Archive for June, 2007

by Theo Swan
When using affiliate programs, the option of getting paid per click is often tempting. This can be in form of contextual advertising, or traditional PPC programs. This option, how ever, is not the best option in all cases. How do you know when to choose to be paid per click, and when to choose a PPS model?

People familiar with adsense or other forms of contextual ads — with a fluctuant amount paid for each click — are aware of the big difference between the price for a click in a competitive niche and a less competitive one. These days, there are numerous websites dedicated to listing and reviewing various keywords and niches for contextual advertising.

If you have a website in a niche lucrative and competitive — and you are attracting visitors — you might stand a good chance of getting a fair amount of money for every visitors you send thru contextual ads, but if you are running a website in a less competitive niche, odds are you not to thrilled with the money you make with contextual ads.

This is a perfect time to switch to an affiliate program. The good thing about affiliate programs lies in the ability to target the products and ads yourself, while with contextual ads, you are stuck with a more or less accurate script deciding what will convert best and pay you the most.

There are a few differences in promoting a pay per sale affiliate program, both difficulties and possibilities.

The main difficulty is you are now hoping for your visitors to, not only click, but to buy the products or services you are advertising. With contextual ads — in its simplest form — all you need to do is place the code on a prominent placed and cross your fingers. With affiliate programs you need to be more subtle. Looking only at the commission you will receive, and not looking at the quality of website you are sending visitors to, will not be a very profitable project. Instead, you should do as much research you possibly can, and always try to improve both your click thru rate and your conversion rate. Don’t be afraid to try new affiliate programs if the first one won’t make you any money.

When using static ads — banner and/or text ads — you have a much better way to choose the ads according to your visitors. Different from the scripts doing the work with contextual ads, you have the means to look at several other factors to decide what you site is about. Looking at your visitors will give you additional information on what products or services they might be looking for, and hopefully buy.

In addition to this, you have a good chance of promoting the products you are advertising, hence pre-selling them. This is known as one of the most important factors when working with online affiliate programs, simply because your visitors often have some level of trust in you and your writing. This has little to do with you or your website, but simply because people tend to believe the person not obviously gaining from it. If a website brags about their products, people will filter it out, deeming it blatant advertising, but if another source — you — tells them the same thing, they are less reluctant to consider it the truth.

As a rule of thumb, traditional pay per sale affiliate programs will perform better than contextual ads in niches of low to medium competition. In niches of high competition — i.e. pharmacy products, gambling and travel — the price paid per click can sometimes make the use of contextual advertising it highly profitable.

Theo Swan is writing regularly about SEO, internet marketing and affiliate programs. Find out more about affiliate payout models or, why not find your self a few PPC or PPS affiliate programs to promote?

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by netZtrack
Content is King. The most important thing to remember about popular web sites is that they are always rich in content.

Stick to your subject. Don’t try to be all things to all people. Keep your goal in mind. Creating a web site is challenging and fun. The temptation to put as many bells and whistles as you can on a page is almost overwhelming. But unless your site is involved with bells and whistles, don’t do it! The purpose of designing a site carefully is not to make it look cool, or win awards. It’s to accomplish the intended goal of the site. It’s a good idea to write down the goal of your the site before starting any design work. It will help you make design designs for the site as a whole.

First impressions count! Think about the message you are sending to your customer. The first page of your web site should be a concise description of the website. Don’t make this page too busy - entice visitors to dig deeper into your site through the use of inviting text and interesting graphics. If you are serious about your business, buy your own domain name and don’t use a “free” hosting service.

Design sites, not pages. Your primary concern should be the site’s overall design. When starting to design a new site from scratch, you should try to create a design that will make sense to users, has a consistent look and feel, and is not to difficult to extend in the future. The consistency of design of a site is one of the factors that differentiates amateur sites from professional ones.

Make it easy to get around your site. Your customer should be able to easily navigate to any page in your web from any page in your page. It’s important to link in a consistent, well thought out manner that users can learn to navigate. Have clear links to your pages and, if are selling a product, make it easy for people to buy it! Show your business name, address, phone number and E-mail address on each an every page. Invite customers to contact you with their questions or comments. Add links to other sites only when necessary, or on a special links page at the end of your site. You want visitors to go through your site before surfing off to another!

View your site through the eyes of a stranger. Once you have completed you site outline, view it in other browsers. Does it look like you wanted it to look?

Don’t forget to tell the world about your new site. Make sure that your URL is on all your company business cards, letter heads, brochures, phone systems, etc. Swap links with other related web sites and consider banner advertising. List your site with the major search engines, but read their rules of submission first!

Keep your site current. Come up with a reason for people to visit and revisit your pages and recommend them to their friends. This could be a series of articles giving tips, a daily cartoon, or other attention catching event. The words most likely to attract visitors are: Free and Special. Be sure you offer something of value if you uses these words!

Survey says… Ask users about your site. Create a survey and give a reward for responding. Ask friends to check out the site, then grill them on what they thought about it. This can be valuable input on what improvements are needed. Often, users can be thrown by things a designer might never see as a problem. Don’t ever stop looking for ways to improve your website. Subscribe to professional E-zines, and keep surfing the web doing market research. What are your competitors doing better? Ask for feedback from your friends, relatives and customers. They will often see things with fresh eyes.

www.netztrack.com

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by Amit Bhalla
The internet revolution has extended the horizon of the people and made the world a smaller place. Information is now at everyone’s fingertips and the click of a mouse can open up a world of opportunities. India, riding on the revolutionary waves, has progressed tremendously over the last decade. It is now a reality that an online directory can give you any information required about any town or city in India. Local search service India is such a concept that offers information related to the address and contact number for any facility starting from a movie hall to hospitals, restaurants, retail stores and more.

Imagine relocating to a new neighborhood, possibly in another city or maybe you have just shifted to India from abroad. New people, new language and new locality, new culture, seem overwhelming for any person and can add to the emotional and mental stress of any person. Local search service India eliminates all these possibilities. The service can be your best friend and guide, no matter where you have relocated in India. It is now easy to know any locality like the back of your hand thanks to local search service India. It saves you the awkwardness of asking around for directions from locals who may not be friendly enough to offer helpful directions and advice.

The local search service India is also a boon for aged people or single women living alone in metropolitan cities and big towns. The ready availability of contact details and directions of emergency facilities like the hospitals, police stations and such other numbers in the vicinity makes them feel much safer. It also reduces their dependence on any friend or neighbor and gives them greater sense of self confidence. Local search service India makes it possible for any person to feel at home in any city of this country. India lives up to its reputation as a hospitable country when a foreigner to the country finds immediate help in the form of an online website offering local search service India.

Even a person who resides in a particular locality may be aware of only a number of places that he frequents on a regular basis, as for example maybe only four Chinese restaurants in the area may be known to him. A local search service India may pleasantly surprise him with a list of sixteen such restaurants which can be found in the vicinity and were not known to him. So we see the local search service India facility not only helps newcomers but also the old residents by broadening their horizons and increasing the options in life. Web accessibility is now also available from the mobile handsets of some companies. Imagine getting any information by simply sending a sms to a local search service India directory provider.

As the mode of communication increases life is becoming simpler. Information is easily available and accessible via the internet and mobiles. And services like the local search service India have further added to the convenience of information seekers.

Amit Bhalla works to help all those who want information about the latest and the best, most happening places in the city. To know more about Local search India,local search services delhi,search service delhi,Yellow Pages India, Local Search Service, local search service India visit www.myquest.in

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by Marc and Kem
When my wife and I got into the www.E-commerce world, we had Visions of easy money and an auto pilot type of business. You know the kind that runs itself and the money just rolls in. Oh yeah, low start-up cost, little time, and low commitment. Just read the commercials and Internet ads.
The Internet can be your friend or it can bite you like a scared dog. Try researching, starting an Internet business. You will find every easy money method in the world. Here is a list of things to consider and these things are just the surface. This is not meant to scare you but to inform you of the reality, before you fall into the money pit. Just remember you have to give before you receive and sometimes we learn from the pain.

Websites necessities or basics:
Host/Server — to store all your files and images. E-mail and other perks. $8 to $12 month
Purchase your domain — www.mysite.com $8 to $???
Merchant/Credit Card service –Credit Card processing. This is a low price. $25Month, $15 service charge, and 30 cents per transaction and 2.5% of sales. (OUCH!)
Paypal — You can use Paypal for your payment option. It’s free. I don’t use it. Nothing is free.
Rent a ready-made store - Now you can go with a company who will host your site and provide a storefront for you. They will even give you products to sell. These are usually database type and provide no SEO. In other words, the only people who purchase from your site are your friends and family. No one can find your site in the Internet desert. You’re on page 200 (if lucky). They run from $40 to $200 month.

Find a wholesaler? No problem, everyone is a wholesaler. What do you want to sell? Leather, Home Décor, Knives and Swords, Collectibles or maybe Kitchen cookware?
Where are the real wholesalers? The ones they buy from. There are many scams and scam tools for sale out there. Now try ordering from them. Late? Back Ordered? Packing? Drop ship costs? Shipping & Handling Costs? Drop ship or Inventory? Taxes???

Build your site - There are many templates out there that look good but if you don’t know how to program HTML forget it. You will probably buy a book or software that shows us dummies that we can create HTML websites without having to know HTML. On the outside it looks good, but on the inside they stink. How are you going to find the time and keep up with the latest in this “part time business”? Search Engine robots don’t like bad programming among other things.

Gather Information - Now that you have a wholesaler, download all the prices and images. Create your spreadsheets to upload all the product information (change them to CSV or some delimited format. Or you may have to do this one at a time… Ahhh!
Fix the images - Adjust the resolution, size, etc. to fit your WebPages. Get the right software to do this…It will save you days of work and cost. I hope you get this done before the prices change or the item is discontinued. Remember that if you have more than one wholesaler, you have more than one tax and drop ship charge. You also have different information and images. They could be in other formats.
My wife and I thought an Internet Shopping Mall would be so cool. We could have different stores, oh boy…That’s where the name MallAboutTown.com came from. Oh yeah. Now you have to have a logo and a theme and all the right colors and, and, and.
It’s kinda like building a house.

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) - You should have been thinking about this from the start. Buy links, buy PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising, buy search engine submissions, buy content, submit articles and link to directories and other Websites, read, read, read and determine who is telling the truth.
After all the smoke clears, you will be in the hole a few bucks. When that first sale comes in you will feel like that golfer getting a hole in one. Then you’re back at it, harder than ever. It’s an addiction. I guess it could be described as the spouse that won’t leave an abused relationship. Like any business, Internet business is not for the short-term commitment. There is so much I had to leave out because many things depend on what direction you take on this journey. Good Luck, remember if it’s too good to be true…..

Our advice is to personally talk to someone that is successfully operating E-commerce site, (not on E-bay) and get the facts. This is what made E-bay so popular. But even E-bay can be tough.
Good Luck,

Marc and Kemella Allyn
http://www.mallabouttown.com

Marc and Kemella AllynPersonal Experience of remembering when

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by Paul Easton
Long term free traffic from the search engines can be achieved with a good understanding of website linking strategies. This strategy needs to fit with your business model to be sustainable over time. Traffic from some links, takes time to develop, but gives long term passive traffic.

At this time, Google owns the ‘search engine’ playing field for traffic. The majority of webmasters approach a linking strategy purely for SEM (Search Engine Marketing). More links to a site is a key when looking to get found in Google

The overall goal should be traffic results based, not purely for search engines.

Links can take anything up to six months to show up. A site that would help indirectly with search marketing results would be Wikipedia.

This free online library allows edits to apply external links to the bottom its pages. The site has a many million pages and a vast amount of traffic

Now Wikipedia has applied the ‘no follow’ HTML tag on its external page links to stop it being abused by some webmasters. This can be seen on any site using this process, by the following steps:

1. Highlight the link by left mouse and holding 2. Right mouse the link and look at the properties.

The text “Nofollow” can be seen in the properties

The no follow tag means Page Rank (or Reputation - PR) will not be passed on to your site and Google will not count it as a link. To Quote Wikipedia:

“nofollow” actually tells a search engine “Don’t score this link” rather than “Don’t follow this link.”

However many of the Wikipedia pages rank very high on Google, and features as a trusted authority site which has power in all search engines. It is likely to send targeted traffic which is really the end result you are looking for anyway.

At the same time, different engines treat these links differently. In a recent interview with the Yahoo director of search, they have stated that the link will be followed to the site, however the details of the link will not be passed on, simply that your site will be found.

There is an easy way to identify these types of links, if you use the Web Browser, Firefox which I highly recommended. It is a good alternative to Internet Explorer as its very clean and easy to use.

It has an Search Engine Marketing add on which, when installed and turned on, it will show you the no follow links highlighted in red.

Also, while searching in Google, it will show a large amount of information on links to the listings, age of the site, alexa ranking etc.

Download it here:

http://tools.seobook.com/firefox/seo-for-firefox.html

Another method that has been used to acquire links, is that of posting comments on blogs. This has resulted in a rash of posting comments only for return links. Wordpress, a quality open source blog software platform, has made all the comment links no follow in order to combat this.

In conclusion, there are many effective linking strategies, for marketing online at the same time the development of goals with an overall plan for the development of these goals should be applied.

Paul Easton is small business marketing specialist and the owner of DigitalAwol.com, The Link Exchange Directory which helps the small online business get traffic from links. You can instantly get 20 High Quality Fre.e Links to your website by visiting: Website Linking Strategies

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by Steve Waganer
Search engine optimization is nothing but just another method to popularize a site on the web. As the name itself suggests it is about making use of different types of strategies and methods to get a site recognized by all the major search engines. The online world is extremely competitive and it is important o keep pace with all the latest that is happening there to stay ahead of competitors. The world of internet is constantly evolving and if you are not keeping pace with these evolutions, there is no chance that you will stay ahead of your competitors. Social media optimization is one strategy that any online business must adopt if they want to become a success story on the web in a short time. Today almost all business has a web presence and business owners must ensure that client reaches to their site in this crowd and becomes their customers.

Search engine optimization is the best methods that one can adopt to ensure that their site becomes popular on the web. Now you must be wondering what search engine optimization is and how does one go about implementing this for your business? Rest easy there are professionals that are perfectly capable of handling this aspect of your business. This is in no way to imply that you cannot do search engine optimization for your own business. If you have the knowledge and the required skills you can go ahead and implement that for your business. But the matter of the fact is that very few people who open up a business venture are actually capable of doing search engine optimization in the proper way. So it augers well for a business if they hand over the search engine optimization work of their business to a third party or in other words a thoroughly trained professional.

Content they say is king and it has been seen again and again that well written content that is updated continuously is sure to attract attention over a period of time. Initially a person may get attracted to the site by seeing just the design and layout, but it is only quality content that will retain those people on a site for along time. Here keyword research is another vital element of social media optimization. A site needs to be promoted on certain keywords and it is important to undertake keyword research properly. So if you are letting the third party handle the search engine optimization work for you just make sure that they do proper keyword research for your site.

Staying ahead of competitors is vital, so make sure that you have a through knowledge about the latest trends that are being followed in the market. It always pays in the long run if you make business strategies after analyzing the existing competition in the market. Search engine marketing is not an easy strategy to implement, so you must make sure that any thing that is being done for this for your business, you have a proper and through knowledge about this.

Steve Waganer has specialization in Web Marketing. He is expert in web marketing,Search engine marketing, Search engine optimization.To get the Search engine optimization tips for your website to get high rank and top position in major search engines visit www.cometsearchenginemarketing.com

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by
You probably hear it all the time. Make $25,000 in your first month. This is the best opportunity in the planet! We are in pre-launch and we made an EASY $50,000 this month alone!

Although it is sometimes true that real people are making an insane amount of money with their internet business opportunity, do not join just ANY program. Before you commit yourself - see if they fit ALL six of these attributes of a good and profitable business opportunity.

Attribute #1 - Real Products That Are Of High Value.

The best business opportunity needs to market real products that offer the end-user exceptional value so that it can create a profitable and long term business. Think about it, it is just common sense for ANY business opportunity to have good products for it to survive in such a competitive market.

But if you ever come across a business opportunity in which it does not have any products to sell you better run be VERY careful. A business opportunity without a product is an illegal pyramid scheme in which you can make a quick buck here and there - but at the expense of your reputation.

Attribute #2 - Steady Cash Flow

The best business opportunity pays you immediately on all your sales so you keep a steady and growing cash flow. Seeing money flow into your bank account quickly also gives you major motivation to promote your business more heavily and thus making you more money.

Attribute #3 - Effective Advertising Sources

The best business opportunity gives you multiple ways to advertise effectively and at the same time gives you a big return on investment. The owners or someone who brings you in a business opportunity should reveal some of these sources for you so that you can get started making money fast.

Attribute #4 — The Right Marketing Tools

The best business opportunity automates your marketing process by providing you with the right marketing tools so that you can increase your daily sales. Some people confuse marketing with advertising.

Let me clarify - marketing is a system of sending out advertisements. The advertisements get the prospects interested in what you are selling.

Attribute #5 - Leverage

Nobody wants to work and sit at their computers all day to make a six figure income. That is why the best business opportunity has a system that allows you to leverage yourself.

This in turn gives you an instant sales team for you that create more income for yourself. Ideally, this system should be so solid that your sales team never slows down in making money for you. One such example that has worked very well for many people is the Australian 2-up plan.

Attribute #6 - Training And Support Most people coming into business opportunities are new and inexperienced. The best business opportunity should have some sort of training and support from real EXPERTS who are already successful and making the kind of money you desire.

These expert mentors should be making a six-figure incomes and have the proof to back it up. Most importantly these mentors should be willing to help you every step of the way and spoon feed you the process whenever you are lost and need help.

I believe ANY average Joe can make a six-figure income with the right business opportunity. If you know what to market and have the right tools to market it (like the six attributes above) — you will greatly increase your chances of creating a solid six figure income.

Alan Quan is an internet marketing coach and owns a successful internet business selling high-end information products. He is helping and now giving his coaching FREE to entrepreneurs who are serious about making money on the internet. Visit http://e-bizcoachalan.com/articles.html and see if you qualify for his exclusive program.

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by J Smith
Ever since website graphics became popular for websites there has been a consistent problem - different visitors with different sized monitor screens and different resolution sizes. Unfortunately, there is not much you can do about it, because there has yet to be a global solution for this problem.

Resolution -

The screen resolution is the amount of pixels vertically and horizontally that your computer screen will show. You might have noticed that you visited a certain website at some point in your life where you have to scroll horizontally to see the whole page. You may have cursed the website creator at the time, but it may just have been your screen resolution.

The lowest screen resolution some people still actually use is 480 X 640. This used to be the most popular screen resolution to use. Those who still use it may not understand the importance of using a higher screen resolution for better surfing the web.

Today there are a variety of screen resolutions to choose from, so it is left up to the user to choose the most appropriate one. If computer manufacturers came to an agreement to create just one or two screen resolutions so users will be less confused and have a better screen resolutions and see the difference when visiting various websites this could possibly solve the problem. But, until then we have to deal with what we have.

The most popular screen resolution that visitors’ use will be 1024 X 768, and the lowest one that they can use would be 400 X 600.

Resolution Problems -

If you someone visits your website with a low screen resolution they will have to scroll horizontally to see your whole web pages. And then, if someone visits your website with a higher screen resolution that what you used to create your website they will see a skinny strip on their screen, sometimes only a couple of inches in width that can be very annoying for the user.

Resolution Solutions -

One solution that some website designers use is to create the website for the lowest screen resolution so that those with the smaller screen resolution will see the website pages normally and those with higher screen resolutions will have to make their window smaller to read the website.

Another solution that works well is to create your website using the most popular screen resolution: 1024 X 768. Once you have your website up and running you can check your website stats to see what screen resolution is most popular among your visitors. If you find that they are using the most popular screen resolution, and some (a small portion) are using a different one, you can make a note on your website that it is best seen with the screen resolution of 1024 X 768, and maybe even give your visitors a little note on how to change their screen resolution.

You could also choose to create an elastic website that will look good in any resolution, but this is the most difficult choice. However, it could be the best choice for you.

For more website tips and to see my XSitePro Bonus Pack, please visit my webiste.

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by jorchav
When a visitor comes to a new website (yours perhaps) he or she is typically wary, skeptical, nervous. They ask, “Where am I? What kind of site is this?” They look around, looking for indicators, clues.

Confidence builders are those things that give visitors confidence that they have arrived at a reputable, honest, reliable website. Without the visible presence of confidence builders, the visitor remains skeptical, doubtful and more likely to leave without taking any action.

When the visitor sees confidence builders he is reassured, he tends to relax a bit, take the site seriously and consider doing business there. He is more likely to stay and sign up for a newsletter, seriously consider what is being offered, even buy something.

From the point of view of the webmaster, confidence builders are an essential element of converting skeptical visitors into customers!

Here is a list of confidence builders that visitors will look for and webmasters should provide, arranged in approximately decreasing order of importance:

1. Contact page. (Who ARE these people? Can I actually find them? Contact them?)
2. Privacy statement. (Can I trust these people with my e-mail address?)
3. Seals of certifying agencies like Hacker Proof, Honest e Online, E-Trust, Better Business Bureau or similar. (Who vouches for these people?)
4. Familiar logos such as VISA, MasterCard and PayPal (Who do they have financial connections with? What financial agencies know them and do business with them?)
5. Name and photo of the person behind the site. (Is there a real person here? What does he/she look like? What does that tell me about them?)
6. Cursive signature. (Is the owner of this site willing to stand behind it? Will he put his name and signature on the line for it?)
7. Testimonials - (Who else has dealt with this website? What was their experience?)
8. Recordings and Videos - are being increasingly used to give websites a personal feeling, that you are hearing from the person behind it. If the people behind the website inspire confidence, the visitor is more interested in dealing with the website.

Numerous split-tests have confirmed that the presence of these confidence builders, either alone or in combinations, significantly increase website conversion rates.

To sell your products or services, it is not enough to just emphasize and sell the positive aspects. There are pre-existing negative inhibitors to doing business with you that must be eliminated or at least neutralized.

Your visitors will arrive skeptical. To sell anything to them you must first reassure them and turn that skepticism into confidence.

For more information on using confidence builders to boost website conversion rates, visit: Confidence Builders
Jorge Chavez is an experienced website confidence builder at http://ConfidenceBuilders.ya23.com

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by Jim Keayes
Why on earth would anyone want to publish a Blog? you might ask.

Well, some people do it because they have an urge to communicate their thoughts to the world…and that’s a fine thing to do…it’s nice to read what other ordinary people are thinking rather than the often slanted views of the popular press.

But we are in business, you and I. We want to publish a Blog for two reasons.

The first is let out readers get some insight into who we are…to get to know us…people are more likely to do business with people they feel comfortable with and trust. The second reason is that we want to create another outlet for our article writing.

Turn your Blog posts into emails to your list and into articles if there’s enough meat on them. Post your emails on your Blog. Post your Newsletter to your Blog.

And always, always, post your articles on your blog. You can even sell your products from your Blog. You see how it’s going round and round here-one hand washes the other-and your web presence grows.

The easiest way to start a blog is to go to Blogger.com and register. It takes about 5 minutes once you select a name and a template for your site. Go to the Dashboard and select the Templates tab to find a template you like. You can edit the fonts etc.

Now select the Settings tab and work through each of the tabs there to set up your defaults. You’ll find the Help menu is quite comprehensive.

That’s it…your blog is live on the web and now you need to get some cont in there.

Keep on Winning

Regards

Jim

Do you want to learn how you can get off to a quick startin Internet Marketing? Then read my fast start guide “3Surefire Ways to Make Money Online”. Download it free here: http://homebasedbusinessontheweb.com/cap/Jim Keayes is an expert Internet Marketer. He coachesinternationally in how to build successful Home BasedBusinesses Online.You can visit his website at:http://homebasedbusinessontheweb.com/

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