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Most Web workers know that email marketing is one of the most effective strategies that businesses can use to reach their customers, but a new study reveals that one email marketing strategy outperforms the others.
Email marketing provider StrongMail surveyed more than 1,000 business leaders last year regarding the benefits of lifecycle email marketing, the results reveal that timing is everything – especially when it comes to email marketing.
Lifecycle emails are timed to reach customers at opportune moments in order to increase engagement – and the study proved that this strategy does just that. Among the survey respondents, 67 percent reported increased subscriber engagement, while 55 percent claimed they saw an increase in open and click-through rates after making the switch to lifecycle email marketing.
Part of the reason why this email marketing strategy outperforms traditional batch email marketing is because of the extra effort that is taken to create and deliver the message at the right time, which increases the likelihood of consumers responding to it. In fact, according to StrongMail, one of their clients experienced a 16 percent increase in revenue by transitioning from traditional to lifecycle marketing.
“These numbers make sense to us, of course,” says Kara Trivunovic, vice president of agency services, StrongMail. "As with so many other aspects of marketing, timing is one of the most important elements for success and that is no less true when it comes to email marketing. Companies that rely on the quality and strategy of their emails simply see better results than those bombarding their readers with quantity. As a result, they spend less time chasing leads and building customer loyalty.”
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Subject Line Testing Tool Gets Right to the Point
posted by AllisonH @ 9:00 AM
Thursday, May 10, 2012
A new tool aims to help email marketers create stronger subject lines.
Marketing service provider Worldata launched SubjectLine.com to help email marketers get the best results from their campaigns. The Subject Line Scoring Tool enables Web pros to test subject lines for deliverability issues and receive marketing-related suggestions for improving open rates.
The tool is free, but users must fill out a registration form to continue using it after the initial trial. The subject line ratings are based on more than a billion email messages that have been sent and tracked via partners and clients of SubjectLine.com.
More than 400 rules are tested, from evaluating filtering and deliverability issues to marketing and performance-related concerns. During a brief trial of my own, I entered what I considered to be one good subject line and one bad one.
In my opinion, both were rated pretty accurately. Both tests came back with a list of reasons for the scores they received, including deliverability and marketing issues (see below).
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A “Social” Publishing Tool for Email Marketers
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 7:51 AM
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Email marketing solutions provider GraphicMail has released a new social publishing tool that enables marketing teams to collaborate on email development.
Connect+, which was developed in partnership with social publishing platform MessageSherpa, essentially adds a social content management system to the GraphicMail ecosystem that enables businesses to share and collect content from those within their network, create email messages from that shared content, and distribute communications by both email and social media posts.
The solution will likely be a good fit for those organizations with extended networks like franchises, chains, distributors, retailers, channel partners, etc., which require a centralized, community-driven repository of information and are increasingly demanding greater collaboration features from their software. Connect+ pricing starts at $9.00/mo.
“It's all about connections and sharing resources,” notes Nick Eckert, CEO of GraphicMail. “Every organization has a network that extends beyond colleagues to include suppliers, sales reps and clients. The network influences the organization's vision and goals and its approach to commerce. Connect+ enables the collection of content from across this network so it can be leveraged to achieve the organization's communication objectives.”
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Oh, Canada: Changes Made to Anti-Spam Bill
posted by Michael Garrity @ 9:30 AM
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
For
the average email user, anti-spam measures are viewed as a good thing. After all, most
inboxes are already crammed with daily deals offers, marketing newsletters, e-commerce receipts
and maybe even the occasional personal email. No one needs some unsolicited
nonsense cluttering things up even more.
For email marketers, however, anti-spam may sound like the kiss of death. Not that all, or even most, email marketing programs are spam-ridden, but often casual users and government regulators have trouble telling the difference.
Which is precisely why many email marketers were holding their collective breath in anticipation of newly proposed anti-spam legislation in Canada. Fortunately, after analyzing the bill, they generally agreed that it’s nothing to lose sleep over.
Many initially had understandable reservations when the legislation was first proposed last fall, but most now feel as though the bill has been drastically improved, in large part due to cooperation with the email marketing industry.
One of the biggest changes to the legislation deals with opt-in consent. Before, the bill insisted that all opt-in consent be granted in written form, but it has since been changed to allow for verbal permission as well.
The initial draft also required email marketers to let subscribers opt-out in a maximum of two clicks, but the new version changes the working to read “readily performed.”
Email marketers worried about similar measures being brought up in the United States needn’t, at least not yet. Much of this recent Canadian legislation was intended to have broader application, more intense penalties and has a greater reach outside of Canadian borders than the U.S. CAN-SPAM Act passed in 2003.
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Facebook, Google, other firms team to fight email phishing scams
posted by Technology @ 12:20 PM
Monday, January 30, 2012
Major tech firms including Google, Facebook and Microsoft have teamed together to fight email phishing scams. Members say the partnership will lead to better email security and protect users and tech brands from fraudulent messages.
The group, which calls itself DMARC – for Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance — says it wants to help reduce email abuse by standardizing how email receivers perform authentication. Now, email senders will get consistent authentication results for their messages at Gmail, Hotmail, AOL and any other email receiver using DMARC.
Email phishing scams are messages designed to trick recipients into providing personal information by replying to the messages or clicking on links. The emails look like they come from a legitimate sender, often featuring brand logos and mimicking the format and language of authentic messages.
With the rise of social media and e-commerce sites, spammers and phishers have "a tremendous financial incentive" to compromise user accounts, leading to theft of passwords, bank account information and credit card numbers, DMARC said.
"Email is easy to spoof and criminals have found spoofing to be a proven way to exploit user trust of well-known brands," the group said. "Simply inserting the logo of a well-known brand into an email gives it instant legitimacy with many users."
Other companies involved in DMARC include Bank of America, LinkedIn, PayPal and Yahoo.
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– Andrea Chang
Image: Screen shot of the companies involved in DMARC. Credit: DMARC
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Microsoft releases Hotmail app for Amazon’s Kindle Fire
posted by Technology @ 10:03 AM
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Microsoft's Hotmail service now has a Kindle Fire app.
OK, this may not be as exciting as Google releasing a Gmail app for Apple's iPhone, and there is still no native Gmail app for the Fire. But the Hotmail app for the Fire should be a worthwhile release for many owners of Amazon's popular 7-inch tablet due to the addition of Exchange Active Sync.
Unlike Amazon's included email app on the FIre, which merely downloads your messages via POP3, Microsoft's Hotmail app will synch emails, contacts, folders and subfolders, said David Law, Microsoft's director of Hotmail product management, in a blog post.
While the free Hotmail app for the Fire is technically an Android app, the version for Amazon's tablet is different from the standard Hotmail Android app used by more than 3 million people, Law said.
The differences between the Fire Hotmail app and the standard Android Hotmail app have to do with the changes Amazon made to Android to create the Fire-specific operating system it runs on its tablet, which as we've noted before is unlike any other version of Android out there.
"Because the Kindle Fire uses a different implementation of Android, we needed to make some updates to our previous Hotmail app for Android to ensure it worked well," Law said. "Now that we've finished the work and the app is ready, we're excited to give customers a great Hotmail experience on the Kindle Fire."
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– Nathan Olivarez-Giles
Nathan Olivarez-Giles on Google+
Image: A screen shot of the Hotmail app listing in Amazon's Appstore for Android. Credit: Microsoft / Amazon
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Google plans to merge more user data across its products
posted by Technology @ 3:05 PM
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Google is alerting hundreds of millions of users of its products that it's changing the way it treats users' data, combining even more information it knows about them from all of its products, from Gmail to YouTube.
The Internet search giant is putting a notice on its home page and sending emails to users starting Tuesday. Google says the changes will give users a better, more consistent experience on Google products and will help advertisers better reach users who are interested in their products and services.
The changes to Google's privacy policy and terms of service take effect March 1. They remove legal hurdles Google had faced in combining information from certain properties such as YouTube or search history.
Google said the new privacy policy responds to demands from regulators around the globe that users have a simpler, more concise way to understand what Google does with their information. Right now users have to navigate a complex web of privacy policies and terms of service for different Google products.
Google says it's been combining information it gleans about users logged into Google for years to tailor search results and ads to their interests. Now it will be able to do that even more broadly. For example, if you search for skateboard tricks on Google and then hop over to YouTube, the video sharing site will recommend offerings from skateboard pro Tony Hawk.
Google says users can still control their information through the privacy dashboard and the Ads Preferences Manager.
Google says it's helping users. But it’s also clearly helping itself, said Danny Sullivan, editor of SearchEngineLand.com.
"This may cause more critics to complain that there is no escaping the clutches of Google," Sullivan said.
And it could throw more fuel on the already heated controversy over Google's recently launched Google Search plus Your World feature which combined information from Google+ into search results.
Under the leadership of Chief Executive Larry Page, Google has moved more aggressively to use its position as the dominant Internet company to promote its Google+ social network.
It's looking to slow the momentum of Facebook and to use personal data from Google+ and other Google products to improve search, maps and ads.
It’s a battle of the Web superpowers. Facebook, which is on the verge of an initial public offering that could raise $10 billion and value the Menlo Park, Calif., company at $100 billion, aims to own everyone’s online identity and already has a rich hoard of information about its users and deep insights into their connections and interests.
To counter Facebook's growing influence, Google is pouring massive resources into reengineering its approach to the Web and make it more social.
Like other major Internet players, it’s walking a fine line between respecting the privacy of users and mining as much information about them as possible.
Google has stumbled when it comes to privacy. Last year it reached a settlement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission that subjects the company to 20 years of privacy audits. It also has drawn heavy regulatory scrutiny in Europe.
Google recently launched a privacy campaign to educate consumers about how it uses their information and how to protect themselves on the Web.
Privacy advocate Ryan Calo, who was given a sneak peek at Google's new privacy policy, says it's unlikely users will read it. Privacy policies are required by law, but few people pay attention to them, even when they are like Google's latest one: short, concise and written in plain English, he said.
"Sounds like Google's overall practices won't be that different; it's more that Google is owning up to how it thinks and what it does," said Calo, who’s with Stanford Law School's Center for Internet & Society, which gets some funding from Google.
But he’s less sure if Google isn’t risking turning off some users with what he calls the "creepiness" factor.
For example, Google says someday it may be able to alert you based on your location, your calendar and local traffic conditions when you are going to be late for a meeting. According to Google: "Google users still have to do too much heavy lifting, and we want to do a better job of helping them."
Do users want Google to do that? It depends, Calo said.
"It's different if I am going to a business meeting or to a strip club,” he said.
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– Jessica Guynn
Photo: A sign for Google is displayed behind the Google android robot, at the National Retail Federation, in New York on Jan. 17, 2012. Credit: Mark Lennihan/AP Photo
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Feedburner Alternatives – RSS to Email (and Monetization) Solutions
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 12:05 PM
Monday, January 23, 2012
RSS was a very important element of content publishing success in years past, but with the introduction of social media, it has for many all but fallen out of view. With email’s continued relevance in digital marketing however, perhaps it’s time to reconsider the options available.
RSS has been dominated in the past by Feedburner (which is a digital property of Google) and there have been few viable solutions outside of it for Web workers to utilize. Feedburner’s RSS to email features have been lackluster at best. Fortunately there are quite alternatives that you may want to consider.
The first place to look of course is directly to your email service provider. Most ESP’s offer the functionality. Some of the most popular, currently, are from vendors including Aweber, MailChimp, Constant Contact, but there are many others. Oftentimes however, those publishing their RSS to email are also interested in monetizing their content. A solution from RevResponse caught our attention and it may just be a perfect fit for marketers.
Rev Response’s RSS to email tool is a Feedburner alternative that allows marketers to send email newsletters (based on their RSS feed) and monetize them with resources including whitepapers, eBooks and magazines. Marketers must simply upload their existing list, choose a template, and set the frequency. Rev Response then manages the list and pays out on each download.
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Visitor traffic may be the most important data regarding a website's success. After all, a business can't sell products or offer services when no one is there to view them.
One of the best vehicles for driving traffic is email, but the size and quality of your email list have a lot to do with its effectiveness. Clearly, a list with only 100 subscribers won’t result in a surge of quality traffic.
One of the most important factors in obtaining more subscribers is the signup form because the form itself can turn customers away. Creating an effective and enticing email signup form is best done by keeping it simple. This includes not asking too many questions, providing content choice options, promoting incentives and linking to your privacy policy so that customers can be assured that they won’t be spammed.
Below are some examples of effective email signup forms from a variety of industries:
This fitness company prominently features its signup form on the upper-right corner of its landing page. Once an email address is entered, site visitors are taken to the email signup form that only requires basic information for signup. The form is easy to read, direct, and, most importantly, easy to find.
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This restaurant invites consumers to become part of Club Fondue (and join The Melting Pot’s email list) at the bottom of the landing page. The signup form is simple and additionally asks only for customers' anniversary and birth dates — useful questions that enable the restaurant to send out coupons as these dates approach.
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The first line of text on this landing page provides customers with a link to receive email updates. When clicked on, a new window appears with the signup form, which is a smart strategy because it keeps customers on the main site. The email signup form tells customers what they can expect once they sign up, and only requires one basic question to be filled out (the email address). Additionally, the company links to its privacy policy, which eases the consumer's fear that signing up will result in an inbox filled with spam.
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This site makes it very easy for consumers to receive emails. The signup link is located, in bright white text against a black background, on the very top of the landing page. Once the link is scrolled over with the mouse, a very simple form appears that only requires customers to enter their email address and hit submit. This simple form also uses a promotion to entice consumers to sign up, with text that says “Sign up for our newsletter and save $15!” — a great incentive to push consumers over the edge for signups, as well as a nice conversion tool.
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The Onion invites site visitors to subscribe to its newsletters under a social tab on the top of the website’s landing page. Once the link is clicked on, it takes visitors to the email signup form, which is simple and direct. The signup form allows visitors to choose the newsletters they wish to receive, and only requires an email address. Forms can’t get much simpler than that.
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Power of Social Sharing in Email
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 8:30 AM
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Social sharing is an important element of successful email campaigns, according to recent data from email marketing service provider GetResponse.
Despite the positive effect that results from including social sharing buttons within email, only 18.3 percent actually integrate them within their designs. That's actually a 40-percent increase year over year so the practice is picking up momentum.
The reason for the greater usage, according to GetResponse, is pretty straightforward in that it works towards generating a higher click-through-rate (CTR). In fact, 115 percent higher.
GetResponse put together this nice infographic of the Share is Power effect, but a few of the highlights include the following:
- Facebook, included in 91 percent of social email, is the most popular sharing option.
- LinkedIn sharing buttons are less popular. The number of email including LinkedIn actually dropped 25 percent. Twitter dropped too, but just 10 percent.
- The number of shares per 10,000 emails was still comparatively small – Facebook (23), Twitter (7) and LinkedIn (4) does emphasize the virtual impact, however.
Via: GetResponse Email Marketing
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Don’t be a Victim in the Graymail War
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 2:32 PM
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Providers of email services have made significant strides in reducing the amount of unsolicited messages (spam) in users inboxes but all of the attention is causing problems for legitimate email marketers.
Hotmail indicated recently that it had reduced "true spam" in the inbox to fewer than 3 percent using its SmartScreen filtering technology. That's great and all, but 75 percent of the messages that people actually reported as spam were really legitimate content in the form of newsletters, offers or notifications. That’s a problem.
Hotmail's newly released one-click unsubscribe feature enables users to click just once to ban a particular newsletter from the inbox. "Just select (or open) a newsletter, and then choose Unsubscribe on the Sweep menu. Hotmail takes care of all the details like telling the sender to take you off their list, setting up a rule to block messages from that sender, and even cleaning up your inbox if you want," read the Microsoft/Hotmail announcement.
Fortunately, several strategies are available which may help email marketers counter the issue.
For starters, it may just be time to start sending fewer emails and at times of the day when recipients are more likely to open them. According to Marketlive, 39% of consumers would like to receive emails weekly from retailers with whom they have opted in. Data from the “2011 Merchant Guide to Maximizing Sales” indicates that this is more than double the proportion indicating the second-most preferred option, twice a month, and triple that of the third-most preferred choice, 2-6 times a week.
Subscriber-level filtering is also being introduced at a faster rate. Many ISP's are using new data points in their deliverability algorithm. Some of those factors might be if the sender is in the recipients address book, if the message has been deleted without being opened as well as the length of the view rate. To counter these measures, email marketers need to revert back to requests for whitelisting, focus on proper targeting, and the compelling nature of their subject lines, and keep pumping out fresh, relevant and meaningful content.
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Christmas may be closing in, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to slow down your marketing campaigns. In fact, now more than ever is a crucial time to make sure you’re getting your message out there. After all, there’s no shortage of last-minute shoppers still looking for the right gift for someone special.
By ramping up your holiday email campaign now you can help these wayward shoppers find their path, and earn your business a holiday bonus in the process. Here are five tips to help you craft the perfect last-minute holiday email campaign.
1. Strong subject lines
Make a striking first impression with a strong, clear, concise title for each email. These customers have been dilly-dallying long enough, and they don’t have any time to waste now. So, if they don’t know exactly what you’re offering, they may not even bother looking at your email.
A good subject line clearly states exactly what products and deals you’re promoting. Something like “50 Percent Off All Jewelry Until Christmas Eve” or “Ten Great Gifts for Kids Ten and Under” let the reader know exactly what is being offered in the shortest amount of time, which is convenient and appealing for them.
2. Shipping deals
Effective shipping promotions can do wonders for your holiday sales numbers, and that’s probably not any truer than during the final shopping days before Christmas. Customers realize they’re in a pinch, and offering deals such as free overnight shipping on orders over $50 can be a gift that keeps on giving.
Make sure these deals are clearly laid out for subscribers, because they’re going to be looking for the quickest and cheapest ways to ensure their gifts arrive before the holiday. (In fact, if your deal is sweet enough, it would probably make a pretty great subject line.)
3. Speaking of deals…
There’s no denying that daily deals are hot. These email specials will allow merchants to send out a new email to subscribers every day, which should help you move a higher volume of that particular item instead of trying to spread your efforts among larger selection of products. When you only have a few days left to market for the holidays, simplicity is nice.
4. Target, target, target
Take the extra time out to share relevant promotions with specific customers. Having an email newsletter means it’s likely that you have some information about your subscribers, so use this information to create specialized email lists and unique promotions. This will help you focus your marketing campaign so that certain segments of your subscriber lists will see the most relevant deals available to them, which should entice them to pay more attention to what you’re offering and drive more people to your site.
5. Don’t forget the deadline
Last-minute shoppers are running out of time, and don’t let them forget it. By conveying a sense of urgency in your emails, customers will feel more inclined to make their purchasing decisions immediately.
Holiday surprise! Forget the deadline and keep the deals coming
Your holiday deals don’t have to end with the holiday. Quite the opposite, as this can be a great time to strengthen your relationships with customers new and old. Reach out to your subscriber base one more time to wish them a Happy New Year and shed some light on new deals that you’re offering in the post-Christmas world. And for customers who purchased from you during the holidays, give them a special thank you in the form of a discount coupon or code that they can redeem the next time they shop at your site, which is a great way to keep them coming back.
Oh, and don’t forget to crunch the numbers and analyze the data you get back from your holiday email campaigns so you can do even better next year!
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Curbing Email List Attrition with Gold Lasso
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 7:30 PM
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Losing more email subscribers than you're signing up? It's called list attrition and it's not uncommon. There are of course some solutions!
Multichannel marketing software provider Gold Lasso for example today released customizable preference pages for their eLoop5 product suite which aims to help email marketers curb attrition levels and lessen the number of unsubscribes.
The new preference pages will enable subscribers to pick and choose the types of communication they receive as well as the frequency. Providing users with only the information they really want – by allowing them to opt-out of certain cateogies but remain in others – can help lower unsubscribe rates dramatically. eLoop5 users will also be able to attach a custom opt-out footer to each message and link to specific preference pages according to their email marketing needs.
Michael Weisel, CTO, commented, "These new features will change frustrated customers who might otherwise completely opt out, into satisfied customers who appreciate their newly given options. This will result in increased customer retention and add valuable data for future segmentation efforts; all while pleasing customers with a more personalized experience."
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Tech company wants to end ‘email pollution’ by 2013
posted by Technology @ 4:53 PM
Monday, December 5, 2011
How many work emails do you get a day? 80? 200? 500? More than 1,000?
If you are one of the many people who feel overwhelmed by the daily deluge of unnecessary emails in your inbox, consider applying for a job at Atos. The French IT services company is hoping to become a zero email company by 2013.
"We are producing data on a massive scale that is fast polluting our working environments and also encroaching on our personal lives," said Thierry Breton, Atos' chairman and chief executive, in a statement. "At Atos Origin we are taking action now to reverse this trend, just as organizations took measures to reduce environmental pollution after the industrial revolution."
Email pollution? That's one way to look at it.
While the idea of an email-free existence makes the prospect of coming back from a vacation more palatable, it's hard to imagine how a company of Atos' size — 74,000 employees spread out over 42 international offices — can function without emailing.
In an interview with ABC News, a spokeswoman for Atos said the company was still evaluating different solutions, but that the end result will probably be a mix of collaborative social media tools like the Atos Wiki that enables employees to communicate by contributing or modifying online content, and also the company's online chat system that also enables video conferencing and file sharing.
She added that the company has already reduced internal email by 20% since it started working towards the zero email goal six months ago.
For a bit of context on Atos' unusual goal, we called Clifford Nass, director of the Communication between Humans and Interactive Media (CHIMe) Lab at Stanford University and author of the book "The Man Who Lied to His Laptop."
"There is no question that the amount of information that is being pressed upon people is more than they can handle," he said, but he's not convinced Atos has found a good solution to the problem.
"The increase of chat is almost certainly a bad thing," he said. "There is a lot of evidence that it is more of a hindrance than a help."
Chat, he said, is simultaneously more distracting than email — if someone wants to chat, they want to chat NOW — and generally less valuable than email since people tend to type out whatever first comes to mind.
As for the idea of a central document that everyone keeps updating, he said that only works if everyone also remembers to check it frequently.
"The real core of this is how often people know what they need to know," he said. "The more people know what they need to know, the more you can have systems with centralized documents and then people know where they can go to find out what they need to know. But when you don't know you need to know something on the document, how will you know to check?"
The issue, he said, is finding the balance between making sure people get information they need to know and are not bogged down with information they don't need to know.
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Photo: Thierry Breton, chief executive of Atos, speaks at the Euro Finance Week conference in Frankfurt, Germany, in November. He has said he hasn't sent or received in an email in three years. Credit: Hannelore Foerster / Bloomberg.
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Mobile Email Opens are Up, But Activity is Lagging
posted by Linc Wonham @ 2:00 PM
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Digital marketing software and services provider Knotice has released new data on the percentage of email opens and click activity via mobile device across 11 industry segments for the first half of 2011.
The Mobile Email Opens Report offers a comprehensive look at overall mobile usage as it pertains to email, including percentages of mobile opens and click-to-open (CTO) rates of permission-based email (CTO is a measure of action taken within an email once it has been opened).
The report includes specific mobile devices or operating systems (including Android, iPhone and iPad); industry segments such as retail, hospitality, telecommunications, healthcare and more; time of day (including smartphone versus iPad usage), and geography (mobile penetration percentage by state).
Key insights include the following:
Mobile email opens rise 51 percent – The number of emails opened on a mobile device (smartphone, iPad, etc.) rose 51 percent the first half of 2011 over the last quarter of 2010. This lends further proof to the fact that smartphone adoption rates, as well as the comfort level of mobile users, are on the rise.
People are not saving emails to view later on a different device – Despite the rise in mobile email open activity, only 3.09 percent of the sample of 701 million emails were opened on both mobile device and desktop . Of that 3.09 percent, only one-third were opened on mobile device first, then viewed on a desktop device later. While some marketers resist optimizing email for mobile, rationalizing that a poor mobile email experience can be reopened once the recipient is at their desk, the data clearly shows that is not happening.
Best time of the day can differ for opening email versus taking action – Mobile open rates and CTO rates by time of day do not always correspond. Understanding the demographics of each send segment remains important.
Mobile email open rates rise, while mobile click-through activity lags behind – Even if a person opens the email, the real measure is what they do once it's open. The lower rates of CTO activity may reflect the growing need for optimization, as it may be difficult for mobile users to take action on emails that have limited functionality when viewed via a mobile device.
Other findings include:
• Apple's iOS and Google's Android operating systems remain the clear market leaders.
• The B2B, cable and telecommunications, consumer services and entertainment industries saw significantly increased mobile email open activity from Q4 2010.
• The email CTO rate on mobile devices is far lower than the CTO rate on desktop devices. This data reinforces the need for a mobile optimized email experience.
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Find the ROI of Email with GetResponse
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 6:30 PM
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Email marketing service GetResponse has focused more of its attention on analytics, launching a solution which aims to bring some much needed intelligence about email ROI by providing "one-chart" comparisons of different messages to help marketers identify trends.
The tool, dubbed Email Intelligence, is able to track sales and conversions occuring on the website without the need for integration with other software. How that actually happens is not addressed in the announcement, but the platform is showing number of visits, sales, sign-ups or downloads coming from email campaign links.
Email Intelligence calculates averages for each metric to identify the weakest and best-performing elements of a campaign, reporting patterns, and providing email marketers the ability to segment and email specific groups in a few clicks from the insights generated directly on the report.
Many of the features will be appealing to Web workers.
For example, marketers can pinpoint the time of day certain groups open and click; ideal for those scheduling their emails.
With 44 percent of marketers rating email marketing ROI as the most significant challenge to email marketing effectiveness in 2011, and 68 percent mention targeting recipients with highly relevant content, the Get REsponse solution seems to come at an important time. (MarketingSherpa, 2011 Email Marketing Benchmark)
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Drop The Turkey, Get Back to Work
posted by Peter A. Prestipino @ 7:00 AM
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Xobni has released the results of its 2nd annual survey of holiday email behavior and it's pretty dismal. If you're planning on not checking work-related email over this long weekend, then you'll be in the minority.
Hightlights from the study include:
- 79% of U.S. working adults say they receive work email on traditional holidays
- 19% of people said that they are actually “thankful for the distraction” or “relieved” to receive work email on holidays.
- 37% of people surveyed admitted to feeling annoyed, frustrated or resentful after receiving work-related emails on holidays.
- 41% of people that admitted to checking email because they believe doing so would ease the work load once they return from the “break.”
So who are the worst offenders? According to the Xobni survey, employed, middle-aged adults. 58 percent of those age 35-44 admit to checking work email around the holidays.
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Link Building in Online Marketing: Tougher Than It Sounds
You probably don’t need to read the latest advice from the online marketing consultants to figure out the basic idea behind link building. Without links, your site won’t develop authority. Without authority, it won’t move up on the search engines. But even the most savvy online marketing consultant would have to admit that doing that is just not as easy as it sounds.
* More Is Not Better In Link Building
Just going out and getting a bunch of links won’t necessarily help your site. You need quality links to get higher search rankings. But sometimes figuring out what makes one link better than another is tough. This is where you do need to keep up with what the online marketing consultants are recommending or you may just be wasting your time.
* Targeted Anchor Text Is A Must
When you start pursuing links on sites, you need targeted anchor text. However, you don’t want to use the same text everywhere. Google will notice that in a bad way. You want to use two or three different phrases and the proper name of your website. If you can’t get anything but an image link, make sure the site owner puts your anchor text or the name of your site in the ALT tag of the image.
* Pay Attention To Links In And Out
Google looks at the site where your link appears and decides how much benefit your site gets back. A site with a lot of inbound links passes more authority to your site. At the same time, being linked on a site full of low-quality, outbound links probably won’t help you much.
* PageRank Isn’t Everything
Don’t be one of those site owners who sees nothing but PageRank. A site with high PageRank can still have low link value. This is especially true of sites that sell links. Steer clear of sites that use phrases like “sponsored by” or “paid for by.” Google may not let that site pass PageRank at all. Move on. They’re not worth your time.
* Concentrate On Site Relevance
Let’s say your site is about red widgets. You get a link on a site about purple doohickeys. That link isn’t worth as much as one on a site about red widget management. Make sure you’re pursuing links in relevant places and look at how those places are optimized. If a site owner gives you a choice of having a link on a page titled “About Us” or one with the title “About Red Widgets,” which one do you choose? The link on the optimized page, “About Red Widgets,” has more value.
* An Online Marketing Consultant Checks What’s Not Obvious
Take your cue from the pros and check sites in ways that aren’t obvious. For instance, in any search engine, you can type in “cache:” followed by a site url and find out if the site has been indexed and when it was last crawled. But what do those dates mean?
Chances are good that if the site hasn’t been crawled in 30-45 days, it’s not a good place for a link. But some domains have more value than others. For example, links from .edu domains are better than from a .com, but .info is worth less. All these factors should be weighed in judging a site’s worth in your link building efforts.
* Does Social Networking Matter?
We’ve all seen the little link bars under blog posts and in forums asking people to Digg or Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, or StumbleUpon. Do you need to try to get links in places where social networking can happen? Yes. Alone those links may not have a lot of value, but Google is increasingly looking at the “active Web” in determining site authority.
It’s time consuming, but participating in forums and social sites and getting blog owners to run your articles with your linked anchor text included can be worth your time. But remember, relevance is a basic rule in online marketing consulting.
* Are You Getting Clean Links?
When you get a link on a site, do you go look at the page’s source code? Is there anything extra in the “href” tag on the link? Is the site using redirect code? Is there a “nofollow” in the site’s meta data? If there is, the link is useless to you. It won’t pass any authority to your site because that code tells the search engines not to follow the link. Make sure you’re getting clean links.
When you’re on a tight budget and trying to develop your site and get higher search rankings, it can be a tough decision to work online marketing consulting into your thinking. The Web used to be pretty much a do-it-yourself place. That all started to change in 2004 when people began talking about “Web 2.0.”
It’s harder than ever to judge quality link building in the new world of Web applications and social networking. You can do it, but try to stay up to speed on what the online marketing consultants are recommending as good strategies. The Web is changing all the time. Good link building takes time and effort; you don’t want to waste those any more than you want to waste money during hard times.
“5 Tips on How To Use Google Sidewiki Efficiently”
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
“5 Tips on How To Use Google Sidewiki Efficiently”
Google launched Sidewiki on 23rd Sep 2009 as a part of its toolbar. Google Sidewiki appears as a sidebar in the browser and allows visitors to comment on any webpage. Its main aim was to collect useful information on any webpage from people around the world and therefore lead to better user experience.
For example, a person searching for a local restaurant can see its review in the sidebar by the previous diners.
Google Sidewiki comprises of an algorithm which pulls out the most useful and valuable comments from its database. This ensures that a visitor will see the most relevant comments on a webpage. Listed below are 5 steps for using Google Sidewiki efficiently.
1. Get Started With Google Sidewiki
Sidewiki is available in the options tab of the Google toolbar. Simply download the Google toolbar and select the option to integrate Sidewiki using the checkbox. It appears as a blue sidebar in the browser which slides open when you click on it. Google Sidewiki works perfectly well in Firefox. Although, Google’s own browser, Chrome seems to be having some issues in integrating Sidewiki.
2. Add Comments on Useful Webpages
Adding comments in Google Sidewiki is extremely easy. You need to log in to your Google account and click on the “Make an Entry” link which appears at the bottom of the sidebar. Enter your comments and publish. It is advised to add something which ads more value to the content. If your comment is relevant to the topic, then it can be placed on the first page of Sidewiki for that web page, unless you are the website owner.
3. Claim Your Position At The Top Of All Comments
If you want to place your own comment at the top, you need to verify ownership of the website by using Google Webmasters Tool. If verified, as the page owner your entry is placed at the top entry for that page. The top slot can be used to leave a note for anyone who is yet to comment.
4. Share Your Comments With Everyone
Each comment in Google Sidewiki has the option of being shared on Twitter, Facebook or emailed to any user. This enables everyone to read the Sidewiki entries without using the Google Toolbar. This option is very useful if your web page has received some great comments from visitors. Sharing these comments will pull readers from others streams like Twitter and Facebook onto your website.
5. Flush Out Negative Comments By Blocking Sidewiki
Google Sidewiki does not provide an option for blocking or deleting negative comments on a webpage. Many users have expressed their displeasure with Google for not providing an option for this purpose. If your web page is inundated with negative or irrelevant comments which are harming your website, you can block Google Sidewiki. This can be done by switching from normal http:// to secure https:// pages.
Google Sidewiki is not the first of its kind. One of the first commenting add-on, Third Voice was launched way back in 1999. AddATweet and Kutano are plug-ins which can be installed on your browser and let you tweet comments on a webpage.
Despite many competitors, Google Sidewiki has risen to become the most popular commenting tool of its time. Start your week by experimenting with this comment tool.
What Strategic Link Building Means To You?
Strategic link building can gratify your desires to make it big online. Despite the fact that you might find that even a minor tweak in your site can get you enough traffic through search engines, there are other more sensible procedures to use your time and money to ensure a high influx of target traffic. For one, you could incorporate your link building campaign with competitive intelligence and see the change. Achieving this will not only double, but triple your conversion rate.
* Strategic Link Building: How To Use It?
We all know that link building is related to SEO. This is why many web users also fail to see that link building can have a separate strategy away from search engine optimization as well. By itself too, strategic link building can get you a lot of traffic for your website. Let’s discover how:
The first approach is straightforward to use. Go browsing the on the internet and zero in on the sites you like. If you like them, in all probability your visitors will like them too. Once you have a list of some great sites, set them in priority and choose the number of sites you’d like to link with.
Request a reciprocal link or a one-way link from these site owners. As all websites might not respond favorably to your request, it’s advisable to request links from a number of sites. With time and effort, you’ll notice that websites won’t refuse your requests as often.
While you’re sending requests for links, be certain you let those sites know that you’ve visited their site, liked what you saw, and find that a link with them would benefit both parties. This will make your e-mail sound more sincere and not a spammish.
The second strategic link building method involves submitting articles to free content sites. By doing this, you’ll reach those sites, e-zines and newsletters where you’ll get a amazing chance to market yourself though the utilization of your resource box at the end of each and every article you write.
With each article that you write, you can do some strategic link building by placing your website URL into the resource box. Your prospective clientele will read your articles, and if they like what they read, should click over to your website and view what you have to offer.
The third strategy involves writing a press release. If it’s very good and gets publicized on numerous websites, you might even get to publicize your work and website on TV or even in a nationwide magazine. You could begin with writing press releases for the community media in the beginning.
The fourth strategy entails posting to forums and news groups. It’s an easy and fun way to make strategic links. While going about it, be honest. Seek to post in only those forums that you like, and those that deal with topics you believe in.
The fifth strategy is to use competitive intelligence to give a boost to your strategic links. You could use the Google toolbar to know the keywords that your competitors are using, and also to know the websites that are sending target traffic to your competitors.
You’ll have to use the link called “Backward Links” on the tool bar for this work. Many of such competitive intelligence tools could help you to monitor your competitor’s traffic sources. All in all, strategic link building can make you a favorite with search engine spiders, and enable your website pages to enhance in the rankings as well.
“Five Tips To Increase Your Backlinks”
Getting a top position in the search engines is no easy task. The key to achieving this is constantly building links to your site – here are five simple strategies…
1) Put Pen to Paper
Whatever industry or niche you’re in, you should have an above average knowledge of that topic, so put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard!) and write some informative short articles (300 – 500 words) that would appeal to your target market. You can either syndicate these articles through article directories, or head to the publishers and try to get them published on high ranking sites. Doing both is always a good idea. Every time your article gets published, you score free links – so get going now!
2) Social-ize…
Explore the realm of social bookmarking and get your links featured on as many social networks are possible. The potential for a viral linking explosion is huge in any social network, so work on a good value offer to promote to these networks (something free and useful).
3) Break Into the Forum Community
By registering on, and actively participating in forums that are relevant to your niche, you can quickly build up the number of backlinks to your website using your signature file (provided that they allow this and that the links are “dofollow”). Whilst the “SEO weight” of these links is debatable, you still get the benefit of publicity and who knows, you could learn a thing or two whilst online! A word of warning though – don’t spam the forums with rubbish comments purely to score backlinks to your site – you’ll get kicked out pretty quickly.
4) Follow Some Blogs
Blog commenting is quite a popular link building technique in the SEO community. You simply follow some popular blogs in your niche or industry, and provide constructive comment where suitable, leaving your link in the comment. Make sure that the blogs are “dofollow” type, as the “nofollow” ones are useless.
5) Differentiate or Die
This classic business phrase has a slightly different meaning in terms of link building. When building links (whatever method you may use), always try to differentiate your anchor text used across the web – at least to a certain degree. Having identical links and anchor text all over the web is likely to raise a brow with the search engines.
* Most importantly, commit to the journey of link building
The best link building strategy is a long term, consistent one. Set a target for how many links you want to build monthly, and aim to achieve this amount every month. Be patient and have a little faith – your hard work will be rewarded.
“10 Steps To Getting The Click”
There are a number of steps a webmaster can take to encourage visitors to “click” on a link or graphic located on their website. The following steps will help “get the click”…
1. Colors
Use contrasting colors for links. This makes the links easier to discern from other text on a web page. Also, avoid placing links against a patterned background, as it will make it much more difficult to read the link text. Bottom line, the link color should stand out from the rest of the web page, and be easy to locate.
2. Link Traits
Underlining is still the universal indication of a link. Using the “underline” for links will send a clear message to website visitors about which text on the webpage is just text, and which text is actually a hyper-link. And along this line of thought, you should avoid using underlining for text that is not a link, just to avoid confusion.
3. Visible
Make all the links visible. Do not hide the links or navigation on a web page. Avoid using scripting to display links, as these links will not be visible to website visitors who have turned scripting off in their browser for security reasons.
4. Textual
Text links have a higher rate of clicks than linked images. The one exception is typically a “Buy Now” button, which tends to be more effective than text-only “Buy Now” links. Keep this in mind when creating a linking scheme for your website.
5. Consistent
The location of links should be consistent as the visitor moves from page to page through your website. Do not move links around as the content of the web page changes.
6. Position
Place important links in a location that is easy for the website visitor to see without having to scroll. Position important links “above the fold” on the website.
7. Font Style & Size
In order to make links easy for the visitor to see, be sure to use a font style and size that can be easily read.
8. Graphic Links
If you use image links, the clickable graphics should be vibrant and should stand out from the other content on the page. Use bright or bold contrasting colors for the graphic. Be sure to include appropriate ALT text for each linked image, so the visitor will have an indication of the material being linked to as they move their mouse over the graphic.
9. Split-Test
Conduct split-testing by changing colors and moving links around, and then monitor and track which options and locations result in the highest number of clicks. What may seem intuitive is not always as obvious as you might think.
10. Fresh Eyes
Ask a friend or family member to navigate your website. It may surprise you to learn what they see and where they click. A fresh set of eyes will give a good indication of how others will perceive your website and the clickable content.
Google Analytics: Advice
As a freelance SEO consultant I always set my clients up with a Google Analytics account. This enables them to keep track of what progress is being made and adds transparency to the relationship. However, there are usually a fair amount of questions directed my way as how to understand the data, and what exactly they should be looking for or expecting to see. The main aim of using Google Analytics is to keep an eye on traffic. Not only does this mean seeing how many visitors your site is getting, but also seeing where they are coming from both in the geographical sense, and via other sites on the internet. This article goes through a few basic things can help someone who is unfamiliar to Google Analytics:
* The Dashboard
This is the first page that you will see when you enter the report. It is there to give you an overview on what is going on, and typically includes; Visitor Numbers, Site Usage Data, Unique Visitor Numbers, Map Overlay and Page View details. Any of these modules can be removed and if you’d prefer to include something else in the dashboard e.g Keyword data then you can. To add another module to the dashboard, simply view the report in question and click ‘add to dashboard’.
* Visitors Vs Unique
Visitors At the top of the dashboard you should see a large line graph spanning the page. This graph shows you the amount of visitors or ‘hits’ your website has received. The standard display shows data from the previous month, with points for each day. This can be programmed to display whatever time period you prefer. You can also view time periods from the past to help compare past traffic levels against the present figures. This data shows the total number of visits and will include yours. The number you should really focus on however, is the amount of unique visitors. To get a more accurate view, you can block certain IP addresses from the report.
* Traffic Sources
For anyone involved in SEO this is the really interesting bit. It is crucial for any online marketing that you can keep an eye on where the traffic is coming from, and also see what keywords are sending traffic from the search engines. If you are fortunate to spot a dramatic spike in traffic numbers this report will identify where they have come from. With regards to keywords, you can go into quite a lot of detail and find out not only which phrases send you the most traffic, but which ones are actually converting into customers. This is vital if you are engaging in pay per click advertising when each click is costing you money.
* Site Usage
This is the bit that confuses most people. Once you understand what’s being reported you will find this information extremely useful as it lays out a very detailed report on what people are looking at, and for how long. The three most important things you should be checking are; Bounce Rate, Average Page Views and Average Time On Site. If your site is doing well, you should expect to see a low bounce rate, a relatively high average page view and again a relatively high average time on site (over 2-3 mins is good!). For poor performing websites the bounce rate is often very high, i.e people are clicking on the website and ‘bouncing’ straight off.
GoogleApple War: What does it all mean?
For those who have been living in a cave, Google recently bought AdMob, the small but highly innovative mobile advertising company for the extremely inflated price of $750 Million. That is the gross national product of the country of Kiribati, a small country made up of a bunch of atolls. While AdMob hadn’t quite made anywhere around that amount of revenue, Google wanted to gobble it up before someone else did and to have a quick way to access the growing revenue stream available on Mobile Applicatications. Part of this strategy was to be able to access the significant population of IPHONE users. However, recently Apple came out with new developer rules that will prevent ADMob and Google Adsense from being displayed on iPhone applications… and thus a significant issue with ADMob’s revenue stream. However, perhaps things aren’t as they seem…
Let’s make this really clear, Apple is looking to break into the advertising and eventually search market. Google, as the all encompassing leader of search clearly dominates the market. However, they recently also decided to get into mobile market with the Google Android system, which while itself doesn’t make that much money for the company, the offshoots such as the product development, application development, google interfacing and even their own google nexus phone has been a significant success. In fact, according to most reputable reports, the open-source android phones are taking over as the dominant force in the market, pushing out Apple. Apple, ain’t happy about their market share being taken. They saw themselves as dominating the mobile space for a long time to come. Don’t forget also that Apple had actually wanted to buy ADMob, but the $750M price tag was way too high – they bought a competitor with just as much revenue and potential, it seems for a significantly lower price tag of $250M.
While some people might say this is a stab at Google for getting into “their business”, there is much more here than meets the eye. Apple has no reason to actually allow Google Adsense onto their applications – because they don’t make a single dollar from those ads. Since Apple is making their own system, they need to ensure that the only way to run advertising on the system is through them. It’s pretty damn simple – Google already has an extensive database of advertisers, and they would easily overshadow any attempt by Apple to compete with them even on their own platform. This wouldn’t fare very well for Apple, if in a year a report came out that not only was Google Android overtaking Apple iPhone, but that the predominate type of advertising on the IPHONE was actually Google.
What is strange about this mobile advertising war is the investment versus the actual possible revenue being made. Everyone is talking about mobile advertising on applications and application development as if it is the “end-all” of advertising and will take over advertising left and right. However, people ten years ago pushed application advertising and ad-supported applications as the method that would take over interactive advertising. Now it’s almost impossible to find any program that actually does this and the predominate type of advertising is in the browser.
I honestly think that this is a very possible future for mobile also. As mobile devices get bigger, as the web integrates with mobile more and more, there will be a growing seamless interaction between the two mediums. In fact, if you think about it, a great portion of the “internet” users are really “mobile” – laptops are a “mobile” device of sorts, and they have become smaller and smaller, while phone screens have become bigger and bigger. At some point in the near future they will meet in the middle and we will have laptop/netbooks that are nothing but combinations of mobile phones, laptops that do everything. Most people that I know who have android phones and iPhones spend quite a bit of their time, browsing the web using it as a “little computer” of sorts and see all the banner and other type of ads made specifically for the websites.
So, does this war really matter? Perhaps for the short term, but within a few years, I can’t see it will really matter except to corner a very small part of the marketshare. Mobile as separate entity, with its own features (mobile billing, mobile applications) will become part of the entire interactive, internet, web-process. No one actually believes that ADMob was worth $750M, but sees it as one chess piece in a greater strategy that both these companies have to dominate the web. This has little to do with “Mobile”.
The Power of Google Analytics
Internet marketing efforts need to be tracked so you know if you are using your resources wisely. Google analytics is a good, free tool you can use to track traffic sources, conversion rates, etc.
Make sure you have Google analytics or some other type of analytics installed on your website.
- Traffic Sources
You want to know where your traffic is coming from and where it is not coming from. This will help you allocate your resources properly. Google Analytics is able to track where your site visitors are coming from, where they go on your site, etc.
A few examples of where your traffic may come from:
- Search Engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc)
- Pay-Per-Click campaigns
- Twitter, Facebook, etc
- Articles and press releases that include links
- Websites that have your links
- Etc.
Having this information can help you have a more effective Internet marketing plan.
- Easy Come, Easy Go
It is easy to find out where the traffic comes from and what page they leave from. Both of these pieces of information are valuable. Knowing them can help you identify if your Internet marketing strategy is working.
The page people enter your site on is important. You want to make sure they arrive on your website on a page that has a focused message for what they are looking for (most websites have multiple entry points, each focused on a different search term). Pay careful attention to what page your visitors land on and make sure it is well designed and well written.
The page visitors leave your website on is also important because it may identify a problem with your site. If you find that a certain page is the primary exit point you want to see if there are any technical or other issues with that page that make people leave your site.
- Conversion Rates
Though it is important to learn about where your traffic is coming from it is more important to know where your sales are coming from. Conversion rates in Google Analytics are tracked by traffic source. You can see where your actual buyers are coming from so you can put more emphasis on those resources.
Google Analytics is important to add to a website. Learn about your website traffic, conversion rates and more so you can make important tweaks to your Internet marketing strategy. It’s free to use so all you have to do is go for it.
Time Spent In The Google Sandbox: Still Important To Success
Google denies that they sandbox new websites. Yet, webmasters and SEO gurus alike have been frustrated to no end by the sandbox effect noted when a new website is launched. Google does acknowledge that there may be something in the algorithm that penalizes new websites and gives them lower rankings until they have proven their value. The reasons for such a filter are many and include keeping people from putting up multiple sites with links to one another when one website is what they need. Whatever the reasons behind ending up there, time spent in the Google Sandbox is still important to success.
Whether it was a conscious decision on the part of Google owners or not, they have written into the algorithm a set of filters that manage to establish the quality of a website using time-based indicators. These indicators include the age of the web site or domain, the age of different backlinks and inbound links to the site, and other factors. One important feature to note is that not only new sites are found in the sandbox. Older sites that suddenly get a rush of inbound links are often sandboxed while the value of the links is established.
With these points in mind, many who have paid for SEO services and still ended up in Google Sandbox are wondering what they can do to get out. Sadly, the only true way to climb out is to be patient. Time is actually on the side of those who are in the sandbox. There are several reasons for this.
The first reason is that time spent in the sandbox allows the website owner to work on tweaking any problem that is found with the site so that it is 100 percent ready when page rank climbs to a point where new visitors are coming in large numbers. This is the best time to test and fix any programming errors noted.
The second reason is that it allows you to work on the content of your site and any related sites linked to it. On the internet, content is king and Google is no different on that score. New, keyword optimized content appearing regularly with links that go back to a site that has been sandboxed catch attention and increase the odds of getting out sooner. Of course, these links must be relevant to the material on the website to be of any real value.
It gives webmasters time to establish relationships with others that are considered authorities in their fields. These authorities can include links to a site in their own pages. If these individuals are recognized as authorities in their fields, the value of their links increases dramatically.
Trust is an important part of any business relationship. There are some sites on the internet that are trusted more than others. Links from these sites are seen as more trustworthy by the search engine, and can help boost page rank quickly.
Ideally, you should try for a trifecta by seeking out relevant links from sites owned by recognized authorities in the field who have been deemed trustworthy by Google and users doing business with them. These links can combine in an exponential manner to boost a page ranking significantly regardless of the page’s age.
Another trick to consider is not limiting yourself to Google when performing SEO operations. One can be in the Google Sandbox and still get good organic results on other search engines such as Yahoo or Ask Jeeves.
You can also optimize for more long tailed keyword phrases. The sandbox effect only seems to affect sites that use highly competitive keywords. Therefore, if you sell an item that can be described in the keywords, the longer keyword phrases may help increase page rank. Of course, you must choose keywords that users are likely to type into the search engine.
In a nutshell, to take advantage of these time-based indicators, you should:
1. Get links that deliver the most trust, first.
2. Start your website today and also begin your link-building task as well
3. Target quality 4-in-1 links. This means going for links that are Relevant, Authoritative, from Trusted sources and from High page rank pages.
The Google Sandbox is real, despite denials from Google. These filters are part of the algorithm that assigns page ranks and they do penalize new sites that use competitive keywords. They also penalize established sites that enter into link farming agreements and try to manipulate the rankings artificially. The filters are age related for the age of the domain, the age of the links to the pages, and other factors.
The time spent in the Google Sandbox is important for the success of any web based business. To be more precise, what is done during this time is important. This is an opportunity to work out any bugs in your website that could hurt business. It is also an opportunity to establish high quality relationships with other site owners who can provide links to your site that are relevant, authoritative, from trusted sources, and coming from pages that are ranked highly, allowing you to take advantage of their rank until your own comes into being.
Google Instant Means The End Of SEO
Initially, Google’s new Instant Search system could mean a major change in how web surfers look for information online. Instead of typing a search query into Google and then hitting return, and waiting for a list of results, Googlers now see a dynamic list of results as they type. Google considers this a positive step forward in the development of searching. Google claims this new style of response will save between two and five seconds per search query. That potentially means 11 hours are saved every second. but does anyone other than Google really care?
The internet marketing community, however, will never be very enthusiastic about Google Instant. SEO consultants, who try to get sites listed at the top of Google’s organic search rankings, and SEMs, who battle for their clients’ sites to be placed near the top of Google’s Adwords Sponsored Listings, have been blogging and tweeting as if Armageddon is here.
The SEO community is paranoid at the very best of times, and perhaps with good cause as: a small change in the Google algorithm can determine the future of many websites. In this instance, however, the reaction is not necessary, essentially the results are the same, the sole change is you can see potential results of each word as you type it in, so if you are typing in ‘Italian restaurant’ you will observe everything Italian prior to getting to the restaurant results and then you will have to include your location unless you are very flexible about your travel arrangements, so in fact long tail key phrases are far from dead.
And this time round the latest Google scare is ‘much a do about nothing’ or will it be? There isn’t any denying that Google’s original innovation in search transformed how the Internet worked and made the business of finding stuff considerably quicker and easier. It also created an enormous market – one Google still dominates – that allowed companies to market us things depending on whatever we had entered in that box and all was well, for a while.
But something happened. Social networking, social media, whatever you want to refer to it as… suddenly, content was coming right at us, without us even looking for it. We couldn’t escape it. Several hyperactive egotists in each community began curating content and spewing it out to their friends. People were sharing photos, stories and links so we found that we were spending less and less time foraging around for things and increasingly more time sitting back and allowing it to wash over us.
Fast forward to 2010, and we’re being assaulted by more stuff than we could possibly consume. Facebook, Twitter, and email are shoveling pictures and video down our throats more and more quickly. Feedback loops enabled by sharing and retweeting functions imply that each of us has now changed into an over-sharer as well as an over-consumer. If you are not confused and over loaded with information, you soon will be.
Google Instant Search for Marketing
Google recently introduced their “Instant Search” feature which starts to populate search results the instant you start typing into the search box. At the same time, Google suggests alternate search terms as you type to help narrow your search without forcing you to enter entire search phrases.
The main idea behind this new feature is to save users a few seconds on each search and cut down on misspellings for search terms, business names or product names. Users may not notice much difference in their overall experience, however, for small businesses and online entrepreneurs, this new search method carries a few interesting ramifications.
Since Google clearly ranks as the “900 lb. Gorilla” of the online marketing world, acting as de facto gateway to the Web for millions, any change to their system makes businesses nervous. Many have expressed concern that this latest change will force users of Google’s AdWords program, the search giant’s lucrative pay-per-click marketing arm, to pay for more expensive keywords.
They reason that since the most popular search terms appear in the search box first, and that most people will opt to accept Google suggestions, those most popular searches will carry the highest click prices. In other words, businesses that depend on Google to show their ads fear that Google will force them to pay more money by recommending more expensive keyword searches.
I disagree.
The suggested search term feature actually appeared on Google quite a while ago, and all that’s really changed is Google starts to display the actual search results AS you type. With the old 2-step process, Google made suggestions as you typed and then you clicked the search button to see the search results.
Instant Search just creates a FAST way to see the results for different search variations without forcing you to click the button each time to see those results. This process makes it simple to see the results, change your mind, and not wait for the results each time you change the phrase.
My experience shows that most people always start with a broad search and then narrow it by including more descriptive terms (often called “long-tail” keywords) to better find what they want. This new process won’t change that.
In fact, it will give people more chances to refine their searches on-the-fly by providing Google more details of what they want. Instead of posing a threat, I believe this new Instant Search feature creates an opportunity for any business to perform high-speed market research to look for possible opportunities and trouble spots.
The following four steps will help any small business use Google’s new feature for instant results.
1. Go to Google and search for your business as if you were a consumer.
2. Make a note of the keyword suggestions Google offers as you type.
3. See if those suggestions give you any ideas for your own marketing (since they should represent the most popular phrases).
4. Note which competitors show up and where you appear in relation to them.
These 4 simple steps make a great barometer for taking a read on your local market, fast.
Who appears consistently?
Who shows up hit-and-miss or every once in a while?
Who shows up in Google Maps?
If your competitors show up and you don’t, you’ve got some work to do!
Bottom line: as a small business, use Google’s new Instant Search to quickly get the big picture when it comes to your business, industry, and local competition.
The Buzz about Buzz
If you haven’t treated yourself to a lovely shiny new g-mail account, then you are missing out. Not only does it have endless memory, quick processing of large attachments, and a lovely search function of deleted e-mail; it also has a super cool new function called Buzz.
Buzz functions like many other popular networking sites, but it has a few new perks. Instead of friend-ing someone, like on Facebook, with Google’s new Buzz you follow them. So you want to get as many people following you as possible. Start with friends, family, and people you network with regularly on other social web-sites. Now for the cool part: any website that you have attached to your Buzz account generates posts via Buzz. Websites that you can attach to Buzz include Google Chat Status, Picassa, Flickr, posted via Buzz@gmail, Google reader, and Twitter.
Once you have connected any of these websites to Buzz, anything you post on the other website automatically appears as a post on Buzz. Anyone who is following you will be able to see these posts. You get twice as much exposure with half of the effort. You can post information about events, a sale your business is having, or a gig your band is playing. Buzz will get the information out.
Buzz also has some other nifty features, similar to other networking sites. You can comment on someone else’s post or a post of your own. You can like a post. You can re-share a post, e-mail a post to anyone (whether they have Buzz as well or not), and finally, and probably the most cool, is one of your contacts is online and has their G-mail account open you can reply to the post by chat, which is conveniently built into G-mail’s website.
- How Does This Affect Pay Per Click Marketing?
Buzz taps into Google’s AdSense program with a more refined algorithm. If someone clicks on an add while on a Buzz screen, then the logic states that their friends might also like similar ads, articles, and websites. This adds a powerhouse punch to pay per click advertising. Much like harnessing the power of Facebook, PPC advertisers now have new avenues opened before them. Unlike fishing on particular keywords, potential customers are assisting in the event. Using this analogy it is like having fish help teach you how to fish.
This sort of advertising momentum can take your marketing campaign to the next level. Couple this with analytics tools and your PPC approach will be unstoppable. All PPC Google ads permits companies to set their advertising budget down to an exact dollar amount. In fact, the minimum required daily budget to advertise with Google through PPC Ads is one dollar. As always, the advertiser only pays when an ad is clicked, and Buzz doesn’t change that, it only helps to harness the power of social media for the purpose of ad refinement and dissemination.
Tips For Google Adwords
One of the best Google Adwords tips I can give you is to not consider this a do it yourself type of traffic tool. Adwords has many elements to it and if you want to make more money than you spend you will need to find someone, or some course, to teach you how to get the most out of it.
Pay Per click (PPC) can work exceptionally well at getting hordes of very targeted traffic to your website virtually instantly. Of course, you may be asking, if it’s so good, why doesn’t everyone use it?
That is the crux of the matter. PPC is not an easy thing to learn how to do. It will take time and you need to be willing to invest not only the time but the money too. You will need to carefully test and track various elements of each ad that you place. In the start you will spend way more money than you will earn.
Another challenge is that Google isn’t really worried to much about you or your advertising budget, they are more concerned that their searchers get what they are looking for. The searchers on any of the search engines are the real customers and if they don’t find what they want they’ll go elsewhere. That is why Google wants to make sure to keep them happy by providing them with just what they’re looking for.
To do this, Google will periodically change the way they do things. They will rewrite an algorithm or make other changes and if you’re not right on top of those changes you can find that the ad that once made you a lot of money is now costing you a lot of money.
Here are a few tips that you can use to optimize your PPC campaigns:
1. Find a course or a mentor who can teach you the ins and outs of PPC advertising. If you try to just jump in and figure it all out on your own you had better make sure you have a lot of time and very deep pockets.
2. Carefully choose the keywords you use. Don’t even try to compete for the one or two word keywords since they will almost always have so much competition you’ll be spending way too much per click. Instead focus on the keyword phrases that have 3, 4, or 5 words in them. These ‘long tailed keywords’ can fly under the radar yet still get you some decent click through rates (CTR’s).
3. Always test your ads. You can do this by having several versions of each ad running at the same time. Find out which headlines get the most clicks. Which body text gets the most clicks, etc. Keep testing until you’ve got a winning ad. When testing make sure you only change one element at a time otherwise you won’t know which change really made the difference.
Out of all the Google Adwords tips I can give you the one I think is the most important is to find someone to show you the ropes. PPC is effective if you know how to do it right, but if not it can very quickly become a money pit.
Most people in the world don’t know just what cloud computing is actually. The thought can be extremely confusing, but I will try to apparent that will upward for you personally. Cloud computing is essentially technology that will allow people to usage of making use of selected applications upon just about any laptop or computer. These types of programs won’t have to become attached to your personal computer. Providing some type of computer has Access to the internet it’ll be able to utilize the application form. This is extremely wonderful since you don’t have to be over a certain computer or even spot to take a step. You could take a step which should be done properly aside in the home in lieu of needing to go right down to the work location.
There are many different forms of cloud computing. The previous that individuals can discuss is SaaS. This specific type is really a single request. This kind of computing is fairly easy. While there is just one application it is extremely simple for the business to take care of. This also signifies that the price less difficult below an alternative type with plenty of forms of software. For the client there isn’t an energy production as far as machines or software accreditation.
An additional type of cloud computing will be power computing. Very good regarding cloud computing is booming. This sort of computing is generally used by organizations regarding requirements that aren’t consequently critical. This type of computing generally is a extra type of computing for an organization. Sun, along Microsystems and IBM tend to be 3 firms which can be truly making this type of computing very well liked and has effectives exams designed for the teaching purpose like 000-280 & 000-032. For the reason that acceptance is booming, utility computing could become not only an extra sort of computing device. It may become a core concentrate for a company’s computing wants.
1 / 3, along with the final form of cloud computing being mentioned, is Web services within the foreign. This sort of computing is incredibly close to the kind of computing that is finished with SaaS. On this type of computing the World Wide Web will be used because of its functionality. Applications aren’t actually provided with this form of computing. Providers can provide items for instance discrete organization providers, and other types of APIs that are offered by such techniques for example Yahoo and Google Roadmaps. This type of computing may be used for any number of reasons, and by various firms.
If you would like to know anything about the tests listed below you can easily find it on IBM web site.
10 Steps to Triple Your Prospect Conversions with an Email Mini-Course
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
10 Steps to Triple Your Prospect Conversions with an Email Mini-Course
For years, I’ve been giving away a PDF ebook as my client attraction device to entice prospects to sign up for my list. This strategy has served me well as a way to grow my list. However, what I’ve discovered during that time is that many people download my ebook and then never open it. So, as you might imagine, my rate of converting a customer prospect to a buyer isn’t as high as I’d like.
Just like the people who join my list, I, too, often don’t open a PDF ebook when I download it. What I have noticed, however, is that when I subscribe to an ecourse that someone is giving away as a client attraction device, I’m much more likely to pay attention to it, since I’m getting emails every day with new information in them. And, all indications are that the conversion rate of prospect to customer is higher, as well, for this same reason. Your mini-course helps you automatically build a relationship with subscribers and drive sales of your products and services.
Here’s how you can create your own client attraction ecourse to help you triple your conversion rate:
1. Buy autoresponder system. In order to create your email mini-course, you need to purchase an email marketing system that has autoresponder capability, which is the ability to pre-set emails to go out at a periodic interval when someone opts into a list.
2. Determine your theme and catchy name. Your ecourse needs to have a theme or subject. What is it that you want to teach your prospects? Once you determine the theme, your ecourse needs to have a catchy title. Typically, you’ll want to focus on solving a problem or the result someone receives by enrolling in your mini-course.
3. Create content. Your ecourse should consist of 8-12 emails. The bulk of these emails need to contain valuable, actionable content that will help your prospect solve her problems. In a couple of the emails, you can break up the content delivery by introducing your prospect to other resources you offer that will help them, as well. In my new mini-course, I simply re-purposed a number of articles I had already written, paring them down to 400-600 words each, in most cases.
4. Add your soft sell. Rather than hammering a prospect over the head with sales hype, I did three things in each of the followup emails. First, I included a resource box at the end of the email with a link to the call to action I want my prospect to take or a postscript (P.S.) that included a link to the call to action. Secondly, in the body of the email, I made a natural transition based on the content of the email to ask people to buy the product I wanted them to buy. Thirdly, at the end of each lesson, I added, “In our next lesson, we’ll talk about…” to keep the reader engaged and anxiously awaiting the next email.
5. Format and upload your ecourse. In order to best track your open rates of each segment of the ecourse, you’ll want to format each email as HTML. This means that you’ll want to have a header designed and template created so that you can simple copy and paste the content into a properly formatted HTML template. To increase the likelihood that your ecourse will reach its destination, also format a plain text version of each segment of the course, as well.
Next, create a catchy subject line to entice your reader to open that email. Lastly, copy your ecourse into your autoresponder system and create the followup sequence. Ideally, you want your prospect to receive one email from you for a 8-12 days.
6. Design your opt-in box. Your email marketing program should provide instructions on how to create an opt-in box for prospects to join your list. Typically, all that you want to request of your prospects is a first name, last name, and email address. Once you have created the opt-in box, copy the code you’ll need to add the opt-in box to your web site.
7. Create a graphic. To make your email mini-course more appealing, have a graphic designed that visually represents the ecourse. I simply had a spiral book cover designed that contained my name and the name of my ecourse.
8. Create your landing page. To entice prospects to sign up for your ecourse, you’ll want to create a landing page that “sells” the mini-course. In today’s world, you have to “sell” free just like you do something for a fee, so create a short list of the benefits that someone will receive by signing up for your course, and add the code for your opt-in box. Since anyone opting in for my ecourse is also added to my ezine list, I make sure that all prospects know this at the time they sign up.
9. Copy the course content to your web site. To prevent your prospects from emailing you that they are missing some number of lessons in the ecourse, copy the content to your web site. Then, at the bottom of each email lesson, you can add a note that if they have missed any of the lessons, they can read them on your site. You can create one page for each lesson, or a couple of pages containing a few lessons.
10. Track and measure. The only way to realize the success of your mini-course is to track and measure. Create a simple spreadsheet with the open rates of each email and the unsubscribe rates. If you notice over time that many prospects are unsubscribing from your list when they receive a certain lesson, you need to review the content of that lesson and change it until your unsubscribe rate diminishes. And, of course, you need to track how many sales result from your ecourse.
Create an email mini-course to help you establish a relationship with your prospects and lead them to taking the action you desire. You’ll discover that a mini-course is the most effective way to convert a prospect into a paying customer.
How To Set Up a Blogger Blog?
Setting up a blog on Blogger is quite easy. The first thing you want to do is to set up a Google account for the blog. You can do this by going to Blogger.com and then following the link in the resources section.
It takes about 2 or 3 minutes to set up a Google account. If you already have a Google account you can use it if you wish.
After you have set up your Google account you should go back to Blogger.com and sign-in using your Google account username and password. Your username is typically the e-mail address you used when creating the account.
You can set up your account so it remembers your username and password. Only do this if you are on a non-shared computer.
Look for the “Create a blog” option on the dashboard of Blogger. The dashboard is the page you go to every time you log onto your Blogger account. You can manage several blogs from the same dashboard if they were all created with the same Google account.
You will be asked to name your blog. You want to create an easy to remember, easy to find name that makes it clear what your blog is about. Try not to have a blog name that is too long. It will be the first part of the web address of your blog. For example if you name your blog “Teds Tidbits” your URL will be: tedstidbits@blogspot.com.
The next thing you need to do is to choose your template. Blogger has a number of templates to choose from. You do not have to agonize over which template to use because you can change the template at any time.
Write your first official blog post using the template Blogger provided. Feel free to add a picture, etc. Once you submit that first blog posting you will be able to view your new blog, edit the posting, etc.
At this point you can personalize your blog so it stands out. Many different aspects of the blog can be changed, moved around, etc. Click on the “Layout” option and start to make your blog stand out from the other blogs out there. You can undo virtually anything that you do so do not be shy to experiment with different layouts for your blog.
Once you finish your layout you are done. I wish you Happy blogging!
How to Get the Maximum Number of Links to Your Blog?
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Monday, March 28, 2011
It is every blogger’s dream: to be read by as many people as possible. But it’s not as simple as it sounds. Several things have to fall into place to capture that wide audience.
First is to get the word out that your blog exists, second is to hold visitors’ interest in what they are reading, third is to make them return for more, and fourth is for them to start referring you to others.
That is why when SEO marketers sit down with blog owners to talk about increasing audience viewership, one of the strategies they instantly recommend is to build as many links to the site as possible.
Just how does link building equate to a wide captive audience?
The equation goes something like this: links to your blog from other sites generate referral traffic and increase your blogs’s Google page ranking.
The former is possible when users go to another site and click on the link from that site to your blog. The second is when Google’s search algorithms consider the links to your site as a vote of referral from the other sites, taking that to mean that you are a site of substance, thereby elevating your page rank. The higher the page rank of your blog means that when users search via Google, your blog will be one of the first ten sites listed on the first page.
Sources of Blog Links
When you commit to link building, there are many sources where you can get these links. Below are a few of them:
- Common-niche blogs, websites, forums, and communities. Visit these sites and drop a comment or two in forum messages and posts. Be helpful by answering questions or offering information. Sign your posts on these sites with a link to your blog site. As your presence in these sites is established, so will your blog site generate more traffic.
- Social networking sites. StumbleUpon and Digg have proven track records in generating traffic to sites, so take advantage of this. Consider other sites such as Facebook and Twitter as well.
- Directory submissions. This technique is still good for link building, but you have to be careful to submit your site to quality directory sites only, because there are many directories out there that turn out to be mere link farms.
More Tools and Tips for Link Building
Link sources may be there for the taking, but the key to success is in actually keeping in mind the following rule-of-thumb:
- Link building takes time. Many sites require webmaster’s approval for links to be established. And with Google suspicious of a sudden increase in links, a slow but sure approach gets the links in the long run.
- Link building means never having to give up. Not all link-building efforts strike gold – moderators and webmasters may disapprove of your posts, or remove your link signatures, or worse, consider you spam. Continue your link-building and don’t get discouraged.
- Link to quality sites. Although they are more discriminating in whom to give their links, links from quality sites are worth more than low-ranked sites.
- Create quality content. Interesting and useful content gives your link requests a higher chance of being accepted and your blog linked to by other sites.
Successful link-building for your blog generates referral traffic and increases your blogs’s Google page ranking. The result? A bigger blog readership than ever before.
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Is There a Brand in Your Stand?
Watch out for the branding gurus. Beware of the branding police who focus only on images of brand. Fire the branding consultants who feel qualified to tell you what your brand should be. Ignore the branding zealots who proclaim “brand or die.”
Good, now that we have frightened off the undesirables let’s address some fundamental questions about branding and offer you some probing questions to consider. That first paragraph demonstrates the three rules of creative positioning as explained below.
* Should you have a brand?
Maybe. It depends on the goals of your business. You need to ask yourself some questions. Will the brand give you the return on your investment? Will you invest the resources to claim and sustain the brand?
* What is a brand?
A brand is the emotional bond that your clients have with you. Ask your best clients how they would describe you to others. Look for the common message in what they say – especially the emotion. That might be your brand.
Brand is the feeling others experience when they think about you and your product. Brand can help them think of you first – or better yet – only you. Brand can justify higher prices – or even better – make price a non-issue.
* Not Branding
Branding is not about creative logos, pretty fonts and pantone colors. Fire anyone who attempts to sell you that pabulum. Those things are only images. Have you noticed that the successful brands change these images every few years?
Branding is a marketing strategy. It is only one of many marketing strategies from which you might choose.
* Is branding an accident or on purpose?
Because branding is about creating emotional messages you are always branding. However, are you aware of your messages, are you consistent and are you effectively branding yourself?
You could create or claim your brand. Domino’s Pizza created their brand – “Pizza in 30 minutes or its free.” They own that brand. It’s simple, memorable and unique. Some companies look for an opening and build their business to create that brand. Some companies discover their brand by accident. Feedback from clients, remarks from the media or a competitor’s comment reveals the brand that was hidden in plain sight. In that case it is up to you to claim the brand and run with it.
Avis claimed their brand by turning a disadvantage into their brand when they launched their marketing campaign with “Avis is only Number 2 in rent-a-cars, so why go with us? We try harder.” And with cheekiness they leverage further on their “disadvantage” by adding, “The lines at our counters are shorter.” That brand has been successful for over 40 years.
* How do you create your brand?
There are two ways. Like Coke, Nike and McDonald you could throw gazillions of dollars at it. Or you could use creative positioning. Look for the holes in the marketplace. Go to where your competition is not and claim that position. Take a stand like Harley Davidson, Buckley’s Cough Mixture and Nova Scotian Crystal.
Each of these companies claimed positions in the market the competition was unwilling to take. Folks either love or hate Harley Davidson. Buckley’s proudly claimed that “it tastes awful but it works” along with a money back guarantee. Nova Scotian Crystal is proudly the only Canadian crystal manufacturer and they offer an incredible one year breakage warranty. Drop your whiskey glass and they will replace it; no questions asked.
You can read the interview with Rod McCulloch, President and CEO of Nova Scotian Crystal on my “Business in Motion” blog.
Each of these companies was willing to take a position that would drive some folks away while attracting a loyal crowd of fans.
The three principles of creative positioning are best explained by UK entrepreneur BJ Cunningham, who as CEO of The Enlightened Tobacco Company sold a cigarette called “Death Cigarettes”. It was presented in a black package emblazoned with a white skull-and-crossbones logo. Just imagine how this might appeal to the rebels. Everyone except the tobacco companies knew that cigarette smoking was bad for your health. BJ did what none of the other tobacco companies were willing to do. He took a stand.
Cunningham’s three principles of creative positioning:
1. Take a polarized position.
2. Make enemies.
* Create tension
Branding starts with market review and self-examination. Standing alone can be scary, exhilarating and hugely profitable. It you are going to claim a powerful brand take a position away from the crowd. Stand where no one else is standing.
How To Create Your First Info Product in 7 Easy Steps?
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Monday, February 21, 2011
How To Create Your First Info Product in 7 Easy Steps?
Once you’ve mastered your online marketing system and you’re growing your list on a daily basis, this is a good time to then set about creating additional offerings for your subscribers. This is where you start to look at your Product & Marketing Funnel and see where the gaps are and where new products can fit.
If you’re like most solo service professionals you’ll have something at the top (i.e. the widest part) of your funnel, which is usually your free taste, and then you’ll have something at the bottom (i.e. the narrowest part) of your funnel, which is usually your most expensive one-on-one services, but you won’t have anything in-between.
This is where you need to create products at different price points so that your clients and customers can experience your services and expertise without having to invest in your top (most expensive) service, but they want more than you are offering at the ‘free’ level.
A great first info product to create is one that sits at the second level within your Product & Marketing Funnel; somewhere between $1 and $50.
So, here is the step-by-step guide on how to create that all-important first paid offering.
Step 1: Host a Free Teleclass
Not only is this a great way to build your list, but it also exposes your audience to your expertise. You get to interact with your target market via the teleclass and they are able to ask you questions right there on the call.
Step 2: Record Your Teleclass
In addition to this being a great incentive to getting more sign-ups (if a registrant is not able to make it to the live teleclass they know that they’ll be able to get hold of the information afterwards via the recording), but this is where you’ll turn your free teleclass into your first paid info product.
Step 3: Create an Accompanying Guide or Special Report
Using the notes you prepared for your teleclass, turn these into a guide to accompany your teleclass. Or turn your notes into a special report and sell the report as the paid product and offer the teleclass recording as a bonus.
Step 4: Create a Workbook
If you also provided instructions or how-to information as part of your free teleclass, take that information and create an additional workbook. A workbook is a simple document that will allow your customer/client to make notes, write down their ideas, or plan out how they’re going to implement the how-to information that you shared with them on the teleclass.
Step 5: Bundle It All Together
Now that you have your teleclass recording, and you’ve created an accompanying guide/ebook and/or workbook, bundle all this information together to offer as a paid product at the second level within your funnel i.e. between the $1 and $50 price range.
Step 6: Create a Sales Page and Shopping Cart Link
You now need to create a sales page for your product, and associated shopping cart link. It is also a great customer service feature to create an autoresponder so that you can follow-up with your customers to check that they are happy with their purchase and are implementing the information you shared with them.
Step 7: Promote to Your List
Once you have your product all set up (Step 5), and created the sales page (Step 6) it’s time to promote it to your list and make sales! This is the exciting part! Include some teaser information in your newsletter leading up to the launch of your product, and once you’re ready to take sales send a solo mailing announcing the launch of your product. A solo mailing is much more effective than including the announcement as part of your regular newsletter.
After the initial launch continue to promote your product through your newsletter; promote it on your blog; and tell all your social networks about your product.
An Excellent Web Promotion is the key to success
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Online advertising is a form of promotion that uses the internet and World Wide Web for the expressed purpose of delivering marketing messages to attract customers, this form of advertising is about getting your website in front of the people who are interested in your product
or service and for such all you have to do is find the best terms and phrases that people search for who would like to purchase exactly your goods and services.
The number of internet users is on a rapid rise worldwide and internet is used by people of all age and types, internet has become a major medium for communication, entertainment and is in the process of replacing the traditional entertainment and informative media such as
television, radio, newspaper, magazines etc. WebVisible offers a range of creative services like corporate communications, promotions and branding new media, logo design, exhibitions and events, advertising, direct mail and editorial design, they are an Advertising, Marketing &
Brand Consultancy firm and work with strategic creativity, they are amongst the world´s fewest advertising firms who offer a Pay-for-Performance model for the professional fees.
WebVisible has the ability to deliver guaranteed services is proven by the fact that they possess expertise across all media be it direct, broadcast, out of home or digital media, their ideas are led with passionate and driven by making businesses a success, as compared with offline advertising the main advantage of online advertising or marketing is the much affordable price when compared with the traditional advertising costs, with a much lesser cost you can advertise on the net for a wider range of audience and geographical locations.
It is an online advertising portal that gives your ads a wider coverage and this globally wider coverage helps in making your advertisements reach more audiences, which may ultimately help you in getting better results through your online advertising campaign with a measurability and
easiness to track the conversion that makes online advertising miles ahead on the traditional advertising methods, a lot of effective analytics tools are available to measure online advertising campaigns which helps in more improvisation of the ads.
Online advertising is much faster than offline advertising and you can start sending out your ads to a wider audience, the moment you start your advertising campaign you are able to convey more details about the advertisement to the audience and that too at relatively low cost.
Take Heed of the Factors When Purchasing a Business Database
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
When being looked at in a positive manner, a business database would not only contain various entries to make a business increase its overall rate of income but it would also contain a ton of benefits for your firm to succeed. However, it is important to take a look at some of the most important points before purchasing this kind of database.
We all know that if there is one thing that most businesses have in common it is their extreme desire to make their firm stand out from the rest. To achieve this goal, businesses need to be always at their prime and to achieve success in today’s business world. Acquiring a business database for your company would definitely let the firm achieve this result and let it acquire a ton of benefits in the process.
First of all, let us take a deeper look on what a business database truly is.
A business database would contain a number of entries that contain all the necessary and vital information about a certain target market of business. For instance, if a company would like to target the technology sector within an enterprise then they can very well do so through taking advantage of this database.
Now where can you acquire such a database for your business?
There are many lead providers available all around the globe that can provide you with such a database. It is just a matter of choosing which of would be the one that is most capable of meeting your expectations with regards to the quality of the database. Therefore there are some factors to consider when you want to purchase a database for your business to get more fresh sales leads. Let us take a look at some of those important factors.
• The database should contain data entries that are always fresh
When we talk about how fresh a lead is, it means that the prospect has not yet affiliated themselves with another company within a similar industry. Doing so can let you be ahead of the competition. Look at it this way; it would look like a prospector that has finally struck gold.
• The database provider should exhibit their list of satisfied clients that have previously purchased some of their databases
Most people would want to look at how credible and reliable a particular product or service is before attempting to purchase it. This holds true for when business owners want to take advantage of this database.
When searching for the right kind of database for your business, make sure to ask the lead provider of a list of their clients that have been satisfied by the use of their database for their firm. If they cannot, then better look for another provider elsewhere.
• The entries within the database should have all the necessary information about your desired target market
The database should contain all the information that you need about a certain client or prospect. This is to allow you to effectively make your sales campaign a success by making new business opportunities for the firm as well as keeping long-term business relationships.
• The lead provider should have a considerable amount of positive feedback
When searching for this kind of database, always make sure that you check the feedback rating of the lead provider. If there are a lot of negative feedback found within the background check of the lead provider, then maybe it is time to look somewhere else for a database.
In addition to these three factors, you should always consider the price of the database. Make sure to get a database that would provide you for your money’s worth. You do not want to spend on something that would not benefit your business in any way. That is why it is very important to take heed of these factors before purchasing any kind of database for your business.
Alice Clark is a sales and marketing consultant specializing in business contact database management. Alice invites you to visit http://www.contactdb.com/ to learn more about business contact lists and databases.
Something For Nothing… It Would Be Nice Right?
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Monday, February 7, 2011
Of course we all look for better ways of getting our jobs done, but I am sorry to burst any ones bubble… There is no such thing as something for nothing. Why am I taking the time to burst your bubble today, you ask. Well I had an interesting experience with a potential customer today and I wanted to share it with you.
I met with a gal who is spending thousands of dollars creating a website for her company. She is a real estate agent and is interested in showing up first when the words real estate and her local area are typed into Google. She is working with a company to help her SEO and here is the plan she has designed. Each time a property is listed it generates a new URL with in her page and then each picture of the property also generates a new URL. She is working to make it so each page is flagged with her specific key words, with the idea that it will increase her websites SEO. She says she will be creating many website each with link backs to the brokers main page as well as each page having keywords. Its brilliant right? She has created a system that generates many pages each with keywords and links to her page.
With this in mind let me take a step back and give a little bit of information regarding SEO and what Google thinks is important.
1: Original Content
2: External Link Backs
3: Traffic
Now of course Google may have thousands of things they look for when determining true SEO, but these three items are extremely important. What this gal is lacking is (1) she is not creating content, sure it’s a picture, but the value in comparison is very low. (2) She has no external links back to her site; each of the new created sites are internal pages which gives no SEO value. Google expects all your internal links to link to your-self. What Google is looking for is external good quality sites linking back to you for SEO value. (3) By doing what she is doing she is not creating traffic, its creating a lot of website (internal pages) but its not creating SEO helpful traffic.
When working to become a powerful presence with Google remember Google does not hand out ranking for free. You need good quality “original” content, you need this content to be found on many “different” URL’s each that link back to your website. If you spend your time coming up with quality content to use in your blogs, articles, videos and so on you will have much more success when it comes to SEO.
Again there is nothing for free, SEO work can be fun, just let your potential customers know about you and your products and services with good quality content. Good luck to you in your blogging and other marketing efforts.
Top Notch Athletic Performance With Truth About Quickness
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Sunday, February 6, 2011
The Truth About Quickness Insider’s System is the combined knowledge of two speed training experts: Alex Maroko & Kelly Baggett.
Alex is a young trainer who is also the creator of the Effective Ball Handling Program. Kelly is somewhat of a legend within the sports activities coaching community, and his most well-known work is the Vertical Jump Bible.
Kelly is extremely educated as well as experienced in relation to speed training, but he’s not that good at communicating his ideas. Alex makes up for his lack of expertise with superb communication skills. Combined, they deliver a terrific training program.
I am not saying that Kelly can not communicate or that Alex does not know speed training. In truth, they each do that better than ninety nine percent of the coaches around. What I am saying is that what one lacks, the other one makes up for, and more.
The Truth About Quickness program is very easy to grasp and simple to follow. It also helps that the exercises are actually short, and you can literally finish every exercise in roughly 10 minutes. You also get videos of all of the workout routines so you understand precisely the best way to do them, plus the charts show you how to keep track of your exercises.
The only liability that I might uncover with the program is that the video quality appeared low. It was taken in a rugged fitness center, which seems like it has been utilized by a number of athletes. However, simply because the videos were not taken in HQ doesn’t do anything to diminish from the truth that the Truth About Quickness is a superb speed training course.
Listed below are 3 of my favorite basketball training workouts for blazing on-court speed:
1. Low, On-Off Box Jumps
To do this training, find a low stair or box about 2-6 inches in height. Subsequently, stand in front of the box, and hop on and off the box as easily and rapidly as possible. Do that for 2-4 sets of 10 reps (hopping on top of the box after which off it counts as one rep).
2. Lateral Line Hops
To accomplish this exercise, draw a straight line on the ground or use a piece of adhesive tape. Next, stand on one side of the line and hop horizontally forwards and backwards across the line. Perform the jumps as rapidly as you can. If you would like more bounce in your step, jump slightly higher above the line and concentrate extra on timing and smoothness than simply speed. Do that for 2-3 sets of 20 repetitions (1 jump across the line is counted as 1 repetition).
3. Pogo Jumps
To accomplish this training, you’ll want to leap as high as you can, but concentrate on getting all of your hops out of your plantar flexors (ankles). To do that, maintain your knees and hips almost locked, and just use your ankles to propel yourself into the air. Really concentrate on bouncing off the floor, and reduce your ground contact duration. Do that for 2-3 sets of 15-20 repetitions.
Aston Martin, the great British sports car manufacturer has been producing the DB9 since 2004; it is best described as a GT Sports Coupe. The DB9 is the first model to be built at Aston Martin’s Gaydon production facility in Warwickshire, UK. The DB9 is the predecessor to the DB7; both of these models have been designed by Ian Callum. The “DB” initials stand for David Brown, who owned Aston Martin for a significant period of time in its history.
Here is a little bit of humour and fact, the very popular British motoring TV show Top Gear decided the Aston Martin DB9 Coupe was too cool for its famous cool wall. So, the DB9 received its own category called “DB9 Sub Zero Fridge”, which as it sounds – was a mini fridge with the car’s card within it.
The DB7 was based on the Jaguar XJ-S but, the XJ9 is a completely new and different car hence it was decided to be called a DB9 rather than a DB8. If named DB8, then it may have seemed as more of an evolution of the DB7 rather than a revolution. The DB9 also comes with a V12 engine, not a V8, so the DB8 name may have suggested it comes with a V8.
Both the coupe and convertible variants of the DB9 come with a 5.9 litre V12 petrol engine. The sheer size of the engine produces diesel like low end grunt, helping the DB9 pull away even at low revs. The DB9 is available with a manual and automatic six speed gearbox, the auto box is also available as a paddle shift set-up.
The DB9 is a fine example of British Sport cars; it is beautiful, elegant, reliable and powerful. It appeals to everyone from a young city worker to a retired businessman.
Five Easy Ways To Improve Your Brochure Graphics
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Friday, February 4, 2011
Do you not know what to do and how to improve your brochure printing graphics? Well let me give you a couple of tips and professional practices that you can try out.
Using a decent enough software application for brochure printing, these tips can easily be done without too much trouble but with guaranteed great results. So listen well and remember these five easy ways to improve your graphics.
1. Get the original high-resolution source – Sometimes, all that it takes to improve the look of your graphics is to get the original high-resolution source. Many newcomers to design think that the low-resolution graphics displayed on the web are enough. However, in many cases, this will net people some very bad brochure prints since those pictures tend to get fuzzy when printed.
By getting the real high-resolution source of all your images and graphics, you will get the most clear image rendition once they are printed. You will need to either create or buy and acquire those images yourself to get those original graphics. As long as you scale and crop that image right, it should turn out a lot better than any web images that you might have wanted to use.
2. Adjust the brightness and contrast settings – Another simple way to improve your images is to adjust its brightness and contrast settings. This might sound basic, but believe me it does a lot in adding quality and energy to most images. Of course, you have to be careful not to burn the image with these adjustments, but typically adding 10-20 on either setting or both settings can make the image look more vibrant and appealing. Most design software should be able to handle this so try it out.
3. Cropping properly and beautifully – Sometimes, it is in the cropping that can make the images more beautiful and appealing. I have seen many people improve their color images simply by re-cropping their images precisely so that it is balanced and complementary with the content.
All it takes really is an eye towards the proper composition of the picture. You should have the crucial elements at the top 1/3 of the frame since that is where most people look at first. With the right cropping, you will see a distinct improvement with your images, so make sure you compose and test out your images well along these lines.
4. Flipping or inverting the orientation – Another easy way to improve the images is to simply flip it or invert it. This especially applies to graphics that will look okay even when converted, inverted or flipped. Many special design applications have “free transform” features that should easily let you handle this, and this tool is perfect when you want to balance out certain elements when placed on the sides.
5. Applying some light or color filters – Finally, you can apply light or color filters in your custom brochures to make them look better. If you look at most image-editing software today, you will probably see special filters that add special effects to that image. From black and white effects, sepia, color tints, flushed light etc. there are tons of special effects to choose from. This can add that extra character to the images and all it takes is a simple filter application.
Therefore, those are the five easy ways to improve graphics. Even absolute newcomers can do these things really, as long as one is determined to learn. So take note of all these and try to apply them in printing.
Kaye Z. Marks is an avid writer and follower of the developments in brochures and brochure printing that help businesses in their marketing and advertising campaigns.
Microsoft understands the fact that it is almost impossible to introduce any software product to the contemporary market without its customization and integration into other systems. With the sound understanding it brings out Microsoft custom application which can further develop existing products and integrate them into customer’s existing systems. Moreover, where necessary, it develops brand new applications, tailored specifically to the needs and budget of the customer.
.Net is one such Microsoft custom application which is used for custom application development. Before the application development a comprehensive and detailed analysis of the business needs of the client, preparation of design specifications, initial design concept, programming, testing or validation, client support (Training & support material provided) and ongoing development and maintenance, etc. is done.
Consisting of common Language Runtime which provides an abstraction layer over the operating system, .Net has Base Class Libraries – which in fact is a pre-built code that is used for common low-level programming tasks. Moreover, considered as Microsoft’s platform for building applications that have visually stunning user experiences, it helps in seamless and secure communication. It is also known for its ability to model a range of business processes.
Microsoft .NET Integration & Customization is used for developing integrated applications on top of Microsoft .NET Frameworks. Used for architecture design & planning, it helps in creating scalable infrastructure, platform and application architectures for customer’s solution. Moreover, custom application development wherein Visual Studio 2005, C#, ASP.NET and .NET Framework, etc. which in turn are in vogue these days.
Microsoft custom application for integration strategy & deployment in which custom and middleware based solutions for integration with back office, legacy, other web applications and web services are implemented offer executable solution. Notwithstanding, Microsoft custom applications are secure as they secure the platform and applications with hardware, product, services and guidance around the customer’s security requirements.
Software development companies use .NET solutions to meet customer’s current and future requirements and build world-class .NET solutions that are cost effective and offer measurable ROI. Moreover, they also help in migrating customer’s existing application to .NET with the least possible disruption to the business. Integration into new functionality or extension of the functionality of customer’s existing application using .NET technologies is a leading feature of Microsoft custom application.
Microsoft is also known for offering training services to software developers on .NET technologies and provide valuable consultancy and best practices in .NET. Moreover, it supports and maintains customer’s critical applications. There are various reasons behind the popularity of Microsoft custom application and one of them is that it is a low cost solution which has low TCO or Total Cost of Ownership.
Some other features that a Microsoft custom application possesses are cross language inheritance, memory leak and crash protection, multi-device support, rich output caching, easier deployment, better scalability & improved performance, etc. However, the most crucial one is that the .NET Framework helps customers build applications that work the way they want in the programming language they prefer in terms of software, services and devices.
Direct Marketing Tips: What to Focus On?
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
There are many different forms of direct marketing, from leaflets to telemarketing.
However my direct marketing tips will focus on using email marketing. Email marketing is the most cost effective way of direct marketing and is easily automated. But it is also easy to get wrong.
Once you’ve managed to build a targeted mailing list, from an email capture form on your blog or site, you are ready to start broadcasting messages.
Below are my direct marketing tips:
1) Keep regular contact with your mailing list, sending out helpful information like “how to” videos and articles.
2) Don’t over sell to your list. One marketing sales message per month.
3) Prepare your readers for the sale. Tell them that you’ve found something that’s pretty great but you don’t want to tell them what it is yet because you want to make sure works.
4) Don’t over do it. I personally hate it when I get messages from the same guy every day, even if they are helpful. Two emails a week should be fine.
5) Be a leader. One of favourite direct marketing tips is telling people to act like a leader. Start acting like a leader now and before you know it you’ll actually be one. This is when people start coming to you and actually asking to buy what you sell… crazy.
Remember to keep your emails basic and to the point. The title is very important because you need people to actually open the message. Try using Re: at the beginning because it makes people think they’ve had previous correspondence with you. It’s a bit cheeky but it works.
Direct marketing is an easy way of reaching out to lots of people, but it can be difficult to make those people convert. So take your time and learn as much as you can. If you’re new to this you need to realise that you won’t convert well at first. Not many people will open your messages, let alone buy something because of them. It’s once you’ve managed to build up a decent sized list that you will really see the rewards.
Even if you have a small list don’t worry about getting started with broadcasting your messages. It’s best to do as much as you can now so that you can learn and build confidence because it will pay big in the future.
Top 3 Best Online Backup and Storage Services
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Monday, January 31, 2011
An online backup service is pretty much the same thing as physical backup software that you may have on your home PC. The only difference is that all your data is stored at an online data center, allowing you to access it even if you are not at home, or at your office, or wherever you would normally keep your physical backups.
There are literally dozens of options out there for online backup and storage services, but there are three that really stand head and shoulders above the crowd, in terms of both usability and price. Do some research for yourself before committing to anything here, but this quick list should at least get you started on the right foot.
1- Mozy
This is easily my favorite backup and storage service out of the few that I’ve tried personally. Mozy personifies all the requirements you should look for in a backup service: reliable, automatic backups, inexpensive, and exceptional ease of use.
To set up an account, just go to the Mozy website and sign up. Then you need to download the software and specify the file types that need to be backed up, and let it do its thing. MozyHome is only $4.95 a month for unlimited storage and backup space.
If you don’t have much to backup, MozyHomeFree will give you 2Gb of backup storage on their servers for absolutely no charge.
2- IDrive-E
Very similar to Mozy, although the software takes a bit more getting used to. They offer a wide range of features which is why I included them in this list, including file sharing and mapped drive support. They have unlimited service for the same $4.95 per month, although here’s the catch…”unlimited” in this case is limited to 150Gb.
IDrive-E Basic offers a free 2Gb of online storage.
3- Carbonite
Just like the first two, with Carbonite you simply sign up for an account and download the software from the website. Compared to the other two, Carbonite software feels a little clunky, and it doesn’t offer as many features as either Mozy or IDrive-E. The reason I felt it made the top three is because of the low annual price. $49.95 per year, making this easily the best option if you need an online backup or storage service for a long time.
One Way Link Building Can Help You Gain Higher Site Visibility
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Sunday, January 30, 2011
All site owners want to be ranked at the top in the search engines. The top ten on the result pages are prime real estate. When you hear the old theme of ‘location- location -location’ it’s very much like that with result pages.
Whenever you hit the number one slot, it means a lot more traffic for your site. This is what the whole game is about. You have to get lots of traffic if you want to be successful with your site. And targeted traffic is the only kind to deal in, they’re the ones who are already interested in what your selling, and will result in more sales for you. One proven tactic for getting yourself to the number one spot on the results page is one by way of one way
links.
Page Ranking Goes Up From Traffic Sent From High Page Ranking Sites – This is one of the beautiful things about getting one way links from quality sites.
Page ranking is an essential part of the game when it comes to search engines.
Whenever a high page ranked site links up with your site, your page ranking goes up. But it’s not just a one-shot deal. You need to acquire as many of these as possible, because not just the quality of the link is considered, but so is the number of them you have, the relevance they have, and how popular your article marketing sites are, will all factor into the equation.
So a site that has a page rank of 35 will beat out one with a page rank of only 5.
Know That Traffic Increases Traffic – You want to link up to sites that are already getting a good amount of unique traffic. If you link yourself up to one that’s generating a couple million visitors every month, the search engines will see the high volume of traffic as a sign of relevance, because so many people go there. And people will show up if a site keeps good fresh and relevant types of content on their sites. That’s what brings them in. You can get much more traffic from this type of site if you can manage to get your one way link from there.
Ensure You Get Relevant Types of Links – It’s good to get a link from a popular site, and it will always increase your traffic, but if it’s not relevant to your site, it won’t send you ‘targeted’ traffic. If you are
selling pet supplies, then a link from a dog trainer could help you out. But if you are selling pet supplies and get a link from a car mechanic site, even if it’s a good one, the traffic from there won’t net you much. And the search engines don’t like sites that don’t match up, and you could get penalized for doing it. So it’s not a good idea.
If you’re not well-versed in SEO, then sometimes it pays to hire professionals to do this type of thing for you. Find yourself a reputable link building service to launch your campaign for you.
3 Steps to Grow Your B2B E-mail List More Effectively
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Friday, January 28, 2011
B2B marketers say that their internal e-mail lists are seven times more effective at generating quality sales leads than third-party lists. However, most also say that their e-mail lists aren’t large enough to drive the volume of leads their sales organization needs.
What they’re missing is a list-growth strategy that attracts a lot of high-quality names without undermining list growth and vitality. If you follow these three tactics, you should begin to see genuine list growth soon and avoid the dangers that lie in wait when you try to grow your list too fast without the proper controls.
Step 1: Work With Your Sales Team
Traditionally, sales teams and e-mail marketers don’t seen eye to eye over list growth. In fact, most salespeople are reluctant to share their contacts with their e-mail teams. They fear “marketing” will hurt their sales relationships by bombarding customers or prospects with too many confusing or irrelevant e-mail messages.
Smart B2B e-mail marketers are transparent with their sales teams and work with them to define goals and objectives for the e-mail program.
- Offer details regarding the messages you’ll be sending out, including the frequency, call to action, and message points that you’ll use for the campaigns.
- Explain exactly what data points you define as necessary for complete and accurate lead data and what questions you’re using to segment respondents for sales classification and follow-up.
- Listen to the feedback from salespeople. If they say, “That isn’t going to work,” discuss their ideas and make changes, as necessary, to the program to support the sales process and ultimately boost conversion.
Once you’ve established comfort and trust within sales, you’ll be amazed at how many e-mail addresses you’ll find available for your internal list and lead nurture program. I recently worked with a client that tripled its list size in less than three months by opening new communication channels with its sales organization.
Step 2: Build Your List Organically
Most e-mail marketers have mastered e-mail list-growth basics such as promoting e-mail sign-up on your website, in all of your online and offline marketing collateral; asking for sign-ups at trade shows; and capturing e-mail addresses at the time of purchase.
However, you can have many other creative tactics to build your list. Consider these ideas:
- Think beyond the trade show booth: Develop a thought-leadership series – webinars, white papers, e-books, even one-page takeaway articles with Q&As or best practices lists. These give your prospects and customers valuable answers and advice. Require the customer or prospect to register to access the content and ask for opt-in e-mail marketing permission at registration.
- Leverage search and social media marketing: Provide a simple e-mail opt-in in the header and footer of each paid search landing page and social media shared content. Then ask prospects and customers to share e-mail and Web content with their social networks and make it easy for network members to become subscribers.
- Identify offline opportunities to drive people online: Southwest Airlines has mastered this technique. It promotes e-mail sign-up with a call to action on everything from its schedule boards and jet bridges to in-flight magazines, drink napkins, and even its peanut bags. Consider where your customers might be standing around doing nothing and seize the opportunity to promote e-mail sign-up.
- Utilize QR (quick response) codes: QR codes are small, barcode-like images that smartphones with digital cameras can scan and send to a mobile website. Create a QR code that directs customers and prospects to a special landing page to view more information and sign up for e-mail. Include the code on business cards, marketing collateral, airport ads, and print ads so prospects don’t have to type in a Web address or remember a URL.
- Implement Facebook Connect: The Facebook Connect API gives you access to the information prospects have already added to their own Facebook pages when you offer them the option to sign on to your website using their Facebook accounts. They will be asked to provide permission for you to access their public information, send them e-mail, and access their Facebook profile, which you can use to send more targeted e-mail messages.
Step 3: Don’t Turn to List Rental in a Panic
Avoid renting lists as much as possible. Third-party lists are expensive and typically do not perform well. You can spend $10,000 to $15,000 on a highly targeted, high-quality list, only to fall far short of your intended goals.
If your organic list growth strategies still haven’t moved the needle as much as you hoped, invest in carefully targeted paid search campaigns that will drive people back to your site and build your own list.
The Last Word
Remember, generating high-quality leads must be the goal and result of good B2B e-mail list growth. Make sure you track the opt-in source and continually analyze which sources bring the best leads. Continuous tracking will allow you to optimize your list growth efforts and learn which sources to avoid.
When you succeed, you will have a high-performing internal e-mail list that delivers highly qualified prospects that your sales organization can turn into revenue.
How to Destroy Your eBay Business
Don’t be fooled. What you are about to discover could prevent your eBay business from failing. Reputation is everything when selling on ebay and when tarnished with the wrong type you will forever struggle to regain buyer’s confidence. Be very aware of the following and by ensuring you are never guilty of any of these, you have every chance for eBay success.
Untruths: If it does not work, don’t sell it. Don’t say it’s in perfect condition when it has a defect of any Lind. Honesty will be rewarded.
Your auctions end anytime: If your auction ends say during the middle of the night, how many potential bidders do you think will be around to create that bidding frenzy? How many will be around to ensure that they are the winner?. Ensure your eBay auction finishes at a “profitable” time.
Why would you ever sell rubbish?: If you would not be prepared to sell it elsewhere else, don’t expect a rush of bidders just because it is eBay. If you think that you can make good money selling anything that you can pick up then think again. EBay buyers are just as discerning as any other buyers. And they won’t buy rubbish either!
Never give discounts: Ever considered that a special deal might just seal a sale to a very happy and grateful customer that will make them return to your site to buy again. EBay is still like the real world, discounts and special deals are always good incentives to make sales. Don’t ignore their power.
Unattractive listings: The easiest way to make a potential bidder click the back button is to have your listing full of noise, clutter, colour, capital letters, wrong font. You get the answer. Just because it is eBay, does not mean you can be bold and brash with your listing. What listings are professional and successful? Look at them and copy their ideas.
Photos. Who needs them?: You do! Never, I repeat, never make an auction listing without the benefit of a photo of the item. All eBay Power Sellers use photos, so make sure you do to. As a customer, you will want to see the item that you are buying, so have the same atitude as a seller. And the more photos the better. Leave no question unanswered by the use of photos.
Only use a short description: Never think that a two line quick description shall do.The more information that you give the potential bidders, the more inclinded they will be to place a bid. EBay is all about giving as much information as possible so an informed decision can be made by the person as to whether they wish to bid or not. Never let a potential bidder click off because they did not have enough information on which to make a decision.
Ignore emails: A potential bidder may want to ask you a specific question about the item. This person could be the winning bidder; they may start what could turn into a bidding frenzy. You don’t know, so don’t restrict your opportunities by giving poor service by ignoring emails. If the customer does not receive a reply from you, how likely is is that they will bid?
Posting at your leisure: An ebay customer will remember, they will post bad feedback and your reputation will suffer all because your mailing of the itemjwas not efficiently dispatched. A last point, don’t overcharge on the posting. There is a fair post charge and there is a blatant money making postage charge. Don’t antagonise the customer, here is someone that is liable to buy from you again so treat them well and that will be rewarded.
Tips For Launching A Successful Email Marketing Campaign
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Tips For Launching A Successful Email Marketing Campaign
If you’ve ever considered launching an email marketing campaign, you probably very rapidly discovered that there are two main road-blocks between you and email marketing success. The first is the question of how to get your hands on an email subscriber list. And the second is once you have begun building your list, what should you send them? This article will focus on those two fundamental tasks of email marketing.
List-building is not as hard as you might imagine. All it really takes is the effort of asking people you are already coming into contact with to join your mailing list. You can do this in person if you run a restaurant, dealership, or other brick and mortar venue. At a retail store, the cash register is the best place to offer a free membership. If you are trying to convert your existing web traffic into email subscribers, you will want to create an attractive sign-up form and place it very prominently on your web site. You will also need to provide a good explanation of the value that people can expect to receive by being subscribes to your mailing list.
We all know that high quality content is not cheap. And when you’re dealing in email marketing, that is likely to be the primary expense related to your campaign. So you want to make that investment worthwhile by getting as many potential buyers as possible signed up for your mailing list. Take advantage of your existing web traffic by making your subscription form a central feature of your web site. It should almost always appear above the fold, and almost always on every page of your site. Keep in mind, email list subscribers convert much better than one-time web site visitors, so you should not be afraid to lose a sale or two in the short term in order to collect a large number of subscriptions that will become valued clients over the long term.
When you think about designing content for your email list, there is a very important question you should ask yourself: What will people in my target market be happy to receive? What value can I provide to them? Because the first task of an email list is to ingratiate you to your subscribers. If the list is ultimately going to convert into sales, then your subscribers must trust you and see you as someone who provides things that they value. Once you have developed the unique proposition for your mailing list, then you can begin developing content to fulfill that promise.
These two basic steps are all it really takes to build an effective list that you can continue to improve upon indefinitely. The list and the techniques that you use to market to the list will evolve over time along with your overall business strategy. But the long and the short of it is simply this: create a mailing list that offers a real value to your market, and then ask people to sign up for it. Everything else simply improves on this basic, winning formula.
10 Ways to Energize Your Email Marketing
posted by Web_University @ 8:00 AM
Friday, September 17, 2010
10 Ways to Energize Your Email Marketing
Email marketing has grown tremendously over the years and it can benefit your business substantially. As with any type of marketing, email marketing takes a great deal of time and effort to insure it is working effectively.
There are many types of email marketing such as sending out periodical newsletters/ezines, sending out promotional emails and product updates, tutorials, etc.
Regardless of which type of email marketing you utilize, one important thing you must do is continually evaluate the effectiveness of your email marketing campaign. Do not let your email marketing go stale. You need to keep it alive, fresh and energized.
Below are 10 ways you can help energize your email marketing campaign:
Fresh and Helpful Content – Always be sure to include good, solid content. Check the content to make sure it is reliable. You want to make sure you are providing true, helpful information for your mailing list. Offer good resources, tools, tips and other content that will actually help your subscribers. This will help in building the foundation of the essential trust relationship between you and your mailing list members.
Make it Personal – Making your email more personal will help build trust and your reputation. You need to connect with your list and by making your emails more personal, warm and friendly, you will accomplish this task.
Grab Their Interest with Your Subject Line – Grabbing the readers’ interest with the subject line can make all the difference as to whether they open the email or just delete it. Keep the subject line short and to the point. Use words that will pique the readers curiosity and make them want to know more. Use power and/or action words such as new, innovative, secret, reveal, etc.
Which email would you open?
How to Increase sales or
New, Innovative Sales Strategy Revealed…
Be Available for Your Readers – There is nothing worse than emailing questions to a company about their products/services and waiting days or longer to get an answer. Make it a point to answer questions and concerns as soon as possible. Be as helpful and responsive as possible. You will be amazed at the difference this will make in your business.
Be Consistent – I know some people that will send out an email here and an email there – sometimes with months in between. This will never bring you any results. Send out your emails on a regular basis using the same design, layout and format each time. Keep them neat, clean and free from a lot of clutter. You want your readers to become familiar with your mailings.
Add New Features – Always be thinking of new features to add to your mailings to keep it fresh and alive. Add a Q&A section or do interviews with your readers. Give your readers a weekly challenge to accomplish to help them obtain their goals.Publish success stories. The possibilities are endless!
Offer Subscriber Only Specials – Let your subscribers know they are appreciated by offering them deals and specials that you would not offer anyone else. Give them an extra percentage off the price or give them a free gift in your mailings. Doing little things like this can go a long way for your business.
Get Your Mailing List Involved – Encourage them to email you with ideas, suggestions and feedback. Let them know you are willing to consider all their suggestions. Ask them if you can use their feedback. Post their questions with the answers to help all your readers. Make them feel like they make a difference because THEY DO!
Contests and Competitions – Hold contests and competitions for your subscribers and offer prizes. For example: Each week in my newsletter I have a trivia challenge for free advertising and a movie quote contest for a free e-book. They are a lot of fun and my subscribers let me know how much they enjoy it.
Offer Referral Incentives – Let your mailing list members know that if they refer people to your mailing list, they will be rewarded. Have contests on who can get the most referrals for a grand prize.
Business owners who successfully implement an email marketing campaign are likely to gain a huge advantage over those who don’t. But you must keep your email marketing fresh, alive, consistent and reliable. Keeping in contact with your mailing list members and providing them with useful, helpful information and resources will help build a solid foundation of trust with which to grow your business!
For many online marketers, conversions rates are a mere fraction of what they use to be. At the same time, there are a few marketers that I’ve chatted with who have experienced no significant drop in conversions. These are all marketers who have built incredible subscriber loyalty over the years.
For many online marketers, the biggest problem is email deliverability. Their email is simply not getting through. Email is being filtered so heavily today that often less than 20% of a large ezine mailing gets delivered.
There are things you can do to improve your email deliverability, such as run it through a spam checker prior to sending it out. Top mailing list management systems, such as ProfitAutomation.com, have built in systems that allow you to grade an email against the Spam Assassin database prior to sending it. If your email scores higher than a 2, I personally would revise it to lower the score.
I’ve talked to friends over a year ago, who often confided in me that they sometimes sent out emails and got absolutely NO response. They wondered if anyone even got the emails or read them.
Many savvy marketers also realized that a business totally dependent upon email was not a very solid business. They realized that what they really needed was a database that contained not only names and email addresses, but physical mailing addresses. That way, if something dramatic ever did happen in the world of email, they could just shift their marketing to direct maíl, and still be in business. This is one of the reasons that you started seeing some online marketers offering loss leaders on CD or DVD. It gave them the perfect tool (excuse) to build out their databases. They knew that email could someday go the way of fax broadcasts.
Some of my in-the-know friends have also shared with me that many ISP’s now monitor things such as email delivery rates, bounce rates, and open rates. They use readily available data, and if a given ISP or third party list host had a dismal record, they may block ALL email from that source.
That’s pretty scary. I was also told that a few well-known list management providers were having emails coming off their servers BLOCKED, or “black holed.”
If ISPs are tapping into databases that reveal which mail servers send out a lot of mail that has very low open rates, for example, and blocking email from those servers, that does very well spell the slow death of some email marketers… unless they move their list to other platforms.
Ok, so I just painted a pretty dismal picture for some marketers.
When I was in the military, my bosses always told me that they wanted the truth from me. They insisted that I not “sugar-coat” the facts. However, they also told me not to bring them problems, without also bringing them viable solutions.
Solutions to the email deliverability issue are out there. For example, paid “sender verification” is one that is often suggested.
One that I’ve looked at many times over the years is some type of direct-to-desktop solution. That’s one where your subscribers install tools that allow your communications to tap into technologies not even dependent upon email.
The objection always brought up when discussing direct-to- desktop applications, is that there’s only so much desktop real-estate, so a person can only subscribe to so many of these independent channels.
Another solution that I like very much is building your list on a hosted platform, so that communications take place within the system.
A good example of this can be seen on the social networking site Sokule, pronounced “so cool.” The Sokule community is built on a platform that looks and feels a lot like Twitter, except that it’s built for marketers, so you are encouraged to market on the platform. In fact, there are several built-in features that allow members to monetize their community membership.
While members of many social networking communities tend to de-emphasize getting lots of followers, Sokule is different. Sokule seems to encourage you to get as many followers (called “trackers”) as you can in two ways:
1) They have a quasi-currency, called “sokens” that you can provide to other members to reward them for following you. You earn these sokens, and then you provide them to community members as a reward for following you. In a way, you can buy followers.
2) They allow upgraded members to direct message ALL of their followers a maximum of once every three days. That means that in a very real way, when you build a following on Sokule, you ARE building a list.
When you set up your Sokule account, you enter three of your areas of interest. This allows others to search the database for members with like interests, whom they can then track (follow). In theory, this means that when you send out a direct message, your message should be going to people interested in the same topic.
Just as with an email list, you need to respect your trackers on Sokule, and provide genuine value to the relationship.
To check out Sokule, visit my profile page at: Sokule.com/postit/williec There you can see how you can personalize your profile and monetize it. The links that you’ll notice on the left side of the page are to five of my pet websites. There are also links on the left side of the page that promote Clickbank products. Those links are coded with MY Clickbank ID.
My old military bosses would be proud of me today. Yes, I came bearing bad news. Email marketíng as it once was is dying an agonizing death. However, I also did as my old bosses taught me and presented you with a viable, proven solution.
In future articles, I’ll share with you some more solutions to “the email problem.” For now, check out Sokule. Sign up for a free account and take it for a test drive. It’s quicker to do that at:” Sokule.com/williec . The key to survival in business, just as it was for me in the military is to be aware of, and adapt to, changing circumstances. That’s something you’re now ready to do.
Here are 8 points you NEED to know to have success in emailing campaigns.
Point 1, Know your audience
Before you sit down to write your email sales letter, you`ve got to determine exactly who your audience is. This is a
master key to getting results from email marketing, knowing what appeals to your target market.
Point 2, Get the emails opened with great subject lines
Before an email can generate results, recipients need to open it. But what can you do to spark their interest and get their interest “motor” revved up? The SUBJECT LINE.
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