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Websites > FAQs > Promote Your Site
Promote Your Site
The old cliché, "if you build it, they will come," does not apply to websites. With literally millions of sites on the World Wide Web today, your site may never be found by Web surfers. If you’ve spent time building a site with valuable content, you’ll also want to spend time (and possibly money) promoting your site.
There is no magic formula for marketing or promoting your site, but here are some tips to help drive traffic to your Lutherans Online hosted website.
Keep content fresh
Before you begin promoting your website, make sure your site contains good content and lots of it! Provide up-to-date, accurate and helpful information. Try to be unique and give your site visitors a reason to come back to your site time and time again.
Use the calendar feature in Lutherans Online to keep your visitors informed about upcoming events and points of interest. Again, keep it up to date!
Provide visitors with opportunities for social interaction. Message boards and chat rooms are easy to add to your Lutherans Online site. Help keep the conversation going to keep visitors coming back.
Add a poll to your site. It’s amazing how many people are willing to share their opinions and points of view when given the opportunity.
Create a short and intuitive URL
A website address is referred to as a URL (Uniform Resource Locator). People reach your website by going to your unique URL. Much like your home address, the postman needs an accurate address to get your mail to you. The shorter and more relevant your URL, the easier it will be for people to remember and find your website. The URL of your Lutherans Online site can be long and cumbersome for print pieces. Therefore, creating an alias URL for your site is highly recommended:
- Go to the home page of your Lutherans Online website (be sure you are logged in).
- Click on "Website Manager."
- Click on "Edit Web Site URL Alias" (under Settings and Preferences).
- Type your desired alias name and click "Done." Your website's alias URL will be www.lutheransonline.com/xxxxxx (where xxxxxx is the name you selected for your alias).
NOTE: Search engines and directories may view an alias as a redirect, so if you submit your website to search engines and directories, be sure to use the longer URL of your site (assigned automatically by the Lutherans Online publishing system) for the submission.
Another option for a shorter URL is to purchase a domain name.
Communicate your site and URL (Web address)
Tell people you have a website. Word-of-mouth referrals are an excellent promotion channel. Tell everyone you know and have them tell everyone they know, etc.
Include the URL of your site in all print materials including:
- Church bulletins and inserts.
- Newsletters
- Brochures
- Bulletin boards
- Email signature blocks.
- Stationery and letterhead.
- Content of letters and email.
- Envelopes
- Postcards
- Business cards
- Yellow pages
- News releases
- Ads
- Flyers
- Posters
- Banners (Thrivent Financial chapters can order customized banners containing the chapter URL).
- Apparel and giveaways customized with your URL.
Exchange links with other websites
Some search engines and directories will rank a website based on link popularity. In other words, the more links you have to your website from other sites, the better chance you have of appearing higher in the ranks.
Consider contacting other website owners and asking them to provide a link to your site. In return, you could create a Links of Interest page on your site and ask if they would like to be included to return the favor. Some sites to consider linking up with include:
- National, regional, and district church body (ELCA, LCMS, WELS, etc.).
- Area churches
- Schools
- Town or city chamber of commerce sites.
- Family websites
- Area Christian book stores.
- Special interest groups.
- Local non-profit organization.
Note: Check your links regularly to make sure the sites you’re linking to are still active.
Register with search engines and directories
Don’t wait for spiders and Web crawlers to find your site; take the initiative and register your site with various search engines and directories (Yahoo, Google, AOL, etc.). By registering your site, you have a better chance of your site’s information being accurate in the directories.
Some directories charge a registration fee, so you may incur some costs when you register. You might also want to check with your local electronic store for some inexpensive computer software to help you with registration.
Give your site visitors what they want
Keep your visitors coming back by giving them what they are looking for. If your visitors find your site useful and fun, they will probably tell their family and friends about your site. Get to know your audience and give them what it is they are looking for. Provide your visitors the opportunity to share feedback via email or an online form. To add a "form" to your Lutherans Online site:
- Go to your "Website Manager."
- Click on "Manage Website Pages."
- Click on "Add a New Page."
- Select "Online Form" as your page style and follow the online instructions to build a form.
Share a monthly eNewsletter
Keep in touch with your site visitors regularly through a monthly eNewsletter. Share information about recent changes to your site, upcoming events and more. Be sure to ask and obtain permission from your site visitors to send them email. Nothing turns visitors off more than spam.
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