redant's Blog

If you’re reading this blog, chances are, you’re a new Internet business owner, looking for marketing advice. Or perhaps you’re thinking about joining an MLM program or a cash gifting club and are looking for information on how to market your opportunity. Either way, blogging is one of the one of the best ways for YOU to get going in the online business community.

A blog (short for weblog) is an online journal containing regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Blogs could be about anything, from strictly personal life observations to pop culture gossip.

So why should an Internet entrepreneur, such as yourself, maintain a blog? It’s quite simple. Blogs are a GREAT way for you to increase traffic to your business web-site while creating a trust relationship with your readers. The ultimate goal of your blog should be to increase visibility of your online business web-site, NOT to sell products or services. If you try to “plug in” a sales pitch in the middle of your blog, at the very least, the readers will be put off and leave and at the worst they will flag your blog as spam or inappropriate content. On the other hand, if you provide quality content, a vast majority of your readers will repay you by checking out your opportunity.

The other major added bonus of posting blogs is that they create what’s called “back-links” to your web-site, which is something that search engine spiders look for when they determine the position of any given web-site in the search rankings. More blogs = higher position in the Google and Yahoo! search engines.

So, how do you write a quality blog? How can you attract prospects to your online business without overtly “selling” them something? No one likes to be sold to, but everyone likes to buy. The key is to write your blog in a way that doesn’t aggressively “sell”, but “helps” the potential customers make their choice in favor of your product/service/opportunity.

For example, let’s say your business is selling electronic cookbooks. You might think that it would be best to write a blog like this:

“Super-Duper-Crazy-Cookbooks.com is EVERYTHING an aspiring chef could only dream of!

For only $9.99 get HUNDREDS of recipies, including rare dishes from Taiwan and Morocco!

Surprise your guests by whipping up our famous chocolate-strawberry souflee!

Create incredibly tasty meals for the whole family in 20 minutes or less!”

You get the idea. There are a couple of major problems with this blog. It sounds a lot like an ad and doesn’t provide any educational content, thus it is likely to be flagged or ignored by a majority of readers. Also, it is an extremely weak piece as far as search engine placement because it doesn’t have any “keywords” in it. Keywords and key phrases are what a person types in when they’re searching for things on Google and Yahoo. In the example with cookbooks, they will look for “the best Indian food cookbook”, “electronic cookbook reviews”, “best Chinese recipies” and other such key phrases.

Think about what it is that you have to offer that is unique and interesting. Perhaps, using the cookbook example, it’s your exotic Ethiopian food recipies. Then, it would be a good idea to target that audience by providing a blog like this:

“Ethiopian Food – Is It The Right Choice For Your Family? Recipies, Cooking Tips etc.

Ethiopian cuisine consists of spicy vegetable and meat dishes, served atop injera, a large sourdough flatbread. Ethiopians eat with their right hands, using pieces of injera to pick up bites of entrées and side dishes. No utensils are used.

Ethiopian cuisine is gaining popularity with families in America: the children are allowed to eat with their hands while getting a highly nutritious meal, filled with lean protein and vitamins.

So, is Ethiopian food the right choice for your family? You decide! Here is an easy-to-prepare recipe of one the most popular Eithiopian dishes, provided by Super-Duper-Crazy-Cookbooks.com:

The recipe is here.”

A couple of notes about this blog: it provides something of value for free which is going to be appreciated by many people; it also contains many search engine key phrases such as “Ethiopian dish”, “Ethiopian Cusine” etc., which vastly increase the chances of this blog being found on the Internet.

Once your first entry is written, create an account with as many of the major blog sites as you can. It’s a very good idea to post your blog on at least 6-7 blog sites (you may wish to use a blog disseminator). If you haven’t yet joined an online business opportunity, make sure you ask your team leaders for help with blogs. For example, I provide a list of the best blog and article websites to my team along with detailed tips on how to post the blogs without any problems. Remember that the more blogs you write, the more people will go to your website. I would recommend writing a blog every other day for the first month after your start/join an opportunity.

I hope this was helpful to you! I wish you the best of luck in your blogging endeavors.

Brad Smith

blueoctopus@cox.net

Business owners are facing a harsh reality: A website in itself offers no guarantee of business. “If you build it they will come” is a cliché that has misled many into believing all a company needed was an online presence to succeed. However, without a strategic marketing plan and a tactical approach, you’re more likely to fail than to reach your goals. Proper planning will not only improve your chances of success, but it will also keep you from throwing away money on e-commerce fiascos.

The first step of planning is to define your goals in light of the target market you aim to reach. As you classify your target, you should determine the core needs of that group and observe the buying behavior that occurs among your potential purchasers. Characterizing their purchasing habits enables you to position your business to appeal to your target market with compelling information before they buy from another resource.

Several online resources can help you place your business in the forefront of your target audience. The process, however, can be complex because a variety of online vehicles, if utilized properly, can help you yield the results you desire. Also, the key to successful online marketing is in developing a diverse marketing plan which takes advantage of several approaches to deliver your message. Components in your marketing plan should include such elements as search engine marketing, pay-per-performance, ad placement, joint ventures, targeted traffic, e-mail marketing, media marketing, optimization and copywriting.

Search engine marketing has been one of the most highly visible forms of online marketing. With millions of businesses employing search engines to gather information daily, search engine placement for key terms has been a major business generator for companies who properly place themselves in the search engines under the right terms relevant to their market offering. An obstacle to being ranked at or near the top, however, is that thousands can be competing for the same position. And with the search engines changing their algorithms often, achieving placement on the first page for the terms relevant is extremely difficult without a solid working knowledge of and experience in the search engine marketing field. Consequently, one should not solely rely on ranking.

Another marketing technique on the rise is pay-per-performance advertising. This is a method for which you pay per click, impression, or visit that a site refers to your site. The application works best if the placements chosen are locations that directly connect with the target market you desire to reach. Advertisement rates are based on an auction format in that the highest bidder obtains the top placement. If your bid is $1.00 for every time someone utilizes your link while your competitor bids $1.01, your competitor will gain a better placement than you. If 100 individuals click your link, you should understand that you will owe $100 whether they buy from you are not. Pay-per-performance advertising clearly requires a full understanding of your conversion ratio to determine the budget necessary to commit to such a program.

Ad placement is similar to pay-per-performance in that you pay for advertisement on sites or newsletters. The difference is that you typically pay for impressions and market reach. Impressions encompass how many unique visitors view the location in which your ad is placed. The market reach refers to the number of individuals accessing that website or newsletter over a period of time. However, you have no guarantee of the number of visitors who will follow your ad to your website. The concept is similar to traditional print ad placement in that advertisers have no guarantee that people exposed to their print ads will visit their places of business.

Another method, joint ventures, can be highly effective in helping businesses obtain referral customers. Joint ventures can be as simple exchanging links with another website or as complex as assembling a tiered affiliates program.

Targeted traffic marketing is an additional online marketing tool with two main applications. The first involves the purchase of a demographic defined list. Such a list will contain individuals that fit a specified demographic to whom you have permission to send information freely either through an e-mail campaign or a sales call. The second form of targeted traffic entails the purchase a specified number of unique visitors to your site who fit a demographic. This is a mass marketing or shotgun approach. Using either approach requires a skilled implementation of marketing content or your conversion ratio will be low, meaning you’ll be wasting money.

The most criticized but still effective form of online marketing is e-mail marketing. Too many marketers utilized this method improperly by imposing upon individuals who had no interest in their products or services. The answer to marketing effectively using e-mails lies in ensuring you have permission before sending to the individuals on your list.

A more effective method would be to utilize media marketing in which you write articles, white papers and other content relevant to your industry to be published. Sharing valuable insights and information rather than out-and-out selling helps to validate your company’s expertise as you also acquire free brand exposure.

Finally, marketing effectively online requires the right kind of preparation for your website. Many sites fail in that they generate traffic but they lack the kind of relevant content that retains the visitor, educates the prospect, and/or encourages the prospect to take action. Developing content that relays a clear message to your visitors is critical. Copywriting professional Sallie Boyles states, “Lead with your punch line. Be clear. Be concise. Rather than covering each page top-to-bottom with solid content, use windows and links to provide detailed explanations as needed. When people gather research online for an immediate or future purchase, they want ease and efficiency—or they’ll leave the site and go elsewhere.”

In developing your next online marketing plan, follow these key steps to success: First, define and research your market. Second, prepare your site for action. Third, position yourself in the marketplace utilizing several marketing methods. Fourth, be prepared to follow up and close the deal. A world of e-commerce awaits!

Just because there are masses of new and almost fashionable advertising formats out there, it doesn't mean that all of them will work in the type of industry you are in, or meet your requirements as a buyer or seller. We take a look at some of the options in the ever changing world of advertising.

Even though there are many modern advertising methods to choose from these days, it doesn't automatically mean that the most up to date and technologically driven formats are the best and most cost effective to use.

There is no doubt that advertising is all around us and our acts and behaviour can sometimes be influenced by advertising on the TV, radio, traditional media formats and the internet.

Of course, they push our buttons in many different ways and the human mind can react to different designs and messages in a very focused, direct or an almost subliminal fashion. It is this diversity that makes advertising so exciting.

Some of the most modern advertising methods involve technology and it seems the next big response generator will be the format that has a certain WOW factor attached to it.

The three big players leading the way are in the areas of outdoor, mobile communications and the internet.

If you take a trip outdoors, you'll see that a lot has changed since the introduction of standard billboards on the side of the road, motorway or highway.

It is now more about positioning and impact than ever before and if you can add a highly desirable and interactive value to this, it becomes an accepted and targeted proposition for advertisers and consumers respectively.

One of the striking new formats to emerge in this area is in underground and subway stations. This digital screen format allows advertisers to show short, high quality video ads to commuters on a high definition moving canvas. What is also very exciting is the fact that advertisers can target consumers by changing campaign messages to match things like in-store promotions and other special announcements at the touch of a button. This now becomes a very powerful promotional tool for the advertiser and one that is difficult to avoid for consumers.

Not only are these ads situated on the platforms facing the passengers, but they are also located on the entire length of the adjoining wall on moving escalators. They are making an appearance in locations all over the world and can be a highly effective tool in attracting a busy, affluent, reactive and highly social audience.

With mobile communications, the concept is simple, but the impact has already been huge.

A lot of major players in the marketing and advertising game are convinced that mobile phone advertising will be the next big thing and as phones get even better online browsers, more and more people will be using them to buy, sell, communicate and generally spend enough time online to receive targeted offers from regional and national advertisers. The fact is that mobile communications equipped with GPS technology will allow advertisers to focus in on their specific targets by sending offers and messages to consumers within a very short distance of their establishment. New technology certainly plays a big hand in the main development issues here and although there are certainly opt-in rules in place, it won't be long before the ads will become part of the functionality and overall user experience.

Finally, we take a brief look at how web advertising has evolved and what we can now expect as we move into a more sophisticated and interactive marketplace.

Although the days of traditional banner advertising bringing in massive reponses seems to have gone, the standard size formats for leaderboard and skyscraper banner ads still seem to play a role in developing brand and producing a decent number of click throughs.

What seems odd is that we now refer to older online style adverts as branding or awareness ads, much in the same way as we term larger ads in magazines as corporate style advertisements.

The truth is that no ad format is producing the high click through rates we used to see when it all started in the mid to late 1990's. Back then it was a new and exciting concept and people were clicking on ads and exploring the internet at much higher 'per page to per user' levels than we are currently seeing.

It is now more about getting the targeting right on specific pages and sections rather than seeing general page impression rates on run of the mill pages. Now that more people are advertising online, they have to justify their spend by constantly providing evidence that it is not only good value but also providing a good return on investment. Most online advertising (and their providers) should now offer some form of tracking and if they can't provide buyers with stats, it is a sure sign that they are hiding something.

One of potential big players in this online marketplace is video. This format can not just capture our attention quickly, but it can also communicate messages in a way that we can understand and relate to. Although we are used to seeing graphics and animation, it is real-life footage of situations that we can relate to that will really hit the spot.

Video does this so well and with the introduction of Google video via You tube, it is now possible to closely match the video with the content of the pages we are looking at. This is just a developing strategy of a hugely successful contextual text and image ad set up that is now part of the largest ad coverage in the world.

There is no doubt that online advertising is evolving as our appetite for quick and interesting content becomes more of an issue and a main requirement. Watch this space for the next big update.