Are you confused by the flood of information on how to improve your internet marketing results?
Mastering the search engines, pay-per-click advertising, affiliate marketing, website design, writing articles, and on it goes.
Doesn’t it seem more and more complicated to focus in on what really works and what doesn’t?
After working to build many businesses from the ground up over the last 10 years, it’s more clear than ever that there are 2 main principles that will largely dictate your success in any business. All of the other techniques build on these first two principles.
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July 18th, 2006
As an artist, the key to selling more artwork is maximizing its exposure. The internet is an increasingly popular tool for promoting original art, and if done properly, can be quite profitable.
One of the most effective (and free!) online marketing tools for artists is the blog. Artist blogs provide an easy way to display your art, discuss your creative process, post exhibition announcements and more. Best of all, blogs require no working knowledge of HTML and the search engines love their dynamic content.
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July 18th, 2006
With 95% of all Internet businesses failing, it is important to find out what actually works and what doesn’t. Most online business failures can be attributed to one or more of the following marketing errors:
1. Free Domain Hosting. Failure to obtain and use your own domain name gives your site visitors a poor impression of you and your online business. With domain registrations under $10/yr., there is no good reason not to have your own domain name.
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July 18th, 2006
It’s a common story. Someone builds a great site, populates it with lots of fantastic content and beautiful graphics. They spend weeks or month making sure everything is perfect before the big launch day arrives. Then in the hours, days and weeks after the upload, a few people trickle in but nothing really explosive. What happened? How can such a great site not naturally take the internet community by storm? Simple ? the marketing of the site was not planned (and often not even thought about!).
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July 18th, 2006
Before you set out to explore the online shopping market you should do some planning, take a piece of paper and pen and write down the steps that will help to bring in traffic to your website.
And once they have visited you must have something to entice them to remain and do some shopping, in our website: www.shopshopshop.org We try to mix our affiliate, we have some highly recognizable name and some not so well known.
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July 18th, 2006
So you have a new website but the phone isn’t ringing off the hook? Were you expecting an overnight success with your website?
Having a website professionally designed ensures you have a good looking site that is optimised for the search engines. This article is not about web design or search engine optimisation but outlines some suggestions that you, the site owner, can take to help boost genuine visitors to your site once it has been professionally designed. Once your site has been completed, you may be sitting back wondering where all your new clients are. There are some simple things to keep in mind and some low cost ideas to help you get your website kick started.
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July 18th, 2006
Building a web site is only the first step in a long process when starting an online internet business. You need traffic to your web site and the best way to get traffic is through incoming links from other sites.
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July 18th, 2006
As a search engine optimization specialist, I often run across search engines of different sorts than most people are aware of. This week I stumbled across a free site that is used by journalists to do background checks and fact checking on sources of news stories. I am also an advocate for personal and financial privacy and find privacy invasion particularly offensive, so this search engine offends me.
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July 18th, 2006
Website promotion is a vital area in internet marketing that you should learn to master immediately. Your website is your HQ on the web, and as such, should be made prominent at the soonest possible time. The more people who would know about your website, the more visitors you would have.
Increased web site traffic would mean more potential sales and an expanded customer base. Here are a ten useful ways to increase the volume of traffic of your site:
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July 18th, 2006
Web Site Promotion - Are You Requesting Free Backlinks?
by: Robert Fuess
Everyone who is trying to improve their web site’s ranking wants backlinks. This is an essential ingredient to your web site promotion strategy. Some happen because the right person (a webmaster) stumbled across your web site and likes your content. But you can get many more links on other web sites pointing to yours - if only you ask them. One-way links (where they link to your page but you don’t have to link back) are much more valuable to your web site promotion than link exchanges, and they often take the same amount of effort to obtain. Search engines rate these more heavily when evaluating your web site. These free backlinks can be obtained by politely asking the webmaster to make the addition of your web site resource.
Only if a webmaster requests a link exchange do I consider doing such. The web site promotion strategy I normally use is to start by asking for what I really want.
WHAT NOT TO DO:
Above all, courtesy and personal touch is a must with these emails. Don’t make these requests appear too cold or canned. Don’t be insistent or prideful.
GOOD WEB SITES TO REQUEST A FREE BACKLINK FROM:
Many times when you send out a request - even a polite one, you may get ignored. To minimize this scenario, use the following web site promotion trick: Find out who has given backlinks to your competitors. Then ask these webmasters to link to your web site. There are a few different tools out there that can help you with this. I would recommend using the backlink checker from Submit Express http://www.submitexpress.com/linkpop/. You can also use it to monitor your web site, since you will seldom be notified if they do follow your suggestion and put in a link to your site. A good backlink checker is an essential tool for any webmaster interested in web site promotion.
FINDING WHO TO CONTACT:
Most web sites have a contact page or an email link to the webmaster. Search around.
(The following is assuming the web site you are researching is http://www.yourwebsiteurl.com )
Next try going to http://www.yourwebsiteurl.com/info.txt . This is an info page on the web site that many webmasters have. Also, try looking at Alexa information for their website. Many web sites have information on who to contact in their Alexa account. Here is the format. http://info.alexa.com/data/details?url=http%3a//www.yourwebsiteurl.com/ Or you can click on this link and change the web site in the textbox at the top of this page.
If you still cannot find it, you could always make an educated guess. Many web sites follow webmaster@yourwebsiteurl.com or admin@yourwebsiteurl.com pattern for the webmaster. Also look for a “add your link” section or page. This may be on a links page or it may be elsewhere. If a web site has an established procedure for asking for backlinks you will always want to follow them. That is a courtesy they will expect.
WRITING THE EMAIL:
The subject of the email should make them want to read your email. Don’t misrepresent the email purpose by pretending to be a long lost friend or say “Lottery Winner”. No one likes to be duped. You may want to put a brief comment such as “I love your web site! May I ask you a question?”. You want to attract their interest in a courteous manner and not look like you are being sneaky.
THE BODY OF THE EMAIL:
The first part of your email body should complement their web site somehow. Make this a couple of sentences. This is the most tailored part of the email. It also keeps your email from being thrown out automatically. Those who get a preview of the top 2-3 lines of an email will see a complement - and may to read further. If they don’t read it, your web site promotion efforts will not work.
Then, you should let them know how you found their site (what search engine and what keywords you used). Many webmasters find this to be valuable information, since it tells them what is working for their own web site promotion.
THEN you should politely request the honor of a link to your web site. (Or you may suggest your website as an additional resource . . . if your website has good resources or tools.) TIP: Not all those you contact will understand the term backlink. Just use the term “link”. And especially don’t mention the phrase “free backlinks”. You don’t want to imply that they could or should charge for them.
When you email other webmasters asking for backlinks, you should include the following:
* The URL of where you want the link to go to
* The suggested text for the link. This would be what you want the link to look like to visitors on that web site. Make sure that it encourages people to visit your web site and appropriately represents what your site is about. Having a keyword phrase in here is good - if you think the webmaster will go for this.
* A suggested description for the link. They may use this next to the link or in the title attribute of the link.
* The suggested HTML for the link.
* The page you would like the link to be on. Normally this would be a relevant page to your product or service. Sometimes it is in their list of links on a separate links page. Only rarely will this be the home page.
The last part should thank them for their time and encourage them to contact you if they have any questions. This is a must! They did you the favor of reading the email.
In your signature, put your full name, your email address and your title (such as Webmaster).
THATS IT!
Ideally, I would recommend sending out the emails as you find the web sites. This keeps you from forgetting or losing interest in that site. Have fun with your web site promotion!
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July 18th, 2006