My Wizard Ads HowTo Marketing Tips and Resources for Online Entrepreneurs

Achieving Success In Business After Years of Failure | Solo Ad Explosion

2011-03-08T01:59:00.000-08:00

Achieving Success In Business After Years of Failure | Solo Ad Explosion

Is It High Time to Outsource Your Backlinks?

2007-10-21T11:48:00.000-07:00

In a world gone mad with the concept and reality of internet marketing, website owners struggle day in and day out to stay ahead of their competitors.

Using every trick and non-trick in the book, their goal is to achieve global and/or local awareness of what their website has to offer the consumer, home business seeker, student, surfer.

So what makes a website "popular?" What elevates one guy's (or gal's) website over and above the next? Is it that stirring copy? Are words what dazzle? Or, could it be something else entirely?

Driving real people to one's website and commanding that all important sale is the number one goal of all website owners. Even when "selling" per se isn't an agenda, the "sale" still involves real people landing on one's site and sticking around to use that website's resources.

"Outsourcing" involves transferring or sharing management control and/or decision-making of a business function to an outside supplier, which involves a degree of two-way information exchange, coordination and trust between the outsourcer and its client. "Outsourcing" involves transferring or sharing management control and/or decision-making of a business function to an outside supplier, which involves a degree of two-way information exchange, coordination and trust between the outsourcer and its client.

Many organizations today are making the decision to outsource. In today’s global marketplace outsourcing has made itself accessible to many organizations on a national and international level. Offshore outsourcing has provided many businesses with the opportunity to harvest the benefits of lower labor costs in developing countries with few workers rights laws and to exploit the value of artificially manipulated foreign currencies, where the exchange rate is intentionally undervalued. Through outsourcing, companies today have the ability to develop competitive strategies that will leverage their financial positions in the ever competitive global marketplace. Outsourcing is also successful in increasing product quality and/or substantially lowering firm and consumer costs (e.g., increases the quality to cost ratio). Because outsourcing allows for lower costs, even if quality reduces slightly, which is sometimes the case, productivity increases, which benefits the economy in the aggregate. Outsourcing can also present advantages to less developed, typically non-Western states. "Developing" countries, such as China, Philippines, and India, but also countries of Eastern Europe, benefit from the patronage of companies that outsource to them - in terms of increased wages, job prestige, education, and quality of life.

Some of the major advantages that today’s organizations can expect to obtain through outsourcing include the ability to purchase intellectual capital, to focus on core competencies, to better anticipate future costs, to lower costs. Overall outsourcing is viewed by many organizations as a strong business tactic that ultimately is a superior economical approach to developing products and services.

Backlinks are incoming links to a website or web page. The number of backlinks is an indication of the popularity or importance of that website or page. In basic link terminology, a backlink is any link received by a web node (web page, directory, website, or top level domain) from another web node (Björneborn and Ingwersen, 2004). Backlinks are also called as incoming links, inbound links, inlinks, and inward links.

Search engines often use the number of backlinks that a website has as one of the factors for determining that website's search engine ranking. For example, Google's PageRank algorithm uses backlinks to help determine a site's rank. To see a site's PageRank, you need to use the Google Toolbar for Microsoft's Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox, view the bar graph indicating a website's PageRank in Google's directory, or download the PageRank plugin for Mozilla Firefox.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Theresa Cahill and Jeff Greer invite you to explore the unique benefits of creating quality backlinks to promote your website. Visit Molten Marketing today!

Copyright 2007 - All Rights Reserved

Your New Best Internet Marketing Buddy - Viral Marketing

2007-07-02T18:02:00.000-07:00

Marketing on the web has some unique attributes that general marketing cannot necessarily enjoy. Something called viral marketing, which can refer to anything from branding to backend sales to word of mouth advertising, is prevalent on the Internet. Viral marketing can be incredibly lucrative. The value of viral marketing is of such import that examples abound everywhere on the Internet.

One of the greatest ways to build confidence in a product or service is through word of mouth advertising. Most people believe that this is only possible in real, live, face-to-face conversations, but that is just not true. With the prevalence of text messaging, blogs, instant messages, and emails, word of mouth advertising can actually be achieved via the Internet. After all, the bulk of communication, particularly for younger people, has moved online. This is but one example of the value of viral marketing. Advertisers tapping into this vast network of potential customers can attest to its the success.

One of the ways in which you accomplish viral marketing is through entertainment on the web. Video vignettes, games, etc., that are being shared with millions of users often have advertising attached. Therefore, the value of viral marketing can be recognized by those who know that literally millions of people are being reached by this form of publicity. Consider also the exponential effects of passing along an email to everyone in an inbox. If one person sends a message to ten, and of those, five pass it along to another ten, and so forth, then, in a matter of days, an immeasurable number of people will have received advertisements from people they know! Therein lies the value of viral marketing.

Similarly, backend sales are a great way to realize the value of viral marketing. Backend sales refer to sales to existing customers. In essence, once you have established a good relationship with a satisfied customer, they are likely to be willing to purchase more from you, a trusted source. Likewise, branding is another great example of this type of marketing. Once a consumer recognizes a brand that can be trusted and relied upon, they are more likely to come back for more. They are also more likely in both of these instances to tell their friends how much they enjoy your products — which, of course, is word of mouth advertising or viral marketing.

So you see, the value of viral marketing can be realized through a number of avenues. Whether it is through word of mouth, backend sales, or branding, the value of viral marketing cannot be discounted, as it is a veritable cornucopia of opportunity for the online marketer.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more.

Theresa Cahill and Jeff Greer invite you to educate yourself in the highly profitable arena of viral marketing. Visit Molten Marketing for more info today.

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Molten Marketing is Ready - Your Personal Invitation

2007-06-02T18:33:00.000-07:00

Greetings to you!

Theresa and Jeff here with a very special invitationto extend to you today.

Molten Marketing is going LIVE and we invite you to join "the motherload of marketing memberships" right now.

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SIDENOTE: If you don't want to wait a second longer, go here http://www.moltenmarketing.com/ for all the details and join now

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Our "official" grand opening will be later on this coming week. We'll be doing our press releasing, etc., to let the whole world know.

With this in mind, it's important that we give YOU the opportunity to "get in ahead of the rest."
What you'll find when you reach the site:

7 different services designed to market your website kicking it into high gear (yes, you get all 7)

And... so many, many, many more features we'd have to just replicate the sales page here to even begin to give you a small clue about what's inside.

The one thing you can count on with Molten is nothing stays the same - this is not your typical membership, we set out to make it unique and... it really is!

Another point you need to know:

Molten doesn't need to be, but will be, a limited membership. This means there are only so many openings available and when it fills up, the join button comes down.

Many "typical" memberships do this because they MUST, we're doing it for a different reason - because we WANT to :)

This means there are only 750 (at this initial writing) available openings. Plenty of room right now for you, and all those you know, but THIS WILL NOT LAST.

You're about to step inside the membership of all memberships. Molten will truly be the last membership you will ever need.

See you inside!

Theresa & Jeff
Molten Marketing
Henderson, Nevada & Baltimore, Maryland

P.S. Stop reading *smile!* and get over there now
http://www.moltenmarketing.com/

Why Do People Join Membership Sites

2007-05-27T09:39:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2007 - All rights reserved

I field emails and phone calls weekly from people who have signed up for a program or programs online and need help.

More often than not, the caller has actually joined a program that was created to address the same questions I am being asked. I think to myself, "What's not right here?"

In order to be considered a viable program or service online, the website owner is required to provide something in return for your hard-earned dollars. Typically, that something is information. Information in the form of ebooks, software, or training are the most common kinds of membership sites.

When considering joining any online program, there are two questions you need to address, whether it is a membership site or not. These two questions are:

1. What is the program selling you for your money?

2. Other than promoting that program to others will it also show you how to make money online for any business?

Hence the dilemma presented above. This person arrived at the membership site sales page. They had predefined reasons for hunting for a membership in the first place. Then, hit with an offer they cannot refuse (vast amounts of cash for telling others about that membership) they totally forgot why they needed it in the first place.

The second scenario is they did not have any set plan to begin with. Instead they think that taking the "easier" route of using someone else's stuff to promote will be their ticket to online riches. No business plan, no real strategy. Unfortunately, more often than not, nothing could be further from the truth. That program, membership or not, is not your business, it belongs to someone else.

Conversely, the other scenario is the hunter had no intention of building a business. He or she was merely looking for an "easier road." Find something to promote and tell others. This creates a problem though, you are an affiliate only and not the owner of the membership or product.
This is the background painted for you, but the problem does not stop there. In the rush to tell others about their wonderful find, they totally neglect to educate themselves on the finer points of what that program (membership or not) has to offer.

They skip the details.

Keep your priorities firmly in mind. If you joined to learn how to build your own business, sure tell others about your membership, but use the tools (assuming the site delivers the goods) to do just that... build your business.

If, conversely, you joined purely for the allure of telling others and thus gaining financial benefits for yourself in the telling, at least know what you're offering. Believe it or not, morally you do have that responsibility. Know thy product.

If your reason for joining was just the allure of making money with that membership or program, then at the least learn everything there is to know about what you propose to sell. When others join under you, I would hope that you'd agree that you have a moral responsibility to that downline individual to help them succeed, too.

Educate yourself before you sell.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill & Jeff Greer cordially invite you to explore the unique qualities of online marketing membership programs presented at Molten Marketing

Molten Marketing is Coming

2007-05-16T23:09:00.000-07:00

The long awaited motherload of all marketing membership sites is coming soon! If you've been looking for an online marketing membership that provides you with internet advertising and marketing services and great products to build your website or start your own niche market, don't miss out on this soon to launch program! Sign up TODAY:

http://www.moltenmarketing.com

Residual income opportunity included!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Good Marketing Strategy is Key to Home Business Success

2007-03-13T22:21:00.000-07:00

Let's face it, a company without a marketing plan is a company adrift. Offline or online, any business started without a marketing strategy is a company almost certain to fail. A solid marketing strategy must be the foundation upon which you build your business. And, although it's not “rocket science,” an online internet marketing plan is a carefully constructed means by which to bring warm market buyers to your web site. Yes, the goal of any marketing strategy is to create a stream of good, quality prospects that your web site turns into active, paying customers.

The problem, however, lies in the fact that developing the best internet marketing strategy for your online business is not only time consuming, but it takes the average home business owner a large amount of trial and error. This trial and error can, in a short amount of time, prove costly.

Did you know that a good online marketing strategy is not just advertising or pricing? More often than not, the web site owner mistakenly assumes that placing ads and underbidding their competition will win them the customers they so desperately need. Or, conversely, when asked about their strategy, many web site owners do not even have one.

Creating an effective online internet marketing strategy takes more than a well-designed website. Your marketing strategy must be aimed at the “warm market.” Warm markets online are created primarily through the use of search engine placement. Ranking well ensures your web site is in the returned results for those actively looking for what you have to offer. But, meta tags and meta keyword descriptions can, and do, only get you so far. There are most likely millions of competing web sites. Your marketing goal must be to climb your way past your competitors into your rightful spot within that searched-for query.

Above I made the statement that the process was not “rocket science.” However, creating a website marketing strategy is a complex and extremely individualized process. Cookie cutter approaches are not a fraction as effective as using a web strategy consultant. Systems are systems. People can make a difference if they actively participate in developing your marketing strategy.

Finding a good source to strategize, research, plan and implement your can make the process simple. After analyzing the information, an Internet Marketing strategy is created. Planning your Internet marketing strategy is vital before committing money to the online business sector. I am finding that developing a marketing strategy is one of the more difficult aspects of creating a successful business.

One of the keys to a successful marketing strategy is focus.

When you ask just about any new business owner what their marketing strategy is, the chances are they won't be able to answer. Taking short-cuts in developing your web marketing strategy is NOT the answer, because that will only cost you precious time and money in the long run.

The impact of technology on sales and marketing strategy. Without an effective sales marketing strategy, most businesses would fail within a very short period of time. Determining the proper marketing strategy is key to your success.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and her partner Jeff Greer would like to assist you in effectively marketing your business online. Our marketing strategies work. http://www.market-for-me.com

Pre-Launch Notification for Molten Marketing

2007-03-03T20:49:00.000-08:00

Are you the victim of joining membership site after site and/or buying and downloading worthless junk? We've all been there and while it's stressful emotionally, it most certainly takes its toll on our wallets and bank accounts!

Jeff Greer and I have HAD ENOUGH!

We're putting together the mother of all membership sites set to launch in April 2007. If you are ready for molten, red-hot, laser targeted marketing you won't want to miss this launch!

Click through and sign up for notification. Make up your mind on launch, but if you don't sign up you won't get the heavy discounts planned for pre-signup visionaries!

http://www.find-a-home-business.com/wow.html

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

The importance of backlinking and article writing

2007-02-15T13:39:00.000-08:00

Yes I'm going to take the time here first to remind you that what Trey writes about is exactly what Jeff and I can do for you at http://www.market-for-me.com - not just some of it, but ALL of the below - quality backlinks, quality articles, and more.

What a great article sent to me this a.m.! Enjoy!

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No Website Is An Island - Back Linking is Essential for Success
By Trey Pennewell,
Links And Traffic (http://www.LinksAndTraffic.com) (c) 2007

Creating back links to your website is one of the best ways togain a higher ranking in the search engines. Almost any SearchEngine Optimization (SEO) expert will agree with this point. The SEO experts will also tell you that your placement in the SearchEngine Result Pages (SERPs) can make or break your website.

It is commonly thought by many that if your website does not rankon one of the first two pages of the SERPs that your website will rarely be seen by visitors. For most people searching the web, this means that you must be in the top 20 search results. Think about it, when you do a search and you cannot find what you are looking for after a couple of pages, what do you do? I know what I do, I type in a different keyword or a variation of what I was looking for in hopes of getting better results.

Google and Yahoo love to see a website that has back links leading to it. You can check this for yourself, take a look at apopular keyword phrase that everyone is trying to get ranked for. Most likely you will see that the top few sites have a large number of back links leading to that site. Conduct your own case study and look at your #1 competitor; does that site have more back links than you do? You can determine the number of backlinks that a site has by entering the following into the search engine of your choosing: link:http://www.yourdomainurl.com

Of course back links are just one part of the equation, but they are a big part of the equation in getting good SERP results. So, if creating back links is such a good idea, why isn't everyone doing it? Well, not everyone is doing it, because it can be a real pain to create back links.

Let's look at some of the more common methods of building backlinks:

* Email A Fellow Webmaster

It is recommended that the back links that you get to your site be from a site that is relevant to the topic of your own website. Having a website about cars linked to a site about fishing does not help you in the SERPs, as much as having a site about cars linking to a site about tires.

The problem here is that you can literally spend hours upon hours emailing various webmasters and asking them to give you a backlink. In addition, it is common practice that you offer a reciprocal link to their website. This is fine for some people, but others do not want to clutter their pages with links that take visitors away from their website.

Additionally, you will want to look and see if the site that you are trying to get a link from has a good Google page rank (PR). Google says that a back link from a related site with good PR counts as a strong "vote" for your site; the more votes that you get, the higher your SERP and the higher your PR will be at the next update.

Once you create a sales pitch to a Webmaster for a link exchange, you have to hurry up and wait. You can email 100 webmasters and get a varied response, that is, if you get a response at all. It has been cited that reciprocal linking campaigns have about a2-5% acceptance rate. In other words, out of those 100 people you took the time to research and to email, only 2-5 of them will give you the back link that you are looking for. Of course, a few more may be willing to do it for a fee.

* Directories

Directories are another "tried and true" method of generatingback links to websites. Again this is a process that will takehours of work. The two most popular directories are DMOZ.comand the Yahoo directory.

DMOZ is human edited; this is good, because they work hard atonly approving quality sites. The downside is that they oftenlack the actual human beings to approve or disapprove all ofthe sites that are submitted. There simply are not enoughpeople volunteering for DMOZ to stay on top of all thesubmissions.

Yahoo will allow for directory submissions for free if yourwebsite is not deemed to be a business website. If your websiteis deemed to be a business website, plan on shelling out about $300 to be "considered" for a listing in their directory. Theydo not guarantee that your website will be listed in theirdirectory. Yahoo only guarantees that they will consider yourwebsite for inclusion in their directory.

You will find that many webmasters operate their own directories. You can find a list of many directories on message boards like the one at DigitalPoint.com (http://forums.digitalpoint.com/). Many of these directories provide free listings, or they wish fora reciprocal link in exchange for placing your link. At many of these directories, you can also pay for a sponsored link.

The problem here? These directories are usually operated bysoftware and are not human edited. This means that your sitecould end up in the wrong category or that your site is simplylisted and forgotten about. These link directories often boastof having decent PR on their homepage, but the actual page thatyour site will be listed on usually has a 0 PR. These smalldirectories also have numerous requirements, and you need toread the fine print. One mistake and the 15 minutes you spent constructing your submission could be wasted, when yoursubmission is rejected.

* Reprint Articles For Back Links

This is an option to create back links that many webmasters overlook. Probably the primary reason that webmasters do not take full advantage of this is because they do not feel comfortable with writing articles. Another reason is that the Webmaster may not have the time to write a quality article.

Consider this, one well-written article can be submitted to literally thousands of publishers of ezines and newsletters, niche webmasters, and free reprint article sites and can result in dozens, hundreds or thousands of back links. Now, not every publisher will pick up your article, but for the ones that do use your article, you will get a back link from their website.The back link is achieved in the "about the author" box that is required to stay in place with your article.
The more informative people find your article, the more linking results you can expect to achieve from your reprint article.

A webmaster that says he or she doesn't have the time to spend an hour or two writing an article needs to take a look at how many hours have been spent submitting to directories or writingto other webmasters asking for back links.

Don't feel comfortable writing your own article? Then hire a ghostwriter.

Once the article is written, then you should consider paying a distribution service to distribute your article for you. Again, this is a relatively small price to pay in order to get those all-important back links.

Some recommended article distribution services in alphabeticalorder include:

* http://www.ArticleSubmissionSites.com/article_services.htm
* http://www.EzineTrendz.com/
* http://www.PRLeads.com/article.htm
* http://www.SubmitYourArticle.com/
* http://www.thePhantomWriters.com/

In the end, you can save yourself time, money, and a lot of headaches by using articles to create back links to your site. You may be surprised by how many websites are starving for content and are more than happy to place your free reprint article on their website. Odds are that if they are placing your article on their website, then they are in your same niche market--- which only adds to the value that the search engines will place on that back link. Don't forget that people actually read these articles, and you can gain a boost in traffic as a bonus to all of your new back links.

In Conclusion...

I know, you don't want to shell out the money to use reprint articles as a linking method, but how much money have you spent on being listed as a "sponsored" website in directories?
How much time have you wasted in trying to drum up new back links through other methods? After all, your time is your money. You can spend your time or your money to do the tasks that you need to do to be successful. And literally, sometimes it makes a whole lot of sense to outsource specialized tasks to experts in their fields.

No website is an island. You cannot just build your website and expect people to be knocking down your door to buy your productsor services. You have to advertise. People have got to have a way to find your website.

If you take the time and expend the effort to build your website in such a way as to attract the search engines and to provide what the search engines consider to be a good website, then you will find that the search engine companies can be your business' best friend. And whether you like it or not, one of the ways that the search engine companies deem a website to be a good website, is by the number of back links pointing to the website.

You can have the best website on the internet, selling the best products and services at the best prices, but if people cannot find you, then your website is pointless. If you desire to be successful, then you need to do whatever is necessary to build links to your website. Give the search engines what they want (back links to your website), and the search engines will give you what you want (targeted traffic).
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Trey Pennewell is a writer who writes for the "Links And Traffic"guaranteed link building service. They use reprint articles to develop quality links from quality websites. Their writers know what it takes to write informative articles that generate above average linking results, and they put their money where their mouths are, by guaranteeing their results. Learn more at: http://www.LinksAndTraffic.com . Feel free to reprint this article on your website, so long as this About The Author information and all live links remain with the article.

Marketing Effectively Through Article Writing

2007-01-22T22:39:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2007 - All Rights Reserved

When it comes to marketing online many web site owners opt to try their hand at advertising to begin their online presence.

One method often chosen is the "solo ad." A solo ad is a standalone mailing sent to an individual list owner’s readers. When you don’t have your own list, or want to expand your reach online by using another person’s list, the solo ad fits the bill.

The "disadvantage" of the solo ad is the fact that typically it is a one (or two) time mailing. The subject line is the only portion initially seen by the reader since the mailing arrives in that person’s inbox. Use an uninspiring subject line, and your solo ad is deleted without even being read.

Opened, the solo ad body itself must be compelling enough to get that reader to click and go to your website, or perform the action you are hoping to achieve. Once at the site, the web page itself must be strong enough to "close the sale."

Solo ads can be effective, but more often than not larger amounts of money must first be expended to come up with the "perfect solo ad," an ad that achieves the desired action - the visit to your web site.

If you’ve been online for any length of time, you may already be familiar with the advantages of writing articles. Any successful online marketer usually includes the benefits of article writing in his/her ebooks, courses, web site, etc. When it comes to long-term "advertising" (which translates into great "marketing" of yourself and your web site), article writing is one thing no web site owner cannot not do. Ignoring the benefits of article writing is one mistake every web site owner should go to great pains to avoid making. You must write!

However, article writing is an art form - not only must you be continuously creative, but you also must have the "stick to it" capacity to write at least monthly for effectiveness. Weekly is ideal!

Then once your article is written, you must have the wherewithal to submit your new creation to not one or two but dozens of article directories. Inserting your article into a mailing and "blasting" it out to directories is never effective. Hand selection of the correct category for your article should be your top priority.

As a web site owner, it is important that you see the difference between the solo ad and article writing.

One is a shot in the dark - because typically no one is anticipating receiving your offer in solo/advertising form. Solo ads, no matter how well-selected a list may be, are still cold marketing.

The article, conversely, is warm marketing. Articles are read by readers intentionally looking for what your article covers. In addition, articles are picked up by publishers and other web site owners and used as content for their own visitors and readers.

It is important to note that an article cannot be written like an ad. That is not the purpose of an article. An article needs to be informative, possibly entertaining, and "broad based." The resource, or About the Author, box is where you state who you are and what you are interested in promoting. Written incorrectly and your article will be refused by the directory owner(s). Written and submitted correctly and, again, your article is self-perpetuating.

Wise web site owners use a balanced blend of both solo ad advertising and warm market article writing to achieve their desired result - visitors to their web sites!

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and her business partner, Jeff Greer, specialize in helping internet business owners effectively market their websites. Submit your business for a free site evaluation at Market-For-Me.com. Theresa also is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

An Internet Marketing Strategy That Lasts a Lifetime

2007-01-04T12:18:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2007 - All Rights Reserved

Today, the internet is the preferred platform for conducting business. However, while the Internet has been a blessing for business, it comes with a few downsides too: competition has increased unbelievably. Whereas earlier, a business had to contend with 10 local competitors, it now has to compete with a thousand global ones.

So what is the best way to ensure that your business is successful and doesn't fall into the list of unheard-of's? To be a successful online business venture, you require a sound internet marketing strategy. The object is the same as any other marketing strategy, except that it is designed for business conducted over the internet.

Components of a Successful Internet Marketing Strategy

Here are 3 key factors you cannot forget when it comes time to develop your Internet Marketing Strategy:

* Build your company's credibility
* You are your web site
* Be seen. Be heard.

Developing an effective strategy along these lines will ensure that you have a successful business. All the three mentioned above are critical items and lack of even one of these can be lethal for the success of your business.

Build Your Company's Credibility

In the World Wide Web, nothing is more important than credibility. If people don't trust your company, they aren't going to spend money on your site. The horror stories about Internet scams have almost become a permanent segment in the morning daily news shows. Building a credible image is invaluable on the Internet, so always tell people if you've been in business for a number of years - that makes people feel better. Show customer testimonials on your website. If others have spent money with you and they're still happy, that makes people feel better. Write articles on topics in your industry. When people see you as an authority in the industry, they will feel more at ease spending money with you.

You Are Your Website

Ever heard the phrase: "You are who your friends are?" Same goes for your website. It has to look clean, organized, and fit the target market you serve or people will view your company as sloppy, disorganized and speaking a different language. Would you give your money to a company like that? Answer questions. Provide relevant information in a clear manner. Your website is your store and how it is perceived is one of the most important aspects to an effective Internet Marketing Strategy.

Be Seen. Be heard.

Of course, none of the other two steps will ever matter if nobody steps foot in your store. That's why you must have a Search Engine Placement strategy that yields results and gets your company site listed near or at the top of the list in relevant keyword searches. Some great ways to improve your search engine ranking include writing keyword-dense articles, amassing as many inbound links as possible and crafting a solid meta keyword and title tag in your website's code.

Your Internet Marketing Strategy is just like an offline marketing strategy: You must have a trusted company image and then be creative to find as many ways as possible to connect with your target market. Follow these techniques and you'll have laid that solid foundation to build on. You can differentiate your company from thousands of others by implementing a well-thought-out, organized, adaptable internet marketing strategy.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and Jeff Greer specialize in developing and implementing that effective internet marketing strategy perfect for your online business. Free analysis available at Market-For-Me.com. Theresa Cahill also is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Why Internet Marketing is a Non-Stop Process

2006-12-13T15:03:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

Creating your first (or 10th) website is always an exciting time! You work hard to ensure your web site is alluring to your potential customers. Your images are up and your content is first rate. Now you ask yourself, "How am I going to get people to notice me? How can I promote my website?"

Marketing is an age-old process. Most likely even the first humans strove to market themselves or their goods to each other. It's a basic human instinct to want to tell others what we have, what we've created.

To effectively market your web site takes persistence, determination, and the ability to do repetitive tasks over and over - daily, weekly, and monthly. The central theme when approaching marketing (versus advertising) is to strive for the flood of potential customers typically found in the search engines. This type of traffic is considered "warm marketing," because those doing the searching already have a basic understanding of what they intend to find.

Even the big players on the net, like Wal-Mart, Amazon, and others actively seek the traffic derived from search engine searches. During the holiday season, a 2006 statistic shows Wal-Mart relying on 12% or more of its own traffic to come from active searches online. You may be thinking, "But I'd just type in their url myself." You would be wrong. Many a looker-turned-buyer start their way to your online business using a search engine.

Getting into the search engines is one thing, however, getting to the front of a search-returned result is the ulimate challenge all business owners face.

Knowing the value of keyword and keyword phrases designed specifically for what you are offering is invaluable. Many business owners make the mistake of going for "broad" terms, words and phrases they have no hope of getting decent search engine placement for. Pick too broad a term and you are going up against the biggies online. Their sites are at the top and at the top for a reason. Don't optimize for a word that is out of your reach.

Be picky. Be specific.

Once you have determined how you are going to go about your battle to the top, you must use a variety of methods to get there. The most difficult task a web site owner faces is sticking to a system. Haphazard marketing results in haphazard sales (if any).

Be diligent. Be wise. Know your strengths and weaknesses. Often outsourcing tasks can be the wisest option for those without the skill level, resources, and time needed to effectively promote a website.

With that in mind, the following are just some methods that have stood the test of time in terms of promoting your web site:

Article Writing

Writing is an extremely effective way to gain search engine recognition. You must be willing to write articles (or have someone write for articles for you) on a weekly basis (at a minimum). Once written, your articles need to be distributed to as many directories as humanly possible - each and every week.

Setting up an onsite article reference area of your own is also a good internet business marketing strategy. But don't stop there... create a blog and/or rss feed and post your articles to them, too.

One Way Backlinking

Search engines love authority sites. To have your web site recognized as an authority means that everyone on the net points to you, without you having to "point back." The greater the number of incoming links, the higher your online business appears to the eyes of search engines and their spiders. Ineffectively done, backlinks can cost a small fortune and take up a huge chunk of your time to create. Gaining backlinks from high-ranking sites (in the eyes of the search engines) is very important. Backlink by linking forward whenever possible.

Reciprocal Linking

Once upon a time the be all and end all of having an online web site meant finding as many other web site owners as possible to link to your own site. Most of the time this meant, "I'll post yours if you'll post mine." Reciprocal linking is still advisable, but in the correct proportion. Your web site needs to have more incoming links than outgoing. In addition, for any reciprocating arrangement, you want to swap with complimentary sites, not competitive ones. Being selective is the name of the game with reciprocal linking.

When it comes to promoting your website, marketing is a non-stop process that must be executed wisely. Internet marketing also must be approached aggressively to rise to the top of the search engines for terms relative to your online business.

Too often when someone thinks, "I will promote my website!" they fail to realize just how non-stop that process really is. Gaining the first foothold and moving to the front for returned results is just the first step. Keeping and holding that position means never letting down your guard. Never give your competition the edge to move right past you.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and her business partner, Jeff Greer, specialize in helping internet business owners effectively market their websites. Submit your business for a free evaluation. Find the best methods to promote your web site at Market-For-Me.com

Theresa Cahill is also the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Do It Yourself SEO: Ten Search Engine Optimization Tips

2006-12-12T07:09:00.000-08:00

By Donald Nelson (c) 2006

Using a professional search engine optimization service can sometimes be expensive. However, if your budget is tíght and you have a basic understanding of web page construction it is possible to optimize your own website without hiring an SEO specialist. For those who would like to give it a try, here are ten "Do it yourself" search engine optimization tips:

1. Think about SEO right from the start.

Many people plan, design and build their websites without giving any thought as to whether their site is search engine friendly or whether it will be capable of attracting traffíc in organic search engine results. At the last minute, after most of the site has been built, they try to optimize their site, not realizing that this work should have been done throughout the planning and building process.

It is far better to think about search engine optimization in the earliest stages of the project. For example, if it is at all possible, choose a domain name that will allow you to include your most important keyword or search term in your URL. If you are selling bicycles then you would do well have to a domain name like www.xyzbicycles.com . And don't stop with the domain name; include your keywords in your file names as well. For example, a sub-page of this hypothetical site might be www.xyzbicycles.com/road-bikes.html

2. Design your site with both search engines and users in mind.

Your site should be easy for your human readers to understand, but it should also be easy for search engine robots as well. If you want to see what a search engine robot will "see" then view your site in a notepad document or use the html view of the popular web editing programs.

If you have used gif images to represent your headlines or other important text, then this text will not be picked up by the search engine robots. In addition, if you have designed a site that is entirely in a flash format, you will not be providing the search engine spiders with much "food," or searchable text.

Furthermore, if you have long strings of java scrípt and complex style instructions in the head section of your html page it is better to put the java scrípt in an external file and the style instructions in a separate CSS (cascading style sheet) file, in order to give prominence to the actual text of your web page.

3. Write individual title tags for each and every page of your website.

From the standpoint of search engine optimization, the single most important sentence on any web page is the title tag. The title tag gives the search engine a good indication as to what your page is all about. Incorporate your main keywords or search phrases into your title tag, and keep them at the very front of the sentence. These keywords are more important than your company name (unless it is Coca Cola!). So our XYZ Bicycle Company might have a title tag that looks like this Bicycles: Racing Bikes, Mountain Bikes, Road Bikes, Bicycle Accessories from the XYZ Bicycle Company.

The title tags of each of the sub-pages of the site should reflect the main content of those pages. Nevër use the same title tag for all the pages of the site.

4. Write a concise description tag for each of your web pages.

Just as the title tag is the most important sentence or phrase on any page, the description tag is the most important paragraph on any page. Summarize the gist of your page in two or three sentences, again incorporating the keywords and search phrases for which you think people will use when searching for your site. A description tag for the home page of the XYZ Bicycle Company could look like this: "The EXZ Bicycle Company manufactures mountain bikes, racing bicycles, road bikes and bicycle accessories. Our bicycles are distributed and sold around the world."

5. Put your keywords into headers and headlines on your page.

Your human readers and search engines alike need prominent headlines in order to understand what your page is all about. While a human reader only needs to see the headline in a large bold text, search engines distinguish the headlines, which they regard as important indicators of the page, by noting which phrases are encased in header tags such as H1, H2, H3, etc. H1 is considered most important and your first headline should be labeled with this tag. If the header tags make your copy look too big, then you can change the size of the headers by creating style instructions that will render the headlines into sizes that are consistent with the look and feel of your site.

6. Write copy that includes your keyword and search phrases at the beginning, middle and end.

If you want to write website copy that is search engine optimized, then you only have to follow good writing and presentation procedure. State clearly what you want to say in the opening paragraph, elaborate on your basic ideas in the middle section of your text and at the end summarize what you have said, reminding your readers with text that is similar to the opening paragraph. Be natural; don't try to stuff your page with the keywords. If you read the page out loud and it sounds funny, then you have overdone the repetition of your search phrases and keywords. A density of 2% is considered to be OK. Thus in a 400 word page of text your keyword might be repeated eight times.

7. Place your keywords and phrases in the link text of your web pages.

So far we have placed the keywords in the strategic places of the web page: the title, the description, the headlines and the body text. Now we have to see that the keywords are included in clickable link text on the page. Whenever you are linking to sub pages or other pages of your site, make sure that your keywords are included in the clickable portions of the links. Thus, instead of making a link that says "clíck here" for more information about bicycle accessories, it would be better to write: clíck here for more information about "bicycle accessories," with the keywords "bicycle accessories" being the anchor (clickable) text.

8. Install a navigation system that can be easily followed by search engines.

One of the most important steps in getting more traffíc to your site is to ensure that all of the site's web pages are included in the search engine indices. Normally a search engine robot will visit the main page of a site and follow links to the other pages. If your navigation system is based on java scrípt, or on images, there is a possibility that some search engine robots will not be able to follow the links and thus they will not pick up the interior pages of your site. One simple remedy for this problem is to build an additional text-link navigation bar and place it at the bottom of the page. This additional navigation bar will serve multiple purposes:

a. Help the search engines to reach the interior pages.

b. Put your keywords in link "anchor text".

c. Remind the user to go deeper into the site by repeating the navigation options again.

9. Build a site map page or use the Google sitemap option.

Getting all of your pages indexed is so important, that it is also prudent to take another step that will ensure that all of your pages are visited by search engine robots. A site map is a page that has text links to all of the pages of your site. As with a text link navigation bar, a site map serves multiple purposes:

1. It helps users to find what they are looking for on the site by providing an outline summary of all of your pages.

2. It helps search engine robots to land on the interior pages.

After you build your site map page, be sure to make a link to it from your home page and the other important pages of your website.

In addition to a normal site map page, you can also make an XML site map, upload it to the server and then register it with the Google site map tool. You can use a free online utility to create your XML site map at: http://www.xml-sitemaps.com/ and visit http://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps for more information. This process is easy to accomplish, and registration with the Google sitemap program will supply you with important statistical information from Google as well as help to get all of your pages indexed.

10. Once your website is up and running concentrate on off-site optimization.

So far all the steps that I have outlined are concerned with on-page factors, the parts of your website that are under your control. But your ranking in Google and other search engines will also be heavily dependent on off-page factors such as how many high quality sites link to your site. Unless you obtain a good amount of high quality links to your site you will not be able to compete in highly competitive search categories.

By far the best way to get links to your site is to build a site that has valuable content. You should endeavor to build a site that is so "cool" or so unique, that other people will link to you without even asking you. Of course this is easier said than done, but it should be what you are striving for.

The next best way to get high quality back links to a website is to write informative articles and get them published on other websites with a link back to your site. This process is known as article marketing and it not only helps to build incoming links, but it also builds your online reputation as an expert in your field.

Other common methods of increasing incoming links include submissions to important directories, participation in forums and careful trading of links with respected websites.

If you follow the ten "do-it-yourself" search engine optimization tips that I have described in this article, you will have taken a big step towards guaranteeing the success of your online enterprise.

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About The Author

Donald Nelson is a search engine optimization specialist. His company, A1-Optimization.com offers affordable search engine optimization, website copywriting, article writing and link building services.

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Why Outsourcing Takes Your Business to a Higher Level

2006-11-16T21:50:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

Outsourcing is a term used in business and it is gaining popularity on the net as millions of web site owners discover they do not have all the tools and skills necessary to handle each and every portion of their businesses.

Unlike having to find, interview, and hire an employee - and thus incur the tax liability of a new employee - often savvy business owners turn to outside companies. Outsourcing services take on the tasks underlying a business leaving the owner more free time to pursue the front-end of his or her business.

Wikipedia states:

"Outsourcing" involves transferring or sharing management control and/or decision-making of a business function to an outside supplier, which involves a degree of two-way information exchange, coordination and trust between the outsourcer and its client."

Outsourcing, therefore, becomes an integrated part of your business. The importance is to determine what should be outsourced, why it should be outsourced, and who will provide your outsourcing services.

Business segments typically outsourced include:

* Information technology
* Human resources
* Facilities
* Real estate management
* Accounting
* Direct Online Marketing and SEO

In addition, many companies also outsource their customer support and rely on call center functions.

Using the Know How of Others

The business owner must be able to step back and make an honest evaluation of his or her talents. We are not all created equal. We all have different strengths. One surefire strength for business success that a business owner must cultivate is the ability to delegate responsibility through the use of outsourcing. That's how a well-run, profit-pulling online business accomplishes its goals.

Today's businesses - large and small - gain immense benefits by finding other companies outside their own arena who possess the technological know how to analyze, plan, and implement target objectives.

In the case of the smaller web site owner looking to gain greater footing with the hot market of search engine results, finding an outsourcing service to handle marketing (and a small portion of advertising) is one such effective strategic move.

Traditional approaches to search engine marketing have, for decades, focused primarily around a web site's meta tags, firming up web page content, and then submitting the site on a regular basis to the search engines. From a purely advertising basis, other companies will insist that just driving "targeted traffic" to a site is "enough."

While both of these methods are viable, a good outsourcing company often adds these two methods at low cost or no cost - just bonuses while the real work of marketing is underway.

Choosing the Right Outsourcing Company

As an online business owner it is easy to become frozen in place trying to keep up on all the possible, working, methods for marketing online. Even if one could find the time to read everything and devise a plan, putting that plan into action becomes cumbersome. Doing even the "smallest" of tasks can literally take hours of your week away from you. Hours better spent on web site enhancements and new products, mailing list contacts, and just being there for your web site visitors. Unless the web site owner is willing to give up some control, the grind of working the foundation of marketing too often must supercede the human approach to being there for your customers.

While we all love to do our initial digging online, pick up a phone and call or send email inquiries or submit forms for call back when choosing an outsourcing service. Make sure your questions are addressed intelligently and at a level of understanding that you feel most comfortable with. Avoid listening to pre-scripted sales pitches where all they want to do is monopolize the phone and beat you down to the point where you really don't know what they can or cannot do. Take control of the conversation, then turn that conversation into an effective two-way street of open communication. Any company not willing to do that - or vague in their explanations of how - should be moved to the bottom of your list as you locate the best outsourcing company to work with you and your website.

Finding a company that understands and weeds out fad flash-in-the-pan methods, and builds your marketing business on solid, proven methods of web site promotion should be your goal. Find that company and establish a two-way street of information and trust in order to work effectively together.

How to Incorporate Outsourcing Into Your Business

"Prior to the contract development of any outsourcing agreement, the outsourcing company develops a request for proposal (RFP) document which highlights the major requirements and scope of the project which is to be outsourced."[1]

Through a bid-like process, or the acceptance of agreed upon stated services at given costs, the recipient company has an actual proposal of services in hand. They know what they are getting, what timeframe to expect, and projected results from this outsourced service.

By outsourcing, the owner understands what the benefits to the service(s) are, but the strategy, planning, and implementing can be safely placed into more knowledgeable and efficient hands to get the job done.

In Summary

Outsourcing is not just for the "big guy." Overall outsourcing is viewed by many organizations as a strong business tactic that ultimately is a superior economical approach to developing products and services.

Simply put, don't try to do everything yourself. You may have many fine strong points, but running your online internet business single-handedly should not be one of them. Learn when and delegating responsibility can actually make your business grow by leaps and bounds. Then find an outsourcing service you can work with - one with a complete understanding of your web site - one that is willing to go extra miles to make your business a success.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and her business partner, Jeff Greer, put their experience at your disposal. Hire our effective, reliable outsourcing service specializing in home business, or storefront marketing. You are invited to receive a FREE online marketing strategy analysis at Market-For-Me.com.

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

How to Increase Your ROI Using Online Internet Marketing

2006-11-10T13:30:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

Internet marketing is time consuming. It cannot be approached in a hit or miss fashion. Developing a strategy to market any web site through research, planning, and implementation is the only viable choice a business owner has to surpass his or her online competition. Without a solid internet marketing plan, your marketing budget can quickly spin out of control and produce little, if any, lasting results.

In general, online internet advertising is the use of the internet to advertise and sell goods and services. Pay-per-click advertising, banner ads, e-mail marketing, and interactive advertising are all just that... advertising. Advertising reaches out to a cold market. Advertisements must be hard hitting and pursued diligently to stay ahead of your competitors. A web site business owner often concentrates on nothing but advertising without gaining solid footing. Solid footing is achieved through marketing.

Marketing is the foundation for promoting any web site. The tools to market differ from those of advertising since the intention of marketing is to build web site recognition - long term - within search engines and other hot market areas on the internet. To effectively implement a solid marketing plan takes knowledge, ingenuity, skill, patience, time, and money.

Any company wishing to use the internet to its advantage needs a plan for online internet marketing. Set your goals and objectives. Ask yourself where you want your business to go and also ask yourself when you want to achieve that goal. Know your target customers and who are likely to be your best customers. Examine the gender, age groups, educational level, marital status, income level and other demographics so you can match your marketing to their needs and desires.

One way to match offers and customers is through the design of your website. Think about what will draw customers to your website, what keeps them interested once they hit your landing page, and what will get them to return. It is much easier and cost-effective to retain the business of a customer than it is to attract the business of new customers. So, make sure your website meets their needs and work toward building trust and loyalty.

Your web site must reflect a highly perceived value, have ease of use, and ensure conversion elements to win your share of the highly-competitive internet business. Bear in mind that 62% of visitors to a site cannot find the product or service they were looking for. Can you imagine if half of the customers who walked into a store couldn’t find the merchandise?

An effective online business also needs a plan for selling. What payment methods will you accept and how will you make your customers comfortable with making a purchase on your website? The ability to use major credit cards is enough of a comfort factor for many online customers. Some want to a secure server certificate to feel at ease with the exchange of money on the internet.

These are just some of the basic steps to take and issues to consider for good online internet marketing.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill and Jeff Greer specialize in online internet marketing. Receive your FREE internet marketing strategy analysis at Market-For-Me.com.

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Keywords: marketing, internet marketing, advertising, outsourcing,

Marketing - When You're onto Something HOT!

2006-11-05T09:31:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

After years of being online, it's great to see a new wave of individuals truly interested in started their own home businesses. For much of my time online, I've watched the wave of affiliate program promoters - who unfortunately come and go.

Under the right circumstances, affiliate marketing can be very lucrative. But it is difficult. Promoting someone else's program can be an uphill battle.

Finding one's own niche, however, can be extremely rewarding. You've now settled into an area you truly enjoy and can focus your time, energy and money promoting your very own web site.

Once you've determined what it is you can really sink your teeth into, the next step is finding effective - long-term - methods for promoting that web site.

To market one's own business, you need to key in on the search engines themselves. Warm markets for home businesses are always advisable. "Advertising," cold marketing, becomes a sideline, an adjunct to a good internet marketing strategy.

Time-wise it is best to delegate responsibilities. To effectively market means knowing what your strong points are - and what they aren't. It is very easy to waste (and I do mean waste) the first several months flitting from method to method. People flit because they undertake concepts that they cannot possibly find the time to do effectively and efficiently. Once that method has exhausted you, often the tendency is to "flit" to the next one.

Consistency is your key to marketing. Delegating the time-consuming chores to increase your ROI is wise. Finding the best internet marketing strategy and service to do the job for you should be your #1 priority when launching any home business web site.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill has over two decades of online and offline marketing experience. Together with her business partner, Jeff Greer, they put that experience to use assisting business, home business, and store front owners in promoting their websites. You are invited to receive a FREE online marketing strategy analysis at Market-For-Me.com.

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds, service marketing web site strategic internet marketing market for me

Offline Marketing in an Online World

2006-11-03T18:16:00.000-08:00

With the holidays upon us (yikes!) this article struck my fancy to post. Brought to you by Affiliate Programs.com

Enjoy!

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Offline Marketing in an Online World

Take advantage of the offline world of marketing to propel your site forward this holiday season.

While much of your site traffic is going to come from search engines, never overlook the potential benefits of offline marketing, especially during the holidays. All too often, online businesses limit their potential by only focusing on search engine marketing. By diversifying your marketing strategy, you can dramatically increase brand recognition and website traffic. The following offline marketing strategies are a cost-effective way to advertise your business and draw readers to your website.

Business Card Marketing

What makes business cards effective? A business card serves as a sort of introduction and helps potential customers remember you and your business. By establishing this direct connection with your audience, these potential customers will be more likely to seek out your website in the future.

Start by choosing a simple but effective design that clearly explains your identity, your purpose, and your location. Your company logo should also be prominently displayed on your business card. Provide important contact information including your name and phone number, as well as addresses for your office, e-mail and website location.

Direct Marketing

Direct mail is another relatively inexpensive offline marketing tool that can pay off in increased website traffic. Many people mistakenly begin their direct mail campaigns without carefully choosing a target audience. Who will be reading your direct mail advertisements? Before you begin, make a list of the people who you anticipate to be your core audience. Once you have chosen your audience, select what type of direct mailing you will use. Catalog, sales letters and flyers are just a few options you may want to try. Remember to place your website address where it can be clearly and easily read. Finally, follow up on every potential lead generated by your direct mail campaign. Promptly respond to any phone calls, letters or e-mails, and direct these readers to the right links that will net you affiliate commissions.

Alternative Marketing

Alternative marketing strategies are sometimes referred to as guerrilla marketing.

-Placing flyers around your community, such as on car windshields, grocery bags, church bulletin boards and in local stores.

-Selling T-shirts and other wardrobe items that advertise your business and website.

-Advertising in community newsletters, restaurants and businesses.

No matter which venue you choose, always remember to clearly identify your business and website location. These small-scale approaches can greatly improve the profile of your business within your community and can generate great word-of-mouth results.

Traditional Offline Marketing

Finally, never overlook the potential of traditional offline marketing strategies. Radio commercials, television advertisements, billboards and newspaper ads are all highly effective and proven ways of reaching out to new customers. These tools can also give you an important edge over your online competition. By establishing an offline connection with your audience, potential customers will be more likely to remember your business and website in the future.

Compliments of Affiliate Programs.com

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

What's Your Internet Marketing Strategy?

2006-10-28T21:10:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

After spending the past decade talking with individuals wishing to promote their products and web sites online one theme appears to repeat itself and may be at the root of the marketer's problem.

Wikipedia states that:

"Real-life marketing primarily revolves around the application of a great deal of common-sense; dealing with a limited number of factors, in an environment of imperfect information and limited resources complicated by uncertainty and tight timescales. Use of classical marketing techniques, in these circumstances, is inevitably partial and uneven."

The average advertiser often perceives himself or herself as a full-fledged "marketer." This, too often, is far from reality. As the quote above shows there is an abundance of misinformation and limited, trustworthy resources on which one begins to build a marketing base. Choose the wrong ones and you are running around in circles, with little to show for your efforts.

Developing the best internet marketing strategy can be difficult. It must encompass a wide variety of services, methods, and techniques to even begin to show results. Often, the web site owner chooses one particular method, applies himself or herself to that task for a short period of time and then puts it on the back burner. They find that either the technique they decided upon was too hard to implement or too time consuming to pursue.

Then it's off to find the next "biggest and best" idea.

The lack of follow thru compounded with life pressures forces many to give up effectively working their online marketing strategy. Reviewing their plan of action, often it is discovered that there really is no method - just a hit and miss approach to try to gain web site recognition from a virtual world full of competitors.

Cost effective internet marketing and a solid online marketing strategy are key elements to your online business success. Following the latest and greatest fad becomes an all-consuming monster because reality tells us that there just isn't enough time in the day to work a fully developed online marketing strategy... not if you are going it alone. To further hinder one's efforts, many try to discover the "secret" from one online source or another. This, too, came chew up time and money without shedding any real light on effective marketing.

Individuals, small businesses, and large corporations running successful endeavors online have one thing in common - a solid marketing strategy and effective ways to implement their plans.

Remember, there is a good reason sayings like "Rome wasn't built in a day!" remain true even to today. Haphazard marketing brings haphazard (and frustrating) results.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads. With two-plus decades of online and offline marketing experience, she enjoys helping business, home business, and store front owners in promoting their websites. You are invited to receive a FREE online marketing strategy analysis at Market-For-Me.com.

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online marketing marketing internet marketing strategy market for me

Effective marketing to promote your web site is here...!

2006-10-27T11:28:00.000-07:00

Just a bit of recap about our newly formed partnership of Market-For-Me.com...

Opened for business October 11, official first web site marketing campaign launch on October 13. Four clients with a wide variety of business ranging from sugarless candy, Forex training, the perfect golf swing, and womens self defense.

Taking time out, we've just released our first press release for Market-For-Me.com ourselves :)

Market-For-Me Directs Web Traffic To Virtual And Brick & Mortar Storefronts.

Thanks for reading, it's exciting! We hope to help YOU soon!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

D-lectable.com

2006-10-19T22:34:00.000-07:00

Nothing beats the great taste of chocolate!

Up until now, healthy chocolate was nasty chocolate :) D-lectables has changed all that...! New sugarless products are coming on the market using a brand new, healthy "sugar that's not sugar."

The most recent round of sugar free candy and chocolate uses sugar alcholol as sweetner. I don't know about you, but that plays havoc on my body!

D-lectable.com is developing a new sweetner for healthy snacks. Low in calories and low in carbs, you'll be able to "pig out" on all your favorites: pies, cakes, ice cream, chocolates, gummy bears... the works!

My advice is to stop by this gorgeous website and take a look! Watch for new product launches coming soon!

D-lectable... Yum!

Tags: healthy chocolate, sugarless, healthy snacks, advertising, marketing, classifieds

Your Web Site Marketing is Different from the Guy Next Door

2006-10-12T20:49:00.000-07:00

Every web site and web site owner is different.

Market-For-Me.com specialize in promoting store fronts, true work at home web sites, and business.

We're "people just like you" and understand the need to take a marketing and advertising budget and make it stretch. We also realize that you must have a budget and be willing to commit time (in terms of months not years) in order to reap the benefits of doing business online.

For a personal, no cost or obligation review of your needs, please fill in the fields below. We will contact you, discuss your various options and budget, and tailor a program specific to YOUR needs.

Reference: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Has Your Online Marketing Stalled?

2006-10-11T18:05:00.000-07:00

Has Your Online Marketing Stalled?
http://www.market-for-me.com

Sometimes you just never know where the best ideas will come from...

Recently my phone has been ringing off the wall with calls from newbie and veteran marketers needing to discuss ways to advertise online. Some (as newbie implies) are just starting out and need a bit of guidance (with a healthy dose of common sense thrown in). Others have been marketing for a while, but with minimal results.

Market-For-Me.com was literally born overnight. Okay, technically it was a brainstorm in the morning and fully active by midnight last night :)

Often the problem with marketing (other than figuring out where to begin and what to do) falls into two categories:

* Not enough time in the day
* Not trusting to, or able to find, the writing skills required
* Not knowing what works or doesn't and avoiding doing anything right

Taking the foundation I know to be true when it comes to advertising, and building upon that foundation with further-reaching marketing avenues (many aimed at the warm markets associated with search engine placement), Market-For-Me.com provides the resources and tools to promote your web site. The glorious benefit to many is... placing the "tedious tasks" into someone else's hands (in this case my own) to get this accomplished!

Pulling out the stops, Market-For-Me.com's marketing packages are specifically tailored to individual web site storefront, home business, and business websites.

If you're wondering, "What else can I do online to promote?" or "I know what to do but don't have the time!" this new marketing and advertising adjunct to My Wizard Ads and Everenterprise.com is just right for you!

Come Visit Us and Request a Free Web Site Analysis and Quote!

* * * *
Reference: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Shame on You if You are Not Writing

2006-10-05T10:14:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

As an ezine co-op owner, I'm often asked "how can I make money online... today!"

While there are no concrete ways to actually achieve this, it is possible to have income rolling in in say a day or two or a week.

What you need to do is have faith in yourself, and START WRITING!

This Resource Can Do This For You!

Now, if you need a little "shame on you!" inspiration, I'd like to tell you a short story about a 15 year old girl in my son's PE class.

Last year she started a novel, Decision of a Heartbeat.

She's finished, had it published, and is actively promoting it.

Now don't you feel foolish?? If a high school student has the motivation and drive to put her words into something as large as a compelling thriller, romance, suspense novel, don't you think YOU could at least write an article or two?

Resources abound. Writing and posting and publishing are surefire methods to advertising yourself online.

Use the url above (and check out Danielle's book!) and get started... TODAY!

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: writing, publishing, articles, advertising, marketing, classifieds

More Great Affiliate Marketing Tips and Info

2006-10-03T22:43:00.000-07:00

Things just kept getting better in my inbox today. Earlier I posted an excellent advice article for affiliate marketers on the My Wizard Ads website (click on title above), and then lo and behold in comes another! For all us email marketers, take note... plenty of meaty information below!

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Affiliate Email Marketing Subject Lines that Work
September 19th, 2006
Nicky Senyard, CEO Share Results

Affiliate email marketers understand that email subject lines are the hooks that entice readers. If affiliates focused on email marketing have a strong grasp of their target audience (subscription base) and understand how to relate interest and relevancy to the reader, then high open rates for promotional and newsletter emails will follow.

Keeping your readers in mind, here are some guidelines for successful email subject lines that Share Results has used over the years:

Branding counts

Make sure your opt-in affiliate mailing list readers immediately recognize your emails as a trusted source, by reinforcing branded “From” fields with subject lines that also include your brand and/or domain name.

Segment, then personalize

No, we’re not suggesting affiliates write every subject line as “Jane Doe – One Day Only Cat Toy Rebates for Fluffy”. Instead, be sure to segment your mailing lists as much as possible, and create custom email subject lines catering to niche interests. [Editor’s note: If you do happen to know your customer’s name, and their cat’s name, by all means use it!]

Spam filters

Know what content gets blocked by spam filters at the ISP, server and individual account holder level and test every subject line with spam content checking services. Create numerous test accounts with as many free email providers as possible, and send test emails to those accounts.

Reader filters

Guard against sensationalism, overly promotional subject lines, or offers that sound too good to be true. Slick sales pitches turn off most readers even if they’ve made it through spam filter algorithms.

Keep it short

Studies back that email subject lines of 50 characters or less generally have higher response rates, so pare content down to the bare minimum.

Attention grabbers

This is by far the most controversial element in email subject line copywriting. Many email affiliate marketers favor the hard-sell content that delivers offers, states benefits, stresses urgency or evokes curiosity, lines like “Last Minute Baby Shower Gifts – 10% Off” “Only 5 days left… Save on Custom Baby Blankets” and “6 Newborn Essentials for First-time Parents”. Other affiliates argue that simple descriptive subject lines such as “Koo Koo Bear Kids Newsletter – October 2006” are an affiliate marketer’s best bet. As with everything affiliate marketing, test your audience to find out what they prefer.

Track

Always analyze which subject lines generate the highest open and clickthrough rates, and tweak future mailings accordingly. Testing and re-testing should be the mantra of every affiliate email marketer, and it’s often the first activity dropped by busy affiliates!

So one of the key questions email marketers ask: Do today’s consumers, oversaturated by advertising messages, still respond to traditional benefit-oriented email subject lines?

For affiliate email marketers, the answer is… it depends!

Top email advice from AffiliatePrograms.com

A 2006 study published by MailChimp, a product of The Rocket Science Group, tested over 40 million emails sent by its subscribers to at least 100 recipients each, and yanked out the ones with the highest open and clickthrough rates and the lowest, 20 from each group.

The ones with the best open rates (averaging 60% to 87%) bear a striking similarity to each other.

Typical best performer email subject lines include such exciting examples as:

“[COMPANYNAME] Sales & Marketing Newsletter”
“Eye on the [COMPANYNAME] Update (Oct 31 - Nov 4)”
“[COMPANYNAME] Newsletter - February 2006”
“Happy Holidays from [COMPANYNAME]”

Of the top 20 email subject lines, 17 included the company or brand name, and 13 featured words like “newsletter” “news” “update” “upcoming events” and “invite”.

Now let’s take a look at the worst performers, with open rates between 1% and 4%.

Lines from this group included:

“Last Minute Gift - We Have The Answer”
“Valentines - Shop Early & Save 10%”
“Need More Advertising Value From Your Marketing Partner?”

Only 8 featured a company name or brand, and only 1 included “news”. Most fell into the pure benefit lead trap that screams “Hey –this is an ad! Read this so I can sell you something!” that jaded consumers are quick to reject.

Of course, there are a number of factors influencing how email subject lines are received, such as the make-up of an opt-in mailing list, brand strength, the length of time readers have been subscribed, deliverability, product market awareness and more. It would have also been interesting to pull not only the top and bottom 20 lines, but also focus on individual company case studies, to see if the [Company Name] – [News] subject line consistently had the best open rates.

What you can always count on with subject lines is that there is no one magical formula to write them! At Share Results, we always aim to cover two bases: make sure the subject line reflects our email’s content, and continue to “mix it up” through experimentation.

About the Author

Nicky Senyard, CEO ShareResultsNicky Senyard is CEO of Share Results, a boutique affiliate network working exclusively with large brands and niche merchants as committed to affiliate partnerships as we are. Discover affiliate programs powered by Share Results’ affiliate software and affiliate management services, including eDiets, KooKoo Bear Kids, Zazzle and Real Networks: ShareResults.

Reference: affiliate,advertising, marketing, classifieds

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Info Products and How to Make Your OWN Money Online

2006-10-02T21:49:00.000-07:00

Tonight I sent out an invitation to my clients to use what they know and make money for themselves online. Too often we rely upon "other people's products," and wait and wait and wait for the cash to start rolling in...! Why not take your experience(s) and package it up and SELL IT FOR MONEY!

For a great resource, click the title of this post. For further additional excellent information, read what Wendy has to say :)

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"Online Revenue: Package Your Brain Into Info-Products"
by Wendy Gray Maynard, Your Friendly Marketing Maven

If you provide a professional service, there will always be a ceiling on how much you can earn based on the number of hours you can work in a week. Even if you hire an assistant and/or raise your rates, you are only raising the ceiling a little higher. The way you can blast that ceiling sky-high is to "package your brain" into information products.

You have a particular system and unique way of providing service to your clients. Package it into an information product that will show people step-by-step exactly how you do it. The incredible advantage to this is that you can teach people all over the globe, day and night, every day of the week.

With infoproducts, you don't have any limit on the number of information products you sell. While your service will always be limited by the amount of time you have to give face to face, your information product can teach countless numbers of people regardless of your schedule. And you can sell them online 24/7 - making money while you are sleeping is a great way to go!

Another advantage of packaging your brain is that you can develop it into more than one product. Your packaged brain can be sold on your website and at your public speaking events as CD sets, e-books, paper versions, recorded online seminars, DVDs, and so on. Because you will be developing a loyal client base who wants to learn more and more from you, you will be able to feed this hungry audience with your infoproducts.

Here are other benefits of packaging your brain into information products:

1. A low-cost option to use your services. By offering your clients infoproducts, they can purchase your packaged brain for substantially less than they could ever hire you for. For instance, a home-study course could provide a condensed version of what a financial planner or a coach provides to clients over a series of months.

2. A lower-risk alternative for prospects. Often your system serves as a doorway to your more expensive services. Your prospect may study your system first and then later purchase your full-meal deal. This is powerful - your prospect pays you to be your lead! She begins to feel like she knows you. Remember, people work with people they know, like, and trust. Your infoproduct is building relationships for you.

3. Your products build credibility. Like writing books, producing infoproducts will elevate your perceived expertise. You reinforce your brand and people find you trustworthy because you have outlined the exact steps to solve their problem. Remember, this is always about answering "What's in it for me?" from your target audience's perspective.

4. You become more efficient. By turning your process into a system, you can demonstrate the precise sequence that you use to help your clients. Instead of trying to be intuitive about how to solve each person's problem, take him or her step by step through your process. You save time because you will know what each session will focus on and how long it takes to achieve results. Your customers will be impressed when you have worksheets and specific homework assignments for them to work through.

5. You can offer package options. Because you know each step of your system, you can offer your customers several options. People are MUCH more likely to make a purchase if they have options. By giving your customers choices, they can purchase what is right for their unique situation. Your clients may decide to do one option now and add something else later. The nice thing about this is your customers get RESULTS and you don't have to work as hard because you have a pre-defined SYSTEM.

6. You can turn your package into a very expensive option. Once you have your brain packaged, you can create an expensive option that will give your prospects a LOT of information that you present in a live seminar format. Most people that offer this generally run a live event over several days. Because you are spending hours and hours to personally provide your audience with your unique system, people are willing to spend anywhere from $1,500 to $10,000 and more for this type of program. With a powerful sales letter that is placed on your website, you can bring 25 to 150 people to your event. You do the math!

7. You can use your system for your talking points. Once you have a system developed into various infoproducts, it becomes much easier to make sales, give presentations, and offer public talks because you have specific talking points which will always tie directly back into your infoproducts. You can offer people a chapter or a sample session based on a section of your system to give people a taste of what you offer.

8. Prospects can become customers at many different price points. If you are selling information products, the going rate for an e-book is between $17 to $97 and for a teleseminar, the range is about the same. For a manual, the price ranges start to spread out quite a bit. I've seen them between $100 and $1,000 depending on the complexity of the information. In general to command more than $100 - $200, you have to start including CDs, templates, and other value-added components.

I hope this is getting your brain percolating on how you can package your knowledge as systemized infoproducts. And how infoproducts will make it SO much easier for you to both market and implement it. The end goal is you can attract more customers and make more money with less effort. You can also offer all of your infoproducts for sale on the Internet that bring in round-the-clock passive revenue.

ACTION ITEM: Take a look at your current offerings. What can you do to package your brain into your first infoproduct? What format will it take? How will you market it? What will it cost? The information-product business is a wonderful one to get involved in and very addictive for both you and your customers (in a good way). So don't delay...get started packaging your brain!

© 2006 Wendy Gray Maynard

Wendy Maynard, your friendly Marketing Maven, publishes REMARKABLE MARKETING, a weekly marketing ezine for business owners, freelancers, and entrepreneurs. If you're ready to skyrocket your sa1es, easily attract customers, and have more fun, subscribe at www.gomarketingmaven.com/ezine.com

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Are You Watching and/or Doing Adsense? Important Info!

2006-09-27T20:11:00.000-07:00

The Death of Google Adsense And Other Myths
By Titus Hoskins (c) 2006

Recent changes in the Google Adsense program has many online website owners and marketers seriously concerned. Many have seen their Adsense profíts and income flatline... seen their four or five figure monthly Adsense income disappear overnight. For many the Google Adsense bubble has burst.

What happened?

First, Google made a change in its Adsense program, letting advertisers choose between putting their ads in the search results or on the content pages of Adsense publishers. Search won out and started to receive the higher bids. Search results convert better than content ads.

Next, Google has cracked down on Junk Adsense sites, like they should. These sites consisted mainly of software generated re-hashed search engine links and were totally annoying to say the least. But Google also cracked down on 'squeeze pages' or 'affilíate landing pages' - a lucrative source of income for many online marketers, mainly because these pages helped marketers build an opt-ín list or use permission based email.

The results of these changes produced an Adsense meltdown for many online marketers.

Some Internet marketers are speculating recent changes could even mean the death of Adsense. One online marketer, Scott Boulch even published a free report entitled 'The Death of Adsense".

Many affilíate marketers would agree with Boulch on some of his points, especially the obvious fact that using Adsense on your web content is starting on the bottom rung of the online marketing ladder. Instead of receiving pennies per clíck with Adsense, alert marketers and webmasters have already discovered that by using CPA (Cost-Per-Action) and direct affilíate links, they can produce significantly more revenue from their web pages. Why eärn pennies per clíck when you can eärn $5, $10 or OVER $100 per clíck?

But the fine people at Google are catching on...

In the past Google has made its own swing to the Cost-Per-Action direction with its referral system for the Firefox Browser and giving webmasters credít for signing up Adwords and Adsense accounts.

Many online marketers believe Google needs to expand on these baby steps and open their Adsense affilíate program up to third party products/advertisers. In a recent company statement Google offered some hope: "We're always looking for new ways to provide effective and useful features to advertisers, publishers, and users," the company stated "As part of these efforts we are currently testing a cost-per-action (CPA) pricing model to give advertisers more flexibility and provide publishers another way to eärn revenue through AdSense." Basically, in cost-per-action, advertisers pay for leads, purchases or customer acquisition. It would help with the clíck fraud issue and the monetary returns could potentially make Adsense's revenues pale in comparison.

As more and more commerce goes online... acquiring customers for such diverse services as ínsurance, real estate, telephone, marketing, web hostíng, travel, mörtgage loans, cable TV, banking... you name it, almost any service or product sold in the marketplace is now turning to the Internet for customers and lifelong clients.

Enormous sums of monëy will change hands. Perhaps, the most lucrative of these is customer acquisition. Advertisers are turning to the Internet and webmasters/marketers for acquiring these lifelong customers for their respective services and products. Businesses and companies are quickly realizing paying an attractive lead generating fee/commission is smart business. They quickly build a client base for their services or products and quickly recoup their expenses - realizing in the long run these leads will generate huge profíts.

It can also mean huge profíts for the CPA networks like ValueClick's Commission Junction and Rakuten's LinkShare who supply the advertisers with publishers and website marketers to harvest these leads. It can be a lucrative venture for all involved, especially for those online marketers who have cornered the search engines for lucrative niche markets in big ticket items. Even small ticket items pay quite well for those marketers who know how to market online.

Contextual advertising is fine, but CPA (Cost-Per-Action) will offer much better returns for the website owner. Making any profitable site much more profitable. It will and is opening up a whole area of marketing opportunities that nevër existed before we had the Internet. Creating a complex structure of advertisers, publishers and the Affilíate/CPA companies that connect the two.

Of course, cutting out the middle man has always been even a more profitable venture for most marketers. As more and more webmasters realize they can make much more with dealing directly with companies, rather than going through a middle process like Google Adsense or the countless other affilíate/CPA networks ... online marketers can reap even bigger rewards.

For an online marketer when you get a telephone call or email from the CEO or the affilíate manager with a company or service you're promoting with your website - you know you have made it! Dealing directly with a company usually means bigger commissions and special exclusive deals just for you or your sites.

Only fly in the ointment, all that extra paperwork and business wheeling and dealing. Many marketers and website owners like the idea of someone else handling all the tracking, collecting payments, promotional materials... they just like to sit back and build more websites and content. It gives the affilíate marketer a lifestyle that they are looking for on the web. They just like to market and promote with their sites and let someone else worry about the details. Therefore, there will always be a place for contextual ads like Google Adsense... "Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated."

However, could CPA be a better alternative for the current Adsense contextual ads?

Google would be the natural choice for a middleman if there ever was one. Besides, many savvy marketers know the Google brand name is trusted online, any product/service promoted through Google would be an easy sell. Many argue Google already dominates the web, why should it not be the one to handle these CPA transactions through its Adsense program.

On the flip side, over countless updates and changes to its indexing, many webmasters have experienced more than a few negative dealings with Google. Many have won, many have lost in this Google Age, but all have realized riding the Google Search Engine is like running with the bulls at Pamplona, totally thrilling unless you're one of the unfortunate few who get trampled in the process.

About The Author
The author is a former teacher who now works full-time online operating numerous websites, including two sites on Internet marketing. For the latest web marketing tools try: http://www.bizwaremagic.com. For the lastest trade information in your own industry try: http://www.bizmagic.tradepub.com.
2006 Titus Hoskins.

This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Blogging... A Starting Point Information Article

2006-09-20T06:25:00.000-07:00

We're heading off for a long weekend getaway to Hawaii (you sigh, I'm freaking out LOL). But in the meantime, I hope you enjoy the following article for wanta-be bloggers. Simple, easy, and it will get you on the road to blogging :)

==================================

Blogging: A Start-Up Guide
by Claire Brent

Blogging is so easy that you probably do not need a start up guide, but for those who have blogaphobia, I am doing this.

1. By reading this you are half way there. This is a blog style post.

2. If you post, you are blogging to an extent.

3. If you take my advice and get a blog, you are a blogger.

4. If you sell anything, or create money trail, you are making money blogging.

Now that I've bored you with a list, you probably want something good. I'll give it to you. If you have never blogged, this little start-up guide is for you. If you have blogged, maybe you just need a refresher course.

Anyway, you probably want to know how to blog. You know what blogging is and you know you can make money with it. What you may not know is how you start.

Well, it's easy. Choose a provider. Make sure it's someone who has the up-to-the minute programming so you don't look ancient.

Create an account - Then, start writing! Alas, you are going to say "exactly HOW do I just pop into the blog and write?"

It's not some horrid thing where you have to have a book next to you figuring out designs and codes. For the most part, there are layouts you choose from and often you can even pick colors of fonts and such. It's like decorating a living room, only this is a living room about 12 million people could possibly visit. So make it look nice!

You don't have to have software usually or anything snazzy. You simply pick a design or layout and create a look or image based upon choices that you'll be prompted to make.

Is it an article, a column? What the heck IS a blog? As mentioned before, in another article -blogs are actually entries. It's like a diary or a journal. You simply write, but note - that whatever you do not want the world to see, do not write. After you write your entry, you will be asked to publish or post it. Once you do that you still can often, go in and edit or delete it. You will usually give your blog a title. You type your entry, which you may call "blog" or "Content" and away you go. You've just blogged.

Sometimes, you allow (or not allow) the public or a select bunch you've invited to make posts or comments to what you have written. This makes for fun if you do allow it but sometimes it can be downright harsh. There is usually no screening on posts unless you specifically in your template and choices make sure no one has potty mouth or gossip mouth. The way to do this is to be a moderator, or to even hire a moderator. This way, all posts first go to an email address (they have no idea) and you or someone with some degree of ethics and standards, will edit, delete or allow the post to go through. That personally is my advice; don't let downers, potty mouths or idiots post on your site unless you are really sure that you will attract only a top-notch crowd. Since blogs are often public places - think of the blog as a public bathroom. Only let the people in who flush and wash their hands. This is an especially nice feature also for control freaks.

Do I have to be youngish? Hip? Can I be a boomer or older than dirt? Anyone can blog. There is no set rule of thumb. It used to be hip kids, journalists and maybe a select other few who did it. Now, you have grandparents who blog and let their kids blog also - and grandkids. It's a great way to keep the family as a unit if you keep everyone together, you know?

Blogs are special. They are unique. They are really nothing more than a public diary or journal - where a web site is all about people going to the site and just staring at it, a blog is all about saying, "Come on in and sit a spell" - which is why you will find that blogs tend to be more upscale, than say, a chat room or chat board. Blogs are the welcome wagon of the internet. Chat rooms are like a seedy bar. Chat boards are like hospital waiting rooms where people sometimes share doom, gloom and gossip. But Blogs are really usually positive. Sure you will have that negative blog here and there - but a decent blog owner will beget decent posters for the most part.

It is a small world. So, when you visit a blog, or when you have a blog - expect people to comment online. It's a diary where people will actually say - "this is cool, and I want to be a part of your life and share this with you" and...they will! If you allow this in the template, you will have comments that agree, disagree or just share. You may have folks promoting themselves, or you may have cheerleaders supporting your blog. Either way, it's a great way to make friends and yes, make money if that's what you wish.

You need to realize that your blog could and very well may be found on the net during someone's search. For instance, if you have certain tag words in your blog, or it's just plain popular, a key word search could turn up your blog. It's the net, and it's public. Blog smart!

Blogging is for you, even if you think it isn't. You may think you are not a writer. So what? First of all, if it is a personal blog meant for only a few folks, and you don't care that you are not a thespian of the paper, then don't worry about it. Also, you don't have to be a super-duper writer at all. Even if you are a writing savant, you certainly at least have an opinion, correct? Voice it through blogging! You also probably have a passion such as gardening, cooking or fixing old cars...that a bajillion people also have, that you could talk to and share with. Again, you can make money. If you like gardening, you may want to think about selling seeds, or dried lavender from your garden, or renting ad space or a few thousand other ways to make money. Maybe an online course where you teach the power of planting? As long as you have passion and ideas, there will always be possible ways to make money that are fun and proactive.

Blogging is absolutely one of the most easy, fun, economical yet possibly financially rewarding hobbies you can start for yourself.

About the Author

Michelle is a bona fide professional blogger. If you're aiming for six figure online profits then you NEED her fresh, upbeat advice!

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Is Your Web Site Drawing People or Pushing Them Away?

2006-09-11T19:37:00.000-07:00

Thanks again to Kim Roach we've all got a fantastic article to read and ponder. When it comes to our web sites and laying them out, are we following the crowd? Doing what's easy? Or... are we optimizing for the EYES of our readers? Kim clues you in... you decide :)

==============================

See Your Website Through Your Visitors Eyes
By Kim Roach (c) 2006

Every time a visitor comes to your site, they take a particular path. Their eyes move in quick motion, hopping from one hotspot to the next. If you don't know how your visitors are traveling, your conversion rates will suffer dramatically. Fortunately, there is a company who has performed in-depth testing for you, revealing the common behaviors of people viewing web pages.

The company is known as Eyetrack and they began studying online behavior in 1999. Because of these studies they have been able to help web masters to improve their site designs, headlines, font sizes, navigation, article formats, and even their ads.

They track eye movements as a visitor travels through a website and how they scan any individual page. With this information, they have created heat maps to show where visitors focus most of their attention. On these heat maps, red areas are the most popular and blue areas are the least popular.

You can see some examples of heat maps at PoynterExtra.org.

You can also find a complete summary of the EyeTrack results at: http://www.poynterextra.org/eyetrack2004/index.htm.

However, since the results comprise over 300 pages, I've provided you with the golden nuggets that can be gleaned from this study below.

Article Formats

Your visitors are certainly not reading your website word for word. They are scanning and picking out relevant information that they feel is important. Fortunately, you can attract your visitors to certain content simply by placing it in the right spots.

These simple changes can increase your salës, subscriber sign-ups, and your return on investment.

The headline, for example, is often the first element that people see on your site. To draw people into an article, you must have a compelling headline that speaks directly to your visitors needs and wants.

In fact, a change in the headline on a salës page can produce a 1,900% increase in salës. This is certainly an element that should not be taken lightly.

You might also want to begin your articles with a boldface introductory paragraph. 95 percent of readers in the Eyetrack study viewed all or part of the introduction when presented with an article to read.

On the Internet, where information abounds and the majority of people are paralyzed by information overload, most appreciate the addition of an introductory paragraph that summarizes your article.

Once they have come to the actual content, however, how do you get them to continue reading? There are a few formatting issues to keep in mind when designing the layout of your article.

You will definitely need to use short, snappy paragraphs. Eyetrack III research found that shorter paragraphs received twice as many eye fixations as those with longer paragraphs.

Most people also seem to focus on the left side of the page and look for related words that might entice them to read closer. Therefore, you will want to include some important keywords on the left-hand side of the page so that readers can quickly see them out and be pulled further into the material.

You can also encourage your readers to continue reading by using bolding and enticing sub headings.

Font Size

The Eyetrack III research discovered that smaller type encourages focused reading rather than scanning. Very interesting. In general, their testing found that people spent more time focused on small type than large type. The largër type resulted in increased scanning of the page. Of course, you don't want your visitors to be squinting to try and read your text. The key is to find the appropriate balance that will encourage readers to focus on your text more than they scan.

It was also found that underlined headlines discouraged readers from viewing the following text. Overall, visual breaks (such as a line or rule) discourage people from looking at items beyond the break.

Nöw, on to one of my favorite web design topics...

Navigation

Eyetracker found that navigation at the top of a homepage performed best, meaning that it was seen by the highest percentage of test subjects and looked at for the longest duration.

Advertising

So, what about ads? As you have probably heard, many people ignore ads. The online world has a massive case of banner blindness. However, good placement and design can often improve your results.

For example, ads in the top and left portions of a homepage receive the most attention.

[Theresa's Note: See the One Way Link Placement on my web site.]

Ads on the right side of the page don't do as well.

In addition, ads that are placed next to important editorial content can really help attract attention to the ads. These ads perform best when they are truly integrated into the actual content of the page.

If you are using images within your advertising, keep the following in mind.

Images receive much more attention if they are largër. For example, one of the test pages in the Eyetrack III test found that a postage-stamp sized image was viewed by 10 percent of the participants while an average sized photo (about 230 pixels wide and deep) drew the attention of 70 percent of the people.

Their research also showed that clean, clear faces in images attract more eye attention on homepages. So, if you are using small images within your advertisements, you may want to enlärge them a bit if you want people to be drawn to them.

On the other hand, people seem to avoid ads when a visual barrier is placed between the ad and the content.

These breaks can consist of either white space or a border.

Ads that blend into the look and feel of the page draw the most attention. In addition, text ads were also found to receive the most response.

By nöw, you may be wondering what these studies have shown about search engines. Exactly what do people look at when they are presented with a list of search engine results? Well, that is an excellent question and one that has been studied extensively.

A joint eye tracking study performed by search marketing firms Enquiro and Did-it and eye tracking firm Eyetools has shown that the majority of eye activity during a search happens within a triangle at the top of the search results page.

This area of maximum interest has been referred to as the "golden triangle". The study showed that the top 5 results (ones above the fold) received the most exposure.

Below is a chart showing the organic ranking visibility of the top 10 positions.

Rank 1 – 100%
Rank 2 – 100%
Rank 3 – 100%
Rank 4 – 85%
Rank 5 – 60%
Rank 6 – 50%
Rank 7 – 50%
Rank 8 – 30%
Rank 9 – 30%
Rank 10 – 20%

Side sponsored ads receive significantly less attention. See the overview below of the visibility of the side sponsored ads based on position:

1 – 50%
2 – 40%
3 – 30%
4 – 20%
5 – 10%
6 – 10%
7 – 10%
8 – 10%

This is largely due to an "F" shaped scan pattern in which the eye tends to travel vertically along the far left side of the results and then scan to the right occasionally if something catches its attention.

These statistics show the importance of ranking well and also of using relevant keywords within your title and description. With a relevant and interesting title and description, you can attract more eyeballs within the search engine results.

As always, keep in mind that the information gleaned from these studies are simply a guide. Nothing can beat your own testing. If you don't have good content it doesn't matter how good your layout is.

However, by using some simple layout techniques, you can influence the path your visitors take within your website.

About The Author
Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews and SEO-News newsletters. You can also find additional tips and news on webmaster and SEO topics by Kim at the SiteProNews blog. Kim's email is: kim @ seo-news.com

* * * * * * * * * *

Keywords: howto, mywizardads, advertising, marketing, classifieds

Why RSS is Critical to Your Web Site's Success

2006-09-10T08:24:00.000-07:00

A Gentle Warning To All Webmasters About RSS
By Titus Hoskins (c) 2006

RSS is fast becoming an obsession for me. I didn't plan for it to be that way. It just happened.

I have been interested in RSS for a couple of years now but it was only around this time last year that I started taking a serious look at this little syndication standard that's changing how we communicate on the web. Really Simple Syndication. Simple phrase but it changes everything.

I figured what better way to get to know a subject than to write about it. Going through the vast resources of the Internet, blogs, forums, ebooks to collect what information I needed for my ebook and articles. The Internet is one huge storehouse of knowledge that more than supplied me with enough material to write a hundred articles.

Coming from a fine art background, I also knew the only way to really learn about a subject was 'hands on' experience. So at the same time I started to really implement RSS tactics on my own sites to get 'first-hand' evidence to prove or back up my articles and writing. I concentrated on website RSS techniques that worked with the major Search Engines; starting my own blogs and RSS feeds to enhance my sites and manipulating the search engines, feeding the spiders with very legit content to build targetëd traffíc to any keyword or market sector I wanted to promote.

Experiences that have opened my eyes wider than they have been since kindergarten and RSS is still surprising me at every turn. Only after I had started researching and writing about RSS did it dawn on me that I had no idea just how Big a Player RSS is becoming and will become in the very near future. The impact will be felt in all areas of the web.

Some of the major ones:

Google Blog Search - Which now opens up the whole area of blog content and feeds to the one search engine that counts. Google also finally embraced RSS despite its major investment in the other syndication standard - Atom. Google bought Blogger.com a while back which promotes the Atom feed.

Microsoft's Windows - The next version of Windows - Vista - will have RSS embedded into its operating system. This will open up RSS to the mass market. This will put RSS center stage for computer and Internet users.

Google Sitemaps - This XML powered system lets you update and quickly index your site's pages in Google.

Podcasting - The enormous popularity of sending audio files or podcasting is opening up a whole new audience for RSS.

Media RSS - This will permit the syndication of all types of media, including video and TV programs through RSS, further opening up RSS to becoming a broadcasting system for the Internet.

RSS Search - MSN, as well as other search engines, makes it possible to search RSS feeds for the information we need.

Mozilla Firefox Browser - This RSS powered browser with its 'Live Bookmarks' is proving very popular with surfers. It also proves you really don't have to know a thing about RSS to enjoy its benefits - it can be seamlessly integrated into the background or operating system with the end-users oblivious to even the existence of RSS.

Commercial RSS - Then there is the whole potential of RSS ads and advertising which would commercialize RSS and bring it into play by large corporations who are mainly interested in the bottom line.

Not to mention all those orange XML or RSS buttons popping up on website after website. RSS is taking on a life of its own, gaining in popularity and growing in strength. RSS is becoming a force that has to be reckoned with by every webmaster.

How about you? Is your site RSS ready? Are you taking advantage of RSS? Are you using RSS?

This is a gentle warning that you will start using RSS if you haven't already and here's why... if you want your site to remain truly competitive you must have RSS on it. Without RSS you will be losing visitors and traffíc to RSS empowered sites. You will be losing traffíc to sites that are targeting keywords with blogs and feeds. You will be losing traffíc to those sites using the XML powered Sitemaps. You will be losing traffíc to sites that are RSS User-Friendly and fully optimized for RSS.

You must have an RSS User-Friendly site if want your site to be competitive. Just ask yourself, when the next Windows browser comes online, how competitive will your site be without RSS? What role will RSS play in getting visitors and repeat visitors to your competitor's website?

Webmasters should be gearing up now for RSS, if they haven't already. You have to prepare your sites for RSS. You have to position your sites to take full advantage of the coming RSS revolution! Take advantage of Google's Sitemaps, Blog Search, RSSMedia, Next RSS powered Windows...

Get Ready. Prepare your site.

RSS is not only changing the rules, it is changing the whole ball game. RSS will transform the Internet. RSS will play a bígger and bígger role in the success or failure of your website.

Proceed without RSS at your own risk.

About The Author

To Put RSS On Your Site Within Minutes -
Visit This Link:
http://www.bizwaremagic.com/RSS/Lead_Capture_Page.htm.
For the latest and most effective Interne Marketing tools -
Visit: MarketingToolGuide.com

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Looking for Hot Spots to Advertise? Follow Kim!

2006-09-05T18:16:00.000-07:00

Taking ones own advice is often the hardest thing to do (see my FREE report on computer maintenance and more)! On the verge of crashing completely, I scrambled this past weekend to get a new computer (Acer Aspire, lots of RAM and storage and only $550 with tax at Circuit City). Let's hope - for business at least - this is a good one and will last as long as my other one (10 years!).

In the meantime, writing a post just wasn't on my priority list *smile!* but as always Kim comes through with exceptional advice! Enjoy!

============================================

Untapped Advertising Hot Spots
By Kim Roach (c) 2006

Online advertising is exploding. By 2007, online advertising spending is expected to reach over 20 billion. With such growth, a multitude of opportunities have opened up for the online marketer. Unfortunately, not all of these are worth your time or your ínvestment. That's why I would like to show you some of the untapped advertising hot spots that are currently available to you.
As an online entrepreneur, it's not enough to have a great website with quality information. You must also position yourself in front of a qualified audience of people who are hungry for what you have to offer.

So, let's explore 4 of the most lucrative online advertising spots that are currently available to you. They include CPA programs, blog ads, comparison shopping engines, and the ISEDN.

CPA Programs

Cost per action is an online advertising model that is highly undervalued. In this model, you only pay when a qualified visitor converts to a sale, registration, or other action. Because of this, CPA (cost per action) is often much less risky and often more profitable (in terms of ROI) than cost-per-clíck.

To begin your own CPA marketing campaign, you can choose from a variety of companies. AzoogleAds is the top CPA network. Within their network, you can advertise on sites like True.com, Stamps, NetFlix, BlockBuster, and a number of Fortune 500 companies.

You may also choose ClickBooth. Within the ClickBooth network, you will have access to over 25,000 of the biggest publishers in the industry.

Hydra Network, another leading advertising network, reaches over 100 million Internet users. Find out how you can tap into this traffíc at HydraMedia.com.

Each one of these companies can help you devise a successful CPA campaign that only requires you to pay when you acquire a new customer.

BlogAds

In recent years the popular belief has been that most blog readers are comprised of nerdy teenagers who live in their parent's basement.

However, this simply isn't true. Blog readers have quite a lot of buying power. In fact, according to the 2006 blogger reader surveys from BlogAds, 75% of blog readers make more than $45,000 per year. Blog readers are journalists, opinion makers, and powerful online citizens.

The blogosphere is becoming very influential on the Internet. This demographic is a hot spot online that many advertisers are missing out on.

So, how do you tap into this kind of audience? Well, there are a number of options.

One of the most popular blog advertising agencies is BlogAds. With BlogAds, you can sign up to advertise on sites like SearchEngineJournal.com, Lockergnome.com, PFBlog.com, and BlogShares.com.

Another great source of blogger advertising is the Creative Weblogging network of blogs. They power 70+ blog sites in categories ranging from personal finance and social entrepreneurship to social networking and Web 2.0. In fact, they have recently joined forces with the Washington Post, which links to some of their blogs on the homepage.

The Creative Weblogging network delivers 5 million page views per month. To find out more about their different advertising options, go to Creative Weblogging.

Wherever you choose to advertise, please keep blogs in mind. Through blog advertising, you can tap into a very targeted group of individuals.

Comparison Shopping Engines

If you're selling products online, then one of your main advertising sources should be the comparison shopping engines. Unfortunately, many online sellers do not take advantage of this potential goldmine.

Yahoo! Shopping, Google's Froogle, Bizrate.com, Become.com and other comparison sites make it much easier for you to get the online exposure you need to be successful in a very crowded online marketplace. These sites allow you to get listed by all the big names like Best Buy and Circuit City.

One of the biggest benefits of this advertising option is that visitors from comparison shopping engines are buyers. They are there for a reason. They are looking to compare prices, evaluate different companies, and buy their desired products. Because of this, the return on ínvestment from this type of traffíc is much higher; a stark contrast from the general search engines which can send you visitors who aren't truly interested in your products.

Much like traditional search engines, comparison shopping engines position your product based on a number of factors. Some of these include bid price, product price, user rating, relevance, and CTR (clíck-through rate). Each of the shopping engines has a different ranking algorithm and uses different factors to position your products.

If you would like to start experimenting with this advertising medium, I would suggest you start with Froogle, which is free. However, don't underestimate Froogle's power. Just because it's free doesn't mean that it can't send you lots of qualified visitors when used correctly.

I urge you to start taking advantage of these lucrative advertising spots for your own website. Remember, comparison shopping engines send you buyers, not browsers.

You only pay for perförmance.

ISEDN

Another untapped marketing hotspot is the ISEDN. This paid inclusion program is a cross between the older paid inclusion models and the current pay-per-clíck model.

Purchased ads are displayed in a similar manner to the PPC ads shown by Google, but advertisers are charged on a flat fee basis, not on a per clíck basis. You can buy top 10 exposure across the network for $3 to $4 per month. Your ad will then be shown across a network of 230+ members.

Through the power of the collective community, ISEDN paid inclusion ads are displayed over 150 million times per month. This equates to 150 million potential advertisng opportunities.

For more information on this advertising model visit ISEDN founding member ExactSeek.com.

About The Author

Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews and
SEO-News
newsletters. You can also find additional tips and news on webmaster and SEO topics by Kim at the
SiteProNews blog. Kim's email is: kim @ seo-news.com

=========================

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Is Your Money Tree Nake?

2006-08-29T16:39:00.000-07:00

My post for today is spawned by the phone calls I've been receiving from extremely nice people who've joined this or that program and now wonder what they should be doing to promote it.

In some cases, additional resources are included for a fee, resources designed to pull in the leads to be converted to sales for this or that person.

My advice in a nutshell is to go to the source of the program. Find out what their resources are, how they are being used, and how the heck you personally benefit from their advertising on your behalf.

If you've joined the program (whatever it may be) and paid a fee to join, you have a god-given right to expect answers to your questions. I really don't care of whether you've spent a lowly $5 or mortgaged your home for $50,000 to become involved (I pray you did not do the second!). When money changes hands, the person doing the paying has a right to ask questions and expect answers - replies in a decent amount of time that answer the question.

Making someone submit support tickets one after the other with no reply is a poor way to do business - I think we'd all agree on that... right?

One last remark for today... no matter what the web site claims "join and do nothing and we'll make you rich" cannot possibly work. Sheer common sense should tell you you can't fill a basket with air and expect money to come raining out. One must promote - individual members must promote. It is unrealistic not to understand that most basic of marketing, banking, financial concepts.

After thoroughly researching any program, and I mean takes days or weeks to mull it over and investigate, and making the decision to sign up be sure to also allot within your budget for the much to be needed advertising you most certainly will need to do to hold up your end of the air-filled basket.

Money does not grow on trees nor does it rain from the skies. It comes from hard, diligent work and patience. Making wise choices helps :)

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Search Engines and Trust Featured Article

2006-08-27T14:00:00.000-07:00

Once again the folks at SiteProNews have put out another great article to help those in their efforts to gain a foothold in Google and other search engines. I'd also like to suggest that while you most definitely pursue a great search engine like Google, there is a quick and easy and FREE way to get a foothold into an Alexa-ranked (25,000!) search engine. Click here to get yourself - for free - a top position keyword or keyword phrase for your own web site or affiliate program!

* * * * * * * *

3 Things to Help Google Trust You
By Mark Daoust (c) 2006

Google is all about trust. Who knows, maybe they were in a bad relationship, but if you want to rank well with Google, you need to be trustworthy. And let me make the bold assumption that you are currently not trustworthy (most sites are not – especially new sites).

So how do you get Google to trust you? The most obvious answer, and most commonly quoted answer, is to get inbound links from trustworthy sites. Any webmaster who has been around the block a couple of times knows that this is a bit of a catch-22. Sites that are high in Google's trust typically do not just hand out links to small startups – those go to sites that are already established.

Unfortunately, while this is probably the most frustrating answer you can receive, it is also the lions share of building trust with Google. There are, however, a few other things you can do to help Google trust you more. While having these things may not rocket your site to the top of the rankings, they will bring you closer to finding a good relationship with Google.

Define a Privacy Policy

A privacy policy is a page that explains to your users what information is collected, how it is being used, and what options they have to access or change that collected information. It may be a bit ironic that a major search engine would place any emphasis on privacy in light of the recent AOL data release scandal, but having a privacy policy in place shows a certain level of trustworthiness.

This may seem like a very small step when we look at the big picture, but keep in mind that Google is looking for responsible and reliable websites to send their users to. A privacy policy, while non-consequential for many websites, shows an attention to detail and a sense of responsibility to user's privacy.

For many small website owners, this is a step that can be quite tricky. Offering detailed contact information on your site shows that responsibility and reliability that Google is looking for, but at the same time many small website owners are not running their websites as a full-time business.

You should always offer some sort of contact information on your site. At a minimum, you should offer an email address (I was surprised at how many websites – specifically blogs – did not offer any contact information at all). If possible, you should include your address and a telephone number where people can contact you. Of course, if the only phone number you have is your home phone number, this may not be the most ideal option.

Show Consistency Over Time

This may be the single most important tip in this article. Google has shown an affinity towards sites that remain consistent in structure, growth, content, and popularity. At the risk of sounding prosaic, outside of receiving highly trusted inbound links, the best way to bring Google to trust you is to show Google over time that you are trustworthy.

Think about your relationship with Google as you would any other relationship. Relationships take time, they take commitment over time, and trust in a relationship needs to be cultivated. If you happen to screw up, it takes time to regain any trust that was lost.

With your website, show Google that you are consistent, that you are dedicated, and that you actually care. Do not change your website's structure or focus entirely just because you feel like it. Spend time every day for months, even years, growing your site and promoting your site. Take the time to make sure it is as user friendly as possible taking into account issues such as accessibility. And whatever you do, do not take the chance of trying to cheat on Google by using a 'shortcut' – it can and will set you back in your relationship several months, if not longer.

It May Not Be the Best Model

Far be it from me to be a Google apologist – I certainly do not agree with everything that they do. The move towards a trust-based system is one that has received both praise and criticism, and both praise and criticism is deserved. While Google might be doing well in fighting search engine sp@m, they have simultaneously (if not inadvertently) hurt the small business owner who does not know any better.

There are many who complain about Google being 'unfair' towards website owners. Whether or not they really are being unfair is ultimately a moot point, Google is what Google does. If you choose to continue to care about having quality rankings in Google, complaining will not bring you higher rankings, adapting to their changes will.

These days Google wants to know that they can trust you. If you have been around long enough, they may already trust you, but if you are starting fresh, or if you have made mistakes in the past, you may have a long road ahead of you to prove to Google that they should care about your website, and that it is suitable for their rankings. Keep in mind that high trusted, one way in bound links will always be the fastest route to rankings, add a privacy policy and good contact information, follow the typical guidelines that make a site reliable (see Google's webmaster guidelines), and be consistent with your site.

About The Author:

Mark Daoust is the owner of Site Reference. Recently he just launched the nice site Brewing KB. Take a moment, if you will, to visit Brewing KB, a community for home brewers.

====================================

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

You ARE Serious About Marketing... Right?

2006-08-26T20:33:00.000-07:00

Good Evening!

If you are truly serious about marketing online, and not just hoping, then you're going to really appreciate, understand, and want to get in on this... definitely make it a part of your marketing toolbox!

First... it's FREE! Yep a free honest to goodness chance to immediately get yourself to the TOP of a medium-sized and growing search engine for your key word or phrase associated with your program, product or service.

Click Here

Sure you COULD submit to the search engines every month for a few years and finally, finally with luck (but this won't work with affiliate programs in most cases) get a semi-decent placement in a few search engines online.

OR you can cut to the chase and become the proud owner of a FREE keyword or key phrase for your program... yes, not years from now, TODAY. And OWN YOUR OWN search engine site (in essence).

Pay YOURSELF to search! Honest, this is a no brainer :)

Click Here

I talk and email back and forth with wonderful people who, just like me, are always looking for additional ways to get the word out about their programs.

Most serious marketers make sure they are covering the bases with ezine ads, solo ads, targeted traffic, article writing, blogging, etc.

The thing they tend to forget is going after a good place in the search engines!

Well here's that chance :)

Act NOW before the keyword you'd really like is GONE forever! It wouldn't be the end of the world, but if you have a certain one in mind... act RIGHT NOW to get it. If yours is gone, try variations on the same idea... it's sure to still be available and it can be YOURS.

Sign up! Do some SEARCHES. See the results come back for your key word or phrase. For the most part, this works in reverse of stuff like adwords and overture (both programs that can be extremely expensive!). You want terms (words) that have a LOT of people using them...

The reason? You will be FIRST in line for that search each and every time.

And... as an added bonus remember search engines also pick up OTHER search engines. The ramifications are must LARGER than just FREE (that is just a wonderful bonus to the original idea).

For me I've spent YEARS getting into the search engines and fighting to maintain my keywords placement. I'm not giving that up, but I'm sure as heck not turning down the opportunity to own out-right top keywords for my site at:

Click Here

If YOU have YEARS to wait and hope, do NOTHING.

If you do NOT have years to wait... what are your waiting for...????

All the best,
Theresa

* * * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Question: Should you do something just because you can?

2006-08-22T23:24:00.000-07:00

My post this evening is more concern about a growing trend online - and I'm wondering "just because you CAN, should you?"

This week has seen the launch of several major marketing programs by major players. These guys (and gals) have magic fairy dust surrounding them, literally everything they touch - and throw out there - turns to gold... for them.

Now that in itself is not a bad thing. I'm all for free enterprise :)

The problems I'm wrestling with tonight are small potatoes I'm sure to the guy pulling in literally millions.

The thing is... I get phone calls ALL the time from people who've tried this and that on the net. People of limited means - financially - yet those same people still strive to discover something that will truly work for them. Help them make their mark on the internet.

Enter the newest "launched" products.

Some are extremely useful, heck maybe all of them are, and for the most part many are affordably within the means of the average marketer.

My dilemma harkens back once again to the phone calls I receive. I've literally heard from hundreds of people who have spent thousands upon thousands of dollars scarfing up this program and that program. With still nothing to show.

Let's face it... if you know how to write good sales copy, and you team up with the right individuals, the skys the limit on what you can get people to buy... and spend. Even if YOU SHOULDN'T!

I'm just praying to the force this evening that every would-be marketer who jumped on the various bandwagons today was given the time to speak one on one with the other guys on the other end. The guys raking in the BIG bucks.

Did they take the time to PREQUALIFY their buyers? I doubt it. Should they, when you're selling pie in the sky, anyone can do this, types of programs? YES!

I'm not badmouthing what's out there. I'm sure the time and effort to develop the product, hype the media, and get the crowds coming compensates for most costs.

The thing is though... while the THING itself may be better than sliced bread any day, after one spends the HUGE bucks to get it is the buyer aware that 10 to 1 he or she (the buyer) does NOT have the list the big guy(s) have... it's the LIST that pulled the sales. It doesn't matter what you just bought, if you have no list you will have to spend more money to see if you can recover your costs. So many who truly should not have bought will have to incur even greater debt trying to justify what they just did... A truly vicious and unnecessary cycle if responsibility is shouldered by all.

FACT:

Once hundreds or thousands of dollars are shelled out, without the benefits of these hugely responsive lists, more often than not the buyer is left holding basically a big expensive bag of nothing.

It's going to cost even MORE money to advertise (since he or she doesn't have the same high pulling lists). Were these buyers qualified, financially, to purchase? God I hope so...

Watching people spend money when they are hanging on by a thread at home with kids to raise and food and shelter to cover... and still being bamboozled to add even MORE debit to their credit cards on a HOPE... it just wrings my heart.

I truly hope that if you DO make the financial commitment online that the ones behind each and every program will continue to BE THERE for you. I hope they make a true commitment to make sure all these "money back guarantees" never have to happen.

I'd love to see hundreds of thousands of "NOBODIES" make it big online. I'm also just afraid that it very rarely happens :(

I DO hope I'm WRONG!

Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Keys to Increasing Your Sites Search Engine Ranking

2006-08-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

by Maxine Hough
(c) 2006 All Rights Reserved

When you discuss search engine ranking, the first thing you need to think about is the market place. Many people ask, how many keywords should I put in my anchor text? What is the keyword density that I should have on my page? Should I use 200 words on my copy or should I use 600 words? Can I use flash? How many keywords should I put in my "alt" text? And so forth and so on.

Generally speaking there are no magic numbers. The most important thing you can understand as it applies to search engine optimization is that algorithms change. Just when you think you understand what is going to make you number one for a search phrase in a search engine, something changes, and you end up spending months or years trying to find out the engineering of the algorithm again.

It is better not to try to reverse engineer the algorithm instead do something much easier, observe your competitors. All you need to do is to understand what elements your competitors are using that are making them rank on the top positions.

So what those things are?

- Number and quality of inbound links pointing to the site
- Keyword density
- Fresh content

The first thing to observe from your competition is their back link index. This would be the number of sites that have a link pointing to their website. You can easily measure it by going to Google and typing:

"link://www.yourcompetitorssite.com"

But it would be a mistake to limit this only to Google since Google discriminates sites much more than other search engines. Yahoo and MSN are much more accurate for measuring the back link index so do include these engines when you check back links.

Observe not only what the links say, but where the links come from. What categories do those links come from. If you start seeing recurring patterns, you should start actively searching for links coming from those categories.

Some marketers use special software for robotic content creation. They generate thousands of pages with links pointing to their sites. This practice is very dangerous because Google often penalizes unnatural linking as a violation of their terms of service. If a site has 50 links one day and the following day it has 2,050 links, all saying the same thing and coming from the same IP address, this sends up a red flag with Google and can get you penalized or banned.

If you understand how to observe, this will never happen to you. You will learn how to look at your competitors, and observe how they are getting linked to.

The second thing you’ll want to observe is the keyword density of your competitors. How many times should we repeat our main keyword? In which part of the web page should our main keywords be mentioned? Remember there are no magic numbers, it's all about observing and measuring against your competitors. So what should we measure?

- Meta tags
- Alt tags
- Titles
- Names of the images on the page
- Highlights: h1, h2, h3...
- Frequency and position of the keywords on the body text

Each one of these items should be measured independently. There are tools to run keyword density against your competitors. If you run them against the top 3 or 5 sites, you may start to understand the secrets of top rankings.

Again, your keyword density needs to look natural, otherwise you may fail in over optimization. This is when you use keywords too often or too early. If you look unnatural, your page ranks will suffer as a result.

The key to success is to understand what Google likes about their top 5 pages, and to apply this to your own website promotion.

The last thing to observe is how much fresh content the top sites have. If they have many articles and they are continuously adding new content to their sites, then it is a sure bet that the search engines like content and are ranking those sites better which have more updated information.

People surfing the web are searching for one thing: information, and web marketers know that content is the "fuel" or “king” of internet traffic. If you want to attract more customers to your site, then you need to make sure that you provide enough content that is relevant to their interests.

Copyright 2006 Maxine Hough

----------------------------------------------------------
Looking for effective internet marketing tools that work?
Maxine Hough has created the ultimate web site of "cutting
edge" internet marketing tools designed to increase your
sites traffic flow and revenue significantly!
The Internet Marketing Tool Site

For more great articles or to submit your own:
Visit the My Wizard Ads Library

Keywords: search engines, advertising, marketing, classifieds

Checking Out the Competition - Site 2 Review

2006-08-20T12:53:00.000-07:00

This is a heads up on my recent
"let's see what the competition is up to"
research I conducted on August 20, 2006
(I do not name names)

Let me first tell you that investigating this competitor's site had me almost losing my mind.

Should you find yourself investigating this service and trying to research each ezine listed, you will be driven absolutely nuts with the number of popups that have nothing whatsoever to do with trying to get the information you would be after...

Truly, this investigation and the frustration levels I experienced, would have sent me running to the hills without ever looking back... let alone thinking of placing an order.

The Results:

One Group - 20 Ezines (all my sanity would allow me to do)

Actual Publications Your Ad Would Be Shown In: 6 ezines

Breakdown of the 14 ezines not qualified to be listed:

1. 8 of the 14 did not have a website at all

2. 2 of the 14 were obvious google adsense websites

3. 1 of the 14 was a shopping site/search engine site

4. 1 "ezine" site was For Sale

5. 1 website probably publishes, but advertises hosting (no ezine in sight)

6. I'm adding the owner's ezine itself only because it's impossible to tell what the most recent issue is... taking a guess and stepping inside one of the archives, there is no date anywhere telling me when it was published.

Of the 6 qualified ezines, 2 of the publishers work with me here at My Wizard Ads. The other 4 are unknown to me.

Again, due diligence choosing any service please!

All the best,
Theresa Cahill
Owner of My Wizard Ads
Doing Business Online Since 2001
(c) 2006 - All Rights Reserved

My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Building Affiliate Marketing Websites

2006-08-20T09:49:00.000-07:00

Here are some myths regarding affiliate marketing (which, unfortunately, too many people believe to be the truth):

o Managing an online business is easy,

o One can make a fortune through online marketing in an instant.

Fact: Less than 10% of online affiliate marketers see any sort of returns, quickly (let alone "overnight").

Fact: Setting up your own program and having your own affiliate marketers working for you is a much better solution.

Developing a product, finding the right niche, having a plan of action, creating your own merchant accounts and affiliate program, working your buns off to get it all off the ground... these are all viable ways to make money online.

Here are a few (most very obvious) pointers for starting your own affiliate program:

o Choose a theme or niche of your website. It would be better if you already have an idea what products or services to promote as this would help you plan the design and lay-out of your web pages.

o Pick a great domain name and get yourself great hosting. Hosting is not something to scrimp on... support and features are your best allies for choosing the best hosting service (trust me!).

Your domain name should be a unique name used to label the actual address of your website on the Internet. In deciding what domain name to register, look into the type of products you are endorsing and the theme of your site. Having the right keywords in your domain name would give you better chances of drawing more visitors to your website. Also, choose a top level domain or extension, such as .com because it is more popular. In selecting your web host, consider the security of servers and up time guarantees.

o Create your own website. Make sure that it is not just an ordinary website. Take the time to build (or have one built for you) a professional looking one. An outstanding tool for easy web site building (and maintaining and updating!) is XSitePro. Even a novice can quickly master this easy to use program. Even more importantly, it is a breeze when it comes time to update or move or delete information from your site!

The key to driving visitors to your website is high quality content; several other factors contribute to the success of your affiliate marketing site, but great content tops the list.

o Write interesting articles related to your theme.

o Look for affiliate programs that complement your site.

o Add links to business sites and other good, informative web sites.

o Do not hype your product. Keep your readers interested by presenting lots of relevant and useful information.

While this article only skims the tip of the iceberg, there are plenty of free resources online to keep you growing in the right direction. Not all resources (information) need be bought. Learn the keywords associated with what you are seeking to find, use the top search engines to hunt for results, and continue your web master education.

Soon you’ll find yourself successful with your affiliate marketing.

* * * * * * *

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Checking Out the Competition

2006-08-19T12:08:00.000-07:00

Checking Out the "Competition" Overiew
Please Do Read This First So You
Understand My "Why"

Click Here to Read My August 19th Findings

August 19, 2006 - This morning I received an email from a marketer asking for help. His response to ezine advertising was marginal at best (dismal is more like it). His email got me thinking... thinking led to researching... researching led to writing this...

A co-operative venture - like an ezine ad directory - is only as good as the owner or owners of the web site make it.

In the past, MWA has had as many as 190 publishers and their ezines listed. Today, the number hovers consistently in the 40-50 range and frankly, I like it that way!

Why you ask?

Because claiming more - and knowing full well that my list is not current - is NOT an option for me.

I've stated over and over that if My Wizard Ads only listed 10 ezines, but all 10 were hardworking, dedicated individuals doing their job - that would be good enough for me!

Lucky for me, I've got a true dedicated bunch of professionals doing their job (which is publishing and running your advertising - at the same time!).

I take updating extremely seriously - ask any of the publishers kind enough to work with me and list their ezines.

I'm actually quite ruthless when it comes to listing or not listing an ezine. The Publisher must, of course, be publishing - not just using MWA as a fishing spot for more leads for themselves. He or she also must respond to my emails and update in a timely manner each month. I also maintain a subscription to each and every ezine listed at My Wizard Ads, and each of those ezines has their own personal folder in my email account. To top that off, everything is kept color-coded in my Excel file.

No ezine, no email replies, no update... no listing.

My goal is not to provide a LOT of subscribers,
My Wizard Ads' goal is to provide you with REAL advertising resources.

Please do your homework. It's very easy to believe what you're told (at face value) and spend money.

My suggestion is investigate then spend if it's appropriate.

Click Here to Read My August 19th Findings

All the best,
Theresa Cahill
Owner of My Wizard Ads
Doing Business Online Since 2001
(c) 2006 - All Rights Reserved

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Featured Article on Integrating RSS Into Your Marketing

2006-08-18T10:22:00.000-07:00

Once again I present to you some truly outstanding information written by Kim Roach. I know the value of this article because I've been making diligent use of RSS feeds and blogs for a while now. Please read and/or visit the url above for all her valuable information.

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How to Integrate RSS Into Your Marketing Mix
By Kim Roach (c) 2006

RSS is changing the way we consume information online. Instead of being overloaded with mounds of information in our inbox, we can pick and choose exactly which content providers we want to hear from.

On the other side of the story are the publishers. Not only is RSS changing the way visitors view information, but it is also opening up vast opportunities for publishers wanting to syndicate their content across the Internet.

RSS is turning into one of the most popular distribution channels for webmasters, publishers, article writers and news syndicators. With RSS, you have the opportuníty to have a continual digital conversation with your readers. You can use RSS to syndicate a wide variety of media formats including text, video, and audio.

No longer is the Web all about text. You can use RSS to syndicate your very own talk show, weekly podcast, or a collection of video tutorials.

With over 100 RSS and blog search engines available online, it's time that you started integrating RSS into your marketing mix. This article will outline how you can combine the power of RSS with your current marketing activities.

To begin, let's start with email marketing. Some people have predicted that RSS will one day overtake email as the top communication model. However, this is not likely to happen considering the differences between these two technologies. Instead, the two should be combined to form a powerful marketing duo.

Email Marketing and RSS Intertwine

You can complement your email marketing campaigns with one or more RSS feeds. By providing your readers with alternatives, you will reach a much largër number of subscribers.

There are a number of ways that you can integrate RSS into your current email marketing campaign.

1. Use RSS to announce each new issue of your ezine. Announce your e-zine in your RSS feed as a single RSS content item. When your subscribers click-through, they can access your newsletter in full on your website, drawing additional visitors to your content.

2. If you are currently using email autoresponders, provide those very same autoresponders as RSS feeds. You can do this at http://www.zookoda.com .

Using RSS, you can syndicate a wide variety of content. One of the most obvious uses of RSS is to deliver content updates to your users. RSS is an excellent communication medium for delivering daily updates of your web site content. You can't expect your visitors to come back to your site every day to chëck for updates, but with an RSS feed they can quickly pick up any changes that interest them.

However, this is just the beginning of what is possible with RSS.

Deliver Content Updates, News, and So Much More...

You can also use RSS feeds to deliver news announcements, forum discussion updates, new product releases, quick tips, quotes, new coupons, job listings, classifieds, and real estate listings.

RSS can even be used to deliver content that is not available on your site. Let's face it, you cannot possibly publish all of the great information that is available on your site's particular topic.

However, you can supply your users with a content aggregation service that directs them to the best content within your industry.

With all of the digital junk that is currently being delivered online, you would be delivering an extremely valuable service simply by syndicating the most important and relevant information within a particular niche.

Keep in mind that relevant information goes beyond whether or not the content relates to your visitors' interests. Relevant information can also speak to each individual user. Just like email marketing, you can use personalization within your RSS feeds to increase your response rate.

Speak Directly to Your Visitors with Personalized RSS Feeds

One of my favorite examples of personalization can be found at Babycenter.com. As soon as you enter the site, you are asked for two pieces of information:

Your due date or your child's birthday and...
Your email address

After you submit your information you start receiving a weekly e-zine that is relevant to your pregnancy stage or the age of your child. If you have a 2-year old, you'll be receiving articles, tips and product recommendations for that age.

Do you see the power in this? By using profiling, webmasters are able to send information that is highly relevant to their readers on a case-by-case basis.

You could use this same idea with your RSS feeds.

Basic personalization might include elements such as the reader's first name, while more advanced personalization might deliver personalized content, product recommendations and so on.

Once you have decided on what type of content you would like to syndicate, you must then start organizing content for your feed. If you want to use RSS to its full potential, then I would highly advise you to create multiple RSS feeds for your users.

Use Multiple RSS Feeds to Increase Your Exposure

You can do this by creating RSS feeds for each category of content you cover. This extends your reach and marketing capability. Do not pack all of your content under one generic RSS feed. This is not beneficial for you or your visitors. By breaking your RSS feeds into categories, your visitors will be able to tap into the exact information that they are looking for.

For example, visitors who only want to keep up with forum updates shouldn't have to sift through articles, news, and other content.

When you begin marketing your RSS feeds, keep in mind that this is still a fairly new technology.

RSS Isn't Quite Mainstream, So Educate Your Visitors

Take your visitors step-by-step through the process of locating, subscribing and reading an RSS feed. By doing this, you are informing your website visitors and helping to promote the use of your own RSS feed.

To see a really good example of this, go to BBC News.

There is one last step to integrating RSS into your overall marketing strategy. This one is often overlooked, but can be extremely powerful when executed properly.

Take Your RSS Marketing to the Next Level with Your Affíliates

Provide your affíliates with an RSS feed of your product catalog. They can then use your feed to syndicate your latest product releases on their own websites. Whenever someone clicks on a headline, they would be directed to your web store. If they decide to make a purchase, the referring affíliate would make a commission on the sale.

Of course, this type of RSS would most likely need to be customizable, allowing the affíliate to carry only the products updates they feel would be a good match for their website.

Amazon.com has implemented this very same technique and it's time that the rest of us do so as well.

RSS is one of many ways to communicate with your customer base. RSS should not be your only communication mechanism, but rather simply a piece of the marketing puzzle. When RSS is combined with other communication models, including email and postcard marketing, your message will finally receive its true potential. When any of these techniques are used alone, they löse much of their marketing power.

About The Author

Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews and SEO-News newsletters. You can contact Kim at: kim @ seo-news.com

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

What Google Offers to Marketers and Surfers Alike

2006-08-15T12:30:00.000-07:00

Today I added a quick resource page to My Wizard Ads, with short explanations on the various products and services Google offers the internet user.

Let's face it, the search engine with the current highest kick is... Google!

Google makes products and services designed for the web site owner and the online advertiser. Teaming up with Google just makes good, common sense.

From Google adsense (web site owners make money showing ads on their site), to Google adwords (pick and choose keywords specific for your programs, products, and services and get them on the front pages of Google by paying per word), to using the latest browser Foxfire with the Google toolbar, all the way to their Google Pack, there is definitely something for everyone.

Click the title above to visit the web page directly :)

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Once Again... It Only Took 4 Hours to Build a Web Site

2006-08-12T23:13:00.000-07:00

My post for tonight is to once again sing the praises of XSitePro!

If you read my post on August 8th, you'll already know that it takes next to no time to create web sites with this amazing program.

Tonight, just for the fun of it, I bought a new domain name, added it as a subdomain to one of my accounts, and started making a new website on slimming down and losing weight.

I'm a big Atkins nut so this is right up my alley :)

Granted, I'll be adding to the web site off and on over the next few weeks. But, by and large, there's a full-fledged web site sitting there with some really good information and a product on getting your flabby abs into shape :)

Honestly, if you've been wondering how in the world to make your own web site and you haven't followed my advice and at least looked at XSitePro, please do so now.

The only person you're hurting is yourself... having your own web site is really the only way to go online.

Oh... if you're wondering "what web site?" just click the title of this post to take a peek :) Remember it's still a work in progress (and will continue to be), but it's up and functioning... in less than 4 hours!

All the best,
Theresa

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Tonight's Featured Article on Hidden Content Sources for Your Website

2006-08-11T23:00:00.000-07:00

As it pushes midnight here in the desert, I wanted to make sure to post the latest article I received from SiteProNews. Kim Roach is one of my favorite authors, lots of great information written so everyone can follow it :) Enjoy!

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Hidden Content
Sources for Your Website
By Kim Roach (c) 2006

As I travel through the Google search engine, there is one element that defines almost all of the top-ranking websites. It's great content. People come online for information and those that offer the best content reap the greatest rewards.
Unfortunately, this type of content is hard to come by. In most cases, you either have to spend hours in front of the keyboard or outsource the job to others. Both of these options are very costly. One requires your valuable time and the other requires an ínvestment of around $10 - $20 per article.

That's why I have scoured the net in search of valuable frëe content sources. I'm still not quite sure why I'm revealing my treasured piles of frëe content, but I certainly hope you enjoy them.

One of my favorite sources of content is public domain. This comprises the body of knowledge without a copyright. Anyone can use this material for commercial or non-commercial purposes. Below are some excellent sources for public domain material.

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is a library of 18,000 frëe ebooks whose copyright has expired. "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes", "Pride and Prejudice", "The Time Machine", "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer", and "The Canterbury Tales" have all passed into the public domain.

This means that you can put these on your website or even sell them in electronic or book format.

Explore a wealth of frëe content at Gutenberg.org.

Archive.org

At Archive.org you can find thöusands of works that are currently in the public domain. Want to put some cartoons on your web site? Take a look at the "Film Chest Vintage Cartoons", which is full of classic animated cartoons from the 1930's and 1940's. The collection includes Popeye, Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, The Three Stooges and Betty Boop. They also provide tons of other reproducable content including:

Brick Films: Commonly called "LEGO Movies". Brick films are dedicated to the art of stop motion animation.

SabuCat Movie Trailers: The world's largest collection of theatrical trailers.

Feature Films: A large number of classic feature films and shorts.

Universal Newsreels: Newsreels were shown before every feature film in the pre-tv era.

Computer Chronicles: Was the world's most popular television program on personal technology during the height of the computer revolution.

Net Cafe: Television series covering the revolution during the height of the dot com boom.

All of these content sources are available for you to put on your website. You can find them at Archive.org.

Another popular public domain destination is Wikipedia.org. Here you will find over 1 million articles ranging from Greek mythology and Egyptian history to business, health, and technology.

Go to Wikipedia.org for a huge collection of articles you can reprint on your own website.

Creative Commons

Every creative work receives copyright protetion as soon as you put pen to paper, hit save, or press record. Because of this, no one can use that work without express permission from the author.

Creative Commons provides a new content license that allows you to share your work with others. If you want, you can even allow other people to expand upon your existing work. This allows for creative co-authorship.

The Creative Commons license has made piles of content available for use on your web site. Whether you are looking for audio, images, video, or text, you can find an abundance of reusable information within the creative commons.

To search for content to put on your own web site, go to CreativeCommons.org.

Government Web Sites

Works produced by the U.S. Federal government are not copyrighted. If you obtain a government document from the net, you are frëe to copy and distribute the document. I have found plenty of great content about finance, retirement, health, business, and traveling on government websites.

To search for content offered by the United States government, go to http://www.google.com/unclesam.

Article Directories

There are thöusands of writers on the internet and many of them would love for you to reprint their articles on your website. You can find thöusands of frëe web articles at the following article directories.

GoArticles.com
EzineArticles.com
ArticleCity.com

Interviews

I consider interviews to be one of the best sources of quality content for your site. Simply interview industry professionals and post the recording and transcript on your website. This allows you to create original content very quickly.

Don't be afraid to ask for an interview, most experts would be delighted to speak with you. Remember, this is probably one of their greatest passions. If you ask them politely, your chances for landing an interview are good.

You can conduct an interview in person, over the telephone, or even through an e-mailed questionaire.

RSS Feeds

RSS is changing the way we consume information online. In addition, it has also provided thöusands of new content sources for the online publisher. RSS is simply a file format similar to XML that is used by publishers to make their content available to others in a format that can be easily understood by web publishing software and content aggregators.

By using RSS feeds, you can enhance the content on your site without ever writing a single word. And remember, on the Internet, content is King.

Want to put Amazon products on your site, updated news from the New York Times, financial advice from Motley Fool, or press releases from PRWeb?

This is all possible with RSS. No matter what type of information you are looking for, RSS can provide you with a constant stream of updated content for your web site.

To search for an RSS feed to enhance your own website, go to Syndic8.com. You can even mix and match a variety of rss feeds at RSSMix.com.

Facts & Statistics

Looking for facts or figures to put on your website? Take a look at some of the sources below. You'll likely be surprised how many facts, figures, and definitions are available in the public domain.

The CIA World Factbook provides a number of statistics on countries, territories, and dependencies. Each profile tracks such demographics as population, ethnicity, and literacy rates, as well as political, geographical and economic data.

http://www.census.gov/: One of the largest repositories for data and statistics related to the U.S.

http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Main_Page: One of the best encyclopedia's ever written was published over 90 years ago. Search over 40,000 articles, all of which are available for publication on your own site.

http://www.bibliomania.com/2/3/257/frameset.html: A searchable interface of the 1913 public domain Webster's dictionary.

Private Label Articles

Private label articles can be bought for pennies per article. This is possible because they are sold in bülk.

Many people criticize these articles and have declared them as worthless. However, I am here to tell you that private label articles can be very powerful when used appropriately.

Unless you have hours of frëe time every day, it is unlikely that you are going to be able to create the amount of quality content that your web site deserves. This is where private label content enters the picture.

You can use private label articles to:

Add content to your web site.
Acquire hundreds of inbound links by syndicating the articles to article directories.
Create a frëe report for your visitors and other website publishers.
Create an information-packed RSS feed.
However, the key to using private label articles effectively is to optimize them. Straight out of the box, these articles are near worthless. To give them value, you must add your own touch.

Inject your personality into the article. Combine multiple articles and do some additional touch-ups to ensure that the article is in top shape for your readers.

Once you are finished you can add your resource box and send it off to article directories and website publishers.

If you are looking for one of the top private label article providers, go to InfoGoRound.com.

Images

Quality images can make your content much more inviting and keep people at your site for longer periods of time. Fortunately, there is a site that offers thöusands of pictures completely frëe of charge. Find it at Stock.XCHNG.

Quotes

Quotes can give your website a special touch. Quotes provide interesting content in addition to an element of credibility. I often like to add related quotes to my web site simply to engage the reader's attention.

To find some quotes for your website, go to QuoteLand.com.

In the end, you always want your content to be unique. Not for the search engines, but for your visitors. With quality content comes quality links. Once you have built up a reputation for delivering unique content, you will nevër have to worry about having an audience eager to visit your website.

Did You Find This Article Useful? Then Digg It.

About The Author
Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews and SEO-News newsletters. You can contact Kim at: kim @ seo-news.com

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Popular Arts and Crafts - New Website with a story

2006-08-09T00:14:00.000-07:00

Well I did it... After posting my "learn html the easy way" article this morning, I proceeded to purchase a domain name, set up my hosting, and create a "by hand" website on arts & crafts.

I'm actually quite proud of it. I search out the articles myself (on beads, gift basket making, starting your own home craft business, crafts for kids, macrame and more). No automation was used in creating the website - everything was hand selected by me for me.

When I mentioned earlier today that XSitePro was incredible, I thought I'd prove it... put my money where my mouth is and show you just what can be created in the space of a few hours.

Sure I could have run one automated program after another, but I choose to hunt out true arts and crafts content. I went to the best source for arts & crafts articles, and hand picked the best complimentary products for an arts and crafts website.

So voila! I hope you enjoy visiting it... and seeing just how fantastic XSitePro really is :)

All the best,
Theresa

My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

How to Learn HTML Without Even Trying

2006-08-08T12:12:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All Rights Reserved

Today I'd like to ask... do you have your own website?

You've heard all about the importance of having your own site to promote from - it's easier, all your interests rest on one site and promoting one url (one site) is always easier than trying to keep track of several.

You should also know about how important it is to have a site that is easy to navigate, and from your standpoint, easy to update at the drop of a hat!

For years, I "did it myself." I learned HTML from scratch. Hand coded everything on the MWA web site (other than java scripts and forms)... and I LIKED doing it myself.

I didn't use frontpage or dreamweaver (DW costs an arm and a leg and frontpage is too glitchy for me - I'm very picky about spacing and other things that both programs think you are too stupid to be able to do yourself).

BUT... after years of insisting only I could get the look I wanted... I've switched and I'm loving it.

(The title of this posting will take you to what I'm talking about... I'm having trouble posting this article... sigh!)

This most a.mazing web site builder is designed with a highly effective tutorial (which for a change I actually took the 2 hours to do) and a system so advanced I have yet to find something that I needed that was left out... there just isn't anything.

I speak with many people who know they should teach themselves HTML and build their own sites. Yet, they are overwhelmed and feel it's something they can "put off 'til later."

No it is not.

Do this for yourself. Get out from under the necessity of promoting affiliate urls and only af urls. Teach yourself a new skill - today - in 2 hours or less and have a brand new web site all your own this week.

Heck, I converted MWA in a weekend and that's because I'm picky as can be... it really took less time but I just love to tweak LOL!

You CAN and MUST do this some time... and some time is most definitely now.

The title of this posting will take you there.

That's my tip for today... see ya soon!

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

What Advertising Direction is Best? Is there a best? What should I do to succeed online?

2006-08-05T22:54:00.000-07:00

This evening, after spending a very long night last night and all of today converting my web site (still in progress), as I was calling it a night, I received the following email (thank you Stephen!):

Hello My Wizard Ads!

I hope you are doing well. I ran a couple of Ezine Advertisements with several companies that over promised and under delivered. Unfortunately I received no Real traffic to my site www.SimpleCashSystems.com.

I know there are no promises in this Industry, but when you spend hard earned money and see no return, it kind of hurts.. :) If you had a Business Opportunity, what direction should I go??

I have heard great things about your company, and I am anxious to begin working with you. I feel this will be a great partnership for both of us into the future. If you can guide me to the best options for home-based business opportunities, I will go with what you say! Thank you for taking the time out today, and I look forward in working with you soon!

Yours in Prosperity,
Stephen Scott

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PRELUDE TO MY REPLY:

I don't want to say I have a "standard" reply, but if you've spoken with me on the phone or written back and forth by email, you just might recognized my response this evening. Please understand, this is the ONLY thing I know to tell anyone. Regardless of what gurus tell you... you and I are destined to WORK at our jobs online. Money will not fall into our laps, but that's okay... hopefully, like me, you like what you're doing.
========================================

So here was my reply:

Hi Stephen!

Unfortunately your story is very familiar - lots of promises and than WHAM!

I do not make any promises or guarantees... I can't. There's no way to compare apples to oranges. I can tell you I have many returning customers and new people happy with the customer service and advertising I provide.

Others are not as fortunate. Some pick winning things to promote and others are fighting a hopeless battle. The hopeless cases I truly encourage to keep looking - even better to take the time and build their own websites and find something they would be truly happy keeping busy with... hence the niche sites that do so well.

Affiliate programs can be really tough unless you can turn a special angle with them that others are not doing.

My suggestions are basic and simple:

1. Submit on a clockwork-like basis to the search engines - starting every 15 days and in a month or so going to every 30 days... but you MUST remember to do it http://www.submitplus.com has a fr.ee program submit tab, use it, they are good. Also, http://www.google.com/addurl and don't believe them when they say "thanks you don't need to do this again." You do. Over and over - could take upwards of a year.

2. Get involved in the social bookmarking sites and "craze" that is not going to disappear. Search engines love those. Read everything (for free!) that you can about it. http://del.icio.us is a great place to begin. Yahoo thought this up and delicious is Yahoo.

3. Get traffic. You might not make sales initially, but you need to show the search engines (read Alexa) that traffic is coming your way in a steady stream. This also takes time and patience, but must be done. Shop carefully for this... I am a direct path to a primary source online, not a seller of a reseller of a reseller. The prices I've seen jacked up make my head spin. Either I'm too stupid to do it, or they are criminal in the pricing.

4. Always, always, always run a classified ad in ezines and newsletters. Become a part of the readership. Provide feedback, articles, suggestions, etc. Every time you do, include your name and web site url and ask (beg if need be, but you won't need to) the publisher to include your remarks. Make them intelligent informed and caring replies and get YOURSELF know to the other readers as a reliable person with good remarks and insight. People do tend to buy from people they feel they know. It's that simple.

5. Make sure the programs, software, ebooks, whatever you are interested in promoting have been read and used by you. If it's junk, get a refund. If it's not, write informed and insightful reviews on why someone should check it out. Be helpful.

6. Write. Write articles. Get someone else to write them for you for a fee if need be. Good articles worth taking someone's time to read. Ezine article directories are plentiful on the net and a great place to sign up and get yours included. I have one myself at www.mywizardads.com/library. My personal article library is at www.mywizardads.com/ArticleLibrary.html. Read a few of them. They aren't rocket science, but do tend to help people more often than not :)

These are the basics. Setting a schedule to get it all done is primary and critical. Keep at it and sooner or later - and it does take a lot of doing - things will begin to "pay off."

Hope this helps LOL!

In fact, you've just given me my post for the night to my blog at:
My Wizard Ads HowTo Marketing Tips and Resources for Online Enrepenuers (you're reading it right now *smile!*) Thanks!

All the best,
Theresa

================================================

I hope YOU found this useful, too :) Magic exists in fairy tales. You CAN do this... but it takes persistence and the drive to DO IT. Even in the not so good times, until you "get it right."

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Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

No Longer a Fan of Norton Antivirus

2006-08-03T16:47:00.000-07:00

After last night, I (a diehard Symantec Norton Antivirus user) have forever cast Norton and Symantec products into the bottom-less pit of never-to-be-retrieved online products.

You would not believe the hell I went through last night!

Actually, it started a few days ago. Nothing definitive, but definitely something "not quite right" as I used one program or another or surfed online. Of course the first thing I did was scan my hard drives. Nothing wrong (according to the 2006 version of Norton's Antivirus program).

But still the lagging and odd this and that persisted. Running out of virtual memory at the drop of a hat, on and on, problem after problem. Scan, scan, update, scan, scan. Never one little thing did 2006 find.

In reverse, I also ran my spyware sweeper from my Zone Alarm Pro (and before you think that was my problem, it's not - these two programs had been working quite harmoniously on my computer for years, the problems only started AFTER I upgraded to Norton's 2006 version!). And... each time Zone Alarm found spyware and typically things that Norton, if working correctly, SHOULD HAVE ALSO FOUND.

Hmmmm... So, having spent the extra bucks and also had Symantec ship me a backup disk, I started the (now) unthinkable. I uninstalled everything - both Norton and Zone Alarm for good measure.

At around 8:30 p.m. last night the fun began.

By 3:00 in the MORNING, after repeatedly trying in vain to get Norton to fully install on my computer, and with only my lowly Zone Alarm Pro to protect me against the bitter outside world - in total disgust and RAGING ANGER I turned everything off and went to bed.

Five hours later, I was at it again.

Only this time, I was SO smart! I headed straight to ZoneLabs never giving Norton another backwards look.

I called the wonderful folks at ZoneAlarm, received some OUTSTANDING support, help (and sympathy which I sorely needed by then), and upgraded to ZoneAlarm Security Suite 6.5.

I did my homework. I read around. C/Net has actually moved Norton way down the list (it might even be past McAfee at this point), and clearly proclaimed ZA's Antivirus program superior.

As a current customer, it's an easy upgrade to the ZA Security Suite - and a financial savings to boot.

Fully installed on my computer SURE ENOUGH there was a big bad bundle of trouble that ZA caught - the first time around (!) - and fixed and eliminated. Since spyware checking also comes with this suite, along with a bunch of other things, I ran that, too. A total of six spyware sneaks eliminated.

I am a paranoid individual when it comes to me and my computer. I don't want you to get the idea that I wasn't updating or wasn't scanning or using Norton's Antivirus 2006 properly. I was. The rotten part is I THOUGHT it was protecting me. It wasn't. Glitchy, nasty, stinking rotten program - and it takes a lot for me to say that... I've been using Norton for years. However, if you currently have 2004 or 2005 on your computer my advice is DO NOT upgrade it to 2006. It's like a bad beta program that should never have left the shelves without a lot more research.

On the other hand, my computer is SO happy now - and my stress level has dropped to the point where I'm pretty sure I won't have a stroke today just by making the wonderful decision to switch over to ZA's Security Suite.

Thank you ZoneLabs! Live long and prosper :)

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: antivirus, computer, security, spyware, mywizardads

TrackBack and PingBack by CNET News

2006-07-31T22:48:00.000-07:00

This evening as I looked around the net for something truly interesting to present (lacking the energy after a full day of doing website and advertiser updates), I stumbled across the most amazing bit of information at CNET News.

You watch, in a bit if it hasn't happened already, some "guru" type will write a book about this ... when the information is FREE! In the meantime, get a jump on trackback and pingback - what they are and what they do. Here's a tiny excerpt from the page:

What are TrackBack and Pingback?
TrackBack and Pingback links are records of links made to CNET News.com pages. A publisher sends a ping (or notification) to CNET News.com that a link to the CNET News.com page has been made. CNET News.com records that notification and builds a page including all the notifications, with links back to the linking site.

The implications are clearly huge... not only allowing bloggers and rss'ers to keep readers up to date with great news and more, but in turn, sites can help each other... I'm big on that :)

Take a moment now to read all about it.

All the best,
Theresa

* * * *

Keywords: trackback, pingback, advertising, marketing, classifieds

Two Great Scripts and One Really Bad Website Owner

2006-07-30T18:22:00.000-07:00

Time to praise and rant...

Today I was on a high having purchased two outstanding scripts XML-Sitemap Generator and GoTryThis (which I'm still figuring the ins and outs of but I love it!) [new comment... I DO know all about it now, didn't take long and MAN what power this program has!].

For once, I was able to install both of these scripts without asking for any help from support or picking the brains of my good friend, Jeff Greer (bless his heart I'm sure he's thrilled, too).

The first is obvious, but as you'll see by the testimonials at the site I'm in a huge group of very satisfied customers.

The second is an excellent way to get solid stats on web links - be it on your site or in your emails or wherever. I'm anxious to start that up and running to its fullest.

Unfortunately, after two very successful script installations today I then received a very sour grapes email from the inventor to another program I had bought (three in one day is unheard of for me, but I was on a roll). This program appeared to be ideal. A program that I was looking forward to suggesting to the newbie and not so newbie marketers online needing web page creator help.

Again, unfortunately, I was disappointed. The program was glitchy and the support graphics, etc., that came with it required purchasing Photo Shop Deluxe (or another scammed off version) which frankly is out of my price range. I use CoffeeCup and like to code myself. Above and beyond that though, the features it listed as being able to perform where either nonexistent or so deeply hidden I could not find more than one (rounded corners which is cool, but not worth $67).

VERY politely I informed the owner that I was requesting a refund through Clickbank. Clickbank operates Monday through Friday so I very politely (nothing like above) told this person it just wasn't going to suit my needs. At the same time, I also informed him I was very interested in one of his other products (I've seen a demo and really thought it was nifty) and would be purchasing that... since I've also been able to "try it out" somewhere else, I knew that one would fit the bill nicely.

The reply I got back was insulting, rude, obnoxious and totally un-businesslike. Phew! If I ran my business that way, well there would be no business at all. I was amazed.

And still, in a last reply to him, my response was business-like as I explained my shock at his behavior. I also stated that purchasing something else, while I would have loved to have had it, was definitely not going to happen. There's $97 out the window for this guy.

So, as I wind out my praises and rants for the day, a word of warning. There are just too many programs and products out there. If we search long enough we can also find something very much like what we were after... putting up with sheer rudeness is not an option. Just keep moving! There are tons of wonderful people online just waiting to help make sure you get what YOU NEED.

You win some, you lose some. Too bad this guy didn't know the difference.

(P.S. For obvious reasons, I cannot tell you what website I was on... I just hope you're not unlucky enough to find it.)

All the best,
Theresa Cahill
My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op

Keywords: scripts, installing scripts, software

Google Buttons for Your Google Toolbar

2006-07-29T22:19:00.000-07:00

Tonight, while digging around at digg.com I ran across a post about the latest and greatest buttons you can add (easily) to your Google toolbar.

Your choices are almost limitless. There are buttons for blogs, buttons for travel, buttons for gaming, shopping, technology and more.

At the moment I'm sitting on just the landing page and I'm looking at buttons for URLwire, digg, sports, a dictionary, video... oh heck, just too many to list.

If you're a serious marketer, you know the importance of getting yourself the google toolbar. As a marketer, you always want to know the pr ranking of the page you're scooping out - especially if it's for advertising and most definitely if you're considering joining any new (or existing program).

My toolbar tip-off is always followed up by a trip to a good domain lookup. Both important factors in determining your next step.

Granted Google plays games with its algorithm... so often that it's a wonder our heads aren't continuously spinning. But no one (to date) would tell you not to use this resource while you do your own due diligence checking things out on the net.

Until next time, enjoy your new buttons!

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Save the Baby Racoons - You Can Help

2006-07-27T11:08:00.000-07:00

Hello again!

My good friend Matzo has asked for your help. She runs a "Coondo" for orphaned baby racoons and other unfortunate wildlife.

Here's an email I received, and I hope you'll find it in your heart to help:

====================

Hi Theresa-

It's me - Matzo. Long time out of touch!

I have been really busy with my Wildlife rehabbing and have set up a Live CoonCam of this year's orphans in the Coondo. This season is absolutely nutso with babies still being born during this time of the season when most are preparing for release!!

At any rate, I am on a mission to sell 1,000 VCD's (these are Video CD's that just start playing the video when you put it in a computer). I'm working on a DVD version of the CoonCam capture footage and live video clips to raise funds to feed these babies. Can you do any kind of promotional help on this? At least go check out the CoonCam and see what you think.

http://www.doryandtheorphans.com/cam.html

Here Fund Raiser Page I set up that will also take you to the CoonCam. I'd like to use this as an entrance page for the CoonCam for the project. Any ideas or helpful advice?

Hope all is well with you & yours!

Blessings,

Matzo
Licensed WI Rehabber

* * * * *

And something I received this morning:

Your timing is great. We had some pretty nasty thunder storms for the past 3 days, and a funnel cloud (tornado) touched down just a few miles from here last night. The damage my Coondo sustained was minimal, but the tarps were all torn loose and just general havoc to clean up and now replace some items. So the CoonCam was offline today!

The storms also brought in a few orphans - one is a baby squirrel that was blown out of a tree. She is about as big as my thumb, has to be fed every 2.5 hours 24/7. Named her Arwyn.

* * * * * *

If you'll just take a moment and click through to the page, the picture is sure to stir you to action and lending a helping hand.

All the best,
Theresa

Keywords: habitat, wildlife, endangered, racoons

How to Make Your Blog Stand Out in a Crowd

2006-07-26T14:35:00.000-07:00

This morning right on schedule I received my latest copy of WebPro News. Their most recent writeup explains how "popular" and "influential" blogs differ (and how they are somewhat alike).

To build a popular blog is a challenge at best there are just so many out there. To create a blog of "influence" though should be the goal of all online marketers.

Within Jason Lee Miller's article entitled Finding Influence in Blog Marketing are key points too numerous to cite here. However, one link I'd like to share is his reference to a past article written by Lee Odden. Lee writes:

With so many blogs being created every day, it's a mystery to many bloggers how to make their blog stand out.

He then proceeds to tell you 25 steps/tips to make it happen for yourself. Please take the time to read his article. Just click the title of this post above.

While I've got a few of those 25 tips covered, I can clearly see I've got my work cut out for me! :)

* * * * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Advice on How to Submit Your Website to Free Directories

2006-07-26T10:42:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd share an email I received this morning regarding free directory submissions and the proper way for you to submit your url to these websites.

======================================

Hi Theresa,

I have elaborated a bit more on the process of manually submitting your website to search engine friendly directories.

I have included a list of over 300 free directories that you can submit your website to right now. I have also included the pagerank of each directory.

There are also links to some interesting news articles that you will want to read. Keep on top of your game!

Follow the link below to read the report:

The SEO Directory Submission Guide
http://www.seo2020.com/seo-articles/directory-submission.html

I am always here to help, if you have any questions feel free to respond to any of my emails. I actually do read them.

Kind regards,

Charles

======================================

While you are there, my suggestion would be to also get yourself a copy of Charles' free report on back links.

All the best,
Theresa
My Wizard Ads Site Map

* * * * * * * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Have Secure Pages? Are You Sure...?

2006-07-22T11:28:00.000-07:00

Theresa's Note: Strangely enough, this very topic came up yesterday while talking to a good friend of mine. We were wondering if it is truly possible to keep those "secret, members only" web pages from the prying eyes of search engine spiders. David Utter of Webpronews covered it today in a small article.

======================================

How Google Can Find Your Secret Page

..."In looking at the source code, one section revealed that whatever is entered as a password would trigger a redirect to a page named {password}.html. The right password would reveal the press page."

To read the full article:
Just Click Here

The header title to this post is linked to my rss feed.
Click here to visit My Wizard Ads.
I'd love to see you :)

* * * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, technorati advertising, technorati marketing, classifieds

Google, GoogleBots, MediaBots, AdBots & More

2006-07-19T16:09:00.000-07:00

Hello again! I'm still up to my eyeballs working on a new niche product so finding the time to write my own article is tenuous at best. But today, once again, Kim Roach has written an excellent article explaining Google and Googles different bots that visit your site. Which bot does what and why. Enjoy!

========================================

Today's Google Bots and What They Do
By Kim Roach (c) 2006

Google currently indexes over 8 billion web pages. However, before these pages were placed in the index, they were each crawled by a special spider known as the GoogleBot. Unfortunately, many web masters do not know about the internal workings of this virtual robot.

In fact, Google actually uses a number of spiders to crawl the Web. You can catch these spiders by examining your log files.

This article will attempt to reveal some of the most important Google spiders, their function, and how they affect you as a web master. We'll start with the well-known GoogleBot.

GoogleBot

Googlebot, as you probably know, is the search bot used by Google to scour the web for new pages. Googlebot has two versions, deepbot and freshbot. Deepbot is a deep crawler that tries to folow every link on the web and download as many pages as it can for the Google index. It also examines the internal structure of a site, giving a complete picture for the index.

Freshbot, on the other hand, is a newer bot that crawls the web looking for fresh content. The Google freshbot was implemented to take some of the pressure off of the GoogleBot. The freshbot recalls pages already in the index and then crawls them for new, modified, or updated pages. In this way, Google is better equipped to keep up with the ever-changing Web.

This means that the more you update your web site with new, quality content, the more the Googlebot will come by to chëck you out.

If you'd like to see the Googlebot crawling around your web property more often, you need to obtain quality inbound links. However, there is also one more step that you should take. If you haven't already done so, you should create a Google Sitemap for your site.

Creating a Google sitemap allows you to communicate with Google, telling them about your most important pages, new pages, and updated pages. In return, Google will provide you with some valuable information as well. Google Sitemaps will tell you about pages it was unable to crawl and links it was unable to follow. This allows you to pinpoint problems and fix them so that you can gain increased exposure in the search results.

The next Google bot in our lineup is known as the MediaBot.

MediaBot - used to analyze Adsense pages
useragent: Mediapartners-Google

MediaBot is the Google crawler for Adsense Publishers. Mediabot is used to determine wich ads Google should display on Adsense pages.

Google recommends that webmasters specifically add a command in their robots.txt file that grants Mediabot access to their entire site. To do this, simply enter the following code into your robots.txt file:

User-agent: Mediapartners-Google*
Disallow:

This will ensure that the MediaBot is able to place relevant Adsense ads on your site.

Keep in mind that ads can still be shown on a page if the MediaBot has not yet visited. If that is the case, the ads chosen will be based on the overall theme of the other pages on the site. If no ads can be chosen, the dreaded public service announcements are displayed instead.

There is a strong debate over whether or not the MediaBot is giving websites with Adsense an advantage in the search engines.

Even Matt Cutts has confirmed that the Adsense Mediabot has indexed webpages for Google's main index.

He states, "Pages with AdSense will not be indexed more frequently. It's literally just a crawl cache, so if e.g. our news crawl fetched a page and then Googlebot wanted the same page, we'd retrieve the page from the crawl cache. But there's no boost at all in rankings if you're in AdSense or Google News. You don't get any more pages crawled either."

Matt Cutts claims that your website does not get any advantage by using Adsense. However, in my mind, simply getting your site updated in and of itself is an advantage.

This is very similar to Google Analytics, which also promotes a slightly higher degree of spider activity.

Those who run Google Analytics on their site can expect additional spider activity.

However, you certainly shouldn't depend on any of these tools for getting your site indexed. The key to frequent spidering is having quality inbound links, quality content, and frequent updates.

Have images on your site? If so, you have likely been visited by our next Google spider, the ImageBot.

ImageBot - used to crawl for the Image Search
useragent: GoogleBot-Image

The Imagebot prowls the Web for images to place in Google's image search. Images are ranked based upon their filename, surrounding text, alt text, and page title.

If you have a website that is primarily image based, then you would definitely want to optimize your images to receive some extra Google traffïc.

On the other hand, some web sites may not benefit from Google image search. In most cases, the traffïc from the Image search engine is very low quality and rarely converts into buyers. Many people are often just looking for images that they can swipe. So, if you want to save some bandwidth, use your robots.txt file to block ImageBot from accessing your image directory.

One of the few exceptions I would make is if you have a site dedicated to downloadable images.

Our final bot is completely dedicated to the Google Adwords program.

AdsBot - Checks Adwords landing pages for quality
useragent: AdsBot-Google

AdsBot is one of Google's newest spiders. This new crawler is being used to analyze the content of advertising landing pages, which helps determine the Quality score that Google assigns to your ads.

Google uses this Quality score in combination with the amount you are willing to bid to determine the position of your ads. Therefore, ads with a high quality score can rank higher even if other advertisers are paying more than you.

This is one of Google's many efforts to ensure that they are delivering the best results to their users.

Can you still block being spidered? Of course, but it will lower your overall Adwords quality score, which could end up lowering the positioning of your ads. If possible, it is best to give AdsBot complete access to your site.

Today's Google bots are becoming more advanced all the time. However, nothing beats relevant, quality, updated content. Deliver that and the search engines will eat it up.

============================
About The Author
Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews and SEO-News newsletters. You can contact Kim at: kim @ seo-news.com

* * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Marketers Grab This Quick... Fantastic!

2006-07-17T20:31:00.000-07:00

When it rains it pours :)

Today I'm just stumbling all over great products and services and websites to enhance every online marketers marketing capabilities.

SeachAutomator - what a great tool. I don't even know where to begin to explain what this will do to help you search out QUICKLY just about anything you can think of... imagine being able to fill your given niche market with precise resources. At the click of a button, tons of really pertient information just falls into your lap.

Here's what another well-known marketer has to say:

Derek Franklin has created the Search Automator, the
hottest software - the power this tool holds is truly
amazìng and will keep me busy for months.

In this information-crazy society, there are a number
of people and businesses whose success largely depends
on information - finding it, consuming it, packaging it,
and/or selling it.

-- S.Kumar

I'm busy on a project with a great friend of mine, and I'm thrilled to pieces! This is going to cut the potential workload in [more than] half!

Everything we could want to find pertinent to our niche, right there at the drop of a hat. Amazing!

... You know what my only complaint is...?

Why oh why didn't I develop something like this first LOL!

Don't Wait! Read All About It and Grab It Up Now!

* * * * *

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

What Is An Ezine? E-Zine? Email Newsletter? E-Newsletter?

2006-07-17T15:13:00.000-07:00

Theresa's Note: Today, one of the emails I receive (again on a regular basis, it's that great of a resource) was a shocker to me. I guess when a person is using certain terms day in and day out, we just tend to assume everyone knows what we are talking about... and, owning an ezine ad advertising co-op, I may have become complacent assuming everyone knows ezines and what they do, what they are, how they work, etc.

Then, out of the blue, I remembered how 8+ years ago I wrote to a friend of mine who was publishing and asked her, "What the heck is an ezine?" (And my business was off and running).

So the following article does make sense to publish. And I hope you enjoy it. It's a reprint :)

================================================

What Is An Ezine? E-Zine? Email Newsletter? E-Newsletter?
by Christopher Knight

An ezine (a.k.a. e-zine, email newsletter, e-mail newsletter, or e-newsletter) is a newsletter that is delivered via email that you can subscribe or opt-in to it.

Email delivery frequencies range from multiple times per day (almost never recommended) to daily to multiple times per week to weekly to bi-weekly, monthly, quarter or any periodic delivery schedule. Some of the best ezines are delivered dailiy, weekly, bi-weekly or month. Any delivery frequency longer than monthly is not recommended.

An important component to an 'ezine' is the permission you give the ezine publisher. Double or confirm-opt-in is the best method of subscription and this means that you not only requested to receive the email newsletter, but you confirmed your request to receive it by clicking on a confirmation link or replying to an email verification. Any ezine that does not require confirmation or a subscription process is spam (unsolicited commercial email).

What an ezine is not: Web-based only. While it is true that you can put an ezine on the web and you should do that, if your ezine is only available on the web, then it is a webzine at best...and definitely is not an 'ezine'.

An ezine usually will come in a plain ASCII text format or via a rich HTML format or allow both formats via an auto email client detection strategy called MIME/Multipart. You should never send PDF's or any other large file to your email list members unless they are expecting it and can handle it receiving your files.

Why do people publish ezines? It's a critical business tool to develop relationships within your niche, to keep in contact with your clients or members, build your credibility or perceived expertise in the marketplace and drive leads, sales and/or revenue by selling products/services or advertising along-side quality original content.

=========================
About the Author

This Ezine-Tip was submitted By Christopher Knight -- Email List Marketing Expert, author and entrepreneur. Get your weekly dose of Email newsletter publishing, marketing, promotion, management, email-etiquette, email usability and deliverability tips by joining the free Ezine-Tips newsletter: emailuniverse.com

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Back Links... Do It Right the First Time and Profit

2006-07-16T16:47:00.000-07:00

Today, at the advice of a good friend of mine Jeffrey Greer of EverEnterprise, I headed out to inspect a blog he'd uncovered.

Of course Jeff was right - it's great!

I also discovered a free report available to anyone wanting a copy on the right way to create backlinks that will last and last no matter how much scrutiny your website may come under (and with the right links you want the spiders crawling all over your site again and again!).

I thought I could just give you a copy of it here (it's a pdf), but the author, Charles Heflin of seo2020.com would appreciate a visit directly from you :)

The report, 17 pages of truly worthwhile information on creating effective linking to your website, is located at this seo webpage.

Don't worry, once you've got your copy, Charles does NOT hit you left and right to buy anything from him! Honest, he just gives you the information - no strings attached, nothing else to buy.

Thanks Jeff for sending me in the right direction. And thank you Charles for writing that report. It will help many :)

All the best,
Theresa
My Wizard Ads Ezine Ad Advertising Directory

====================================

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Technorati Profile

A Day in the Life...

2006-07-14T14:19:00.000-07:00

Good Afternoon and thanks for visiting!

Do you ever have days when you feel you're just spinning your wheels getting no where fast? Today's been one of those...

I started by checking into several blogging sources and I did find a few interesting ones, including Link2Blog. Looks promising. Any time you can get your blog out there and exchange with other (hopefully) decent and family-rated ones, you're on the right track.

Then I checked the forum of one of my tag and ping resources. The sad news is that one fantastic spot for tagging appears to have gone belly up :(

So it's back to looking for more. Not that there's not a ton of them out there, of course. But, I believe I'm finding that while "popular" is good, some "lesser known" ones are even better. This defunct service was a medium-sized social bookmarking place with such a great interface for posting that I'm actually depressed about it not making it. I know it was widely-used, so I can only assume some idiot(s) ruined the whole thing or... you fill in the ...

Then it was off to check some of my current pings with a great service everyone already knows about which is FeedBurner. These guys really have their stuff together, the system is so easy to use. And, they've got a great sense of humor so going from section to section of your account is humorous as well. For pinging your feeds I highly recommend Feedburner.

I've also been messing around, and messed up, an installed script (par for the course for me!), which has been frustrating to say the least. It's an excellent script, but in my hands everything script-like turns to mush LOL!

In between, I'm checking out a new niche that has great potential. It's still very hush-hush, and I won't even mention my partner... yet! Don't need anyone stealing him away!

Well time to step outside again into our lovely 104+ degree weather, if for no other reason than a breath of fresh (and hot) air.

Thanks for reading, this post was just most a rambling to help me get back on track.

All the best,
Theresa Cahill
====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: mywizardads, advertising, marketing, classifieds

Why Aren't You Using LinkBait?

2006-07-12T13:08:00.000-07:00

Theresa's Note: This morning like clockwork I received my next issue of SiteProNews. This outstanding resource has been a marketing mainstay of mine for quite some time. Today's article, written by Kim Roach, does (as usual) such a wonderful job of presenting that it would be like trying to build a better mousetrap to do it myself. I hope you enjoy this enlightening article about "Link Baiting."

============================================

Why Aren't You Using LinkBait?
By Kim Roach

You've heard of the olden days when people would hunt for potential link partners. Well, those days are long gone and smart web masters are moving on to greater things, while decreasing their reciprocal link building effort.

If you are wondering what this new technique could be, it's actually quite simple... in theory. It is known as linkbaiting. This is a strategy that brings links to a website simply because of the unique and popular content on a website.

With the rise of the blogosphere and social bookmarking sites, all it takes is one person to notice an interesting page and link to a site. Once a link is passed around once, it becomes easier for it to spread further.

Bloggers around the net constanly use linkbait to encourage other bloggers to mention them or to get their content passed around the blogosphere. However, many traditional web masters have not quite latched on to this powerful technique.

The benefits of creating quality, unique, or even controversial content go way beyond what one might first imagine. When a web site offers true value to the visitor, they can create hundreds and even thousands of backlinks without even asking.

Unfortunately, simply having good, quality content on your site doesn't always work. To gain the full potential of linkbaiting, you need a good hook. Some of the most popular ones include:

News
Controversy
Resources and...
Humor

News Hook: Everyone loves to read about industry news. However, the key to attracting some real traffíc is to add a twist to the latest news. Find out exactly how it affects your web site visitors. If you just give a rehashing of what everyone else has already said, no one will care.

However, if you inject your own twist or personality into your news story, then you are prepared to catch someone's eye.

Look at CNN.com as an example. What do they offer? They provide the latest news every day of the week. In the world of information that we live in, news is a commodity. Because CNN offers such appealing content, thousands of sites are linking to them. Do you think CNN sent these sites a little email asking if they would be interested in a reciprocal link? Of course not.

Instead, they employ linkbaiting. Their fresh and interesting content automatically encourages other people to link to it. Luckily for us, we can use this same technique on our own web sites.

News is one of the best ways to attract incoming links, especially if the news is controversial.

Controversy Hook: Before we move on, I must warn you that this hook can be very powerful and also very dangerous. It involves contradicting what someone says, preferably someone very prominent in the industry.

When used correctly, controversy can be very effective in bringing traffíc to your site, but always be careful.

To begin, look for articles and stories in your industry. Some of the best places to find this type of content is on blogs, news sites, and social bookmarking sites. Once you have found a good story, take an opposing viewpoint or give it some sort of twist. This will make your content stand out from the hum drum of what everyone else is publishing.

The next hook is actually one of my favorites. It is known as the resource hook.

Resource Hook: Information is powerful online. If you have information that is not available anywhere else, you become an authoritative resource. Many of these resources come in the form of a list.

You would be surprised at the power of a list. You can organize:

a list of helpful tools that would be beneficial to your readers
a list of the best blogs in your niche
a list of popular news stories within your industry (When you are doing this kind of list, be sure to sprinkle in some of your own commentary)

One of my favorite lists is located at SEOCompany.ca, where they offer over 150 SEO tools. Simply by linking out to their favorite SEO tools they get tons of traffíc each and every day.

Robin Good of MasterNewMedia is a webmaster who uses lists especially well. One of his most popular resource pages is a list of RSS and blog directories that webmasters can submit to. You can see it at: http://www.masternewmedia.org/rss/top55/".

However, not only does he show you over a hundred places where you can submit your blog and RSS feed, he also gives you an overview of each service, some commentary on which of these directories are the most influential, and exactly how to submit to each one.

This one page alone has thousands of incoming links to it because it is an invaluable resource.

Another popular resource hook is to create a useful online tool that your visitors can download for frëe. Once they have downloaded your frëe tool, let them rebrand it and give it away on their own sites.

Humor Hook: Have you ever received a joke or some other sort of humor in your inbox? If you are like most people, then you probably have. Jokes, funny stories, and wierd pictures are some of the most viral hooks on the Internet.

Within your own web site, you can add your own touch of humor. However, you must make sure that it fits with your personality. People on the internet want to see your true self.

Many companies have made their web sites an impersonal void. This is not the way the web works. The Web is an engaging and interactive community of people. When you start giving your web site some personality, people will start taking notice. The ordinary is simply too easy to pass over.

Another key to remember when employing linkbaiting is that your article or news story should almost always link out to leading industry web sites or influential bloggers. There are so many web sites who are afraid to link out to other sites. However, by mentioning other web sites and bloggers, you would be surprised at the number of people who start linking to you.

Bloggers are a group of web masters who realize the power of linking to others. Within the blogoshpere, links are spread willingly to those who provide great content. As a result, they all receive more traffíc than they would alone.

Final Verdict

The term linkbaiting itself may sound a little fishy, but it's not. If you are a good web master, you should always strive for your content to be linkbait. This simply means that your content is of such quality that others simply can't help but link to it.

============================
About The Author

Kim Roach is a staff writer and editor for the SiteProNews & SEO-News newsletters. You can contact Kim at: kim @ seo-news.com

=============================

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds, mywizardads

Article Apart from the "Norm" Worth Reading

2006-07-11T18:31:00.000-07:00

Note from Theresa regarding the following article:

My blog's strong points center around marketing, but when I came across this today reading one of the numerous ezines of a publisher I work with at My Wizard Ads I felt compelled to post it here in this blog. If for no other reason than to spread some sort of "yes there is help" message. This is not my article. It is a reprint (with full permission to freely distribute) written by Angie Lewis (see bio below). What caught my eye was the "setting boundaries." Setting boundaries works in all aspects of one's life. I know because I do it. If you aren't, try! Especially in situations mentioned below, ask yourself... "What do you have to lose?" The answer of course is nothing... but everything to gain! I hope this reprint helps anyone needing this great advice. Again you can thank Angie Lewis.

==================================

Q: Are You Married To An Alcoholic?

A: Are you married to an alcoholic? Is your husband/wife a different person when they drink? Are you tired of the Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde Behavior? Are you at your wits end, and just can’t take it anymore? What can you do?

1. Stop trying to get your husband/wife to stop drinking.

No matter how much you nag and complain at them to stop drinking, it is not going to do a bit of good. What will is taking care of you. I know, it sounds backwards, but when you’re emotionally stressed out, it will be more difficult to help your loved one. You have no verbal power over the alcoholic. What you do have control over is your actions. What you do and say to the alcoholic will have a direct affect on whether or not they will continue drinking or not.

2. Detach with love.

Be loving and supportive of the person you married, not the alcoholic. Don’t take any of the emotional garbage they dish out while drinking. Have you noticed how when your spouse drinks they start to berate you and want to start arguments? Don’t argue or fight back. Let them know you will not argue with them while they are drinking, period.

Above all, never allow the alcoholic to trespass against your spirit when they are playing one of their mind games. Walk away and close the door behind you. Go visit a friend, take a walk around the block, or put some ear plugs in your ears. Your mental health is what helps the alcoholic the most. This is what detaching with love is all about. Detaching yourself from the disease is what helps the alcoholic see that he needs help.

3. Set boundaries

Did you know that the person who takes the verbal abuse of an alcoholic is sometimes just as mentally and emotionally sick as the alcoholic? This is why it is absolutely necessary, especially for spouses of alcoholics, to set boundaries for themselves while the alcoholic is drinking.

Don’t allow their roller coaster emotions to affect you. At least do not let them see that they are affecting you. The alcoholic wants to get a reaction out of you, don’t give them that satisfaction. When they are drinking, treat them like a stranger. Remember, you love the person you married, but you do not love the disease. Don’t be nice to the disease but love the person. Do you understand?

4. Do not enable the alcoholic

Don’t help the alcoholic by enabling their addictive behavior. Don’t help them to bed. Don’t let them drive while drinking. Do not let them argue, fuss or fight with you while they are drinking. Do not talk to them, leave the house or room and shut and lock the door behind you. Do not buy them alcohol, even if they beg you to. Don’t let them drive! Don’t treat them any differently because they have a drinking problem. Don’t give them any special attention while they are drinking.

5. Be supportive when they are sober

When the alcoholic in your life is sober, give them extra special attention. Tell them how much you love them, but not the disease. Talk to them about your new boundaries when they are sober. Write them on the refrigerator so they can’t say they forgot. Basically let them know all the bad and awful things they do to you and the rest of the family while they are drinking. They need to know.

6. Go to Alanon

This is very important when you are living with an alcoholic. This is how you heal yourself from the abuses of the alcoholic. This is where you will meet friends who are going through the same things as you. You are not alone.

7. Pray everyday

Never relent in your silent appeals to God for your spouse’s sobriety. I cannot say enough how important it is to keep a well balanced mind, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually when living with an alcoholic. They can literally tear you apart. I encourage you to seek God for your comfort and encouragement during this difficult time in your life. God answers our incessant appeals for healing. He feels our suffering and pain. Please do not give up hope.

=========================

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Angie Lewis writes on subjects such as love, sex, and intimacy between couples. Her marriage books center on the biblical foundations that God outlines for couples to follow for an exceptional marriage.

Angie writes numerous articles and e-books covering such issues as adultery, addictions, temptation, and forgiveness in marriage. Check out Angie’s website for additional information about her books and online marriage ministry. http://www.heavenministries.com

* * * * *

Keywords: alcoholism, addictions, self help

Featured Article

2006-07-11T10:26:00.000-07:00

"My Emails Are Not Being Delivered.
Black Lists and White Lists Explained "

This article may be reprinted in your ezine or on your site in its entirety so long as the author's credits and all links remain intact.
Please send a copy of your publiction to support@blacklistmonitor.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My Emails Are Not Being Delivered.
Black Lists and White Lists Explained
By Karen Fegarty

Over 40% of all emails within your marketing campaign are not being delivered. You may not even be aware of this, as many ISPs will not send back a bounce message. In fact if you are sending messages to AOL customers, AOL is now blocking over 80% of the messages that come into their servers.

One of the main reasons that this is occurring is that your IP or Domain may be Black Listed. All major ISP's and many corporate email systems now check against Black Lists and will refuse to deliver any emails that come from an IP that is Black Listed.

But what exactly is a Black List?

DNS black lists are lists of domains and IP's that are known to originate Spam. Many anti-spam software programs used by corporations and ISP's use these lists to control Spam by refusing any email that originates from one of these domains or IPs.

Unfortunately there are many instances of false positives as there are few checks and often little objectivity when listing a particular IP. In order for a black list to know that a domain is sending Spam, the offence must be reported . It may take only one report via a web form for you to be listed.

You may be listed maliciously through one complaint of a client, or that of a competitor. Many Black Lists, as well, will list not only the IP that is suspected as spamming, but will list any IPs in that range of addresses. If someone using the same Internet provider as you is accused of spamming and is placed on a Black List, you may be listed as well.

DNS blacklists are usually maintained by anti-spam organizations or by individuals.

What are some of the most popular Black Lists that ISPs are using?

Some of these include:

MAPS - http://www.mail-abuse.com/
Spam Cop - http://www.spamcop.net/
SpamHaus - http://www.spamhaus.org/
SPEWS.org - http://www.spews.org/
ORDB.org - Open Relay Database - http://www.ordb.org/

How do I know if I am on a Black List?

Unfortunately, you really can't be 100% sure if you have been black listed. You may be on someone's black list and not even know it. There are, however, ways to check most of the lists.

One way is to check your server log when sending your campaigns. You will often see an email bounce notice indicating that the message has bounced because you are on a particular black list.

Many of the major black lists also allow you to enter your IP into a form on their site. These checks will tell you whether you appear, or not, on their list.

A useful tool, is the Black List Monitor.
http://www.blacklistmonitor.com

It automatically checks your IP against most of the major Black Lists and tells you which ones you are listed on. It also gives you help in getting removed. All your IPs are constantly monitored for any changes, listings, or delistings.

But what is a White List and how can this help?

Many corporations and ISPs will create a white list. This is a list of trusted IP addresses that they feel confident will not send spam to their customers. If your IP is listed on a particular white list then your email messages will be delivered to the destination email address. It is important for reputable marketers to work with the major ISP's such as AOL to ensure that you are on their white list. For most, it can be a lengthy process, but well worth your efforts.

Other third-party email certification programs now exist. Bonded sender www.bondedsender.com is one such agency. By joining Bonded Sender, senders improve deliverability rates and differentiate their brand. Senders go through a formal application process, adhere to email standards and post a bond against potential complaints. Major ISPs such as MSN/Hotmail now check against Bond Sender's white list and allow these email to pass.

Knowing if you are on a black list, getting removed if you are and getting established on white lists is critical if you are email marketing. The more messages delivered equals more sales!

------------------------
About the Author:

Author Karen Fegarty is with MailWorkZ the creator of Black List Monitor-- advanced service that continuously checks all the major blacklists for you, and then some. Don't be treated unfairly! Keep a handle on who may have you blacklisted. Get a free trial and find out more at http://www.blacklistmonitor.com.

Keywords: email, hosting, advertising, marketing, classifieds

YOUR FREE RSS READER WITH STEP-BY-STEP INSTRUCTIONS

2006-07-04T19:45:00.000-07:00

Date: July 4, 2006
From: Theresa Cahill at My Wizard Ads

You CAN do this... my step-by-step instructions are very easy to follow :)

http://www.tristana.org/download/Setup.exe
(or copy and paste that url into your brower's address bar)

A download window will appear.
Click SAVE

SAVE it to your desktop - or somewhere you can find it easily.

Once your download is done, double click on the icon.

Follow the onscreen instructions to install it onto your own hard drive.

[Note: If you run ZoneAlarm or any firewall, I have already checked
the download with Norton Anti-Virus Professional Version 2006.
It is 100% safe.]

As the installation installs:

CHECK MARK the box to give yourself a Quick Launch and/or Desktop icon.

UNCHECK the box to have it load at startup (saves memory and start up
time when you turn on your computer if you don't mark this box).

OPEN your new RSS reader using the T on your start bar
(bottom blue bar on your desktop)
or by clicking the icon ON your desktop.

Once opened, you'll see that the Tristana reader comes preloaded with some feeds.

If you do NOT want these preloaded feeds:

In the left hand column left-click the first one on the list, then
SHIFT & CLICK the last one on the list. They should now all be highlighted.

Use the "X" icon (delete) on the bar at the top of the reader. Delete them.

Create a folder for My Wizard Ads:
(and each website you visit, you'll stay much more organized that way):

Click on FILE and hold down (top left hand corner)
Choose CREATE FOLDER
Name that Folder - My Wizard Ads
DOUBLE CLICK on the My Wizard Ads folder icon in the left hand column

Click on the "+" (add) icon on the bar at the top of the reader.

Type in (or copy and paste) the following:

http://www.mywizardads.com/category/classifieds.xml
click ADD

http://www.mywizardads.com/category/feed.xml
click ADD

* * * *

Explanation of What You Just Added:

The first set of urls are my own personal rss feeds for the
free bonus classifieds and my articles.

When you click on any url in the TOP window, in the BOTTOM
window is the information posted on the reader. You can opt
to read it right from the bottom window, or choose the HTML
in Browser. The HTML/browser link will open that link in a
new window online.

If the xml files you just added to your My Wizard Ads folder
are not showing, check the url for typos (that would be the
only reason you would not see anything unless the website
is down which rarely happens).

* * * *

You might also choose to add:

http://mwa-classifieds-online.blogspot.com/rss.xml
and/or
http://mywizardads.blogspot.com/rss.xml

These two are really the same as the first two, but are hosted at Google's Blogger.com.

Both "styles" are easy to read.

You're now all set to enjoy your new rss reader.

As you surf around the net, and find other readers you'd like to stay in touch with easily, just open the program and

"+" (add) FOLDERS, OPEN the newly made folder, and
"+" (add) the rss feed displayed on that website.

It really is that easy!

All the best,
Theresa Cahill
www.mywizardads.com

Copyright © 2001-2006
Theresa Cahill
- All Rights Reserved

=====================================

Keywords: rss, advertising, marketing, classifieds

A Brand New Internet World

2006-07-04T11:20:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All Rights Reserved

A while back I heard the statistic that every 20
minutes 400 people begin using the internet for the
very first time.

400 people every 20 minutes... wow.

For the veteran marketer beginning to feel like there
are no new frontiers to conquer, this should provide
hope :)

Granted, it takes a while for those with the
inclination to explore the possibilities of making a
living online to find our little niche on the net.

And for those of us who've been around for a while, it
may seem like we've talked to every potential
customer, client, and interested party.

But... 400 new people every 20 minutes...!

So it's safe to assume... nothing.

For example, this morning my brother-in-law called
from Texas. Though not heavy internet users, he and
his wife have pre-existing experience on the net and
using email. My basic assumption was since they
already were using the net and their email, there
wasn't a lot I could tell them.

I was wrong.

Recently they decided (rightly) that to do business
online they needed to get rid of their old dial-up and
switch to high-speed access (in their case, DSL). This
much-needed switch now allows them to talk on the
phone and walk perspective clients through the signup
process - in the moment. Very basic, very necessary.

They received their new isp's information by mail, and
proceeded to follow what they thought would get them
up and rolling with their email. Unfortunately, this
wasn't the case. What one reads and what one does can
most certainly be two different animals.

Thinking everything was set up correctly, and still not
being able to get their email, they assumed it was a
problem on their "old" end - the dial-up service. Yet,
they are surfing with their DSL, so in essence that
cannot be the problem (though making sure one isn't
still being billed by the old company most definitely
requires follow up).

So we took a look via telephone conversation at their
outlook express account. Boy, what a mess - either the
directions they received were written totally wrong or
(much more likely) they did not understand or follow
said directions "to the T."

After a bit of screen-by-screen, line-by-line input,
voila! outlook express stopped sending "wrong!"
alerts and seemed ready to use. However, when I sent
them a test email, within seconds I received a
nondeliverable message. The message stated,
"Username unknown."

This, of course, indicates that their new isp hadn't a
clue that suchnsuch@suchnsuch.net even existed. When I
last left them - going as far as I could over the
phone - they were going to place a phone call to their
new isp to get the information to gain access to the
isp's member/client area. Inside there, one must first
create the email account in order to use the email
name to receive and send. Basic to most? Sure, but
again, not so basic to them.

The purpose to my not-so-short story? Never assume
anything!

I've two fre.e reports circulating that explain the
basics of both computer use (some not all) and ezine
a.dvertising. When I first put them together I
thought, "Geez, I hope people don't think that..."
(fill in anything you'd like at this point, but be
kind please, *smile!*). I worried that I might insult
someone by leading them step-by-step through what I
perceived as "simple as pie" usage.

But it's just not the case. These reports are
downloaded almost every day by those who need help.

From a marketing viewpoint?

Never assume when you make a contact or send
information or follow up on a lead that the person on
the receiving end has the computer and internet
knowledge sufficient TO follow up on your advice,
help, guidance. And, from their side of the fence,
not knowing means just that... they won't and don't
know enough to even be able to TELL YOU that they
don't know.

It is your responsibility to "feel them out." Ask
questions to assure yourself that they do in fact
have enough internet, marketing, and/or computer
savvy to take your program, product, or service and
run with it.

Ask them pointblank questions like, "Can you? Do you?
Will you?"

Honestly, it's the little things that fall through the
cracks. Stuff as basic (to some of us) as email and
not-so-basic like research and marketing can be a full
and as-yet-unexplored plate for your lead. Just copying
and pasting one of your ads may be too big a task for
your brand new affiliate. Never assume!

Put your service, product, or program in their hands
and not follow up, and you're sure to have one
frustrated, unhappy, and soon to quit individual.

And vice versa of course! Help them to be able to help
themselves and you've not only gained a friend for
life, but have ensured that - with work - they, too,
become marketing pros :)

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

A Basic Analysis of the Free to Join Program

2006-06-26T19:53:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All Rights Reserved

So you've just found that perfect program and you're all
fired up to join!

The greatest part (you say to yourself) is it's not going
to cost me a penny!

You just know in two-weeks time your total investment
of zero dollars is going to net you $1000, $2000, $5000
or more.

That's what the website said.

So great, so wonderful, so... insane.

I don't care what your level of education is, I can almost
guarantee that as early as kindergarten you learned:

Anything x zero = ZERO

Here it is again:

Anything multiplied by 0 equals 0

- zip, zilch, nada.

You cannot possibly hope to make money in return for
never putting any money up front.

Think about how many downlines you have filled to
overflowing with free-to-join memberships. And every one
of those free loaders (oh, I mean members) causes your
own (and their own) downline to sit dead in the water.
You've all missed the point.

The simple law of business says to make money you must
also be willing to spend money.

If you could make money on the net without ever parting
with a dime, don't you think - by now - we would all be
millionaires?

Stands to reason, doesn't it?

So take a good look around you. How many people do you
personally know - not some lame individual on a website
you've never met (or are likely to meet) - but how many
flesh and blood individuals do you know that actually have
become wealthy online BY NOT SPENDING ANY MONEY?

Think you know someone? Think I'm wrong? Then ask that
person... "Okay, so you're wealthy and it didn't 'cost you
a dime' to get that wealth... what did you do to advertise?
How did you find a perfectly free (no setup fees, etc.)
affiliate program? Where do you get your domain names,
web hosting, email accounts, internet connection... etc.,
etc., for absolutely free?"

[If you get a miracle answer... email me!]

Let's face it, we are all guilty. We've joined something
for nothing and that's what we've made... a big fat
nothing.

Repeat after me... "You cannot NOT spend money online
and expect to make money."

It is not possible.

So... the next time you're tempted to "join something
for nothing" (unless it's a free and okay-but-not-great
way to advertise) ask yourself if YOU are ever really
going to upgrade?

If you're not... step aside. Downlines are filled to
overflowing with those that join for the sake of joining
and do nothing. Sure the numbers look good. You've got
220 people under you in some program, and, in over a
year, not a single one of them has - or ever will - upgrade.

ALL programs designed with a join-for-free business
foundation can only exist (and stick around) if their
members get the point of upgrading.

That gets the ball rolling.

Money makes money.

Empty wallets stay empty.

0 x 0 = 0

It's Basic Arithmetic.

====================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds

Should You Be Here?

2006-06-24T20:14:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All Rights Reserved

If you follow any of my articles (and if you do a big thank
you!), you'll know much of my writing comes from business
situations or phone calls or emails or casual conversations.

This is one of those... It actually started as the ravings of
a mad woman, but numerous revisions later I believe I've
got a valid article to present. Something that needs to be
said. Something that must be said.

I started off sitting here pondering what makes people tick,
especially online.

I was muttering to myself, shaking my head... sending out
good thoughts, but mostly shaking my head.

The very first person who put the idea out there that riches
and wealth were just the click of a button away should be...
well it's not kisses and red roses I'm thinking at the moment.

Whoever that person is or was, he or she did one of the
greatest disservices to online mankind - probably the
number-one-of-all-times disservices.

I know the hope of instant wealth runs rampant in most
of our minds. You've probably got your reasons, be they
good reasons or greedy ones. Images of the Publisher's
Clearinghouse van pulling up to the door (even though
you've never entered and never will) dance the sugar-plum
fairy dance in many of our heads.

Most of us know that dreaming is good, but risking
everything is not. Sane people see much more clearly...
and they still dream. Grounded individuals (who can still
be dreamers, too) know the difference.

So what got my goat today?

Human nature and hard luck stories. Recalling the countless
number of times I've been told of the vast amounts of
money people have thrown away pursuing unattainable,
unrealistic (and they are unrealistic) dreams on the net.
People who tell me they are going to be evicted by the
end of the month. Others who are going to lose their
car, their house, their utilities if they "don't make it this
time."

Are you nuts?

I'm a really nice person, I swear to you I am, but I'm also
rational enough to think what in the world are you doing
plopping your buns in front of a computer, wasting even
more money on fruitless ventures, AND paying for an
internet connection if you can't afford to feed your kids
or yourself this month?!

... Sigh

Please be reasonable.

The magic fairy of wealth and happiness is not going to
visit your house before the roof falls in... not this month.
She's personally told me she's too busy to see you.

She does, however, suggest you sell your computer,
disconnect AOL, and get a job.

She also suggests that after your life has settled down,
and you really can afford the internet connection, that
you take a deep breath and enter virtual reality again
with your eyes wide open.

Clear your mind and set yourself some attainable and
realistic goals.

That's the best advice she's got...

Even at this point, will you become the next Bill Gates?
Who knows... I sure don't (and I can tell by her expression
she hasn't a clue either).

But we're both willing to venture that when you put your heart
and soul (and not your last drop of cash) into an endeavor
anything is possible.

But re-enter slowly... cautiously...

Find something that can initially "keep you amused," and
then with luck and hard work you just might turn it into
a profitable business.

Set goals and then take your internet life one day at a time.
Effort and persistence. Start with an initial thought that
paying the water bill this month "will be enough." Work up to
buying your kid a new bike. Plan for a vacation, contribute
to charity... set attainable, happy goals for yourself.
Expand slowly.

Plan, work, plan. Work your plan. Then work some more.

There's nothing wrong with "dreaming big" as long as you
know the difference between dreaming and hurting yourself
or your family pursuing the wrong dream.

Be smart. The net isn't going any place, it will still be here
when you are ready to come back. You'll be happier, and
you and your family will be a whole lot safer.

====================================

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of
My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising
Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for
ezine ad advertising, solo ads,
targeted traffic, and more!

Categories: mywizardads, classifieds, marketing, advertising, ezine, directory, web, internet, pr, media

Keywords: advertising, marketing, classifieds, making money

Social Bookmarking... Confused? You're Not Alone

2006-06-17T15:11:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

The word is out that social bookmarking is the thing, that
special flavor of the month (or year or decade?), but only
by taking it in small steps have I been able to figure out
some of its ins and outs.

The long and short of social bookmarking is, it is a way to save
your Favorites folder (or portions thereof) online. This
means no matter where in the world you happen to be,
as long as you've got a connection to the internet,
you just log into your social bookmarking account and
voila! at your fingertips are all of the important urls you
might find yourself needing - but without access to -
since your computer is sitting home and you're not.

Now that is a good idea! Saves uploading a bunch of
urls to your domain, or remembering to send them to
your Aunt Sally before you visit, on the off chance you'll
need to remember that special something while you're
away.

(By the by, it's also a quick way to actually use your
home computer. I don't know about you, but my Favorites
folder is virtually useless at this point.)

But, there's even more to social bookmarking then easy
access. You can also share this information with others.
Your friends, family, co-workers, subscribers, whoever,
can easily see what you've been uncovering on the
web and decide, at that point, if it's something so useful
and/or interesting that they, too, would like to access it
easily through their own social bookmarking account.

The logical step from there (since I'm assuming that you
are reading this because you, too, are interested in
new ways to market on the net) is to find a way to tie
bookmarking to your service and/or website.

Personally, I'm starting small. I've created my own account:
http://del.icio.us/tdgac

It wasn't hard to signup. Nothing tricky there.

After logging in, I began adding specific pages with specific
tags to the "post" field inside my own account.

The description, tags, url... all make sense. Sure enough
when I hit save, there it is... in my "your favorites" area.

My next step was to make a quick check using the
"recent" url at the upper right hand corner of my own
account. Since I'd only just added my page, I was
anticipating the joy of seeing it posted at the top of
this huge, huge list. Seemed reasonable, right?
Wrong!

Either billions of people are hitting the "save" key at
the very moment I am or I'm sorely missing something.

Hmmmm... definitely confused now.

[I'm positive that at this moment some of you are just
shaking your heads at my extreme ignorance. I can just
picture, too, many more thinking "yipee! I just might
be getting this right now!"

You see there are all sorts of people at all sorts of
stages of understanding - all online at this same
point in time.

Bless those that "get it" right away! And thank heavens
there are a few (like I'm demonstrating right now), that
basically fumble their way around for a bit before it
all starts to "sink in!"

For those of you way ahead of me, thanks for reading!
For those who would like a bit of guidance to get started,
I'm here to help... I hope. We'll fumble along together.]

That said... If this is all new to you, too, head here:
http://del.icio.us/tdgac

You'll see a few urls under the "All tdgac's items."
Beside each of these web page entries are the faint
words "save this."

Put your mouse over the "save this" and click.
If you have an existing del.icio.us account, it will take
you to the log in page for your account (for you
smart ones!). If you don't have an account yet, you'll
be given the opportunity to create one now.

[BTW, give a lot of thought to your username... that's
where the "tdgac" part came from mine LOL, so think
it through first. You'll be stuck with it unless you delete
and recreate your account.]

After creating your account and logging in, you'll see
an area on your screen where http://del.icio.us/tdgac
is shown. There's also a description box, a notes box,
and a "tags" area.

Give yourself something descriptive so you'll remember
who in the world tdgac is... My Wizard Ads or Theresa
Cahill might make a good description.

Hit the save button and voila! You've got the beginnings
of your social bookmarking!

At this point, under your "settings" area (upper right
hand of screen in del.icio.us) you can do any number
of things. Importing your current Favorites folder (or
portions thereof) is available. Explore!

Now that you're on the road to social bookmarking
comes the fun part... telling others what you're doing.

If you have a website, you can easily add (assuming
you do your own webmastering or know the rudiments
of copying and pasting) a "save this page" to any and
all of your important webpages within your site. Use the
"help" link, then read "For Publishers" under the Feeds
and Tools section. That's where you'll find the code.

In addition, you'll want to share you're newly found method
of communication with others. Get your family, friends,
subscribers, mailing list involved in bookmarking your
small chunk (del.icio.us listing) of the social bookmarking
web.

Then, make use of it! Don't just load it up with junk.
If you're a writer and find interesting writer's resources
add them to your account. If you're a news junkie and
track particular newsworthy items, post those!

As you get more and more familiar with social bookmarking,
you'll understand the importance of "tagging" your
information correctly. According to del.icio.us, your
page goes on the front page (I've yet to see any of
mine though) and also is filed away under sub-indexing
using those all-important tags.

I'll admit, I've only just scratched the surface so far.
I don't claim to be an expert (that's obvious), but I
do know that with further education and implementation,
social bookmarking as a marketing tool is definitely worth
the effort.

And... like all new things takes a bit of fumbling around
before we get it right.

So ahead! Get started! See where it leads you - the
next brainstorm idea is only a few minutes (okay
maybe hours or days) away! :)

====================================

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Reference: social bookmarking

YOU HAVE TO THINK LIKE THEM

2006-06-17T11:34:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All Rights Reserved

Target your traffic. Sounds easy doesn't it? Well, think
again.

Just as your text ads and solo advertising must be written
from the other guy's point of view, your selection of
targeted traffic needs this very same attention.

Let's say you've joined a program where the thrust of the
website is marketing tools. You may or may not have joined
because of those tools, but the $100 commission per sale
sure caught your eye.

You sign up and then go looking for targeted traffic.

Your first choice, since you're looking to make money, is
"Income Opportunities." What's wrong with that you ask?
Nothing, for starters, but are you going to leave it at
that?

My question is... What's inside? What incentive does that
person have for joining? What about going after the traffic
in the places where people needing the products and
services reside? What about...

Whoa, let me slow down. The fastest and easiest way I can
make my point is by illustration. So... let's pretend:

You own a website catering to children. You decide now is
the time to target your market. You head for targeted
website visitors. You select, to begin with, Children's
Products.

A good start... but is that it? No!

You could also target:

* Babies
* Clothes
* Crafts & Craft Making
* Costumes & Uniforms
* Family
* Gifts
* Kids Activities, and
* Shopping

to name a few.

But WHY you ask when it's obvious that you sell "Children's
Products?"

The answer is very simple. Your AUDIENCE is the moms and
dads of the world, the grandmothers and grandfathers, aunts
and uncles, cousins, neighbors, godparents, etc.

And what are THEY searching for when they go online? I'm
fairly sure they are also typing in "family gifts," "crafts
for children," "baby clothes," etc.

Targeted website traffic points heavily trafficked expired
domain names in YOUR direction. IF you choose wisely and
choose a broad-range of possibilities, your stream of
traffic can be endless.

Imagine, someone at some time went to a lot of trouble to
get their domain into the search engines, get listed, get
traffic rolling and then, for whatever reason, let it slip
through their fingers.

With the right targeted website traffic service, these
traffic-rich sites can be redirected to point to YOUR
website. You gain all the benefits of someone else's hard
work.

So, just imagine the possibilities! Stop thinking from a
"What can I get out of it" perspective to a "Where are they
hanging out?" point of view.

The list of possibilities is endless when it comes to
traffic.

Stretch your imagination! Come on... you can do it!

====================================

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads, Online Advertising Co-Op, a true one-stop spot for ezine ad advertising, solo ads, targeted traffic, and more!

Keywords: marketing, advertising, traffic, classifieds

Why Call?

2006-06-16T13:45:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright - All rights reserved

This morning my father asked me, "Do people really call you?" and "Why would they call you?"

First, you need to know what I do online, and that is I help connect advertisers with the right advertising choices.

However, he just seemed sort of amazed that someone would pick up the phone to discuss advertising online.

For my part, I can think of several very good reasons why you would – and more importantly should – make that call.

Both new marketers and veteran marketers alike have very good reasons for calling any service first. In order of my personal importance, I would list them as:

1. Where should I start?

2. What should I do to get the most bang from my advertising dollar?

3. What are the benefits to advertising online?

4. Are you a real person or am I throwing my money down the toilet?

I'm sure there are more reasons for calling, but this makes a good starting point.

WHERE SHOULD I START?

If you've never advertised online or have had disappointments advertising online, my suggestion is to always start "small." Funny enough, starting "small" is a very strong way to begin. Lots of people who do call, call about solo advertising when, in fact, they aren't really ready to take that plunge yet (unless you're advertising a great affiliate program with an exceptional solo ad already written for you in your back office).

Classified ads are a great place to begin. Inexpensive, if you shop around, they give you an edge in multiple ways. By limiting your spending, and getting a good "run for your money," classifieds allow you to take your time to test and tweak your message. Through a co-op, sent to a selection or two of ezines at a time, for the right price, you can afford to spend these slight amounts of money to develop your award-winning text.

In addition, more often than not, ezine publishers now archive their issues online. This means after your initial showing in xyz issue, your ad is also archived on their website. Weeks, months, sometimes for years!

HOW TO GET THE BIGGEST BANG FOR THE LEAST AMOUNT?

Take the information in the above section, and combine it with real traffic (visitors not hits), and you've got yourself a winner. This can be done for very little and has a good 30 day run for your money.

Some people like to read ads. Some people really want to see the website. Some do both. By combining your text and visuals, you've accomplished it all.

BENEFITS OF ADVERTISING

This one is pretty basic. If you're marketing online, you've got to advertise - simple. No visitors, no potential customers. You cannot sign up for something or develop something and not tell anyone - not if you hope to make even a tiny living online.

ARE YOU A REAL PERSON

Ah! Now we've reached my most favorite reason for picking up the phone!

Are you for real? This should be the uppermost question in your mind when you're heading toward the "pull out the wallet and buy" aspect to anything online.

We know when we enter the doors of Walmart that Walmart exists. Buying online gives us no such guarantee. However, there are basic things to look for and do prior to spending.

Check the website. Look for addresses, phone numbers, copyright dates (to some extent), ways to get in touch other than just an email address.

Check out the domain using any lookup service - it's free. My personal favorite is www.betterwhois.com. With luck, and assuming the owner of the site hasn't made the information "private" (a very popular thing to do nowadays), you'll glean lots of information from taking those three seconds to check into any particular company.

Then - if you're still in doubt - pick up the phone AFTER checking the website for the location of that company.

On the east coast of the U.S.? Calling the west coast? Subtract three hours. World clocks abound on the net to give you the precise time it is anywhere in the world.

Also, do keep in mind that, like you, many businesses online are run by individuals. While their email is available 24/7, they'd probably appreciate not getting a phone call at 2 a.m. (again use those world clocks).

I just love the convenience being online provides - from banking, to purchases, to starting up a business. It can't be beat! But doing your homework - first - is always the best place to begin.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads. Her job is to make your online advertising experience as effective and effortless as possible!
My Wizard Ads - Online Advertising

Articles also listed at:
EzineArticles.com

Reference:
Marketing
Advertising

Do You Think for Yourself or Do You Just Think You Do?

2006-06-16T12:18:00.000-07:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved

I just got off the phone and, as often happens, theurge to write was like a tidal wave. I get my best inspiration that way :)

Due to this conversation, I'm about to touch onsomething that I did not think I would ever put into print. It just may do one of three things:

1. Inflame you
2. Make you curious
3. Not make a bit of difference to you.

I hope it gets you thinking.

Our topic of conversation initially began abouthealth, swung to marketing, and ended up "saving humanity from itself."

I found myself, to my surprise, on the "odd end" ofthe argument. A stance I never thought I'd take...

The thing is... for years, okay most of my life, I'velived under the shadow that we are destroying the planet we live on and ourselves.

I've heard all the disaster warnings... melting icecaps, air population, ra.ping the land. I believed just like you probably do that we're dooming ourselvesthrough our greed and/or ignorance.

I've read great scientific articles (by great I meaneasy to read and compelling) in various publications that I'd deem overall "trustworthy." The theme is thesame over and over... we're killing ourselves.

However, recently I received an eye opener and it camethrough an unlikely, and probably overlooked, source... a fiction novel.

This work of fiction was just that, pure fiction. Theauthor did not lay claim to presenting anything other than an entertaining story.

Frankly, I struggled with this story for more than7/8th's of the plot. Not because it wasn't gripping enough... it was... but because the evidence providedwent against every grain in my body. My own belief system stood on its head.

And while I desperately wanted to poo-poo the wholething as just a story, the author's researched sources for the varies pieces of "scientific proof" were realand undeniably first rate.
Authentic sources. Real research by real scientists.

I struggled. I just knew that...

“Global warming" is real... right?

You'd be a lunatic not to believe everything that's been thrown at you... right?

I mean big names, big businesses are all telling usthere's a reason for huge concern, why would they steer us wrong... right?

Hmmm...

"Global warming," as it is currently being sold to us, is nothing more than another big business, only this one is cloaked in goodness and light.

Did you know...

For every one person claiming the "sky is falling,"there is a small tidal wave of scientists saying,"Hey, we REALLY DON'T KNOW and "the other side" knows it!"

Do you realize...

That more often than not small "qualifying" statements are inserted into "official" reports - sort of a "just in case all the experiments we ran are faulty (which they aren't) we might be wrong" disclaimers. And these are often picked up as "fact" when the rest of theresearch is more or less thrown out the window.

Anything for a "good cause" right?

Hey, let's face facts. If you want continued funding, and the guys with the checks have a certain viewpoint, doesn't it stand to reason that someone(s) somewhere just might "help" support these preconceived viewpoints? Right or wrong?

I'm not naive. But (duh) it just never occurred to me that people would lie about such a thing. (Okay, yeah I'm naive!)

I tracked down and read many of the "other side"reports. I verified for myself that these sources are as legitimate as the author stated them to be. At this point, science cannot - without a shadow of a doubt -make the claim of global warming.

Definitive proof cannot be produced.

Yikes... My world was extremely shaken, I’ll admit.

Don’t I need a “side” to be on? Won’t I sound like a nut case if I don’t “go with the flow?” Won’t it seem like I don’t care about the planet?

Then I thought… to heck with that!

My conclusion? Think for yourself! Every movement on the face of the planet, regardless of its theme, is motivated more often than not by... money and power(real shocker there, isn't it [sarcasm implied])

It's unfortunate but the way to hold the masses together (read under someone or someone(s) thumb) is through fear. It's quick, gets immediate attention, and almost guarantees compliance.
There's also a HUGE amount of money to be made even under the seemingly "goodness" side of any faction.
Don't get me wrong. I recycle. I don't use fluoride. I take care of myself and my family. I do care about the planet we live on. I think over-fishing the oceans is criminal, etc., etc.

What I've also come to understand is that if I'm willing to "lay claim" to the beliefs of other people without really investigating both sides to an issue, I'm doing a disservice to that very thing I hold dear.

I've abdicated my god-given right to THINK FOR MYSELF. Played right into the hands of those just waiting for a sucker like me.

Causes are good. Good causes are the best. Intelligently participating in any "good cause" is wisest and healthiest. My advice... Don't be a sheep.
======================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of MyWizard Ads.
Her job is to make your online advertising experience
as effective and effortless as possible.
http://www.mywizardads.com
ezine ads, solo ads, target traffic and more

(P.S. Curious? Get Michael Crichton's "State ofFear.")

(P.S.S. For those waiting for my advertising & marketing implication I don’t want to disappoint you. That great program you just have to join could also fall under the “Causes” heading. Research and make informed decisions. Thanks for reading!)

advertising
politics

How to Make Your eZine Work for You Long After It's Published

2006-04-19T18:20:00.000-07:00

If you publish an email newsletter, do you convert the issues to HTML and archive them on your website? If you haven't been doing so, you should start now, today.

To read the rest of the article, please click on the title above.

Time to Regroup? Think Checks Not Charges!

2006-03-06T10:56:00.000-08:00

DOES THIS SOUND LIKE YOU?

If your family is anything like mine, you've probably been in a similar situation. You get all your "time to pay"bills together and think, "Holy Cow!"

Actually, you might not be thinking that exactly - that is not until you get out your handy calculator and add up the outstanding totals on your credit cards. Then, it's entirely possible words of a much stronger flavor come flying out of your mouth!

This was our situation at the beginning of 2006. I won't go into details here, but I can tell you I was utterly flabbergasted. Looking at each bill one at a time every month (and noting a balance that went no where fast) was alarming enough. To actually total up those puppies was a huge shock!

So, we went shopping for a refinance.

Our problem was both my husband and myself are self employed. I've been working at home for about 15 years now. My husband (with over 25 years in construction) has been self-employed only since the beginning of 2005.

Longevity in our professions we have, but his short self-employment record was insufficient for several of the mortgage companies I checked into... that was until ICALLED QuickenLoans.com [see footnote].

Quicken offers a QuickSmart loan.

Having good to excellent credit helps. Having equity in your home is a requirement. With excellent credit and equity, you don't have to send them a single thing. Your good name and appraisal does it all.

The result? Even with a higher loan amount, our mortgage payment increased by less than $100 a month.

Consider carefully that an average $2000 credit card, making only minimum payments each month, will take a person approximately 30 years to get rid of... 30 years!

And we are living proof that making even MORE than the minimum payment still doesn't give you a snowballs chance in h___ of eliminating those balances. Yes, it is totally frustrating!

However, after getting up off our duffs and making the decision to refinance and incorporate our credit cardbills, the benefits are truly outstanding. They include:

1. Obviously no more credit card bills each month!

2. For us, saving over $1600 a month (we made more than the minimum)

3. Applying a SENSIBLE WAY to make use of our cards!

THINK CHECKS NOT CHARGE IT!

This is the exciting section.

It's not just the joy of not supporting the billion dollar a day credit card industry, but it's also about using your card(s) WISELY!

For our family, everyone carrying a debit card or a checkbook would be a huge mistake. So, what we do now is use our cards AS IF we were carrying checks. AS SOON AS a charge is put on any card, I receive a phone call from hubby and immediately log into our online banking. From there, I "cover the check." This way NO balance is ever built up - we do NOT wait until the end of their billing cycle (thereby allowing them to include their outrageous finance charges).

Several times a month, and I don't care how many times, the"check is most definitely in the mail" to cover gas charges and other purchases.

Obviously, to make this work and avoid going back into debt, you MUST APPLY this protocol! You must garner self-discipline. If you don't have the cash in your checking account, do NOT charge anything until you do!

Almost every analyst out there is recommending, urging actually, the consumer to refinance - especially if your home mortgage is an ARM.

Find the mortgage company that is right for you, include your cards into the loan, and then BE SMART ... now and always!

The credit card companies are rich enough. It's your turn!

* * * * * * *
[footnote]

While we will definitely use QuickenLoans for any future transactions, shop around for the best company for your needs. However, QuickenLoans was remarkable. By speaking directly with a mortgage banker we were was able to find the perfect loan for us. They took ALL the information they would need for the Smart Loan in under 20 minutes, and within the hour we'd digitally signed everything online. It took less than 25 days to close this loan without a hitch.

======================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads. Her job is tomake your online advertising experience as effective andeffortless as possible. http://www.mywizardads.com/

Disruptive Technologies by Glenn Grundberg

2006-03-04T16:07:00.000-08:00

From the emini course: "VOIP: the Future is Now!"

"A disruptive technology is a new technological innovation,product, or service that eventually overturns the existingdominant technology in the market...

Click on the Title Above to Read the Rest of the Article

The SMART Way to Set Goals

2006-03-03T11:17:00.000-08:00

Goal setting is equal parts art and science. Many people create goals that simply don’t work. If you’re in business...

Read the rest of this article by clicking on the title above.

* * * * * * * *

And don't forget that My Wizard Ads offers some of the best forms of advertising and promoting online... for pennies on the dollar! Don't get ripped off - we are a HARD WORKING co-op here for YOUR success!

Land of the Free?

2006-02-28T08:26:00.000-08:00

by Theresa Cahill
Copyright 2006
All Rights Reserved

February 25, 2006 - Let me begin by making the statement that the issues below deal specifically with the United States, butI personally feel they apply to the world as a whole. Individuals make up this planet, and we have responsibilities.

This article is such a deviation from my typical writing, but some things just need to be said or a person will go crazy.

Here we, the citizens of the United States, sit on what should be a peaceful Saturday morning with our fate in the hands of those that hold only TEMP JOBS in Washington, D.C.

The latest development?

The current administration [secretly] is selling off the security rights to our major U.S. ports:

Miami, New York, Philadelphia, New Jersey, Baltimore, NewOrleans

Sure enough, "the Bush administration approved the ports deal last month"(1) giving up control of our major harbors to the United Arab Emirate (UAE).

How does that grab you???

It should tear your heart out and make you break out in a cold sweat!

Our country is supposed to be based on the premise that"we the people" make the decisions. The Declaration of Independence (the men that signed that 200+ years ago must be rolling over in their graves!) clearly states that those in a position to act MUST act. It's not referring to the temp job holders in Washington, D.C., and various States and counties - it refers to US, the citizens, the individuals comprising this country.

I've been on this planet for about a half a century now, and the one thing I've always (tried) to believe is that we the people have the right to speak up and defend what is right for ALL OF US.

Do we just continue to sit by and let the temp workers of our nation dictate our fate? Are we afraid of reprisal? Or are we just so lazy we'll leave our lives in the hands of others?

Shock, disgust, disappointment, fear - these must be overcome and "we the people" need to get a grip and voice our opinions.

You have the right to be heard. You have the responsibility to be heard. Contact your government representatives on this, and EVERY issue.

If we don't, we give up our rights and the rights of future generations.

Freedom... is it just a hollow word?

* * * * *
(1) Las Vegas Review Journal, "Bush might delay ports deal"Friday, February 24, 2006

======================================
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Theresa Cahill is the owner of My Wizard Ads. Her job is to make your online advertising experience as effective and effortless as possible.
My Wizard Ads

Read her other articles at the website or
Ezine Articles.com

Have You Lost Your Focus?

2006-02-28T08:22:00.000-08:00

by Jude Wright

I believe that one of the key causes of failure of online businesses in their first year is the lack of focus by the owner...

Read the full article by clicking on the title above.
Enjoy!