Web Promotion Articles

The Long And Short Of It Is That These Two Sales Techniques Are The Same

With the Internet beginning to stand up and be counted as an online business medium, many are beginning to realize that selling online is not only possible, but very profitable. People are seeking ways to improve their sales technique online and close on more of their website visitors. It was bound to happen. The problem now is that there are thousands of different companies telling you that their way is the best way and that you should follow their advice. I don’t subscribe to all the thousands of new and fangled ideas to sell anything. This article describes two methods described by many as ‘new’ online sales techniques, which many people call the long copy versus the short copy debate. It’s actually simply a mix of the ways we’ve all been selling stuff since print was invented.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

How to Increase Your Website Traffic in 3 Easy Steps

Promoting your website might seem like an enormous task that you cannot undertake own your own. However, increasing your website traffic and getting more people to visit your site is actually very easy to do. In fact, you can increase your website traffic in as little as three easy steps that do not take a lot of effort, time or even thought. All it really takes is action and a commitment to meeting your traffic goals. Implement the following three steps in your marketing strategy as soon as possible and watch your website traffic explode.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Contracting out SEO Article Writing

Contracting out SEO Article Writing

 by: Brian Stocker

In a recent thread at webmasterworld, when asked if members had 10 people to assist promoting their website, what would they do. This interesting question produced the surprising answer by one member that they would have 9 people writing articles and one person linking.

Articles are a great way to get theme related one-way links, linkable content and can be contracted for around $10 per 400 - 500 word article. Prices vary though, and so does the range of qualifications.

Article writing, like link building, is an excellent candidatate for outsourcing, or perhaps more correctly, Outtasking.

Why Outsource?

Oursourcing is great because you can purchase services you need when you need them. You don’t have to worry about meeting payroll, or providing computers, desks or equipment. While a freelancer is researching and writing you can take care of other things.

Often, a freelancer represents a group, allowing you access to the more resources and expertise.

Misconceptions

One of the biggest misconceptions is you can ‘just give it to them’ and it will all be good. Nothing can be futher from the truth. In fact, the more time and effort you put into it, the better the chances of success.

Example Project of 10 articles.

Before talking to my partners in the Philippines, I research keywords and use the keywords to set up the titles and content of the articles. This usually gives me 6 or 8 of the article titles. Since not all articles get syndicated, I go to several articles syndication sites and research which articles in my area have the most links in YAHOO. This give more data for article topics and titles and general tone. Next, I decide what type of article suits the titles best. Is it to be a “information about this” article or a “how to” article with a bulleted list of actions the reader can take right now?

Once all this has been written out, I send it to my partner and ask to see 4 or 5 articles right away so that I can confirm everything is on track.

Or course, I have specified in advance the articles must be original, and I make periodic checks to make sure. Once you have dealt with a freelancer a few times you can ease up, but it still pays to check all the time.

Don’t use software

There are lots of people offering software that scrapes article syndication sites and/or the web for content, re-arranges it, and spits out hundreds of articles. My experience is it would have been easier and certainly faster to write the articles myself, or hire someone to do it.

Automated re-writes of scraped content seems to work on the Search Engines for now, but how long it is going to last is anyone’s guess. The achilles heel of automation is that it has to use templates and will always leave a footprint that other automated systems (ie bots & crawlers) can easily detect.

Price vs. Turnaournd time

Most freelance writers take on more contracts than they can handle and juggle turn-around times to maximise immediate cash flow. At any moment they only have a few contracts to work on, although they have many outstanding. Sound familiar?

Knowing this, expect to get a low price with a longer turnaround, OR a short turnaround with a higher price.

Low or High?

Don’t choose the lowest price and don’t choose the highest. Review what they say and examples of their work and make a decision on which one you like first, then look at cost.

A team is also important. Ofter ‘a freelancer’ represents a small group who work together. With a team of 5 people writing 20 articles, you get different approaches and points of view. I give preference and pay a slightly higher price for a team.

Qualifications

Qualifications are important in relation to what you need. I like newspaper writers because they are in the business of writing snappy headlines and catchy articles, which is what I like for my sites.

Other sites may prefer novelists or technical writers to suit the tone of their sites.

Contracting out or outsourcing is still work — just a different kind of work. Managing freelancers takes some skill and practice and if done properly, can increase productivity and lower costs substantially.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Can You Really Use Articles To Build Your List?

Can You Really Use Articles To Build Your List?

 by: Gerardas Norkus

Getting customers to your site should always be ranked as high as the importance of the quality and the excellence of the product and the services you provide. They should go hand in hand in providing your customers the satisfaction they get in exchange for the money they have paid for them. Customer service should as well be as fantastic so that the customers are provided with the same satisfaction.

One of the ways you can combine marketing and customer service is through opt-in marketing. With an opt-in list you get the opportunity to introduce your site and products on a good time basis. Opt-in marketing strategy is a marketing strategy that is virtually low cost and not time consuming. Here, you get the consent of your website visitors to subscribe to your newsletters and other promotional materials such as catalogs and free promotions.

Opt-in marketing uses your list of subscribers to send e-mail to. These e-mails will contain the materials you will send to your subscribers. It is essential that you present your promotional items in a manner that will catch the interest and the eye of your subscribers to keep them wanting for more. The best way to do this is to provide fun, entertaining and informational articles.

Well written articles full of content and useful information will help in building your list as more subscribers will be enticed your list. When they have read the samples of your contents in your sites, they will be intrigued as to what will come next. Subscribing to your newsletter will offer them a glimpse of what you have to offer next.

Many sites and companies have captured the importance of articles and this also aids in search engine optimization. As more people are heading towards the internet for their information needs, serving the right information to them via articles in your site will increase the flow of your website traffic. With more traffic, the percentage of your sales will grow. More sales turn into more profit.

There have been the rise for the importance of well written, information enriched and keyword packed articles for the content of their site as well as for newsletters. These articles provide the information many are seeking in the internet. If your site has them, more people will be going to your site for information and research.

Well written articles would also boost your sites reputation. If they are filled with many information you will be regarded as well informed and an expert on the subjects that you tackle. Your articles must be well researched so that the people will trust you. When you have gained their trust, they will always come for you for their needs on that subject.

In connection, you must write articles or commission them to tackle subjects that are closely connected with your type of business. If you have a site for a medicine tackling a certain disease, your articles must be about the diseases. Or if you sell materials for home improvements provide articles with those themes. Most articles searched for are tips, guidelines, methods, manuals and such. If you provide these articles to your customers and you have their trust, they will always go to your site for help and advice as well as for your products.

With the loyalty of these customers, they may subscribe to your opt-in list to receive all the information you have. If you provide them with the answers for that need, they will be happy to be receiving your newsletters as well as other promotional materials to keep them well informed. Others may even forward your newsletters to other people when they find a certain article interesting.

You should provide links in your newsletter so that when other people are reading it and wants to read more, they may click on the link and go to your site. With the articles you have in your site that are good, they may decide to sign up as well for your opt-in list. This will build your list and make it bigger.

Make sure to keep your subscribers happy and interested in your newsletters and promotional materials. Keep on posting and writing good articles for your site and newsletter. If you are not interested in writing them or if you just don’t have the time, there are many available well experienced and knowledgeable writers available to help you out. This is an investment that will pay for itself in time.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

How to Quickly Create an Adsense Site That Brings In the Bucks

One of the hottest crazes for online marketers is Adsense sites. These marketers trade in information and build sites that are tightly focused around one small niche. To build an Adsense site, all a marketer needs is a Google Adsense account, a website (or even a free blog account), and some articles. When the marketer makes his site live, he includes the Adsense HTML code so that it serves ads alongside his content.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Smartpages - Legitimate SEO Or Spam?

Smartpages are highly optimized pages which draw stampeded of search engine traffic to your website….or so the sales blurb goes. The fantasy is that smartpages are the push-button answer to online success. The reality is quite far removed from that.

In the world of online marketing everybody is striving to gain any advantage over the competition. To that end some people are willing to go to any lengths to gain a foothold online. When smartpages first appeared they seemed the answer to every search engine optimizers dream. Feed in a list of keywords and out comes thousands of highly optimized pages for you to upload.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Have You Heard Of Website Optimization

Have you heard of website optimization ? If you are building a website or have a new one and you have never heard of it, then you had better take note, because if you want to climb the ladder on the search engines it is something you need to learn about. Website optimization means optimising your website so the search engine spiders will love it.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Duplicate Content Penalty - How to Lose Google Ranking Fast!

Duplicate content penalty. Ever heard of it? This penalty is applied by Google and possibly other search engines when content found on your website is largely the same as what is found elsewhere on your site or on other websites across the internet.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Better Results By Spending Less On Your PPC Campaign

Better Results By Spending Less On Your PPC Campaign

 by: Robin Dary

Finding the right keywords to choose for your pay-per-click campaign sounds easy, doesn’t it? My site sells hiking boots I’ll buy the phrase hiking boots or my site focuses on computer repair I’ll buy the term computer repair.

Well, those are two very popular search terms. You could be competing for thousands of searches per day. What does that mean to you? That means those phrases are going to be expensive.

And because these phrases are so broad you may get visitors to your site but your conversion may not be good. A conversion is a purchase, click, subscription to your newsletter or some positive action by your site visitor.

Now let’s say you define it further. And look at Merrell hiking boots, comfortable hiking boots, computer repair in Denver, Colorado, or spyware removal as your search terms. These terms will be cheaper and much more defined.

If your term is hiking boots and someone goes to your site looking for Nike and you don’t sell it - you’ve just paid for a wasted click. However, if you buy Merrell hiking boots someone coming to your site is specifically looking for that brand.

The same holds true for the computer example. If you offer spyware removal the person who clicks on your PPC campaign link to spyware removal will get exactly what they are looking for.

Google and Yahoo offer suggestions for search terms and wordtracker.com also offers help with selecting search terms. This site, http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/, will also help you select key words for your PPC campaign.

You may get fewer clicks in to our site this way but they will be more targeted. And more targeted clicks convert better.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006

Search Engines: The Alternative Way

Search Engines: The Alternative Way

 by: Glenn Ford

Hate them or love them, but we still have to face the fact that over 80 per cent of all traffic that websites receive comes from the direction of search engines.

As infuriating as it is there is really nothing much you can do when the all-powerful search engine wake up one morning and decide to suddenly change the rules without any warning, causing your agonizing hard work in terms of SEO to be flushed down the drain. Nobody seems to care that you spent months and some small fortune to get your site up there in the first place.

But actually there is plenty that you can do.

Search Engines: How Smart Webmasters Are Fighting Back

You can get your site listed in alternative search engines and web directories that apart from giving you valuable links pointing back at your site will also drive respectable daily traffic in the direction of your site.

While it is true that one of the alternative, less well-known sites will be able to drive the sort of massive traffic that some websites enjoy from the big but sometimes arrogant boys, there are a few ideas you can use and you will soon find that you hardly miss the big boys.

For instance while one of these small search engines and directories such as http://www.mostpopularsites.net/, http://www.joeant.com/, and http://www.best-websites.net/ will be able to give you only a handful of traffic every day on their own, by combining quite a number, the figures will quickly add up. A good place to find this collective power of search engines and directories is at http://www.best-web-directories.com/.

Search Engines: Entertain As Many Alternative Methods As You Can Find Because Nobody knows Who The Heir To The Throne Will Be

The really fascinating thing about all these different search engines is the fact that a wide range of different methods and rules are used to rank site popularity. For instance Yahoo! are betting heavily on their new Web 2.0 social search engine where people recommend sites that they have found interesting and useful to others.

Nothing lasts forever, and this is even more true online. What this means is that the only constant thing we can expect on the net is change itself. Nobody knows what the next really big search engine criteria is going to be. And more importantly what particular search engine will come up with it. So what every smart webmaster and blog owner is doing is entertaining as many search engines as they can find. With all their different and widely varying criteria, nobody knows who the heir to the big 3 search engines throne will be.

Conclusion

Taking the alternative way, as far as search engines are concerned is the smart way to guarantee traffic to your site for many years to come. It allows webmasters to ensure that they have not placed all their eggs, dangerously into just one basket. Instead you will find that they have numerous friendly search engines out there working very hard for them.

Add comment July 2nd, 2006