BloggingGuru

TIPS TO YOUR RSS FEED SUBSCRIBERS

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 10:26:00 +0000

This is the case with most of new and old bloggers, even when the blog is successful they don’t have a large number of Subscribers. Well on contrary why we should need them when we are getting enough traffic?

No one rejects free cheese now, do you? We all know the the benefits of RSS Feed subscribers! You may get a lot of visitors daily but if you have a large no of feed subscribers than you will get some more, as it lets your readers know about your blog updates.

Importance of feed subscribers is not something which is needed to be explained – so below are my 5 tips that may help you to gain a lot of feed subscribers.

1. WP Greet Box – This a plugin can help you increase your blog exposure and build loyal readership. Whenever someone open any of your blogpost than this plugin show a notification at top or bottom saying – “Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic.”

What better option can you get? Check out the above picture!

2. Remind Them: Try to add a banner at the bottom of your post or provide a simple link at the bottom the post asking your reader to subscribe to your blog. This this really work great, if a reader likes your post and suppose its a tutorial in parts than the chances that the reader subscribe to your blog increases widely:

Don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS-feed and follow us on Twitter for recent updates.

You can also try banner at bottom of the post like some have done:

3. Add Subscription link at Sidebar: All professional bloggers know the importance of adding a subscription link in sidebar. Add an icon and/or simple text box for email subscriptions:

4. Send newsletter to all your commentator: Yes, you can send some updates or club together your best tutorials or posts and send them to all your commentator, though this one is really tedious and tiring process and no blogger with good traffic do that, but in case you want subscribers real badly that try it. And at the end of the newsletter provide a Subscription link.

5. Contest: Contest, this is the most easiest and fastest and of course 100% reliable way of getting huge number of feed subscriber all you have to do is organize a contest on your blog or a giveaway and among your various terms and condition, you have to cunningly add one more – yeah you got it. Add a condition that “you should be our feed subscriber in order to participate in the contest”. See how simple is that!

A Piece of Advice: Don’t go with the someone who promises 1000+ subscribers for xxx amount of Dollars. Trust me you will end up badly with a lot of bot’s (a computer program) as your subscribers. And by the time you realize that all your money will be gone.

By: RiteshK@TWC

HOW TO IMPROVE ALEXA RANK OF YOUR WEBSITE

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 10:20:00 +0000

Alexa ranking is provided by Alexa.com based on your blog traffic. But I have seen blog generating a lot of traffic but still their Alexa is not good enough. The reason is simple Alexa don’t know about them. In this tutorial I will tell you a way by which you can improve your Alexa ranking within a week and it is 100% working no fake promises.

What is the Alexa Rank?
The traffic rank is based on three months of aggregated historical traffic data from millions of Alexa Toolbar users and is a combined measure of page views and users (reach). As a first step, Alexa computes the reach and number of page views for all sites on the Web on a daily basis.

The main Alexa traffic rank is based on the geometric mean of these two quantities averaged over time (so that the rank of a site reflects both the number of users who visit that site as well as the number of pages on the site viewed by those users) – Alexa.com

Just follow these simple steps:

1. Add Alexa Site Widget: As I said you need to let Alexa know about your blog, so what better way you can find than adding a Alexa site widget at your sidebar which let Alexa know about your pages when your visit access them. Just put this widget and will assure you your Alexa rank will definitely be improved.

2. Install the Alexa toolbar: This also serves the same purpose as the Alexa site widget, as it sends information of you particular page to Alexa.

3. Encourage others to use the Alexa toolbar: But like Alexa site widget which is available on each page and is helpful when a page is loaded either by you or your visitor, Alexa toolbar doesn’t serve the same purpose. It is helpful only when most of your visitor uses it. So encourage your visitors to use Alexa toolbar.

4. Get reviews: Ask your friend and visitors to write a short review of your blog at Alexa, this will also help to improve Alexa ranking. You can use Alexa review widget for this.

5. Claim your Site: Claim ownership of your site to easily update your site information and engage your users by responding to reviews of your site.

And whats the use of a good Alexa rank?

Websites like SponsoredReviews.com, Bidvertiser.com, etc in general all paid review websites see your Alexa ranking. A low rank gives you higher paying posts. Most advertisers still check your traffic rank and Google PageRank if they are deciding to advertise on your blog.

Write Unique content & update your blog daily. Moreover promote your post on social networking and social voting sites. These are some simple steps that you must do in order to improve your Alexa ranking. But main thing is you do add Alexa Site Widget.

By: RiteshK@TWC

7 REASONS YOU SHOULD SELF-HOST YOUR BLOG

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 10:15:00 +0000

Blogging is something you on to satisfy your inner callings. There are two reasons why you may start blogging! It’s either because you want to do it for some fun and/or you may also want to earn money from blogging.

For some new-comers, I suggest that you use first try WordPress.com or Blogger.com to facilitate your entry in the world of blogging. Once you have got your hands wet, I always suggest that you move on to hosting your own domain.

Why? The following reasons may give you some answers:

1. CONTROL – When you have your own blog or you have self hosted blog you have all the control & authority. You can decide on what to do and you can manage it well for the benefit of you and your blog as well. Since you have the authority over your blogs, you can now decide what to do on your blogs. That is why you really manage it well for some other reasons.

2. POPULARITY – If you have the intention of making it as your business then it is a big help if you start a WordPress self-hosted blog. WordPress is a very popular blogging format and it will also help you to popularize your blog more if you self-host it.

3. EARN MONEY – Once your self-hosted blog becomes popular, it is easier for you to start making money online. You can decide now to earn money online using AdSense, Paid Reviews, Affiliate marketing, In-text ads, etc.

4. UNLIMITED THEMES – Blogger.com giver you a limited choice of themes. Wordepress.com gives you more. But if you self-host a WordPress blog the choice of blog themes & plugins you have is near unlimited!

5. SEO FRIENDLY – It is easier to do search engine optimization on a self hosted blog. WordPress has several plugins like because there are lots of plugins available like Platinum SEO, etc which will allow you to carry out SEO easily.

6. BUILD & OWN YOUR DOMAIN

– It can be easier if you have a self hosted blog because your domain name can be more convenient to remember. You also own the domain name!

7. EARN RESPECT AS A SERIOUS BLOGGER – Moreover, once you have a self hosted blog, you will be taken more seriously as a blogger!

Those are just some few of those important reasons why self hosted blog, esp a WordPress blog is a more convenient way to blog.

By: RiteshK@TWC

THREE HIGH-LEVEL KEYS TO AFFILIATE MARKETING SUCCESS

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 22:21:00 +0000

"The $60,000 question: What makes some affiliates earn thousands when other people struggle to earn hundreds? I was asked this question and it made me revisit some of the main keys to success with affiliate marketing... "

The $60,000 question: What makes some affiliates earn thousands when other people struggle to earn hundreds?

There is absolutely nothing wrong with making $100 to $300 a month extra on the side. But wouldn't it be better to make 10 to 20 times that amount?
Before we start, let me tell you the way it is:

Everybody can't make $5,000 to $10,000 a month doing affiliate marketing. There is too much competition.

There is no easy money that will fall into your lap without you doing anything. (And in case there was any easy money I would keep that information to myself and not write it in an article read by thousands of people.)

You will find the best working affiliate opportunities only by finding them yourself, either through testing and research or networking and business development.

With all this said, let me give you the three high-level keys to making money with affiliate programs on the Internet.

1. Google and Overture rock!

The days of free traffic are not completely over, but certainly fading away at a rapid pace. Sure, you can work hard to create pages that score high in the search engines and build sweat equity into a site.
But by paying for clicks and focusing on Google and Overture you will have the top three positions on all search engines that really count on the Internet.
If you want to generate traffic from Yahoo, you need to be on top of Google, it's as simple as that. Overture and especially Google are the best key drivers of qualified traffic on the Internet. Pay-per-click search engines let you quickly test different affiliate offers and new landing pages on your site. When it works, you can scale. Stay away from top competitive keywords for $1 to $2 per click. Niche marketing on Overture and Google works.

2. Do you have your own email list yet?

Sending offers to your own email list is the true way to build freedom and residual income. Instead of just sending traffic away and hoping for the best, you should have your own email list to which you can send multiple offers.

Use subscription forms on your web site.

Use co-registrations or co-op marketing campaigns.

Buy email lists.

3. Consider starting your own affiliate program and/or your own unique offer.

If you know that each filled out form on your web site generates $0.50 in revenue, would you be willing to pay someone else $0.25 to generate that lead?
Probably the most overlooked way of generating traffic is to have other people generate it for you. The only thing you need is a destination site that is profitable. It can even be with other affiliate programs as the back-end.

Identify companies that pay well for co-registration leads and bundle 3-4 offers together with your own subscription form (for your own email list, remember?).

Find a successful company and recruit new affiliates for them and make a commission on their sales. Brokering deals (unique deals) can make you quite an income.

The bottom line:

What do all these three techniques have in common? It involves paying for traffic in one shape or another. To accelerate your income, you need to invest smartly in advertising. Spend limited amounts of money to test offers. When you find something that works - scale it. And repeat.

To your success!

By: Ola Edvardsson

53 ways to make money with affiliate programs

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 22:03:00 +0000

Part 1: Beyond article marketing and Squidoo

Are you stuck in an affiliate marketing rut?

Here are 53 ways to make money with affiliate programs. They range from free, amateurish and basic to highly innovative and outrageously expensive.

Note: Part 1 of this article is aimed mainly at affiliate newcomers.

If you're an experienced affiliate, you probably already combine several of these methods to attract traffic and make sales.

It's good to concentrate on what you do best, but if you're a newcomer just doing bum marketing and creating Squidoo lenses, you may be overlooking affiliate marketing techniques and strategies which could make your marketing more businesslike and more profitable.

This isn't a "how-to" article. It's designed as an idea generator.

Here are 53 ways you can make money with affiliate programs...

1. Banner farms

Remember them? Banner farms are one of the simplest, dumbest ways to try to make money with affiliate programs. Basically, they are very simple websites, often free-hosted, consisting of stacks of affiliate banner ads, sometimes grouped by topic. These days, banner farms may also contain AdSense ads. Banner farms were popular in the 1990s before affiliates learned better. They lack credibility and almost no one wants to link to them, so they wither and die. You can still find some among the millions of sites at Freewebs.com.

Nowadays, they've evolved into something cool and classy like iStorez.com.

2. Free advertising without a website

Some affiliates do this stuff, but to me posting free ads and hoping for sales seems too much like working at a job when you should be building a website and email lists that can grow into valuable assets.

You can search in Google for "free classifieds" or "free advertising" and find sites which allow you to post free ads. Their rules vary hugely. An old favorite with many affiliates is USFreeAds, which has paid and free options, and says it has 10,000 new members signing up each month. USFreeAds allows you to post a complete, persuasive article promoting a product using your affiliate link.

I've seen USFreeAds ads ranking highly in Google. Some affiliates use article marketing and teasers in forum signatures to promote their free ads.

3. Bum marketing/article marketing

"Bum" marketing started as a very simple idea. You write a keyword-rich article and post it on article directories. You include an affiliate link in the resource box at the end. Readers click on the link and buy something. You earn commissions.

Then article directories started changing their rules and banning affiliate links in resource boxes, so bums had to buy a home - or at least buy a domain name. For example, EzineArticles.com allows affiliates to use domains like YourDomain.com redirecting to VendorName.com/affiliatelink.html.

Most domain name registrars make such URL forwarding easy.

These days, many bum marketers direct traffic to their own small website and may tease visitors to click by publishing Part 1 of an article on the article directory, linking to Part 2 on their own site.

4. Sneaky/subtle URL forwarding

Here's another use of URL forwarding. Let's say the affiliate merchant is called VendorName.com. The affiliate buys a very similar domain name, such as Vendor-Name.com. The affiliate emails their list discussing VendorName.com but calls it "Vendor-Name.com".

With the help of URL forwarding, readers are whisked off to the merchant and - in some cases - are unaware they've clicked on an affiliate link.

Similarly, a successful affiliate may be interviewed for an ebook and use the same tactic in his conversations with the author.

Some vendors encourage these tactics. Some affiliate agreements specifically disallow them, because the vendors don't want to weaken their brand.

If you do this stuff without first reading the affiliate agreeement, you may forfeit any commissions you earn.

5. Squidoo lens

At Squidoo.com you can create a website or "lens" or a large number of "lenses" on topics you choose and presell affiliate products. Such tactics are often combined with article marketing.

Smart affiliates use their lenses as feeder sites to direct traffic to their main sites.

6. Free blogs

Google's Blogger.com enables affiliates to create free blogspot blogs. Warning: Sometimes an affiliate will get a little over-enthusiastic and create 50 or so blogspot blogs designed purely to display Google AdSense ads. Google eventually notices that the affiliate is doing something wrong and Whammo! Fifty blogs are disabled and all that work goes down the drain. If you work with Google, it's a good idea to obey Google's AdSense rules and Webmaster Guidelines.

Even better, get your own domain name and host your blog where YOU control it - on your own website. If you get a memorable domain name, you'll have an advantage over the blogspot crowd.

7. Blogs

WordPress is an enormously popular, versatile tool for building blogs. It's easy to use and loved by many affiliates. Sadly, most bloggers struggle to get noticed among the clutter and struggle to generate revenue.

Memo to newbies: You DON'T have to fill your blog with trivia and time-wasting chatter. For example, one of our blogs, KeywordWorkshop.com, contains nothing but useful articles and in-depth reviews.

When it comes to blogs, one guy I admire is blog tutor Yaro Starak, of Brisbane, Australia. Yaro has figured out how to use a blog as part of a total business strategy which funnels traffic to his business and allows him to do LESS blogging less while earning a six-figure income. His Blog Mastermind course teaches his business strategy.

8. Blog networks

You can create a network of blogs, either built around one theme or on a variety of topics.

Chris Pirillo's Lockergnome.com started out as a technology website and morphed into - among other things - a blog network with the contributors' blogs published on the Lockergnome domain.

If you're even more ambitious you could be like b5media, which owns more than 350 blogs and hires bloggers to create posts on many different topics.

If you like the idea of owning a few dozen blogs and want to do it efficiently, check out what another Australian, Andrew Hansen, who lives near me, is doing. He's created a time-saving system called Firepow for setting up, managing and promoting multiple blogs.

9. Free-hosted niche sites

Many "experts" will tell you that you can't make money online with a free-hosted website and say it's impossible to make money with them. Don't believe them. It IS possible to make hundreds of dollars a month with a free-hosted site.

However, I DON'T recommend free hosting. In 1997, I put months of work into a free-hosted site and was getting 100 visitors a day when the free host went broke. I couldn't redirect that hard-won traffic to another site. It was lost forever. What a dreadful waste!

However, if you're broke or up to your neck in debt and really and truly can't manage to scrape up a few dollars for a domain name and hosting, you can get free hosting or free pages at places such as Squidoo, Freewebs, Synthasite, Blinkweb, HubPages, Weebly, Jimdo and Google Knol.

Make some sacrifices. Stop buying cups of coffee. Look at all the stuff you're buying. If you're typical, you should be able to save the funds necessary to buy a domain name and web hosting. If you do, you'll be taking a little step towards creating a serious online business.

10. Small niche sites

Creating small niche sites is the approach I recommend to affiliate newcomers. Choose a niche and build a site around that topic. If you're not already an expert in that topic, aim to become one. Topics which work best are ones in which a large number of people are desperate for an answer to a problem or have a passionate interest in the subject. However, such topics are usually intensely competitive.

Affiliates have found success with an enormous array of niche topics. Effective niche sites often include "how-to" articles and detailed, enthusiastic reviews of products.

Ideally, the affiliate aims to attract BUYERS, not just curious lookers. For example, on a digital photography site, articles about how to shoot sunsets will attract readers and help you build trust, but a review of the latest model Canon will attract potential buyers.

CreditCards.com is an example of a highly polished niche affiliate site.

The classic newbie mistake is to read a book on ways to make money online and then create a site on the topic "How to make money online". Naturally, the site lacks credibility. Note to newbies: You have thousands of other, less competitive website ideas to consider. Here's an article I wrote describing dozens of ways to find website ideas.

You don't have to be brilliant to do this stuff. Because you're aiming to get free traffic from search engines, you can make some mistakes and still succeed.

My free Affiliate Program Tutorial describes the 18 steps I recommend an affiliate newcomer should take.

11. Networks of affiliate sites

A few years ago, affiliates created networks of small sites and heavily interlinked - or crosslinked - the pages of these sites. The strategy worked - for a while. Then Google identified the networks as artificial linking structures and many such sites plummeted in search rankings.

These days, interlinking of sites still works as long as it's not overdone. Ideally, the links between your sites should be a small proportion of each site's external links.

12. Email newsletters

Even in these spam-laden times, newsletters are still a very powerful way to build relationships with your readers. Email is so important to most people online that they check for emails several times a day. So don't overlook the importance of publishing a newsletter or at least building an email list.

Sophisticated affiliates give their readers lots of choices - providing newsletters to suit a range of interests.

Affiliates who publish genuinely useful or entertaining newsletters win their readers' trust. These affiliates know they're more likely to make sales if they first make a strong connection.

A true master at forming a connection with his readers is Paul Myers. He's an original thinker. Instead of promoting an endless array of affiliate products the way most Internet marketing newsletter publishers do, he mainly promotes his own products or promotes products to which he's bought resell rights.

If you've never published a newsletter, you'll be pleasantly surprised to find how easy companies like Aweber and GetResponse make the technical aspects. They provide you with the code to paste into a web page to give you a sign-up form. They handle subscribes and unsubscribes automatically.

13. PDF newsletters

A few affiliates experiment with publishing their newsletters in PDF format, which makes them look more impressive and also makes it more difficult for publishers to copy their words. Anik Singal's Affiliate Classroom newsletter is a good example.

14. Email lists

Affiliates use "squeeze" pages, usually giving away a free report in exchange for an email address. Typically, the subscriber receives a newsletter or an autoresponder series delivered with the help of Aweber or GetResponse.

Smart affiliates provide subscribers with several items of useful information to build trust before recommending a product.

15. Two-tier affiliate program hawkers

Perhaps I shouldn't mention this one - I don't want to increase the junk emails I receive.

You don't need a website for this. You find a good two-tier affiliate program, perhaps by searching in the AssociatePrograms.com affiliate directory. Then you write to the owners of websites which seem to be a perfect match for the product and persuade them to join the program and promote the product. You earn commissions on THEIR sales. Well, that's the theory.

Recipients of such emails tend to regard them with suspicion, especially if the emails contain vague language and redirect links which hide the real destination.

The dumbest such letters are computer generated, addressed to no one and give no indication that the author has any real knowledge of your website. In short, they're spam.

Remember, people who are suspicious are unlikely to take the action you desire. Tread carefully. It's very important that you try to figure out what the other person wants and provide it.

You can also promote a two-tier program on your website. The problem is that affiliates who sign up are likely to copy your technique. Instead of promoting the PRODUCT they'll promote the program. Result: No sales and no lazy second-tier commissions for you.

Years ago, I was really enthusiastic about two-tier programs. These days, I'd rather rely on my own skills and not waste time hoping someone else will make sales for me.

16. JV brokers

JV brokers such as Mike Merz have a much a classier way to earn second-tier commissions. Mike sends invitations to a long list of "friends" and to people who have opted in to receive JV announcements.

Here are Mike's JV terms.

This is really good strategic thinking. It's all about being a key person in a key position.

17. Blogs, email lists and RSS

Affiliates combine blogs, email lists and RSS to increase their repeat traffic and therefore their sales. Aweber's Blog Broadcaster enables you to convert your blog's RSS feed into an email newsletter. You can schedule blog newsletters weekly, daily or as you publish new posts.

Rosalind Gardner, author of Super Affiliate Handbook, a top-notch manual for affiliates, does this sort of thing very well.

18. Forums - your own

As you can tell from all the dead forums online, it's tricky getting a forum established. It's easier if you build a site, attract 1,000 or 2,000 visitors a day and THEN add a forum. You'll probably be surprised by the high percentage of forum visitors who look but don't contribute. Such is life. Sometimes controversial topics will attract new members who have been lurking for years but not posting - until a particular post touches a hot button.

People arrive at forums intending to read posts or make posts. If you want to lure them away to an affiliate product you're promoting, you'll need to do something really eye-catching.

To create the AssociatePrograms.com affiliate forum, we used free phpbb software, plus our own modifications. For the SpeedPPC private forum and for another site we're creating, we've chosen to use vBulletin.

19. Posting on other people's forums

Newbie affiliates and selfish oafs spam forums with blatant ads which get deleted and the affiliates get banned. Even quite experienced affiliates sometimes don't bother reading forum instructions, so on our affiliate forum I wrote a post describing five ways to promote affiliate products on forums...

20. Directories

All sorts of niche directories have been created on all sorts of obscure topics. And there are directories which list directories. Some directories provide straight links and are supported by fees or advertising. Some charge a listing fee. Some consist purely of affiliate links.

Tricky affiliates create directories mainly with the aim of boosting their other sites in the search engines. They're in a position to give a new website - or a particular page - a valuable, prominent link from a well established authority site.

21. Review sites

Product review sites publish specific product makes and model numbers, which people who are in a buying mood type into search engines. Thus they attract visitors at a crucial moment in the buying cycle.

Some review sites are created purely by the website owner. More sophisticated review sites, such as Epinions and Buzzillions, publish customer reviews written by website visitors.

22. Shopping malls

We go to a shopping mall offline and can often do all our shopping in one place, so the same should apply online, right? Trouble is, you can flee from an online shopping mall as easily as clicking a mouse. So most of the simple 1990s-style shopping malls died and have been replaced by sites which offer something more attractive, such as coupons or bargains...

23. Coupons and bargains sites

Examples of coupons and bargains sites are Dealcatcher, FatWallet.com, Amazing-Bargains.com, CleverMoms.com, CouponCabin, CouponSurfer, FlamingoWorld.com, DealHunting.com and 24hourmall.com. Coupon sites may also include forums where members share tips on how to save money.

DealCatcher, which was founded in 1999, now offers coupons, bargains, sales, reviews, rebates and forums. Dan Baxter, who founded the site, says it gets more than 6 million page views a month.

Another good one to examine is BradsDeals.com. Its co-founder, Brad Wilson, says that consumers using BradsDeals have spent more than $100 million.

If you're interested in setting up a coupon site, check out the large affiliate networks. Here's a list of affiliate networks.

24. Price comparison sites

Price comparison sites, sometimes known as price engines, enable you to compare prices of specific products. Examples are Pricegrabber, Shopzilla, Nextag and Shopping.com.

Some serious programming and knowledge of data feeds is required. You're getting into the big league here.

25. Portals

Portals are mega-websites which typically publish a combination of useful articles, reviews, a directory, a forum, blogs, newsletter, etc. The are "sticky" sites which aim to encourage enthusiastic repeat visitors.

If you're going to build a portal, or even just a forum, think carefuly about who is going to be responsible for the website maintenance when you take a vacation or a long weekend off. Delegating stuff to employees or outsourced workers is absolutely essential.

By: Allan Gardyne

53 ways to make money with affiliate programs

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 22:03:00 +0000

Part 2: More ways to make money with affiliate programs

Have you seen all these ways affiliates earn commissions?

PPC, bonuses, offline marketing, software with embedded affiliate links, widgets, shopping communities... affiliates generate revenue in a wide variety of ways.

Here are some 28 more idea generators...

26. PPC direct to advertisers

It's much more difficult than it used to be, but some affiliates still join affiliate programs, buy pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and send the visitors directly to the vendor, earning a commission on the sale. This technique was popularized by Chris Carpenter in GoogleCash.

27. PPC to websites

Pay per click marketing is one of the toughest ways of generating affiliate commissions because your money can run out so fast if you get it wrong. However, when it's done right it has the potential to be much more lucrative than most other affiliate marketing methods.

You buy PPC traffic from Google AdWords (or Yahoo! Search Marketing or MSN), send it to a website, and have a high enough conversion rate so that you earn considerably more in commissions than you spend on advertising. That's the goal.

To achieve it you need certain skills, such as the ability to select products that pay well, write eye-catching ads that get the click, write compelling web pages and monitor the results.

It's more challenging than many ebook authors would lead you to believe, but if you get it right, the rewards can be huge.

The SpeedPPC system, invented by my business partner Jay Stockwell, enables you to get great Google Quality Scores and click-through rates and create perfectly targeted landing pages which are dynamically created. You can do a month's work in minutes. SpeedPPC is best for experienced PPC marketers. If you not sure you need it, read the glowing testimonials for SpeedPPC.

28. PPC arbitrage

Google and Yahoo! have taken steps to restrict PPC arbitrage, but haven't killed it entirely. Affiliates buy PPC advertising on cheap keywords, sending visitors to pages using contextual advertising, hoping to generate more revenue than they spend.

For example, they may buy traffic from Google AdWords and send it to a page monetized by Yahoo! contextual advertising, or vice versa. You need to be good at achieving high conversion rates and monitoring statistics.

Other affiliates add a twist to the technique by sending visitors to pages which promote pay-per-lead products, in which affiliates are paid for the lead.

29. Brandable reports and brandable ebooks

Affiliates create reports and ebooks and allow other affiliates to rebrand the reports and ebooks with their own affiliate links and give away the reports.

You need to produce a high quality, genuinely USEFUL report that other affiliates will be happy to give away. Here's an article explaining how to create Brandable ebooks.

30. Affiliates pay other affiliates

To build a large opt-in list very fast, affiliates pay other affiliates a small commission, typically 50 cents or $1, for every person they refer who downloads a free report.

Such reports are typically highly controversial (remember "Death of AdSense"?), attract public arguments and generate buzz. They usually presell products on which the author earns a commission.

31. Affiliate bonuses

Especially popular in the Internet marketing field, bonuses are offered by affiliates to encourage more sales. The most effective bonuses are ones that complement the product being sold. For example, a case study which shows how the affiliate used the product to achieve X amount of sales.

The pitch often goes something like this: "If you buy this ebook through my affiliate link and send me your receipt I'll give you..."

One problem is that affiliates normally have to check those receipts and manually send the bonuses. Steve Diamond solved that problem for ClickBank affiliates by creating affiliate bonus manager software which automatically sends the bonus to the customer.

32. Videos

First, videos were powerful sales tool for vendors. Videos make it easy to demonstrate a product. They increase conversion rates, sometimes dramatically.

Then affiliates caught on and started using videos, too.

The simplest way to put a video online is to grab a digital camera that takes videos and follow the instructions at YouTube. Then you can simply paste the code that YouTube provides into your website. YouTube kindly hosts the video for you - no bandwidth problems.

Eric Holmlund and Michael Nicholas have made things even easier for affiliates by coming up with Affiliate Video Brander, which enables affiliates to use affiliate vendors' videos and still direct traffic through an affiliate link.

33. PLR - private label rights

Affiliates use PLR (private label rights) articles and PLR products in a variety of ways to save time and money and generate revenue. For example, PLR articles can be used as blog posts, website content and in email courses. Here are some good places to find PLR articles.

34. Offline affiliates

Offline affiliate marketing can be as simple as posting notes on noticeboards in shopping centers and colleges, or as sophisticated as getting yourself interviewed on radio or buying ads on TV.

Offline marketing can be done by using a short, memorable domain name which redirects people straight to the vendor's site. Or you can send visitors to your site where they opt in to get a free report. The report presells the affiliate product, and the visitors are also signed up to an autoresponder series.

Some affiliates visit offline businesses. Others volunteer to speak at club meetings and arrange teleconferences.

One affiliate vendor who provides a heap of assistance and tools for offline affiliates is Ken Evoy of SiteSell. He provides an Offline Sales Kit which includes marketing guides, a PowerPoint presentation, brochures, fliers, ads, handouts, etc. He pays $75 commissions, plus commissions on renewals.

"Chambers of Commerce are a perfect place to meet lots of local business owners," Ken tells his affiliates.

35. Type-in traffic

Affiliates buy dozens or even thousands of domain names which contain keywords which are so common that people can successfuly guess the domain name. People type the domain name straight into their browser and arrive at a site that promotes affiliate products, or PPC links.

CNN reported in 2007 that Rick Schwartz owns 5,000 domain names and says he makes $2 million a year from type-in traffic.

36. Freeware and shareware plus affiliate links

You - or a programmer you hire - can create software which promotes an affiliate product. As a bonus, you can get hundreds or thousands of one-way links to your site.

Directories such as Download.com, TuCows.com, FreeDownloadsCenter.com and thousands more list freeware and shareware software.

Smart affiliates tap into these huge traffic sources.

They create a simple downloadable application that promotes an affiliate product. In his book,Confessions of a Lazy Super Affiliate, Chris Rempel describes how he creates three types of freeware programs that promote a high-converting, big-demand affiliate product. Then he mass-submits the shareware to about 600 software directories.

If authority sites review the application, you can score a freak success. Chris has one application that has been downloaded more than 140,000 times and generated $19,000 in commissions.

He says he's created more than 150 applications promoting a wide variety of products. In his book, he describes which types of applications work best, and how to create them.

37. Upsells and back-end sales

Vendors create upsells and back-end offers promoting affiliate products, knowing that they're striking at a crucial moment - when the customer is already in a buying mood.

Upsells are most effective when the customer is able to acquire another product without having to enter their name, address, and credit card details a second time. This is extra work for your programmer, but well worth doing.

38. eBay

On eBay, affiliates used to be able to sell downloadable reports $1 or so. The reports would presell a product and contain affiliate links. The auction site clamped down on that, so affiliates put their reports on a CD and sell that. Because more costs are involved, they now need stronger skills.

39. Widgets

Widgets are snippets of code that can be added to websites and blogs and can spread virally. An early popular one was Trivia Blitz, a java game applet provided by Uproar.com in the late 1990s. It included an "Add this game to your website button" which enabled it to spread to thousands of sites. Those who spread it earned a referral fee.

These days, developers are creating applications for Facebook, such as iLike, which has more than 4 million active users and generates revenue when users follow links and buy music on iTunes or tickets on Ticketmaster.

Here's an interview with Ali Partovi which includes a discussion on how the iLike widget generates revenue.

40. AdSense

Many affiliate marketers love AdSense because because it's so easy to paste some AdSense code into a website or blog and get paid per click when your visitors click on the AdSense ads. Although it's hugely popular, it's just one of many ways to monetize a website.

These days, affiliates who own a large number of sites often own what they hope will become an AdSense empire. These MFA (made for AdSense) sites are often built with the help of PLR (private label rights) articles, cheap labor from outsourced workers and perhaps article spinning software which turns one article into hundreds.

And Google doesn't know what's going on, right?

More forward-thinking affiliates are building networks of sites that contain high quality, genuinely unique, useful content. They're building valuable sites that have a good chance of still ranking well 10 years from now.

I'm no longer surprised when I come across affiliates who have been using AdSense for years but haven't bothered reading the free helpful tips published on the AdSense site. Here's a good case study of a successful AdSense publisher. It's free on Google's own site.

41. Data feed sites

Merchant data feeds enable affiliates to add hundreds or even thousands of keyword-rich pages to a website. However, you can't just grab a merchant data feed from an affiliate network, shove it online and hope to get a lot of traffic from search engines, says affiliate datafeed veteran Gary Marcoccia. He says data feeds must be coupled with relevant content. I interviewed Gary to get his advice on affiliate datafeed sites.

Datafeedr is a new membership service which makes setting up stores using a merchant data feed quick and easy. Based on WordPress, it's provided by Eric Busch and Stefan Everaet. You can choose data feeds from CJ, LinkShare, Shareasale and ClickBank. Datafeedr is designed for affiliates who aren't techies and don't want to hire a programmer.

42. Data feeds + PPC

Sites using data feeds can be large and complex, with various types of content added to make each site unique. In contrast, affiliates who send PPC traffic to datafeed sites usually aim to keep each page fairly simple, with nothing to distract visitors.

One way to combine PPC and data feeds is to use SpeedPPC. It provides a Campaign Builder, Landing Page Generator, and Affiliate Datafeed Software.

Using the Affiliate Datafeed Software, you can import data directly from data feed files to build a super-targeted campaign and matching landing pages. Manually, this would be a extremely tedious and time consuming.

43. Incentives or rebate sites

"Incentivized" sales are encouraged by affiliates who offer points, prizes or cash rebates to people who buy through that particular site. The aim is to persuade customers to return to the affiliate site next time they wish to buy. Some affiliate networks won't accept incentive sites.

Sometimes large companies are involved. You may not think of American Express as being an affiliate, but it is: ShopAmex.com.

Rebate sites like Memolink.com, ExtraRebates.com and MrRebates.com collect email addresses - a valuable asset. Memolink says it has 10 million members, and has its own referral program.

Incentives offered don't have to be cash. PhoneHog.com offers its members free minutes of long-distance phone calls when they sign up for offers which pay PhoneHog per lead.

For example, Josh Kulp's NoCostGifts.com, which is aimed at U.S. residents, promises cash rebates and directs people to bargains and gifts at favorite restaurants and department stores, DVDs, movie tickets, long-distance calls, electronics, and so on. To receive any of these offers, a visitor has to become a member, so Josh collects email addresses fast.

I interviewed Josh to find out how he created the site and how his system works.

44. Teleconferences and teleseminars

Teleconferences and teleseminars increase credibility and trust by allowing potential customers to ask questions and sometimes listen to existing customers talk about their experiencee with the product. Teleseminars can sell many thousands of dollars worth of affiliate products in only an hour or so.

They can also be recorded, and the recording sold via an affiliate program.

45. Charity sites

Some shopping mall style sites say they give all or some of their affiliate commissions to charities. Charity sites vary hugely in quality. Some are rather vague about how much they donate.

If you're planning to create a charity site you need to provide solid proof that you're donating the money to charities.

46. Affiliate networks and CPA networks

Affiliate networks and CPA networks used to be just places affiliates would go to find products to promote. Then successful affiliates started launching their own CPA networks and taking a slice of the action from some of the products offered.

47. Affiliate podcasting

Podcasting (from the words "iPod" and "broadcast") involves distributing audio or video files via RSS to people who can play them on their computers or on MP3 players.

Podcast fans like the fact that they can transfer the file to their iPod and listen to it while they're out walking or away from their computer. Whoops! If they're out walking, they can't click on the link you're telling them about, can they?

Visual folk wish podcasters would provide a transcript.
People like to learn in different ways - reading, listening or watching. By using podcasts, you widen your audience.

48. Social shopping communities

Kaboodle.com does its best to make shopping fun. It's obviously working - the site has more than 600,000 registered users and gets more than 7.5 million visitors a month.

Kaboodle, launched in 2006, describes itself as a "social shopping community where people discover, recommend and share products".

Visitors can organize their shopping through lists, discover new things from people with similar style, get discounts on popular products and find best prices. Members create and join groups, share advice, feedback and product suggestions and personalize their profiles with polls and other widgets.

Another social shopping community is venture-funded ThisNext.com, where members discover products based on recommendations.

49. Interactive sites

Here's an innovative affiliate site which doesn't fit neatly into any of the previous categories. It's Zafu.com. If you're looking for a nice bra, pants or jeans, you head to Zafu and answer a few questions on fit, size and styles. Zafu's "jeans-finding engine" then locates the ideal items for you from among 90 brands and explains why each style works for your body.

More products are coming soon. Zafu is growing into a clothing search engine.

When you do something clever like this it's easy to get wonderful free publicity. In its first six months more than 1 million women used Zafu's jeans-finding engine.

Zafu earns an affiliate commission on every bra and pair of jeans sold. The site also carries advertisements.

50. Visual search engine

Another highly innovative site is Like.com, which describes itself as the "first true visual search engine". You can search for products by color or texture. When visitors like the handbag or shoes or whatever they see and click, they're whisked directly to the affiliate merchant.

Like.com's owner, Riya Inc, raised $19.5 million in venture capital and, according to VentureBeat.com, is raising millions more.

CEO Munjal Shah says Like.com gets more than 5 million unique visitors a month and is buying traffic profitably. He won't say just how much traffic he's buying.

51. Customers provide product review videos

Kurt Lohse's Nuuvy.com allows anyone to provide video reviews of products - and pays from $1 to $10 per review. Under each video, there's a "Where to Buy" link, which takes you to coupon site KeyCode.com.

ExpoTV is another affiliate site which encourages visitors to provide video reviews of products. Visitors can earn up to $10 per video. They earn 1 cent each time a video is viewed.

52. Sites with a cause

One of the most powerful ways of selling is to be the public face of a worth while cause. That's what Randy Paynter, founder of Care2.com, has done. It grew out of his apartment. Now it has more than 50 employees and more than 9 million members. He promotes green living, health, civil rights, and a heap of other causes.

Another affiliate-driven site with a vision is MarchOfDimes.com, which fights for the health of babies.

If you motivate people, they'll spread the word for you, giving you unbeatable free publicity.

53. Social networking, social media

Affiliates join Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and so on and communicate and build and strengthen bonds in a friendly, helpful, interesting way with other people, without blatant advertising. Instead of trying to sell, smart affiliates provide excellent content. Eventually people follow links which lead to the affiliates' websites, buy products and sign up for their newsletters and RSS feeds.

In Traffic Secrets 2.0, John Reese says on CD No.7 that 99% or more of Internet marketers are using social media incorrectly - and waste an awful lot of time.

Whew! I'm running out of steam. Social media is a huge topic. We'll have to leave that for another day.

This two-part article "53 ways to make money with affiliate programs" doesn't cover every way you can make money with affiliate programs, not by a long way. Perhaps one day I'll do an update and add to the list.

If you're doing something innovative which deserves a mention, I'd love to hear from you.

In the meantime, I hope this list has helped spark a useful ideas.

Instead of ideas: Solid ACTIONABLE steps

If, instead of idea generators, you're looking for step-by-step instructions, have a look at this...

Marlon Sanders' new Promo Dashboard is a point and click, organized way to promote your own products or affiliate products. Like his other popular "Dashboard" products, it gives you a system to follow.

The "Dashboard" has six rows of icons. Each row has six icons - 36 steps in all. It's designed as roughly a six-week program. You simply work your way through the steps, probably one step per day, taking an hour a day. Some people may take longer and some will be quicker.

Here's what you'll be doing as you follow the Promo Dashboard system...

You start by researching your market, and probably finding out more than you ever knew about your typical customer - what blogs they read, what websites they visit, what age they are, etc. Marlon shows you how.

Next, you come up with a "killer freebie" that compels people to opt in on your squeeze page. It can be a screen capture video, a PDF, an e-course or some other "freebie". The aim is to get15% to 25% of your visitors to opt in. Marlon shows you how. He shows you squeeze pages that WORK.

Then you send out emails containing what Marlon calls the "full arsenal". You impress your subscribers by using such things as podcasts, videos, PDF reports, audio reports, webinars... Don't worry if you don't know how to do these things, Marlon takes you by the hand and shows you how, step by step. (There's a LOT of really good, solid stuff in this Dashboard.)

Your goal is to get 10% of your subscribers, over time, to buy your product. Your results will depend on your target market, your industry, and so on.

Again, Marlon is really GOOD at getting people to buy. He was selling products full-time online long before many of today's gurus were even online. He takes you step by step and shows you how, without any fluff and "guru speak".

He uses step-by-step instructions, short audio messages, screen captures and short videos. He gives very clear, easy to understand instructions.

By: Allan Gardyne

Brandable ebooks

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:59:00 +0000

How to boost your affiliate income and reputation with brandable ebooks

Brandable ebooks are a valuable tool to increase traffic and revenue. Anyone interested in Internet marketing or creating a profitable affiliate business knows about ebooks, right?

Thousands of them are available, and if you give them away, they can be a useful way to direct free, targeted traffic to your site.

Brandable ebooks have to be one of the best methods of viral marketing available. You write the book, include the links you want, and let your web site visitors give it away for you!

It's a win-win-win situation. For you as the author, for the person giving the book away, and for the reader.

If you want people to promote your free ebook, you must provide them with a powerful incentive.

Here it is...

In the ebook you include affiliate links to products or services you recommend. You allow your readers to change some or most of those links to THEIR affiliate links.

If those links are to two-tier affiliate programs, you'll earn second-tier commissions when other affiliates recommend your book.

In some brandable ebooks, readers benefit by being able to rebrand the book with their name and web site details, effectively making it look like THEIR book.

The reader benefits by gaining access to your knowledge and ideas, usually with just a mouse-click.

Tips on creating brandable ebooks

Creating and writing a brandable ebook takes time, so you want it to be a profitable exercise.

It has to be not only a good read, it must contain helpful, practical information so that your readers will be eager to recommend it.

One way to do it is to contact experts and persuade them to contribute one article each. This method has the advantage that your contributors can then promote the book for you, giving it away as a bonus for subscribing to their newsletters or as a bonus when someone buys one of their products.

Be tough. If you get other people to contribute articles, examine what they write critically. You don't want self-serving articles in your ebook. You'll probably need to edit their contributions. If what they write isn't adequate, don't be shy. Go back to them and ask some tough questions to encourage them to provide useful content.

One advantage of writing all the book yourself is that it's easier to retain control over the quality of the content.

You don't have to be a Hemingway or Woolf. Have a look at some examples of brandable ebooks currently available on the web. They vary widely in style, substance and length.

A short report will do

You don't have to write a whole ebook. Just a short report will do. The usefulness of the contentis much more important than the length.

Make it easy. Don't expect affiliates to change 10 or 12 affiliate links in an ebook. If they have only ONE link, you'll have a better chance that they'll do do what you want them to do.

Here are a few examples of free brandable ebooks.

If you want good tips on writing attention-grabbing text, I recommend Ken Evoy's Make Your Words Sell

[UPDATE: Make Your Words Sell! (MYWS!), which used to be sold for $29.95, is now FREE.]

Once you've picked your topic, you need to set up your affiliate links. Or you could choose to do it the other way around. Decide on the best affiliate links, then write your ebook.

Affiliate links with two-tier programs or lifetime commissions are obviously your best bet. You do the work once, and get paid over and over again.

You can check out LifetimeCommissions.com for more information on dozens of programs that pay residual commissions.

Finally, your brandable ebook has to be created in a format that enables YOU to decide which links can be altered. My preference is PDF (Portable Document Format). It's stylish, professional, user-friendly, and suitable for both PCs and Macs.

Adobe Acrobat 6.0 lets you quickly and easily convert any Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, or other electronic document to a reliable PDF file. It's expensive.

One popular program used to create rebrandable ebooks is Activ E-Book Compiler, which creates .exe files, and includes branding software in the download package. You can get a free trial download.

However, PDF files are more universally accepted than .exe files.

For that reason, I recommend you get Michael Wagner's viralPDF software and use it to rebrand PDF files. Michael also provides useful tips, including links to free software you can use to create PDF files.

By: Ros Oliveira

BLOG PLATFORMS THAT DRIVE SEARCH ENGINE TRAFFIC

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:41:00 +0000

Affiliate marketing, search engine traffic and well-managed blogs all work together in making the difference between a broke affiliate marketer and one who is making a living at it. Search engine traffic is the lifeblood of affiliate marketing. For some, using blog platforms is the cardio shock they need to get their business pumping.

However, just how do blog platforms drive search engine traffic, and which ones are the best at the job? Let's find out.

Blog Platforms And Search Engine Traffic
In truth, all blog platforms are excellent for driving search engine traffic. The trick is to stick with one platform and keep your blog up-to-date. The longer you use the same blog platform, the stronger it will stick with the search engines. If you change blog platforms often, you will be starting from scratch each time you make the change, at least in the eyes of search engines.
Blog platforms like Blogger, Wordpress and TypePad are commonly found in the upper reaches of the search engine results. Their user-friendly tools make it simple for users to continually update their blogs with new content, photos, videos or audio clips. With fresh content hitting the blog platform often, it causes search engines to take notice and thus pay them more attention.
Blog Platforms Driving Search Engine Traffic
There are a number of blog platforms available that exceed at driving search engine traffic. However, the reality of the fact is the blog's content is what truly drives the traffic to the blog. Blogger, TypePad, Wordpress and Tripod are four of the best platforms currently available for blogging. In fact, Google runs Blogger, so you can imagine its search engine worth.
Maximizing Your Blog For Search Engine Traffic
There are a few tips you can follow to increase your blog's search engine performance. Aside from writing compelling copy, infuse the copy with special keywords that your readers are typically searching for in the search engines.
This is the essence of "search engine optimization." The search engines will pick up on the special keywords embedded in your copy, thus increasing your blog's ranking within the search results.
Next, you can visit MyYahoo.com and set up a feed so the Yahoo! search engine can effectively spider your blog. Once you've completed that, surf over to SubmitFire.com and submit your blog to the other traditional search engines.
Lastly, you can submit your blog to a number of blog directories online to help spread the word about your affiliate marketing blog.
Over time, the search engines will begin taking notice of your blog and your readership will increase. However, it doesn't happen overnight. Your best chance of affiliate marketing success is to stick with the blog platform you choose and keep it optimized for the search engines.

Source: AffiliateTips.com

STEP BY STEP GUIDE TO OPTIMIZING YOUR WEBSITE

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:36:00 +0000

When you become an affiliate marketer, you want to have a website that will be visible to as many people as possible. This will make or break your success in selling the products you promote on your page. One of the best ways to get your website noticed is ensuring your site is search engine optimized (SEO).

Customizing your Website for SEO

The first thing you must do is find out popular keywords relevant to your products. You can use an online keyword tool or program, which will display all relevant keywords on your topic and how many people have searched for it. Take the first few keywords to focus on in customizing your website.

When creating the URL of your website and web pages, be sure to use these keywords. You want your site's URL easy to remember as well as attractive to search engine robots.

For every page you have on your website, you should use a keyword in the page title. These page titles are the first thing SEO spiders look for and will display them on the search engine results page.

Meta descriptions for your page are exclusively for search engines. This script, which is invisible to visitors to your site, will include your primary keyword and relevant keywords in a description about your site. Make sure not to include a keyword more than three times in the description or it will not be used.

Whenever you have a description or article on your site, be sure to include a list of Meta tags or keywords at the end.

Many people who have simple websites do not believe they need a sitemap. However, sitemaps are not only for navigation purposes for your site, it is also for the search engine spider. A sitemap will guide it through your site so it picks up as much information as possible.

SEO Content for Your Website

Search engines want fresh content, so it is imperative you update your site regularly with articles or a blog. When you place articles on your site or blog, make sure to incorporate relevant keywords to your products in them. Subheadings with keywords are also important. It is also important to include links to other pages on your website in your blog and articles. Finally, add images with ALT text that include keywords.

Following these steps will make your website attractive to the all mighty search engine spider cache. It may take some time before your website receives a page rank, but with time and marketing efforts, you will see your traffic increase and so will your revenue.

Source: AffiliateTips.com

KEY SUCCESS FACTORS FOR OPTIMIZING YOUR WEBSITE

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:16:00 +0000

According to most experts, the majority of website traffic is generated from just a handful of search engines. Since search traffic is so vital to the success of your business, it is important to earn a high search rank for the key terms that your target customers use in the search engines. How can you accomplish this task? While there are many websites out there competing for the attention of the same viewers, applying a few simple website optimization tips can dramatically increase your search rankings and site traffic.

Optimize Your Website With Keyword Research
Initial research is a key success factor that you simply should not overlook. In order to target the right words and phrases, develop the appropriate website content and truly understand what your customers are looking for on the web, you need to spend some time researching search terms and consumer trends.
There are plenty of great keyword research tools out there, but the real key to success is knowing how to use them. After entering a potential keyword, take a critical look at the suggestions. Make a list of the potential keywords that seem to be the most promising.
Next, perform a little keyword competition analysis. While a particular keyword may receive a large number of searches each month, it may not be the right choice for you. Instead of going after the most searched keywords, consider selecting keywords and phrases that are slightly less popular and feature far less competition. While there may be fewer people searching for these terms and phrases, you will be more likely to rank high and achieve better traffic results.
Remember That Content Development Is An Essential Key To Success
After you have chosen some keywords and keyword phrases, the next step is to develop website content around those particular search terms. Whether you choose to create your own content or outsource it to a professional writer, always remember to optimize your copy for the web.
Include your key phrase within the first three sentences and keep paragraphs relatively brief. Utilize subheads and bulleted lists to make content more readable and be sure to use your key phrase between five to seven times throughout the page text.
Successful content development involves more than simply creating articles devoted to a specific keyword or phrase. It is also important to create links between related articles on your website. Rather than write just one article on a particular topic, develop a whole collection of related articles that can be cross-linked to maximize search results and website traffic.
Most importantly, only focus on one keyword per page. Trying to optimize for multiple search terms on a single page can hamper your results.
Always Optimize Every Page For Search
Upon developing the content, it is time to publish and optimize your web pages. While it may be tempting to simply cut-and-paste your copy onto the site, making a few simple tweaks can significantly improve your results. A few of the key success factors that can make all the difference are to optimize your title tag, META data, subheads and links.
Start by creating a title tag that incorporates your keyword, but is also appealing to online readers. Next, write a META description that mentions your keyword in the first 60 characters and include your target keywords in the META tag section. Finally, be sure to include your chosen keyword or phrase into the subtitles and anchor text of on-page and off-page links.
While optimizing your website may require some additional time and energy, the potential benefits are well worth the effort. In addition to improving your search ranking and attracting more traffic, website optimization can dramatically improve your business branding and online sales. Start implementing some of these key success factors today in order to make the most of website optimization.

Source: AffiliateTips.com

HOW TO BUILD GOOD FOREX AFFILIATE SITES

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:12:00 +0000

Building good Forex affiliate isn't a lot different than building good affiliate sites in general, but there are some specific factors to pay attention to.

Forex trading is a very specialized field, and successful affiliates treat it as such, knowing the ins and outs so that they get the most mileage out of the affiliate sites they build.
Who's Your Customer
The first (and most obvious) tip is to know your customer. The typical Forex trader tends to be young and very aggressive as far as their tolerance for risk, so you'll want to keep that in mind when building your affiliate sites.
Forex traders tend to be pretty savvy, usually transitioning from investing in mutual funds or stocks to trading options, then moving on from there to trading futures or Fx. Since your target audience is more sophisticated, you'll want to tailor the content on your site to match that.
Don't waste time explaining very basic financial concepts, as the typical visitor to your site interested in Forex trading is far beyond that level.
Adding Applications And Tools
Like other investing niches, forums or chat applications can be a great addition to your Forex affiliate sites. Investors and traders often feel very isolated and love to get feedback from other people as far as potential trades or outlooks, so forums can be a great way to add stickiness to your Fx affiliate sites, as far as giving visitors a reason to keep coming back.
Keep in mind, too, that traders can get all the quotes and charts and slick tools from their Forex broker's site, so try to think outside of the box and offer things that they won't find there, such as community features, private messaging applications, chat, blogs, etc.
Forex Affiliate Sites And SEO
Last but not least, you'll really need to focus on SEO and keyword research if you want to succeed in the competitive Fx affiliate world. With big potential profits come lots of competition, so make sure all of your content and pages are built with an eye towards SEO, and that you're able to target a wide variety of keywords.
Try to structure your sites so that you can add more content over time without looking like you're artificially tacking on pages just for keyword purposes. Providing reviews of various Forex brokers can be a good way of doing this, as well as providing a glossary of general terms or a tips and strategies section with various trading techniques.

Source: AffiliateTips.com

THE SECRET OF FINDING PROFITABLE PPC KEYWORDS

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 21:01:00 +0000

PPC is an investment, both in time and money. You can't afford to make a lot of mistakes so it pays to know right from the start what keywords are your best bet. And while some PPC advertisers experiment with keywords using actual campaigns, you can save a lot of money by applying these 5 PPC keyword research tips before you launch your campaign.

NOT ALL KEYWORD RESEARCH IS THE SAME
Before you dismiss keyword research because you've done it before, you need to remember that SEO keyword research is actually quite different from PPC keyword research.
SEO Keyword Research
PPC Keyword Research
High volume keywords (at least 1500 monthly searches)
Volume not important
Diverse keyword phrases to cover all traffic streams
Narrow keyword selections to focus on something specific
Keyword intent not important
Commercial intent to focus on buyers, not just people looking for free advice
It's important to be clear on this point. The approach you've used for building upSEO organic traffic for your website won't work for PPC.
#1 Buyer Keywords
You need to use keywords that have commercial intent, which means that the keywords used indicate the person is looking to buy, or is implying they are willing to pay for a solution to their problem.
Keywords that have commercial intent include phrases that use words such as "buy". That's an obvious one and I'm sure you can think of more that relate to the sort of people who are happy to hand over their credit card details rather than those just looking for free stuff.
While on the subject of focusing on buyers, a tip to weed out non-buyers even further is to include some negative keywords. Negative keywords are words that will prevent your ad from being displayed. For example, if you were bidding on "SEO software" you might add negative keywords such as "bittorrent", "limewire" or "cracks" as people using these words are generally looking for free stuff.
#2 Urgent Keywords
Sometimes a keyword phrase indicates that the person has an urgent or desperate problem they want fixed now. It might be something that's painful, embarrassing or urgent. For example, if someone is searching on "Save my marriage" there's every chance it's an urgent problem they want fixed in a hurry and more likely to purchase something that could help instead of casually searching for free advice.
Other urgent keywords include: Fix, Stop, Repair, Quick, Cure, Remedy or Fast.
By working these words into your phrases you can target people who are desperate enough to want to purchase something to fix their problem.
#3 Product Names + "Review"
PPC keyword research allows you to focus on very narrow keyword phrases, also known as long tail keywords. Long tail keywords are often used by people who know exactly what they want and are at the stage of preparing to buy. They are just looking for some reassurance the product is good, and a product review offers them that peace of mind.
Consider bidding on popular misspellings of the product name as well. Use theGoogle Keyword Tool to research the phrase to see variations you could add to your ad group.
On the subject of product names it's prudent to add that some merchants won't allow affiliates to bid on their trademarked product names, and in many countries outside the US and UK, it is not permissible to bid on these trademarks anyway.
#4 Author Names + "Review"
Similar to product names, author names are also a narrow, long tail keyword that is used by people getting close to buying. It can also be used by someone who has bought one of the author's products, was impressed with it and is now looking for additional material from the same author. In both cases, they are good buying keywords.
The great thing about both author and product name keywords is that often the searcher doesn't require a lot of persuasion to buy. They are often at the cusp of buying and a positive review or free bonuses can be just what's needed to convert them.
#5 Spy On Your Competitors
Why reinvent the wheel when you can just take notes on what successful competitors are bidding on and follow suit? But how can you do that? It would seem like a lot of spade work to track specific advertisers, find out what keywords they're bidding on and track their progress.
I'm a firm believer in letting the machines do the heavy lifting and in this case there's a free SEO software tool called Traffic Travis. It will track who is advertising for a specific phrase, how many advertisers there are, the most popular websites for the phrase and even display the ad to give you some ad-writing inspiration.
But the real beauty of Traffic Travis is that it allows you to know which keywords advertisers are sticking with, indicating it's obviously profitable. By tracking a phrase over time, such as a few weeks or a month, and seeing if there are no, or very few, changed advertisers then you'll know it's a money-making PPC keyword!
Start Slow And Go From There
PPC is easy to get started with but can take a while to master. There's every chance you'll lose money but you can also be extremely profitable as well. So if you're just getting going with PPC take it easy. Being cautious is the key. Keep your budget low and test the water with a few different phrases and ads, monitoring their performance closely and tweaking them.
In summary, it's all about having the best performing or, more accurately, the most profitable ad you can for your campaign. Applying the five tips we've mentioned here should help you reach that goal.
PS: PPC - "When it comes to earning money through affiliate programs there are several ways to get paid. One of the most common is PPC, pay per click, a good payment alternative to secure your profit. For every unique click on your link or banner you’ll earn a fixed amount. Learn everything you need you know about PPC affiliate marketing and other issues regarding it through our articles."

Source: AffiliateTips.com

15 Adsense Alternatives

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 20:59:00 +0000

With Google Adsense “Smart Pricing” continuing to cut into many blog and website owners income, a wise Internet Marketer will look over thealternatives to Adsense.

Smart pricing as Google calls it, was allegedly an attempt to increase “value” for advertisers. From what I can tell, no one can tell exactly how “Smart Pricing” works. From the discussions on many of the forums lately, Adsense revenues are falling further and further for site owners.

Yesterday I was reviewing my Adsense revenue, which by the way is down across all my sites, and notice there was one ad that received 10 clicks. I got 26 cents for those 10 clicks. Not 26 cents per click, 26 cents for all those clicks! That comes out to a whopping 2.6 cents per click for that ad!

As far as I can tell, and many other website owners as well, Smart Pricing is an excuse for Google to keep more of your money.

ADSENSE ALTERNATIVES TO HELP BOOST YOUR WEBSITE OR BLOG EARNINGS

Here’s quick rundown of some alternatives for replacing Adsense on your site.

AdBrite - AdBrite advertises that it serves 727 million impressions to 33,534 sites. The income is a 75/25 split in the site owners favor.
Advertising.Com – They have a wide range of advertisers to choose from. They have CPA and CPC programs with a net 15 payout.
AzoogleAds- Azoogle has many companies to choose from with many different ways you can apply those ads. This is a popular Affiliate Network for credit card offers, debt relief, car loans and insurance offers.
BidClix- This is a model where advertisers bid for the highest placement. BidClix advertise that they serve over 30 million ads a day for their advertisers. They pay every 15 days.
Bidvertiser- Bidvertiser serves up ads that look like Adsense ads (as does many of these other companies). They also will pay your through PayPal, which I like!
Burst!- Burst has over 4200 specialty content websites currently on over 400 channels. Some of their recent advertisers include John Deere, Weight Watchers, Vonage and State Farm just to name a few.
Chitika – Let’s face it, they have the best looking contextual ads on the Web. But a wise publisher will do their research before joining up. Read the Internet Marketing forums and ask questions.
Claxon- Claxon pays on the 15th and the 30 or 31st of every month. At one time Claxon payed 85% of the gross. I’m not sure if that’s still the case since they were bought by Human Ingenuity International. You’ll have to contact them or join their program.
IntelliTxt- Another inline text contextual advertiser. They advertise that they serve over 250 million user-initiated video ads per month.
Kontera- Kontera offers inline text ads. Personally, I’d do more research on them before joining. They advertise that they’ll get back to you within 5 business days of submitting your application, but it took them over 2 weeks to get back to me the fist time and they denied 5 of my sites. Oh yeah, the denial email was a form letter that said they denied my claim because my “site” was offline (remember, I submitted 5, not 1). Ummm…yeah. So I recently submitted them under Joel Comm’s link and its been nearly 3 weeks and I haven’t heard a peep. They don’t seem to be real big on answering emails or applications!
Miva- They offer pay-per-click ads (resembles Adsense ads) along with inline-pay-per-click ads.
MSN Adcenter- Another Adsense type contextual program from the good people at MSN.
TribalFusion- TribalFusion says it serves up 19 Billion impression…yes, that’s Billions as in starts with a “B” plus some of the highest payouts on the Web. They pay 55% of ad revenue with a $50 minimum. You’ll have to wait 45 days for you money though.
ValueClick - They pay by the 25th of each month for the previous months clicks. They also pay by PayPal.
YPN- This is Yahoo’s version of Adsense. Trustworthy and their ad blocks resemble Adsense.

Okay, there you go. 15 alternatives to Adsense. Sure, there are other advertisers who you can sign up with, but these 15 seem to be the big players in the industry.

Many site owners have got complacent and have failed to test other Contextual Advertising Programs. (myself included) I’m sure we’re leaving money on the table. It’s time we all put Adsense aside and tried out some of these other networks.

Also, you need to know that I’m only an affiliate for a few of these companies and I’m certainly not an expert on any one of them. I’ve provided the link to their sites so you can do your own research to find your Adsense alternative!

If you’ve tried any of these networks, let me know how they worked for you!

Source: AffiliateWatcher.com

9 Low Cost Ways To Promote Your Site

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 20:53:00 +0000

Blog and Website owners are always looking for effective ways to drive quality traffic to their sites. For some, this can be a hair pulling effort. For others, it seems no matter what they try, traffic comes rolling in.

HERE ARE 9 LOW COST WAYS TO DRIVE TRAFFIC TO YOUR SITE

Pay-Per-Click Programs - You should try Adwords and other Pay-Per-Click programs such as Yahoo Publisher Network and Microsoft AdCenter, only if you have a good understanding of how PPC programs work. Newbies should not dive into PPC unless you have a large budget. A better way to use Adwords would be to use the site targeted feature of Adwords and choose sites that are relevant to yours. Site targeted Adwords are charged on a CPM (cost per thousand impressions) basis rather than a per-click basis.
Banner Advertising – In my blog post title “15 Adsense Alternatives“, I feature 15 programs to replace Adsense. You can use many of these same programs, such as AdBrite, to advertise on. Speaking of AdBrite, I’ve seen them on some very specific sites where Adsense was not used. This could be for a variety of reasons, but it’s worth checking into sites where you’d like to advertise and see which program they are using to monetize their site.
Sponsored Reviews- Paying for a few site targeted reviews of your site could bring in a huge flood of new readers to your site. Sites like PayPerPost, ReviewMe and SponsoredReviews can be a low-cost goldmine for site owners.
Private Advertising – You don’t have to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to get your ad on sites like JohnChow or ShoeMoney to take advantage of private advertising. There are a lot of popular sites on the Internet that have very targeted readers where you can buy an ad for peanuts. You can get a nice banner ad on some of these sites for as little as $25 per month.
Text Link Ads- Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know what Google says about buying text links. When done right, Google or no one else can spot a paid link. They’re effective when placed on the right site and when done correctly. I Do Not recommend buying site wide text links in sidebars. I think the best links to buy are the ones in related post about relevant services or products you offer. You can find links on sites such as the Marketplace on DigitalPoint Forums, SitePoint, Text-Link-Ads and TextLinkBrokers. Another effective method is just to email the site owner and offer them some money to buy a one way link to your site. Don’t try to be cheap, it’ll turn off the site owner and they may never respond!
Blog Networks – I’ve never used Blog Networks, but I know a few site owners who swear by the traffic from Blog Networks like Blog Explosion,Blog Advance, Blog Soldiers and the new Blog Rush. With these networks, you get credits for sending traffic to other Network members sites. In many cases, you can also purchase credits at a reasonable rate. In turn, you use these credits to “buy” impressions back to your site. As good as that sounds, I still bring in more traffic with article marketing andezinearticles.
Stumble Upon Ads- StumbleUpon sends me a lot of traffic naturally on many of my sites. But for those who just don’t have the time or expertise to get that rush of traffic from SU, they do have ads and many can be had for as little as 5 centers per click. This is cheap in anyone’s book!
Paid Posters – This is another method I’ve never used, but know some people who swear by it. This works by paying people to post on forums and blog comments and leaving a link back to your site. From the prices I’ve seen, you can get this done for as little as 10 to 20 cents per post. Browse the Marketplaces on DigitalPoint Forums and SitePoint to find paid posters.
Automobile Ad Wraps – (bet you didn’t see this one coming!) These can be very effective if you have a product or service that serves a local market. This program works when a broker pays drivers to drive around with magnetic signs or auto-wraps on their vehicles. People pay attention to ads on vehicles and this can drive some very targeted traffic to your site or local business. Places to look are; Ad-Wraps,AutoWrapped.Com and AutoMurals.Com. I know a small businessman in the Northwest that post “Want Ads” on Craigslist, Kijiji and other local classified ad sites looking for driver. He cuts out the Middleman and saves some serious money in the process.

The important thing is to test, test and test more if you want to take full advantage of any of these programs! I think you’ll be amazed at how much traffic you can generate with a little bit of money.

Source: AffiliateWatcher.com

Domain Name Tips

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:35:00 +0000

Your domain name is a CRITICAL part of your business identity in the same way your brand name, trademark or logo is. Your customers will quickly associate your domain name with your company or your particular product or service so it’s worth taking the time to choose the right one.

When choosing your domain name remember that it will probably be used for several different purposes, including your website, email address, etc. It will be an integral part of your marketing campaign so you must get it right as it could cost a lot of time and money to change it at a later date.

If your domain name can be easily remembered then you will attract more customers. People will use your web site or email address to get immediate and convenient access to the information or service that you are providing.

Domain names are portable. You can move physical address, change phone numbers, change Internet service providers, change the company that hosts your web site and still keep the same domain name. This provides an extremely flexible method of keeping in touch with your customers and users.

With these points in mind consider the following tips for choosing domain names:

DO know the domain name format. Domain names can generally be up to 67 characters long (including the extension), and contain two or more of the characters a-z, 0-9 and ‘-’ (hyphen). Some domain names must be a minimum of 3 characters (not including the extension). Domain names cannot start or end with ‘-’ (hyphen). Domain names are not case sensitive, therefore DomainName.com and domainname.com and DoMaInNaMe.com are all equivalent. You can now also register multi-lingual domain names.
DO know your target audience. Choose domain names that are appropriate for them. Depending on who you are targeting this could mean choosing names that sound sincere, cool, current, active, professional, or that use key words from the industry for example.
DO keep domain names short and simple. Generally, the shorter the domain name the easier it is to remember or write down and the less chance of users noting and remembering it incorrectly. Restrict the domain name to one, two or three words at most. (The one exception to this is the next tip). All other things being equal, give preference to words with fewer syllables and words that are easy to pronounce. Short is good, but don’t use difficult to remember acronyms, such as qmxf.
DO register a long domain name containing a list of relevant words for your web site to achieve a higher ranking in some search engines. Several of the major search engines rank web sites much higher if the search terms are contained in the domain name. You can use up to 63 characters to create a long domain name with keywords and automatically redirect visitors to the real web site. Some registrars offer the redirect service as standard in their price.
DO use the appropriate pluralisation. For example, newhomes.com is probably better than newhome.com if the web site is not relating to “a” particular home. If in doubt you can register both domain names.
DO use words that can be visualized. Vision is the strongest of human senses. Even better, use words that involve several of the 5 senses. This usually involves choosing more common nouns (names or objects), verbs (actions), and adjectives (descriptions). For example, the word “fire” is easily imagined. It includes strong cues in four of the five senses – visual (red and yellow flames), auditory (crackling and other noises), feeling (heat), and smell (smoke).
DO plan for the future. If you are planning on releasing other products or services from this domain name in the future then don’t limit the relevance to the initial product or service. That being said Internet marketing experts believe that your web site should have only one subject or focus. All products or services listed on the web site should be related. A web site with a broad focus is not as appealing to someone who is looking for particular information.
DO use a domain name search program such as Mozzle Domain Name Pro to generate and check your domain names. There are some great free and free to try programs available, and several include advanced word and character combinations and other features far beyond those that web based services provide. For example, Mozzle Domain Name Pro contains an automatic thesaurus, acronyms, alternative domain name spellings, trademark searches, a pattern search and so on. These tools can save you many hours of time.
DO register the domain name in the correct global or country level domain. For universal appeal use a .com, .info, .biz, .org, or .net domain. For local appeal use an appropriate domain in your country, such as .co.uk or .org.au. Note that many domains have restrictions on what domain names can be registered. In some domains you can only use a name that is derived from a registered business or organization name.
DO check that you are not infringing on an existing trademark or other name that rightfully belongs to another company or individual. An available domain name does not necessarily give you the right to register and use it.
DON’T use hyphens between words if possible. A domain name with hyphens is harder to describe when said aloud. It is commonly accepted that a domain name with multiple words does not include hyphens. An exception to this rule is when choosing a domain name that has many words or words that are hard to decipher. Consider using capitalisation when displaying the domain name in marketing material instead. For example, SuperBaitAndTackle.com is easier to read than superbaitandtackle.com.
DON’T use confusing spelling. If your domain is targeted at a worldwide audience then stay away from words that are spelt differently throughout the world, such as words ending in ize(US)/ise(UK). This also applies to many words that have different meanings throughout the world. Some common English words are even offensive in other languages.
DON’T choose domain names that are very similar to others if possible. After all, you want customers coming to you, not your competitors! An exception to this rule is if you register the domain name of a commonly misspelt word, in the hope of catching additional customers, provided that you are not infringing on any trademarks.
DON’T choose domain names with words that join to form unintentional words such as “Jeans Wearing” which can read “Jean Swearing”. Avoid them altogether or use capitalisation in marketing material (JeansWearing.com) or hyphens in the domain name (jeans-wearing.com) to separate the words if really necessary.

Bear these points in mind when choosing your domain name and you will save yourself the hassle and expense of having to change any part of your business or marketing campaign in the future.

All the best,

By: Steve Peirce

Achieving Success Faster With Affiliate Marketing

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:34:00 +0000

More people than ever before are achieving varying levels of success with internet affiliate marketing and, with the myriad of products and systems available nowadays, there are more opportunities than ever to help you achieve success online.

So, once you’ve found a product to promote and have decided to press ahead, how can you start making money and achieving a successful promotion as fast as possible?

The tips I have listed below will be relevant to everything you do online and, although they shout ‘common sense’ at you, it’s worth taking a step back once in a while to remind yourself about how you should be working rather than just ploughing on and never taking the time to analyse what you are doing and how you are doing it.

Tip 1: Stick to One Course at a Time

Once you’ve bought a course that is going to show you what to do and how to do it, stick with that one course ONLY.

There’s always another promotion that will drop into your in-box and claim to be able to do a similar thing but trying to juggle two (or more) different strategies will only confuse things and distract you from your goal.

I’m not saying don’t buy or sign up to more than one, just dedicate yourself 100% to the one you select as the strategy / course / product which best suits your business model.

For instance, if you opt-in to my own Clone Cash System (it’s FREE by the way – this is not a sales pitch) to get yourself started online as an affiliate marketer, discipline yourself to follow the course from start to finish without the distraction of dropping onto a couple of other courses in the hope that one of them will work.

We’re talking here about achieving success as quickly as you can and this is a great way to save a bunch of time and keep your focus.

Tip 2: Learn Your Core Software Programs Well – And Then Sick to Them

The same principle applies here. There are so many programs and software tools available to help us with our marketing and you need to stick with the ones you are most familiar with but will still do the job you need.

Learning new programs all of the time can be a huge drain on your time and, after all, time and efficiency are what we are talking about here.

Tip 3: PMA – Positive Mental Attitude

Working online as an affiliate marketer demands a positive mindset as you will be putting a lot of effort into your project(s) over a protracted period of time, especially if it is one of your first projects and you are still ‘feeling your way’ a bit.

You need the discipline to stay positive and, although this sounds a bit deep, it can be as easy as surrounding yourself with positive people or sharing your progress with people or other marketers who can give you positive feedback.

You will have knock-backs – every marketer does. The successful guys are the ones who can push on and stay focused and driven to succeed.

Tip 4: Ditch Your Subscriptions to Marketers Who Are Nothing but a Distraction

This might sound like a bit of an odd concept but what I’m talking about here are lists that you are subscribed to that bombard you with promotions and are not really that interested in your success or development.

Now I’m not saying for a moment that you should purge your subscriptions and only stick to 1 or 2 marketers’ ideas. A lot of my business comes from email marketing and the name of the game is to develop your list and market to them regularly over a period of time.

What I’m talking about are the marketers who bombard you day after day with promotions to squeeze every penny from you as quickly as possible. The type of guy that never sends you free stuff without there being a catch and the type of guy whose emails turn you off.

Don’t let these be a distraction – there are loads of great lists on which to be subscribed so ditch the ones which are of no use to you.

Tip 5: Find Someone to Share Your With Ideas and Whose Opinion Matters

I’m really fortunate to work with a really experienced group of guys at Income Elite who I can bounce ideas off and who will both give me the encouragement I need and tell me if I’m going down a ‘blind alley’ with an idea.

You don’t necessarily have to have a ‘partner’ who works within the internet marketing business but you would benefit from someone who will give you a slap on the back when things are good and kick in the butt when it’s needed (and, be honest, we all need one of those every now and then).

To your success.

By: Steve Peirce

3 Golden Rules For Building a Profitable Opt-In List

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:29:00 +0000

Let’s be absolutely clear about this, building an opt-in list is the life blood of any online business.

No doubt you’ve read countless sales letters, articles and blog entries describing how people regularly make fortunes on the strength of their opt-in lists and you might be wondering how you can get yourself into a position to do just the same as them.

It could be that you have an opt-in list but you’re unable to make it convert for you. Having gone to the time, trouble and expense to build your list you’re just not converting it into sales (and, more importantly, profits) and you can’t work out why this should be.

So what could have gone wrong? Why have others succeeded where you have failed?

I’ve listed below the 3 fundamental rules you should follow to build your opt-in list:

1) Get your customers to trust you and your products first.

Trust and reputation are critical when you are running ANY business and just launching your opt-in list would not necessarily make you an expert and a believable seller in your customers’ eyes. Try posting a good number of topic-related articles online first before you start an opt-in list.

Try to post on forums first to gain knowledge about your customers and about their wants and needs and target those wants and needs.

Join forums from other sites as well. Provide expert advice and enhance you profile by giving recommendations. When you feel that you have established yourself within your particular niche and people are likely to trust you, you will be able to start your own opt-in list.

You can build a base as well with other forum users. You can ask them to join your list. Friends are always good customers. Put up a link to your site so that they may be able to see what you’re business is all about.

The simple fact is that the product sales and the money will only come in when the consumers and subscribers believe and trust in you. They want a product or service that could be a good exchange for their money – real value for money. People are less likely to buy something based on your recommendation if they don’t know you.

2) Find a product or service that people want and need.

Although the subject / niche may not be your forte, if you provide a service and product that you have researched well, and have educated yourself on, you can progress with the business and expect to make income from that niche. If you do your research well there is no reason why you should create a profitable business in any niche.

The point is that the most profitable niches may well be those in which you would normally have no real interest. That should be irrelevant if you are looking at a niche from the perspective of how profitable it can be. It’s a very important distinction to make.

3) Get to know other marketers within your niche who also have established opt-in lists.

Quite apart from the fact that you can negotiate list swaps or joint ventures with these acquaintances, it could be that the people you get to know have more experience in your niche and can give you personal, one-to-one advice to help you avoid future pit falls. This could be invaluable to you and of huge benefit to you and your business.

Nobody builds a profitable opt-in list overnight so you need to have a modicum of patience. As your list grows, you should also go to some efforts to maintain the quality of your list. Keep it organized and manageable. Make sure that your subscribers are happy and satisfied and they will be willing to buy from you again and again.

So there you have it. Building an opt-in list for ANY niche is absolutely ESSENTIAL. These are basic rules you should bear in mind and adhere to when practicable.

To your success.

By: Steve Peirce

The Benefit of Writing Your Own eBooks and Special Reports

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:28:00 +0000

eBooks and Special Reports are becoming more and more popular and publishing your own unique content in electronic form is one of the most cost-effective ways to provide your target audience with information specific to their requirements.

Also, as you develop your business and your list, you’ll find it beneficial to be able to react to the requirements of your readers/visitors to produce an information product within a very short time scale.

Why you should write your own eBooks

The beauty about producing, marketing, selling and delivering your work online is that there are no overheads, printing or distribution costs. As long as you can use a text editor or word processing programme, you will be able to produce your own eBooks.

eBooks can be used as traffic generators, as electronic newsletters, as information products and as an excellent way of generating income through affiliate links.

The eBook is the perfect marriage between writing and internet marketing, providing an opportunity to make money without the risks associated with traditional offline businesses.

One of the main reasons that eBooks are becoming so popular on the web is because most people are searching for easy access to information. Since that is true, the hottest topics are non-fiction ‘How to’ type eBooks.

The possibilities for a ‘how to’ eBook are endless. There will always be a market for good quality and well presented information that meets a specific need and I’ve already become aware of a myriad of different niches being developed by Income Elite members.

Putting your eBook together

Once you have decided on your topic within your chosen niche, there are many different ways to approach creating your eBook:

• Provide your readers with a list of practical tips
• Research the most frequently asked questions or searches within your topic and provide answers that address these issues
• Provide step-by-step instructions for a task or process that people are having problems with
• Provide useful tips and shortcuts to solve typical problems that are encountered within your target market
• Undertake research on your chosen topic and then publish your findings

Bear in mind that people are interested in details and simple explanations so try to be as specific as you can. The majority of your audience are not interested in broad theories – they are looking for information on what to do and how to do it.

You don’t have to write the equivalent of War & Peace. Your eBook or Special Report can be as short and concise as 30 pages but try to pack as much information as possible into this. A high perceived value of any one of your products will mean that your customers will consider you a trusted person and are much more likely to buy further products from you, whether they are your own products or affiliate products you are recommending to them.

I can’t stress strongly enough the importance of providing value in whatever you promote as, without the trust of your customers, you will never be able to grow a responsive list which, after all, is the life-blood of any internet marketer’s business.

One of the biggest benefits of writing your own eBook is that you have many opportunities to insert hyperlinks to your own web pages. You have complete editorial control. If you have a network of sites, promoting relevant products and/or services, this can be a superb source of traffic generation.

When you begin, you should aim to include a suitable introduction and notice about copyright at the beginning of your eBook.

You should also include a table of contents and, of course, it is customary to include a short biography or ‘About the Author’ section too. This promotes familiarity with the reader and makes the product more personal.

When creating an eBook, consider beginning with a Spider diagram or a Mind Map. I’ve found that this is a great way of structuring you eBook and developing the theme and sub-themes. Other people simply list as many topics as possible before finalising the content of their eBooks.

Another really useful way of organising your content is to write each of your ideas on an individual Post-It note. You can then move them around and put them in clusters or classifications until you are happy with the overall shape or structure of your eBook. This then becomes your outline and Table of Contents.

Try writing with a conversational tone as this is easiest for your reader to identify with and it’s easier to convey a sense of quiet authority about your subject.

A quick and easy way of creating a special report is simply to select ten high quality blog posts on a similar topic and compile them into eBook form. You can add value to this idea by including, with permission, articles from other experts on the topic.

Whatever you’re using to produce your eBook don’t forget to use all the tools available within your word processing or text editing package, especially the grammar and spell checking functions. Read your eBook out loud and make adjustments until you are happy with the finished text. You can add content to the headers and footers, insert page numbers and insert images to add emphasis or clarification. It’s really worth spending the time to get this right.

Promoting your eBook

The easiest way to promote your eBook is to have it listed in one of the many eBook directories available on the internet. An eBook directory is a website that accepts eBook listings. These eBook directories are high traffic, so if you list your eBook people will visit and download it.

Here are several high traffic eBook Directories on which to list your eBook:

Bizzy Days Ebook Publications – http://www.bizzydays.com/
Ebook2u – http://www.ebook2u.com/
Ebook88 – http://www.ebook88.com/
Ebook4Free – http://www.ebooks4free.net/
EBook Broadcast – http://www.ebookbroadcast.com/
EBook Heaven – http://www.ebookheaven.co.uk/
EBook Gallery – http://www.ebookgallery.com/
EBook Jungle – http://www.ebookjungle.com/
EBook Leads – http://www.ebookleads.com/
EBooks Library – http://www.ebookslibrary.com/
EBook Palace – http://www.ebookpalace.com/
EBook Zone – http://www.e-book-zone.com/
Ecourse Web – http://www.ecourseweb.com/index.php
E-Library Open Ebooks Directory – http://e-library.net/
Free eBooks – http://www.free-ebooks.net/
Free Book Miners – http://freeebookminers.com/index.php
Free Ebooks Online – http://www.free-ebooksonline.com
Free -n- Cool – http://www.free-n-cool.com/
Free EBook Directory – http://www.freeebookdirectory.com/
Jogena’s eBook and eZine Directories – http://www.jogena.com/
Mushroom Ebooks – http://www.mushroom-ebooks.com/
Power Business Publishing – http://www.powerbusinesspublishing.com/
E-Book Directory Name – http://www.sharewareebooks.com/
The Ebook Directory – http://www.ebookdirectory.com/
Virtual eBooks – http://www.virtual-ebooks.com/index.htm
Web Success Central – http://www.websuccesscentral.com/index.shtml
WitGuides – http://www.witguides.com/

Finally, think carefully about what response you want from your eBook. If you simply want to generate some income, and generating traffic is a secondary consideration, then you should price it according to the market demand.

If, however, you are looking for as much traffic as possible, you may want to give it away or even sell resale rights to get the widest possible distribution.

One last thing you could consider, especially if it is your own product and unique content, is either promoting it or offering it as a special offer of free giveaway on one or more of the many internet marketing forums.

If you’re not aware of the value and power of internet marketing forums, have a look at the biggest and best online, www.warriorforum.com. If you click on the Warrior Special Offers, you’ll see the way people either offer special deals on their products or give them away in order to create further traffic for other projects.

Believe me, it’s powerful stuff and there are a number of really good quality forums online that you should consider for this type of offer.

Good luck.

By: Steve Peirce

3 Things Affiliate Marketers Need To Succeed Online

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:25:00 +0000

There’s a lot of advice about how to achieve your goals online but, much of the time, the trick is simply to stick to basic, well proven principles.

This article is to remind you of 3 of those basic principles that you should adhere to. After you’ve read this, be sure to make a bit of time to have a look at the other entries on this blog related to affiliate marketing. I’m sure you’ll find a few handy tips that you’ll be able to apply to your business today.

So, what are these 3 tactics that will help you improve your chances of making more profits from your online business?

1. Using unique web pages to promote each separate product you are marketing.

Do not lump all of your products and promotions together just to save some money on web hosting. It is best to have a site focusing on each and every product and nothing more.

If you can, always include product reviews on the website so visitors will have an initial understanding on what the products can do for those who buy them. Also include testimonials from users who have already tried the product. Be sure that these customers are more than willing to allow you to use their names and photos on the site of the specific product you are marketing.

You can also write articles highlighting the uses of the product and include them on the website as an additional page. Make the pages attractive compelling and include calls to action on the information. Each headline should attract the readers to read more or even contact you.

Highlight the points that represent the biggest benefits to the reader. This will make it obvious to your readers what the page is about and they will want to find out more.

2. Offer free reports to your readers.

If possible, position them at the very top right hand side of your page so they simply cannot be missed. Create autoresponder messages that will be mailed to those who input their personal information into your sign up box.

According to research, a sale is closed usually on the seventh contact with a prospect. If you didn’t close a sale, then it’s likely that person may never return to your website ever again. This is why you want to get them onto your mailing list, and why it’s so important to use it as a means to follow up with prospects.

By placing useful information into their inboxes at certain specified periods, you will remind them of the product they were interested in, and later, you will find out that you’ll close more sales.

Be sure that the content is directed toward specific reasons to buy the product. Do not make it sound like a sales pitch.

FOCUS ON THE IMPORTANT BENEFITS TO THE PROSPECT

Focus on important points like how your product can make life and things easier and more enjoyable. Include compelling subject lines in the email. As much as possible, avoid using the word “f*ree” because there are still older spam filters that dumps those kind of contents into the junk before even anyone reading them first. Convince those who signed up for your free reports that they will be missing something big if they do not avail of your products and services.

3. Get the kind of traffic that is targeted to your product.

Just think, if the person who visited your website has no interest whatsoever in what you are offering, they will be among those who move on and never come back. Write articles for publication in e-zines and e-reports. This way you can locate publications that are focusing on your target customers and what you have put up might just grab their interest.

Try to write a minimum of 2 articles per week, with at least 300-600 words in length. By continuously writing and maintaining these articles you can generate as many as 100 targeted readers to your site in a day.

Always remember that only 1 out of 100 people are likely to buy your product or get the services offered. If you can generate as much as 1,000 targeted hits for your website in a day, that means you can make 10 sales based on the average statistic.

The tactics given above are not difficult to do. It just requires a little time and an action plan on your part.

Once you perfect these basic tactics, use them to replicate your business and create multiple streams of income. ALL of the successful marketers online do this and you should be looking to do this too. Think about it – you might make $500 / week with one site and one product but look what you can do if you run 10 sites concurrently.

By: Steve Peirce

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Affiliate Marketing

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:24:00 +0000

You’ll find that many top internet marketers promote affiliate products these days even though they make huge amounts of money selling their own products. Why? Because they can make huge sums doing this as well with a lot less effort.

Now, saying that, affiliate marketing is no walk in the park either, as some of you might already be aware. There are plenty of pitfalls that can consume your budget and cause you to take a mighty step backwards so you need to be aware of these:

Pitfall 1: Choosing a Bad Product to Promote

If you decide to choose a product from a list on, say, Clickbank, select very carefully as not all products are created equally.

Rather than making a beeline straight for the product with the highest commission rate, take a good look at the ones with the highest popularity and gravity ratings. The logic is that, if alot of people are buying the products, they must be as good, or better, than other products being sold in that niche.

It goes without saying that, as well as just looking for good products within a certain niche, you should be looking for the best niches as well.

Focus on products that lots of people want or, better still, NEED. Better still, if there are times of the year when the popularity of this niche surges (ie – gardening products in the spring) you can judge the best time to get into the market.

Pitfall 2: Picking a Low Converter

Although it sounds mercenary, as an affiliate marketer you are profiting from someone else’s hard work and from the originator’s investment in software, product developers and copywriters.

The products you are looking for have utilised these skills and have been professionally put together. You are looking for good copy, clean graphics and a professional look. Remember, the products you promote reflect on you and good products can enhance your reputation and your standing with your list.

Before you start promoting a particular product, read the sales page carefully and compare it with others. Ask yourself, do you feel compelled to buy the product? Did the copy reel you in? Did any of the graphics put you off? These things have to be right for you to choose this product to promote.

Pitfall 3: Jumping on Every Bandwagon

This is especially important for those of you that have a list. Remember, all it takes is one erroneous product promotion and you could end up with a mass exodus from your list.

You may be tempted to always promote the next biggest launch but make sure the product and the sales page are what you want to promote to your list. Don’t just buy into anything. Several marketers have lamented their decisions to promote products where the sales copy contained profanity, sexist comments, etc, which reflected the personality of the originator but was not popular with many list members.

Another idea is that, instead of signing up immediately for the next big promotion, wait until the buzz dies down slightly and then release a comprehensive review of the product (something most affiliates do not provide). This has a much better chance of getting sales for you and will also help you to maintain credibility.

Lastly, avoid promoting products that make outrageous or unsubstantiated claims. Claims of hig earnings are usually accompanied by screenshots providing proof of income. Don’t associate yourself with products that make the claims but cannot provide the proof.

Pitfall 4: Picking Products That Offer Meagre Commissions

If you are marketing to your list, it’s obvious that they are only going to consider so many offers in a given period of time, so select your promotions wisely. Avoid promoting a product that will pay you a 25% commission when a similar product in the same niche will pay you 50% or even 75%.

In terms of the dollar value of your commissions, don’t get too hung up on this. There are plenty of marketers who concentrate on promoting the big ticket products as a few sales can generate alot of money but you can still make a killing selling lower value products. The rising popularity of the $7 report is testament to that.

So avoid the sellers offering low percentage commissions but don’t worry too much about the monetary value of the product.

Pitfall 5: Failing to Collect Leads

This is a cardinal sin. If you do nothing else, always capture leads – it’s the lifeblood of your business.

Rather than generate your traffic through SEO, PPC and other methods and then sending them straight to your affiliate link, you should make a real effort to convert them into list members first.

So what’s the benefit of doing this? You want to make sure that people who don’t buy from you initially opt in to your list as well as those who have bought from you. This way you will get the chance to contact the willing buyers and the more reluctant and, once they’re on the list, it is no longer a one-off effort. You get the chance to promote to them again and again over the months, or even years.

As a marketer, one of the best tools you have is your list. Make it your priority to build it and develop it.

Pitfall 6: Ignoring the Importance of Timelines & Events

Ideally you need to find a product launch that qualifies as an ‘event’, something that people are going to be talking about and commenting on. These can be physical products or internet marketing products but, whatever it is, it’s critical that you engineer your own build-up and release to coincide with the build-up and release of the actual product.

The people on your list are likely to belong to other lists and you want them to buy the product from you, not one of your competitors.

In short – pay attention to the clock and the calendar. If there’s a big launch coming up you need to be in a position to capitalise on it. There may not be a second window of opportunity so take it when you have it.

Pitfall 7: Ignore Important Numbers

For example, many affiliate marketers will simply look at the price and commission offered for a Clickbank product without being fully aware of the portion Clickbank take for each sale. Keeping on top of these costs is critical to running a profitable business.

You also need to keep on top of your marketing costs. Don’t get carried away daydreaming about the riches that are possible online and lose sight of the cost of your traffic generation (especially PPC).

So do yourself a HUGE favour – keep track of your conversion rates, bid prices, commission rates, product broker fees and all of the other little numbers that it is easy for affiliate marketers to ignore. You’ll be glad you did.

By: Steve Peirce

The Power of Direct Mail

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:20:00 +0000

DIRECT MAIL refers simply to anything you send to people in the post – letters, brochures, etc, and can, if properly understood, realise significant profits for you and your business. You could consider using this method either to compliment your online marketing activities or, depending on your product ir service, as an alternative to doing everything online.

This post is designed to introduce you to the basic principles of Direct Mail and to dispel some of the myths surrounding the subject of Direct Mail. It also clarifies the key guidelines that you should follow to run a successful and profitable direct marketing campaign.

First, let’s address the argument that ‘Direct Mail doesn’t work.’

This sweeping statement is made based on the fact that most people throw away their unsolicited mail and, therefore, it must be a waste of money. What you have to remember is that Direct Mail, like so many methods of marketing, is a numbers game and the fact is that, even if only 1 person out of 100 who receives your mailshot buys your product, it can still be a profitable marketing campaign. (One of the important factors is to make sure that your mailing is so compelling that people DO open it and read it – but we’ll come to that later.)

So the reason that Viking Direct and many other big companies bombard you with mailings is because they work. These companies have spent a fortune testing and fine tuning their mailings – they know what works and what doesn’t. But here’s a word of warning – it is true that a significant amount of direct mail does not work – and that tends to be the mailings conducted by small and medium sized businesses who do not really understand what they are doing. When it’s done well direct mail can make your profits soar. When it’s done badly it can eat up your marketing budget instantly. So be careful.

The second myth to be dispelled is that there is a magical percentage conversion rate that a successful mailing campaign should receive. In other words, you should ‘expect’ 3% of the people you mail to buy from you. This is absolute nonsense – and it’s very dangerous nonsense.

First of all, the price of what you are offering is a significant factor. If you’re selling CDs at £9.95 you’ll probably get a different response rate than if you’re selling million pound yachts.
Secondly, it’s not the percentage response that counts – it’s whether the mailing is profitable or not.
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, nobody can ever predict the response from a direct mail campaign. This is why TESTING is absolutely imperative in Direct Mail.

You should never embark on a Direct Mail campaign without testing it on a small scale first. Why? Because the beauty of Direct Mail is that it is statistically very predictable. If you send out 2000 letters and get 20 responses, you can predict with some certainty that if you send out 4000 letters (to the same group) you will get somewhere in the region of 40 responses. Equally, if you send out 2000 letters, get 1 response and lose money on the mailing, it is highly unlikely that if you send out 4000 letters you will have a profitable mailing.

Why is this so important? Because far too many people spend a fortune on a glossy brochure, mail out 10,000 copies to a dodgy list, get a terrible result and lose thousands of pounds. I’ve seen this again and again and it can really harm your business.

So always test your mailing on a small scale first. It needs to be small enough to be an amount of money you can afford to lose if it doesn’t work out but large enough to be able to hopefully generate at least 7 or 8 responses.

Any mailings you consider are likely to fall into two categories:

Mailings to your existing customers.
Mailings to potential new customers.

If you do not currently do much direct mail, and you have a list of existing customers, you should start by mailing these companies or individuals.

Let me be more explicit. Every client I have ever worked with who has existing customers has been sitting on a goldmine of untapped profits because they have not been utilising direct mail with these customers.

Think of something you can offer these customers, send them a letter and measure the response. If it works, mail them again next month and measure the results. If it keeps on working, keep on doing it.

Then there is using Direct Mail to attract new customers. This is an art and science in itself – and you may want to bring in outside help – but again there are some fundamentals which you will want to follow. Here are eight of them to keep you going:

1. Remember to TEST any Direct Mail campaigns for new customers on a small scale before rolling them out.

2. Consider testing rented mailing lists relevant to your target group. There are thousands of highly accurate mailing lists which can be a great way of reaching new people. A favourite of mine in the UK is www.hilitedms.co.uk but if you Google ‘list brokers’ I’m sure you’ll find many more.

3. Always include a letter with any brochure you send – it will increase the response rate. People buy from people and this will personalise your mailing.

4. Make sure that the contents of your mailing focus on the BENEFITES of your product or service. You want it to be about your potential customer and what you can do for them rather than just being about you.

5. Don’t limit Direct Mail to pure selling. You can use it to say ‘thank you’ to customers. You can use it to ask for referrals or to introduce your customers to a company you’ve partnered with. It’s only limited by your imagination.

6. If you repeat a successful mailing three weeks later you can expect a response rate around 50% of the original.

7. Test mailing postcards – they are cheaper than a normal mailing and in some cases will produce a higher response rate.

8. If you follow up a mailing with a phone call you can increase the response rate by up to 1000%. This is not for everyone but it’s worth bearing in mind.

Direct Mail is a huge subject but these principles should help you make a start on your next campaign and avoid costly mistakes in the future.

By: Steve Peirce

Email Marketing – Keep It Simple…

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:13:00 +0000

You may think that it’s only experienced internet marketers who can put together effective email marketing campaigns. Well, you’d be WRONG!

You may think that you don’t have the creativity or literary skills to be able to communicate your message to your readers effectively enough to generate income from them. WRONG AGAIN!

You may even think that tried and tested methods of grabbing your readers’ attention, capturing subscribers and, ultimately, generating business won’t work for your product or your style of writing. Guess what……WRONG AGAIN!

Email marketing is one of the most effective tools in your arsenal and an email marketing campaign doesn’t have to involve ‘mass control’ techniques or multi-step product launch steps to be successful and, most importantly, profitable.

Don’t get me wrong, these techniques are hugely effective if done properly but you can run a successful campaign by keeping things simple and following a few basic principles of email marketing.

Use SCARCITY to add incentive and value to your offer

This is not an underhand method. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. No matter what the product is that you are selling, you will have substantial competition and you must offer good value to your reader to encourage them to part with their hard-earned cash and take you up on YOUR offer.

For example, say you’re launching a new product and the regular price point is going to be $97. What you should do is launch it to your email list (remember, these are people who have already given you their email addresses so they will read your offer) for just $67 for the next 48 hours.

Explain it to them like this:

“I’m grateful that you’ve previously chosen to subscribe to one of my lists and as a big ‘Thank You’ I would like to offer a special $30 discount if you act within the next 48 hours…”

Incorporate this discount into your email and your sales will increase significantly as scarcity is a very strong CALL TO ACTION.

You are encouraging your readers to ‘act now’ and you are being genuine with your list members which makes the correspondence even more powerful.

It will also, most importantly, encourage people to read your future emails and remain on your list(s) as you are a trusted marketer.

Quirky Headlines Stand Out in the Crowd

Your email campaign might be 10 emails long so, in perhaps 2-3 of these emails, make the headline quirky so it grabs the reader’s interest.

For example: “Top Copywriter Gets a ‘C’ on Copywriting Test”

Headlines like this can really improve your click through rates simply because they are DIFFERENT. They stand out in the crowd and intrigue your reader. Remember – your email is one of 20 they might have received that day so you need to think outside the box a bit.

‘Big Benefit’ headlines are great and should still make up the majority of your email headlines but try throwing a couple of these into you campaign. It looks like current news and will intrigue your reader to click through to see what’s on the other side.

Where possible, you need to try to make your headlines STAND OUT. You DON’T want you email to be one of the ones that is deleted before being opened.

The ‘Multiple Calls to Action’

You shouldn’t always try to do things differently – make sure you use ‘tried and trusted’ marketing methods as well. Don’t always try to reinvent the wheel.

One such method used by most successful internet marketers is the multiple calls to action within an email. All this means is that you are putting more than one link to your product offering in the email. The trick is to put the links into the text in such a way that the email is still easy to read and not a ‘hard sell’.

By: Steve Pierce

Long or Short Copy?

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:11:00 +0000

Here’s a question that’s been debated ever since internet marketing was in it’s infancy – which is the best format of copy to use for promoting your product on your website?

The simple answer is that there is no simple answer.

There are statistics prove that long copy outperforms short copy. There is also a popular school of thought that most readers won’t bother to read long copy (the counter argument is that these readers were not going to be buyers anyway).

So which side of the arguments do you believe will be best for your business? There has to be a compromise, right?

To find that compromise you need to put yourself into the same mindset that your visitor is likely to be in when he lands on your site. Look at things through his eyes.

There are two things that happen when he visits your site.

1. On arrival he needs an instant quick overview of what your site offers, for example “an ebook about search engines which costs $27″

He does not want to wade through thousands of words to extract this information, so this is best dealt with by short copy.

2. At some point he begins to get interested and may consider a purchase. Now he wants to know everything about the product and how it can help him.

So now he wants to see all the detail − long copy.

So if it were possible you’d like to be able to switch from a summary to a full description.

You could start with short copy and at the end have a link to a second page with the instruction ‘For the full details click here’.

But a good alternative is to insert ‘more detail’ links throughout the body of the short copy and have them come up as pop ups which the reader can open and close while remaining on the main page.

On the subject of sales copy I would say that copywriting is one of the most profitable skills to acquire and here is one of the reasons why:

Suppose you spend the next 3 hours preparing an advertising campaign in a newsletter. You may produce successful results but these will appear as a one−off spike in the chart of your sales figures. You would need to continually repeat these campaigns to maintain the improved figure.

Instead let’s devote these 3 hours to revamping your sales copy. They say that simple improvements to a headline alone for example can see conversion rates multiply by 5, 10 or more. But let’s allow a modest increase − you are able just to double the conversion rate.

Then your sales figures will double from now on, and remain doubled without any further effort.

If you are serious about learning to write as the copywriters do, come and join me on a 5 day trial at www.incomeelite.com to share all of the resources you need to get to grips with this subject.

We’ve got a comprehensive copywriting guide waiting for you which has been written by our own Phil Coleman, a seasoned copywriter in his own right.

By: Steve Peirce

Press Releases – the Benefits to Your Business

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:02:00 +0000

A press release is a written document that is created explicitly for the news media to publish and syndicate. A press release should be newsworthy and make an announcement about you, your business, your website or your products regardless of whether your business is based online or offline.

Press releases are one of the very best ways to get your message spread all over the Internet and, with the news media involved, it can spread to some of the top news websites on the Internet, as well as offline news sources.

WHY YOU SHOULD USE A PRESS RELEASE

Press releases are seen as official documents, not blatant marketing sales pitches, so you can gain a lot more exposure with a press release than with a regular article.

People also tend to see them as impartial stories and not as sales letters. As such, most people do not expect a press release to be selling anything, so they are syndicated, spread and used by many of the big news services within your market.

To be seen and noticed in today’s busy marketplace, you need to use press releases, as many of the top marketing experts do. They are great for generating a quick surge of traffic and can be re-released at a later date if you need to.

You should think about using press releases whenever you want to announce a product or a new service as part of your business, as well as if you launch, say, a new or updated website.

WRITING THE PRESS RELEASE

You should always include quality content in your press release in order to initiate a lot of traffic to your website. Of course, your aim is to make sales and encourage the reader to visit your site, but you must avoid the hard sale used in most online advertising.

You should write your release in a journalistic manner by revealing something new in order to capture the attention of the readers and other people in the media. Press releases are different from articles, and the layout should also be different. You need to tailor your writing style to the news media rather than the end user, or it will not be published in the big news sites (and you will lose a lot of traffic and free exposure).

Here are some points you should keep in mind when you are writing your press release:

The press releases must be compelling and interesting to read. It must have an angle and that should be clear to anyone reading. Make an announcement!

Use a journalistic or newspaper approach when writing. You should be reporting on the story instead of overtly selling.
It should be informative and have valuable information. Give away some quality facts and reveal some information that other people would not know.
The most important details should be included in the opening paragraph of the press release. The reason for writing should be very clear after reading the opening paragraph.
The remainder of the press release should contain more information about your business and how to contact you. You can include a call to action here, but don’t let it come across as a sales pitch.
The media won’t publish stories that are simply sales pitches, so avoid this or your press release will fail to reach your intended audience.

There are also a number of important sections to add into the press release. If you create the press release with these features, you will have a very good chance of getting it published by the big services.

Remember to include the following when writing your press release:

Facts about the topic you are writing about.

Quotes from people mentioned in the story, or even from people who have been affected by the topic of the story.
Write it like a newspaper article informing people about an event they should be aware of. Don’t sell them on a product or service.
The history of your business and how it relates to the announcement.
Images of the product, service, launch, event etc.—images are a great way to break up the main text.
Statements that back up the main theme of the press release.
Contact info (choose whether or not you want your telephone number, address, or a by-line).

PUBLISHING YOUR PRESS RELEASE

The initial stage in the process is to publish the press release as far and wide as possible in relevant markets and locations. You can do this manually by hand, or use some services that will cost you a small fee. Such services promise to promote your press release to a set number of locations.

Publishing Press Releases Yourself

It can take a little time to locate and find the best possible places for press release submission, although there are a number of free resources online that offer great help for beginners.

You need to know where you will get the best exposure and where the most people will see and act on the release. This will ensure you get the maximum benefit and traffic from the work you have done by writing the press release.

Press Release Services

There are also a number of press release services available on the Internet. Pay attention to the submission guidelines that the service uses, as you may be in breach of some them without realising it. Some services have strict guidelines that you need to follow, or your press release could be removed from their database for not meeting their requirements.

There are a number of press release services that require you to use a character-per-line format. Other services allow you to submit the press release in other formats. They are all different, so make sure that you read the terms of service first.

Probably the most popular and well-known press release service online is called PR Web. It can be found at www.prweb.com.

PR Web offers a broad range of service to users and it will cost between $80 and $360 per press/news release, depending on the level of service you want. The high-end option guarantees a lot of attention from the media offline and ensures that a major online presence is seen as well.

By using PR Web or any other service, you are guaranteed to have your press release syndicated to newspapers, radio stations, and offline magazine publishers. Besides this, it is also sent to a host of top webmasters and other press releases services.

As with anything nowadays you can easily search Google and find options for a whole gamut of services to suit your budget. Just do a Google search for ‘press release sites’ and see the breadth of options available to you.

Press releases will always generate a lot of traffic, especially if the press release is well written. It is a marketing technique that I encourage you to explore further and take the advantages that it offers.

By: Steve Peirce

Viral Marketing – What is it and Why use it?

noreply@blogger.com (BlogMoney Project) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 16:59:00 +0000

WHAT IS VIRAL MARKETING?

Viral marketing is one of the very best kept secrets in online marketing and can generate huge quantities of traffic to your website very quickly.

The best way to think about it is just like a virus spreading. All the small actions that people take online combine to create a much larger, unstoppable force as your information gets passed around the Internet.

The effect can happen via emails, forum comments, blog comments, word of mouth, social networking sites, articles, and so on. There are literally hundreds of ways to spread your viral marketing message.

You can use this “word of mouth” style advertising in your own promotions with great effects. A viral campaign will outlast any paid program, as it can never be stopped, unless people take down their websites.

This means that a constant stream of traffic will flow to the website you create the viral marketing promotion around.

HOW TO USE VIRAL MARKETING IMMEDIATELY

Give away free viral special reports on a topic within your market.
Give away free viral ebooks.
Give away free viral articles and e-zine publications.
Give away free viral software (which links to your website).
Give away free viral audio recordings (which links to your website).
Give away free viral video (which links to your website).

THE KEYS TO SUCCESSFUL VIRAL MARKETING

Here are some quick tips to getting started and, most importantly, being effective:

Allow other marketers in your market to give the free viral product to their customers free of charge. Put a value on the price of the book, and code the links so they all point back to your main website. This is a good way to promote your products.
Create a report around a subject that is a hot topic or that solves a big problem for people.
Give away the great content to people for free, simply for just visiting your blog or social networking profile page. If you demonstrate what you have to offer for free, then people will wonder how great your actual products are.
Encourage people to pass the product to their friends and other people. People will want to publish it online and post about it on forums, blogs, and so on.

HOW TO CREATE VERY SIMPLE VIRAL REPORTS TO GIVE AWAY

The key is to give the impression that the free report has huge value and is worthy of a $47–$97 price tag. Provide great content and give away some of your best secrets. This will really create a buzz about you and your website.

The report should provide enough value that people cannot believe you have given it away free. This will create posts on forums and blogs and really get it to spread quickly.

If you write articles for your prospects, then a good tip is to combine ten or more and compile them into a viral report. This is a very quick and easy way to get started with viral marketing.

As long as the content is good quality and you distribute it widely enough, it will just continue to spread and spread. The keys are your content and picking the right style for your market.

Let’s look into that in more detail…

WHAT TYPE OF MARKETING WORKS BEST?

Content is king when it comes to viral reports, as people won’t pass it on if it’s useless information. The content you create should be something that solves a problem for people or engages them on a current topic of conversation.

Decide what people want to know most in your market, and then give it to them. You can ask your prospects and customers questions and get them to fill out questionnaires in return for the free report when complete (via your blog or social networking profile).

Look at current trends that are being discussed on forums, blogs, and social networking sites. Look for the most popular ones and then create a report about them—linking your own product into the equation.

Tips and Article Reports:

Some of the best viral reports to create are based around tips and articles in the market you are promoting to. You can simply combine a number of articles that already exist on the subject and edit them and add some further clarification. People love to be given new tips and advice on how to do something better, faster, or cheaper.

In certain cases, the more plain and bare the reports look, the more people are prone to reading them and passing them on. On the other hand, if they are seen as unusual and new, then the viral reports can create a lot of interest.

White Papers:

You can also create white papers (authoritative reports) and spread them virally. This can be a good idea, as many people see them as official documents and are more likely to read them than a report with a fancy graphic on the cover.

Special Reports to Solve a Major Problem:

Another idea is to create special report on a subject that is causing a lot of people problems. The viral report should just focus tightly on one particular problem and explain how to solve it. Make the report a step-by-step guide on how to remove the problem or get around it.

Trial Versions:

Offer a trial version of a product, or a limited version. If the product is software, then this works very well. Typically you can offer a 30-day trial run without any problems. This is known to increase traffic as the application is passed around the Internet virally.

If you are promoting an information product, you can cut certain chapters out of the ebook and publish them for free inside a viral ebook. This is like a sneak preview, but provides really valuable content. If the content is high quality, it will be passed virally from person to person.

Case Studies & Interviews:

You should also think about writing case studies of customers who have bought your product and then building them into full-length interviews in which the customer reveals all.

People like to read exclusives (just think about the popularity of celebrity gossip) and find out what the real secrets are.

WHERE TO GIVE THE VIRAL PRODUCT AWAY

You must market and “sell” the free report as much as you would a paid product. This is one of the missing keys in viral marketing. A lot of people think that you only need to create something free and people will go wild over it, but this is not true. In fact many people don’t use free products, as they perceive them to have no value.

You should mention your free report in the following places:

Blogs—add this as a permanent feature on your site and talk about it in each blog post.
Blog comments—make reference to it on other people’s blogs.
Forums—add the link to the report inside your blog signature file as discussed earlier. You can also create a new conversation for people to provide feedback on.
Email important people in your marketplace and offer to send them the report for free.
Ask other authors in your market to send it to their email list. They will probably do this if the content is good enough.
Add the attachment to social networking sites and send out announcements to your friends list. Ensure that every page has a link back to your website and a clear call to action. Include partial stories in the ebook, which are explained in more detail on the website. This is a great way to ensure people visit your website.

SUMMARY

Always try to incorporate viral marketing into any website or any marketing campaign you create and run. You can really increase your exposure and web traffic from something that is relatively simple to do.

By: Steve Peirce

SEO Keyword Research	PPC Keyword Research
High volume keywords (at least 1500 monthly searches)	Volume not important
Diverse keyword phrases to cover all traffic streams	Narrow keyword selections to focus on something specific
Keyword intent not important	Commercial intent to focus on buyers, not just people looking for free advice