One of our clients has a couple of mirco-sites … mini-websites with their own URL … and this is one of them: http://www.stratford-avonsecurity.co.uk/
If you conduct a little research using Google, you’ll find there’s quite a lot of information about micro-sites, but it can be confusing and inconclusive. There are three main reasons for this:
- Some of the information is several years old, and Internet search has moved on
- All of it is based (or even biased) on the opinions of the writer
- No one knows the search engine algorithms
Perhaps it would be a good idea to ask why anyone might want a micro-site.
Link-building
This is NOT a good reason for having micro-sites, and the search engines (Google in particular) don’t like link-building schemes which try to artificially improve results. Thumbs down for this one.
Chasing keyword optimisation
Why not have a website dedicated to a particular search term or keyword? Perhaps, but is there a reason for not just having a dedicated page on the main website? There could be genuine reasons why you might want to separate out different aspects of your business (and thus your keywords). But it should be more than just targeting search terms … think about the benefits (or otherwise) to your human visitors.
Product or service differentiation
Picking up on this point in the previous section, if you are launching a new product or service you might want to consider a separate domain and website. If you are moving into a new geographic area, it can be important you’re seen as a company with local connections (in which case you may benefit from a local office too).
Special offers and promotions
This is used by big businesses as part of large promotional campaigns. It could be used to launch a new car, breakfast cereal, or movie.
Making it work
OK. So you’ve decided a micro-site fits with what you want to achieve, how do you make it work? Just building the site and hoping the search engines and visitors will find you isn’t going to work any time soon.
We often find websites left dangling in the ether because they are not integrated into a marketing campaign or strategy. So, create new incoming links from relevant sites to relevant content, but make sure it is relevant. You’ll also need to perform all the other marketing activities associated with a new product or service offering.
Then check the stats … is it working? … what changes can you make? … review and modify.
Some of the better resources I found on line are:
B2Web: Are Microsites Effective? Microsite Best Practices for Small Businesses
Spark Report: The 7 most important principles about Microsites
