It amazes me on how many people just "don't get it" when it
comes to following up with potential customers.
Did you know that it can take up to 7 times contacting
someone before they purchase a product - it's true! But
again, there are a growing number of people out there that
are trying to make sales without doing something as simple
as setting their marketing on auto-pilot.
Thankfully there's an online service that provides anyone
with the kind of marketing system they need that can almost
guarantee success. And one that I can whole-heartedly
recommend!
GetResponse.com is one of the most recognized follow-up
systems on the Internet; and there's good reason.
GetResponse.com uses some of the fastest and most reliable
email servers available. This, combined with more
specialized features that any other autoresponder, is it any
wonder everyone raves about it?
But... despite how good GetResponse.com is, it just got
better! That's right, the new Smart Responder Pro 2005 has
just been launched and it has an incredible number of
powerfully new features.
Just take a look at what you get with Smart Responder 2005!
- Personalization of emails
- Unlimited follow-ups
- Complete import and export features
- Send a broadcast email to your entire list all in one shot
- Attach files to any or all of your autoresponses
- Track your leads and responses
- Your choice of 19 different domains names to send from
- Send HTML-enhanced messages
- Your own "confirmation" screen
- Selective broadcasting
- Block unwanted email addresses
- Bounce-back management
- Full activity reports via email
- Free, unlimited technical support
- much, much more!
As you can see, this is way more than your everyday run-of-
the-mill autoresponder systems - using any other just
doesn't make good business sense!
So what are you waiting for? You owe it to yourself and
your online business to at least take a look at what
GetResponse.com can do for you.
Check it out today at:
http://getresponse.check-free.info/
Sincerely,
Phil Bradshaw
P.S. If your sales are in a slump, do what all the 'gurus'
do, follow-up with your potential customers and watch the
sales roll in! It's simple and it's effective!
P.P.S. Did you know you can try out GetResponse for free?
Click here for details now!
http://getresponse.check-free.info/
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Local Search Marketing The Next Wave
Local Search Marketing provides the opportunïty to geo-target customers like nevër before.
The Good News:
Local customers are actively searching for a business likes yours on the Internet. And studies show that these customers have a serious buying intent.
The Problem:
As a local business you have to figure out how to cost-effectively connect with them. You probably have heard of search engine marketing or pay-per-click advertising; but what does that mean to your local business
The Internet is changing the way your customers are searching for your type of business. The days of lugging out a 12 lb. telephone book to find very limited and outdated business information are coming to an end. People are still letting their fingers do the walking, but they're doing it over a computer keyboard. Below are some revealing facts from the Kelsey Group.
Where Are Your Customers Searching?
Search Engines
This is the primary location for your business to have a listing, because the search engines are the primary places your customers are searching. There are basically two methods to list your business in search results. They are through Search Engine Optimization and Pay-Per-Click advertising.
Search Engine Optimization -
Search engine optimization has become a major industry because of the potential profït from a prominent search ranking. Through proven techniques, you can optimize your web pages and get prominent ranking for no chärge. But you must first understand the dynamics of the search engines and learn how they reward pages with top listings. They are in the business of providing the best search results possible to their audience. That's how they make monëy.
So, if you are a wedding photographer in Seattle and someone is searching for a wedding photographer in Seattle, the search engines want you both to connect. In order to connect, you must create a page that is optimized for the term "Wedding Photographer Seattle." But equally as important, you must solicit quality in-bound links from other web sites that relate to your business.
The search engines determine ranking by:
Optimized Pages + Quality In-Bound Links = Prominent Search Ranking
Pay-Per-Click Advertising - In conjunction with search engine optimization, a pay-per-click advertising campaign should be an integral part of your online marketing strategy. If you search for a term on Google, Yahoo, or MSN, you will notice a list of sites on the very top of the page and along the right hand column. These are PPC sponsored advertisements. Businesses pay the search engines to advertise on specific keywords/phrases.
If a person clicks on your ad, you pay a per-click price. The position of your ad in the listing and the price you pay is based on a bidding/auction model. The popularity and the competitiveness of the keyword will determine how much businesses are willing to pay-per-click. A keyword like "home mortgage" can command more then $50 per clïck because of the potential profït involved
As a local business, you would bid on terms that reflect your products and services, and combine those terms with regional terms. An example would be "Wedding Photographer Seattle," or "Golf Property Pinehurst." Or, you can advertise through PPC in a define radius (5, 10, 50, 100 miles).
The appeal of pay-per-click advertising is that you are in control. You determine which keywords you'll bid on, you set the maximum price per-click, you determine your daily budget, and you can turn on or off your campaign at any moment. In just a few years, pay-per-click advertising has grown to a multi-billion dollar industry. That's due to the efficiency and profitability of this advertising model.
Frëe Listings in Local Resources, Search Engines, Yellow Pages and Directories
In addition to SEO and PPC, there are a number of opportunities to get listed for frëe in a number of local resources. Identifying these online resources and taking advantage of this valuable opportunïty is a must for your business. Examples, are Google Local, Yahoo Local and Superpages.com. But there are also regional or industry specific resources that will allow you to list your business for frëe.
Paid Listings in Local Resources, Search Engines, Yellow Pages, and Directories
There are a number of profitable opportunities to advertise in local resources. But you must use caution, since the majority will waste your monëy. Determine if they reach your prospects and have ample traffïc. Most important, track and analyze your results.
The Internet is changing how local businesses are marketing. The future of your business will be determined by your ability to effectively adapt to this media.
Local search marketing is the next wave of the Internet, in fact, it will be a tsunami. Nöw is an excellent opportunïty to position yourself and get the jump on your competition. Will you be ready to ride the wave?
About The AuthorFred Waters is the author of the Take No Survivor Guide to Local Online Marketing. Designed for local businesses that want that want to reach new customers through the Internet.
The Good News:
Local customers are actively searching for a business likes yours on the Internet. And studies show that these customers have a serious buying intent.
The Problem:
As a local business you have to figure out how to cost-effectively connect with them. You probably have heard of search engine marketing or pay-per-click advertising; but what does that mean to your local business
The Internet is changing the way your customers are searching for your type of business. The days of lugging out a 12 lb. telephone book to find very limited and outdated business information are coming to an end. People are still letting their fingers do the walking, but they're doing it over a computer keyboard. Below are some revealing facts from the Kelsey Group.
- 74% of U.S. households use the Internet as an information source when shopping locally.
- Approximately 45% of local searches had a buying intent.
- The percentage of respondents who used yellow page directories decreased from 75% to 62%. (If you have a yellow page ad, it is time to consider buying a smaller ad and shifting your marketing dollars to the Internet.)
Where Are Your Customers Searching?
- The major search engines, including Google, Yahoo and MSN. All three of these search resources have a local search feature.
- Internet Yellow Pages. The offline Yellow Pages see the writing on the wall and are scrambling to transfer their business model to the Internet.
- Local Directories and Portals. There are national directories like CitySearch that offer localized business information. In addition, there are directories and portals that only service local regions.
- Industry Specific Directories. There are numerous directories that focus on specific types of businesses and services and will list them geographically. For example, wedding photographers, realtors, hotels, bed and breakfasts, and web designers.
Search Engines
This is the primary location for your business to have a listing, because the search engines are the primary places your customers are searching. There are basically two methods to list your business in search results. They are through Search Engine Optimization and Pay-Per-Click advertising.
Search Engine Optimization -
Search engine optimization has become a major industry because of the potential profït from a prominent search ranking. Through proven techniques, you can optimize your web pages and get prominent ranking for no chärge. But you must first understand the dynamics of the search engines and learn how they reward pages with top listings. They are in the business of providing the best search results possible to their audience. That's how they make monëy.
So, if you are a wedding photographer in Seattle and someone is searching for a wedding photographer in Seattle, the search engines want you both to connect. In order to connect, you must create a page that is optimized for the term "Wedding Photographer Seattle." But equally as important, you must solicit quality in-bound links from other web sites that relate to your business.
The search engines determine ranking by:
- How a page is optimized for a particular keyword/phrase.
- How many websites point to your site with external links.
Optimized Pages + Quality In-Bound Links = Prominent Search Ranking
Pay-Per-Click Advertising - In conjunction with search engine optimization, a pay-per-click advertising campaign should be an integral part of your online marketing strategy. If you search for a term on Google, Yahoo, or MSN, you will notice a list of sites on the very top of the page and along the right hand column. These are PPC sponsored advertisements. Businesses pay the search engines to advertise on specific keywords/phrases.
If a person clicks on your ad, you pay a per-click price. The position of your ad in the listing and the price you pay is based on a bidding/auction model. The popularity and the competitiveness of the keyword will determine how much businesses are willing to pay-per-click. A keyword like "home mortgage" can command more then $50 per clïck because of the potential profït involved
As a local business, you would bid on terms that reflect your products and services, and combine those terms with regional terms. An example would be "Wedding Photographer Seattle," or "Golf Property Pinehurst." Or, you can advertise through PPC in a define radius (5, 10, 50, 100 miles).
The appeal of pay-per-click advertising is that you are in control. You determine which keywords you'll bid on, you set the maximum price per-click, you determine your daily budget, and you can turn on or off your campaign at any moment. In just a few years, pay-per-click advertising has grown to a multi-billion dollar industry. That's due to the efficiency and profitability of this advertising model.
Frëe Listings in Local Resources, Search Engines, Yellow Pages and Directories
In addition to SEO and PPC, there are a number of opportunities to get listed for frëe in a number of local resources. Identifying these online resources and taking advantage of this valuable opportunïty is a must for your business. Examples, are Google Local, Yahoo Local and Superpages.com. But there are also regional or industry specific resources that will allow you to list your business for frëe.
Paid Listings in Local Resources, Search Engines, Yellow Pages, and Directories
There are a number of profitable opportunities to advertise in local resources. But you must use caution, since the majority will waste your monëy. Determine if they reach your prospects and have ample traffïc. Most important, track and analyze your results.
The Internet is changing how local businesses are marketing. The future of your business will be determined by your ability to effectively adapt to this media.
Local search marketing is the next wave of the Internet, in fact, it will be a tsunami. Nöw is an excellent opportunïty to position yourself and get the jump on your competition. Will you be ready to ride the wave?
About The AuthorFred Waters is the author of the Take No Survivor Guide to Local Online Marketing. Designed for local businesses that want that want to reach new customers through the Internet.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
When Is Your Independene Day?
=========================
When Is Your Independence Day?
By Yanik Silver
========================
July 4th for Americans is a chance to celebrate our independence.
Trust me, I'm not going to get on a soapbox and start waving the
flag - but I do think it's important no matter what country
you live in to really think about that word "independence"
and its meaning for you.
My father reminded me that July 3, 1976 was his
"Independence day" since that's the date my family came
over to the United States from Russia. (Pretty cool
since it was right before the bi-centennial celebration.)
For me, my independence day was on July 1, 1999.
That's the date I left my father's business to work on my
own. It was by far one of the hardest decisions of my life.
You see, I had worked for my dad since I was 12 and he
thought I was going to take over the company. I had that
same thought as well until I got the "bug".
In fact, my wife, Missy, and I were talking about this
recently. She was talking about how when she met me 9 years
ago, I had only one thought: "how to grow my father's
business". I would stay late working on new ads and
marketing pieces. I was in early calling my accounts trying
to make sales, etc. etc.
Now I had been studying direct marketing, and results were
really paying off for my dad's business. (Actually they
still use a lot of the ads I wrote in 1998 because they
still work today.) But with every ad I wrote I was getting
more and more aggravated. Not because the ads weren't
producing sales - they were - but because of the grief and
politics I had to deal with. Everybody seemed to be an
advertising expert even though they've never studied or
read anything on the subject. People mistakenly believe
that if they wouldn't "read all that copy" then nobody
will. Or if the ad is "ugly" and has no pictures or pretty
graphics it won't work.
Complete and total crap.
For every ad I wrote I had to fight to get it out there. I
got sick of it and decided I would create my own product so
I could write ads for myself. My first product was to help
dermatologists who wanted new cosmetic patients. It was a
big kit (manual, tapes, reports, diskette, etc) based
around some marketing consulting I was doing on the side
for one of my customers.
I ran my first ad in April 1998 in Dermatologic Surgery
magazine. I got 10 responses so I sent them the 20-page
sales letter I'd written selling this $900 kit. Not one
order.
I waited...
Sent out a 2nd notice to those 10 respondents.
Nothing...
Then I sent a 3rd notice telling them the expiration date
to get all the free bonuses was only 10 days away. Finally
on the very last day of the expiration date I got one order
over the fax machine.
Yipeee!!
I still remember that doctor's name in Flushing, NY. What
an incredible feeling. That was the start of my
independence. I realized I now had the power to chart my
course as I wanted. That first sale. That's one of the
greatest feelings in the world - when something you've
created is sold. It took me a little over a year after that
first order to realize I wanted my freedom and I finally
quit on July 1, 1999.
Maybe it's the new confidence you get when you realize
you've created something that people want and are willing
to exchange money for. That first sale is usually the
hardest (but also the most rewarding).
It's wonderful when I help turn on that light in people.
I've seen it first-hand working my Apprentices and seeing
them launch their products. How amazed they are by the
money pouring from around the globe. I love it!
And my wife is striking out on her own with a little bit of
my help. She set up her first web site -
(www.InstantThankYouLetters.com) and she's getting
checks each month.
So when will your independence day be?
If you've already achieved it - I bet you can remember it
perfectly. Sometimes the bleakest times that we believe are
terrible actually turn into a perfect opportunity.
Take my good friend, Jim Edwards', for example. His
independence day came because he got fired. To him that
wasn't a blessing at first but as he looks back on it -
it's the best thing that ever happened.
I remember the conversation we had right after it happened.
I was drinking a bourbon and Jim was having a beer. We were
talking about different projects he could try and pursue
and do now. We were throwing around some ideas and we came
up with "33 Days to Online Profits".
(www.33daystotoonlineprofits.com)
It was right there during that call that we outlined each
of the days and moved forward from there. And "33 Days" has
been a tremendous six-figure income earner for both of us
and it doesn't seem to let up.
So what can you do to achieve your independence?
I'll give you a couple things to take to heart. I can't
remember the author who said this but he said if you show
me what a man does in his spare time I'll show you the type
of man he'll become. What are doing with your spare time?
- Watching TV or reading?
- Napping or practicing your copywriting?
- Yakking to your friends or studying direct marketing?
It all comes down to the choices we make every single day.
In fact, you shouldn't let one day go by without making
sure you are taking at least one proactive step towards
your own independence. Just because the thought of you
doing what you want when you want may seem so far away -
don't let that stop you from taking those baby steps each
and every day. That's one of my rules and I hope you'll
adopt it.
What else?
Learn to be different. The truth is you need to become
extraordinary to achieve extraordinary results. You can't
be like everyone else (and why would you want to). That
means doing the things other don't (or won't) do. That
means not listening to their advice (unless they are doing
what you want to do). Frankly, if you simply did the exact
opposite of what everyone else is doing you'd turn out
okay. Why? If only 5% of people are truly successful and
the 95% are the mediocre majority - doesn't that mean the
majority is wrong? Don't engage in their thinking. Don't
follow their lead. Don't adhere to the same values and
standards the "95-percenters" do.
Two people who really helped me clarify my thinking on
this was Early Nightingale and also Dan Kennedy. (See
next article for his insight and a special gift I've
arranged for you.)
Please don't get me wrong - in no way am I trying to be
elitist. I'm not. But it is tremendously important to go
through your day with your eyes wide open. The truth is
most of your friends (right now) probably don't want you to
change and succeed. That would imply that they are losers.
That would mean they are failures. Nobody is going to
propel you to succeed except yourself.
So get on it and proclaim your own Independence Day
starting T-O-D-A-Y!
(c) Surefire Marketing, Inc.
==========================================================
Yanik Silver is recognized as the leading expert on
creating automatic, moneymaking websites...and he still
doesn't know how to put up a website.
He is the author, co-author or creator of several best-
selling online marketing books and tools, which can be
found at http://33days.check-free.info/
==========================================================
When Is Your Independence Day?
By Yanik Silver
========================
July 4th for Americans is a chance to celebrate our independence.
Trust me, I'm not going to get on a soapbox and start waving the
flag - but I do think it's important no matter what country
you live in to really think about that word "independence"
and its meaning for you.
My father reminded me that July 3, 1976 was his
"Independence day" since that's the date my family came
over to the United States from Russia. (Pretty cool
since it was right before the bi-centennial celebration.)
For me, my independence day was on July 1, 1999.
That's the date I left my father's business to work on my
own. It was by far one of the hardest decisions of my life.
You see, I had worked for my dad since I was 12 and he
thought I was going to take over the company. I had that
same thought as well until I got the "bug".
In fact, my wife, Missy, and I were talking about this
recently. She was talking about how when she met me 9 years
ago, I had only one thought: "how to grow my father's
business". I would stay late working on new ads and
marketing pieces. I was in early calling my accounts trying
to make sales, etc. etc.
Now I had been studying direct marketing, and results were
really paying off for my dad's business. (Actually they
still use a lot of the ads I wrote in 1998 because they
still work today.) But with every ad I wrote I was getting
more and more aggravated. Not because the ads weren't
producing sales - they were - but because of the grief and
politics I had to deal with. Everybody seemed to be an
advertising expert even though they've never studied or
read anything on the subject. People mistakenly believe
that if they wouldn't "read all that copy" then nobody
will. Or if the ad is "ugly" and has no pictures or pretty
graphics it won't work.
Complete and total crap.
For every ad I wrote I had to fight to get it out there. I
got sick of it and decided I would create my own product so
I could write ads for myself. My first product was to help
dermatologists who wanted new cosmetic patients. It was a
big kit (manual, tapes, reports, diskette, etc) based
around some marketing consulting I was doing on the side
for one of my customers.
I ran my first ad in April 1998 in Dermatologic Surgery
magazine. I got 10 responses so I sent them the 20-page
sales letter I'd written selling this $900 kit. Not one
order.
I waited...
Sent out a 2nd notice to those 10 respondents.
Nothing...
Then I sent a 3rd notice telling them the expiration date
to get all the free bonuses was only 10 days away. Finally
on the very last day of the expiration date I got one order
over the fax machine.
Yipeee!!
I still remember that doctor's name in Flushing, NY. What
an incredible feeling. That was the start of my
independence. I realized I now had the power to chart my
course as I wanted. That first sale. That's one of the
greatest feelings in the world - when something you've
created is sold. It took me a little over a year after that
first order to realize I wanted my freedom and I finally
quit on July 1, 1999.
Maybe it's the new confidence you get when you realize
you've created something that people want and are willing
to exchange money for. That first sale is usually the
hardest (but also the most rewarding).
It's wonderful when I help turn on that light in people.
I've seen it first-hand working my Apprentices and seeing
them launch their products. How amazed they are by the
money pouring from around the globe. I love it!
And my wife is striking out on her own with a little bit of
my help. She set up her first web site -
(www.InstantThankYouLetters.com) and she's getting
checks each month.
So when will your independence day be?
If you've already achieved it - I bet you can remember it
perfectly. Sometimes the bleakest times that we believe are
terrible actually turn into a perfect opportunity.
Take my good friend, Jim Edwards', for example. His
independence day came because he got fired. To him that
wasn't a blessing at first but as he looks back on it -
it's the best thing that ever happened.
I remember the conversation we had right after it happened.
I was drinking a bourbon and Jim was having a beer. We were
talking about different projects he could try and pursue
and do now. We were throwing around some ideas and we came
up with "33 Days to Online Profits".
(www.33daystotoonlineprofits.com)
It was right there during that call that we outlined each
of the days and moved forward from there. And "33 Days" has
been a tremendous six-figure income earner for both of us
and it doesn't seem to let up.
So what can you do to achieve your independence?
I'll give you a couple things to take to heart. I can't
remember the author who said this but he said if you show
me what a man does in his spare time I'll show you the type
of man he'll become. What are doing with your spare time?
- Watching TV or reading?
- Napping or practicing your copywriting?
- Yakking to your friends or studying direct marketing?
It all comes down to the choices we make every single day.
In fact, you shouldn't let one day go by without making
sure you are taking at least one proactive step towards
your own independence. Just because the thought of you
doing what you want when you want may seem so far away -
don't let that stop you from taking those baby steps each
and every day. That's one of my rules and I hope you'll
adopt it.
What else?
Learn to be different. The truth is you need to become
extraordinary to achieve extraordinary results. You can't
be like everyone else (and why would you want to). That
means doing the things other don't (or won't) do. That
means not listening to their advice (unless they are doing
what you want to do). Frankly, if you simply did the exact
opposite of what everyone else is doing you'd turn out
okay. Why? If only 5% of people are truly successful and
the 95% are the mediocre majority - doesn't that mean the
majority is wrong? Don't engage in their thinking. Don't
follow their lead. Don't adhere to the same values and
standards the "95-percenters" do.
Two people who really helped me clarify my thinking on
this was Early Nightingale and also Dan Kennedy. (See
next article for his insight and a special gift I've
arranged for you.)
Please don't get me wrong - in no way am I trying to be
elitist. I'm not. But it is tremendously important to go
through your day with your eyes wide open. The truth is
most of your friends (right now) probably don't want you to
change and succeed. That would imply that they are losers.
That would mean they are failures. Nobody is going to
propel you to succeed except yourself.
So get on it and proclaim your own Independence Day
starting T-O-D-A-Y!
(c) Surefire Marketing, Inc.
==========================================================
Yanik Silver is recognized as the leading expert on
creating automatic, moneymaking websites...and he still
doesn't know how to put up a website.
He is the author, co-author or creator of several best-
selling online marketing books and tools, which can be
found at http://33days.check-free.info/
==========================================================
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Access Your PC From The Road
© Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
http://www.thenetreporter.com
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Have you ever sat in front of your computer and wished you
could show someone else what appeared on your screen?
Maybe you were experiencing a problem, or couldn't figure
out how to make something work, but you knew if someone
else could see what was happening on your screen, they
could help you fix the problem immediately.
Ever had a phone conversation with someone about a
particular business topic, but you just couldn't "connect"
with your ideas because it was too hard to explain over the
phone?
Now, visualize jumping on the phone with that same person
and literally sharing your computer's desktop to
collaborate, discuss, and create virtually anything
together, even if you are separated by thousands of miles.
Though this may sound like an episode of Star Trek, remote
computer sharing is actually a daily business reality.
Imagine you need to take a trip and you either don't want
to or can't take your computer.
The thought of emails piling up for days makes you crazy
and you also need to monitor some things on your pc.
Instead of trying to lug your laptop (or fit your desktop
into your suitcase), you can use "remote desktop" software
that allows you to access your computer through the
Internet from any other computer in the world.
One of the most common remote desktop services is
GoToMyPC.com, which provides a safe and secure way for you
to go down to the local internet café, log on, and access
your office or home computer just like sitting at your own
desk.
Now, before you panic and think anyone can access your
computer, let me explain security.
First, you log in to the GoToMyPC.com website with a
username and password.
Once logged in, you then click a link to log onto your PC,
which will then ask you for another password.
GoToMyPC.com has even thought of a solution for those of
you worried about people looking over your shoulder as you
enter your passwords on a public computer or if the
computer you use might carry a keystroke logger.
Before leaving home, you can program in a series of up to
99 passwords that only work one time.
This means even if someone watches you log into your
computer or records your keystrokes, the password you used
won't work again.
If a would-be thief tries to access your computer too many
times, GoToMyPC.com will shut down all access attempts to
your PC.
The benefits of remotely accessing your PC from the road
are numerous, but the bottom line is that it enables you to
use your computer from the road like you never left home.
For example: while traveling to a conference this weekend,
my wife (and business partner) accessed our office computer
from my laptop and, instead of the usual pile of 4,000
emails that would normally await after 5 days away, we just
picked up this morning like we'd never been gone.
The same company that offers GoToMyPC.com also offers a
service called GoToMeeting.com which allows you to remotely
host a meeting where multiple users can share and
collaborate on a single computer desktop.
This service makes it super simple to provide online
training, do software demos, and even make complete sales
presentations.
I personally use both of these services and find them easy,
reliable and well worth the price.
--
Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the
co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how
to use free articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
visitors to your website, affiliate links, or blogs...
-=-=-==-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Your own *Best-Selling eBook* can bring you years of goodfortune... make you very, very wealthy... and more!Almost anyone can create one! Discover the *Proven Secrets*http:// ebksecrets.check-free.info
-=-=-==-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
http://www.thenetreporter.com
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Have you ever sat in front of your computer and wished you
could show someone else what appeared on your screen?
Maybe you were experiencing a problem, or couldn't figure
out how to make something work, but you knew if someone
else could see what was happening on your screen, they
could help you fix the problem immediately.
Ever had a phone conversation with someone about a
particular business topic, but you just couldn't "connect"
with your ideas because it was too hard to explain over the
phone?
Now, visualize jumping on the phone with that same person
and literally sharing your computer's desktop to
collaborate, discuss, and create virtually anything
together, even if you are separated by thousands of miles.
Though this may sound like an episode of Star Trek, remote
computer sharing is actually a daily business reality.
Imagine you need to take a trip and you either don't want
to or can't take your computer.
The thought of emails piling up for days makes you crazy
and you also need to monitor some things on your pc.
Instead of trying to lug your laptop (or fit your desktop
into your suitcase), you can use "remote desktop" software
that allows you to access your computer through the
Internet from any other computer in the world.
One of the most common remote desktop services is
GoToMyPC.com, which provides a safe and secure way for you
to go down to the local internet café, log on, and access
your office or home computer just like sitting at your own
desk.
Now, before you panic and think anyone can access your
computer, let me explain security.
First, you log in to the GoToMyPC.com website with a
username and password.
Once logged in, you then click a link to log onto your PC,
which will then ask you for another password.
GoToMyPC.com has even thought of a solution for those of
you worried about people looking over your shoulder as you
enter your passwords on a public computer or if the
computer you use might carry a keystroke logger.
Before leaving home, you can program in a series of up to
99 passwords that only work one time.
This means even if someone watches you log into your
computer or records your keystrokes, the password you used
won't work again.
If a would-be thief tries to access your computer too many
times, GoToMyPC.com will shut down all access attempts to
your PC.
The benefits of remotely accessing your PC from the road
are numerous, but the bottom line is that it enables you to
use your computer from the road like you never left home.
For example: while traveling to a conference this weekend,
my wife (and business partner) accessed our office computer
from my laptop and, instead of the usual pile of 4,000
emails that would normally await after 5 days away, we just
picked up this morning like we'd never been gone.
The same company that offers GoToMyPC.com also offers a
service called GoToMeeting.com which allows you to remotely
host a meeting where multiple users can share and
collaborate on a single computer desktop.
This service makes it super simple to provide online
training, do software demos, and even make complete sales
presentations.
I personally use both of these services and find them easy,
reliable and well worth the price.
--
Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the
co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how
to use free articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
visitors to your website, affiliate links, or blogs...
-=-=-==-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Your own *Best-Selling eBook* can bring you years of goodfortune... make you very, very wealthy... and more!Almost anyone can create one! Discover the *Proven Secrets*http:// ebksecrets.check-free.info
-=-=-==-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Sunday, November 06, 2005
Ego Searches and RSS
Ego searches are frëe and simple searches designed to monitor blogs and news portals for mentions of your company, product, competitors or other specific keywords. Conducting ego searches not only allows you to stay informed, but also allows you to maintain a strategic advantage over competing companies.
A number of new Internet services are freely available that make these 'ego searches' painless and easy.
Automated tracking of specific subjects or industry trends, based on keywords, provide businesses a great deal of valuable information.
Ego searches are a great way for businesses to keep an ear to the ground, without having the expense of conducting a market survey or competitive analysis.
Businesses can use the frëe "ego search" resources to stay informed about what customers are saying.
The dynamically created keyword based RSS feeds, update in your RSS reader or news aggregators, each time new information containing the keyword appears in the searched resources. The dynamic feeds match requests against new information, as it comes online in real time.
The following frëe services allow for RSS feed ego searches.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Editorial Note:
If you have not yet installed RSS Reader/News Aggregator software, we recommend the following popular freeware readers/aggregators:
BlogExpress - Easy to use and has built-in Web viewer.
Pluck RSS Reader - Browser-based RSS reader plug-in for Internet Explorer and/or FireFox.
SharpReader - Handles all RSS versions. Numerous useful features.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Google News - Simply conduct a keyword search of Google News and then clïck the text that says "RSS" then save the url of the RSS feed into your news reader. Every time a new article with that keyword appears in Google News the feed in your RSS reader will automatically update.
BlogPulse - Find out what is being said about your products, company or your industry in the blogosphere. Conduct a keyword or url search on BlogPulse. Clïck the orange RSS icon above the search results and save the feed in your reader. Each time the keyword appears in a blog indexed by BlogPulse you will receive a new item in your feed reader. Another feature of BlogPulse is it will graph the keyword occurrences, providing a picture representation so that trends can be easily visualized. Hovering over the lines of the graph will provide details of actual blog mentions
PubSub - Search on a keyword, then save and add the feed to your RSS reader using the icons provided. Optionally with PubSub you can direct your search to only alert you of posts in specific areas of interest including Press Releases, SEC/EDGAR Filings, Newsgroup Posts, or Weblog Entries.
Technorati - Create watch lists, by entering the search term add item to the watch list and then scroll to the bottom clïck the blue RSS icon to obtain the url of the RSS feed that can be added to your reader. Technorati is a real-time search engine that keeps track of what is going on in the blogosphere. In order to setup a watchlist you will have to create a Technorati account.
Ice Rocket - Simply search Ice Rocket then clïck the RSS 2.0 button to obtain the url of the RSS feed that contains your search term. Add the url to your RSS reader or newsaggregator.
Find Articles - Traditional media channels can even be monitored using RSS. FindArticles routinely scans magazines and publications for keyword mentions. Conduct a search then clïck "RSS Alert" to obtain the url to the RSS feed. Add the feed to your reader to receive instänt notification of new articles.
NewsTrove - NewsTrove indexes millïons of news articles from a myriad of sources. Build an RSS feed on any topic imaginable. Enter your search words in the search box. Clïck 'Search', then clïck the orange XML icon on the right side of the search results page and save the feed to your news reader.
BlogDigger - BlogDigger monitors the blogosphere and generally what is said daily in the blogs. Conduct a search on Blogdigger and clck the orange XML icon to retrieve the url of the search feed. The feed should then be added to your RSS reader.
DayPop - Conduct a search and clïck the icon on the right that says XML, save the feed to your RSS aggregator. Only the most recent search results will appear
Yahoo News - Conduct a search then clïck "view as RSS" in the right column and save the feed in your aggregator. The feed will chëck Yahoo news for mentions.
TalkDigger - TalkDigger is a meta-search engine. The results of which can be displayed using RSS. TalkDigger essentially aggregates the mentions that occur in a number of other blog search engines.
Overall, ego searches are an excellent way to stay informed and maintain a strategic advantage over competitors. Knowing exactly what your online competitors are doing provides a competitive edge that can be used to your advantage. Keyword RSS feeds can be used to monitor key phrases for trademark abuses or monitoring the effectiveness of a specific press promotion.
Updates to RSS feed searches occur in what could be considered realtime. An additional subscriber benefit to RSS based ego searches, is that subscribers don't have to release any private information or an email address, to monitor keywords. Although they sound daunting, utilizing frëe resources to conduct ego searches is simply good business sense.
About The AuthorSharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition, Sharon manages marketing for FeedForDev an RSS component for developers.
A number of new Internet services are freely available that make these 'ego searches' painless and easy.
Automated tracking of specific subjects or industry trends, based on keywords, provide businesses a great deal of valuable information.
Ego searches are a great way for businesses to keep an ear to the ground, without having the expense of conducting a market survey or competitive analysis.
Businesses can use the frëe "ego search" resources to stay informed about what customers are saying.
The dynamically created keyword based RSS feeds, update in your RSS reader or news aggregators, each time new information containing the keyword appears in the searched resources. The dynamic feeds match requests against new information, as it comes online in real time.
The following frëe services allow for RSS feed ego searches.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Editorial Note:
If you have not yet installed RSS Reader/News Aggregator software, we recommend the following popular freeware readers/aggregators:
BlogExpress - Easy to use and has built-in Web viewer.
Pluck RSS Reader - Browser-based RSS reader plug-in for Internet Explorer and/or FireFox.
SharpReader - Handles all RSS versions. Numerous useful features.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Google News - Simply conduct a keyword search of Google News and then clïck the text that says "RSS" then save the url of the RSS feed into your news reader. Every time a new article with that keyword appears in Google News the feed in your RSS reader will automatically update.
BlogPulse - Find out what is being said about your products, company or your industry in the blogosphere. Conduct a keyword or url search on BlogPulse. Clïck the orange RSS icon above the search results and save the feed in your reader. Each time the keyword appears in a blog indexed by BlogPulse you will receive a new item in your feed reader. Another feature of BlogPulse is it will graph the keyword occurrences, providing a picture representation so that trends can be easily visualized. Hovering over the lines of the graph will provide details of actual blog mentions
PubSub - Search on a keyword, then save and add the feed to your RSS reader using the icons provided. Optionally with PubSub you can direct your search to only alert you of posts in specific areas of interest including Press Releases, SEC/EDGAR Filings, Newsgroup Posts, or Weblog Entries.
Technorati - Create watch lists, by entering the search term add item to the watch list and then scroll to the bottom clïck the blue RSS icon to obtain the url of the RSS feed that can be added to your reader. Technorati is a real-time search engine that keeps track of what is going on in the blogosphere. In order to setup a watchlist you will have to create a Technorati account.
Ice Rocket - Simply search Ice Rocket then clïck the RSS 2.0 button to obtain the url of the RSS feed that contains your search term. Add the url to your RSS reader or newsaggregator.
Find Articles - Traditional media channels can even be monitored using RSS. FindArticles routinely scans magazines and publications for keyword mentions. Conduct a search then clïck "RSS Alert" to obtain the url to the RSS feed. Add the feed to your reader to receive instänt notification of new articles.
NewsTrove - NewsTrove indexes millïons of news articles from a myriad of sources. Build an RSS feed on any topic imaginable. Enter your search words in the search box. Clïck 'Search', then clïck the orange XML icon on the right side of the search results page and save the feed to your news reader.
BlogDigger - BlogDigger monitors the blogosphere and generally what is said daily in the blogs. Conduct a search on Blogdigger and clck the orange XML icon to retrieve the url of the search feed. The feed should then be added to your RSS reader.
DayPop - Conduct a search and clïck the icon on the right that says XML, save the feed to your RSS aggregator. Only the most recent search results will appear
Yahoo News - Conduct a search then clïck "view as RSS" in the right column and save the feed in your aggregator. The feed will chëck Yahoo news for mentions.
TalkDigger - TalkDigger is a meta-search engine. The results of which can be displayed using RSS. TalkDigger essentially aggregates the mentions that occur in a number of other blog search engines.
Overall, ego searches are an excellent way to stay informed and maintain a strategic advantage over competitors. Knowing exactly what your online competitors are doing provides a competitive edge that can be used to your advantage. Keyword RSS feeds can be used to monitor key phrases for trademark abuses or monitoring the effectiveness of a specific press promotion.
Updates to RSS feed searches occur in what could be considered realtime. An additional subscriber benefit to RSS based ego searches, is that subscribers don't have to release any private information or an email address, to monitor keywords. Although they sound daunting, utilizing frëe resources to conduct ego searches is simply good business sense.
About The AuthorSharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition, Sharon manages marketing for FeedForDev an RSS component for developers.
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
Yahoo Publisher Network: Another Way to Have Your Website Earn Its Keep
Have you ever wished for someone to come along and compete with "Google's Adsense Program"? With the launch of "Yahoo's Publisher Network"(YPN) you could say that some wishes really do come true.
If you're not familiar with Adsense or YPN, both programs allow you to add specialized coding to your website pages and then display text-based ads which are related to the content on the page. For example, if you have a sports related website theme, then ads would be shown for sporting goods and services.
Google had this market cornered for a long time, but with YPN there's nöw some "friendly competition" -- which is a good thing for everyone involved.
Yahoo's Publisher Network (YPN) is currently in beta and önly available to publishers in the United States. You can apply for the program at http://publisher.yahoo.com. Word on the "Internet Street" is that Yahoo hopes to be out of beta by the end of the year and has plans for offering additional services as well.
Once accepted into the program (which they're calling "Content Match"), you'll need to log into the YPN control panel to select your ad formats and colors. There are 10 different ad unit sizes to choose from. For example: Square 250X250, Large Rectangle 336X280, Small Rectangle 180X150, Banner 468X60, and so on. Most of the sizes offered are similar to those you'll find on Google's Adsense.
Customized color schemes can be created for your ad layout, or you can go with any of the standard ad colors. You can set background color, text and link colors.
YPN offers full reporting and tracking capabilities. You can track up to 50 channels to find out which pages and ads are your top performers
Once the code is in place on your pages, Yahoo will crawl your site's content to insure that relevant ads appear. If no targeted ads are available, public service ads will be shown.
YPN gives you a bit of control over competitors' ads showing up on your site, with the option of blocking up to 200 of them.
In their efforts to differentiate themselves from Adsense, YPN is also offering something called "Ad Targeting." This allows you to choose up to two ad categories for your entire site, or just for specific pages. This is done in order to target your visitors with ads based on their specific interests. This in no way guarantees that önly ads from those categories will be shown; it just gives Yahoo a better idea of what types of ads you'd like to see appear on your site.
You can choose up to two categories per targeted URL, to a maximum of 50. If you don't see a category that fits your pages, you can always suggest it be added. There are currently 20 categories to choose from. For example "automotive, B2B, computing," with 109 sub categories.
If you've been showing Google ads on your site for some time nöw and are thinking about adding YPN's to increase your revenue, keep in mind it is against Yahoo's terms of service to display any other contextual ads on the same pages as theirs. So if you want to run both programs on your site you'll have to put one on each page, or get your hands on a rotation scrïpt that will rotate both ad types, one at a time, on all pages of your site. One such scrïpt can be found at Shoemoney.
Another really nice feature that Google is lacking is Yahoo's "Balance Transfer Option." If you also use Yahoo's Search Marketing Program for your pay-per-click advertising and you use the same user name and password for both, you can transfer monëy from your publisher network account at YPN to your sponsored search account. There are no minimum amounts for transfers and you'll need to manually make the request in order to move the funds, but this is a handy feature.
When it comes to payday and any earnings you may have coming to you, there is a minimum payout of $100.00 before Yahoo will cut you a chëck. Checks are sent 45 days after the close of the calendar month. For example, any earnings made in September will be paid to you by November 15th. I'd like to see them shorten up the pay cycles in the future, as most small entrepreneurs generally need cäsh sooner rather then later.
It's going to be interesting to watch this new race heat up between Google and Yahoo. Competition is always a good motivator and who knows, it may encourage Google to offer new features as well knowing they don't have the corner on the contextual market.
Keep your eyes peeled for future changes and enhancements and may the best man wïn!
About The AuthorArticle by Merle- Want to Know the SECRETS of Article Promotion? Discover everything you need to know in this brand New Ebook, "How to Use Articles to Drive Website Traffïc". Get your F-r-e-e Copy today at http://articleannouncer.mcpromotions.com
If you're not familiar with Adsense or YPN, both programs allow you to add specialized coding to your website pages and then display text-based ads which are related to the content on the page. For example, if you have a sports related website theme, then ads would be shown for sporting goods and services.
Google had this market cornered for a long time, but with YPN there's nöw some "friendly competition" -- which is a good thing for everyone involved.
Yahoo's Publisher Network (YPN) is currently in beta and önly available to publishers in the United States. You can apply for the program at http://publisher.yahoo.com. Word on the "Internet Street" is that Yahoo hopes to be out of beta by the end of the year and has plans for offering additional services as well.
Once accepted into the program (which they're calling "Content Match"), you'll need to log into the YPN control panel to select your ad formats and colors. There are 10 different ad unit sizes to choose from. For example: Square 250X250, Large Rectangle 336X280, Small Rectangle 180X150, Banner 468X60, and so on. Most of the sizes offered are similar to those you'll find on Google's Adsense.
Customized color schemes can be created for your ad layout, or you can go with any of the standard ad colors. You can set background color, text and link colors.
YPN offers full reporting and tracking capabilities. You can track up to 50 channels to find out which pages and ads are your top performers
Once the code is in place on your pages, Yahoo will crawl your site's content to insure that relevant ads appear. If no targeted ads are available, public service ads will be shown.
YPN gives you a bit of control over competitors' ads showing up on your site, with the option of blocking up to 200 of them.
In their efforts to differentiate themselves from Adsense, YPN is also offering something called "Ad Targeting." This allows you to choose up to two ad categories for your entire site, or just for specific pages. This is done in order to target your visitors with ads based on their specific interests. This in no way guarantees that önly ads from those categories will be shown; it just gives Yahoo a better idea of what types of ads you'd like to see appear on your site.
You can choose up to two categories per targeted URL, to a maximum of 50. If you don't see a category that fits your pages, you can always suggest it be added. There are currently 20 categories to choose from. For example "automotive, B2B, computing," with 109 sub categories.
If you've been showing Google ads on your site for some time nöw and are thinking about adding YPN's to increase your revenue, keep in mind it is against Yahoo's terms of service to display any other contextual ads on the same pages as theirs. So if you want to run both programs on your site you'll have to put one on each page, or get your hands on a rotation scrïpt that will rotate both ad types, one at a time, on all pages of your site. One such scrïpt can be found at Shoemoney.
Another really nice feature that Google is lacking is Yahoo's "Balance Transfer Option." If you also use Yahoo's Search Marketing Program for your pay-per-click advertising and you use the same user name and password for both, you can transfer monëy from your publisher network account at YPN to your sponsored search account. There are no minimum amounts for transfers and you'll need to manually make the request in order to move the funds, but this is a handy feature.
When it comes to payday and any earnings you may have coming to you, there is a minimum payout of $100.00 before Yahoo will cut you a chëck. Checks are sent 45 days after the close of the calendar month. For example, any earnings made in September will be paid to you by November 15th. I'd like to see them shorten up the pay cycles in the future, as most small entrepreneurs generally need cäsh sooner rather then later.
It's going to be interesting to watch this new race heat up between Google and Yahoo. Competition is always a good motivator and who knows, it may encourage Google to offer new features as well knowing they don't have the corner on the contextual market.
Keep your eyes peeled for future changes and enhancements and may the best man wïn!
About The AuthorArticle by Merle- Want to Know the SECRETS of Article Promotion? Discover everything you need to know in this brand New Ebook, "How to Use Articles to Drive Website Traffïc". Get your F-r-e-e Copy today at http://articleannouncer.mcpromotions.com
Monday, October 31, 2005
Raise Your Website Traffic with RSS-Blogs and YAHOO (Part1)
It is the trend du jour. They are the subject of pundit press, guru glare, and are ready for mainstream adoption. RSS feeds and their communication kin the blog -- are bandied about as the next big thing.
Everywhere you look there are articles and ebooks touting the electronic affinity and high value of these two forms of media creation and distribution. However can these two forms of digital media drive more traffïc to your site, or -- are they just hype?
Blogs are short for web logs and are like daily dairies on the web. Blogs started out as ways for Internet reality types to share their lives with other people on the web, without having to learn very complicated web design applications like Dreamweaver or Microsoft FrontPage.
While on the other hand RSS feeds are the natural extension of Blogs. RSS without getting into all the arguments over the name (for the purpose of this article) stands for Really Simple Syndication.
RSS feeds can take your blog postings and syndicate a prevïew of your blog headlines all over the Internet. Therefore in theory RSS feeds can drive traffïc to your blogs and websites similar to how search engines have become major marketing channels.
If your blog's headlines are syndicated on major high traffïc websites, RSS directories and Internet Portals, it could be another major source of traffïc to your website. But how effective is blog marketing to the average Internet marketer who doesn't have a major personal brand name like John Reese, Yanik Silver, or Dr. Ken Evoy?
This question is reflected in the concerns of bottom-line focused Stephanie McIntyre, president of eSales Unlimïted, an eBay Power Seller, auction trainer and coach. Stephanie has generated over $200,000 in profitable salës on eBay and has low tolerance for marketing hype.
"I am not convinced that blogging can really drive traffïc or profitable salës states Ms. McIntyre. Internet Gurus like James Maduk haven't convinced me that I can really make monëy with a blog."
She isn't alone in her skepticism. Many online business people are confused why all this hype is being created about blogs and RSS feeds. Many wonder if they can really deliver on their potential to drive more traffïc and salës to business oriented Internet websites.
In short, can blogs and RSS boost really boost our website traffïc? I put the technology to the test in the last four weeks to get some definite answers.
I found blogs are having some major income impact on the bottom-line of some companies and business people.
Despite many reservations by some Netpreneurs, blogs and RSS feeds have been boosting the bottom-lines of some marketers. Willie Crawford, a well known Internet marketer generates over $1000 dollars a day from mostly blog generated Adsense™ revenue. Blogging for Crawford has become yet another profitable part of his business.
Weblogs Inc., a publisher of almost 100 targeted niche blogs is noted as being on its way to generating 1 million dollars in Adsense™ revenue! This had to be a compelling reason for AOL to recently buy Weblogs Inc., for a whopping 25 million.
Still another very successful Internet business person I spoke with (who doesn't what to be identified) uses blogs as a förm of buzz advertising, resulting in $50,000 in indirect eCommerce salës when properly timed. This business person does close to 17 million dollars in online salës.
I also have been having good success saving time and monëy by publishing quickly with blogs. My blogs generated good income for me, however I wanted to see if the distribution of my blog headline via RSS feeds would bring in any new revenues.
One of the promotional ways blogs and RSS are purported to increase your online traffïc is the strategy of increasing your website's traffïc with what I call horizontal SEO. Horizontal SEO is called "winning the search engine lottery" by Internet salës star John Reese
Most SEO firms and web marketers focus solely on high rankings for popular keywords (Vertical SEO). In contrast a more comprehensive search engine driven Internet marketing campaign would scale more horizontally or deeper with more rich keyword informed content pages.
In other words a horizontal SEO campaign would be like playing the lottery. Your odds of winning the lottery are greater if you have more tickets.
According to Reese "search engines algorithms change from day to day. Therefore, your ranking will go up or down. But if you have more and more tickets in the SEO lottery you have a better chance of winning."
Blogs and RSS feeds give you the ability to create and distribute a lot of web information (content) on the fly that's distributed throughout the Internet at myriad media outlets. Blogs and RSS feeds drive more traffïc to your site by helping you wïn the SEO lottery with horizontal SEO.
Blogs and RSS can be the easiest and most efficient way to wïn the SEO lottery. They do this by creating lots of targeted niche content on your, and other partner, sites that carry your feeds.
In the last 4 weeks, I launched a website with a blog component without optimizing it in the traditional vertical SEO fashion. It doesn't appear on top of any search engine results worth mentioning. I wanted to see if the blog powered by RSS feed would drive significant traffïc to my site.
The results are amazing! I have been totally blown away by the research. Chëck out why I have become a big believer in blogging and RSS in part 2 of this article. Visit http://www.searchengineplan.com/blog.htm to stay informed on the latest blogging, RSS, and SEO developments.
About The AuthorKamau Austin is publisher of eInfoNEWS.com and runs SearchEnginePlan.com. He is author of Always On Top "How to Get the Highest Search Engine ranking for your website. See more about his strategies at AlwaysOnToptheBook.com.
Everywhere you look there are articles and ebooks touting the electronic affinity and high value of these two forms of media creation and distribution. However can these two forms of digital media drive more traffïc to your site, or -- are they just hype?
Blogs are short for web logs and are like daily dairies on the web. Blogs started out as ways for Internet reality types to share their lives with other people on the web, without having to learn very complicated web design applications like Dreamweaver or Microsoft FrontPage.
While on the other hand RSS feeds are the natural extension of Blogs. RSS without getting into all the arguments over the name (for the purpose of this article) stands for Really Simple Syndication.
RSS feeds can take your blog postings and syndicate a prevïew of your blog headlines all over the Internet. Therefore in theory RSS feeds can drive traffïc to your blogs and websites similar to how search engines have become major marketing channels.
If your blog's headlines are syndicated on major high traffïc websites, RSS directories and Internet Portals, it could be another major source of traffïc to your website. But how effective is blog marketing to the average Internet marketer who doesn't have a major personal brand name like John Reese, Yanik Silver, or Dr. Ken Evoy?
This question is reflected in the concerns of bottom-line focused Stephanie McIntyre, president of eSales Unlimïted, an eBay Power Seller, auction trainer and coach. Stephanie has generated over $200,000 in profitable salës on eBay and has low tolerance for marketing hype.
"I am not convinced that blogging can really drive traffïc or profitable salës states Ms. McIntyre. Internet Gurus like James Maduk haven't convinced me that I can really make monëy with a blog."
She isn't alone in her skepticism. Many online business people are confused why all this hype is being created about blogs and RSS feeds. Many wonder if they can really deliver on their potential to drive more traffïc and salës to business oriented Internet websites.
In short, can blogs and RSS boost really boost our website traffïc? I put the technology to the test in the last four weeks to get some definite answers.
I found blogs are having some major income impact on the bottom-line of some companies and business people.
Despite many reservations by some Netpreneurs, blogs and RSS feeds have been boosting the bottom-lines of some marketers. Willie Crawford, a well known Internet marketer generates over $1000 dollars a day from mostly blog generated Adsense™ revenue. Blogging for Crawford has become yet another profitable part of his business.
Weblogs Inc., a publisher of almost 100 targeted niche blogs is noted as being on its way to generating 1 million dollars in Adsense™ revenue! This had to be a compelling reason for AOL to recently buy Weblogs Inc., for a whopping 25 million.
Still another very successful Internet business person I spoke with (who doesn't what to be identified) uses blogs as a förm of buzz advertising, resulting in $50,000 in indirect eCommerce salës when properly timed. This business person does close to 17 million dollars in online salës.
I also have been having good success saving time and monëy by publishing quickly with blogs. My blogs generated good income for me, however I wanted to see if the distribution of my blog headline via RSS feeds would bring in any new revenues.
One of the promotional ways blogs and RSS are purported to increase your online traffïc is the strategy of increasing your website's traffïc with what I call horizontal SEO. Horizontal SEO is called "winning the search engine lottery" by Internet salës star John Reese
Most SEO firms and web marketers focus solely on high rankings for popular keywords (Vertical SEO). In contrast a more comprehensive search engine driven Internet marketing campaign would scale more horizontally or deeper with more rich keyword informed content pages.
In other words a horizontal SEO campaign would be like playing the lottery. Your odds of winning the lottery are greater if you have more tickets.
According to Reese "search engines algorithms change from day to day. Therefore, your ranking will go up or down. But if you have more and more tickets in the SEO lottery you have a better chance of winning."
Blogs and RSS feeds give you the ability to create and distribute a lot of web information (content) on the fly that's distributed throughout the Internet at myriad media outlets. Blogs and RSS feeds drive more traffïc to your site by helping you wïn the SEO lottery with horizontal SEO.
Blogs and RSS can be the easiest and most efficient way to wïn the SEO lottery. They do this by creating lots of targeted niche content on your, and other partner, sites that carry your feeds.
In the last 4 weeks, I launched a website with a blog component without optimizing it in the traditional vertical SEO fashion. It doesn't appear on top of any search engine results worth mentioning. I wanted to see if the blog powered by RSS feed would drive significant traffïc to my site.
The results are amazing! I have been totally blown away by the research. Chëck out why I have become a big believer in blogging and RSS in part 2 of this article. Visit http://www.searchengineplan.com/blog.htm to stay informed on the latest blogging, RSS, and SEO developments.
About The AuthorKamau Austin is publisher of eInfoNEWS.com and runs SearchEnginePlan.com. He is author of Always On Top "How to Get the Highest Search Engine ranking for your website. See more about his strategies at AlwaysOnToptheBook.com.
Sunday, October 30, 2005
Using New Content to Build Links
Sometimes, link building is more than just searching out sites to request links from. Sometimes you have to get creative in how you build links.
In this article, we look at another way of building links that doesn't really require you to go out and search for relevant sites to request links from.
The web is growing at a phenomenal rate
Technorati, a popular blog search and syndication site estimates that the blogosphere alone doubles in size every 5 months. As of the end of July 2005, Technorati was tracking over 14.2 million weblogs, and over 1.3 billion links.
Who knows how much the rest of the web grows? I would bet that while it doesn't double every 5 months its rate of growth is pretty impressive.
It is because of this growth in the web that other forms of link building become somewhat easier. I am talking about building links through content creation and publishing.
Chances are you are reading this article on the Text Link Brokers blog, or one of a number of syndication partners who agree to republish the article with links intact.
Through such syndication, you could come across this article through a variety of high profile websites on the web. In addition, these high profile sites are industry specific.
This means that any links I embed into this article (which is then syndicated) will ultimately point back to this site on important key phrases.
Think about this, for the time it takes me to write this article, I could have built as many as 2 dozen high quality, keyword rich links back to both the main site as well as the blog site.
Normally, for me to build 2 dozen high quality links for one of my clients I'd have to start with a list of about 500 somewhat related sites, filtering out those that are lower quality and submitting to 50 to 100 sites in hopes of achieving those 20 or so links.
And it has been my experience that I would be lucky to achieve 5 to 10 links from that initial list of 500 sites.
All this would have taken me about 5 or 6 hours - even longer if I hadn't used a few tools to help gather those links.
Yet hëre I am with much less effort, able to achieve almost the same number of links.
That's the nice thing about content - it can do so many things for your site:
- A growing site helps encourage search engine crawlers to visit repeatedly.
- A growing site has more pages which have the potential to rank for other phrases.
- A growing site offers more entry points to searchers.
- A growing site offers more opportunities for others to link to it.
- A growing site can help positively influence link popularity (if internal navigation is coded properly)
- And More...
Further, as visitors do searches on search engines, there is a greater opportunïty for your content to appear for those searches, helping to build your brand.
If you take your content development program a step further and syndicate your content to a wider audience (via blog pings and so on) you can reach even more people, potentially building even more links and allowing your name (and brand) to reach beyond the "traditional" web.
For example, when I do a search for my name, I find myself in traditional organic SERPs but also on sites like Google News, as well as most of the main blog search engines. This is because this site, and others I write for, are syndicated. Plus those sites that I mentioned earlier - the syndication partners - are also syndicated.
So my articles appear numerous times for the same search. This helps build my reputation online.
Not only does my name appear throughout the web, but articles like these also get picked up by even more sources. Ones that perhaps didn't read this blog, or one of the syndication partners, but they may have found it on Bloglines, Technorati or any of the other large blog search engines.
Then, the article gets picked up by even more sources, in its entirety, with links and all.
So, the number of new links I've created has nöw jumped from the original two on this article, to a couple dozen on our syndication partners to ????
It's interesting to see where articles get picked up. I've found myself quoted in PDFs belonging to Universities, on foreign sites where I've been translated into Korean, Chinese and even Russian. And, you guessed it, the links remain intact.
That's because these articles aren't like news - they last much longer than a press release which, while gaining huge exposure for 2 or 3 days, quickly disappears.
The articles last "forever" because they continue to be circulated by various sites who find them in searches, and either copy them or link to them. Then their sites get syndicated and found by others who then also link or copy the article.
You may begin to see that this type of linking can go on almost forever, because what I'm writing hëre isn't necessarily newsworthy, but it is an article that people will find useful for months and years to come (I hope). As it becomes more and more established on the web (and more entrenched, because of the number of high quality related links already pointing to it) it begins to take on a life of its own.
And the more articles which I write for this site which appear like this, the better it is for the site.
So, what is the downside to this plan?
The only one, really, is that you have to be able to write. And not just scribble your ideas down, but make them intelligible and easy to read.
This is what takes the practice. But I can tell you that while you may (and likely will) labor for hours over your first few articles, over time they do get easier.
So much so that you will begin composing them in your sleep, or while you are waiting for your bus, or any place else where you have "down time."
So if you are concerned that a massive and costly link building campaign is your only option to increasing your online visibility think again. Sometimes something as simple as an "I was thinking" article can drive dozens of new relevant links to your site.
About The AuthorRob Sullivan - SEO Specialist and Internet Marketing Consultant. Any reproduction of this article needs to have an html link pointing to http://www.textlinkbrokers.com.
Monday, August 15, 2005
How To Get 1000's Of Free Visits From Google This Week
**How To Get 1000's Of Free Visits From Google This Week
**How You Can Make $600 A Week Even If No One Buys Your
Online Product Or Your Affiliate Product!
**How To Get Listed On Google In 3 Days Guaranteed
**Plus... How To Make A Fortune Giving These Secrets
Away For Free
, Check this out...
...How would You like to Divert 1000’s of fresh,
new visitor's Daily to Your web site or Affilaite
web site from Google, Yahoo, MSN and others At $0
cost to you...
And...
...Automatically Get 100's of other High Ranking web
sites eagerly linking to your web site no questions
asked.
...never once will you have to beg for link exchanges
from high rankings web sites. They link to you
automatically no questions asked.
...your web site will quickly achieve Ultra Hight Link
Popularity on the Major Search Engines
...you'll get 100's of Highly Targeted visitors to your
web site or affiliate web site overnight
...many are getting more Customers and Sales than they
can handle
***Plus... See How You Can Make A Boat-Load Of MOney
by Giving Away This amazing secret Strategy To Others
For Fr*e*
---------------------------------------
HERE'S HOW IT WORKS
Whether you’re selling Fruit Baskets, an MLM
Program, a Business Opportunity or a Consulting
Service it doesn’t matter.
As long as you’re selling a product from a
web site or from an affiliate web site you
can now divert 1000’s of targeted visitors
from major search engines using an amazing
new software program called...
..."The Traffic Panther"
==Get The Traffic Panther at $0 Cost Today====
Yes... you heard right!
For a limited time, you can get fr*e access to
this amazing software program "The Traffic Panther".
This software will allow you to do everything I
mentioned above with the click of a few "command"
buttons. You do nothing else guaranteed.
Go to the link below and You'll quickly see
how to use it tonight and begin diverting 1000's
of Targeted visitors from major search engines
to your web site right away.
In Addition...
This Program will Automatically Get 100's of other
people eagerly placing a link to your web site on
their web site no questions asked.
PLUS... you'll see how you can give the software
away to others for fr*e and make a "boat-load"
of money while you do it.
Can you guess how many people online would love to
divert 1000's of targeted hits to thier web site
for fr*e??
The number is staggering, and so is the potential
for you to make money by giving this program away
to them for fr*e.
===========================================
NOTE: This is a Limited Offer.
We can only allow 487 people to take full
advantage of this amaizing new traffic generating
program and make money giving it away for fr*e.
I urge you to Check out the full details while it's
still in pre-launch and still cost $0.
===========================================
I promise, this is no gimmick and I Guarantee
you'll be blown away by what you find!
Click Below Now - If the link is non operational,
please know this promotional offer has ended:
http://www.thetrafficpanther.com/members/egenerate
Be Safe, be courteous...
Jodi Hans
Creator/Founder
The Traffic Panther
P.S. Everyone wants and needs web traffic. The
Traffic Panther software prgram is hands down
the most revolutionary new way to get search engine
traffic Flooding your web site within days.
Plus see how you can earn money giving it away
to others for Fr*e.
P.P.S. 46% of all web sites are discovered
through Search Engine traffic. Do Not wait a
moment longer to begin using search engines to
get 1000's of people coming to your web site
looking exactly for what you have to offer...
http://www.thetrafficpanther.com/members/egenerate
**How You Can Make $600 A Week Even If No One Buys Your
Online Product Or Your Affiliate Product!
**How To Get Listed On Google In 3 Days Guaranteed
**Plus... How To Make A Fortune Giving These Secrets
Away For Free
, Check this out...
...How would You like to Divert 1000’s of fresh,
new visitor's Daily to Your web site or Affilaite
web site from Google, Yahoo, MSN and others At $0
cost to you...
And...
...Automatically Get 100's of other High Ranking web
sites eagerly linking to your web site no questions
asked.
...never once will you have to beg for link exchanges
from high rankings web sites. They link to you
automatically no questions asked.
...your web site will quickly achieve Ultra Hight Link
Popularity on the Major Search Engines
...you'll get 100's of Highly Targeted visitors to your
web site or affiliate web site overnight
...many are getting more Customers and Sales than they
can handle
***Plus... See How You Can Make A Boat-Load Of MOney
by Giving Away This amazing secret Strategy To Others
For Fr*e*
---------------------------------------
HERE'S HOW IT WORKS
Whether you’re selling Fruit Baskets, an MLM
Program, a Business Opportunity or a Consulting
Service it doesn’t matter.
As long as you’re selling a product from a
web site or from an affiliate web site you
can now divert 1000’s of targeted visitors
from major search engines using an amazing
new software program called...
..."The Traffic Panther"
==Get The Traffic Panther at $0 Cost Today====
Yes... you heard right!
For a limited time, you can get fr*e access to
this amazing software program "The Traffic Panther".
This software will allow you to do everything I
mentioned above with the click of a few "command"
buttons. You do nothing else guaranteed.
Go to the link below and You'll quickly see
how to use it tonight and begin diverting 1000's
of Targeted visitors from major search engines
to your web site right away.
In Addition...
This Program will Automatically Get 100's of other
people eagerly placing a link to your web site on
their web site no questions asked.
PLUS... you'll see how you can give the software
away to others for fr*e and make a "boat-load"
of money while you do it.
Can you guess how many people online would love to
divert 1000's of targeted hits to thier web site
for fr*e??
The number is staggering, and so is the potential
for you to make money by giving this program away
to them for fr*e.
===========================================
NOTE: This is a Limited Offer.
We can only allow 487 people to take full
advantage of this amaizing new traffic generating
program and make money giving it away for fr*e.
I urge you to Check out the full details while it's
still in pre-launch and still cost $0.
===========================================
I promise, this is no gimmick and I Guarantee
you'll be blown away by what you find!
Click Below Now - If the link is non operational,
please know this promotional offer has ended:
http://www.thetrafficpanther.com/members/egenerate
Be Safe, be courteous...
Jodi Hans
Creator/Founder
The Traffic Panther
P.S. Everyone wants and needs web traffic. The
Traffic Panther software prgram is hands down
the most revolutionary new way to get search engine
traffic Flooding your web site within days.
Plus see how you can earn money giving it away
to others for Fr*e.
P.P.S. 46% of all web sites are discovered
through Search Engine traffic. Do Not wait a
moment longer to begin using search engines to
get 1000's of people coming to your web site
looking exactly for what you have to offer...
http://www.thetrafficpanther.com/members/egenerate
Saturday, August 06, 2005
A Sneaky Little Technique
A Sneaky Little Technique That Can Boost
Your Online Profits By Up To 330%!
Today, I'm going to teach you an extremely powerful, marketing "secret" that will get your profits multiplying like rabbits.
But first… let me ask you something.
When is the last time a computer bought your product or paid for your service?
The answer is never. No one sells to machines. And yet, because of the net… because of the technology… because of the automation… experienced entrepreneurs who take their business online, forgot that they’re doing business with PEOPLE.
The fact that your "store" is a website or that your marketing message is delivered via email rather than snail mail doesn't change who your target is: real, live human beings with thoughts, emotions…and hopefully deep pockets!
Even though you're using a webpage, an autoresponder, or an email, it's really YOU -- a person -- who's reaching out to a customer or prospect. Success in selling happens when a one-to-one personal connection occurs.
Relationship is the key.
You can't sell benefits to a computer. You can't get a computer excited about how good it will feel after using your product or service. It's so obvious; it's ridiculous. You're selling to a person. And if you want that person to buy from you, you need to put yourself out there.
So why do a lot of people act like they're criminals and disappear when they’re selling online? Are you guilty?
Do you use the Internet itself to create walls that hide "human side" behind technology. Do you hide behind emails instead of making phone calls? Do you peak out from behind your website without offering a "hard copy" way to reach you?
And do you play a weird game of hide-and-seek with customers using frequently asked questions and customer service "tools" so that you never really have to connect?
I know, I know! You're saying that automation and technology are the biggest advantages of the Internet. All these streamlined communications processes help you do good business.
That's fine, if what you want is good business. But personal communication can make your business great.
Sometimes just by adding that personal touch… that human factor… to your site can boost your sales by 100%, 200% to as much as 330%!!!
What am I talking about? I am talking about a tangible demonstration that your business is trustworthy because trust is at the foundation of every sale.
So it turns out that this secret strategy is actually a simple one, too. I'm talking about adding a phone number to your site… and a mailing address…and a fax number. I'm talking about giving your customer an option contact you one-to-one.
I'm talking about talking! Just talk to your customers and find out what they want.
Now you might say, “Dan, this won't work for me. I'm a one-person operation and I'd get so buried by phone calls that I wouldn't be able to do anything else."
You know how important testing is in business, don't you? Well, why not test my theory before you reject it. Do it my way. And see if you will actually get a lot of calls.
I think you'll be surprised. I have a lot of clients who add phone numbers to their sites, and they don’t really get that many phone calls.
If you're really stretched to the limits time-wise, you could hire someone to handle it for you in-house or outsource it… although I think outsourcing almost defeats the purpose by putting you one step further away from your customers.
Personally, I urge you to talk to your customers once a while. It's time well spent…even if time is money. You’ll learn a lot from the conversation -- what people want and how they want it.
And that, I assure you, can be worth millions (literally) to your business.
Do you know that a lot of people actually have a fear of picking the phone and calling a stranger? So it's unlikely that you're going to get flooded with a lot of Chatty Cathies and Talky Teddies you've never met before who just want to shoot the breeze for ten minutes.
So why will people pick up the phone and call you? Probably for one of four important reasons that make these valuable calls that you'll want to take.
1. They have an urgent problem, and they need a solution now! If your product/service will solve their problems, they’ll buy from you - NOW.
2. They want to buy from you, but they might just have a few questions and you answer them well, they’ll buy from you - NOW.
3. They might have a comment regarding of your product or service. This could be helpful to your business and make them more likely to buy from you in the future.
4. They might have a problem, and they’re mad. But even if they are, you can fix it for them. Then they’ll love you, and they'll buy from you again and again. You may not have realized it before, but every telephone inquiry from a customer or prospect is a money call. And when money calls, you want to be sure to answer. Because each one of these money calls mean sales in one way or the other.
Personally, I love it when my phone rings. Because it’s either one of my deep-pocketed mentoring clients who wants to run something by me OR a prospect who wants to give me money.
Ching-Ching! How can you NOT love those calls?
And here's a special message for you if you’re selling a luxury service or a high-end product. It's tough to sell big-ticket items offline, and even tougher online. It’s not impossible… but it’s tough.
Think about it. Someone who's looking for a marketing consultant and sees your site is probably NOT going to plunk down $5000.00 in an electronic payment just based on nothing more than your online sales copy.
And don't be fooled that an autoresponder series will do the trick any better. It’s tough to close a sale for thousands or tens of thousands of dollars just through emails. Not impossible… but tough.
But, you can easily close a $5000.00 sale via the telephone. (If you know how to "give good phone," that is).
A lot of copywriters don't do it the "easy way." They avoid the telephone. They only communicate via emails. Or they charge exorbitant "consulting fees" for phone calls as a way to telegraph that they don't want to speak to people.
Now, that’s their personal preference. But perhaps they should put themselves in the shoes of their clients who say, "This means I'm going to hire a copywriter and pay thousands of dollars to a service provider -- an employee -- that I won't even be able to speak to by phone? That stinks!"
Worse than annoying a prospect, lack of accessibility makes people suspicious. They might feel like you’re hiding something… that you’re not being totally upfront.
Take the mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. The mayor's office has a website, but his home phone number is listed in the telephone directory. And, while it sounds unbelievable, he actually does pick up the phone when he's home and talk to his constituents.
They love him for it.
Take me for example. I am actually one of the very, very, very few experts who can be reached by phone. If I'm not on a call already or working one-on-one with a client in my office, I always pick up the phone.
And when I can't pick up before the machine does, I try to return all my calls promptly. (Unless, they’re trying to sell me insurance or some crap.)
Accessibility is, in a way, my unique selling proposition. People are actually very surprised when I call them back. They know how busy I am. And my prospects respect and appreciate that I prioritize them.
Is every call a walk in the park that ends with a trip to the bank? Well no. Sometimes I do get calls from some jerk who just wants to "bust my balls" or waste my time.
But really… the whackos are few and far between. Most of my callers are good people. They’re calling me because they want me to help them with their conversions, not because they want to BS the weather.
I’d say 95% of the people who call are very serious and I'm happy to have the opportunity to speak with them. As for the other 5%… once they "reveal" themselves, I get off the phone very quickly.
So how can you use this sneak technique to beef up conversions on your site? To borrow the old phone company slogan: "Reach out and touch.
Add a telephone option to your site and take orders via telephone. If you think this could be overwhelming, you could test just taking calls within business hours.
If you’re doing huge volume, add a toll-free number.
If you’re doing big business in the international market, outsource so that you can accept phone orders 24/7.
The Internet is the Land of Opportunity, although some online entrepreneurs think they're in Lazy Land… and don't understand why they're not succeeding.
They want to live the ultimate Internet marketing lifestyle dream. They want everything to be automated. They want their ads to find the prospects, they want their site to sell the prospect, take the money, and forward a deposit directly into their online bank account.
That dream can be real, but too many business people are relying too much on the technology to do ALL the work for them. Sometimes, it’s good to go back to old-fashion communication. Silence may be golden, but in business… talking is pure platinum.
We'll "talk" more soon.
Dan
Copyright © 2005 Dan Lok
About the Author...
Dan Lok is known as "The World's #1 Website Conversion Expert", with a proven track record of selling over $25.7 million dollars of merchandise and services. Dan has resuscitated copy that was previously in "critical condition" and helped his clients to double and triple their conversion rates… some as much as 417%!!! More than 200 websites have been "Lok-ed" and loaded for Internet action. Go to: http://www.WebsiteConversionExpert.com
Your Online Profits By Up To 330%!
Today, I'm going to teach you an extremely powerful, marketing "secret" that will get your profits multiplying like rabbits.
But first… let me ask you something.
When is the last time a computer bought your product or paid for your service?
The answer is never. No one sells to machines. And yet, because of the net… because of the technology… because of the automation… experienced entrepreneurs who take their business online, forgot that they’re doing business with PEOPLE.
The fact that your "store" is a website or that your marketing message is delivered via email rather than snail mail doesn't change who your target is: real, live human beings with thoughts, emotions…and hopefully deep pockets!
Even though you're using a webpage, an autoresponder, or an email, it's really YOU -- a person -- who's reaching out to a customer or prospect. Success in selling happens when a one-to-one personal connection occurs.
Relationship is the key.
You can't sell benefits to a computer. You can't get a computer excited about how good it will feel after using your product or service. It's so obvious; it's ridiculous. You're selling to a person. And if you want that person to buy from you, you need to put yourself out there.
So why do a lot of people act like they're criminals and disappear when they’re selling online? Are you guilty?
Do you use the Internet itself to create walls that hide "human side" behind technology. Do you hide behind emails instead of making phone calls? Do you peak out from behind your website without offering a "hard copy" way to reach you?
And do you play a weird game of hide-and-seek with customers using frequently asked questions and customer service "tools" so that you never really have to connect?
I know, I know! You're saying that automation and technology are the biggest advantages of the Internet. All these streamlined communications processes help you do good business.
That's fine, if what you want is good business. But personal communication can make your business great.
Sometimes just by adding that personal touch… that human factor… to your site can boost your sales by 100%, 200% to as much as 330%!!!
What am I talking about? I am talking about a tangible demonstration that your business is trustworthy because trust is at the foundation of every sale.
So it turns out that this secret strategy is actually a simple one, too. I'm talking about adding a phone number to your site… and a mailing address…and a fax number. I'm talking about giving your customer an option contact you one-to-one.
I'm talking about talking! Just talk to your customers and find out what they want.
Now you might say, “Dan, this won't work for me. I'm a one-person operation and I'd get so buried by phone calls that I wouldn't be able to do anything else."
You know how important testing is in business, don't you? Well, why not test my theory before you reject it. Do it my way. And see if you will actually get a lot of calls.
I think you'll be surprised. I have a lot of clients who add phone numbers to their sites, and they don’t really get that many phone calls.
If you're really stretched to the limits time-wise, you could hire someone to handle it for you in-house or outsource it… although I think outsourcing almost defeats the purpose by putting you one step further away from your customers.
Personally, I urge you to talk to your customers once a while. It's time well spent…even if time is money. You’ll learn a lot from the conversation -- what people want and how they want it.
And that, I assure you, can be worth millions (literally) to your business.
Do you know that a lot of people actually have a fear of picking the phone and calling a stranger? So it's unlikely that you're going to get flooded with a lot of Chatty Cathies and Talky Teddies you've never met before who just want to shoot the breeze for ten minutes.
So why will people pick up the phone and call you? Probably for one of four important reasons that make these valuable calls that you'll want to take.
1. They have an urgent problem, and they need a solution now! If your product/service will solve their problems, they’ll buy from you - NOW.
2. They want to buy from you, but they might just have a few questions and you answer them well, they’ll buy from you - NOW.
3. They might have a comment regarding of your product or service. This could be helpful to your business and make them more likely to buy from you in the future.
4. They might have a problem, and they’re mad. But even if they are, you can fix it for them. Then they’ll love you, and they'll buy from you again and again. You may not have realized it before, but every telephone inquiry from a customer or prospect is a money call. And when money calls, you want to be sure to answer. Because each one of these money calls mean sales in one way or the other.
Personally, I love it when my phone rings. Because it’s either one of my deep-pocketed mentoring clients who wants to run something by me OR a prospect who wants to give me money.
Ching-Ching! How can you NOT love those calls?
And here's a special message for you if you’re selling a luxury service or a high-end product. It's tough to sell big-ticket items offline, and even tougher online. It’s not impossible… but it’s tough.
Think about it. Someone who's looking for a marketing consultant and sees your site is probably NOT going to plunk down $5000.00 in an electronic payment just based on nothing more than your online sales copy.
And don't be fooled that an autoresponder series will do the trick any better. It’s tough to close a sale for thousands or tens of thousands of dollars just through emails. Not impossible… but tough.
But, you can easily close a $5000.00 sale via the telephone. (If you know how to "give good phone," that is).
A lot of copywriters don't do it the "easy way." They avoid the telephone. They only communicate via emails. Or they charge exorbitant "consulting fees" for phone calls as a way to telegraph that they don't want to speak to people.
Now, that’s their personal preference. But perhaps they should put themselves in the shoes of their clients who say, "This means I'm going to hire a copywriter and pay thousands of dollars to a service provider -- an employee -- that I won't even be able to speak to by phone? That stinks!"
Worse than annoying a prospect, lack of accessibility makes people suspicious. They might feel like you’re hiding something… that you’re not being totally upfront.
Take the mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. The mayor's office has a website, but his home phone number is listed in the telephone directory. And, while it sounds unbelievable, he actually does pick up the phone when he's home and talk to his constituents.
They love him for it.
Take me for example. I am actually one of the very, very, very few experts who can be reached by phone. If I'm not on a call already or working one-on-one with a client in my office, I always pick up the phone.
And when I can't pick up before the machine does, I try to return all my calls promptly. (Unless, they’re trying to sell me insurance or some crap.)
Accessibility is, in a way, my unique selling proposition. People are actually very surprised when I call them back. They know how busy I am. And my prospects respect and appreciate that I prioritize them.
Is every call a walk in the park that ends with a trip to the bank? Well no. Sometimes I do get calls from some jerk who just wants to "bust my balls" or waste my time.
But really… the whackos are few and far between. Most of my callers are good people. They’re calling me because they want me to help them with their conversions, not because they want to BS the weather.
I’d say 95% of the people who call are very serious and I'm happy to have the opportunity to speak with them. As for the other 5%… once they "reveal" themselves, I get off the phone very quickly.
So how can you use this sneak technique to beef up conversions on your site? To borrow the old phone company slogan: "Reach out and touch.
Add a telephone option to your site and take orders via telephone. If you think this could be overwhelming, you could test just taking calls within business hours.
If you’re doing huge volume, add a toll-free number.
If you’re doing big business in the international market, outsource so that you can accept phone orders 24/7.
The Internet is the Land of Opportunity, although some online entrepreneurs think they're in Lazy Land… and don't understand why they're not succeeding.
They want to live the ultimate Internet marketing lifestyle dream. They want everything to be automated. They want their ads to find the prospects, they want their site to sell the prospect, take the money, and forward a deposit directly into their online bank account.
That dream can be real, but too many business people are relying too much on the technology to do ALL the work for them. Sometimes, it’s good to go back to old-fashion communication. Silence may be golden, but in business… talking is pure platinum.
We'll "talk" more soon.
Dan
Copyright © 2005 Dan Lok
About the Author...
Dan Lok is known as "The World's #1 Website Conversion Expert", with a proven track record of selling over $25.7 million dollars of merchandise and services. Dan has resuscitated copy that was previously in "critical condition" and helped his clients to double and triple their conversion rates… some as much as 417%!!! More than 200 websites have been "Lok-ed" and loaded for Internet action. Go to: http://www.WebsiteConversionExpert.com
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Google Warning
Hi there
I just wanted to alert you to something Google are currently doing if you’re trying to do an Adword sales campaign on the internet. They’ve just introduced something they call a ‘Fast-Start’ whereby they help you do the marketing.
NOT a good idea. Here’s why…
A good friend of mine was having a hard time trying to make money from an Adword on this ‘fast start’ program and couldn’t figure out why. Just before he was about to abandon the whole thing, he thought he’d click on his ad to see what the actual visitor would see… and got a shock. Of course, what the visitor should have seen after clicking on this (or any) Adword is some sales info- a sales letter. Instead, the customer in this case was going straight to the order page!! Erm… no surprises there as to why sales were so low!
Why had this happened? Apparantly, because it was on this ‘fast-start’ program, some snot-nosed kid on the Google staff, after attending an hour’s class on marketing, made this change. He said, “customers don’t want all the hard-sell”. Could my friend get a refund? No. Should you use the fast-start program? You decide.
Anyway, thought I would save you some money! If you don’t know what a Google adword is, you should do as it’s a great way to make money. I’ll shortly be announcing a seminar date where I can explain more and we can meet up.
Best Regards
Jim Sheridan
I just wanted to alert you to something Google are currently doing if you’re trying to do an Adword sales campaign on the internet. They’ve just introduced something they call a ‘Fast-Start’ whereby they help you do the marketing.
NOT a good idea. Here’s why…
A good friend of mine was having a hard time trying to make money from an Adword on this ‘fast start’ program and couldn’t figure out why. Just before he was about to abandon the whole thing, he thought he’d click on his ad to see what the actual visitor would see… and got a shock. Of course, what the visitor should have seen after clicking on this (or any) Adword is some sales info- a sales letter. Instead, the customer in this case was going straight to the order page!! Erm… no surprises there as to why sales were so low!
Why had this happened? Apparantly, because it was on this ‘fast-start’ program, some snot-nosed kid on the Google staff, after attending an hour’s class on marketing, made this change. He said, “customers don’t want all the hard-sell”. Could my friend get a refund? No. Should you use the fast-start program? You decide.
Anyway, thought I would save you some money! If you don’t know what a Google adword is, you should do as it’s a great way to make money. I’ll shortly be announcing a seminar date where I can explain more and we can meet up.
Best Regards
Jim Sheridan
Here's your trial copy
I'm handing out trial copies of the "Accelerated Internet
Wealth Video" series, and I'd like you to have one!
Let me explain...
I'm thinking of offering this set of wealth-building
videos -- where Derek Gehl and his team reveal *exactly* how
they grew $25 into $40 Million in online sales -- to all of
my customers...
... but first I want to make sure that other people can
duplicate the incredible results I got with my *own* online
business from watching them!
So here's what will happen:
1. You'll receive -- by courier -- a package containing 9 DVDs
or video tapes that lay out *in detail* the exact strategies
they've been using to earn $40,000,000 online.
2. Spend 30 days watching these live demos of their most
successful test results and case studies, and profiting
from as many of the hundreds of wealth-building strategies
as you can.
At the end of 30 days, you choose...
If you're convinced that you'll be able to make hundreds of
times more money than your competitors by using this
information, you can keep the videos!
Otherwise, just send them back.
These are the techniques Derek and his team have been using
to make $20,821 a DAY online, and they've NEVER shared them
publicly before!
You'll discover how to guarantee all your e-mail gets delivered
(and not accidentally deleted as spam)... how anyone can turn
an idea into a profitable web site with almost no up-front
cash in less than a month... how they made $2,031,959 last
year using just ONE "forgotten" marketing technique... and
much more!
But you need to move fast...
Derek is limiting the number of people who sign up, in order
to make sure there are enough trial copies for everyone!
So I'd like to encourage you to follow this link right away:
http://www.marketingtips.com/t.cgi/783618/trialseries
Good luck with the trial. The information in these videos
helped me -- and I *know* it'll help you, too!
Phil
P.S. Don't underestimate the value of the information in this
trial. Just ONE of the secrets cost Derek and his team over
2 years to learn, and cost them $100,000 in research and
expenses!
=================================================
Wealth Video" series, and I'd like you to have one!
Let me explain...
I'm thinking of offering this set of wealth-building
videos -- where Derek Gehl and his team reveal *exactly* how
they grew $25 into $40 Million in online sales -- to all of
my customers...
... but first I want to make sure that other people can
duplicate the incredible results I got with my *own* online
business from watching them!
So here's what will happen:
1. You'll receive -- by courier -- a package containing 9 DVDs
or video tapes that lay out *in detail* the exact strategies
they've been using to earn $40,000,000 online.
2. Spend 30 days watching these live demos of their most
successful test results and case studies, and profiting
from as many of the hundreds of wealth-building strategies
as you can.
At the end of 30 days, you choose...
If you're convinced that you'll be able to make hundreds of
times more money than your competitors by using this
information, you can keep the videos!
Otherwise, just send them back.
These are the techniques Derek and his team have been using
to make $20,821 a DAY online, and they've NEVER shared them
publicly before!
You'll discover how to guarantee all your e-mail gets delivered
(and not accidentally deleted as spam)... how anyone can turn
an idea into a profitable web site with almost no up-front
cash in less than a month... how they made $2,031,959 last
year using just ONE "forgotten" marketing technique... and
much more!
But you need to move fast...
Derek is limiting the number of people who sign up, in order
to make sure there are enough trial copies for everyone!
So I'd like to encourage you to follow this link right away:
http://www.marketingtips.com/t.cgi/783618/trialseries
Good luck with the trial. The information in these videos
helped me -- and I *know* it'll help you, too!
Phil
P.S. Don't underestimate the value of the information in this
trial. Just ONE of the secrets cost Derek and his team over
2 years to learn, and cost them $100,000 in research and
expenses!
=================================================
Tuesday, July 05, 2005
Internet Success Interviews price SLASHED
I've just found out that Neil Shearing has released a
new version of his "Internet Success Interviews" product.
Get this...he's created a new and improved version
but has SLASHED the previous price by more than half!
I REALLY don't believe Neil is offering such incredible
value... he must really want to be WAY out in front of
everyone else when it comes to offering value for money!
The actual interviews are by people who have achieved
real success online including such famous names as Jonathan
Mizel and Yanik Silver. These guys were grilled and
revealed many of their top success secrets. Neil has
also piled on the bonuses... he's even offering an
interview where he was questioned for FOUR HOURS about
how he makes hundreds of thousands of dollars online
each year! That bonus alone is worth the price of the
product... especially at the new, crazy price!
OK, you can probably tell that this new version gets
two thumbs up from me. Do yourself a favour and find
out what it really takes to succeed online... click here...
http://www.scamfreezone.com/t.cgi?a=176089&e=/interviews/
new version of his "Internet Success Interviews" product.
Get this...he's created a new and improved version
but has SLASHED the previous price by more than half!
I REALLY don't believe Neil is offering such incredible
value... he must really want to be WAY out in front of
everyone else when it comes to offering value for money!
The actual interviews are by people who have achieved
real success online including such famous names as Jonathan
Mizel and Yanik Silver. These guys were grilled and
revealed many of their top success secrets. Neil has
also piled on the bonuses... he's even offering an
interview where he was questioned for FOUR HOURS about
how he makes hundreds of thousands of dollars online
each year! That bonus alone is worth the price of the
product... especially at the new, crazy price!
OK, you can probably tell that this new version gets
two thumbs up from me. Do yourself a favour and find
out what it really takes to succeed online... click here...
http://www.scamfreezone.com/t.cgi?a=176089&e=/interviews/
Sunday, May 15, 2005
How to Make Money With Your Blog?
Ryen Kim
Make money blogging is fun: you enjoy blogging and getting money
from blogging. As long as "making money with your blog" is
concerned, it doesn't matter matter actually whether you enjoy
or not. The way generating money from blogging is the same
regardless of whether you enjoy blogging or painfully doing.
Let's get to the point.
Every business has the same process. That is, make potential
customer come to you and sell your product, service or
information. Paraphrasing it into blogging term, let the readers
come to your blog and make them click the link like "Buy now",
"Join Now", "Adsense Ads", etc.
We call readers as traffic. And about how many out of your
readers click the link refer we as conversion rate. Of course,
the higher the conversion rate, the better.
Specifically, make-money blogging follows for steps:
In short, make-money-blogging is doing step-by-step action: that
is, you blog, bring traffic, PREsell your blog readers and
finally monetize. Without bringing traffic and achieving
PREsell, it is not possible to monetize your blog. That's why
you need to keep in mind the fact that make-money-blogging is
step-by-step action.
Due to the space limitation, I can't
explain all the detail. If you want to know more about each
step, you can read it from the article, what blog can make money?.
About the author:
Ryen Kim is an MBA, specialized in marketing research and
analysis. His current focus is blogging and home based affiliate
business as a work-at-home scheme. He is a founder of Blog Sites and running Hom Based
Affiliate Business web site.
Make money blogging is fun: you enjoy blogging and getting money
from blogging. As long as "making money with your blog" is
concerned, it doesn't matter matter actually whether you enjoy
or not. The way generating money from blogging is the same
regardless of whether you enjoy blogging or painfully doing.
Let's get to the point.
Every business has the same process. That is, make potential
customer come to you and sell your product, service or
information. Paraphrasing it into blogging term, let the readers
come to your blog and make them click the link like "Buy now",
"Join Now", "Adsense Ads", etc.
We call readers as traffic. And about how many out of your
readers click the link refer we as conversion rate. Of course,
the higher the conversion rate, the better.
Specifically, make-money blogging follows for steps:
- Step 1: You blog, if not, start blogging.
- Step 2: Bring traffic to your blog.
- Step 3: PREsell with your blog.
- That is, your blog content attract your reader to
do some kind of action: buy your own product or go to the link
you prepared, for example. But did you notice the word
"PREsell"?. That's the most important thing in your make-money
blogging plan. Many experienced Internet marketers say that
people are not buying anything when you extensively try to sell
something. This makes sense if you recall your own experience.
Did you buy something when a blogger tried to sell something?
Maybe not! Instead, give your readers useful information and
create the warm mood by giving them the benefits of product that
you have in mind. And then, only then place a link so that your
readers click through. This is so called PREsell.
- Step 4: Monetize: This is your final goal and the monetization has
two streams.
-Sell your own product, service or information, if you have
one.
-For the blogger who don't have their own product,
it's still possible to earn money from their blog thanks to the
many affiliate programs among which most popular one is "Google
Adsense". But it's just one example out of hundred affiliate
programs. if not thousand.
In short, make-money-blogging is doing step-by-step action: that
is, you blog, bring traffic, PREsell your blog readers and
finally monetize. Without bringing traffic and achieving
PREsell, it is not possible to monetize your blog. That's why
you need to keep in mind the fact that make-money-blogging is
step-by-step action.
Due to the space limitation, I can't
explain all the detail. If you want to know more about each
step, you can read it from the article, what blog can make money?.
About the author:
Ryen Kim is an MBA, specialized in marketing research and
analysis. His current focus is blogging and home based affiliate
business as a work-at-home scheme. He is a founder of Blog Sites and running Hom Based
Affiliate Business web site.
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