Unique Selling Point (USP)

January 21, 2010 by 1 Comment

Someone pointed out this article (Build An Online Shop You Can Be Proud Of) from last year. I read through it and decided it is worth it to not only link to it, but talk again about one topic that it touched on.

If you talk to any marketer, she shall tell you that it is very important to establish a USP for your business. A unique selling point is something that differentiates you from your competition. Why should I buy watches from you and not from the shop down the street? Is it because you are cheaper; is it because your watches are better; or is it because you have painted your shop all pink? Whatever the reason, that’s your USP. But of course everyone already knows that they need a USP.

Having a USP can also be pretty good for marketing your website online. Suppose you have an online business. It is very important to make it very clear why customers should choose you over other online businesses (i.e you need a USP). Since your USP is something that attracts customers, it is reasonable to assume that there are people out there looking for exactly what you offer. Once you make your USP crystal clear, you can create additional web pages or blog posts to demonstrate this USP further. This will work to not only make your USP more ‘visible’ but the additional blog posts/web pages should rank well in the search engines (because people are looking for what you offer, for your USP). This simple strategy thus ensures that: a) you make your USP stronger and b) you attract more visitors to your site.

What do you think?

Filed Under: Tips Hacking and Reviews Tagged With:

Websites Influence 97% of Online Purchase Decisions

January 20, 2010 by Leave a Comment

“Your website may very well be the most powerful tool in your marketing kit. Not only is it the place prospects and clients go to learn more about you and your services, but it has a huge impact on their ultimate purchase decision. In fact, only 3% of the 200 buyers surveyed – from companies of all sizes – say a provider’s website has no influence whatsoever over their purchase decision.

The survey was conducted by RainToday.com and included more than 200 buyers responsible for more than $1.7 billion in professional services purchased, such as accounting and financial consulting; architecture, engineering, and construction services; human resources consulting; IT consulting and services; legal services; management consulting; marketing, advertising, and public relations; and training services.” – HubSpot

So, yeah, even as you are working on Facebook, Twitter, or anything else to market your business online, do note that the most important tool in your arsenal is your website. Spend more time and money on it than on anything else!

Filed Under: Case Study, Internet Culture Tagged With: ,

Stealth Mode?

December 24, 2009 by 2 Comments

Sometimes I get a lot of emails from people wishing to start a new business or website. One thing that I almost always get from these nice people is that they want me to assure them of absolute secrecy regarding their project. They are afraid that if other people hear about it, then their idea will be stolen.

But is that really true? The sad fact is that no one really cares about your idea anyway. And I speak this from experience – we’ve been involved in a whole lot of projects and the level of secrecy surrounding a project does not affect its success in the least. In fact, the more secrecy there is, the less your chances of success. I bet some of you never thought about it that way, ama? This is especially true if your project involves a lot of technology.

Why? Because high technology start-ups are very very much shaped by and demand a lot of user feedback. You cannot build a perfect project while tucked away in your basement – you need people to continually test it and give feedback so that your product ‘evolves’ into something that is just perfect for your target market. This is the plain truth, dear readers.

Please have a look at: Stealth Startups, Get Over Yourselves: Nobody Cares About Your Secrets by TechCrunch.

What do you think of all this?

Filed Under: Case Study, Cool Sites, Tips Hacking and Reviews Tagged With: , ,

An Online Strategy For Companies in Kenya

November 24, 2009 by 10 Comments

This one is from a while back. Someone asked me:

My question to you is, what do you think should be the online strategy for a tour company in Kenya and how should they approach it and what tools should they apply?

Here’s my response:

What would be a good online strategy for a tour company in Kenya? This is an interesting challenge. So let’s see, what I would do is launch an elegant website that is intuitive to use and stylish (web2.0-ish also). I’m assuming this site will have some sort of ‘place’ (a shopping cart, online booking form etc) where a sale needs to be made – focus on this. Make the buying/ordering process easy to use for even a passing browser. And the sales copy around it has to be absolutely well done. If need be, hire professional copywriters for this one page (menwithpens or Kenyan Freelancer come to mind). You do this to make sure that your site doesn’t suck at selling.

Now, in my mind, the target visitors of this site are not in Kenya. True? So you need to find how to reach them. I would include a blog with the website. You can talk honestly and with a personal voice (no corporate-speak) about Kenya, and why it’s such a great country. I’m sure there are tons of things that your blog can talk about.

How to get visitors? I like the organic way – make a remarkable site and blog and then apply SEO VERY well (the works: link building, directory submissions etc). Also, since your visitors are not from Kenya, it should be easy to find out where they hang out – other travel blogs, forums, etc. Go there and join those conversations and, by all means, get noticed. But be subtle.

To complement this sort of ‘organic’ strategy, also carry out a PPC advertising campaign (with Adsense or YPN). This will get some visitors and some sales (if you did your sales copy well). I don’t like extended PPC campaigns so probably you should phase this out as the organic traffic rises – unless your returns on the advertising are very good.

As you get visitors to the site, have some way to opt in visitors into an email marketing campaign. Use mailchimp (by my experience they rock!) to provide your auto responder software/services. Don’t spend too much money on this – people sometimes go crazy – just a basic Mailchimp account will do (they even have a free offering). Be creative in how you get people to join your email list (NEVER buy email addresses). Perhaps you could offer free Swahili lessons via email, or an amazing free video of unseen Kenyan delights. But I’m sure there’s no shortage of creativity on your end.

I think if you do this, you’ll have a good strong start. I doubt many other Kenyan sites have done this well. 😉

To recap:

  • Build an elegant site. Let is be super easy to use.
  • Do your sales copy excellently.
  • SEO everything.
  • Market the site by authentically joining the conversation on other travel blogs, forums and other sites.
  • Carry out a PPC campaign and consider stopping it (or slowing down) when there is enough organic traffic.
  • Create an email marketing campaign.

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I had not mentioned a social network strategy (Facebook, twitter, etc). I’ll work on that and post it here soon. Stay tuned. Got questions? I have answers! 🙂

Filed Under: Lazyweb, Small Business, Tips Hacking and Reviews Tagged With: ,