My website bears most of the marketing weight for my business. Here's a list of the things it does for me:
- Helps me get found by new clients by being well search engine optimized. The system that I created to help small businesses get good ranking on the search engines is here: <a href="http://www.howtoraiseyourranking.com/" target="_blank">http://www.howtoraiseyourranking.com/</A>
- Helps me grow my list of prospects through my Stand Out! Newsletter here: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/newsletter-branding.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/newsletter-branding.html</A>
- Helps me keep in touch with past clients through the same newsletter
- Explains my processes for logo and web design: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/process-design.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/process-design.html</A>
- Acts as my professional portfolio (and is easier for me to update than a printed version): <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/portfolio.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/portfolio.html</A>
- Helps me get the occasional speaking gig: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/about-Erin-Ferree-speaking.html">http://www.elf-design.com/about-Erin-Ferree-speaking.html</A>
- Helps me to handle the requests for quotes that are constantly coming in without doing any additional work or estimate writing. This is great for giving people a rough idea of costs for business or marketing planning. <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/quoteCMP.php" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/quoteCMP.php</A>
- Provides clients and prospects with my contact information:<a href="http://www.elf-design.com/contact.html" target="_blank">
- Gives me a place to publish my thought leadership, both in this blog and here: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/articles.html">http://www.elf-design.com/articles.html</A>
- The articles section also allows me to communicate with journalists who might be writing articles on design, and I've been featured in many publications because of that.
- Acts as a shopping cart for both services: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/packages.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/packages.html</A>
- And products: < a href="http://www.elf-design.com/products.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/products.html</A>
- Lets me show my personality through showcasing recipes, paintings, photos, and t-shirts I've designed: <a href="http://www.elf-design.com/fun.html" target="_blank">http://www.elf-design.com/fun.html</A>
As you can see, it does a lot more than being just pretty – and handles some assistant-level tasks, PR tasks, and publishing tasks for me. It also helps extend my brand and helps me find clients. Not too bad for some HTML code, right?
