Of Relevance

So I have this little online project on the side, www.click.co.za (it is a collection of user generated reviews and ratings on e-commerce shops in South Africa) and now I need to promote the site to gain maximum exposure.

The trick, of course, is to do so with minimum (or ideally zero) cost. Luckily, the venture is online and not on some street corner downtown, so in theory it shouldn’t be too difficult.Also, the audience is geographically targeted.

I am going to keep a brief log of all my ideas and the results they generate, and will gladly collect all your suggestions too.

Off the top of my head, here are some methods that are free or negligible that can be used to market online ventures.

Twitter: a good place to get initial feedback from a tech-savvy crowd. Also good for generating ideas, and creating the initial push for “viral” posts.

A blog: The foundation of any good online campaign. This can be in the form of an independent post (like this one), or a dedicated blog for the online venture (I have one of those too. You can subscribe here). You can ask others to blog about your venture for you, or guest blog it on other blogs yourself. Blog posts can be propagated using Digg and a (countless) number of other tools.

Facebook: Good for spreading news, links to blog posts, etc. Groups are quite powerful if used correctly, becasue they draw targeted eyeballs to your message. Facebook applications are also an option.

Comments on other blogs. If well written and relevant to the blog post and your online project, they can draw good traffic to your site.

SEO: Search engine optimization. Powerful way to get a completely new yet targeted audience audience. With a bit of careful planning and simple guidelines, you can ensure that your site appears in top search results (for free) when people search for relevant topics.

WOM: Simple word of mouth, propagated by the above tools.

Visual and Audio Media like Youtube, podcasts etc. These can help a message spread virally in a very short period of time.

Each of the above methods can fill a book on the exact how-to’s and when-to’s and best practice. Luckily none of it is new to me, so I can launch right into it. And of course, I am not going to limit myself to online PR only.

It has been suggested that a new online website should double its traffic every two weeks. I am not sure how correct this is, or for how long this applies. But I will be sure to keep a neat record of stats, so I can draw (and share) my own conclusions.

Any other suggestions?

So the Ideacamp that I am organising with Innovation Hub is going full steam ahead, and is on schedule for Monday.  The GIBS MBA students are attending, and we need about 15 online “techies” to participate as well.

If you have an idea for an online venture and need money to get it going, it is worth your while to attend this!

The event is on Monday, 2pm -5 pm at the Innovation Hub, Pretoria. Sign up here.

Here is a quick synopsis:

“The Innovation Hub, together with the University of Pretoria and Ideabank, will host the first Ideacamp for online entrepreneurs on the 3rd of November from 14h00 to 20h00 at The Innovation Hub in Pretoria. Do you have an idea for the next successful online application and only need to align yourself to a killer team consisting of marketing, business and “geek” brains to make it happen?

Then you cannot miss this opportunity! The Ideacamp has been established to help make your business idea a reality.This forum will address issues relevant to launching online applications with global potential. Topics of discussion will include:

* Innovation, revenue models, African potential
* Incubation, angel funding, venture funding, developing on a shoestring
* Choosing the best development platform for your application
* Creating the right strategy and putting together the best team

The second phase of the Ideacamp, dubbed Business Beat, helps structure teams that will compile a business plan and demo model of an online application with revenue potential. Each team will then present their concept to a number of pre-approved venture capitalists to contend for funding. The best three teams will be eligible for space into The Innovation Hub’s Business Incubator to fully develop their application.

Business Beat is scheduled for the beginning of 2009; it is a prerequisite that applicants interested in Business Beat attend the Ideacamp in November 2008.

Interested parties must sign up on http://ideacamp.pbwiki.com/Sign+Up+List or contact Eve Dmochowska at eved@ideabank.co.za or visit http://ideacamp.pbwiki.com for more information or to view the programme.”