Feb. 2008

Promoting Your Amateur Radio Club Website  

If you rely on search engines to be found, you're just another can of beans (and Ham) on the shelf!

In the early days of the Internet I was not surprised to see hundreds of ads like "Your Web Page Seen By 25,000,000 People!" I AM surprised, however, that in 2008, the same ads can be found, only now the number is anywhere from 50 - 100 million viewers of your web page! Let's look at this realistically by comparing your web page and 50 - 100 million people, with your house and the U.S. population of over 300 million people.

Considering the population of the United States, there are over 300 million people that could see your house IF they 1) WANTED to see your house, 2) had the CAPABILITY of seeing your house, and 3) knew the LOCATION of your house. Now, let's compare search engines and phone directories. Let's pretend that you live in Ohio. Open your local phone book and pick out any address. Now, ask yourself, what are the chances that John or Jane Doe in Texas know that the address you are looking at in the Ohio phone book even exists? Zero would be a safe bet. What are the chances that John or Jane Doe in Texas want to see the house in Ohio? Again, zero would be a safe bet.

So, to say that "We'll Make Your Web Page Available To 50 - 100 Million People" is like saying your house is available to over 300 million people. Technically it is, but in reality, only the people who normally drive down your street, or make deliveries, or are actually searching for YOUR house, or are INVITED to your house will ever see it.

Some experts say that 99% of all search engine traffic comes from the 20 largest engines and that there are really only about 300 real search engines and directories to be considered. Now, if 99% of the traffic comes from only 20 places, why would anyone waste time submitting their site to the other 280? It is an absolute waste of time to do so! Even if automatic submission software were used, it still could not be justified.

I read once that celery has "negative" calories. It does have caloric value, but it is very small and you actually burn more calories chewing the celery than the celery had to begin with! This can be compared to submitting your web site to those other 280 search engines and directories. If you were to skip the other 280, and used that time to mail just ten web site announcement postcards, you would probably see more results!

You've seen those ads "Submit Your Site To 2,000 Search Engines & Directories For $19.95". If there are only about 300 real search engines and directories, where did the 2,000 (or 3,000 or 6,000) come from? Most of these are (were) called FFA or "Free For All" link sites. This was a good idea in the beginning, but it didn't last long. The system worked (or works) like this: You visit an FFA site where you can post a link to your web site for free. In exchange, you agree to receive an e-mail from the webmaster containing an ad. Fair exchange, you think. And I think so, too. You might actually read the ad! After all, it's only one ad.

Then came along the automatic submission software. Someone figured out how to load up thousands of these FFA sites and submit their link to all of them at one time. That's great! A link to your web site will be on thousands of the FFA sites for thousands and thousands of people to see! What went wrong? Are you going to read those 2,000 (or 3,000 or 6,000) e-mails that come rushing back at you after you hit the "submit" button? Of course you're not! You couldn't if you wanted to. Soon everyone was using the automatic submission software instead of submitting by hand to one site at a time.

So here we have the problem of FFA directory sites: everyone is submitting, but no one is reading the ads that return, AND no one is actually going to the FFA sites to see the links that are being posted. Since it is all done by automation these days, I doubt if ANY FFA sites are visited by a human anymore! To prove how worthless they have become, a major operator of a well-known FFA chain puts in the instructions that you should get a 'throw-away" email address to deal with all the ads that will be coming your way!

Here's the bottom line on promoting your Amateur Radio web site: If you feel like submitting to them, that's fine. If you don't, that's fine also. When it comes to "Amateur Radio", only the people that you invite to your web page will ever see it. Make this simple test: plug in "Amateur Radio", "Ham Radio ", or some similar term into your favorite search engine and watch the glut of returns you'll get.

Now, ask yourself, how many people in your community, over the next week, will search for "Amateur Radio (your city)"? I think it would be safe to say zero on an average week.

There are really only two ways to promote your web page in your community. The best way is to put your web address in front of people in PRINT! That means your local newspaper and/or "shopper" type publications. The second best way is to publish your club web site address in a local Internet site that you are SURE is POPULAR and VISITED by the locals. But, print is at least 10 times better!

Have you noticed all the TV ads today with major corporations promoting their web addresses? They aren't relying on search engines, and you and I shouldn't either.

73,

WF5TX