Walling on Startup Marketing

Ok, so marketing is crucial. How’s it done economically?

• Core strategies like building an audience, search engine optimization and participating in niche communities have far more impact on your bottom line than most of the new media tools
• Many approaches will not work in your market. For example: using Twitter to market to pool cleaners is not going to yield great results
• Much like building good software requires an understanding of your users,
  • Gaining an understanding of your marketing is your first step to building a successful business
• High quality traffic means each visitor is very close to your ideal customer and they know and trust you
  • TechCrunch traffic is not profitable for startups, unless your niche market is other startups
• While it’s nice to have several thousand people visit your website…
  • if they don’t convert, they may as well have not shown up at all

Top Shelf Traffic Strategies

1. A Mailing List
2. A Blog, Podcast or Video Blog
3. Organic Search (SEO)

Second Shelf

4. Social Media / Social Networks
5. Pay-per-click Advertising
6. Forums
7. Press Releases
8. Guest Blogging
9. Affiliate Programs
10. Banner and other advertising
11. Everything else…

Marketing Toolkit

• Search engine optimization (SEO) is a must

• At a minimum you should create a keyword list and perform on-page SEO

  • Next step, focus on link building strategies to raise your organic search rankings

• Some build entire businesses on pay-per-click (PPC) advertising

  • It’s not something I recommend as a long-term approach
  • Use it for finding keywords that convert for you
    • Spend the time and money to search engine optimize for those terms
  • Pouring a never-ending supply of money into Google AdWords is no way to build a business

• A mailing list is the most effective marketing tool you will possess. It works in any market

• Getting people to engage with you, to listen to and trust you will have more impact on sales than any other marketing approach

• For every person like yourself looking to gain the audience of a market so you can promote your software…

  • ….there is someone with insider knowledge looking to be recognized as an expert in that same market

• Blogs offer twice the marketing punch by catering to both your audience and the search engines

• If you spend a year or two:

  • Writing engaging, original posts,
  • submitting them to social media sites, and…
  • prominently displaying your RSS and email subscription icons,
  • you will gradually build an audience of readers who learn to know and trust you

• Optimize your blog for search engines

• Tweak your posts to target specific search keywords

• Google views a website with constantly updating content as alive and relevant, and it will rank higher

• Google likes large quantities of content and blogs tend toward that direction

• Google likes individual pages that focus on a theme

  • Blogs are ideal for this since every new post is its own page

• Google likes straightforward link structures

SEO is Actually Super Powerful

• SEO is only two components: on-page factors and incoming links

  • Your page titles, Meta tags, URL structures, and even your domain name
  • Do not get caught up in the apparent complexity or mystery surrounding SEO
  • Implement your on-page SEO and move on

• Incoming links are the currency of the internet

  • The more links you receive from relevant, authoritative websites…
    • ….the more authority Google will grant your site
  • A link implies trust and credibility
  • Link building is the “hard” part of SEO

• The ideal link would come from a page with a high PageRank and few outgoing links

• The website should be extremely relevant to the topic of your site

• Focus 50% of your links on your most important term for that page…

  • ….and the other 50% spread across the other 3-5 terms that page is targeting

• Receiving a big chunk of links at once is only helpful if you continue to build links at a steady pace each month

• DMOZ – Free. Still worth submitting to

• JoeAnt – $ 40

• Many directory submissions are free

  • Choose your link text wisely and submit to each one by hand

• Websites that link to your competition will more than likely have an interest in linking to you

• Email the linking site’s owner and ask for your site to be added to the list

• Create an alert for all variations of your product names,

  • company names,
  • competitors’ names,
  • and your name,
  • as well as quoted terms with high relevance to your product

• If someone is talking about a problem that you can solve,

  • ….make an intelligent comment or contribution and include a link to your product

• Article marketing is an under-utilized startup marketing tool

  • Submit unique, focused niche articles that link back to your website
    • ….using specific link text to help your SEO
    • Depending on the subject, hire someone to write them for you

• For articles, 500-700 words is best

• Offer a Free Academic/ Non-profit Version of Your Product in Exchange for a Link

• Contact companies whose products you use and…

  • ….offer to provide a testimonial if they will include a link to your website