What exactly is 'Web Marketing'?
This is the practice of getting your website in front of all the people who need to see it. It's the most technical aspect of the process of owning a website and also the most important. You can have the best, coolest, most gadget packed site but if people can't find it you won't achieve anything. It would be like creating the best department store in the world and then opening it in the middle of the Scottish highlands and not telling anyone about it.
Is it really so complicated?
There are a lot of different elements to this, from ranking highly on search engines, gaining a presence through social media and placing adverts to help gain visitors. All of these have a cost, whether it is the direct costs of placing adverts or the indirect costs of the time associated with the building of an online prescence. The vast majority of website owners will benefit from help in understanding these costs and what they can expect to achieve with the budget they have available. Squeezing the maximum return from careful allocation of that budget can make a great deal of difference to the amount of visitors to your website.
So do I need a big budget?
Absolutely not, it all depends upon what you are trying to achieve. For those who just want a website that gives some basic information about themselves along with contact details etc. the marketing spend will be negligible, especially if they have a unique name, service or catchment area. On the other hand if you want to use your website to actively generate more sales leads this will have a cost. The good news is that, compared to traditional forms of promotion and advertising, you may be pleasantly surprised at what you can achieve for a sensible budget.
How much will this cost?
Unlike the writing of a website, where costs can be estimated accurately with the very minimum of information, this is much more closely tied to the individual situation and requirements of each website. What we can say is that this side of things is infinitely tailorable to the customer's needs. Some websites invest quite heavily in this area every month, others are more suited to a 'pay as you go' type arrangement and there are those who invest almost nothing in this area and still achieve the results they are looking for. With all our websites we take great care to ensure we provide the right level of marketing and our customers fully understand what this will cost them.