upfront
7. Do track your customers beyond the original visit
8. Do pay commissions in a timely manner
9. Do have affiliates on your site

Tips provided by Alison Berke, President of Bworks.com, award winning internet marketing firm. Alison can be reached at Alison@bworks.com .