What is a microsite? well it is a small website (sometimes called a minisite or weblet) focusing on one part of a businesses services of products. It could be a big eCommerce site has a new brand it wants to feature and draw more attention too, or a special event or promotion that is the focus of the microsite. They may also target a specific customer groups, presenting information to the chosen target audience group in a very exact way.

In the most basic it is a small website, they can be temporary or permanent they are usually independent from the main site and have their own URL but linked to a larger website or brand. It is targeted to achieve a specific purpose, brand awareness, information gathering or just highlighting one (or a few) of a brands products.

Microsites offer you the chance to try something new

Microsites give you the opportunity to be more fun or creative than the main site, they can incorporate Facebook, email marketing and advertising campaigns and offer customers another way to engage with your brand or product.

They can also offer you the chance to test out interest or effectiveness of certain ways of presenting the product or service, so you know what is most likely to work on your main website. They also can just be dropped if they are found not to be effective, without any detriment to your main website or brand.

Like any website they need to be designed well, they are small but they need to carry the information the viewer is looking for, they need to be visually engaging and carry over the branding and links to the rest of the brand and main site.

The benefits of a microsite

One of the main benefits of a microsite is that it can deliver they information very targeted to a specific target audience. Visitors will stay on your site longer if they find the information they are looking for, they don’t want to wade though categories and sub categories for it, they just want to see the information they are interested in. Microsites make this possible.

In addition to this they offer SEO benefits, creating content on a specific topic or product should rank highly in searches, which could drive traffic to your products and services both on the microsite and on your main site too. Each link to your website is beneficial to your search engine optimisation and therefore your search ranking.

Another plus is that a small site can be set up rapidly to capture a new trend and direct searches to you.

Recently I have set up a few microsites for a tiling company in Harrogate, creating small websites, visually similar to the main site but focusing on specific product lines, these microsites give the products an enhanced presentation and boost for the search algorithms and more of a chance to show up when searched for.

And finally the more hooks (websites) out there give you the added presence and opportunity to grab the customers attention.

Setting up a microsite can be great value for money

We can offer microsites complete with hosting and email accounts, linked and designed to enhance your main site for really affordable prices,  our price for a 5 page microsite is just £195, less than a one off advert in a magazine!  So if you are interested in getting a microsite, just let me know.