Many people will tell you that the marketing of a product is at least as important as the product itself. In fact, a great product that is marketed poorly will actually do a lot worse than a mediocre product that is marketed very well. We see this phenomenon every day in nearly every industry.

Be Seen

One of the biggest challenges that you will encounter over the course of your Internet marketing journeys is simply the matter of getting your brand name “out there.” It is very easy to get lost in the mix and ignored by the masses, so you have to do what you can to get noticed. You want to be that figure that is seen, not the one that blends into the crowd.

So, how can you do this? It starts with strong branding and continues with your consistent branding. Have you decided on a color scheme that will be representative of your brand across all mediums? Whether you are buying AdSense ads or you’re taking out an ad in the local newspaper, you want those colors to be consistent.

Red and Blue

Take Coca-Cola and Pepsi, for instance. You immediately think of red for the former and blue for the latter. That’s because they rarely deviate from these core color choices, once again reinforcing the brand name into the minds of consumers. The color scheme carries through to the website design, marketing materials, promotional products, and more.

Similarly, you want to have a strong and distinctive company logo. You may also develop separate logos for each of your product lines, but at least early on, it’s much more powerful to establish your core company brand first.

Unique Logos on a Budget

Thanks to the power of the Internet, getting a unique logo is not nearly as expensive as it used to be. If you can afford a custom graphic designer, great. If not, there are many online marketplaces and “crowdsourcing” resources that you can consider and these typically come in at a fraction of the price.

Carry through this logo and branding imagery to everywhere you have an online presence, whether it be Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Flickr. Use the logo and core messaging everywhere, paying specific attention to being as consistent as possible.

A strong online brand will help your company transform into a strong offline brand too. With that solid foundation, the actual sale of your products or services will be a relative walk in the park!

Just because you have decided to work for yourself doesn’t mean that you need to work by yourself. The life of an Internet marketing and online entrepreneur does not have to be one that is led in isolation. In fact, the very success of your online business could hinge on the relationships that you forge.

No Man Is an Island

The truth of the matter is that there are only 24 hours in the day and you are only one person. You only have one set of knowledge and your expertise can only go so far. By networking with other like-minded (and even not so like-minded) individuals, you can advance your business far beyond what you could do on your own.

Capitalize on the knowledge they have that you do not. Learn from the experiences they have gained and the advice they have to give. Share the workload and figure out how you can help one another drive your respective ways toward success.

Networking has the additional benefit of giving you yet another marketing channel. The more people that are in your network, so to speak, the larger reach you may have in the marketplace and, thus, the better chances you have of reaching customers and profit.

Finding Similar Interests on Twitter

Keep an eye out for mentions of your business or any tweets related to your industry. If you see someone pose a question that you can answer, do so. This helps to establish you as an expert in your field and it helps to expand your network to people who actually care about what you care about.

Whether or not they are local, some of these people can not only become good Twitter contacts; they can become friends too.

Engaging with Others on Blogs

Just as you can look out for niche-related content on Twitter, you can do the same in the blogosphere. Leave valuable comments on the blogs you read, especially those related to your industry.

Don’t do so in the spam-like manner, but do engage with the blogger and hopefully they will do the same back to you in kind.

Networking Offline to Network Online

Ultimately, one of the best ways that you can effectively network online is to start networking offline. Many cities and towns have meetups from time to time for just about any industry and any interest. Attend these whenever you have the chance, exchange business cards, and build up your network.

By meeting your “online” friends in real life, the connection becomes much more real and legitimate. You become more than a screenname; you can become a valued business contact, associate, colleague, and friend.

It doesn’t really matter if you have a positively stellar product when you don’t know how to sell it. Sales and marketing are arguably even more important than research and development. This is true both of tangible products and of digital products or services.

Your sales page can oftentimes shape the initial impression that a potential customer may have of your product or service. That is why it is very worthwhile for to consider how to optimize your sales page. Here are five critical tips that you’ll want to keep in mind.

Use Catchy Headlines

Particularly in the online realm, visitors can have very short attention spans. More often than not, you can fully expect them not to read every word that you write. It is much more likely that they will simply skim the page for key information.

That is why your titles, headings, and bold text should be chosen very selectively. Think about what headlines would capture your attention and encourage you to read further (and take action). Guide your site visitors in the right direction.

Limit the Link Options

Yes, it is positively useful for search engine optimization purposes to deep link to other pages on your site, but these may lead your visitors astray. Remember what the target objective of your sales page is: to generate sales.

In this way, do not use too many outbound links on your sales page; focus those links and guiding your visitors to the order page. This will help with conversion rates, because your site visitors are more likely to stay on track.

Use Visual Aids

As mentioned above, web users typically have rather short attention spans. They usually can’t be bothered to read (and absorb) everything. One way to help with this is to use visual aids.

People like pictures. Include shots of your product, particularly in action, so potential buyers can preview what to expect. Charts and tables can make a lot of data much more digestible too. Just be careful not to overuse pictures as too many can be very overwhelming.

Be Mindful of Keywords

A big part of the battle is getting visitors on your sales page to convert into active sales, but half the battle is getting them onto the sales page in the first place. Search engine optimization, as a result, is of paramount importance.

As you create the sales copy for your page, be mindful of the keywords and keyword phrases that you repeat throughout the write-up. In like manner, be careful with keyword density. Too little density lacks targeting, whereas too much can lead to being flagged as a “spam” page by major search engines like Google.

Sell Benefits, Not Features

Traditional sales advice still applies in the online realm of sales pages. When you are optimizing your sales letter, keep the old adage in mind. You want to sell the benefits, not the features.

For instance, if you are selling a cloud-based online storage solution, remind potential buyers about the reliability and peace of mind they can enjoy, as well as the convenience of anywhere access. Mention the features, like capacity and bandwidth, but focus on how these can be of value to the customer.

It’s a term that you might have heard thrown around in a corporate boardroom, but you’re not really sure what it means. What exactly is media buying and how is it relevant in the modern Internet marketing realm? Let’s find out.

Buying Media Intelligently

If you want to get the word out about your company, product, or service, it makes sense to consider advertising in several different venues. This can help with brand exposure and it can help get more people to know about what you have to offer.

However, it is not in your best interest to buy this advertising so broadly and blindly. There’s no sense in wasting hundreds, thousands, or even millions of dollars on advertising that doesn’t target the right demographic.

And that’s where media buying comes into play. According to Wikipedia:

Media Buying is the procurement of the best possible placement and price of a piece of media real-estate within any given media.

In short, it’s about getting the best bang for your marketing buck when it comes to a media-based ad purchase.

Modern Day Media Options

Traditionally, someone hired as a media buyer for a company will go out and optimize the purchased advertising based on budget and scope. These ads would typically be placed on the radio, on TV, or in print.

While all three of these are certainly still viable advertising options today, the concept of media buying has expanded well beyond those traditional media consumption realms. Internet marketing, like buying private ad spots on a website, can undergo much the same kind of research than a traditional media buy may entail.

In fact, given the available metrics for Internet-based advertising, media buying research is even more powerful. You can target for specific demographics, geographic locations, surfing habits, hobbies and interests, and several other criteria.

This pinpoint marketing, along with great metrics to track conversions, makes Internet media buying a powerful tool for business owners and entrepreneurs of all sizes.

The Future of Media Buying

Looking ahead to the days and years to come, there could be another major revolution in the world of media buying.

More specifically, television advertising can become much more affordable and accessible to the general public through Google TV Ads. It uses the same familiar Adwords engine, but in the context of buying national cable television advertising.

Ever wanted to promote your gadget blog on G4TV? With Google TV Ads, you just may. TV commercials can run for as little as $20 per spot. You don’t have to be a Budweiser or McDonald’s to afford that.

The world of Internet marketing is constantly evolving and changing with the times. One format that is quickly increasing in popular is video. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth so many more. However, it is also a format that is easily mishandled and misused.

Are you thinking about using video to promote either your own product or the product of someone else via an affiliate program? Look no further. This article will help to outline some of the key tips and hints that you’ll need to create effective marketing videos.

Video = Picture and Sound

When most people think about video, they think about the picture quality. While it is certainly important to keep image quality in mind, you need to make sure you don’t neglect audio quality either.

This doesn’t mean that you have to invest in the most expensive equipment, but it does mean that you should make use of a quiet location and try to minimize any “echo” effects that plague so many videos on the web.

Make the Video Obvious

There’s no sense in putting a video on your site if no one is going to know it is there, let alone view it. Make it painfully obvious to your website visitors that you have a video for them to watch; many users can quickly scan past an embedded video, assuming that is just a static image.

While you’re at it, you can also make it obvious that the embedded video is relatively short. Most people don’t want to sit through a marketing video that is too long; get to the point and keep it short. It’s up to you whether you want the video to autoplay upon loading of the page — as is the case with Blog Profit Camp — or if the user needs to click on a “play” button.

Cast the Technical Details Aside

If you are going to use video for marketing purposes, you’ll want to keep the content relatively accessible for the novice user. The technical details can be further explored in a future video, but the initial contact should be conversational and casual in nature.

Assist with this understanding by ensuring that the on-screen information complements the words being spoken. Simple “mirroring” of key terms of concepts can be infinitely useful.

Utilize Your Branding Power

Millions of videos are viewed on the Internet each and every day. What are you going to do to stand out from the crowd? How are you going to avoid being forgotten?

One tactic you can try is to watermark the video with a brand logo or the URL to your website. This helps to solidify the relationship between the video and your brand. By making this connection clear, the end user can more easily remember who said what.

Search engine optimization can be a confusing and challenging subject, especially since the major search engines can change their rules at just about any time. What’s more, they never really publish how their ranking algorithms work, so we are left with taking our best guesses.

No single SEO strategy will automatically skyrocket your site to the top of the search engine results page for your target keywords or keyword phrases, but a good multi-faceted approach can yield some impressive results. Here are five tips to improve the SEO for your website.

1. Add a Blog

In general, search engines appear to prefer dynamic websites over static ones. Sites that updated on a regular basis consistently rank closer to the top than those that remain unchanged for extended periods of time.

The core material on your site, like your product portfolio or company profile, can be quite static. To alleviate this concern, consider adding a blog. These periodic updates, even if they’re not the most compelling or powerful of posts, will show Google that your site is always current, fresh, and new.

2. Do Keyword Research

There is no such thing as ranking well in a search engine in general. It is all about ranking well for your target keywords and keyword phrases.

By doing some keyword research, using the various tools available on the Internet, you can shed some light on which keywords offer high volume but relatively low competition. This way, you can rank for terms that your competitors may have missed.

3. Get Others to Blog about You

On-site search engine optimization can only get you so far. Backlinks are incredibly important, so you’ll want to foster those relationships.

The more high-ranking sites that link back to your site, the better. This is especially true if they are one-way links and if they are deeplinks using targeted anchor text.

4. Tag All Your Images

Most search engine spiders can only really understand text, so you’ll want to consider the SEO ramifications of non-text elements. All the images on your site should be optimized too.

This includes given them descriptive filenames (digitalcamera.jpg vs. DSC001.jpg) and appropriate TITLE/ALT attributes, as well as surrounding them with relevant material. This gives the search engines more information about their contents and, thus, an added advantage when it comes to ranking for your target terms.

5. Skip the Flash Intro

As visually appealing as the designers may tell you it is, a Flash-based website typically does not perform well in regards to search engine optimization. Relating back to the previous point, search engine spiders have a more difficult time “understanding” the content of the site when it is in Flash.

Instead, you are much better off with a simpler website with clear labels, easy-to-understand text, and relevant content. All the iPad and iPhone users in the audience will appreciate the lack of Flash too.

So, you’re ready to get into the business of selling things. Good for you! Unfortunately, most people aren’t too familiar with the product development and launch cycle. This is the first in a multi-part series about how to launch a product and it will hopefully guide you in the right direction.

For the purposes of this series, we will be focusing on digital products that can be sold over the Internet. This way, we don’t have to deal (as much) with the logistics of a supply chain and the manufacture of a physical product. Examples of digital products include e-books, WordPress plugins, and premium web templates.

It Starts with an Idea

It’s all well and good that you want to pursue your passion, but it’s integral to see whether your proposed product will actually be marketable and profitable. That’s why the first step to launching a successful product is market research.

Take a look at your target niche and see if other similar products are already available. How are they doing? Take a look at the search volumes for your target keywords. Is there a lot of competition? Based on this and other information, you can determine whether or not your product is worth pursuing.

Building, Refining, and Testing

Now you’re ready to start developing your product. Throughout this product development cycle, you’ll want to keep your final target in mind and how you will go about marketing this product to your target audience.

It is also during this time that you will want to start building your mailing list. Build a basic landing page or squeeze page where prospective buyers can sign up to be notified when your product is available. To encourage more signups, you can offer a free bonus of some kind.

As you get closer to having a (near) final product ready to launch, you’ll want to invite some trusted beta testers to give your product a proper run-through. Be sure to use both experts and novices, because they can offer different perspectives on its usability and functionality.

Prepare the Documentation

Good documentation can mean a world of difference between a product that succeeds and one that flops. This includes not only the information on the site where you will be promoting the product, but also any user manuals and related documents that will coincide with the product launch.

It can be difficult to finalize this documentation before the product has been finalized, since significant changes to things like the user interface can occur, but you need to start getting the pegs in place. All the while, keep building that list!

Stay tuned for part two to this series in the very near future.

Continue reading… How to Launch a Product – Part 2

In the first part of this multi-part series on how to launch a product, we discussed some of the tasks and variables involved in the product development cycle. We also talked about beta testing and building your marketing list.

In this second part, we approach the actual product launch date itself and the strategies that you need to have in place in preparation for that very important day. Whether you’re launching a new e-course, selling a new e-book, or launching a new WordPress premium theme, the fundamental tactics remain largely the same.

Presales and Preorders

While you in the middle of beta testing and ironing out the kinks related to your product, it is a good idea to start with the pre-marketing strategies to build interest in your product.

This is partly why Apple decided to announce the iPad tablet months before its official release date, getting everyone on the Internet to start talking about the new product. This also presents an opportunity to start collecting presales and preorders, helping you gauge the level of interest that you can expect during the initial launch window.

Once again, this is where the importance of a good landing page or squeeze page can come into play. Have you been building your mailing list and collecting pre-order interest? Perhaps you could try offering a small discount to early adopters or even put an affiliate program in place so that you can effectively compile an army of salespeople.

If you don’t want to manage the actual sales yourself, you could invest in a variety of different plugins or even host your product through a marketplace like Clickbank.

Hit the Ramp with a Marketing Blitz

You know how they say that slow and steady win the race? When it comes to the Internet sales, that may not necessarily be true. Instead, you want to hit what is known as the “the ramp” and get as much attention as you can in the shortest amount of time possible.

For the couple of weeks surrounding the launch date for your product, you’ll want to engage in a massive marketing blitz. Set up and promote a Twitter account. Start a Facebook fan page so people can join. Order several paid reviews from some of the top blogs in your niche. Order sponsored posts and sponsored tweets from the corresponding services.

This initial period is absolutely critical, because you want to have a very strong first week (or even first day) of sales. This will help to put your product on the radar of some major players and, if done well, this increased attention will only attract even more attention.

As ironic as it may sound, it can sometimes be better to spend $10,000 in advertising in one month than it is to spend $1,000 each month for ten months.

What will we learn in part three? Stay tuned to find out!

Continue reading… How to Launch a Product – Part 3

This is part three in our multi-part series on how to launch a product. More specifically, it’s a guide on the steps you need to take to successful launch a digital product on the Internet.

In the first two parts, we approached such topics as beta testing and hitting the ramp. Now, it’s time to really start selling this thing.

Sell, Sell, and Sell Some More

A product launch can’t possibly be called successful if the sales numbers don’t back up that claim. In addition to the massive marketing blitz described in part two of this series, you’ll need to get out there and pound the virtual pavement.

Are you contacting all the people on your mailing list, checking to see if they have gone through with buying your product after expressing initial interest through a presale? Are you going out there and reaching through other avenues that have the potential of opening up your market?

As much as you are interested in the product development cycle, none of that really matters if no one is buying the thing. That’s why sales and marketing will be two of the most important factors in any successful product launch. Take every opportunity available, whether it be speaking at local events, connecting with the right people online, or aggressively growing your Twitter following.

Follow Up with New and Existing Customers

Since digital products are much easier to update and upgrade than their physical counterparts, the follow-up survey can be a very useful tool in your product launch arsenal.

Using a mailing service like Aweber, you can time an email to be sent to a buyer about one week after purchase. In this customer survey, you can ask for feedback on what they like and don’t like about your product.

This opens up the opportunity for future releases that build on the initial product, improving it in ways to attract even more customers and even more buyers.

Build Successful Launch After Successful Launch

If you’ve done it once, you’ve done it a million times. At least, that’s how you’d hope it was. While you may be lucky enough to experience some great success with your first product launch, most people don’t. Build on your experience, draw on your newfound knowledge, and arm yourself with this information for Product XYZ 2.0.

Internet marketers will tell you about the power of the list, but it can be easy to alienate or frustrate the people that are on your mailing list. They can unsubscribe quite easily and this can have a dramatically negative impact on your business. At the same time, you want the system to be as streamlined and painfree as possible.

That’s why a drip email system is so appealing. Also known as e-mail drip marketing, this is a more advanced version of the typical e-mail newsletter. Instead of sending out the mailings on a “live” basis, the messages are actually composed ahead of time and sent out on a defined schedule. For instance, someone signing up for an online course can receive the weekly lessons automatically.

Many e-mail marketing systems, like AWeber, have “drip” functionality built into them. With some of these, you can have new subscribers enter the system and be sent out the same messages as existing subscribers. With others, you can have the complete set of e-mail messages sent to new subscribers on the prescribed schedule.

After the initial introduction email, the former system can be fantastic for real estate agents. Prospective leads can be sent the new listings every week or every two weeks, ensuring that your name is the first they’ll contact when they’re ready to buy.

The latter system is more appropriate to content that isn’t quite so time-sensitive. As mentioned above, an online course would be best suited to use this type of e-mail drip marketing. Each lesson is sent out periodically and each of these can contain an additional affiliate link of some kind that you can use to promote another product.

Both types of drip email can be very effective for marketing your business and maintaining your brand presence in the marketplace. More and more people may be moving toward social media, like Facebook and Twitter, but there is still a great deal of power to be yielded through e-mail marketing.

By using drip email, your involvement can be minimized and the process can be better automated. This opens up opportunities for upsells, suggestive sells, and even more passive income. Set it up once and watch as the money rolls in.