What Internet Marketers Can Learn From Obvious Ada

What Internet Marketers Can Learn From Obvious Adams

by: Jo Han Mok

A very long time ago, 1916 to be exact, The Saturday Evening Post began publishing a column about a young man named ขObvious Adamsข. Adams was a fictional caricature of a wouldbe advertising man who was so simple, and so guileless, in his thinking that he was brilliant in spite of himself.

The column gained popularity in business circles for its plain wisdom and straightforward advice. The Adams narrative wasn’t merely a ขgood storyข, it was a source of actionable information. Each installment found young Adams facing a new marketing challenge bestowed upon him by his employer. His knack for finding the solutions which hid in plain site earned him his namesake.

The story of Adams was finally published in book form by Robert Updegraff and used as a primer for new advertising executives. Although the text is somewhat quaint, it is a quick, pleasant read and I highly recommend locating a copy for your library.

So, what can you learn from Mr. ขObvious Adamsข? A lot! We will examine and discuss a few choice excerpts from the work, and reveal their application to your every day marketing challenges.

The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Oil

ขI want to get into the advertising business and I want to work for you, and I thought the obvious thing to do was to come and tell you so.ข

What is the lesson here? If you want something: ask! Likewise, if you want results, take immediate action.

Let me ask you this: how many opportunities have you let slip past simply because you were afraid to go direct to the source of profit? For example, how long have you had a super joint venture idea sitting on the backburner because you’re afraid to contact potential partners?

In the quoted material, Adams is addressing a fictional advertising big wig named James B.Oswald. Adams had promptly awoken in the morning to pay a visit to the man and ask him for a job. Do you find that a bit gutsy? After all, he’s a no name kid. Oswald runs a huge, profitable corporation.

Similarly, do you ever say to yourself: ขWho do I think I am? These big internet marketing gurus won’t give me the time of dayข? Well, guess what? They’re human just like you are. They got where they are by asking for what they wanted and needed and by taking action.

When you have a desire and a plan of action, don’t sit around hemming and hawing about it or doubting yourself. Follow Adams’ lead and shut out all other thoughts except the most logical. You want X, do Y. You need to make contacts, go make the contacts.

You can’t know what the possibilities are until you reach for them, and you can’t get what you want unless you ask for it.

Live and Breathe Your Market

ขAdams proceeded to study up on the subject of peaches. He though, studied, dreamed and ate peaches, fresh, canned, and pickled. He sent for government bulletins. He spent his evenings studying canning.ข

Do you really want to be more competitive? Would you like to know the absolute best price point for your products? Would you like write absolutely killer copy that pulls in sales and outperforms your current control? If you do, then you need to live and breathe in your market.

This is an obvious business principle that often gets overlooked by new home business owners. You jump into a niche and maybe you have some experience – maybe it’s one of your hobbies – but do you really know the industry? Do you know which trade publications to read? Do you know what the current wholesale price is for your product, or what the demand is for your information?

It is very difficult to sell something you don’t know much about. Pick a subject you aren’t familiar with, invent an imaginary product and try writing copy for it. Not very easy, is it?

Now, pick something you do know a lot about, and try to write out everything you know. You’ve probably got a sizeable list, but I ‘ll wager that you’ve left off more than you realize.

Adams went to great lengths to read up on peaches. Peaches! What more can be said about a peach than its piece of fruit, grows on trees and tastes good? Well, as Adams revealed, there’s a lot more to be said.

Don’t ever assume that you know all there is to know about your market, your customers or your product. There is always another feature or benefit hidden somewhere in the fine print, in those daytoday facts that we are so used to we become immune from them.

Are You ‘Selling’ Enough?

ขWe have been doing wonderful cake advertising, but we have overlooked the very things you have pointed out in your plan. We have been doing too much advertising and not enough selling.ข

Read that last sentence again. It reveals a very important distinction. Advertising and selling are not mirror images of each other.

In fact, the best way to discern the difference between the two is in the following definition: Advertising focuses on features and facts. Selling focuses on benefits.

AD

We offer the very best in leather jackets. Our spring sale features 50% discounts and free shipping!

Sales Pitch

The soft, supple skin of our topofthe line bomber jacket will make everyone envious of you! The woollined interior will keep you warm in the winter so you can brave the harshest elements. The zip out feature lets you use the jacket in cool weather, too – so you won’t be too hot or too cold but you’ll still look stylish!

An advertisement says: ขHere is our product. Here’s what it can do. Here’s how much it costs.ข On the other hand, a powerful piece of sales copy says: ขYou’ll feel 10 years younger and rekindle your love with our product: Here, touch it, feel it, test it, have a sample of it.ข

An advertising campaign creates brand awareness and creates general interest. A sales campaign captures that interest and converts it into desire.

So, if your conversion rates aren’t what you’d like them to be, the first thing to do is check your copy. Does your sales letter read like one big advertisement? You’re spending money on traffic, but what are the customers seeing once they arrive at your site? Are they being sold effectively?

There is always a reason for the customer’s decision not to buy, and failure to execute good salesmanship is one of them. It doesn’t matter how good your product is or what it costs. It doesn’t matter if you’re giving away millions of dollar worth of value for pennies on the dollar. If the customer can’t see the benefits of owning the product himself, he won’t buy.

The Path of Least Resistance: Common Sense

ขIt’s that everlasting obviousness in Adams that I banked on. He doesn’t get carried away from the facts; he just looks them squarely in the face and then proceeds to analyze, and that is half the battle.

Indeed, many of the answers to your most pressing marketing challenges are hidden within common sense. The problem is that many people just don’t enjoy thinking. They’re lazy and thought takes up too much energy. Imagine how much expense you could save yourself if only you were to put in the hard work of an honest analysis of your business – and that means sitting down and analyzing:

Your overhead

Your prices

Your copy

Your traffic stats and logs

Customer feedback

Keyword performance

Email campaign data on open rates and conversions

The answers you find can sometimes be as simple as having a server crash or a nonworking order link, or as tricky as a design element on your page which looks fine to you but confuses prospects and drives them away.

You should test and track every element of your sales chain. This means you need to pay attention to your traffic sources, to the copy on the links from those sources, to the landing page which gives visitors their first impression, to the follow up material you send. Each element plays an important role in finetuning the prospect’s mind and opening it up for your ultimate pitch.

Any weak link in the chain can cost you sales. Imagine one day that you send out an offer to your list without first double checking that the link works? Then, you have to send out a second message to apologize and provide the correct link. The odds are good that a significant percentage of your list won’t bother opening the second email. If you’d reached them the first time, though, there would be money in your pocket.

Some of the other ‘gotchas’ that can ruin a campaign: click fraud on the pay per click engines, product theft, missed customer support emails and wasted money on underperforming keywords and other forms of advertising.

There’s no real excuse for being lazy on these things! Yes, you can try to cut corners, but you’ll pay for it at some point. It’s like a brick and mortar merchant leaving the doors unlocked at night. You’re practically guaranteed to experience a wipe out sooner or later.

In Conclusion

There’s an old classic from the same era as ขObvious Adamsข called How to Live on 24 Hours a Day. The wisdom one can glean from Adams’ straightforward and common sense approach to business could be called How to Market on 24 Hours a Day. Too often we overcomplicate things when the simple answer is staring us right in the face. Learn to step back and execute a ‘horsesense’ analysis of the facts at hand. The time you save, and the profits you keep, will be immeasurable.

Copyright 2005 Jo Han Mok

About The Author

Jo Han Mok is a frequent guest and featured speaker at Internet Marketing bootcamps and conferences on subjects such as copywriting and Joint Venture Marketing. Discover his hardcore sixfigure pulling secrets of กsalesmanship in printก at: http://www.MasterWordsmith.com.

This article was posted on January 23, 2005

by Jo Han Mok

Affiliate Program Basics

Affiliate Program Basics

by: Albert Hallado

Affiliate Program is a ground floor opportunity. All you have to do is send visitors to your affiliate web site by placing a textlink or banner on your website and receive a commission on each sale, without the complication and expense of selling anything yourself.

Instead, you earn a commission for producing a ransaction. Affiliate programs, also known as Referral Programs, Associate Programs, Profit Sharing Programs or Reseller programs, give affiliates the ability to create an online business selling thousands products and services.

One of the first affiliate programs was run by the mega bookstore, Amazon.com. They still have the largest base of affiliates on the net although they may not be the best affiliate program for many! with over 600,000 web sites being affiliated.

Affiliate programs are generally offered by sites selling goods or services, although some affiliate programs reward other types of transaction such as getting a visitor to sign up for a free newsletter, or a download.

Some affiliate programs pay per lead rather than per sale, in other words, you bring them a prospective customer and they pay a fixed กfinderกs feeก for the chance to market to that customer.

This is a typical arrangement for affiliate programs in the insurance, real estate and credit card industries, for example:

Types of Affiliate Programs

Pay per sale: If you refer a visitor to the online merchantกs site and if visitor makes a purchase you get a percentage of the sale as commission.

Pay per lead: You get paid a onetime fee for generating a lead for the merchant. Usually you get paid $2$5 if the visitor you referred fills out an application.

Pay per click: You get paid for every visitor you send to the online merchant regardless of any sale or purchase. Usually companies pay $0.05 $0.15 per click.

TwoTier: You get commission on direct sales you generate and also you get commission on sales generated by affiliates you recruited. Usually companies pay 25% commission for direct sales and 5% for sales generated by your affiliates.

Bounty: You get a onetime finderกs fee payment for the visitor you referred. You will not get commission on any future purchases that customer makes.

When you join an affiliate program, you will be given a specially formatted URL (Links) that you should use to link to the affiliate providerกs site.

This will enable the affiliate provider to monitor traffic to your site and pay according to the type of affiliate program.

The Benefit of an Affiliate Program

Is that you just need to drive traffic to your affiliate site. Write a few articles and provide a few links.

You don’t need to find or deal with brokers, wholesalers, inventory, process orders, shipping & handling, customer service, tech support, handle returns, warranties, employees, etc

An affiliate doesn’t even have to be present, your site will keep earning money while you’re sick, on vacation, or just doing something else.

Another advantage of being an affiliate, is that you do it from almost anywhere in the world..

How The System Works?

Many affiliate programs pay a commission based on a percentage of the revenue generated by purchases made by visitors coming from your website.

For example; if you’re participating in an affiliate program that offers a 25% commission and you

send a visitor who purchases US$100 worth of products, youกve just earned US$25 in commissions.

The commission rate itself can vary from 20% up to 50%+ in the case of intangible products such as eBooks or website subscriptions.

Affiliate programs vary widely in terms of overall quality, reliability, commission , statistics, the amount of help that the merchant site offers in marketing the products or services it sells, and so on.

By thoroughly understanding an affiliate program, youกll minimize the risk of not getting paid and maximize your potential earnings.

About The Author

Albert Hallado

Owner of netbizreview.com (Guide To Internet Based Business)Albert is known for interviewing online business experts and Helping Entrepreneurs Doing Business On The Internet

[email protected]

This article was posted on December 04, 2004

by Albert Hallado

Five Step To A Successful Online Shopping Business

Five Step To A Successful Online Shopping Business

by: Linda Quinones

Before you set out to explore the online shopping market you should do some planning, take a piece of paper and pen and write down the steps that will help to bring in traffic to your website.

And once they have visited you must have something to entice them to remain and do some shopping, in our website: www.shopshopshop.org. We try to mix our affiliate, we have some highly recognizable name and some not so well known.

One frequent complain we get is the cost of shipping, people are willing to pay for convenience but they do not want to pay for shipping, so we use the free shipping banners when available.

And the great savings the affiliates are offering, this is a lure to catch their attention, after all when people are saving money and are provided with theconvenience of shopping from the comfort of their home they are happy.

Step (1). Mix your affiliates you want some well known names, but remember the well known retailer pay the lowest commissions and are the most demanding.

Don’t settle for the first affiliates that accepts you, you may start with a few, but if you build your site right some of the affiliates that turn you down will revisit your site and approve you.

Make sure to keep good records, and stay on top of the affiliate emails to be able to use the incentives they provide to induce people into buying the products your affiliates are offering.

Develop a program where shoppers will provide their email address so that you can inform them of future promotions and savings available to them.

(2). Links are a way to have search engines give your site a high ranking, reciprocal link exchange are a good way to get started , many businesses are in the same position you are in and are looking to link to somebody.

The more links you have leading to your site the better the search engine will rank you. You may choose to pay for links and here again make sure they are giving you good companies to link with.

If you a have a family oriented business you don’t want to be link to an adult site. You want sites that related your business or are complimentary.

A example would be if you have a site that sells only clothing you would like to link with a site that sells jewelry or footwear.

(3). Keywords: key words play a crucial role in your internet business, people must be able to find you. Keywords are what people search for on search engines.

People who have never heard of your company are not going to look for youby name but they go on the search engine and type in keywords to be let to a site that matches the keywords provided.

If the keywords type in relate to the keywords on your site then you will getcustomer to come and visit your site, and hopefully buy something.

You will want to have as many combination of keywords as possible in order to drive web traffic to your site, Make sure you have the most popular search terms and use as many as possible.

Keywords is the key to traffic and traffic the key to sales, when your web page comes up near the top ten in response to a searches on searche engines , your traffic will increase and so will your sales.

(4). Contacts: everybody knows somebody so start using the those contacts to promote your business, but do so in a tactful manner so that people are not turn off by your aggressiveness.

Giving somebody a business card and asking them to checkout your website might be a very soft sell that might lead to conversation about your business and help you gain a potential customer.

Just think of all the people that you come in contact with on a daily basis, by themselves it will not be enough to make a fortune but added to the other marketing results it could make your business venture a profitable one.

(5). Incentives: Offer businesses incentives to continuously use your site for their purchases, businesses expend thousands of dollars every month on office products and other essential items for their businesses but get nothing in return, so offer them some kind of rebate or free items for purchasing through your site.

Offering a free gift for individual is also a good policy but make sure that it is contingent on purchases being made so that you don’t attract all the freeloaders.

Everybody shops the question is where? Your job is to make sure they do it on your site. Or preferably at www.shopshopshop.org.

About The Author

Linda Quinones has been active in promoting her own site while helping others to succeed in the Internet marketing field. Previously she was involved the financial sector for several years. Her website is: http://www.shopshopshop.org.

This article was posted on August 12

by Linda Quinones

Pizzazz Prevents Piracy of your Articles

Pizzazz Prevents Piracy of your Articles

by: Darby Higgs

Writing articles for the web is an effective way to bring more traffic to your site. You write the article, you include a link in the authorกs info box, you submit it to article distributors and it gets reproduced with a link back to your site. You get traffic from the link as well some kudos from the search engines which will eventually build even more traffic. Bonza!

But what happens if someone just grabs your article and reuses it without the link? You get nothing for your effort in writing the article!

Before you can do anything about it you need to know how to find the culprits. Enter stage left our friends at Google. Google has a wonderful service called Google alerts which will send you an email if and when a page containing a keyword or keyword phrase is found by its busy little spiders.

Access Google Alerts by going to www.google.com/alerts Then you can enter your keyword phrase inside double quotes, select Web for Search Type and decide on a frequency of report. You can come back to change any of these details later, experience will guide you to the best settings for your situation. Easypeasy. Every time the spiders find your phrase you will get an email telling you where it was found.

The alerts will tell you how successful your distribution method has been and it will also tell you if people are reproducing your articles without including the link. Then you can do something about it.

What has this got to do with pizzazz? Distinctive keyword phrases are needed to make this monitoring work. If you use a phrase like web promotion or like traffic building you will get lots of false positives, webpages with the phrase but not your article.

So you need to spice up your articles with some unusual words in unusual combinations in other words pizzazz. Use two or three word phrases, just ignore any punctuation, Google will treat it as spaces. Don’t forget to put your key phrase into double quotes. Google will then find just your page or copies of it and you can easily check that everyone is playing cricket. Pirates will be quickly detected.

For this item I could use any of these as my keyword phrase false positive webpages, pizzazz distinctive, traffic bonza, cricket pirates All in double quotes). None are likely to appear elsewhere on the web, but if they do Google Alerts will pick them up, and I can edit the alert to ensure only this article is reported.

Writing articles with pizzazz (use a thesaurus) is more fun, and your articles will stay in the mind of your readers mind a little longer.

About The Author

Darby Higgs is editor of OzArticles at http://wwww.ozarticles.com a clearing house of articles with Australian content.

darby @ozarticles.com

This article was posted on March 27

by Darby Higgs

Google Page Rank Important Or Just Another Numbe

Google Page Rank Important Or Just Another Number?

by: Richard Grady

In my last newsletter I wrote about how your websites Alexa rating is not actually that important to the success of your online business. In this issue, I want to look at another popular statistic Google Page Rank and ask a similar question is it that important?

First a quick overview as to what the Google Page Rank actually is…

Google Page Rank (or PR as it is often referred to as) is simply an indication of the number of websites that link to a specific website. It also attempts to indicate the quality of those links. PR ranges from 0 to 10 (with 10 being the กbestก PR and 0 being the กworstก). The vast majority of small business websites will usually find they have a PR of between 0 and 5.

To calculate a particular sites PR, Google uses a fairly complicated algorithm based on the number of web links that it is aware of that link to the site in question. This algorithm will also take into account the PR of the page that is providing the link, thus a link from a web page that has a PR of 7 will be considered more valuable than a link from a page with a PR of 4.

Because of the way in which links from higher PRranked sites are considered more important, many people are choosing to buy links from websites with high PRกs just so that they can increase their own PR. I have seen sites selling a simple text link on their home page for over $700 a month purely based on the fact that they have a PR of 7 or above. This may seem like a lot of money but when you consider that the website owners that are buying these links often have websites that are in no way relevant to the content of the site linking to them, it is absolutely ridiculous.

Take this example, letกs say you have a website about health and fitness and you buy a link for $500 a month from a random website because it has a PR of 7. This random website has no relevance to your health and fitness site so what is going to happen? Well, your own PR may increase as a result of the link. You may get a bit of extra traffic but probably not much since people don’t click on links that that they are not interested in. You will definitely be $500 poorer at the end of the month!

Instead, why not spend the $500 on payperclick advertising and benefit from some quality, targeted traffic?

Of course, there is a bit more to it than that and the reason that most people want to increase their PR is because Google takes this statistic into account when determining where a website will be displayed in their search results. Many people assume that a high PR automatically equals a high search engine placement for their chosen keywords. Not so….

PR is just one of over 100 different factors that Google takes into account when deciding where your website will feature (and these factors and the main algorithm change on a very regular basis). It is perfectly possible for a website with a PR of 5 to get a higher ranking than a PR 7 site if it has better content or is more relevant for the search term in question.

Remember that relevance is all important with Google and a link from a website that is not relevant to your own site will be considered far less important than a relevant one (which makes buying links from random sites purely because they have a high PR even more crazy).

I have read several rumours lately that Google haven’t updated PRกs for a couple of months and they are considering phasing PR out or modifying it in some way. This is pure speculation but it wouldn’t surprise me in the least. PR is easily manipulated (for example by purchasing links as described above) and Google doesn’t like to have their calculations or search results manipulated. It stands to reason that they will be looking at ways of preventing this.

So, in summary, is Google Page Rank important to your business?

Well, it is a good indicator of how many other sites link to yours and how important Google considers your site to be BUT I personally don’t place too much importance on this statistic and I certainly won’t be paying out for a link from a website just because it has a high PR.

As I said above, Google changes itกs rules on a regular basis and I see little point in chasing a particular PR on the basis that it might get you higher search engine rankings. If Google do decide to do away with PR, all your work will have been for nothing.

Instead, concentrate on building quality, relevant links from sites that are connected in some way to your own site content. This will ensure that any traffic you receive via these links will at least have an interest in your site. Building links on this basis will automatically increase your PR over time (without the need to pay out for overpriced, irrelevant links). If you do things this way and Google does scrap the PR indicator, it shouldn’t affect you in any way and the links you have in place will continue to benefit you.

Remember, in the same way that a low Alexa rating doesn’t guarantee traffic or sales, neither does a high PR. Sure a high PR is a กnice to haveก but lots of traffic and high sales is even nicer 🙂

Copyright 2004 Richard Grady

About The Author

Richard Grady has been helping people earn online since 1998. Find out more about Richard at: http://www.thetraderonline.com Free wholesale search engines: UK http://www.wholesale118.co.uk and US http://www.thewholesaletrader.com

This article was posted on October 04, 2004

by Richard Grady

Advertising กClick Fraudก Rampant Online?

Advertising กClick Fraudก Rampant Online?

by: Jim Edwards

กPayperclick,ก by far the most popular form of online advertising, recently came under fire as charges of rampant กclick fraudก gather steam on the Web.

Google and Yahoo! earn the majority of their money through sales of advertising to tensofthousands of online merchants, companies, and professional.

In fact, some estimate that 99% of all Googleกs revenue comes from advertising sales. Unfortunately, allegations of click fraud may well rain on Googleกs otherwise sunny parade and cause a whole scale revamping of current online advertising practices.

Payperclick advertising does exactly what it sounds: advertisers pay for each click on their ad, usually mixed in among search engine results or displayed on relevant websites.

กClick fraudก occurs when, for whatever reason, an ad gets clicked by someone or something (usually an automated กbotก that simulates clicks) with no intention of ever buying anything from the advertiser.

The sole intention of click fraud is to simply drain an advertiserกs budget and leave them with nothing to show but an empty wallet.

Who commits click fraud?

Usually an unscrupulous competitor who wants to break a rivalกs bank, online กvandalsก who get their kicks causing other people grief, or search engine advertising affiliates who want to earn fat commissions by racking up piles of bogus clicks.

Regardless of who does it or why, click fraud appears to be a growing problem search engines hope stays under their advertising clientsก radar.

This problem isn’t exactly news to the search engine giants.

In fact, on page 60 of their 3rd quarter Report for 2004, Google admits that they have ‘regularly refunded revenueก to advertisers that was กattributed to clickthrough fraud.ก

Google further states that if they don’t find a way to deal with this problem ‘these types of fraudulent activities could hurt our brand.ก

Bottom line for Google and Yahoo! (which owns Overture, the Webกs largest payperclick search engine): as word of click fraud spreads across the Web, they must act quickly to calm the nerves of advertisers who could well abandon them over doubts about the veracity of their advertising charges.

The search engines all claim to carry measures that identify and detect click fraud, but details about how they do it and to what extent remain sketchy.

They claim revealing details about security would compromise their efforts and give the perpetrators a leg up on circumventing their defenses.

This sounds good, but affords little comfort to advertisers who feel caught between losing out on their best traffic sources and paying for advertising that won’t result in revenue.

One way to protect your business against click fraud is to closely monitor your website statistics.

Look for an unusually high number or regular pattern of clicks from the same IP address.

If you need help, enlist the aid of your hosting provider to aid you in spotting suspicious trends in your website traffic.

Also, a number of services such as ClickSentinel.com have sprung up online to help advertisers spot and quickly analyze and compile the data necessary to effectively dispute fraudulent click charges with the search engines.

© Jim Edwards All Rights reserved

http://www.thenetreporter.com

About The Author

Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the coauthor of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how to use fr^e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website or affiliate links…

Simple ‘traffic Machineก brings Thousands of NEW visitors to your website for weeks, even months… without spending a dime on advertising! ==> http://www.turnwordsintotraffic.com

This article was posted on August 29

by Jim Edwards

Where Do You Find Time for a Home Based Business?

Where Do You Find Time for a Home Based Business?

by: Gobala Krishnan

I am very often asked this question by affiliates in my home business network, and almost every time it happens, I just shake my head in pity and disbelief. They just don’t get it…

Where DO you find the time to run, manage and promote your home based business? I honestly don’t know. I know one thing for sure; you can never really กfindก time; you must กmake timeก.

Many who are new to the concept of running a home based business suffer what I like to call the กIndecision Syndromeก. They have not made up their minds that they WANT or NEED a home based business, and my friend let me tell you, until you have made a decision you will never have time on your side.

You will never be able to devote even 1 hour to building a business for yourself if you don’t have the sense of urgency, and if you don’t understand what a home based business can do for your life and your family in the long term.

Hereกs what the people who claim they can’t กfindก time do; they put the least priority on their business. Everything else in life seems more important to them and they generally place their home based business last in the in the order of daily importance, such as this:

Spend 45 minutes in a jam

Go to work and slug for their boss

Hangout with friends a local pub after work

Spend 45 minutes in a jam

Get home and cook dinner

Do all the domestic chores

Watch a few hours of TV

Get ready for the next day of work

Sit on their PC and read sports news

Devote the rest of their time to their home based business

If you’re one of those that feel you have กno timeก for your home based business then I challenge you to tell me this is not at least somewhat true. Prove me wrong. Make me eat my words. Chances are youกll find that difficult to do…

Guilty as charged, right… 🙂

If you prioritize your hours in such a way, how do you even realistically expect to กfind timeก? How do you realistically expect to กBe your own bossก and have กFinancial Freedomก?

The truth is anyone who REALLY wants to build a home based business must make a conscious decision that they are going to do it no matter what it takes. After that lifechanging decision is made, there has to be sacrifice…

I can almost hear you say กHuh? Sacrifice? Sacrifice what?ก

You have to sacrifice the time you spend doing nonproductive and nonincomegenerating activities everyday, and replace the gained time to do the really important tasks. If you’re serious about making time for your business, there is no other way. Youกll be amazed at how much you can achieve.

Stuck in a jam?

Hereกs what I do; I always have some educational or selfmotivational cassette or CD in the car. I even have Internet marketing CDs that I listen to dayin and dayout for 90 minutes (actually mineกs not that long). Thatกs a whole 90 minutes of learning new things every single day, and improving my interpersonal and technical skills constantly. Don’t I like to listen to music while driving? Yes, I do. But the sacrifice has to be there. I now listen to about 15 minutes of music only if I really feel like it.

Chill out with friends?

Hereกs what I do; I tell them not to bother me during the week because I am busy, but I make it a point to get together at least once a fortnight with some really close associates. Because of my attitude, I get curious enquiries like กWhat is it that you’re so busy withก?

And guess what I tell them? I say กLook John, I have found a way I can be financially free in 23 years and I am dedicating my life to it. I know for a fact that I will achieve it, and Iกd like to have you as my partner. If you’re interested to find out more, let me know. Otherwise, don’t stop my progressก.

Excellent prospecting line too, don’t you think?

What about all the household chores that you have? Hey, I have them too. But I know that there are better ways to make use of my time, so I กoutsourceก my laundry, car maintenance and almost everything I can. I know I will probably spend more money than I usually do, but I am intent on กmaking timeก for my home based business.

I stopped watching TV years ago, and even went almost a year without one. However I do go to the cinemas and watch the news, but I just can’t be bothered with watching every season of CSI or the American Idol because I know there are more productive things I can do with my time. Now you may be wondering ‘that’s radical. Do you mean I have to sacrifice my entertainment when I start my own business?ก

No… not really, but you MUST learn to control it. Go to the local bookstore and try getting a book on profiles of really rich and famous people. I guarantee you that youกll find out most of them don’t watch much TV either. The theory of Delayed Gratification states that in order to have any amount of success in life, you must learn to postpone your pleasures until you have achieved your goal. Isn’t it worth sacrificing your TV time for 2 years, and after that, be able to watch your favorite shows on a 56 inch plasma TV, with all the time in the world?

You tell me…

Don’t let the little things rob you of great opportunities. Time is the only common denominator between the rich, the middleclass and the poor. In other words, the only thing the rich and the poor share is that they both have 24 hours a day. Itกs how we make use of our time that will determine how far we go towards achieving our dreams.

Copyright 2005 Gobala Krishnan

About The Author

Gobala Krishnan is an author and home based business entrepreneur. Get his free ebook called กMy Internet Dreamก and 10 FREE training lessons on Internetbased network marketing at http://www.MyInternetDream.com today!

This article was posted on April 14

by Gobala Krishnan

Writing Powerful Effective Solo Ads

Writing Powerful Effective Solo Ads

by: Steven Boaze

Everybody wants to make more money… In fact, most people would like to hit upon something that makes them fabulously rich! And seemingly, one of the easiest roads to the fulfillment of these dreams of wealth is writing effective solo ads and using them correctly

The only thing is, hardly anyone gives much real thought to the basic ingredient of selling by email the writing of profitable solo ads. If your online business is to succeed, then you must acquire the expertise of writing solo ads that sell your product or services!

So what makes a solo ad good or bad? First of all, it must appeal to the reader, and as such, it must say exactly what you want it to say. Secondly, it has to say what it says in the least possible number of words in order to keep your operating costs within your budget. And thirdly, it has to produce the desired results whether inquiries or sales.

Grabbing the readerกs attention is your first objective. You must assume the reader is กscanningก the page on which your ad appears in the company of two or three hundred solo ads. Therefore, there has to be something about your ad that causes them to stop scanning and look at yours! So, the first two or three words of your ad are of the utmost importance and deserve your careful consideration. Most surveys show that words or phrases that quickly involve the reader, tend to be the best attentiongrabbers. Such words as: FREE… WIN… MAKE BIG MONEY…

Whatever words you use as attentiongrabbers, to start your ads, you should bear in mind that theyกll be competing with similar attentiongrabbers of the other ads on the same page. Therefore, in addition to your lead words, your ad must quickly go on to promise or state further benefits to the reader.

In the language of professional copywriters, youกve grabbed the attention of your prospect, and interested them with something that even they can do.

The next rule of good solo ad copywriting has to do with the arousal of the readerกs desire to get in on your offer. In a great many instances, this rule is bypassed, and it appears, this is the real reason that an ad doesn’t pull according to the expectations of the advertiser.

Think about it youกve got your readerกs attention; youกve told them itกs easy and simple; and you’re about to ask them to do something. Unless you take the time to further กwant your offer,ก your ad is going to only half turn them on. theyกll compare your ad with the others that have grabbed their attention and finally decide upon the one that interests them the most.

What Iกm saying is that here is the place for you to insert that magic word กguaranteedก or some other such word or phrase. So now, weกve got an ad that reads: MAKE BIG MONEY! Easy & Simple. Guaranteed!

Now the reader is turned on, and in their mind, can’t lose. You’re ready to ask for their money. This is the กdemand for actionก part of your ad. This is the part where you want to use such words as:

Limited offer Act now! Write today! Only and/or just… Putting it all together, then your ad might read something like this: MAKE BIG MONEY! Easy & Simple. Guaranteed! Limited offer. Send $l to:

These are the ingredients of any good solo ad Attention Interest Desire Action… Without these four ingredients skillfully integrated into your ad, chances are your ad will just กlie thereก and not do anything but cost you money. What i have just shown you is a basic solo ad. Although such an ad could be placed in any leading publication and would pull a good response, itกs known as a กblind adก and would pull inquiries and responses from a whole spectrum of people reading the publication in which it appeared. In other words, from as many ‘timewastersก as from bona fide buyers.

To give you an example of the kind of solo ad you might want to use, say to sell a report such as this one… Using all the rules of basic advertising copywriting, and stating exactly what our product is, our ad reads thusly:

MONEYMAKERกS SECRETS! How To Write winning solo ads. Simple & easy to learn should double or triple your responses. Rush $1 to BC Sales, 10 Main Anytown, va 75001.

The point i am making is that:

Youกve got to grab the readerกs attention…

Youกve got to กinterest themก with something that appeals to them…

Youกve got to กfurther stimulateก him with something (catchphrase) that makes them กdesireก the product or service…

Demand that he act immediately…

Thereกs no point in being tricky or clever. Just adhere to the basics and your profits will increase accordingly. One of the best ways of learning to write good solo ads is to study the other solo ads out there try to figure out exactly what they’re attempting to sell and then practice rewriting them according to the rules Iกve just given you. Whenever you sit down to write a solo ad, always write it all out write down everything you want to say and then go back over it, crossing out words, and refining your phraseology.

Generally speaking, readers respond more often to solo ads that include a name than to those showing just initials or an address only. However, because advertising costs are based upon the number of words, or the amount of space your solo ad uses, the use of some names in solo ads could become quite expensive. If i were to ask our ad respondents to write to or send their money to The Research Writers & Publishers Association, or to Book Business Mart, or even to Money Makerกs Opportunity Digest, my advertising costs would be prohibitive. Thus we shorten our name Researchers or MoneyMakers. The point here is to think relative to the placement costs of your solo ad, and to shorten excessively long names.

The important thing is to know the rules of profitable solo ad writing, and to follow them. Hold your costs in line. once your solo ad is written, now is the time to use it wisely know the basics…grab their attention… the rest is up to you.

About The Author

Steven Boaze (Chairman) is The Owner of The Corporate Headquarters Boaze.com Which houses and controls four companies (Web Development Technology www.webdevelopmenttechnology.com) (Boaze Publishing www.boazepublishing.biz) (Business Marketing Guide www.businessmarketingguide.com) (Ezine Remedy www.ezineremedy.com). Steven is also the author of กHidden Secrets To Business Marketingก Ebook along with numerous articles on Marketing and Advertising published by Boaze Publishing. Copyright © 19982003 Boaze.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on December 23, 2003

by Steven Boaze

กMarketing as a Spiritual Practice II: Unearthing

กMarketing as a Spiritual Practice II: Unearthing Your Potentialก

by: Allison Bliss

Marketing as we know it is over. Done. Finito.

People the world over are bored and spammed to the brink of tears. But there is good news: There’s a better way to connect with precisely those you wish to reach … and it works far better than traditional, expensive, gimmickdriven marketing.

We call this method ขMarketing as a Spiritual Practice.ข Why? Because marketing is actually a process, just like any real spiritual quest. It takes time. There are countless ขmonstersข (or at the very least, struggles) at every juncture. We learn our lessons through trying and failing. And despair, it seems, is always just around the corner. But this process teaches us invaluable lessons:

Experiencing success and failure shows that you are really trying. True, you’ll have periods of denial, followed by frustration, and anger. But these will eventually be followed by enlightenment and elation.

Marketing really is much more than a task to achieve financial success. It’s about unearthing potential—in your business, in the leaders of your company, and in the kinds of clients you attract. And when you learn to market as a spiritual practice, the sense that marketing is a ขchoreข will vanish. Instead, the process becomes meaningful, so you’ll value and enjoy it.

Once you break from hohum marketing and learn to put your deeper beliefs ขout to the universeข (think: ขa broader level of promotionข), a remarkable thing will happen: You will attract those who really need and appreciate the products or services your company provides. It’s an incredibly simple concept. [Then again, Buddhists say their methods are simple, yet it takes decades for their monks to master them.]

Rules for Marketing as a Spiritual Practice

If the following rules for this new marketing paradigm sound ขNew Age,ข read between the lines of any enormous business success story (even Donald Trump) and you’ll find similar guidelines (OK, so maybe #4 would be a major stretch for The Donald!).

Whatever you put out to the universe, you will get back.

Use intuition, willingness, clarity, and truth in your messages.

Let your vision, beliefs, and values guide all decisions for the greater purpose of your work.

Address problems with a willingness to learn, openmindedness, and most important – with compassion.

Continue to grow, take calculated risks, believe your clients, have faith in yourself and your business … and take action to gain success!

Listen to Your Intuition

When you are ready to refocus your marketing, there are practices you can begin right away. First, consider that when you do not listen to your intuition, things often go very, very wrong. Consider these examples:

Case Studies: FedEx and Starbucks

Let’s start with understanding the value of intuition. Like these successful business founders, you must continually practice ขtrusting your gutข to make appropriate marketing decisions.

Based on his intuition of the market demand and potential for a guaranteed overnight delivery service, Fred Smith wrote a paper for his college professor. Said professor was not encouraging in the slightest. But Smith still followed his gut instinct, did his research and preparation, and developed solid marketing. As a result, his company, FedEx, is one of the world’s biggest success stories.

A similar intuition struck Howard Schultz. While in a café in Milan, Schultz realized that Americans would pay over $3 for a cup of coffee. Thus did the creator of Starbucks give birth to his company, which has enjoyed phenomenal international growth in the past few years. Obviously, Schultz was correct in following his instinct!

Willingness & RiskTaking

Willingness is the state of mind that takes an idea from intuition to creation. But too often, this willingness is defeated by a belief (especially inherent in business owners or entrepreneurs) that ขwe can do it all ourselves.ข If you are open to assistance and you have good direction, you will usually reach your goals.

Case in point: We worked with a writing firm owner who wanted to return to her roots, doing more journalistic projects. After years of writing marketing materials and web content for technologybased firms, this owner lacked the confidence to approach editors of consumerfocused publications and pitch her story ideas.

After a Speed Consulting session (just $180), our team helped her map out a strategy for breaking through her painpoints, and created several simpletoexecute tactics:

development of a story outline

creation of an attentiongrabbing & strategic editorial pitch

identification of a targeted media list to contact

In just a week, we convinced two publications to pick up one of her articles. True, few stories are sold this quickly. But we believe that it was the writer’s willingness to adapt to the editors’ exact needs that allowed her business goals to be realized. In fact, one of the publications has since advised her that they would like her to write a series of articles…so this could be the beginning of an exciting, ongoing relationship for this very talented writer.

What is the Value of This ขSpiritualข Approach? In Her Own Words …

ขAfter 20 years as a writer, and writing about everyone else’s products and services, I found it hard to pitch my own. But Allison helped me to remember that editors are simply another target market seeking a product (my writing) that will meet their editorial requirements, and will be of interest to their readers.

What was really wonderful about my consultation with Allison was that she made the process so simple. I had only to accomplish a few tasks, play to my own strengths, and the rest took care of itself. I could never have done this without Allison’s immediate grasp of my needs, her very wise counsel, and her help with the pitches.

I tell my friends: If you’re paralyzed by a bad case of the ขbutsข (I’m really good at this, but…), and you truly have a willingness to succeed, do yourself a HUGE favor and call Allison! She can get you ขunstuckข and back on track in no time, with her intelligent, caring, costeffective, noBS brand of marketingข — Owner, Lucchesi Communications

More Tips for Implementing Marketing as a Spiritual Practice

If you really care about your clients, you owe it to yourself and to them to stay in touch. Think they’ll automatically remember you? Realistically, when they have a zillion other pressing concerns, and you haven’t been in touch for a while, it’s not likely. It’s absolutely imperative to stay in touch with those you have put so much energy into helping. So keep helping them! Establish a communications program to let these potential clients know you’re still around, and that you’re still available to help them.

Use your network! Trust those who have benefited from your products or services in the past to value you, to want to help you, and to want to help their friends or colleagues by referring you. Ask them to refer you to their associates! Better yet, give them an incentive for referring closed business, such as a coupon for a free massage, dinner for two, tickets to a game, or perhaps an industryappropriate gift.

Take your referrals and leads seriously. If you’re trying to develop your business, you should talk to every potential customer or client, at least, to determine if they need your product or service now or later. If they’re in the ขlaterข category, add them to your database and be sure to stay in touch regularly. Make a concerted effort to do this in the next four months, and you can expect to see some real rewards.

Get help when you need it. When you find yourself working on the tenth revision of a postcard, flier, website, brochure, letter to clients, or similar tool, it’s time to get professional help … no, not a psychotherapist, a marketing pro!

We have New Marketing Products Under $15 that will help busy business owners get what they need right away!

Write Your Company Bio or Profile

Close Sales Faster

Learn the Most Important Website Marketing Tips

Prepare for a Trade Show

Create Advertising that Works

Write a Job Description to Attract the Best Employees

Stop Sabotaging Your Marketing

Removing the Thorn: When Marketing Hurts

About The Author

As a former film & television director, producer, and manager, Allison rebelled against misleading, pushy marketing by consulting with businesses on กMarketing as a Spiritual Practiceก. Clients include United Airlines, Apple Computers, Chevron, ABCTV, HBOTV, advertising agencies, and hundreds of other smaller businesses.

Allison Bliss Consulting combines an expert team of seasoned professionals from the fields of advertising, promotional design & copywriting, event and television production, who offer Fortune 500 companies and entrepreneurs an integrated range of doityourself marketing products & cusomized handson services.

allisonbliss.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on October 05, 2004

by Allison Bliss

How To Appear In Googleกs Local Search Results

How To Appear In Googleกs Local Search Results

by: Lea de Groot

Google doesn’t only exist at http://google.com/ Google also has local versions, such as http://google.ca/, http://google.com.au/ and http://google.co.uk/. Each of these has a selection below the query entry field that allows the user to select either กsearch the webก or กsearch pages from ก. If the visitor selects กsearch pages from ก they will only see results which Google judges as being local to the country in question.

Many webmasters are unaware of what is required to be listed as being กfromก their own country. This article discusses what you need to know to have your site appear in a Google Local search results page.

When Google tries to determine whether your site is appropriate for each of these countryspecific search results, it will firstly examine the TLD of your domain name. For example if you have a site called mysite.co.in, then you will appear when a searcher queries at google.co.in for Indian results.

If you don’t pass this test, Google will give you a second chance and look at the physical location of where your site is hosted. For example, a site hosted in Canada will appear to be a Canadian site to Google and will appear in the results set for a query on google.ca for Canadian pages. (Its actually a little more complicated than that; it depends on the location of the company that owns the IP address used for hosting your site. But 90% of the time the location matches the ownership, so the above description is an adequate approximation.)

So, when I am asked the question กwhy doesn’t my site appear in the google results for my country?ก I answer by first asking if the domain name has a local TLD and then if they are hosted in their country.

If the answer to both is กnoก then I explain they need to either buy a local domain name or move their hosting and then (after a delay while Google กnoticesก) they will appear in the desired result set.

Note that the major exception to this is the US while Google has the .us domain name, it diverts to the general google.com site, so there is no way for US residents to use Google to find local sites.

Getting your website to appear in the local search results as well as the general Google results isn’t hard, but you do have to know what you are doing.

About The Author

Copyright Lea de Groot

Lea de Groot is CEO of Elysian Systems (http://elysiansystems.com/), a leading Australian Search Engine Optimisation & Web Development company based in Brisbane.

A shorter form of this article originally appeared in กWebTalk: Putting Businesses on the Internetก, a newsletter for companies who wish to use their website more effectively (http://elysiansystems.com/newsletter/).

This article was posted on March 16

by Lea de Groot

The TechHeads Need To Build New Software That Mak

The TechHeads Need To Build New Software That Makes Obtaining Information And Collective Communication A Simple Process For The Average Human

by: M6.net

Being the total opposite to a technical person, it is hard to imagine future Internet software advances. The technohumans have come up with incredible ideas and subsequently their ideas have come to fruition. It seems like anything a human puts their mind to can be done. Our species has come such a long way, but I feel the key to the next part in our evolution of technology and consciousness is to integrate the ideas of the average person. Who do we build all this technology for anyway? I think it’s made for humans to have a better life. It’s time to start making the technological advances in computing with the noncomputerbased people of the world in mind. A famous American journalist Sidney J. Harris once said,

ขThe real danger is not that computers will begin to think like men, but that men will begin to think like computers.ข

Computer and Internet specialists have to realize that they have gone so deep into their fields that they now can no longer see what the computer world looks like to a novice like myself. All this technojargon and hundreds of different types of software can be quite overwhelming to a normal person who just wants to take part in this new way of interacting with reality and society.

We’ve got to simplify if we want this awesome force to be integrated into our lives in its highest form. I know the Internet is growing at an incredible rate already. One only has to look at the example of India to see the incredible mark Information Technology has made. You can go into a tiny village that looks relatively the same as it has been for fifty years; the general infrastructure is shocking: broken traffic lights, decrepit buildings, power lines splaying out in chaotic patterns. But, something big has changed; each town now has a satellite dish, and an ISP connection (Internet Service Provider)! This is truly amazing. However I believe it is only the beginning of a new revolution that will arrive when we simplify the information and communication processes.

So what’s the special answer to the sacred question? Well, I haven’t got all the ideas, but I know of six billion human souls out there who I’m sure would have an opinion if you asked them. Find out what people really want and need. Recently I wrote an article on how great it would be if we could get our News from multiple sources instead of the onetomany, topdown structure that feeds us so much negativity today. An opportunity to only read relevant News to the individual’s liking also sounds like a great project to take on. Wouldn’t it also be great if we could communicate easily with others of similar interests? E.g.: Finding the blogs and websites that interest us without having to search for days on end to find them!

These are just a couple ideas the software masters could approach to make the new revolution of collective consciousness and independent thinking a reality. I truly believe the Internet could be the gate of entry into a new dimension for the average citizen of Earth, a dimension that thrives on the sharing of knowledge from multiple perspectives, communication that involves everyone, and incredible access to individuals who you’ve always wanted to meet. Come on people, let’s get with the program! Humans are a resilient, powerful race of creatures; it’s time to duplicate all this energy we’ve put into producing technology and put it into making it easily used by the masses for positive means. The plant has grown into a tall healthy tree, now it’s time to harvest the fruit of all our labor.

About The Author

Jesse S. Somer http://www.m6.net

Jesse S. Somer is a simple humanoid attempting to help bring the separate worlds of social consciousness and technology into the ‘one world’ it is destined to become. Check out his personal humanistic/philosophical blog: www.thepowerofeverythingthatis.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on May 04, 2004

by M6.net

The Workfromhome Fashion Primer

The Workfromhome Fashion Primer

by: David Leonhardt

Last week, I reported how writers, stayathome parents and online marketing geeks had chosen careers as hermits:

http://www.thehappyguy.com/hermit.html

Thousands of workfromhome hermits responded, confessing that they were wearing their pajamas while reading my column. Fortunately very few sent me photos. Here are some of the questions they asked:

Q: Is it acceptable to wear pajamas at high noon if Nobody sees me, or am I committing a fashion fauxpas.

A: It is totally acceptable to wear pajamas at high noon. You can even wear them at low noon. In fact, you can wear them all day long. The only exception is in England you must not wear pajamas at tea time. Pajamas and tea don’t mix. The combination can be lethal. (See the November 2002 report: กSpontaneous combustion among British workathome hermits.ก)

Q: How should I handle กcasual Fridaysก in my workplace?

A: I have replaced casual Fridays with กformal Thursdaysก. Every Thursday, I take my daughter to the play center, forcing me to shower, shave and don formal wear. Don’t go overboard, though. My threepiece suit includes jeans, tshirt and shoes.

Q: But what if I never go out?

A: Then stick to casual Fridays. Why not make Friday the day you wash your pajamas? All Nobody will see is the back of your chair, anyway.

Q: What if FedEx Guy comes to the door?

A: Tell FedEx Guy itกs casual Friday, and ask him if he really wants to see how workfromhome hermits celebrate casual Fridays.

Q: If I work from home, do I still need a purse?

A: Of course. Without a purse, what would you carry to the bathroom? Make sure your purse matches your pajamas, though. You would not want Nobody to catch you with a poorly coordinated wardrobe. Personally, I don’t have a purse, but thatกs just a guy thing.

Q: What about taking out the garbage?

A: When the odor starts to repel the postman, you might need to take out the garbage (just in case there is a rare check in the mail). Wear your pajamas to the curb, but I suggest replacing your slippers with shoes. Snowshoes are recommended in Edmonton…except in July and August. Don’t walk to the curb if you live on a houseboat.

Q: I feel so alone. Is that normal?

A: Get over it. You are part of a glorious economic movement, where people around the world choose to reject antiquated social norms and barricade themselves in their homes to make $53,976 in the first week of their new businesses. How could you feel lonely with so much money?

Q: Wow. I made only $3 in my first week. I bet my husband $3 that I could stay in my home office for three straight days without coming out. I won the bet, but I was forced to shower.

A: Thatกs not a question.

Q: OK, what if I make only $3 a week?

A: You might have to share your pajamas with Nobody…until you can afford a second pair.

Q: Is this really a growing trend?

A: Yes. The International Institute of Social Isolation reports that by 2055, 95% of people will be operating a home based business. The National Organization for Studying You (NOSY) reports that by 2055, 95% of people will be sharing their pajamas with Nobody…until they can afford a second pair.

Q: Wow. Thatกs a lot of pajamas. What does this mean for the future.

A: It means the pajama industry will become a major economic force.

Q: Do you know any good pajamabased mutual funds I could invest in to take advantage of this trend?

A: No, but how rich can you get investing $3 a week, anyway?

Thatกs it, everything you wanted to know about fashion etiquette for the workfromhome hermit. One more thing: if you provide feedback to this article on a casual Friday, please turn off your web cam.

About The Author

David Leonhardt writes the Happy Guy humor column:

http://www.thehappyguy.com/positivethinkingfreeezine.html

and A Daily Dose of Happiness:

http://www.thehappyguy.com/dailyhappinessfreeezine.html .

He also wrote Inspiration & Motivation To Go

http://www.thehappyguy.com/l/dailymotivationinspiration.php

and Climb Your Stairway to Heaven: the 9 habits of maximum happiness:

http://www.thehappyguy.com/happinessselfhelpbook.html

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 10, 2004

by David Leonhardt