To Camcorder Enthusiastกs: What Does ‘Reality TV’

To Camcorder Enthusiastกs: What Does ‘Reality TV’ Really Mean? Great News for the camcorder user!

by: Mark Sturge

Reality TV is experiencing an upsurge in popularity and its presence has conditioned the publicกs acceptance of a number of things:

That lead actors being trained and polished กperformersก is no longer a necessity.

Camcorder movement. As the use of กdolliesก, กjibsก and even กsteadycamsก to obtain smooth motion/tracking shots are often at odds with site and time constraints.

Reduction in production values of video, lighting and audio.

Whilst a ‘reduction in production valuesก may not inspire confidence, it bodes as a positive to the small time camcorder operator in reduced production costs. And the savvy camcorder operator can make up any shortfall with a little imagination and a lot of ingenuity.

กAnyone can be a video producerก, says Mark Sturge, of KMS Productions ‘technology has delivered the tools and there is an emerging group of people who know that (don’t tell anyone this) video and even television production is easy, if you have the right plan.

กDesktop video is a huge opportunity.ก Mark goes on to explain กEveryday people are looking for special memories to be preserved on video tape or DVD. That family occasion/party/wedding or their childrenกs sports events filmed with a camcorder. And now getting their favourite sport or hobby on TV is possible. Yes… possible. And you can be the video producer that does it for them!ก

Most people think that it takes big bucks to produce video for television or commercial release. The inside secret is that you can produce quality video productions with a relatively small investment and having the right plan that can take you stepbystep through the process is a crucial component. Here are the steps Mark suggests you should follow:

Get yourself a high resolution camcorder.

Learn how to use your camcorder to produce กcompellingก video (this sounds obvious, but it can be where the majority of operators กdrop the ballก).

Engineer cost effective solutions to produce professional production values (in particular the areas of lighting and audio).

Polish your production with your desktop editing system.

Submit your production to program managers that accept public submissions, create a professional looking DVD series to sell etc..

So what are you waiting for? Pick up that camcorder, boot up your pc and กSay It With Videoก!

About The Author

Mark Sturge

Mark Sturge is the owner of KMS Productions and webmaster at http://www.videoproductionmastery.com/camcorder.html A site where visitors can find information, training videos and manuals that help people to better their video techniques or discover ways to earn an income from their video taking hobby.

This article was posted on September 05

by Mark Sturge

In Mourning for the Google Cash system

In Mourning for the Google Cash system

by: Darren Power

Do you remember when you could pick an affiliate program, hustle up a few hundred keywords toss it all into your Adwords account & wait for the commissions. No me neither! I was busy doing something else during those glory days.

If it ever was that easy it certainly isn’t any more, thereกs a lot of competition & intense bidding for keywords. There are big corporations bidding on anything that moves & paying tens of thousands of dollars every month for number one listings.

Just in case you weren’t getting the message. Google changed the rules. Now Google will only list one ad for each domain name in any given set of results. If youกve ever searched for something obscure and found three or four ads telling you it can be found on eBay you will understand why they did this. The result of this change is that you almost certainly now need your own website to succeed.

But never fear, there are still opportunities for the little guy to earn big.

You just need a plan to maximise revenue from everything that you do and from every visitor that passes through your online real estate.

Here are my top five tips steps for maximising income from affiliate programs.

#1 Sell to a niche. I know youกve heard that message a thousand times before. There are hundreds of guides to niche marketing online and you might be forgiven for thinking itกs just the latest big hype. But the fact is if you choose a small market you can focus your product more precisely on your target market. If you get this right more of your visitors will think that your recommendation was written just for them and for their situation. The result? More of your visitors will buy.

#2 Always collect contact details from your visitors, if they don’t buy today many will buy tomorrow or the day after. If you have a responsive mailing list, you have an asset that can earn you money on demand. All lists start small and small lists can earn big money.

#3 Once you have their mailing details keep in touch, don’t let these people forget who you are. Certainly don’t only send them mail when you have something to sell. Send them freebies and news as well. Build a relationship, tell them about your life, be their trusted friend.

Side Bar

I read a post on a forum a while back about a guy who had been promoting an affiliate program for about a year. Then the program decided they didn’t want affiliates any more. This guy calculated that he had sent over 10,000 paying customers to the merchant over the course of the year. Now he had lost a whole revenue stream and had no way to earn from his past efforts.

If only he had kept in touch with these people by collecting names and mail addresses and keeping in contact, he would probably have made more sales along the way but better still he could now contact them and tell them about another great product.

End Sidebar

#4 Upsell your list. If they didn’t buy initially then keep reminding them of the benefits of the product. If they still don’t buy after later mails sell them something else. If they were buyers of the initial offering then upsell them on something bigger and more expensive.

#5 Don’t stop. Never stop sending mail to your list and don’t leave it so long between mails that they forget who you are. Keep sending useful information every week, build a rapport with them. Do this right and they will come to trust you like a friend and when their friend recommends something they will buy it.If they don’t want to hear from you any more they will use the unsubscribe link. Don’t assume they are all sold out. A good list is good for as long as you maintain it. Which can be until the day you retire.

Build your business right and you will be building an asset that will keep you for the rest of your life.

One great benefit to taking the long term view instead of immediate profits is that you will be in a better position to compete in the PPC marketplace. If the goal of your campaign is to build a list as opposed to making a profit then you can bid higher and run a break even campaign.

Would you like a free subscription to a monthly magazine dedicated to affiliate marketing? Visit http://www.ireviewguru.com/freeresources.html

About The Author

Darren Power is your host at IReviewGuru.com where you will find news of the latest Internet Marketing products along with reviews, articles and free resources

This article was posted on March 14

by Darren Power

If You’re a Marketer, You Should be Blogging

If You’re a Marketer, You Should be Blogging

by: Craig Desorcy

Blogging has captured the interest of many across the World Wide Web. The cold, robotic nature of the virtual world becomes warm and cozy when we see personality and real life thoughts appearing on our screens. Sometimes we make a connection with the blogger that leaves an impression. We’re caught! Our natural curiousity will draw us back on a regular basis to get the juicy updates the blogger throws our way.

Wise marketers are incorporating this trend into their marketing scheme. The inexplicable urge to return time and time again is a gold mine to be escavated. After all, isn’t that exactly what a marketer’s goal is? Not only are people drawn to revisit, but search engine robots can’t seem to neglect a site that has regularly updated data. Blogging is a winwin situation that you don’t want to miss out on!

Mark was a smart and moneywise kind of guy. He’d spend hours thinking about how to get the most out of his money, and his bank account had a lot to show for his efforts. Mark had been a successful business man for some time, and now he was contemplating an expansion a virtual expansion that is.

One of the greatest of all business expenses is advertising. Mark remembered how he had snookered his way into free advertising in the local newspaper. While his counterparts paid big bucks for big ads, Mark resorted to figuring out ways to make the local news, which everyone read. It had worked marvelously in the real world, but how could he do the same thing in cyberspace?

Blogs, blogs, blogs! Blogs are the answer to free advertising in the virtual world. Search engines will gather your latest news and broadcast them worldwide while you sit back, fold your arms and smile. Who could keep from smiling when search engines index your site free of charge and heavy traffic is being directed to your virtual doorstep without costing you a penny?

( Get The Fast and Easy Way To Blogging and Using RSS Feeds Click here> http://www.effectiveinfo.com/blogsrss.html )

Not only will blogs save you a bundle of money in advertising fees, but the very nature of blogs spells out timesavings. Marketers are busy people who could use a little extra time to golf or fish. It doesn’t seem feasible to think that something as short and sweet as a blog would net as much interest as a wellthoughtout newsletter or sales letter, but in fact marketers across the world are finding it to be true. Hey, get out that dusty fishing pole, and invest some in some new tackle!

While you’re out relaxing and enjoying a much needed break, who knows how many people will be visiting your site? It could be….no, don’t hurry back to see!

About The Author

Get The Fast and Easy Way To Blogging and Using RSS Feeds

Click here> http://www.effectiveinfo.com/blogsrss.html

This article is copyright © Craig Desorcy

Craig Desorcy is an Internet enthusiast who Lives and works in Japan, spending most of his free time on the internet running his blog and websites of interest.

Craig(at)effectiveinfo.com

This article was posted on February 05

by Craig Desorcy

Find the Online Business Made For You – 7 Steps to

Find the Online Business Made For You – 7 Steps to Set You free

by: Mira Marsellia

Best Tips to Help You Break Out of Searching Frustration

Are you confused by the huge selection of online business at the internet and offering letter in your inbox? Do you have online business but don’t give you good result as you expected? Let’s avoid being frustrated and stuck in spending more time in long search. If you don’t know exactly what you want to do and where from you start, it’s worthwhile looking the tips hereunder.

1. Learn Directly from Successful Internet Marketer.

Identify people who are succeeding as internet marketer and a ขbigdogข in the business. Learn from their website, what they sell, what the do, and what the promotion they campaign for their business. Sign up for their newsletter. Many successful internet marketers would be like to share their tactic and give advice. It’s the same with looking for a job, if you want to get succeed then learn from people who are good at it.

2. Join with Focus Group and Mailing List

You can get much information here about good online business and share with others thought. You can also use your networking here for building your own business. Do not hesitate to learn from others and ask for their advice. Being active is nothing to loose if you want to find the best online business that suitable for you.

3. Change your perspective and attitude

Don’t you think doing business give a lots of fun like playing the game? Do you believe doing business online make your mind active and upgrading your knowledge? Then you will get paid for something you really enjoy and give you accessibility to financial freedom life. If you think doing business is something that burden, you will lose most of fun in doing that.

4. Persistence is the Main Rule

You must be mentally and financially prepared for your online business to last longer than you expected. Allocated big money at one time is not good idea. You better allocate small amount for your business in consistent way. Many experts says the higher the income from online business you are expecting the longer the online business building can take. Persistence means keep searching, then trying, learning, and evaluating. Online business is not one time job, keep in your mind: the NEVER EVER GIVE UP words. What causes so many people in online business to fail is that they have small amount of mental success quality. They keep in their mind to run the business in a short limited time only. Once they reach the dead line they made, they give up without any business running at all.

5. Expect the Unexpected

Be prepared for the fact that in internet business realm, changing is a must. Day by day new business are created, new method are invented. Keep your mind active and be creative. If you look for strategy and best tactic that always being uptodate in internet marketing, then join with experts business. Some of them will give good training and tools, marketing library and ebook for free.

6. Go After the Business You Really Want to

If you want to be a supper affiliate internet marketer, then look for that. If you like to be the sky is the limit network marketer, and then get up to it. The important thing you have to stick to reputable company if you don’t have your original own product and service. Don’t mess your website with many different kind of product and service. It won’t do any good since those won’t set you a focus.

7. Get out from your Comfort Zone

Don’t worry from being failed, rejected, refused, and disappointed. When you do your business step by step, you will get expert day by day, and someday you will be able to banish all the obstacles far behind.

About The Author

Mira Marsellia is member of Elite Team International.

Giving you 30 Days FREE Training of Internet Marketing.

Website at: http://www.EliteTeamMarketing.com/37296

More about Elite Team Marketing at Elite Team Center : http://www.eliteteamcenter.com/37296

[email protected]

This article was posted on January 17

by Mira Marsellia

Marketing Your Web Site

Marketing Your Web Site

by: Lynn Holter

Congratulations! Your Web Site is finished! Now what? Your first instinct is to submit to every search engine possible and leave it up to them to bring traffic to your site. Despite what you may have been told, it doesn’t happen quite that way. Yes, you will need to submit to the search engines, and they will eventually bring traffic your site. It will take anywhere from 3 – 6 months for a search engine to even get you listed. After that another year or so to make it to the top of the listings, that is, if you are extremely diligent in promoting to them monthly and following all the different rules for each search engine.

There are several ways to market your web site yourself. Your marketing efforts will yield more results than any other form of marketing.

Include your URL on the following…

Business Cards – I cannot stress enough the importance of putting your URL on your business cards!

Letterhead – also on envelopes.

Anything your company uses such as statements, invoices, order forms, etc.

Anything that your company publishes or advertises.

Anything your company prints and sends out to people such as fax cover sheets.

Include a plug with your Phone Message Service like: ขvisit our web site at yourwebsite.com.ข

Window stickers and Bumper stickers.

Basically put your web site address on anything you would put your company name on.

Check your Chamber of Commerce. Find out if they have a web site you can add your URL to. Find out if your town has a Visitors Information center. Find out if you can list your business with them. Also find out if you can leave brochures or business cards at the center for people to browse when they visit.

Include your web site URL in your email signature. This way your site URL is being sent to everyone who receives an email from you or anyone in your company.

Keep the lines of communication open with your web designer. Remember it will take a joint effort to make your web site successful. Be willing to provide information your designer will need in the creation of your site.

About The Author

Lynn Holter is owner of www.elldesigns.com. I have have years of experience with web site creation, redesign, search engine optimization, and web site marketing. I provides my clients and web site visitors with personal and excellent customer service. For more information please contact me at [email protected].

This article was posted on January 20, 2004

by Lynn Holter

The Four Steps to Effective Cold Calls

The Four Steps to Effective Cold Calls

by: Mark Dembo

One of the mostfeared, and yet most effective, ways to develop business is the dreaded, and much maligned ขcold call.ข But, if you develop a consistent approach to your cold calls, you can overcome the fear of not knowing what to say or how to respond when the person on the other end of the phone actually answers!

First thing: remember the goal of your cold call. Your goal on a cold call is to GET AN APPOINTMENT. Your goal is NOT to sell on the phone. (If your job is telesales, then of course your goal would be to sell on the phone; we will be covering that topic in a separate article.) When you set your priority on getting an appointment and not on selling, it becomes much easier to for you to actually get in front of the people you need to see to make your goals and close more business.

Here are the four steps that go into a successful cold call:

1. Opening:

In your opening statement you want to get the other person’s attention (by using their name), give a brief ขcommercialข about your company and tell that person why you are calling (to get an appointment.) So, for example, your opening might sound like this:

ขGood morning Ms. Smith. This is (your name) calling with XYZ Company. We are the largest manufacturing of remanufactured widgets specializing in the giggabot industry. The reason I’m calling you today is that that we’ve recently successfully completed a project with ABC Company where we were able to help them reduce their time to market by using our widgets in their manufacturing process. I’d like to get together and show you how we were able to help them achieve this result. How’s Tuesday at 2?

2. Response:

The person you’re speaking with is now going to respond to you; most likely with an ขobjectionข – or a reason why they shouldn’t meet with you. Think about the most common responses you are likely to hear in your business, and be prepared to turn their response around.

For example, if you know that you will typically hear something like ขWell, thanks for your call, but we’re all set for nowข (and you probably hear that a lot, right?) you should have your ขturnaroundข ready to go…

3. Turnaround:

To turn around a response, you want to reassure the person on the phone that you’ve heard what they said, and that you understand their response – BUT, don’t just give it up. Your response should sound something like this: ขYou know, Mr. Smith, many of our clients said the same thing when we first spoke with them, until they saw how our widgets were able to benefit them. Why don’t we get together, and I can show you how. How’s Tuesday at 2?

4. Appointment:

After you’ve tried to turn the call around, you’re either going to the appointment, or you’re not. If you’ve tried two or three turnarounds, and the prospect still doesn’t want to meet, then it’s time to thank them for their time, and move on to the next call. Don’t spin your wheels expecting to get an appointment with everyone you speak with.

Will this approach work every time? No – but then again, nothing will work every time. Will you get more appointments if you use and practice these techniques? You can you will – absolutely. Guaranteed.

Copyright 2005 Lexien Management Consultants, Inc

About The Author

Mark Dembo; President, Lexien Management Consultants (http://www.lexien.com) Mark has over 20 years of sales, sale management, and business development experience, focused on improving the performance of individuals and organizations. Lexien Management Consultants provides sales training, consulting, and coaching services to organizations and individuals who are motivated to grow their businesses. Each month, Lexien publishes the Sales Success Newsletter, http://www.lexien.com/Newsletter/SalesSuccessNewsletter.htm

Lexien Management Consultants is an affiliate of DEI Management Group. You can contact Mark at 9146822069, or at [email protected].

This article was posted on February 04

by Mark Dembo

Ezine List Building: Wealth Mentor Teaches 5 Easy

Ezine List Building: Wealth Mentor Teaches 5 Easy Steps To Skyrocket Your Subscriptions and Profits

by: Rick Miller

Would you like an Internet Marketing tool that can put your efforts on autopilot?

In a recent interview for the List Crusade program, Matt Bacak revealed what he called the กfoundationก for automatically building a successful and profitable ezine.

(Note: To access Matt Bacakกs complete audio interview for fre^e, see end of article)

A little about Matt: He was the leading facilitator for Robert Kiyosakiกs (of Rich Dad, Poor Dad fame) Cash Flow 101 program. One of his secret techniques he used was to create the Millionaire Minutes ezine, which allowed him to stay in contact with participants even after the seminar was over.

With a several hundred thousand subscribers and around 750 new subscribers each day, Matt knows how to quickly develop an optin subscriber list.

The ezine was so successful that he was able to do mailings to his subscriber list three days before an event and fill the room to capacity.

He attributes the success of this ezine with causing him to cross over from wealth building to the Internet Marketing world. He now is considered one of the top Internet marketing mentors in the world.

Bazek gives these steps to develop and promote your ezine.

1) Get a Smart AutoresponderYour Internet business must have a solid foundation with a Smart Autoresponder. The smart autoresponder allows you to capture names and email addresses.

You can then set it up to email a sequence of messages. For example, one of Mattกs ezine has messages set up to be mailed automatically over a period of two years. That means he can go on extended vacations and his sales messages still go out and make him money.

2) Choose a good title and description. Choose a title that captures your Unique Selling Proposition. Next write a 1530 word description of your ezine to entice the subscriber with benefits of กwhatกs in it for me?ก This is absolutely necessary when you begin submitting to ezine directories.

3) Next contact other ezine owners and set up joint ventures. Many will be glad to promote your ezine to their list if it has value to their readers. There are literally thousands of other ezine owners out there. You can offer to promote their ezine to your list also.

4) Start submitting your ezine to directories. A search on the Internet will reveal many fre^e ezine directories on the web. Theyกll list your title and description at no charge. You can begin getting subscribers almost immediately. If you have extra cash to help promote your ezine, try some of the paid directoriesfor a fee, you can be listed on these site along with many other sites that are members of their network. These can definitely speed up the growth of your ezine.

5) Use a mentor that can help you set up your ezine stepbystep, laying the foundation to put the ezine on autopilot. Often getting first hand guidance from someone who has set up a successful ezine is the boost youกll need to get started.

With those foundational steps, you can quickly start a successful ezine and quickly bring in money, all on autopilot.

Copyright 2004 Rick Miller

About The Author

Rick Miller is a Certified Master of Web Copywriting and cofounder of List Crusade. For fre^e access to the entire interview and fre^e coaching session with Matt Bacak, along with 51 other audio lessons from top Internet Marketing and Self Help Gurusgo to: http://www.scientificinternetmarketing.com/bacak.

This article was posted on December 13, 2004

by Rick Miller

I Don’t Need A Website!….Do I?

I Don’t Need A Website!….Do I?

by: Janice D. Byer, MVA

Once upon a time, in a small home office, a busy entrepreneur wondered why he wasn’t quite as busy as he would like to be. ขI market my business as much as possibleข, said the entrepreneur, who has implemented many marketing procedures while running his business.

Our entrepreneur, we’ll call him Bob, runs a computer repair business. His services allow him to provide his clients with his expert advise, either in their offices, by email, or on the phone. Because of this, Bob has a large potential market, both locally and internationally.

Bob has a great brochure, filled with all his features and benefits; he attends as many networking events as he can; he advertises in the local newspapers; and he has a huge ad in the yellow pages. But, Bob doesn’t have a website. Why?

ขI don’t need a website, do I?ข asks Bob. ขI do everything else possible to market my business and I also get many customers by referrals. Why would I need a website?ข

Glad you asked Bob! Let’s see if we can’t outline some of the benefits of having a website… both locally and internationally…

Your website is a live brochure that is available for anyone to see from anywhere, no matter if they are 5 miles away or 5000 miles away.

For potential local clients, they may first find your company in the yellow pages but, if they are looking for more information about you and the services you offer, the Internet is one of the first places they will look to do their research.

Many potential long distance clients may be in different time zones or would rather not make a long distance call. Because of these factors, the Internet is where they would go for more information. Having a website enables your information to be available anytime and, by including your email address on your site, they have a cheaper and more convenient of contacting you.

Your website allows you to create and show much more of your information than a print ad or brochure. The more information you provide, the more likely a potential client will be to buy from you as they can see everything they need to know. You can even include a little something extra, such as tips and resources, to help your clients see your dedication to providing topnotch customer service.

Your website also allows you to be more creative in how your present your information than with something that is in print. You can add bells and whistles (but not too many) that show that can be creative in your efforts.

Many people use the Internet to find out more information about products or services that they are in need of. Your website is a means of offering information to those who may be researching online before buying. If you don’t have a website, how are they going to even get a chance to see what you have to offer?

In the same respect, if a potential client has heard about you but can’t find your business card, they may turn to the Internet to try and locate your contact information or to learn more about you.

Your website opens the door to a larger market of prospective clients. Even if your service is normally only preformed locally, there is always the potential to expand. And, you are more likely to increase your local client base if your website is available for them to research your service.

Even if you cater to only a specific clientele, your website can be a place for them to visit or where they can point others to who they are referring to you.

Your website is the one piece of marketing material that is easy to change without a huge cost. So, if you have a special event coming up or you want to include more information on a certain service, you simply have your web designer make the change. And, almost instantly, your information is fresh and visible, without the costs of reprinting new marketing material.

We could go on and on about the benefits of having a website. In short, having a website is the ‘way to go’ these days and, if your company does not have a website, are you losing customers? Are they finding your competition when using the Internet but not you? Are they wondering why you do not have a website when all of your competition does?

Your website is your company’s 24 hour advertising medium. Why wouldn’t you consider having one? Bob?

About The Author

Janice Byer is a certified Master Virtual Assistant and owner of DocuType Administrative & Web Design Services (http://www.docutype.net). See this and other articles on her website.

[email protected]

This article was posted on December 18, 2002

by Janice D. Byer, MVA

The Added Effectiveness of Promotional Products in

The Added Effectiveness of Promotional Products in Your Marketing Plan

by: Ethan Woods

Recently, I stopped by a new car wash in my town and while preparing to insert my six quarters into the machine to start the cleaning process, the owner came over to me and thanked me for stopping in. He also handed me a pen that had the name and address of the car wash imprinted on it.
The fact that the owner was going around passing out free promotional pens to patrons impressed me. I stop at car washes all the time and never get free stuff. In fact, if the cleaning wand removes most of the dirt and the spotfree rinse is actually spotfree, Im pretty happy.
You may be thinking to yourself, Thats a nice gesture, but is it really very effective as a marketing tool?
Absolutely.
Not only are promotional products effective marketing tools, but they can actually foster goodwill toward your company or organization and its salespeople or representatives.
In fact, a study conducted by Baylor University suggests that customers who receive a promotional product with a sales letter will view your company and its sales reps 52% more favorably than customers who receive a sales letter without a promotional product.
Whats more, the study revealed that when compared to customers who did not receive a promotional product with their sales letter, customers who did receive a promotional product with their sales letter perceived the companys sales reps as being 16% to 34% more competent.
Did you catch that?
Despite the fact that none of the customers who received the sales letter and promotional product actually talked to or met with a sales rep, customers receiving the promotional product actually perceived the sales reps as being more competent.
With all the competition out there for your business to contend with, wouldnt it be great to have that kind of advantage over your competitors?
Promotional products can be an easy, affordable and profitable addition to your marketing plan.
For example, the carwash owner made an initial investment of about $1.30 for each of the pens he was passing out. The minimum amount of money I had to spend to wash my car was $1.50 (it took six quarters to start the washing process). Because no other carwash owner gave me a free pen, and because I was satisfied with the washing experience, Ive returned to that particular carwash on five other occasions in the past three months. Thats a minimum of $10.50 spent at the carwasha $9.20 return on the carwash owners original $1.30 investment. Of course, Ive spent much more than the minimum required to wash my car, so the return on investment is even greater.
Promotional products range in price from less than a dollar to several hundreds of dollars each, and there is virtually no end to the kinds of promotional products available.
Youre already familiar with promotional items such as pens, calculators, and key rings, but did you know you can get TV remote controls, microwave popcorn, and even executive leather desk chairs with your logo and contact information printed on them?
Given the variety of promotional products available, theres no reason you couldnt find a product to fit your particular marketing need and budget. If you spend a little time searching, you will find a great price on a great promotional product that will significantly increase the effectiveness of your marketing plangenerating sales and leads for your business.

About The Author

Ethan Woods is a Promotional Products Specialist for Keen Promos. Keen Promos caters to small businesses. Visit www.KeenPromos.com and sign up for our once monthly email notifications that feature the newest products, exclusive discounts, and closeout and discontinued items.
This article may be reproduced freely as long as it is not changed significantly, used for profit, and as long as the Author Byline and web site link remains intact.
[email protected]

This article was posted on July 20, 2004

by Ethan Woods

Are You A Marketing Octopus or A Marketing Worm?

Are You A Marketing Octopus or A Marketing Worm?

by: André Bell

One of the greatest challenges to effectively marketing a business is determining which marketing method is best suited for your business.

Most people look at what their competitors are doing to market their businesses and then simply imitate that, whether good or bad.

The best marketing strategy does not involve selecting only one or two marketing approaches that we see others using.

The best marketing approach resembles an octopus.

An octopus is very effective at catching food with eight limbs. If the octopus loses one limb it may momentarily lose some of its strength and agility, but it adapts and continues on as an effective hunter and predator.

It’s the same with marketing your business. The more marketing approaches you use simultaneously the more successful you can become and the easier it is to continue growing your company.

You will continue to thrive despite the challenges that your competitors may face. No setback in any one marketing approach will ever devastate you or pose major problems.

Despite the many options available most companies use no more than two or three marketing methods at best to grow their company.

Few realize that there are over 100 methods for bringing in new business, for increasing web traffic, for selling more to existing clients, and for increasing repeat sales that their competitors are not using.

They basically imitate worms in their marketing attempts. A worm’s approach to life is singular. It does not use multiple limbs because it has none. Its existence is slow and laborintensive. Very unlike an octopus.

The great thing about this is that most competitors are making this same mistake. They may be too busy, too shorthanded, or too myopic to do much more than hand out boxes of business cards and sit around talking ‘fish stories’ of the one that got away.

That is a marketing approach to avoid.

Don’t just settle for an ad in the yellow pages, your local newspaper, or on the radio.

Use as many marketing methods as make sense for your industry, your market, and your company. Then you will become a marketing octopus while your competitors remain marketing worms.

About The Author

André Bell is principal marketing consultant with André Bell Consulting Group. A free copy of his new book ก101 Marketing Secrets Revealedก is available through his site at http://www.economicbooster.com

This article was posted on April 07, 2004

by André Bell

The Art Of Fear Free Advertising

The Art Of Fear Free Advertising

by: Mark Vurnum

Is fear of failure an issue when you commit valuable money in advertising?

Well how about if I showed you a way to remove this fear and you know that you would be able to spend money advertising KNOWING you would get a return?

Is that a valuable lesson?

Course it is!

So, how do you do it?

The answer is testing!

Itกs simple really.. Instead of sending out 1000 sales letters for example. Send out 500. In these 500 have 5 different headlines so 5 x 100 = 500

Why?

Well what we are trying to establish here is what headline or sales offer pulls best. Once we know which one works then we do a mass mailing, but not before then!

You see I have seen so many companies waste hundreds even thousands of pounds on non result direct mail… all because they didn’t test!

So save yourself time and money by testing EVERTHING you do.

If itกs an advert in the local press, sign up for 5 small inserts over 5 weeks rather than 1 big page as a one off. This will be cheaper but will also allow you to test different offers.

About The Author

Mark Vurnum is a leader in small business marketing. Regulary putting on marketing seminars, his 13 proven steps seminar has allowed businesses to grow 50% in a matter of weeks. www.smartmarketingconsultants.co.uk

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 22, 2004

by Mark Vurnum