You may have heard that having a web community is a great way to increase sales, customer loyalty and word of mouth for your web business. In fact a web community itself, if large enough and targeting an affluent demographic (or one that advertisers like to target), has the potential to bring in revenue. Commonly people use a web forum as the centre point for a web community. However building a popular forum is no easy task and requires patience and dedication.
Start at the beginning: Which forum software should I use?
Perhaps the least important variable, but certainly a vital aspect, is the forum software you choose. I came to settle on Invision Board as my favourite forum of choice. Over the years I became very familiar with Invison Board functions so it would take a lot for me to switch to different forum software. Unfortunately the team at Invision recently stopped offering a fully functional free version and the most current free version has limitations on numbers of users. I'm a strong supporter of Invision so I still recommend using the free service and then paying to upgrade once your board is large enough to warrant it. Chances are with your forum being that popular means you can justify the fee anyway.
The other top quality free forum out there is phpBB which is the open source offering. I haven't used this myself but with Invision no longer being free I can see this being the main player for all small business forums. I see this forum everywhere so I think you can take that as a strong endorsement.
Another popular choice, especially for large companies that can afford the fee is vBulletin. This seems to the professional forum of choice for those with the moolah to afford it. I only played with this forum many years ago when they had a limited use free version (in fact it was the first forum I ever installed). It's definitely a top forum with a great design, but you pay for it.
As I said which forum software you choose is not too important. You are going to have to learn to use at least one, so choose the one that satisfies your criteria and then get playing. If the idea of installing forum software is daunting to you then I suggest you look at the installation services most forum businesses offer. You can pay a small fee and one of the staff or community members will install the software for you. There are also remotely hosted forums where you don't install any software at all on your server but instead use one hosted by the forum company. Note this often either costs money or is advertiser supported so you might have some icky banners or other ads streamed across your forum. I recommend you host the forum on your own server because you get control, ownership and better search engine benefits.
How to attract and keep members
Regardless of which forum software you choose the hardest part of building a community is getting members, and members that stick around. Obviously your forum should be targeted to your business niche or target market if it's not a business site.
Picking the niche area you target is vital for success, and the individual forums you create for your community must clearly represent the purpose of your community. However this is where some lessons can be learnt. At first when you start building categories and individual forums you might get carried away with all the interesting forums you can create. You dream of your users lapping it up and talking away about every little area of interest you can come up with. This is the first major mistake you can make. You end up creating way too many forums that have no topics in them. Even if you do manage to bring some quality visitors to your site, they hit your forum and see an empty place and then move on. No one feels compelled to join an empty forum.
But you may ask then, how can you go from having an empty forum to one filled with topics when no one wants to get things started? It's a catch 22 isn't it! The number one concept to remember is that people bring in people. If visitors see topics and posts and discussions they are interested in they are more likely to contribute. It's hardest early on when you first launch but there are some tricks you can do. Here are the key pointers I've learnt to get passed this early stage of a ghost-town forum.
1. Think minimalist when building categories and forums
Look to about four forums maximum to start with, even less if possible. If you find yourself coming up with many different forum subjects, try and group them together under one forum. Then in that forum you can create individual topic posts to cater to each area. That way you are creating conversation starters and making the place look a little busier. As the forums grow and you have enough individual entries to start breaking down forums you can justify creating new ones. You can then move the existing topics into the appropriate categories and the forum doesn't start off empty.
2. As the owner you must keep contributing
This might seem obvious, but it's hard to keep motivated when week after week you create new topics and try to stimulate conversation and you seem to be talking to yourself. Personally I get the most excited when I first build the forum, thinking of all the great topics that can be discussed. Unfortunately once everything is done it does take some effort to keep writing fresh content. The only rule I can give is stick to it. Get into a routine of making a few posts everyday.
Expanding on this idea...
3. Create some fake personalities
This may seem a little dishonest, but a little trick you can use to stimulate conversation is to create a few different member accounts each with their own personality. Basically you create some fictional members and get posting. You can even have full forum conversations between your characters (just don't go insane!). Only you know which characters are fake. To everyone else it appears as if your forum is getting popular.
I had a friend take this idea so seriously that he kept profile notes on each character such as age, sex, personality type, occupation etc so whenever he made posts he made sure to get into character first. It's like forum acting.
This method again takes dedication because you need to keep logging in with each character and making new posts. However it can be MUCH more effective than if it was just you making all the posts as your own identity. It looks sad when the webmaster is chatting away to no one, but not quite as sad when Jim, Katie, Chris and Jane are having conversations even if they really are all controlled by the webmaster.
4. Publish content
There are sites available such as Ezine Articles that have articles you are allowed to publish on your site provided you follow their terms of use policy (which usually means you publish the articles exactly as they are and keep all links intact). The authors of these articles make them free because they get good promotion if their article is widely published. Note that because these are free articles you will most likely find that you are not the only site out there with the content.
If you want unique content you may have to pay for it and consider hiring columnists. With MTGParadise.com we had such a good community that many of our members were happy to write articles and reports for free. They enjoyed writing and seeing their article published. It's not easy to generate free unique articles this way especially early on before you have a community running, so it might be necessary to throw around a little cash and buy some articles.
If you can find content relevant to your market and distribute it to your community you have a good way to stimulate conversation and make your forum look a little busier.
5. Recruit your mates and spread the word
This is harder than you'd think. If you are like me, most of my closest friends are too busy or not really the forum community types so they won't help out much. Generally though you should have a few friends that are interested in the topic of your forum and they might help out with a post every now and then. Don't put to much pressure on them and be thankful for anything they contribute. You don't want to get carried away trying to get your forum off the ground that you lose your friends because you constantly pester them to make posts or join up.
As a general rule, don't be shy; tell everyone you know about your forum. But only do it once in a polite manner. Say you are inviting them to check out something you have created and that you want their valuable opinion before you officially launch. This "sneak peek" will make your friends and family feel special because you are demonstrating that you value their opinion so they will be more inclined to check out your site.
You can put a note in your signature file in your email about your new community, make a few posts at newsgroups that focus on your target market and hit some other complimentary (not competitor) forums to advertise your new forum. Remember always be courteous, follow rules and don't come across too desperate whenever you promote your forum. All this will come across negatively and harm your chances of new members signing up.
Don't give up
The most important tip I can give you to grow your community is to not give up. Even though YoungActivist.com is sitting out there all alone with no members and very old content I still value the site. While I didn't achieve the success I wanted off the bat, I haven't given up and hope that one day can I can get the site growing again.
Sometime after months, maybe even years of making new posts, adding content and spreading the word, you will find that your forum has grown to have a few hundred members, a handful of devoted regulars and no longer requires daily injections of posts from you. You reach a critical mass and your community moves forward without too much intervention from you. This is the holy grail of forum building because your members became the best advertising tool you could ever have. Word of mouth helps the site to continue to grow and attract new members. You can start creating new forums with confidence that they won't be empty for long. Best of all, you now have an audience that you can either leverage around your own products or services or start to derive revenue from through advertising, premium services or subscriptions etc.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Online Community
How do we define a bad website design? And why are there a lot of bad we design techniques being used today? For a regular internet-user, this could create a degree of annoyance. In my personal experience, bad web designs drive me crazy! How on earth could they create such a low-class site considering that there are tons of good web design information available at their disposal? Here is a list of the worst web design techniques that could drive anyone to the edge of sanity.
1. Pop-ups and Broken Back Buttons
· Don't you just hate websites that has broken your browser back button? Ugh. This can drive you crazy! But what can drive you crazier is when they start hurling pop-ups you way before you could even read the website's headline. Did they really think that bombarding us with pop ups and locking us down on their page could convince us to buy from them? I don't think so. I won't think twice in adding them to my blacklist, that's what I'm going to do!
2. A Gigantic Flash Intro Screen
· First and foremost, visitors visited your site to see what it is about-review products and services that you sell and not feast their eyes on your flash effects. This is just annoying, to the nth power, especially for someone who has a slow dial-up connection. No way are they going to wait for 5 to 10 minutes for your site to load. The easiest solution is close the browser and move to the next prospect.
3. Horizontal Scrolling
· Everybody hates horizontal scrolling. Period! It's a lot of hand work and it can drive people nuts. There's no reason for horizontal scrolling to be present in your website.
4. Snail-like loading Time
· Internet users are impatient. They want to navigate through a website and find what they want as fast as possible. A slow loading site is instantaneously banished from our "good website lists". Slow loading time is usually caused by cheap web hosting, poor coding, un-optimized and too much graphics.
5. Too Many Banner Ads
· If you want your website to be likened to a classified ads, then bombarding it with 50 banners ads is not a problem. Otherwise, you have to be careful with what you put in there. If you're selling cellphones, placing banner ads for shoes and batteries doesn't make sense at all. This could leave potential customers confused.
1. Pop-ups and Broken Back Buttons
· Don't you just hate websites that has broken your browser back button? Ugh. This can drive you crazy! But what can drive you crazier is when they start hurling pop-ups you way before you could even read the website's headline. Did they really think that bombarding us with pop ups and locking us down on their page could convince us to buy from them? I don't think so. I won't think twice in adding them to my blacklist, that's what I'm going to do!
2. A Gigantic Flash Intro Screen
· First and foremost, visitors visited your site to see what it is about-review products and services that you sell and not feast their eyes on your flash effects. This is just annoying, to the nth power, especially for someone who has a slow dial-up connection. No way are they going to wait for 5 to 10 minutes for your site to load. The easiest solution is close the browser and move to the next prospect.
3. Horizontal Scrolling
· Everybody hates horizontal scrolling. Period! It's a lot of hand work and it can drive people nuts. There's no reason for horizontal scrolling to be present in your website.
4. Snail-like loading Time
· Internet users are impatient. They want to navigate through a website and find what they want as fast as possible. A slow loading site is instantaneously banished from our "good website lists". Slow loading time is usually caused by cheap web hosting, poor coding, un-optimized and too much graphics.
5. Too Many Banner Ads
· If you want your website to be likened to a classified ads, then bombarding it with 50 banners ads is not a problem. Otherwise, you have to be careful with what you put in there. If you're selling cellphones, placing banner ads for shoes and batteries doesn't make sense at all. This could leave potential customers confused.
Local Service Providers
Don't think that because you are not a retailer or have a strong presence in your community that you do not need to develop an online presence. It is a fact that most people begin any search for an organization, a service, or a product by conducting online research. You will be invisible to this audience and may be missing out on significant business opportunity by not capitalizing on this comparatively inexpensive marketing opportunity. People simply do not use print phone directories anymore; they turn to search engines like Google®, Bing®, and Yahoo!®
Things to Consider
Get online or evaluate your current website. If you're not online yet, there is a multitude of free website builder tools available online, and typically, they offer templates that are easy to use and will help you at least have a one-page site that can explain to potential customers who you are, what you do, and instruct them on how to get in touch with you.
Compare web hosting packages to find one that fits your needs and budget now and offers flexibility for future growth.
Basic website elements:
A logo unique to your business or organization
Colors, fonts, images coordinated to unify your brand
Contact information
Clear outline of your services and service areas
A brief outline of the company or organization, including a mission statement or vision if relevant
For search engine optimization purposes, you will want the page or pages have a sufficient amount of content, at least 200 words per page.
Use your company name a few times, as well as identify the key terms that customers may use when looking for your company: This will make it easier to find your company locally.
Your website can also serve as a marketing tool. Once you cut your teeth on getting the site up or revising it and using your regular marketing outlets to advertise its existence, you'll be ready to accelerate your online efforts.
Marketing your Online Presence
Online marketing doesn't have to be intense or daunting. You can do a few simple things to get the ball rolling, then proceed as time, budget and skills develop.
Submit the site to directories
Register your site with Google. This will allow your site to appear when a searcher enters keywords related to your company in the search engine.
Look for directories that are industry related or locally collected. Many users may turn to these lists to find area providers of certain services. Typically, if a customer is using this method of finding service companies, they just want to get a phone number to call and speak with someone, set up an appointment, or drive to the local storefront. This plays right into your hands.
Geo-Targeting
Geo-targeting is a search engine optimization (SEO) term. It uses geographic keywords in your site content and in the behind the scenes coding of your website to make sure your site is more likely to be found by the right audience. As you add pages to your site, add content, or undertake online marketing, you'll want to make sure you target your service region with location-rich keywords (e.g., Oskaloosa Baptist ministry or Italian cultural organizations Chicago).
Geo-targeting offers two distinct advantages:
Better targeting of the right customers
Maximize your SEO dollars
SEO efforts are aimed at gaining rankings and PPC campaigns provide a way to attract people to your site. But any effort is only as good as the amount of actual business that closes. Geo-targeting to get the right customers to your site is a critical step for a small, local business. You can look at some Web hosting companies for tips to get started.
And Beyond
Once you have a website up and have begun online marketing, targeting a local audience, you can do a few other things to expand your presence, such as:
Adding pages and articles to your site regularly
Hosting a blog on your site
Contributing to other industry blogs and linking to your site
Offering online scheduling or form downloads
Things to Consider
Get online or evaluate your current website. If you're not online yet, there is a multitude of free website builder tools available online, and typically, they offer templates that are easy to use and will help you at least have a one-page site that can explain to potential customers who you are, what you do, and instruct them on how to get in touch with you.
Compare web hosting packages to find one that fits your needs and budget now and offers flexibility for future growth.
Basic website elements:
A logo unique to your business or organization
Colors, fonts, images coordinated to unify your brand
Contact information
Clear outline of your services and service areas
A brief outline of the company or organization, including a mission statement or vision if relevant
For search engine optimization purposes, you will want the page or pages have a sufficient amount of content, at least 200 words per page.
Use your company name a few times, as well as identify the key terms that customers may use when looking for your company: This will make it easier to find your company locally.
Your website can also serve as a marketing tool. Once you cut your teeth on getting the site up or revising it and using your regular marketing outlets to advertise its existence, you'll be ready to accelerate your online efforts.
Marketing your Online Presence
Online marketing doesn't have to be intense or daunting. You can do a few simple things to get the ball rolling, then proceed as time, budget and skills develop.
Submit the site to directories
Register your site with Google. This will allow your site to appear when a searcher enters keywords related to your company in the search engine.
Look for directories that are industry related or locally collected. Many users may turn to these lists to find area providers of certain services. Typically, if a customer is using this method of finding service companies, they just want to get a phone number to call and speak with someone, set up an appointment, or drive to the local storefront. This plays right into your hands.
Geo-Targeting
Geo-targeting is a search engine optimization (SEO) term. It uses geographic keywords in your site content and in the behind the scenes coding of your website to make sure your site is more likely to be found by the right audience. As you add pages to your site, add content, or undertake online marketing, you'll want to make sure you target your service region with location-rich keywords (e.g., Oskaloosa Baptist ministry or Italian cultural organizations Chicago).
Geo-targeting offers two distinct advantages:
Better targeting of the right customers
Maximize your SEO dollars
SEO efforts are aimed at gaining rankings and PPC campaigns provide a way to attract people to your site. But any effort is only as good as the amount of actual business that closes. Geo-targeting to get the right customers to your site is a critical step for a small, local business. You can look at some Web hosting companies for tips to get started.
And Beyond
Once you have a website up and have begun online marketing, targeting a local audience, you can do a few other things to expand your presence, such as:
Adding pages and articles to your site regularly
Hosting a blog on your site
Contributing to other industry blogs and linking to your site
Offering online scheduling or form downloads
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Most Popular Web
With its very inception in the web development arena, PHP has transformed the tradition in which dynamic websites were developed earlier. When a user thinks to go further with the idea of creating a dynamic website, a number of things come in his mind. These aspects include its flexibility, usability, scalability and its user friendly nature. Thanks to this widely acclaimed open source programming language that stormed the web development floor to make the web developers able enough to accomplish all above mentioned criterion with deep impact. Let's discuss the factors that make this language highly adaptable with critical web development environment.
An open source programming language: Being an open source server side programming language, PHP is available free of cost and quite easy in coding. PHP is very efficient on multi-platforms like Windows, Linux, and UNIX and recognized by the web developer community as the most suitable language for developing dynamic web pages. Due to its availability as the open source programming language, user's systems do not required much of the processor space and thus doesn't impact the system speed.
A dynamic programing language: PHP works in the close correlation of HTML in order to display dynamic contents and other related elements on the page. Only code that's written inside the its delimiters is parsed by the PHP. Anything written outside its delimiters is sent to the output directly and PHP doesn't parse it.
Less Resource utilization: Using PHP and its procedures in during the web development process doesn't require huge chunk of system resources. It loads and executes functions and processes very quickly as it uses Apache module written in C language. Working compatibility of PHP with other software is also very commanding and swift.
Dynamic Content Management:
Gone are the days when managing content was the biggest headache for the web developers. With very advent of the PHP in the web development arena, creation of the dynamic content is became very simple. All one have to do is to put the entire content at a central database server. Web developers write code for fetching the contents from the database as need arise.
Below listed are some of the basic points one need to know about PHP:
Easily available coding libraries
An open source programming language
Numerous Several HTTP server interfaces
Database support with MySQL, MS SQL, Oracle, Informix, and PostgreSQL etc.
Very similar with C and java
Platform compatibility
An open source programming language: Being an open source server side programming language, PHP is available free of cost and quite easy in coding. PHP is very efficient on multi-platforms like Windows, Linux, and UNIX and recognized by the web developer community as the most suitable language for developing dynamic web pages. Due to its availability as the open source programming language, user's systems do not required much of the processor space and thus doesn't impact the system speed.
A dynamic programing language: PHP works in the close correlation of HTML in order to display dynamic contents and other related elements on the page. Only code that's written inside the its delimiters is parsed by the PHP. Anything written outside its delimiters is sent to the output directly and PHP doesn't parse it.
Less Resource utilization: Using PHP and its procedures in during the web development process doesn't require huge chunk of system resources. It loads and executes functions and processes very quickly as it uses Apache module written in C language. Working compatibility of PHP with other software is also very commanding and swift.
Dynamic Content Management:
Gone are the days when managing content was the biggest headache for the web developers. With very advent of the PHP in the web development arena, creation of the dynamic content is became very simple. All one have to do is to put the entire content at a central database server. Web developers write code for fetching the contents from the database as need arise.
Below listed are some of the basic points one need to know about PHP:
Easily available coding libraries
An open source programming language
Numerous Several HTTP server interfaces
Database support with MySQL, MS SQL, Oracle, Informix, and PostgreSQL etc.
Very similar with C and java
Platform compatibility
Money Online
Web 2.0 is a modern platform that allows people to connect, interact with the websites and with each other and share information online. So, Web 2.0 encompasses blogs, social network sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and also the social bookmarking sites like Digg, Tumblr, StumbleUpon, etc. What affiliate marketers need to do to assist their quest to make money online is to harness all of this Web 2.0 traffic to their advantage in affiliate sales.
Every single affiliate marketer loves nothing more than free traffic and Web 2.0 has enabled this to be a huge possibility. In fact Social networking has become a fundamental part of any affiliate marketers Arsenal.
The idea is to promote your products and not pay once cent for advertising by getting your squeeze page URL around the most popular of the Web 2.0 community. As you do this it gets passed around by the community and creates highly target traffic back links to your website.
There are still many thousands of marketers who do no use this method and prefer to pay for their traffic and they are really loosing out on the power of Web 2.0. To start you need to sign up to most popular of the free account sites and start to build your Web 2.0 community with links for your website, where hopefully you will then collect subscribers. In addition you can create multiple user profiles and link them to one another through the URL links. By creating multiple user profiles for related topics, you drive your website ranking upwards.
These sites are also great place to place videos. Where millions of people will share the ones that appeal to them, which spreads your message around the community, which should drive traffic to your website.
Every single affiliate marketer loves nothing more than free traffic and Web 2.0 has enabled this to be a huge possibility. In fact Social networking has become a fundamental part of any affiliate marketers Arsenal.
The idea is to promote your products and not pay once cent for advertising by getting your squeeze page URL around the most popular of the Web 2.0 community. As you do this it gets passed around by the community and creates highly target traffic back links to your website.
There are still many thousands of marketers who do no use this method and prefer to pay for their traffic and they are really loosing out on the power of Web 2.0. To start you need to sign up to most popular of the free account sites and start to build your Web 2.0 community with links for your website, where hopefully you will then collect subscribers. In addition you can create multiple user profiles and link them to one another through the URL links. By creating multiple user profiles for related topics, you drive your website ranking upwards.
These sites are also great place to place videos. Where millions of people will share the ones that appeal to them, which spreads your message around the community, which should drive traffic to your website.
Local Service Providers
Don't think that because you are not a retailer or have a strong presence in your community that you do not need to develop an online presence. It is a fact that most people begin any search for an organization, a service, or a product by conducting online research. You will be invisible to this audience and may be missing out on significant business opportunity by not capitalizing on this comparatively inexpensive marketing opportunity. People simply do not use print phone directories anymore; they turn to search engines like Google®, Bing®, and Yahoo!®
Things to Consider
Get online or evaluate your current website. If you're not online yet, there is a multitude of free website builder tools available online, and typically, they offer templates that are easy to use and will help you at least have a one-page site that can explain to potential customers who you are, what you do, and instruct them on how to get in touch with you.
Compare web hosting packages to find one that fits your needs and budget now and offers flexibility for future growth.
Basic website elements:
A logo unique to your business or organization
Colors, fonts, images coordinated to unify your brand
Contact information
Clear outline of your services and service areas
A brief outline of the company or organization, including a mission statement or vision if relevant
For search engine optimization purposes, you will want the page or pages have a sufficient amount of content, at least 200 words per page.
Use your company name a few times, as well as identify the key terms that customers may use when looking for your company: This will make it easier to find your company locally.
Your website can also serve as a marketing tool. Once you cut your teeth on getting the site up or revising it and using your regular marketing outlets to advertise its existence, you'll be ready to accelerate your online efforts.
Marketing your Online Presence
Online marketing doesn't have to be intense or daunting. You can do a few simple things to get the ball rolling, then proceed as time, budget and skills develop.
Submit the site to directories
Register your site with Google. This will allow your site to appear when a searcher enters keywords related to your company in the search engine.
Look for directories that are industry related or locally collected. Many users may turn to these lists to find area providers of certain services. Typically, if a customer is using this method of finding service companies, they just want to get a phone number to call and speak with someone, set up an appointment, or drive to the local storefront. This plays right into your hands.
Geo-Targeting
Geo-targeting is a search engine optimization (SEO) term. It uses geographic keywords in your site content and in the behind the scenes coding of your website to make sure your site is more likely to be found by the right audience. As you add pages to your site, add content, or undertake online marketing, you'll want to make sure you target your service region with location-rich keywords (e.g., Oskaloosa Baptist ministry or Italian cultural organizations Chicago).
Geo-targeting offers two distinct advantages:
Better targeting of the right customers
Maximize your SEO dollars
SEO efforts are aimed at gaining rankings and PPC campaigns provide a way to attract people to your site. But any effort is only as good as the amount of actual business that closes. Geo-targeting to get the right customers to your site is a critical step for a small, local business. You can look at some Web hosting companies for tips to get started.
And Beyond
Once you have a website up and have begun online marketing, targeting a local audience, you can do a few other things to expand your presence, such as:
Adding pages and articles to your site regularly
Hosting a blog on your site
Contributing to other industry blogs and linking to your site
Offering online scheduling or form downloads
Things to Consider
Get online or evaluate your current website. If you're not online yet, there is a multitude of free website builder tools available online, and typically, they offer templates that are easy to use and will help you at least have a one-page site that can explain to potential customers who you are, what you do, and instruct them on how to get in touch with you.
Compare web hosting packages to find one that fits your needs and budget now and offers flexibility for future growth.
Basic website elements:
A logo unique to your business or organization
Colors, fonts, images coordinated to unify your brand
Contact information
Clear outline of your services and service areas
A brief outline of the company or organization, including a mission statement or vision if relevant
For search engine optimization purposes, you will want the page or pages have a sufficient amount of content, at least 200 words per page.
Use your company name a few times, as well as identify the key terms that customers may use when looking for your company: This will make it easier to find your company locally.
Your website can also serve as a marketing tool. Once you cut your teeth on getting the site up or revising it and using your regular marketing outlets to advertise its existence, you'll be ready to accelerate your online efforts.
Marketing your Online Presence
Online marketing doesn't have to be intense or daunting. You can do a few simple things to get the ball rolling, then proceed as time, budget and skills develop.
Submit the site to directories
Register your site with Google. This will allow your site to appear when a searcher enters keywords related to your company in the search engine.
Look for directories that are industry related or locally collected. Many users may turn to these lists to find area providers of certain services. Typically, if a customer is using this method of finding service companies, they just want to get a phone number to call and speak with someone, set up an appointment, or drive to the local storefront. This plays right into your hands.
Geo-Targeting
Geo-targeting is a search engine optimization (SEO) term. It uses geographic keywords in your site content and in the behind the scenes coding of your website to make sure your site is more likely to be found by the right audience. As you add pages to your site, add content, or undertake online marketing, you'll want to make sure you target your service region with location-rich keywords (e.g., Oskaloosa Baptist ministry or Italian cultural organizations Chicago).
Geo-targeting offers two distinct advantages:
Better targeting of the right customers
Maximize your SEO dollars
SEO efforts are aimed at gaining rankings and PPC campaigns provide a way to attract people to your site. But any effort is only as good as the amount of actual business that closes. Geo-targeting to get the right customers to your site is a critical step for a small, local business. You can look at some Web hosting companies for tips to get started.
And Beyond
Once you have a website up and have begun online marketing, targeting a local audience, you can do a few other things to expand your presence, such as:
Adding pages and articles to your site regularly
Hosting a blog on your site
Contributing to other industry blogs and linking to your site
Offering online scheduling or form downloads
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Community Websites
In this article I will discuss how important is it to build community websites rather than straight forward sales pitches. Selling online is about bringing people together, not about stuffing products down your visitors throwts and expecting them to buy from you.
We have conditioned our minds all of our lives to accept advertising billboards, radio ads, newspaper ads, commercials, and all sorts of other advertising materials wherever we go. The same applies on the internet. This "conditioning" has enabled us to see past all the ads and look directly for the pertinant information that we are seeking.
People who are new to the internet are more likely to click on your ads for no apparent reason but to simply search and keep searching. Others that have beed online for years now, tend not to pay attention to as many ads on a daily basis like they used to.
If you are serious about making money online without having to spend too much of your budget, create a "community online". It is in our nature as human beings to want to belong, or to be involved within a community setting. Communities come in all shapes & sizes and are not limited to gender, race, nationality, or religion. A community can cater to whatever topic you wish and welcome whomever you desire.
Same concept applies to your website!
Building a community within your website is the key to increasing your business, keeping visitors coming back, and keeping your advertising budget in the bank. Show your visitors that you aren't just here on the internet to sell them something. For example, we (Smartads), we are here to teach what we know about internet marketing. By teaching, we too learn more, gain more business, and attract new visitors.
RESIDUAL TRAFFIC IS THE KEY!
As i've always mentioned to my clients & readers, getting people to your website is the easy part. Anyone with a $500 credit card can get traffic to their website, it's keeping them there and getting your visitors to come back on their own time is what makes owning a website a dificult proposition.
Visitors always come back to communities they can relate to!
I always to go back to internet marketing communities online like:
www.webpronews.com
www.sitepronews.com
www.searchenginewatch.com
and so on... There are many internet marketing resources available for business owners. We are fortunate to have access to the vast amount of resources that we do, in order to increase our business & to increase our knowledge.
More resources online also increases competition. There are literally millions of websites out there and many of them might possibly be your competitors. Without building a community, people won't remember who you are, or what it is that you do. Infact, if you are spending all of your money on banner ads, pay per click advertising, affiliates, and other marketing areas online, and at the same time you aren't paying attention to increasing your home base, when your advertising budget runs out so too will the bulk of your traffic.
If your website isn't good enough, your sales won't be good enough. Granted; building a website can be very time consuming but just remember that you don't need to create an empire over night. Just a little here, a little there, and before you know it, it all adds up to something you can be proud of. Over time, your website traffic will constantly be increasing.
PLEASE NOTE: If you stop advertising, your traffic won't grow. Growing your website is all part of the whole plan.
What do we need to create a community website?
You always want to add extras to your site that interest you. By doing so, you will also attract people with similar interests and help to bridge the credibility gap online.
You can always add these to your website:
Personal blog
Helpful tips
Mini-ebook courses (on how to be a better client for you)
Other people's articles
Chat forum (requires a lot of maintenance & promotion)
Free business directory listings
Family albums for users
Fun online questionnaires
Mind benders
Games
Contests (with actual prizes)
"How to" articles
Government resources
Local community resources
Support local companies & vice versa
I think we can now get a sense of what building a "community" website means. The key is to take your industry (even if it is boring), and teach someone about what it is that you do. The internet allows us to take in more information than we could ever imagine. There is always someone out there who wants to learn about your industry.
The key is to add on a little at a time. Talk to your web designer. Try and find unique little ways to build a community website online. Ask people what they look for within your industry. After time, you will know what it takes to keep creating more for your company online, and your wallet will love you for it.
Just remember the more you build, the less your advertising budget will be when you get there. Just keep it up until you get there, don't give up on yourself, your company, or your future.
We have conditioned our minds all of our lives to accept advertising billboards, radio ads, newspaper ads, commercials, and all sorts of other advertising materials wherever we go. The same applies on the internet. This "conditioning" has enabled us to see past all the ads and look directly for the pertinant information that we are seeking.
People who are new to the internet are more likely to click on your ads for no apparent reason but to simply search and keep searching. Others that have beed online for years now, tend not to pay attention to as many ads on a daily basis like they used to.
If you are serious about making money online without having to spend too much of your budget, create a "community online". It is in our nature as human beings to want to belong, or to be involved within a community setting. Communities come in all shapes & sizes and are not limited to gender, race, nationality, or religion. A community can cater to whatever topic you wish and welcome whomever you desire.
Same concept applies to your website!
Building a community within your website is the key to increasing your business, keeping visitors coming back, and keeping your advertising budget in the bank. Show your visitors that you aren't just here on the internet to sell them something. For example, we (Smartads), we are here to teach what we know about internet marketing. By teaching, we too learn more, gain more business, and attract new visitors.
RESIDUAL TRAFFIC IS THE KEY!
As i've always mentioned to my clients & readers, getting people to your website is the easy part. Anyone with a $500 credit card can get traffic to their website, it's keeping them there and getting your visitors to come back on their own time is what makes owning a website a dificult proposition.
Visitors always come back to communities they can relate to!
I always to go back to internet marketing communities online like:
www.webpronews.com
www.sitepronews.com
www.searchenginewatch.com
and so on... There are many internet marketing resources available for business owners. We are fortunate to have access to the vast amount of resources that we do, in order to increase our business & to increase our knowledge.
More resources online also increases competition. There are literally millions of websites out there and many of them might possibly be your competitors. Without building a community, people won't remember who you are, or what it is that you do. Infact, if you are spending all of your money on banner ads, pay per click advertising, affiliates, and other marketing areas online, and at the same time you aren't paying attention to increasing your home base, when your advertising budget runs out so too will the bulk of your traffic.
If your website isn't good enough, your sales won't be good enough. Granted; building a website can be very time consuming but just remember that you don't need to create an empire over night. Just a little here, a little there, and before you know it, it all adds up to something you can be proud of. Over time, your website traffic will constantly be increasing.
PLEASE NOTE: If you stop advertising, your traffic won't grow. Growing your website is all part of the whole plan.
What do we need to create a community website?
You always want to add extras to your site that interest you. By doing so, you will also attract people with similar interests and help to bridge the credibility gap online.
You can always add these to your website:
Personal blog
Helpful tips
Mini-ebook courses (on how to be a better client for you)
Other people's articles
Chat forum (requires a lot of maintenance & promotion)
Free business directory listings
Family albums for users
Fun online questionnaires
Mind benders
Games
Contests (with actual prizes)
"How to" articles
Government resources
Local community resources
Support local companies & vice versa
I think we can now get a sense of what building a "community" website means. The key is to take your industry (even if it is boring), and teach someone about what it is that you do. The internet allows us to take in more information than we could ever imagine. There is always someone out there who wants to learn about your industry.
The key is to add on a little at a time. Talk to your web designer. Try and find unique little ways to build a community website online. Ask people what they look for within your industry. After time, you will know what it takes to keep creating more for your company online, and your wallet will love you for it.
Just remember the more you build, the less your advertising budget will be when you get there. Just keep it up until you get there, don't give up on yourself, your company, or your future.
Forum Community
Forums and online communities are excellent additions to websites that make them interesting and informative. Forums provide a means for your website's visitors to interact with one another to discuss about anything they wish, or about products and services you are offering. With human activity on your forums, visitors are more inclined to stay and interact with other members. What your forum members post may be added content to your website as they bring with them unique knowledge and experiences which are added to your website, thus expanding your offerings. Other visitors who are reading these forums may find information useful and stay to learn more or join the forum in order to ask the other members of the forum.
The most successful forums turn a website ‘sticky’. A sticky website is one in which surfers are interested in visiting over and over again. One reason for the stickiness of a website is the content available, and forums have information that is updated frequently if members are very active. Visitors transform from one-time browsers to residents and regulars of the website just to check out what is new and what others have to say. A “sticky” website also attracts more visitors as members of your forum grow with the community and spread your website’s URL to friends and contacts. This word-of-mouth marketing is priceless and can very often generate a lot of traffic to your website with almost zero costs. These new visitors who become members then continue to spread the word about your forum community and very soon you would have a thriving community that supports and feeds your website with new traffic.
In addition to turning a website sticky so that visitors come back often to find new information and content, forums offer additional content that may improve your search engine ranking. As every webmaster knows, a tremendous amount of traffic can come from a first position ranking in the search engines such as Google, Yahoo or MSN. These 3 search engines account for almost 100% of the web-searches done by people on the net. Being ranked number one for the search term that your site is optimized for, such as the keyword “sports shoes” will almost ensure that everyone who searches for that keyword would click on the first returned result from the search engine and land on your website. If your website sells sports shoes, you can almost guarantee that that tremendous amount of traffic can be turned to huge sales and revenues. So by adding a forum where members can discuss sports shoes on your website, you are generating content related to “sports shoes”. These content pages are then indexed by search engines and increase the number of pages that your site has on the search engine. With such relevant content, other sites linking to your content and the content itself will aid in your climbing of the search engine rankings.
The most successful forums turn a website ‘sticky’. A sticky website is one in which surfers are interested in visiting over and over again. One reason for the stickiness of a website is the content available, and forums have information that is updated frequently if members are very active. Visitors transform from one-time browsers to residents and regulars of the website just to check out what is new and what others have to say. A “sticky” website also attracts more visitors as members of your forum grow with the community and spread your website’s URL to friends and contacts. This word-of-mouth marketing is priceless and can very often generate a lot of traffic to your website with almost zero costs. These new visitors who become members then continue to spread the word about your forum community and very soon you would have a thriving community that supports and feeds your website with new traffic.
In addition to turning a website sticky so that visitors come back often to find new information and content, forums offer additional content that may improve your search engine ranking. As every webmaster knows, a tremendous amount of traffic can come from a first position ranking in the search engines such as Google, Yahoo or MSN. These 3 search engines account for almost 100% of the web-searches done by people on the net. Being ranked number one for the search term that your site is optimized for, such as the keyword “sports shoes” will almost ensure that everyone who searches for that keyword would click on the first returned result from the search engine and land on your website. If your website sells sports shoes, you can almost guarantee that that tremendous amount of traffic can be turned to huge sales and revenues. So by adding a forum where members can discuss sports shoes on your website, you are generating content related to “sports shoes”. These content pages are then indexed by search engines and increase the number of pages that your site has on the search engine. With such relevant content, other sites linking to your content and the content itself will aid in your climbing of the search engine rankings.
Church Website
Building a sense of community among church members is valuable to church leaders. Networking through interactive social media sites like Facebook and LinkedIn are popular tools that people use—including church people—to stay in touch. An interactive church website provides an opportunity for both. Such a site can be customized to support the unique ministries of an individual church.
Here’s why you may want to consider an interactive website for your church:
An interactive website combines a church picture directory with social media
Picture directories acquaint church members with one another by helping them connect names to faces. Social networking media sites like Facebook and LinkedIn include that feature along with the capability of interactive communication. Combining these features in an interactive church website creates an environment that improves recognition and encourages personal interaction among members that helps build healthy relationships.
An interactive website improves organizational communication
Along with encouraging interpersonal communication, an interactive church website also enhances the communication of organizational information. Telephone and e-mail lists are easily generated and announcements can be quickly sent to all members or targeted to special groups and committees.
The site can include other helpful communication tools as well, like online calendars, department information pages and customized pages that promote opportunities and serve particular church ministries.
An interactive website is easy to administrate & update
An interactive church website de-centralizes data entry by allowing members to enter and update their own pictures and personal information. This removes the burden from administrative staff who are normally responsible for assembling picture directories (that are quickly outdated), and managing information through client-server applications, spreadsheets and other database programs.
The information itself, however, is centralized and easy to access (based on security clearance) from anywhere. The interactive website can also be updated in real time so pictures and contact information are current and relevant.
An interactive website increases security
The Internet is full of spammers and other predators. It’s hard to be sure the person you’re communicating with is who they claim to be. An interactive church website controls the environment in order to maintain propriety and insure personal integrity.
It also secures information. The common practice of e-mailing Excel Spreadsheets can expose sensitive and personal information that puts a member’s identity at risk. A password protected, interactive website secures information and makes sure the right people have access to it.
An interactive website assists in enlisting volunteers
Enlisting and maintaining volunteers is a challenging and time consuming task. Often, filling the position with a person takes priority over finding the right person. An interactive website will help by allowing you to conduct searches based on pre-defined criteria.
You can search by hobbies, professions, volunteer experience and other search criteria to identify talents and abilities. You’ll more effectively match the right person to the right job, which will increase volunteer longevity and overall ministry effectiveness.
An interactive church website is only a tool. But it’s an interactive tool that promotes and improves the communication that is essential to building church community.
Here’s why you may want to consider an interactive website for your church:
An interactive website combines a church picture directory with social media
Picture directories acquaint church members with one another by helping them connect names to faces. Social networking media sites like Facebook and LinkedIn include that feature along with the capability of interactive communication. Combining these features in an interactive church website creates an environment that improves recognition and encourages personal interaction among members that helps build healthy relationships.
An interactive website improves organizational communication
Along with encouraging interpersonal communication, an interactive church website also enhances the communication of organizational information. Telephone and e-mail lists are easily generated and announcements can be quickly sent to all members or targeted to special groups and committees.
The site can include other helpful communication tools as well, like online calendars, department information pages and customized pages that promote opportunities and serve particular church ministries.
An interactive website is easy to administrate & update
An interactive church website de-centralizes data entry by allowing members to enter and update their own pictures and personal information. This removes the burden from administrative staff who are normally responsible for assembling picture directories (that are quickly outdated), and managing information through client-server applications, spreadsheets and other database programs.
The information itself, however, is centralized and easy to access (based on security clearance) from anywhere. The interactive website can also be updated in real time so pictures and contact information are current and relevant.
An interactive website increases security
The Internet is full of spammers and other predators. It’s hard to be sure the person you’re communicating with is who they claim to be. An interactive church website controls the environment in order to maintain propriety and insure personal integrity.
It also secures information. The common practice of e-mailing Excel Spreadsheets can expose sensitive and personal information that puts a member’s identity at risk. A password protected, interactive website secures information and makes sure the right people have access to it.
An interactive website assists in enlisting volunteers
Enlisting and maintaining volunteers is a challenging and time consuming task. Often, filling the position with a person takes priority over finding the right person. An interactive website will help by allowing you to conduct searches based on pre-defined criteria.
You can search by hobbies, professions, volunteer experience and other search criteria to identify talents and abilities. You’ll more effectively match the right person to the right job, which will increase volunteer longevity and overall ministry effectiveness.
An interactive church website is only a tool. But it’s an interactive tool that promotes and improves the communication that is essential to building church community.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Avoiding Pitfalls
SMM or Social Media Marketing is about using our existing skills and expertise, to develop social media skills, to leverage the Social Web to promote and market our products and services.
Marketing has its roots in word-of-mouth conversations that have connected buyers and sellers for thousands of years. Now many of us call ourselves Professional Marketers. One's reputation has always been built on experience. With the introduction of modern advertising, mass communications, and public relations, the individual conversations that drove the sales cycle were all but buried. The Marketers gained control over the message with every professionally created tag-line, PowerPoint slide deck, and ad. As one-way mass communication grew, so did the Marketers control.
Now the pendulum is swinging back; individual voices are once again being heard and asserting their primal value. The voices have taken on a new roll by creating collective conversations expressed on the internet. The social Web - Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, or social networks, along with blogs and conversational communities such as Seesmic and Twitter - is bring the consumers voice into the collective conversation in a big way, and those voices are being heard. As a result, some Chief Marketing Officers now find themselves in a tough spot. Markets, at all levels, not only need to deal with the fragmentation and new landscapes in traditional marketing channels, but they are now looking at the takeover of the brand communications by consumers as they restate, remix, and publish how they, themselves, see the brand and product. When they agree and boost your message, it is the wonderful, but if they do not, things look bad real fast.
Building on the individual freedom and empowerment that the Internet is known for, consumers are actively talking online with each other, to share stories and information about anything and everything from toys and tools to food and drink. As they do so, they are amplifying and reinforcing marketing efforts or beating marketers at their own game by simply sharing their experiences and thoughts with each other. Because customers are more likely to trust conversations between themselves more than any form of advertising, marketers are now faced with the advertising message being routinely held up for verification in online communities where they or their PR and ad agencies have a very small amount of control, if any. For the marketers and agencies who are very much used to control - this is a game changer.
This series of training is about teaching the skills needed to properly use the Social Web to your marketing and business advantage, and how to join in and participate as a marketer, by incorporating the underlying behaviors that drive the Social Web, enabling you to make marketing and business plans. t's about giving up control - you can not control social conversations - while asserting influence by becoming a respected member of those communities that matter most to you. This training will impress upon you, the importance of the connection between participation and influence, and help you see what is on the horizon. You will see many examples of trends and best practices all laid out and the motivation to create winning plans.
This editorial is part of the Commanding The Social Web article series, available to the community, at no cost, and can be easily found on the World wide web. I know you will want to find and read the whole series, to capture the triumph that can be yours from your interaction with the web community. You will be choreographing your own success on the Social Web.
Read more: http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/Avoiding-Pitfalls-Of-Social-Media-Marketing----Flourishing--Social-Media-Marketing-Comunities/1201674#ixzz0pczxRNjP
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution No Derivatives
Marketing has its roots in word-of-mouth conversations that have connected buyers and sellers for thousands of years. Now many of us call ourselves Professional Marketers. One's reputation has always been built on experience. With the introduction of modern advertising, mass communications, and public relations, the individual conversations that drove the sales cycle were all but buried. The Marketers gained control over the message with every professionally created tag-line, PowerPoint slide deck, and ad. As one-way mass communication grew, so did the Marketers control.
Now the pendulum is swinging back; individual voices are once again being heard and asserting their primal value. The voices have taken on a new roll by creating collective conversations expressed on the internet. The social Web - Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, or social networks, along with blogs and conversational communities such as Seesmic and Twitter - is bring the consumers voice into the collective conversation in a big way, and those voices are being heard. As a result, some Chief Marketing Officers now find themselves in a tough spot. Markets, at all levels, not only need to deal with the fragmentation and new landscapes in traditional marketing channels, but they are now looking at the takeover of the brand communications by consumers as they restate, remix, and publish how they, themselves, see the brand and product. When they agree and boost your message, it is the wonderful, but if they do not, things look bad real fast.
Building on the individual freedom and empowerment that the Internet is known for, consumers are actively talking online with each other, to share stories and information about anything and everything from toys and tools to food and drink. As they do so, they are amplifying and reinforcing marketing efforts or beating marketers at their own game by simply sharing their experiences and thoughts with each other. Because customers are more likely to trust conversations between themselves more than any form of advertising, marketers are now faced with the advertising message being routinely held up for verification in online communities where they or their PR and ad agencies have a very small amount of control, if any. For the marketers and agencies who are very much used to control - this is a game changer.
This series of training is about teaching the skills needed to properly use the Social Web to your marketing and business advantage, and how to join in and participate as a marketer, by incorporating the underlying behaviors that drive the Social Web, enabling you to make marketing and business plans. t's about giving up control - you can not control social conversations - while asserting influence by becoming a respected member of those communities that matter most to you. This training will impress upon you, the importance of the connection between participation and influence, and help you see what is on the horizon. You will see many examples of trends and best practices all laid out and the motivation to create winning plans.
This editorial is part of the Commanding The Social Web article series, available to the community, at no cost, and can be easily found on the World wide web. I know you will want to find and read the whole series, to capture the triumph that can be yours from your interaction with the web community. You will be choreographing your own success on the Social Web.
Read more: http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/Avoiding-Pitfalls-Of-Social-Media-Marketing----Flourishing--Social-Media-Marketing-Comunities/1201674#ixzz0pczxRNjP
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution No Derivatives
Web Sites' Discovery
As Web sites strive to be
flashy and addictive, the drug
of choice of some is . . .
money.
A few online retailers, video
portals and gaming sites are
offering cash or cost savings
in a bid to make up ground
against Web giants such as
YouTube and Amazon.com.
E-tailer Jellyfish.com, video
site Metacafe and game site
Weblo are among the startups
using dough as a lure to snag the attention of more online users.
Success will be tough, but lessons might have been learned from the past. This
time around, e-tailers seem to be tweaking their promotions to their audience,
says Peter Kim, a Forrester Researcher analyst. That's something many failed to
do "in the last dot-com boom and bust," he said.
Offering financial incentives can work, "but it has to be tied into good content
through a good experience," Kim said.
The firms have different ways of providing financial incentives.
Madison, Wis.-based Jellyfish.com is an e-tail site, where users can search for
products and get a list of links and ads from its participating merchants. But then, if
a Jellyfish user ends up buying a product from that merchant, Jellyfish will return
to the buyer a portion of the price, generally 3% or more.
How can it do this? Basically, it gives its users a kickback from the ad revenue
Jellyfish gets from its participating vendors.
"It's been incredibly successful for a number of reasons the addictiveness, the
retention, the amount of users it has attracted," said Brian Wiegand, chief
executive and co-founder of Jellyfish.com.
The company says its users on average visit the site 18 times a month and spend
50 minutes there. "That's an eternity when you think about Internet time,"
said. Forrester's Kim agrees that both figures are high.
The site launched last year, and in October announced it had received $5 million
in funding from private equity firms Clyde Street Investments and Kegonsa Capital
Partners. Clyde Street principal Ralph Dillon, former CEO and chairman of Cost
Plus Imports, joined Jellyfish's board.
In November, Jellyfish has added a gaming element to its site. It's a regular
feature it calls Smack Shopping. Several times a day the site will auction a random
item at a continually falling price. Users can guess what the final price will be. The
winner gets to "spin" an electronic wheel to win prizes that have included $1,000 in
cash and a Nintendo Wii video game player.
"Smack Shopping is really using advertising to create fun, to create
entertainment," said Mark McGuire, Jellyfish's president and other co-founder.
"Over the next couple years more and more creative kinds of advertising are going
to be invented and brought to the mainstream that sort of invites consumers in."
The company says Smack Shopping has sold more than 1,000 goods at a 44%
average discount.
Jellyfish also reaching out to Web communities such as MySpace and blogs,
letting users of those sites know about its Smack Shopping and other "shopping
events."
For 4-year-old YouTube rival Metacafe, the money lure goes to the amateur
makers of videos that prove to be popular. Its producer rewards program awards
$5 for each 1,000 clicks a video gets, assuming the video adheres to a few
company rules. The company says one person has made more than $26,000 this
way. Its home page lists the weekly top earners.
With more than 24 million unique monthly visitors, Metacafe is a leading video site.
The company, with offices in Israel and Palo Alto, Calif., has secured $20 million in
funding, mostly from big-name venture firms Accel Partners and Benchmark
Capital.
"We're growing because we have a great audience and great content," said Erick
Hachenburg, CEO of Metacafe. "We're seeing revenue growing month over
month, quarter over quarter. And advertisers want to be associated with great
content. Producer Rewards provides the incentive to have more great content, so
it's been very successful for us."
Hachenburg says the site's traffic rose 26% in March vs. a year earlier, which he
partly credits to the release of the site's "Caf Confidential" competition. It offered a
$1,500 shopping spree to clothing retailer American Apparel for the best video.
Weblo is also using a gaming element, and the chance to earn money, to try to
build an audience that will click on the ads placed on the site. The 6-month-old
startup is building a site where people pay real money for virtual real estate and
then try to attract visitors to that real estate.
The site, which describes itself as "monopoly on steroids," will share some ad
revenue with some members of its community.
"We're paying people to be part of the community," said Sean Morrow, Weblo's
director of marketing.
The site's sales include its virtual state of California, which it says netted $53,000.
Morrow said people use their Weblo sites as places to blog, provide links, make
profiles, anything that might generate traffic. But the key to financial rewards is to
get people to click ads, not just look at them.
"We're moving to an era of online advertising that's moving to actions, not just
page views," Forrester's Kim said. "In the greater scheme of marketing, marketers
need to be more accountable for their spending and where their leads come from
and how efficient their leads are."
s
flashy and addictive, the drug
of choice of some is . . .
money.
A few online retailers, video
portals and gaming sites are
offering cash or cost savings
in a bid to make up ground
against Web giants such as
YouTube and Amazon.com.
E-tailer Jellyfish.com, video
site Metacafe and game site
Weblo are among the startups
using dough as a lure to snag the attention of more online users.
Success will be tough, but lessons might have been learned from the past. This
time around, e-tailers seem to be tweaking their promotions to their audience,
says Peter Kim, a Forrester Researcher analyst. That's something many failed to
do "in the last dot-com boom and bust," he said.
Offering financial incentives can work, "but it has to be tied into good content
through a good experience," Kim said.
The firms have different ways of providing financial incentives.
Madison, Wis.-based Jellyfish.com is an e-tail site, where users can search for
products and get a list of links and ads from its participating merchants. But then, if
a Jellyfish user ends up buying a product from that merchant, Jellyfish will return
to the buyer a portion of the price, generally 3% or more.
How can it do this? Basically, it gives its users a kickback from the ad revenue
Jellyfish gets from its participating vendors.
"It's been incredibly successful for a number of reasons the addictiveness, the
retention, the amount of users it has attracted," said Brian Wiegand, chief
executive and co-founder of Jellyfish.com.
The company says its users on average visit the site 18 times a month and spend
50 minutes there. "That's an eternity when you think about Internet time,"
said. Forrester's Kim agrees that both figures are high.
The site launched last year, and in October announced it had received $5 million
in funding from private equity firms Clyde Street Investments and Kegonsa Capital
Partners. Clyde Street principal Ralph Dillon, former CEO and chairman of Cost
Plus Imports, joined Jellyfish's board.
In November, Jellyfish has added a gaming element to its site. It's a regular
feature it calls Smack Shopping. Several times a day the site will auction a random
item at a continually falling price. Users can guess what the final price will be. The
winner gets to "spin" an electronic wheel to win prizes that have included $1,000 in
cash and a Nintendo Wii video game player.
"Smack Shopping is really using advertising to create fun, to create
entertainment," said Mark McGuire, Jellyfish's president and other co-founder.
"Over the next couple years more and more creative kinds of advertising are going
to be invented and brought to the mainstream that sort of invites consumers in."
The company says Smack Shopping has sold more than 1,000 goods at a 44%
average discount.
Jellyfish also reaching out to Web communities such as MySpace and blogs,
letting users of those sites know about its Smack Shopping and other "shopping
events."
For 4-year-old YouTube rival Metacafe, the money lure goes to the amateur
makers of videos that prove to be popular. Its producer rewards program awards
$5 for each 1,000 clicks a video gets, assuming the video adheres to a few
company rules. The company says one person has made more than $26,000 this
way. Its home page lists the weekly top earners.
With more than 24 million unique monthly visitors, Metacafe is a leading video site.
The company, with offices in Israel and Palo Alto, Calif., has secured $20 million in
funding, mostly from big-name venture firms Accel Partners and Benchmark
Capital.
"We're growing because we have a great audience and great content," said Erick
Hachenburg, CEO of Metacafe. "We're seeing revenue growing month over
month, quarter over quarter. And advertisers want to be associated with great
content. Producer Rewards provides the incentive to have more great content, so
it's been very successful for us."
Hachenburg says the site's traffic rose 26% in March vs. a year earlier, which he
partly credits to the release of the site's "Caf Confidential" competition. It offered a
$1,500 shopping spree to clothing retailer American Apparel for the best video.
Weblo is also using a gaming element, and the chance to earn money, to try to
build an audience that will click on the ads placed on the site. The 6-month-old
startup is building a site where people pay real money for virtual real estate and
then try to attract visitors to that real estate.
The site, which describes itself as "monopoly on steroids," will share some ad
revenue with some members of its community.
"We're paying people to be part of the community," said Sean Morrow, Weblo's
director of marketing.
The site's sales include its virtual state of California, which it says netted $53,000.
Morrow said people use their Weblo sites as places to blog, provide links, make
profiles, anything that might generate traffic. But the key to financial rewards is to
get people to click ads, not just look at them.
"We're moving to an era of online advertising that's moving to actions, not just
page views," Forrester's Kim said. "In the greater scheme of marketing, marketers
need to be more accountable for their spending and where their leads come from
and how efficient their leads are."
s
Free Web Traffic
We all know that traffic is the most important thing for a successful Internet business firm. There are m reliable ways to jumpstart your traffic flows even though most of them would cost some money. Moreover, some of them will save you hundreds or even thousands of dollars. The first strategy alone can produce you through $2,000 equivalent of free-targeted traffic.
Well, here are the 7 surefire formulas capable of skyrocket your traffic commencing from today.
1. Free Pay Per Click Marketing That Works
The Adwords by Google, Yahoo's Overture and many other pay per click search engines provide superb sources of targeted Internet. They are very truly popular among web marketers. However, as the pay per click search engine managers want to increase their buyer base so they require persuading people like you that pay per click advertising surely works.
Here is the good news, there are dozens of pay per click search engines who will give you up to $100 in free credits to endorse that pay per click marketing will work for you. To claim your credits all you require do is visit the many engines and web directories and sign up. There are no catches and it will not cost you whatever accepts your time. It could not be simpler to accumulate such free pay per click marketing.
2. Use remunerative Keywords Or Keyword Niches For Your Site's Content
Generally, internet users use search engines to find what they are looking for. Search engines in return use keyword rankings to divulge relevant search results. If you would like your site to appear at the most recognized lines of search engine results, you must use proper keywords and keyword phrases.
Try to take into service the most remunerative, of higher demand keywords at your site content. You could write your own content or you could hire somebody to do it for you. If you are generating articles on yourself, you have to make it more entertaining and informative. In doing so, you can get high rankings in search engine results and potent incoming traffic without any expenses.
3. Exchange Links With Partner Sites
Another superb idea is trading links with partner, or even competitor sites. This works well mainly when both sites feature an identical niche. Exchanging or trading links with other sites, both of them could benefit. When one site characteristics another sites link, they will provide one another with the traffic they both produce.
The efforts are very beneficial because it sounds like both sides are in employment to produce much enhanced traffic. The more links exchanged with more sites the more traffic might be expected. Again, you do not have to spend a cent. All you have to do is to communicate to another webmaster and to reach with him an arrangement.
4. Write Articles And Publish Them Across The Internet
Many sites offer free submission and posting of your articles. You had better to submit articles to sites containing an identical subject that your site deals in. If you sell computers, write press releases and articles about computers and personal computer parts. Try to provide helpful considerations guides and good advice. Making articles that contain good service and know-how would bring the needed mileage your traffic flow requirement.
When people find in your article something of interest, you have good chances of going after the track by finding out where the article originated. It lasts for you just to attach a brief description of your site or service at the closing of the article and to include a link.
5. Join Forums, Blogs And Other Online Communities
You can profit from online forums, blogs and web communities. The superb thing about forums and online communities is that you can target a particular group that fits the certain demographic that you are looking for. You can discuss about multiple things about the goods or services that you represent or offer.
With online communities and forums, you can create recognition for your firm. You must capture the market niche you represent and show your expertise and credibility. When you created a good foundation for your site, people will trust you and your web business. Your buyers will pass their trust and credibility to many people all through the Internet. Traffic will definitely increase for the reason that they know that you can provide what they require.
6. Offer Newsletters Or Ezines
You can also make usage of newsletters. Provide people with a catalog of your products and attractive useful articles. If your texts are really attractive and entertaining, more people will register for your newsletter and suggest it to other people. The more people who signs up for your newsletter, the more people will be willing to arrive to your site. Therefore, if you arouse the curiosity of your buyers they would be pushed to help you growing your traffic.
7. Advantages Of Viral Marketing
Viral marketing is a promotional technique that enables you to spread the word about your firm and product without any expenses. All it takes is to provide a great idea, a good addicting game, a funny story, many ideas are even out there. Start a gossip or a buzz, many web projects are advertise by the utilization of scandals and rumors to make them more generalized.
In addition, you can provide your web site visitors with content they would not read anywhere else. People will hold on longer at your web site to read the unique content. With this technique, people are infecting with the creativity and entertainment of the website content and they will pass it on to numerous people.
Each of the above-mentioned formulas can drive streams of free traffic to your website. All it takes is a bit of effort and generalized person hours. Learn all you can about the formulas depicted here and you will soon have a site with an excellent traffic flow without the common costs that come with it.
Well, here are the 7 surefire formulas capable of skyrocket your traffic commencing from today.
1. Free Pay Per Click Marketing That Works
The Adwords by Google, Yahoo's Overture and many other pay per click search engines provide superb sources of targeted Internet. They are very truly popular among web marketers. However, as the pay per click search engine managers want to increase their buyer base so they require persuading people like you that pay per click advertising surely works.
Here is the good news, there are dozens of pay per click search engines who will give you up to $100 in free credits to endorse that pay per click marketing will work for you. To claim your credits all you require do is visit the many engines and web directories and sign up. There are no catches and it will not cost you whatever accepts your time. It could not be simpler to accumulate such free pay per click marketing.
2. Use remunerative Keywords Or Keyword Niches For Your Site's Content
Generally, internet users use search engines to find what they are looking for. Search engines in return use keyword rankings to divulge relevant search results. If you would like your site to appear at the most recognized lines of search engine results, you must use proper keywords and keyword phrases.
Try to take into service the most remunerative, of higher demand keywords at your site content. You could write your own content or you could hire somebody to do it for you. If you are generating articles on yourself, you have to make it more entertaining and informative. In doing so, you can get high rankings in search engine results and potent incoming traffic without any expenses.
3. Exchange Links With Partner Sites
Another superb idea is trading links with partner, or even competitor sites. This works well mainly when both sites feature an identical niche. Exchanging or trading links with other sites, both of them could benefit. When one site characteristics another sites link, they will provide one another with the traffic they both produce.
The efforts are very beneficial because it sounds like both sides are in employment to produce much enhanced traffic. The more links exchanged with more sites the more traffic might be expected. Again, you do not have to spend a cent. All you have to do is to communicate to another webmaster and to reach with him an arrangement.
4. Write Articles And Publish Them Across The Internet
Many sites offer free submission and posting of your articles. You had better to submit articles to sites containing an identical subject that your site deals in. If you sell computers, write press releases and articles about computers and personal computer parts. Try to provide helpful considerations guides and good advice. Making articles that contain good service and know-how would bring the needed mileage your traffic flow requirement.
When people find in your article something of interest, you have good chances of going after the track by finding out where the article originated. It lasts for you just to attach a brief description of your site or service at the closing of the article and to include a link.
5. Join Forums, Blogs And Other Online Communities
You can profit from online forums, blogs and web communities. The superb thing about forums and online communities is that you can target a particular group that fits the certain demographic that you are looking for. You can discuss about multiple things about the goods or services that you represent or offer.
With online communities and forums, you can create recognition for your firm. You must capture the market niche you represent and show your expertise and credibility. When you created a good foundation for your site, people will trust you and your web business. Your buyers will pass their trust and credibility to many people all through the Internet. Traffic will definitely increase for the reason that they know that you can provide what they require.
6. Offer Newsletters Or Ezines
You can also make usage of newsletters. Provide people with a catalog of your products and attractive useful articles. If your texts are really attractive and entertaining, more people will register for your newsletter and suggest it to other people. The more people who signs up for your newsletter, the more people will be willing to arrive to your site. Therefore, if you arouse the curiosity of your buyers they would be pushed to help you growing your traffic.
7. Advantages Of Viral Marketing
Viral marketing is a promotional technique that enables you to spread the word about your firm and product without any expenses. All it takes is to provide a great idea, a good addicting game, a funny story, many ideas are even out there. Start a gossip or a buzz, many web projects are advertise by the utilization of scandals and rumors to make them more generalized.
In addition, you can provide your web site visitors with content they would not read anywhere else. People will hold on longer at your web site to read the unique content. With this technique, people are infecting with the creativity and entertainment of the website content and they will pass it on to numerous people.
Each of the above-mentioned formulas can drive streams of free traffic to your website. All it takes is a bit of effort and generalized person hours. Learn all you can about the formulas depicted here and you will soon have a site with an excellent traffic flow without the common costs that come with it.
Sunday, April 4, 2010
How To Express Yourself
Some of the best layouts on Myspace include cute, animated graphics, videos, awesome photos and interesting blogs. Do you want to get your Myspace page seen by millions of people? Then change your boring, dull white Myspace background and Myspace layout into something that expresses your individual personality. With minimal effort, you can create a cool Myspace layout that millions of people will see. If you change your Myspace layout on a regular basis, you will keep your users guessing, always wondering what you’re up to next!
The key to success on Myspace is to keep people entertained while learning more about you. If you want to promote yourself, your business or your band, changing the Myspace graphics that you have on your profile will help your develop your style and unique individualism. It’s no small task to increase your networking potential into the millions, so creating a cool Myspace layout that everyone wants to include on their Top Friends should be your goal.
Start simple. Changing your Myspace cursor is a great way to stand out in the crowd. Everyone has the boring hand and cursor tool but you don’t have to follow the crowd! Change your Myspace cursor into a sparkly pink heart or a Japanese animation character and provide your users with a little fun when they come across your page. Add some music to your Myspace page, this will be the soundtrack that your users will hear as they search around your page, read your blogs, read your Myspace comments and check out your photos, videos and information about you.
Find a funny quiz online and paste it into your Myspace page. Your Myspace quiz will then be embedded into your page, there are millions of quizzes out there from the hilarious to the downright scary. Your users will find out more about your personality and they will have the option to take the Myspace quiz or survey themselves, get their results in Myspace code, paste it into their web page and create a circle of communication that everyone will be talking about the next day in school.
Everyone has a Myspace page these days and the most successful pages with the most friends have interesting Myspace layouts. Change your Myspace graphics to express your individuality. Using a Myspace layout generator makes this task easy, and you don’t even have to understand HTML or CSS anymore. There are so many options, it’s mind boggling! Change your Myspace background once a week to keep your friends guessing what’s coming next from your genius mind. They’ll wonder how you got such a cool, free hot Myspace layout and want to copy your style.
The Myspace editor makes it easy to change your fonts, colors and graphics to describe your mood or general attitude. If you want a cute Myspace layout one day and a hard core punk rock Myspace layout the next, it’s easy to do using a Myspace layout generator or copying the code from one of the many resouce site out there such as getonmyspace.com. Simply make your choices in the Myspace layout creator and copy the Myspace code into the “About Me” or similar section of your profile page and watch the thousands of friend requests roll in!
Myspace Profile
It’s official. Now you can pimp your Myspace page with amazing, free Myspace layouts available from resource sites such as getonmyspace.com. With some great new tools, you can change the way your page looks and feels, and you don’t have to be a computer programmer to do it! You can create unique, individual, complicated Myspace layouts with ease. It used to be that you’d have to have a pretty solid knowledge of HTML coding and CSS in order to create a unique page that surpassed most people’s limited knowledge of the Internet. Now, it isn’t true! As technology advances and becomes more user-friendly, Myspace is in on the latest in trends and provides you a simple way to include sophisticated Myspace graphics into your personal page.
Including songs on your profile is now made easier with Myspace music and Myspace music codes. Myspace music includes hundreds of thousands of major-label bands and independent musicians who have their music registered and available on all of the networks users. When you find the song you want to include on your profile, it’s easy to get the Myspace music code and drop it into the layouts editor provided by Myspace. Change your music every day if you want to! The choices are almost endless with the vast amount of new and archived music within Myspace music. Let your friends know what you are listening to and which bands you think are cool by including a song on your profile page. If you can find it within Myspace music, you can include it as part of your profile.
So, you want to make your Myspace page a cute Myspace layout? How about including a Myspace icon to your page? If you search online, you can find animated icons and photographic icons to fill your page with cuteness. Find Myspace icons from every topic! You want Japanese animation, Punk rock icons, religious icons, glitter icons or food icons? It’s all out there on the Internet. Simply search for Myspace icons and you will find millions of graphics that are available for you to include on your Myspace page. Use the Myspace code that the website provides, drop it into any section on your Myspace page and you can have tons of Myspace icons added to your page!
When you create your Myspace page, you are conveying something about your personality to millions of viewers. You can choose to keep it simple, using the pre-existing Myspace layout or you can bump it up a notch by using the free Myspace layout generator. Including a survey can be a fun element to add to your page. A Myspace survey is a great way to get your friends to communicate with each other. You can send out a Myspace survey over the Bulletin Board, your Myspace blog or paste the Myspace survey code into your page. Have fun finding out about your friends deep, dark secrets. Find out if that guy or girl has a crush on you using Myspace surveys! The free Myspace layouts provided can make your page stand out from the rest of the crowd.
MySpace Marketing Tips
Marketing tips on MySpace begins with selecting a good profile picture that should be bright and smiling and the message put up on the page should be weighty and valuable. We are very well acquainted with the famous adage ‘ first impression is the last impression’ so the same thing happens with your profile. Remember that good profile will attract people who would like to network with you and the business relation will thrive until and unless you don't turn them off. There are options to upload more photos in your page but make sure that those photos are lively.
To really get connected with people & build strong friendships - even with people you have never met and would like to be connected for long terms, there are some tips that will help you to increase you friends circumference and will also help you in which is very essential for marketing heir business.
To get connected with the people around, you need to visit the pages of the members having the same interest as yours and send them a significant message with your intents, together with your appreciation regarding the work of the same person. Practicing this on a regular basis will help you to stretch your friend circle. Use the MySpace blog function to write your thoughts about your daily work. To get more interaction with your Friends list, take digital pictures of something interesting in your life, and post the photos in your MySpace back office. You can also post a bulletin under "My Mail" with a good, short headline about your photos that might find your friend pretty interesting.
A lot of people now look at MySpace as an advertising medium, for promoting an idea or a business, or looking for a date. It takes lots of patience, persistence, and follow-up. There are some excellent marketing forums online, and they serve as great models for how to market to people. In these forums, one-person posts a question or thought and others answer or comment with no expectation of anything in return, not forgetting to attach a signature file after their name that links to another page, that may include info about your deal. You can even make comments on the pictures of MySpacers who have pictures in their back office and zero comments which is a simple way to get a conversation started. Connecting with people creates traffic and draws attention to you thus helping you to market your business.
Myspace Music
Want to jazz up your Myspace page with a better Myspace layout? It's easy to pimp your Myspace with a Myspace layout generator. Myspace is the leading social networking website on the Internet. From your little 12-year old sister to your 50-year old next door neighbor, it seems that everyone who's anyone has a Myspace page these days. Setting up your own page is very simple. All you need is a valid email address and a password and you're on your way to creating a unique, individual webpage that expresses your personality.
When you sign up with Myspace on the Myspace login page, you are entering into a phenomenon that millions of users have found to be very useful. You can find long lost friends from high school or make thousands of new friends. If you have a cool and interesting Myspace page, you will be more likely to draw the attention of millions of viewers. This can be extremely beneficial for you if you want to promote yourself, your business or your band!
If you are a band, the first thing you'll want to do is create a Myspace page for your band. Adding your music to Myspace music is a great way to gain much-needed exposure for your innovative music and broaden your audience. Your new friends can be the best marketing tool to help get your videos and music seen and heard.
Adding music to your Myspace is as simple as adding the Myspace music code into your profile and it will be instantly displayed on your profile page for all your viewers to hear. Myspace music is fast becoming a promotional tool that famous, major-label bands are using as well as your brother's new band that's been formed in the garage. Whether you have one song or two hundred songs, Myspace music can give your band Internet 'airplay' as well as exposing your music to major and independent labels. You never know, you might get a record deal if you get your music heard by the right people on Myspace.
So, having great music isn't the only way to expose yourself to the millions of users of Myspace. Having an interesting Myspace layout complete with awesome Myspace backgrounds, Myspace graphics, Myspace cursors and even Myspace quizzes or Myspace surveys are some of the myriad ways that you can create a unique webpage that will keep your users coming back for more! Your users will ask to be your friend, pass on the link to other friends and, pretty soon, you will have a network that spans into the millions. Imagine how many people can view your Myspace page in one, single day!
Using a Myspace generator to help you visualize your band's vision or simply to promote yourself or your business is an excellent marketing tool for the 21st century. Your cute Myspace layout could be the key to your success! Check out the Myspace editors,such as can be found at getonmyspace.com, to give your Myspace layout the boost it needs to develop a profile page that everyone wants to have on their 'top friends' page!
MySpace Precautions
Myspace is the hottest online communities where members can create personal websites and meet new friends or reconnect with old friends. It will continue to be pleasurable experience till you can keep yourself safe from Internet stalker. You also need to understand the terms of service on Myspace and also being able to differentiate between a good and a bad profile holder in myspace. “Prevention is better than cure” is a famous adage, which is highly applicable in this field. Precaution should be taken by every users of Myspace to prevent any mishaps.
First and foremost that any Myspace user should take is to safeguard their personal information so that Internet stalker could not locate you with their wrong intention. Personal information includes your full name, contact number, place of birth, High school attended and year of graduation, names of children and location and date of their births and physical address. Apart from these there are several other personal information that people are highly aware of and they are their social security number, credit card number and bank account number.
Myspace is the hottest online communities where many people sign up daily to have a pleasurable experience. Beware of the wolves in sheep clothing. There are users on Myspace with wrong intentions causing physical harm to the user and they deliberately misrepresent themselves just to prey on the innocent or the weaklings. Therefore precaution should be taken while accepting or sending a friends request. Go through the profile several times and allow some space to your research to achieve a positive result. Generally misrepresentation may be lying about interest or activities for the purpose of being more attractive to someone you have a crush. They may also lie their age, sex and location in order to lure another member into a harmful situation. Numerous national headlines about young users of MySpace being abducted by individuals they met online not with only one reason to physically harm them but there are other potentially harmful reasons why an individual on MySpace try to be pretentious. MySpace members can avoid both physical and financial danger by exercising caution in their interactions with other members of the community by avoiding posting sensitive information on MySpace pages unless the profile is made private. Users should also take precautions when sending emails and instant messages.
Members of MySpace should familiarize themselves with the terms of service provided by MySpace which will help the members to understand which actions are permissible and which actions are prohibited in order to prevent a member from unknowingly breaking the community rules and running the risk of being banned from the community.
Myspace Layouts
MySpace layouts have made the use of the community very interesting. All the users who have accounts on this site can have a load of fun. This is because they have plenty of layouts to choose from, and the activity itself is completely interesting. All users are allowed to customize their profiles as and when they need. It is a great deal of fun to use these layouts because you will be able to create your own as well.
Any color that you need, and any graphic design or theme can be used. If you do not find the ones that you want, then just pick the type of design that you need and use generators to make your own layout. You can play with as many designs and colors that you want. You will be given endless choices to pick from, and this will only make your profile more unique.
This is indeed a very unique aspect of the site, and you will not have such options on any other site. Though there will be a great number of myspace layouts to choose from, you should pick the appropriate one. You should choose the right colors so that people are able to read the content of the profile. You should also choose the right graphics so that is easily loads onto the page.
Next you will have to decide whether you want a layout that scrolls or a fixed one. It can be used according to the profile again. If you have specific information about yourself, which you want to highlight, then you can place that on the top of the profile. While using different options, you must also consider the fact that you will need to keep the visitors attracted to the profile.
All of this is not at all difficult, and it will not be a tedious task, as it seems. It will only be a lot of fun, as you will have the option to get as creative as you want. From picking colors to designs, everything will be of a creative choice. This is fun because with the use of MySpace layouts, you can get a lot of new friends. There are bound to be plenty of new friends because they are interested in the unique layouts that you display on the profile.
Besides allowing people to look at your profile by themselves, you can create layouts in such a way that you attract many of them. You can do so by forming new groups, and also using a group related theme on your profile. This will make your profile and your interests stand out. By taking such initiatives with the layouts, you can gather a lot of new acquaintances.
Business Sense of Blogging
One of the easiest things to do, when you do decide to give it your best and quit your full time job to blog, is getting lost in the newfound “I have no boss!” feeling. But let me reign you back to the third rock from the sun for a while, and give you some tips on how to make it so you now don’t fail.
Here’s some of my quick tips and tricks for you.
Create a business plan, which includes step-by-step marketing ideas. This will be the blueprint for your business. Your blog is a business, so treat it like one!
Create a name of your business. On your site, always put contact information. Not only will potential joint venturists look for you, but also web site visitors.
Speaking about the name of your business, why don’t you make yourself official and get a business name. You can file directly online athttp://www.irs.gov for a tax ID (or an employer identification number). Check with your state government to see how to file a fictitious business name, corporation, or other entity.
Join a local organization, even if you have to volunteer your time, and especially in the topic of your blog. This is especially important if they have a newsletter that you can write for! For a $10 donation, I joined a local Korean-American organization called Ta-Ri (www.ta-ri.org), which put a link to my web site, mentioned me in newsletters, allowed me to network, and helped me network. Once in a while, I write an article for them, and I get free advertising for my web site. Word of mouth is still a powerful tool in the blogging world. I’ll never know, but maybe I picked up a hundred loyal readers!
Gather up all the local, free newspapers. Although this may not pan out to any money, it gives you a lot of free advertising! Included in your by-line put your blog’s web site address and your name. You get bonus points if you write about events from your local organization. Check the copywrite guidelines for these newspapers, because you could double dip and put up the article on your own blog, which will make you look good to your readers.
Join the local Chamber of Commerce. For a few hours per month, these organizations help you network. You may be surprised at how many people will visit your blog, or offer you a joint venture. At one such meeting, I was offered a regular writing gig, which really helped ease my mind (and provided me some extra cash).
Create business cards, and hand them out to everyone.
Always put your web site and your services at the bottom of every e-mail. You’d be surprised how many people will check it out.
Be smart and create your own bank account for your business. For the first few months (until money starts rolling in), don’t spend anything except legitimate business expenses. Remember to attach your PayPal, Amazon Associates, Google Adsense, and all other freelance stuff to your new bank account.
Be honest with your books, and remember to write every single expense off. Don’t spend any money unless you have to! Mean Uncle Sam will come to get you if you don’t play it by the IRS rules. It takes some (ok, a lot of) self-restraint to not spend that hard-earned cash. My rule of thumb? Transfer 20% of that money to PayPal. Likewise, if you get paid via PayPal, keep it in there! That way, at tax-time, you aren’t crunched. Your reward? When you file your taxes, you can count on that money in your PayPal account to pay your taxes, and anything left over is like a big tax refund. Yes, you will get a “refund” – you’re taking 20% of your business income when you get to write off a bunch of stuff.
Remember what it was like to be a college student. In other words, don’t live like a Mercedes when you have an income of a Hyundai. Act like a starving artist, because that’s what you are, until of course, you aren’t.
This is a serious, full-time job now. Even at the worst, most depressing times, I got up every working day (Monday through Friday) at 7:00, showered like I would for a normal job, and got dressed. My boyfriend finished off the basement to his house and gave me a desk and a nice chair in my new “office.” Not only that, but you can now write off a portion of your rent/mortgage, utilities, and other household expenses (please check with an accountant before doing this). We even got to write off the cost of making my office.
Turn off the boob-tube. Don’t even think about watching television during the day. The only exception would be if you need background noise to work. But be brutally honest with yourself. Are you turning it on to catch a sneak peek at the soaps, or do you really need background noise (and an occasional mind-break)?
Online Video Communities
According to “Global Content Survey 2007” - user-generated video content may become a real threat in the next few years for traditional media, and a real windfall for web consumers. This gives a tip-off about the impact of the online video sharing communities on the Internet and many other sections like television, media, entertainment and the businesses as a whole.
The main aspects of the impact of the online video sharing communities are as follows:
· Better Communication
Commercial or personal videos uploaded on the video communities are becoming more effective rather than the traditional communications online. Videos are set to fast replace the traditional features of the Internet like communication, business promotion, advertising and marketing as a whole.
· Quality Online Videos
As the videos uploaded are paid based on the number of the views, every video uploaded is expected to get better response and popularity by the video author. Consequently, he/she who produces the video will take much care about the concept and content of the video footage to be aired on the video sharing community. This automatically improves the quality of the video, which gives better entertainment to the viewer.
· Video SEO
Video SEO is ensuring the video content gives more traffic to the target websites compared to using the traditional methods. As video acts as a better medium when compared to simple text to promote business, the concept of video SEO is gaining momentum in the promotion of the websites. For example, a number of American TV networks provide free promotional video clips on the online video sites to drive traffic to their own sites, which contain full-length episodes.
· Online Video Marketing
The online video sharing websites have grown in size and gained publicity. Video Marketing is the latest addition to the online marketing industry. This is not only essential because of the large audiences that can be reached, but also because it allows the promoter to create his/her own and unique promotional films. That means the videos are made based on his/her knowledge and experience about the target market and the market as a whole. This result in bringing traffic to the target web page and ultimately convert into sales.
Thus, the online video communities will have a multifold impact on the basic features of the Internet.
People Search Online
Do you want to locate a person or want to have an access to the public records of a person? Yes, that is possible. In the past, if you wanted to have personal records or identify someone, you have to hire a private investigator to do the work for you. Indeed, private investigators have their ways to locate someone, but this method takes time and it is expensive. These days, there are several ways for you to locate and investigate someone.
If you want to conduct people search, you can go online since there are counties, states, and localities that post their websites since they provide public records that you can have access on. There are plenty of government agencies that scan arrest reports and driver licenses and post them on their websites. With all of these, you can conduct people search with these free websites.
With the creation of the internet, almost everything can be found in here, since most companies and agencies post their websites and willingly provide information to internet users. Imagine how many times social security numbers are being written on official documents and these includes other information such as addresses and aliases, so you will be having a chance to do people search and find these information through government agencies websites and you can even get it for free.
There are also police departments that post arrest warrants on their websites, so you can find information through these free websites. If you didn’t have any luck with these websites, you can ask information with police stations through email or phone.
In order for you to find these free websites when you want to perform people search, you have to go with the popular search engines such as Google and Yahoo. If you are conducting people search to an inmate and you want to check the person out, you can type the quote such as ‘Travis County Jail’ in the state that you want to conduct search for. You can see only about what the offender is wanted for, nothing more. But at least, you can check out the dates and can check out if they are still in that area.
It is understandable that you wish to perform the search in locating someone, and if you wish to do it for free, you will need to allocate time and effort for it. It is not that simple to find information about someone through free websites. It can be frustrating and disappointing sometimes but at least you can try it out. If you get any information when you conduct people search at these free websites, then that’s good for you. The time and effort that you allocate is worth it.
But if you need results immediately, going with free websites is not the appropriate thing to do. Better to go with paid search services if you need the information right away since paid search services can give you results in minutes. You won’t need to search and narrow down lots of different results. With the paid search service, you can perform people search easily and faster at the comfort of your own home and have great result.
Creating a Blog
A blog is an online journal that allows post information, opinions, thoughts and other material online. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, Web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important feature of the blogs.
Purpose of Blogging:
The major purpose of creating a blog is to get exposed to the online world with views and outlooks. The following are some other popular purposes of blogging –
Channel for expressing thoughts: A blog is one of the best and effective channels to express personal views and thoughts. Many bloggers use their blogs to post their opinions on some topics they are interested or proficient in.
Share personal experiences: Blogs can be used as a means of sharing personal experiences, hobbies or details of the blogger is maintained as an online dairy of the blogger. Many bloggers with distinct personalities and unique thoughts were successful to use their blogs as an effective means to become popular.
Blogging for businesses: Many businesses have found blogging as an efficient resource to communicate with a good number of people online. Blogging acts as an effective means of communication to provide information to target audience through online. Thus, they could enhance their business opportunities using online resources. Many businesses also use internal blogs to communicate effectively with their employees.
Blogging for Internet marketing: Internet marketers, these days, have started using blogs as resources to create backlinks for their websites. Thus, blogs help them to enhance search engine rankings of any website.
Effective monetization resource online: There is a vast percentage of bloggers who create and use their blogs to make money online. Bloggers earn money on blogs through programs like advertising, affiliate programs, blogging for businesses, raising donations, blog flipping, etc.
Entertainment module: There are many blogs run online merely run for entertainment purposes like Vlog, Photologs, Podcasts, etc. A blog, which focuses on music, movie videos, wallpapers and photos, etc., is called an entertainment blog.
Educational purposes: Blogs are also used for educating people online. Bloggers post information on a wide variety of topics like health tips, computers, home, do-it-yourself, traveling, sports, business etc.
The flexibility and ease of blogging resulted in the adaptation of blogs for various purposes. The constant search for new elements by the blogging service providers has resulted in many advanced features and options for the bloggers. These features are helping the bloggers to take the advantage of the blogs for various purposes.
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