The ideal world of affiliate marketing does not require having your own website, dealing with customers, refunds, product development and maintenance. This is one of the easiest ways of launching into an online business and earning more profits.
Assuming you are already into an affiliate program, what would be the next thing you would want to do? Double, or even triple, your commissions, right? How do you do that?
Here are some powerful tips on how to boost your affiliate program commissions overnight.
1. Know the best program and products to promote. Obviously, you would want to promote a program that will enable you to achieve the greatest profits in the shortest possible time.
There are several factors to consider in selecting such a program. Choose the ones that have a generous commission structure. Have products that fit in with your target audience. And that has a solid track record of paying their affiliate easily and on time. If you cannot seem to increase your investments, dump that program and keep looking for better ones.
There are thousands of affiliate programs online which gives you the reason to be picky. You may want to select the best to avoid losing your advertising dollars.
Write free reports or short ebooks to distribute from your site. There is a great possibility that you are competing with other affiliates that are promoting the same program. If you start writing short report related to the product you are promoting, you will be able to distinguish yourself from the other affiliates.
In the reports, provide some valuable information for free. If possible, add some recommendations about the products. With ebooks, you get credibility. Customers will see that in you and they will be enticed to try out what you are offering.
2. Collect and save the email addresses of those who download your free ebooks. It is a known fact that people do not make a purchase on the first solicitation. You may want to send out your message more than six times to make a sale.
This is the simple reason why you should collect the contact information of those who downloaded your reports and ebooks. You can make follow-ups on these contacts to remind them to make a purchase from you.
Get the contact information of a prospect before sending them to the vendor’s website. Keep in mind that you are providing free advertisement for the product owners. You get paid only when you make a sale. If you send prospects directly to the vendors, chances are they would be lost to you forever.
But when you get their names, you can always send other marketing messages to them to be able to earn an ongoing commission instead of a one-time sale only.
Publish an online newsletter or Ezine. It is always best to recommend a product to someone you know than to sell to a stranger. This is the purpose behind publishing your own newsletter. This also allows you to develop a relationship based on trust with your subscribers.
This strategy is a delicate balance between providing useful information with a sales pitch. If you continue to write informative editorials you will be able to build a sense of reciprocity in your readers that may lead them to support you by buying your products.
3. Ask for higher than normal commission from merchants. If you are already successful with a particular promotion, you should try and approach the merchant and negotiate a percentage commission for your sales.
If the merchant is smart, he or she will likely grant your request rather than lose a valuable asset in you. Keep in mind that you are a zero-risk investment to your merchant; so do not be shy about requesting for addition in your commissions. Just try to be reasonable about it.
Write strong pay Per Click ads. PPC search engine is the most effective means of advertising online. As an affiliate, you can make a small income just by managing PPC campaigns such as Google AdWords and Overture. Then you should try and monitor them to see which ads are more effective and which ones to dispose of.
Try out these strategies and see the difference it can make to your commission checks in the shortest of time.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Incraese Website Traffic - Why Paying For It Is A Smart Move
Here's why paying for your website traffic is a smart move. Increasing you website traffic is essential to maintaining and growing your internet business. Without it, your business will dry up, but if you can manage your paid advertising, use it along with free methods, your business will be a success.
There are so many success stories you will hear about businesses making it good in the internet. The troubling thing is, there are maybe a tenfold or even a hundredfold of stories contradictory to theirs. Many have unsuccessfully launched a business enterprise that is internet based but only a handful shall succeed.
Is this through luck? That is even more remote. It takes good business sense and a lot of help and team effort. Most importantly, it is the eagerness to succeed and the determination to learn and the willingness to invest in a lot of hard work and some money.
The Very Basic
Like Neo, traffic is "The One". Without traffic, all your effort would just go to waste. Every business needs customers, without them you wouldn’t have anyone to sell your products to. In the internet world traffic is the walk in customer. The more traffic you have the more people would be able to sell your products to.
But like any business that’s in every corner building or in the mall, not everyone that goes in will buy, but the greater of number that do come in to browse your merchandise, the greater number of people that will buy your products. It is a simple and known fact.
But, how do you get traffic, traffic large enough that could make a small percentage of eventual buyers enough to make a good profit. Many big companies generate traffic of tens of thousands a day and a measly ten to fifteen percent actually buys, but that small percentage is enough to provide them with good business.
Many of these success stories get their traffic from paying others. Yes that’s right; you have to spend money to make money. Advertising is the key. The more people that knows that your site exists; the more people would of course go to your site, that’s common sense.
While there are many ways that can get you advertising for free, this does not generate the same high volume as those methods that are getting paid. These paid advertisements include advertising schemes by Google and Yahoo.
The Value of Searches
The search engine will be the easiest and fastest medium in finding what a person needs in the internet. Search engines have been very popular because they provide a vital service to many people. They are free and easy to use. With this popularity, they get many visitors and clicks that they are the most common sites that people go to. It is easy to understand why so many companies would pay to advertise with these search engines.
Search engines provide information to the millions of users that they have each day. They provide links to many sites that a user may be looking for. If your sites link pop up in the high ranks of the search results page, you get a great chance that they will go to your site. While search engine optimization is a cheaper and low cost way to get your site a high rank, paying for advertisements will ensure that you will be on the top ranks.
When you pay for your advertisements, it is like paying for your traffic. This may sound like not such a good idea, but the payoffs would tell a different story. When you pay for your traffic, you are guaranteed of a consistent traffic flow to your site. You will never go with an empty sales day.
Paying for your Traffic
Usually, you will be charged with the number of hits a link gets when your ads is clicked, this is called pay per click. For some search engines, you will be charged with the number of times your ad shows up when a certain keyword or keyword phrase is searched. It is imperative that you have good keyword content in your ad. There are many tools that aid you in using the right keyword for the right moment.
All the money you spend in paying for your traffic will not be for naught. You will get an impressive boost in traffic which will also result to a great boost in your sales figures. Paying for your traffic would be a really good idea and you will get all the benefits it has to offer, but you must know the right keywords to bid on. You must be able to find keywords that are relevant to your niche market, and have little or no competition. By doing this, you can be ranked at the top of Google, Yahoo and others, driving a steady stream of targeted eager traffic to your site, without costing you a fortune!
There are so many success stories you will hear about businesses making it good in the internet. The troubling thing is, there are maybe a tenfold or even a hundredfold of stories contradictory to theirs. Many have unsuccessfully launched a business enterprise that is internet based but only a handful shall succeed.
Is this through luck? That is even more remote. It takes good business sense and a lot of help and team effort. Most importantly, it is the eagerness to succeed and the determination to learn and the willingness to invest in a lot of hard work and some money.
The Very Basic
Like Neo, traffic is "The One". Without traffic, all your effort would just go to waste. Every business needs customers, without them you wouldn’t have anyone to sell your products to. In the internet world traffic is the walk in customer. The more traffic you have the more people would be able to sell your products to.
But like any business that’s in every corner building or in the mall, not everyone that goes in will buy, but the greater of number that do come in to browse your merchandise, the greater number of people that will buy your products. It is a simple and known fact.
But, how do you get traffic, traffic large enough that could make a small percentage of eventual buyers enough to make a good profit. Many big companies generate traffic of tens of thousands a day and a measly ten to fifteen percent actually buys, but that small percentage is enough to provide them with good business.
Many of these success stories get their traffic from paying others. Yes that’s right; you have to spend money to make money. Advertising is the key. The more people that knows that your site exists; the more people would of course go to your site, that’s common sense.
While there are many ways that can get you advertising for free, this does not generate the same high volume as those methods that are getting paid. These paid advertisements include advertising schemes by Google and Yahoo.
The Value of Searches
The search engine will be the easiest and fastest medium in finding what a person needs in the internet. Search engines have been very popular because they provide a vital service to many people. They are free and easy to use. With this popularity, they get many visitors and clicks that they are the most common sites that people go to. It is easy to understand why so many companies would pay to advertise with these search engines.
Search engines provide information to the millions of users that they have each day. They provide links to many sites that a user may be looking for. If your sites link pop up in the high ranks of the search results page, you get a great chance that they will go to your site. While search engine optimization is a cheaper and low cost way to get your site a high rank, paying for advertisements will ensure that you will be on the top ranks.
When you pay for your advertisements, it is like paying for your traffic. This may sound like not such a good idea, but the payoffs would tell a different story. When you pay for your traffic, you are guaranteed of a consistent traffic flow to your site. You will never go with an empty sales day.
Paying for your Traffic
Usually, you will be charged with the number of hits a link gets when your ads is clicked, this is called pay per click. For some search engines, you will be charged with the number of times your ad shows up when a certain keyword or keyword phrase is searched. It is imperative that you have good keyword content in your ad. There are many tools that aid you in using the right keyword for the right moment.
All the money you spend in paying for your traffic will not be for naught. You will get an impressive boost in traffic which will also result to a great boost in your sales figures. Paying for your traffic would be a really good idea and you will get all the benefits it has to offer, but you must know the right keywords to bid on. You must be able to find keywords that are relevant to your niche market, and have little or no competition. By doing this, you can be ranked at the top of Google, Yahoo and others, driving a steady stream of targeted eager traffic to your site, without costing you a fortune!
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
3 Things You Must Do Before You Submit To Article Directories
To all writers and non-writers out there, now is the time to start digging up those creative writing skills back. With modern communication technology comes the popularity of information-based marketing, which is one of the oldest and most effective techniques in getting targeted prospects to sites and converting them into buyers. This is why article writing, submissions and publications are also getting popular.
There are already many tools that people can use to make the process of distributing their articles more easily. Though this is invaluable in getting the contents more exposure, which is only half of the story.
Let us take a look first at the common mistakes that some people make before submitting their contents to article directories:
1. Confusing the reason to promote the articles with the reason to write them.
In article writing, there are three key benefits why you are promoting them; branding, lead generation and promotion, which are all part of your optimization efforts.
But there is only one reason why you write an article, and that is to inform your audience. If the article is not focused on this primary and most important purpose, it will fail to achieve the three promotion benefits because no one will be interested in reading them.
You need to figure out first how to get people to read what is in your article, then make them click on your resource box. You can achieve this by producing better contents.
2. Failing to maximize the promotional opportunities of article marketing.
You may know already that your articles can help you generate additional links back to your site. But do you know that you can get more visitors and better search engine results from the same articles?
Mention keywords at strategic places. Just be sure not to overdo them. Some are even using anchor texts which is also an effective method. But it is important to know that majority of the directories are not able to support this.
Remember that it is not only about the links back to your site. Part of doing well in your article marketing is getting picked up by publishers with a large number of audiences and gaining the ability of leveraging other brands because of the quality of your work. Better search engine results also are great benefits.
But these things do not put much money in your pocket. There are other factors that can turn your article marketing efforts into an opportunity that can boost your earnings. Not just increase the number of visitors to your site.
Start out with a plan and see to it that your article will serve the function that you intended it to have.
3. Publishing content that does not help your readers.
Maybe in the process of writing articles, you are thinking that all that is you wanted is links back to your site. And any visitors it can generate are fine.
Guess what? Not all article banks and directories are going to accept your content automatically. Oftentimes, they have some guidelines and specifications on the articles that they are accepting.
You can double the number of sites you can submit to by writing articles that the directories want to share with other people. All it takes is one publisher with a hundred thousand readers to increase your potential audience overnight.
Write the articles that publishers want in their publications if you want your article marketing to work the most effective way for you. This also means you have to obey the standard guidelines, spell checks, researching on a good topic and even hiring a writer to produce a good content on your behalf.
In the end, it is all really a matter of choice on your part. You can start getting a little exposure from increased links back but on a very basic level. Or enjoy massive exposure from a little extra time making quality contents.
It will be your choice. You may not be aware of the fact that an article submitted on directories is not meant to have the same level of exposure as highly-targeted content ones geared on a narrow group of people.
Learn the difference between these two and it will surely help you know what kinds of articles to write and to submit.
There are already many tools that people can use to make the process of distributing their articles more easily. Though this is invaluable in getting the contents more exposure, which is only half of the story.
Let us take a look first at the common mistakes that some people make before submitting their contents to article directories:
1. Confusing the reason to promote the articles with the reason to write them.
In article writing, there are three key benefits why you are promoting them; branding, lead generation and promotion, which are all part of your optimization efforts.
But there is only one reason why you write an article, and that is to inform your audience. If the article is not focused on this primary and most important purpose, it will fail to achieve the three promotion benefits because no one will be interested in reading them.
You need to figure out first how to get people to read what is in your article, then make them click on your resource box. You can achieve this by producing better contents.
2. Failing to maximize the promotional opportunities of article marketing.
You may know already that your articles can help you generate additional links back to your site. But do you know that you can get more visitors and better search engine results from the same articles?
Mention keywords at strategic places. Just be sure not to overdo them. Some are even using anchor texts which is also an effective method. But it is important to know that majority of the directories are not able to support this.
Remember that it is not only about the links back to your site. Part of doing well in your article marketing is getting picked up by publishers with a large number of audiences and gaining the ability of leveraging other brands because of the quality of your work. Better search engine results also are great benefits.
But these things do not put much money in your pocket. There are other factors that can turn your article marketing efforts into an opportunity that can boost your earnings. Not just increase the number of visitors to your site.
Start out with a plan and see to it that your article will serve the function that you intended it to have.
3. Publishing content that does not help your readers.
Maybe in the process of writing articles, you are thinking that all that is you wanted is links back to your site. And any visitors it can generate are fine.
Guess what? Not all article banks and directories are going to accept your content automatically. Oftentimes, they have some guidelines and specifications on the articles that they are accepting.
You can double the number of sites you can submit to by writing articles that the directories want to share with other people. All it takes is one publisher with a hundred thousand readers to increase your potential audience overnight.
Write the articles that publishers want in their publications if you want your article marketing to work the most effective way for you. This also means you have to obey the standard guidelines, spell checks, researching on a good topic and even hiring a writer to produce a good content on your behalf.
In the end, it is all really a matter of choice on your part. You can start getting a little exposure from increased links back but on a very basic level. Or enjoy massive exposure from a little extra time making quality contents.
It will be your choice. You may not be aware of the fact that an article submitted on directories is not meant to have the same level of exposure as highly-targeted content ones geared on a narrow group of people.
Learn the difference between these two and it will surely help you know what kinds of articles to write and to submit.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Affiliate Marketing Strategies - The 3 Things To Avoid When Emailing Your List
When you decide to have an opt-in list, it is not just a matter of sending your subscribers your promotional newsletters or catalogs. There are many things to consider in avoiding many complications. While there are so many ways you can make people subscribe to your list, there are also some things you must do to avoid subscribers from wanting to get off from your list.
Aside from that, you also want to avoid any problems with the law and your internet service provider or ISP. There are now many laws and rules that are applied to help protect the privacy of the internet users from spamming and unwanted mails. With the popularity of the electronic mail as a medium for marketing because of the low cost, many company’s have seized the opportunity and have flooded many people’s e-mail accounts with promotional mail.
But, with an opt-in list, you avoid this annoyance because people subscribe to the list; they want to receive the newsletters and promotional materials. They have consented to being on the list by subscribing themselves, just don’t forget to put an unsubscribe feature everytime in your opt-in list so that you avoid any confusion. There may be times when an email account was provided when the real owner didn’t want to subscribe.
It is essential that you keep your list clean and manageable. Arrange it by using the many tools and technologies available for your opt-in list. Do not worry; your investment in this marketing strategy is well worth it with all the coverage you will get which will likely be converted into sales then to profit.
Keep yourself and your business out of trouble and potential run-ins with the law and the internet service providers. Keep your operation legit and clean. Your reputation as a legitimate businessman and a legitimate site depends on your being a straight and true marketing strategist. As a tip, here are three things to avoid when emailing your list.
1) Take notice of your unsuccessful sends. These are the e-mails that bounce. Bounced emails, also known as undeliverable messages, are those messages that, for whatever reason, were not successfully received by the intended recipient.
There are bounces that happen or occur because the server was busy at that time but can still be delivered in another time. There are also bounces because the inbox of the recipient is full at that time. There are those bounce messages that are simply undeliverable ever. The reason for this is that it may be an invalid email address, a misspelled email address, or an email address that was abandoned and erased already.
Manage your list by putting markings on those that bounce. Erase an email account from your list so that you have an accurate statistics and records as to how many are actually receiving your mail. You may also want to check the spellings of your email addresses in your list. One common mistake is when an N instead of an M is placed in the .com area.
2) Always provide an unsubscribe feature in your site and an unsubscribe link in your mails. When someone in your list files a request to be unsubscribed, always take that request seriously. If you don’t take them off your list and keep sending them your e-mails, you are now sending them spam mail.
When you are reported as a spammer, you and your business can get into a lot of trouble. You can be reported to the authorities and maybe blacklisted by many internet service providers. You will lose a lot of subscribers this way and many more in potential subscribers.
3) Do not provide pornographic or shocking and disturbing content in your newsletters. It is hard to decipher the age of the recipient and many complaints may stem from these. Controversial issues also are to be avoided to not be branded by your subscribers. Stick to the nature of your site and business.
Always remember these tips in this article so that you can have a healthy relationship with your subscribers as well as be kept within the boundaries of what is allowed in sending mails to an opt-in list.
Aside from that, you also want to avoid any problems with the law and your internet service provider or ISP. There are now many laws and rules that are applied to help protect the privacy of the internet users from spamming and unwanted mails. With the popularity of the electronic mail as a medium for marketing because of the low cost, many company’s have seized the opportunity and have flooded many people’s e-mail accounts with promotional mail.
But, with an opt-in list, you avoid this annoyance because people subscribe to the list; they want to receive the newsletters and promotional materials. They have consented to being on the list by subscribing themselves, just don’t forget to put an unsubscribe feature everytime in your opt-in list so that you avoid any confusion. There may be times when an email account was provided when the real owner didn’t want to subscribe.
It is essential that you keep your list clean and manageable. Arrange it by using the many tools and technologies available for your opt-in list. Do not worry; your investment in this marketing strategy is well worth it with all the coverage you will get which will likely be converted into sales then to profit.
Keep yourself and your business out of trouble and potential run-ins with the law and the internet service providers. Keep your operation legit and clean. Your reputation as a legitimate businessman and a legitimate site depends on your being a straight and true marketing strategist. As a tip, here are three things to avoid when emailing your list.
1) Take notice of your unsuccessful sends. These are the e-mails that bounce. Bounced emails, also known as undeliverable messages, are those messages that, for whatever reason, were not successfully received by the intended recipient.
There are bounces that happen or occur because the server was busy at that time but can still be delivered in another time. There are also bounces because the inbox of the recipient is full at that time. There are those bounce messages that are simply undeliverable ever. The reason for this is that it may be an invalid email address, a misspelled email address, or an email address that was abandoned and erased already.
Manage your list by putting markings on those that bounce. Erase an email account from your list so that you have an accurate statistics and records as to how many are actually receiving your mail. You may also want to check the spellings of your email addresses in your list. One common mistake is when an N instead of an M is placed in the .com area.
2) Always provide an unsubscribe feature in your site and an unsubscribe link in your mails. When someone in your list files a request to be unsubscribed, always take that request seriously. If you don’t take them off your list and keep sending them your e-mails, you are now sending them spam mail.
When you are reported as a spammer, you and your business can get into a lot of trouble. You can be reported to the authorities and maybe blacklisted by many internet service providers. You will lose a lot of subscribers this way and many more in potential subscribers.
3) Do not provide pornographic or shocking and disturbing content in your newsletters. It is hard to decipher the age of the recipient and many complaints may stem from these. Controversial issues also are to be avoided to not be branded by your subscribers. Stick to the nature of your site and business.
Always remember these tips in this article so that you can have a healthy relationship with your subscribers as well as be kept within the boundaries of what is allowed in sending mails to an opt-in list.
Affiliate Marketing Strategies - 5 Steps To Become A Super Affiliate
Affiliate marketing is a simple concept. It is a no risk partnership between you and another person or company that allows you to promote their product or service, and when a sale is made, you receive a percentage.(look for programs that pay a minimum of 50% commission) You are assigned a unique URL that you drive traffic through to the companies sales page.
The real beauty that appeals to most is that fact that in order to start making money right away, you don't need, a product, website, sales letters, follow up messsages, you don't process payments, ship orders or do any customer service. So it is a very quick and easy way to be up and running in a very short period of time. All that being said, there's still some key affiliate marketing strategies that you must do in order to be successful. Below are 5 keys to any affiliates success online.
1) In order to become a successful, or super affiliate, you must be able to collect the names and email addresses of those that you refer to the affiliate sight. It's not enough just to direct someone to the sales page of the product that you are promoting. On average, it takes someone 5-7 exposures before they purchase that product or service. You need to incorporate a 'squeeze page' between the link they click and the companies website. A 'squeeze page' is simply a page that usually has a free offer(report, ebook, e-course, software trial) in exchange for their information. The process should look like this:
A) They click on your link from an article, blog, advertisement.
B) They are directed to you 'squeeze page' that has a special offer for them.
C) After they fill in their name and email address, they are redirected to the companies sales page.
You can now start to build a relationship with them, which is critical for repeat sales in the future. Remember, people buy from others that they know, and more importantly, that they trust. If you are missing step B), then you are missing a huge opportunity for future sales.
2) To become a super affiliate you must define, and dominate a niche market. A niche market is simply a smaller, more detailed area of a larger market. For example, 'tropical fish' would be a large market, but 'How to raise Oscars' or any other specific type of fsh would be your niche market. This is a market that may get 1000's of searches a month, with very little competition.
3) Super affiliates tend to be perceived as experts in their field. Because niche markets are more close knit, and because will easily pass along information that they deem to be of value, your name can spread like wild fire. So they will pass along your, blogs, articles, reports, ebooks ect, to others with similar interests, making them viral. TIP - Make it easy for your informatin to be passed on, include a 'send to a friend' link. Make it simple and your on your way.
4) Successful affiliates or super affiliates tend to over deliver on the information they give away. When you give them more then they expect, they will come back for more. Make the information valuable to them, solve some, but not all, their problems or questions. You don't want to give away everything for free, or they will have no reason to purchase what you have to sell them.
5) Super affiliates build and nurture a relationship once they capture there potential customers information . People buy from others that they know and trust, and therefore, you must show that you are there to help them. A fatal flaw that most newbies make is, they hard sell before the relationship has had a chance to form. You can include soft sells within your communications to them, but people will turn and run the other way if they think that you are just out to get their hard earned money. Build that relationship to ensure long term growth with back end sales.
That's 5 important keys that, if followed and done right, can build the solid foundation that ANY business needs to be a smashing success and realize long term, sustained growth.
The real beauty that appeals to most is that fact that in order to start making money right away, you don't need, a product, website, sales letters, follow up messsages, you don't process payments, ship orders or do any customer service. So it is a very quick and easy way to be up and running in a very short period of time. All that being said, there's still some key affiliate marketing strategies that you must do in order to be successful. Below are 5 keys to any affiliates success online.
1) In order to become a successful, or super affiliate, you must be able to collect the names and email addresses of those that you refer to the affiliate sight. It's not enough just to direct someone to the sales page of the product that you are promoting. On average, it takes someone 5-7 exposures before they purchase that product or service. You need to incorporate a 'squeeze page' between the link they click and the companies website. A 'squeeze page' is simply a page that usually has a free offer(report, ebook, e-course, software trial) in exchange for their information. The process should look like this:
A) They click on your link from an article, blog, advertisement.
B) They are directed to you 'squeeze page' that has a special offer for them.
C) After they fill in their name and email address, they are redirected to the companies sales page.
You can now start to build a relationship with them, which is critical for repeat sales in the future. Remember, people buy from others that they know, and more importantly, that they trust. If you are missing step B), then you are missing a huge opportunity for future sales.
2) To become a super affiliate you must define, and dominate a niche market. A niche market is simply a smaller, more detailed area of a larger market. For example, 'tropical fish' would be a large market, but 'How to raise Oscars' or any other specific type of fsh would be your niche market. This is a market that may get 1000's of searches a month, with very little competition.
3) Super affiliates tend to be perceived as experts in their field. Because niche markets are more close knit, and because will easily pass along information that they deem to be of value, your name can spread like wild fire. So they will pass along your, blogs, articles, reports, ebooks ect, to others with similar interests, making them viral. TIP - Make it easy for your informatin to be passed on, include a 'send to a friend' link. Make it simple and your on your way.
4) Successful affiliates or super affiliates tend to over deliver on the information they give away. When you give them more then they expect, they will come back for more. Make the information valuable to them, solve some, but not all, their problems or questions. You don't want to give away everything for free, or they will have no reason to purchase what you have to sell them.
5) Super affiliates build and nurture a relationship once they capture there potential customers information . People buy from others that they know and trust, and therefore, you must show that you are there to help them. A fatal flaw that most newbies make is, they hard sell before the relationship has had a chance to form. You can include soft sells within your communications to them, but people will turn and run the other way if they think that you are just out to get their hard earned money. Build that relationship to ensure long term growth with back end sales.
That's 5 important keys that, if followed and done right, can build the solid foundation that ANY business needs to be a smashing success and realize long term, sustained growth.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
5 Key Steps To Increased Conversion With Email Marketing
Email marketing is, at first, not about the instant sale of your product or service. Although you may see some instant results, email marketing is about building a relationship that is essential in long term growth for your business.
Here's 5 key steps to improve your conversion rate, and to start building the relationships neccasary for they sustained growth of your company.
1) Must be an opt - in list. With all the trouble that you can get into for spamming, IP shuts you down - big fines - jail time - you must make sure you have permission to send your emails. Opt - in just means that they must confirm their information and their request to receive future emails from you. They sign up, immediately receive a confirmation email from your autoresponder, and click a link, and they are now a person who has given you permission to send them future emails.
2) Make it simple and easy to sign up. Don't make them jump through hoops in order to join. All you want is there name and email address, that's it. If they have to fill out a page of information, you will most likely loose them forever. You can ask for more specific information once you have built a solid relationship with them.
3) Use a free offer, something of value to them, in exchange for their name and email address. A free news letter subscription, ebook or free report. With all the free offers available, you must be willing to over deliver on your offer, stand out from the crowd. Make it relevant, and of the highest quality, and you will have them waiting and excited to receive your next email.
4) Include a 'Send to a Friend' link. Again, make it easy for your readers to do this, and you can dramatically increase your list with, no extra effort or money. Place a link throughout your emails or your website, and keep it simple for them to do. You have instant credibility because infornation that is being sent is from someone they already know and trust. This alone could dramatically increase the size of your opt - in list, and it didn't cost you a penny extra to do.
5) Use an autoresponder to cut your costs and workload, and increase sales. This should seem so obvious to anyone marketing online today. An auto responder works, 24/7 - 365, that's every single hour of every single day. How powerful is that, how much would you have to pay employees to accomplish the same? You most likely couldn't. Try and stay away from the free autoresponders out there. They tend to have other advertising throughout, which can take away the attention of your reader. They also tend to have limits as far as the list size, number of lists you can have and very few options. Not only that, but people can spot them, and if your claiming to be a professional in your field, how does that make you look?
That's 5 keys that will improve your next email marketing campaign. Email marketing is a method that is used incorrectly by so many people and companies, but one that can reap enormous rewards when done right. Be honest and ethical in your campaigns, offer great value, and you will be rewarded with a highly responsive list of eager customers just waiting for your next email.
Here's 5 key steps to improve your conversion rate, and to start building the relationships neccasary for they sustained growth of your company.
1) Must be an opt - in list. With all the trouble that you can get into for spamming, IP shuts you down - big fines - jail time - you must make sure you have permission to send your emails. Opt - in just means that they must confirm their information and their request to receive future emails from you. They sign up, immediately receive a confirmation email from your autoresponder, and click a link, and they are now a person who has given you permission to send them future emails.
2) Make it simple and easy to sign up. Don't make them jump through hoops in order to join. All you want is there name and email address, that's it. If they have to fill out a page of information, you will most likely loose them forever. You can ask for more specific information once you have built a solid relationship with them.
3) Use a free offer, something of value to them, in exchange for their name and email address. A free news letter subscription, ebook or free report. With all the free offers available, you must be willing to over deliver on your offer, stand out from the crowd. Make it relevant, and of the highest quality, and you will have them waiting and excited to receive your next email.
4) Include a 'Send to a Friend' link. Again, make it easy for your readers to do this, and you can dramatically increase your list with, no extra effort or money. Place a link throughout your emails or your website, and keep it simple for them to do. You have instant credibility because infornation that is being sent is from someone they already know and trust. This alone could dramatically increase the size of your opt - in list, and it didn't cost you a penny extra to do.
5) Use an autoresponder to cut your costs and workload, and increase sales. This should seem so obvious to anyone marketing online today. An auto responder works, 24/7 - 365, that's every single hour of every single day. How powerful is that, how much would you have to pay employees to accomplish the same? You most likely couldn't. Try and stay away from the free autoresponders out there. They tend to have other advertising throughout, which can take away the attention of your reader. They also tend to have limits as far as the list size, number of lists you can have and very few options. Not only that, but people can spot them, and if your claiming to be a professional in your field, how does that make you look?
That's 5 keys that will improve your next email marketing campaign. Email marketing is a method that is used incorrectly by so many people and companies, but one that can reap enormous rewards when done right. Be honest and ethical in your campaigns, offer great value, and you will be rewarded with a highly responsive list of eager customers just waiting for your next email.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Goal Setting Activity - Goal Planning
Goal setting and goal planning have been preached for years by all the big names in motivational speaking, Tony Robbins, Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and many more. Whether you belive in goal setting or not, the first thing writing out your goals does is to get your mind thinking in the right direction.
Whether it works or not, whether you believe or not is irrelevant. Their was one study that all the famous self help gurus would recite about a study in 1953 at Yale. The story goes like this.. In 1953, researchers surveyed the graduating seniors at Yale to find out how many had specific goals, written down, for their future. 3% was the response. The same researchers went back twenty years later, polled the surviving members of the class and found that: the 3% that had set goals, and written them down, had accumulated more wealth then the other 97% combined!
Some claim this story as the truth, and some claim it to be made up, a myth created by the gurus to show unbiased proof that it does work. True or false, if you talk to successful people in their industry, you will probably find some had set goals, and some did not. The one true thing about setting a goal, and writing it down is this: It sets your mind and body down the right path to accomplish the said goal. It's easier to develop an action plan, when you know where you want to end up. Just like going on a trip to somewhere that you have never been before. If you just get in your car and start driving and hope you'll arrive at your destination, well you may make it, but a destination that would take 8 hours to get to, may end up taking you 15 or 20 hours. Same goes for your plan to succeed in your chosen business. Why take twice as long if you don't have to?
Once you have an end goal set, just work backwards to get your monthly or weekly actions that you will have to take to reach it. If you set a yearly goal of $100,000 in sales, and you sell ABC Widget for $50 each, then work back to find your monthly, weekly, daily and even hourly actions that you will need to take in order to reach $100,000 in sales. $8333 per month, $1923.00/week, $274.00/day, $34.00/hour. Now if you've never made $100,000 before, it may seem a little daunting, but if you work back and see that you only have to average $34/hour, not even 1 ABC Widget, then your mind is more easily convinced, and proceeds on the path to achievement. What the mind can conceive, it can achieve.
Although there may not be any hard proof, such as the Yale study of 1953, setting goals, and writing them down, will help you accomplish almost anything you want. Having a plan and doing the daily actions on a consistant basis, will lead you to success, in whatever end goal you are setting.
Whether it works or not, whether you believe or not is irrelevant. Their was one study that all the famous self help gurus would recite about a study in 1953 at Yale. The story goes like this.. In 1953, researchers surveyed the graduating seniors at Yale to find out how many had specific goals, written down, for their future. 3% was the response. The same researchers went back twenty years later, polled the surviving members of the class and found that: the 3% that had set goals, and written them down, had accumulated more wealth then the other 97% combined!
Some claim this story as the truth, and some claim it to be made up, a myth created by the gurus to show unbiased proof that it does work. True or false, if you talk to successful people in their industry, you will probably find some had set goals, and some did not. The one true thing about setting a goal, and writing it down is this: It sets your mind and body down the right path to accomplish the said goal. It's easier to develop an action plan, when you know where you want to end up. Just like going on a trip to somewhere that you have never been before. If you just get in your car and start driving and hope you'll arrive at your destination, well you may make it, but a destination that would take 8 hours to get to, may end up taking you 15 or 20 hours. Same goes for your plan to succeed in your chosen business. Why take twice as long if you don't have to?
Once you have an end goal set, just work backwards to get your monthly or weekly actions that you will have to take to reach it. If you set a yearly goal of $100,000 in sales, and you sell ABC Widget for $50 each, then work back to find your monthly, weekly, daily and even hourly actions that you will need to take in order to reach $100,000 in sales. $8333 per month, $1923.00/week, $274.00/day, $34.00/hour. Now if you've never made $100,000 before, it may seem a little daunting, but if you work back and see that you only have to average $34/hour, not even 1 ABC Widget, then your mind is more easily convinced, and proceeds on the path to achievement. What the mind can conceive, it can achieve.
Although there may not be any hard proof, such as the Yale study of 1953, setting goals, and writing them down, will help you accomplish almost anything you want. Having a plan and doing the daily actions on a consistant basis, will lead you to success, in whatever end goal you are setting.
Monday, March 3, 2008
3 Easy Ways to Get Leads Even With No List
There are strategies, that when done correctly, will drive massive amounts of traffic to help build your opt - in list. The money, long term, really is in the list, not only the size, but, more importantly, the quality of the signups to your list. Here are 3 easy methods you can start using right now.
1) Buying or renting an opt - in list. This has been a very popular and effective way for those who are new ebusiness owners. You can gain immediate access to hundreds or thousands of prospects within their target market. You can start to drive people to your sign up page, and see results in days rather then months. Using these lists can prove fatal if not done right. If you just send out a flashy sales copy, expecting just sales, you will just be wasting your money. The statistics show that it takes an average of 5-7 exposures before someone will make a purchase. The objective for using this method should be to collect their contact info by offering a free report or newsletter. Then you can start to build the relationship and eventually turn them into future sales.
-important tip- if using this method, make sure you know where and how the email addresses were obtained. You do not want emails that are 'harvested' from free forums and such. You only want email addresses that have requested information. Anything else and you are asking for trouble. You don't want to be accused of spamming and have your ISP shut you down, not to mention the fines you may face.
2) Co registration services. When someone signs up for a particular newsletter from one of these services, your newsletter is also offered for them to sign up to. You can expect to pay between .50-$2.00 per signup. The higher quality, more targeted signup, the higher the price. Here again, don't just try and sell to your new signups right away, build that relationship needed to get the future sales. This is a great way to get laser targeted prospects that have requested information, that you have to offer.
3) Using a 'Send to a friend' link. Simply place a link that someone can click to forward the information to a friend or business associate. Make it easy or they won't do it. If you include a link like that, and you offer quality material, your list will start to increase dramatically. It's like the old hair shampoo commercial, you tell two friends and they tell two friends and so, it goes viral! You can see how much of an impact this could have on building a quality list with targeted prospects.
However you decide to build your list, do it honestly and ethically. Make sure that you only include those that opt - in or request the information that you are offering. Using these guidelines you can insure long term success. Remember, the quality of your list is more important then the quantity. Make sure you are focusing on gathering those who share the same topic of interest or business.
1) Buying or renting an opt - in list. This has been a very popular and effective way for those who are new ebusiness owners. You can gain immediate access to hundreds or thousands of prospects within their target market. You can start to drive people to your sign up page, and see results in days rather then months. Using these lists can prove fatal if not done right. If you just send out a flashy sales copy, expecting just sales, you will just be wasting your money. The statistics show that it takes an average of 5-7 exposures before someone will make a purchase. The objective for using this method should be to collect their contact info by offering a free report or newsletter. Then you can start to build the relationship and eventually turn them into future sales.
-important tip- if using this method, make sure you know where and how the email addresses were obtained. You do not want emails that are 'harvested' from free forums and such. You only want email addresses that have requested information. Anything else and you are asking for trouble. You don't want to be accused of spamming and have your ISP shut you down, not to mention the fines you may face.
2) Co registration services. When someone signs up for a particular newsletter from one of these services, your newsletter is also offered for them to sign up to. You can expect to pay between .50-$2.00 per signup. The higher quality, more targeted signup, the higher the price. Here again, don't just try and sell to your new signups right away, build that relationship needed to get the future sales. This is a great way to get laser targeted prospects that have requested information, that you have to offer.
3) Using a 'Send to a friend' link. Simply place a link that someone can click to forward the information to a friend or business associate. Make it easy or they won't do it. If you include a link like that, and you offer quality material, your list will start to increase dramatically. It's like the old hair shampoo commercial, you tell two friends and they tell two friends and so, it goes viral! You can see how much of an impact this could have on building a quality list with targeted prospects.
However you decide to build your list, do it honestly and ethically. Make sure that you only include those that opt - in or request the information that you are offering. Using these guidelines you can insure long term success. Remember, the quality of your list is more important then the quantity. Make sure you are focusing on gathering those who share the same topic of interest or business.
4 Proven Strategies To Build Your Opt-In List
Learn 4 proven methods that will help you build your opt-in list with, quality, targeted prospects eager to give their information in exchange for the valuable knowledge they will get.
In order to collect your prospects email address, you must compell them to exchange their contact info for something of value to them. You can not just offered the same old rehashed stuff that's out there already. With so much information out there, you have to over deliver on your content and make it unique. Here are 4 proven ways to do that.
1) Offer a free e-book. This is perhaps the most widely used tactic to gather your prospects email address. By giving away an e-book, you can start to be recognized as an expert in that field. Also, you make your prospects familiar with that products that you are promoting. You can also make it viral. Allow your readers the opportunity to forward it to others that they know may be interested. They can do this as long as they do not alter or change it in any way. By doing this, your e-book could receive massive exposer, and therfore growing your opt-in list at light speed. You can write it yourself, 5-10 pages crammed full of unique, quality information, or you can have it written for you, this may run anywhere from $15 - $85 an hour. You can also buy resale rights which allow you to give it away or sell it and keep 100% of the profits. There's also Private Label Rights, which allow you to alter and change it, sell it or give it away, and claim it as your own.
2) Offer a free newsletter. Again, widely used as an incentive, and still very effective. As with your e-book, your newsletter must be packed full of unique, highly informative information. You must decide how often you offer the newsletter. Once a week, twice a week, bi-weekly, once a month. This will depend on what information your offering. If you have a newsletter on the stock markets, you may be able to offer it twice a week, as the markets change daily and therefore there would be new info to share often. A newsletter on say, real estate may be okay to offer twice a month as there may not enough quality content to fill twice a week. Statistics would suggest you try and offer it at least twice a month minimum. People sign up for a lot of newsletters and tend to forget quickly what they signed up for, so you must keep your name and business in front of them as often as possible.
3) Free download if promoting software. You can offer you prospect a free trial download of a software program that may be good for 15 or 30 days before they have to purchase. People feel very comfortable offering their contact info for a trial version with no strings attached. It gives them the opportunity to try it before they committ to buying. The trial version may be missing a few elements and only avaiable when they buy or upgrade. Or they may need a registration key to activate the paid version. You can use your autoresponder to drip on them through out the trial period, and offer them a discount or a bonus to buy just before the trial period is over. Very effective!
4)Free E-course. Lots of people still love getting things for free, especially if they get high quality information from it. People are always looking for ways to save, time, money and effort. So if you can teach someone how to 'Save 25-45% Building Your House' and someone is building their own house, they would be very intrested, and willing to give you theie contact info in exchange for the e-course. This as well could become viral. People are always willing to share info that they find valuable.
No matter what you are offer to help build your opt-in list, make sure you over deliver on the content and quality. With the internet making it so easy to access information nowadays, if your offer is not unique and of the highest quality, they will just click to the next offer. Find your target market and give them the answer to their questions and your list will grow faster then you can imagine.
In order to collect your prospects email address, you must compell them to exchange their contact info for something of value to them. You can not just offered the same old rehashed stuff that's out there already. With so much information out there, you have to over deliver on your content and make it unique. Here are 4 proven ways to do that.
1) Offer a free e-book. This is perhaps the most widely used tactic to gather your prospects email address. By giving away an e-book, you can start to be recognized as an expert in that field. Also, you make your prospects familiar with that products that you are promoting. You can also make it viral. Allow your readers the opportunity to forward it to others that they know may be interested. They can do this as long as they do not alter or change it in any way. By doing this, your e-book could receive massive exposer, and therfore growing your opt-in list at light speed. You can write it yourself, 5-10 pages crammed full of unique, quality information, or you can have it written for you, this may run anywhere from $15 - $85 an hour. You can also buy resale rights which allow you to give it away or sell it and keep 100% of the profits. There's also Private Label Rights, which allow you to alter and change it, sell it or give it away, and claim it as your own.
2) Offer a free newsletter. Again, widely used as an incentive, and still very effective. As with your e-book, your newsletter must be packed full of unique, highly informative information. You must decide how often you offer the newsletter. Once a week, twice a week, bi-weekly, once a month. This will depend on what information your offering. If you have a newsletter on the stock markets, you may be able to offer it twice a week, as the markets change daily and therefore there would be new info to share often. A newsletter on say, real estate may be okay to offer twice a month as there may not enough quality content to fill twice a week. Statistics would suggest you try and offer it at least twice a month minimum. People sign up for a lot of newsletters and tend to forget quickly what they signed up for, so you must keep your name and business in front of them as often as possible.
3) Free download if promoting software. You can offer you prospect a free trial download of a software program that may be good for 15 or 30 days before they have to purchase. People feel very comfortable offering their contact info for a trial version with no strings attached. It gives them the opportunity to try it before they committ to buying. The trial version may be missing a few elements and only avaiable when they buy or upgrade. Or they may need a registration key to activate the paid version. You can use your autoresponder to drip on them through out the trial period, and offer them a discount or a bonus to buy just before the trial period is over. Very effective!
4)Free E-course. Lots of people still love getting things for free, especially if they get high quality information from it. People are always looking for ways to save, time, money and effort. So if you can teach someone how to 'Save 25-45% Building Your House' and someone is building their own house, they would be very intrested, and willing to give you theie contact info in exchange for the e-course. This as well could become viral. People are always willing to share info that they find valuable.
No matter what you are offer to help build your opt-in list, make sure you over deliver on the content and quality. With the internet making it so easy to access information nowadays, if your offer is not unique and of the highest quality, they will just click to the next offer. Find your target market and give them the answer to their questions and your list will grow faster then you can imagine.
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