Tourism Internet Marketing U

Use Professionals for a Professional Looking Site

Now that you have the storyboard done for your site it is time to get in to the nitty-gritty details of designing your site. Now you need to develop the specific content, text and graphics for each page of your site.

If you want a professional looking Web site then you must get the help of professionals. However, you know your target market  better than anyone. You know what makes them purchase, you know what packages and specials they want, you kow the buzz words for your industry far better than anyone, including your Web developer. Therefore it is important that the first draft of the text, for each page, should be developed by you.

Once you have that first draft done, you want to have it reviewed and edited by an online copywriter. Online copywriters often have a background in PR or advertising, and they know how to get the message across in as few words as possible. Online copywriters know how to grab the reader’s attention and get them to do what it is you want them to do. Internet users don’t want to read pages and pages of text,—they want to get what they’re looking for quickly. Online copywriters know that the text should be short, to the point, and written so it can be easily scanned.

Once the copywriter is done, you want to have the content reviewed and edited by an Internet marketer. Make it clear to the Internet marketer that their job is to review and edit the text and graphics making sure that the keywords are used in the appropriate places for high search engine ranking. The Internet marketer should be responsible for making sure that the keyword(s) assigned to a particular page should be used appropriately in the page title, the text throughout the page, the meta-tags for keyword and description, the headers, the Alt tags, and the comments tags. There is a real science to this so be sure to choose your Internet marketer carefully. Be sure that the Internet marketer you choose has expertise in search engines and their ranking criteria, repeat traffic generators, viral and permission marketing as well as the latest trends in online marketing like podcasts, blogs and interactive maps, etc..

Once you are satisfied with the Internet marketers work, the next step is graphic design. The graphic designer will develop the “look and feel” for your site—the navigation bar, the background, and the separator bars. The graphic designer knows that your online and offline corporate identity should be consistent.

Even though it is important to get the help of professionals, you know your objectives, target market and products and services better than anyone. That is why you must review and approve EVERYTHING. Once the copywriter is finished, review their work, once the Internet marketer is finished, review their work and same goes for the graphic designer. You want to make sure that the substance of your text has stayed the same and only the form has changed. 

Once all this is done, and everything has been reviewed and approved, you are ready for the programming to start. 

There’s still so much more to learn. Get all the right answers with my new book 101 Ways to Promote Your Tourism Business Web Site.

- written by Susan Sweeney, CA, CS, HoF