Help with advertising, getting "known", etc...

**kit1420** · 07-31-2008 10:28 PM

Hey everyone,

I am brand new to this site and this is my first post. I am i guess what you would call an "entrepreneur" .. I have a question, but first let me explain what I do... I sell diamonds like engagement rings and whatnot that I get at wholesale prices.. Now I have actually had very good luck on craigslist, but Id liek to step it up. I do make sales advertising on there, but not as many as Id like. I usually only accept cash, but I just opened a merchant account in hopes of expanding my sales... now my questiion(s).. obviously I want my business to grow and to "be known". How would I go about getting my own website? if I got one thhen how would I advertise that? i am also looking for other inexpensive ways to advertise. Craigslist is nice causae its free, but you can only reach so many people that way.. Does anyone have any suggestions? ASny advice would be great. I thankyou in advance!

**gregdavidson** · 07-31-2008 10:40 PM

First of all you need to choose which cart you want to use. Oscommerce is a good free one. Next you'll need to hire a professional web designer to add a professional, custom design to your cart so it doesn't look like everyone else's. You can post your project on Guru.com or simply find a web designer through Google to do the work for you. Find a few online jewelry stores and tell your web designer that you want something that looks like that. You might also want to get a toll free number because that will make your business look like a bigger company than what it is. As far as FREE advertising goes, the TOP free advertising technique would be SEO or "Search Engine Optimization". Go to Keyword Discovery and find about 4 or 5 phrases that you want to go for. Don't try to saturate your website with random keywords because that usually doesn't help. Go for keywords/phrases that get about 500 to 1,000 searches a month. Anything more than that may be too competitive. Add those phrases in your title, meta description, throughout your content. Another good way to advertise your site is through "video advertising". Create videos with a cheap digital camcorder or camera that has video and post those videos on YouTube with a link to your website somewhere in the video. You could advertise your "specials" so more people will visit your site for your great deals. Each video will probably bring in about 250 people to your site so the more videos you make the more visitors you'll probably get.

**kit1420** · 07-31-2008 10:53 PM

Thanks Greg those videos are actually a really good idea. Do you happen to know how much it costs to get a website built?? I know there is cheap and expensive places, but whats the average to get it up n runnin?

**gregdavidson** · 07-31-2008 11:22 PM

For a really professional design it might cost about $800 to $2000 since the software is already available to you. Some people will try to give you a better deal but it's better to pay 2 or 3 times to get the job done "right" rather than sacrifice the quality of your website. A lot of these cheap designers are lacking skills or need you to hold their hand through the entire process. Also, don't go along with web designers that require you to use their hosting service. A "basic" hosting account with Godaddy.com is usually good enough to start off with. It costs about $10 or $15 for a couples of months of hosting with a domain. You can get your account switched over to a dedicated server if you find you need more bandwith or if your website is going too slow.

**gregdavidson** · 07-31-2008 11:25 PM

BTW There's also other websites where you can post your videos besides YouTube. YouTube would obviously be the best place to post them but it wouldn't hurt to post them in 4 or 5 other places to maximize your traffic per video

**kit1420** · 07-31-2008 11:27 PM

Why do you say dont go with their server? Do they over price it or are they usually just poor quality?

**gregdavidson** · 07-31-2008 11:30 PM

They usually charge you more money (up to $30/month) and their hosting would be considered "shared" hosting since you don't get the server all to yourself. You'll probably get far less space and bandwith than you would with a cheap Godaddy account. There also could be issues with downtime and if you find you need a dedicated server that may not be an option. If they're a dishonest designer they may even charge you a huge fee to release you from their hosting services.