One of the most difficult, but key components of the Internet marketing process is to design your website to achieve the goals you have set for your business.  But this critical step is usually the one business people skip, or just leave it to their web designer to consider, which can be even more damaging to their overall goals.

By strategically planning your new website or an update of your existing website, you will ensure you have a marketing piece that showcases your business to its best, allows you to be in control of ongoing content updates, and achieves the goals you have set for your business.  Below are a number of steps to follow while planning your new website:

1.  Create a list of anything your website visitors will want to know about the product or service you are offering.  If you are planning a website for a school, for example, the visitors would be interested in how man students attend, classroom sizes, staff information and sports offered.  Try to list every possible topic about your industry, service or product that a visitor to your new website might be interested in knowing.

2.  Imagine for a short time that you are a potential website customer.  Visit and review some websites similar to the one you will offer as if you were a potential customer.  As a potential customer, what are the things you like and dislike about each website you visit?  Does the website inspire you to take further action?  Can you find what you are looking for fast? How many different pages do you have to click through to find what you want?  Note all this data down with the intent of making your new website as easy for your visitors to use as possible.

3.  Investigate to find out the keywords your visitors will most likely search for to find your website. Google has a free keyword research tool that will work fine for this purpose.  Type in a general phrase such as “high school” and see what other keywords come up.  These are the topics that people are searching for already.  With this information in hand, you can plan your website to feature content that answers people’s questions.

4.  Make sure to plan your website to grow.  Don’t be lured into a website format that won’t let you expand easily to add new content pages or products.  You will find that building a great website is a constant work in progress.

5.  Finally, make sure your website is easy to control, so you don’t have to rely on your website designer to make even the smallest changes.   Today’s dynamic Internet marketing environment demands new and fresh content added to your website often, and the old fashioned sites that rely on a web developer to make changes just won’t work anymore.  You need a website platform that will allow you to add website content fast and simply.

Usually, a new website is one of your business’ largest expenses.  Don’t waste it with an inferior website that doesn’t support your business objectives.

Marty Dickinson is the founder of HereNextYear, Inc., a full service Internet marketing company in business for over 10 years. His specialty is Internet marketing solutions for the small business owner, speakers and authors. Visit to see what HereNextYear has to offer and to learn more about their innovative new website packages fully integrated for ease with social networking and other Internet marketing strategies.

An opt-in list allows for a company to market their wares and site via e-mail. With an opt-in list, a site and a subscriber consent to sending and receiving a newsletter from your company. Through this, you can keep your subscribers abreast of what is currently available on your site as well as whatever is coming out.

And because there is mutual consent between the two parties, any mail sent to the list is not considered as spam. There is a great number of successfully read promotional materials such as catalogs, newsletters and such that are sent because the subscribers themselves have signed up for them, meaning, they do want to be sent those items.

Building a list is crucial, only a small percentage actually subscribes for an opt-in list. Many people find promotional mails annoying but if you provide a good newsletter or promotional material, you will see your list build up and grow. You can also achieve this by having good content on your site. If people like what they see and read on your site, then they surely would want more. Newsletters would be a way to attract them back to your site – a little teaser or appetizer if you will.

But other than marketing your wares and your services, an opt-in list can also be used to earn extra profit. Not all lists can be used though. It would be good to first build a successful list with a huge number of subscribers. The more subscribers you have, the more money you stand to make. Here are seven ways to make money using nothing more than your list.

1) Place advertisements. There are many corporations who will be willing to pay to put their banners and ads on a list with many subscribers. Selling or renting out lists is not a good idea so rather than doing that, many companies would just rather place ads with lists that have a huge subscriber base. Your newsletter could be placed with many ads and each one spells money. A well designed ad, done by an experienced web design firm, will actually add to the visual appeal of your newsletter and may even attract even more subscribers.

2) Have affiliations with other companies that have at least a semblance or relation to what your site is about. Here other companies will provide links and brief descriptions of what products and services they offer. With every click made on the link that directs or leads a subscriber from your list to their site, the company will pay you. This is called P4P or pay for performance.

3) Make deals with other companies by asking for a small percentage of sales done through your list. With every sale done by customers that have come from your list and have gone there because of your newsletter, the other company will pay you a small percentage of your sales. The more people who buy from them, the more money you will make.

4) You may also get products from other sites on a consignment basis and sell them to your list via your newsletter. Place descriptions, articles and photos of the product in your newsletter. There will be those who will buy from you and when that happens, you can order the product from the other site and sell it to your buyer.

5) Sell e-books or a compilation of your articles on your list. Manuals and how-to articles are in great demand. Many people will be willing to shell out money to gain knowledge about a certain topic and subject. With your existing list trusting your expertise in that area, an e-book could be offered and sold or used as an incentive.

6) Create a network out of your list. Get people to invite more people to view your site and subscribe to your list. The larger your list, the more people will be able to click on your links and affiliate links as well as make your advertisement rates higher.

7) Subscribers are willing to pay for information if they know that it can be trusted and relied upon. Use your list to get more and more people to subscribe to you as well as browse your site. Lastly, you can use your list to earn money by making them your partners. Your list will be the bloodline of your growth and increase.

Some of these techniques may seem difficult to implement but there is lots of list building software and bulk email companies out there that could assist you. Of course you can always employ a reputable web design company to design your newsletter template for you and to create your opt in list for you, with all the bells and whistles attached.

Some internet marketers make huge profits with their opt-in lists, so don’t ignore your list, it is literally the life blood of your organization.

Rian Schoeman

SilverFox Web Design.