Advertising DOs and DON'Ts
by Mal Keenan

From early on in my online career I realised that the fastest way to internet riches was to find a marketing concept that brought me profits and plough as much as I could into that resource, thus building my business and capital as I went.

For those just beginning in home business marketing it would be prudent to start off with a very small investment (I started with around $30) and try to build from there. It would like to report that I was very wise after the first investment but the truth is that the illusion of easily gotten riches lured me into a spree of buying virtually every item of software/marketing resource that I happened to feast my eyes upon.

Needless to say this is not the best way to go about building a successful online career but the experience and benefits I got from this initial burst of enthusiasm, in how not to go about targeted advertising, far outweighed the financial losses. I have spent money on most of what the web has to offer in terms of marketing and can now enlighten you on what to buy and what not to touch with a 12 ft barge pole.

FFAs or Free For All link pages were once a useful free resource and could have provided at least a few hits per day given the right ad. Today using the free version of these pages is all but useless and in my humble opinion a total waste of time. The vast majority of people submitting to these sites today are using automated submission software so human eyes WILL never see your ad and as far as I know Automatons (Robots to some people) DO NOT buy products;-)

Paid or free safelists from my experience are just not worth the effort involved. The very fact that everyone posting to a safelist is not interested in the subject matter but in selling their own products gives us some idea on the ineffectiveness of this method. Couple this with the time spent sorting through emails mostly for deletion you really could spend your time in more worthwhile marketing ventures.

Moving up the ladder of effectiveness we have banner advertising. From my experience the best banner I was able to design brought me in a maximum of 2.8% click through rate and from what I hear this is a GREAT %. Most banners will only pull a 1% CTR. If you can find a company selling banner advertising cheap enough to bring you into the profit zone then certainly give it a bash. Please remember though to track all your banner ads otherwise you will not know whether you are getting massive click throughs or none at all.

If you are going to post to classified sites then opt for the free version. There is some good classified submission software out there and may be worth the investment. Again ALWAYS TRACK YOUR ADS.

Renting an email list is a good option and can bring you many hits to your product or affiliate site. Make sure that the list is optin only, meaning the people have requested to see your ad. There are many good reputable companies out there and if you are willing to pay sometimes high fees to rent a list, this can be a profitable venture.

Search engine submission is definitely a worthwhile project and considering a good listing will bring you daily and continuing free traffic I suggest you spend a bit of time perfecting this method. I use Web Position Gold software to automate my submissions and prepare my pages for submission. This cuts down in hours of work and I would certainly recommend any budding business owners to get a copy.

I have also paid for a listing to Yahoo's directory. At $299 per year this may sound very expensive to some but the traffic I have gotten from this listing paid for the submission within a short period of time.

Pay per click advertising is another good advertising resource to drive TARGETED traffic to your site. First figure out how much you can afford to pay per visitor to your site. For instance if you make a sale every 100 visitors and your product costs $20 then if you paid 20 cents per visitor you would break even. The reality is of course that you can get visitors for much less than 20 cents and I have many keyword phrases that will send visitors to my site for 1 cent each. If you can find a few good keyword phrases at a profitable price then you will do well. Two good PPCSEs to start with and that I use are Overture and Findwhat.

Ezine advertising is by far the best form of advertising and more importantly is reasonably priced. From my own experience a solo or top spot ad are the most effective and will return more visitors for the price. For a good list of ezines The Directory of Ezines.

A word of WARNING before closing this article: If you want to keep your business and your reputation intact then NEVER EVER use bulk email advertising. It just isn't worth the risk. The hassle that you will get from sending out unsolicited email to 1000s of untargeted prospects will bring your business down in the long run. There are enough forms of advertising listed here to keep you going for a long time. Don't waste your time on unproductive and senseless SPAMMING.

I wish you all the best in your efforts:-)



Mal Keenan is editor and publisher of Home Business Tips Newsletter and Forum.
For An Online Home Business You Can REALLY Believe In Check Out: Top Rated Home Based Business

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7 Reasons To Start Your Own Internet Business With An Affiliate Program
By: Juhani Tontti, Posted on: 2007-07-15

When you think to start your own internet business and join an affiliate program for free, it means that your target is to start promoting the merchants web site, i.e. to bring targeted visitors to the site. And of course to make a hefty commissions.
1. By joining an affiliate program to start your own internet business it is both easier and cheaper. Also the amount of studying is so much smaller that, in all fairness, the affiliate program is the best way for a newbie to start his own internet business.To put it simple, the only thing a newbie needs are the mental tools. The attitude of the winner is the most important one.
2. The merchant has done a huge amount of work to set up the affiliate program. The web site, payment systems, logistic system, pricing, sortiment, marketing tools, training ( DVD, video, audio etc.), support, forum etc.These all are at the use of the affiliate. Later when you manage the affiliate program marketing you can, if you want, to set up your 100 % own system.
3. I doubt whether it is wise to build an own system, because there are some many high earning affiliate program marketers online. Why are they so good?Because their secret is the specialization. They can find the profitable target groups and they can communicate to them. Thats all.
4. But on the other hand, the marketing is the most important part to start your own internet business. If a newbie learn to do that, he is able to run whatever business online. He will learn how to find the right niches, what is the need there and how to communicate with the niche.
5. Another, maybe bigger reason is, that the affiliate program system is flexible and can be changed in one second to better respond the new requirements of the market.This not an empty benefit. All marketers will follow thoroughly the changes and can change their marketing immediately if needed. This concerns of course the products.So when you as a newbie has so much to learn, the affiliate program offers an excellent opportunity to concentrate into a narrow topic. The marketing. That should be the hottest topic when you start your own internet business.
6. There are also other benefits. When an internet marketer needs at least 20 income streams, it is easy to change the nonprofitable ones and replace them with the better ones.What about the situation, if the products were your own ones? In that case to find a reason, why they do not do well would be complicated and also expensive.
7. The core affiliate programs in your business must be quaranteed successes. To be able to find them, just surf the net and visit the web sites of the most appreciated internet marketers. They normally recommend the affiliate programs they have used.Why to invent the success again? Just pick the best affiliate programs and the most important part of your internet business is in shape.
Juhani Tontti,B.Sc., Marketing. I Invite You As A Newbie To Visit My Site And Discover All The Quality Newbie Tools For Your Own Successful Affilite Program To Start Your Own Internet Business . Click HERE!
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Targeted Web Site Traffic To Your Home Internet Business By SEO Article

By: Juhani Tontti, Posted on: 2007-05-30

Search engine optimized or SEO article, has a nice set of benefits for your home internet business.

It pre sells the landing page, brings targeted web site visitors, make visitors want more about the issue, brings free traffic for years and will build up your authority image. On the top of this, the SEO articles with new keywords, can carry the web site into new markets. ( You can bookmark this page press Ctrl+D ).

These benefits of the SEO article make it one of the most effective tool to promote your home internet business. Because a SEO article uses only on page optimization technique, without any backlinks, you have to follow a certain technique in writing.

I will go through the technique, which is not difficult to learn but requires a lot of discipline.

How To Write A Home Internet Business SEO Article?

1.Pick the theme for your SEO article.

For instance this article has a theme, which you can read from the headline. The theme has to be very relative to the topic of the landing page, i.e. to include the same promise so that a reader can smoothly move into the landing page and bocome even more interested.

2.Choose from 2 to 3 keyphrases.

As an example this article uses two keyphrases related to home internet business, both are already in the title. It is easier to write a SEO article, if the keyphrases have a natural link between each other, like SEO article brings targeted web site traffic to the home internet business.

I suggest, that you will select keyphrases with Overture demand of from 1.000 to 3.000 a month to keep and Google supply under 10 million, to keep the competition moderate for your home internet business.

3.Research five top competitors.

It is very important to research your top competitors, because SEO article writing uses 100 % on page optimization techniques, without no backlinks.To be able to get the pole position at Google, you simply have to beat the competion per each keyphrase.

Analyze the competition per each keyphrase and if you found out that the page, which is not properly optimized, there is your chance. On the top of that, if there is no links and PR is 0, your chances are even better.

4.Write your main keyphrase into the title, body and the author box of your SEO article.

Let us say you have each of your keyphrase mentioned ten times, then you have to write them at least once using bold, italic and underlined fonts. Search engines love this! A practical rule is to write the keyword in each paragraph of appr. 4 lines.

5.Write your both keyphrases into the author box.

In this way you will build an anchor text for your link.This anchor text will influence in a very positive way into the search engine ranking of the landing page. This is why it is very important to use the same keywords in the SEO articles, which you have used on your home page. For search engines, the anchor text is a sign of the related link.

6.Finally, use always unique content.

Write always your SEO article by yourself. Your readers and search engine spiders like this. And if your target is to build an image of the authority among your home internet business visitors, the unique content is the only way.

Juhani Tontti, B.Sc., Marketing. Got Interested! Find A Quality FREE eBook To Learn About SEO articles From Home Internet Business . Click HERE!

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Searching on eBay & Sellers and Buyers
By: Stephen Campbell, Posted on: 2007-05-14

On the left side of the eBay home page there are 39 general categories listed. The list begins with Antiques and ends with Video Games and Everything Else. That list is only the tip of the iceberg so to speak. You can find everything that is for sale anywhere in the brick and mortar world listed for sale on eBay.

With such an enormous array of merchandise and services available under one roof, you might think it would be difficult to locate a single product or service. It isnt Ebay made locating particular items very simple. In the upper right hand corner of the eBay home page you will find a search box. You can type in a key word or two hit search and be taken to a list of items that match your search criteria. The more specific you can be the faster you can find what you are looking for.

For example: if you are looking from a bathroom rug don't just type in bathroom rugs as you will get hundreds of listings. You will still get a lot of search results but there will be a lot less the more specific your search words are. Also at the top of the eBay home page you will see an advanced search box.

By selecting a category from the drop down box and typing descriptive words into the first box you can refine your search quickly and easily. Additionally some but not all categories have a product find feature.

This feature allows you to search by brand name, color, size, price range, condition (new or used), location of the product and many other search criteria and can reduce your search time for a particular item significantly.

SELLERS AND BUYERS:
All of eBay is made up of buyers and sellers. That is after all the sole purpose for the sites existence. Ebay has gone to great lengths to bring buyers and sellers together for a mutually beneficial experience. Once a buyer has bid on an item and won the bid he is required to purchase the item. A binding agreement has been made and a buyer cant just change his mind.

For this reason it is very important that buyers read descriptions of items carefully and learn about the seller before they place a bid on an item. When an item is sold, the seller is obligated to deliver the item that has been sold and to do so in a timely manner. The buyer can't wait weeks before they ship the purchased item to the buyer.

Ebay strives to create a cordial relationship between buyers and sellers and for both to be able to tell other eBay users about their buying or selling experience with one another. For this reason both buyers and sellers are asked to send feedback about each purchase and each sale that is made. Both buyers and sellers establish reputations on eBay via feedback left for each transaction that they are involved in. There are three feedback options. There is a positive, neutral, and negative feedback option.

A positive feedback raises a buyers or sellers rating by one point. A neutral feedback neither raises nor lowers a buyers of sellers rating. A negative feedback lowers a buyers or sellers rating by one point. The feedback procedure is very simple. It requires only a minute, yet it is a very important part of each transaction made. Leaving a negative feedback is a serious thing and should not be done without just cause.

Stephen Campbell is a Business Consultant, Internet Marketer & Entrepreneur. He produces topical articles, & newsletters for his clients such as those at www.EzineMarketingInformationCenter.Com/

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