Archive for August, 2006

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If You Dont Like The Weather…Just Wait For 10 Minutes

Sunday, August 27th, 2006

This old saying which addresses the variability of the weather in Montana is also applicable to the market dynamics for an online business. If there is one thing that is certain about the future of online marketing, it is that it will continue to change.

A generation in Internet marketing seems to last 12 months or less and therefore it is very important for online marketers to reassess their marketing plan frequently. It wasn’t too long ago that popups and banner ads were all the rage and now they’re about as welcome as a telemarketer or a lawyer.

In earlier times, just getting traffic to your website could spell success. That just is not the case today. In the current environment, Internet marketers have many tasks before them including increasing traffic, maximizing traffic quality, and improving conversion ratios. Much simpler said than done, but the key element is to understand that we are dealing with a dynamic marketing landscape where change is almost a continuous process. A successful Internet marketing campaign will always be a work in progress.

A dynamic internet marketing campaign will be a continuous process of monitoring & analyzing, followed by tweaking & experimenting, followed by measuring the impact (more monitoring & analyzing) of the changes made.

The first step in analyzing your marketing campaign is pinpointing precisely where the prospects are coming from. Whether it’s search engines, email, or from other sources. All of this data can be found in your server logs and there are some very good traffic analysis tools (many of them free) that will provide you with the information without requiring you to become technically proficient at deciphering raw server logs.

By analyzing the information taken from the traffic analysis tools you can track keywords and other parameters which will tell you how visitors are getting to your site which, in turn, will help you improve and target traffic.

The goals for your particular site will depend upon the nature of your online business or endeavor. A good way to determine how well your site attracts and converts visitors is to analyze your traffic and then experiment or tweak some of the different elements of your site such as sales letter copy, special price promotions, limited time offers, free offers, headlines, color schemes, testimonials, etc., etc.

After making changes in your program, once again analyze your traffic to obtain a measure of the impact (good, bad, or none) that your tweaking has produced. And then start the process all over again, retaining the changes that yielded a positive result and, of course, rejecting those that did not.

Remember folks, it is up to us to stay in touch with the fact that there is one certainty about the future of online marketing, and that is that it will continue to change.

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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 »

Web Copywriting: The Psychology Of Scarcity, Less Is More If You Want Faster Sales

Sunday, August 27th, 2006

Countdown to Armageddon – at least you’d think so judging from some of the garish copy and blaring headlines screaming at you from so many websites.

At the opposite extreme though, you’ve some sites which don’t even have a single decent headline anywhere that captures visitors attention, let alone leads them into captivating copywriting that’ll get them a sale.

Although it’s true to say human emotion hasn’t changed in the last 10 years online, the consumer and buyer reactions have undoubtedly become far more sophisticated over the past decade. Further, with something like 43% of all web shopping carts being abandoned at the point of sale it’s crucial we understand and react proactively to this new buyer sophistication.

In short, todays online buyers are both pretty wired and wised up. Unless you understand this and adjust your offering accordingly your headlines are very likely to drive prospective clients away rather than entice them into your copy for a second look if they’ve even a sniff of hype about them or just plain bore them silly.

Either of the above extremes is obviously counter-productive but rather than opting for a bland ‘middle way’ approach to your copywriting or headlines, here’s a sure fire way to generate intensely gripping copy that rivets even ultra sophisticated buyers to every word you publish. It keeps them spellbound all the way down your pages until they’ve executed your desired marketing action – either opting in, clicking through to a new page or making a purchase without dumping the cart.

If you want these type of results then use “The Psyschology Of Scarcity” and you’ll soon have these new ’sophisticats’ under your marketing spell and more importantly, get them buying what you sell. Here’s exactly how it works…

The basic underlying principle is widely known of course, and springs from the proven psychological response people give when they’re denied or given limited access to something they intensely desire. Basically, when people are told they can’t have something they want it all the more. As a result incredibly powerful emotions are released which go on to drive actions often deemed irrational under normal circumstances. As marketers we can take advantage of this almost primitive reaction (ethically of course) to bypass even sophisticated buyers resistance and go on to make the sale.

Here’s a further demonstration to show powerful this is…

Imagine for a moment tonights TV news announces a grave national emergency and petrol (gas) is to be be strictly rationed to one just full tank for your car for an entire month… but this rationing won’t start until one weeks time. However, you are not allowed to stockpile petrol because that’s bad. Now I don’t know about you honourable folks but almost instantly a picture of my storeroom stacked to the ceiling with Jerry cans full of petrol popped into my mind!

I’m not saying I’d do that if this was a true scenario but I’d probably have a couple of cans laid aside, just for emergencies of course. At the pumps and service stations there would be a stampede, because the psychology of scarcity would release these deep emotional responses. This actually happened here in UK two years ago and there was mayhem.

Now let’s see if we can insert a mechanism deep into our headlines and online copy that’ll immediately invoke exactly the same kind of emotional responses within those who visit our sites. If we can then all the sophistication in the world won’t stop our visitors from reaching for their credit cards to buy what we sell.We’re looking for the response that comes directly from the gut – that’s not filtered out by the sophisticated mind. That’s where we aim our copy at, the heart not the head.

The type of mechanisms we’ve found work best in invoking these emotion driven responses are as follows…

1) Strictly limit the amount of product you are selling in each promotion, put it right up front in the headline or first sentence where everyone can see it and strictly adhere to your statement. If you say you’ve only got 100 widgets to sell, then pull the promo when you reach that point or people will see the whole thing as a facade. Here in the UK the richest sofa and 3 piece suite supplier uses this technique very well, although now after 2 years we’re all beginning to see through these ‘promo weekend specials’, so be wise when you use it.

Make your product scarce… because then you make it valuable and desired in others eyes.

2) Set time sensitive deadlines that really do expire – Set a deadline for the promo to finish and give a special discount on the product if purchased before that time. When you reach that day pull the promo headlines, ad, the lot. People will heed what you say and buy far quicker next time you set a deadline. I’ve done it myself, got to a site with expired deadline and missed out, next time I payed far more attention to their pitch and the website gained credibility in my eyes.

3) Use number limits for recruiting headlines – when recruiting people for sales teams, affiliates etc use figures that limit the amount of people you ‘appear’ to wish to recruit. For example use a headline portion including “We urgently require 5 key individuals for our new IT project…”. At the same time as limiting the opportunity here you also give each individual a glimmer of hope that they’ll be among the ‘chosen few’ to land the rare but rather plum project.

4) Bundle extra products, services, customer support along with your product they’d not normally get, especially from your competition. This is also a good way to get affiliate sales. Your visitors realise they can’t get the ‘extra’s from other affiliate sites so they buy from your affiliate link. Your product becomes ‘value enhanced’ and in the marketplace where there are thousands doing the same thing, yours is perceived as valuable because of the rare extras bundled with it. Think of it – you’re giving chips (fries) along with the main event for free, your competitors aren’t, who will buyers go with?

5) Give special ‘insider access’ passes or memberships to the first 20 respondents etc or if your visitors order before a deadline. You increase value and evoke quick response by limiting the number of memberships available. Tell folks at the same time – “… in a few days our national advertising campaign will be rolled out and these 20 memberships are likely to be snapped up within minutes, order now to secure yours.” etc.

6) Give forward dated ‘Future Proofed’ Discount Vouchers for future product releases – for example, “Buy a X widget right now at £199.00 and you’ll get our brand new Y software at £99.00 when we release it next month. That’s a whole £100.00 off the Y software retail price of £199.00. Lock this discount in today by buying your X widget NOW and save yourself a whole £100.00.”

Then make this offer even more powerful by number limiting this ‘future’ offer too. Say something like “Obviously we can’t make this offer available to everyone or our profits on next months new release would be affected but we would like to say a special ‘thank you’ to you as a valued client if you’ve bought an X widget. As a result we’re willing to give you a very special £100.00 discount on the new Y software, but sadly we can only offer this to the first 50 respondents for the reason I mentioned earlier. Please act now and purchase your X widget and I’ll be happy to lock in your special £100.00 Y software discount right now.

7) Show dramatic visual countdowns to increase the sense of scarcity – when running a promo that limits purchasers to say 50 copies of a book or manual, special health clinics etc then countdown the progress of the sales before your prospects eyes. On Monday at the start of the promo you only had 47 left, a week later 24, then 12, 7, 3 etc. This is very gripping and effective in any industry.

When you make your product so scarce it literally disappears before visitors eyes they want it all the more. Nowadays you can get little javascript codes to insert into your pages, or pop ups to make this ‘live’ countdown seem very real indeed and it’s extremely effective.
8) Add value to your product by tying a celebrity name to it – for example “Aretha Franklin swears by our nutritional vitamin syrup because she says it makes her feel like she’s seventeen again and protects her vulnerable vocal chords so she can sing like an angel…” Other nutritional syrups are basically the same but yours would be the only one used and endorsed by a famous celebrity. It may not be possible to get Aretha Franklin but with a little imagination you’re likely to be surprised at the folks you could team up with like this. Their end of the deal is they get extra exposure, or even a share in the sales from the promo you run.

9) Tie up with other related business owners and run a dual promo offering a unique ‘Double Whammy’ product – As an example a specialist seat cover maker could do something along the lines of…

“Order One Set Of Super Soft Custom Leather Car Seat Covers and our friends at Alloy Wheel Kings will give you a full set of alloy wheels at 50% discount. Obviously this is such an incredible deal we can only afford to let the first 25 respondents participate in this promotion which we expect to be sold out by next wednesday. Please book your covers now – click here”

NB: You really need to give such a humdinger of a deal to make this kind of offer fly off the page – 15% off the alloys example above wouldn’t be enough. If the owner of ‘Alloy Wheel Kings’ feels there’s not enough profit in the deal by giving away 50% on the alloys then you’d offer to enhance his profit by building in some extra ‘fat’ in the price of your ‘Super Soft Custom Leather Car Covers’.

You get the picture, but remember the better the offer the faster it flies. The best part about this type of special ‘dual deal’ is you create a very scarce and unique product in your market which your competition don’t have. Sure there may be thousands of car seat cover manufacturers but none that also bundle in superb alloys with their deals. That’d make you stand out in a crowded marketplace wouldn’t it?

Okay that’s enough for now, I’m sure you get the idea.

Hopefully this sprinkling of ’scarcity’ mechanisms will inspire you to employ them in your own headlines and throughout your web copywriting. You don’t need to be garish or loud or use screaming titles etc to get your message across and get serious buyers reading.

If you state simply and clearly, a genuinely scarce commodity is available to a hungry targeted market who you know beforehand want what you have, and you strive as your copy reads on to make it almost literally ‘disappear before their eyes’, folks won’t stop reading, and if you’ve done it correctly they’ll order at the end… sophisticat or not.

Remember, you’ve got to get them ‘in the gut’ bypassing the intricate sales filters of your prospects minds, and this is one of the very best ways to do it – try it and enjoy watching what happens.

Dave Alston is the Author of ‘Revealed: The Hidden Truth About Web Design’ and owner of http://www.aceofwebs.co.uk – small business web success driven by crystal clear copywriting. Subscribe to his ‘Ace Tips’ SME Marketing RSS feed by copying and pasting http://www.aceofwebs.co.uk/rss/wp-rss2.php into your RSS Reader.

Posted in Web Design | No Comments »

How to get an Internet Marketing Education Without Spending a Nickel

Sunday, August 27th, 2006

Do you want to create a passive income? Are you bewildered by all the educational Marketing products out there? Are you on a low budget or trying to escape from a huge debt load?

Well, I answered a big “Yes!” to all the above, especially, the last one

My job sucks. I can barely make ends meet and I have some medical problems which make a “normal” working lifestyle very difficult.

That’s why I become an Affiliate. I refer people to a merchant’s site and make a decent commission. I run ads on Google linked to the product.

It is a really easy way to make money but there is a learning curve involved. Without a solid understanding of Internet marketing, pay-per-clicks and affiliate programs you could waste a lot of money. I did. At first. But, then I discovered a way to get a free education. You can do it, too.

Five Simple Steps to Valuable free Information

1. Search the net for marketing products in the areas you are interested in ie: Affiliate programs, Search Engine optimization, Keywords, website building etc.

2.Find the sign-up for their free newsletter or ezine. All the Marketing Pros have them (but you might have to allow popups on some sites)

3. Sign up for the ezine or join the affiliate programs.

4. Repeat the process.

5. Check your inbox.

Now, you may be thinking: “Hold on a sec, there Dave! Aren’t these guys just going to pitch the hell out of me for stuff I can’t afford? What’s in it for me?”

All the Web Gurus have to face these questions everyday. How do they stop people from unsubscribing? How do they keep them coming back?

Lots and lots of free stuff! They reward their readership on a regular basis because they know “Buy! Buy! Buy!” is not going to… sell.

I receive about 40 newsletters from the Uber Affiliates and the like. It’s amazing the amount of free info I have acquired. They give away reports and ebooks. They give away How-to’s and tutorials. They give you free e-courses and informative interviews.

It’s a great headstart on your new marketing career but they don’t reveal everything. That’s when you can judiciously spend your hard-earned dollars on some of their products. It has saved me thousands!

So, if you are a running on a shoe string, have the time to read and assimilate tons of good info, and are willing to separate the wheat from the chaff… this method is for you. Oh, and you have to like get something for nothing. That is key. ;)

There’s gold in them thar emails!

Why would anyone buy information or an ebook online when they can find it for free?

It takes time to search and acquire all this free information and, as they say: time is money.

If you find a product that will immediately provide you with the solutions you need (and you can afford it) I suggest you consider buying the information. I buy as many marketing ebooks as my budget allows.

-David Parton
Copyright 2005

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NOTE: Feel free to "reprint" this article online as long as it remains complete and unaltered (including my “resource box” at the end). Please send me a copy of your reprint to david@expandingmind.com

Posted in Internet Marketing | No Comments »

Warning: Your Domain Name Could Infringe On Trademark Rights!

Sunday, August 27th, 2006

If you have or are about to purchase a domain name, YOU could be in trouble and you don’t even know it yet…

See, what the domain sellers won’t tell you is that the domain name you are purchasing or have purchased can possibly infringe on trademark rights and you can lose that domain name or even worse.

Trademark and servicemark laws apply not only off-line but on-line as well and they even apply to domain names.

Now, a trademark generally applies to goods where as a servicemark applies to services. For the purpose of this article I will refer to trademarks as the same rules apply.

A trademark can be a word, name, symbol, or device and it is used to distinguish and indentify the goods and services from one person or company from that of another.

The purpose of a trademark is to prevent confusion in the eyes of the consumer relating to particular goods and services. Basically, they are in place to prevent unfair competition.

So with that said, just because you purchased a particular domain name it does not necessarily mean you have exclusive rights to it.

If there is a trademark in your domain name, the mark owner has a legal right to send you a “cease and desist” letter and possibly take that domain name away from you.

If you don’t believe a word I’ve said so far then I offer myself as proof because it happened to me. I recently lost one of my domain names under this exact same circumstance.

For legal reasons I can’t tell you the domain name as I agreed to make no further references to it, but there were two words in my domain name that were associated with a trademark.

Now, I wasn’t aware of this when I purchased the domain name. And I definitely wasn’t aware of trademark laws.

Don’t be ignorant on the subject like I was. You can avoid any potential problems by educating yourself and thereby preventing the samething from happening to you.

Don’t make the same mistake that I did!

Do your research before you buy a domain name and make sure there is NO trademark associated with that name.

There are trademark search engines where you can type in a word or a phrase and it will tell you if it is a trademark.

You can visit the United States Patent And Trademark Office (USPTO) website to do a trademark search:

http://www.uspto.gov/

Now, in my case I chose not to fight the trademark dispute and gave up my domain name voluntarily. I felt it just wasn’t worth the time, money and headaches to launch a fight over this.

If this should ever happen to you, you do have rights and there are proper channels to go through to settle the dispute. Contact a lawyer who specializes in this field.

And don’t even think for one minute that this sort of thing can’t happen to you. Trust me. If you have a trademark in your domain name it is only a matter of time before you get that letter in the mail like I did.

There are numerous cases all over the internet concerning disputes over trademark and domain names.

Don’t you be one of them…

If you would like more information on the subject of trademarks and domain names then I highly recommend you visit this website:

http://www.chillingeffects.org/domain

This article and any links associated with it are for informational purposes only and not intended as legal advice. As always, speak to an attorney who specializes in this field in the event of a dispute.

Al Martinovic is the publisher of the Millenium Marketers Newsletter where you will find powerful concepts, killer strategies, useful tips and no bull business advice: http://www.milleniummarketers.com

Posted in Domain Names | No Comments »

Link Cheating On The Rise

Sunday, August 27th, 2006

Website owners and webmasters who are trying to improve their search engine ranking by trading links with other sites should beware of being cheated. Beware of link cheating. What is link cheating?

Link cheating is when the other party in a link exchange does not live up to the bargain and does not add your link to his site. Link cheating can happen when you add someone else’s link on your site first, then submit your link info, and assume that they will reciprocate and add your link to their site. What often happens is they don’t add your link. And you end up with a one-way link, giving a link and getting none in return, improving someone else’s search engine ranking and not yours. Link cheating. Even worse, you end up wasting a lot of your valuable webmaster time and energy for nothing. And, often, you won’t even know it. You may not know you are the victim of link cheating or may not find out your link was never added to the other site until weeks or months later! Because link cheaters don’t email you telling you your link has been added to their site and they don’t email you telling you they have decided not to add your link (for whatever reason). They will just take advantage of the one-way benefit of you linking to them. Link cheating.

How can you protect yourself from link cheating? As a webmaster, protecting yourself from link cheating is very time consuming and frustrating. Of course, you can check every site you linked to and see if your link has been added to that site. This is very time consuming, even with a “link checker” tool, and you may not find your link even if it is there! Or, if you don’t find your link you can follow up with a polite email. And, if you don’t get a response within a week or two, you can remove their link from your website. Unfortunately, by then you’ve been promoting the other site(s) for a month or more and getting zero in return. Link cheating.

Link cheating costs trusting webmasters, trying to build their website ranking, a lot of time and a lot of irritation. A lot of time adding links, submitting links, checking links and, ultimately, a lot of irritation removing links which don’t reciprocate. One website owner became so fed up with link cheating (20 times in 2 weeks) that he changed his reciprocal link policy. DestinyFinders.com no longer will add a link to their site unless their link is added first, and confirmed to them by email. They promise to then add your link provided it is deemed suitable and acceptable. And they will no longer be a victim of link cheating, by avoiding sites who force you to use those automated you-go-first-but-we-don’t-have-to-reciprocate link management programs. Many of these are good programs but they are being abused by bad webmasters.

As for the link cheaters, in the interest of internet honesty and fair play, webmasters who offer a reciprocal link exchange should abide by the agreement. If someone links to you you should honor the link exchange and reciprocate. That means adding the other party’s link to your site. Or, if you have decided not to reciprocate at least have the professional courtesy to email the other party stating that their link has not been accepted.

Link cheating is reaching epidemic proportions and appears to be on the rise. And there appears to be no easy cure. But here’s some good advice for website owners and webmasters who wish to trade links … beware … be aware … and don’t cheat.

Maya Pinion is a freelance writer and contributing editor for News4Net. DestinyFinders.com is credited with coining the term “link cheating”.

Posted in Website Promotion | No Comments »

Search Engine Optimization For Blogs

Saturday, August 26th, 2006

Blogging software is really a simple Content Management System (CMS) that easily adds new pages and integrates them into your site’s navigational structure and linkage.

Blogs and blog posts are naturally search engine friendly because they are text-rich, link-rich, frequently-updated webpages that use stylesheets or CSS, and have very little extraneous HTML.

Optimizing a blog is very similar to optimizing a website, and optimizing a blog post similar to optimizing a web page.

But depending on the blogging service or software you use, the results may look somewhat different.

If you follow some simple rules for search engine optimization, your blog can rank much higher than static website pages in the search engine results pages.

Here are the most important rules to follow to get your posts listed for keywords of your choice.

1. Use your primary keyword in your blog domain

Whether you purchase a separate domain (recommended) for your blog, or host it on a blogging service or a subdomain of your own site, try to ensure that your URL contains the primary keyword you want to optimize for.

For example, if you want your blog to get found for the keyword “rss” get a domain with the keyword “rss”, or use the keyword in a subdomain as in

http://ebizwhiz-publishing.com/rssnews

Getting a domain name with your own name might make for good branding, especially if yours is a personal blog.

But if you’re doing it for business and want the targeted traffic to flow your way, keywords in the domain or subdomain are a move in the right direction.

2. Use your primary key phrase in your blog header tags and the title of your posts

If your primary key phrase is “business blogging” make sure that the word business, or blogging, or both, appear in your blog headers (the H1 or H2 tags) as well as the title of each of your posts.

Most blogging software will take the keywords in your post title and put them into the file name of the permalink posts it creates.

For example, if you have a blog on Blogger and title your post “Search Engine Optimization For Blogs”, Blogger will automatically create a page with your post and name the file “search-engine-optimization-for-blogs.html” or something similar.

With other server-side software like Wordpress and Movable Type, you may require the mod_rewrite command to save the title of your entries as a permalink.

3. Use your secondary keywords in the body of your post

If you want to get listed for secondary keywords use them infrequently in the body of your post and pepper your blog titles or links with them appropriately.

Don’t overdo this or your posts will end up sounding unnatural and spammy to readers.

4. Use your keywords in the anchor text of links

Keyword in links have more importance than simple text.

Use your primary and secondary keywords in the anchor text of links when linking to other blog posts or to other pages on your main site.

Link keywords where they naturally appear in the body text, but again, don’t overdo it, or you’ll end up with spammy looking pages.

5. Make sure search engines can spider your blog easily

Set up your blog so that the side navigation bar is present on all pages.

Make sure your archives and previous posts are accessible from all pages of your blog so they get spidered easily.

6. Get backlinks from other blogs or websites

Links pointing to your blog or posts are essential to build pagerank and make your blog rank higher in the search engine listings.

I’ve seen many people recommend Blogrolling as one method of building links to your blog.

BlogRolling is a one-stop linklist manager for your blog or journal. But all this service actually does is give you a bit of javascript code that “calls” the links.

As far as search engine rankings go, this method of linking is of little use, because spiders can’t read external javascript code.

Instead I recommend that you focus your linking efforts on the methods here.

Submitting to Blog Search Engines and Directories:

Submitting your blog and RSS feed to blog search engines and directories is essential for getting high-quality links back to your blog.

Here is the best list I’ve found of places to submit your feed or blog.

Best Blog Directory And RSS Submission Sites

Link Exchanges:

Many similarly-themed blogs are often willing to exchange links with other blogs and form richly interlinked networks or communities. Link exchanges with other blogs are easy to implement with most blogging software.

Trackbacks:

You can also get links back to your blog using trackbacks. One of the disadvantages of using Blogger is that it does not automatically create trackback urls that others can use to link back to your posts.

Haloscan is a free service that will automatically add comments and trackbacks to your Blogger blog.

But if trackbacks are an important component of your linking strategy, I would advise using another software or system that adds this feature automatically.

Comments:

You can also get back links to your blog by posting legitimate comments in response to posts on other blogs.

7. Update frequently

There’s no better food for search engine spiders than fresh content.

Post and update your blog frequently using all the rules outlined above and there’s no reason why your blog will not get you top rankings in a short period of time.

8. Stay put

Once you create your blog, try to stick to the same domain and blog host or system for as long as you continue to publish.

You could end up losing a lot of your traffic, your readers and all your search engine listings if you decide to move.

For more ways of building traffic to your blog, read the article “How To Build Traffic To Your Blog.”

Priya Shah publishes an internet marketing ezine by day and doubles as a Blog Maniac by night. Blog Brandz is the legitimate offspring of her affair with the blogosphere.

Posted in SEO | No Comments »

Five Reasons You Have to Stop Your Web Site

Saturday, August 26th, 2006

That’s right. Your method, behavior and strategy you are now using to manage your website may be justifiable reasons to stop it as soon as possible.

Right now, there are millions of websites on the Internet, many of them are dead static pages with not or very few visitors. The owner of websites are paying lots of money and effort to make the website up and running and are giving service to visitors. From within these much of website owners, a little of them are earning money from their website or their website is beneficial for their business, most of the others are wasting their time and money.

However if you do not have a web site on the Internet, your business is under a very serious risk to be bypassed by your competitors, but if you are not running your website in a right way, then it would not only be a useless but also a threat to your whole business. If you ask why, just read just five more important reasons that you have to stop your website.

1-Your website is not well designed.

People trust to their eyes more than their other senses. So, if your small website is not well designed, it is crowded, bad colored and improperly written text, so they might think that your real store or your office should also be something like that. Having technical problems like JavaScript error messages, run time errors on loading pages, slow page download, useless graphics and flash animations are also factors that should be considered.

2-Your website is not up-to-date.

If you have put old and obsolete data and content on your website and you do not pay enough time to make it up-to-date, then how visitors could trust on your knowledge. How could you prove you and your team’s knowledge is not obsolete too? There are millions of websites that deliver very new information and are updated daily or even hourly. Visitors would not tolerate with old content. If they reach to useless and out of date information on your web site, then they leave your website to visit your competitors’ web site.

3-You do not reply your e-mails regularly and without delay.

If you do not pay enough attention to your website visitors and their e-mails, then you may have the same manner in your real world business with your customers. Replying e-mail is the simplest routine that you should have put in your daily tasks. You are not expected to reply e-mail immediately. Replying every 24 or even 48 hours is also acceptable. If you delay in response, then your competitors would win in reaching hopeless visitors that have sent you a price quote weeks ago and still are waiting. Even they have not received a simple auto responder to be sure you have received their e-mail.

4-Your website is not optimized for search engines.

So, all your potential clients that search for your services and products would be captured by your competitors who have invested to be on top in search engines. If you are paying a lot of money for your website hosting, design and support, if you make your website content up-to-date and pay time and energy to reply your e-mails, but have not a good ranking in major search engines, then you are losing your money. Being visible in the huge world of Internet is vital for your online business and search engines are very useful for this purpose. However, you should target your audiences in many other promotional methods rather than search engines, like, banner ads, e-zines, e-books, articles, forums and newsletters.

5-Insufficient information and facilities in your website.

If you have not mentioned your complete postal and contact address or you have not included price list of your services and products on your website, then you won’t be able to capture visitor’s interest. No pricing information means no path for decision. Visitors decide on many parameters, price is the most important one. Besides, a very intuitive shopping cart that could be easily managed and online credit card processing with security considerations would be the next thing your visitors would search for on your website. Not having these items, better to stop your website.

There are lots of reasons you could find in articles that having a website is vital for your business. There are also check points that you can follow to make a good website. You can use those check points to run a very successful web site to help your business and who knows, you may some day stop your real world business and just rely on your website, like many other businesses that you can find them just on the Internet. eBay, Amazon and Yahoo!. But if you are deciding to have a successful business online, you have to consider that not having set a strategy for your online business means losing reputation, money, energy and resources both on your online and real business.

This article tried to make you aware that, some day you may reach to a point for a hard decision that is, stopping your website or your very expensive website just because of your incorrect management methods. Hope you never see that day.

About The Author

Mahmood Bashaash is the owner of SGNetway Company in web address of www.sgnetway.com which is focused on developing web sites and web applications and is the author of MahmoodB web site and newsletter that reveals hundreds of killer Internet marketing tips and tricks. To access his articles, visit: http://www.mahmoodb.com; mahmoodb@sgnetway.com

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Headlines Bring Sales–Where and How to Use Them – Part 2

Saturday, August 26th, 2006

Headlines are short vital statements to stimulate your potential customers and clients to take action. That means sales! Since you only have 10 seconds to attract your visitor or reader, create headlines to make ultimate sales.

Your benefit-driven headlines are your 24/7 sales team working for your while you relax your favorite way.

Without them, your ezine ads, email promotions, special reports, eBooks, book and article titles, chapter titles, ezines and print newsletters, and Web site will not pull visitor attention, trust, credibility, traffic or sales.

Headlines bring far more sales than the copy following them. Perhaps you are a skimmer too. Skimmers usually just read the headline. Part one of this article is available, email article-71@bookcoaching.com.

How to Use Headlines

Within the body of the piece use headlines to inspire and motive the reader to keep reading to get their questions answered. The reason they read your article is to learn how to solve their problem. Headlines organize and guide your reader to make it easy for him/her to read. With appreciation for your useful article they may click on your product or service to buy you offer in your signature file at the bottom.

Within “The BIG 3 Marketing Machine” report, this headline pulls reader action: “Leverage your Sales Through a Short Headline.”

4. EBOOK TITLES AND TABLE OF CONTENTS

Your eBook or print book title is an example of a headline. With only 4-8 seconds to impress, make sure it sizzles with the number one benefit and your preferred audience included.

Sample titles that sell: “Increase your Traffic and Web Sales Five Times in 30 Days,” “Ten Roadblocks Between You and a Real Life,” “Cold Calling: The Reverse Selling Way,” and “Speak Like a Pro For Profit.” Notice the benefits.

Within your book your chapter titles are also examples of headlines. These are so important to guide the reader through your information in an organized, compelling style. They help focus your reader and make your book easy-to-read, a great selling point. Since your chapter titles evolve into your table of contents, make them stimulate your possible buyer to pay for your book right now. These are what my eBook calls “Essential Hot-Selling Points.”

In one client’s chapter “You’re Having No Fun and it Makes You Sick” from a book on how relationships can be hazardous to your health, she offered these headings: “No One Told You? You Put Off Fun Til Later? He Healed Himself with Laughter! Are You Stuck in the Muck? and Stretch Your Fun Muscles.”

5. EZINES AND NEWSLETTERS

Just as with your chapter titles, every section of your ezine needs a headline. For instance, “Feature Article of the Month,” “Business Tip of the Month,” or “Publisher’s Message.” These are listed in your ezine’s table of contents near the top of the ezine. They give your prospective reader benefit-driven headlines to attract them to read on.

6. WEBSITES

Since headlines are the most important part of your home page and sales letters on your Web site, think about your site now. If you don’t have headlines on your home page that lead your visitor straight to your product or service sales letter and order page, you probably have low sales.

Why will visitors buy from you? They certainly don’t care about your bio, your mission or purpose. They won’t stay if your home page opens with a large graphic. Your potential customers want to learn more about how you can solve their problem, and that demands dazzling, meaty headlines.

For an eBook, one author put this headline on his home page: Want to Know How to Add 200 New Subscribers Each Month?” This headline led Web potential buyers straight to his sales letter and links to where the Online promotion product was sold.

For a Feng Shui Kit one client put this home page headline and link to her product sales letter on her home page: “Do you Miss the Sacred in Your Daily Life? Rediscover it with “The Sacred Collection.” In her sales letter she wrote more headlines and bullets for specific benefits throughout her sales letter.

7. LINK EXCHANGE

Reciprocal Web link exchanges are a win-win in business, since this is one way to optimize your search engine placement. When you agree with another Web site to exchange links, offer both a short and long version of your link. In the longer one, be sure to place a benefit-driven headline with the URL and a free offer. These annotated links stand out from the crowd and give visitors more information to make a decision..

When you add zesty, power-packed headlines to anything your write or use to promote yourself and your business, you will attract your target potential buyers who evolve into buyers.

Judy Cullins ©2004 All Rights Reserved

Judy Cullins, 20-year Book and Internet Marketing Coach works with small business people who want to make a difference in people’s lives, build their credibility and clients, and make a consistent life-long income. Author of 10 eBooks including “Write your eBook Fast,” “How to Market your Business on the Internet,” and “Create your Web Site With Marketing Pizzazz,” she offers free help through her 2 monthly ezines, “The Book Coach Says…” and “Business Tip of the Month” at http://www.bookcoaching.com/opt-in.shtml and over 155 free articles. Email her at mailto:Judy@bookcoaching.com.

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Two Pillars of a Successful Web Site

Saturday, August 26th, 2006

For a web site to get close to fulfilling its potential, you need absolute clarity on two points.

First, achieve clarity on what your site’s core purpose is

Is to provide information? Is it to complete direct sales? Is it to drive prospects to pick up the phone and call you? Is it to start a free trial? To register?

The more companies I work with, especially larger ones, the more apparent it becomes to me that very few sites have absolute clarity of purpose.

All too often, too many different stakeholders impose a variety of different ‘purposes’. The result? A site that is not clearly focused. A site that appears disorganized and complicated to its visitors. A site that wanders, meanders and ultimately fails ? because none of the writers or designers really know what they should be doing.

When and if you do achieve clarity as to the purpose of your site, everything becomes easier.

You can look at every page, every heading, every line of content, every link and image…and ask yourself this simple question: Is this content working hard enough to achieve our purpose?

If it isn’t, change it, or dump it. It’s as simple as that.

You may be thinking, "Nick you are so naïve. Our business is complex. We have more than one purpose."

That may be. If you are selling high-end hospital equipment, for instance, your site may serve both to drive new sales and also to support existing customers.

That’s OK. But make it clear. Make it clear on your home page. Make it obvious to visitors that there are two distinct areas of the site ? one for people who already have some of your equipment, and one for those who don’t.

Then apply the same discipline to every page in each area. Does the page drive your purpose?

Second, understand what your visitors are hoping to find

I’m written about this before. But without this second pillar in place, your site won’t work as hard as it should.

Put simply, you need to understand the expectations of your visitors. Understand why they are coming to your site, what they are hoping to find.

When someone arrives at your site, whatever the landing page, they have a ‘pain’ or problem they want solving.

If your site is doing its job, it will take that visitor only a couple of moments before they think, "Yes, I can find what I need right here."

When that happens, they become filled with confidence.

It’s then your job to help that person achieve their task as quickly and as simply as possible.

Both pillars working together

When your own purpose is clear, and when you meet the expectations of your visitors, everything becomes golden. You both get what you want.

How do you get to this ‘golden’ place?

Just step back from your site for a while and do some thinking. Get clarity on the purpose of your site. And go back over your site’s history to figure out what it was people were hoping for when they arrived.

For sure, not everyone came to your site for exactly the same reason ? but maybe 80% came for one of three reasons.

This isn’t about achieving perfection. It’s about getting as close as you can.

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.

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Benefits of Website Localization

Saturday, August 26th, 2006

Benefits of Website Localization

Maximising profit today involves reaching beyond national markets. Accessing an international customer base is vital if a business wants to expand and participate in international trade.

‘Localization’ relates to the act of modifying a product to make it both usable and suitable to a target market. Website localization therefore refers to the process of taking an English, western-orientated, website and moulding it to conform to a foreign audience.

The World Wide Web, as its name suggests, is a means by which businesses can reach an international audience. Companies are now recognising that a key step in successfully approaching and selling to international customers is through website localization.

Website localization brings with it numerous benefits. The three main benefits of localization are:

Website localization crosses language barriers

32% of internet users around the world are non-native English speakers. With PC ownership and access to the internet most rapidly increasing outside of North America and Europe, this figure will increase even more. Website localization breaks linguistic barriers and opens doors to other continents.

Companies are now waking up to the fact that English is no longer ‘the’ international language but one of many including French, Spanish, Arabic and Chinese. With the number of companies now realising the benefits of website localization, there are more pages in foreign languages than ever before. This means if your company’s site has not undergone the localization process yet, it will be playing catch up in the future.

Website localization builds credibility

If your company only has a site in English and your competitor in all major languages, which one will gain more credibility? Localization of your website demonstrates that you are a truly international player. In addition, through localization it shows that you understand, value and have respect for that particular country or region.


Website localization increases revenue

Billions of dollars, pounds and francs in potential revenue are lost each year due to lack of investment in website localization. Most internet users will naturally feel more comfortable and understand a company better if their information, products or services are presented in their native language. By undergoing the website localization process you access potentially millions of new customers.


It is clear that website localization is a must for any truly international business. In addition to the technical and programming elements of website localization many cultural factors must be borne in mind.

For example, has language been translated properly and cultural variations in terminology, phrases, metaphors and sayings been taken into consideration? Have symbols, graphics, pictures, colours and general layout been viewed for their cultural applicability?

Website localization is a huge investment and should not be viewed as a straightforward process. When localizing your site, ensure you get the expertise of both a website designer and a cross cultural communications consultancy to ensure your site has maximum impact on the target audience.

Neil Payne is Director of cross cultural communications consultancy http://www.kwintessential.co.uk

Permission is granted to reproduce the article in full on the condition I am made aware of any intention to use it. npayne@kwintessential.co.uk

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