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Hi Tom,
First to website marketing:
Who is your target market on your site? With the colors and graphics, I assume women? From your previous posts, it sounds like that is correct, but wanted to check.
Also, what is your ideal clients' greatest need/pain? This is what should be indicated on your main headline on your home page.
Then, on every page, whether it's about your services, or even the contact page, you want to address that topic from your reader's point of view. HOW does training services help them with their problems? Even your about you page (which I address below) will come from the perspective of helping them with THEIR issues.
Still another two ways to draw traffic to your site is to write articles and submit to article submission sites and to create a blog. One example of where you can send articles to is www.amazines.com. To create a blog, you can literally set one up on Wordpress.com and you're up and running. Then link that blog to your website.
So, we could go on all day long about marketing strategies, but I think some resources might be the most helpful to you right now:
First of all, Wordpress offers some free search features, then they offer VERY affordable options for going further in SEO. Here is my affiliate link to them. Before I hired out my sites, I did them all myself and had spent HOURS learning this stuff (like Christina): http://www.meg-enterprises.com/compo...atid,23/id,25/
Without spending much/any money, you can literally do a Google search on SEO and get tons and tons and tons of information.
As mentioned in a few other posts, today, you want to create a contact list of potential clients. People need to get to know you a bit before they're willing to hire you. Especially women hiring a man for training, Tom. So, I see two things that are missing on your site; a newsletter subscription option and an 'about Tom' page.
A great option for an autoresponder is Aweber. Grin; here's another affiliate link: http://www.aweber.com/?215581
I LOVE Aweber, but because I also now have a shopping cart, I had to change to 1shoppingcart.com. They're fine, too, but Aweber has excellent customer support. Then you can put a web form on your site (not that hard) and people can sign up for any contact information you wish to send them. It's time consuming to write a newsletter, but it can be VERY simple at first, and it's essential to create that ongoing contact. I literally have had people subscribe to my newsletter for years, and when they're ready for coaching, they know more about me than I could have imagined! These people are VERY 'qualified' clients!
Then you have to create an about you page, Tom. Today this is what many, many people want to check out before contacting you. Even if your potential client lives next door.
Something else to consider is my ebook, "Websites Made Easy, Quick and Affordable" at http://www.websitesmade-easy.com/. What makes this ebook unlike others is it not only explains how to set up your own site (which you have), and helps readers create search/decision criteria when they are ready to hire someone, but it also walks you through how to write your text for your home page and about you page (which is CRITICAL!).
Now for the marketing in general:
You have to get out there. People have to see you. Until it fits into your budget, don't spend money on an ad in the paper, unless you can find a great deal. However, since the average number of times a person has to see an ad before they'll respond to it is VERY high, it's not the best ROI (return on investment). Literally, when I was still training and ran an ad in the paper of my target area, I had people (MORE than just a few) call me and say, 'I've had your ad on my refrigerator for a year, now, and after seeing it in the paper today, decided it was time to call.'
A better approach would be to see if you can either write a weekly column in your local paper or find a local reporter who you can create a relationship with, so YOU can be the go-to person for topics related to health. Being interviewed in a local paper will definitely lead to your phone ringing! Works every time.
Join local professional groups; chamber, Toastmasters (as we discussed before), etc. Get involved in these groups and develop those relationships (again). Become the person everyone thinks of when they think of fitness and personal training. Be the fitness professional, NOT just the local personal trainer.
OK, as usual, I can go on, but time to get back to finance school work!
Oh, and one more self-promotional thing: My book definitely can help address many of these marketing issues. PLUS, I am currently taking registration for the first 10-month teleclass series that walks people through the entire process of building their business from 'ho hum' (or just the dreaming stage) to really earning an income they can be proud of BY June, 2009. To read more about the teleclass, go to this link: http://californiabasedpublishing.com...nt/view/17/31/
Margie
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