I realize that hoards of new people are coming online every week. And, I can only HOPE that's the excuse for this, because I don't have time for idiot management, BUT ...
PLEASE learn to use text format email! You probably get a bazillion ezines already and 99% of them are done in TEXT. There's a REASON for that! Take the clue!
This html email is a PITA. How am I supposed to read what you wrote over your jungle background? How am I supposed to read the part that you laid over your dark blue border because you haven't learned how to handle a table yet?
Can YOU read it? No? Then, why are you sending it to ME? Think I have powers you don't have?
Even without those silly backgrounds, I STILL don't want your html email! How am I supposed to read your pale yellow text on white? Do you send your off-line business correspondence looking that ridiculous? It's black type on white. Period!
If you want to be an artiste - do it on your personal (not business) web site! DON'T do it in my email. DON'T make ME change formats just so your fancy junk will copy into the reply.
And, do you READ the lists where you send that html email? Haven't you SEEN the mess it makes on the lists? Or, do you only write to the lists and not read them?
Haven't you noticed that YOUR html message looks like hieroglyphics? Haven't you noticed that all messages don't look that way? Don't you think there might be an answer for that? Do you want people to read it or not?
If I could figure out how to do it, I'd make a filter that would bounce all html email. It would attach an autoresponder message to the sender of the obnoxious stuff. Here's what it would say ...
"Your email has just been dumped into my D-U-M folder, never to be seen by me.
I don't want to see your adorable puppy dogs and kitty cats blocking the words. I don't care about your gorgeous parrot background. I don't want blinking banners and cutsie graphics in my email files. If you want to send me a display of orchids, call the florist.
I refuse to go blind trying to read your pink, lavender, yellow - or ANY color print. Black will do very nicely, thank you. So try again - try in TEXT format - and your email will reach my in-box. Send me a proper business letter and - lo and behold! - I'll even respond. Just like magic!"
Monday, June 11, 2007
Use HTML Email at Your Own Risk
Get Returned Visitors
Update your website pages frequently. Stagnant sites are more likely to be dropped by some search engines than a site that is dynamic. You may even think about placing a date counter on the page to show when it was last updated. The search engines will spider your site more often, and your visitors are more inclined to return on a regular basis to see what's new.
Offer additional value on your website. You can place links to affiliate and partner sites and products and request that they do the same for you. It is also effective to promote their books or videos as long as these products relate to your industry and are not in competition with your own product. You can invite customers to ‘opt in’ to get discounts and special offers. Place a link on your site to ask customers to ‘opt in’ to get a monthly newsletter or valuable coupons.
Place a “Book Mark” or “Add This Site to Your Favorites” link on your home page to encourage visitors to return. Add a link titled “Recommend this site to a Friend” so that the visitor can email your website link, with a pre-written title, for example, “Thought you might be interested in this”, just by clicking on it. In other words, make it as easy as possible for your visitors to return to your website and to invite their friends to do the same.
Brand your website so that visitors can easily see that they are on “your” site. Use consistent colors, logos and slogans throughout the site and always include a “Contact Us” link on each page. Create a page titled “Our Policies” that clearly explains your philosophy and principles in customer relations. Also post your privacy policy as well so that clients know they are secure when they visit your site. Create a FAQ page which addresses and clarifies the most likely issues about your product or your company that are likely to be asked about. This will help to resolve most of the customers concerns in their first visit to your site.
Ensure that each page on your website has proper titles and keywords so that your customer can find their way back to your site if they lose the book mark. Never, never, NEVER! spam a visitor, who has opted in for newsletters or information, with unsolicited emails. If they later decide that they want to “opt out” of your newsletter or other mail, be sure you take them off the mailing list immediately. They may return if they like your products. But they will surely not come back if you continue to flood their email box with mails they consider “junk mail” or spam. Just remember to give your visitors plenty of reasons to want to revisit your website, and make it as simple as you can for them. They will be back.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Paul_Moore
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Build a Mailing List
How important is building a mailing list to the success of your website?
If you're new to web design and web business, you might not realize how crucial a mailing list is for the success of your website.
You can create an e-zine, or electronic magazine, to send tips and resources to your site visitors. Or, you can create a mailing list of updates for customers who have already purchased from you.
Either way, a mailing list is the key to getting repeat visitors and sales!
Here are 5 explosive reasons to build a mailing list:
1. Grab Hold of Your Website Visitors
"Your visitors came, they saw, they left!"
That's what you will say over and over if you don't add a mailing list to your "priority" list. Even if your site really grabs a visitor - so much that they would bookmark it and return later - it's not enough to keep them coming back over and over. How many times have you bookmarked a really good site and then forgot about it by the end of the day?
If your visitors really enjoy your site, then offering them free tips or resources by email would be of benefit to them and you. By capturing their email through a subscription form, you are actually grabbing hold of your visitors before they leave your site. Otherwise, you might never get another chance to reach them.
2. Offer Free Tips for Joining Your Mailing List
With a mailing list, you can send visitors free tips by email. At the conclusion of your free tips, you can include your bio or a link to your site. Every newsletter or tip you send visitors is an opportunity to turn them into repeat visitors.
3. Announce Updates
Anytime you update your website or add something new, you can broadcast the information to subscribers on your list. You should announce site design changes, new products added, new articles, etc.
4. Test Response
With a mailing list, it's easy to test ads, articles and links to see how your customers respond. For example, in your ezine you can place classified ads and test your response by the number of clicks to those ads. You can make special offers to your subscribers such as discounts off the normal price of your products or free bonuses. Some mailing list services provide detailed tracking for you.
5. Earn Extra Money or More Visitors from Your Mailing List
Other list owners in your business field might be willing to pay for advertising in your newsletter or exchange classified ads with you. With an exchange, your classified ad will be featured in their ezine and their ad will be featured in your ezine. You both receive exposure!
12 Best Traffic Solutions Revealed for Your Website Guaranteed!
By: Imanuel
Master 12 Best Traffic Solutions, generate surge traffic to your website and there's simply no way to fail.
Ad Software Specialty
Here are some ways you can get web traffic to your website. Getting traffic to your website is not easy. A new website might get 10 - 20 vistor's daily. If your blog is good and improved frequently it will give you up to 100 - 200 vistor's daily. Some websites will have up to 1000 vistors daily. However if you just want your website to be visited by an international visitor, then its essential you promote your product or service. Below is 12 ways I find the most efficient in generating traffic to your site:
1. Pay Per Click. The Fastest way to get exposure online in world is by advertising with PPC (Pay Per Click) programs. Ads start running within minutes after you submit your billing information. You bid on relevant keywords and pay the bid amount each time someone clicks on the link through to your site.
2. Traditional Website Optimization. The factors that you must know for getting the top rankings: title of the page, description META tag, keyword META tag, in your headline, use HTML Tag, your first line of text, once or twice per paragraph, once/twice in bold, in the text of a link.
3. Weblog Optimization. Blogs are short for weblogs which is just an online journal where you can post articles, news and just comment on anything you want. You can set blogs up for free by using blogger which is also run by Google.
4. Article Marketing. Search engines love content, and it's that very content that let's you invite traffic from search engines. Here are double benefits from using this method: drive direct targeted visitors from hundreds of high traffic sites and increase your page rank and link popularity.
5. Press Release. A press release is news about your business. It is not an ad. Focus on telling your potential customers something about your business. Remember the who, what, when, where, why, and how of journalism.
6 Link Exchange. A good link exchange is when you exchange links with a site that is relevant to yours and complements yours because it is on the same or similar topic. This methods can increase your PR website.
7. Blog & RSS Directories. Blog and Ping is a service that you can use to let the blog and RSS directories know that you have updated your blog.
8. Autoresponder system. Once you run online advertising to drive traffic to your landing pages, so that you can collect subscribers. Many internet marketers neglect to build their own mailing list, and are losing out in a big way. Don't be one of them. Top internet marketers ALL build their own mailing lists.
9. Ezine Marketing. There are thousands upon thousands of ezines published on the Internet, and chances are excellent that there are many ezines published on a topic relevant to your site.
10. Viral Marketing. Viral Marketing allows you to build up your own opt-in list. These types of systems are usually based on some type of viral matrix, smiliar to a multi level marketing set up.
11. Auction. The system that ruthlessly convert visitors to bidders to finding wholesale suppliers and drop shippers all over the world for any product you want.
12. Traffic Exchange. Some systems require you to log-in to a "start page" and start surfing across other member's web pages. Each page you view earns you credit towards increased display of your own site.
How effective are these traffic methods? I am certain the traffic methods will help you get more incoming links and traffic to your web site. Doesn't matter what product you promote. More information about best traffic solutions, go to:
http://ad-software-specialty.blogspot.com
21 ways to increase webtraffic
by: Mikel
Internet traffic is the life of any website, and the fact is that good traffic is not always easy to obtain. However, there are some easy and effective ways for getting quality traffic to your website, some of them are free some cost more, either way you’re going to have to put some time and effort into it.
1. Get your own domain name. People will never forget catchy domain names. Be sure to choose a short and easy to remember domain name that is suitable for your business.
2. Submit to search engines: This is one of the first steps towards increasing your website traffic. Don-t wait for the search engines to find your site, go ahead and submit it to them. Visits by the search engine robots are a key way to increase website traffic.
3. Add your ad or website address to your own email or blog signature. This way each time you send an email or write in a blog, you-ll promote your own website.
4. Tell your visitors to bookmark your website. They may see your web site listed in their bookmarks and visit again.
5. Ask your visitors to sign your guest book. When people sign your guestbook you may get valuable feedback or constructive criticism on how to improve your web site.
6. Update your website, your website should always be up and running. Maintain a clean design and check for broken links, images and pages. If visitors always find what they want and need, they will surely be coming back. Plus, search engine robots love a site with changing content.
7. Pay-Per-Click Campaigns (PPC). Almost all search engines offer some sort of Pay-Per-Click advertising. This is a great way to get targeted traffic to your website. Keep in mind that major search engines will charge more than smaller ones.
8. Put yourself in the shoes of your potential clients. Ask yourself what search words they would use to find your types of services.
9. Print T-shirts, order custom-made shirts and wear your web address on your back. Sponsor a local sports team who will wear them, or use them as promotional giveaways.
10. Traffic Exchanges. Traffic exchanges offer a webmaster an instant, free way to get traffic to their site. The way most traffic exchanges work is pretty straightforward: I view your site, you view my site. The ratio of sites you view to your site views varies from site to site, usually 2:1. Traffic exchanges also offer a multi tier referral program that gives you a fraction of traffic earned by affiliates you bring into the program. You can simply search the term "traffic exchange” or “autosurf” in any search engine and you’ll find hundreds of them.
11. Another great way to boost your traffic is by a Tell a Friend form or button that you can put on your website. With this, your visitors can invite their friends and their friends, on and on. This way your traffic will keep flowing if this happens.
12. Give away stuff, purchase things like pens or mouse pads with your website name and URL on them and give them away to your customers.
13. Writing articles is a great, free way to promote your website, and can bring in a substantial number of targeted customers to your site, usually within a few days. The key is to submit your article to as many databases and directories as possible.
14. Link exchanges are a fantastic way to increase web traffic, and the benefits are twofold. Not only do you get traffic from the linking website, you also get the added benefit of better search engine placement through link popularity.
15. Buy web traffic. This is a more "hands-off" way to get traffic to your website. Pricing for quality, targeted web traffic can vary greatly from site to site but it is recommended to look for web traffic campaigns that offer targeting to your particular audience.
16. Although this more of real world approach, it is also a good way to promote you website, you can try; sponsoring a car, purchasing a billboard or printing out flyers.
17. Copy winners, if there are sites in your topic area that already get lots of hits, visit them to see what they do that is different from your website. If it-s at all possible, mimic what they do to add the same value on your website.
18. Free advertising sites, there are many websites, newsgroups, directories that will allow free publicity of your website. You can post ads there and promote your website.
19. Test your website frequently for ordering glitches, bad links, broken graphics, etc. Those types of errors will make your website look unprofessional. If your visitors can-t order, navigate to where they want to go or see pictures of your product, they likely won-t revisit or order.
20. Link with government offices; check if your local town / county government or county tourism office has a website; ask to be included on their website if it-s suitable to their content. New-comers to a town and those considering relocating to your area, often check these sites to familiarize themselves with what services are available. Plus it doesn’t hurt to have one more website linking to you.
21. Make sure you are giving them access to contact you via:
a. A valid and frequently checked email address.
b. A valid and working phone number.
Using Niche Marketing and PHP Scripts to Make Your Millions
By: Talia
Niche marketing is simple and it is effective. If you have not yet learned how simple this concept is then you are missing out on a fantastic opportunity.
Making millions online is something that we can all do, honest. All we need to do is learn the tricks of the trade, for example niche marketing and the power of PHP scripts online. Using niche websites to make the big bucks is the fastest way to do it not to mention the most fun.
A niche website can be anything from gall bladder disease or a special kind of car or even a single car part. Try to think of things that you have always wanted to know about but have had trouble finding info on. The more niche you go the better your chances of succeeding because the competition is nil.
Writing for niche websites is easy. You can use all kinds of sources for information. You can check out the library in your area to get some free resources or you can use the internet. The competition may not be very much but it is still there and by seeing what they have you can learn what to change or make better for your own. You can see what the weaknesses are of those sites and make sure you avoid them completely. This is a great way to make sure that you are always at the top of the heap.
Niche sites can be a lot of fun to work with. The topics can be pretty out there, you can go with something like senior dating or something as simple as how to find good car parts. Then add some Google adwords or sell and ebook or two and you are set. You will be raking in the dough all day long all week long!
The next step to making your niche website a good one is to get some good PHP scripts. These can be found online without any trouble at all, and even more important without having to pay an arm and a leg.
If you have ever had to pay a programmer to write a script for you then you know the hundreds or even thousands of dollars it can run you, it is painful! That is why getting a good PHP script package online is such a great idea.
This makes everything simple and straightforward. These packages come with all the things you need to make your niche marketing website a great one. You can find payment processors, email PHP scripts and everything else that you need to make your site one for the record books.
Niche marketing websites are the way of the future and if you want to make money fast and easy then it is high time you check them out for yourself.
Saturday, June 9, 2007
9 Tips to Drive Internet Traffic To Your Website Which You Can't Affort to Overlook
You have set up a website with very useful information that you think it will benefit your visitors. Day to days, you keep update the latest information and publishing articles; hoping people will visit your website and found your useful information. But day in day out you check your website traffic stats, there are no one comment and your website has very low impressions. Why it's like that? There reason is nobody knows your website. There are thousand of hundreds of website on internet, you put your website on internet but who will know your website if you not announce it. Yes, you need to drive the traffic to your website, but how?Here are 10 tips in no particular order of importance, that you can start doing now to get traffic moving to your website.
1. Submit or Add Your Site to Major Search Engines Search engines submission will increase your Page Ranking and when your web page is ranked in a high ranking positions, your website will be easily searched and seen by internet users if your pages are meeting their relevant search keyword. Focus on major search engines such as Yahoo, Google and MSN. Don't use the free submission service or fee submission which will submit to many search engines because those services might hurt your page ranking as many has banned by major search engines such as Yahoo and Google.
2. Pay-per-click (CPC) Marketing If you marketing budget is sufficient, you could use Pay-per-click (CPC) marketing service provided by Google (Google Adwords) & Yahoo. CPC is one of very effective way to drive traffic to your website.
3. Audio Postcard for email marketing Internet has been for a short time but it has gone through various revolutions, today, silence web now can start talking and help you to promote your website. AudioGenerator.com is one of leader in providing integrated human voice audio clip which you can be added to your website and email. Because the human voice has the power to influence, motivate, and persuade prospects to click "Order Now" buttons faster and with less resistance. AudioGenerator.com also has audio postcard which can help you drive significant traffic to your website. We had tried the audio postcard of AudioGenerator.com to drive traffic to our website at studykiosk.com, it a proven method.
4. Press Announcement Making press announcement can be one of effective method of create backlinks to your website and it really help in your page ranking positions. Website like prweb.com provide FREE press announcement service, you can utilize it to drive traffic to your website.
5. Articles Submission Articles submission to article bank is one of the best ways to expose your website to the public. There are many visitors drop by these sites to look for related information and your articles might be among their search results.
6. Trade Link Request & One Way Incoming Links One of the search engines optimization is to have as many as possible the incoming links to your website. You could request trade links or link exchanges with other webmaster. One way incoming link is other website link to yours without the need of you to link to them. If you website has useful information to other website, they probably will add a link to their website to link to yours. There many website which provide one-way links service, but almost all of them are need monthly or year subscription fee.
7. RSS Feed Make sure you have an RSS feed URL that people can subscribe to. The acronym RSS means Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication. It is a document type that lists updates of websites or blogs available for syndication.
8. Viral Marketing Viral marketing is another way of say "word-of-mouth". On internet, "word-of-mouth" spread so fast thru email. The key to successful of viral marketing is to send out something that people want to share. That can be anything from a joke, funny story or link to home-made video.
9. Blogs & Forums Blogs & forums invite comments from readers and most of them will allow you to leave a link in your signature line. One of way to create backlinks and drive traffic to your website.
Top 4 Ways to Avoid the Scam of Online Affiliate Marketing Program
You will discover and learn why affiliate marketing business is suitable for people who want to start their business and top 4 ways to avoid the scam of affiliate programs. In this article, those 4 ways will definitely help you before joining up any online affiliate marketing program on the internet.
Typically, the home based affiliate marketing business is a great opportunity for those people who want to venture out on their own. The minimal risk and zero start up costs make it an attractive option to many. The affiliate marketing partner programs are perfect for those people who are motivated and self starters. They are also great for those who want to set their own working hours. Also, they are free to sign up and join for advertising online.
In general, the internet has been proven that it has helped up change so many aspects of our lives. We can study and work from home with the help of a computer and high speed internet access. We can exchange and find out the information easily on the internet. However, there are unfortunately lots of hackers out there ready to take either your money or your work to use for their benefits. Many of these email scam programs and work at home schemes have little hope of amounting to any kind of living.
Unfortunately, these hackers have made their ways into the world of affiliate marketing as well. There are some excellent affiliate marketing partner programs to get involved with; the trick is how to spot the hackers.
The face and manner of the internet and home based affiliate marketing business is constantly changing. This makes it very difficult to produce a definitive list of what we should do and do not. However, there are some signs that we can look for. If the company displays any of these signs, it does not mean for sure that we should avoid forever. Actually, it should warrant further investigation hardly if the affiliate program is worthwhile. You will learn top 4 ways to avoid the scams of affiliate marketing partner programs below:
1. Walk through and check their website carefully. If the company has no quality website, then you should consider something else. Legitimate affiliate marketing partner programs generally have a detailed website with all the information you need. One should be suspicious of companies that operate only by email. A website is fairly easy to create so why this company has not invested the time to do so. Also, a website leaves a bit more of a trail to a company. If they do end up scamming you, the chances of tracing the people, via a website, are much better then tracing them through masses of email addresses.
2. Look for their support service in the affiliate program. The affiliate marketing partner programs should always provide you with some supports. This can include an agent that you can contact with questions or problems. A legitimate company should want you to do well. The better you do, the better they do. Your sales are their sales either. It should at very least contain a toll free phone number, email address and fixed street address. If the company is an online affiliate marketing partner program, the lack of an email or web page should definitely raise some red flags. Other things such as no phone or address do not mean necessarily that they are trying to scam you. However, it is a good idea for you to investigate them further.
3. Send couple emails to ask some questions for their affiliate programs. Personally, I believe that another good test is to send the company couple emails with some basic questions. If it takes them weeks to get back to you, then you need to give this venture careful consideration. Again, they may not be a scam for you, but if they are poor at communication, this could be a sign of other internal problems. The highest recommendation is to avoid the affiliate marketing partner programs, which have a very poor communication. With the poor communication, it can lead to other problems particularly related to your affiliate commission payment. Also, I believe that you are not comfortable with the poor communication and other internal problems, which you don’t know.
4. Communicate directly to their dedicated affiliate manager. It is obvious that you should determine how well communication of the affiliate marketing partner program is to determine by their dedicated affiliate manager. An affiliate manager in the company is the person who takes a fully responsibility of the affiliate marketing partner program and affiliate marketing entrepreneurs. Without a dedicated and proactive affiliate manager, you should put more consideration on the affiliate marketing partner program. Communicating with the affiliate manager is the most effective approach to determine whether the affiliate marketing partner programs is scam or not. With the right communication, you can ensure that those affiliate programs are real.
Truly, many of us would love the opportunity to work for ourselves. We would love to chuck in the day job and start our own home based affiliate marketing businesses. However, the costs of starting a business combined with the risk involved stop most of us, before we even get started. The home based affiliate marketing business is a great way to make some money by working for you. The costs are none and the risk minimal. One needs to use some caution when signing onto a program. Make sure there is adequate support available to you. Make sure the company is contactable and that they answer queries in a timely fashion. Be incredibly cautious of companies that have no website. These factors do not always mean that the company is out to scam you; however they should be looked at carefully.
Final thoughts, it is obvious that those above approaches can definitely help you far away from the scams of online affiliate marketing programs. With those approaches, you can ensure that which online affiliate marketing partner programs are real or not. A part of those scams, the affiliate marketing business is an absolutely great place for anyone in the world, who wants to start their business. You can start earning extra money on the internet by selling other people's stuff.
Articles to Directories in the Newbie World
As a newbie to the web world, I designed my first web site in December last year. Having read a number of publications, I was fully aware that I would have to produce links to my new site.
I was further aware that one route that I had to go was to write articles, a daunting task for a newbie. Even more of a problem was the means of getting the article to the numerous article directories, groups, and ezines that populate the web.
I appreciated that there were three possible distribution routes. I could submit my article to an article distributor who would send out my article to their selected directories. An alternative would be to do it myself, accessing each of the directories, cutting and pasting into the numerous input fields, having subscribed to each prior to submission. I discounted this method because of the time involved.
A third possibility would be to use available software to speed up the latter process. Unsure of the best route, I decided that I would write two articles, one for each process, and measure the results. The purpose of this article is to share the results with you and the conclusion I reached..
My first article was a review of the software that I had used to create that first site, and entitled “Dreamweaver too complicated?, Go Live and Frontpage too steep a learning curve?” I decided that I would use one of the professional article distribution services for my first effort and looked at available agents. I selected one, paid my quarterly fee of $39.95, which allowed me an unlimited number of submissions for three months. I searched, today, for the title, using the “exact phrase” box of Google’s “Advanced Search” and found only 15 matches, which is way below my expectations.
My second article, “The Newbie World of Affiliate programs” followed shortly afterwards. Having spent the last twenty years with software houses, the last ten being with the world’s largest database company, I am aware that I can sometimes be over- critical about a product. To distribute this second attempt, I selected a software program selling around $150, and offering a three day free trial. I downloaded, and examined the submission sites, finding some of them obscure, and others where the software did not submit at all. There were103 web sites, 9 needing a logon, and 23 email sites. Again, at the time of writing an “exact phrase” Google search yields 4 matches.
At this stage I started to think that it was my ability as a first-time author that was in question.
Far from happy, and having wasted a good many hours, I paused to take stock of the situation. I didn’t like the software I could find, I thought that the article submission services were too expensive and I did not want to do it manually. The answer must be to design my own.
The prototype submits to 220 sites. I have excluded specialist directories and, therefore, all will accept articles on a wide variety of subjects. The software logs on automatically, fills in every field on the submission form, including the category, and presents me with the filled-in web form.. All I have to do is scan, then press the “submit” button. It takes around 10 seconds for one article to be sent to one site, most of that time being the directory response time. At 6 submissions per minute, with concentrated effort, it takes around 35 minutes to submit to all 220 directories. Whilst I could make the procedure completely automatic, without the need for me to do anything, I still value the peace of mind that the quick scan provides.
Six days ago, I wrote my third ever article, and submitted it using my system. The title of the article is “My Mistakes as a Web Design Newbie”. Again, going to Google’s “Advanced Search,” and entering the title in the “exact phrase” box, at the time of writing, the results show 34,300 entries.
My next stage will be to add around 150 email submission sites, and then a further 100 non-specialized directory sites.
Use Forums in a Profitable Way – Get website TRAFFIC!
Message boards, discussion forums and newsgroups can all produce very profitable results for you and your business. Most of us already participate in one or more of these and the more you participate the bigger the benefits to you and your website will be. Forum is a gathering of people that normally have a common interest on certain topic like investing, health etc. People in forums can share ideas, ask questions, socialize, get help and give advice. This little awesome thing called a “forum” can be a real help for many of those using it.
Posting on forums, newsgroups and boards is the start of a relationship between you and others who read these venues. Many message boards and forums also allow you to use a picture of yourself. This adds to making the whole experience much more personal between you and other readers. It allows for many friendships to be formed, friendships that usually get something real good. People can share their opinions and thoughts in a very constructive way. But not only that you can help somebody else by using forums. You can help yourself by promoting your own business. However, you cannot post your advertising or any other promotional material in the forum as this is considered as SPAM! Unless, this forum is specially mentioned that allow you to post such promotional material.
So, how to use forums as a free way to get traffic? Here is one little trick that can help you!
In most of the forums, you are allowed to create a signature file which you can place your description, attractive words and the link to your website or subscribe your newsletter. Every time, when you post your sharing in the forum, at the end of your post will be automatically followed by your signature file which allow people to click the link to your site if they are interested to your description.
People go to the forum normally when are seeking solution to solve their problems. You can share your experience to help them. For this you must answer their questions in a very comprehensible way. Of course, there are some techniques in answering. For example, the most popular question is, "How to start internet business?" It is highly recommended that not answering like selling a product, e.g. "Oh, you can join xxx program, click my link will show you how ..". It’s too direct and inefficient.
But, what about this?
"Hi Mr. X, there are many ways that you can build your internet business, basically start an internet business by building websites. However, if you find it difficult to build a website, you can join certain affiliate program If you need further helps, you are welcome to email me or post your question here. I will be ready to help you."
Which do you feel better? Of course second is the most appropriate.
So, not only you can get free traffic, by sharing your ideas, helping people to solve their problems, you are also building your reputation. People will trust you and people normally buy something from whom they trust!
In conclusion, if your budget is limited and you want to get targeted prospects, go to the related forums, setup your attractive description in signature file, and post as many sharings as you like but please don't SPAM. People won't trust a spammer. Of course, if you have question to ask, you are welcome to post your questions and you will get help!
Increase Web Site Traffic With These 7 Ways
You've got some content on your site. You are looking to get the word about your site out there. Getting a marked increase in web site traffic can be a challenging task for webmasters, especially aspiring webmasters. Internet traffic plays a huge role in determining the success of your web site.
Don't have enough traffic? Then you won't have enough opportunities for visitors to perform your most desired action. This action could range from getting your visitor to subscribe to your newsletter or to contact you for more information about your business.
So how do you get that increase in web site traffic you want? There are a variety of ways, both free and paid, to get more web site traffic. You could go about getting any type of traffic, but that wouldn't help much unless it was targeted. Targeted visitors are more valuable. Targeted visitors come to your site with the right frame of mind. They are hoping that your site will provide them with the information they are looking for.
1. Search engines
Search engines can provide an enormous increase in web site traffic. Search engine spiders can find you through their daily travels on the web. However, it doesn't hurt to manually submit your site to search engines. And if you want to increase the chances that you'll be found in search engine rankings, read up on search engine optimization.
2. Link exchanging
When you exchange links with relevant, non-competing sites, you add value to your web site. If your visitors can't find what they're looking for on
your web site, your links may help them. And if you have only high-quality links, you'll increase the chance that your visitors will come back to your web site.
3. Submit to directories
Submit to major directories like the Open Directory Project and Zeal so that your web site becomes more visible. Also submit to themed directories with topics relevant to your web site. Smaller directories may not be too beneficial in terms of web site traffic but they can give you more inbound links.
4. Pay-per-click advertising
Pay-per-click advertising can help you get more web site traffic. Pay-per-click advertising is a popular form of advertising where you pay for an ad to be included in specific search engine results pages. It's easy to lose money with this type of advertising so get a guide. Pay-per-click advertising can deliver targeted traffic to your site as interested visitors click on your ad. Make your ad specific and bring them to a relevant page on your web site.
5. Submit articles
Write excellent articles about your web site's topic. Articles can increase your reputation and establish you as an expert in your field. Or they can shine a negative light on you if you submit total garbage. If your articles keep readers interested, then they may want to visit your site for more information.
6. Word of mouth
Tell everyone you know about your web site. If your web site is excellent or stands out from the crowd, the word will spread as more and more people hear about it. If it works, the effect can be huge. So do whatever you can to mention your site in your daily contact. For example, add an email signature to promote your web site.
7. Traffic exchange
You have to be careful with traffic exchanges. Some programs tend to be very untargeted as they simply show pages to members. However, there are programs that can bring in more targeted visitors. Some programs let you show ads so only visitors who are interested will come to your web site.
Minisite Madness, Mania and Money!
Did you know that you don't need to maintain your website in order to generate revenue from it? That you can for little cost create dozens of these websites each earning constant passive income? You can create a cross linked revenue gathering empire that actually encourages visitors?
The internet is alive. It is a beast that changes and adapts to its environment. When the internet changes, so does the way we work with it. The way we build websites, the way we promote, and the way we generate revenue. New trends and fads come and go, some becoming insanely popular than falling heavily, and others providing sluggish income for the long term.
The latest and most industrious way to generate regular serious cash online, is through the power of, Minisites.
What is a Minisite?
A minisite is a small website consisting of only a few pages or a single page. It is basic in design and usually conforms to an imageless, fast loading attractive CSS styled colour scheme. There are generally no rash, in your face flashing banners, headers or text.
The purpose of a Minisite?
The ideal that drives a Minisite is a fast loading, efficient page that displays useful information for the reader. It is Optimized for search engine spider crawlability. It displays relevant, ie: contextual advertisements as well as text links to high quality sites.
So.. Where does the content come from?
All across the internet there are article serving sites that provide access to reprint articles for free. There are many categories in which the articles fit, and several hundred thousand articles to choose from. In return for the use of the author's article, you are required to leave a author information box with a static link intact at the bottom fot the page.
And the revenue comes from?
People will access your Minisite the majority of times through search engines. To get to your site, if it is Optimized correctly, the person is looking for information on somehting to do with the article you have on your Minisite. Hence, placing contextual advertisements on your Minisite provides realted adverts for your visitors, giving you an enhanced clickthrough ratio.
What else can I do to get maximum revenue?
An effective way to maximise on your advertising income is to build a network of interlinked Minisites. Each one is unique in colour and content. You then implement a "Related Links" box into the tag and link to other Minisites that are relevant. Not only does this help visitors navigate their way around your revenue machine, it also enables search engines to crawl your sites and watch for updates.
Minisites are the most effective way to generate and aggresive income stream on the internet today. All you need is Notepad, an Adsense account and one of hundreds of thousands free reprint articles available on the web today. Get into Minisites before your the only one who isn't.
Beginning Steps to Marketing Success
Getting noticed on the web is the holy grail of most webmasters and rightfully so. Not only can you turn visitors into dollars, if done properly, but it also gives a feeling of accomplishment. In all honesty getting people to your sight is really not that difficult. There is probably 1000 things that you can do to attract visitors. The real trick is making use of all of them. The mistake that a lot of people make is believing that there is one magical way, some mystical ritual that will invoke the visitor magnet spell. Ok, so I’m being facetious but the reality is it does take work and diligence to make things happen. This is by no means a complete list, for a beginning webmaster or someone who is interested in becoming a webmaster, to follow. I am going to assume that an idea for a web site has already been decided upon.
1. The web site itself. This is a very important aspect of web marketing but I am focusing primarily on external web marketing. There are, however a few things that I want to cover here because I believe they are very important.
CONVENIENCE This is a big one. People today are accustomed to getting things fast from drive thru pharmacies to high speed internet. Instant gratification has become the rule of the day. With this in mind, web pages should load quickly. Believe it or not a 4 second load time for a page is extremely slow today. When the page is loaded potential customers expect to find what they are looking for immediately. Your site should be very well laid out and everything should be easily and quickly navigated. The brick and mortar days of putting the most popular items in the back so customers have to walk through the whole store are not effective for online businesses. This strategy should be avoided at all costs. Some studies have shown that if customers do not find what they are looking for in the first 15 seconds they will move on.
2. The first steps in getting the word out. Visit the popular business directories. http://dir.yahoo.com/, http://sbd.bcentral.com/, http://yellowpages.aol.com/#,. There are hundreds more.
3. Search engine submittal. A lot of web sites offer this service for a fee. I personally have never found it worth it. I recommend doing this yourself. It is easy and does not take that long to do if you submit it to the top search engines.
4. Forums. Get to know your market. There really is no better research than visiting forums related to your market and reading. Find out what your customers concerns are. Keep reading until you feel comfortable enough to post. Don’t spam the forums and be sure to read the rules for posting. A lot of forums will allow you to leave a link and some will not. Either way make sure you respect the guidelines for posting. I did come across a trick for getting recognized by search engines. Most forums allow you an avatar. That is a picture that appears when you post. You can usually set that up in your preferences when you sign up at most any forums. Typically it is a link to offsite where the picture is hosted. Make sure it is hosted from your web site and named after it. I made a bunch of avatars for a lot of friends and hosted them from my web site. To my surprise, it definitely caught the attention of the search engines. You goal here is to help not only advertise. After long enough you might just be the person everyone has questions for.
By starting with these four marketing strategies you can lay the foundation for a strong presence on the web. It will not happen over night but it will increase the popularity of your web site. Remember, web marketing is a cumulative proposition. The more marketing strategies you use the better.
15 Top Rss & Blog Marketing Tips
1. Place all your feeds on the following website and the directories listed on this page - http://www.rss-feeds-directory.com/blog_lists.html
2. For fast inclusion into yahoo, get yourself a "my yahoo" page - http://my.yahoo.com/ and place your rss feed on that page.
3. Have a link which allows other people to put your rss feed on their own "my yahoo" page. See "my yahoo" for details.
4. For fast inclusion to msn, also open a "my msn" account and add your rss feed to that page.
5. Place your blog on all the major search engines - http://www.thewebtrafficco.com/search_engine.html
6. Join this site and add your blog (free) - http://www.BlogExplosion.com
7. Ping your blog after every post at - http://pingomatic.com/
8. Place a "blogroll" on your blog using - www.blogrolling.com
9. Make a blog post at least every day or less. Why? - http://www.feedforall.com/why-use-rss.htm If you don't think you can write enough content on a daily basis, there are many free articles out there you can use.
10. Invite other editors/writers or webmasters to write on your blog as co-editors. Make sure you allow them to include their "resource box" at the bottom of each post and set up an "about our editors" page.
11. Place a link and description to your blog on all your websites, out going emails and any autoresponder courses you have set up.
12. Announce your blog at forums you currently use/participate in.
13. Place informative responses in the "comments" box of other highly trafficked blogs in your field of business.
14. Once you have 10 to 15 posts on your blog, announce it with a press release.
15. Download this free rss marketing ebook by top Rss expert, ‘Rok Hrastnik’ - http://www.rss-feeds-directory.com/rss_the_business_case.zip
Searching for the Right Keywords through Staff Leasing Companies
A growing number of websites compete to be among the top ten listings in the search results. This position gives them a higher possibility of getting more customers compared with a lower rank. Web marketers use several tools to achieve high rankings, probably one of the most important although others don’t realize, is keyword research.
There are many tactics for optimizing a site to have high search rankings. But since most visits to a site start with a search engine click, optimizing a site for the right keywords is really critical. This is why keyword research is so important, right?
It is really important that you will be able to target all relevant keyword phrases to be able to be among the top rank websites. You just can’t afford to guess the keywords often searched by people, or else you’ll see your businesses slowly toppling down. Searching for the right keywords for your websites doesn’t simply take a day or two. It would sometimes take a week or more.
If this is so, how can busy people maintain or increase the ranks of their websites. Yeah, maybe it can be done, but how sure that it is done systematically and professionally? Hiring a new employee to do this can also be costly for a company especially if it is just starting. Some resort to webmaster staffing…
Getting someone from a webmaster staffing company to do professional keyword research and other services can do no harm to your business; it is to your advantage, in fact. The company wouldn’t have to provide office space for the staff as they will be working in their own place but still under your directions. Plus, you’re free from hiring and training costs. Staffs from webmaster staffing companies like Agents of Value are already well-trained and were able to pass extensive screening process to be able to provide world-class services.
Opting to hire from a webmaster staffing company can lessen your overhead expenses like overtime. This companies also charge lower for their services compared to others so you will be able to save in your labor cost. Most outsourcing offices are found in places with lower cost of living.
Keyword research may sound so easy but finding the right ones takes time and effort. Only people who have the time, knowledge and training can do this efficiently. If you want to get your sites on the top list, a webmaster staffing company is the best choice for you to look for someone who’ll work it for your business!
Increase Conversion Rate In No Time!
Identifying your site’s conversion rate is vital to determine whether your site is surviving the internet business or not! Conversion rate refers to the number of site visitors that are converted into customers. The higher your site’s conversion rate is, the higher is its sales and return on investment. Sales and ROI are directly proportional with the conversion rate. Along with your efforts of improving your website, you should also consider improving your site’s conversion rate. Here are some of the effective strategies you can use in ensuring that your site gets the best conversion rate it could possibly have.
- Maintain honesty in dealing with your customers.
- Don’t waste your visitors’ time.
- Offer a reasonable return policy.
- Provide your customers various payment alternatives.
- Identify your Unique Selling Point.
More often than not, online customers appreciate honesty. If you are running out of a particular product, tell your customers right away so they won’t expect for it. Just imagine what your customers will feel if they go on the usual procedure of adding the product to their online cart only to find out that the product is out of stock? This could be a reason enough for your customers to be annoyed and purchase from your competitor instead.
Even when it comes to pricing, be very honest with your customers. Avoid the idea of hiding additional charges – like shipment charges. Tell your visitors right away if the price is inclusive or not of shipment charge and other additional costs. It can be frustrating enough to have budget your money then later on find out you still need to pay for additional costs, right?
Online shoppers and users are usually the busy ones. Don’t waste their time by letting them fill up too many boxes just to be able to purchase your product or service. To ensure they will purchase from your site, ask only for the most relevant information. If they see that they need to fill up pages of forms, they might just leave your site and transfer to other sites where less information is required.
Admit or not, there will be an instance wherein the customers are not fully satisfied with your products – for instance a dress doesn’t fit. When instances like this happen, what guarantee can you give to your customers that they won’t end up being the loser in the transaction? In these cases, the return policy becomes beneficial. It makes your customers more at ease in pursuing the purchase.
It will be a whole lot easier and comfortable for your customers if they will be given various alternatives when it comes to payment. There may be customers who don’t have a credit card so provide them with a different alternative. This will increase the number of your site’s customers; thus, increasing your site’s conversion rate, as well.
From the name itself, USP or Unique Selling Point is your business’ unique edge over your competitors. It is the factor that lets your customers decide to purchase from your site instead from your competitors’.
Simple as they may seem, these strategies actually work and they can really be trusted. Follow these simple strategies and your conversion rate is bound to boom in no time!
Well-Written Website Content Improves Your Business Image
As a business writer, I spend a lot of time conducting internet research. You'd be surprised at the amount of unreadable information floating around out there. It's disheartening to see so many business websites filled with awkward writing obviously created for search engines. Search engine placement is important, but website content should also read well. After all, people don't care how many keywords are on your website. They care about well-written content that provides useful information.
Don't frighten your visitors away with badly-written website content. Here are a few suggestions:
1. Pay for quality as well as quantity. Let's say you want 50 original articles or 50 pages of well-written content for your site. You want this, but your budget is $50. Plenty of writers will promise well-written content for cheap. But you should realize you're going to get what you pay for. I speak with many writers in my field, and I know there are writers who'll work for dirt-cheap, take your money, and knowingly provide plagiarized or badly-written content.
Quality is just as important as quantity, maybe even more important. No one wants to read page after page of bad writing. If you can only afford $50, then find the best writer within your budget. Focus on quality instead of quantity. You may have to settle for less website content or articles than you originally wanted, but your website will be better for it.
2. Hire experienced writers. Anyone can learn to type and use Microsoft Word, but that doesn't mean they're a writer. The ability to create well-written website content takes skill and effort. It's not as easy as some people like to think. With that in mind, always review a writer's portfolio before hiring them.
Even without significant experience, a writer should have a few samples for review. If the writing is awkward, sounds thrown together, or has grammatical errors, then you may want to consider another writer. Or at least be willing to perform proofreading and editing duties on the results.
Of course, you can ignore this advice and do all of your own writing. This is fine if your writing skills are in good shape. But if you haven't written since high school English class, read a few writing books or websites for tips. Your visitors will appreciate it.
Web Marketing with Search Engine Submissions
Most people on the Internet start with a search engine when we're looking for what we want. Search engine submission should naturally be on your list of to-do's when it comes to website marketing. You'll want your website listed in as many search engines as you can. This will extend the reach of your website as far as possible, thus bringing in visitors from every nook and cranny of the net.
Search engine submission doesn't guarantee that you'll receive good rankings, though. A search engine submission will let the search engine know where your page is and what it's about. This is the first step to getting more search engine exposure for your website. To improve your rankings, it might also be a good idea to invest time in the search engine optimization of your individual website pages.
If you're looking to do search engine submissions yourself, be prepared to spend a bit of time at the computer if you're doing more than 5-10 submissions. It can be a very time consuming process, and can get old quick. I know submissions may be grueling, but they are too beneficial to your website to ignore. There's plenty of services online that can help you in this area for a reasonable price and will get the job done quickly. It might be a good idea to check out one of these services, and see if you can benefit from what they offer.
When you combine search engine submissions as well as web site directory submissions, then you will really be helping the link strength of your website. Try to spend your time getting as many links from other places as possible, this is a good way to boost your rankings in search engines. Submissions can also build links when you need them, so you'll be able to see the positive results from your site quicker than normal.
Search engine submissions will let the search engines know that you're here, so they can give you the visitors that your website needs.
What is a Niche and Why do You Need One?
No matter where you go online, you are likely to hear the same thing. “Before you can get started with your online business, you must find a niche.” You will do well to pay heed to this advice, especially if you are new to Internet Marketing.
Each day, thousands of people go online in search of, you guessed it, WEALTH. So many, tend to jump right into those markets that are already so completely saturated with competition and then wonder why it is that they are failing to make any money.
If a person has unlimited money, time and patience, they may have a chance at succeeding. But what about those who do not have unlimited supplies of these resources, it would then be much wiser to start your online business having a smaller niche market.
So what is a niche anyway?
You could purchase anyone of the hundreds of e-books telling you all about niche markets and get the longer answer. Or you could find the definition of a niche from the dictionary. But to give you the shorter version, niche simply means individual or distinct.
Seems everyone and their mother wants to start an Internet Marketing business. The big guns are making their money in this niche market, so it must be the way to go, right. Wrong, that’s the problem. So many people have years of experience in this area, that they have totally saturated the market. So, when someone new tries to compete in this broader market, they will likely not have any chance of success.
Susan Ward on About.com, defines Internet Marketing as “the strategies that are used to market a product or service online, marketing strategies that include search engine optimization and search engine submission, copywriting that encourages site visitors to take action, web site design strategies, online promotions, reciprocal linking, and email marketing". Anyone who is new to starting an online business will not know enough about all of the areas above to be able to compete in this fast pace market.
So can a new person have a chance at becoming successful? Yes.
But you must think smaller – think niche!
You could possibly come up with any one of the following niches just from the definition above:
Copywriting
Linking
Marketing
Email Marketing
Web Site Design
Search Engine Optimization
Even if you are already extremely experienced or lucky in any one of the above niches, there is still a lot of competition out there in these broader niches. You may decide to do this anyway in the end, but spend some time exploring smaller niches within the more broad areas. This may lead you to finding a niche that you are better suited to anyway.
Finding just the right niche market can be time consuming, for this reason using a resource such as Wordtracker can be helpful. Even though you can find similar software programs on any number of sites, Wordtracker will help break a broad site concept down into many smaller niches.
What you will end up with by using software such as Wordtracker is a list of keywords relevant to your niche that your can focus your business on. Choose a smaller niche so that you will have a better shot at being successful with your business, rather than a broader topic such as Internet Marketing.
Keep in mind, that in order to be successful in any business, it all comes down to supplying a product or service that the public has a demand for and the market has room for. Discover the right niche and you will discover that you are on the right path.
Tips for Building Niche Websites
By Kevin Reid
The first step is to find a niche area. You could draw inspiration from your friends, media, books, yellow pages, or from top affiliate programs. Once found that, the next important thing is to market the website so as to attract a good traffic to the website everyday. In fact, this is the difficult most part in building a niche website. This article discusses few tips that could effectively help one to market his/her niche websites.
1) Write articles and submit to various popular directories. This is an efficient method to drive traffic to your websites. But, ensure that the articles have a link back to your website.
2) Participate actively in various discussion forums in your niche. Find few good and popular forums in the web and register for an account. Observe the activities in the forums for few days to get a feel of it and then have a go at it by answering few questions, all the while subtly promoting your website.
3) Use blogs to your advantage. Publishing your blog with RSS feeds and updating it regularly will ultimately increase the visibility of your website.
4) Link exchanges can increase a website's page ranking. Hence link to other relevant and high quality websites in your niche. However, it must be kept in mind that linking to low ranked websites could be counterproductive.
5) Posting comments in other blogs in your niche is also a good way to improve the visibility of your website. But, while doing so, never attempt anything unethical like abusing a particular entry or making hostile criticisms.
6) Another effective way to popularize your niche website is through periodic press releases, on something news worthy that is happening in your portal. Designing an affiliate program and recruiting hard working affiliates in exchange of a share of your profits is also a decent idea you can try out. Finally, if you are prepared to shell out few bucks, consider pay per click advertising - like MSN AdCenter and Google ad words - banner advertising or buying paid links to high PR websites.
7) All these aspects could increase the popularity of your niche website. But what purpose it serves if the website does not figure in the first few search results in a search engine? Therefore, some serious SEO while designing the website is also important. Sans SEO, it is next to impossible to remain visible in the web.