How many pages are required to promote a site? That's like asking how long is a piece of string. My usual answer is as many as you want, or as many as it takes. It depends on what the web site is about. How many possible combinations of popular keywords need to be top 10 in the search engines. How many internal pages - within our URL - and how many external pages - hook pages outside our URL - are required.
If it is strictly a lead generation site, you probably need only a few pages and an online form. You just want the lead. You'll have your sales representative call the interested party. The same goes for a site that sells only one product, or perhaps a small store with a regional focus like a deli. Maybe a couple of pages of food shots and a fax-in order form (so you don't need a computer to take the orders).
I strongly caution about spending too much money on the actual site. A lot of fancy bells and whistles are not required at this point. A basic, low technology site will do just fine. What's important, is to focus more on marketing and search engine placement, rather than spending money on the site itself. So you might have a five page site, and 10 more hook pages that lead to it.
When it comes an online retail store, each product category will need its own page. You might also want pages dealing with warranty information, returns, shipping, testimonials, FAQs and so on. The product area might have 10 or so product pages and the service area another 10 or so pages. Then add in 35 hook pages (depending on how many keyword phrases you have) and you're up around 55 pages for a single web site. Multiply this by 5 or so web sites - virtual locations - all selling the same thing and you're up to 275 pages. Seriously, cellwest.com had 330 pages working for them in the search engines, at the time of this writing.
What about a searchable database? Wouldn't it be better to put all those product pages in a searchable database. Yes, except for one problem, search engines cannot usually find pages inside a database. They need static html pages, pages they can find and catalog. No search engine is sophisticated enough to fill out a form on your site and do a search to find out what is inside.
There are recent developments, however, that allow search engines to find dynamically generated pages, also known as active server pages or ASP.
The solution is to turn your database inside out. Yes, you can still have a searchable web site, but make each one of the product pages a "live" html page as well. This way, you can offer people the convenience of searching your database with keywords, as well as providing search engines with tons of pages they can catalog and index.
If you only have one product then you'll only need 2 internal web pages and 5 to 10 hook pages to promote your site. I've seen it done where one home page is tuned for a major search engine and it leads directly to a sales message with an order form. One domain, one product, where the only logical solution is to buy the product or move on. Simple and effective, this model works well with an email solicitation that drives people to the sales message, where they buy the product.
There is a full range of needs when it comes to the "right" amount of pages. There are sites with just a few pages and online retailers with hundreds. The best solution is to determine what it is that you're doing. Are you selling product or gathering leads? Decide if it's leads or final sales that you're after, and take it from there using the guidelines I've set forth above.
Just don't set up a huge web site and have nothing left over to market it. It's the same mistake we find in the dirt world where a business spends everything on fixed assets and no money left for advertising. Such businesses are doomed to fail.
Start with a small site selling a few hot items. Spend twice the amount of dollars marketing it, pushing it, making it go. And if you push really hard, it will go faster and farther than your wildest dreams.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Michael Campbell is the CEO of
Dynamic Media Corp and The
1st Internet Marketing Store and the author of two best
selling e-books, "Revenge of the MiniNet"
and "Clickin' it
Rich". He is also the editor
of The Internet Marketing Secrets Newsletter.
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