Google Adsense is a fantastic way to monetize your website. There is no point having a website if it is earning no money when you can easily ad some Adsense ads to it and earn a good income.
Some webmasters find it hard to earn a reasonable amount of money using Adsense while others are earning a remarkable income just using Adsense alone.
The reason why some webmasters do better than others in the amount of income that they earn is the way in which they set up their website, the way they place their ads and the way they optimize their site for search engines.
To reach the highest potential of income with Adsense it is important to spend the time in setting up your website correctly and not just rushing a site and placing any Adsense ads anywhere.
It is amazing how much difference it can make to your income by tweaking your ads and your website.
The type of Adsense ad that you use can make a huge difference to the clicks you will receive. The Large Rectangle for example tends to receive much more clicks than other size ads. Your main goal is to have as many clicks as you possibly can, so it is best to use the ads that tend to perform better such as the Large Rectangle or the Medium Rectangle.
Where you place your ads can also make a big difference. Not everyone stays on a website long enough to scroll down the page, so it is vital to have ads above the fold (where they show on the page before scrolling down).
Near the link bar on the left of the page is a place where most people look and is therefore also a god place to put a block of ads.
The types of colors you use for your ads will also make a big difference to your number of clicks. It helps to have the background color of your ad the same color as the background of your site.
By setting the border color to the same as the background color will make the border disappear, making your ads look less like ads and encourage more clicks.
By having the color of the ad titles the same color as the headings on your website will also blend your ads into your webpage and make them look less like ads.
It is quite important to use of relevant keywords throughout the content of your website. If you optimize your site well with god quality keywords you will be favoured by the search engines and gain a good page ranking. The higher your page ranking the more visitors you will receive to your website.
You need to drive traffic to your website to receive enough clicks on your ads to earn a good income. Without traffic you will not get any clicks. Do some research and explore the different ways to drive traffic to your site and use as many ways as you can. The more traffic you receive the more income you will make.
It is worth it in the long run to spend the time working on your website and getting it just right. If you aren’t seeing enough clicks on your Adsense ads, then tweak your site a bit more, make some changes and see if they make a difference. Find out what works best for you and your site and stick with it.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Is Working Online Really For You?
What was it that made you start looking online to earn an income?
Perhaps you know someone who makes money online or perhaps you saw a story on television of someone successfully making money online.
It doesn’t matter what brought you here, what matters now is:
Is working online really for you?
Where do you start?
How to start making money without blowing your budget?
Is working online really for you?
The first thing you need to look at is your self discipline. To make an income online and be your own boss requires a lot of self discipline.
It is very easy to get side tracked when you are working online and very easy to spend more time on your computer than you originally intend.
Spending too much time online can affect your family life as well as affect the quality of your work.
To be able to work well and achieve good results you need to stay focused and if you overwork you will lose your focus.
You need to be self disciplined enough to give yourself tasks and a time limit online and make sure you stick to it.
Taking breaks is just as important as spending time online. Taking breaks gives your mind the rest it needs to concentrate fully on your work when come back to work after your break. By not taking breaks you will easily become distracted and not be able to think clearly.
Having good self discipline and keeping on track with your goals is very important. If you can do that, then working online can very well be for you.
Where do you start?
The first thing you will need to do is research. You will need to look into the different ways to make money online and decide which one would best suit you.
There are many ways to make money online such as:
• Selling on ebay
• Selling from your own website
• Earning money from Adsense
• Writing articles
• Writing ebooks
• Promoting items for commission as an affiliate
• MLM programs
And more.
You will need to do a little research to find out how some of these work and what will be involved. Find out which one will best suit you and your needs and decide which one you wish to pursue.
How to start making money online without blowing your budget?
Many of the above ways of earning money online can be started with little or no capital.
If selling on ebay is what you would like to do long term, you can start off with no capital by selling items around the house that are no longer needed. Earn a little capital by doing this and then move on to visit some second hand shops or garage sales. You would be amazed at what you can pick up from a garage sale that can sell for much more than you pay for it.
The other way to sell on ebay without any start up capital is to dropship. With dropshipping you are selling an item that is stocked with the supplier. You don’t pay the supplier until you have received the money from the customer. Then you pay the supplier and the supplier will ship the item direct to your customer. This is a good way to sell since you don’t need to worry about storing stock and you can do it with no money upfront.
Writing articles is another good way to start earning money with no start up capital. There are companies online that will pay you to write articles for them. There are many topics to choose from to write about and you don’t need any cash at all to start. This is a great way to earn money to then invest in other online ventures.
Whatever you decide to do online, always make sure you do your research before jumping into anything and especially so before handing over any money.
Perhaps you know someone who makes money online or perhaps you saw a story on television of someone successfully making money online.
It doesn’t matter what brought you here, what matters now is:
Is working online really for you?
Where do you start?
How to start making money without blowing your budget?
Is working online really for you?
The first thing you need to look at is your self discipline. To make an income online and be your own boss requires a lot of self discipline.
It is very easy to get side tracked when you are working online and very easy to spend more time on your computer than you originally intend.
Spending too much time online can affect your family life as well as affect the quality of your work.
To be able to work well and achieve good results you need to stay focused and if you overwork you will lose your focus.
You need to be self disciplined enough to give yourself tasks and a time limit online and make sure you stick to it.
Taking breaks is just as important as spending time online. Taking breaks gives your mind the rest it needs to concentrate fully on your work when come back to work after your break. By not taking breaks you will easily become distracted and not be able to think clearly.
Having good self discipline and keeping on track with your goals is very important. If you can do that, then working online can very well be for you.
Where do you start?
The first thing you will need to do is research. You will need to look into the different ways to make money online and decide which one would best suit you.
There are many ways to make money online such as:
• Selling on ebay
• Selling from your own website
• Earning money from Adsense
• Writing articles
• Writing ebooks
• Promoting items for commission as an affiliate
• MLM programs
And more.
You will need to do a little research to find out how some of these work and what will be involved. Find out which one will best suit you and your needs and decide which one you wish to pursue.
How to start making money online without blowing your budget?
Many of the above ways of earning money online can be started with little or no capital.
If selling on ebay is what you would like to do long term, you can start off with no capital by selling items around the house that are no longer needed. Earn a little capital by doing this and then move on to visit some second hand shops or garage sales. You would be amazed at what you can pick up from a garage sale that can sell for much more than you pay for it.
The other way to sell on ebay without any start up capital is to dropship. With dropshipping you are selling an item that is stocked with the supplier. You don’t pay the supplier until you have received the money from the customer. Then you pay the supplier and the supplier will ship the item direct to your customer. This is a good way to sell since you don’t need to worry about storing stock and you can do it with no money upfront.
Writing articles is another good way to start earning money with no start up capital. There are companies online that will pay you to write articles for them. There are many topics to choose from to write about and you don’t need any cash at all to start. This is a great way to earn money to then invest in other online ventures.
Whatever you decide to do online, always make sure you do your research before jumping into anything and especially so before handing over any money.
Is A Full Time Income Achievable As An Affiliate?
Can you really make a good income online as an affiliate or do you really need to have your own product to make a great income?
There is no doubt that having your own product can be very profitable, especially if you are making money from backend products, but it is also very possible to make a good income as an affiliate.
There are many people that make money online solely by promoting products as an affiliate and quite a few of them are making amazing amounts of income.
You can make a greater income as an affiliate marketer than you could make with an average 9 to 5 job.
Not everyone is able to make this sort of income however, and it may not always be as easy as it seems.
To make a good income as an affiliate you will need to do some research. You will need to find out which products convert well and what the best ways of promoting them are.
You need to keep up to date with changes in products and technology. The last thing you want to do is to keep advertising a product long after it has ceased to exist or has become outdated.
To make good money as an affiliate you also need to put a good deal of effort into it. As with any online business, you will only get out of it what you put into it. You will need to promote your affiliate products just as you would promote the product if it were your own product.
The advantage to promote products as an affiliate as opposed to having your own products is that you don’t have the initial setting up and creation of the product. If you are not the sort of person who can write ebooks easily or create software products, then you will be better off in promoting other people’s products as an affiliate.
Also by being an affiliate you don’t have to worry about keeping your ebook up to date. Ebook creators need to constantly keep up to date with their topic and update their ebooks regularly.
By using marketing methods such as article marketing and ebook marketing, you can be very successful at promoting products as an affiliate. Article marketing is one of the most effective ways to promote affiliate products and you are not limited to just one product, you can use article marketing to promote a number of different products.
Using Google Adwords is another popular way to promote affiliate products. There are costs involved in using Adwords for promotion however, so if choosing this method of promotion you will need to take your costs into account to make sure you will still profit from your sales.
Email marketing is another very effective way to promote products and as with most online businesses you will be much more successful if you build yourself a mailing list that you can promote to.
As long as you put the effort into promoting your chosen affiliate products then there is no reason why you can’t make a good income online doing so.
There is no doubt that having your own product can be very profitable, especially if you are making money from backend products, but it is also very possible to make a good income as an affiliate.
There are many people that make money online solely by promoting products as an affiliate and quite a few of them are making amazing amounts of income.
You can make a greater income as an affiliate marketer than you could make with an average 9 to 5 job.
Not everyone is able to make this sort of income however, and it may not always be as easy as it seems.
To make a good income as an affiliate you will need to do some research. You will need to find out which products convert well and what the best ways of promoting them are.
You need to keep up to date with changes in products and technology. The last thing you want to do is to keep advertising a product long after it has ceased to exist or has become outdated.
To make good money as an affiliate you also need to put a good deal of effort into it. As with any online business, you will only get out of it what you put into it. You will need to promote your affiliate products just as you would promote the product if it were your own product.
The advantage to promote products as an affiliate as opposed to having your own products is that you don’t have the initial setting up and creation of the product. If you are not the sort of person who can write ebooks easily or create software products, then you will be better off in promoting other people’s products as an affiliate.
Also by being an affiliate you don’t have to worry about keeping your ebook up to date. Ebook creators need to constantly keep up to date with their topic and update their ebooks regularly.
By using marketing methods such as article marketing and ebook marketing, you can be very successful at promoting products as an affiliate. Article marketing is one of the most effective ways to promote affiliate products and you are not limited to just one product, you can use article marketing to promote a number of different products.
Using Google Adwords is another popular way to promote affiliate products. There are costs involved in using Adwords for promotion however, so if choosing this method of promotion you will need to take your costs into account to make sure you will still profit from your sales.
Email marketing is another very effective way to promote products and as with most online businesses you will be much more successful if you build yourself a mailing list that you can promote to.
As long as you put the effort into promoting your chosen affiliate products then there is no reason why you can’t make a good income online doing so.
Begin To Make Money With Adsense
Google Adsense can be one of the most lucrative ways to make money online. A website can be well monetized by using Google Adsense. You can generate an extremely large income if you have your website set up correctly. However, if your website is not set up correctly you could be missing out on money that could otherwise be collecting in your bank account. I’m guessing none of us want to leave any money behind.
Earning money using Adsense is very simple and you can be earning a fantastic income within a couple of months. It can take a little time and effort to get your website up and running the right way but it is well worth it in the end. Once your website is up and running and making money then it will run almost on auto pilot.
So you will want to spend the time at the beginning to get it right and make the most of your website. This way your Adsense income will reach it’s fullest potential. You will be amazed at the great results you will see in a short period of time.
The first thing you will need to do in setting up your website is to write some good quality content articles and make sure you use your keywords throughout your articles. If you have a gift of writing, then why not make that gift work in your favour and use it on a website and earn some income with it.
Don’t start to panic if you don’t have that gift for writing, even if writing doesn’t come easily to you, writing articles can still be easy. You will need to start by doing some research and find information relating to the topic of your website. You can find information on the internet, in books or at the library. Always make sure that you rewrite any information you find into your own words, never copy someone else’s information word for word.
Search engines will reward you for having good quality content on your website, so make sure you keep up with the demands of the search engines and keep your content good and unique. By doing this the search engines will love your site and will reward you with good rankings.
Build a good quality site with unique content and a good usage of keywords and this will ensure that the Adsense ads placed on your site will relate to your sites topic. This is where all that you’ve done initially will go to and this is also where they will prove their worth to you.
Where you position your ads on your site can be very important. Don’t just place your ads anywhere, make sure you position them carefully. Try to position your ads where surfers are most likely to click on them. The one place that surfers look first when they visit a website is the top left. The reason for this is because that is where your website navigation links are usually located. So by placing your Adsense ads directly under your navigation links will usually get some good clicks.
Even if you think you are doing well with your Adsense earnings, it can still pay to play around with your ads. There are techniques and styles that can help to generate more clicks and sometimes just by tweaking your ads your earnings can be doubled or even tripled. By working out what techniques work the best for your site, you can be earning much more than what many people earn through their Adsense websites.
Stay away from banner ads and skyscraper ads – they don’t tend to get as many clicks as the other ads. These ads are clearly recognized as an advert and so many internet surfers tend to ignore these types of ads. There is no point in putting ads on your website that aren’t going to get you the clicks you want, it will be more beneficial to use ad types that are more likely to receive a higher click through rate.
To really make a great income with Adsense, you should have a definite focus on what you want to achieve and how to go about achieving it. Like any business venture, you need to give it time and patience.
Keep an eye on your ads and click through rates, if you aren’t seeing enough clicks then play around with your ads a bit and keep track of which ads perform better for you.
Earning money using Adsense is very simple and you can be earning a fantastic income within a couple of months. It can take a little time and effort to get your website up and running the right way but it is well worth it in the end. Once your website is up and running and making money then it will run almost on auto pilot.
So you will want to spend the time at the beginning to get it right and make the most of your website. This way your Adsense income will reach it’s fullest potential. You will be amazed at the great results you will see in a short period of time.
The first thing you will need to do in setting up your website is to write some good quality content articles and make sure you use your keywords throughout your articles. If you have a gift of writing, then why not make that gift work in your favour and use it on a website and earn some income with it.
Don’t start to panic if you don’t have that gift for writing, even if writing doesn’t come easily to you, writing articles can still be easy. You will need to start by doing some research and find information relating to the topic of your website. You can find information on the internet, in books or at the library. Always make sure that you rewrite any information you find into your own words, never copy someone else’s information word for word.
Search engines will reward you for having good quality content on your website, so make sure you keep up with the demands of the search engines and keep your content good and unique. By doing this the search engines will love your site and will reward you with good rankings.
Build a good quality site with unique content and a good usage of keywords and this will ensure that the Adsense ads placed on your site will relate to your sites topic. This is where all that you’ve done initially will go to and this is also where they will prove their worth to you.
Where you position your ads on your site can be very important. Don’t just place your ads anywhere, make sure you position them carefully. Try to position your ads where surfers are most likely to click on them. The one place that surfers look first when they visit a website is the top left. The reason for this is because that is where your website navigation links are usually located. So by placing your Adsense ads directly under your navigation links will usually get some good clicks.
Even if you think you are doing well with your Adsense earnings, it can still pay to play around with your ads. There are techniques and styles that can help to generate more clicks and sometimes just by tweaking your ads your earnings can be doubled or even tripled. By working out what techniques work the best for your site, you can be earning much more than what many people earn through their Adsense websites.
Stay away from banner ads and skyscraper ads – they don’t tend to get as many clicks as the other ads. These ads are clearly recognized as an advert and so many internet surfers tend to ignore these types of ads. There is no point in putting ads on your website that aren’t going to get you the clicks you want, it will be more beneficial to use ad types that are more likely to receive a higher click through rate.
To really make a great income with Adsense, you should have a definite focus on what you want to achieve and how to go about achieving it. Like any business venture, you need to give it time and patience.
Keep an eye on your ads and click through rates, if you aren’t seeing enough clicks then play around with your ads a bit and keep track of which ads perform better for you.
How To Use Your Autoresponder Profitably
How important is it to have an autoresponder on your website?
If you have been in internet marketing for any period of time you will know how hard it is to promote your website and achieve a decent amount of traffic coming through your site.
Imagine if you have an amazing website that converts your visitors into buyers at a good rate. But what about those sales you could be missing?
Imagine if you have a visitor who has come across your website and your product is exactly what she has been looking for. However, just as she is about to make her purchase, she hears her baby crying. Baby is awake so she leaves the computer – and your website – to attend to the baby.
There is a very likely sale gone, just like that.
But what if you have an autoresponder installed on your site and have already captured her email address. Well now you can follow up with her through your autoresponder and quite probably make the sale at a later stage when she has time to return to your site.
Not only can autoresponders be used to capture that almost lost sale, but you can also use your autoresponder to turn that casual visitor into a profitable customer.
Offering a free subscription to your newsletter when the visitor signs up to your autoresponder is a great way to capture subscribers and also to follow up with your visitor about your services or products.
Statistics show that most people will not purchase an item until they have seen it three or four times. So by using your newsletter to promote your products, you have a much higher chance of making sales if your customer is viewing your newsletter and therefore your products a few times.
If you are an affiliate for products you can offer your visitors reviews on products and ebooks and have your affiliate links within the reviews. Many people will try to read as many reviews as they can on a product before purchasing, so to read a review from a ‘trusted’ person can very likely lead to a sale.
To gain trust with your subscribers you will need to make your newsletters personal and informative without always trying to sell them something. If you try to sell something with every email you send out, they may look at you as someone just desperate to make sales. If you send personal emails, your subscribers will come to look to you as someone they can trust and as an expert in that field.
Another great way to use your autoresponder is to offer your visitors a free email course. With an email course you send out an email every day with a lesson for the day. You can set your autoresponder up to do this automatically each day.
Make your lessons good quality and not just a sales pitch, that way your content will do the selling for you. Then you can include a link to your product with perhaps a short statement showing how your product can benefit the reader.
Another very effective way to make sales through your subscribers is to offer your subscribers deals that you don’t offer anywhere else. Let them think that they are special that they are in an elite group that are the only people online that will have access to your special deal.
Give them a great price on your product or perhaps a free bonus.
These are just a few ways that autoresponders can work well for you. I’m sure once you get started you will come up with many more ideas that can make your autoresponder benefit you.
If you have been in internet marketing for any period of time you will know how hard it is to promote your website and achieve a decent amount of traffic coming through your site.
Imagine if you have an amazing website that converts your visitors into buyers at a good rate. But what about those sales you could be missing?
Imagine if you have a visitor who has come across your website and your product is exactly what she has been looking for. However, just as she is about to make her purchase, she hears her baby crying. Baby is awake so she leaves the computer – and your website – to attend to the baby.
There is a very likely sale gone, just like that.
But what if you have an autoresponder installed on your site and have already captured her email address. Well now you can follow up with her through your autoresponder and quite probably make the sale at a later stage when she has time to return to your site.
Not only can autoresponders be used to capture that almost lost sale, but you can also use your autoresponder to turn that casual visitor into a profitable customer.
Offering a free subscription to your newsletter when the visitor signs up to your autoresponder is a great way to capture subscribers and also to follow up with your visitor about your services or products.
Statistics show that most people will not purchase an item until they have seen it three or four times. So by using your newsletter to promote your products, you have a much higher chance of making sales if your customer is viewing your newsletter and therefore your products a few times.
If you are an affiliate for products you can offer your visitors reviews on products and ebooks and have your affiliate links within the reviews. Many people will try to read as many reviews as they can on a product before purchasing, so to read a review from a ‘trusted’ person can very likely lead to a sale.
To gain trust with your subscribers you will need to make your newsletters personal and informative without always trying to sell them something. If you try to sell something with every email you send out, they may look at you as someone just desperate to make sales. If you send personal emails, your subscribers will come to look to you as someone they can trust and as an expert in that field.
Another great way to use your autoresponder is to offer your visitors a free email course. With an email course you send out an email every day with a lesson for the day. You can set your autoresponder up to do this automatically each day.
Make your lessons good quality and not just a sales pitch, that way your content will do the selling for you. Then you can include a link to your product with perhaps a short statement showing how your product can benefit the reader.
Another very effective way to make sales through your subscribers is to offer your subscribers deals that you don’t offer anywhere else. Let them think that they are special that they are in an elite group that are the only people online that will have access to your special deal.
Give them a great price on your product or perhaps a free bonus.
These are just a few ways that autoresponders can work well for you. I’m sure once you get started you will come up with many more ideas that can make your autoresponder benefit you.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Is the Economic Recession Getting You Down?
Discover the Secret to Weathering a Recession and Walking Away with Your Bank Account, Your Retirement Fund, Your Investments and Your Pride!
Exclusive Offer!
Never Before Revealed Information!
When you’re unprepared for the impact of recession on your life and your business, the consequences can take you completely by surprise.
The economic recession brought on by over eager lenders, under-prepared borrowers, and overzealous government and an economy that cares more about its bottom line than its citizens has been pummeling Americans from coast to coast, and it doesn’t show any signs of going away any time soon.
Are you sick and tired of counting your pennies? Looking for a way to be free of the constant fear that one day you’re going to walk into your office and find a pink slip sitting there waiting for you? Would you like, just once to be the once sitting back and making a profit instead of the one worrying about whether this will be the week your business is going to have to close its doors?
Let Me Show You How...
Did you know that economic recessions aren’t anything new? The lifecycle of the business world very closely resembles the lifecycle of the average insect-it circles around, and around, and around, and…well, you get the picture. There are many stages inside that circle that keep business flowing smoothly and the wheels of progress turning the way they’re meant to.
An economic recession is only one of these stages.
Economic recessions are a vital part of the well being and health of our economy, and a study into our history will show that they actually happen on a fairly regular basis-and they usually don’t leave much damage behind. Why, then, do we panic so badly at the thought that this time might be our turn to weather an economic recession?
Because we don’t know what to do about it!
Business magnates understand that economic recession, a time when consumer spending is going to decrease for one reason or another and have a negative impact on the life and health of their company, is a necessary stage of life. From the moment they step into their corner office they’re carefully grooming and preparing the company for the moment when recession is going to rear its unattractive head and take a bite out of their profits.
Those of us who haven’t finished our MBA usually aren’t that well informed.
Without being aware of the necessity and the inevitability of an economic recession, most of us don’t realize that sooner or later recession is going to happen, and it’s going to impact all of our lives. We’ve been lulled into complacency by the constant boom and growth of the American economy, and we’re so focused on finding instant gratification for our desires that we don’t see when recession starts to creep up until it is far too late.
Everyone knows about the negative impacts of an Economic Recession. But what about the positive ones?
When you’ve walked into an unemployment office and seen hundreds of people filling out paperwork in the hope that somehow, someway, someone in that office will be able to help them find a job, it can be hard to believe that there are actually benefits to an economic recession. They are there, however, and if you’re a savvy business person you’ll be able to figure out how to take advantage of them. How do you think so many companies manage to stay in business when recessions happen at least once a decade?
Major corporations around the globe has learned how to weather an economic recession and keep making a profit, and now you can do it too! Regardless of whether you’re an entry level janitor or the CEO of a major corporation, the recession is going to have an impact on your life personally. The question is, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to let the recession bowl you over and leave you struggling for a way to keep your job and pay your bills? Or are you going to look at it as an opportunity to expand your horizons, stretch your wings and show the world what you can really do?
That was a choice I had to make for myself not too long ago
Two years ago I was sitting pretty. I had a good government job working as a contractor for the military, a good retirement plan, a salary that more than met our needs and an insurance program that kept my kids in antibiotics and vaccines.
All in all, life was looking pretty good. Then the recession hit.
I don’t know if any of you out there were unfortunate enough to be a part of this, but over the last two years military contractors have been steadily laying off hundreds of employees in an attempt to trim the fat from their bottom line and help them stay afloat as government contracts began to be canceled left, right and sideways. Because I had just accepted a new position within the company I was considered to be the new kid on the block, even though I had been working for them for years, and my job was among the first to go.
I was devastated.
Suddenly there I was, with a family to support and no income other than what I had coming in from our investments. I’m not ashamed to say I panicked at first. I couldn’t see how, at my age, I could possibly pick up and start all over again in another job. I’d invested too much time and effort to get where I had been, and the thought of having to climb that ladder all over again was enough to make me want to lock my door and hide for a year or two.
My general fondness for eating on a semi-regular basis got me out the door soon enough, however, and it wasn’t long before I was roaming the streets looking for another job. I was fortunate. I had remained in touch with many of my old college buddies, and one of them happened to work for a firm that had just lost one of its key employees and was looking for someone qualified who would be able to fill his place-quickly.
My friend’s recommendation and my own experience had me inside a new job within a month, but over the course of that month I saw hundreds of other contractors I had worked with who weren’t as lucky. They were out of work for months, many of them taking jobs that were far below their skills, their education and their experience just to have a paycheck.
And then there were a few of them that decided to start their own companies and offer their services to the private sector. A few of them started new careers in real estate. When I first heard what they were planning I thought they were out of their minds, but it wasn’t long before they started turning a profit-a big one.
I was astonished. If the U.S. government was losing money hand over fist and having to shut down its operations, how on earth were these little start-up companies managing to not only survive, but to thrive?
They were able to do it because they figured out how to take advantage of the recession!
I would never have believed that there would have been anything about an economic recession that would allow a company or a private entrepreneur to thrive, but as I talked with my old friends I realized that there was a side of the recession that we never saw-and that side could make the difference between surviving and thriving in the middle of an economic recession.
This is the ultimate guide to showing you how to thrive when everything else seems to be falling apart!
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How Can Your Business Survive an Economic Recession
Your business will surely be affected during an economic recession. If you don’t find ways to make it ride out the storm, chances are you will have to file for bankruptcy and close. Fortunately, there are things you can do to keep it afloat.
Remember that the heart of every business is customer service. If you give special treatment to your customers, these people will leave feeling satisfied and always come back. This is something that your employees must understand because if they don’t, these individuals will be the first one to go since you have to cut back on your expenses.
One way of doing that is to reeducate your employees. You can hold seminars on customer service or simply give them a refresher course of the products and services that you are offering because this will impress the customer the moment they walk in through the door.
You should also motivate them because good morale always achieves positive results. Being the owner of the business, you should lead by example by rendering longer hours at work. If they see you are doing whatever it takes to stay afloat, they will do the same because again, their jobs are on the line and they could be dismissed if things get worse.
Most businesses think that letting people go is always the first option. You don’t have to make the same mistake when these reductions can be made elsewhere as long as quality is not compromised. If you have to buy things, see if you can get longer credit periods or better rates so large expenses can become smaller ones making it easy to manage.
It is always nice to have customers pay in cash but during an economic recession, that is hard for the consumer so if you don’t use a credit card machine yet, now will be a good time to get one. Studies have shown that more people will be able to buy from you using a credit card especially during a time of financial downturn.
The objective of any business is to make money so part of surviving an economic recession will be also to lower your profit margins. By informing your customers of this move, they will be able to buy more at a very reasonable price. You can raise prices again when things get better since such a crisis is only temporary.
Instead of relying on people coming through your door, you can also look at other ways to promote your business. One of the most affordable ones to date is the internet so create your own website. If you can’t do this on your own, hire someone to do it and then make sure that is it both attractive and interactive.
Other businesses are also feeling the crunch and they are also doing their best to stay afloat. Ask around what they are doing and share the same information as well so you will have other ideas and options when the ones you have right now are not working.
We are not yet out of the woods in the recent economic recession. A lot of people are still losing their jobs and their homes, which is why it is important for you to take the steps mentioned rather than doing nothing and hoping for a miracle.
Remember that the heart of every business is customer service. If you give special treatment to your customers, these people will leave feeling satisfied and always come back. This is something that your employees must understand because if they don’t, these individuals will be the first one to go since you have to cut back on your expenses.
One way of doing that is to reeducate your employees. You can hold seminars on customer service or simply give them a refresher course of the products and services that you are offering because this will impress the customer the moment they walk in through the door.
You should also motivate them because good morale always achieves positive results. Being the owner of the business, you should lead by example by rendering longer hours at work. If they see you are doing whatever it takes to stay afloat, they will do the same because again, their jobs are on the line and they could be dismissed if things get worse.
Most businesses think that letting people go is always the first option. You don’t have to make the same mistake when these reductions can be made elsewhere as long as quality is not compromised. If you have to buy things, see if you can get longer credit periods or better rates so large expenses can become smaller ones making it easy to manage.
It is always nice to have customers pay in cash but during an economic recession, that is hard for the consumer so if you don’t use a credit card machine yet, now will be a good time to get one. Studies have shown that more people will be able to buy from you using a credit card especially during a time of financial downturn.
The objective of any business is to make money so part of surviving an economic recession will be also to lower your profit margins. By informing your customers of this move, they will be able to buy more at a very reasonable price. You can raise prices again when things get better since such a crisis is only temporary.
Instead of relying on people coming through your door, you can also look at other ways to promote your business. One of the most affordable ones to date is the internet so create your own website. If you can’t do this on your own, hire someone to do it and then make sure that is it both attractive and interactive.
Other businesses are also feeling the crunch and they are also doing their best to stay afloat. Ask around what they are doing and share the same information as well so you will have other ideas and options when the ones you have right now are not working.
We are not yet out of the woods in the recent economic recession. A lot of people are still losing their jobs and their homes, which is why it is important for you to take the steps mentioned rather than doing nothing and hoping for a miracle.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Telemarketing: Handling A Job
A particular script is always there for the telemarketers, which is supposed to be a guideline for them while marketing-process. But, what happens at times is that the scripts become so irksome for both and then, you can choose to have some words of your own. Your supervisor should be in no position to impose anything on you. If asked, you should boldly say that the change was necessary. All he needs is the sale of a product. So, do this and show it to him.
Changing oneself according to the given circumstances is of immense importance. Well, putting in your name is a part of the script and experience makes it perfect. If you are Jewish or Spanish i.e. if you belong to an ethnic background, bear in mind your targeted area. For instance, if a person namely Sam Goldberg is calling in a primarily Jewish area, it’s fine but this name wouldn’t hold water in a Christian area and there might go for a name like Stan Green which is Christian sounding or at least, unbiased sounding.
It often happens while conducting your conversation to your customer that they go on to ask you a complex question, which, you can’t answer properly. In case like this, confess it. If you want to get rid of it with a lie, it may have an adverse effect. Bear in mind that you need to say the truth and at the same time, you are in need of making your customers convinced that at least going for the product for once, would be a good idea for them. If needed, show them the way to return the product if they do not like it as it has a money back guarantee.
Telemarketing On Your Own
Here’s some good news for you, if you are desperately looking for a job. We all know how telemarketing has become an important sector for people to join or work from home and earn some quick bucks. All you need to succeed as a telemarketer is patience and a fair bit of effort on your part. If statistics are to be believed then millions of telemarketers globally are doing a great job of earning money while working from the relaxed ambiance of their homes. So don’t loose courage and grab your opportunity instead.
Another alternative sector that is really starting to take off along side telemarketing is the telemarketing outsourcing industry. But since this sector is just starting off and there is a desire to recruit staff, you might be fooled into joining it without actually having the right qualifications. Don’t get fooled by promises of high payments at jobs which apparently need little effort or expertise. Telemarketing is a relatively specialized field where you need to have a few special skills or knowledge, and you can’t get away easily by just reading a telemarketing guidebook or manual for an hour. You have to have fairly good communication skills and a decent knowhow about the service sector that your industry carries. Say for example you are telemarketing microwaves for a company, you must then a have a basic knowledge about how the microwave business is functioning presently and what therefore is the market scenario.
You must also be able to take care of the following things:
- You must know how to conduct buyer service duties
- Know how to take orders
- Sew sales
- And be able to deal with any other unforeseen circumstances that might crop up
When you consider yourself ready to start off with telemarketing do so by finding an actual home telemarketing purpose and keeping it simple and realistic. Make whatever your are selling, sound effective as well as true, only then will you be successful. Talk about other aspects as well apart from the structural or physical elements of the product.
Telemarketing Call Centers
The first thing to consider when looking for a one is the price offered to you. When looking for an affordable telemarketing call center, it is sensible to consult with the center for a logical direct comprehensible price quote without any hidden costs and uncertainty. This includes quotes per minute or quotes based on the number of representatives who will be engaged. Also, note if there are any required travel expenses for the employees and keep in mind that overhead charges will be required for various expenses like preparation, training, infrastructure and setup.
Experience should be taken into account when searching for a telemarketing call center. A more experienced call center would usually have other trustworthy patrons, or it may feature a good general standing according to other groups who are using that certain center. When you find an interesting center suited to your budget, check to ensure how reputable that call center is. It is a good idea to talk with companies that use that particular call center for information on how well it works and if those companies are content with that same call center.
The workers, or sales representatives, of a telemarketing call center are highly a significant component in your choice of call center. You should talk with the exact call center you are concerned in working with for facts about how well it hires its employees and what opportunities it has. This includes looking at how the payment structure of the center works and what are the requirements for someone who will be hired by that group. After knowing these, you will get a good idea of how soundly the telemarketing call center takes care of its employees, presenting to you a fair idea of how motivated or demoralized the employees are. Apart from this, be sure to ask how long employees will stay with the call center for, as it is imperative to work with a group that is committed to the employees and what opportunities and future schemes the call center may have for them.
In summarizing the above points, check the cost, the familiarity and the reputability of the employees at a telemarketing call center so as to find more information as to which center is best and conducive to profit for your business. After finding the right call center you can be assured of more success in your line of work and expand your business advantageously and gainfully with a growing number of customers.
Telemarketing Laws
A long time ago, telemarketing was a novel idea. The suggestion of people calling you up at home to sell you something was unheard of, but it rapidly became very lucrative. Suddenly telemarketing companies came up everywhere. It was unsafe to answer your phone. To sugar coat it, people were starting to get annoyed.
The congress and the telemarketing laws as we know them today rescued the harassed callers.
Congress got into the act in 1991. They passed an act conceding customers definite rights to protect themselves against these infuriating telemarketing calls (no offense the industry). Their genius was in writing an anti-telemarketing script for consumers to use when receiving a call they supposed was a telemarketer. They would ask questions like, "Are you calling to sell me something?" "Can you tell me your full name?" "Can you tell me the company’s name?" "Do they have a do not call list?" "Can you put me on that list?" If they answer negative to any of these questions, then you can legally sue them.
Congress was taking a proactive role against telemarketing calls. Apart from this script, they enforced telemarketing laws. Regrettably, congress did not control the telephones, which was an FCC matter. So the congress went to the FCC and asked their assistance, giving the FCC their proposal to set up a national database of telephone numbers of all consumers who did not wish to be called by telemarketers.
Unsurprisingly, by dropping the number of calls made, meant less money for the phone companies and this was not in the FCC's best interests as unhappy phone companies meant an unhappy FCC. Consequently, the FCC proposed a more "cost efficient" series of "company do not call lists", by which the consumer called up the company which he did not want to be bothered by. So, either you had to call the company beforehand, or you had to wait for their call first. This was FCC’s grand solution liked only by the telemarketers and the FCC.
This was short lived. Ten years later, the FTC did what the FCC wouldn't do. Due to the crash in long distance rates, overseas telemarketers called frequently, many of which were absolute scams. This is when the FTC stepped in with telemarketing laws.
Chiefly, the FTC put some severe restrictions on calls coming in from automated machines. No longer could these whole calls be mechanized. An actual operator had to enter and if the consumer wished, he could ask the operator numerous questions and be put on a do not call list which would take care of calls for all companies, not just the one calling. If the company failed this, they were held answerable.
Telemarketing: Generating Leads
Of late telemarketing has become a popular method by which businesses can generate leads. Such lead generation through telemarketing usually uses prerecorded messages and is of two main kinds. Inbound telemarketing and outbound telemarketing, in the first the system dials up any number and in the second it sticks to a given list.
Telemarketing is a more effective technique of generating leads, because though mails or other forms of advertising may be ignored by the recipient, a telephone call is usually answered, thus giving the telemarketer a scope to get a lead. Also this technique is adaptable to various kinds of circumstances; the telemarketer can answer the various queries of the potential customer on spot.
In the case of inbound lead generation it is the customer who evinces interest by calling up the company, and inquiring about the goods or services they have to offer. It is obviously the preferred lead generation type. The prospective customer has shown his interest first and it is the telemarketer’s duty to answer all his questions and sustain his interest in the product or the service. Sometimes people call up to ask about discounts and other offers, here too the telemarketer has to perform the role of informant.
In case of outbound telemarketing it is more difficult. Because the telemarketer who is calling up the potential customer is doing so uninvited, so it may result in a case of cold calling. The recipient of the call is not expecting the call, so they do not always welcome such calls and behave rudely. Only the best telemarketers can deal with a cold call successfully. Outbound callers are often supplied with a list of people who might be interested in the product or service and then its their job to single out customers.
Lead generation system is an alternative for telemarketing nowadays. Thee are machines which can dial random phone numbers, and then a prerecorded message is played. These machines are cheaper though sometimes people hang up before listening to the message. If lead generating machines are provided with a list of numbers of people who might potentially be interested it might prove more effective.
Lead generation telemarketing is the field for young people who can communicate well. It is a cheap, cost effective, fast method of generating leads and increasing sales. It is also easy to adjust this type of telemarketing to various situations.
Telemarketing And Telesales
Although several companies find the idea of using telemarketing or inside sales people to boost their business ridiculous, there can be no doubts about the effective nature of telemarketing in the present age, as has been proved by several big companies. Telemarketing is especially effective when it comes to increasing the sales and contributing towards the overall growth. It’s a highly productive way of doing the job when compared to employing professionals for outside sales strategies.
Telemarketing or inside sales people come in useful when it comes to filling up the fissure that forms between marketing, lead generation and people involved in field sales.
Most companies apply telesales and telemarketing techniques in the following ways:
- For lead generation qualification or to follow up on the leads that are provided by the marketing programs.
- For executing inside sales functions and closing deals-which can be done over the phone.
- This is a model which combines the above idea. Here, companies qualify opportunities, close the appropriate deals over the phone and transfer bigger relationship based sales opportunities on to the outside sales personnel.
If you’re considering increasing sales field personnel or introducing a new sales field department, then remember that through telemarketing or inside sales, you can improve your sales efficiency without having to spend a bomb on it.
The things that you need to remember once you’ve decided to introduce inside sales or telemarketing personnel within the company are the following. If you don’t have enough experience in this area, then it would be a good idea to secure the consultation or outsourcing powers of trained individuals who can help you set this up. An outsourced pipeline or telesales development consultant with adequate experience can influence your company in a positive way, thus ensuring your success.
However, the absence of knowledge regarding this area could affect the company in a negative rather than a positive way. Many companies have realized this the hard way with the failure of their telemarketing or telesales projects, simply because those controlling these projects did not have sufficient management skills. It is thus necessary for you to hire good managers when you hire the personnel who are slated to do the actual telemarketing. An able telemarketing professional can help you with every aspect of the job, even those which you could easily discard as petty. A professional will be able to guide you through the various aspects such as the target, the way to approach individuals, and of course, the all important message and the selling proposition that can set you apart from other businesses in the same field. He/she can also guide your telemarketing force through the necessary details such as the script and the call flow.
Telemarketing Myths
Telemarketers are considered, most often these days, as people who would pest your life forcing you to listen to every word they have to utter, any time of the day. This is what telemarketing has boiled down to. And things will get worse if such myths are not busted as quickly as possible. For most part, certain telemarketers are surely to blame for creating such an impression of the entire industry as a whole. There are, however, others who practice the most ethical and genial technique of telemarketing. Their callers do not infest your life at critical moments. They respect the privacy of others. If they as asked never to call again, they simply stop.
However, in order to help bust the myth so as not to miss out on anything important, even the customers called must follow certain practices. Here are a few things they must keep in mind.
- If you are being called at a wrong time, do not abruptly snap the caller away and give him or her a piece of your mind without first listening to what he has to say. For all you know, he might be offering you a good deal on something that you were really looking for. Give the caller a chance
- If you are still being pestered even after you have shown no interest or the product the caller is calling for is of no interest to you, you may politely tell the caller that you are not to be disturbed and that you are not interested. Good telemarketing agencies respect the privacy of customers and pursue only those who might be interested.
- Conversely, some people have a habit of appearing enthusiastic to everything giving a false impression that they are actually considering the deal, which may not be the case. The least you can do at first is just listen to what the caller says, ponder over it if it catches your attention and get back to them. Or, wait for them to call you.
- You can also choose when to take a call. If you are busy you do not necessarily have to answer the call. You can choose to ignore it and take it when they call again at some later point. Ignoring these calls indefinitely is not a good idea either. You can take it when you are free, see if had anything interesting to offer you, and politely decline. They will automatically put you off their calling list!
Telemarketing: The Advantage
Telemarketing is gradually becoming the most popular and the most effective way to market a product these days, so much so that it is even leaving television, radio, and newspapers far behind. The following article aims at giving you a brief introduction to what are the implications of telemarketing and what its advantages and disadvantages are.
What is telemarketing?
As the name suggests, any marketing done over the telephone can be categorized under telemarketing. What one required\s for this purpose is the telephoning resource and a staff that will make and take these calls. Telemarketing can be of two types. First is the inbound telemarketing which entails being a part of the customer care where customers can call in and clear their doubts about your product, etc. the second is the outbound telemarketing which means aggressively advertising and marketing your product by calling up people and talking about it to them.
Knowing the Advantage
- The first and basic premise on which telemarketing works is the use of the telephone. This, in the sense that a ringing telephone is something that one just can’t ignore. You may miss an advertisement on television or on the radio. You may skip through an advertisement that you see in a newspaper. But if someone calls you, you listen to that person to see what he or she has to say. This can be more effective than other forms of marketing.
- Telemarketing makes the potential customer’s relationship with the company more personal and interactive. An ad on TV can easily be forgotten. Plus there is a sense that it is there fore everyone to se, whereas a call is made personally to only one person at a time by one caller.
- Telemarketing establishes a platform for dialogue right away. If the customer finds your product interesting, they may have a question they’d like to ask you. Your telecallers can immediately satisfy their queries, building trust with the potential customer.
- Such telemarketing call centers function all through the day and also in the night. You can call a customer at a time that they prefer most so that you do not catch them in the middle of something very important or infringe on their privacy. your staff must be trained to determine the best time to call a particular customer at. If the customer is free, chances are that he will pay more attention to what the caller is telling him than when he is busy.
Telemarketing: Use It Effectively
Telemarketing has grown to become the one of the most effective means of marketing if utilized in a proper way. The following are some of the ways in which telemarketing can be executed to get maximum benefit out of that or your organization
- Make a list of all those things you would like to achieve using telemarketing. For instance, if you wish to increase your sales, make new clients, build on your office staff, etc, you will need to delineate these requirements to decide which of these you want the telemarketing portion to handle. Everything can basically be handled by telemarketing; you will just have to decide what exactly you want it to do.
- Train your telemarketing staff well, both on voice and off voice. This is important because they must be clearly briefed about what exactly is expected of them and how they are to go about it. Your company’s motives must necessarily be reflected in how they approach the clients when they call them.
- It is also a good idea to divide the telemarketing staff according to the kind of personality and age group they belong to. College students turned telecallers are more likely to strike a chord with students and youngsters rather than professionals and lawyers, for whom the more mature and concrete telecallers will be required to convince them.
- You also need to make sure of the technology you are using and whether it is, at all, suited to your telecallers. This is because your staff needs to be adapted to this kind of technology so that they may successfully exploit them
- You also need to constantly keep motivating your staff. You must realize answering calls all day is not an easy and exciting job. But if you manage to make it so by motivating your staff, your customer care unit, for example, can function extremely well and help you retain customers.
- Try and get your staff to develop an intuition regarding the people who they are to follow up. Only the person who makes the call can judge whether the person will at all be converted to a customer. This is important because you do not want to waste time and resources pursuing someone who wouldn’t convert.
- Keep a constant check on the progress you are making using this form of marketing so that you can work on the areas that are not bringing in fruitful results.
- Finally, make sure the person being called is listed with either Telephone Preference Service (TPS) or Corporate Telephone Preference Service (CTPS).
Telemarketing: Hiring A Firm
A professional telemarketing firm is one of the major requirements of any business that wishes to expand its client base using telemarketing techniques. For a business that has just started, the owner himself can dial up a few numbers and talk to t6hem about the product to see if they are interested. But once the business begins to roll, responsibilities and work increases in many folds and services of an agency or a firm providing telemarketing services becomes inevitable.
Here are some reasons why you will require the service of such a telemarketing firm
- You, on your own, have managed to generate some leads. These leads, however, will have to be followed up and pursued with care so that you don’t lose those leads. However, you cannot do this on your own because the time you have at hand does not permit you to get into it. Hiring a telemarketing firm at this stage is what you will require.
- You will also need someone to manage the large number of inbound calls that you get. If people and customers are constantly ringing you up inquiring about the product, or about the order they have placed, or about feedback, you need a staff to take those calls and see to it that everyone’s queries are answered. Sometimes, the traffic of this call is very large to be handled within the company alone. A telemarketing firm must necessarily be hired, which charges on the basis of inbound calls you anticipate within a given period of time.
- If you want to pursue advertisement and marketing though the telephone ideally you would want to reach to as many people as you can in a day. Therefore, going in for a professional telemarketing firm to make these outbound calls for you, you gain the opportunity of being able to contact hundreds and thousands of persons in a day.
- Since a telemarketing firm is a professional organization, their staff will know when to contact what kind of customers. People do not appreciate being rung up any odd time of the day. A telemarketing firm’s staff is trained to judge that so that potential customers are not put off by calls from your company.
- Internet marketing is gaining ground to which telemarketing is losing. Telemarketing firms actually put in a lot of research into this to come up with new ways of using the telephone as an effective tool to market. Hiring such a firm is a good idea.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
LEGALITIES & TAX ADVANTAGES IN A HOME BUSINESS
Every year, several thousand people develop an interest in "going
into business." Many of these people have an idea, a product or a
service they hope to promote into an income producing business
which they can operate from their homes.
If you are one of these people, here are some practical thoughts
to consider before hanging out the "Open for Business" sign.
In areas zoned "Residential Only," your proposed business could
be illegal. In many areas, zoning restrictions rule out home
businesses involving the coming and going of many customers,
clients or employees. Many businesses that sell or even store
anything for sale on the premises also fall into this category.
Be sure to check with your local zoning office to see how the
ordinances in your particular area may affect your business
plans. You may need a special permit to operate your business
from your home; and you may find that making small changes in
your plan will put you into the position of meeting zoning
standards.
Many communities grant home occupation permits for businesses
involve typing, sewing, and teaching, but turn thumbs down on
requests from photographers, interior decorators and home
improvement businesses to be run from the home. And often, even
if you are permitted to use your home for a given business, there
will be restrictions that you may need to take into
consideration. By all means, work with your zoning people, and
save yourself time, trouble and dollars.
One of the requirements imposed might be off street parking for
your customers or patrons. And, signs are generally forbidden in
residential districts. If you teach, there is almost always a
limit on the number of students you may have at any one time.
Obtaining zoning approval for your business, then, could be as
simple as filling out an application, or it could involve a
public hearing. The important points the zoning officials will
consider will center around how your business will affect the
neighborhood. Will it increase the traffic noticeably on your
street? Will there be a substantial increase in noise? And how
will your neighbors feel about this business alongside their
homes?
To repeat, check into the zoning restrictions, and then check
again to determine if you will need a city license. If you're
selling something, you may need a vendor's license, and be
required to collect sales taxes on your transactions. The sale
tax requirement would result in the need for careful record
keeping.
Licensing can be an involved process, and depending upon the type
of business, it could even involve the inspection of your home to
determine if it meets with local health and building and fire
codes. Should this be the case, you will need to bring your
facilities up to the local standards. Usually this will involve
some simple repairs or adjustments that you can either do
personally, or hire out to a handyman at a nominal cost.
Still more items to consider: Will your homeowner's insurance
cover the property and liability in your new business? This must
definitely be resolved, so be sure to talk it over with your
insurance agent.
Tax deductions, which were once one of the beauties of engaging
in a home business, are not what they once were. To be eligible
for business related deductions today, you must use that part of
your home claimed EXCLUSIVELY AND REGULARLY as either the
principal location of your business, or place reserved to meet
patients, clients or customers.
An interesting case in point: if you use your den or a spare
bedroom as the principal place of business, working there from
8:00 to 5:00 every day, but permit your children to watch TV in
that room during evening hours, the IRS dictates that you cannot
claim a deduction for that room as your office or place of
business.
There are, however, a couple of exceptions to the "exclusive use"
rule. One is the storage on inventory in your home, where your
home is the location of your trade or business, and your trade or
business is the selling of products at retail or wholesale.
According to the IRS, such storage space must be used on a
REGULAR Basis, and be separately identifiable space.
Another exception applies to daycare services that are provided
for children, the elderly, or physically or mentally handicapped.
This exception applies only if the owner of the facility complies
with the state laws for licensing.
To be eligible for business deductions, your business must be an
activity undertaken with the intent of making profit. It's
presumed you meet this requirement if your business makes a
profit in any two years of a five-year period.
Once you are this far along, you can deduct business expenses
such as supplies, subscriptions to professional journals, and an
allowance for the business use of your car or truck. You can also
claim deductions for home related business expenses such as
utilities, and in some cases, even a new paint job for your home.
The IRS is going to treat the part of your home you use for
business as though it were a separate piece of property. This
means that you'll have to keep good records and take care not to
mix business and personal matters. No specific method of record
keeping is required, but your records must clearly justify and
deductions you claim.
You can begin by calculating what percentage of the house is used
for business, Either by number of rooms or by area in square
footage. Thus, if you use one of the five rooms for your
business, the business portion is 20 percent. If you run your
business out of a room that's 10 by 12 feet, and the total area
of your home is 1,200 square feet, the business space factor is
10 percent.
An extra computation is required if your business is a home day
care center. This is one of the exempted activities in which the
exclusive use rule doesn't apply. Check with your tax preparer
and the IRS for an exact determination.
If you're a renter, you can deduct the part of your rent which is
attributable to the business share of your house or apartment.
Homeowners can take a deduction based on the depreciation of the
business portion of their house.
There is a limit to the amount you can deduct. This is the amount
equal to the gross income generated by the business, minus those
home expenses you could deduct even if you weren't operating a
business from your home. As an example, real estate taxes and
mortgage interest are deductible regardless of any business
activity in your home, so you must subtract from your business
gross income the percentage that's allocable to the business
portion of your home. You thus arrive at the maximum amount for
home-related business deductions.
If you are self-employed, you claim your business deductions on
SCHEDULE C, PROFIT(or LOSS) for BUSINESS OR PROFESSION. The IRS
emphasizes that claiming business-at-home deductions does not
automatically trigger an audit on your tax return. Even so, it is
always wise to keep meticulously within the proper guidelines,
and of course keep detailed records if you claim business related
expenses when you are working out of your home. You should
discuss this aspect of your operation with your tax preparer or a
person qualified in the field of small business tax requirements.
If your business earnings aren't subject to withholding tax, and
your estimated federal taxes are $100 or more, you'll probably be
filing a Declaration of Estimated Tax, Form 1040 ES. To complete
this form, you will have to estimate your income for the coming
year and also make a computation of the income tax and
self-employed tax you will owe.
The self-employment taxes pay for Social Security coverage.
If you have a salaried job covered by Social Security, the
self-employment tax applies only to that amount of your home
business income that, when added to your salary, reaches the
current ceiling. When you file your Form 1040-ES, which is due
April 15, you must make the first of four equal installment
payments on your estimated tax bill.
Another good way to trim taxes is by setting up a Keogh plan or
an Individual Retirement Account. With either of these, you can
shelter some of your home business income from taxes by investing
it for your retirement.
into business." Many of these people have an idea, a product or a
service they hope to promote into an income producing business
which they can operate from their homes.
If you are one of these people, here are some practical thoughts
to consider before hanging out the "Open for Business" sign.
In areas zoned "Residential Only," your proposed business could
be illegal. In many areas, zoning restrictions rule out home
businesses involving the coming and going of many customers,
clients or employees. Many businesses that sell or even store
anything for sale on the premises also fall into this category.
Be sure to check with your local zoning office to see how the
ordinances in your particular area may affect your business
plans. You may need a special permit to operate your business
from your home; and you may find that making small changes in
your plan will put you into the position of meeting zoning
standards.
Many communities grant home occupation permits for businesses
involve typing, sewing, and teaching, but turn thumbs down on
requests from photographers, interior decorators and home
improvement businesses to be run from the home. And often, even
if you are permitted to use your home for a given business, there
will be restrictions that you may need to take into
consideration. By all means, work with your zoning people, and
save yourself time, trouble and dollars.
One of the requirements imposed might be off street parking for
your customers or patrons. And, signs are generally forbidden in
residential districts. If you teach, there is almost always a
limit on the number of students you may have at any one time.
Obtaining zoning approval for your business, then, could be as
simple as filling out an application, or it could involve a
public hearing. The important points the zoning officials will
consider will center around how your business will affect the
neighborhood. Will it increase the traffic noticeably on your
street? Will there be a substantial increase in noise? And how
will your neighbors feel about this business alongside their
homes?
To repeat, check into the zoning restrictions, and then check
again to determine if you will need a city license. If you're
selling something, you may need a vendor's license, and be
required to collect sales taxes on your transactions. The sale
tax requirement would result in the need for careful record
keeping.
Licensing can be an involved process, and depending upon the type
of business, it could even involve the inspection of your home to
determine if it meets with local health and building and fire
codes. Should this be the case, you will need to bring your
facilities up to the local standards. Usually this will involve
some simple repairs or adjustments that you can either do
personally, or hire out to a handyman at a nominal cost.
Still more items to consider: Will your homeowner's insurance
cover the property and liability in your new business? This must
definitely be resolved, so be sure to talk it over with your
insurance agent.
Tax deductions, which were once one of the beauties of engaging
in a home business, are not what they once were. To be eligible
for business related deductions today, you must use that part of
your home claimed EXCLUSIVELY AND REGULARLY as either the
principal location of your business, or place reserved to meet
patients, clients or customers.
An interesting case in point: if you use your den or a spare
bedroom as the principal place of business, working there from
8:00 to 5:00 every day, but permit your children to watch TV in
that room during evening hours, the IRS dictates that you cannot
claim a deduction for that room as your office or place of
business.
There are, however, a couple of exceptions to the "exclusive use"
rule. One is the storage on inventory in your home, where your
home is the location of your trade or business, and your trade or
business is the selling of products at retail or wholesale.
According to the IRS, such storage space must be used on a
REGULAR Basis, and be separately identifiable space.
Another exception applies to daycare services that are provided
for children, the elderly, or physically or mentally handicapped.
This exception applies only if the owner of the facility complies
with the state laws for licensing.
To be eligible for business deductions, your business must be an
activity undertaken with the intent of making profit. It's
presumed you meet this requirement if your business makes a
profit in any two years of a five-year period.
Once you are this far along, you can deduct business expenses
such as supplies, subscriptions to professional journals, and an
allowance for the business use of your car or truck. You can also
claim deductions for home related business expenses such as
utilities, and in some cases, even a new paint job for your home.
The IRS is going to treat the part of your home you use for
business as though it were a separate piece of property. This
means that you'll have to keep good records and take care not to
mix business and personal matters. No specific method of record
keeping is required, but your records must clearly justify and
deductions you claim.
You can begin by calculating what percentage of the house is used
for business, Either by number of rooms or by area in square
footage. Thus, if you use one of the five rooms for your
business, the business portion is 20 percent. If you run your
business out of a room that's 10 by 12 feet, and the total area
of your home is 1,200 square feet, the business space factor is
10 percent.
An extra computation is required if your business is a home day
care center. This is one of the exempted activities in which the
exclusive use rule doesn't apply. Check with your tax preparer
and the IRS for an exact determination.
If you're a renter, you can deduct the part of your rent which is
attributable to the business share of your house or apartment.
Homeowners can take a deduction based on the depreciation of the
business portion of their house.
There is a limit to the amount you can deduct. This is the amount
equal to the gross income generated by the business, minus those
home expenses you could deduct even if you weren't operating a
business from your home. As an example, real estate taxes and
mortgage interest are deductible regardless of any business
activity in your home, so you must subtract from your business
gross income the percentage that's allocable to the business
portion of your home. You thus arrive at the maximum amount for
home-related business deductions.
If you are self-employed, you claim your business deductions on
SCHEDULE C, PROFIT(or LOSS) for BUSINESS OR PROFESSION. The IRS
emphasizes that claiming business-at-home deductions does not
automatically trigger an audit on your tax return. Even so, it is
always wise to keep meticulously within the proper guidelines,
and of course keep detailed records if you claim business related
expenses when you are working out of your home. You should
discuss this aspect of your operation with your tax preparer or a
person qualified in the field of small business tax requirements.
If your business earnings aren't subject to withholding tax, and
your estimated federal taxes are $100 or more, you'll probably be
filing a Declaration of Estimated Tax, Form 1040 ES. To complete
this form, you will have to estimate your income for the coming
year and also make a computation of the income tax and
self-employed tax you will owe.
The self-employment taxes pay for Social Security coverage.
If you have a salaried job covered by Social Security, the
self-employment tax applies only to that amount of your home
business income that, when added to your salary, reaches the
current ceiling. When you file your Form 1040-ES, which is due
April 15, you must make the first of four equal installment
payments on your estimated tax bill.
Another good way to trim taxes is by setting up a Keogh plan or
an Individual Retirement Account. With either of these, you can
shelter some of your home business income from taxes by investing
it for your retirement.
Website Or No Website…That's The Question
Do you want to make money through the Internet but you don't have enough experience or capital to start your own online business? You don't have to worry, for a lot of online marketing options exist for you to start with. One of these options, and shall I say the best, is affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing provides first time online marketers like you the chance to market something online even without having your own product to sell. All you have to do is to sign up with an affiliate marketing program, which is usually owned by an online merchant or retailer, and start picking the products you want to promote. As an affiliate, you are paid by the merchant for your services on a commission basis, that is whenever you have directed a visitor to the merchant's site and the visitor actually buys something.
Becoming an affiliate in an affiliate marketing program is often quick and easy, and for most affiliate programs, signing up is also free. But despite these and all the benefits being promised by affiliate programs, many people are still hesitant to get into affiliate marketing. One of the reasons why a lot of people remain hesitant is the lack of a website to start marketing his affiliate products with. This now leads us to the question of whether a website is required or necessary in affiliate marketing or not.
Many people say that one can do affiliate marketing even without a website to start with. Actually, one can really start promoting and marketing his affiliate products even without a website; and there exist a lot of ways on how this can be done. In fact, many affiliate marketing strategies that leads to success can exist without actually needing a website. Among these strategies are email marketing, offline promotions, writing e-books, writing ezines and engaging in online discussions like forums, chats, message boards and others.
*Email Marketing
Email marketing, or maintaining email lists, is actually the most popular affiliate marketing strategy that doesn't require the affiliate to maintain a website. In this affiliate marketing strategy, what you basically do is maintain a list of the email ads of your prospective customers and provide them with articles that are relevant with the affiliate products and programs you are promoting. Articles that you provide your contacts with need not always be promotional, for many individuals find such types of email annoying. Rather, it would be better if you provide them with something informative and just add small text ads that link to your merchant's site.
*Offline Promotion
There are many ways on how you can promote your affiliate products offline. Among the common medium used for such promotions are classified ads, brochures and flyers. Classified ads would generally work better compared to the other two because classified ads in periodicals often get a wider audience.
*Writing Free e-books
If you have a knack in writing, writing an e-book can be the best way for you to promote your affiliate products in the absence of an actual website. Just like in emails and newsletters, your readers would better appreciate your e-book if it is not too promotional but rather informative. Be sure, however, to make the contents of your e-books relative to the actual affiliate products you are promoting. And just like in email marketing, you can just place text ads or banners somewhere near the end of your e-book that links to the merchant's site.
*Writing Free Ezines
Ezines are publications or articles that aim to inform individuals about a particular topic. If you don't have a website and yet want to be an affiliate, you can well use ezines to promote your affiliate products or to insert links to your merchant's site. If you have a website, your ezine article may actually work well as content for your site. But since you have no website, you can just submit your free ezine articles to various websites that hosts ezines, like goarticles.com, ezinearticles.com and others.
*Online discussions (Forums, Chats, Message Boards, etc.)
With or without a website, you just can't ignore online discussions because they are great venues for marketing your affiliate products. In chats, forums, message boards and discussion boards with topics related to your products, you can easily find people who may be interested with the products you are promoting.
With all these strategies, it may appear that one really doesn't need to have a website to start marketing his affiliate products and promoting his affiliate programs. Well, starting in an affiliate program without a website may be easy, but getting successful in affiliate marketing without a website is another thing. While one can actually gain enormous success in affiliate marketing even without a website, it is a rare instance that "newbies" like you can reach the same levels of success.
Having a website is not really a pre-requisite in entering into an affiliate program, unless otherwise the program owner would require you to have one. But while this is so, I would still recommend that you have for yourself a website, if not now, then maybe at a later time. Having a website creates a lot of advantages in affiliate marketing. For one, it provides you a place where you can creatively promote not only one of your affiliate products but all of your affiliate products. With a website, you can also advertise your affiliate products to a wider market.
Again, having a website is not a requirement in affiliate marketing. But with the advantages that a website can provide, I'd rather have one for myself and make affiliate marketing a lot easier for me.
Affiliate marketing provides first time online marketers like you the chance to market something online even without having your own product to sell. All you have to do is to sign up with an affiliate marketing program, which is usually owned by an online merchant or retailer, and start picking the products you want to promote. As an affiliate, you are paid by the merchant for your services on a commission basis, that is whenever you have directed a visitor to the merchant's site and the visitor actually buys something.
Becoming an affiliate in an affiliate marketing program is often quick and easy, and for most affiliate programs, signing up is also free. But despite these and all the benefits being promised by affiliate programs, many people are still hesitant to get into affiliate marketing. One of the reasons why a lot of people remain hesitant is the lack of a website to start marketing his affiliate products with. This now leads us to the question of whether a website is required or necessary in affiliate marketing or not.
Many people say that one can do affiliate marketing even without a website to start with. Actually, one can really start promoting and marketing his affiliate products even without a website; and there exist a lot of ways on how this can be done. In fact, many affiliate marketing strategies that leads to success can exist without actually needing a website. Among these strategies are email marketing, offline promotions, writing e-books, writing ezines and engaging in online discussions like forums, chats, message boards and others.
*Email Marketing
Email marketing, or maintaining email lists, is actually the most popular affiliate marketing strategy that doesn't require the affiliate to maintain a website. In this affiliate marketing strategy, what you basically do is maintain a list of the email ads of your prospective customers and provide them with articles that are relevant with the affiliate products and programs you are promoting. Articles that you provide your contacts with need not always be promotional, for many individuals find such types of email annoying. Rather, it would be better if you provide them with something informative and just add small text ads that link to your merchant's site.
*Offline Promotion
There are many ways on how you can promote your affiliate products offline. Among the common medium used for such promotions are classified ads, brochures and flyers. Classified ads would generally work better compared to the other two because classified ads in periodicals often get a wider audience.
*Writing Free e-books
If you have a knack in writing, writing an e-book can be the best way for you to promote your affiliate products in the absence of an actual website. Just like in emails and newsletters, your readers would better appreciate your e-book if it is not too promotional but rather informative. Be sure, however, to make the contents of your e-books relative to the actual affiliate products you are promoting. And just like in email marketing, you can just place text ads or banners somewhere near the end of your e-book that links to the merchant's site.
*Writing Free Ezines
Ezines are publications or articles that aim to inform individuals about a particular topic. If you don't have a website and yet want to be an affiliate, you can well use ezines to promote your affiliate products or to insert links to your merchant's site. If you have a website, your ezine article may actually work well as content for your site. But since you have no website, you can just submit your free ezine articles to various websites that hosts ezines, like goarticles.com, ezinearticles.com and others.
*Online discussions (Forums, Chats, Message Boards, etc.)
With or without a website, you just can't ignore online discussions because they are great venues for marketing your affiliate products. In chats, forums, message boards and discussion boards with topics related to your products, you can easily find people who may be interested with the products you are promoting.
With all these strategies, it may appear that one really doesn't need to have a website to start marketing his affiliate products and promoting his affiliate programs. Well, starting in an affiliate program without a website may be easy, but getting successful in affiliate marketing without a website is another thing. While one can actually gain enormous success in affiliate marketing even without a website, it is a rare instance that "newbies" like you can reach the same levels of success.
Having a website is not really a pre-requisite in entering into an affiliate program, unless otherwise the program owner would require you to have one. But while this is so, I would still recommend that you have for yourself a website, if not now, then maybe at a later time. Having a website creates a lot of advantages in affiliate marketing. For one, it provides you a place where you can creatively promote not only one of your affiliate products but all of your affiliate products. With a website, you can also advertise your affiliate products to a wider market.
Again, having a website is not a requirement in affiliate marketing. But with the advantages that a website can provide, I'd rather have one for myself and make affiliate marketing a lot easier for me.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Autoresponders
The typical example of an autoresponder is a sequence of emails sent out over time to people
in the form of a 'mini course'.
Talk about a sequence of messages e.g. a person signs up and then they get
• Message #1 immediately
• Message #2 after 1 day
• Message #3 after 3 days
• Message #4 after 7 days
• Message #5 after 10 days
• And a new message every 10 days after that
What are the benifits of sending out Autoresponder messages
Stop and think for a moment. Most people who visit your web site come once, have a look
and then move on right? (it's what you do when you're looking around).
The problem is, people often forget who you are and they forget about your product or
service. But, if you can convince people to give you their email address and then over time
contact them (automatically of course), you do achieve some very important goals:
1. You get into people's long term memory. You build up recognition for you or your brand.
2. You build up a (very large) database of prospects you can contact at any time. Imagine
having a database of 50,000 prospects who are used to receiving high quality content
from you? If ever business is ever quiet, or if you want to maximize your sales, you can
simply send out an offer to your list of potential customers and drum up new work!
3. And you can position yourself as the guru for your particular industry!
The secret to success using Autoresponders
When it comes to writing successful autoresponder messages, the most important key is
having quality content.
Unless you provide your subscribers with some valuable information in return for the time they
spend reading your autoresponder messages, then they'll quickly lose interest in reading your
messages.
It's fine to include a sales pitch, but people must always feel they're getting more value than
sales pitch.
One option is to have a defined ratio of emails that are a sales pitch (e.g. 1 sales pitch to
every 5 content emails).
Another option is to write newsletter-style e-mails which are full of great content and put a
short sales pitch at the bottom of each e-mail.
Depending on your business model, one of these strategies might suit your business better
than the other - but both have proven to be very successful for Alliance Software clients who
have used them.
The nice thing is in many businesses, if you educate, you actually create the need for your
product service at the same time.
Think about it from the perspective of a website development business (e.g. Alliance
Software). By showing our customers some of the advanced web marketing strategies used
by the most successful online businesses today, we position ourselves as the natural
suppliers. You can do the same.
Isn't this spamming people? Won't this annoy some people?
The technical definition of spam is unsolicited commercial emails. So long as people have
given their consent for you to send them e-mails (which happens when they voluntarily sign
up), then it's not spam.
However, even without breaking the spam laws, you can still be viewed as a "spammer" if you
don't have quality content in your e-mails. If the content is good, people will appreciate your
emails. (It's like a trade - you're essentially "buying" the ability to give your sales pitch to
people in return for giving them valuable information.)
Finally, Autoresponder emails allow people to unsubscribe at any time. That means, if you do
offend or annoy someone, they are able to click a link and stop receiving your e-mails.
How do I get people to sign up for my Autoresponder sequence?
In order to get someone to sign up for your autoresponder sequence, you need to "sell" them
on the idea of giving you their e-mail address.
This means showing them the benefits of signing up to your autoresponder sequence, such
as telling them about the great information they'll receive on a regular basis.
A common trick used by Alliance Software clients is to offer an enticing little bonus at the start
in return for their e-mail address.
This is often something Downloadable (such as an e-book, audio or video download), but can
also be a small gift which is cheap to manufacture and post out (such as a DVD, CD or book),
or even a discount voucher they can use next time they buy from you.
Whatever you choose to offer as your enticing bonus in return for people signing up, make
sure it's something relevant to your customers, and something they would want to receive.
The better the bonus you're offering, the more likely it is that someone will sign up to your
autoresponder sequence.
Finally, when you're writing your pitch for people to sign up to your autoresponder sequence,
make sure you gain their trust by telling them how you will keep their personal details private,
and they won't receive spam.
A lot of people are distrustful of web-sites which ask them to provide their e-mail address as
many less scrupulous sites end up selling or renting e-mail addresses to spammers.
By putting these sort of fears to rest for your web-site visitors, it's more likely that they will give
you their e-mail address and sign up to your autoresponder series.
Can I send out special offers to my Autoresponder list?
Yes, of course you can!
If you have a special offer, or an announcement, you can send it to all (or a select group) of
your subscribers at any time.
Your autoresponder list is essentially a list of potential customers who have previously
expressed interest in your company.
Communicating your special offers and announcements to these people is a great idea if you
want to boost your sales!
in the form of a 'mini course'.
Talk about a sequence of messages e.g. a person signs up and then they get
• Message #1 immediately
• Message #2 after 1 day
• Message #3 after 3 days
• Message #4 after 7 days
• Message #5 after 10 days
• And a new message every 10 days after that
What are the benifits of sending out Autoresponder messages
Stop and think for a moment. Most people who visit your web site come once, have a look
and then move on right? (it's what you do when you're looking around).
The problem is, people often forget who you are and they forget about your product or
service. But, if you can convince people to give you their email address and then over time
contact them (automatically of course), you do achieve some very important goals:
1. You get into people's long term memory. You build up recognition for you or your brand.
2. You build up a (very large) database of prospects you can contact at any time. Imagine
having a database of 50,000 prospects who are used to receiving high quality content
from you? If ever business is ever quiet, or if you want to maximize your sales, you can
simply send out an offer to your list of potential customers and drum up new work!
3. And you can position yourself as the guru for your particular industry!
The secret to success using Autoresponders
When it comes to writing successful autoresponder messages, the most important key is
having quality content.
Unless you provide your subscribers with some valuable information in return for the time they
spend reading your autoresponder messages, then they'll quickly lose interest in reading your
messages.
It's fine to include a sales pitch, but people must always feel they're getting more value than
sales pitch.
One option is to have a defined ratio of emails that are a sales pitch (e.g. 1 sales pitch to
every 5 content emails).
Another option is to write newsletter-style e-mails which are full of great content and put a
short sales pitch at the bottom of each e-mail.
Depending on your business model, one of these strategies might suit your business better
than the other - but both have proven to be very successful for Alliance Software clients who
have used them.
The nice thing is in many businesses, if you educate, you actually create the need for your
product service at the same time.
Think about it from the perspective of a website development business (e.g. Alliance
Software). By showing our customers some of the advanced web marketing strategies used
by the most successful online businesses today, we position ourselves as the natural
suppliers. You can do the same.
Isn't this spamming people? Won't this annoy some people?
The technical definition of spam is unsolicited commercial emails. So long as people have
given their consent for you to send them e-mails (which happens when they voluntarily sign
up), then it's not spam.
However, even without breaking the spam laws, you can still be viewed as a "spammer" if you
don't have quality content in your e-mails. If the content is good, people will appreciate your
emails. (It's like a trade - you're essentially "buying" the ability to give your sales pitch to
people in return for giving them valuable information.)
Finally, Autoresponder emails allow people to unsubscribe at any time. That means, if you do
offend or annoy someone, they are able to click a link and stop receiving your e-mails.
How do I get people to sign up for my Autoresponder sequence?
In order to get someone to sign up for your autoresponder sequence, you need to "sell" them
on the idea of giving you their e-mail address.
This means showing them the benefits of signing up to your autoresponder sequence, such
as telling them about the great information they'll receive on a regular basis.
A common trick used by Alliance Software clients is to offer an enticing little bonus at the start
in return for their e-mail address.
This is often something Downloadable (such as an e-book, audio or video download), but can
also be a small gift which is cheap to manufacture and post out (such as a DVD, CD or book),
or even a discount voucher they can use next time they buy from you.
Whatever you choose to offer as your enticing bonus in return for people signing up, make
sure it's something relevant to your customers, and something they would want to receive.
The better the bonus you're offering, the more likely it is that someone will sign up to your
autoresponder sequence.
Finally, when you're writing your pitch for people to sign up to your autoresponder sequence,
make sure you gain their trust by telling them how you will keep their personal details private,
and they won't receive spam.
A lot of people are distrustful of web-sites which ask them to provide their e-mail address as
many less scrupulous sites end up selling or renting e-mail addresses to spammers.
By putting these sort of fears to rest for your web-site visitors, it's more likely that they will give
you their e-mail address and sign up to your autoresponder series.
Can I send out special offers to my Autoresponder list?
Yes, of course you can!
If you have a special offer, or an announcement, you can send it to all (or a select group) of
your subscribers at any time.
Your autoresponder list is essentially a list of potential customers who have previously
expressed interest in your company.
Communicating your special offers and announcements to these people is a great idea if you
want to boost your sales!
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48. http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
49. http://www.blogoole.com/ping /
50. http://www.blogoon.net/ping /
51. http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
52. http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
53. http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
54. http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
55. http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cg i
56. http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc /
57. http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
58. http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
59. http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
60. http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
61. http://www.weblogues.com/RPC /
62. http://xmlrpc.blogg.de /
63. http://xping.pubsub.com/ping /
1. http://1470.net/api/ping
2. http://api.feedster.com/ping.php
3. http://api.moreover.com/ping
4. http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
5. http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
6. http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
7. http://bblog.com/ping.php
8. http://bitacoras.net/ping /
9. http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
10. http://blogbot.dk/io/xml-rpc.php
11. http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc
12. http://blogmatcher.com/u.php
13. http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
14. http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
15. http://coreblog.org/ping /
16. http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchat t
17. http://ping.amagle.com /
18. http://ping.bitacoras.com
19. http://ping.blo.gs /
20. http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc /
21. http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc /
22. http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
23. http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc
24. http://ping.fakapster.com/rpc
25. http://ping.feedburner.com
26. http://ping.myblog.jp
27. http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
28. http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
29. http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
30. http://ping.weblogs.se /
31. http://pinger.blogflux.com/rpc
32. http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2
33. http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2
34. http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger /
35. http://rpc.britblog.com
36. http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080
37.http://rpc.pingomatic.com /
38. http://rpc.tailrank.com/feedburner/RPC2
39. http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
40. http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
41. http://rpc.wpkeys.com
42. http://services.newsgator.com/ngws/xmlrpcping.aspx
43. http://thingamablog.sourceforge.net/ping.php
44. http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
45. http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php
46. http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
47. http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
48. http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
49. http://www.blogoole.com/ping /
50. http://www.blogoon.net/ping /
51. http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
52. http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
53. http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
54. http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
55. http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cg i
56. http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc /
57. http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
58. http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
59. http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
60. http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
61. http://www.weblogues.com/RPC /
62. http://xmlrpc.blogg.de /
63. http://xping.pubsub.com/ping /
Affiliate Program Marketing and Management Forums
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4. Allan Gardyne's Associate Programs
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5. Phil Wiley's Affiliate Talk Forum
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13. The Top Affiliate Affiliate Program
Marketing Forum
2. Affiliates4U Forum
3. Affiliate Boards Forum
4. Allan Gardyne's Associate Programs
Forum
5. Phil Wiley's Affiliate Talk Forum
6. Shawn Collins' Affiliate Manager Forum
7. Affiliates Directory Forum
8. Brad Larned's Affiliate Talk Forum
9. ClickBank Success Forum
10. CB Guide Affiliate Marketing Forum
11. Rosalind Gardner's Net Profits Today
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12. RevShare Discussion Forums
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Saturday, August 9, 2008
Those Tricky Customers
Internet marketing can be a cat and mouse game with you being the cat and the customer being a very wily mouse. Internet denizens are a clever sort and if they see something on your web site, they will not hesitate to sign up for a membership and even agree to receive your promotional emails. But those tricky customers have ways to dodging your email advertising so even though you think you are advertising to them, your messages are actually vanishing off the face of the earth. So we have to be just as clever as well.
Knowing how customers think is a big part of being successful in your marketing plans. Internet customers are just like customers in the old marketing model. They are curious about promotions and they want to enjoy your give aways and dodge ongoing advertising. The cat and mouse game is to get them to want your advertisements by attaching them to things they want and get them to give you their email addresses and even to add your email identification to their preferred contacts list so your marketing emails fly right through their spam filters.
Much of what goes into web site design is making a web "place" that will draw customers to register for a "membership" or otherwise provide you with their real email address. When you develop a system that is working with actual visitors on your web site, you can then build a mailing list that is of much greater value than any list of email addresses you might buy from a mass mailing email service. Your email list is pure gold because it consists of real customers who actually had an interest in your web site and your product or service and who are likely to come back if your marketing is well done. Not only is that email contact list gold to you as a business, it is of great interest to other businesses in similar lines of business as you who will pay well to get their hands on that marketing email contacts list for the same reasons you value it.
However, those tricky customers of yours even have ways of stepping around your validation schemes and it all lies in the fact that anyone can set up as many email addresses online that they want. You know from your personal use of email that you have one or two primary email accounts, probably with your ISP that go directly to your desktop email software such as Microsoft Outlook. But most of us also set up two or three or many more other email accounts with services like HotMail, Yahoo and others. Its easy to set up an account on these services to use for games or to register for contests.
Those alternate services are where tricky online customers can trap your emails and actually give you the impression that you are advertising to them when you are not. A typical ploy by internet denizens is to send any incoming emails that are not personal or of immediate value to a yahoo, hotmail or other free email service. The result is that even if you harvested their email address when they signed on for a service or became a member of your web site, your advertising emails are being "dumped" into these alternative email inboxes which the customer has no intention of keeping up with.
The customer might check those email boxes every few weeks and just hit "delete all" on the inbox knowing that they don’t want to see any of those emails. And when they do that, there goes your advertising and you may never know what happened.
One way to try to bypass this problem is to make verification of email a part of the registration process. In that way, the customer has to log onto that email box to see a verification email and hit a link in that email to validate that it is a valid email address. But the final answer is to make your marketing emails so interesting and valuable to your customers that they don't want to "dump them" into a holding tank email because they want to see what you are going to send them. And when you get to that level of relationship with a customer, you really do have a gold email list that will result in much higher sales for your online business.
Knowing how customers think is a big part of being successful in your marketing plans. Internet customers are just like customers in the old marketing model. They are curious about promotions and they want to enjoy your give aways and dodge ongoing advertising. The cat and mouse game is to get them to want your advertisements by attaching them to things they want and get them to give you their email addresses and even to add your email identification to their preferred contacts list so your marketing emails fly right through their spam filters.
Much of what goes into web site design is making a web "place" that will draw customers to register for a "membership" or otherwise provide you with their real email address. When you develop a system that is working with actual visitors on your web site, you can then build a mailing list that is of much greater value than any list of email addresses you might buy from a mass mailing email service. Your email list is pure gold because it consists of real customers who actually had an interest in your web site and your product or service and who are likely to come back if your marketing is well done. Not only is that email contact list gold to you as a business, it is of great interest to other businesses in similar lines of business as you who will pay well to get their hands on that marketing email contacts list for the same reasons you value it.
However, those tricky customers of yours even have ways of stepping around your validation schemes and it all lies in the fact that anyone can set up as many email addresses online that they want. You know from your personal use of email that you have one or two primary email accounts, probably with your ISP that go directly to your desktop email software such as Microsoft Outlook. But most of us also set up two or three or many more other email accounts with services like HotMail, Yahoo and others. Its easy to set up an account on these services to use for games or to register for contests.
Those alternate services are where tricky online customers can trap your emails and actually give you the impression that you are advertising to them when you are not. A typical ploy by internet denizens is to send any incoming emails that are not personal or of immediate value to a yahoo, hotmail or other free email service. The result is that even if you harvested their email address when they signed on for a service or became a member of your web site, your advertising emails are being "dumped" into these alternative email inboxes which the customer has no intention of keeping up with.
The customer might check those email boxes every few weeks and just hit "delete all" on the inbox knowing that they don’t want to see any of those emails. And when they do that, there goes your advertising and you may never know what happened.
One way to try to bypass this problem is to make verification of email a part of the registration process. In that way, the customer has to log onto that email box to see a verification email and hit a link in that email to validate that it is a valid email address. But the final answer is to make your marketing emails so interesting and valuable to your customers that they don't want to "dump them" into a holding tank email because they want to see what you are going to send them. And when you get to that level of relationship with a customer, you really do have a gold email list that will result in much higher sales for your online business.
Selling and Teaching via Email
Probably the most reliable way to get around the problem of email delivery problems is to shift the desire for communications from the merchant, which is you, to the customer. By turning the tables so the customer wants your emails, the customer will take the steps to white list your email sending address to make sure he or she gets every single email you send. And the best way to create that desire is to give them something of value in their email each week.
People come to the internet for many things including entertainment, discussion, free stuff and diversion. But one of the most common things that people want is knowledge. Yo have a specialized knowledge you can offer to your customers that will not only benefit them but it can be used as a marketing tool to open communications to your customers email inboxes in a far more effective way than any blind email or mass mailing could ever do.
There are several ways to offer training courses online including ebooks or videos. But what is most effective for the sake of opening a long lasting communication channel to your customers is an email course in which you step by step lay out your specialized knowledge about your field of expertise over a period of twelve to fifteen installments.
Sometimes this kind of offering is called an autoresponder series because the function of an autoresponder software package can be helpful with distribution of the e-course. An autoresponder is a specialized service or type of software that either automatically responds to events or emails by sending out a response email or it can be used to generate email traffic on a schedule. So you can use an autoresponder to send the next installment of your email course to those who "subscribe" to it and know that it will go out without fail on the appointed day.
Now probably the biggest challenge of offering an autoresponder email course is how to create the course. Few of us are writers and while you may have the knowledge, you may have trouble composing that knowledge in the form of a course. There are a couple of ways to solve this problem…
. You could hire a ghostwriter to compose the course for you.. You could speak the course contents into a tape recorder and then have it transcribed into a written course that could be sent to customers in short email installments.. You could even have a friend "interview" you to draw that specialized knowledge out of you. The interviews could be fairly free form and then you could take the transcriptions of the interviews and organize them by topic into an e-course to offer your customers.
Once you have the contents laid out, don’t publish the course until you look it over to see where in the outlines you can integrate marketing messages. Many of the products or services you offer as part of your business are directly related to your specialized knowledge. So by including links to your shopping cart pages or to web pages that can lead customers to purchase decisions, the course is both instructional and useful for promoting your web site and sales as well.
The next step is to get the course into the hands of your users. The first candidates to become "students" are the active cyber citizens who spend a lot of time on your web site. So look at the regular posters on your message boards and blogs or citizens of a chat room on your site or contributors to your wiki and open conversations with them about offering a course.
You can also create multiple ways to allow your customers to subscribe to the course series. An online sign up is always a good choice because you can harvest their email address there and then open communications to their email and see to it that your business email is added to their favored contacts spam filter list so they do not see the courses disappear into their spam bucket each week.
As the customer enjoys learning from your series, the added benefit of getting them used to an active interaction with you and your web site is put in place. And the course can be viral to be passed along to friends and family members so it recruits new customers as well.
People come to the internet for many things including entertainment, discussion, free stuff and diversion. But one of the most common things that people want is knowledge. Yo have a specialized knowledge you can offer to your customers that will not only benefit them but it can be used as a marketing tool to open communications to your customers email inboxes in a far more effective way than any blind email or mass mailing could ever do.
There are several ways to offer training courses online including ebooks or videos. But what is most effective for the sake of opening a long lasting communication channel to your customers is an email course in which you step by step lay out your specialized knowledge about your field of expertise over a period of twelve to fifteen installments.
Sometimes this kind of offering is called an autoresponder series because the function of an autoresponder software package can be helpful with distribution of the e-course. An autoresponder is a specialized service or type of software that either automatically responds to events or emails by sending out a response email or it can be used to generate email traffic on a schedule. So you can use an autoresponder to send the next installment of your email course to those who "subscribe" to it and know that it will go out without fail on the appointed day.
Now probably the biggest challenge of offering an autoresponder email course is how to create the course. Few of us are writers and while you may have the knowledge, you may have trouble composing that knowledge in the form of a course. There are a couple of ways to solve this problem…
. You could hire a ghostwriter to compose the course for you.. You could speak the course contents into a tape recorder and then have it transcribed into a written course that could be sent to customers in short email installments.. You could even have a friend "interview" you to draw that specialized knowledge out of you. The interviews could be fairly free form and then you could take the transcriptions of the interviews and organize them by topic into an e-course to offer your customers.
Once you have the contents laid out, don’t publish the course until you look it over to see where in the outlines you can integrate marketing messages. Many of the products or services you offer as part of your business are directly related to your specialized knowledge. So by including links to your shopping cart pages or to web pages that can lead customers to purchase decisions, the course is both instructional and useful for promoting your web site and sales as well.
The next step is to get the course into the hands of your users. The first candidates to become "students" are the active cyber citizens who spend a lot of time on your web site. So look at the regular posters on your message boards and blogs or citizens of a chat room on your site or contributors to your wiki and open conversations with them about offering a course.
You can also create multiple ways to allow your customers to subscribe to the course series. An online sign up is always a good choice because you can harvest their email address there and then open communications to their email and see to it that your business email is added to their favored contacts spam filter list so they do not see the courses disappear into their spam bucket each week.
As the customer enjoys learning from your series, the added benefit of getting them used to an active interaction with you and your web site is put in place. And the course can be viral to be passed along to friends and family members so it recruits new customers as well.
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