Camping In Ontario Update Newsletter June 2019 September 2013 | Page 24

CAMPING IN ONTARIO UPDATE | 24

The Internet May Be King but Print Is Far from Dead
I often advise people that their Web address should be
treated like their second business name. I also tell them
that their URL should be short, memorable, and easy to
spell. Ideally, it is the shortest possible variation of your
actual business name. This advice is based upon the fact
that there are many ways to drive traffic to your website.
Many people think that they build a website, then just sit back and
wait for a flood of new business to be magically generated by Google. Well, it doesn’t quite work that way. If you look at the Google
Analytics for the average website, you will quickly learn that there are
three basic sources of incoming traffic. One is search engines (where
Google and Bing are, for all practical purposes, the only games in
town), another is referring sites (like Go Camping America, your state
campground association, and your local tourism office or chamber
of commerce), and the last is what is referred to as “direct traffic” In
.
many instances, those three broad sources of traffic break down into
equal thirds. In this installment, I would like to concentrate on that
last segment: Direct traffic.
You can have one of the world’s best websites but, without traffic,
it is nothing more than a business with its lights out. People need to
find your business, and whatever it might be, every single potential customer counts. If direct traffic represents a third of your potential with
respect to new business, you cannot afford to turn a blind eye to that
traffic. To start, it helps to know direct traffic’s sources of origin.
Some direct traffic is what is referred to as “type-in” traffic. These
are people who, although they already know your business, are probably not familiar with your website. They simply presume that entering
your business name, followed by .com will take them to your website. (Hopefully for you, that is the case!) This is the argument in favor of
choosing a short, memorable, and intuitive domain name.

Other sources of direct traffic include advertising and listings in
printed directories and publications that reach your clientele. If you
are a campground owner, you simply cannot afford NOT to be found in
your state association directory. These are profe 76