 |
Further
Reading ...
|
|
5 Essential Tools of the Successful Affiliate Marketer - Curtis Sexton
In the time I have been running my internet home business I have realized that there is a wealth of information available about ‘working at home’. Unfortunately a lot of this info does nothing more than waste your time and money. It has become very...
How To Save Money On Your Mortgage - Tom Levine
Obtaining a home loan is arguably the most expensive transaction you’ll experience in your lifetime. Therefore, getting the best home at the greatest value is an endeavor worth pursuing. Whether you’re trying to squeeze in to a higher priced home...
Having FUN In Leadership - Richard Gorham
”Don't measure your life by your goals, but rather by what you are DOING to achieve them.” –Unknown One of the biggest mistakes leaders make is getting so wrapped up in achieving results, they forget to ensure that people are having fun along the...
How to build link popularity - Salihu Ibrahim
How To Build link popularity. Link popularity is very important with regards to search engine placement or ranking. Most Search Engines including Google, place much importance in a Website's link popularity. They use the number of outgoing and...
|
|
|
Advertising DOs and DONTs
|
 |
Written 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. For free classifieds visit:
http://www.workathomebiz.info/adlandpro.html
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 - continued below ...
|
|
|
continued ...
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. To learn more about Webposition Gold visit this link:
http://www.webpositiongolddownloads.com
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.com and Findwhat.com.
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 visit:
http://www.directoryofezines.com/
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:-)
Copyright 2004 Mal Keenan
Mal Keenan is editor and publisher of Home Business Tips Newsletter: http://www.home-business-tips-newsletter.com/
For a comprehensive leads package and followup system in one visit here:
http://www.homebusinessnetworking.com
For A Home Business You Can Believe In:
http://www.eliteteamireland.com/
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
| _Additional Resources ... |
|
What To Do When Successful Training Fails - Anthony Griffin
Why Successful Training Failed Elizabeth M., Human Resources Director for a mid-sized furniture manufacturer, earnestly shared with me her hopes for developing a skilled cadre of supervisory personnel who would effectively lead their work groups by...
Basics of Publishing Your Own Newsletter - JC Anderl
Publishing your own newsletter is one of the greatest ways to keep in touch with your visitors. The basic idea is that once you have taken the time and/or money to direct a person to your website, you want to get their name and email address so that...
"The ONE Button To Push For Online Success!" - Ewen Chia
How many ebooks, reports or ecourses have you bought or read this year? Or should I ask, have you read them at all? How many latest hyped-up programs have you joined, hoping for the 'REAL DEAL' that'll make you rich? Scary statistics reveal that...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
