A better approach to construction marketing

Statcounter.com provides incredibly comprehensive traffic data -- and it is free.

Last night, in reviewing some of the inbound links to this construction marketing blog (you can gather amazing data about your visitors with most blogging software) I visited a site promoting some Internet marketing scheme where you could, purportedly, be among the one per cent richest people in the world, quickly and easily, by purchasing the "no risk" program.

The video impressed me with its slickness and its various attention-retaining devices to draw the viewer into the story, and to make it seem so believable that of course only a fool would fail to see the value of the offer and part with money to make the dream come true.

Of course, I'm a sceptic about these sorts of things, so even before the  video ended, I had left the site, avoiding the "squeeze offer" when I initially tried to leave the marketer's video page. I used Google to search the offer proponent's name and, within a few minutes, discovered reports from some early clients, knowledgeable Internet marketers, who said there indeed could be some value in the program, but it certainly won't solve every one's problems and is not a magical fix-all solution.

Internet marketers like the video producer say that if you purchase their products, you'll achieve incredible traffic and with that traffic and your slick marketing, you can sell others' works through affiliate deals and make a small (or, more accurately, large) fortune by selling other peoples' work.

Sure . . . anyone can build an Internet marketing site and theoretically reach a sizable percentage of the world's population, virtually instantaneously, but we know that is far from the reality for most of us.  Google, especially, is wary of tricks and gimmicks to build traffic -- if you cross a line, you could be banned to search-engine purgatory.

Of course, architectural, engineering and construction marketers are not really looking for massive amounts of traffic from visitors anywhere in the world.  We are seeking qualified potential clients, and to maintain healthy relationships with current and previous customers.  Unless we are operating a national franchise serving millions of consumers, our markets are largely constrained by geography (the more local the better) or scope (if we are building multi-million dollar theme parks, we don't really want nor need to reach typical consumers in middle-income neighbourhoods.)

A successful blog or site within this industry would probably measure daily traffic in the hundreds, much less likely than the thousands or tens of thousands.

I track traffic and source/nature of visitors through a free (for small numbers) service, Statcounter.com, which allows me to see who is arriving at our sites, and when.

As for dreams of instant wealth, I've discovered that sometimes incredibly wonderful things can happen, but this success is rarely achieved by blindly following an Internet guru's videos showing fancy cars and houses.  It's fine to dream, but it never hurts to keep the real world in perspective in planning our construction marketing.