by Jon Wuebben

With the downturn in the economy encompassing nearly every aspect of our lives, businesses large and small are feeling the pinch. MarketingSherpa recently published a survey stating that over 60% of large companies are unceremoniously planning on slashing their marketing budgets significantly this year.

With smaller marketing budgets, companies are hunting for cost-effective, measurable solutions to sagging sales figures. This naturally leads to metric-friendly online marketing in order to generate new prospects and customers. Surprisingly, many sales and marketing heads don’t know enough about the true power of web marketing and the latest tips and tricks to take full advantage of its cost-effective nature. The goal is to recession-proof your online content and marketing.It all starts with a powerful, search engine-friendly website that converts. Companies today need to focus on the words they are using to communicate with their prospects and how they leverage this content in order to maximize their online exposure. In a time when more companies are chasing fewer prospective customers, ensuring your online copy is strong and then accessing the viral nature of the web to get it out there, can put you well on your way.

If you want to begin harnessing the power of cost-effective online marketing, there are 7 quick and easy tips to follow:

1. Embrace the Basics. Web Content 101. Start with the easy stuff. Take a look at your existing copy. What do customers think? Ask their opinion. How is your site performing? If you haven’t done it yet, perform some keyword research and look at your website analytics. Can’t afford it? Use Google Analytics – and then start discovering which content is making a difference and how your visitors are making their way through the site.

2. Expand the Breadth of Your Content. If you’re like most businesses with an online presence, all you have is a website. Five or six years ago, this would have been fine, but online marketing - and the web itself have continued to evolve in that time. Are you writing optimized press releases? How about articles? Do you have a blog? Many businesses publish a monthly newsletter – not a bad idea. Ensure that you leave no stone unturned, there are many forms of web content that you should be actively using. Consider it another way to recession-proof your online content and marketing.

3. Create New Content Directed at Your Existing Customer Base. What are we talking about here? Building that precious relationship with your customers. If you haven’t considered a newsletter or frequent email marketing to your most loyal customers, its time you do. This is money in the bank during a recession. Develop new content and then get it to those who are most likely to respond.

4. Put Together a Content Distribution Strategy. What channels are you using for your online copy? All linking happens because of great content that everyone wants to be a part of. How are you going to get your optimized content out there? Definitely use search engine optimization (SEO) techniques. Seriously consider starting a blog. If you have a product that will sell well, consider an affiliate network. Whatever you do, make sure the copy is benefits-rich, easy to read and asks them to do something.

5. Leverage Your Content. Once you write something, whether its a blog post, a press release, a web page, an article or a white paper, you can use it over and over again. Of course, you don’t want to use it verbatim – change it up here and there so you don’t have duplicate content. The point is this: you have an idea that can make an impact and it needs to be communicated in many different ways. Don’t re-write it every time – leverage it. It’s a great way to recession-proof your online content and marketing.

6. Optimize Your Online Content for Social Media. What is social media optimization (SMO)? SMO focuses on making changes to optimize a site so its more easily linked to, more highly visible in social media searches on custom search engines like Technorati and more frequently included in relevant posts on blogs, podcasts and vlogs. A good way of accomplishing this step is to see what types of content are hot on the social media sites like Digg, Stumble Upon and Facebook, and then submitting this exact content so you can get in the game and maximize response.

7. Make Your Content “Conversion-Friendly” - Ask for the Sale. Make sure that the copy includes specific “calls-to-action” which compel your visitors to the next step in the sale. Are the words “Order Now” found next to your product? Is the phrase “Click here to get your free newsletter” visible anywhere? Add these calls-to-action as they promote the visitor to take a more active and involved approach.
If you have a site that converts visitors into buyers and continually improve the conversion rate, you decrease your cost per acquisition. This means you’re spending less on advertising.

You shouldn’t have to worry too much about recession-proofing your online marketing and content. In fact, if you’re well ranked on the search engines for your keyword phrases, you may not be paying anything. In my new book “Content Rich: Writing Your Way to Wealth on the Web,” I also emphasize a good balance between design and copy and improving usability to impact website conversion. The combination of winning copy, strategic SEO and off-page factors will put your website on the right track to make your business a success – no matter what the economy is doing.

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