Thursday, September 22, 2005

Multiply Your Sales Through Affiliate Programs

By Jason Walsh

What could be better than exceeding your personal
sales goals for a given month or year? How about
doubling, tripling or even more of you sales goal for
the month? This is exactly what affiliates can do for
you. The amount of growth potential through
affiliates is unlimited; the more affiliates you have
the more money you can make, after all, if Sam Walton
tried to run every Wal-Mart store, he obviously
wouldn’t be very successful. You must realize that
for maximum growth you cannot do it alone. Think of
the success of companies such as Avon or Home
Interiors. Their success is based on two things; a
great product and excellent affiliate programs.

To attract affiliates to your company you should make
it worth their time. Offering one percent of sales,
is not an attractive offer, the higher the commission
that you are able to offer your affiliates the more
affiliates will be tempted to join your team. You
should also provide your affiliates with the tools
that they will need to successfully market your
product such as banner ads, articles, and anything
else that will help them to better market the product.
You should provide the affiliates with updated
product information through newsletters, new
promotional campaigns and other things to motivate and
inform the affiliates.

You can choose to run your affiliate program in a few
different ways, both of which are beneficial to your
business. A one-tier affiliate program allows you to
generally offer a larger commission and pays on one
level. The affiliate will receive a predetermined
amount for each sale. Using a two-tier affiliate
program, affiliates are paid on two different levels.
This is done by allowing the affiliates to recruit
others to sell under them. In this situation, the top
level affiliate would receive a slightly larger
commission than the recruit or second level affiliate.
For example if the top level seller makes 20% of the
sale, then she/he would make 15% giving the second
level affiliate the 5%.

Setting up the affiliate program can also be done in
two different ways. One way is to do it yourself
through an affiliate tracking software. This software
will provide you with a way to track affiliate sales
as well as allow the affiliates to view their
progress. The downside to this option is that you are
responsible for making payments. You can also choose
to hire an affiliate tracking company to do all the
work for you. These companies will allow the use of
credit cards and completely run the affiliate program
from billing customers, paying affiliates, and also
pay you. This is a great option for the busy business
owner or the beginning business owner and it is
affordable as most affiliate tracking companies charge
a small one time fee. However you choose to run your
affiliate program it is sure to increase profits for
your business.
About the author:
-------------------------------------------------------
Jason Walsh can help YOU
start your own profitable business on the Internet
within the next 24 hours... To learn more, visit:
http://www.achievable-together.com

Designing A Website That Sells

By Jason Walsh

Would you buy meat from a grocery store that left the
bad meat in with the good meat or wasn’t clean? Would
you buy a car from a sales lot that had totaled
automobiles on the front lot? I wouldn’t and neither
would you. Your website is your grocery store; your
car lot. You must have an atmosphere that is pleasing
to buyers. One that tells that buyer that you are not
an amateur, but instead a trained, seasoned
professional. Your site is a direct reflection of
your product and that is why that having a well
designed website can make or break your sales.

The first thing to keep in mind when designing your
website, is “surfability”. Take a few minutes a look
around at several web pages. What makes them
appealing? Were there some that you closed out of
immediately? Why? Take notes and do your research.
Keep in mind that when a person visits your site they
have a goal in mind. They are either seeking
information or shopping for a product. Give the
person what they want without having to search for it.
Be sure that all the information on your site is
relevant to your product. Make the buyer think that
they need your product to solve their problem.

Your main page serves a very specific purpose. It
should be an avenue by which the customer can shop
your site. It should be easy to view and load very
quickly. This is your first impression and we all
know that first impressions can either close the deal
or loose the deal. Make it simple. It is best to
have links that are easily viewable by the reader that
will navigate them to where they want to be. Tables
are often a great choice when deciding on a way to
design the main page of your site. Your main page
should load very quickly, chances are if it takes the
page more than ten seconds to load even on a 56k
modem, the customer will click away to save time,
hoping to find the information or product elsewhere.
To increase the loading speed of your main page you
should avoid large graphics or excessive graphics. To
many banners or special effects can cause a page to
load slowly as well.

To make your web site more appealing to the eyes, you
should stick to mild colors. If your site is a
content site where the user will be doing a lot of
reading, it is best to stick to black and white.
Color can be added when using tables, as a way to
brighten up the page, but remember to keep the overall
look of the page professional and appealing to the
audience that will be visiting most often. Since
screen resolutions vary among monitors, it is a good
idea to set the pixels to a standard 800x600. You may
also choose to set the tables in your web page to span
a percentage of the page rather than a set number of
inches. This will be sure to accommodate all screen
sizes. You should remember that a lot of Internet
users will not use the same browser as you, and
therefore you should be sure that your site looks as
good on other browsers as it does your own. You can
do this by downloading several browsers through which
to look at your page.

Be aware of the fact that the overall look of your
website is a way to make money. The appearance of the
site, if designed properly, can be an excellent
marketing strategy for your product or service.
About the author:
-------------------------------------------------------
Jason Walsh can help YOU
start your own profitable business on the Internet
within the next 24 hours... To learn more, visit:
http://www.achievable-together.com

Five Proven Methods for Internet Marketing Success

By Jason Walsh

There are hundreds of ways that you can promote your
online business or website, some more effective than
others. These five proven methods will help you to
generate traffic to your site and also to generate
income into your wallet.

1. One thing that appeals to everyone is “free.” If
it is free people will take it. Think of the samples
of cheese given away at grocery stores. Do you really
want a small piece of cheese? Of course not! But you
take it simply because it is free and someone is nice
enough to offer it to you. The same principle applies
with information or services offered from your
website. You can send out free newsletters or offer a
free trail period. One popular thing that is being
given away now are free credit reports or free PC
scans. These freebies are what we in the marketing
field like to call teasers. After running the free
credit report or PC scan we alert the customer if
there is something found on their credit record or PC
and then offer to show them what it is or repair the
problem for a price. This can be an effective way to
get information to your potential customers, create
sales or to generate traffic to your site.

2. Your website contains information about a service
or product that you are very knowledgeable about. You
can use this knowledge to generate traffic to your
site by writing articles in your area of expertise and
having them published in an ezine or an article
information site. The most effective way to use these
articles is to write them for free and ask in return
that the publisher allow you to include a byline. A
byline is a very short summary of the author, their
credentials and their website. Your byline is a way
that readers will come to know you as an expert on the
topic and will in turn come to trust your site as a
source of credible information.

3. Some search engines will allow a website to
purchase their ranking. This is an excellent Internet
marketing technique in that it is effective and
inexpensive. In the pay-per-click programs, website
are only billed for those who actually visit the page,
unlike banner ads which may be seen by millions but
only used by a few. When using the pay-per-click
program you are asked to choose keywords and when
those are entered your site will appear and if the
surfer chooses to view your site, you are billed for
that click. Many pay-per-click programs will offer
other benefits as well, such as updated lists of
commonly used keywords.

4. You should remember that others are in the same
boat as you. You can choose to network with those who
have similar marketing ideas. When networking you
will be able to share links and refer customers to
each other. You should always be very cautious when
choosing a networking partner as everything that you
recommend is a reflection of yourself or your product
and therefore, you should be certain that your
networking partner is a reputable source of
information.

5. Simply because your website is online, doesn’t
mean that all your advertising should be. Advertise
in newspapers, TV, the radio or you can even send out
a press release to get your information to thousands
of people all over the country.
About the author:
-------------------------------------------------------
Jason Walsh can help YOU
start your own profitable business on the Internet
within the next 24 hours... To learn more, visit:
http://www.achievable-together.com

Marketing on a Shoestring

Marketing on a ShoestringThe costs of marketing can be overwhelming, particularly fora new company. With a little planning and time, it may bepossible to save yourself a considerable amount of money.If you look closely you will see that there is more adviceon saving money than you could possibly read. Indeed muchof the advice is not worth reading. Here are some quickand easy ways to save you a bit of cash on your marketing.Set out a plan that you will follow. A bit of extra timeand consideration at the outset will go a long way toensuring that you do not spend more than you want to onyour marketing campaign. Remember that small amounts willadd up so plan and document everything if you do not wantto get a nasty surprise.When you are starting any marketing plan, you should makesure that you are able to track the sales that result fromthis approach. Only try one approach at a time so that youcan easily determine what is the most successful method foryour product.Try one approach at a time, and start with the cheapest.Why bother spending thousands of dollars on a televisionadvert if a cheap home made flyer would have been equallyeffective.Make sure that you target the right people. You can save alot of money by limiting your target audience to the peoplethat are really interested in your product. If you target awider number of people you will waste money, as you willhave to produce more material for a lesser return.Customers do not necessarily appreciate adverts that areall singing and dancing. In fact, simple and easy tounderstand adverts are much more likely to be successful.Think simple. Many people are actually put off by flashyadvertisements. By creating simple, plain material you willnot only save money but you may also appeal to more people.Biggest is not always best!Scott F. Geld is the administrator and proprietor of http://www.marketingblaster.com">Marketing Blaster,Inc., a pay-per-click traffic source that repeatedlybeats the major search engines in conversion ratio and ROI.For more information please visit:www.marketingblaster.com

Security and RSS Feeds

RSS is growing at a lightening speed. What was once only known as a "techie tool", RSS is becoming a tool that is continuously being used by the general population. Along with the good comes, the not so good. And while some have mentioned the emergence of RSS spam, where content publishers dynamically generate nonsensical feeds stuffed with keywords, the real concern relates to security. While an annoyance to the search engines, spam in RSS feeds pales in comparison to the possible security concerns that could be in RSS' future.

Security Implications Related to RSS.
As RSS gains momentum security fears loom large. As publishers are quickly finding innovative uses for RSS feeds, hackers are taking notice. The power and extendibility of RSS in its simplest form is also its achilles heel. The expansion capabilities of the RSS specification, specifically the "enclosure" field which has launched the podcasting phenomenon, is where the vulnerabilities lie. The enclosure field in itself is not the problem, in fact the majority of RSS feeds do not even use the enclosure tag. The enclosure tag is essentially used to link to file types, things like images, word documents, mp3 files, power point presentations, and executables and can be thought of in similar terms to email attachments.

The fact that RSS can be used to distribute these file types has opened a myriad of doors to users of the syndication standard, but also has created cause for concern. Most people do not feel that the risk is significant because people "choose" the content that they receive, and while it might make the distribution of malware, viruses and spy applications via RSS less prevalent, their is still the inherent risk of a infected file being distributed.

The problem is one of both technology and lack of education.
The danger lies in the fact that many RSS readers, news aggregators, or pod-catchers automatically download the information contained in the enclosure field regardless of its file type or source.

Most RSS developers acknowledge the risks associated with the enclosure field, but few have had the forethought to include filtering, screening or authentication capabilities and many automatically download enclosures.

Nick Bradbury of Bradsoft/NewsGator seems to be proactive, designing FeedDemon with security in mind. FeedDemon uses an editable safelist of file types as well as allowing users to monitor what files are automatically downloaded. FeedDemon also contains hard-coded warnings related to specific file types.

Developers of ByteScout took a different approach to the handling of enclosure files, ByteScout does not automatically download anything without user intervention for each download.

Unfortunately, not all RSS readers, aggregators and podcatchers consider the possible security implications associated with RSS feeds and podcasts, some will automatically download enclosures without warning or any thoughts of security. Be sure to examine how your RSS reader handles files contained in the enclosure field of an RSS feed.

With the increased use of RSS and podcasting, the security risks increase with it. Their is cause for concern, however proactive users and conscientious developers can easily subvert the risk by taking precautions seriously. Computer viruses and malware are cause for legitimate concern, there is ample time and action that can avert potential problems.

About the Author:
Sharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll http://www.feedforall.com software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition Sharon manages marketing for FeedForDev http://www.feedfordev.com an RSS component for developers.