A client of mine just asked how to go about promoting a business website. I fired off a few ideas, then thought that the same advice would be helpful for a larger audience. Here ya’ go!

• Start a mailing list. Gather customers’ email addresses (with permission), then send them periodic newsletters about product specials, advice for your area of expertise, exclusive contests, and other items they’d enjoy. I recommend Your Mailing List Provider as an inexpensive, quality newsletter service. This content can also be used as an online article archive; Google likes it when you update your site often.
• Make a Facebook business page. Offer discounts, contests, fun links, discussion-starters, and other content to draw visitors into your fan group. Then, whenever you update your status, they’ll see it on their Facebook page.
• Engage in social media (Facebook, Twitter, forums, etc) to build up a reputation online as a helpful, quality organization in your community.
• Build your search engine ranking.
  –Search engine optimization: Research keywords for which most people search, but relatively few websites cater to. Then add those keywords to specific places to show Google that your site is relevant to searches for those keywords. Wordtracker is a great service for finding the best phrases.
  –Search engine/keyword marketing: Advertise with Google AdWords: You pay a few cents to a number of dollars each time a person clicks on your link in the “Sponsored Listings”of the Google search results. [see also Tweak Keywords or Pay Per Click?]
  –Build inbound links: Email or call other related and local sites, asking them to link to your website, increasing your reputation with Google.

Whatever you do, keep your site fresh and make sure you never abandon your website. You don’t expect a person to find your magazine ad from three months ago and buy your product, so don’t expect the same from your website. Keep it fresh, keep it fun, keep ’em coming back. Happy Web promotion!