Now that I’ve got WordPress set up and I’ve bought a template lets upload my new theme.

First thing I am going to do is ftp into the site using FileZilla. I’ll then go to my wp-content folder and look for the folder called themes and I will upload my new theme into this folder.

Once this is done I will go to my sources folder and look for my plugins and upload those.

Then I’ll upload my folder called uploads. As I upload these folders I will look for folders already named uploads and plugins and just add these to what is already online in those folders now.

Once this is done I will go into my sources folder and upload then theme sql. But before I do that I will need to replace the current URL with the URL for my site.

Sorry about the spainsh but that says replace all.

Now I’ll go into cpanel by adding cpanel to the end of my domain name.

And I’ll look for phpMyAdmin and click on that link.

I’ll then find and upload my new database.

And now my website should look and feel exactly like the theme I just bought.

I’m going to take you through the steps I would take if I was starting a business from scratch.

On the Internet there’s nothing written in stone and everything is constantly changing. So everything that follows from this point on is nothing more than my opinion of how I would set up a business online.

With that being said I’ve been making my total living online for the last 10 years and have had projects that were really successful and projects that were total failures. In most cases the difference between the ones I made money from and the ones I lost money on was the amount of time I was willing to put into the project.

Let’s get started;

Due to the current power of Google it’s important that you build a website and set it up so that it ranks well in Google. About the only way I know how to explain this is to you is to do it and write the steps I would take to get it done, as I do it.

I will be referring to my website designedtorank.com as I do this but will be explaining and showing you how to set up a web business in the brand management industry. When selecting a keyword, I do select words with 10,000 and up global monthly searches and I do not care about competition.

Step 1

1) The idea is to rank for the keyword brand management

2) You put the keyword in Google and do a search.

3) You look for “brand management” in bold.

4) You want to know how many exact matches there are in the top 10.

5) Then do a search for (inanchor) type in this: inanchor:”brand management”

This will show you websites that have the most anchor text using the keyword brand management.

You then compare websites that rank in the search results, with the website’s from the inanchor results and if they are the same this tells you there is going to be a lot of competition for that keyword.

The sites that show up on both pages are my real competition.

This tells me that every website that is ranking for Brand management not only has the word brand management in the content of the site but are also the same sites that have the most anchor text pointing at them.

There is a lot of competition for this keyword but that’s a good thing.

Step Two: Domain Selection

It’s time to make a decision. Do you want to build a website for the search engines and try and use an exact match domain name or do you want to use a name you have already have set aside for branding purposes?

While exact match domain names do help you rank it is by far not the most important aspect in ranking.

For example I am using designedtorank.com and I am going to rank it for brand management. While the extension does not have an effect on ranking unless it is a country specific extension I would still try to go with a .com for branding purposes.

Step Three: Build a Website

1. Set up hosting and turn the name servers to point to that host. I prefer Host Gator and the hosting company is an important step in all this. I had a Spanish hosting company block the search engines from seeing my sites one time to save on bandwidth.
2. I love WordPress and I am going to use it for the backend so let me walk you through the steps really fast to set up a WordPress CMS.
   1. You need to add Cpanel after the domain name if you are set up with a hosting company that uses Cpanel, example: designedtorank.com/cpanel.
   2. Enter the password and login you got from the hosting company and you should land on a page that looks like this. At the bottom of the page look for Fantastico De Luxe
   3. 

Click Fantastico De Luxe and you should then land on a page that looks like this.

Now look for WordPress in the left hand Column and click the link.

Now you should land on a page that looks like this and you want to click on New Installation.

Now you should be on a page that looks like this and you want to fill in all the highlighted fields with the password and user name you want to use for your login information.

Click the Install WordPress button and you should end up on a page that looks like the one below.

Click Finish installation and go to your website.

Now…you should see this when you get to your website.

Bottom right hand corner click the Log in button and you are now in the back office, just enter the password and login you used when setting up the site.

I am going to get a cup of coffee and then we will continue on to the website design and optimizing the site for the search engines.

When the internet first began to grow in popularity, it was generally thought to be a means of connecting people from around the world, to share data and information, and to improve communication. As these things became second nature, big businesses grabbed onto the notion of the internet and took it to a whole new level. Soon every major corporation had an online presence, and even the most traditional businesses were forced to embrace the new technology. With millions of people on the web every day, and the internet now a trillion dollar industry, it would be foolish not to try and harness this new technology to your advantage.

Businesses use to think that the internet could only be utilized by large companies with huge marketing budgets. In 2000, millions of dollars were spent on advertising in hopes of driving people online, to make purchases. However at that time the internet wasn’t able to accommodate such huge spending. Suddenly everything fell apart, and in the wake of the dot com crash, it seemed everyone would struggle to make money online.

Over the last few years, however, things have changed dramatically. Technology has improved, the internet has become more popular, and big businesses are now much better placed to harness the power of the internet. It is now the time for a new generation, that of the small business owner.

Everyone uses the internet and is familiar with search engines. Because of this, there is less emphasis on being a household name, and as long as you have a strong online presence, someone is going to find your business. As more and more people search for local businesses, rather than major chains, there is clear potential to dramatically increase your businesses income.

There are various ways you can do this, and we’ll look at the different marketing strategies that can be used to take your business to the next level. There’s a ton of consumers out there who want to find your product or service, and the internet is the best way for them to find you. If you can build a stronger online presence than your competitors, you’ve won a major battle and can look forward to a profitable future as your business grows.

Every day, new people discover the internet, and they could be right next door. Instead of only being used by college students and the younger generation, the internet is now a powerful tool to find almost any customer base you could think of.

Building an online presence

Your first port of call when building your online presence to build a website to showcase your business. This is where you set the foundation for everything else you do. It’s about proving to people that your business can be trusted, and the best way to do that is not to fill your website with boring copy and an uninteresting history of your company. If you look at big businesses, they have all realized this; they have to appeal to a number of different audiences. Therefore, they’ve created much more diverse websites that generally speak in a slightly more informal tone, in order to build trust.

As we can see from the graph below, building your website can have a fantastic effect on your potential customers.

Harnessing the search engines

The most popular way for someone to find a website is by going through a search engine. Google is the most popular, so it’s important to target their results more than other search engines. Here are some incredible stats about search engines that you may not know:

• 75% of Americans use search engines on a regular basis.
  
• 56% of all Americans use one every single day.
  
• 40% of all search engine searches are for local businesses and services.
  
• 54% of Americans regularly use the internet instead of the phone book to find local services
  
• 92% of all local searches will eventually convert into a sale
  

The whole search engine industry used to be about very short “keywords” that would lead people to finding the website they were looking for. Everyone use to simply type things like “web designers” into a search engine, check out the first few results and then make a decision.

However, these days consumers are becoming much better at searching with Google, so keywords have progressively become longer in order to return more relevant results. For example, instead of “web designers” which may give us some good websites for that keyword, we might be looking for something a little more specific. We might type “Best New York Web Design Company”. The reason we would do this is because we’re fed up searching through websites that don’t offer the services we are looking for. Instead of just searching for a product or service, people now search for a niche products or services in a particular area. This means that, instead of massive chains dominating the search results, small business websites are flourishing.

Local Internet Marketing is something that requires a great deal of experience and expertise. Without it, you simply aren’t going to know how to get found on the front page of Google when someone is searching for your product or service. The competition won’t be that fierce considering you will be competing for more specific keywords, but you’ll still need to be able to get in front of consumers to succeed. And once your website starts getting traffic you will need to be able to convert that traffic into sales.

With more people moving towards local searches, you’re going to need to target your Internet Marketing to specific keywords in your area. If you fail to do this, you’ll be competing with the major players in your industry nationally, and it’s a battle you almost certainly won’t win. The graph below shows the massive increases the local search industries.

Building a captive audience

When local customers start searching for products or services in their area, they will most likely be very clear of their intentions. They are generally ready to buy. One of the most powerful parts of internet marketing is the ability to build a relationship with someone without ever having spoken to them directly. By building a website that is tweaked and optimized daily, you can be sure to reach a wide ranging audience, all of whom will be interested in your products or services.

As we can see from the graph below, the internet is an incredibly effective way of selling your product to a potential customer. Never before have businesses been able to communicate so well with their potential customers.

Being found on the internet

People use the internet in very diverse ways, and you can’t possibly hope to capture every single person who might be looking for a product like yours. However, you can make it extremely easy for people to find your business by being all over the internet. With all the different ways of receiving information, there are limitless possibilities for marketing your website on the internet. Whether this is in the form of social media marketing, search engine optimization, or videos you’re sure to find people who are looking for your product or service.

Internet marketing is about being “found” online by people who are looking for your products or services. They will be looking for what you are selling, so you have to make it as easy as possible for them to find you. And once they find you, your website needs to be set up to convert them into a paying client. Done correctly there’ll be a flood of people wanting to do business with you.

Conclusion

As we can see from the graph below, the internet is dominating the way that people find local businesses. The graph shows the breakdown for the primary source of finding local business information:

As we’ve seen throughout this article, the internet is taking over as the way we do business. If you embrace it now, your business will survive and probably flourish even in the most difficult times. All of the data and statistics should tell you everything you need to know, and given that local search has only become truly popular in the last few years; it is likely to grow even more in the future. While there are lots of ways of building an online presence most websites still fail to succeed.

People who make money with their websites don’t do so by stumbling around online. Making money and losing money are a direct effect of the path you follow.

I love my neighbors!

I’ve got the best neighbors. The other day they were in the mall and saw a cake. They decided it looked like something my husband and I would enjoy so they purchased it and asked the store to wrap it up. As they entered the subdivision they asked the guard to deliver it to my house. I was glad it was the guard that was delivering it and not the neighbors because I didn’t have anything to give them in return.

It’s a terrible feeling to accept a present and only have a thank you to give in return. I knew I had to make a trip to the mall and purchase something for them. Don’t get me wrong, I know they purchased the present out of love and fun, but it still created a feeling of being obligated to return the favor. With a gift of equal or greater value. I even opened the present to make sure I didn’t buy something of less value. When someone gives you a present it obligates you to return the favor. You will continue to feel obligated until the favor is returned, even years later. The only way to remove the feeling of being obligated is to do something for them of equal or greater value.

Swapping gifts and favors is what makes us human. It’s necessary for our survival. If you give someone food, shelter, money, a gift or even a favor, it will cause that person to fell indebted to you. The only reason you are here now is because your ancestors shared their food, shelter and skills an honored their obligations. When you give someone a gift you trigger a feeling of being indebted. The only way to get rid of this feeling is to respond and return the gift or favor. Sometimes you can ignore these feelings, but they will linger. It could take years for you to act on them but the feelings will remain until you return the gift or favor with something of equal or higher value.

If you return a gift of lesser value it will leave you with a feeling of an unpaid debt. So, in most cases you are going to have given something of higher value than the original gift.

There was some research done in 1976. They sent Christmas cards to total strangers and not only did they get a large number sending cards back to them, but these people (who were total strangers) continued to send Christmas cards many years after the experiment was over.

This works in the real world for making money.

Think about it like this; you are working in a room with another person. The bell rings and its break time. Your team mate leaves the room and you remain in the room. As break ends your team mate returns to the room and tells you he bought you a Coke. He hands you the Coke and both of you return to work. At the end of the day as you are getting ready to leave your team mate walks up to you and ask you to buy a lottery ticket. He goes on to explain that he’s selling them in hopes of winning a prize. You are already obligated to buy the ticket because of the Coke he gave you earlier. And we all know how hard it is to say no to a gift!

This person obligates you to buy a $5.00 raffle ticket with a .50 cent can of Coke.

They did that experiment!

Half of the time Joe offers the soda. The other half he doesn’t. The results?

When Joe brings you a soda you’re twice as likely to purchase a raffle ticket as when Joe doesn’t bring you a soda. You feel that you have to buy the ticket because he gave you a gift even though the raffle ticket cost a lot more than the soda.

It is difficult to say no to a gift.

BUT NOT every time you give someone a gift does it obligate them!

Let’s say you have an e-commerce website that offers free shipping on orders over $175.00. This does not make me feel obligated to you because you are forcing me to spend a certain amount of money to receive your gift. A true gift has no strings attached.

Okay, here is an example of what I could do with my web design company. When someone decides to take that first step and contact us we could immediately have certain steps we take to remove the more likely to buy buyers from the less likely to buy buyers. A serious of emails that we use to decide how serious someone is, once we have a list of people we feel could buy we begin contacting them and trying to get a better understanding of their business. We take information and decide if it sounds like something worth messing with and how likely the salesman feels the potential client is to make a purchase. If the salesman wants to move forward then the salesman and designer work together to put together a website that has that WOW!
factor.

I know what you’re thinking; this looks like a big experience. And it could be!

But the question is can the expense be paid for by the increase in sales that we create by giving a gift to our clients? Of course it goes a lot further than that. We are forcing our salesman to interact with the customers on a higher level because they have one chance to get it right. We are forcing our designers to take our ideas and knowledge and giving them full range to put together a mind blowing experience for the client.
This means we are able to take both our business and our clients business to a whole new level. We are able to take 10 years of online marketing, search engine optimization, website design, and website conversion and put it into a website with all the bells and whistles it needs to make it successful. The question is will the increase in sales be enough to pay for the gift?

We also save money on refunds by identifying problems before money has exchanged hands. Another bonus is that we’ve worked so hard with the client on the preliminary design that we should be able to nail it the first time out. If the client accepts the design they immediately pay the deposit, we make a couple tweaks and the programmers start programming. The website should be functioning and ready to go online within 24 hours. The client pays the balance and the website goes live. Done correctly this would allow you to create a backend and try and sell clients on another service like search engine optimization, online marketing, or social media marketing just to name a few but all those ideas are built off giving away one free gift.

No, this doesn’t guarantee someone’s going to purchase from you, but it does increase your chances.

You’ll notice when you are online that a lot of websites try to get you to do a survey after any kind of interaction with the site. I personally would not do a survey of any kind due to the amount of information that can be gained from statistics and split testing, why hassle a client to find out what you already know?

But if you want to hassle a client just to hassle them, then here is something to think about.

Wilson in 1993 studied people who buy posters;

• Group 1 listed what they liked and didn’t like about five posters.
  
• Group 2 did nothing.
  

After it was over, each person got to pick a poster to take home. Two weeks later someone contacted them to see how happy they were with their posters. Group 2, who didn’t do anything, was happier with their choices than those in group 1 that studied their posters before taking them home.

I went shopping with my mother-in-law not long ago and we spent hours looking for the perfect purse. About a week after that I called and asked how she liked it and she said she hated it. We had spent so much time studying all the purses that we had forgotten to look at the most important part, the inside pockets.

Another study was done in 2005 where they brought each person into a room and showed them a computer screen of posters and then put them into one of 2 groups.

• In the first group people were told to look at each poster and make a list of the things they liked and didn’t like about each poster. When they finished they were allowed to pick one of the posters to take home.
  
• In the second group they worked on task that had nothing to do with the posters and when they finished they were allowed to pick one poster to take home.
  

And like the first study two weeks later they called to see how they liked their choices and found that the first group was not as happy about their choices as the second group.

The more time you spend filling out surveys that allow you to analyze the business the more likely you are to become unhappy with purchase.