Every business owner wants to get as many people to view their website. And alpaca business owners are no different when it comes to their alpaca websites.We are all impressed with web server logs that show big numbers in the “hits’ column. While getting hits is a good goal, it is not the entire answer and there is definitely more to the picture than large hit counts.
Getting increased traffic is only good if that traffic is actually interested in what you are offering on your alpaca website. Building traffic to your site from the “right” audience is part art and part technology. The art is in the content, design and easy of use of your alpaca website. The technology is in the code and architecture of the website. Both factors need to be working together to keep the right users coming back to your site, and if things are working well, telling others about your site. (After all, you’d trust your friend’s recommendation for a site, wouldn’t you?)
These steps below will help you get the right people coming to your site and will help you get more and more each day.
1. Brand integration and consistency. Your alpaca farm brand is your most valuable asset and it is your most reliable sales tools, as well. Make sure that every visitor to your alpaca website knows without question that they are on your website. Keep logo placement consistent, ( a good location is the upper left corner of every screen.) Your other brand and identity elements like fonts, colors and the tone or voice of your written words are all very important to keep consistent from page to page.
2. Send to a friend. When I get a link to a website from a friend, I always go to that website. I trust that if a friend of mine thinks a site is interesting, I should take a look. It is true, these most frequently “Forward to a Friend” pages are sexual or humorous in nature. You do not need to have naked pictures of your alpacas on your site, oh wait; you already do have naked pictures of your alpacas on your site! It is ok to have some fun and it can be a great way to build this type of “viral” awareness.
3. Sign-up to receive our Newsletter. Building a list of people who are interested in your every word is great business. A loyal following of people who like what you have to say is unbeatable marketing and especially true with alpaca marketing. Those people will talk to other people, too. They will forward your newsletters, your alpaca web pages and more to all their friends. Make it possible for visitors to your alpaca website to sign up for your company newsletter on every page of your site.
4. Search engine optimization. Most users find your alpaca website via search engines such as Google and Yahoo! They type in an item of interest, hit the search key and find your site. That is, if your site is listed. The key to getting your alpaca website listed is something called search engine optimization (SEO). SEO includes a variety of semantic, design and technology enhancements that site publishers can implement in order to make it easier for search engines – and users – to find them. Each page of your alpaca website should have carefully selected “key words” and Page description meta tags.
<!-- "MetaTags" -->
<META name="description" content="A sentence that clearing and simply defines your company. Try to use some of the keywords that are on this page. Don’t “stuff” this area with words that are not on this page.">
<META name="keywords" content="marketing, alpacas, keywords, page descriptions.">
<!-- "MetaTags" -->
Search engines are busy. It may take a while to get picked up by the engines. On average, search engines take as long as six weeks before they even notice you and add you to their all-important results page. You can help this process out by manually listing your pages on specific search engines. You can also hire a firm that specializes in SEO. They will tell you what to change on your alpaca website to get the biggest bang for your buck and they may suggest changes to specific content to be more attractive to search engines.
5. Keep your content up-to-date. No matter how much you invest in various traffic-generating schemes, visitors won’t come – and won’t stay – unless you have compelling content that gets updated on a regular basis. It’s free and it works. Your alpaca records, awards and new cria are all good examples of things that change frequently on your farm and should be changing frequently on your alpaca website, too.
6. E-mail newsletters. E-newsletters are the ultimate traffic generators, especially for sites with strong content. You don’t need to send every last word in your newsletter. In fact, it is often a better choice to send a “taste” of the content, and then add a link to your alpaca website where they can view the entire article. This is also an attractive option because it enables you to track how readers are interacting with your content. Do they just view the newsletter, or do they actually click on story headlines to read more? Measure the results of each newsletter campaign and then adjust your content. If you see that one topic is getting a lot more response, try to learn why that is so special. Then build or write more on the topic.
7. Cooperatives. Being a part of cooperatives is a great way to build traffic. Cooperatives often have high traffic patterns of very interested users. They tend to trust that the cooperative may be more authoritative, may have less of an “agenda” and may be more “selective” about their members. If the cooperative is doing its job right, you will be able to add your company’s site description, links and more. These links all should point to your alpaca farm website. And like the Reciprocal links listed below (item 9), all search engines use the number of links pointing to your website as a gauge of your site’s “relevance” for the topic being queried.
8. Your own alpaca print advertising. Every piece of paper you put out should have your alpaca farm website and email address printed clearly. Put the URL of your alpaca website on your signs, trailer, truck and anything else you can.
9. Reciprocal links. Reciprocal links are links with other sites that are generally related to yours. You link to a site, and that company returns the favor by adding a link to their own alpaca farm website. It effectively adds another potent avenue for your site visitors to find and reach you. The best part is that once you have a reciprocal link in place, it seldom if ever gets taken down. Think about it -- that's free advertising practically for the life of your site.
10. Banner Advertising. While banner advertising is often very inexpensive, it is also of limited effectiveness. Still it is one tactic that you can use from time to time to help raise some awareness. Design sets of banner ads for very specific events or happenings. Making a specific offer on which users can act is much better than a “hey, we are so-and-so” type ads. Buy ad space in sites that you know will be attractive to your target audience. Another traffic-generating form of advertisement is pay-per-click, where you pay search engines to list your ads alongside search results. Both methods are proven to improve your site traffic, but both come with fees attached. Try the free stuff first.
