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By People Building

I find it fascinating that as people, we are drawn to the idea of being part of something bigger than ourselves. We want to find unity and yet still be unique. We want to have similarities but not be the same.

For me, religion is a classic example of where people can find unity and common ground, or common beliefs. A couple of weeks ago, I tried out the whole religion thing. I've not been bought up in a religious family, nor was my school particularly religious- although we sang hymns such. Prayer time was more of an opportunity to sit with my eyes half shut whilst sneakily looking around to see who was genuinely into this praying malarkey, and then usually discovering that the rest of the school was doing the same.

So this was my experience. My boyfriend has been bought up in a very religious family and for him, popping off to church for the evening, was probably equated to the ease at which I could pop off to the pub. But church for me was quite an event, so I took the plunge one week and went with him.

We got fed (great!) and it was cheap (very great!), but I have to say I was quite surprised to see a bunch of Christian grandma's dishing out rice and vegetables, with a decent sized lump of chicken breast on each plate. “That's funny”, I thought, “They've managed to get God’s permission to eat his creatures. There must be some sort of arrangement, where they spread his love and he lets them know it's ok to eat chicken”. Still I know that Jesus ate fish and if it's good enough for him….

After the food, the vicar got up and did a presentation about Jesus and how we can know that he really existed. It was a good presentation. The vicar was quite charismatic and pretty funny, too. Afterwards, we sat at our tables having a chat about what the vicar had talked about. It seemed all the regulars were pretty sold on what the vicar had said. I felt like a troublemaker by throwing some new ideas into the agenda. It's not that I didn't believe that Jesus walked the earth, in my opinion, he probably did. But I don't think he was the only smart spiritual being to have ever set foot on our planet. There's a lot of convincing stuff about other religious folk from other religions. This concept wasn't welcomed I found. Now, don't get me wrong, they were a nice bunch and no one accused me of being in cahoots with the devil, when I told them that I'm a hypnotist (although that has happened since!) When they began to discuss the power of prayer, and I linked this to a higher consciousness rather than a higher being, I knew I was pushing my luck.

Life is filled with possibilities, all the time in everything that you ever do or say. You have an abundance of other possibilities you can take. How then, could anything you ever do, be wrong or sinful? Would someone so great, powerful and majestic as God really spend his time watching a DVD of each of us throughout our entire lives, ready to place judgment on us when our time is up, and tell us if we're spending the rest of eternity in his kingdom or in the fiery furnace of hell? That's a tough call. How would He ever decide? Some people have done some really bad stuff, but they might have done it with a positive intention.

You're probably guessing by now that I am in no way qualified to speak about religion. I don't claim to be, but bear with me.

My other concern for a long time has been that there are a lot of good people in the world. Surely then, heaven must be suffering from over crowding, not least from the vast array of rabbits, hamsters, and goldfish I've had over the years, that my nan told me had all gone to heaven when they'd popped their clogs. I guess there are dead architects up there, god must have gotten them to create a high rise building like they have in China. Especially since Jesus said that the entire kingdom of heaven is smaller than the mustard seed.

If you were married and your partner died, then you met someone else and got married again, which partner do you end up spending the rest of eternity with when you die?

In my confusion, I decided to relate what I'd learned to the presuppositions of NLP, since they have for me for the last few years, been my bible.

This is what I came up with.

Everyone has a unique model of the world. This could mean that what you absolutely believe to be true is true, (for you at least), so if one person has absolute belief in god, then he exists, and if someone else believes that he doesn't then, for that person, he doesn't.

The map is not the territory. In quantum physics, the whole contains the part and the part contains the whole. In the same way that an apple contains a part, which is just a seed, the seed contains all the information required growing into a tree and creating further apples. So I could be god (it has been said!) at the quantum level. When I die the tiniest quantum part of me that remains, could be god, who has the power to create further things.

The meaning of all behavior is dependent upon the context it exists in. This might means that there is no judgment at death.

All behavior has a positive intention and everyone one is doing the best that they can with the resources that they have available. No hell maybe?

Everyone has all the resources they need to succeed and to achieve their desired outcome. Knock and the door shall be opened unto you.

There is no failure only feedback. My flesh and my heart may fail, but god is my strength forever.

I'd never thought about NLP as a spiritual tool before, more as a series of change techniques, but this ever-evolving subject continually inspires me to take on new perspectives in my life. I'm thinking now about starting up a spiritual group- no not a cult! - Something where people can meet together and discuss their ideas about the meaning of life, etc. It will probably create more questions than answer, but what's the harm in that. When we think we know the answer to something, we become cut off from all of the other possible answers. When we have only questions, we also have the wealth of possible answers - you might like to call that confusion! Possibilities create many opportunities. I suppose the one thing that I discovered about my introduction to religion, is that sometimes religion is about stating what you can and can't do, say or believe, how you should or shouldn't behave, and this could limit life's opportunities. I'd like to be part of something that is open to limitless possibilities of being. I think that that's the way god would like me to be.

Welcome to People Building, a self-development company dedicated to inspiring growth, progression and better results in your life. The mind, body and human behaviour have fascinated us for many years now. It is our privilege to present to you authentic NLP and Hypnosis training for the betterment of your skills in Business, Education, Therapy and many other areas. Our unique trainings have been designed as one of the most innovative trainings available in the NLP field of learning. We will never cease to evolve, and it gives me great pleasure, to invite you with us on this epic adventure.

http://www.peoplebuilding.co.uk
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by Brandon Cornett

Direct mail postcard marketing is one of the most versatile forms of marketing available. With its versatility, postcard marketing can serve small businesses and large companies alike.

But, as with any form of marketing, you only get out of it what you put into it. To help you get the most from your postcard marketing efforts, I've assembled 55 tips for success.

Obviously, some of these tips will not apply to your particular postcard marketing needs, but with 55 of them ... there's bound to be something in there for you!

Upfront Considerations

1. To keep yourself on track through all of the steps to follow, create an overall postcard marketing plan. After reading this article, you'll know exactly what to put into it.

2. To save yourself time, headache and hassle, turn the logistics over to a professional postcard printer.

3. To find the company that's best for you, create a list of postcard service providers and begin comparing them on the points that are most important to you (cost, services, easy of use, etc.).

4. Begin thinking about the various elements of postcard marketing and who will handle them (the copywriting, the design, etc.).

5. Track down some colleagues who have used postcard marketing in the past. Buy them a cup of coffee and pick their brain about lessons learned, vendor recommendations, etc.

6. Start reading up on direct mail marketing in general, and postcard marketing in particular.

7. Create a postcard marketing budget that allows for multiple mailings.

Goals and Objectives

8. Gather your marketing folks together to define your marketing goals.

9. Avoid generalizations. Be specific with your postcard marketing objective. Determine the type of response you want, as well as the volume of response.

10. Set realistic goals and objectives. Get an idea of what postcards can do for marketers, and set your goals within those parameters.

11. Set objectives that are based on some form of response (as opposed to branding, awareness, or some other immeasurable trait). Postcard marketing is a response generator, not a brand builder.

Powerful Ideas

12. Create a reason for sending postcards before you send them (a promotion, a special offer, a news flash or announcement).

13. Come up with a big idea that will get people's attention. Avoid mediocrity at all costs.

14. Strive to be different from other postcard marketing messages you've seen in your industry.

15. Build value into your message and your offer...

16. Just realize that true value starts with the product or service, not the postcard.

17. Make it your goal to make people say, "Gosh, I'm glad I got this postcard."

18. Don't rely on yourself to come up with a big idea. Get your top "thinkers" together.

19. Seek outside input on your ideas. Run them by some of your best customers. Make sure that what you think is a "wow" isn't really a "yawn."

List Considerations

20. Obtain your mailing list from a reputable source.

21. Find out how often your list provider updates their data. Make sure your list is as current as possible to increase deliverability.

22. If you plan to use your in-house database, check the list for accuracy, duplications, etc.

23. Divide your mailing list into segments to allow for a more targeted message (current customers vs. prospects, for example).

Your Target Audience

24. Create an audience statement that outlines the people to whom you are mailing your postcards.

25. Expand your audience list to include their wants, needs, fears and concerns — everything you can think of that pertains to your audience.

26. Write down the various ways you (or your product) can satisfy their wants and needs.

27. Keep your audience statement handy as you develop your postcard message (next item).

Marketing Message

28. Pull out your audience statement from earlier. Craft your message in a way that bridges the gap between your audience and your objective.

29. Take your big idea from earlier (item #13) and inject it into your message.

30. Remember, the better your product (or the bigger your idea), the easier it will be to write about.

31. Create a message that solves a problem, presents a solution, and offers value.

The Postcard Headline

32. Create a direct mail headline that directly identifies your primary audience. Call them by name, if necessary.

33. Offer a strong benefit with your headline. Describe the value of the message and offer that follow the headline.

34. Write your headline clearly and honestly. Avoid the use of jokes, puns and complex language. Keep it simple so people get it right away.

35. Make your headline interesting. You can't bore people into contacting you.

36. Whenever possible, use numbers and other eye-catching specifics. Avoid generalities.

Postcard Design

37. Hire a professional graphic designer to create your postcard design. At the very least, start with a well-designed template and then customize it. Don't ever mail a postcard that reflects poorly on your organization.

38. Be original. Create a "purple cow," not just another brown one.

39. Design your postcard in a way that enhances your message and makes it more readable. Don't ever let the design obscure the message.

40. Create the kind of eye-catching postcard that bursts from the mailbox.

A Strong Offer

41. Create a strong postcard offer to motivate your readers and improve your response rates.

42. Build an offer that's related to your product or service in some way. Avoid offers that will attract unqualified prospects and "freebie hunters."

43. Make sure your postcard offer is relevant and valuable to the reader (your target audience).

44. Whatever you are offering, position it in a way that showcases its value.

45. Offer something different / better / more unique than what the "other guys" are offering.

46. With the offer in mind, revisit your headline to make sure it relates to the offer. Make the entire message cohesive and focused.

47. Follow your offer with a specific call-to-action (next item).

Evoking a Response

48. Tell people what to do next. Use your call-to-action to move the reader forward.

49. Make your call-to-action stand out from the copy around it.

50. Repeat your call-to-action on both sides of the postcard (using callout boxes or starbursts as needed).

51. Make it as simple as possible for people to respond. Give them more than one way to respond.

52. Restate the reason they should respond. Restate the value of your offer.

Testing and Tracking

53. Make sure you have a way to track and test your postcard response rates. You can't improve your results until you know what they are.

54. Try to learn something from each and every postcard you mail out. Change one element at a time to measure the difference in response. This is how you create "super postcards."

Further Education

55. Spend some time on the website below to further your postcard marketing education.

* You may republish this article online if you retain the author's byline and the active hyperlinks below. Copyright 2007, Brandon Cornett.

Brandon Cornett is the publisher of PostcardSmart.com, one of the Internet's largest libraries of postcard marketing advice. For more tips on direct mail marketing with postcards, visit http://www.postcardsmart.com

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Author unknown

Imagine thirty thousand menacing obstacles in your path to success.

You are dehydrated, hungry as hell, and wobbling like an Irishman on too much Guinness. Your eyes hurt, your head throbs and your will is all but broken. You are not even sure you want to go on.

You feel like Frodo, the character, in the final episode of the 'Lord of the Rings-The Return of the King.'

Terror and dismay gleam from Frodo's big, expressive blue eyes. In the distance, he can see his goal. However, it seems to him like he will never get there. He turns to Sam and says in a defeated tone, "Sam, it's the Eye," referring to the eye of Sauron - the enemy he must destroy.

And Sam turns to Frodo in a soft, encouraging voice and says, "Let's just get to the bottom of this hill, Mr. Frodo."

Let us just find the underlying cause of this hill, Mr. Frodo.

I spoke at the World Internet Summit in Sydney, Australia, last week. In addition, I saw about two hundred and fifty Frodo's in the audience.

Confused, weary, inundated with dozens of tactics and strategies about the Internet, their eyes stared into nothingness. Frozen stiff at the task of having to build an Internet business from scratch, almost all of them seemed to have a cross too heavy to bear.

In addition, they did not exactly have Sam to encourage them.

I said to them, as I say to you. "Let's just get to the bottom of this hill, Mr. Frodo." Then we will do the next hill, and the next, and the next, until we get to our destination.

You are bound to be struggling. I struggle in Yoga class. I am a first-class doofus. Five minutes after we start the class, I wonder when it is all going to end. I look at the 'human pretzels' twisting and turning to the left and right of me, and I cannot see myself being flexible and I in despair.

However, I have my own personal Sam. I simply say to myself," Let's just get to the bottom of this hill, Mr. Frodo"

And hurrah, yippee yahoo, I've actually made it past Yoga Session #2.

Wouldn't you love to stumble upon a secret library of small business ideas? Find simple, yet electrifying ideas on marketing strategy, psychological tactics and branding. Head down to http://www.psychotactics.comtoday and judge for yourself.

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by Kirk Bannerman

Working at home in your own home based business has sort of a natural appeal for an ever increasing number of people.

The reasons people express for wanting to work from home are many and varied, but most home based business owners cite the ability to set their own hours as a major factor in their decision to work at home. However, many people that have work at home businesses often fall into a trap that flies directly in the face of their stated desire for time flexibility.

The strong growth in home based business activity continues and, according to the Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy, fifty-two percent of ALL small businesses are home-based.

Some home based business owners have been known to become "workaholics" because their office is so accessible. Don't become a slave to your business ... get out of your home office regularly to renew and revitalize yourself.

Close the door to your office or otherwise remove yourself from your designated "work area" and go into your "home" area to live your personal life. If your business involves the use of the telephone and you find it difficult to ignore a ringing phone in the office, simply turn the ringer off and turn the volume on the answering machine way down. If your business is Internet-based, just turn off your computer (or at least get away from the monitor and keyboard).

As a work at home business entrepreneur, you certainly aren't required to be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week just because your business is located in your home. After all, your office or workspace is just an area in your home ... its not your home itself!

Working and living under the same roof has a host of advantages, but it can present some challenges (in addition to the workaholic syndrome mentioned, above) and stress factors.

Here are four ways to create a less stressful home business environment:

1). Remember why you wanted to become involved with a home-based business (i.e. more time for family, work schedule flexibility, etc.)

2). Have discussions with your family members and get their input about the working arrangements and the amount of time they want with you.

3). Use good time management techniques. Keep a list of tasks by order of importance. There are many low-cost and effective "day planners" or "organizers" readily available today.

4). ALWAYS take a little time to "smell the roses."

While not experiencing the negatives common to a corporate office working environment, the home-based business owner may occasionally experience stresses and frustrations that are unique to working at home. Networking with other home-based and small business owners provides an opportunity to connect with others who may be experiencing the same stresses/frustrations that you are. Sharing stressful and/or frustrating issues with someone else in the same situation can relieve your stress and may bring you good advice from a different point of view.

As a final note, remember to observe Home-Based Business Week each year (it is always the week of October that includes the second Tuesday).

Kirk Bannerman operates his own successful home based business and also coaches others seeking to start their own home based business. For more information, visit his Website at Legitimate Home Based Business (http://www.business-at-home.us/) .

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By Ivan Brown

One of the very best ways to make money from any Website or Blog is by using Google's very own advertising program called Google AdSense. You sign up with Google. They will give you a code to copy and paste onto your Website and then Ads will appear on your site. Every single time someone clicks on one of your ads, you will receive a payment from Google, which go directly into your AdSense account. Checks will be paid to you every three months. If you are making absolutely no money from a site, then this is one of the easiest and most mindless ways to create some extra income.

There are many questions asked about the AdSense program. One of the most common questions is, "Will the Ads that appear on my site actually be relevant to my content?" The answer is yes. The geniuses at Google have devised a system that will display Ads based on the keywords that are regularly repeated on the page.

If you have a Website about gardening, then AdSense will display ads all about this topic. After inserting the code, you will probably see Ads for Gardening manuals and lawnmowers, etc. This is great. It means the ads will not look spammy. They fit in perfectly with your content. Therefore, more people will click your ads and earn you some cash. Because the Ads are provided by one of the best-known companies in the world, it adds credibility to the program. It makes surfers more likely to click on the ads because they know it is unlikely to be a scam or a fraud.

Another prevalent question is, "How much can I earn through AdSense?" Many factors need to be looked at; these are:

- the volume of traffic that comes to your site,
- the percentage of people who actually click on your Ads, once at your site,
- how much do I get paid per click

If you have very low traffic, it is extremely unlikely that you can earn much from the program, or any other program, for that matter. However, once you have gotten a regular flow of traffic coming to your site, t you want to s use effective techniques to increase the number of people who click your ads. These are things like blending your Ads in effectively with the background and using pictures. If you can increase your CTR from 1% to 15%, then you will automatically increase your earnings by 1500% without having to increase your traffic.

Finally, the amount earned per click depends on how much the advertisers are bidding for that particular keyword. It all depends on the niche. Some well-paying niches pay out upwards of $20 per click, whereas others will only be $0.05. In order to really maximize earnings and get a better understanding of how the whole system works, it could be a good idea to get Michael Cheney's AdSense Videos, as they have helped thousands of people significantly increase their earnings.

Lastly, one important point to make is do not click on your own ads. Do not tell your friends to click on your ads. Remember Google is extremely clever! If you get caught (and many have been), your account will be suspended and a lifetime ban will be issued.

Ivan Brown's work at home website provides you with articles, ideas, and opportunities to make money now. To find this and much more, visit his site at www.HomeBasedBizOpportunities.com

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By James MacArthur

Seller financing opens your home up to an entirely new segment of prospective buyers. The more buyers viewing your home, the quicker you will find that one qualified buyer. Specifically, you will attract more buyers who don't want to or would have a problem getting a bank loan, or those who want a quicker closing or more flexible payment plans than banks offer. Such buyers include the self-employed, who may be great candidates, but are not viewed as favorable by banks, as are W-2 employees. Also, those with credit blemishes, which may be going down the long road of credit repair. Real estate investors are another large group, since they may own many properties with mortgages, which make it difficult to get another mortgage from a bank.

Banks typically take 30 days to close a loan. With seller financing, YOU make the decision, and it can be done much quicker, thereby removing a buyers contingencies faster, and in effect, leading to a much faster home sale. Make sure you use "Seller Financing" in your marketing and advertising, be it in newspaper ads, flyers, or in the MLS description, regardless of whether you are selling FSBO (For Sale By Owner), or with a real estate agent.

Other Ideas to Sell Your Home Faster

Number 1: PRICE IT RIGHT! Not too high, not too low, check comparables and local agents to get the right number. If you are not getting any action after a week or two, you probably have it priced too high.

If you will be selling FSBO, use a flat rate MLS open listing. For under $500 you can get listed in MLS with no frills. Check the newspaper or call agents to find one who offers this. It will give you much broader exposure and is advertising well spent. Also, strongly consider offering a buyer agent commission of 2-4%, depending on how quick you want to sell and how hot your local market is.

Put up lots of signs around the neighborhood, especially on weekends. Hold regular open houses. Prepare your house for sale. Keep it neat & tidy. Remove the clutter.

Sell Your Home for Full Price

1. Normally a seller will accept a lower price (below market) for all cash, no contingency fast closing.

2. It will sell for market price if the buyer needs 30-60 days to close escrow, will need to qualify for a loan at a bank, and do a home inspection.

3. You as a seller should charge even more (above market) if you will be giving seller-financing terms, maybe 5-10% higher than Case 2, or more depending on the terms.

A Good Investment

Taking back a note can be a very good investment since you will be making interest on your money, which is usually better than CD's, or money market rates. In fact, you can select the interest rate you want! This is especially appealing if you have no need for the money right now.

In fact, it is such a good investment, that many investors buy seller carry-back notes. If you have no interest in holding a note, it is common for a home seller to carry-back a note and sell it at the same time as the home closing occurs. This is called a simultaneous closing.

We Buy Real Estate Notes and can facilitate simultaneous closings, call for more info on this. We can also assist in setting the terms of the note so you get the best price.

Tax Benefits

When selling a home, under current tax law, if you lived in your home for 2 of the last 5 years, your capital gains will be exempt up to $250,000 (twice that if married). Otherwise, your capital gains will be taxed in the year that you collect the capital gains. If you will have significant taxable capital gains on your home sale, it may be very good for your tax situation to take back a seller carry-back note and spread your sale proceeds over several years, or postpone it for several years. Talk to your tax adviser.

Steps for Successful Seller Financing

1. Pull the prospective buyers’ credit report. Their permission will be needed. Always review a credit report on each borrower. It is a small expense.

2. Can they afford the home, job, income? If they can’t afford it, or have a shaky job or income situation, a foreclosure will be much more likely.

3. Use a professional to draft the paperwork. Each state has various laws regarding real estate sales, contracts, and mortgages. Use an experienced attorney to draft the promissory note, mortgage, or deed of trust.

4. Down payment - Sellers usually ask for 10-30% down payment to protect themselves in case the buyer stops making payments and the seller has to foreclose on the loan, and take the property back. The larger the down payment, the more equity protection you, as the seller, have. The buyer will also consider how much money he has put down, if he is in foreclosure and can’t make the payments, and wants to walk away from the house. Zero down is very little encouragement for a buyer, should he hit a rough patch.

5. 1st position or 2nd position - A first position note is much safer for the seller than a second position note.

6. Set the interest rate above current bank rates. This will encourage the buyers to refinance down the road.

Also Read this Article: "Tips for Creating a Seller Carry-back Real Estate Note" at http://www.jmacfunding.com/articles.htm

Other Alternatives to Seller Financing

1. Land Contract / Contract to buy

2. Lease Option

Disclaimer:

I am not an attorney, nor a tax accountant, laws vary from state to state, and any advice implied by this paper should be checked with an attorney and/or tax adviser.

JMAC Funding
PO Box 91472, San Diego, CA 92169
jmac@jmacfunding.com
http://www.jmacfunding.com
(619) 846-1550

James MacArthur, http://www.jmacfunding.com, is a real estate broker-licensed in the State of California, as well as an investor of real estate and debt instruments. We buy real estate notes and real estate contracts nationwide and make private and hard money loans on real estate in California. Feel free to contact me with any feedback, or if you are contemplating selling a real estate note.
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By Paul Levesque

All businesses that out perform their competitors have two key characteristics in common: a highly energized workforce, plus hordes of delighted customers that keep coming back. Two nice things to have - but of course everyone knows the reason so few businesses enjoy a clear competitive advantage is because these two things are so difficult to achieve. If it’s really that difficult, shouldn’t those few businesses that manage to pull it off be absolutely exhausted by the effort? When you take a closer look, (as I have), at those rare businesses that consistently achieve both objectives - flashpoint businesses, as I refer to them - what you invariably see is just the opposite. Employees at all levels seem perpetually fired up, as if every day they’re engaged in some kind of fun group activity. Is there some big secret about "energized workers" and "delighted customers" that these flashpoint businesses understand, and everyone else seems to have missed?

There most certainly is. It has to do with what most people consider the basic difference between "work" and "play". The first step on a shortcut to competitive advantage is to understand the specific elements that make play so much more satisfying than work.

Play Element 1: Challenge

Achieving better bowling scores would be easier if the bowling pins were closer. On the other hand, who would pay to go to a bowling alley where anyone could knock down all the pins every time with ease? Knocking them all down over and over again would quickly begin to feel like the kind of repetitive, pointless activity most bowlers experience at their jobs, and go bowling precisely to get away from it. To be fun, it has to be a real challenge—that’s key.

In most workplaces, there is not one single well-defined “mission” that takes precedence over everything else. Instead, there are all kinds of tasks, objectives, and deadlines that often make workers feel they’re being pulled in a dozen directions at once. For many, the only real challenge on the job is resisting the temptation to quit.

Contrast this with flashpoint businesses, where the one crystal-clear overriding mission is to draw business away from competitors by attempting to delight every customer every time. In these businesses, the reason it looks like workers are having fun is because in many ways their work feels like a game with a single, challenging, shared objective.

Shortcut to Competitive Advantage, Part One: Challenge everyone in your business to think of -outperforming the competition through superior “customer care” as the primary objective that overrides all others at all times.






Play Element 2: Rules

Every play activity has it own elaborate set of rules. In a new game, even before play begins, all the rules are carefully spelled out. These rules add to the challenge, and keep the game fair for all.

In the work setting, the rules are often vague and unclear. They may even seem to shift and change from time to time, based on different situations as they arise. Workers often feel reluctant to take initiatives, unsure if doing so will later earn them praise (for “thinking outside the box”) or rebukes (for “breaking the rules”). They tend to adopt a play-it-safe approach.

By comparison, most flashpoint businesses spell out their values and their priorities—the rules—over and over again. “Your goal is to delight the customer, but not by doing anything that harms the organization in any way.” “We want to pull business away from our competitors, but never in an unlawful or underhanded way.”

Shortcut to Competitive Advantage, Part Two: Ensure that your workers understand how the game is to be played—how, for example, you will be giving them opportunities to come up with their own ideas for enhancing the customer experience. Clarify what constitutes a “foul” or a violation of the rules.

Play Element 3: Scoring

In play activities of every kind, there exists some sort of scoring mechanism that lets the players know immediately how well they’re doing. This immediacy is critical. How popular would bowling be if the pins were in the dark, and players never found out their score, how well they played, until it arrived in the mail weeks later?

This is what it feels like for most workers on the job. They don’t find out how well they’re doing until the “quarterly reports” come out, or until their annual performance evaluation meeting.

Things are different in flashpoint businesses. There, spontaneous positive feedback from happy customers becomes the number-one scoring mechanism. At the same time it also serves as the number-one employee motivator, the basis for endless internal celebration and recognition.

Shortcut to Competitive Advantage, Part Three: Harvest immediate positive customer feedback by every means at your disposal, (especially informal face-to-face conversation), and direct as much of this feedback as possible to your workers.






Play Element 4: Satisfaction

Bowlers know before every game that they won’t succeed in knocking down every pin every time. Players in every kind of game know they’ll never achieve a perfect score—but this does nothing to diminish their attempts to do so. When their score tells them their performance has moved closer to the unachievable goal, their feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment is profound. There’s shouting, ‘high-fives’ and every kind of exuberant victory dance imaginable.

Flashpoint businesses also know they won’t succeed in delighting every customer every time. When the feedback indicates they’ve moved closer to that unattainable objective, the same kind of cheering and celebration erupt. It’s something that’s almost never experienced in the majority of workplaces, and it’s something that’s almost routine in flashpoint businesses. They once again have beaten the opposing team, once again the dance of victory unites all of them in their shared accomplishment—and in their shared determination to repeatedly play the game, and strive together to win another round.

Shortcut to Competitive Advantage, Part Four: Create a culture of celebration that maximizes workers’ sense of accomplishment with every “rave review” from delighted customers. This is the motivational fuel that quickly gains the most powerful competitive edge in any business—and helps sustain it over the long term.

Customer-focus consultant Paul Levesque’s latest book is, Customer Service From The Inside Out Made Easy (Entrepreneur Press, 2006).

Copyright Paul Levesque. All Rights Reserved.

Paul Levesque is available for speaking engagements through http://www.keynoteresource.com 1-800-420-4155. Paul Levesque has more than 20 years' experience as an international customer-service consultant. He has helped hundreds of corporate and small business clients become more customer-focused.
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By Andy West

Every business out there is competing hard with others offering like products or services, thanks to the way the world has opened up. It provides consumers with access to many different resources. Thanks to the pay-per-click marketing strategy found across the internet, someone requiring a service in Canada can easily hire a business in Florida, or a product manufactured in Colorado can reach an end user in Australia. This is great, because the opportunities for higher sales and income are vast, compared to previous decades where your business was only locally known or only popular in the surrounding cities.

Stiff competition, however, has also meant that anyone with a business needs to promote and market their company effectively, encouraging and enticing surfers to visit their site and hopefully purchase their product or service. Having a pay-per-click marketing strategy to make sure your website is seen and it receives plenty of hits is integral to your business's success. If you are not receiving traffic to your site, you have a seriously struggling venture on your hands.

There are plenty of ways to boost sales and promote your website. Information is the current trend in tempting surfers to click links and reach your site. Articles posted on your website to teach people something new or give them pertinent information are helpful to draw in clientele. Press releases can also be effective to bring attention to your business or company. Thanks to the way individuals quickly turn to computers and the internet for their information, the written word and fundamental text become the strongest venue to drawing in business.

Pay-per-click or PPC advertising is another growing method of boosting hits to your website. This principle of marketing is a venture of cooperation between websites, as you ask other sites to display a link for your website. When individuals are attracted to an ad displayed on a website, they click to follow the link through to your business portal. The company advertising your link receives income that you supply. In effect, this pay-per-click marketing strategy is paying someone to promote your company.


For someone adept with computers and having great interpersonal and negotiation skills, pay-per-click can be set up by an individual. Most people, however, do not have the expertise or the time to work through the steps needed to set up this type of advertising. The best thing to do is to hire a PPC consulting firm that has all the resources and networking skills to build an effective promotional program. Not only that, hiring a pay-per-click consulting firm means that you do not have to worry about links on dead sites, maintenance, or creating a catchy advertisement.

Companies devoted to PPC consulting will work with you to develop a strong pay-per-click marketing strategy to know what product or service you are trying to sell. From there, they will define your market target, and develop surveys to help with the set-up of the promotion program. Once they have achieved results from these surveys, pay-per-click consulting firms will create advertisement that reaches the people you want it to and test the results. Revisions are sure to come into play, and businesses geared to pay-per-click consulting will compare their marketing against solid results. Considering the amount of work involved in this type of promotion, you certainly do not want to go less than the full distance by trying to set up pay-per-click advertising yourself.


Reputable consulting firms that specialize in creating a pay-per-click marketing strategy for businesses are ones that are geared to website promotion. Every type of industry has experienced and skilled experts and the common jack-of-all-trades individual will not be able to pull off such an intensive networking to boost your sales. If you are serious about a successful business, you should hire companies that provide exactly what you need and you will soon be able to see that the cost of their time and efforts pays for itself repeatedly as your sales increase.

Andy West is a freelance writer for Vertical Measures. Vertical Measures is an Internet Marketing Company that offers quality pay-per-click consulting for your business. For more information, please visit http://www.verticalmeasures.com/pay-per-click-consulting.html.

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By Stuart Elliott

"If You Are Going to be in Business, You Must Know How to Sell"

In his book, Automatic Wealth, Michael Masterson states that in order to achieve Financial Independence you need to master a financially valuable skill.

Selling is the number one skill you MUST learn if you are going to be in business. This applies offline too. If you do not know how to sell, you and your business will struggle financially.

Now, before you give me that stock answer "I don't know how to sell..." think about this: we are selling everyday, whether we sell ourselves, our friends, or the latest film we've just watched.

Look at this common everyday phrase: - "have you seen x?x?x. I saw it last night and I..."

Sound familiar?

Well, that is selling in a nutshell! Some people do it better than others, but we all do it. With a little bit of training and practice you can soon become a master at it.

If you do not know how to sell or HATE selling, how can you tell people about your product in a way that makes them want to buy it from you? If they don't buy from you - HOW can you make money?

Today, the Internet marketplace is jam-packed with plenty of fantastic ideas and wonderful products. Chances are that you have already located:

* A great idea that you think you can make money from

* A product that solves a specific problem, and/or

* An income opportunity to provide to people online

But the fact is:

"If you do not know how to sell your products, you cannot turn them into money-producing assets, no matter how great the demand or high in quality they actually are"

You can't – period!

Whether you are selling your intellectual asset, service, tangible goods, yourself, or whatever kind of product or solution you have, unless you have the ability to sell, your product or asset is worth absolutely nothing.

This may sound a little harsh but it is the cold hard reality. Sure, you may get lucky once in a while but to really become successful…well, you have to be able to sell.

Good News.

All you need for the selling to be done on your behalf is powerful sales copy.

Take another look at that last statement again because...

"Your Sales Letter is Your Sales Person"

Yes, your sales letter is your virtual sales person. Your sales letter does all the selling to your prospects on your behalf.

Unlike in conventional and direct response marketing businesses, there is no need for you to train and recruit multiple sales people. Instead, all of your efforts should be focused on creating a powerful sales letter that produces a minimum 2 to 4 percent conversion rate, then fine-tuning that letter to improve the conversion rate as you go.

In other words, for every 100 prospects you refer or who visit your web page, you are aiming for a minimum of 2 to 4 of them to be your customers. Once you achieve that (and you will!), all you need to do is introduce targeted prospects to your sales letter, confident that it will do all the selling for you, day after day.

Your sales letter is like a personal letter from you to your prospect, in it you tell him why he needs your service/product. You remind him of his problems and why you have the solution to those problems, thus convincing your prospect to buy your product or the access to a service from you.

What You Need

You have probably already got a great idea, or a product, and some basic selling skills (remember the film you saw the other day?)

Now all you need to do is develop and hone those skills in order to formulate a sensational sales letter. A sales letter that arouses a deep primal need in your prospects and makes them bolt frantically to your order button, desperate to buy your products, every time.

This means that you have to:

1. Improve your writing skills

Since you will be writing your own sales copy, you will need to have good writing skills and a good command of English. Even if English is not your mother tongue, with a little work you can develop this skill.

Note however, that you do not need to be a master of English to write a successful sales letter. As long as your letter carries emotion and personality it will work. Forget all the grammar lessons you learned at school - just copy what works and learn from the masters.

2. Inject your personality into your letter

Yes, you must inject your personality. You will be writing a somewhat personal or emotional letter to your prospects. A letter, which needs to move and arouse them to take action, so be friendly and approachable with your words. You need to write from the heart. Don't write a stiff letter, not only is it boring to read but it will turn people away from your web page faster than you can blink.

NB. Mix your writing skills with your personality, write from your heart with truth and sincerity and you will compose the perfect sales letter.

And last but not least, you need:

3. To take action

There is a wealth of information on how you can write your own killer sales copy staring right at you, don't waste it by not doing anything with it. If English is not your first language - no problem. Print out a couple of great sales letters that move you and copy their structure and grammar (Learn as You Earn) Don't just copy the letter wholesale though that's plain old theft. Your letter must come from your heart.

Got it? Good, now go and get started.

Copyright (c) 2006 Stuart Elliott

Stuart Elliott is a world-class copywriter who has written numerous articles on sales letters and copywriting. Drop by: http://howtowritekickbuttcopy.com/why.html to pick up a free copywriting power guide.
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By David Fishman

You have had your website up and running for a while and the major search engines have yet to recognize the site. You are not alone. Many sites have a hard time becoming indexed. Sometimes it is due to being new or possibly it is just a matter of bad luck. Fortunately there are options in the quest to be indexed and one, if not a combination of a few, will get your website the attention it needs by being indexed by the major search engines.

First method to consider is search engine submission. Sounds easy, right? All you have to do is sign up and your site is indexed. Not exactly! For most of the search engines, simply filling in the requested information on the submission form is enough to get the ball rolling. This method is useful everywhere except when dealing with Google. As the most popular and largest search engine, they tend to be a little pickier. The key to becoming indexed by Google is to get link exchanges from other sites that are indexed by Google. Otherwise the powers that be see the unlinked site as of little value.

Another way to help your website get noticed is pay per click advertising. This one will not actually help get the site indexed, but it may increase traffic to the site. That could increase revenue and make your site more appealing to other webmasters that may allow links to be placed. And that does help with search engine indexing.

While on the subject of links, these little blurbs on someone else’s website can be incredibly useful in getting attention from the major search engines. One way to receive links is to politely request a link exchange of the potential webmaster. Often you will discover that if space on the site allows, the other website owner will request that you place a link on your site back to them. While search engines have gotten wise to this practice, it will up your website’s exposure to the general population. The notion of registering with web directories will help gain the respectability needed to be recognized by the search engines for indexing. Some directories charge a fee for inclusion and others will accept payment to place your listing quickly or higher on the page. If finances are a major concern, there are some web directories that don’t charge for inclusion. It will help with the indexing issue; just not as quickly as the directories that charge.

It can be incredibly time consuming to build up the necessary links to get attention from the search engines. There are programs available that will help you set up a request letter and submit the requests to other websites with similar content to yours, saving you a lot of time. While there is a monetary charge associated with this type of software, it can save the webmaster hours of work and frustration.

While working to get your new, or slow-moving, existing website noticed by the search engines for index inclusion, remember to be patient and get those vitally necessary inbound links.

David Marc Fishman is a link marketer and owns the site http://linknetics.com.

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By Andy West

Are you ready to start making some serious cash? Sick and tired of trying online businesses that seem destined to fail from the start? Then it is time to look at setting up your own AdSense websites for profit. Many people fail to realize that making money online is very simple, if they know where to look. It is true that the money seems to trickle down on the internet in terms of commerce. This is especially true when discussing AdSense websites. Think about how many investors have poured money into Google, and then picture how many millions of people advertise with Google each day. The numbers are mind-boggling. This is why AdSense websites can afford to pay you a ton of cash, if you know how to set up your sites for profit. There is literally an endless amount of money to make with AdSense websites. The person, who takes the time to learn about the trade, can utilize the tools and tips needed to bring home big profits from AdSense websites. Without a doubt, the most consistent way to make money online today is through affiliate marketing. AdSense websites provide you with an easy way to get involved with the Internet's top affiliate, Google's AdSense.

Simply setting up a website, putting the AdSense websites to work for you; will not cut it, and certainly will not make you rich. The key to AdSense websites is the keyword placement, and the building of content and quality. Realizing what is in a secret recipe, one must first understand how AdSense websites really work. Advertisers typically pay Google to put their ads in areas where customers might be searching for them. Then, the advertisers pay more money to have the customers click them. When the AdSense websites are set up for ease of use for a customer, chances are they will get a click. Each time an AdSense website ad gets a click, you will receive a payment for that click, typically a few cents to a dollar per click. This is how AdSense websites work, and how thousands of people have been making a small fortune for years off Google.

One product that works well is adsensegold, a unique e-book that explains how AdSense websites can make you a lot of money. The one time fee of less than $100, accounts for all that one needs to start making money with AdSense websites. It is a great way to get a solid body of knowledge on what works with AdSense websites, and what doesn't. Further, adsensegold is owned and operated by an AdSense guru that has made a fortune using the same techniques.

In addition, a site adsense-powerpack provides a large amount of AdSense websites for you to use for your profit. The websites are unique and custom made. One can utilize them to make major cash from AdSense websites each day.

Whatever the product, it is important to look at unbiased customer reviews of the products before purchasing them. With AdSense websites, it is necessary to check out a site like Review Place where customers chime in about the quality of a product, and its overall ease of use. Visit Review Place. Users can get information about the price, and quality of many AdSense websites, and related products.

Making money with AdSense websites can be an easy task, if you follow the road carefully, and look for the best deals possible. It is not always necessary to purchase a product to make money with AdSense websites, but it can greatly help increase your chances for success.

Andy West is a freelance writer for ReviewPlace. For more information and reviews of AdSense Websites, please visit ReviewPlace at http://www.reviewplace.com/cat-375-InternetBusinessTools--Google-Adsense-Website-Tools.html.

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By Sharon Housley

What are Content Sites?

If you are like many of those starting out with intentions of making millions online and struggling to capture the attentions of the large search engines, you are in good company. Times have changed, and due to the low cost of entry, the online world is becoming very competitive for businesses starting out. Unless a website has a regional appeal or caters to a very niche product or service, it is rare that a webmaster can create a website that is only focused on selling.

What is the answer?

The answer is content. The concept is not new; it comes down to the simple concept of bartering, give something in order to get something. In this case the trade off, is free information in exchange for website traffic and search engine ranking. The key is to create a website with content that other webmasters, bloggers, and publishers will want to link to. In order to generate interest and incoming links that result in web traffic, you will need to provide unique content. Related content drives traffic; understanding what makes one website a standout when others fail is the key to building a content rich portal.

How do I use content to sell my stuff?

First off, the content you provide must be of interest to potential customers. If you are selling a product, why not provide dimensions, customer ratings, reviews, warranty information, additional product suggestions, color or size charts. In addition to additional product information, consider your demographic, and find content that will be of interest to individuals (or businesses) that you feel typify a potential customer. It is also best if the content you provide relates to the product you are promoting.

Lets take a look at some content rich examples:

Gourmet Living (http://www.gourmet-living.com )

How does the site Gourmet Living focus on selling cooking items, use content to promote their products, and sell their wares? Gourmet Living uses recipes to draw in individuals interested in cooking. The topic (recipes) relates closely to the products they are selling (cookware and gourmet cookbooks), additionally the recipes target their potential audience, those with an interest in cooking. The Gourmet Living website uses additional food preparation tips and articles that discuss gourmet cooking to generate additional interest.

Recipe Directory - http://www.gourmet-living.com/recipe-directory.htm

Tips for Food Preparation - http://www.gourmet-living.com/category.html?category=preparing+food

Along with articles that discuss gourmet cooking - http://www.gourmet-living.com/gourmet-articles.htm

Dog Pound (http://www.dog-pound.net)

How does Dog Pound, a website promoting products for dog care, use content to generate website traffic? The Dog Pound website has educational articles related to dog breeds and training. In addition, the dog pound website has videos of common dog breeds, cute pet photos, and free recipes for dog treats. My recommendation would be to take the photo section a step further, encourage individuals to send in their favorite doggy photos and conduct a dog beauty contest.

Articles about dog training - http://www.dog-pound.net/dog-articles.htm

Videos with dog breeds - http://www.dog-pound.net/videos.htm

Dog Treats - http://www.dog-pound.net/other-dog-treats.htm

Photos - http://www.dog-pound.net/dog-photos.htm

Security Port (http://www.security-port.net)

How does security port, a website that does not sell anything and profits from advertising, use content to attract traffic and promote their website? The security port focus is on aggregating a host of security resources, from security glossaries to security forums. By creating a topical portal with information relevant to security, they are providing one stop shop for security information.

Searchable Security Databases - http://www.security-port.com/security-databases.htm

Security Blog - with related security news - http://www.security-port.com/blog.htm

Security Articles - http://www.security-port.com/security-articles.htm

Remember, at the end of the day, all of the advertising campaigns and attractive affiliate programs will only result in traffic spikes, which will be transient. Generating a content rich website that is useful, educational, or entertaining will attract and retain customers. While it is hard to assemble a content-rich site that motivates others to link to you, it is certainly not impossible. Keep in mind that search engine rankings influence the amount and quality of a website's content. Provide content that will make webmasters want to link to your website.

Sharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll http://www.feedforall.com software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition, Sharon manages marketing for NotePage http://www.notepage.net a wireless text messaging software company.
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By SeoAmitPatel

Even in this era of technological breakthroughs, many website owners have a wrong idea about web directories. They think these web directories are simply a way to gain a one-way incoming link. Inclusion in the different web directories is seldom perceived as more than a one-time entry event. The aim, be listed, and obtain the inbound link, for better or for worse. Traffic from some mainstream directories is almost always low and rarely seen as part of the equation. The dormant capability of the directory listings as a source of potential link partners not considered as a strategy at all, which is not a wise move.

In reality, web directories have far more possibilities concealed within their listings than it is generally believed. Many webmasters and search engine optimization experts ignore the less obvious value residing in the numerous categories.

By looking beyond the single link and searching abilities of a web directory, a website owner can have unrestricted access to innumerable potential link partners, waiting to be added. These partners you will find, without much effort, in the major internet directories and in the copious niche directory listings.

Not all web directories are adept in searching for links. The DMOZ (also known as the Open Directory Project), The Google Directory, and The Yahoo! Directory are the directories, which one should use in order to carry out link research tasks.

It will not be an exaggeration to compare the web directories to a gold mine of linking partners if one can get the full potential out of appropriate strategies. Any enterprising and prospecting webmaster can successfully use the web directories as an effective link building tool. It is expected that the readers will now be able to avail this opportunity after reading this article.

The Author SeoAmitPatel is a SEO Expert who owns a SEO Company http://www.theseoworld.com and which is working a major SEO Project http://www.gii.in
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By Karl Stadler

If you are prepared to work hard and take a small risk, then an online business opportunity is waiting for you. Discover for yourself the possibility of creating additional income online.

You are reading this article because it just might be possible for you to make money online, or you might be considering a home based business. Either way, you came to the right place. If you are new to the subject of earning income online, read on and I will show you the basics of being successful on the internet.

I have felt the sting of starting up an online home based business. I know the pain of failure, but now I know the feeling of success. It required testing numerous opportunities, spending quite a few dollars, nearly throwing in the towel and returning to the day-to-day grind of nine to five, just before success came knocking on the door. I am glad I opened that door and pushed harder. The first thing to remember to be in the position to create a six-figure income online from your home is ‘too many secrets are not really secrets anyway’. There are opportunities for everyone. Creating an online income is not just for a ‘select few’.

You can make a very nice income the moment your online business takes off, but to start you need to be realistic in your approach. Allow time for yourself and allocate time for your business. At the beginning, it will take hard work and commitment from you, but when it starts to pay off, it pays handsomely. If you are faint hearted or looking for a get rich quick scheme, then a trip to the casino might be a much better idea than an online home business.

There are many opportunities on the internet for you to create your own business. The challenge, however, is finding the right online business opportunity. You are looking for an opportunity that is legitimate, profitable, easy to start up and just as easy to run and maintain.

Some of the best opportunities to make money online are becoming available as the internet expands globally. This is evident for searches that the major search engines are handling every day. With this growth, more and more people are eager to explore the new possibilities to supplement their income or create a full time income enabling them to quit their nine to five jobs.

The opportunities are just waiting to be taken by anyone willing to take a small risk and do a little hard work. The people who are making it are just regular people like you with a dream to create a better life for themselves and their families.

There are different models of online businesses and then there are the ones that work. Most of the internet sales are downloadable information products, information that people need every day. To the online business owner this means no stock and immediate delivery to the client and money in your bank account.

You do not even need your own product. Most of the online business owners are selling products as affiliates Business Management Articles. It is just a matter of learning and applying the basics.

The great news is that there are legitimate business opportunities available for you. Starting your own online business can be the best life choice you will ever make.

Explore legitimate work from home businesses. It might be the right opportunity for you to make your dreams come true online. Click on the link now to find out how you can start today. http://www.viralbiz.net/jobs.php .

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By Scott Lindsay

A difficulty that standard brick and mortar stores face is in providing follow-up to their customers. When you make a purchase with a normal retailer, your contact information might be used to send sales flyers or an invitation to a ‘customer only’ event. There is very little personal contact with the customer, although a growing number of these stores may ask for email address or other contact information to alert you to upcoming events.

With online marketing, this scenario is quickly resolved using autoresponders (sometimes referred to as auto responders). If someone sends your company an email, an autoresponder can send a return email instantly to advise them their question will be addressed very soon.

This idea has been expanded to include an autoresponder message when a customer concludes an online sale. Once the credit card information is completed and authorized, an autoresponder message is executed providing an immediate thanks for the sale and confirms their order. Generally, these messages are in rich text (html) and can provide pictures, company logos, and other unique design features. Customers will also find contact information and a tracking number in most cases.

Most opt-in mailing lists also provide autoresponder messages that welcome the new member and provide control functions for changing their subscription when they need to.

Online business can take advantage of the many uses for autoresponders by utilizing multiple email addresses for a variety of business applications. Each email address should be set aside for a specific business purpose so an autoresponder message can be put in place that is specific to the intended purpose of the email address.

One of the functions for an autoresponder is important for online business because they can independently send out a series of timed messages that provide a broad overview of your business and provide a welcomed means of learning more about your business.

In essence this means if you have a series of six messages that you plan on sending to customers over a six-week period, you can set up autoresponder software to automatically ship these six messages once a week, for six weeks. On the same day, your software could be sending out each of these six emails to customers who purchased from your online store at separate times. Autoresponders can take the guesswork out of follow up by insuring that every contact you receive will automatically receive a return email.

While this is a broad overview on the subject, hopefully, you gain an understanding that autoresponders provide a meaningful and many times, multiple step mechanism for developing, maintaining, and keeping your customers.

Scott Lindsay is a web developer and entrepreneur. He is the founder of HighPowerSites and many other web projects. HighPowerSites is the easiest do-it-yourself website builder on the web. Get your own website online in just 5 minutes with http://HighPowerSites.com at http://www.highpowersites.com.

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By Scott Lindsay

Building a successful online business is more than simply attempting to place a product on a webpage with the belief that visitors will be drawn to it like a moth to a flame.

If you spend a little time on the web, you will find many such sites with very little in the way of visual interest or compelling reason to explore the product any further. Many of these sites appear to have been created in the mid 90’s, with only marginal skill in website creation. That is not to say they receive no business, after all, their entire website is still up and running. However, if you turned away from the site quickly, chances are many others have too.

The idea of a successful website takes strategic thinking, planning, and execution. The development of an online marketplace requires research and marketing. You need to find a niche and learn to market to that niche. It may also be advisable to discover a niche that is actually of interest to online buyers.

You will likely need to learn certain online software applications and terms that allow further development of your site for easy navigation. The successful optimization of keywords and phrases allow your site to rank higher in the search engine results.

There will be security issues to address along with ezine options, RSS feeds, and the best use of autoresponders. A good website will also make use of affiliate programs for residual income and determine a course of action for a finely crafted website design.

As you roll out your website, you might want to include phased-in plans for video streaming as a means of demonstrating your product or services, or podcasting with experts in the field.

If all of this seems a little too much for you, please understand the reason I bring up so many different marketing tools is to spark the idea that there is as much that is a part of the development of an online business as there is in establishing a brick and mortar storefront.

It may seem easy – even tempting – to throw a site together, but without a plan the site is likely to perform on a mediocre level, at best.

Take the time to visit some of the more successful online stores. As you look through their webpages, you will gain some idea of the things that work on an e-commerce website. A well-defined purpose for your website will go far in determining the initial launch and success of your foray into web-based sales.

Scott Lindsay is a web developer and entrepreneur. He is the founder of HighPowerSites and many other web projects. HighPowerSites is the easiest do-it-yourself website builder on the web. Get your own website online in just 5 minutes with http://HighPowerSites.com at: http://www.highpowersites.com.
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By Michael Moshkovich

Email marketing has been one of the greatest things to happen to smart business owners. The number one reason people use the internet is to send email. The second reason people go online is to find information. With a well thought out email marketing course, you can do both. Let us look at how you can use an email-marketing course for a more profitable business.

1. You will need an autoresponder. An autoresponder allows you to automate your follow-up by capturing name, email addresses, and automatically sending them pre-written messages. You can Google search and find all kinds of autoresponders. Make sure you are getting one from a reputable company; it is the primary tool used.

2. Your email-marketing course should focus on a specific topic. Write about a problem your audience has and then over a series of messages, solve their problem.

3. Keep your emails informational. One sales letter after another does not solve their problem, but asking and answering questions that they have, will. Remember they are researching information and you are giving it to them.

4. Naturally, work the products and services into the content of your messages. This may mean you do not mention a product or your website address until your signature at the bottom of the email. By doing it this way, you give your potential customers a way to find you in a non-threatening manner.

5. Write professional content. If you cannot do this yourself, hire someone to do it. Many people make a full time living selling products by email. If your email-marketing course is written poorly, no one will pay attention to it and will never buy anything from you.

6. Consider selling digital products. No matter what your product is, you can add to it by selling digital products to download instantly. EBooks are great for this because you find thousands of them that relate to the topic of your course. Another idea is to give away a brandable copy of an eBook free. Brandable means that it has your i.d. number in it for a product you sell. You have a chance to make a sale, when people read the eBook. Make it a viral marketing tool by allowing people to give the eBook away free, as well.

In summary, you can use an email marketing course to make more money if you do it right. You might subscribe to a few courses by email yourself. Create a swipe file and put any good ideas you see in it for future courses of you own.

Michael Moshkovich is a web developer and internet marketer who has written over 50 articles on SEO, shopping cart software and PPC marketing. To find out more information about WebCart's seo friendly shopping cart software visit our Website, (http://www.webcart.net/). For additional shopping cart tips, visit the webcart eCommerce Blog (http://www.webcart.net/shoppingcartsoftware).

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By Stephen Wright

This article provides specific details for becoming a home based business and Internet marketing guru through careful and selected networking opportunities. Accomplish this ability through an on-going process of networking.

Becoming a home based business and Internet marketing guru is not something that happens overnight. It takes significant dedication to develop your knowledge, skills, and abilities. During the course of this evolutionary process for yourself, you must develop the relationships and respect of your peers and potential clients/customers. Accomplish this through an on-going process of networking.

Networking in this manner includes spending time in various home business forums, relevant groups, boards, loops, and discussion exchanges. Appropriately, each of these has a primary purpose or relevance focus designed to facilitate and enhance the field of Internet Marketing through ideas, promotions, and topic exchange.

You must personally participate in a significant manner in these sorts of activities and venues. You have the "opportunity" to market yourself, your ideas, suggestions, input, advice, and counsel in support of and in a contributory manner to the field of running a Home Based Business and Internet marketing, as well as to the betterment of others --- your peers. All of which is critical to building a proper foundation of service to others.

There are countless numbers of groups for any given topic or subject area of interest. In addition, the best part, many are free to join. The array included popular Internet topics such as; Internet Marketing Ideas and Tips, eBay buying/selling, Work at Home, Employment, Web Hosting, etc.

As you start the effort of building your "online resume", a word of caution: time management can be critical. It is not uncommon to hear or read about the toll taken on unsuspecting web marketers who get totally and utterly immersed in spending time on the Internet that it can quickly have a detrimental impact on their personal and physical well being. The internet can be time consuming and addictive in nature, compounded by the significant amount of distractions continually vying for our attention while interacting on the Internet. You must find ways to allocate your time and resources, allowing ample time both on and off the web!

Diversification is a key element in building yourself and your abilities. This means continuously taking information and feedback you gain from the networking activities, to be applied back with other activities. For example, gaining information and input from a product development forum allows you to give information as a more informed user on a user forum, exchanging information on similar issues. This allows you to utilize your skills, knowledge and abilities, and continually refine your knowledge base. This also helps build credibility among various groups and users. It is a known fact that people do business with those whom they know or trust. Being successful with a home based business is not different.

Using this approach allows others to see you in a supporting role, not necessarily as one just "interested in profits and making a buck!" Networking in this fashion allows you to establish yourself as a knowledgeable fellow entrepreneur, not as someone only out for self-promotion or worse yet "a Spammer"! The trick to subtle self-promotion is a graciously accepted practice. Shameless and abrupt advertising will get you no-where. Once you have this level of respect and credibility, the revenues and profits will not be far behind. If you want real success Free Reprint Articles, get started networking your way there today.

Stephen Wright is President & CEO of www.InternetMarketingUSA.comWeary from failed programs, tips and makes them rich advice? Get it ALL, step-by-step, the gory details, and the handholding to Get You Rich. It is all waiting for you: http://www.internetmarketingusa.com/pips.html

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by Mary Hanna

Successful free article submissions to directories on the internet are an effective way to market your article and get more traffic to your websites. Submitting to an article directory is a great way for people to find a free article written by you. There are a few problems with this system, but you can overcome them and become more proficient in marketing articles. The trick is to submit your articles without being considered a spammer.

The weakness of the article submitting techniques is; it is very time consuming. I have submitted articles in three different ways: by Hand, with Article Submitter, and Instant Article Submitter software. Many directories require a login, ID and password, so each directory must be visited and a login established before submissions are accepted.

When submitting by hand, you have to cut and paste each section of the article into the individual directories. There are a lot of sections; first the Title, then the Category (very important – I’ll get into this later), Author, Author email, Website Address, Keywords, Article Summary, Article Body, and About Author box. That is nine cut and pastes to submit to ONE article directory. If you wish to submit to 150-200 directories, a good part of your time is spent doing grunt work which does not allow you to pursue other avenues of traffic generation.

Now we come to the "semi-automated" submission software programs. Yes, they are easier, some more than others, but you still must go to each directory individually. It is crucial that you select a Category for your article. If this is not done, the article directories will know you are using automatic submitting software and will treat your article as SPAM. Many directories especially frown on the "Automated Article Distribution Services" for just that reason. Therefore, you will not be published and not only have you wasted your time writing your article but you may be classified as a spammer.

Within the "Article Submitter" Software, they have 138 auto-fills, and 25 manual-fill directories listed. A visit to a majority of the directories must be done first in order to establish a login. You have the option of adding other article directories on your own, which is a nice touch.

The software will open to a page with a form for "User Information". There are typical information requirements you would find in any sign up sheet like, name, company, email, website, etc. Then hit the tab for "Articles" where you will place the article for submission. You will fill in the Title Section, Article Body (including About Author), Summary, and Keywords. Then choose the "Websites" tab. You can "select all" or pick and choose. Click on "Auto Fill" and it will take you to your first directory. A flaw here is that you can only have one article posted in the article section at a time.

Sounds easy, right? Well with "Article Submitter" you must be very careful. Once you have chosen your Category, check each section. This software does not always put the right information in the right box and it leaves some boxes blank. Again, if the directories feel you are using software carelessly, they will delete your article. The manual sites are just that, manual top to bottom. It took me a full day for each article, so it is still a time consuming process.

Then my partner found "Instant Article Submitter" which I have tested thoroughly. It is by far the easiest and quickest available at this time. Set up is still a bit tedious. Once again, you have to establish your logins, but only once. I found them much more accurate in filling in the necessary submission forms. Yes, you still must choose your Category, but only once, for each niche.

They have 100's of Article Directories listed, but there is a tab where you can mark your "Favorites". At first, I was a little intimated, but it is easy to follow and saves you a lot of time. I submitted to over 150 directories in about 4 hours and that was my first time using the software, so I was on the learning curve. Be careful not to hit the "Next Site Button" until after you have the confirmation that your article has been acknowledged.

Therefore, that has been my experience with these three systems for submitting articles to an Article Directory. I do not recommend hand posting – it is much too difficult.

For me the most convenient and least cumbersome was Instant Article Submitter for getting my articles out there to many Article Directories in the least amount of time.

Copyright © 2006 Mary Hanna All Rights Reserved.

Mary Hanna writes eBooks, Software Reviews (for people who are technically challenged like her) and Practical Articles on Internet Marketing, Cruising, Gardening and Cooking. Visit her websites at: http://www.WebMarketingReviews.com http://www.eBookSecrets-Exposed.com and http://www.CruiseTravelDirectory.com.

This article may be distributed freely on your website and in your ezines, as long as this entire article, copyright notice, links and the resource box are unchanged.
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By Craig Bucknall

Do you need an easy way to update your customers with your company news? Try adopting an email newsletter or e-Newsletter on a regular schedule. It can keep them informed, and it may even generate more business.

An e-newsletter combines the benefits of company information and marketing opportunities with little cost to compose and savings realized by using email technology rather than traditional postal means.

Some things you need to consider when preparing your e-Newsletter;

• Frequency – Make a plan to publish your newsletter on a regular basis

• Content – Keep the content focused on the audience, don’t try and oversell any product or service as these emails tend to get deleted very quickly.

• Size – Try to keep the newsletter to 3 – 4 bullet points, in short attention grabbing sentences that lead to full stories on your website.

• Bandwidth – Try not to over indulge your newsletter with too many graphics. Keep in mind many users still have low speed internet connections, and large image sizes will have an impact on downloading. Try to keep your newsletter to less than 60Kb

In this article I will show you the easy way to create a newsletter based on tables in Microsoft Word ready for importing into your email program for distribution.

Step 1: Open a blank word document and insert a table with 3 columns and 6 rows. I recommend merging the top 3 cells and the bottom 3 cells into header and footer rows. You can easily add the company logo on the header row and your address details on the footer row.

Step 2: Merge the left side rows of the remaining rows into 1 column.

Step 3: Add your logo image or Business Name to header area and Address details to footer area. Do not forget to add email and website URL links here, as well.

Step 4: Formulate a welcome message to introduce your newsletter and its content.

Step 5: Keep the information in the newsletter brief and to the point. If you have more information on your website, make sure you link directly to that article or news/product item on your website. Introduce bullet point’s news snippets with links in the left side column.

You have now created A HTML newsletter that looks like a webpage. Modify colors and graphics to suite your corporate colors, etc. You now have a simple easy to edit Word Document ready for publication via email.

Save the document for future editing, and then selecting the entire table, copy and paste into an open blank email.

Tip: Send the email to a friend, or your free email accounts (hotmail, gmail, etc), to see how the finish product will look when your customer receive it.

If no formatting issues are found after test email is sent, send the newsletter to your predetermined list of contacts.

Remember: Frequency is the key to gaining new and repeat business, so compiling and sending regular updates will help educate your customers on your products and services.

Craig Bucknall is the owner and Managing Director of the Sydney based Website Design studio Bullie Graphics. See their website for more information about http://www.bulliegraphics.com.au website design also checkout the http://www.bulliegraphics.com.au/blog website design and seo tips blog.
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By Michael Hayes

Are you a small business struggling to develop your online presence? Regardless of the specific nature of your online business, there are common elements that need regular attention it to prosper. Two essential parts of this process are covered in this article:

1) marketing the online business, and 2) detailing the web site processes and content to achieve the highest possible sales conversion rates.

Maximize traffic to your web site

How long has it been since you last spent time driving traffic to your web site? Do not be left behind. Traffic does not come to your site automatically, search engines and directories send it. Moreover, if you do not optimize your site to convince Search Engines such as Google that you have relevant content, then your site will be largely ignored. Consider implementing a combined strategy:

* Set up reciprocal links from other sites with a higher Google PageRank than yours. One way to do this is to find web sites, forums, or blogs that are related to your market segment, without directly competing with you, and submit articles to them with a link back to your own web site. It is these incoming links that search engines love and your PageRank will rise accordingly. Business and trade directories are another good source of potential traffic. The more relevant you can find the better. An example of this approach could be a small business specializing in a particular form of natural healing. A useful strategy here would be to submit quality articles to an industry site that covered all forms of natural healing, outlining the benefits of your particular specialty. People visiting this high profile site already have an interest in natural healing, and may well be interested in your specialty when guided by an informative article. The benefit to the site accepting your submission is that your article, and others like it, helps to broaden their appeal. If done well, this really is a win -- win situation.

* Dedicate specific pages on your web site to focus on particular themes. Do not make the mistake of trying to cover a grab bag of topics on the one page in the hope that one of them will stick. An experienced web developer, or Search Engine Optimization (SEO) specialist, will be able to help with this process by analyzing your visitor statistics and suggesting themes based on key words and phrases that people are actively searching. After you write an article based on their suggestions, they will then edit it to maximize its appeal to Search Engines.

* Consider paid advertising on a "cost-per-click basis". Google and Yahoo are good places to start, but there are many others. Many of these systems are based on a bidding model where the more an advertiser is prepared to pay for a click, the more prominently the advertisement will be featured. When used carefully, they can be a good way of generating a quick response. This can be important for owners of new web sites while they are waiting for their natural search engine traffic to gain momentum.

Develop a marketing strategy for the next three months

The reason marketing activities should be planned well in advance is to give yourself plenty of time to get in the necessary stock, or if you have a service based business, assemble the relevant resources. For example, if new stock is involved, you will need time to source it and upload the details to your web site. If you are launching a new service, you may need to add an extra page to your web site outlining its benefits and engage additional staff to perform the service. All these things take time. The good news is that by planning you will save yourself a lot of stress.

Detailed planning

This is the 3Ps -- only this time they are Plan, Plan & Plan. Look at your marketing campaigns collectively, and then individually. What do you really want to achieve? Consider planning for the next three campaigns and write a sentence for each one that clearly spells out its main purpose. These are your core propositions. For example, the first could be to clear stock or promote an older service; the second could be designed to tie in with an event such as Easter, while the third could be used to launch a new service or product range. Whatever they are, I suggest that you keep them simple and only have one core proposition per campaign. You will run the risk of confusing yourself and your customers if you try to do more.

Newsletters

It is very common for an online marketing campaign to revolve around a newsletter. If this is the case then all aspects of the mail-out needs to be very carefully planned, drafted and tested.

* There are many sorts of newsletters, however those promoting e-commerce ventures usually have one primary purpose: to drive traffic to an online shop selling products or services. The question is, how best to achieve this. Detailed coverage of the core proposition in the actual newsletter may not be the best approach. Rather, write the copy in such a way that it provides just enough information to whet your customers’ appetite, coupled with a clear link to the remainder of the article stored on you web site. In this way, you stand a good chance of achieving additional sales when customers click through and become re-acquainted with your complete range of offerings.

* In drafting your copy, do not waste time singing your own praises. You or your business may have done some great things, but sadly, customers are not interested. What they want to know is what is in it for them. Keep this as your focus and you will not go wrong.

* Pay particular attention to the subject line of the email newsletter. Remember, with many customers this may be all they read before they look for the delete button. Try to make it compelling but avoid any hype that may trigger junk mail filters.

* HTML email newsletters are acceptable to most customers these days. They present well and they can feature images, but make sure they are correctly constructed. If you are creating your own HTML newsletters, view them in Internet Explorer and Firefox before you send them out. You may be surprised how differently the common web browsers can present the same HTML document. Sometimes with unfortunate consequences. If you are not confident in this area, then seek help.

* Ensure that you comply with all relevant anti-SPAM regulations. If you are not familiar with them, make it your business to find out. In many cases, the penalties for ignoring such regulations are high. At the very least you should always include details outlining who you are, why the person is receiving your email newsletter, and how they can unsubscribe should they wish to do so.

* Before you send out an email newsletter to your whole mailing list, test it, and test it again! That means checking that the content is correct, links work, images display correctly, personalized information is merging correctly, and unsubscribe links are fully operational.

Your mailing list

Mailing lists must be maintained. In addition, I do not use the word "must" lightly. With legislation in place to prosecute those who play fast and loose with their mailing lists, this area requires careful attention by all e-Commerce operators. The technical aspects of list maintenance and email campaigns are beyond the scope of this article, but if you have any doubts, you may be better to consider a hosted solution. A quick search on the Internet for "email marketing" or "email marketing services" should yield results. Constant Contact is one such service that I have used with good results. In general, it is safer to avoid purchasing lists unless you are very sure they are genuine opt-in permission based lists directly relevant to your market segment. Build your own. It may take longer but the result is a list of customers who are genuinely interested in your products or services. Conversion rates with your own list are always going to be higher.

Your online shop

So far, the focus has been on getting customers to your online shop. Now it is time to make sure that when they do, they have a pleasant experience, which encourages them to make a purchase.

* Do the advertised products or services as featured on your web site match up exactly with what you have in stock? If not, take steps to correct this. If the product is not currently available then delete it, or just disable it, if your software will allow. That way you will only have to enable the entry when the item returns to stock. Perhaps, it may be that your published information does not accurately describe the product or service, or the image shows the wrong model or color. If any of these examples apply to your website, then make a point of correcting the detail prior to a mail-out.

* As I have mentioned above, do not be tempted to leave items on display that are temporarily out of stock. You know that they are coming back in, but your customers do not and deliveries can often be late. Online customers have every right to expect that what they see lines up with reality, so it is not surprising that they become very upset when their firm order suddenly becomes a "virtual" one.

* Check the navigation of your site to make sure that all links are operational. Customers quickly find poor navigation frustrating ... and frustrated customers leave.

* Review your terms, conditions, FAQs and freight. I hope there will be first time customers because of your mail-out who will want to check these things. I know this can be boring but do not gloss it over. Put your customer hat on and pretend that you are reading the information for the first time.

* If you have a contact form on your site, test it. You should also place test orders using all the available payment methods your site offers. The last thing you (or your customer) want is a dysfunctional checkout system. In fact, nothing erodes buyer confidence faster.

Finally, good luck with your e-commerce ventures. E-commerce is not rocket science Article Submission; it is just another form of business. Additionally, constant attention to details counts in all forms of business.

As "The Online Shop Designer (TOSD)" Michael Hayes draws on over a decade's experience designing, developing and managing e-Commerce and CMS web sites for small business owners. In doing this he strives to deliver appropriate, manageable solutions that support his client's business goals, and avoid the "technology tension" that so often occurs.

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By Donna Gunter

Grand openings are held to generate good will and begin relationships with business colleagues, current clients, and prospective customers. As the owner of a virtual business, you can now foster that same good will by sponsoring a virtual grand opening for your new business or new website and get your new venture in gear. Below are some ideas to spice up your virtual grand opening/ribbon cutting:

Grand openings and ribbon cuttings do not have to be limited to businesses that have retail locations. If your "real estate" is your website and you work out of your home, this great public relations opportunity is available to you also. You will have to plan it a bit differently than someone with a brick and mortal location. A few years ago I attended a "ribbon cutting" for a client's new website and had a great time meeting people all over the country on a teleconference bridge line.

Since I am a few months away from establishing a new website myself, I wondered how to take powerful advantage of this superb promotional opportunity. I made some posts to discussion lists to which I belong. The ideas listed in this article are the results of my information requests.

Here are some ideas to spice up your virtual grand opening/ribbon cutting:

Technology
At a minimum, you will need a teleconference bridge line. My favorite one is Live Free Conferencing, http://freeconferencing.liveoffice.com/, because you can record the call at no extra charge. The bridgeline holds up to 250 callers. The moderator can mute the entire call if needed, and they offer the ability for muted callers to ask a question via their webcontrol panel.

If you would like more interaction with your visitors, you will want to use web conferencing/virtual conference room software. There are a number of these services out there, so I recommend that you do a search, and try a few before deciding on your provider.

If you would like to invite a group of people to your event, you can use an invitation service like Evite.com. You might send out an HTML invitation to your contact list through your email broadcast service such as, aWeber.com, EzineDirector.com, ConstantContact.com, or an audio postcard through a service like AudioAcrobat.com. In order to have your attendees register for this event, you will need to create a contact form on your website that feeds into your shopping cart or autoresponder service.

Event Activities

1. Virtual ribbon cutting. You can do this via a web cam and actually cut a ribbon draped over your monitor that is displaying the home page of your new site and show it via your webinar service/virtual conference room service. Alternatively, you might find an animated graphic of a ribbon cutting and show that via your virtual conference room instead.

2. Have people register for your event and give out door prizes. You can spotlight your business colleagues by requesting door prizes for them. Electronic info products are the easiest door prizes to award. You do not have to mail a physical package to the winner. If some of your door prizes do require mailing, you need to request a mailing address from everyone who registers for your event.

3. Hold a teleseminar during the grand opening that is partially educational and promotional. You can make a special offer to all those who attend the live call.

4. Give a virtual tour of your new website via webinar/virtual conference room software.

5. Host a roundtable session at your event that permits attendees to give a 30-second commercial of their businesses. Schedule this at the end of your event so it does not detract from your offerings.

6. Hold a scavenger hunt on your site during your grand opening. This hunt creates a reason to have people visit the site and visit multiple pages. Create a 3-5 page report or something that is easy to compile that displays your expertise and is of value to your visitor for the prize. You might use rollover images to give clues or find a funny graphic and hide it in various places throughout your site, in obvious and not-so-obvious, locations. You could also place audio snippets around your site as well and put clues in those audio files.

7. Sponsor a message board and/or chat room on your site. At specific times post a series of questions, polls, etc. that will make your visitors interact. Ensure that the questions are relevant and of interest to your target market. This will instantly create popularity for your website, as well as, keywords pertinent to your target market.

8. Give away prizes every hour (or every 10-15 minutes for shorter events), telling your visitors they have to be present in the webinar room/on the teleconference line to win. Between giveaways, talk about your experience, your offerings, and offer free ‘on the spot’ help for a problem faced by your target market.

Online Publicity/Promotion

1. Post the date and time of the opening of your event on CraigsList.com, on the boards for your city/area, and surrounding areas.

2. Send out invitations through Evite or though your email broadcast service.

3. If permitted, post the particulars about your event on various lists/discussion groups to which you belong.

4. Send out press release regarding the event through online press release services.

5. Create a post about your grand opening/ribbon cutting on your blog and invite attendees to post their comments on your blogOffline Marketing1. Join your local Chamber of Commerce and they will offer to hold a ribbon-cutting for you. For virtual/at home businesses, most chambers will do this in their office rather than your home. Many times a photo or article about the ribbon cutting will appear in the local press and in the chamber newsletter.

2. Plan a couple of local talks, and/or book, or product signings to coincide with your grand opening.

3. Send out postcards inviting people to your new website and grand opening. Offer them a free gift for dropping by.

4. Send out press releases to your local media regarding any "in-person" events you sponsor during this grand opening time. Grand openings are held to generate good will and begin relationships with business colleagues, current clients, and prospective customers. Now, as the owner of a virtual business Health Fitness Articles, you can foster the same good will by sponsoring a virtual grand opening for your new business or new website and get your new venture in gear.

Online Business Resource Queen (TM) and Online Business Coach Donna Gunter help self-employed service professionals learn how to automate their businesses, leverage their expertise on the Internet, and get more clients online. To sign up for more FREE tips like these and claim your FREE gift, TurboCharge Your Online Marketing Toolkit, visit her site at Get More Clients Online (http://www.getmoreclientsonline.com/).

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By Izzy Camacho

If you have been looking into selling products online, then you have probably heard some "expert" recommend that you create a web site, fully automated to help you make money 24 hours a day. While that might sound great, they often forget to tell you HOW to do this.

Well, I'm going to tell you right now, in this article!

First, what IS a Fully Automated Web Site? A Fully Automated Web Site can be defined as one equipped with an integrated suite of both e-commerce and internet marketing tools allowing you to be the most profitable with the least amount of effort.

Most e-commerce systems are equipped with the following essentials:

- A shopping cart.
- Acceptance and processing of credit cards.
- A maintenance system that allows you to add/change products.
- An order-retrieval system that enables you to fulfill orders.

However, what most of them are lacking are marketing tools. If your website hits it big and you don't have the proper tools in place, then you will be a slave to e-mail and order processing. I'm sure that's not what you intended.

There are several marketing strategies that are essential in the creation of a successful e-commerce web site:

- Email marketing (broadcasting) of prospects/customers
- Effective use of autoresponders (generate automatic email messages)
- Online Newsletter
- Online Form / Survey to capture your prospect's email address
- Electronic Product Delivery (if you sold a digital product)
- Advertisement (Ad) Tracking
- Back End Sales
- Affiliate program

Now, if you had a system to support the integration of ALL of these marketing tools, in addition to the necessary e-commerce essentials, then you would have a Fully Automated Web Site. After all, it has been shown that it often takes 7 or more ad exposures before prospective customers actually make a purchase. Consider the following scenario:

A prospect clicks on an advertisement in an online magazine.

These action increments a counter for this particular ad to help you determine how well it is working. They do not decide to buy as of yet, but join your newsletter. They are now considered a prospect. You begin to send them a monthly email newsletter. Additionally, an autoresponder kicks in to thank them for joining the newsletter, as well as, scheduling them to get email twice a month for the next 90 days, reiterating your product benefits, and inviting them to purchase.

Upon sending them one of your "juicy" offers that they couldn't refuse, they finally purchase. They will automatically be removed from your prospect list and added to your customer list.

Based on the particular product or service they have purchased, they will receive a series of emails every two weeks for the next 6 months offering complimentary products.

This will be the engine that will drive your back end sales and keep your customers coming back to your web site.

Being able to play out a scenario such as this using one integrated system, would be impressive, don’t you think?

The internet big boys do this with expensive e-commerce platform suites produced by vendors such as IBM, Microsoft and Oracle.

Having your system automatically perform these follow up tasks frees you to spend more time on your business, your health or your family!

=====> What can you do to create a fully automated web site?

Fortunately, there are ways you can automate your website similar to the way the big boys do. The best and most cost-effective way would be to sign up with one of the handful of Application Service Providers available on the internet, which provide a shopping cart integrated with a full suite of marketing tools. Normally, the shopping cart and tools are very flexible and can be incorporated into any website.

=====> Are there any other ways to automate your business besides working with a total solution provider?

You can accomplish some level of automation without an integrated shopping cart system. However, it will require manual intervention and of course, it would be incomplete. I believe the most important asset of your e-commerce business is your email lists. Therefore, concentrate on the implementation of a good autoresponder/list server system to "enhance" your present e-commerce website. There are several good ones on the market.

Look for providers that allow you to:

- Create multiple lists.
- Add prospects via a web form, email, or manually through a management console.
- Send out an unlimited number of autoresponder messages.
- Send out an unlimited number of email broadcasts.
- Set up and distribute a newsletter.

When setting up your autoresponder system, create one list for your "prospects" and another one for your "customers". Now, here's where you come in: when a person orders your product, you will have to perform the extra task of logging into your autoresponder system and manually remove them from the prospect list and add them to the customer list. This action will then trigger your customer autoresponder series of messages to be sent.

Remember, the key to building a successful e-commerce web site is to automate your marketing engine, as much as possible, and drive your prospects and customers back to your web site. This will certainly create a money magnet e-commerce web site for you!

© Izzy Camacho

****************

To learn more about website automation and to download the complimentary ebook, "Easy Ezine Marketing", visit Izzy Camacho at http://www.internet-marketing-made-easy.com/Automation.htm.

Izzy Camacho is an accomplished software developer with approximately 20 years of experience. He has a degree in computer science from a distinguished university. For the last several years he has been involved in the creation of web site applications for corporate America.
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By Jane Wyvern

No matter the kind of job you have or business you own, it seems like meetings are a part of life. They are necessary to make sure vital information is shared and employees are kept in the loop, but they can be a major expense to the employer.

This is especially true for corporations that need to fly employees across the globe for face to face meetings with other employees or clients.

Thanks to the internet and the latest innovations in communications technology, meetings can now occur over the internet via web conferencing. Today’s web conferencing solutions are state of the art, thanks in part to the availability of high-speed internet access.

Corporations can hold meetings and the employees don’t even need to leave their offices. All they need to do is hook into their web conferencing application;--this works well—similar to face-to-face meetings.

The savings in time and money to business owners is quite substantial when you add up travel time, overtime, and person-hours away from the job to attend meetings in an offsite location.

Productivity and efficiency remain at peak levels and the company saves money at the same time. It is no wonder web conferencing has taken the business world by storm.

It isn’t only big business that benefits. Small businesses and startups who work from home can now compete on a global scale thanks to web conferencing and the ability to communicate instantly with anyone on the planet that has access to internet technology.

There are a couple of options to consider when it comes to web conferencing. The choice will ultimately depend upon the budget of the company. In any case, the money saved by utilizing the web conferencing solution will pay for itself in no time.

For higher end solutions, there are full featured stand alone video web conferencing applications. For most small companies however, initiate a simple web conferencing program over the internet, which saves the expense of purchasing equipment and dedicated communication lines.

Web conferencing is a particular boon to those who work at home. It is relatively inexpensive to set up a web conferencing system utilizing a home computer and high speed internet line. Web conferencing provides a link to employees who work from home and gives those with a home business a more professional outward appearance.

Jane Wyvern is an established freelance writer. You can find more of her writing at http://www.webtalkcentral.com and http://www.webhostmatters.com.
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By Obono John

You are ready to launch that new product or promotion. You are really counting on a piece of advertising copy to come through for you.

You are looking for stellar results! In addition, you are determined to do everything in your power to get them. This means surveys, thorough testing, and ongoing refinement of your ad copy.

Hold the phone!

You finish your draft and run it through this 12-point inspection. Cover all these basics, and you can be certain you are off to a running start.

1 – Do You Have A Compelling Headline?

Does it generate curiosity or envy? Does it promise a benefit that will compel someone with an interest in what you are selling to keep reading? Remember, your headline is the ad for the ad.

When I write direct response ad copy, or a sales letter, or have a very important sales objective of my own, I normally write 25 headlines before I begin the body of the piece.

Then I will pick half a dozen that I think will work & test them. The best of the rest, I use as sub headings throughout the piece to propel readership, and draw skimmers & skippers back into the copy as they move down the page.

2 – Are Your Headlines Pleasing To The Eye?

I most often find that headlines work best when centered on the page, and present a balanced appearance in terms of the shape they create. Encasing them in quotation marks also serves to grab more attention.

Long, top headlines tend to reduce readership, but if they help qualify more effectively, they can improve sales! Try them, but look for ways to modularize the text using punctuation and spacing so your readers do not suffocate trying to read them. Sometimes a long, top headline needs to be two or even three separate headlines.

3 – Is Your Opening Provocative & Arresting?

Does it trip the reader, interrupting the internal turbulence of the day? Each line of your ad copy must serve to "sell" the reader on continued reading, especially at the beginning.

You are looking to build enough momentum and interest to convey the points necessary to generate a greater desire for the product than its price. The higher the cost of the product, the more words required.

4 – Are You FAB Balanced?

You must focus on painting a picture of your prospects future life, because of their purchase. Does your copy promise emotional benefits? Does it pledge the realization of positive feelings, or the relief of negative ones?

Does it show how to achieve these outcomes with concise descriptions of the features and advantages that will deliver them? Your ad copy must strike a balance between emotion and logic if it is to be effective.

5 – Are You Creating Excitement & Enthusiasm?

Demonstrate your personal belief in what you are selling. Will your message quicken the readers pulse? Is it upbeat, positive, & full of inspired energy? Is there a sense of WOW?

6 – Is Your Body Copy Highly Readable?

Remember simple is best. Keep sentences short. Use a plain 10-point to 12-point font. Keep paragraphs to a few lines. Use words that are comfortable and specific to the audience you are targeting. Inject subheads to break up text. Highlight important points.

7 – Do You Have High ‘YOU’ density?

Remember to use the words ‘YOU’ and ‘YOUR’ to the hilt. Your reader is auto-translating to ‘ME’ and ‘MINE’.

8 – Are you speaking intimately?

Can you get a strong sense of personality when you review your letter after being away from it for a while? Visualize yourself, or the character you are personifying, writing a personal letter to your perfect prospect. Never write to a crowd.

9 – Are you inspiring the reader’s imagination?

You must trigger mental images with your writing. The mind has difficulty distinguishing between vividly painted word pictures, and reality. Daydreams enchant, and emotions flow in their wake.

When you have emotion, you have desire. When you have desire, you have suggestibility. When you have suggestibility, you can direct action. Your levers are allegory (storytelling), metaphor, similes, verbs, adjectives, and specificity.

10 – Do you offer proof?

Specific testimonials and convincing guarantees worked into your ad copy are essential.

Obono John is the owner of http://www.butterflymarketzone.blogspot.com, The Viral Marketing Experiment.

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By Damon Smith

Everyone in online marketing or affiliate marketing, earning an income, has to research all over the internet to get the information he or she needs to succeed.

I have seen people spend hours, days, weeks, months, and even years just to come out making little or no income at all. As a publisher online, for Hailey Comet Weekly, I have met some of the most powerful people that have made thousands, even millions of dollars with the time they have been online.

Some have done it in as little as a few months and then retired. Then you have those who work very hard every day, no matter how much they make to help others to do the same. Do you remember when the doublers programs hit the internet and people made hundreds even thousands over night? Do you remember what happened within two months of them hitting the internet? People that were dealing with Storm Pay were stuck holding an empty bag because they went under and all kinds of trouble broke out.

The only true programs that make money are ones that last. There are very few of these. One that has made it to the top is Success University, because of the people behind the program, not because they have specials all the time, but because there are REAL people to talk with and to learn and teach you. I have met with people that joined the so-called PAS program and paid out $3,900!

In addition, most of them did not get anything from it. Do you know why? Because there was no one to teach them how to market the program, to make a profit, and they ended up being burnt!

Look at this link, http://www.damonday.net

If you take the time to read it, you will not only see that this group of master marketers are online to help you make a living , but also to teach you how to talk with others in a way to make them buy from you, and learn to work together as a team.

Success University is just what the name stands for. They have been online for quite sometime. The companies that I own depend on the things that I learn online. I would only suggest what I know will work to my own list of people, and not something, that is gone the next day.

My own list of people in my newsletter trust me because they all know, over the past 9 years, that when I have something to tell them it is only the truth and not something that will break their bank accounts. I have been called "The Howard Stern" of publishing an