Why You Should Separate Your Information Content From Your Products

So, we all know that content is king in gaining PageRank in Google and attracting people to our websites. For product sellers, that typically means adding articles to your existing product selling website.

That’s the conventional wisdom.

The new wisdom: My internet marketing mentor Alice Seba recently advised a member of her Mom Masterminds group to separate the content (information) from her products, by setting up separate sites.

Her basis for this advice appeared in an article by Bobette Kyle, who wrote that customers have four stages to their decision making process, or buying process:

• Need/Want Recognition
• Information Search
• Evalutation
• Purchase

You need to make sure that your site is attracting visitors who are in the right stage of the buying process. If you are wanting people to purchase products when they arrive, you don’t want to bog them down with lots of information. Conversely, if your visitors are still seeking information, you don’t want to shove Buy It Now buttons in their face.

Once you have your new site up, you fill it with articles that will provide information related to your products — and links back to your sales site for the appropriate products. I also recommend you place a mailing list signup form on this site, so that you can send ecourses and update information to your prospects.

So, how do you accomplish this with the [tag]Shop Kit Plus[/tag]?

The easiest way that involves the least amount of design work and money is to setup a new site on a subdomain of your existing site. This method will get you up and going for the cost of a domain name — and you can scale the customization level to meet your budget needs.

So, you have your Shop Kit Plus installed on your hosting account, which you access with your main domain name. Just purchase the domain name for your information site and set the nameservers to Watersweb’s. Then, login to your cpanel and click the [tag]Addon Domain[/tag] button and follow the directions.

Once you’ve done this, you’ll want to go back to the home page of cpanel, scroll down to the Fantastico button and install Wordpress in your new subdirectory. It’s easy. Just click the link, fill out the form and click the button. (And if you have any questions, just contact the Helpdesk for help.

Once you have Wordpress installed, you’ll be able to access it through the new domain name.

At this point, you can find a free Wordpress theme to install on the site — or you can hire one of our Design Partners to customize the templates. The first way is less expensive, the second way will give you a more customized look.

Now, for the fun part: You need to publish articles on your new weblog, related to your products and that will help your prospects through the process of deciding what to buy.

You can write articles yourself, find free articles online, buy affordable Private Label Articles for moms or hire a ghostwriter. Once you have this setup and a few articles/entries under your belt, start spreading your link around with forum signatures (where available), blog comments and memberships at technorati (for example).