How I launched my website and started promoting it

(The first couple of months, warts and all)

View all blog posts about launching my local web directory.

Background: I’ve been working on a Devon directory with a focus on promoting arts and environmental concerns alongside general clubs, blogs and business listings.

Summary: Once the website got to the point of being presentable enough, I started gradually making it more available, while continuing to work on the site, and beginning to actively promote it. This is how I did that and what happened.

July 2007
Started leaving it online for search engines to index. Created a Google XML Sitemap to help with this and opened a Google Webmaster Tools account.

End of July – Linked to it from a news item on my company site’s home page, offering free advertising to customers.

Mid August – added links to it from my customers’ websites (after asking them of course!)

25/8 Ordered business cards and postcards from

30/8 Applied for affiliate programmes via TradeDoubler and others.

31/8 Added it to my online portfolio of work

Comments with Hindsight:

With hindsight, much more testing was needed before linking to the site from anywhere. However, the budget (0!) did not allow for hiring someone else to test it. I felt that I had tested it thoroughly myself, without realising the extent to which as the developer I had developed blindspots relating to possible ways the site could be used, my own skills and assumptions, my own knowledge of the site’s functioning, and so on. Some of these issues may have been picked up before launching if I had paid or persuaded an outsider to test the site. (I tried persuading several, and that helped me fix several usability issues and bugs early on, but most people I approached, even with offers of freebies, were so busy that most of them never got round to it, and a few did test something, but with the best will in the world, the time a volunteer can offer is minimal (though still useful and appreciated – these few people’s help found the most basic problems early on!).

Without paying for testing, you are in a difficult situation: your earliest visitors are more like guinea pigs than they may realise, and they are unlikely to tell you if anything went wrong unless they are charged for it. I had to figure out many of the early problems using web statistics, and found the visitor tracking provided by my javascript statistics from Statcounter, were the only clues I had to how people used the site and why certain things were going wrong.

Regarding banners, adsense and monetising the site in general, many people advise filling a directory first and then thinking about how to monetise it (others disagree). My own opinion is that if the site is ready enough and the space is there for advertising (without conflicting with usability), you might as well get some professional looking adverts appearing in it, as this demonstrates the advertising potential to other advertisers that could purchase ad space directly (which is very unlikely before the content and visitor numbers are there). There’s also the possibility of earning something, however small: as an example, in the first few months this site made nothing from affiliate commissions, but a small amount began to appear via Google adsense. Around Christmas, we saw a small amount of TradeDoubler and Amazon Associates commissions. None of this is money you would leave in the street, however, it’s clear that the main income from a directory would come from either selling adspace directly or charging either for listings or for some aspect of the listings (featured listings being a common option). For either of these options to attract buyers, a directory needs to reach a critical mass of pages listed and readers visiting (which the pages bring in via search engines). To keep visitors returning, listings must also be of a reliable enough quality to maintain the directory’s good name.

From my own point of view as a web developer / designer, the site has paid for itself far more in providing a more technically advanced addition to my portfolio, a means to offer free advertising to my customers, and an opportunity to learn, gain experience of running a directory, and keep improving on new skills.

So to summarise the earliest stage: if a web project has any kind of budget to spend on it, earmark a large proportion of it for hiring outsiders to test it. Also, get the basics of the site’s earning potential in place – this can always be adjusted later. Install detailed web statistics, so you can get an idea of how people are using the site. After testing, the most important issue for a directory is to get enough quality listings in, while it’s important with any new site to keep a close eye on the visitor statistics in case common problems are preventing potential customers using your site.

The next installment of this blog will discuss the early steps I took to get listings in, and the first experiences with outsiders using the site.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 25th, 2008 at 12:02 pm and is filed under Affiliate Marketing, Directories, Launching a Local Directory, Uncategorized, Website promotion, pay per click advertising. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.