The average webpage only attracts 1 or two unique visitors a day from the search engines, and most surfers click away in less than 60 seconds. The average page takes about 30-40 seconds to load. It's difficult to sell something to the one or two visitors that see your website for only a few seconds.
Most webmasters invest most or all of their promotional efforts on the main entrance page assuming that the main page will drive the traffic to the other pages. This approach may work somewhat on one or two page mini-sites selling a single product but this strategy leaves out the most important reason people use the Internet in the first place, to find free and useful information on a subject of interest.
A better Approach - Give Then Ask When surfers type a keyword into a search engine, they are in essence asking a question. Each page's content should answer that previously identified potential question within your defined market segment. Your page's title, description and keywords from your Meta tags are displayed in the search engine results pages. Unless your individual page stands out to attract the click you will not get any visitors, so the first task is to strategize to attract that first click. This is easiest done in choosing compelling and highly targeted content for the webpage.
If you sell more than one product your main index page by definition usually will not have the narrow focus required to attract the traffic you need. The philosophy I use is to give first - then ask for the sale. Only after you have satisfied a need or desire have you earned the right to ask for something in return.
Like it or not, the Internet is first and foremost an information medium. People use the Internet to find information and the most specific information will attract more clicks. Each individual webpage should have a specific purpose, a defined goal, and unique content focusing as narrowly on a targeted visitor's need or desire for information.
Marketing By Attraction There is an old saying that entertainers have employed for years. "Leave them wanting more" Using free and compelling content you can gain your visitor's trust and earn credibility before you offer to sell something. The advantage of employing content-based marketing is you can address a much bigger percentage of a narrower market segment.
You don't want to confuse or mislead your prospects, so make sure you give them the information that attracted them in the first place. Rather than putting the sales pitch directly into your page's content, I prefer to link directly to the sales letter separating the content from the sales pitch.
In addition, because content driven websites are able to attract more targeted traffic they are natural places to sell advertising or place banner ads. I have found that as long as the advertising is distinctly separated from the content it is usually well received.
Link it Up With A Template If you promote several individual pages that are linked to your main page you will attract more traffic than you would by just promoting your main page alone. Each page should offer links to all your more important pages. This improves your visibility and credibility and demonstrates you are willing to serve as well as receive. People crave support and naturally want to support their sources. Developing a common webpage template helps establish your brand. Your template also makes navigation easier. Adding a site search engine helps as the your website grows bigger.
Using The Efforts Of Others
You don't have to develop all the content on your own. You can co-operate with others in your niche by offering to publish the content of others in your niche on your website and including a resource box and links back to their websites. Better yet, you can trade your own compelling content with others. Publishing the content of others and trading content is a win-win proposition. You earn more credibility, offer better solutions and become both a better resource and a destination in the process. Trading resource links with others in your niche helps boost your "link popularity" over time earning higher placements in the search engines for all of your website and especially for the main pages linked on all your content pages.
Success Rarely happens Overnight
Using content-based marketing over time, you can drive highly targeted traffic to your main page and to each product or service you offer. Most likely they will bookmark your pages and will want to return for more information or in the future. If you offer a newsletter or opt-in mailing list you will also earn more subscribers. It follows that if you can build many doorways into your site. Each page generates a few highly targeted visitors every day. You end up getting many times more traffic than you otherwise might have attracted to your main index page. This technique will also work to drive traffic to your one or two page mini-sites. Each page will attract more traffic and will earn higher placements in the search engines because of the narrower focus. Using this strategy, in five years I have grown from a couple of visitors a day to averaging well over 5,000 visitors a day, and the quality of the traffic generated gets better as time goes on.
You can see an example of template driven content on Internet marketing at the following URL. http://smithfam.com/search.html