How You Should Store e-mail Addresses

August 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Collecting opt-in email addresses is key to building your list and profiting from successful email promotions. So now, let’s look at exactly how you can get set up to collect and store these email addresses to create your mailing list.

Collecting email addresses is a fairly simple process that begins with three basic elements; viz:

1. the method of collecting the addresses,
2. the way to transfer these addresses to the place where you will store them,
3. the place to store them (your email marketing program or your database).

When it comes to storing all the opt-in email addresses, you’ll be collecting, you have four major options. These four options are the different ways you can set up the tools to build your opt-in email list. The options are:

1. use your web host to handle your opt-in email list,
2. use a web based list management service,
3. use a database,
4. use a list management software.

Web hosts are not normally in the email list business and they don’t give you the kind of flexibility and control you need to build your list and effectively manage your email promotions. Hence, this option is not recommended.

A web based list management services, are usually third party services available through application service providers (ASP). They can give you all the functionality you’ll need; including customization abilities, personalization of mailing, cross referencing of lists etc.

ASP is a good option. We use the services of GetResponse, an easy, web-based email markeeting software that delivers our campaigns, offers, newsletters, follow-ups and autoresponder messages. Go ahead Get your FREE account NOW!

Using a database driven system is a more complicated option, thereby not advisable to be used by those of you just starting out. For starters, you’ll need to either have good programing skills or have a programmer to write some specialized scripts before you can pass new subscribers’ names and addresses from your web form to your database. It is really unnecessary to go through all these troubles.

Small or home based businesses tend to prefer to run email promotions using a software solutions, because once you’ve purchased the software, there are no extra costs involved. The right software can make managing your opt-in list simple; as once your subscribers’ names and email addresses have been received by the software, it will automatically add their contact information to your mailing list for you.

One such software is Mailloop, developed and marketed by IMC. It is an email and list management automation software that allows absolutely any business owner , no matter what level of experience you have, to easily manage your email lists.

Visit Mailloop for more information on the software.

Why People Don’t Visit Your Website And What Can You Do To Address It

August 14, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Sometimes we wonder why people don’t visit our website. Here are 10 Reasons why that happens !

1. You don’t offer free original content. It’s important to give your visitors information they can’t find any- where else. If you’re the only source for a certain type of information, people will flock to your web site.

2. You don’t offer free software. Most people like to find good deals on software for their computers. If the software is free, that is even better.

3. You don’t offer a free contest or sweepstakes. It’s a fact, people like to win things. If you can fulfill that need, people will stop by to visit.

4. You don’t offer a free directory. Create a directory of web sites on a particular topic that is related to your target audience. People will visit because they will find what they’re looking for, all in one place.

5. You don’t offer a free e-zine. Most people love to get free information that they’re interested in emailed to them on a regular basis. This saves them time and money.

6. You don’t offer a free community. People like to have a place were they can have discussions with others on a particular subject. You could add a chat room or message board to your web site.

7. You don’t offer a free affiliate program. One of people’s basic needs to survive is money. When you offer them a free opportunity to make money they’ll line up to visit your web site.

8. You don’t offer a free online utility. When you offer a utility that can solve a problem, people will visit your web site. The utility could be a free auto responder, e-mail account, search engine submission, etc.

9. You don’t offer free current information. Supply news stories related to your web site. People want
up-to-date news on the topics they are interested in. They will also be interested in visiting your web site.

10. You don’t offer free samples of your product or service. Have you ever been to a store and you jumped at the chance to get a free sample of food?
This same concept will also attract people to visit your web site.

Try adopting some, if not all, of the following 10 cool ways to attract people to your web site. Bet you’ll be surprise with the outcome.

1. Give people a free subscription to your e-zine. Almost everyone is publishing a e-zine nowadays so it’s important to give something extra with the free subscription. You could offer a free gift or advertising when people subscribe.

2. Provide your visitors with free content. Your content will be more attractive to your visitors if it’s up-to-date or original. You could also offer people the option to reprint the content in their e-zine or web site.

3. Offer a free online directory. The directory could be full of interesting ebooks, e-zines, web sites etc. If people find your directory to be a valuable resource they will visit it over and over.

4. Give your visitors a free ebook. You could also include your own ad in the ebook and allow other people to give it away. If you don’t want to take the time to write one, you could ask other writers permission to use their articles.

5. Hold free online classes or seminars. They could be held in your web site’s chat room. The idea of “live” information will definitely entice people to visit your web site. You will become known as an expert on the topic.

6. Give visitors a free entry into your contest or sweepstakes. The prizes should be something of interest or value to your visitors. Most people who enter will continually revisit your web site to get the results.

7. Let visitors download free software. It could be freeware, shareware, demos etc. You could even turn part of your site into a free software directory. If you created the software, include your ad inside and let other people give it away.

8. Offer free online services or utilities from your web site. They could be search engine submitting, copy writing proofreading etc. The service or utility should be helpful to your target audience.

9. Give free consulting to people who visit your web site. You could offer your knowledge via e-mail or by telephone. People will consider this a huge value because consulting fees can be very expensive.

10. Give your visitors a free membership to your online club. People want to belong to something, why not your online club. You could also give away a free e-zine for club members only.

Try them out !

Search Engines and Directories

August 13, 2008 | Leave a Comment

It is important that we understand the difference between Search Engines and Directories.

It is the dream of every internet entrepreneur to have lots of traffic to his or her website. After all, without a steady stream of visitors to your website, how will you earn your online fortune?

The first place you should go when you need a quick traffic feed is the search engines. A top ranking in one of the major engines is the most effective way to increase the traffic to your website.

Albeit, you should however know that statistics show that most surfers never search beyond top 30 results they receive. In fact more than 40% of web surfers will stop reading after the top 10 results! With that in mind, your goal should be to get top ranking positions in search engines for the terms most frequently searched by your target audience.

Getting top ranking in the search engines, however, is not as easy as it sounds. You need to learn the “right” techniques if you want to ensure that your site is well ranked. You need to take advantage of the search engines and build your traffic base.

But first, you need to understand the different types of search technologies being used by your audience and how you can use them to your advantage.

So, what is a search engine? Basically, search engines are programs that use “spiders”; also referred to as crawlers, robots and bots, to crawl the web and automatically index your website based on algorithms (mathematical formulas). Sounds confusing?

Well, for now, here’s what you need to know. The first thing you need to understand about search engines is that in order to get listed in the search engines, you need to submit your website to them. This is to ensure that the spiders find your site and index it.

The second thing you need to understand is that search engines algorithms are constantly changing. What works this week may not work a month from now or even two weeks from now. As a result, submitting your website to the search engines and then forgetting about it is risky. Your listing needs to be optimized and then maintained if you want to generate the traffic that a top spot can bring.

Search engines are not the ultimate answer to dreams of internet success for most online business, but they are definitely a good start. Search engines continue to be a great source of cheap and often free traffic for website owners who are willing to learn the rules required to snag a top ranking spot.

If your website ranks under the keywords most frequently searched by your potential customers, search engines can also be a great source of highly targeted traffic for your website. This is traffic that you can easily convert into subscribers and sales provided your opt-in and sales process is doing its job.

A directory on the other hand, is a compilation of websites that is created and maintained by human editors rather than electronic spiders or robots. The editors review submitted sites and then rank them based on specific criteria.

One of the best examples of a directory is Yahoo, where reviewers organize websites by major topics and sub-topics. Another well known directory is the Open Directory Project (www.dwoz.org) which prides itself on being entirely free, run by volunteer editors who work to provide useful results to searches.