The benefit of having a website or online store has always been significant for any business, but the impact of both is even greater in today’s world, with the COVID-19 pandemic wreaking havoc on businesses of all sizes — especially those with physical storefronts that may have had to partially or fully close.

Whether you are working on a re-launch of an existing site or the launch of a brand new website, it’s important to follow a few key steps to promote your new site, and make your go-live as successful as possible.

1. Create anticipation with a pre-launch page

It doesn’t matter if you already have an existing website, creating anticipation for a new site is important to keep your customers informed and excited. If you have an existing website, this can be as simple as posting a “Coming Soon” banner or blog post on your current site, promoting the big changes that are coming.

If you are launching a brand new website, put your URL to use with a pre-launch teaser page, detailing when visitors can expect to access your new site. As soon as you are confident in a firm launch date, you could add a fun count-down timer. WordPress has a number of different plugins that can help do this. Additionally, you could add a proactive newsletter sign-up box, so visitors can be notified once your site has gone live.

2. Lure visitors with an enticing offer

If you already have email subscribers or active social media accounts for your business, using those platforms to promote an offer is a great way to lure visitors to your new site. Here are some offers ideas that would work:

• Visit the website and subscribe to the newsletter for % discount
• Free shipping on orders placed by 10pm
• Free access to a downloadable white paper or other high-value content
• Free assessment or estimate when contact details submitted

3. Invest in Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing can be a hugely successful marketing strategy for a lot of B2C and B2B companies, as more people are consuming content produced through social media platforms vs. traditional content like television or magazines.

If it makes sense for your brand, reach out to influencers in your target market and let them know about your site launch, and why they might want to share it with their followers. If you’re not sure where to find the right influencer(s) to network with, read through our post about how to build an influencer marketing strategy or check out some collaboration sites like Buzzsumo or Onalytica.

4. Ready-t0-publish, high-quality content

Before your new site is officially live, you should have 4-5 pieces of ready-to-publish, high-quality content prepared. In addition to your products and services pages, you should try to have a blog or resources section where you can provide relevant, highly valuable content to your new visitors.

Having a few articles already published on the live site will not only make it look more full and professional, but it’s also good SEO practice for search engine ranking. To make you look like the industry expert you are, some starter content could include how-to / tutorial / demo posts, industry FAQs, a video tour of your office or facilities, interviews with your team members, etc.

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Set your new website up for success by following these easy tips to promote your site’s launch (or re-launch). It will be much easier to generate traffic if you’ve done a little proactive work to generate interest and anticipation.

Image Credit: SpaceX on Unsplash