Alpaca Learning Library

Provide the Information Your Audience Wants Online

Your website represents your alpaca farm online. This is your chance to make a great first impression.

The type of information you’ll want to make available depends on the needs of your customers. The majority of your prospective customers fall into two groups:

Potential alpaca ranchers who are researching the business, and

Existing alpaca farmers looking to purchase alpacas and related services.

These two groups require different information, and your website should provide both.

To capture and hold the attention of your most immediate customers – those looking to purchase animals or services within the next month – you'll want to convey as many details as possible about your alpaca farm, and especially your alpacas for sale.

Since maintaining high breeding standards is a major concern for everyone in the industry, make sure you show how you contribute to upholding those high standards. Boost credibility for your alpaca farm by showing the industry associations you’re affiliated with, the shows you attend, and the care you take in preserving bloodlines.

A rancher looking for alpacas for sale wants to see photos and learn as much as possible about a specific animal before contacting you about purchasing it. This includes basic statistics like age as well as more advanced details like histogram (record of fiber quality), who the alpaca has been bred to, any progeny and registration certificate.

The more information you provide, the more time you’ll save yourself and your prospect. Those who contact you are likely to be closer to buying, since they've already had a chance to review all your information online. In addition, the more they can learn about your alpaca farm online, the more comfortable people will be dealing with you, as they've had the chance to get to you know you by reading about your alpaca farm online before contacting you.

While the second audience your website may appeal to might not be ready to purchase within the next couple of weeks, you have the opportunity to start building a relationship with the next generation of alpaca farmers. A recent survey conducted by the Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association found that over 96% of prospective alpaca ranchers primarily go online to find information.

And eventually these new ranchers will be looking to build their farm’s inventory of livestock. If your website is a credible source of information during their research phase, you may also be the farm they turn to for their alpaca purchases and breeding services when they take the leap into the industry.

When it comes to alpaca content, more is better. More information can help bolster your image in the eyes of your online audiences. It helps your alpaca web site rank higher in search engines (provided your site structure facilitates proper indexing). And it can serve as a sales tool that moves readers to take the action you want them to.

So, what else can you write about, you ask?

Think about what you wanted to know when you were learning about the alpaca business. Make a list of topics and questions you had.

Look at your email inbox – see what kinds of questions you get from prospective alpaca clients. You may have already sent answers, so scour your emails to see if there is content you can pick up as is.

Once you’ve got a list of topics, you can develop the content in several different forms, depending on how it fits together logically. You might find it easiest to develop an FAQ or question and answer section, adding to it every time you encounter a new idea. If you keep at it, it won’t be long before you have several pages of new content.

Starting an alpaca newsletter and posting archives on your site or even creating a farm announcements section is another way to add content routinely.

What was that? You’re a busy alpaca farmer with no time, much less the inclination to write dozens of articles and site content?

There’s still hope for your site. You’ll find there are many resources that you can draw on to let you focus your time on your alpacas rather than your computer.

First of all, if you are a member of the Ideal Alpaca Community, you have at your disposal a library of expert articles written by well-known alpaca authority Mike Safley. These articles cover every facet of the alpaca business and can help give your farm’s website added credibility. By making these articles available on your alpaca website, you can instantly add rich content that your audience will find indispensable.

But that’s still not content authored by you. Ideally, you want to appear as the expert here. So, in addition to using the valuable content from the IAC, you can work with a copywriter to develop content.

A copywriter is someone who is skilled in writing for businesses, and the content they write for you always appears as if written by you. In this manner, they can function for you like a ghost writer. A good copywriter can take your rough notes or topic ideas and turn them into articles that you’ll be proud to promote your alpaca farm with. And if you only need a fresh perspective or editing for articles you have already written, well, they do that, too.

Where can you find a copywriter who knows about alpacas? There are several places you could try: writers for industry publications, ad agencies serving the alpaca industry, ask other farms with web sites, etc.

Or you could ask your search engine optimization company.

SEO Advantage™, the leading search engine optimization company for the alpaca community, provides copywriting services to develop customized content for web sites, newsletters, press releases, and other online communications. When you work with a professional copywriter such as those at SEO Advantage™, you can be assured that not only is your content professional and well written, but it will encompass your SEO strategy and contribute to higher rankings. So, if you’re looking for the highest bang for your buck, this sure makes a good place to start.

Copyright 2006 - 2012 SEO Advantage.

About the author: Lisa Banks is marketing director and senior alpaca copywriter at SEO Advantage, a web design and SEO firm serving the Ideal Alpaca Community with SEO Alpaca services since 2000. Learn more about custom alpaca website design and search engine optimization today at www.seoalpaca.com.