Archive for August, 2006

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A Couple Of Basic Killer Internet Marketing Techniques

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

There are many simple, infallible ways to earn income, and one of the surest ways is through marketing your business on the internet. When you learn basic internet marketing techniques, you’ll wonder why you haven’t already jumped on the bandwagon. When you think about it, the only things you’ll need to make money is a vision of what you want out of life and the wisdom and energy to put your ideas into motion.

Basic internet marketing techniques can teach us how to acquire wealth, and an important factor is to provide something the public needs (or think they need) whether it is a product, a service, information or something else entirely – there are many choices.

Every business has a goal of making money, and every business has something to sell. You will need knowledge and a product before you begin your internet marketing. You may need at least a small amount of capital to start your business, although the outlay could be relatively small if you are selling information or services as opposed to a tangible product.

You will need to develop a web site for advertising and informational purposes; if you have the ability to do it yourself, so much the better. If you don’t then consider one of my business partners Plug-In Profit Sites, they are an excellent way to start out in online business.

Like any other business, internet marketers need sales leads. Retail merchants who set up offices or shops are able to buy lists of potential customers, or they may ask their employees and acquaintances to provide them with lists of names to get their business started and begin making sales. The world of internet marketing utilises marketing leads, which you can purchase from reputable companies.

Internet marketing is a very competitive market, and a large portion of your time should be spent generating new marketing leads to drive your sales. You can generate these through your own advertising or by growing and developing an opt-in e-mail list of potential prospects to which you can send your offers.

New services and products are introduced over the internet every day as fast as a speeding bullet. Some of the reasons for these new developments can be attributed to market conditions, new technology, improved search engines, or totally new concepts or products. There are services that will help you develop your internet marketing leads and attract new clients, but use them with caution and always make sure your leads are double opt-in to avoid any potential spam complaints.

One of the most common ways to attract new customers is to develop an email list. Although email marketing may not be as effective as it once was due to software that filters out “spam,” it does still work. One of the best features of email advertising is that it is a free method of getting the word out that you’re in business. The response to emails is still good when it does reach the intended party. Incentives such as freebies of reports, programs or products entice potential buyers to read the email.

You can see how I do this on my website http://www.asuccesfullhomebusiness4u.com. I capture signups to my newsletter through a signup form and this produces me a list of targeted prospects to which I send my newsletter and any hot offers I decide to endorse.

An important part of email marketing is that it can be repeated again and again. You can start out with a small list of marketing and sales leads for your online business, and then build from a few email recipients until you have established a loyal clientele. In addition to generating email marketing leads, you may want to consider a couple of other methods of “getting the word out.”

Another internet marketing technique involves utilizing pay-per-click (referred to as PPC) advertising, whereby participants bid on keywords and pay a varying sum of money every time someone clicks on you advert. The two biggest PPC services are Google Adwords and Overture, but it’s definitely worth your while investigating smaller services as the competition is less and prices cheaper. A click is click, as long you hyper target your market it doesn’t matter where it comes from.

An excellent way to inform others about your business is to join one of the many forums related to marketing. You can post information, ask questions and receive answers from other internet marketers, it is also a good way to gain name recognition and credibility within you niche market, which in turn will gain you extra traffic to your website and should increase your sales.

When you begin your internet marketing endeavours, be sure to establish enough marketing leads to sustain your business and make it profitable, develop a good internet marketing strategy early on in your planning stages. An excellent course on how to market your business online is Cory Rudl’s #1 Training Course and provides everything you need to know about marketing your business online.

Copyright © Ian Canaway, A Successful Home Business 4 U

(Feel free to use this article online and in your email newsletters as long as you leave it intact and do not alter it in anyway. The byline and biography must remain in the article.)

Ian Canaway is a home business entrepreneur and the owner of http://www.asuccesfullhomebusiness4u.com and also a home business based blog at http://www.ahomebusinessblog4u.blogspot.com; providing high quality information and resources. Check us out Now!

Posted in Internet Marketing | No Comments »

Writing Web Pages: Get To The Meat Faster

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

Much of my consulting work comprises writing ‘Outside Opinion’ reports on the sites of large companies and organizations. Sometimes I review just a few pages, sometimes fifty or more.

I’m just finishing one up now and have recognized a thread that is common to many of reports.

Here is what I have noticed: On many sites we are too slow to ‘get to the meat’. Too much rambling and introduction on each page.

One of the things I do in each report is create some ‘copywriter layouts’ of key site pages. I do my critique, and then provide some sample page designs to give the client an idea of how I see each page; the key messages, the key actions etc.

But here’s the thing: I create just the first screen, not the whole page.

And within that first screen I make sure that everything that NEEDS to be said is said. I make sure the key messages are prominent. And I include one or more directions or calls-to-action.

How do I manage to get all the important points within one screen? I focus on what the visitor is expecting and hoping to find on the page. For that first screen I spend a lot of time trying to anticipate the frame of mind of the visitor. I know they are coming to the page with some task in mind. They are looking for something, some kind of answer. I either provide the answer as high up on the page as possible, or give clear choices and direction to help them click through to where they’ll find what they want.

When you look at it that way, one screen isn’t such a small space. It becomes small only when too much attention is given to promoting, explaining and applauding the company or organization. It becomes crowded when too many stakeholders are fighting for space.

And yes, I provide links starting with active verbs and get them into that first screen as well.

If someone finds what they want right there, I want to allow them to click through without having to scroll and search.

If someone is still one or two levels away from finding what they need, I want to get them on their way as quickly as possible.

When you keep the visitor at the front of your mind…when you recognize and understand what they are looking for…you’ll serve them best by getting to the ‘meat’ as quickly as possible and providing them with the links they need.

–

Article Resource: Find out more about my Outside Opinion service here.

Nick Usborne is a copywriter, author, speaker and advocat of good writing. You can access all his archived newsletter articles on copywriting and writing for the web at his Excess Voice site. You’ll find more articles and resources on how to make money as a freelance writer at his Freelance Writing Success site.

Posted in eCommerce | No Comments »

The Amazing Ways To Jump Start Your Sales and Attract Orders

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

Every business owner want to attract more orders and have more sales. You can do this in smart ways. Here are some tips and tactics.

First of all, your sales page should be well-written. Include emotional words in your advertisements. Use ones like love, security, relief, freedom, happy, satisfaction, fun, and more positive words.

Secondly, You can create a free ebook directory on a specific topic at your web site. People will visit your web site to read the free ebooks and may see your product ad. This is a viral marketing. When your ebook got passed around, your website will get exposed to many people. So you will get free traffic. Also you can allow people to download software or e-books from your web site at no cost. Just ask your visitors in return if they’ll refer their friends to your web site. It is easy to get that set up with pre-written script and put a referral form on your website. Aother way to get good results is to publish your e-zine only on your web site. Have people subscribe to a new issue” e-mail reminder. This could really increase your traffic and sales.

Combine a product and service together in a package deal. It could increase your sales. If you’re selling a book, offer an hour of consulting with it.

If you sell any products, you can build up the number of people that join your free affiliate program quickly by temporally offering your product for free to the people that sign up. If they help to sell your products, you pay them 20-70% of commision. There are a lot softwares which can help you to set up affiliate program automatically. The quickest way is to negotiate with e-zine publishers who owns large list of subscribers to get free or discounted ads by letting them join your affiliate program and earn commissions on the ad you run.

Add a free classified ad section to your web site. You could then trade banner ads with other web sites that have free classified ad sections. Sell advertising space in your product package. You could sell inserts, flyers, brochures, booklets, and digital ads for electronic products.

There are more ways to jump start your sales:

– Turn part of your web site into a members only site. Instead of charging for access, use it as a free bonus for one of your products.

- Find a strategic business partner. Look for ones that have the same objective. You can trade leads, share marketing info, sell package deals.

- Brand your name and business. You can easily do this by just writing articles and submitting them to e-zines or web sites for republishing.

- Start an auction on your web site. The type of auction could be related to the theme of your site. You’ll draw traffic from auctioneers and bidders.

- Model other successful business or people. I’m not saying out right copy them, but practice some of the same habits that have made them succeed.

- Offer daily or weekly visitor bonuses. This will increase your repeat traffic and sales because your visitors will visit regularly to get the visitor bonuses. Ask people online to review your web site. You can use the comments you get to improve your web site or you may turn the reviewer into a customer.

- Out source part of your workload. You’ll save on most employee costs. You could out source your secretarial work, accounting, marketing, and more. It can save you a lot of time. You can visit http://www.elance.com to get help with low cost.

Finally, remember to take a little time out of your day or week to brainstorm. New ideas are usually the difference between success and failure.

———————————————————
Julia Tang publishes Smart Online Business Tips, a fresh
and informative newsletter dedicated to supporting people
like you! To find out the best online business opportunities,
and to discover hundreds more proven and practical internet
marketing secrets, plus FREE internet marketing products
worth over $200, visit: http://www.best-internet-businesses.com
———————————————————-

Note:You may use this article in your ezine or on your site as long as the article and resource box remain unchanged

Posted in Website Promotion | No Comments »

Website Sales: 10 Reasons Why People Dont Buy From You

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

You’ve put up a website to promote a product or service.

You’ve spent piles of cash to generate traffic.

But sales are not coming in.

So, you’re wondering what is wrong?

Here are 10 website sales secret reasons why they are not buying from you:

1. You don’t make people feel safe when they order. Remind people that they are ordering through a secure server. Tell them you won’t sell their e-mail address and all their information will be kept confidential.

2. You don’t make your ad copy attractive. Your ad lists features instead of benefits. The headline does not attract at your target audience. You don’t list any testimonials or guarantees included in your ad.

3. You don’t remind people to come back and visit. People usually don’t purchase the first time they visit. The more times they visit your site, the greater the chance they will buy. The most effective way is to give them a free subscription to your e-zine.

4. You don’t let people know anything about your business. They will feel more comfortable if they know who they are buying from. Publish a section called “About Us” on your web site. Include your business history, profile of employees, contact information etc.

5. You don’t give people as many ordering options as possible. Accept credit cards, checks, money orders, and other forms of electronic payments. Take orders by phone, e-mail, web site, fax, mail, etc.

6. You don’t make your web site look professional. You want to have your own domain name. Your web site should be easy to navigate through. The graphics should be related to the theme of your web site.

7. You don’t let people read your ad before they get your freebie. When you use free stuff to lure people to your web site include it below your ad copy or on another web page. If you list the freebie above your ad they may never look to see what you’re selling.

8. You don’t attract the target audience that would buy your product or service. A simple way to do this is to survey your existing customers to see what attracted them to buy. This information will help you improve your target marketing and advertising.

9. You don’t test and improve your ad copy. There are many people who write an ad copy and never change it. You have to continually test and improve your ad copy to get the highest possible response rate.

10. You don’t give people any urgency to buy now. Many people are interested in your product but they put off buying it till later and eventually forget about it. Entice them to buy now with a freebie or discount and include a deadline date when the offer ends.

May these website sales secrets help you to make a lot of money and succeed.

Warmly,

I-key Benney, CEO

I-key, a Millionaire CEO from New York City is the creator of “Mscsrrr: Millionaire Secret Cash System”, (online trading), program which has helped thousands of ordinary people from all over the world to attain financial security and shining success during the past 2 yrs.

Mscsrrr Millionaire Secret Cash System helps you to generate $1,500+/Week for life, from home or office, part time or full time. No large investment or hassles. Win $1000-$2000 free "cash"?

Posted in Web Development | No Comments »

How Web Design Can Affect Search Engine Rankings

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

Uniquely built web sites can create unique issues when being promoted on the search engines. From a basic 3 page brochure site to a corporate site with hundreds of dynamically generated pages, every web site needs to have certain design aspects in order to achieve the full effects of an SEO campaign. Below are a few points to take into consideration when building or updating your web site.

1. Size Matters.

The size of a web site can have a huge impact on search engine rankings. Search engines love content, so if you have only a few pages to your site and your competitors have dozens, it’s difficult to see a top page ranking for your site. In some cases it may be difficult to present several pages of information about your business or products, so you may need to think about adding free resources for visitors. It will help in broadening the scope of your web site (which search engines like) as well as keep visitors on your site longer, possibly resulting in more sales.

2. Graphics-Based Web Sites.

While web sites that offer the visitor a more esthetically-pleasing experience may seem like the best choice for someone searching for your product, they are the most difficult to optimize. Since search engine robots cannot read text within graphics or animation, what they see may be just a small amount of text. And if we learned anything from point #1, small amounts of content will not result in top rankings. If you really must offer the visitor a graphics-heavy or Flash web site, consider creating an html-based side of your site that is also available to visitors. This site will be much easier to promote on the search engines and your new found visitors will also have the option to jump over to the nicer looking part of your site.

3. Dynamic Web Pages.

If most of your web site is generated by a large database (such as a large book dealer with stock that is changing by the minute) you may find that some of your pages do not get indexed by major search engines. If you look at the URL of these pages they can be extremely long and have characters such as ?, #, &, %, or = along with huge amounts of seemingly random numbers or letters. Since these pages are automatically generated by the database as needed, the search engines have a tough time keeping them up to date and relevant for search engine users.

One way to combat this problem is to offer a search engine friendly site map listing all your static pages just to let them know that you do have permanent content on your site. If search engines see links going to and from these dynamic pages within a good internal linking system, this may also lead to the pages getting indexed. The link popularity of your site may carry more weight in this case as well, so if you can’t offer as much static content as your competition, make sure you have an aggressive link campaign on the go.

4. Proper Use of HTML.

There is quite a bit of sub-par web design software out there. Word processors usually have a way to create HTML documents which can be easily uploaded to a site via ftp. However, in many cases the code that the search engine robots see is mostly lines and lines of font and position formatting, not relevant content. The more efficiently written web sites usually achieve higher rankings. Our choice for web design software is Macromedia Dreamweaver, as it is an industry standard. It also makes using CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) a breeze, which can drastically cut down on the amount of text formatting in HTML code. Hand-coding HTML to design sites is also a good method if you are proficient enough.

There are some no brainers too: Web sites with abnormal amounts of hyperlinks, bold or italicized text, improper use of heading, alt, or comment tags can also expect to see low rankings.

5. Choosing a Domain Name.

The golden rule to web development of any kind is to keep your visitors in mind above all else – even search engine optimization. When choosing a domain name, one should pick either your business name (if you have a high-profile business name such as Chapters or Coca-Cola) or a brief description of your products. Domain names can always help with search engine optimization, as it is another area of your web site that important keywords can appear. Forget about long- winded domains such as www.number-one-best-books-on-earth.com as no one will ever remember it and it will be hard to print on business cards or in ads.

If you need to change your domain name for any reason you obviously don’t want to lose existing rankings. An easy way to do this, and one that is currently supported by most search engines, is the 301 redirect. It allows you to keep your existing rankings for your old domain name, while forwarding visitors to your new web site instantly.

6. Using Frames.

Don’t use frames. Frames are a thing of the 90’s (and in the Internet world that is eons ago) and are not even supported by some search engines. The search engines that are able to index your site through frames will most likely frown upon them. Whatever you are trying to accomplish by using frames can usually be done with the help of PHP includes or CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Some browsers are not frames-compatible, so there is the danger of some visitors not being able to see your site at all. Bookmarking of individual pages within a frame becomes difficult without lengthly scripts being written.

7. Update Your Information.

Not only does information printed two or three years ago look badly on your organization when it is read by a visitor, it is also looked down upon by search engines. Web sites that continuously update and grow their web sites usually experience higher rankings than stagnant sites. When the trick to SEO is offering visitors the most relevant information, you can bet that the age of web pages is taken into consideration by search engines. Consider creating a section of your site devoted to news within your organization, or have a constantly updated resources area.

Many shortfalls of web sites can easily be attributed to designers who just don’t keep the user or search engines in mind. Search engine algorithms are quickly improving to try and list the most user-friendly sites higher, given that the content and link popularity are there to back it up. So first and foremost, know your target market and make your web site work for them before focusing on search engine optimization. If you build it (properly), they will come.

Copyright John Metzler of Abalone Designs, November 2004. This article may be freely distributed if credit is given to the author. Abalone Designs is a family-run Search Engine Optimization firm in Vancouver, BC, Canada. Visit http://www.abalone.ca for a free personalized analysis of your web site.

Posted in SEO | No Comments »

Choosing Your Web Hosting Package

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

General rule of thumb is not to sign up for yearly web hosting plans. Instead, get monthly plan where you can unsubscribe from on the second month when you are not happy with the service. That is, if you ended up with an unreliable web hosting company in the first place.

Here is a simple guide that can be easily applied to typical web sites:

–Web Space–

Expect a small website to take up 10 and 100 MB. Considering that you may want to expand your website in the near future, it is advisable to get a web hosting plan with ample web space.

Make sure that you know your needs before you start looking for your web host. Not every web hosting plan can be upgraded or customised. More than often, webmasters do not get the features they need and are not able to customise their web hosting features.

–Monthly Traffic–

Data transfer per month are typically referred to as bandwidth. It is the amount of data transfer that occurs between your website and visitors. A small or medium web site will consume between 1 and 5GB of data transfer per month. Larger, commercial or popular websites often consume more than 5GB of monthly data transfer and sometimes, exceeding 100GB of monthly data transfer.

Before you decide on a web hosting plan, be sure to check this:

- What is the monthly data transfer/ bandwidth allowed?

- Will you be charged if your website exceeds its limit?

- Are you able to upgrade/add on your bandwidth?

–Connection Speed–

Visitors to your web site will often connect via 56K modems or ADSL modems but your web host provider should have a much faster connection. Your website should have high web site connections that are approximately 1000 high speed (56 Kilobytes per second) modems combined- T3 fiber optic connections.

In the early days of the Internet, T1- connections was considered a fast connection. The fastest connections available are T3 connections that are used by Internet Service Providers and major corps.

Lester Boey works in an Australian SEO and Web Design company (Australian Search Engine Optimization and Web Designs Company). His life revolves around SEO; providing full-time and freelance seo services to US and Australian businesses. Email: projects@definiteweb.com

Posted in Web Hosting | No Comments »

5 Things You NEED to Know About Your AOL 9.0 Subscribers

Thursday, August 31st, 2006

In Fall 2003, America Online (AOL) released its brand new AOL Version 9. (Have you noticed all the TV ads?) AOL estimates that up to 50% of their users were using the new version by the end of December 2003.

The biggest new feature with AOL 9 is its aggressive method of reducing unsolicited e-mail (sp^m) for its users. Basically, AOL wants users to customize their own inboxes and view or receive only the messages that they choose.

While the crackdown is a noble endeavor, it puts legitimate e-mail publishers in the crossfire — people like us who have worked hard to ensure that everyone on our list has opted-in and given us permission to contact them repeatedly.

To make sure that your AOL subscribers are receiving YOUR e-mails, here are a few things you should know.

  • All Your Graphics Are Blocked by Default

    AOL has taken the drastic measure of blocking all graphics from being displayed in HTML e-mails, as well as deactivating the links for any new messages sent to an AOL 9 inbox. The system is also designed to “learn” what messages are repeatedly marked as sp^m, and they will eventually be sent to the junk folder automatically, once it maps the user’s behavior.

    When an e-mail is received in AOL 9, users have to click a link at the top of each message to view any graphics within your e-mail (“Show Images & Enable Links”). If this action is not taken, images (e.g. pictures, logos) and links will not be displayed or enabled.

  • Your Open Rates Are Likely Affected

    If your e-mail publishing system uses “open tracking” to count how many people open your e-mails, you will start seeing lower numbers because the new AOL 9 also blocks open tracking tools by default. (Read on to learn how to improve your results.)

  • Ask Your Subs to Add You To Their Address Book

    At the top of each issue you send, remind those AOL folks to put you in their AOL address book. For example, “AOL 9 users: Please add Alexandria@EzineQueen.com to your address book so you’ll be sure to receive every issue of our e-zine”.

    Once a user puts you in her address book, all your future e-mails will automatically show images and functioning links. This will also allow the e-mail to be tracked properly as “opened” on your end.

  • Make Sure Your FROM Address is Consistent

    This shouldn’t be a problem unless your list server/e-mail publishing program generates a different FROM address with each e-mail you send. For example, today I got an issue of an e-zine with this FROM address: 16863-return-90-86968736@lb.bcentral.com. But when I looked at the LAST issue of the same e-zine two weeks ago, the return address had some different numbers in there.

    This is BAD, because even if the AOL user adds you to her address book, every issue you send will be categorized as from a new sender. By having a consistent FROM address, you’ll allow your AOL 9 subscribers to add your e-mail address into their address book, and all future e-mails you send will be easily received and tracked.

    NOTE: There is a difference between your actual FROM address and what some call the “from LABEL”. My e-zine’s actual FROM address is Alexandria@EzineQueen.com, but it’s labeled as from “E-zine Queen”.

    If you use Outlook or Eudora, you know what I mean. In your inbox list, you see all the from LABELS and not the actual e-mail addresses. For example, you see “John Smith” instead of jsmith2000@hotmail.com.

    AOL does NOT show its users your from label, it only shows your true FROM address. You can usually access and change these settings in your e-mail publishing program. If you’re not sure how to do this, talk with your vendor.

  • Bottom Line: Never Rely on Images to Convey Your Message

    You can be sure that not all your AOL users will bother to put you in their address book, or understand how easy it is to do.

    So here’s the bottom line: Have fun with graphics and images in your HTML e-zine, but never rely on them to get your message across. Once each issue is complete and ready to send, look at it and pretend all the graphics are gone. Can your readers still instantly recognize it’s a publication? Do they see it’s from you? Is it obvious to them this is what they signed up for? If not, be sure to add text at the top to make things crystal clear.

    I also recommend that if you don’t have AOL yourself, get an account and put that e-mail address on your subscriber list. This will allow you to see how the new AOL 9 works and how your e-zine appears.

    • (c) 2003 Alexandria K. Brown

    ABOUT THE AUTHOR

    Alexandria K. Brown, “The E-zine Queen,” is author of the award-winning manual, “Boost Business With Your Own E-zine.” To learn more about her book and sign up for more FREE tips like these, visit her site at http://EzineQueenTutorial.com/

    Posted in Email Marketing | No Comments »

    7 Tricks for More Holiday Web Sales

    Wednesday, August 30th, 2006

    “Black Friday” has just passed, marking the traditional start of the holiday shopping season. Web sales are already at a record high this year and the fourth quarter of 2004 is projected to bring in $22 billion in online sales alone ? a whole third of the sales for the entire year. (Source: eMarketer.com)

    And since Friday, your in-box has been overflowing with all those new orders… right?

    Or maybe not.

    If you’re like many small retailers, you’ve waited until the last minute to start thinking about your online holiday sales. You’ve been too busy, too short-staffed, too distracted, or perhaps even too confused to take the necessary steps to get your Web site ship-shape for the holidays.

    Don’t despair! you can still take advantage of the holiday sales season ifyou take immediate action.

    Here are seven things you can do RIGHT NOW to boost your online holiday sales this year.

    1. “Hello, is anybody home?”
    Update your Web site. If your home page still boasts “Summer Specials,” this means you! Put photos of your best sellers out front, and highlight any holiday specials.

    2. Use the power of suggestion.
    Make it easy for shoppers to figure out what to buy. Try adding a “Great Gift Ideas” list on your home page with links to each product. Better yet, organize the list into categories: “Gifts Under $20,” “Stocking Stuffers,” “Gifts for Kids,” “Gifts for Him/Her,” etc.

    3. Bundle it.
    Combine popular items into a “gift set” that shoppers can add to their carts with one click. Package them together in an attractive gift box or basket. Be sure to display a photo of the gift packaging.

    4. Sell the gift that always fits.
    Offer gift certificates for the shopper that isn’t sure what to buy, or who needs a last-minute gift. TIP: Make sure your shopping cart ships gift certificates free.

    5. Wrap it up.
    Offer to wrap and ship a gift directly to the recipient for a small fee. You’ll earn loyalty from your customers if you can help them out during a busy, stressful time.

    6. “Will it get there on time?”
    Concerns about delivery are at the top of Web shoppers’ lists. Overcome their uncertainty by posting information about shipping times, order cut-off dates for holiday delivery, and express delivery options in a conspicuous place.

    7. SHOUT!
    NOW is the time to toot your own horn and help people remember that your products and services make great gifts. Email the folks on your mailing list at least once a week until the end of the holiday season. Pick a different gift product to feature with each email, and be sure to include a direct link to the product page. Also, work the phones. Don’t be afraid to be low-tech! Pick up the phone and call your 10 best customers to let them know about your great holiday deals.

    Although there are lots of things you can do to jumpstart your online holiday sales, there’s one thing you *shouldn’t* do right now.

    DON’T try to give your web site or e-commerce system a major overhaul during the peak season. The last thing you and your customers need is to deal with echnical glitches or lost orders during the holiday crunch. If you’re panning a major upgrade, wait until January when things are a little slower and there will be minimal disruption to your customers.

    © Copyright 2004 Jamila White. All rights reserved.

    ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
    Jamila White, "The E-Commerce Diva", is an Internet Strategist, Web Designer, and E-Commerce instructor in the Washington D.C. area. For a FREE subscription to her “Sell More Online” e-newsletter, go to http://www.ecommercediva.com.

    [NOTE: You are welcome to "reprint" this article online as long as it remains complete and unaltered (including the "about the author" info at the end and the copyright notice), and you send a copy of your reprint to info@jamilawhite.com.]

    Posted in Internet Marketing | No Comments »

    Selling Multiple Products? Avoid These Top Blunders

    Wednesday, August 30th, 2006

    When your web site sells more than a dozen items, you may face a fierce challenge of helping shoppers find what they are looking for. You’ll need to classify products into categories, but these will serve as obstacles and even deal killers if those categories do not match those in the heads of shoppers.

    I’ve seen again and again web sites using classifications that aren’t known or understood by a portion of their customers. For instance, I once wanted to buy T-shirts and went to the site of a famous catalog company, where I found a category called “shirts.” So far, so good. But then I had to choose between a category called “woven” or another called “knitted.” There I got stumped. Are T-shirts woven or knitted? I was not sure.

    Another time I was searching for a Toyota car part, ready to buy it, but I could not find it on the Toyota parts web site unless I knew whether it was part of the drive train, an accessory, the exhaust system or something else. I hadn’t a clue. In both these cases, the site wrongly assumed that shoppers understood their jargon, and set that up as a barrier to an online purchase.

    Let’s suppose that you solve the jargon problem and someone finds what they are looking for. The next hurdle for shoppers concerns whether or not people can find answers to all the questions about availability, shipping charges, warranties and return policies that they could easily ask if shopping by phone or in person. In the last year, I would say that only 50% of the time when I’m shopping online I’ve had all of my pre-purchase questions answered by the web site. Among the multi-product sites I’ve toured as a reviewer, I don’t remember a single one that answered enough questions for shoppers.

    Before your site launches, you can think up all the questions people might ask by imagining different kinds of shoppers – people from other countries, corporate buyers, gift givers, etc. – and what they’d need to know. Once your site’s been up for a while, collect the questions that come in by email and phone. Gather the questions and answers in a Frequently Asked Questions page and make the FAQ accessible from every page of your site.

    Especially do not make people put items into their shopping cart and begin checking out in order to find out the shipping charges and refund policies! Another epidemic blunder is not revealing the address of the company behind the shopping site. Not only is this necessary to set at ease the mind of any shopper worried about recourse against no-show orders or faulty merchandise, it’s important for some people to know where items are being shipped from.

    Ditto for your privacy policy. Are you going to be renting out your list of customer addresses and bombarding everyone who’s bought from you with frequent emails?

    Online order forms range from easy to use and complete to baffling and aggravating. Submit yours to what I call “the grandmother test” – ask people who’ve never seen your site before to place an order and talk through the process out loud. Button your lips and listen. Note where they get stuck and fix your ordering procedures accordingly.

    Finally, do you have testimonials attesting to the quality and value of what you sell and the pleasures of doing business with you? That’s the cherry on the sundae of a well-designed site from a company shoppers recommend and return to for more purchases!

    Marcia Yudkin is the author of Web Site Marketing Makeover and 10 other books. A four-time Webby Awards judge and internationally famous marketing consultant, she critiques web sites and performs web site makeovers for clients. Learn more about her detailed critique sessions on five different kinds of web sites (including multi-product sites) at http://www.yudkin.com/websitequiz.htm .

    Posted in Web Design | No Comments »

    Aim At The Bullseye And Your Online Home Business Will Prosper

    Wednesday, August 30th, 2006

    Traffic is one thing, but targeted traffic is everything.

    You have no doubt seen dozens of offers similar to “10,000 hits per hour driven to your website!”. This type of website traffic is completely untargeted and will undoubtedly result in a very low conversion ratio. It’s basically “throw it up against the wall and hope something sticks”. The big incoming numbers give the illusion of progress, but you will achieve better results with a lower volume of highly targeted traffic.

    I speak from experience because in the early days of developing my home business, I went for the big numbers instead of focusing on targeting prospects. It took me a while to appreciate the importance of targeting (quality) instead of just going for the big numbers, but it was a lesson well learned.

    Exchanging links has been an important part of generating website traffic for quite some time, but the vast majority of people looking to trade links don’t understand that just wildly swapping links with any willing webmaster is not the way to go.

    For the last few years, most webmasters have been in a “pleasing Google” mode since Google had such a dominant position. Now that challengers are emerging, most notably Yahoo, MSN, and Ask Jeeves, the search engine ranking landscape is becoming much more complicated than just marching to the tune Google played.

    Many website owners seem to be of the opinion that the sole purpose of exchanging links is to try to improve the search engine ranking position of their website. While it is true that links pointing to your website can help your search engine ranking, the reason for obtaining inbound links goes far deeper than that.

    In my opinion, the targeted traffic that relevant links pointing to your site will bring can be as important as the traffic that comes to your website from people using search engines. This is where linking philosophy comes in. If you limit yourself to exchanging links only with websites that have a theme highly relevant to your own, the traffic you receive from those links will be far more targeted (valuable) than traffic you might receive from links with websites that have nothing to do with your theme.

    Not only do highly relevant links bring you more highly targeted traffic, but they also play a “customer satisfaction” role for visitors to your website who arrived there as a result of a search engine query. If someone arrives at your website after performing a search for, lets say “work at home” and then finds your website full of links to a bunch of off topic sites (Viagra, online casinos, hotel reservations, sports betting, etc, etc) the impression is often not favorable and may actually drive your visitor away before they consider whatever it is that your website itself is offering.

    Keep your eye on the bullseye and develop highly targeted traffic by having good content on your website and exchanging links with highly relevant sites that also offer good content. Remember, traffic is one thing, but targeted traffic is everything.

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    This article is freely available for reprint provided that the resource box at the end of the article is left intact and the article is published complete and unaltered. If you are using this article on a website or e-book, please make sure that the link in the resource box is live or clickable.
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    Kirk Bannerman operates a successful home based business and coaches others seeking to start their own home based business.

    Visit his website at Legitimate Home Based Business for more details.

    Posted in Traffic Building | No Comments »

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