This marketing tactic could prove very useful for integrating in to your marketing plan. Let’s look at what it can do for you.
First, I should probably share what a microsite is incase we have some readers unfamiliar with this term. Our friends at Wikipedia define it this way: a microsite — sometimes called a mini-site or weblet —“is an Internet web design term referring to an individual web page or cluster of pages which are meant to function as an auxiliary supplement to a primary website.” This means, to me, that the site isn’t like your home site, it’s different, but just like your home site it needs a purpose. It should have a goal and it’s own campaign around how you’ll drive traffic, how you’ll measure your success and how long this site will live.
Microsites can play a big role in helping your home site and your brand as a whole. They can be very effective at helping you launch a new product or using the site to run a specific contest or training. With anything in your marketing bag of tricks, you just need to make sure you have a plan for it. Some examples of some successful microsite would include Coca-Cola when it launched the my rewards site. I think they launched this almost five years ago and it’s still going strong.
One of my personal favorite reasons to use a microsite is that it’s more flexible. Lots of companies and brands have their standards for what they will or won’t do on a website. Luckily for most of us, a handbook hasn’t been written on what you are or are not allowed to do on a microsite (let’s keep that trend going!). You can probably get away with a little more fun or a litte more use of visual stimulation or maybe even some interactive element on a microsite that you may not be permitted to try on a home site.
Think of how you can mix in a microsite to your marketing effort (actually, I have eight ideas for you over on our Silver Square blog) and set your plan in place. If you have launched a microsite, share your wins and learnings!
Founder of Silver Square, Raquel Richardson is an urban wannabe, lover of wine and mother of two cupcake-eating boys. Her business talents started at a young age and bloomed a bit more while enrolled at Butler University. Catch her on Twitter, LinkedIn or keep up with their company on Facebook.