Marketing

As you know, getting indexed in the search engines is the only way to get organic traffic.  Not an easy task though many will charge you a lot of money saying they’ll get you indexed quickly.  Maybe they can but there is a free way and it’s much quicker. 
 
How you ask…simply by using a Google Sitemap to get indexed quickly and I’m as guilty as the next for knowing of it but not using one.  That is until I ran across an article entitled “Google Sitemaps Tutorial for WordPress - Get GoogleBot To Visit Your Site In Under 60 Seconds!” written by Andre Chaperon. 
 
The plug-in Andre created was very easy to install and his video tutorial was easy to follow.  I had the file downloaded, file extracted and uploaded on to my server in about two minutes.  Then another two minutes in the admin area of the Blog to configure it and that was it.  The final step, telling Google there’s another site to spider is painless too.
 
Thanks Andre for the fantastic plug-in and tutorial.

Let’s begin by thinking about what Multiple Streams of Income means. Multiple simply means more than one and Income is money or its equivalent received for work you have done, services you have provided or products you have sold.Those terms are fairly straightforward, but what is meant by “streams” of Income? If you and your partner both have jobs then does that mean you are getting Multiple Streams of Income? If you were to look up stream in the dictionary you would probably find references to a steady flow or current.So yes perhaps a two-income family could be classified as Multiple Streams of Income as it is more than one income and it brings a steady flow of money into your bank account but this is not all that inspiring or revolutionary.Here are a few thoughts to make this more exciting:

1. Change multiple from 2 to many more (20, 100, 200)
2. Change steady from being once a month steady to multiple times a day

Perhaps you can start thinking of a Torrent instead of a Stream. Multiple Torrents of Income.

And what could be better than Multiple Torrents of Income? You could have multiple torrents setup but they take up all your time and you can’t enjoy the fruits of your labor. Three terms that you may like to consider are:

*Systemization
*Automation
*Residual Income

Michael Gerber has an excellent book which talks about working on your business rather than in your business and one of the key points he makes is having operating procedures and systems. You make it so that you repeatable procedures. In the book he is treating your business as if it was a franchise. This means if at some point in the future you wish to sell your business it is much more attractive if you are not integral to the business.

When it comes to systemization if you take a look at McDonalds they have systems that teach how to follow the procedures - the gherkins are sliced and placed in such a way so they don’t fall out, the fries are heated to a certain degree and it is all made very simple so they can get fairly low-skilled people to do much of their work. You can apply the same in your own business so that you can focus your money on the areas which are hard to get done cheaply/well.

Systems are not just for other people but also for yourself so you can have a basis from which to follow - for example if you create websites then they can all follow a similar format.

Automation is very useful when you find you do something which is repetitive, complicated and/or boring regularly. We can take a very simple example - within Microsoft Word you might find you regularly type your company name XYZ Widgets Ltd - you could simply set up an autocorrect entry so you type in XYZ and it fills out the rest. There are many things that can be automated when it comes to computers - it can be done through macros, programming, scripts, and software.

This indeed is one of the big allures of selling products online is that you can set it up so you can sell a digital product and the person pays and gets instant access to the product and can sign up to your customer list which then immediately emails them the most common troubleshooting procedures and can also follow up to gather testimonials, to recommend upgrades, to promote products, services and affiliate products.

Residual income continues to come in after you have done the initial work. This does not mean there is not some additional work. An example might be rent on a property which continues to come in month after month. You may have to arrange repairs to the property and handle disputes but it is residual rather than linear income.

The final part of the equation to be considered is Other Peoples Time. Once you have procedures in place then you can get people to follow those procedures to build your business while you deal with the things that are going to bring in more money and concentrate on parts you enjoy. Commonly people are not great fans of tax and accounting so they hire people to do it.

You don’t have to be a great web designer or programmer to be great at Marketing products online - in fact there are some well known “gurus” who have never done any web design in their life and wouldn’t know how to either. The same thing applies to having a book in your name - “ghost writers” are nothing new and are not just for the big celebrities. Indeed all your research for your book can be done by other people too.

Being an author of a successful book can be a very good residual income as sometimes a book can sell well for many years.

Here’s to Multiple Torrents of Residual Income (MTORI)!

In today’s hectic life, as a businessperson it’s a tough balancing act to keep things going and make a profit.  Especially in a sole proprietorship where you don’t have any employees or you may have but one or two.  This presents an interesting dilemma.  That is, do I market today, or do I work and bring in some revenue.  Tough decision at best, the first brings in revenue in the future, the second brings it in today.  What is one to do?
 
That’s a good question and in a recent post titled Balancing Doing and Marketing the author [name not stated] recommends some very good solutions.  I would like to expand on the point of using technology. 
 
The Internet is pure technology and can help you establish an effortless marketing system freeing you up for more important activities. 
 
The key element for the Internet is the website.  If you don’t have a website for your business get one up as soon as practical.  They are much less expensive then a billboard and are the stepping stone to greater profits. 
 
Once in place you can use many methods to drive traffic to your site and increase your client base.  One popular method is Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising.  PPC advertising is highly targeted, even down to your city in many cases.  If your business is global you can reach out to potential customers around the world.  Thousands use this Internet marketing technique quite successfully.  Lets look at an offline method for traffic…your business card.
 
By simply putting your web address on the card your contacts have a clearer picture of what you have to offer and will most likely use your service or product.
 
One final thought, freeing up your time with an effortless marketing system makes your life much less stressful.

Yesterday I didn’t know anything about a trackback until I came across a video tutorial within a membership site about them.  The video really piqued curiosity for further study.

That’s when I came across a very insightful post by Teli Adlam titled “WordPress Trackback Tutorial“.  In the post Teli does an excellant job explaining how to set-up trackbacks.

In just a few minutes I had a trackback implemented on one of my posts and will use trackbacks to populate my Blog with good quality links.

Her comprehensive explanation of the etiquette of trackbacks takes the guesswork out of the process. 

Thanks Teli for the excellent advice.

This article revisits the oldest Web marketing strategy - inbound links. The importance of inbound links to your Web site never diminishes. Search engines still value quality inbound links to a Web site for higher rankings. However, the emphasize is now on the quality, not the quantity of links. A dozen quality links to your site from useful sites are more valuable to a search engine than 700 links obtained through a link exchange program.

Before going into the details of how to obtain quality inbound links to your site, you should know some don’ts of inbound link strategy. Never participate in an automated or manual link exchange program. These programs are useless; they don’t benefit you and sometimes the search engines may even penalize your site for such links. Also, stop soliciting link exchange from other sites where your links will be placed in a link farm on a page along with hundreds of other links. The two don’ts are - link exchange program and link farms.

The number one strategy is to write articles with your resource box attached. Your resource box should mention your expertise in the subject and only one link to your site’s home page. If you have already started frowning on the idea of writing articles to promote your site, you are not alone. Most probably, you already know that writing article for site promotion is not a new strategy and it has been going for the past few years.

Thousands of articles are written everyday and distributed through article directories and submission services. You can still continue promoting your site using article directories and submission services. However, this article will discuss a few new twists to the old article publishing idea to distinguish you from the pack.

Write original articles. If you buy private level rights to an article, rewrite it to make it unique. You don’t have to buy the rights to private level articles to create original article. Using the Internet, find good quality articles on the subject that interests you and read those articles. It requires a few hours of time commitment every week.

On the weekend, take an additional few hours and write in your own words what you have read in the preceding week. Voila, you have a good quality original article. Remember, you can always write in your own words the ideas that you have read in other articles. You cannot simply copy verbatim from other articles. That will be copyright violation.

If you are good at writing humorously, do exploit that skill while writing on any subject. Humor is very powerful and it attracts more readers. People love a bellyful of laughs. If possible, say something bold or controversial without being a hate monger. This will also attract others’ attention.

Once you have your original article written, find a few quality content rich site (not article directories) and offer them your article for free with your resource box attached. You are not asking for any link exchange, you are just giving away your high quality articles for free to a few selected sites.

Once you have a few good articles on the same subject, compile them into an e-book. Write a short bio(less than 300 characters) with your Web site link and ask a few selected site owners to distribute your e-book for free to their visitors. You can also ask other site owners to include your e-book as a free bonus in some of their prime selling products. Ask the site owners to distribute the e-book from their sites with courtesy notes and links back to your site.

If your Web site has a forum, offer other sites to use it from their sites. Setup your forum so that it has almost seamless integration from other sites. Ask other sites to directly link to your forum from their main menu. In return, tell them that you will write nice reviews of their sites and their offerings and publish those reviews in your site.

Develop a tips and tricks section on the subject of your Web site and update it regularly. Allow other sites to publish your tips and tricks for free with courtesy links to your site. Make the process automated (using RSS other techniques) so that when you update your tips and tricks page, all sites publishing your tips and tricks are also updated.

Whenever you get an opportunity, use your cell phone to shoot short videos and take pictures. You need to get a good cell phone with a camera. Give your pictures and videos to other sites for free. Ask them to put links back to your site below every video and picture they publish in their sites.

Join a few social networking sites like MySapce, etc. Create your Web pages on those sites with videos and pictures. Provide links back to your site from those pages. Update your Web pages in social networking sites periodically with fresh videos and pictures.

Publish link to your articles in community based popularity sites like digg. A well “dugg” story can generate thousands of hits to your site. If you have a controversial or humorous story, the chances are even better for “digging” your articles from these type of sites.

Write reviews of products and services, related to your site’s subject, that you have used and publish those reviews on different review sites with a clever way to put links back to your site. Some creativity is required to achieve this feat. You cannot simply spam these review sites. Be genuine and at the same time marketing savvy.

Network and build good rapport with a dozen or so good site owners. Help each other in site promotion, idea and content exchanges. For all content exchanges, don’t forget to include resource boxes with links back to your site.

It’s surprisingly simple to get started posting your very first auction on eBay. Here’s what you need to do.

Step 1: Open an eBay seller’s account.

If you’ve bought things on eBay, then you already have an account - just log in with it and click ‘Sell’ in the toolbar at the top of the page, then click ‘Create a seller’s account’. If you’ve never used eBay before, then you’ll need to open an account first using the ‘register’ link underneath the toolbar, and then click ‘Sell’ and ‘Create a seller’s account’. The eBay site will then guide you through the process. For security, this may involve giving card details and bank information.

Step 2: Decide what to sell.

For your first little experiment with eBay, it doesn’t really matter what you sell. Take a look around the room you’re in - I’m sure there’s something in there that you’re not all that attached to and could put in the post. Small books and CDs are ideal first items.

Step 3: Submit your item.

Click ‘Sell’, and you’re on your way to listing your item.

The first thing you need to do is choose a category - it’s best to just type in what the item is and let eBay choose for you. Next, write a title and description. Include key words you think people will search for in the title box, and all the information you have about the item in the description box.

Now set a starting price. $0.01 is the best starting price, as it draws people in to bid who otherwise wouldn’t, and items will almost never finish at such a low price. The next thing to set is the duration of the auction: 3, 5, 7 or 10 days. This is up to you: longer sales will usually get more bids, but will also seem to drag on forever. If you’ve taken a picture, add it now - items with pictures always sell for more. Finally, tick the payment methods you will accept (just PayPal is best for now), and where you will post to (limit yourself to your own country to begin with). Submit and you’re done!

Step 4: Wait for it to sell.

This is just a matter of sitting back and letting eBay do its thing - buyers will find your item and leave bids on it. Some bidders might email you with questions about the item, and you should do your best to answer these questions as quickly as you can.

Remember that if your item doesn’t sell then you can list it again for free.

Step 5: Collect payment and post it.

eBay will sent your buyer emails guiding them through the process of sending you payment for the item. Make sure you have the money before you send anything.

Once you’ve got the payment, all you need to do is pack the item for posting (make sure to use some bubble wrap), take the buyer’s address from the confirmation email eBay sent you, and write it on the parcel. Put some stamps on, post it, and you’re done!

Putting up a company would of course require a lot of things, to get straight to the point, you need a capital. To make money requires money as well. But of course, with the versatility the internet offers, there are many ways you could find that could help optimize the potential of your site or business in generating traffic.

While there are ways to jump start your traffic flows, many sites don’t have the resources that others have to generate more traffic for your site. Well, you don’t have to spend a cent; all you need is the proper mindset and a lot of eagerness. You also must have the drive and perseverance to do hard work and research to generate more traffic for your site.

How sweet it is to have more traffic for your site without spending a single cent. Now it’s a sure thing that many sites have articles that offer tips and guidelines in how to generate traffic using only free methods. Because it is possible, you don’t need to spend a single cent, it may take time, to say honestly, I’m not going to beat around the bush with you. You get better chances by paying for your advertisements, but at least you get a fighting chance with some of these free methods I’m about to tell you.

Take advantage of online forums and online communities. The great thing about forums and online communities is that you can target a certain group that fits the certain demographic that you are looking for. You can discuss about lots of things about the niche that you represent or offer. Another great advantage is that you know what you are getting into and you will be prepared.

With online communities and forums you can build a reputation for your company. Show them what you are made of and wow them with your range of expertise about the subject, with that you can build a reputation and build trust with the people in your expertise and knowledge.

You can also make use of newsletters. Provide people with a catalog of your products and interesting and entertaining articles. If you make it really interesting and entertaining, more people will sign up for your newsletter and recommend it to other people. The more people who signs up for your newsletter, the more people there will be that will go to your site increasing your traffic.

Another great idea is trading links with other sites. You don’t have to spend a cent. All you have to do is reach an agreement with another webmaster. With exchanging links, the efforts both sites do will benefit both sites. Every traffic that goes to the site could potentially click on the link of your site and visit your site as well. This works well especially when both sites feature the same niche.

Write articles that could pique the attention of people that have interest in your product. Try writing articles that will provide tips and guides to other aficionados. Writing articles that provide good service and knowledge to other people would provide the necessary mileage your traffic flow needs.

Many sites offer free submission and posting of your articles. When people find interest in your articles they have a good chance of following the track by finding out where the article originated. Include a link or a brief description of your company with the article and there’s a great probability that they will go to your site.

Write good content for your site. Many search engines track down the keywords and keyword phrases your site uses and how they are used. It is not a requirement that a content should be done by a professional content writer. You could do your on but you have to make content for your site that is entertaining as well as informational. It should provide certain requirements as well as great quality.

Generally, internet users use search engines to find what they are looking for. Search engines in return use keyword searching in aiding their search results. With the right keywords, you could get high rankings in search engine results without the costs.

All of these methods and more will drive more traffic to your site for free. All it takes is a bit of effort and extended man hours. Learn all you can about the methods depicted here and you will soon have a site with a great traffic flow without the usual costs that come with it.

Abundance is for everyone, not just the limited few that life appears to have smiled on.

We are surrounded by abundance. Nature is lavish, even wasteful in its abundance. Anyone caring to look will find an abundance of love, joy, money, and health is readily available to everyone willing to accept them. If there is any lack in our lives it’s not because there is not enough, but rather, because we are limiting our intake. What we receive in life is controlled by the limits we place on our emotions, behaviors, thoughts and actions.

There are many factors involved in why it is so hard for us to open the valve controlling the flow of abundance in our lives. By the time we become aware of the fact that we create our own limits, the beliefs and habits we’ve developed that produce these limits are so ingrained they are very difficult to change.

Society also has its role to play. Since most of the world’s governments have become capitalistic societies, it’s in their best interest to promote conditions and belief systems that produce large numbers of have-nots. Simple economics tells us that in order for capitalism to thrive, there must be a large supply meeting a large demand and you must have people who are in debt to create a large enough demand to consume that large supply.

The simple reality is that the governments of the world make their money from our poor health, debt, and our struggle to “just get by.” Their abundance is dependant on our lack.

But this does not mean we have to accept these limits. While it’s true that most people will never take advantage of it, information about attracting wealth and prosperity is freely available to anyone caring to look. And the law of attraction says that the more you look, the more information you will attract. What fills your life is what you focus on.

Learning to create abundance in your life is about much more than simply creating material wealth, it is about enriching your Self as a whole. When you begin to understand the principles and laws that govern Abundance, you begin to understand that you are not constrained by the conditions of the economy or the amount of your present income.

Your ability to increase your wealth, live in abundance, and have financial freedom is all based on your understanding of the universal laws that govern the flow of energy controlling your ability to turn potential into reality.

Yet there is more to creating abundance than simply placing an order and then sitting back to wait for its delivery. You have to be giving something of value, adding to the flow, in order to make this work. When this is the case people are more than willing to pay for your contribution.

Wealth, money, success, love, and health are all forms of energy. Being part of the flow means that you are a participating member. Once you understand how to operate in the flow of that energy, you learn to work with the Source of energy and actively create your reality instead of simply letting random thoughts create a chaotic existence for you.

Abundance is about living a healthy, vibrant life with a purpose and experiencing the joy that comes from possessing a strong sense of Self.

Many people will tell you that to get your web site noticed you need to ‘optimize’ your site for the search engines. You are then led up a path where you have to keep changing your web site as the search engines change their ways of listing things. As fast as you ‘optimize’ your site, Google and the others have moved the goalposts, meaning you have to keep optimizing over and over again.

Now consider some facts. Most people in the world are not users of the Internet. Let’s repeat that. The vast majority of people who you want to reach don’t use the Internet. It doesn’t matter how well you optimize your web site, they simply will never find it.

Here’s another fact. Some of the best Internet marketers make most of their sales ‘offline‘. They sell their books, CD-ROMs and so on at seminars, workshops and conferences. Indeed, for many ‘Internet marketers’ these ‘offline’ sales represent the bulk of their income.

So what do these facts tell us? They show us that offline promotion is more important than online promotion. You may be able to optimize your web site to get high rankings in a search engine. But that doesn’t mean you’ll reach the vast majority of people who could buy your product or use your information.

This was confirmed recently by one study that showed most people go to an Internet address (URL) after having read it in a newspaper or magazine, been given it by a friend or colleague, or having heard it being mentioned by someone speaking at a meeting or on TV. In other words, it seems that significant numbers of people who get to your web site will do so having heard the URL somewhere outside the Internet.

You can get many people visiting your web site, even if you are not ranked highly by the search engines. You can do this in two main ways:

1. Write articles for use in regular publications - newspapers, magazines and so on. Always include your URL in the article and you’ll get millions of people to notice your web site address.

2. Speak at every opportunity. Make presentations to business clubs, chambers of commerce, local societies - you name it, you should speak at it. Every time you speak, announce or your web site address.

Although these are the two principal ways of gaining offline publicity for your web site, don’t neglect your business stationery, posters, car stickers and so on. The more your web site address is visible outside the web, the more visitors you will get regardless of how kind the search engines are to you.

Most of the Internet Marketers seem to think of website promotion as just submitting to search engines, directories, link building and advertising in ezines or banner exchanges.

It is a known fact that most people in the world use most of their time off-line. They read newspapers, magazines, listen to radio and watch TV, talk with their friends, neighbors and family. Not all the time is spent surfing on the internet.

To ignore the value of off-line marketing is to leave 65-70% of the money to be made from your websites on the table.

Some suggestions for creating an off-line advertising/publicity campaign are :

Let your local papers know that you have an unique product that will benefit the local community and you are able to help them save time, learn more and be more effective in their daily lives. This could lead to an interview with a local reporter or even with a national with your website product as a featured item and will drive people to at least see what the buzz is about.

At the very least it will create an awareness of your domain name or product in their sub-conscience mind.

Try finding a local business that is related to your product and offer them a discount voucher to give their customers for your product.

Take out small ads in local or niche magazines to advertise the product. Some ads are relatively cheap comparable to a solo ad in a main ezine.

Try handing out flyers with a special offer in the high street or find shops that would allow you to leave them on the counter for customers to pick up.

Try sending a fax broadcast to businesses that could benefit from your product. Some companies have lists of fax numbers and can send out the fax for as little as interview each.

If you can develop an unique twist or benefit of your product or service, then you could become newsworthy and even get an interview with a local reporter, who can write a better article than any you could put together for their readers or listeners.

Investigate the possibility of sending out Press Releases to the local media. Send them your product for review. Get a well known celebrity to endorse your product.

I am sure you can think of many other ways to use off-line marketing, other than sticking notes on lamp-posts to create an awareness of your site.

Good luck