Email has resulted in a revolution in marketing-an explosion in messaging.
For some it is a god-send, a technology and a method that allows people to sell products and services quickly and effectively.
For others, it's a doomsday machine, a spam filled mailbox filled with angry mail from people who will never again be customers.
You have to learn several special techniques before you can truly leverage and make maximum use email -- the Internet's wonderchild.
Here are some important keys to successful email marketing campaigns:
1. Get Permission.
Use web page sign up forms or post card return cards, but get permission in a valid way. Create and offer incentives for people to sign up online to receive value-added information.
2. Target carefully and make it relevant.
Send only relevant email to opt-in subscribers. Develop and give people what they wanted and what you promised. Don't send email that is outside the scope of what was promised to people who opted in. Target and segment your subscriber base and tailor your messages to specific demographic characteristics.
3. Your Subject Line is Critical.
Don't make it look or sound like spam. The purpose of the subject line is NOT to sell, but just to get people to open the email, that's it! Be careful of the words you select. Check your email against a spam checker to see that it doesn't contain words that will automatically result in deletion.
4. Use your personality.
Talk in the first person. Develop your persona as a friend or as an expert. Define your persona based on your customers' needs and desires and based on professional behaviors.
5. Don't sell. Advise, advise, advise.
Offer value-added problem solving information, advice, tools and help. Use email to get people to use your email as a reason to call you or visit your web site. Offer people more of what they like to build and your personal relationship and their satisfaction and your personal connection with your customer.
6. Create a single, clear and benefit laden call for action.
Focus on getting people to take one action. Don't offer more than one action. Identify the action clearly and persuasively and track the results. Get them to click and go to a relevant landing page to net them to take further action.
7. Create a life-cycle campaign.
Design a program that results in you sending out four to six messages over a six to eight week period. These recurring campaigns can be created in advance and operated in a totally automated fashion.
8. Use triggered email.
Design and set up automated email campaigns so that when clients order product or sign up for items or request information online, that a suite of email messages are then sent to them periodically automatically.
9. Use email to get them to Click!
Keep the email short - no more than 3 or 4 pages. Relate first paragraph to subject line. Drive people to a web page and then close the sale, don't try to close the sale with an email. Don't mention price or cost in email. The purpose of the email is to PRE-SELL, not to sell. Again, it's to get them CLICK, then go to your web page. Then you can do the selling there.
10. Comply with CAN-SPAM Act requirements.
Send from a valid address. Respect all remove requests promptly. Never send a second email to someone who has requested removal.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Sunday, July 23, 2006
Starting an Online Business – Get the Basics Right
Many aspiring online entrepreneurs are taking advantage of the vast cyber market that has been created by the advent of the internet.
Whilst, innovative entrepreneurs have discovered a wealth of opportunities to be converted into viable businesses in cyberspace, many are seeing little or no return for their efforts.
The common misconception they labor under is that they expect the internet to make them money, when in actual fact their strategy should be to use the internet as a vehicle to market their goods and services to the cyber market, known as the world wide web.
However, because internet businesses can be set up at virtually no cost or with no risk, more and more people are seeing the internet as a good way to making money easily and quickly.
Well, the reality is that most of these would be internet marketers are not getting the basics right, get disheartened with the lack of activity & money being generated by their businesses and end up quitting with barely making a dollar.
Getting these basics right will at least afford your business a decent chance of longevity and success.
1. Mindset
Often the wrong mindset creates unrealistic expectations in terms of returns and the amount of input required.
So, prior to launching your business you need to understand that success won’t come easily, you won’t earn money in the short term and that you more than likely will not get rich quickly.
Depending on your product, service, market, niche, etc, online businesses generally take a reasonable length of time to become established before they start generating any sort of income.
You also need to understand that despite putting in the long hours day in & day out, that this alone won’t guarantee results – persistence, testing and continually trying different strategies are also some of the requirements.
2. Plan
If you fail to plan, you plan to fail!
Success often comes about when a good opportunity is intercepted by a good plan.
Often internet entrepreneurs are opportunists who reap the rewards when they’re in a position, i.e. have planned & are prepared, to convert opportunities into good money.
3. Web Presence
Your web presence has to portray your business as a professional organization that is geared and prepared to add value to anyone who visits your site.
As there is so much competition on the internet trying to attract your site visitor, your site needs to be innovative, functional, properly structured and well optimized.
Also, whilst your domain name needs to be properly researched and appropriate to your business, your web host needs to be of high enough caliber to ensure 100% uptime and rapid response.
4. Reach and Develop your Target Market
Having a great website without visitors won’t do much for your bottom line so it needs to be properly optimized for search engines (a whole topic on it’s own), popular and very sticky, i.e. your site visitors need to want to come back time and again.
Furthermore, pay per click campaigns, offline marketing and other methods can be employed to drive targeted traffic to your site.
5. Legal Issues
Aside from adhering to the normal legal requirements that need to be adhered to for setting up a business you need to take cognizance of those issues that pertain specifically to Internet Law as well.
For example not checking that your chosen domain name may infringe on a legally protected trademark or other intellectual property rights can cost you a lot of time and money in the long term.
Whilst there are many other aspects that are key to the success of an online venture, the above basics all need to be maximized to give your business a shot at internet success.
Whilst, innovative entrepreneurs have discovered a wealth of opportunities to be converted into viable businesses in cyberspace, many are seeing little or no return for their efforts.
The common misconception they labor under is that they expect the internet to make them money, when in actual fact their strategy should be to use the internet as a vehicle to market their goods and services to the cyber market, known as the world wide web.
However, because internet businesses can be set up at virtually no cost or with no risk, more and more people are seeing the internet as a good way to making money easily and quickly.
Well, the reality is that most of these would be internet marketers are not getting the basics right, get disheartened with the lack of activity & money being generated by their businesses and end up quitting with barely making a dollar.
Getting these basics right will at least afford your business a decent chance of longevity and success.
1. Mindset
Often the wrong mindset creates unrealistic expectations in terms of returns and the amount of input required.
So, prior to launching your business you need to understand that success won’t come easily, you won’t earn money in the short term and that you more than likely will not get rich quickly.
Depending on your product, service, market, niche, etc, online businesses generally take a reasonable length of time to become established before they start generating any sort of income.
You also need to understand that despite putting in the long hours day in & day out, that this alone won’t guarantee results – persistence, testing and continually trying different strategies are also some of the requirements.
2. Plan
If you fail to plan, you plan to fail!
Success often comes about when a good opportunity is intercepted by a good plan.
Often internet entrepreneurs are opportunists who reap the rewards when they’re in a position, i.e. have planned & are prepared, to convert opportunities into good money.
3. Web Presence
Your web presence has to portray your business as a professional organization that is geared and prepared to add value to anyone who visits your site.
As there is so much competition on the internet trying to attract your site visitor, your site needs to be innovative, functional, properly structured and well optimized.
Also, whilst your domain name needs to be properly researched and appropriate to your business, your web host needs to be of high enough caliber to ensure 100% uptime and rapid response.
4. Reach and Develop your Target Market
Having a great website without visitors won’t do much for your bottom line so it needs to be properly optimized for search engines (a whole topic on it’s own), popular and very sticky, i.e. your site visitors need to want to come back time and again.
Furthermore, pay per click campaigns, offline marketing and other methods can be employed to drive targeted traffic to your site.
5. Legal Issues
Aside from adhering to the normal legal requirements that need to be adhered to for setting up a business you need to take cognizance of those issues that pertain specifically to Internet Law as well.
For example not checking that your chosen domain name may infringe on a legally protected trademark or other intellectual property rights can cost you a lot of time and money in the long term.
Whilst there are many other aspects that are key to the success of an online venture, the above basics all need to be maximized to give your business a shot at internet success.
Monday, July 17, 2006
7 Steps to Set Financial Goals for Your Online Business
Every internet marketer wants to make as money as possible. But how much money do you really need? What are the financial goals you want to achieve with your online business? These are the fundamental questions you have to answer when you start an online business.
Like many others you probably stumbled into the demanding task of managing an online business by accident. You bought some ebooks, signed up for multiple affiliate programs, set up your own website, subscribed to several membership sites and at the end of the day you realized that this all costs a lot of money.
You are in desperate need of more income from your business. Common sense tells you that you need to advertise for your business. So you go out there and buy any kind of advertising. This leaves you with even more expenses and like many others not much to show for.
Now you are at the turning point. You have substantial expenses, but not enough earnings to support these expenses. The foolish continue what they are doing and hope for the best. There’s a better way to get your business finances under control. The following 7 steps should give you an idea how to straighten out your business finances and how you can prevent a financial Waterloo for your business.
1. Create a business plan.
This sounds like a broken record, but without a clear business plan you are setting yourself up for disaster. A business plan can be as simple as a few pages describing what you want to do, how you want to do it, how much profit you plan to make, how much money you have to begin with and how long you can survive before you run out of money or you break even with income and expenses.
The idea of a business plan is not to predict the future, but to create a roadmap for yourself, in case you get lost on your journey and need directions to save your business.
2. Separate your finances
It doesn’t matter if you operate your online business as a real incorporated business or if you just want to test the waters. Mixing your business finances with your personal finances is a bad idea period. Create a separate checking account. Use it to deposit the checks you will receive and as the linked account for your business PayPal account. Yes, a separate PayPal account is necessary to track your business finances and to provide a more polished, professional image for your business.
If you don’t have a separate credit card for your business, use one of your personal credit cards and use it for your business expenses only. This way you can easily track your expenses. Knowing the exact financial situation of your business is vital for your survival. If you’re loosing money you need to know right away to make necessary adjustments and if you’re making money you don’t want to wait until tax time to get a rude awakening.
3. Reinvest
A rule of thumb is to reinvest 75% of your earnings back into advertising for your business. In the beginning it can be as high as 100%, because you need to get the word out. Without customers you are not making any money. You do know that an online business is by definition a sales business? You are selling either a product or a service. If you don’t, you don’t have an online business.
Of course a startup online business has no income to be reinvested. However the same rules apply to the startup capital that every new business needs to get started. A new computer and a fancy new car won’t get you any new customers, but good advertising will.
4. Keep track
You need to know where you spend your money at all times. In order to do this, a simple spreadsheet will get you started. Later you need a little bit more help from a professional finance program. Either way this will keep you on track with your spending and you will know how well you’re doing at all times.
Keep track of your advertising. You need to know if your advertising is working or not. Like a real store you need to know why a visitor entered your store and if they don’t buy get at least their contact information. Hardly anybody sells to first time visitors. Repeat business from visitors and customers are the bread and butter for any online business.
5. Organize
This is not only for tax purposes, but you need to organize everything you’re doing with your business. Nothing kills your business faster than not knowing what pays your bills and to whom you owe money. Imagine you forget to renew your domain name registration. A few bucks could cost you a million dollar business. So do yourself a big favor and get organized with your business.
6. Repeat
Readjust non working advertising immediately. If it is not working, dump it. On the other hand repeat a profitable advertising campaign. Rule of thumb, if it brings in more money than it costs to run, keep doing it. This seems to be a simple rule, but many online business owners simply ignore this rule. Instead they are chasing the white elephant and end up with nothing to show for.
If you have a successful advertising campaign, keep it running and build a new campaign next to it. Never drop a profitable campaign, always expand. This is your safety net. In case the new campaign fails. In marketing there’s never a guarantee. Be creative, track and repeat. That’s the only way to get something going.
7. Expand
If your business is not growing your business is dieing. Unfortunately this is reality in today’s business world. This means that you need to adjust your financial goals for your business to allow for expansion. Consult your business plan to determine what went well and what went wrong. Whatever you do, always aim higher.
There you have it, 7 steps to set the financial goals of your online business. I know that it takes more than filling out a membership application to run a successful online business, but you can do it if you keep these steps in mind.
Like many others you probably stumbled into the demanding task of managing an online business by accident. You bought some ebooks, signed up for multiple affiliate programs, set up your own website, subscribed to several membership sites and at the end of the day you realized that this all costs a lot of money.
You are in desperate need of more income from your business. Common sense tells you that you need to advertise for your business. So you go out there and buy any kind of advertising. This leaves you with even more expenses and like many others not much to show for.
Now you are at the turning point. You have substantial expenses, but not enough earnings to support these expenses. The foolish continue what they are doing and hope for the best. There’s a better way to get your business finances under control. The following 7 steps should give you an idea how to straighten out your business finances and how you can prevent a financial Waterloo for your business.
1. Create a business plan.
This sounds like a broken record, but without a clear business plan you are setting yourself up for disaster. A business plan can be as simple as a few pages describing what you want to do, how you want to do it, how much profit you plan to make, how much money you have to begin with and how long you can survive before you run out of money or you break even with income and expenses.
The idea of a business plan is not to predict the future, but to create a roadmap for yourself, in case you get lost on your journey and need directions to save your business.
2. Separate your finances
It doesn’t matter if you operate your online business as a real incorporated business or if you just want to test the waters. Mixing your business finances with your personal finances is a bad idea period. Create a separate checking account. Use it to deposit the checks you will receive and as the linked account for your business PayPal account. Yes, a separate PayPal account is necessary to track your business finances and to provide a more polished, professional image for your business.
If you don’t have a separate credit card for your business, use one of your personal credit cards and use it for your business expenses only. This way you can easily track your expenses. Knowing the exact financial situation of your business is vital for your survival. If you’re loosing money you need to know right away to make necessary adjustments and if you’re making money you don’t want to wait until tax time to get a rude awakening.
3. Reinvest
A rule of thumb is to reinvest 75% of your earnings back into advertising for your business. In the beginning it can be as high as 100%, because you need to get the word out. Without customers you are not making any money. You do know that an online business is by definition a sales business? You are selling either a product or a service. If you don’t, you don’t have an online business.
Of course a startup online business has no income to be reinvested. However the same rules apply to the startup capital that every new business needs to get started. A new computer and a fancy new car won’t get you any new customers, but good advertising will.
4. Keep track
You need to know where you spend your money at all times. In order to do this, a simple spreadsheet will get you started. Later you need a little bit more help from a professional finance program. Either way this will keep you on track with your spending and you will know how well you’re doing at all times.
Keep track of your advertising. You need to know if your advertising is working or not. Like a real store you need to know why a visitor entered your store and if they don’t buy get at least their contact information. Hardly anybody sells to first time visitors. Repeat business from visitors and customers are the bread and butter for any online business.
5. Organize
This is not only for tax purposes, but you need to organize everything you’re doing with your business. Nothing kills your business faster than not knowing what pays your bills and to whom you owe money. Imagine you forget to renew your domain name registration. A few bucks could cost you a million dollar business. So do yourself a big favor and get organized with your business.
6. Repeat
Readjust non working advertising immediately. If it is not working, dump it. On the other hand repeat a profitable advertising campaign. Rule of thumb, if it brings in more money than it costs to run, keep doing it. This seems to be a simple rule, but many online business owners simply ignore this rule. Instead they are chasing the white elephant and end up with nothing to show for.
If you have a successful advertising campaign, keep it running and build a new campaign next to it. Never drop a profitable campaign, always expand. This is your safety net. In case the new campaign fails. In marketing there’s never a guarantee. Be creative, track and repeat. That’s the only way to get something going.
7. Expand
If your business is not growing your business is dieing. Unfortunately this is reality in today’s business world. This means that you need to adjust your financial goals for your business to allow for expansion. Consult your business plan to determine what went well and what went wrong. Whatever you do, always aim higher.
There you have it, 7 steps to set the financial goals of your online business. I know that it takes more than filling out a membership application to run a successful online business, but you can do it if you keep these steps in mind.
Sunday, July 16, 2006
What Does it Take to Really Make Money Online?
Probably the most important step to making money online is the desire to do it. The key to success on the internet, contrary to so many of the headlines we see, is not in a ‘get rich quick’ scheme. Strong internet incomes are achieved the same way brick and mortar incomes are achieved—via hard work, long hours, and dedication to making money online. To make money online, you must be willing to work hard, often long hours, study the latest material on marketing and traffic generation, and be willing to stick with it before you start making the big money online.
• In order to make money online, you must develop a basic understanding of why people buy. The psychological motivations of internet purchases are much the same as offline purchases. People buy things online because they feel the purchase will make them feel younger, sexier, happier, or because it will make them rich or well-liked.
• You must find or develop a product that is well-suited to making money online---it must primarily meet the emotional needs of people online---making them feel younger, sexier, happier, rich, or well-liked.
• To make money online, you must learn everything you can about marketing, both offline and online. You must understand what makes people buy; you cannot simply cut and paste from templates to get good at online marketing.
• You must be willing to test everything you do. Many times what you do online is in massive quantities, unlike some offline marketing. You might send out a million emails, or purchase a thousand PPCs, or receive hundreds of visitors a day. You must be able to identify which types of visitors make you money or you will fail. In many marketing campaigns you run, you will have segments that are profitable and segments that are not. If you cannot identify which are which, for the purpose of eliminating those that are not profitable and increasing spending in areas that are, you will fail.
• You must be willing to reinvest much of your initial profits back into your business. When you first begin marketing, you are excited and you are willing to spend untold hours, until the wee hours of the morning, placing inexpensive classified ads and requesting links with directories and other web sites. However, once you have a thousand subscribers, you will be more focused on conversion rates and your web site and have less time for low-cost traffic generation. You will need to develop a budget for more expensive (and usually higher-quality) traffic. Although it is not always the case that paying more gets you a better lead, it is generally the case that paying less gets you an inferior lead.
• Last but perhaps the most important. You must be willing to stick it out. The first few months you may not make much money online, but you knew that going in and you are excited about the internet riches about which you dream. After a few months of 80-90 hour weeks, you become tired and can become tempted to quit. If (and only if, note) you have been testing every ad you run and every response you receive, you will be able to start making smarter decisions and become profitable over the next few months. But if you burn out and quit, you lose everything you put in. Don’t give up!
• In order to make money online, you must develop a basic understanding of why people buy. The psychological motivations of internet purchases are much the same as offline purchases. People buy things online because they feel the purchase will make them feel younger, sexier, happier, or because it will make them rich or well-liked.
• You must find or develop a product that is well-suited to making money online---it must primarily meet the emotional needs of people online---making them feel younger, sexier, happier, rich, or well-liked.
• To make money online, you must learn everything you can about marketing, both offline and online. You must understand what makes people buy; you cannot simply cut and paste from templates to get good at online marketing.
• You must be willing to test everything you do. Many times what you do online is in massive quantities, unlike some offline marketing. You might send out a million emails, or purchase a thousand PPCs, or receive hundreds of visitors a day. You must be able to identify which types of visitors make you money or you will fail. In many marketing campaigns you run, you will have segments that are profitable and segments that are not. If you cannot identify which are which, for the purpose of eliminating those that are not profitable and increasing spending in areas that are, you will fail.
• You must be willing to reinvest much of your initial profits back into your business. When you first begin marketing, you are excited and you are willing to spend untold hours, until the wee hours of the morning, placing inexpensive classified ads and requesting links with directories and other web sites. However, once you have a thousand subscribers, you will be more focused on conversion rates and your web site and have less time for low-cost traffic generation. You will need to develop a budget for more expensive (and usually higher-quality) traffic. Although it is not always the case that paying more gets you a better lead, it is generally the case that paying less gets you an inferior lead.
• Last but perhaps the most important. You must be willing to stick it out. The first few months you may not make much money online, but you knew that going in and you are excited about the internet riches about which you dream. After a few months of 80-90 hour weeks, you become tired and can become tempted to quit. If (and only if, note) you have been testing every ad you run and every response you receive, you will be able to start making smarter decisions and become profitable over the next few months. But if you burn out and quit, you lose everything you put in. Don’t give up!
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
6 Steps to an Effective Online Business
Creating and running an effective online business is realistically comprised of several hundred, rather than 6, but this will serve as a guide for the direction of your efforts. Contrary to what you may hear rampantly on the Internet, there is no cookie-cutter, get-rich quick scheme on the web. Not only is every online business different, what works for one person or in one month may not work for another person or in the next month.
The Internet is constantly changing, and the online market is inherently different this year than it was last year. New technological improvements occur monthly, and impact the online business environment. What works for one individual when he is the first to sell a certain product a certain way may not work just six months later when he has sold his idea to 40,000 other marketers, and they all begin to promote it. Traffic generation tactics are significantly different than they were just a year ago, and hardly resemble profitable strategies three years ago.
These 6 Steps are simply the bare-bones skeleton of what has to happen for your online business to be successful. They are foundational, and although the implementation strategies are different today than several years ago, the basic steps remain the same.
1. Develop or discover a product. You must find a product that meets today’s needs. A 5 year old product whose resell rights you can buy for a dollar or get for free probably won’t meet the needs of today’s consumers. You must be willing to pay for the rights to sell a current , useful product, or become an affiliate marketer, where you promote a popular product, and in exchange are paid a percentage of the income from the sale.
2. Determine how the potential customers can view your product and see a sales presentation. If you develop your own product or purchase the rights to sell someone else’s, you will need a website. A few tips here: Rather than accept free web hosting, purchase your own domain name and pay to have your domain name and web site hosted by a professional web hosting company with a reputable history. If your free web hosting company goes bankrupt, they generally take your fledgling business with them.
3. Once you have your web site up and running, unless you are using an affiliate program that supplies a sales page, you must develop a sales script and web copy. Aside from your web hosting decision, this is probably the most important thing you can do. You may be tempted at first to write a sales pitch on your own, but unless you already have a lot of experience in the offline market writing effective sales letters, you need to, absolutely must, invest in a few courses on web copywriting. Be willing to spend some money upfront on learning this skill. Too many marketers try to wing it in this area and after a few months of losing money online, finally break down and purchase the knowledge to write a good sales pitch. Do it the other way around—buy the knowledge first, and start making sales from the beginning. Customers will not buy just because you have a web site---they buy from the web site that does the best job of convincing them it has the best product for their need.
4. You must develop a traffic source that works. When you first begin, you may be on a shoestring, and that is OK. Assuming you have been willing to spend some money on sales letter writing and a decent web host, you may be able to skimp in the traffic arena for awhile, if you have plenty of time. If you do not have money to advertise, nor time to seek out low cost advertising, you probably shouldn’t be attempting an online business. If you do choose to go the low-cost route—know two things up front—the returns are really low and you will spend vast amounts of time on traffic generation. Once you begin to make sales, you must invest your income in paid forms of traffic generation. If you do not, you will run out of enthusiasm for generating the free traffic, and without reinvesting the income from your first sales into advertising, you are sure to fail. Good sources of low-cost, but time consuming traffic are: writing articles and posting them to article directories, low cost classified ads, and ezine ads. You may see hyped-up ads for thousands or visitors for a low cost or millions of banner ads for another reasonable price—both of these methods may have worked 2 years ago, but they are a sure waste today.
5. Once you begin to get traffic to your online business site, you must keep detailed records of where the traffic comes from, and what percentage of visitors from each source are purchasing your product. If you have visitors that cost you $50 per hundred to come to your web site, but on average they only purchase $25 per hundred visitors, the income may feel good, but you are not profitable, and are losing money. By tracking your expenses on each type of visitor and by tracking your revenue on the same sources of visitors, you can determine which campaigns need changes or need to be eliminated and which need to be increased in intensity.
6. By following this pattern of steps, and by keeping diligent records (there is plenty of good web site tracking software on the market that can help you do that), you can develop a profitable online business. Again, it will not happen overnight, and you will not get rich quick. However, if you build a solid online business with a solid foundation, and are willing to spend some money learning how to do it right, you really can become successful in business online.
The Internet is constantly changing, and the online market is inherently different this year than it was last year. New technological improvements occur monthly, and impact the online business environment. What works for one individual when he is the first to sell a certain product a certain way may not work just six months later when he has sold his idea to 40,000 other marketers, and they all begin to promote it. Traffic generation tactics are significantly different than they were just a year ago, and hardly resemble profitable strategies three years ago.
These 6 Steps are simply the bare-bones skeleton of what has to happen for your online business to be successful. They are foundational, and although the implementation strategies are different today than several years ago, the basic steps remain the same.
1. Develop or discover a product. You must find a product that meets today’s needs. A 5 year old product whose resell rights you can buy for a dollar or get for free probably won’t meet the needs of today’s consumers. You must be willing to pay for the rights to sell a current , useful product, or become an affiliate marketer, where you promote a popular product, and in exchange are paid a percentage of the income from the sale.
2. Determine how the potential customers can view your product and see a sales presentation. If you develop your own product or purchase the rights to sell someone else’s, you will need a website. A few tips here: Rather than accept free web hosting, purchase your own domain name and pay to have your domain name and web site hosted by a professional web hosting company with a reputable history. If your free web hosting company goes bankrupt, they generally take your fledgling business with them.
3. Once you have your web site up and running, unless you are using an affiliate program that supplies a sales page, you must develop a sales script and web copy. Aside from your web hosting decision, this is probably the most important thing you can do. You may be tempted at first to write a sales pitch on your own, but unless you already have a lot of experience in the offline market writing effective sales letters, you need to, absolutely must, invest in a few courses on web copywriting. Be willing to spend some money upfront on learning this skill. Too many marketers try to wing it in this area and after a few months of losing money online, finally break down and purchase the knowledge to write a good sales pitch. Do it the other way around—buy the knowledge first, and start making sales from the beginning. Customers will not buy just because you have a web site---they buy from the web site that does the best job of convincing them it has the best product for their need.
4. You must develop a traffic source that works. When you first begin, you may be on a shoestring, and that is OK. Assuming you have been willing to spend some money on sales letter writing and a decent web host, you may be able to skimp in the traffic arena for awhile, if you have plenty of time. If you do not have money to advertise, nor time to seek out low cost advertising, you probably shouldn’t be attempting an online business. If you do choose to go the low-cost route—know two things up front—the returns are really low and you will spend vast amounts of time on traffic generation. Once you begin to make sales, you must invest your income in paid forms of traffic generation. If you do not, you will run out of enthusiasm for generating the free traffic, and without reinvesting the income from your first sales into advertising, you are sure to fail. Good sources of low-cost, but time consuming traffic are: writing articles and posting them to article directories, low cost classified ads, and ezine ads. You may see hyped-up ads for thousands or visitors for a low cost or millions of banner ads for another reasonable price—both of these methods may have worked 2 years ago, but they are a sure waste today.
5. Once you begin to get traffic to your online business site, you must keep detailed records of where the traffic comes from, and what percentage of visitors from each source are purchasing your product. If you have visitors that cost you $50 per hundred to come to your web site, but on average they only purchase $25 per hundred visitors, the income may feel good, but you are not profitable, and are losing money. By tracking your expenses on each type of visitor and by tracking your revenue on the same sources of visitors, you can determine which campaigns need changes or need to be eliminated and which need to be increased in intensity.
6. By following this pattern of steps, and by keeping diligent records (there is plenty of good web site tracking software on the market that can help you do that), you can develop a profitable online business. Again, it will not happen overnight, and you will not get rich quick. However, if you build a solid online business with a solid foundation, and are willing to spend some money learning how to do it right, you really can become successful in business online.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
How To Make Money Online
Making money online used to be easier. With fewer websites, it was easier for people to find you. This is not true any longer. Still, some people do well online. What are the secrets of online money makers?
The secrets of online money makers are mostly common sense. If you want to make money online, do something you love. Then realize that this is going to take time and effort.
Many people are looking for quick riches or easy wealth. The secret of online money makers is that they are prepared to work hard. They choose something they love so that they stay motivated. Online money makers learn everything they can about promoting their particular form of making money. They don't expect immediate wealth. They work on their business daily and continue to learn as they grow.
Promotion is a critical secret of online money makers. Promotion helps customers find them. Sometimes the rules of search engines change, and online money makers keep up with these changes. It's what they do for a living.
Good customer service is another essential secret of online money makers. You want customers who will come back and customers who will tell others about you. It's no longer just word of mouth when a business serves somebody well. Now that customer might tell some friends in an email, who will tell other friends, and work can get around pretty fast. They can also post their reviews at various websites, which can gain you more customers.
The secrets of online money makers are not any different than making money any other way. It's about doing what you love, working hard, learning to promote, and serving the customer well. If you can do that, you can make money online.
The secrets of online money makers are mostly common sense. If you want to make money online, do something you love. Then realize that this is going to take time and effort.
Many people are looking for quick riches or easy wealth. The secret of online money makers is that they are prepared to work hard. They choose something they love so that they stay motivated. Online money makers learn everything they can about promoting their particular form of making money. They don't expect immediate wealth. They work on their business daily and continue to learn as they grow.
Promotion is a critical secret of online money makers. Promotion helps customers find them. Sometimes the rules of search engines change, and online money makers keep up with these changes. It's what they do for a living.
Good customer service is another essential secret of online money makers. You want customers who will come back and customers who will tell others about you. It's no longer just word of mouth when a business serves somebody well. Now that customer might tell some friends in an email, who will tell other friends, and work can get around pretty fast. They can also post their reviews at various websites, which can gain you more customers.
The secrets of online money makers are not any different than making money any other way. It's about doing what you love, working hard, learning to promote, and serving the customer well. If you can do that, you can make money online.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
How To Commence An Online Business
Starting off a fresh online business may seem intimidating at times, especially to the greenhorns in the field of Internet. However, with a planned approach and diligent effort, the procedure may well boil down to a much easier chore. Here I present the first in a series of articles that will assist you to establish a strong online presence. Unequivocally, there are four ways that you could commence your online business, and they are as follows:-
a) Start from scratch – You can formulate your own product or service to sell. You might be enticed to follow other eminent businesses and develop a similar product to theirs. However, nothing sells better than a novel concept. So, try carrying out a preliminary market research in order to feel the pulse of the market. This would enable you to establish a healthy customer base, which is critical to boosting your online business.
b) Start away with affiliate marketing – If you are on a shoestring budget and cannot develop your own product from scratch, then affiliate marketing is a viable option for you. You can market the products of a well-renowned company through affiliate programs. The company would typically dole out commissions on each sale accomplished by you.
c) Start an online business by reselling – You can buy hot selling products at wholesale prices from a well established organization. Then onwards you can sell them at retail by promoting them at your website.
d) Start an online venture via direct sales – You may become an affiliate of a Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) company. You can market their products and earn commission on sales accomplished by you. Affiliates signup through an existing member, who is typically placed above them in the distributor hierarchy. That is, the sponsor earns higher commission than a fresh entrant.
An online business can be quite lucrative if planned with discretion. In general, astute investments do pay heavy returns. It is imperative that you realize the importance of choosing a viable online business. The choice of an online business should be made, bearing in mind the resources in hand and the existing business milieu.
a) Start from scratch – You can formulate your own product or service to sell. You might be enticed to follow other eminent businesses and develop a similar product to theirs. However, nothing sells better than a novel concept. So, try carrying out a preliminary market research in order to feel the pulse of the market. This would enable you to establish a healthy customer base, which is critical to boosting your online business.
b) Start away with affiliate marketing – If you are on a shoestring budget and cannot develop your own product from scratch, then affiliate marketing is a viable option for you. You can market the products of a well-renowned company through affiliate programs. The company would typically dole out commissions on each sale accomplished by you.
c) Start an online business by reselling – You can buy hot selling products at wholesale prices from a well established organization. Then onwards you can sell them at retail by promoting them at your website.
d) Start an online venture via direct sales – You may become an affiliate of a Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) company. You can market their products and earn commission on sales accomplished by you. Affiliates signup through an existing member, who is typically placed above them in the distributor hierarchy. That is, the sponsor earns higher commission than a fresh entrant.
An online business can be quite lucrative if planned with discretion. In general, astute investments do pay heavy returns. It is imperative that you realize the importance of choosing a viable online business. The choice of an online business should be made, bearing in mind the resources in hand and the existing business milieu.
Do You Want To Make Money Online?
There are actually many different ways to make money online. Some of them are obviously more lucrative than others, however. Also, there are many scams for supposedly making money online that don't really work, and you end up losing money.
As a general rule, if the online money making opportunity asks for money, it is probably not a good thing. Legitimate ways to make money online will not ask you for money to get the job. The only exception to this is for home businesses. Many home businesses require an upfront investment from you. If you decide that a home business is the best way to go for making money online, then you will probably have to spend some money to get started. However, many people have been very successful with home businesses.
One way that people are making money online is by having several different income streams. This means that you do a bunch of things online that make a little bit of money, which turns out to be a reasonable amount of money when you add them all up. For instance, some people fill out surveys, do some writing, read emails, sell things on Ebay or even do affiliate marketing. These are all ways to have multiple streams of income making money online.
There are actual jobs available online. However, there is a lot of competition for them. Telecommuting from home is one of the best ways for making money online. You need to have an excellent resume and to do a lot of research to find the companies that are hiring people with your skills.
As with any way to make money, the best way of making money online is to follow your passions. First find something you love to do, then find a way to use it for making money online.
You also need to consider your time commitment. Find a way to make money online that won't take up all of your spare time if you are already working a full time job.
Once you have determined how you plan to make money online, spend the time you need. Many people start an online business but lose interest and quit. Find a business that you love so you want to stay with it. Finding a way to do what you love is the best way to make money online.
As a general rule, if the online money making opportunity asks for money, it is probably not a good thing. Legitimate ways to make money online will not ask you for money to get the job. The only exception to this is for home businesses. Many home businesses require an upfront investment from you. If you decide that a home business is the best way to go for making money online, then you will probably have to spend some money to get started. However, many people have been very successful with home businesses.
One way that people are making money online is by having several different income streams. This means that you do a bunch of things online that make a little bit of money, which turns out to be a reasonable amount of money when you add them all up. For instance, some people fill out surveys, do some writing, read emails, sell things on Ebay or even do affiliate marketing. These are all ways to have multiple streams of income making money online.
There are actual jobs available online. However, there is a lot of competition for them. Telecommuting from home is one of the best ways for making money online. You need to have an excellent resume and to do a lot of research to find the companies that are hiring people with your skills.
As with any way to make money, the best way of making money online is to follow your passions. First find something you love to do, then find a way to use it for making money online.
You also need to consider your time commitment. Find a way to make money online that won't take up all of your spare time if you are already working a full time job.
Once you have determined how you plan to make money online, spend the time you need. Many people start an online business but lose interest and quit. Find a business that you love so you want to stay with it. Finding a way to do what you love is the best way to make money online.
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