HomeBusinessTips_KSh_129

Use These Two Numbers to Double Your Business In 12 Months!

by Charlie Cook
http://www.marketingforsuccess.com

========================================
Summary:
Want to hit your revenue numbers this year? Discover
which numbers to pay attention to.
========================================

Everyone wants to see growth in sales and net revenue. It's important for small business owners to set income goals and to watch sales results, but too much emphasis on these numbers can prevent you from reaching your goals.

Using your revenue figure to guide your marketing is like driving by looking in the rear view mirror the whole time. That number tells you where you've been. It doesn't tell you how to get where you want to go.

There are a couple of key numbers and ratios to keep in front of you that will help you get to your sales 'destination'.

Like an Iowa farmer growing soybeans, you've got to carefully plant seeds and nurture plants to maturity to ensure a good harvest and a good profit. The amount of seed you plant and the percentage that germinates and grows well determines your farm's profitability. The same is true in marketing and sales; the number of leads you generate and the number you convert to sales determine your income.

These are the two most important numbers to pay attention to in marketing. Use them to evaluate your marketing and determine how many sales you'll generate:

1. The number of qualified prospects in your database.

These are people who've told you they have a concern or problem you can help them with and who want to hear from you again.

2. Your prospect-to-client conversion rate.

The percentage of qualified prospects you convert to paying clients.

The math is simple; the more qualified prospects you have and the higher your conversion rates, the more revenue you'll generate.

Your sales will stay frozen at present levels if you focus on how much revenue you're making and ignore the importance of building your list of qualified prospects. You could double your business in the next few months by building your database of qualified prospects and improving your conversion rates.

Marketing Numbers

You don't need to be a math wiz to become an expert at marketing math. Pay attention to these numbers on a weekly basis;

- The number of people who saw your ads, read your articles or received your mailings.

- The percentage of these people that responded to your ad or article. It's not how many ads you run, but how many people pay attention to your ads that matters.

- The percentage of respondents that actually gave you their contact information and added themselves to your database. These are the people who have identified themselves as qualified prospects who are interested in learning more.

If you're marketing through your Website, it's incredibly simple to identify these numbers daily and weekly to track the success of your marketing. Here's how;

1. Look at the number of unique visitors to your Website daily or weekly.

2. Divide this number by the number of people who contacted you. This is your conversion rate of site visitors to qualified prospects. If your site is set up correctly, at least one out of ten people should be contacting you and adding themselves to your list of qualified prospects. If you use Google Ads to drive visitors to your site, you can send visitors to specific landing pages and increase your conversion rate to 20% or even 25%.

What should you expect from your Website? For every hundred unique visitors to your site per week, 10 to 25 should be sending you an E-mail requesting more information about your products and services. Each month, your list of qualified prospects and your sales should grow.

Before you finish this article, make a commitment to apply this simple marketing math to grow your business. Set a goal for your business. Look at how many qualified prospects your marketing is currently generating.

Write this number down, then put a diagonal line across it and next to it write down the number of qualified prospects you want to add to your database each week.

I've been doing this little exercise for two years with my current Website. My goals for acquiring qualified prospects get larger each month as my business grows. My latest goal is 500 new prospects per week. This translates into 6 to 7 percent more business each month. With a little planning, you can see your business grow just as fast.

2006 � In Mind Communications, LLC. All rights reserved.

The author, Charlie Cook, helps service professionals, small business owners and marketing professionals attract more clients and be more successful. Sign up
to receive the Free Marketing Strategy eBook, '7 Steps to get more clients and grow your business' at http://http://www.marketingforsuccess.com.

Are You a 'Yes-Dog'?

by Suzanne Falter-Barns
www.howmuchjoy.com

There was once a time (and there still is, to a certain degree) when I would say 'Yes' to every opportunity, request, suggestion, good idea, and even mediocre idea that came my way. And let me tell you, it was exhausting.

It was like I had this automatic, knee-jerk reaction to accommodate any suggestion that came my way -- as if it were my karmic duty. I call this auto-response being a 'yes-dog'. Perhaps you know the feeling.

When you're a yes-dog, your entire being is all about making other people happy; you knock yourself out doing it. No task is too small -- you figure you've always got room in your psyche, your schedule or your soul to squeeze in one more thing that someone wants to fit in. God forbid you should say no -- for then that someone would be unhappy. Which would be unthinkable.

Like a lot of creative people, I'm naturally empathetic -- so I could literally feel other people's pain � an experience I simply wanted to avoid as much as possible. For many years, I thought it was up to me to please the rest of the world. I literally thought it was my job to be a 'yes-dog'.

These days, I'm taking a much more circumspect view. I've come to the realization that I simply can't live my soul purpose AND make the rest of the world happy all the time.

And I realize that being a yes-dog doesn't always make the rest of the world happy -- even in my little corner. The more well-known I get, and the wider my reach, the more I can see it. There is always someone, somewhere, who has a problem with what I'm doing. And therein lay the breakthrough.

I'm no longer uncomfortable with other people's pain. I mean, it's not like I relish it; but I don't run to avoid it. I've come to realize we all have a path, and a learning process we're going through. This means my entire job is nothing more than to be authentic, listen to my gut, and act accordingly. Not only will I not make everyone happy -- I can't!

If someone is upset by this, it's no longer a big problem. Rather, it's simply the way their path is rubbing up against my path; it's part of life, growth, and karma. So I have nothing to fear.

My friend Joan Sotkin has a saying, 'I don't always have to be the one who's uncomfortable here'. Amen! Since I've given up being a yes-dog, and let go of the need to be 'the one who's always uncomfortable', great things have begun to stream my way. My reach, my income, my productivity and my impact in the world
have gone up in quantum leaps.

Best of all, I've relaxed as I go about my business. 'No' is not scary -- it's empowering. And, ironically enough, the world has not turned on me in anger and resentment -- it's actually stepped right up to my door and truly embraced what I'm doing.

Are you a yes-dog? Take my handy quiz below to assess where you are. And may I suggest a step away from that easy little word, to one that can be equally empowering: "No".

The Are You a 'Yes-Dog'? Questionnaire

1. Do you find it hard to say no to your children, even when they're making unreasonable demands.
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

2. Do you long to be able to tell your boss exactly what you think � but you just can't?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

3. Do you find it impossible to deny yourself 'forbidden' pleasures -- i.e. Ben & Jerry's ice cream when you're dieting -- even if you've made a decision not to indulge?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

4. Do your friends tell you that you're a pushover, and advise you to stand firm?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

5. Do you get a queasy feeling in your gut when someone asks you to do something that's just not a good fit for you � and then inevitably cave in despite your feelings?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

6. Are you uncomfortable asking for more m�ney or more responsibility around your work?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

7. Are you always the person who volunteers even when you don't want to?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

8. Are there things you long to do in life, but you simply can't find the time or the courage to get to them?
a) Always
b) Occasionally
c) Rarely
d) Never

Rate your answers:
For every a) give yourself 10 points. For every b) give yourself 7 points. For every c) give yourself 4 points. For every d) give
yourself 1 point.

If your score is 60-80, you're probably saying 'Yes' WAY more often than you want to. Consider getting some coaching on how to say no from a good friend, life coach or partner.

If your score is 40-60, your ability to say 'No' willingly is spotty � try pausing and counting silently to five before you answer.

If your score is 20-40, you've got most situations pretty well in hand. Try saying 'No' just a little more often and see what happens.

If your score is 0-20, you're doing great! Your ability to monitor when to say 'Yes' and when to say 'No' is truly inspiring.

�2005 Suzanne Falter-Barns LLC.

For information on how to find the time, energy, money to live your purpose in life, ch�ck out Suzanne's fr�e ezine, The Joy Letter. Sign up at http://www.howmuchjoy.com/joyletter.html and receive our valuable report, 35 Guaranteed Time Savers. And get a daily blast of joyful tips from the Blast o' Joy blog at http://selfhelpsalon.typepad.com/blast_o_joy/.

Using Traffic Exchanges Effectively

By Dan

If you want your online business to succeed, you have to advertise. There is absolutely no way around it. Unfortunately, for most aspiring online entrepreneurs, advertising on the internet is neither cheap nor easy. Many types of internet advertising do not even guarantee that anyone will visit your site. If there is one form of advertising that will guarantee visitors to your site, it is traffic exchanges. The question is; can you use them to their full potential?

I will not waste your time explaining how traffic exchanges work. I am sure you already know how they work. That aside, when you use traffic exchanges to build up credits/tokens/etc., people are viewing your site, also building up their own stash of page views for their own site. Consider traffic exchanges, will they bring you site visitors who are actually interested and read what your site has to say, or will they simply ignore it and keep clicking, focusing only on building credits?

The truth is most people could care less about your site. It does not matter how it looks, what you are offering, or anything like that. If you want to promote some long sales letter, or a product from some affiliate program, you can pretty much forget about using traffic exchanges. Traffic exchanges have a certain time limit on how long you must remain on a site before you gain a credit. The longest time limit I have ever seen is 30 seconds. Most people will not be able to fully read and comprehend a long sales letter in that amount of time. Even if you are not promoting some sales letter, and instead you are promoting your home page, which has pictures and banners and all sorts of stuff, you honestly cannot expect to convince some random person to buy something from your site in such a short amount of time.

I think I have said enough about using traffic exchanges ineffectively. The mistake most people on traffic exchanges make is they try to sell right away with their home page/sales letter/etc. They also do not seem to realize that every person on a traffic exchange is somebody trying to promote their website, and that everybody is trying to earn credits for page views.

In my opinion, the best way to benefit from traffic exchanges is by having a splash page that features an opt-in lead form for your mailing list. Personally, I advertise a splash page that offers a free e-book when people sign up for my mailing list, and it has worked quite well in growing my list. If you do not have a mailing list, you should at least have some form of a splash page that will captivate the viewer's attention and curiosity in an instant. If successful, a splash page can lead to people checking out your true site because they are curious, not because they are click-crazy.

A splash page is small, so the visitor will not have to scroll much while surfing the traffic exchange, if at all. In addition, it will not take very long to load in the traffic exchange. It is quite possible that if you promote a long site, the timer will run out before your site even loads on the visitor's browser. They still get a credit for surfing, but you lose a credit, even though the visitor did not see your site.

Now here is where things get interesting. There will always be people who do not know what they are doing on traffic exchanges. They will be the ones promoting long sales letters that nobody will read. Therefore, it is to your own advantage to build a splash page that will be eye-candy for visitors, and relieve them from the boredom of clicking through sites they have no interest in reading. With this in mind, traffic exchanges can be very beneficial and profitable for you, if you use them right.

Visit Dan's site to find the
Best rated home based business opportunities so you can earn residual income (http://www.ez-online-money.com/).

Debt Relief

YOURS FREE!300 Money making ebooks! No srings attached! Goto- http://www.eBookDivision.com/top300/toddherrington
Financial debt is now a major concern to many millions of people in the West; options do exist to help but certain steps need to taken before you can clear your debts. There are many ways to provide debt relief but whichever you choose, you must have a degree of commitment to being debt free or it will not work. It is essential to manage debts carefully and get rid of them as soon as possible.

Do not let panic over the situation rule your actions as you will probably end up in a worse predicament. It is often the case where a loan is taken out but circumstances change and it becomes a burden but you need to continue the repayments.

Step one is to sit down and list all your monthly expenses and place them into columns of those that must be paid and those that you can live without. Cut the credit card purchases by introducing a habit of paying in cash as this will restrict your expenditure to the amount of cash you are carrying.

Any spare money can then be placed in a special fund to help with your debt relief payments and although it will take some time for a reasonable amount to accumulate, you will see the benefits in time. Placing restrictions on how much entertaining you do whether it is a complete stop of all restaurant meals or a dramatic reduction you will ensure your fund grows faster.

No-one really wants to increase their mortgage repayments but many homeowners see their only option is to refinance their home which can work but just increases the amount you pay in the long term. Although this is a great way to raise spare cash in the short term you may not think that way a few years later so consider if this is really right for you.

Robbing Peter to pay Paul is a system whereby you remove cash from your credit card account to pay the debts accrued on it, but this really is a short term debt relief solution as it increases the balance on it. If your debt is so high that you have to file for bankruptcy because a re-mortgage option hasn't worked then you should consult a bankruptcy attorney for the best advice.

Some people are able to bypass bankruptcy with the money in their individual retirement accounts (IRA) but such an act can seriously affect your financial future. There is far too much to lose with this option so you would be better advised to find alternative answers and learn debt relief methods that are more fiscally responsible.

Easy Profits with Community Blogs

I live in a community.

It’s a place where people know each other, use each other’s services, know (to some extent) each other’s business and watch for each other’s safety.

The people in my community are individuals but they’re also undeniably connected. They have different strengths which they at times share and a myriad number of weaknesses which, (because people are willing to help one another), often remain invisible to the naked eye.

And although I don’t know everyone’s name, address and personal life story, the fact that we are a community gives us a sense of belonging that’s as strong and real as any family tie.

Consider then a community of blogs.

What might it look like?
How would it function?
How could you benefit financially?

To answer these questions, let’s look at what any blog needs and how that need might be met in a blog community.

1.) In order to stay alive, blogs need fresh content – In a blog community, the content would be based on a single theme (i.e. home business) and would be provided for you. Because it’s a community, you could participate in the creation of that content and profit handsomely.

2.) New articles that are submitted to blogs need to be edited, tagged, and made “keyword rich” – In the blog community, those who had the expertise in that area would take care of it.

3.) Blogs need to be created by someone – In a blog community lots of blogs would be created and linked to other blogs in the community. This service would be performed automatically for all members of the blog community as soon as they joined.

4.) Blogs need to be posted on search engines and submitted to directories – In the blog community, the generation of traffic would be taken care of by those who are good at it. They would use their expertise for the benefit of all the members.

5.) Blogs need to be optimized with ads that create an additional income stream – In the blog community each individual member would create their Adsense code (it’s free) and copy and paste it to their blog. They would even be able to receive help if necessary. They would also receive profits from revenue that’s pooled through community advertising.

If you’re familiar with how much time, energy and knowledge is required to maintain just one profit generating blog, then what you’ve just read must sound like a dream come true.

If you’d like to check out whether it’s real or just your imagination, visit tinyurl.com/6lcexb

There is strength in “blog” numbers!

______________________________________________________________________________

Marsha Sneed reviews quality business opportunities and online resource tools that can be used effectively by newbies and experienced marketers alike to reach their marketing and financial goals. She can be reached at jcsneed@onebox.com.

7 Crucial Tips for Web 2.0 Marketing

by Dave Skul

Web 2.0 offers the next generation of online marketing tools, enabling businesses to harness the power of the Internet to reach customers in unique and varied ways.

Web 2.0's primary focus is getting people together to share their expertise and thoughts through social interaction. Web 2.0 principles embrace those tools and services with social networking applications.

Just as the open source movement changed the face of software development, so has Web 2.0's open source content model changed online marketing-- a change which has the potential to accelerate your business' profits.

Think YouTube, MySpace, del.cio.us, Technorati, Digg and Flickr. These are only a few of the more popular services which have revolutionized the way businesses are reaching their online target markets.

If you are considering jumping into Web 2.0 marketing, use the following tips to help you integrate Web 2.0 into your marketing arsenal.

1. Simple but not easy: Contrary to many claims, Web 2.0 marketing takes hard work and creativity to stay ahead of your competition. Your content will have to be tended to and updated continuously. Make sure you dedicate enough time and budget to keep multiple projects running. Like any marketing strategy, time and patience are critical. Committing to a long-term strategy is ideal.

2. You have to be appealing: Adding fresh and interesting content should be a priority. News becomes old fast. This is when you will have to step up your creative activity. Experiment with podcasts, quirky background information, and news about upcoming events.

3. Check your spin at the door: People who engage in social networks do so either to share knowledge or gain new knowledge, not necessarily to buy something. Recycling old information without offering anything valuable up front is detrimental. There's no getting around it-- you must give first before you can get. If your first response is to sell, people will take notice and you will eventually be pushed aside.

4. You must stay active: Web 2.0 marketing is a two-way street that allows a business to interact with a buyer on a familiar level. You can join in by including videocasts, blogs and wikis on your own site. But, creating your own social network is only half the story. You have to be willing to seek out and participate in other active online communities.

5. Authenticity required: The internet is conducive to anonymity on every level. However, using web 2.0 marketing makes you part of a community. Misuse of that very anonymity that encourages participation can hamper or ruin your plan. You have to be willing to encourage participation without encouraging abuse.

6. Get thick skin: Not everyone will say positive things about your business. Quite the contrary. You will more than likely have to prove yourself before you're given the privilege to participate, much less sell. The way in which you handle critics will go a long way towards demonstrating your poise under difficult situations. No one likes a cry baby.

7. Multimedia rules: Traffic statistics on video sharing sites tell a tremendous story about where consumers are spending their time online. With bandwidth costs continuing to decrease, consumers' appetite for the multimedia experience will only grow. This presents an amazing opportunity for those businesses willing to invest in the latest online communication technologies.

Web 2.0 is still in its infancy. Consumers have already shown they are willing to participate in open source communities. Content, especially multimedia content, will continue to be the deciding factor in whether a business succeeds or fails online. Are you ready for the Web 2.0 marketing challenge?

Relativity is pleased to offer [http://www.relativitycorp.com/]Web 2.0 Advertising - Web 2.0 Marketing - Web 2.0 Promotions - iMedia services to the internet business public. You can download a free e-book with our latest insights into the Web 2.0 marketing world by signing up to our list at [http://www.relativitycorp.com]http://www.relativitycorp.com. We look forward to providing you with fresh creative information and insight into this emerging industry.

Home Based Business You Can Start In Your Spare Time - Gift Basket Designer

By Lili James

Who doesn't love a beautiful gift basket stuffed with sweet smelling beauty products or cheeses with jams and all kinds of different treats? The booming gift basket business brings in more than $1,000,000,000 (one billion) each year to florists, home based gift basket business, gift stores, and through other sales that are related to the business. Gift baskets are a unique gift giving idea that becomes more popular each year thanks to new categories and new interests and available products.

You can sell themed gift baskets -- bed and bath, gifts for children, wine lovers, chocolate lovers, a day at the beach, champagne and caviar, first day of school, Valentines Day, Christmas gift baskets, Easter baskets, 4th of July, etc. -- at gift trade shows, through mail order, Internet auction, etc, At local flea markets you can set up an area where people can put together baskets with products that they choose from your available items -- and you can charge per item or charge a flat fee per basket.

To get your business started you can get business cards and brochures printed that illustrates your available gift baskets and other products.

# You can compile a mailing list of potential customers that you can send a brochure to.
# Give business cards to people in your neighborhood, at work, at the gym, at church, on the train or bus,
# Distribute your cards and brochures to corporate office buildings -- especially during the Holiday seasons
# Take out ads in local newspapers and magazines
# Give sample gift baskets to local radio stations to be awarded as prizes
# Take candy filled dishes to several businesses along with some business cards and brochures

When you have gotten your business organized,

# Go to trade shows to show and sell your baskets and other products to the buyers and other customers at the show.
# Personalize your baskets by designing, printing and using your own labels.
# Spend one hour a month showing others how to make gift baskets -- sell your products at the class to make more money and to steadily grow your business.

Get started with your gift basket business and get your piece of the 1,000,000,000 pie.

http://www.necessaryinfo.info/

7 Steps to Creating Your Own Podcast

By Donna Gunter

Listening to podcasts is not something I enjoy or take time for, frankly. I am a visual learner and prefer to read something rather than listen to it, as I find reading a much quicker way to gather the info that I need. However, with the proliferation of audio listening devices, like the whole iPod family and other mp3 players, I have to acknowledge that I am in the minority, I believe. The world is listening to a wide variety of audio files, much more so than ever before in history, and I need to get on the bandwagon or be lost in the dust.

What is a podcast, anyway? A podcast is an audio file that you create in .mp3 format. You can upload it with an RSS (Really Simple Syndication) file to your server for your target market to download any number of programs created to receive or subscribe to your audio file. You can listen to it at your leisure on the computer or a personal mp3 device.

Why should you create a podcast? I think it serves as a marketing tool for the solo service professional, who might want to do one of the following:

--create an Internet radio show, or talk show, in which you create content-rich broadcasts for your target market

--conduct a teleclass series in which you interview experts who have solutions to problems faced by your target market

--promote a printed book, ebook, or CD/DVD series by releasing promotional snippets to a wider audience

--provide short and valuable expert tips to your target market (my Get More Clients Online, podcast consists of the weekly article I write for my newsletter)

Many podcasts are about an hour in length, especially when they consist of recordings of radio shows or teleclasses. However, I think the listening threshold for most people is about 10 minutes. This means your podcast needs to be 10 minutes or less in length. If it is longer, you really have to grab their attention in the first 10 minutes to keep them listening for the full amount of time.

Good content and a good speaking voice are essential to maintaining interest. Do not make your podcast one long advertisement for your services or products -- share some useful information with your target market to help them solve their problems. You need to have a good speaking voice. Nothing is worse than listening to someone read a speech with a monotone delivery. So, for maximum impact when you record your podcast (especially if you're just recording yourself), get up and walk around, smile, gesture, or do whatever you normally do when you deliver a speech. Modulate your voice, much in the same way you would when you have a 1 on 1 conversation with someone -- put feeling and emotion into your words. I pretend like I am talking to my best friend, and that helps me with a livelier delivery.

What are the steps to creating a podcast?

1. Listen to a few podcasts to get a feel for what others are doing. To listen, you will need a podcatcher (podcast reader), which permits you to subscribe to podcasts in the same way you subscribe to blogs. I favor iTunes as my podcatcher of choice, which is a free online download. You will also need to find podcasts. The quickest way to do that is via podcast directories, which include the iTunes store. Podcast Alley, one of the most popular podcasting sites, has a large podcast directory, and Yahoo Podcasts has a podcast search. To find others, simply search online for "podcast directory."

2. Plan your podcast. Who is your target market? What do they want to listen to? How will your podcast be unique from others in your industry? What is your format (interview others, host a teleclass, or record yourself)? How long will your podcast be? How frequently will you deliver your podcasts?

3. Record your podcast. Many people choose to record their podcast with a free piece of software called Audacity. It has an easy learning curve and advanced features for more experienced podcasters. Mac users might want to check out Garage Band. For best recording sound, do not use the microphone that came with your computer or the one built into your laptop. You will want to get a more professional one, such as the ones offered at Plantronics or Radio Shack.

4. Save and upload your podcast to your server. Once you have created your podcast in an mp3 file, now you have to save it, and upload it to a server, via an FTP program (like CuteFTP) so that it is readily available. You can upload it to your website, or use one of the many podcasting hosting services available. The problem with uploading it to your website is that audio files are space hogs, and you can quickly exhaust all the storage capacity of your hosting account, not to mention your monthly bandwidth capacity if your podcast is popular and is downloaded frequently. That is why I use a fee-based audio service hosting company, Audio Acrobat, which offers me generous storage and bandwidth capacity for a semi-annual fee. Another popular podcast hosting company is Hipcast.com.

5. Create your podcast feed. You can create your podcast feed from scratch. However, I recommend you use a feed service to do so. If you use a podcasting hosting service, this feature is included in your service package. For everyone else, the quickest way to create your podcast feed is through Feedburner.com. This same service creates RSS feeds for blogs. The advantage of creating your podcast feed from this site is that you can create a browser-friendly feed, track your circulation, and enhance your feed with its SmartCast technology.

6. Publish and promote your podcast. If you use a podcasting hosting service, the service will publish your podcast and notify various podcast directories about the availability of your new podcast. Alternatively, you can enter the info directly into the major podcast directories. You will also want to promote the podcast on your website, blog, and in your email newsletter. One of the easiest ways to do this is to add feed subscription buttons (called Chiclets) to your sites. You will have to cut and paste the HTML code into your templates to create the chiclets. You can get directions on how to publish subscription buttons from the various podcasters you want to feature. Lastly, you will want to create "album art" for your podcast, or a graphic representation that many podcatchers upload with the mp3 file. Album art may be from 170x170 to 300x300 pixels square at 72 dpi. Any graphic designer can help you create this graphics file.

7. Make money from your podcast. Advertising on podcasts is still new, but some companies like Fruitcast.com or PodcasterAds.com are places to start. Another option is to place Google AdSense listings on all of your sites to list your podcast, or seek sponsors for your podcasts, just as you would for a radio show.

Do not let the audio world pass you by! Podcasting is a very inexpensive way of helping you get the word out about what you do and what you offer to the world.

Copyright (c) 2006 Donna Gunter

Online Business Resource Queen (TM) and Business Coach Donna Gunter helps self-employed service professionals learn how to 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 http://www.GetMoreClientsOnline.com. Read about running an online biz at her blog, http://www.getmoreclientsonlineblog.com or subscribe to her Get More Clients Online Podcast at http://dgunter.audioacrobat.com/rss/get_more_clients_online_podcast.xml

Ecommerce: Have Cart - Will Shop

By Scott Lindsay

You will need a shopping cart application to facilitate ecommerce, in order to sell products or services online. While your customers simply want a way to make a purchase, if they are interested in your product, you will have already considered tough choices

For Instance...

If you want a full solution for invoicing, statements, receipts, and company financial history, there are solutions to cover all of this with an application for a shopping cart connected to company financial data. One such company is COREsense based in New York. This service requires less redundant work, because data entry on sales to a separate accounting software application is not required due to the full integration of financial data. For most companies, this solution will fall outside normal budget constraints.

If a shopping cart does not fit your budget, you have a couple of solutions that might work depending on your technical expertise. OSCommerce is available at no cost. This product is a fully customizable solution for a shopping cart, but it does require personal programming. In many cases netrepreneurs will hire a programmer to set this shopping cart up for them.

If you have no up-front budget for a shopping cart, PayPal makes one available at no cost. However, they do retain a fee, as well as, a small commission on each sale. The power of PayPal may make this a trusted source for online transactions for your customers.

Yahoo and eBay provide shopping cart services, at $30-40 per month, and offer a few features unavailable with the low-cost or no-cost checkout solutions.

There are other online solutions for cyber transactions with the tipping point based entirely on the size and needs of your online business. If you are a large company with thousands of online transactions, it may ultimately be less expensive to purchase a shopping cart system requiring a monthly fee. In the end, the fees and commissions associated with no-cost carts could outpace a standard monthly fee from other ecommerce transaction solutions.

Your customers have a choice in where they shop online and you have a choice in how you manage online transactions. Spend some time checking out the services offered and how the fees will affect your bottom line, both now, and as your company grows.

As with all ecommerce sites, your business will not do well if it is difficult to checkout. Make sure the transaction solution you choose allow your clients to make a purchase easily. If the process if too difficult, the prospect may bow out before the sale is complete.

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

Here's a Quick Way to Jumpstart Your Internet Profits

Here’s a Quick Way to Jumpstart Your Internet Profits

In 1999, my late husband, Joe, and I decided to create a website for a home based business we were trying to build. Having no previous design knowledge and no online resources, we eventually hooked up with a company who, for a total of $3,500 and 8 telephone sessions promised to help us reach our goal.

We figured it was a good deal at the time because we expected to make a lot of money (once we were up and running). Unfortunately, the only thing we got from it was a certificate of accomplishment and $3,500 worth of credit card debt.

Today if you’re interested in learning how to do internet marketing from the ground up, there are, fortunately, a few quality marketing courses that will give you the “low-down” on all the necessary tools, resources and techniques to succeed.

If, however, you’re like many entrepreneurs – techno phobic, pressed for time and not at all sure how to navigate the high seas of online marketing, there’s a real solution.

A “business in a box” (so named because it comes with everything you need to be successful) can be a way for newbies to profit without stocking or shipping products, processing orders, having a merchant account, having employees or overhead and without talking to customers.

Although any kind of online business can be packaged as a “business in a box”, automated websites have become the most popular and for good reason as they’re usually pre-programmed with more than one income stream.

1) Affiliate Income – These sites can be customized with your own domain name and affiliate profit links.

2) Monthly Residual Income – If you don’t know how residual income is created, it happens when you make one sale and get paid for it again and again.

3) Two-Tier Affiliate Programs – These websites often promote special free affiliate programs that are very attractive to visitors. Anyone signing up for the program becomes your “sub-affiliate”. They can promote products and services featured on your site and you’ll get paid along with them.

4) The addition of your own personal links – With these sites, you’re able to add whatever program you’re involved with and whatever product you’ve created. This gives your site a real stamp of originality. If you’re techno phobic, you usually have access to the company’s authorized website designer for a nominal fee.

The Online Money Machine is just such a site and was created by entrepreneur Jeff Gardner (Gardner Marketing Group Inc.) as a main website to advertise and promote anything and everything you’re involved in.

To find out more about this innovative “business in a box” that can jumpstart your online experience, go to www.makemywebsiteprofitable.com . It’s definitely worth a look.

________________________________________________________________________

Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimization: Any difference?

By Mikhail Tuknov

For many casual internet users, the terms SEM and SEO rarely enter their minds when they are busy jumping from one website to another. However, these terms establish much of what comes out on the results page whenever we type a word in the search tab of any accessible search engine. These terms are also responsible for all those advertisements and pop-ups that link us to even more websites, whether they connect to our original search or not. So just what are SEM and SEO?

In the simplest way possible, SEM and SEO are tools which website creators, especially those who are promoting and selling a certain service or product, use to gain a lot of exposure and a better ranking for their website. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, the simplicity ends there.

To make it a tad bit complex, SEM and SEO are not the same.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM), deals with how a website markets to gain exposure in the different search engines available on the internet. Search Engine Optimization (SEO), deals with how the web creators develop and redevelop the content, quality, and structure of their entire websites. When an internet user types in a particular word in the search tab, their websites have a better chance of appearing on the first few search engine results pages (SERPS).

To make it even more complex, although the functions of SEM and SEO seem different, they are more effective when used together. Since the main function of SEM is to gain further exposure for a website, the common means for attraction are more online advertisements, blogs, internet articles, partner and sponsored websites, and anything that can catch the eye of the internet user.

SEM also makes use of PPC (pay-per-click), and paid inclusion to push a website�s visibility. Lastly, it is also an important process in SEM to submit the name and URL of a website to different search engines and web directories, if only to inform them of the website�s existence. This is carried out to ensure the popularity of a website.

So how does SEO come together with SEM? Despite having all the advertisements provided by SEM, truly the SEO allows the internet user to easily and conveniently find what he is looking for. Since the function of SEO is to gain a better ranking in the SERPS, the web creator has to constantly optimize his website in order to cater to the needs of the internet user; making it easier for spiders or web crawlers to judge whether the website�s content is relevant to the words being searched. Optimization is not a simple and easy task. It involves having to restructure the website regularly, (by editing the html code and meta tags, changing content, reorganizing the site map, developing an easier navigational structure, etc.), to adapt to the rapidly changing demands of the internet user. Still, when done properly, not only does SEO help a website become more useful and therefore, more often visited by the internet user, it also helps gain more exposure since it increases the website�s chances of gaining a better rank in the SERPS.

Both SEM and SEO success rely heavily on the words or context which Internet user�s type in when they search for something on the internet. Take PPC under SEM, for example. PPC is an ad that is triggered by a particular word or context used by an internet user. Once a particular word or context is searched, a corresponding PPC ad for a website comes out. SEO works in the same way. The web creator inputs a particular Meta tag (or keyword) in his html that he believes many internet users will use when searching for information; information, which the web creator�s website may contain.

Although all of these processes involving SEM and SEO are tedious and time-consuming, it all boils down to knowing and serving the target audience. A web creator must be discerning enough to know what the internet users need and want, and at the same time, he must have the real passion to inform and provide the internet users with the right service and product.

Mikhail Tuknov, search engine optimization specialist and a founder of Infatex (Search Engine Marketing Company). With an extensive background in Internet marketing, Mikhail Tuknov offers SEO, PPC, SEM services. http://www.infatex.com/

Network vs. Affiliate Marketing

By Andreas Sundstrom

Running a traditional brick and mortar business with an online presence, is one very good way to make a part of your living online. However, for the purposes of this article, we are going to assume that you do not have your own business. Therefore, I am going to discuss two of the biggest online moneymakers right now: online business opportunities and affiliate marketing.

Network marketing

The typical online business opportunity built around a network-marketing concept, inheriting the basic qualities of the offline business model that has been available for many decades. The basic idea is that you recruit two or more people, who in their turn recruit two, and in this way your efforts, (at least in theory), are greatly leveraged.

The main difference doing this online is that, utilizing the power of the Internet, you as a network marketer can literally reach people all over the planet.

The problem with the network marketing, or "mlm", concept is it sounds so good on paper - excessively good. Most people who join with a company of this type tend to get a dose of Mr. Reality rather soon.

They discover that recruiting new people, which is what mlm�s are all about - even if they try to tell you differently -, is not at all a simple process. There have been plenty of fraudulent businesses in this niche, and people tend to stay on their toes as soon as they hear the words mlm or network marketing.

To further complicate things, this business model is also based on you paying a set monthly fee - whether you make any money or not, which means many people who start this kind of business actually end up losing money.

It is definitely possible to make a good living in network marketing, but it is definitely not for everybody. "Getting in on the ground floor" is allegedly not always as good as it seems.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is similar to network marketing, in the sense that you will be promoting a product produced by another company or person. This can make life simpler for you, as the merchant usually takes care of all shipping and customer support issues. Amazon.com is probably one of the most well-known (and respected) companies utilizing the power of affiliate partnerships.

As an affiliate, your task is simply to refer new clients to the merchant. When these people buy something, you receive credit with a certain percentage of the sale.

Contrary to network marketing, acting as an affiliate marketer, is generally free. There are certain companies that have a hybrid structure between network and affiliate marketing, which require you to pay a start-up and/or monthly fee to market their products. Most affiliate programs are completely free to join. I would personally stay away from those using their affiliate programs as an income generator, in its own right, or "affiliate sharks�, as one marketer aptly named them.

Affiliate programs are a great way that anyone can start to make money online, without having to invest a lot of money, if indeed any at all.

However, there are certain strategies and marketing methods you need to be knowledgeable of, if you are to make anything but peanuts with your affiliate marketing.

Choosing the right affiliate program, and promoting it to the right people in the right way is an art form in its own right. The people who are good at this, generally referred to as "super affiliates", make a very good living doing nothing else than selling other people's products.

If you are looking to make an additional income from the Internet, or eventually even replace your current income altogether, affiliates marketing is a great way to get started. To achieve the success you desire, you should study and learn the same techniques �super affiliates� use on a day-to-day basis.

Andreas Sundstrom has made a full time living online for the past six years, largely thanks to the power of free affiliate programs. At his website http://www.webhosting-tips.info/affiliate/ he will share some of the most important super affiliate secrets.

How to Take the First Steps with Autoresponders

By Ian Simpson

One of the most effective forms of low-cost Internet marketing is using email to reach a targeted audience. While email marketing has undergone changes over the years, in particular, the outlawing of spam email, it still has great appeal and is one of the most widely used internet marketing techniques. It is quite simply the best way to keep in touch with your customers on a regular basis on autopilot. Providing you respect the spam laws and use email properly, you will have a trouble-free email marketing business.

Email marketing is more commonly associated with the use of an autoresponder service. It allows you to import your email messages into the autoresponder and send them out to your customers at a fixed date and time - you could have a series of messages sent over a period of weeks, months or even years, if you wanted. The exciting thing is that once the autoresponder has been set up, that part of your business will run hands free, allowing you to concentrate on other important things.

The costs associated with an autoresponder vary considerably from free up to $100 a month. Try to avoid free autoresponders where possible, although they are free, they come at a price! The price being the restrictions on usage, and they will nearly always carry an advert of some sort on your message, which can distract your recipient from the real reason, why they have received the message. In addition, it is not necessary to pay a silly price for an autoresponder, big companies may want to pay top price because they can afford to but as an individual, you do not need to. Excellent, cost effective autoresponder services can be obtained from aweber.com or getresponse.com. These are web-based programs so they will work for you 24/7.

You could of course, use a desktop-based autoresponder such as Mailloop. This type of program is a software application installed on your computer and it allows you to manage your email campaigns from your desktop. You need to be aware that you will need to leave your computer running all the time or else you will not be able to receive or send emails automatically. However, it is a great way to have a series of autoresponders for a one-time payment and no recurring fees.

So, having decided on using autoresponders for your email business, what do you do with one? Well, building up a customer database should be a priority. Initially, you will want to create a form for your website that allows potential subscribers to insert their details. When they agree to subscribe, they enroll automatically onto an email course that you will have loaded into the autoresponder. The course can, as long as you want it to be, sent automatically over a period of time - this is where the automation of your email business will come into its own. It is essential that any information you send to your subscribers is of value and instructive. It is no good sending rubbish; you will lose your subscriber quicker than you got him! Quality email courses you can use are found in the Turbomembership.com.

If you offered a 14-day email course on internet marketing, for example, then you could provide links to various marketing ebooks or resources. In each email would be a link to a different ebook. Of course, each link would have your unique affiliate code. The unique Turbomembership.com affiliate program provides quality marketing ebooks and software scripts that you can re-sell at 95% commission.

This is just one of the many ways you can use autoresponders in your email marketing business. Finding and using the right autoresponder service, setting up your autoresponder, and loading, it with quality information is just the tip of the iceberg where marketing is concerned. However, it is a good place to start and gain the necessary experience for future marketing projects.

Ian Simpson reviews and writes about software and informational products on the internet. Great marketing resources can be found at http://information4income.com/sfpr.

The Most Powerful Tool a Marketer Can Have

By P.V. Reymond

In Internet Marketing, many tools exist to build your business or increase your income. You can find lots of software, books, or videos, but you have to know how to use them.

Before you begin to use them, you need to have clarity. There is a tool you may not know very well. It is the most powerful tool that we all have; it is the mind.

Nothing can compete with your mind. You have to use it well. With your mind, you will be able to control everything. Did you know that Yoga experts can stop the beat of the heart or have surgery without anesthesia? Maybe someone does not believe it but it is true and in Internet Marketing, it is the same. If you are using your mind in the right way, you will get good results, and you will have a high percentage of success.

In order to achieve your goals you need to concentrate and have a clear vision of all the ways you have to travel. You have to create the conditions for good concentration, removing all marginal distractions possible, and ignoring others.

It is important to prepare a long-term plan, and divide it into levels, and each level into a systematic process. When you achieve level one, you go to level two, and so on. In this system, your mind plays a fundamental role because there is no software able to build your system. You are the only one that can build it, because you know what you want and where you want to go. This is the point; your mind is your guide. It controls the whole process and it is stronger than any other tool you have.

The essential thing is to maintain an attitude of mental activity, and to avoid anything that will reduce this and make you passive. Thinking and applying systematically will help you to grow; you will discover the power of your mind. Train your mind.

Do not be afraid to make a mistake. Remember, nobody learns from the mistakes of others; you have to try to believe in you. Put such fears to rest! You only have to think, think, and think; and in this way you will learn how to act and how to do everything right.

It is obvious you will have to face some problems traveling along your road. Then your mind will come to help you and you will find the solution in a short period. A powerful mind accomplishes results in the shortest time and with the least amount of wasted motion.

In order to be successful in Internet Marketing you have to focus your niche and to pay close attention to it. Ask yourself, what am I looking for? Keep it in the background of your mind and search for the answer. Knowing everything about you and about what you want, will help you to develop your business.

Keep your mind free; keep a sharp lookout, at every point, to see that you build into the foundation only those materials and that workmanship which will support a masterly structure.

Everyone has difficulty in the concentration of attention, workers in business and industry, students and even professors, complain of the same difficulty. Attention seems in some way to be at the very core of mental activity. Therefore paying attention to your niche and working only in this direction is crucial.

Using your mind as a tool is the most effective factor to be successful.

Copyright � 2006 PV Reymond.

P.V. Reymond is a marketer that built his business alone. He was growing inside the crowd, studying and learning how big marketers treat their customers, and how customers want to be treated. He came out from the crowd to teach people the whole process in how to build a profitable Internet Business with his Free Internet Marketing Education. If you are not making money online or you want to increase your income, then you should visit his site http://www.pvreymond.com.

Direct Mail - Getting You Envelope Opened

By Robert Wilkinson

If you use direct mail, it is in your best interest to get as much of it opened and read as possible. You may have spent a small fortune on the copywriting and the expensively printed brochure, but if you do not ensure that as many packs are opened and read as possible, then both copy and brochure are wasted.

There are two main schools of thought on how to avoid being binned. The first is to use disguise, and the second is to use persuasion.

Using disguise is mainly a business-to-business approach, but it works for business to consumer mailings also. Businesses to business promotional mailings are marked out so they do not appear to have been handled individually. This can be indicated by an envelope pre-printed with a postage mark, and the use of a window or address labels to show an address.

Try one or more of the following to give the envelope a more individual look.

Use stamps. They have to have been put on by hand, so it must be individual. There is no more obvious an indicator than a pre-printed stamp impression. When using a preprinted impression in conjunction with a window envelope it practically screams, advertising so do not do it.

Hand write the address on the envelope. This is probably only viable for higher value items and certainly get more attention this way. It does not have to be copperplate; it just needs to look as though it has been handled individually.

Use an unusual material for the envelope, say vellum or a textured paper. In tests conducted by a paper merchant, this alone increased responses significantly. The additional revenue generated by the mailing more than compensated for the additional cost for the special paper.

Again, do anything to make your mailing appear more individual and personal to the recipient. Probably the most important element is the use of stamps. This on its own can be enough to get you under the recipient's radar.

Secondly, use persuasive tactics. This is completely the opposite from disguise and is used mainly for business to consumer, but again it works for business to business too. In this instance, we mark it out specifically as commercial by using advertising images, copy, and headlines on the outside of the envelope itself. In this instance, it does not matter if you use a printed postal impression.

Unlike the previous method, which uses curiosity to get your envelope opened, we need to give the recipient a good reason to open the envelope. This can take a variety of forms, but as a couple of examples you can state a benefit, "Increase sales by 15%", or alternatively provide an incentive, "Reply by the end of the month and get 2 for the price of 1".

Be very clear and very specific about what the contents are going to achieve and remember you are only trying to get the envelope opened and read. Avoid anything vague. Do not expect to appeal to everyone using this method. You do not have that much room on the envelope and you cannot be all things to all people.

I hope you will achieve a strong enough response in a small percentage of recipients that they will open, and read the contents. Your persuasive copy will follow logically on from the envelope copy, and keep your prospect interested.

There is a lot of advice against this in business-to-business direct mail, and there is probably an element of truth in this. If you are mailing to an executive whose mail is screened then its likely good advice. However, there are plenty of owner/managers out there that still open their own mail, if the offer or benefit is clear enough, and of interest to open. You may well consign your mailing piece to the bin for the 99.5% of your prospects by doing this, but it was not about them, was it?

In summary, it is simple. Do not be run of the mill. Step away from the norm and make sure your envelope is overtly commercial with a clear benefit, or incentive, or alternatively make it look personal. If you do this, you are halfway to getting it read and that is more than half the battle.

Robert Wilkinson is the owner of http://www.arhiann.com a direct mail production company specializing in mailings for small and medium sized business.

Ten Tips to Higher Response Ads

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.

Direct Mail - the Deadly Sin of Not Testing

By Robert Wilkinson

If there were one thing to make direct mail a reliable method to drum up new business, it would have to be the ability to test different versions of a pack to achieve a better return on investment. Having processed many mailings over the years, I can attest that clients rarely take full advantage of this feature. In fact, more often than not, clients do not test at all.

Not testing is commercial suicide! In today's competitive climate, if anything can be done to reduce the cost to acquire a customer, then it must be done. It is a no brainer. Research shows that in times of depression, those who continue to advertise are those that do well. It also shows those who continue to advertise also make the efforts to stretch their budget even further.

You decrease your direct mail costs by applying a little commonsense and by testing which will produce the best response. We will look at the example of a direct mail pack that comprises five parts in all.

The parts of the pack are as follows:

1) Envelope
2) Personalized Letter
3) Brochure
4) Leaflet/Order form
5) Business Reply Envelope

Looking at this, you would think that this is it, but we have forgotten the most important part of all:

6) The Data

Now there is enough here to get your message out.

Experience shows the most important part of the mailing is the data. We must test this part. A badly produced but well targeted letter will almost certainly produce a better return than a well-written badly targeted letter.

You may have a particular target audience already decided, for example, lawyers. You will be able to get lists of lawyers from more than one source to be tested. Equally, you will have the option of mailing to a named individual, or to a job title, so you can test that way, also. So far, that is at least four permutations, provided you use two data suppliers. It would be six if you used three suppliers. If you had not narrowed your field to one sector, then the choice of tests to run could be massively increased, but it is not practical to take it to the extreme.

Targeting is everything! You must get that right, and you can only find that out if you test.

Looking at the envelope, you have a huge number of choices available, also. You can send plain with a stamp, or printed with a message. You could make the material from an unusual paper, print in full color, or use different sizes. You could print different designs, or use different taglines and the like.

Depending on how your envelope is made, you may be able to run multiple designs for a minimal charge. The nature of some jobs is they are printed two or three on a sheet, so you will be able to produce equal quantities of more than one design. Even if it is not free, chances are it will not be that expensive for a plate change.

For the letterhead, you can change the material. Studies by paper merchants have shown a 20% increase in response just by changing to a textured paper. The copy itself on the letter can be changed, and offers can be changed. The number of options to test here is almost limitless.

Moving on to the leaflet, the same applies here as indicated for the letterhead. Copy, material, imagery; they are all fair game.

Finally, yet importantly, we move on to the BRE (business reply envelope). The choices here are limited. White or manila envelopes, perhaps, maybe even a coloured BRE. If it is not going to cost a lot, why not try it.

Using these methods over time, you can increase the effectiveness of your mailings. Always test, even when you think you have the perfect pack, continue to run a test campaign against it, even if the difference between the two is really quite small. If you continue to do this, your costs to acquire a customer should decrease and diminish.
Overall, the point is that there is an almost infinitely large and almost limitless opportunity for testing. Maybe, it is this huge scope for testing that puts people off, but I do not think it is. I think it is just a lack of awareness of what you can do. You do not need to complicate things; you can just run two packs with one difference between them and see how it goes.

Whatever you do though, do not commit commercial suicide and fail to test.

Robert Wilkinson is the owner of http://www.arhiann.com, a print, design, and direct mail business specializing in direct mail and envelope production for small and medium sized businesses.

How To Get Higher Converting MLM Leads For Less

By Don Luttrull

If you are involved in an mlm or network marketing business, you have tried to find the best ways, online as well as offline, to get qualified people to your website or to the company�s website. There are many different ways to find qualified people who are actually looking to start a home based business.

You need to realize that most people who are looking for a home based business are not aware of what they are looking for and are simply gathering information. These types of people are the non-targeted leads you find being sold by countless mlm lead companies online.

These types of mlm leads have a terrible conversion rate. This puts your excited mood into one that causes you to start second-guessing yourself and the opportunity you are marketing. Quality mlm leads from an actual mlm leads company with proven results is what you need to build a successful mlm business, and to have the right mindset.

If you were to compare mlm lead companies, odds are you would start with your sponsor or up-line in the business you are currently marketing. This method is not effective to use. The result is your upline is simply trying to get a commission or a bonus off you by sending them to one of the low converting mlm lead companies.

You may take the above statement as being rude or labeling all sponsors, but in all honesty, most people in mlm and network marketing companies are following the same pack of people barely making any real income. You need to set yourself apart from the pack and become a leader in your company.

If a company sponsor is trying to teach you the correct methods to building your business but have not seen any real success himself or herself, then you need to find a new method in which to build your business. Mlm is mainly duplication of a proven method. If your sponsor is not seeing the large monthly income, then I personally would not try to duplicate their methods.

With all the many different ways to get mlm leads, which are done with pay per click accounts and even door-to-door methods, one truly proven method has the highest conversion ratio as long as it is done correctly.

You need to find an mlm lead company that has proven results and offers you a residual income that will pay for your leads as your downline signs up under you, for their leads also. There are a small handful of mlm lead companies worth comparing and sometimes they can be hard to sift through. Mlm lead companies are selling leads that have sold 1,000 times and will not convert for nothing.

If you are looking to build a solid mlm business, you should research and compare mlm lead companies. You need to look for a company that allows you to buy at minimum, 72-hour fresh leads. Along with being extremely fresh, you also need to find an mlm lead company that offers a monthly residual income plan. Having a matrix payout plan attached to a solid mlm lead company can end up paying out more then your mlm company is paying you.

Remember when researching and checking the many mlm lead companies out there, you will usually get what you pay for. Any company offering you 1,000 fresh leads a day for $20 is nothing but a fraud style company and will end up giving you a very bad name in the mlm community. Find a company that is successful and has mlm leads that are actually converting into real mlm sign ups and sales.

Don Luttrull runs a MLM lead comparison site. MLM and Network Marketers vote on which mlm leads company has the best conversion ratios and those companies are then ranked. To see who they have voted for go here http://www.comparemlmleads.com.

Power of Learning = Earning!

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 and my newsletter is in most of the biggest Co-Ops and directories and forums. The reason for my success is because of people like Damon Day (It is funny we both have the same first names)

However, a "FLY BY NIGHT" company Success University is not. Some of the biggest companies there are back it. It is not just for people who are into affiliate marketing but also for people just starting out online and do not want to lose a lot of money. I will tell you from the start that it takes money to make money. This one company can take your funds, and turn it into something to be proud of. Right now, they are running a $2 14 day trial offer, and the monthly cost is less then a night on the town. So do not miss something that will give you everything you need to earn online.

So take five minutes of your time and look. It will surprise you to see what some people will do to help others instead of just thinking of themselves and what they can get out of people that don�t know any better.

Example: http://www.damonday.net

If you talk with Damon, tell him that I sent you to him so he will know that after everything we have been through, I still believe there are good people online!

Damon Smith is the publisher of Hailey Comet Weekly eZine that gives you the truth about online marketing and advertising. You can check out his newsletter at http://www.haileyscometweekly.com and get some of the best insight info on how he went from nothing to earning thousands a month by helping others.

My Number One Internet Marketing Strategy (For Producing an Online Income)

By Titus Hoskins

Here is my number one Internet Marketing Strategy for producing an online income. It is so simple it actually works! Discover how this one marketing technique can also help you succeed online and work from home...

I am often asked, "How does one start an Internet Income?"

"Where do you begin? What do you need to start?� In addition, these questions are often followed by, "How did you get started?� These questions are popping up more often now as my name and sites become better known. However, I still get some very skeptical looks whenever I mention I work full-time on the Internet. For many people the Net is still a place chock full of 'quick-rich-schemes' and 'con-artists', where someone is ready to rip you off at the very first opportunity.

Of course, the reality of working on the Internet could not be further removed from this unflattering image. In my case, I make it a point to only deal with top name companies such as Dell, Sony, Toshiba, Amazon, Apple, Google... or top web marketers with solid reputations such as Marlon Sanders, Neil Shearing, John Reese, Ken Evoy...

In addition, I quickly learned Money Talks! It does not matter who you are, where you are operating from or how small or big your online sites/activities are, if you can generate through your online marketing efforts monthly sales in the 100-200k range for any company - you will be noticed. And your sales don't have to be in that price range, if you can generate any sales through your web site or sites, you can start to build a business online and work from home.

I come from a background in art and education but nothing compares to working on the web from the comfort of your own home. The freedom is very liberating. Once you start earning a nice income here, there is no going back. Money talks in many ways! However, how do you get started? How do you begin? I believe my own very modest success comes from one simple strategy. It has to do with learning, more importantly; it has to do with HOW we learn.

One key strategy I have learned and it is quite simple: always learn from the inside. Get as close to the source as you possibly can. No matter the field or subject area, get as close to the real experts in that field as you can possibly get. It is something all artists do instinctively! This very simple strategy has proven to be very effective for me. There is no reason why it cannot also work for you.

Here is how it is done: instead of buying the latest marketer's info product/ebook/webcourse... you join their affiliate program first! You will receive marketing information, countless free audios/training materials on this marketer's products and methods. You will get the inside information on how these marketers operate and how they are working the Internet.

You will also probably receive great discounts for any products that you do buy. You will receive updates, invitations to web seminars, free promotional material, if you are well known, or are a valuable affiliate, you will receive free copies or products to review.

What is even nicer, once you start generating sales, this affiliate relationship often develops into a personal relationship with the owner or company. You get to know the owner or the affiliate manager on a personal level and this opens many doors for other business opportunities.

This simple strategy works great. I apply it almost every day in my own marketing and even in my own life. For example, around each New Year, everyone is talking about making resolutions and setting goals, both for their businesses and in their personal lives. It is an important topic. I wanted to learn more.

As I make it a point to seek out the top person or person in any field, I wish to learn about (in this case) goals or goal setting. The name that immediately came to mind was Gary Ryan Blair. He is known as the GoalGuy! What more can you ask for? Gary Blair has made goals his business.

He also has an excellent affiliate program, which you or anyone can join. In addition, by joining Gary Blair's affiliate program, you will receive valuable information on goal setting and strategic planning from the inside, if you really want to learn about Internet Marketing, how to build websites, how to earn money from the web... just find the Top Guy in that field.

My suggestion for the top person is Ken Evoy.

Ken Evoy, of SiteBuildIt and Make Your Site Sell fame, is the perfect person for learning about the whole web marketing game. One of the best ways to learn what Ken knows is to join his affiliate program first! You get tons of free marketing info and products. You will learn how his system works. You will also learn how Internet Marketing really works.

Perhaps the main reason I chose SBI is its great online community. If you want to succeed at something, you must 'hang-out' with people who are succeeding in that particular field. Might sound a bit simplistic but there is more truth in this philosophy than most people realize.

If you want to be a jackass, associate with other jackasses! If you want to be a millionaire, associate with other millionaires! If you want to be an Internet marketer, you must associate with other Internet marketers! It is kind of a no-brainer but many people do not do this. I repeat, if you want to be a web marketer Article Submission, you hangout with web marketers and learn from the inside.

A simple Internet marketing strategy works, one that has served me well as I continue to build my online business. This can also work for you.

The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous niche websites, including two sites on Internet marketing. For the latest and most effective web marketing tools try: www.marketingtoolguide.com For the latest Internet Marketing Strategies go here: www.bizwaremagic.com 2007 Titus Hoskins. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

Tips for Affiliate Marketing Newbie's - Is Pay Per Click a Viable Option?

By Carsten Cumbrowski

Why you should look into Pay Per Click Marketing if you are an Affiliate Marketing Newbie. Tips and tricks for beginners and why you should look beyond PPC to be successful in the long term.

If you are a newbie to Affiliate Marketing, I do recommend to look into Pay-Per-Click Advertising at the beginning, because it is still one of the more easy ways (or less difficult would probably be more true) to get started in this industry AND get fast results. Results referring to earning commission. No more and no less.

Using the PPC services of the big three US Search Engines, Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing, Microsoft AdCenter, or services of "second tier" Search Engines like Miva, Kanoodle, Ask.com, or Looksmart is still not as complicated as most people believe. It will get harder as time progresses though. Nobody would argue this fact. Also bid prices will most likely continue to rise and not get back to what they were just a few years ago.

The "golden age" of PPC marketing might be over, but it is still much easier to earn some commissions with it compared to most other, older and more mature marketing strategies.

Take Search Engine Optimization for example. If you start a new site today, chances are you will not see very much, if any results for 3 to 6 months, assuming that you already know SEO, what is probably unlikely. "Trial and Error" is a concept that translates to years of trying and failing in SEO compared to hours, days or weeks for trying something new in Pay-Per-Click marketing.

It will not work without spending and loosing some money up-front, while you learn to get the basics straight. Set low spending limits for new test campaigns, if the feature is available. Wait a few days, spending only a little bit of money, and watch how it converts. If you make money, which is simple to find out, by subtracting the number of click, multiplied by the average cost per click, (= spending for the PPC Service) from the earned commissions. If the dollar amount is a positive amount, you made profit.

Do not go over board because of it, though. You can increase spending a bit, but I do not recommend going full force without a spending limit and buy every click you can get at this point. Wait at least until you have posted your first commission check successfully to your bank account. I would wait even two commission checks with a bit of increase in spending and hopefully commission each payment cycle.

Also loosing money on the first few campaigns should not discourage you and make you stop. See breaking even as a success and progress. It is not very likely, nor impossible, to make profits right from the start. If you do, good for you, If you don't, try to find out why. Once you did use the services, you will at least know how the process works and understand a lot more of discussions at forums, related articles, and tips from professionals. You will not, if you do not do anything and give up before you even started.

You should not just stop at PPC though and only rely on paid traffic to your site; especially, if you rely completely on direct or redirected traffic to the merchant where you are merely a proxy in the conversion process without the customer being aware of your existence at all. If you have a site or "Landing Page" the customer sees first, you will get the chance to do something with visitors that do not convert for the specific offer you are promoting via PPC Ad.

The visitor you paid for is on your site and not the merchants and you might be able to get him interested in something else. Merchants do that too and so can you. Be careful though. Don't create a conflict which could result in a "Lower Conversion Rate" of your "Landing Page" for the original offer. This "something else" should be a "Secondary Conversion Goal" for your Ad and landing page; not just for non-converting traffic, but also as "secondary goal" for the traffic that you actually convert for your "Primary Goal".

May be a similar offer to the one he showed obvious interest in; remember, he clicked the link from your paid Ad; but then decided not to follow through with it for whatever reason. Similar does not mean the same thing, but from another brand or merchant, but similar in topic. Don't offer another TV Set when you promote a TV Set. Offer a TV Program Guide or Magazine instead for example.

This goes beyond the topic of this article, but I wanted to provide you with some "Keywords" and "Terms" for further research. You should look into all the other opportunities and possibilities available for promotion of products and services as well, but with long-term goals in mind. Paid Search can help you financially while you get something more substantial going.

Paid search will only work long term if you really dig deep into this type of marketing and become an expert yourself. This requires many technical Health Fitness Articles, mathematical and analytical skills, and most people do not have them.

Carsten Cumbrowski is doing Affiliate Marketing since 2001and Search Marketing since 2003. He also operates the portal Cumbrowski.com, which provides free resources to paid search (http://www.cumbrowski.com/CarstenC/searchenginemarketing.asp), landing page optimization, keyword research (http://www.cumbrowski.com/CarstenC/seosem_keyword_research.asp) and much more that are vital to success for internet marketers.

The Biggest Secret in Internet Marketing

By Alex Nghiem

In the Internet marketing world, there are many misconceptions and outright lies. However, the biggest secret is one that is so obvious nobody wants to talk about, or even being aware. In this article, I share what I (and many world-class marketers) consider the biggest �secret� in Internet marketing.

At this point, you are probably wondering. �What is the BIGGEST secret?�

Before I share this secret with you, let me share a common mistake committed by 99% of Internet marketers. Almost all Internet marketers I know can quote you their opt-in rate and spend hours, days, weeks, and even months tweaking their landing pages to get the highest opt-in rate. This is accomplished by asking for as little customer information as possible and casting as wide a net as possible. This usually requires asking for only the first name and the primary email address.

In many industries, this results in optimizing for the wrong results. What do I mean by that?

I spend a lot of time in multiple industries other than Internet marketing (including real estate, art, etc.) and for a long time, I was focusing on increasing my opt-in rate, but rarely closed any sales (my sales for my products and my clients� products range from $997 to $25,000 per sale). When I thought about it, I realized that in all of these industries and especially at these price points, the sale is accomplished via the phone, not via the Web.

Thus, without realizing it, I was not collecting all the necessary information for me to complete a sale (that is, I was not asking for a phone number because I knew this would reduce my opt-in rate). Most of the �gurus� who are teaching list building do not take into account industries that conduct business primarily offline and/or the fact that high-end products are not closed via email alone. I am not sure any of them has ever tested their methods in offline businesses!

Now, I do a 2-step opt-in rate that allows me to have the highest opt-in rate on the first page and then ask for additional info (including the phone number and mailing address) on the �thank you� screen. This enables me to follow up via offline methods including postcards, direct mail, and even telemarketing.

What does this have to do with the biggest secret in Internet marketing? Simple�the most valuable leads often require you to follow up using offline methods. However, this contradicts almost all list building techniques being taught, which usually teach how to get the highest opt-in rate. In this case, I made more money by having a lower opt-in rate�but I got higher quality leads, which enable me to follow up via offline methods. Again, in many, many industries, the sales happen via the phone and in some cases via the fax and direct mail.

Therefore, before you spend too much time focusing on optimizing your opt-in rate alone, think through the sales process and figure out the best way to close the sale. Collect information for that to happen, even if it means a lower opt-in rate.

Now you know the biggest secret in Internet marketing. The next time somebody brags about their 50% opt-in rate, you will know that he/she is probably optimizing on the wrong thing and leaving WAY too much money on the table.

To get regular notifications on high-end product creation secrets, visit http://www.backendcashmanuscript.com/fromarticles

� Blue Samba Publications � All Rights Reserved
http://www.backendcashmachine.com

Alex Nghiem is the founder of Blue Samba Solutions, creator of the Backend Cash Machine, a proven system for enabling clients to make up to 10X by building a backend of high-end products. His system has been used in multiple industries including art, real estate, and many offline industries.

Why is Content Important?

By Dechen Lau

Content is the soul of a website. Content is comprised of the words or text on a web page along with the graphics and structure of a website. Today Web content is the best tool for building relations with your potential customers. The look and feel of a site is crucial, but quality web content may be more important.

Two of the most popular methods of getting traffic from search engines include PPC � (Pay Per Click), and SEO � (Search Engine Optimization).

PPC:

Pay per click advertising on search engines allows you to choose keywords that you would like your site to appear for, when a search is performed. You decide how much you are willing to pay each time a person clicks on the search results. The more you are willing to pay per click, the higher your site will appear in the results for the keywords you choose. Pay Per Click is advertising provided by the search engine providers (Google, Yahoo! and others) where you PAY for top placement. Their strategies for placement differ slightly. Some search engines will give you higher placement if your ad has a higher click-through rate, (meaning more people click on your ad in ratio to the amount of times your ad appears); others give top positions to the highest bidder.

You already know surveys are excellent for finding out what your target market wants. However, if combined with low cost, quick and dirty Google PPC, surveys can also send many targeted prospects to your site every month.

In either case, you PAY. It is a quick way to be listed in the search engines and a smart way to get your traffic flowing. You could spend far more than is profitable for your business, if you do not know what you are doing.

Search Engines: While crawling pages of a website, search engines look for content more than anything else. Search engines can pick up quality content and it is the only factor that they emphasize and value most while ranking a website. For the benefit of their users, search engines try to find the best and most useful content on the Internet for any given set of keywords.

SEO:

Search engines are extremely competitive (in terms of placement). The major search engines account for over 90% of all traffic. With that though in mind, companies that are serious about earning a share of the internet market should be committed to securing top 10 rankings for the keywords or phrases that pertain to the products and services that they offer.

The best way to ensure a solid return on your website investment is to employ the services of a Search Engine Optimization firm with a proven track record of success, knowledge of current and cutting edge techniques, and experience working with the business community.

There are a lot of companies working �behind the scenes� to help website owners get plenty of traffic from the natural search engine listings. Natural listings mean the search engine has ranked you according to the value it believes your site will offer an individual searching for a specific word or phrase.

Understanding exactly WHAT the search engines want to see when ranking sites requires knowledge of the algorithms. These algorithms change all the time as search engine providers try to outwit the search engine optimizers trying to find loopholes in the ranking system.

Some SEO companies will promise you top spots for a certain cost. Some are honestly creating optimized websites � others may be using techniques that could possibly get your site BANNED from the search engines entirely, (once the search engine catches on). However, optimizing your website for better placement in the search engines is a technique that you should become familiar with and use to your advantage.

Both of these traffic methods have their pros and cons for generating traffic from the search engines. You will find out more about using them properly later on. First, you need to know what REALLY works�

Dechen Lau., is an Author, Speaker and Internet Marketing Consultant
http://www.powersuccessmarketing.com
http://www.powersuccessresponder.com

Brand Building 101: Does Your Business Card Build Your Brand?

By Krishna De

Are you losing credibility and damaging the brand of your business through lack of attention to one of your critical marketing tools in your business, your business card? Discover how your business card can enhance your brand and ensure that you stand out from your competition.

When we are at a networking event or meeting a client, exchanging business cards occurs.

Very often, without realizing it, we are assessing our colleague by their business card, and asking ourselves:

- Is the business card professionally designed?
- Is the business card crumpled at the edges?
- How does the weight of the business card feel - substantive or flimsy?
- Does it look like the business card was made on their PC - or worse, does it have a message at the bottom of the card to say where you, too, can access free cards?

I have collected thousands of business cards over my time in business. I am sub-consciously assessing the professional status of them and their business when I receive their business card.

We review someone's card at least 3 times:

1. Once on receiving it
2. A second time when we put it in our pocket, folio or bag as we leave the meeting
3. A third time as we make a decision to keep it, transfers the information into our data bank, or bin it!

Our business card is a critical part of our marketing collateral. If you cannot afford to put in place other marketing materials, short changing the investment in developing a professional business card is definitely not something we should do, if we are looking to develop a professional brand.

When meeting someone in person, alongside how you present yourself in person, your business card can enhance or devalue the strength of your brand, and it reveals how others perceive you.

Here are four tips to enhance your brand through your business card:

1. Ensure that you work with a professional designer to develop your business card. It is not whether you like the design; it is about whether it will represent your business effectively and professionally to your target audience.

2. Ideally, have your business card printed on 400g card and by a traditional lithographic printer. Yes, it is more expensive than digital printing, but the quality is worth investing in and a litho print gives far greater definition to your corporate identity and the color of your brand.

3. Matt laminates your card on the reverse for extra stability and style. Do not laminate both sides as people will not be able to write on your card - we often note down things to remember about the person we met on their card.

4. Use the valuable real estate on the back of your card to provide a call to action, for example, how to access your white paper or special report on your web site.

Take action:

Over the next 30 days, take the opportunity to review the business cards of your contacts and assess their card against yours.

1. What can you learn from other people�s business cards?

2. How could you take those learning�s and further enhance your business card?

Your goal is to ensure that your business card is a positive reflection of both you and your company, and it represents a strong brand.

Invest in your business card, distribute it widely and you will be sure of expanding your professional success.

Krishna De invites you to join her in conversation with experts from around the globe to discover how to build your brand and grow your professional services firm at http://www.bizgrowthlive.com/. You will also receive access to Biz Growth Express a weekly newsletter bringing you strategies, inspiration and tips to grow your professional services practice. Register today at http://www.krishnade.com/.

�Krishna De, Oneocean Ltd 2006. All rights reserved Worldwide. Reprint Rights: You may reprint this article providing the article is printed in its entirety; you leave all of the links active, do not edit the article in anyway and include the copyright statement.

A Look at Slogans

By Sharon Housley

Let us look at slogans and how just a few words can say volumes. A slogan is a memorable phrase used in conjunction with a political, commercial, or religious advertisement. Slogans convey a deeper meaning. Slogans elicit emotions, or the slogan might paint a visual image that implies something more.

When considering a slogan or a tagline, keep in mind your objectives. What image do you wish to portray? Slogans should be short, but not to the point of being curt. Slogans should conjure positive images and distinguish the value your company or product provides.

The best way to analyze slogans is to look at a few.

Slogan: "The toughest job you will ever love" (Peace Corps)

Message behind slogan: This is much more than just a job; it takes heart to be in the Peace Corps; join the Peace Corps and you will be a better person. This job is not about money, it is about helping people.

Slogan: "Be Seen, Be Sold" (Shareware Promotions)

Message behind slogan: Being found on the Internet is not easy. Use us to be found on the Internet."

Slogan: "You could learn a lot from a dummy. Buckle up" (National Highway Traffic Safety Admin)

Message behind slogan: Learn from test dummies, be safe and buckle up.

Slogan: "Parents who use drugs have kids who use drugs" (The Partnership for a Drug-free America)

Message behind slogan: Model what you preach; do you want your children to do drugs? It is your responsibility to model appropriate behavior for your children.

Slogan: "This is your brain on drugs" (The Partnership for a Drug-free America)

Message behind slogan: Do you know what this stuff does to you? Taking drugs is stupid.

Slogan: "A diamond is forever" (DeBeers '1948)

Message behind slogan: Diamonds represent marriage; marriage should be forever. If you really want your marriage to last, seal it with a diamond.

Slogan: "It takes a licking and keeps on ticking" (Timex Corp)

Message behind slogan: It does not get any more durable than this, other watches cannot stand up, but Timex will endure regardless of the treatment.

Slogan: "For all you do, this Bud's for you" (Budweiser)

Message behind slogan: After a long hard day, drink beer to relax.

Slogan: "Where's the beef?�(Wendy�s)

Message behind slogan: Our competitors use small patties, but our burgers are big.

Slogan: "I love New York" (NYC)

Message behind slogan: New York is a special place, everyone loves NY, you should come and visit, you will love it too.

Slogan: "See what brown can do for you" (UPS)

Message behind slogan: We do more than just ship packages; we have additional offerings and can do more than just ship.

Slogan: "The few, the proud, the Marines" (US Marines)

Message behind slogan: We are a select group of very special individuals. Do you want to be elite? Take pride in representing the US.

Slogan: "Friends don't let friends drive drunk"

Message behind slogan: You will die if you drive drunk. It is your responsibility to protect your friends. Be responsible, do not let people drive drunk.

Effective slogans leave impressions in the minds of people who see or hear the slogans. Often slogans will have hidden meanings, or be a play on words. The goal of the slogan creator should be to create a memorable tagline that conveys a key benefit or differentiates the brand. Slogans will often help position the product or service in the marketplace. Slogans with just a few words can indicate superior value, excellence, or inspiration.

A business identity and image conveyed through a short statement will affect the way that consumers, competitors, and others in the industry perceive your business. Slogans will distinguish your company in a unique way. Words are powerful, and if used properly, they can be an important sales tool.

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.

Unlock the Untapped Commissions in Your Client Database

By Paul McCord

Right this minute, you are probably sitting on tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of commissions. Most registered reps have a database of current and past clients whose potential referrals are worth several thousand additional commission dollars per month. Yet, this resource goes virtually untapped for most advisors.

Why? Simply because most reps have not learned how to successfully convert their client relationships into referral relationships. Acquiring referrals from clients is not as simple as "doing a good job" and then asking for referrals. Generating a large number of highly qualified referrals from a client is a process that starts from the moment the prospect is met, not a one-time act after the sale has been completed. It requires an understanding of what a successful referral is based on, and how to exploit that referral to insure a successful contact with the referee.

Every referral involves the interaction of three people and four relationships among those three individuals. The strength or weakness of each of these interactions will influence the success or failure of the referral for the advisor:

1. The Advisor/Client relationship:
In order for the client to be willing to give a quality referral, build a strong bond of trust between the rep and the client. A client may give a "referral" to someone they do not trust, but they will not give a referral to someone they know well and respect if they do not trust the salesperson. If there is only a weak bond of trust between the advisor and client, the "referral" the client is likely to give will be to someone the client either believes will not meet with the advisor or someone the client does not know well or respect.

2. The client's purchasing experience:
Clients will not give high quality referrals if their purchasing experience did not meet or exceed both their expectations and their priorities. All clients enter purchasing relationships with certain expectations and priorities. Expectations and priorities are not the same. A client may expect to be kept fully informed during the course of the sale and may have certain product or service functionality requirements as his top priority. In order to receive a large number of high quality referrals, the rep must make sure that they meet or exceed both the client's expectations and priorities.

Despite the current parroting of the buzz phrase, "exceeding the customer's expectations," meeting and exceeding client expectations is seldom accomplished. Few people take the time and effort to discuss with their client what the client's expectations and priorities are-rather most reps, and companies, assume they know. At best, all they can knowingly accomplish is meeting or exceeding their expectations of what they think their client should expect.

3. The Client/Prospect relationship:
The trust and respect relationship between client and referee are of great importance. The stronger the bond of trust and respect between the client and the prospect, the easier it will be for the advisor to set an appointment with and then sell the prospect. In referral selling, a great deal of the rep's credibility, or lack thereof, is built on the trust and respect the prospect has for the client who made the referral.

If the client/prospect bond is strong enough, the rep is virtually guaranteed a sale. On the other hand, if the bond is particularly weak, the referral is little better than a cold call. Consequently, it is of utmost importance for the advisor to know as much as possible about the client's relationship, and likely bond of trust, with the prospect.

4. The advisor's initial contact with the referee:
Based on the client/prospect bond, the advisor must determine how best to contact the prospect to produce the greatest opportunity to acquire a meeting. The weaker the relationship between the client and the prospect, the stronger the contact method the rep should seek to employ. If the client/prospect relationship is extremely strong, virtually any contact method, including a phone call from the salesperson mentioning the client's name will suffice, but for a weak relationship, the rep must strive to use the strongest contact method possible. In descending order, from weakest to strongest, possible methods of contact include a phone call to the prospect from the advisor, an email from the client, a client letter, a client phone call, a client/prospect/advisor lunch meeting.

Fortunately, the advisor can control most of the above interactions. Only the client/prospect relationship is completely out of the rep's hands. Even then, the rep can compensate for a less than ideal client/prospect relationship through using a stronger initial contact method.

If you understand the foundation of a referral, you can quickly increase your referral-based business and begin to mine that gold mine in your client database.

Paul McCord
Nationally known author, trainer and leading authority on prospecting, Paul McCord's latest book Creating a Million Dollar a Year Sales Income is available throughout the US and Canada. He also offers a free ebook Understanding Referral Generation: A Primer at http://www.powerreferralselling.com.