Many people mistakenly believe putting up a website is marketing.

FACT: Websites need to be marketed so likely customers will visit them.

Many people mistakenly believe offering items on a website is sales.

FACT: You can have lots of traffic and still not make sales.

How will you build your website's sales? And what will you pay?

Assuming you have a good product, and a market exists for your product, you will need to add online sales and
marketing expertise to your webbusiness.

You have 3 options.

1. Hire a full-time Internet Sales Marketing Director.

Description: He or she understands how to attract and keep customers. Manages budgets and people, sets goals and
evaluates performance.

Pros: Knows how to build sales. Can have industry-specific experience and contacts, which may give your firm an
advantage. The best will have extensive online sales marketing experience.

Cons: A huge investment, which makes this option only available to larger firms.

Cost: It varies by experience and where your business is located. According to Salary.com, a sales and marketing
director position can command $96,000/year in Chicago, $107,000/year in Boston and $103,000/year in San Diego.

2. Contract with an online sales marketing specialist.

Description: These consultants have built up web-specific selling expertise. He or she is fully versed in attracting potential customers and converting them into buyers. Can
develop a sales and marketing plan, prepare budgets, implement the plan and adjust it as needed.

Pros: Should be able to tell you how to get the most impact for your marketing dollars. Will first determine what needs to be done, then is connected to the copywriters, webdesigners, search engine specialists and the necessary online tools.

Cons: May only be experienced in one area. For example, he may only be experienced in search engine placement
and unaware of other tactics that would work especially well for your particular business.

Cost: Prices vary depending on the consultant and the size of your website. You can have a website tuneup done starting at a few hundred dollars.

3. Do-it-yourself
Description: You can help yourself to free resources online or you can buy a book. The two top-sellers are the ebook
Make Your Site Sale by Ken Evoy, and the 2-binder set, The Internet Marketing Course by Corey Rudl. There are also books available focused on search engines positioning,
copywriting, traffic-building and more. A list of links to these resources is available at
http://www.jawdrop.com/resources.html

Pros: Inexpensive and fast access to information from people who are succeeding at selling online. Many times these books contain specific info and lots of examples.

Cons: Even if you read the materials completely, the next challenge is implementation and accurate evaluation of the results. For example, a website owner may try a pay-per-click ad. If it fails to build sales, he may think
"pay-per-clicks don't work", when an expert may see that it was the ad itself that failed, or that the ad pulled traffic but the website itself is hindering sales.

Cost: $0 - $397 plus time to get up to speed.

To get sales and marketing expertise, you can spend nothing to over a hundred thousand dollars.

Sales and marketing help for your website is out there. Reach out and get some now.

About the Author
Raynay Valles is an online marketer who turns non-performing websites into websites that sell. Email her now at rvalles@jawdrop.com or visit http://www.jawdrop.com