This does not mean jazzing it up with flashy animations or complex images. Beware of those--in fact, they will make your web pages take longer to load, and chase your potential customers away. No one wants to spend minutes waiting for a web site to load.
Visual appeal is that combination of colors, layout, fonts, and style that make your web site easy on the eyes. Think of how hard it is to read white print on a brilliant red background or to try to decipher some fancy font that looks more like a 114-year-old's scrawl.
Think of all the potential visitors to your site. Some of them may have failing vision. If your web site tries to pack a million words on the first page, they'll move on the next more user-friendly gift basket business's web site--even though they might be pricier and their baskets may not even stand a close second or third to yours.
Submit your site to search engines
Most of the major search engines have a page dedicated to web site submission. There are even free web site submission services.
Make your search engines fall in love with your site
Search engines love keyword-rich sites. But, you can't trick them by just including them randomly here and there on your web site. You must include keywords and keyword combinations in the appropriate context--in sentences that make sense or better yet, in titles and near the top of the page. Search engines will then fall in love with your site and project it as one of their favorites when people search (for example on Google or Yahoo or ixquick) using one or more of the keywords you've included.
Build a mailing list and send out newsletters on a regular basis
If you have a flair for penmanship, and know how to appeal to the masses through the written word--more especially from a marketing perspective without being too pushy, then author the newsletter yourself. Otherwise, hire a professional copywriter. The money you spend on this could return a thousand-fold if the advertising is done well.
Form partnerships and exchange links with gift reminder services
That's a good way to get targeted traffic-people who are really searching for and ready to buy a gift basket--not just "window shoppers". Ideally, you want every visitor to turn into a customer.
Advertise your web site using Google Adwords or a similar service
When you create such an advertisement, it is shown to right side of search engine results. And, if your ad has an effective title and body text, people might actually read it over search engine results.
A good gift basket web site with effective means to draw targeted visitors to it is a win-win combination.
