Muscle Marketing - The Ultimate Internet Marketing Blog

Boost your online sales: eComm tips and tricks

2012-01-04T13:12:00.000-05:00

I've published this next article before, but still get many emails about it. If you've read it, please re-read, as you may learn something new. If this is your first time reading it, don't take the following recommendations for granted. They may seem simplistic, but they DO most definitely impact your online conversion rate. The current economic environment has been hard on both brick and mortar & online sales. But there are a few simple, yet powerful, things you could do to boost online sales and gain loyal customers.

1. Make Sure Your SSL Seal is Prominent. SSL or secure socket layer is a sign that the site is encrypted...that the information consumers enter, such as personal and credit card information, is protected. Most eCommerce sites must file for an SSL certificate from vendors such as VeriSign, GoDaddy, eTrust, TRUSTe, and others. It's a good practice to display the vendors logo on your order page, as well as make sure in the browser window the "https" or image of a lock is present. This is a clear and comforting sign to consumers that they can order on line with confidence.

2. Encourage Online Sales vs. Other Order Mechanisms. Offer special "Internet Only Pricing" to customers. It could be a discount of 5-10%. This reduces any potential overhead costs for staffing fees such as telesales or order entry personnel.

3. Offer Free Shipping. Many eTailers already factor shipping into their published price, so when there's a big, flashing banner next to the item saying "free shipping" it gives consumers that extra little push to move forward with the transaction. It boils down to basic psychology. Everyone likes to feel like they're getting something for free.

4. Use Buyer Feedback To Your Advantage. Have an area on your website or next to select items that says "Customer Favorite" or "Hot Item". Also, have some glowing customer testimonials next to the product for potential prospect to see. Consumers like to feel good about the item they are about to purchase. To see a great testimonial and knowing that others purchased the product is a validation and comforting feeling. In addition to helping the conversion, this tactic also helps reduce buyer's remorse and product returns.

5. Advertise Products in Google Product Search (formerly Froogle). http://www.google.com/shopping is a free product information platform from Google where you can post a single item or submit a data feed. Your products will appear in Google Product search and may also appear in Google.com search results, depending on keywords used.

6. Make Sure Your Product Pages are Optimized for Search Engines. After doing some keyword research on actual search behavior for your product, refine your meta description, meta keywords and title tag of your product pages. This will help consumers find your product in the organic listing of search engine results.

7. Have a Special Coupon Code Banner on Your Home Page. This is a best practice with online fashion retailers. There's typically a banner ad on their home page stating something like, "Summer Blow Out Sale, Use Coupon Code 1234". This is another great way to offer a special discount for your online customers that makes them feel good about the purchase. You can also encourage viral activity by having a "forward to friend" text link that opens a MSOutlook email window with the coupon or coupon code. Make sure to have some great intro copy mentioning how customers should "pass on the great savings to friends, family, and colleagues."

8. Consider Payment Plans. For your higher ticket items, consider setting up extended payment plans that allows customers to pay for an item over a few payments. If an item is let's say, $200, you might want to offer a flex pay of "6 easy payments of $33.33" that is conveniently auto-billed to their credit card. Just be diligent when calculating your payment prices as well as creating your return/refund policy for these items. The general rule is that your actual production costs/hard costs should be covered in the first 1-3 payments.

Remember to keep testing methods that help improve sales and drive prospects to your storefront. Make note of when you implement new tactics, such as the above, and then after a month of being live, compare sales results year-over-year to see if you found the sweet spot in your eCommerce efforts. I'm confident that you will see an improvement in online sales.

12 Things You Must Do To Grow Your Biz For Free or Cheap

2012-01-04T13:07:00.003-05:00

Ok, so 2011 was a tough year for a lot of business owners. Perhaps you got caught in the maelstrom of economic uncertainty and your business paid the price either by being neglected with marketing or duped by so-called online gurus who promise the world with their wonder products, which ultimately only benefit one person - them. Certain marketing tactics are tried and true because they work year after year, decade after decade. They're proven. And they get results.

But for some strange reason, I can't figure out for the life of me why someone would pay hundreds, or even, thousands of dollars to learn something that is already out there for free and given a new, jazzy name. Today, I going to go over some proven winners to help create visibility, drive website traffic, increase sales, generate leads and produce buzz for the low, low price of F-R-E-E (or cheap). These are low to no cost tactics that fit most any budget and most any business niche. All you really need is the time or resources (manpower) to implement them. And the few that do involve a budget, are extremely cost effective. Without further ado...

Affiliate Partnerships/Affiliate Marketing Plan. This includes JVs (joint ventures), affiliate marketing, guest editorials, and editorial contributions. This tactic is extremely effective and cost efficient. The key here is having some kind of leverage then approaching publishers that may want your content or a cross-marketing opportunity to your current list (note: this only works if you have a list of decent size another publisher will find attractive). In exchange for content or revenue share efforts, you and the other publisher agree to reciprocate either eNews ads or solo emails to each other's lists, thereby sending a message to a target, relevant list for free. Well, if you agree on a rev share, it's free as far as ad costs, but you are giving that publisher a split of your net revenues. In addition, you can create a robust affiliate program offering a competitive commission and incentive program as well as using cost-effective, off-the-shelf or WordPress-based affiliate tracking software. The key here is PR, getting the news out about your program to as many targeted locations as possible.

Content Syndication. I've written about this many times, but can't stress it enough. Content is king and you can leverage it via my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM, which is the focus of my best-selling book (formerly the #1 web marketing book on Amazon!), "Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web For Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz". SONAR is an organic (free) online strategy that is powerful and proven. It's a method of repurposing and synchronizing content (albeit text, audio, video) distribution into various, targeted channels. And it allows companies, publishers, entrepreneurs ... basically anyone with content on their website ... the ability to ultimately turn traffic into sales. SONAR represents the following online distribution platforms:S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sitesO Online press releasesN Network (social) communitiesA Article directoriesR Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and bulletin boards. SONAR works hand-in-hand with your existing search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), and search engine optimization (SEO) tactics.
If you have original content ... you can do SONAR marketing!

Search Engine Optimization. In order to drive as much organic traffic as possible to your website you need to make sure your site is optimized for the correct keywords and your target audience. Once you optimize your site with title tags, meta descriptions, and meta keywords, you need to make sure you have revised your site to harness the traffic that will be coming. That means adding eye-catching email collection boxes to home page, relevant banners, and obvious links to get to product pages. You don't want to miss any opportunity to turn traffic in to sales or free newsletter subscribers. Done your SEO already? Great, but you need to review your analytics and visitor usage patterns, keyword history and more and refine keywords quarterly.

Online Lead Generation Polls. Incorporating a poll on your website, or having a poll on another site or eNewsletter (via a media buy or ad swap) is a great way to build your list. It's important to spend time thinking about your poll question - something that a hot topic, controversial, and relevant to the locations you're placing your poll. You want to pull people in with your headline and make the poll entertaining. Your answers should be multiple choice and have an "other" field which encourages participant to engage with your question. I've found this "other" field as a fantastic way to make the poll interactive. Many people are passionate about certain subject matters and won't mind giving you their two cents. Then to show appreciation for talking the poll, tell participants they are getting a bonus report and free eNewsletter subscription (which they can opt out of at any time). And of course, make sure to mention - and link to - your privacy/anti spam policy. After you kick off your list building efforts, make sure you start tracking them so you can quantify the time and resources spent. This involves working with your webmaster on setting up tracking URLs specific to each website you're advertising on. It also means looking at Google Analytics for your website and corresponding landing pages to see traffic and referring page sources.

Viral Marketing. Make sure you have a "forward to friend" feature in your eNewsletter to encourage viral marketing. It's also important to have a content syndication blurb in your newsletter, this also encourages other websites, publishers, editors and so forth to republish your content as long as they give you author attribution and a back-link to your site. In addition, the SONAR model above incorporates viral buzz in its strategy, so deploying SONAR will help you increase your website visibility and reach.

Cost Effective Media Buying. To compliment your "free" online efforts, you may want to consider targeted, low cost media buys (paid online advertising) in the form of text ads, banner ads, blog networks/ads, or list rentals (i.e. eNews sponsorships or solo emails). You're paying for the placement in these locations, so you must make sure you have strong promotional copy and offer for the best results possible. Blog ad networks and online ad networks are a great, cheap alternative and they have a wider reach. Networks to consider: Advertising.com, ValueClick.com, BurstMedia.com, and FastClick.com. You can find a full list of sites here: http://www.imediaconnection.com/resourceconnection/adnetwork.asp.

Pay Per Click (PPC). Many people try pay per click only to spend thousands of dollars with little results. Creating a successful PPC campaign is an art - one that I've had success with. If PPC is new for you, then don't start out with the big guys like Google or Yahoo, run your 'test' campaign on smaller, second tier networks. In addition, you must make sure you have a strong text ad and landing page and that the ad is keyword dense. You must also have a compelling offer and make sure you do your keyword research. Picking the correct keywords that coincide with your actual ad and landing page is crucial. You don't want to pick keywords that are too vague, too competitive, or unpopular. You also need to be active with your campaign management which includes bid amounts and daily budget. All these things - bid, budget, keywords, popularity, and placement - will determine the success of the campaign. And most campaigns are trial and error and take anywhere from 3-6 weeks to optimize.

Free Teleseminars or Webinars. These are a great way to collect names for list building, then cross-sell to those names once they're in your sales funnel. You can use services like FreeConferenceCall.com, where it's a toll (not toll free) call. But in my experience, if the value proposition of the subject matter is strong, people will pay that nominal fee. Promote a free teleseminar or webinar to prospects (that is not your internal list). Remember, this is for lead generation. So your goal is to give away valuable information in exchange for an email address. You can have a 'soft sell' at the end of the call and follow up with an email blast within 24 hours. But the most important thing is getting that name THEN bonding with them through your editorial.

Free Online classified ads. Using http://www.craigslist.org/ or similar high traffic classified sites is a great way to sell a product or get leads. The trick is geo-targeting, picking the right location to run your ad in. Picking the right category. As well as creating an ad that is persuasive and powerful. Ads are free, so why not test it out. For a full list of states and cities, check out: http://www.craigslist.org/about/sites.

Reciprocal Ad Swaps. One of the best kept secrets in the industry. Some of your best resources will be your fellow publishers. This channel often gets overlooked by marketers who don't give it the respect it deserves. In the work I do for my clients, I spend a good portion of my time researching publishers and websites in related, synergistic industries. I look for relevant connections between their publications (print and online) and my clients. Let's say I come across a natural health e-letter about that has a list of readers similar in size to one of my clients, who is a supplement manufacturer. Since many of their audience share similar interests, cross marketing each other products (or even lead gen efforts) can be mutually rewarding. Swapping ads will save you money on lead-generation initiatives. Since you won't be paying for access to the other publisher's list of subscribers, you can get new customers for free. The only "cost" is allowing the other publisher to access your own list. It's a win-win situation. This technique also opens the door to potential joint-venture opportunities.

Snail Mail. Direct mail is still a consumer favorite - and another good way to get your sales message out. It can be especially effective used in concert with another effort, such as an e-mail campaign. A recent survey published in DM News indicated that 70 percent of respondents preferred receiving unsolicited correspondence via mail vs. e-mail. As with any marketing medium, though, you can end up paying a lot between production costs, list rental costs, and mail shop/postage costs. The most costly direct-mail packages are magalogs and tabloids (four-color mailers that look like magazines). However, 6 x 9 postcards, tri-fold self-mailers, and simple sales letters are three low-cost ways of taking advantage of this channel. Note that copy, list selection and geo-targeting an be crucial for direct mail success no matter which cost-effective mail format you pick. Although 100 percent ROI (return on investment) is what you should aim for, many direct mailers are content with 80 percent. This lower figure takes into consideration the lifetime value of the names that come in from this channel, because they are typically reliable buyers in the future.

Print Ads. This is another channel that's gets a raw deal. One reason is because it can be costly. To place an ad in a high-circulation magazine or newspaper, you could shell out serious money. But you don't need a big budget to take advantage of print ads. If you don't have deep pockets, consider targeted newspapers and periodicals. Let's say you're selling an investment report. Try using the Internet to research the wealthiest cities in America. Once you get that list, look online for local newspapers in those communities. These smaller newspapers hit your target audience... and offer a much cheaper ad rate than some of the larger, broad-circulation publications. You end up getting quality rather than quantity. I once paid for an ad in a local newspaper in Aspen, CO that had a flat rate of less than $500. My ROI on this effort turned out to be more than 1,000 percent. How's that for a positive response rate! Most important rule: Know your audience...that will determine placement (and price).

2012: The Year of Content (Article) Marketing

2012-01-04T09:41:00.000-05:00

It’s been said that 2012 is going to be the year of content and social marketing. According to recent articles by Target Marketing and Forbes, “…content marketing and social media marketing should be part of your 2012 marketing strategy”.

January, 4, 2012 Palm Beach Gardens, FL (Free-Press-Release.com) It’s been said by marketers and publishers alike that 2012 is going to be the year of social marketing and content (article) marketing. According to recent articles by Target Marketing and Forbes, “…content marketing and social media marketing should be part of your 2012 marketing strategy”.

Content marketing has been a staple to seasoned Fortune 500 marketer and bestselling author, Wendy Montes de Oca, who’s book, ‘Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz’ [Que Publishing, Paperback, ISBN# 0789741083 http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0789741083], hit #1 on Amazon bestseller list for web marketing books back in September.

In addition, Montes de Oca has created a proven, organic strategy called The SONAR Content Distribution Model TM, which is the focus of her book, and a powerful, method of repurposing and synchronizing release of original content it into targeted, free online channels.

According to Montes de Oca, “SONAR marketing is more comprehensive then article marketing and has extended reach … it’s like article marketing on steroids. SONAR is a systematic, methodical strategy which includes several no-cost, high performing online channels including syndicate partners, online press release distribution, network (social) communities, article directories, and relevant posts to forums, blogs and message boards.”

Montes de Oca adds, “I’ve been using SONAR for years and leveraging original content through this manner is extremely beneficial for a business owner or publisher and utilizes ‘white hat’ search engine marketing techniques. It’s helped create noticeable and measurable website traffic, relevant back-links, improved search engine visibility and rank, increased market presence, and even helped generate leads, sales and buzz.”

The SONAR Content Distribution Model TM and ‘Content Is Cash’ centers around the synchronized strategy of using great, original content that is ‘UVA’ (useful, valuable, and actionable), which business owners and publishers have already created, then repurpose and distribute it into targeted, relevant locations on the Web, based on target audience and business objectives.

Montes de Oca continues, “So many marketers are recognizing the power of content marketing (and social marketing) because it’s cost effective and easy to use. And in the current economic environment, business owners are looking for free and creative ways to create more visibility and traffic for their website.”

She concludes, “I’m utterly thrilled content marketing is finally getting the attention and respect it deserves. Content really is king. Creating solid, original content will first and foremost provide valued information to readers and encourage bonding; but it can also help the publisher with website exposure and visits. That increased traffic can then be harnessed for online product sales, advertising sales, and more. And best of all, this strategy can be used for virtually any business, in any niche, with any budget … all that’s needed is the content!”

For more information visit http://precisionmarketingmedia.com/book/wendy-book.html.

About Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA
Ms. Montes de Oca’s diversified background includes nearly 20 years of experience in direct response and online marketing, media, publishing, financial services and law. She’s worked for renowned publishers and Fortune 500 companies. Ms. Montes de Oca is an Internet marketing expert with a proven track record for both acquisition and retention efforts. During her career, she has generated over $150 million in total revenues for various corporations, consulting clients, and her own consulting firm, Precision Marketing and Media, LLC.

Want To See What's Inside Bestseller, Content Is Cash?

2011-12-06T10:42:00.002-05:00

If you haven't had a chance to read the Internet marketing bestseller, Content is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing], then check out the full Table of Contents.

Then you can decide if there's information in the book that appeals to you.

Take a sneak peek here: http://books.google.com/books?id=ANR1dLr3aeAC&pg=PR10&lpg=PR10&dq=content+is+cash+table+of+contents&source=bl&ots=g6ZtFcGen8&sig=g_MXb-cgMhXKAMymRqNUFgbLi1g&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

Internet Marketing Bestseller, Content Is Cash, By Wendy Montes de Oca, On Amazon Top 100 List For Ten Weeks

2011-12-06T10:16:00.003-05:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

CONTACT: Precision Marketing and Media

media@precisionmarketingmedia.com

http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/

Internet Marketing Bestseller, Content Is Cash, By Wendy Montes de Oca, On Amazon Top 100 List For Ten Weeks And Focuses On Leveraging Great Content And the Web

December, 6, 2011 Palm Beach Gardens, FL Looking for proven, powerful and cost-effective ideas to get the most out of great content? ‘Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz’ [Que Publishing, Paperback, ISBN# 0789741083 http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0789741083], by Fortune 500 and top publishing marketer, Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA, contains the formula for online success for virtually any business in any niche.

Content Is Cash has been on the Amazon ‘top 100’ best seller list for more than 10 weeks since it’s August publication date. The book hit #1 and #5 simultaneously in Internet Marketing (Kindle and paperback, respectively), #13 in Business and Culture, and #1,806 in Amazon’s entire universe of over 8,000,000 books on September 26, 2011. Content Is Cash was featured by Newsmax.com and Target Marketing Magazine as well as being on Website Magazine’s ‘Hot Reads for Web Marketer’s’ list and PracticalEcommerce.com’s ‘25 Top-Selling eCommerce Books in August 2011’.

Content Is Cash describes several high-performing, organic (free) strategies which are part of a comprehensive, systematic method known as the SONAR Content Distribution Model, to help increase website traffic, visibility, and more. SONAR marketing is similar to article (content) marketing, but more comprehensive and has an extended reach.

According to Montes de Oca, “The book centers around a synchronized strategy of using great, original content that is ‘UVA’ (useful, valuable, and actionable) which business owners and publishers have already created, then repurposing and distributing it to targeted, relevant locations on the Web, based on target audience and business objectives”.

She continues, “SONAR represents five organic online channels: S (Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites), O (Online press releases), N (Network [social] communities, social bookmarking sites), A (Article directories) and R (Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and message boards).”

Content Is Cash has received praise from some of the most respected marketers, publishers, and entrepreneurs in the industry including Michael Masterson, Bob Bly, Martin Weiss, Ph.D., Marc Charles, MaryEllen Tribby, Brian Edmondson, Conrad Hall, Dr. Jonny Bowden, and more.

Says Montes de Oca, “The book has been embraced by consumers and colleagues alike. I think what resonates with people is this powerful, yet easy-to-implement strategy which leverages great content for virtually no cost. And in the current economic environment, business owners are looking for free and creative ways to create visibility and website traffic for their business.”

She concludes, “It really is all about the power of great content and that content is king.
Creating solid, original content will first and foremost provide valued information to its readers and encourage bonding; but it can also help the publisher (business owner) with increased website exposure and visits. That increased traffic can then be harnessed for online product sales, advertising sales, and more.”

Content Is Cash is available at Amazon.com, QuePublishing.com, BarnesandNoble.com other book retailers and e-tailers world-wide.

For more information visit http://precisionmarketingmedia.com/book/wendy-book.html.

About Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA
Ms. Montes de Oca’s diversified background includes nearly 20 years of experience in direct response and online marketing, media, publishing, financial services and law. She’s worked for renowned publishers and Fortune 500 companies. Ms. Montes de Oca is an Internet marketing expert with a proven track record for both acquisition and retention efforts. During her career, she has generated over $150 million in total revenues for various corporations, consulting clients, and her own consulting firm, Precision Marketing and Media, LLC.

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Turn Your Website into a Powerful eCommerce Machine

2011-11-22T12:39:00.001-05:00

The current economic environment has been hard on both brick and mortar & online sales. But there are a few simple, yet powerful, things you could do to boost online sales and gain loyal customers.

1. Make Sure Your SSL Seal is Prominent. SSL or secure socket layer is a sign that the site is encrypted…that the information consumers enter, such as personal and credit card information, is protected. Most eCommerce sites must file for an SSL certificate from vendors such as VeriSign, GoDaddy, eTrust, TRUSTe, and others. It’s a good practice to display the vendors logo on your order page, as well as make sure in the browser window the “https” or image of a lock is present. This is a clear and comforting sign to consumers that they can order on line with confidence.

2. Encourage Online Sales vs. Other Order Mechanisms. Offer special “Internet Only Pricing” to customers. It could be a discount of 5-10%. This reduces any potential overhead costs for staffing fees such as telesales or order entry personnel.

3. Offer Free Shipping. Many eTailers already factor shipping into their published price, so when there’s a big, flashing banner next to the item saying “free shipping” it gives consumers that extra little push to move forward with the transaction. It boils down to basic psychology. Everyone likes to feel like they’re getting something for free.

4. Use Buyer Feedback To Your Advantage. Have an area on your website or next to select items that says “Customer Favorite” or “Hot Item”. Also, have some glowing customer testimonials next to the product for potential prospect to see. Consumers like to feel good about the item they are about to purchase. To see a great testimonial and knowing that others purchased the product is a validation and comforting feeling. In addition to helping the conversion, this tactic also helps reduce buyer’s remorse and product returns.

5. Make Sure Your Product Pages are Optimized for Search Engines. After doing some keyword research on actual search behavior for your product, refine your meta description, meta keywords and title tag of your product pages. This will help consumers find your product in the organic listing of search engine results.

6. Have a Special Coupon Code Banner on Your Home Page. This is a best practice with online fashion retailers. There’s typically a banner ad on their home page stating something like, “Summer Blow Out Sale, Use Coupon Code 1234”. This is another great way to offer a special discount for your online customers that makes them feel good about the purchase. You can also encourage viral activity by having a “forward to friend” text link that opens a MSOutlook email window with the coupon or coupon code. Make sure to have some great intro copy mentioning how customers should “pass on the great savings to friends, family, and colleagues.”

7. Consider Payment Plans. For your higher ticket items, consider setting up extended payment plans that allows customers to pay for an item over a few payments. If an item is let’s say, $200, you might want to offer a flex pay of “6 easy payments of $33.33” that is conveniently auto-billed to their credit card. Just be diligent when calculating your payment prices as well as creating your return/refund policy for these items. The general rule is that your actual production costs/hard costs should be covered in the first 1-3 payments.

Remember to keep testing methods that help improve sales and drive prospects to your storefront. Make note of when you implement new tactics, such as the above, and then after a month of being live, compare sales results year-over-year to see if you found the sweet spot in your eCommerce efforts. I’m confident that you will see an improvement in online sales.

9 Great Ways to Build Your List

2011-11-22T12:35:00.001-05:00

Whether you're an entrepreneur, corporation, or publisher - the power of the "lead" is critical in growing your business. Leads, also known as prospects, are typically the entry level point of the sales funnel.

A popular business model by many online publishers is to bring in leads at the free level (i.e. free report, free newsletter, free webinar), then add those names to their "list" and usually over the course of 30 - 90 days (the bonding time) that lead will convert into a paying customer. This practice is known as lead generation, name collection or list building efforts.

Today, I'm going to share with you some proven online marketing methods I've used and had great success with at some of the top publishers in America. And bonus ... many of these tactics are little or no cost!Here's the list, in no particular order:

1. Teleseminar or Webinar. This is a great way to collect names. Promote a free teleseminar or webinar to prospects (that is not your internal list). Remember, this is for lead generation, not bonding. So your goal is to give away valuable information in exchange for an email address. The trick is to promote the event in as many places as possible without incurring advertising costs.

2. Co Registration. Co Reg is another way to collect names, but involves a nominal fee. Co Reg is when you place a small ad on another publisher's site after some sort of transaction (albeit a sales or lead gen offer). So for instance, after someone sign s up to AOL Travel eNewsletter, a Thank You page comes up with a list of sponsors the reader may find interesting as well - other free eNewsletter offers. The text ad is usually accompanied by a small graphic image representing the sponsor. The key here is to pick publishers and Co Reg placements that are synergistic to your publication and offer. Another important note is to make sure you follow up quickly to these names so they don't forget who you are. I suggest a dedicated autoresponder series. Co Reg efforts can cost you around $1 - $3 per valid email address.

3. Affiliate Partnerships. This includes JVs (joint ventures), affiliate marketing, guest editorials, editorial contributions, and reciprocal ad swaps. This tactic is extremely effective and cost efficient. The key here is having some kind of leverage then approaching publishers that may want your content or a cross-marketing opportunity to your current list (note: this only works if you have a list of decent size another publisher will find attractive). In exchange for content or revenue share efforts, you and the other publisher agree to reciprocate either eNews ads or solo emails to each other's lists, thereby sending a message to a target, relevant list for free. Well, if you agree on a rev share, it's free as far as ad costs, but you are giving that publisher a split of your net revenues.

4. Content Syndication. I've written about this many times, but can't stress it enough. Content is king and you can leverage it via my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM . SONAR is a cost effective, yet powerful, method of repurposing and synchronizing content (albeit text, audio, video) distribution into various, targeted channels. And it allows companies, publishers, entrepreneurs ... basically anyone with content on their website ... the ability to ultimately turn traffic into sales. SONAR represents the following online distribution platforms:
S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites
O Online press releases
N Network (social) communities
A Article directories
R Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and bulletin boards. SONAR works hand-in-hand with your existing search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), and search engine optimization (SEO) tactics.

5. Search Engine Optimization. In order to drive as much organic traffic as possible to your website you need to make sure your site is optimized for the correct keywords and your target audience. Once you optimize your site with title tags, meta descriptions, and meta keywords, you need to make sure you have revised your site to harness the traffic that will be coming. That means adding eye-catching email collection boxes to home page, relevant banners, and obvious links to get to product pages. You don't want to miss any opportunity to turn traffic in to sales or free newsletter subscribers.

6. Media Buying. To compliment your "free" online efforts, you may want to consider targeted, low cost media buys (paid online advertising) in the form of text ads, banner ads, blog ads, or list rentals (i.e. eNews sponsorships or solo emails). You're paying for the placement in these locations, so you must make sure you have strong promotional copy and offer for the best results possible. If you're thinking about buying online ads and want to make sure you get the best rates around, then check out my new ebook, Muscle Media: The Complete Guide to Buying Online Ads For Less.

7. Pay Per Click (PPC). Many people try pay per click only to spend thousands of dollars with little results. Creating a successful PPC campaign is an art - one that I've had success with. You must make sure you have a strong text ad and landing page and that the ad is keyword dense. You must also have a compelling offer and make sure you do your keyword research. Picking the correct keywords that coincide with your actual ad and landing page is crucial. You don't want to pick keywords that are too vague, too competitive, or unpopular. You also need to be active with your campaign management which includes bid amounts and daily budget. All these things - bid, budget, keywords, popularity, and placement - will determine the success of the campaign. And most campaigns are trial and error and take anywhere from 3-6 weeks to optimize.

8. Viral Marketing. Make sure you have a "forward to friend" feature in your eNewsletter to encourage viral marketing. It's also important to have a content syndication blurb in your newsletter, this also encourages other websites, publishers, editors and so forth to republish your content as long as they give you author attribution and a back-link to your site. In addition, the SONAR model above incorporates viral buzz in its strategy, so deploying SONAR will help you increase your website visibility and reach.

9. Polls. Incorporating a poll on your website, or having a poll on another site or eNewsletter (via a media buy or ad swap) is a great way to build your list. It's important to spend time thinking about your poll question - something that a hot topic, controversial, and relevant to the locations you're placing your poll. You want to pull people in with your headline and make the poll entertaining. Your answers should be multiple choice and have an "other" field which encourages participant to engage with your question. I've found this "other" field as a fantastic way to make the poll interactive. Many people are passionate about certain subject matters and won't mind giving you their two cents. Then to show appreciation for talking the poll, tell participants they are getting a bonus report and free eNewsletter subscription (which they can opt out of at any time). And of course, make sure to mention - and link to - your privacy/anti spam policy.After you kick off your list building efforts, make sure you start tracking them so you can quantify the time and resources spent. This involves working with your webmaster on setting up tracking URLs specific to each website you're advertising on. It also means looking at Google Analytics for your website and corresponding landing pages to see traffic and referring page sources.

When deploying social media or SONAR tactics, it's important to look at which sites are linking back to you. You can check this with several free back-link tools such as http://seopro.com.au/free-seo-tools/link-checker/ , http://www.iwebtool.com/backlink_checker , http://www.backlinkwatch.com/index.php . As well as set Google Alerts for related keywords to your marketing efforts. You'll then be notified when someone republishes your content as well as general buzz about you.

This will get your visitor's attention every time...

2011-11-22T12:33:00.000-05:00

Whether your goal is cross-selling or lead generation, interstitials are a great way to get someone's attention. An interstitial is not a pop up ad. And typically doesn't get blocked, like pop up ads, by many website or search engines. (For example, Google Adwords won't approve an PPC campaign if the redirect URL goes to a website that has pop up ads).

An interstitial ad is a full-page ad that appears before the actual webpage. Your webmaster or web programmer can put in place via an html script. In a nutshell, it's an ad in the front/center of the screen (some sites even keep the ad in place if you scroll up or down, which I find annoying).

The ad is in color and typically has a strong headline, call to action and graphic. Then the background of the ad is greyed-out where you can still see the website behind the ad, but it's faded - so your focus is on the main ad - the interstitial. There's also a clear and obvious way to close the interstitial. No tricks or hard-to-find 'x' buttons.

Interstitials are ideal if you don't have room for banner or text ads on your website or you don't want to affect the current layout of you home page.Not all interstitials, however, are created equal. I've seen some implemented that are not only unattractive, but are also ineffective with its copy and execution.A text book example of an interstitial ad can be found at EarlytoRise.com. if you go to the home page, wait 10-25 seconds, the ad will appear in the center of the page with the backdrop shaded.

The beauty of this is that you can make your actual ad space as big or small as you need. Your offer can be to sell something or to obtain an email address. You can include eye-catching images or have a countdown box to an event.

Whatever your offer or need ... an interstitial can deliver. And best of all, you don't have to wonder if your website visitor saw the ad or not. It's no doubt they did. You are just giving them the option to act on it OR close it.

List Building 2.0: Polls For Prospecting

2011-11-12T12:35:00.000-05:00

By now most people know that Web 2.0 is simply the evolution of the Internet into an environment of interactivity, reader participation, and usability. Web 2.0 opens up the dialog between user and website or blog. This connection can help generate traffic and a viral buzz.

But from a search engine marketing (SEM) standpoint, the benefits are clear and measurable: More traffic and frequent interactivity (or posts) equal better organic (free) rankings in search engine results. Getting good organic rankings is a powerful way to find qualified prospective customers.

So what online tactic encourages Web 2.0 principles as well as helps with search engine results page rank, visibility and listing building efforts? Targeted online acquisition polls.

Online acquisition polls can help you collect names and e-mail addresses, gauge general market (or subscriber) sentiment, and generate sales via a redirect to a promotional page. They also allow for interactivity, where a user can sound off about a hot topic. I've been including polls in my online marketing strategy for nearly a decade now, and have rarely been disappointed with the results. Some websites, like surveymonkey.com, allow members to set up free or low-cost surveys and polls.

However, they may not allow you to include a name-collection component or a redirect to a promotional offer. If that's the case, either ask your Webmaster to build you a proprietary poll platform or use a poll script. (You'll find examples at hotscripts.com, bgpoll.com/, ballot-box.net/faq.php, micropoll.com, and 2enetworx.com.) Here are eight ways to help make your online poll a success:

1. Make it engaging.Your poll question should engage the reader, encourage participation, pique interest, and tie into a current event. And be sure to have a "comments" field where people can make additional remarks. Sample topics: politics, the economy, health, consumer breakthroughs, the stock market, foreign affairs. Sites that highlight the most talked-about (and searched) topics on the Web include buzz.yahoo.com/, 50.lycos.com/, and google.com/press/zeitgeist.html.

2. Be relevant.Your poll question should also be related to your product, free e-zine topic, or free bonus report topic. This will greatly improve your conversion rate (the number of people who actually participate in your poll) and your up-sell rate. Let's say your free offer is a sign-up for an investment e-zine and your up-sell is a redirect landing page promotion for a paid investment newsletter. In that case, your poll question should be market related, something like "Where is gold headed in 2012?"

3. Offer an incentive.After people take your poll, tell them that to thank them for their participation you're automatically signing them up for your free e-zine or e-alerts... which they can opt out of at any time. To reduce the number of bogus e-mail addresses you get, offer a free "must-read" e-report too. And assuming it's your policy not to sell or rent e-mail names to third parties (and it should be), indicate that next to the sign-up button. This will reassure people that it's safe to give you their e-mail address.

4. Tag the responses.Having your poll question somehow tie into your product line makes the names you collect extremely qualified for future offers. Each name should be "tagged" by your database folks according to the answer they gave. Segmenting the names into such categories will make it easier for you to send targeted offers to them later. Let's say your product line includes an investment e-zine on equities. In that case, your poll question might ask people which investment product they think has the best returns: money market, gold, equities, or options. Those who answer "equities" will be prime candidates for a promotion for the e-zine.

5. Use the results for new initiatives.In addition to collecting names, online polls will help you gauge general market opinion - and could help you come up with new products. Keeping with our above example, you would flag all of the responses that come in. Then, if an overwhelming number of responders indicate an interest in an investment product you don't have - maybe one on gold - you should consider developing one. Because you now have an instant market of people to sell that product to.

6. Strengthen your new relationships.You need to reinforce the connection between the poll people just participated in and your e-zine or e-alerts. So make sure each name that comes in gets an immediate "thank you" (for taking the poll). Then send an automatically generated e-mail with the link for the downloadable free e-report you promised. Consider sending a series of "bonding" e-mails to them too - to help them get to know who you are, what you do, and how it will benefit them. This will help improve their lifetime customer value.

7. Gratify participants with the results.Don't just leave poll participants hanging. Make sure you tell them that the results will be published in your free e-zine or on your website (to encourage them to check it regularly). This will help increase readership and website traffic.

8. Publish the best reader comments.On your poll landing page, mention that some user feedback may be published (anonymously) in your e-zine or on your website. Pick the very best, most powerful responses to use. Republishing user feedback is fundamental to the Web 2.0 concept. And it has been extremely successful for social networking communities and blogs.

Marketers have used polls internally (on their own company website) for years. But now more than ever, with its cost effectiveness and efficiency, polls should be used to collect leads and interact with prospects. Polls aren't just for finding leads, either. They are also great for measuring market sentiment - which, in turn, can be insight that impacts your customer retention and service efforts.

Create Market Demand And Visibility

2011-11-12T12:33:00.001-05:00

If you're about to launch a new product, book, website, or whatever and don't know where to begin - then you MUST read this...

After launching multiple products, websites and creating the marketing launch plans for several books that hit Amazon #1 best seller status in record time -- such as books by Michael Masterson, Bob Bly, and my own book, Content Is Cash -- there's a proven formula that works every time no matter what the actual "thing" is you're launching. Even better, many of these tactics are low to no cost. It's coordination and synchronization of online marketing efforts all culminating around a specific time period (i.e. certain a day of the week).

These efforts include:

--Staggered messages. These will go to your list and other external, synergistic lists such as affiliates, JV partners, friends, and industry contacts and include solo emails, ezine ads, editorial contributions (with ed. note) and social marketing efforts. The goal is to build anticipation and create a pent up demand about the "thing" that is going to be launched. Efforts should start 2-3 weeks out and pick up intensity and frequency on the designated launch date. Qualified people that demonstrated an interest during your pre-launch "teaser" efforts can be added to you hot list can also be the first to know about future new releases, beta testing and similar "insider" privileges. In addition to your regular bonding efforts and auto responder series, these names will then have potential to also be your top buyers new products.

--Social media. Start seeding relevant blogs, message boards, chat rooms and forums with information about your soon-to-be-released "thing". Record a video of yourself and your product on YouTube. Push out relevant, useful and actionable editorial that ties to your "thing" on top social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Ultimately, create messages that have the potential to go viral and create buzz around your launch.

--Content Marketing. Write a few keyword rich articles that tie into the theme of your launch and upload to top tiered article directory sites. Link all to your launch promo page (or wherever you want to drive traffic to for consumer to take action). Make sure you start your efforts a few weeks prior to launch so can gain momentum and exposure in search engine results pages.

--Pay per click. If you have the budget, bid on your relevant keywords to your launch theme and have a pre launch page that collects names to build your hot list. Offer a free report that also ties into your theme to help start the buy in and create demand. This is a great way to gauge general market interest in your product, but note, that this is a lead gen effort and not an immediate sale. So be prepared to pay for the lead. The sale should happen within 30 days of your launch, after proper bonding efforts are established and your normal sales funnel commences.

--Online PR. Get your message out quickly and cost effectively through free online press release distribution services. Make sure your release is truly newsworthy and not just fluff, if you want it to be credible. These efforts should occur the day of your release. If you have a budget, you can compliment free online PR efforts with a paid service, such as PRWeb.com, for a nominal one-time fee, and it will greatly increase your reach and exposure. Either distribution channel, the release will get picked up by bloggers, media websites, industry websites, and online news aggregators (such as Yahoo and Google) and not only increase awareness, but also give you back-links (SEO!) as well as have the potential to go viral.

--Online Classifieds. Increase your launch exposure by placing free text ads on sites such as CraigsList. The ad can be about your "thing" and link preferably to your promo webpage. Just make sure you select the right (relevant) category to put your add under in order to ensure you capture the right audience.

--Webinar/Teleseminar. Have a post-launch date free event to help increase visibility, leads and sales. Promote it through social media, internal lists and external partners. Again, the theme must tie into the "thing" you've launched as well as include an added value such as free Q&A session or workshop where participants can text in questions either real time or before the event (depending on how you set up your event). This also helps with bonding and credibility.

All of these efforts together tend to create an "avalanche" effect by picking up speed and getting bigger the more the efforts roll out. This helps create momentum and online traction. In a nutshell, you're creating market demand and interest poising yourself for optimum results.

Maximizing Your Fulfillment and Collateral Pieces

2011-11-12T12:31:00.001-05:00

Here are some simple ideas, when applicable, for print and electronic fulfillment that helps encourage sales and customer lifetime value:

Personal Welcome or Thank You letter Catalog (whether it's for newsletters, products, or services. It could highlight all products OR current top sellers).

Cross-marketing flyer (a flyer highlighting a current hot product OR a natural, synergistic up-sell from the product ordered).

Coupon or special discount offer (or if electronic, coupon/promo code for online ordering).

Free sample (Women may remember Avon used to include tiny little lipsticks or perfume with their order. This approach is similar, could be a small, economy/sample size product OR bonus report or download access. Customers love, love, love freebies!).

Renewal (in publishing, this is called "renewal at birth". If you're selling a subscription service, include a renewal order form with your first issue).

Friends and family savings (another coupon for customer to pass on to friends or family. This encourages viral/word of mouth marketing).

Packing slip with product return label/instructions

As most marketers know, the first 0-30 days is when a client is red hot. Don't leave them cold. Leverage this time frame with your correspondence and turn your fulfillment pieces into another way to monetize sales and relationship build with your customers.

How to Maximize and Monetize Your Friends, Followers, Fans & Customers

2011-10-04T10:30:00.003-04:00

Precision Marketing ezine issue 10/04/11

Today's issue features some useful and practical excerpts from my new, best-selling book, Content Is Cash: Find out how to convert your 'Triple F's' to help grow your business as well as discover what to do to 'know your list' better. Also, learn the trick to getting high-performing, lost cost print ads and how to understand the customer life cycle for maximum results to your bottom line.

Yours for success and profits,
Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA
~President, Precision Marketing and Media, LLC.
~Publisher, Precision Marketing eNewsletter
~Author, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, 2011, Paperback]
~Blogger, MuscleMarketing.Blogspot.com

***************

Quick Power Tip: How To Get A Cost Effective Print Ad

This channel often gets a raw deal. One reason is because it's typically a costly platform.

To place an ad in a high-circulation magazine or newspaper, you could shell out serious money. But you don't need a big budget to take advantage of print ads. If you don't have deep pockets, consider highly targeted newspapers and periodicals in specific geographic locations.

For example, let's say you're selling an investment product or service. Before taking out a print ad in a large scale magazine or publication, such as Forbes, Money, Wall Street Journal, or similar, begin your search on the Web.

This is something I've done many times before and it not only worked wonderfully, but it brought in highly qualified leads. The following is an example for a specific niche. Your search queires may be different, but this gives you a solid idea how to approach this task.

First: Search the Internet by a targeted query albeit niche, geographic location or similar. In my case, I searched for the wealthiest cities in America.

Second: Several lists came up. I picked the top 20 and then did a second search for local newspapers within those communities (cities). These smaller newspapers hit my target audience (wealthiest cities) and had a decent circulation size. Even better, because these were local papers, the ad rates were much than some of the larger, broad-circulation publications. Bottom line - you end up getting quality rather than quantity.

Third: Email each paper asking for print ad rates, paid and free circulation, ad size and location. Put all your information into a spreadsheet then send your ad to the top 5 papers based on price and coverage.

I once paid for an ad in a local newspaper in Aspen, CO and Rancho Cucamonga, CA - two highly affluent areas - each with flat rates of less than $500. Both ads brought in tens of thousands of dollars in client revenues. My ROI turned out to be much more than 1,000%. This is a great, cost-effective way to drill down to your target audience, test out new creatives, and save money all while you're getting your feet wet with print ads.

Converting Your Triple F's: Friends, Followers and Fans

I recommend that you make a special conversion effort to encourage social media followers to give you their email addresses with you (as mentioned in my last issue, having an email address opens up the line of direct communication and list building) -or, as we say, opt in to receive your marketing messages. This typically involves creating strong promotional copy, which is sliced and diced and then used for social media posts and updates.

This promotional copy drives followers to a lead-generation landing page (or squeeze page), where the goal is to capture the email address of the friend, follower, or fan.
The offer should be something that will resonate with your follower, such as a useful freebie-perhaps a bonus report, e-zine subscription, audio download, bonus video, webinar, or teleseminar.

Ideally, this is something that has a perceived value and is immediate and relevant.
You run the campaign for a two-week period at a time, mixing your conversion messages with your regular, organic daily tweets or Facebook status updates. Then you monitor email sign-ups and website traffic (via Google Analytics), to ensure list growth and traffic source referrals. Aside from captivating copy, many variables come into play to make sure the effort is successful.

These include making sure email collection boxes are at the top, middle, and bottom of the lead-generation landing page being used. There should also be links to your privacy policy and an assurance statement alleviating any concern about email addresses being rented or sold to third parties.

It's also critical to clearly disclose before users submit their email address that opting in to receive your freebie also gives them a complimentary subscription to your e-newsletter (if applicable), along with special messages and offers from time-to-time.

Finally, you should follow up with a series of autoresponder (targeted messages) emails welcoming the new subscriber, offering strong editorial content and special offers. These emails facilitate bonding; validates that the correct email was given; ensures that the user is aware of the sign-up; and helps reduce false "do not mail" reports, email bounces, and general attrition.

Maximize Your Customer Life Cycle For Better Life Time Value (LTV) and Conversions

One of the most profound business books I ever read was Permission Marketing by Seth Godin.
The ideas in the book were very innovative at the time. The Internet and e-mail marketing were still young, and, like the Wild Wild West, most marketers and business owners were still trying to "wrangle it in" and figure out how to leverage the Web's possibilities... and, more important, turn those possibilities into profits.

In a nutshell, the book explained "how to turn strangers into friends and friends into customers." The principle behind this is to first understand the difference between cold (or interruption) marketing - like those annoying phone calls you always seem to get during dinner asking you to subscribe to the local newspaper... and permission marketing - where the prospect is actually giving you permission to contact them by "opting in" to receive your messages.

To help you get the most out of your Internet marketing, I have expanded on Mr. Godin's "stranger/friend/customer" concept and added two key components: multi-buyer and advocate. And I'll show you how you can leverage each of these segments to help grow your business.

Leveraging Your Customers Throughout Their Entire Life Cycle
You may think that a customer is someone who buys from you - period. But that's a very limited view. From the instant you "meet" your customer... until he's become a VIP buyer who's spent hundreds or thousands of dollars with your company... you should be interacting with him in different ways. Treating him properly every step of the way will create a true win/win situation. Your customer will continue to enjoy satisfying experiences with your company, and your company will enjoy the positive effect this relationship will have on its bottom line.

Here are the five stages a customer can go through during his life cycle, and how you can make the most of each one...

Stage 1: Stranger
The stranger or "prospect" doesn't know you. Your job is to get her attention. You have only a few seconds to get her to react - whether it's by asking her to click on your ad or open your e-mail message. Which means that your copy for the ad headline or e-mail subject line is critical.

Once you've captured her attention, your #1 goal is to have this stranger "opt in" to receive your messages, giving you a chance to continue to bond with her. This is also the time to start to build trust. Show your creditability. And explain what you can do for her (fill a desire, answer a need).

Stage 2: Friend
The friend has demonstrated an interest in your initial promotion and has opted in to receive more information from you. This gives you an outstanding opportunity to introduce him to your philosophy, your company, and your mission, and to re-enforce how you can help him.

During this stage, it's best to send a series of introduction e-mails (anywhere from 5 to 7) and withhold your new friends from your general mailing list. You don't want them (the newest names on your list) to start receiving promotional messages BEFORE they receive some of your editorial messages.

For most of my clients, I recommend sending introductory e-mails to new subscribers. Each e-mail is a special issue that's composed of articles that present the publication/gurus core philosophies. This gives new subscribers a chance to "warm up" to expert contributors, the format of the enewsletter, and the topics typically addressed. Only after they are warmed up do they go into 'general population' - that is, I start sending them editorial and promotional emails as usual.

Stage 3: Customer/Client
The customer (or client) is someone who has bought into your philosophy and purchased a product (or service) from you.

Many companies make the mistake of ending the customer relationship at this point. But after reading this article, you'll know better... you'll know that getting the customer is only the beginning. Keeping him is another story.

You don't want to put all your eggs into one acquisition basket while having few or no retention efforts. Good retention strategies entail ongoing communication (both promotional and editorial), outstanding customer service, quality products, and fulfilling your promises. Of course there will always be things outside of your control (like losing customers to market conditions). But the idea is to be proactive and not reactive. Keep the "80/20 rule" in mind - which states that 80 percent of your sales come from 20 percent of your customers.

Stage 4: Multi-Buyer
The multi-buyer is a customer who is tied into your brand and demonstrates product loyalty with your company. Multi-buyers have purchased several products from you, and are not afraid to spend money. These folks are your best list to roll out new products to or test higher price points. If you are thinking about creating a "VIP" or "Lifetime" product, you're going to want to advertise to this list. Multi-buyers will have a high lifetime value (LTV) for you, and will likely purchase cross-channel. In other words, they will buy from you no matter how you contact them - whether via banner ads, e-mail marketing, direct mail, or telemarketing.

Stage 5: Advocate
This segment of your customer database is your holy grail. Your list of advocates is made up of the most satisfied and loyal of your customers - and contains your best "unpaid" employees. Advocates will do your advertising for you by telling friends, family, colleagues, and acquaintances about your products and services. And in today's Net-based environment, advocates are a major force in getting your name in the blogosphere and social communities... and spreading your marketing message virally.

So how do you create advocates? Well, advocates are not created, they're cultivated over time. The advocate must, of course, believe in your products and services. But for this special group, the customer experience goes deeper... to an emotional level. The advocate feels personally touched by your service, product, or guru. Because of you, her life is changed - and she's busting at the seams to help others as she has been helped.

Your advocates are people you want testimonials from. People you can invite to be in BETA test or focus groups. And people to get feedback from to help develop future products. Even better, this group can help you make more money in the future. For my clients, some of the best JV (joint venture) partnerships have been with advocates - people who understand the core values, respect the business, and have a company or product that is synergistic to my clients.

You want to treat these folks like the VIPs they are and invite them to special events or let them be the first to receive discounted offers. You may even consider creating affiliate marketing or referral programs to "formalize" this group's verbal recommendations.

Always keep in mind that the effort does not stop at the sale. Since it costs more to obtain new leads than to retain existing customers - now, more than ever - you have to know how to optimize the five stages of the customer life cycle.

Know Your List!

The most important rule in publishing is to know your list, your audience, or your subscribers. Knowing your current readers (customers) also helps you find new, targeted prospects.

If you haven't done so, I strongly recommend that you conduct at least one subscriber
survey per year (most of my clients conduct two per year-one at the midpoint and one at the end of the year).

This survey should include demographic, geographic, and physiographic questions. Find out who your subscribers are, what other newsletters they're reading, what their interests are, and things they like and dislike.

The more you know about your audience, the easier it will be for you to write useful and relevant information. Knowing who makes up your list and gearing specific content for your audience will get your articles read and passed around to likeminded readers.

You can use the data in your survey to create a subscriber profile both editorial and marketing staff with critical information about who an ideal subscriber is. If you understand your ideal subscriber, you'll understand your target prospect.

This information is invaluable for acquisition and retention efforts, so make it readily available to key staff members for easy reference. It's a constant reminder of who you're writing for and who you'd like to add to your database. In addition to its editorial and marketing uses, this information can help with media buying, joint venture opportunities, and creative and product development.

'Content Is Cash': #1 Web Marketing Best-Seller on Amazon

September 26 was a memorable day for me as an author. Content Is Cash hit #1 best-seller on Amazon for Internet marketing with it's Kindle version and simultaneously hit #4 in the same category for the paperback version.

In addition, the book was ranked 1,806 out of over 8,000,000 books on Amazon as well as #13 best-seller in the broad 'Business and Culture' category.

I was nearly doing back flips when I saw the stats in Amazon's Author Central area and even took a screen shot for posterity and posted it to my Facebook page.

It means so much to me that the public has embraced the book and it's resonated with so many marketers, entrepreneurs and business owners. Consumer reviews have been simply amazing.

No doubt the pre-launch buzz from industry legends such as Michael Masterson, Bob Bly, Martin Weiss, MaryEllen Tribby, and many others who have all praised the book helped set the tone.

And on top of that, the book was also featured by Newsmax.com, Amazon.com, and Target Marketing magazine as recommended reading for business and marketing enthusiasts.

If you're looking to grow your business using FREE, proven and high-performing organic marketing methods, then you gotta check this book out. Amazon has several chapters online to peruse.

The SONAR Content Distribution Model featured in Content Is Cash will work for virtually any size company, in any niche and with any budget.

The book is available on Kindle and Paperback at Amazon.com, read more at http://www.amazon.com/Content-Cash-Leveraging-Increased-Biz-Tech/dp/0789741083

The book is also available in ebook and special bundle packages by the Publisher, read more at http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0789741083.

Happy reading!

Frienemy Marketing: Maximizing Joint Ventures and Other Business Opportunities For Increased Visibility, Sales and Leads

2011-09-10T10:22:00.001-04:00

Frienemy Marketing: Maximizing Joint Ventures and Other Business Opportunities For Increased Visibility, Sales and Leads
By Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA

With the economic climate as crazy as it’s been, now’s a great time to look to your ‘friendly’ competition for opportunities to help grow your list and add extra revenues to your bottom line.
Even better, this can be done for virtually no out-of-pocket cost. Let me explain…
For many of my clients who have start-up companies or home-based businesses, I tell them how important is to think outside the box and implement high performing, organic (no cost) online marketing strategies that leverage what they already have: Content.

One such system is the SONAR Content Distribution Model TM, which I discuss in great detail in my new, best-selling book, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, paperback].

SONAR is a powerful method of repurposing and distributing free content (albeit text, audio, video) and synchronizing its release into various, targeted, organic channels. It can work for virtually any business, in any niche, with any budget. SONAR represents the following online distribution platforms: S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites O Online press releases N Network (social) communities, social bookmarking sites A Article directories R Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and message boards

Now to cover all the tactical nuances of each of the five SONAR platforms wouldn’t be feasible in this article, and in fact, is already covered in great depth in my book.

However, what I’d like to shed some light upon is the most popular, yet illusive SONAR dove-tail strategy that is often overlooked by many business owners – one that actually encourages relationship cultivation with your competitors – and that I call, ‘Frienemy Marketing’.

When it comes to business growth and visibility, don’t rule out collaborative efforts with your friendly competitors, and by friendly, I mean synergistic and respected formidable adversaries with a like-minded community of followers to your own.

This is a great way to leverage your content and increase market share, enhance brand awareness, grow sales and leads, and establish credibility with a new, yet synergistic list.
As a consultant, and even back in the days when I was leading the marketing efforts at top publishers like Agora, Weiss and Newsmax, it was important for me to be ‘strategically creative’ and deploy as many no-cost online marketing tactics as possible for greater return on investment (ROI).

I would concentrate on the marketing and editorial relationships I had forged with fellow publishers and aggressively pursued ad swaps, guest editorials, and joint ventures (JV).
The idea is to develop synergistic relationships that are mutually beneficial – to look for areas of deficiency in your competitors and think of ways your company can fill the void.

One potential partner may have a great front-end product (e.g., a low cost e-book) but no up-sell (e.g., a higher-priced related kit containing DVDs, CDs, and workbooks). Another potential partner may have an innovative back-end product but no cost-effective front-end product to bring new customers in the door. Still others may have large, qualified lists but need editorial to bond with their lists.

Some tips to keep in mind when looking for partnerships with friendly competitors:

• Do your homework. Find out, in advance, who will be at industry events that you’ll be attending. (Check the program for speakers, vendors, and participants.) Sign up for their e-newsletters. Read their promotional e-mails. Maybe even purchase some of their products.

• Look at EVERY opportunity as a way to maximize your company’s brand during presentation breaks, lunch time, and cocktail parties. When you go to industry events, don’t eat dinner alone in your hotel room. Go to functions. Mingle. Network. Have a genuine conversation with a potential partner… then, if there’s a synergy between your two companies, exchange business cards.

• Before you contact a potential partner, get familiar with his products and target audience and figure out how your company may be able to dovetail with his product line or marketing efforts.

So, once you’ve made the connection, now what?

Reciprocal Ad Swaps
Assuming you both have content-based ezines, you can test the waters and see how your lists will react by doing an advertising swap. In other words, you run an ad in his e-newsletter and he runs an ad in yours for either name collection (lead generation) or product sales. Both list sizes should be close in circulation size, hence the reciprocity. You both keep any sales or email addresses collected, and call it a day.

To make sense out of the results of that test, you have to know your “opportunity cost” – the “cost” you will incur for running an outside ad to your list instead of your own ad. If you normally sell ad space in your e-newsletter, this cost could simply be the flat rate fee you typically charge. Or, if you know the average revenues an issue brings in, you could calculate the potential “missed opportunity” of letting another ad run to your list on a given day.

You should also agree to share important information with your partner. Before his ad runs in your e-newsletter, point out any creative issues. Provide your partner with your e-newsletter’s sent and deliverability sizes, open rate, and ad click rate. Exchanging performance data is critical to a long and mutually beneficial relationship. It has to be a win/win situation for the partnership to work.

Guest Editorials/Editorial Contributions
You can also look into doing guest editorials in other publishers’ e-newsletters – with an editorial note or byline that links to your offer. This is a great way to get introduced to a new list with the “implied” endorsement of the publisher. His endorsement gives you credibility. And if you provide his readers with good, solid, useful information, they will bond with you quickly.

This is a soft-sell approach that may or may not yield results on its own. But when coordinated with either a dedicated e-mail (if your partner is on board with a revenue split) or an e-newsletter ad the same week, your conversion rate (the number of people who go on to buy your product) will dramatically improve.

Joint Ventures (JVs)
I’ve got one more idea for you: joint venturing. This is a quick and cost-effective way to make money with your list even if you have not yet developed any products.

With a JV, you have an instant product line with no overhead costs. Your partner will supply the products, fulfill orders, and provide customer support. All you have to do is promote the products to your list and split the net revenues with them. For an even a more turnkey approach, you can sell e-reports through sites like Clickbank.com, where everything is automated.

To determine the viability of a potential JV product, there are several strategic marketing variables to consider. I like to think of them as “PPPGS”:
P = Product quality
P = Price point
P = Performance (when promoted to your potential partner’s house list, as well as to outside lists)
G = General market demand
S = Subscriber interest (when promoted to your list, as determined by feedback, surveys, etc.)

Remember – you’re looking for long-term partners, not one-hit-wonders. So carefully select the people you approach, making sure their products, brand and message makes sense to your business…and, together, you can reap the unlimited profit potential of Frienemy Marketing.

Ed note:
Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA has nearly 20 years of marketing experience with Fortune 500 companies and top publishers and an expert at organic marketing tactics. She is the President of Precision Marketing and Media, LLC, and author of the Amazon best-seller, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, Paperback]. To learn more about SONAR marketing or get your copy of Content Is Cash, click here now!

http://www.amazon.com/Content-Cash-Leveraging-Increased-Biz-Tech/dp/0789741083/

Killing Two Search Engine Birds with One Stone: PPC and SEO

2011-08-11T15:51:00.000-04:00

There's a great tactic that will help your list building efforts -- both with paid AND organic search.

And it's not much additional work ... if you already have a lead generation landing page you're using for PPC, you can cover your basis on the organic side with a few additions.

Here's how:
--Start by creating a new URL for SEO purposes using the existing PPC landing page.

--Make sure the new SEO URL is packed with your targeted and relevant keywords (one caveat: before this, make sure you've done your research to see which keywords to use and the search volume on each one).

--Add relevant and targeted keywords into the new SEO lead gen page's tags including: title tag, meta description, and meta keywords. Also, if you have images on the page, make sure to add relevant keywords to those.

--If not already done, drop in the Google Analytics code to this page so you can track page visits/traffic.

After your page is indexed by the search engine spiders (which may take a few weeks), your lead gen page should start appearing in organic search rankings based on the keywords you've indicated in your tags.

What will also help your page's ranking be more favorable is if you can get some back-links from high traffic websites linking to this new, SEO landing page.

So start link-building efforts with sites that have the 2 R's - rank and relevance. Remember, search engines like back-linking between synergistic websites.

5 'Must Knows' For Better CoRegistration Conversion Rates

2011-08-11T15:50:00.000-04:00

CoReg names (leads) come in from another website after a transaction and people tend to forget what they opted in to receive.

For optimum results, flag names that come in (segment) and withhold them from eLetter circulation for approx. 5-7 days.

Use this time to reconnect with them and let them bond with you, your gurus, your pub, or your philosophy.

Let them build that "warm fuzzy feeling" for you. Do this by following up with targeted introduction emails.

After the email series, where you'll also be giving them fantastic editorial, send them a special offer (such as discount, special new subscriber pricing, etc.) to help monetize the names.

Avg. cost per lead (CPL) for coreg tends to be between $1- $5. Implementing the email intro series also helps the LTV (life time value) of the subscriber. They'll buy more frequently, monetarily, and be more loyal.

Tweeting for Leads: Building your Twitter Presence

2011-08-11T15:38:00.001-04:00

Unless you've been in a cave, you've likely heard of Twitter.

Twitter, or "Tweeting", is a way to connect with like-minded people by broadcasting short, headline oriented messages into the Twittospher. Then, those interested in what you have to say and want to hear more will "follow" you.

Twitter is a great outlet for information as well as a way to promote your business, newsletter or blog and build your prospect database. Many companies, publishers, entrepreneurs and others have jumped on the Twitter bandwagon to leverage this hot social networking outlet. But unless you're a celebrity or someone that already has universal name recognition ... and groupies ... getting individuals to opt in and "follow" your messages could be challenging.

So here are some tips to start building your presence on Twitter:

Promote the heck out of your Twitter URL (http://twitter.com/youraccountname). Remember, at this point, if you don't have a notable name and a built-in audience the goal is to drive targeted traffic to your Twitter home page so people can follow you. Remember to include your Twitter link in your emails (as an autosignature). Cross-market it in your newsletters and other correspondence. Mention it in your bio, bylines or editorial notes (whether you're a public speaker, on your PowerPoint slides, in press releases, article directory postings - virtually any place your name is). Link to it on other social networking sites from your Linked In, Facebook, and MySpace accounts. Add it at the closing in all your business proposals. Have it printed on your business cards. And of course, have it somewhere prominent on your website or blog. The mention is simple, "Follow me on http://twitter.com/youraccountname."

Make sure you have a keyword rich and relevant Twitter bio so the right people can read about you and follow you. Text is limited, so pick your descriptive keywords carefully. I suggest updating your bio quarterly with relevant keywords to your target market (follower). Think strong, short and pithy ... similar to a good headline that grabs your attention.

As far as content, keep your Tweets frequent, useful, relevant and entertaining. Don't just spam messages. It's transparent and will have a negative effect. Make people want to hear from you. Your headlines should be engaging and provoking, linking to the full article on your website or blog.

Follow the right people yourself. Many Tweeters have the mentality, you follow me, I'll follow you ... it's reciprocated. So as you're following other like minded individuals to expand your interest and knowledge base, they'll typically return the favor and follow you, thereby helping you build your presence.

Tweet daily. Try and have a regular presence on Twitter. The more frequent you Tweet the more you appear increase your odds to appear under 'Who to follow'. There are a few tools to help you determine when the best time to tweet is, check out: http://www.whentotweet.com/, http://www.tweriod.com/,http://www.tweetwhen.com/ and http://14blocks.com/. Most are free.

Engage with your followers. Retweet or reply to their tweets to help foster relationship cultivation. After all, that's what social media is all about ... building a community of like-minded 'friends'.

You'll see, with a combination of the above and a little time, you'll build your Twitter following. My clients have been implementing these tips and are enjoying steady growth on Twitter.

How Targeted Marketing Can Save Your Business

2011-07-26T22:51:00.002-04:00

A few nights ago I was watching 'Minority Report' with Tom Cruise on Cinemax. There was a scene in the movie when Tom's character was walking through this futuristic mall and as he walked by various retail stores, these state-of-the-art eye scanners would move over his corneas and a personalized, digital marketing message was produced for only him to see/hear. These promotional messages not only addressed him by his first name, but apparently included his interests (as the scanner had access to archive information stored in his mind of past purchase patterns, consumer behavior, and more).

Sound hokey? It's not all that far off from what actually can be done today with personalized marketing (also known as one-to-one or targeted marketing).

Personalized marketing is more than just including someone's name in a subject line or salutation of a message. It's actually having some consumer knowledge albeit demographic, geographic and psychographic ('DGP') data about the person then crafting targeted promotional messages to suit certain data points. If you have the ability to collect even deeper data, such as purchase behavior, even more power to you.Some also call this type of marketing 'database marketing' or 'data mining', as you're mining and refining your in-house list.

In a nutshell it's leveraging the data you have and simply the art of crafting a specific, targeted message to a person or group of like-minded people. And studies have shown that this type of marketing skyrockets open and conversion rates.

Now, there is one important caveat to successful personalized marketing or database marketing efforts ... that's having a robust email interface that collects and stores consumer/client/prospect activity down to the user level and also can group them into 'buckets'. Those buckets could be categorized by DGP data points, website activity or purchase behavior.

For most small businesses, who tend to use the likes of MailChimp, Constant Contact, and similar cost-effective email marketing companies, that level of tracking is simply not offered.The email marketing companies that do offer such robust systems often have tiered pricing based on email volume (usually large scale), and even then, those rates are usually too steep for the start-up entrepreneur or home-based business.

So what's a small business owner to do?

The answer is quite simple (and affordable): Conduct periodic surveys, approximately one to two times a year, of your own list then store and group the data. Once that data is stored you can create universal 'buckets' of important group interests then send targeted messages to those groups of people.

This can be done even using cost-effective email marketing services, such as Constant Contact, and the help of Survey Monkey, to collect the data.Survey Monkey is a free survey service, but if you want the detailed level of data that needs to be tied down the user level (by email address), then you have to pay a nominal monthly or annual fee. But trust me, it's worth it.

You can easily set up your questions (I suggest 20 max) and have multiple choice or fill ins. I suggest multiple choice as it saves the user time. Most users want to complete a survey in a few minutes. So carefully think out your questions and answer options. Make sure to throw in your standard DGP questions as well as some competitor and interest related questions.

For example, let's say you have a list that has a combination of copywriters, marketers, and business opportunity folks. The copywriters may only care about things related to promotions and creative development. The marketers might only respond to messages that pertain to direct response and Web marketing. And your biz-op subscribers may only care about things related to entrepreneurship or home based businesses. Not segmenting your lists means you're alienating 66% of your list each time you send a promotion. That's huge! Talk about leaving money on the table.

However, if you're speaking to each group about their own specific interests, you're now engaged with 100% of that list group each time you send a promo, thereby boosting open and conversion rates. You're also likely to see a reduction in attrition as well, since people will be getting targeted messages.

Test this out for yourself. See the tremendous difference targeting your promotional efforts makes. Then, if you see hard results of improved open and conversion rates, try the same for your editorial (ezine) messages. This will increase bonding and reduce opt outs. It may also improved your viral marketing (forward-2-friend), as readers are going to be so pleased you're 'speaking' directly to them about they're interests.

Both of these tactics may be a little extra work, but it will also ensure no money is left on the table.Your survey results will not only prove useful in your personalized marketing messages, but can also be used as market research, product development, and even potential joint ventures and media buys.

To help entice your list to taking the survey, consider offering an exciting, immediate, easy to fulfill offer as well as compelling subject line in your email message for the survey itself.If you have buyers and non-buyers (i.e. clients and prospects), make sure you survey each list separately.

Not finding the time to survey your list is really doing a dis-service to your clients and subscribers as well as your business. 1) You're not really knowing and engaging with your audience as best as you could - and this will affect product development, promotional and editorial efforts; and 2) You're not reaching a level of maximized sales capacity.

So before you start wondering why your subscribers aren't buying, or why open rates are low, or why you're getting increased unsubscribes ... ask yourself when was the last time you surveyed your list?If it's NEVER, then you're long overdue.

Are You Buying "Smart Media?"

2011-07-21T21:14:00.001-04:00

Media buying, or online advertising, is more than just a Web strategy to help grow your business. It’s both a science and an art. It involves a bit of finesse, competitive research, creativity, and good negotiation skills. Sadly, with most online advertising experiences, the lagging partner is typically the business owner by no real fault of his or her own … it’s simply from sheer lack of industry knowledge and media savoir faire. Here are some powerful "insider" tips and tricks to buying smart media.

Media buying, or online advertising, is more than just a Web strategy to help grow your business. It’s kind of like a dance between two people: you and the account executive (or publisher).

As with all dances, one person usually leads and one person gets led. Sadly, with most online advertising experiences, the lagging partner is typically the business owner by no real fault of his or her own...it’s simply from sheer lack of industry knowledge and media savoir faire.

You see, in buying online media for more than a decade, I can honestly say it’s both a science and an art. It involves a bit of finesse, competitive research, creativity, and good negotiation skills.
But if you don’t have time to go through trial by fire and want the crash course to not only dance, but lead, than you need to pay close attention to some powerful ‘insider’ tips and tricks to buying smart media.

The most common types of online media are banner ads or text ads (aka display ads). When you buy these forms of media you can buy them directly from a website or blog (the publisher) or buy them through an ad network.

Banner ads come in a variety of sizes and website placements, but I’ve found over the years the best performing ones are the medium or large rectangles that are closest to the content on the page. I have never had great luck with leaderboards or skyscraper[el]you know, those large horizontal and vertical ads that are either at the very top of the webpage or on the side.
However, you can also ‘rent’ lists have the publisher send a dedicated, solo email to their list on your behalf or place an advertisement (text or graphical) in their ezine. These are known as list rentals and are more costly, because of the publishers ‘implied endorsement’, but generally perform better.

No matter which form of online media your buying there’s some important things to know before you engage with the account executive and sign an insertion order (agreement).

Here are my 10 'must do/must ask' things when conducting online media buys.

1. Competitive analysis—Find out what is the typical industry rate for that particular ad spot and placement in your niche. For instance, if you're interested in running a 300x250 banner ad, do some research. Call some ad networks and find out what that ad unit costs on the home page and 'run of site' within your target niche.

2. Competitive analysis—What ad units typically get the best click thru rates (also known as CTR)? Read some online ezines or blogs and get an idea on average metrics so you have a benchmark to measure your campaign against.

3. Publisher placement—Ask your account rep. if your banner ad will be "run of site" (ROS) or "run of channel" (ROC). This will determine exposure and pricing.

4.Ad targeting—Find out if the publisher allows day parting (running ad during specific time periods). This can save you money on ad rate especially using the CPM (cost per thousand) pricing model.

5. Publisher placement—Find out if your ad position will be fixed or rotated (shared) with anyone else's ad. Again, this will give you a good idea of your potential exposure. Also, if your ad placement is being shared with other advertisers, you should try to negotiate a better rate, as the spot is not dedicated to your message.

6.Publisher placement—If shared placement, find out what percentage of impressions (or views) you will receive.

7.Dedicated email—Find out the size of the list you're thinking of renting, the frequency the list goes out, and the average unit sale (AUS) per subscriber.

8.Dedicated email—Ask the publisher who's mailing for you if there will there be a lift note (an introduction or implied endorsement). Lift notes help 'warm up' the list (subscribers) and boost conversions.

9.Out clause—Ask your account executive if the media agreement has an out clause or termination right. This is important as if your campaign is not working, you don't want to have to ride it out and waste money. You want the ability to end it and cut your losses. Also find out if you can pause your ad during a slow traffic times (i.e. summer, holidays) as not to waste impressions (CPM).

10.Reporting—Ask your account executive if you will I be given daily/weekly reporting OR access to the online ad serving system. This will allow you real-time access to click thru rates and more to evaluate if creative (banner and landing page) is striking a cord with the target audience.

Bonus Tips!
Ok, if the previous 10 tips weren’t enough, here are some key influencers to make sure you ask about to help you get the best pricing possible:

Seasonality—Each niche has their highs and lows, but generally speaking it’s typical to see drops in website traffic during summer (June – Aug.) and around certain U.S. holidays. Research your industry and use consumer purchase behavior to your advantage. For instance, in some industries, the days around Thanksgiving is slower than usual. If you’re running a campaign that falls on this timeframe, ask about getting lower rates or pausing your ad during the slowdown. DoubleClick [http://www.google.com/doubleclick/] and ClickZ [http://www.clickz.com/] is a great source of information and often releases quarterly consumer Web reports on buying patterns and traffic.

>>Exclusivity—Similar to economies of scale (where the more that’s produced the cheaper the unit price), if you’re banner ad is sharing space with other advertisers for less ‘solo’ time, you should be paying less. It’s important to ask whether your ad will get 100% of the rotations or sharing ad exposure. And if sharing, find out what percentage of exposure you are ultimately getting during your ad run. This is known as being “fixed ad placement” or “shared ad placement”. If you’re told you have shared placement, this is a great bartering tool to get a more competitive rate.

>>Site Targeting—You’ve heard in real estate it’s always about location, location, location, right? Well online real estate is no different. Find out if your ad will be run of site (ROS), run of channel (ROC) or on specific high traffic pages. Typically, the further you drill down the more you pay. It’s known as ‘site targeting’. Similarly, the higher you go up, the less you pay. ROS is the highest (most broad) level, so it’s usually the cheapest ad location. Next is usually ROC, whose ads appear on certain channels or sections of a website. Then there are also specific pages or demographic targeting. Your goals and budget will determine which placement is best for your needs.

>>Remnant Space—Often the forgotten about query, remember to ask if remnant space is available. Remnant ads are those ad units that the publisher or ad network is having a difficult time selling for whatever reason. They can also be last minute specials or units that are now available due to another deal falling through. With more popular, high traffic websites, you can save a fortune buying remnant media. Just pay close attention to the Terms and Conditions in the insertion order, as with most special deals, there’s usually lots of restrictions and little leeway.

All of these factors will help determine the value of your ad space, and ultimately, the cost you're willing to pay to access that audience.

For more powerful and cost effective strategies to compliment your online marketing efforts, check out my new book, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, Aug. 2011].

Goin' Green: Repurpose, Refresh, Repackage, and Republish Your Content!

2011-06-30T13:47:00.002-04:00

Sometimes, content is right under our nose... we just don’t know where to look for it. Reusing content is a great way to bond with subscribers and add revenues to your bottom line. You just have to think out of the box and be "strategically creative." The content must be relevant to your overall website, objective and target audience and provide some value to the reader.

In this article, I'll help you discover where to find your "hidden treasures" and use them to drive traffic to your website for traffic, sales, leads and buzz.

If you're a publisher, then I don't have to tell you there is no shortage of content in your world. But do you truly know how to leverage all the content you have? Even more so, do you know where to find all the hidden content you may have?

Remember, content comes from a variety of sources, such as text, audio, and video.
Sometimes, content is right under our nose…we just don’t know where to look for it. Today, I’m going to point you in the right direction and give you some great ideas where to find your ‘hidden treasures’ and use it to help drive traffic to your website which in turn can be monetized for sales and leads.

You can leverage content and repurpose it from the following sources:

-Old newsletter (ezine) issues or articles
-Old bonus materials such as free reports, bulletins, and white papers
-Old products or kit components
-Past teleseminars
-Past webinars or webcasts
-Past presentations such as PowerPoint slides
-Preview recorded speeches at tradeshows or other events
-Interview transcripts
-Fulfillment materials
-Conference call notes or transcripts
-Your own website’s content, such as in a news, Q&A or FAQ section of your website
Press releases

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Click here to read the full article: http://www.quepublishing.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1722558

Marketing Myths and Misconceptions: The REAL Truth to Building an Online InfoPublishing Business and Community

2011-06-27T23:46:00.002-04:00

Anyone that tells you that you can build (not launch, but build) an online info-publishing business fast and furious is flat out crazy. When building an online info-publishing business and related subscriber base, there are a few core drivers for success: Increased website visibility, Increased website traffic, Increased market exposure, Increased community (list size and followers).

Typically, there are two things that help you achieve those goals: time and/or resources. And one directly affects the other. There is a powerful, easy, and virtually no cost formula for success, you just need to know about it.

I've being leading marketing efforts for top publishers such as Agora, Weiss, Newsmax as well as and Fortune 500 companies such as GE, ADP, Chase, Salmon Smith Barney/CitiGroup for nearly 20 years now.

And over the last decade or so I've seen and heard a lot of, quite frankly, baloney about how easy and quick it is to build an online business and it's community (aka followers, list or ezine subscribers).

First, let me say, that anyone that tells you that you can build (not launch, but build) an online infopublishing business fast and furious is flat out crazy.

When building an online infopublishing business and related subscriber base there are a few core drivers for success:
1. Increased website visibility
2. Increased website traffic
3. Increased market exposure
4. Increased community (list size and followers)

Typically, there are two things that help you achieve those goals: time and/or resources. And one directly affects the other.

For example, if you have no resources (money) then your online marketing strategies to build your website and related newsletter will tend to focus around free marketing strategies such as social media marketing, search engine optimization, search engine marketing, link-building, guerrilla marketing, and more. In this scenario, you are sacrificing expediency for cost (which in this case is none). You see, most free strategies can take anywhere from 3-12 months to gain momentum and gain a foothold. In this scenario, you are sacrificing the time.

If you have resources, then you have more options at your disposal to grow your list such as online media buying, list rentals, and co-registration that would likely produce results quicker, but in this case you are sacrificing the money. And even then, there are many variables that will affect performance such as list or website selection, creative development, copywriting strength, and persuasive landing page creation.

Having launched and built many online business and websites over the last 10+ years, I not only know, but have mastered the formula for success and trained several CEOs, entrepreneurs, business owners, marketers, and publishers.

For instance, when I led the marketing efforts at popular online publisher, Early to Rise as (2007-2009) one of my primary tasks was to launch a health website for the business as well as a health ezine. I championed this from concept to execution involving:
--Name and mission of website and ezine
--Look/theme/layout of site and ezine template
--Researching the contributing panel of experts and gurus
--List building efforts
--Visibility efforts
--Cross-selling efforts
--Product development efforts

That site is the popular alternative health source, TotalHealthBreakthroughs.com.

My tactics for building the business and the list, for the most part, comprised of a mix of free online strategies: search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), online press releases, guerrilla marketing, and most importantly, leveraging either guest editorials, dedicated emails or newsletter ads in sister publications as well as industry colleagues' publications.

But not everyone has leverage like that or has access to an editorial network of contacts. Most folks have to go it alone and have no idea where to start first. For the average Joe, building a community (list) and online business takes patience and being strategically creative.

I don't want to rain on anyone's parade, but that is the real deal. Nothing bothers me more than so called 'Internet gurus' that sell bogus products for a fortune or spew nonsense with greatly exaggerated claims or promises, only for the average Joe to find out it doesn't work for him.

You’ve seen those emails that promise an obscene amount of money in rapid time. The ones that tell you how you can make a gazillion dollars in 24 hours. These are promotional ploys that rely on smoke and mirrors: fancy digital tactics, outlandish persuasive copy, and twisted claims. In all honesty, these promotions are preying on the average consumers’ greed for sales. But in reality, the only person that typically makes the money is the product’s creator. And sadly enough, many small business owners, entrepreneurs, and home-based businesses fall victim to these scams.

Many companies I work with have actually been burned by these scams and are in the hole for thousands of dollars. Some are also start-up companies with little budget or resources, but are looking for solid results.

That's why when you don’t really have the time or money to grow your business it’s critical to market smarter, not harder. You need to use proven strategies that perform time and time again. That means employing tactics that are effective, cost virtually nothing, and are easy-to-learn and implement.

That is the core of my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM and the principal of my upcoming book, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, Aug. 2011].

SONAR Marketing is not a theory, but a real Internet strategy that works. It can be applied to virtually any size company[md]large, small, entrepreneur, at home business. SONAR works in any niche, with any budget, and at any stage in a company's business cycle (start-up, maintenance, or growth).

Simply stated, SONAR is a cost effective, yet powerful, method of repurposing and synchronizing content (text, audio, video) distribution into various, targeted channels. SONAR allows companies, publishers and entrepreneurs -- basically anyone with content on their website -- to monetize it by turning traffic into sales.

SONAR represents five free online distribution channels:
S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites
O Online press releases
N Network (social) communities, social bookmarking sites
A Article directories
R Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and message boards

Learning SONAR and incorporating it into your online marketing plan will help you build your business and community through increased traffic generation, bonding, awareness, email collection, and revenues.

Even better, SOANR results are all measurable. You can use simple direct response marketing and PR metrics to track your campaigns for a quantifiable return on investment (ROI).
In a nutshell, SONAR helps you turn content into cash. So if you want to REALLY find out how to monetize your content and propel your business, you've got to check it out!

For more information and full article visit http://www.quepublishing.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1722557.

Is Blogging Dead?

2011-06-18T12:55:00.001-04:00

I read something recently that said, ‘blogging is dead’. It made me think … with the rising popularity of free enewsletters and free e-magazines, as well as social media, is blogging really dead?

I don’t think so. And I don’t think you have to deploy one strategy (free newsletter or e-magazine) versus another (blogging or social marketing). Here’s why:

Blogging and free ezines are both conduits – ways to communicate with readers. The goal of blogging and the goal of either a free newsletter or e-magazine are virtually the same, except the business model behind the driving force of each conduit are slightly different. And both tactics that I believe complement each other.

Let me explain…
With blogging, you’re using ‘pull’ marketing. Through search engine marketing and optimization (SEM and SEO), article marketing, and SONAR marketing you are driving traffic and readers to your blog for ‘UVA’ information, that is, information that is useful, valuable, and actionable.

On the blogging conduit you can certainly try to monetize the visits through mechanisms like Google Ad Sense and banner or text ads (for cross-selling and other revenue opportunities) as well as lead generation mechanisms to capture the reader’s email address and further bond with them via targeted correspondence. And once you capture that email address, you’ve opened up the lines of communication – getting permission to contact that person and reach them through editorial, advertorial and promotional messages – delivered directly to their in-box.

Same goes for social media. You may have, what I like to call, ‘Triple F’s’ (friends, followers or fans), but how deep is that relationship? You don’t really have permission to correspond with the user personally. And you don’t have their email address. With social media, the relationship is shallow. A substantial level of bonding as well as conversion is usually more challenging then with a subscriber, as you are limited with either character counts (as with on Twitter) or background noise … unless you have a profile stalker that is frequently visiting your page.

…Which leads to ‘push’ marketing.

Enewsletters and e-magazines are correspondence being ‘pushed’ out to your audience. You already have their email address, so the main purpose of your effort is bonding (through UVA information) AND direct response marketing (cross-selling via newsletter ads and solo emails). You don’t have to rely as heavily on search engine optimization for this conduit, but rather use SEO and SEM for the website that the enewsletter or e-magainzine sign up box is housed on.

Newsletters and e-magazines can also benefit from outside revenues from external advertising opportunities and affiliate marketing products. The size and quality of the list (number of subscribers) along with some other variables such as open rate, click rate, bounce rate, average unit of sale will determine the value of the list, and therefore, the advertising rate you can get for that list.

For me, I wouldn’t say blogging is dead nor would I give up blogging and put all my eggs in one basket with enewsletters, e-magazine, or social media. I would do them all and treat them each different strategies. I believe blogging is more personalized, raw, and intimate. This is where I would speak to my reader as if they were next to me. To be unedited and uncut. Give them the inside scoop.

For an enewsletter or similar, I would still have juicy tid bits, but the form of delivery would be more polished. More editorial in nature.

And for social media, I would combine a mix of posts that were for bonding, lead gen and sales. I would let my followers see me as both guru and virtual friend.

I think nowadays, marketers need to try and test all online platforms to see which ‘conduit’ is right for their business, audience, and objectives. Don’t rule anything out. Learn how to be strategically creative!

Leveraging Your Worth: 6 Great Ideas To Make More Money For Yourself

2011-06-15T22:21:00.002-04:00

Are you sick of busting your butt for someone else? Tired of long commutes? Looking to make extra money with little risk or start up cost?

For many of the reasons above, tens of thousands of Americans are opting to work from home either part time or full time. With the economy struggling over the past several years, online and home-based business launches have seen a spike. That’s because this is an ideal opportunity for stay-at-home moms, retirees, recent college grads, unemployed workers, and anyone looking for another source of income.

Using your talents, skills, and computer to generate cash can also be a seamless way to obtain an optimal work-family life balance.

But be warned: working from home isn’t for everyone. If you crave an office-type environment, thrive on in-person social interaction, and like the hustle and bustle of the rat race (which believe it or not, some people do), then you might find working from home isolated and slow.

However, depending on what business you decide to launch, you may be quite busy as well as get professional satisfaction, enrichment, socialization, and fulfillment without the commute or stress of the traditional corporate environment.

The main advantage: you call the shots.

Here are some tips and ideas on starting your own business, whether it’s online or offline:

1. Infopublisher. This is a great and easy way to make money. Most infopublishers create a website and ezine (free enewsletter), and fill it with useful, valuable and actionable content. Then through bonding with subscribers, you cross-sell infoproducts (digitial products like ebooks) to your readers. However, although that is the typical formula for success, you can put your toe in the water by starting with an ebook. See if infopublishing is right for you. Pick a topic to write about that you are an expert at and passionate about. Also, do some market research to see if the topic you picked has general market interest. Then write your little heart out. Once you finish, proofread and save as a .pdf file for universal viewing. Finally, join digital marketplaces like ClickBank.com. ClickBank is a cost effective way to sell digital products that is turnkey with virtually no overhead costs. They have a onetime registration fee (around $50) and then take a small percent of commission (like a few bucks) for each sale you make. Price your ebook accordingly based on page count and value of information. ClickBank will then send you monthly checks once you reach your payment threshold, which is an amount you set up. It’s that easy. If you see you have a flair for writing you can continue to sell only ebooks or step it up and create your basic website and ezine.

2. Article Directory Website Owner. This one is more complicated, as it involves hiring a web programmer, but you can set it and forget it. Basically, you create a website that is an online directory, similar to popular directories like ezinearitcles.com, selfgrowth.com, goarticles.com, articlesbase.com and many others. You create sub categories for popular topics (you can get a format and inspiration from aforementioned article sites) and create buzz through social media and search engine optimization about your directory. The business model is that when people find your site and upload their articles, the relationship is reciprocal. You will get the traffic and email address (required for registration); and they will get the search engine marketing/link building benefit. Once your site obtains a strong and steady visitor pace and traffic rank, you can then open up your business model for advertising revenues – that is, charging advertisers for banner or text ads on your website. In addition, you can monetize the email addresses you collect through registration (which you’ll disclose of course) by sending them both editorial and promotional messages.

3. Consultant/Freelancer. This one is a no-brainer. If you’re an expert at something, leverage that expertise and passion by assisting other companies with your special skill. It can be anything from marketing, to graphics design, to proof reading, to editing … and the list goes on. I wouldn’t suggest quitting my day job for this route, but it’s a great second income until your freelance business picks up. You don’t necessarily need a website, but I think it lends credibility and is a great source for consumers to find you (just remember to optimize your site!). Then, you can market yourself to your target audience on targeted social media sites as well as free press release sites. You should also contribute free articles on related websites that highlight your experience and knowledge base about your skill. Finally, you can register on freelance portals like elance.com or ifreelance.com and look for as well as bid on projects that be right up your alley.

4. Sitter or Walker. Becoming a ‘sitter’ is a popular profession where I live. There’s pet sitters, baby sitters, and home sitters. Because I live in Florida, home sitting is actually quite popular with the ‘snow birds’, people that live up north but have homes in Florida. They often need a local to look after their home and check things out during the unoccupied months. Pet sitting and dog walking are also popular choices for home-based businesses and pet sitters can charge anywhere from $16-$25 per visit (and most pets require 3 visits per day). The key to success here is shelling out some basic start up costs for business cards, marketing (such as flyers and brochures) and promoting your business in targeted locations locally. You should also take advantage of free online Yellow pages and Superpages as well as sites like CraigsList.org to promote your services. Also consider leaving business cards or brochures with synergistic business in your area such as veterinarians, pet stores, and super markets. Once you get a few clients, you can offer referral incentives to existing customers and both of you benefit from new business opportunities.

5. Blogger. If you have a lot to say and are dying for a soapbox to preach from, then blogging may be for you. Setting up a blog is fast, easy and free. You can go to popular site like BlogSpot.com and select a template that’s right for you. Then, register you blog with top blog directories. Some great resources can be found at: http://www.technotweaks.com/top-20-blog-directories-to-submit-your/. Then start your rant. You can blog about anything. I suggest you have a theme and write your content for your audience. For example, if you’re a stay-at-home mom, gear your blog for other moms and write tips for child care, great coupon locations, at home remedies, and more. Again, with website or blog success, it’s all about visits and exposure. So take advantage of the Web and mention your blog in related forums or message boards; create a free online press release; get the word out to help drive traffic to your blog. Once you get steady traffic and decent page rank, you can sell ad space on your site either on your own or through a network, such as BlogAds.com. You can also incorporate Google Ad Sense on your site (which is a simple widget on BlogSpot.com, so it’s easy to deploy) to start blogging for dollars.

6. Affiliate Marketer. Many people are professional affiliate marketers or as the industry refers to them ‘super affiliates’. These folks are no joke. Marketing other people’s products are their livelihood. Basically, you search top affiliate marketing networks, directories and forums for the best paying product websites, that is, those offering the best commissions. Often times these are well-known products and sites, but not always. Sometimes, it’s good to start with a simple Google search using keywords such as: best affiliate marketing programs, highest commission affiliate marketing programs, and top affiliate marketing programs. If you have a specific company in mind, search that company name and add ‘affiliate marketing program’ to the search string. Then, sign up for the free affiliate marketing programs and start marketing for that company. The way it usually works is you have to agree to the company’s terms and conditions, then you can download creatives to market on the Web – banner ads, text ads, emails, and more. Based on the commission model, you may get paid (percent) on leads or sales. Popular payment terms: PPS (pay per sale), CPO (cost per order), CPA (cost per acquisition), CPL (cost per lead). Some programs are quite robust and offer real-time reporting, various creatives, automated payouts, and more. Some good resources are: http://www.top-affiliate.com/, http://www.affiliatetips.com/, http://www.abestweb.com/, and http://www.affiliateseeking.com/.

Have You Heard?

2011-06-08T23:13:00.003-04:00

My wildly successful and acclaimed SONAR Content Distribution Model is the principal of my upcoming book, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, Leads and Buzz [Que Publishing, Aug. 2011].

You can get some preliminary information about SONAR on my website, order the 'rough cuts' manusript of my book through the publisher, or pre-order the actual book via Amazon, Borders, or Barnes and Noble. My book is targeted for global release on Aug. 16, 2011.

If you want to REALLY find out how to monetize your content and propel your business, you gotta check this out.

See what all the buzz is about...

"Wendy's book is an impressively thorough account of the marketing options open to Internet businesses today. I have it within reach of my desk and I intend to make good use of it."
--Michael Masterson, Publisher, Agora, Inc., Early To Rise.com

“If you want to transform content into some very substantial money for your business, this must-read book will show you exactly how.”
--Martin D. Weiss, Ph.D., Bestselling Author

"Wendy's new book, Content Is Cash: Leveraging Great Content and the Web for Increased Traffic, Sales, is exactly what is needed in today's turbulent business world. By reading and putting the tactics and strategies into action you will position yourself for more profits and a stronger a business."
--MaryEllen Tribby, Founder/CEO, WorkingMomsOnly.com

"When it comes to marketing online, content is an afterthought for far too many marketers. It's a pity because, as Wendy Montes de Oca points out in her new book, content can be a huge source of income for any business. That's why I love that Wendy has comprehensively explained dozens of ways to leverage content for an online business. The best part is that - like the pro direct marketer she is - Wendy's strategies are all trackable and quantifiable. So you know exactly how valuable your efforts are to your business."
--Jason Holland, Associate Publisher Early to Rise.com

"Everybody talks about marketing with content, but Wendy Montes de Oca provides a systematic approach, SONAR, for actually doing it. By following her model you get higher search engine rankings and other results instead of just churning out an endless pile of articles that go nowhere and do nothing."
--Bob Bly, Author, Copywriter, Publisher, The Direct Response Letter

"Content is Cash is a classic! We implemented Wendy's SONAR system and saw results (traffic, qualified prospects and opt-in subscribers) within hours, not days or months. It's easy to become overwhelmed with Internet marketing "advice". There were more than 26,000 books on Amazon.com this morning dealing with the topic. The SONAR system is not run-of-the-mill advice. You won't find a more complete collection of content marketing anywhere on the planet. Highly recommended!"
--Marc Charles, Entrepreneur, Author, Freelance Guru

"Whenever I think about monetizing content, the first person that comes to mind is Wendy Montes de Oca. I've personally used just one of her strategies in this book to generate thousands of leads and establish instant authority in my niche. Content Is Cash is a must have in serious online marketer's library."
--Brian T. Edmondson, Internet Marketing Expert, TripleYourProfits.com

"Wendy told me about the SONAR system almost two years ago, and swore me to secrecy. Now she has done far more than just reveal the SONAR system. In Content is Cash, Wendy gives you a complete blueprint for the right way to use free content. I especially recommend Content is Cash to anyone who has tried using free content and been frustrated. Follow Wendy's proven method, and you'll have the cure for what frustrated you."
--Conrad Hall, Best-Selling Author, Speaker, Radio Host Conrad Hall Copywriting, LLC.

“This book brings the urgent and swirling noise of contemporary marketing strategy and tactics all together. Wendy has written a practical, no nonsense guide to improving sales and marketing results for any size company. It takes contemporary marketing to a whole new level. Her proven SONAR model is easy to grasp and her style is easy to follow.”
--Chris Binkert, Chief Marketer, Soundview Publications, Second Opinion

“Most Internet marketers know “content is king”. But no one has given us a systematic formula for “syndicating content”, until now. Wendy’s SONAR Content Distribution Model is a genuine masterpiece. I’m serious. There are tens of thousands of books available on Internet and content marketing. But Content is Cash will be the centerpiece of your Internet business and profits.”
-- Mark Smalley, Owner, Mark Smalley Direct

“Wendy's insights are priceless and have the ability to payoff in a big way. Content is Cash is a must read for anyone tasked with driving more traffic and revenue in an increasingly more competitive online environment. I'm looking forward to implementing many of her tips, tricks and tactics in my own business immediately.”
-- Julie McManus, President, Julie McManus Marketing Associates, Inc.

“Wendy’s book, “Content is Ca$h”, is a great book for anyone who wants to leverage their content – publishers, marketers, you name it. It’s well organized and explains Wendy’s system that can help you build your website and drive a boatload of traffic, and do it in a cost-effective manner. As a writer, I gleaned insight on what kind of articles I should be writing – or what I should emphasize in the articles I’m already writing – to grab eyeballs and hopefully turn them into more sales for my company.”
--Sean Brodrick, Editor, UncommonWisdomDaily.com

Content is the single most important factor in building a thriving web business and no one drives that point home better than Wendy Montes de Oca. In Content Is Cash she takes the mystery out of putting your content to work for you. Anyone trying to build traffic, sales, or leads would be a fool to not have a copy of this go-to reference on their desk.
--Alice Wessendorf, Managing Editor, HealthierTalk.com

6 Low Cost, High Performing Ways To Build Your Business This Summer!

2011-06-08T23:11:00.001-04:00

1. Online classified ads. Using www.craigslist.org or similar high traffic classified sites is a great way to sell a product or get leads. The trick is geo-targeting, picking the right location to run your ad in. Picking the right category. As well as creating an ad that is perasuasive and powerful. Ads are free, so why not test it out. For a full list of states and cities, check out: http://www.craigslist.org/about/sites.

2. Organic Search Results (Search Engine Marketing). Search engine marketing (SEM) has a nominal cost. Annual fees with search engine networks or directories typically range from $25 to $95 per year, but many submissions to top sites like Google, Yahoo, Ask and Bing are free. Some consumers give organic search results more "credibility" than paid search ads. And because they "trust" the results of an organic search more, they are more likely to click on an organic link. A recent survey by Jupiter Research illustrated that 80 percent of Web users seek organic search results. Their rationale is that organic results are un-biased. The marketer didn't pay for that ad space. So the link's appearance in the search results is based purely on various search algorithms and Web crawlers. Your goal should be to balance your online presence with both paid ads and organic search results. You should make sure you have keywords in all the right places. That includes your title tags, URLs, and inside the published articles themselves.

3. Cost effective media buys. Running banner ads on other websites can be another cost-effective part of your online marketing mix. The pricing model for this is typically CPM - a specified price for every 1,000 impressions/views you receive (usually between $3 and $10). Since contextual space is limited in banner ads, your headline and visual elements are critical for success. And of course, your landing page should have strong, persuasive copy. Your media budget for banner ads will vary by:

-the website you're running (the higher the traffic, typically the higher the banner advertising rate) ad unit size/type (300 x 250 typically performs best, so those are priced higher than other ad units)
-location on website (home page, inside pages) whether the ad is targeted to a specific page or is on every page of the site (a/k/a run of site)
-the time of year the ad is running

Blogs and online ad networks are a cheaper alternative. Their CPMs (cost per thousand) usually ranges between $2 and $6, and they have a wider reach, although some networks may offer a universe of, lets say 20 websites, when only 5 websites are really considered "top tier". Networks to consider: Advertising.com, ValueClick.com, and FastClick.com. You can find a full list of sites here: http://www.imediaconnection.com/resourceconnection/adnetwork.asp.

4. Reciprocal Ad Swaps. One of the best kept secrets in the industry. Some of your best resources will be your fellow publishers. This channel often gets overlooked by marketers who don't give it the respect it deserves. In the work I do for my clients, I spend a good portion of my time researching publishers and websites in related, synergistic industries. I look for relevant connections between their publications (print and online) and my clients. Let's say I come across a natural health e-letter about that has a list of readers similar in size to one of my clients, who is a supplement manufacturer. Since many of their audience share similar interests, cross marketing each other products (or even lead gen efforts) can be mutually rewarding. Swapping ads will save you money on lead-generation initiatives. Since you won't be paying for access to the other publisher's list of subscribers, you can get new customers for free. The only "cost" is allowing the other publisher to access your own list. It's a win-win situation. This technique also opens the door to potential joint-venture opportunities.

5. Snail Mail. Direct mail is still a consumer favorite - and another good way to get your sales message out. It can be especially effective used in concert with another effort, such as an e-mail campaign. A recent survey published in DM News indicated that 70 percent of respondents preferred receiving unsolicited correspondence via mail vs. e-mail. As with any marketing medium, though, you can end up paying a lot between production costs, list rental costs, and mail shop/postage costs. The most costly direct-mail packages are magalogs and tabloids (four-color mailers that look like magazines). However, 6 x 9 postcards, tri-fold self-mailers, and simple sales letters are three low-cost ways of taking advantage of this channel. Note that copy, list selection and geo-targeting an be crucial for direct mail success no matter which cost-effective mail format you pick. Although 100 percent ROI (return on investment) is what you should aim for, many direct mailers are content with 80 percent. This lower figure takes into consideration the lifetime value of the names that come in from this channel, because they are typically reliable buyers in the future.

6. Print Ads. This is another channel that's gets a raw deal. One reason is because it can be costly. To place an ad in a high-circulation magazine or newspaper, you could shell out serious money. But you don't need a big budget to take advantage of print ads. If you don't have deep pockets, consider targeted newspapers and periodicals. Let's say you're selling an investment report. Try using the Internet to research the wealthiest cities in America. Once you get that list, look online for local newspapers in those communities. These smaller newspapers hit your target audience... and offer a much cheaper ad rate than some of the larger, broad-circulation publications. You end up getting quality rather than quantity. I once paid for an ad in a local newspaper in Aspen, CO that had a flat rate of less than $500. My ROI on this effort turned out to be more than 1,000 percent. How's that for a positive response rate!

The six marketing channels I've just described can help you reach more customers... and eventually add dollar signs to your bottom line. So start the summer off with a marketing bang. By leveraging the six channels of multi-channel marketing, I'm confident you will be amazed by the results.

Social Marketing Shockers and Secrets

2011-06-08T23:04:00.002-04:00

Social marketing can be fun, can increase awareness, and can drive website traffic. But there's also some things you should be aware of before you dive in and spend time or money on this method.

The following are some comments I've heard over the years and my response, based on personal experience and observation:

Social media can't be measured. False. It surely can. Even better, the tools to help you measure them are all free. What you use is good old fashioned direct response and public relations metrics - outputs, outcomes and objectives. Outputs measure effectiveness and efficiency. Outcomes measure behavioral changes. And objectives is simply comparing direct product sales during the time of the campaign to other sales that occurred before the campaign. Online resources that can help with these measurements are Google Analytics, Google Alerts and Back-link checkers. You can also use your own in-house stats for subscriber sign ups (i.e. your email service provider) and sales (i.e. online shopping cart or ecommerce platform).

With social marketing, I don't need an ezine or free newsletter? False. You can certainly just have social media accounts and not have a daily, weekly or monthly ezine, but that is not ideal. You see, with social media accounts, you don't have the friend/follower/fan ('Triple F') email address. You post comments and thoughts, which can be entertaining, strategic or random, but you 'really' don't have a direct line of communication between you and your Triple F. This email address is like gold. Having an email address for your prospects gives you permission to bond with them through strong editorial as well as cross-sell them through targeted, persuasive promotional copy. Not having this is really doing your business an injustice. Not everyone is a 'profile stalker'. Not every Triple F is going to visit your social media page frequently to truly resonate with your message or buy your products. There is so much social media 'noise' that without having your Triple F's email, you're likely to get lost in the chatter.

Twitter is better for conversions than Facebook. False. Personally and for my clients, I have found that Facebook followers/fans convert better than Twitter. My thought for a few reasons: Facebook has more character limitations (420 or so characters per post) as well as a variety of features so you can say more, bond more, and sell more to your audience. Twitter has very strict character limitations (140 characters) making it difficult to have more than a shallow relationship with your audience posting short and pithy blurbs here and there. In addition, did you ever notice most people's 'Following' and 'Followers' numbers are very close or nearly identical in range? That is because with Twitter, you get more random followers that will 'Follow' most anyone looking for a reciprocal follow. Sure, you can set your account with a security feature to not just let people follow you but actually approve potential followers first. But that is not common practice for the most part (unless your ultimate Twitter purpose isn't for business or marketing). With Facebook, as a default you have to approve all friend requests first, thereby you can sort of qualify your audience. I believe with both of these platforms, it's truly quality over quantity. I don't recommend getting caught up in the numbers of how big your friend or follower list is, it's better to have a small list that is responsive, interacts and converts - than a large list that is uninterested in your messages.

It's ok to grab an email address from a 'friend' or 'network' profile page on Facebook or LinkedIn and send them promotional emails. Absolutely not.. Never. This is spam pure and simple. If you haven't noticed, at the bottom of your Facebook info. page or LinkedIn home page, your email address is posted for your network to see. In Facebook, this is a security setting that can be shown to friends only, friends or friends, or everyone. On LinkedIn it's similar. Believe it or not, shortly after I accepted some industry colleague requests, I started getting these solicitations for these people's products. There were pure, hardcore promotional emails. Now, I now I never signed up for there ezine. And it was within days after accepting their request. I could only conclude that these social media barracudas friend targeted people (that are ideal potential customers) and then once friended use that access to view personal email address and spam away. I find this not only tacky and obnoxious, but also violation of anti-spam practices. Needless to say I un-friended these people soon after. But use common sense and know that it's a best practice not to do this.

What are some tricks to increase your presence in Twitter? Keep your Tweets frequent, useful, relevant and entertaining. Use hash tags (#) with targeted keywords. Make sure you have a keyword rich and relevant Twitter bio so the right people can read about you and follow you. Text is limited, so pick your descriptive keywords carefully.

Social marketing is a waste of time. No, not if done correctly. Last year, my friend Bob Bly had a hot social media discussion brewing on his blog, www.Bly.com/blog. One commenter said, ""...by a direct response marketer's metrics, social media is a waste of time..." and "...social networking is simply real world interpersonal networking digitized...". I disagree. Social media, in my opinion, is a hybrid between relationship/network marketing and direct marketing. It's relationship marketing if you know how to be a strategic thinker as well as be creative with your marketing messages. In other words, what to say and where to say it. Targeting is key. You have to look at each social media website to see if it, and it's users, are the right fit for your marketing message and business. Then, you need to craft your message accordingly. And that requires good creative, copywriting skills. It's direct response as you can measure results. Granted, it's not as cut and dry as some other online marketing methods, like email. Where deliverability, clicks, opens, sales, and ROI is concrete. But, for me (and my business), I can specifically track any leads or sales I get back to specific social media platforms. And I can measure traffic to my website via Google Analytics from those same sites. As a core direct marketer, I don't waste my time on something I can't tie a metric to.

A Launch Strategy That REALLY Works!

2011-04-26T23:00:00.003-04:00

Is Co-Registration Worth Testing?

2011-04-26T23:00:00.001-04:00

Co-Registration (or 'co-reg') is a form of online marketing where your subscription or promotional offer appears on a webpage AFTER the primary transaction of the publisher whose site you're advertising on occurs.

For instance, let's say you're on a site like MSN.com. You see an ad for one of MSN's free enewsletters. After you sign up for one of MSNs free newsletters and hit 'submit' a Thank You page may pop up with other publisher's offers. These offers usually are laid out as a bunch of small advertiser logos accompanied with a short description of the offer. This tactic of online marketing is usually used for lead generation purposes since the word count is so limited, it's often a challenge to sell a product with limited space. However, it doesn't much space to convince someone to try something for free in exchange for their email address.

The key in getting co-reg to work for you is to follow up with any leads that come in quickly. The names collected through this mechanism need to be segmented from the other names in your file since these co-reg leads are virtually "cold" to you -- meaning, they really don't know your company at all and need time to buy into your gurus, philosophy and mission. These people also tend to forget who and where they signed up for free offers, so targeting co-reg names with a timely, specific offer reminding them where they signed up and the benefits/value proposition of your enewsletter is a helpful with keeping these names on your file longer.

To get the most from co-reg names and improve your conversion rate and potential life time value, you'll need to bond with co-reg subs first and then hit them with a special cross-sell offer. It's usually best to have a series of introductory emails that try to accomplish this and after the editorial 'bonding' stage, you insert your first solo promotional offer. Popular offers are 'limited time introductory offers' with discounts such as 10-25% off you're front-end product.

The average CPA (cost per acquisition) in co-reg agreements can range from $1.50 - $5.00 per name. Make sure this is "net" names - after any bad emails or duplicates (names you already have in your file) are removed.

Like most online marketing, my belief is not to rule out any tactic until you've at least tested it. If you have the budget to accommodate a test, it's definitely worth trying as long as you have your strategic plan and autoresponder series mapped out in order to get the most of the test.

Grab Your Website Visitor's Attention Now!

2011-04-26T22:59:00.001-04:00

Whether your goal is cross-selling or lead generation, interstitials are a great way to get someone's attention.

An interstitial is not a pop up ad. And typically doesn't get blocked, like pop up ads, by many website or search engines. (For example, Google Adwords won't approve an PPC campaign if the redirect URL goes to a website that has pop up ads).

An interstitial ad is a full-page ad that appears before the actual webpage. Your webmaster or web programmer can put in place via an html script. In a nutshell, it's an ad in the front/center of the screen (some sites even keep the ad in place if you scroll up or down, which I find annoying). The ad is in color and typically has a strong headline, call to action and graphic. Then the background of the ad is greyed-out where you can still see the website behind the ad, but it's faded - so your focus is on the main ad - the interstitial. There's also a clear and obvious way to close the interstitial. No tricks or hard-to-find 'x' buttons.

Interstitials are ideal if you don't have room for banner or text ads on your website or you don't want to affect the current layout of you home page.

Not all interstitials, however, are created equal. I've seen some implemented that are not only unattractive, but are also ineffective with its copy and execution.

A text book example of an interstitial ad can be found at EarlytoRise.com. if you go to the home page, wait 10-25 seconds, the ad will appear in the center of the page with the backdrop shaded.

The beauty of this is that you can make your actual ad space as big or small as you need. Your offer can be to sell something or to obtain an email address. You can include eye-catching images or have a countdown box to an event. Whatever your offer or need ... an interstitial can deliver.

And best of all, you don't have to wonder if your website visitor saw the ad or not. It's no doubt they did. You are just giving them the option to act on it OR close it.

More Profits in Your Pockets: Business Building Super Issue!

2011-04-12T11:12:00.005-04:00

Stop Leaving Money On The Table!

All too often I hear from business owners that they want to launch their business, but need more time: time for cash flow, time to flush things out, time to lay a strong foundation ... time. If you have the right people, or person, on your team you don't have to sacrifice time for profits. It's not one or the other. Having the right players makes all the difference. You can collaborate and strategically plan your businesses launch from concept to execution. You can look at market research, product viability, barriers to entry, marketing strategy, product development, branding, and more. Every day you hesitate in launching your business is money left on the table - opportunities missed.

If you are a subscriber of the popular success newsletter, Early to Rise (ETR), you'll be familiar with their guru's mantra: ready, fire, aim. Michael Masterson wrote an entire book about this strategy and it's engrained in most every ETR issue. I know, and believe in this, wholeheartedly especially since I was the VP of Marketing and Business Development at ETR for over 2 years. Ready, fire, aim in a nutshell is about not spending months after month on things.

Does this mean you should launch a business and throw it out there in a week? No. But it means that after you lay a good foundation for your business - a few key elements in place - instead of going back and forth for months trying to iron irrelevant issues trying to make things 'perfect' ... you can go live and start building your list and revenues, then tweak things post launch.

Any smart online marketer and business owner knows websites are dynamic - always changing - so it's ok to launch with one website than refine your site based on business objectives or consumer behavior 3, 6, 9, months down the road. Businesses must be fluid and adaptable to change for ultimate success. If you put off things 'waiting' to be ready or looking for 'perfect'; that 'readiness' might not ever occur and that 'perfect' will not ever be achieved. However, if you're creative, strategic, and smart you can get your business ready ... get it out there (fire) ... and then adjust it (aim) as necessary - all the time brining in leads and sales.

Profit Makers and Breakers: Business Building 'Must Knows'

In my career, I've seen many businesses make good and bad decisions. Looking at various scenarios - whether it's for companies I worked for, or clients I consulted, or when launching my own firm - my decades of real-world experienced combined with an MBA, helps me look at business decisions in a different light and analyze them from different vantage points.

Here are some profit makers and profit breakers for most ALL businesses.

Profit Maker: Leverage Content: Develop A Free Report, EZine, eAlert or eBulletin. No matter what business you're in, you need a strong, sure fire way to bring in leads (prospects). Creating free content is a great way to give something and get something in return. You're writing about something you are passionate about ... you're area of expertise. You're offering free, powerful editorial content. And in return, you're asking for an email address from the reader. Creating this type of content isn't just good for acquisition efforts, it's also good for branding and establishing you as an expert within your niche. You can then leverage your free content to build your list (prospect database). Your list is your key to future sales. Growing and cultivating your list through editorial is a proven business model from top online publishers. It's a great way to bond with ... and cross-sell to ... your readers. And this helps create a loyal following, a community if you will, of like-minded followers. From there, the sky is the limit!

Profit Breaker: Limited Products or Services. No matter what you're selling, whether it's products or a service (i.e. copywriting, freelancing, consulting) you should always have a variety of price points for customers at every level. Offering front-end products and back-end products gives you room to bring in a customer at a low level and up-sell them. Having only one pricing model or product/service excludes people by interest level and price threshold.

Solution: Think about your target audience and different ways you can serve them. Pick a high, middle and low pricing structure to capture sales at all levels. Then, create products/services that fall into each of the pricing categories. Try not to turn away any reasonable business. Of course, you'll always get the person who wants it all for practically pennies. But losing them is no real loss, as they were probably not a serious prospect anyway.

Profit Maker: Market Smarter, Not Harder with SONAR. There are many 'creatively strategic' ways to increase visibility, traffic, sales, leads and buzz. Leverage internet marketing for its speed, reach and cost efficiency as well as look at 'old school' marketing for your local efforts like classified ads, flyers and bulletin boards. Don't be afraid to seek guidance from a professional. Check out my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM for some great, proven, and easy ways to market your company for practically nothing! This proven, powerful and systematic method is actually the subject of an upcoming book, Content Is Cash, by publishing leader, Pearson Education/Que Publishing, targeted to be in bookstores and online etailers everywhere Aug. 2011. This will be the only online marketing book you'll ever need. Here's a preview: http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=013269607X

Profit Breaker: Being Penny Wise and Pound Foolish. It's wise to be cognizant of your finances, but don't make decisions that may save a few bucks now, but will cost you growth and returns down the road. I know one business owner that let the marketing department go - the team that would help bring in new business and create ways to retain current clients - but kept non-revenue generating positions such as several web programmers. When what they should have done was downsize marketing keeping at least one or two people, but also downsize the web team and other areas of the company that weren't profit centers, such as accounting or human resources.

Solution: Have vision and foresight. Realize that it's ok to take calculated risks. When reviewing your numbers, evaluate if the reward is greater than the risk ... and the odds of reaching the reward are stacked in your favor. Look at the big picture and allocate funds and resources accordingly. Also, have a realistic timeline for growth, prospect acquisition and customer conversion. It's not a seller's market anymore. The economy is tough and consumers are watching every nickel they earn and spend, therefore conversion time may be longer than a few years ago. Bonding with your prospects and customers right now is crucial for sustainable profits.

Profit Maker: Build Your 'Power' Network. Networking and relationship cultivation are extremely important whether you're an entrepreneur or work for a corporation. Creating a contact list of people that can be influential or beneficial to your business is always a good thing. Take time to go to industry events when possible and attend the social functions. This is where people loosen up and deals are made. Don't be the guy or gal in your room checking emails. Get out there and build relationships. Today's cocktail buddy may be tomorrow's business partner.

Profit Breaker: Not Doing Competitive Research Or Market Surveillance. Whether you're a start-up business or seasoned company, it's always advantageous to keep abreast of your competitors. This will help you devise creative and strategic ways to either break into new markets or expand in your existing market. It will also help you with product development, marketing, pricing strategies, and customer service.

Solution: If you're a start-up company, I highly recommend that you research the market you're considering and the audience you want to target BEFORE you launch your business. If you're an existing business, I recommend doing market research at least once per year to make sure you're a leader and not a laggard within your niche. Clearly define what will make your product stand out ... your "USP" (unique selling proposition) ... in the marketplace. Understand your target audience and how to create messages and products that will resonate with them. Don't try and guess what your prospects are thinking. Infiltrate relevant forums. Do keyword research. Find out exactly what your target audience wants. This will ultimately save you time and money down the road with marketing and product development efforts.

Profit Maker: Actively Pursue Joint Ventures and Affiliate Marketing Opportunities. Many clients I work with always push affiliate marketing aside as an afterthought effort. Big mistake. Having a carefully thought out affiliate marketing plan in place as soon as possible is a great way to bring in revenues fast. Don't have any products yet? Not a problem. You're mission is to find out other affiliate marketers that have products that you actually believe in and sell them to your list (subscribers, customers, clients). By selling someone else's relevant products to your list you (A) have an instant product line with no overhead and (B) can start creating cash flow without necessarily having your own products developed yet. One caveat is that if you're selling someone else's products, make sure that they don't conflict with a product that you 'may' be thinking about creating for your own list. Because if you do, it will be harder for your own list to make the transition to your product, if they already have product loyalty to your affiliate. So be strategic when thinking about affiliate products to sell to your list. Pick out products that compliment, but are not potentially competitive.

Profit Breaker: Not Following Expert Recommendations. As a consultant, I can't help a clients' business if a client doesn't listen to me and implement my recommendations. If your employee or consultant gives you their expert opinion, and you don't listen, then don't wonder why you're not getting optimum results. Keep in mind, every decision has a consequence.

Solution: Bosses, business owners, managers -- be open minded and let go. Sometimes you need to believe in, trust, put your ego aside, and listen to the experts. You know, the people YOU hired with the proven experience, performance, and track record coming out of their wazoo. I know it's hard for you to hand over the controls, but it is critical for ultimate success. You have to believe in the person you hired and their years of experience. If you've done your 'due diligence' before you hired them, then you should take comfort in knowing you've hired the right, capable person to lead your business to greatness. If you don't listen to the expert, then you must be accountable - for better or worse - for 'going rogue'.

Profit Maker: Savvy Up and Embrace Online Marketing. Online marketing is a quick, cost-effective way to expand your reach and market share. Its immediacy, broach reach, and ability to target specific customers is second to none as far as marketing channels. And there's so many tactics to choose from: online PR, email marketing, banner ads, text ads, search engine marketing, social media marketing, viral marketing ... and the list goes on. If you have a business where you have been sticking to offline tactics such as direct mail, print ads, or even grass roots marketing, then I urge you to test some low-to-no cost online marketing tactics. Put your toe in the water. You may not think Internet marketing is applicable for your particular business or target audience, but you just have to think outside the box. I always say, if you're a creative and strategic thinker, you can whip up some really interesting ways to leverage this channel for profits.

Getting More Profits In Your Pockets: 7 Secrets to Revenue Acceleration

Many people often ask me, "How did you do it?"

That is, how did I leave the comfort of a nice, corporate job (and salary, I might add) -- as Vice President of Marketing and Business Development for the Internet's top online publisher and launch a new business during a tough economy. And ... on top of that ... launch a new business on the heels of becoming a mom and taking care of my newborn son and busy household.

Well, in all honesty, starting my own business wasn't the initial plan. Shortly after my maternity leave was over, my husband and I soon realized that daycare was not a viable solution for us.

You see, I loved my job and didn't want to leave, making my decision all the harder. But there was no other option. However, as luck would have it, on my last day in the office when I was emailing many industry friends to tell them I was leaving, several people started emailing me back asking me now that I was "available" would I be interested in freelancing for them? "Heck yea!" I thought. These folks all worked with me over the years in one capacity or another and were all aware of my reputation for honesty, integrity, timeliness, results, and most importantly: nearly 20 years of direct response marketing experience.

Hence, the second birth in my life ... the "birth" of my new consulting firm.

Now, launching new business always lends itself to some apprehension. But launching a business during a volatile economy makes it a tad bit more intimidating. However, my business didn't only survive, it thrived. And going on almost two years later, it is still flourishing with several long-term clients (in excess of 6 - 12 months, which in consulting time is almost unheard of), many new clients, and lots of client referrals. In a nutshell, I had taken a company with $0 cash flow and catapulted it to more than a six figure revenue generator in only 10 short months after start up. And you know what ... the revenues are still coming in strong more than 3 years later!

So, back to the original question, "How did I do it?" Well, timing sure wasn't on my side. However, I owe the success of my business to a few critical drivers that I'm going to share with you. You can take these principals and apply or adapt them to your own business efforts as you see fit.

1. Market Smarter, Not Harder. This is a no-brainer. Any start up entrepreneur will tell you they have little to no marketing budget. So how do you build your brand and create awareness? It's being a strategic AND creative thinker. And it's also taking something most companies have (that's content) and leveraging it. Using a systematic approach I developed called the SONAR Content Distribution Model TM. SONAR is simply taking your content and disseminating the release of it on the Web in a strategic and synchronized manner. The platforms you're releasing it to is targeted, highly visible, and free. This helps create a momentum in traffic, buzz, and then you help monetize that traffic though lead generation (or sales) via your website. I've mentored many clients and former employers of this strategy; written several articles about this; as well as held a 2-day teleseminar; and a book is on the horizon. The main reasons: it's easy, it's cheap, it works! This strategy is the focus of my upcoming book, Content IS Cash. See below for details!

2. Relationship Cultivation. Tapping into your network, is key when launching a new business OR gaining market share with an existing business. I happen to have a very strong Rolodex of friends, colleagues, and professional acquaintances that helped create a good foundation for my launch efforts. Always keep relationships open. Touch base with your network. Build relationships with synergistic 'friends' or 'fans' on social media sites. Offer assistance (gratis) if people in your network have questions - not just to those that can be advantageous to you, but anyone in your network that seeks guidance. There are many people that only help out those they feel can do something for them in return, something they see immediate "value" in. Keep an open mind and see the bigger picture. Share your knowledge. People will reciprocate the gesture and it could lead to a multitude of benefits.

3. Strong Work Ethic/Reputation. People that know me ... that I worked for ... or worked with me know my experience - they know what I bring to the table. They also know that I am easy to work with and am committed to virtually any project on my plate. It's a strong work ethic that helps people remember you and helps build your reputation in whatever niche you're in. Your reputation should speak for itself. And that doesn't just help with new business or referrals, but also helps with getting testimonials from those you've worked with. Those testimonials are invaluable as a marketing tool on your website, in social marketing, and in collateral material. Prospects can get a good idea of what to expect from those few "sound bites" about your work. What does your reputation say about you? Make sure you leave a positive impression with those you come in contact with.

4. Leveraging Social Media. I have fully utilized social media. It's cost effective and casts a wide net. Where else can you get your message out to community of like-minded individuals for zero advertising cost? I've had the most success with LinkedIn.com and other social networking sites, as well as social bookmarks, user generated content sites and doing free press releases (that get picked up by bloggers and online news aggregators). For LinkedIn, which is a professional networking community, I joined several "groups" where my target client would be and started writing relevant and useful articles. Soon, people started contacting me (on average 5 per week) with requests for proposals. I actually had so much success with LinkedIn I spoke on the subject matter at last year's SIPA Mid-Year Marketing Event in Miami. If you're interested in a copy of that presentation, please contact me.

5. Contribute Content. I happen to enjoy writing and enjoy sharing my knowledge on my blog and newsletter. In addition to syndicating my blog's content on the Web, I also reached out to relevant marketing newsletters and magazines and asked about being an editorial contributor or guest author -- providing strong, valuable editorial. I also speak at industry conferences. From these efforts I've gained exposure for my business, built credibility, and got leads. When you look for guest editorial opportunities, look for synergistic websites, blogs or enewsletters that would value your content and whose readers would find it useful. See which websites your editorial can fill a void. This is great to increase market visibility and branding. It's also great for branding and potential joint ventures with these same sites (i.e. revenue sharing). Don't forget to get a byline or editorial note in your article with a brief description about you with a back-link to your website.

6. Business Basics. Create a strategic plan. Determine where you want to be in 1 or 2 years and what tactics you're going to do to achieve your goal. Go over your break-even point per month and how many clients/customers it will take to maintain or exceed that point. Keep little overhead. Establish a "true" home office. Share office space. Rent space or time at a business office center. Or get a "virtual office". When you're just starting out, cash flow is vital. If you need to outsource work, look into college interns related to the field you're in or bid out jobs in places like elance.com or ifreelance.com. When it comes to hiring team players, look for 'superstars' that are multi-talented and can multi-task.

7. Balancing Act. Any start-up business can be a drain on your life and family. A lot of time and effort goes into launch, maintenance, and client relationship management. Then of course there's the administrative functions like daily accounting, record keeping, and invoicing. Many entrepreneurs try to take on the full weight of the business and burn the candle at both ends. But it doesn't have to be that way. Make sure you set specific time for your work and time for your family. When work is done, leave it in the office (even if your office is another room of your house). Make sure you find balance in mind, body, and soul. The business will be taken care of during business hours. Enjoy time with your loved ones and soon you all can reap the rewards of a successful company. After all, you work to live, not live to work!

Follow and 'Like' Me... http://twitter.com/PrecisionMktg http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/ http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Florida/Precision-Marketing-Media-LLC/139310392787888

Like what you've read? Feel free to retweet it on Twitter!

Hot Off The Presses! My New Book... My upcoming book, Content Is Cash (available mid August by Que Publishing), is already available online via 'Rough Cuts'. Note: the table of contents and cover artwork is still being edited (TOC has additions and they will be adding the "MBA" title next to my name on the cover). But this gives you a good idea of what's to come! The book is part of Que's popular 'Biz-Tech' series. It will be available in bookstores and online: Amazon, Barnes and Nobel, and more! Check it out! This is so exciting :) http://www.quepublishing.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=013269607X

Datamining For Dollars: How To Segment Your List For Better Performance

2011-03-15T11:20:00.001-04:00

One of the best ways to build your online business is to build your list - that is, your subscribers or database of potential customers (prospects). But you can also do it by changing the way you market to your existing customers.

Today, I'll show you how you can segment your database of names to boost sales, increase bonding and shorten conversion time. Data mining, list segmentation, or strategic database marketing, is basically the art of slicing and dicing your own in-house list of names for optimal perforance. You do this to help increase the response to your promotional and conversion efforts. You see, once you divide your list of names into smaller groups ("segmentation"), you can specialize your product offers. Then, by targeting your offer based on customer needs, you'll be promoting products to people who are more likely to buy them. You increase your customers' satisfaction as well as your potential conversion rates. (The conversion rate is the number of people who not only read your offer but actually purchase the product.) And higher conversion rates means more money for your company.

One proven model is the RFM method. It's practiced by direct-response marketers all over the world, and is a marketing method used at many large publishers and direct response marketing companies. "R" stands for Recency, how recently a customer has made a purchase. "F" stands for Frequency, how often the customer makes a purchase. And "M" stands for Monetary, how much the customer spends. Here's how you can use the RFM method to help lift your sales.

Recency
Whether your house list is made up of people who signed up to receive your free e-zine or people who paid for a subscription, you can segment your database according to how long your customers have been with you. Let's say, 0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-12 months, and 12+ months. You would look at these groups as your hot subs (newest subscribers), warm subs (mid-point subscribers), and cool subs (those who have been subscribing to your e-zine the longest). Let's say your list is made up of subscribers to your free e-zine. Here's how you use that information...Because your "cool subs" may have lost their initial enthusiasm for your e-zine, you should cross-reference them with your open rates. If most of them haven't been opening your e-zine in six, nine, or 12 months, you should consider sending them a special message asking if they still want to receive your e-zine. But that doesn't mean you ignore them. These inactive subscribers are a great group on which to test new marketing approaches, new prices, new subject lines, and so on. After all, you have nothing to lose. Your goal for this group is to re-engage them. And since they aren't responding to your current e-mails, why not use this platform to test? Your "hot subs" are your newest, most enthusiastic subscribers. They are ripe to learn more about you, your products, and your services. If you handle this group properly, you can cultivate them into paying customers. So you may want to send them targeted offers and messages.

For example, you could send them a special introductory series of e-mails (also known and auto responder series). This special series would introduce them to your e-zine's contributors and philosophy. It could also tempt them with specially priced offers. Sending an introductory series like this can not only increase the number of subscribers who convert to paying customers, it also increases their lifetime value (LTV) - the amount they spend with you over their lifetime as your customer. Hot Tip! Make sure to suppress the recipients of your auto responders from any promotional efforts until the series is complete to ensure more effective bonding.

If, instead of subscribers to a free e-zine, your house list is made up of people who paid for their subscription, the same segmentation process applies. You break your active subscribers into hot subs, warm subs, and cool subs. You also break out expirers (those who allowed their subscription to run out) and cancels (those who cancelled their subscription). Cross-marketing to these lists is usually effective. The expirers often just forgot to renew and simply need a reminder. And just because someone cancelled one subscription doesn't mean they may not be ideal for another service or product that you provide. If they're still willing to receive e-mail messages from you, add these folks to your promotional lists. Once you've gotten these otherwise inactive subscribers to open your messages, turning them into paying customers is just a matter of time. Most Internet marketers would have written these people off. So any revenues you get from them are "extra."

Frequency
This segmentation tactic is another way to break down your house list: by how frequently customers have bought from you. So once you've divided your list based on recency, you look at it in terms of your customers' purchase behavior. First, you identify your multi-buyers - customers who've purchased more than one product from you. You then split this list further, segmenting out two-time, three-time, four-time (and more) buyers.Those who have bought from you most often have proven their loyalty and obviously like the products and service they've been getting from you.

So if, for example, you're considering launching a new product with a high price point, these would be your best prospects.

Monetary
Finally, you look at your list in terms of money. One way to do this is to divide your list by the amount of money each customer has spent with you. You might, for example, assign a benchmark dollar amount, such as $5,000, $10,000, or more. Customers at that level make up your "premium buyers." This is the group that has the most favorable LTV for your company. These are your "VIPs." Once you discover who your VIPs are, you can design products or offers specifically for them. Let's say you have some kind of exclusive - and expensive - lifetime membership club. You would market this to multi-buyers who also fall into your "premium buyer" category.

If you offer payment options to your customers, another monetary way to divide your list is according to the payment options they have chosen: monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc. This will help you determine the initial purchase tolerance of each group of customers and which ones may respond best to future price points. As you can see, by looking at your customers' purchasing habits - recency, frequency, and monetary - you can identify the best customers for certain products. And by offering a product to customers who are likely to want it, you can improve your conversion rates.

By using the proven RFM model and other data-mining techniques, I've seen conversion rates double and triple. I've also seen inactive subscribers' open rates surge from 0 percent to more than 30 percent. That's quite an accomplishment, considering that the average open rate for the industry is about 20 percent.

However, many companies that send emails don't have the capacity for datamining.
Unfortunately, many smaller business or start-up companies typically cut email features for cost. Oftentimes, these companies save money using cost-effective and efficient online email service providers that can certainly get the job done, but don't offer robust segmentation tools that allow the client list analysis and dissection features. So try to think of the bigger picture when shopping for email service providers. Hot Tip! When looking at email marketing companies, make sure you ask if there's a list segmentation or datamining feature that can easily be done through their email platform. Find out if it's standard or an upgrade, and what those costs may be monthly. Sometimes it may be an additional fee, but will certainly pay for itself over time.

Is Your Website "Off the Radar"? Rescue Your Site From Internet Obscurity

2011-02-22T13:39:00.002-05:00

Okay, so you have a website. You've spent time and money getting this thing up. You've used all your creative juices to get the words just right. And you added some nice graphics to make the site aesthetically pleasing. Now what?

A website is of little use if nobody can find it. It's like having a storefront with no signage. A telephone book ad with no contact information. It's basically useless.

Mastering organic search ranking has proven to be a fundamental part of the online marketing mix. (By "organic," I mean the "natural," as opposed to "paid/PPC," listing that appears when someone conducts a search on Google or other search engines. Optimal placement is typically within the first 20 listings or three pages.)

Search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO) - the ability to increase your site's visibility in organic search listings and refine the content structure on the site itself - are critical for market awareness and customer acquisition. According to WebProNews, 66.3 percent of searchers click on organic listings before they click on a sponsored link. Even more important, a recent study by CreativeWebsiteMarketing.com indicates that most people who buy online start with a search engine. Don't let your site get lost in Internet obscurity. Here are five simple ways to help boost your website's traffic and optimization.

1. Create online buzz about your site, product, or service. You can do this by generating online press releases. There are services on the Web, such as PRWeb.com or Free-press-release.com, that do this for free or at a nominal cost. Another idea is to post comments to high-traffic blogs, bulletin boards, chat rooms, or forums. Do a Web search for top blogs or news forums that are related to whatever it is that you're selling. Go to each site, one by one, and post a comment. (Start a new topic or reply to an existing one.) This helps in two ways: One, you create buzz in the marketplace. Depending on your tactics, your message can even go viral. Two, you get a "back-link" to your site that helps when the site is indexed by search engine spiders. An important note: Your post should be relevant and genuine. Your comment should be related to the question you're replying to, have some sort of value to the readers that view it, and be posted to the proper area/subject matter on the forum you're posting to. Stay away from posts that are blatantly self-serving. These posts are viewed as spam by forum webmasters and could get you banned from the forum, or at least be deleted.

For example, when I was VP of Marketing at EarlytoRise.com I took an interview that the publisher had done with Newt Gingrich and repurposed it into a press release. I also uploaded comments about the interview to news-aggregating services, blogs, and political forums (with a back-link to the release posted in the newsletter archive).Within the weeks following the initial interview, website visits and traffic ranking more than doubled and conversion also showed a spike. Three months later, the release was still being picked up by the media and through syndication... and the website enjoyed residual traffic and back-links from this effort. These techniques and the others, including my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM I'm about to go into have helped increase traffic to the site nearly 80 percent with a monetization of more than 150 percent ROI.Which leads me to my next strategy...

2. Initiate a relevant inbound link program. Set up a reciprocal link page or blog roll (a listing of URLs on a blog, as opposed to a website) that can house links from industry sites. Contact these sites to see if they'd be willing to swap links with you - a link to your site for a link to theirs. Again, relevance is key. Search engines shun link harvesting (collecting links from random websites that have no relevance to your site), so these links should be from sites that are similar in nature to your business.

3. Give Web searchers great content and a link back to your site. Upload relevant content to sites that make such information available to other sites that want to publish it, such as EzineArticles.com, Amazines.com and others. This is a great way to increase market awareness as well as establish an inbound link to your site. There is also a syndication opportunity, as third-party sites may come across your article when doing a Web search and republish your content on their own websites. As long as third-parties give your site editorial attribution and a link, getting them to republish your content is just another distribution channel for you to consider.

4. Website pages should be keyword rich and related to your business. Make a list of your top 20 keywords and variations of those words, and incorporate them into the copy on your site (avoiding the obvious repetition of words). Search engine "spiders" crawl Web pages from top to bottom, so your strongest keywords should be in that order on your home page and sub-pages (the most relevant on the top, the least relevant on the bottom). You'll want to do the same for your tagging. Make sure your title tags (the descriptions at the top of each page) and meta tags are unique and chock full of keywords. And your alt tags (images) should have relevant descriptions as well.

5. List your site in online directories by related category or region. This is an effective way to increase exposure and get found by prospects searching specifically for information on your product or service by keyword topic. Popular directories (like Business.com) typically have a nominal fee. But there are many other directories (like Dmoz.org, Info.com, and Superpages.com) that are free.

Most important, before you start your SEO initiatives, don't forget to establish a baseline for your site so you can measure pre- vs. post-SEO tactics. Upload a site counter (which counts the number of visits to your website), obtain your site's Alexa traffic ranking at Alexa.com, or get your site's daily visit average (from Google Analytics or another application) - and then chart your weekly progress in Excel.

Understand that it typically takes two to three months for a site to be optimized ... so be patient. You will eventually see results.

7 Infallible Ways to Increase Visibility, Traffic, Leads and Buzz!

2011-02-08T10:15:00.000-05:00

A few years ago I led the marketing and business development efforts at top online publisher, Early To Rise. While I was there, I also wrote several articles for their ezine focused on marketing, entrepreneurship and business building. Below is one of those articles, but I recently updated it for this publication. The tactics are proven, powerful and worth mentioning again!

Whether you're talking about the articles you include in your e-zine or about your sales message, one thing is certain: Content is king. The written word has the power to educate and inform... as well as create buzz about your website, product, or service. That's one of my main tasks for my consulting clients - to circulate their e-zine articles through multiple delivery channels. Reaching potential subscribers thereby increasing readership and, ultimately, revenues.

I am a firm believer of leveraging all content - marketing and editorial. By circulating it in multiple channels - online, e-mail, print, direct mail, and so forth - you can reach your prospects through whatever medium they prefer. And for those who like to receive their information through more than one medium, your message is re-enforced every time they see it in another channel. I strongly encourage you to take this multi-channel marketing approach with your own online business.

Here are seven of the best and most cost-effective channels I've used at top publishers and for my consulting clients:

1. Paid Search Ads (Pay-Per-Click) Google and Yahoo are the Titans of the paid-search ad world, with nearly 70 percent of market share. But there are other search engines that have a loyal following, such as Bing.com (with 16 percent market share), AOL.com (with 9.6 percent), Ask.com (5.1 percent), Infospace.com (1.1 percent), and Lycos.com (0.9 percent). Pay-per-click (PPC) ads with any of these search engines is a cost-effective way to target prospects looking for your specific product and get broad exposure. You create a text ad, then bid on keywords (the words or phrases your target audience will be searching for) to determine your ad's placement. PPC paid search ads are perfect for acquiring new customers. That's because leads that come in this way are searching specifically for your information (via targeted keywords). This makes them highly qualified prospects.

2. Organic Search Results (Search Engine Marketing) Search engine marketing (SEM) has a nominal cost. Annual fees with search engine networks or directories typically range from $25 to $95 per year. Some consumers give organic search results more "credibility" than paid search ads. And because they "trust" the results of an organic search more, they are more likely to click on an organic link. A survey by Jupiter Research illustrated that 80 percent of Web users seek organic search results. Their rationale is that organic results are un-biased. The marketer didn't pay for that ad space. So the link's appearance in the search results is based purely on various search algorithms and Web crawlers. Your goal should be to balance your online presence with both paid ads and organic search results. You should also optimizes all your efforts by (among other things) making sure keywords are in all the right places. It's important for your writers/editors to work with your search marketers. This includes title tags, URLs, meta keywords, meta descriptions, and body content.

3. Banner Ads Running banner ads on other websites can be another cost-effective part of your online marketing mix. The pricing model for this is typically CPM - a specified price for every 1,000 impressions/views you receive (usually between $3 and $10).Your media budget for banner ads will vary by:
-website
-ad unit size/type (300 x 250 typically performs best)
-location on website (home page, inside pages)
-whether the ad is targeted to a specific page or is on every page of the site
-the time of year the ad is running

Online ad networks are a cheaper alternative. Their CPM usually ranges between $2 and $6, and they have a wider reach. Some networks to consider: Advertising.com, ValueClick.com, and FastClick.com. You can find a full list of sites here:
www.imediaconnection.com/resourceconnection/adnetwork.asp. If you're interested in how to get the best pricing for online advertising, check this out !

4. Reciprocal Ad Swaps or Editorial Contributions Some of your best resources will be your fellow publishers. This channel often gets overlooked by marketers who don't give it the respect it deserves. In the work I do for my clients, I spend a good portion of my time researching synergistic publishers and websites. I look for relevant connections between their publications (print and online) and my clients.

Swapping ads or providing guest editorials will save you money on lead-generation initiatives and give you added exposure to an external list source you might not otherwise have been featured in. Since you won't be paying for access to the other publisher's list of subscribers, you can get new customers for free. If you're writing an article, you can simply use an Editorial Note section for your byline and include a link to your newsletter sign up page. If you're running a text ad, then simply have content and link to your squeeze page. The only "cost" is allowing the other publisher to access your own list. It's a win-win situation. This technique also opens the door to longer-term joint venture opportunities.

5. Co-Registration Co-registration - or "co-reg" - is the practice of referring leads, subscriptions, or memberships in conjunction with another registration transaction, and usually happens after the fact.Co-reg ads use a CPL (cost per lead) payment model. You pay for the leads you capture. Your text ad and a small image of your publication appear on a webpage on another publisher's website after a primary transaction occurs. Your ad shares the page with other publishers looking to build their own e-mail lists with free subscriptions to their e-letters or free e-reports.

To make this work, I've found that you need to send special introductory "bonding" e-mails to the people who sign up for your newsletter before they get added to the general circulation. This helps them remember that they signed up for your e-letter. (So when it shows up in their inbox they won't think it's spam.) And it helps increase the potential that those subscribers will convert to paying customers.

6. Direct Mail Direct mail is still a consumer favorite - and another good way to get your sales message out. It can be especially effective used in concert with another effort, such as an e-mail campaign.

A recent survey published in DM News indicated that 70 percent of respondents preferred receiving unsolicited correspondence via mail vs. e-mail. As with any marketing medium, though, you can end up paying a lot. The most costly direct-mail packages are magalogs and tabloids (four-color mailers that look like magazines). However, 6 x 9 postcards, tri-fold self-mailers, and simple sales letters are three low-cost ways of taking advantage of this channel. Although 100 percent ROI (return on investment) is what you should aim for, many direct mailers are content with 80 percent. This lower figure takes into consideration the lifetime value of the names that come in from this channel, because they are typically reliable buyers in the future.

7. Print ads This is another channel that's gets a raw deal. One reason is because it can be costly. To place an ad in a high-circulation magazine or newspaper, you could shell out serious money. But you don't need a big budget to take advantage of print ads. If you don't have deep pockets, consider targeted newspapers and periodicals.

Let's say you're selling an investment report. Try using the Internet to research the wealthiest cities in America. Once you get that list, look online for local newspapers in those communities. These smaller newspapers hit your target audience... and offer a much cheaper ad rate than some of the larger, broad-circulation publications. You end up getting quality rather than quantity.

I once paid for an ad in a local newspaper in Aspen, CO that had a flat rate of less than $500. My ROI on this effort turned out to be more than 1,000 percent. How's that for a positive response rate!

The seven marketing channels I've just described can help you reach more customers... and eventually add dollar signs to your bottom line.

It's not too late to start this New Year off with a marketing bang. By leveraging the seven channels of multi-channel marketing, I'm confident you will be amazed by the results.

Internet Marketing Quick Tip: Optimize Your PPC Efforts With Site Targeting

2011-01-18T23:55:00.001-05:00

If you're finding that the Yahoo, Google or Bing universe is too broad and vast for your niche products (or ad budget), consider testing a campaign on smaller pay-per-click ad networks such as Miva.com, Kanoodle.com, Avertising.com (formerly Quigo.com) or AdBrite.com.

Each of these networks allow PPC site targeting as well as have specialized publishers/websites in their network. In my experience, since their universe is smaller than Google or the other 'top 3' search engines, you find yourself the big fish in a small pond - increasing your click thru and conversion rate and reducing your overall cost per lead (CPL).

Of course, it goes without saying that having great copy both in the text ad and landing page is crucial to success in most ANY ad network. Advertising.com, for instance, has some heavy-hitters intheir network, like major cable and broadcast new channel websites. Since the universe is smaller, you will likely have less competition, thereby a lower bid price.

This will help you stretch your ad dollars longer than on a more competitive platform such as Google Ad Words. It's worth running a test: take the same ad and pick the same keywords, yet run the campaign in two different ad networks such as Google and Advertising.com. After 2 weeks, review the results. You may be pleasantly surprised!

[Editor's Note: To learn more great ways to save big with online advertising, click here now!]

What Does Customer Lifetime Value And A Hair Salon Have In Common? More Than You Know…

2011-01-08T15:19:00.006-05:00

Sometimes business lessons can occur in the weirdest places and at the most unexpected times.

A few weeks ago, I went to my normal salon for hair coloring. I’ve been going to this place for over a year and consider myself a loyal customer. I have even referred friends and neighbors to this salon. The staff are usually friendly and attentive. And the atmosphere is comfortable yet sophisticated, similar to a New York hair salon, which originally had attracted me to them.

After showing my hair stylist (who’s also the owner) a picture of the color I wanted and reiterated the color should be in the same palette of 'bronze, copper, caramel, and amber', he proceeded to color my hair. Let me preface this by saying my natural hair color is light-medium auburn brown, but back in September my hair had gotten very blonde, so I wanted to go back to my natural color.

After touching up my roots then adding a ‘temporary’ wash color, he took the towel off my head and unveiled the results. You can see he was so proud of himself, which was very short lived. The expression on my face spoke a thousand words. “I hate it”, I said. “It’s not what I wanted…it’s not what was in my picture…it’s not bronze, amber or caramel”. My hair was almost plumb red. I mean, really, really red with no trace of a brownish color.

My stylist kept saying, “Let me blow it dry and you’ll love it.” The frown remained on my face and he finished blowing it dry. “Nope, I don’t like it”, I proclaimed. He then said, “Step outside with a mirror and see the real color in the sunlight, the lights in here are dim and making the color look darker.” So I walked outside with a mirror to the back alley behind the salon, looked at my hair, and the color was still plumb red ... just a brighter appearance with the sunlight above me.

I came back inside the salon and said, “Nope, it’s not what I wanted.” My stylist then added, “Well, it’s only a temporary wash in color, it will fade to the color you want in about 6 weeks.” To which I replied, “There’s no way in hell I’m walking around 6 weeks with a plumb red head.”

So he then said he could try and offset the redness and monotone color with some honey-blonde highlights (or 'foils').

Foils are done. Hair finally looked good. I was happy with the final result as the added highlights did reduce the drastic red color. And the highs and lows with the color looked beautiful.

Then I get the bill: Not only did my stylist charge me for the horrendous temporary ‘wash’ that he used which screwed up my hair, but he also charged me for the foils that were only needed to correct his initial botched up hair color job.

When I inquired about the charges, I was told that: (A) I actually got a discount on the foils because instead of getting charged for a ‘full foil’ I only got charged ‘per foil’ which turns out to be slightly cheaper and (B) that it was my option to get the foils as I could have just waited the 6 weeks and my desired color would have eventually shown through with oxidation and hair washings.

Needless to say that was the last time I went to this salon. In addition, I’m telling practically every person I know about this event and never referring business to them again.

But I left thinking, "Could this business owner be so short sighted that he couldn’t do the right thing and eat the cost of the foils? I mean, didn’t he ever hear of the saying, ‘the customer is always right’?"

And on top of that, doing the simple math and looking at the bottom line, is it really worth saving a few hundred dollars (the cost of the foils) in the short-term and losing a loyal customer as well as referral business – which will certainly impact my life time value (LTV) – in the long-term?

I could have easily spent thousands of dollars per year, every year, in this salon until who knows when.

What a dumb decision on his part.

As business owners it’s important to listen to your customers and do the right thing. Don’t be shortsighted. Don’t be penny wise and pound foolish. Think of the big picture and life time value of each customer as well as referral business. Extending a little ‘good will’ can go a long, long way.

Here’s a great article I wrote a few years ago while I was VP of Marketing at Early to Rise that validates this very point. Happy Reading!

---------------------------------
The 5 Faces of Your Customer

By Wendy Montes de Oca
One of the most profound business books I ever read was Permission Marketing by Seth Godin.
The ideas in the book were very innovative at the time. The Internet and e-mail marketing were still young, and, like the Wild Wild West, most marketers and business owners were still trying to “wrangle it in” and figure out how to leverage the Web’s possibilities… and, more important, turn those possibilities into profits.

In a nutshell, the book explained “how to turn strangers into friends and friends into customers.” The principle behind this is to first understand the difference between cold (or interruption) marketing - like those annoying phone calls you always seem to get during dinner asking you to subscribe to the local newspaper… and permission marketing – where the prospect is actually giving you permission to contact them by “opting in” to receive your messages.

To help you get the most out of your Internet marketing, I have expanded on Mr. Godin’s “stranger/friend/customer” concept and added two key components: multi-buyer and advocate. And I’ll show you how you can leverage each of these segments to help grow your business.

Leveraging Your Customers Throughout Their Life Cycle

You may think that a customer is someone who buys from you – period. But that’s a very limited view. From the instant you “meet” your customer… until he’s become a VIP buyer who’s spent hundreds or thousands of dollars with your company… you should be interacting with him in different ways. Treating him properly every step of the way will create a true win/win situation. Your customer will continue to enjoy satisfying experiences with your company, and your company will enjoy the positive effect this relationship will have on its bottom line.

Here are the five stages a customer can go through during his life cycle, and how you can make the most of each one…

Stage 1: Stranger
The stranger or “prospect” doesn’t know you. Your job is to get her attention. You have only a few seconds to get her to react – whether it’s by asking her to click on your ad or open your e-mail message. Which means that your copy for the ad headline or e-mail subject line is critical.
Once you’ve captured her attention, your #1 goal is to have this stranger “opt in” to receive your messages, giving you a chance to continue to bond with her. This is also the time to start to build trust. Show your creditability. And explain what you can do for her (fill a desire, answer a need).

Stage 2: Friend
The friend has demonstrated an interest in your initial promotion and has opted in to receive more information from you. This gives you an outstanding opportunity to introduce him to your philosophy, your company, and your mission, and to re-enforce how you can help him.
During this stage, it’s best to send a series of introduction e-mails (anywhere from 5 to 7) and withhold your new friends from your general mailing list. You don’t want them (the newest names on your list) to start receiving promotional messages BEFORE they receive some of your editorial messages.

I recomment to my clients to sent introductory e-mails (autoresponders) to subscribers. Each e-mail should be comprised of articles that present the core philosophies of the client. This gives subscribers a chance to “warm up” to the 'guru', expert contributors, as well as the format of the newsletter, and the topics typically addressed. Only after they are warmed up should you start sending promotional e-mails.

Stage 3: Customer/Client
The customer (or client) is someone who has bought into your philosophy and purchased a product (or service) from you. Many companies make the mistake of ending the customer relationship at this point. But after reading this article, you’ll know better… you’ll know that getting the customer is only the beginning. Keeping him is another story. You don’t want to put all your eggs into one acquisition basket while having few or no retention efforts. Good retention strategies entail ongoing communication (both promotional and editorial), outstanding customer service, quality products, and fulfilling your promises. Of course there will always be things outside of your control (like losing customers to market conditions). But the idea is to be proactive and not reactive. Keep the “80/20 rule” in mind – which states that 80 percent of your sales come from 20 percent of your customers.

Stage 4: Multi-Buyer
The multi-buyer is a customer who is tied into your brand and demonstrates product loyalty with your company. Multi-buyers have purchased several products from you, and are not afraid to spend money. These folks are your best list to roll out new products to or test higher price points. If you are thinking about creating a “VIP” or “Lifetime” product, you’re going to want to advertise to this list. Multi-buyers will have a high lifetime value (LTV) for you, and will likely purchase cross-channel. In other words, they will buy from you no matter how you contact them – whether via banner ads, e-mail marketing, direct mail, or telemarketing.

Stage 5: Advocate
This segment of your customer database is your holy grail. Your list of advocates is made up of the most satisfied and loyal of your customers – and contains your best “unpaid” employees. Advocates will do your advertising for you by telling friends, family, colleagues, and acquaintances about your products and services. And in today’s Net-based environment, advocates are a major force in getting your name in the blogsphere and social communities… and spreading your marketing message virally.

So how do you create advocates? Well, advocates are not created, they’re cultivated over time. The advocate must, of course, believe in your products and services. But for this special group, the customer experience goes deeper… to an emotional level. The advocate feels personally touched by your service, product, or guru. Because of you, her life is changed – and she’s busting at the seams to help others as she has been helped.

Your advocates are people you want testimonials from. People you can invite to be in BETA test or focus groups. And people to get feedback from to help develop future products. Even better, this group can help you make more money in the future. Some of my best JV (joint venture) partnerships have been with my clients' advocates – people who understand their core values, respect their business, and have a company or product that’s synergistic to my clients.

You want to treat these folks like the VIPs they are and invite them to special events or let them be the first to receive discounted offers. You may even consider creating affiliate marketing or referral programs to “formalize” this group’s verbal recommendations.

Always keep in mind that the effort does not stop at the sale. Since it costs more to obtain new leads than to retain existing customers – now, more than ever – you have to know how to optimize the five stages of the customer life cycle.

Don't SPAM Your Fellow Social Network Community Members!

2010-12-27T23:49:00.003-05:00

Ok, you decided to implement social media marketing. You have been actively engaging in LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other popular sites. You carefully accept friend, follower, and fan requests. Then it hits you like a ton of bricks ... you’ve just been spammed by a ‘friend’!

Facebook and LinkedIn publish your email address on your user profile page for all your ‘friends’ to see. And many ‘social marketing barracudas’ use this personal information and decide that it’s fair game to now send you unsolicited, unwanted and un-opted in emails that are typically promotional in nature OR trying to get you to hire them for their services.

Remember, if you didn’t ‘opt in’ to receive someone’s promotional-type communications to your personal or business email address, than those emails are spam - plain and simple.

Don’t engage in this abusive practice.

If you wish to correspond with a fellow social network community member, use social marketing etiquette and either post to their wall or send them a direct message thru the social media community platform. For instance, Facebook has a way where you can ‘direct message’ friends so it’s private to that reader and not a public post for all to see. This way, you’re not invading this person’s privacy and sending correspondence to their ‘personal’ email address.

When I receive messages of this nature I not only pay them no creed as the user is typically inauthentic and desperate for business -- but I also un-friend the person immediately. So it’s a lose/lose situation.

This is a blatant disregard to the social community members as well as just bad marketing.

‘Can Social Media Marketing Work For Me?’

2010-12-22T14:22:00.000-05:00

I get many questions from clients asking me how to leverage social media for bonding and sales.

I believe, like any marketing tactic, you must first evaluate if this ‘channel’ is right for your business. Depending on your target market and mission, social media may not be for you.
If you determine that social media is a viable channel to at least test, then there’s little tricks for optimum results:

Engagement. It’s all about creating a community, interacting with your ‘triple F’s’, that is, Friends, Followers and Fans, and cultivating a cyber-relationships. Post insightful, thought provoking, and powerful editorial. Ask probing questions. Exchange witty and fun comments. With social media marketing, it’s all about relationship building and bonding.

Friend and Guru. You want to come across as both a friend AND expert. This can be accomplished by posting quasi-personal information or photos of your life and letting your triple F’s take a little peek into your world. It’s also posting strong messages, articles or recommendations that are relevant to your field … you’re expertise.

Marketing and Advertising. Uploading banner ads, offering free reports to encourage sign ups, having text links to squeeze pages or promotional pages are all creative ways to try and monetize your social media efforts. It’s also a good idea to implement a special auto responder series or segmented social media conversion plan to help expedite the sales process.

One-on-One Time. When you can, make an effort to respond to individual posts as well as send direct messages to individual followers. As a question. Convey birthday wishes. Discuss sports, family or other interests. Share a funny story. Personal communication goes a long way. People feel extra special through direct dialog. It will help them remember you above the many others they may be following on Twitter or FaceBook.

Which leads me to my next question that I get asked a lot, ‘which is better, Twitter or FaceBook?’

Personally, I like the diversity and flexibility FaceBook offers as opposed to Twitter. Twitter posts are limited to small amount of characters which makes bonding harder. In addition, I’ve found FaceBook followers more loyal than Twitter. Many people on Twitter follow people just to get that reciprocal follow and build their following. It becomes more about reciprocation, than about relevance. And since many of your Twitter followers may not be ‘relevant’ or targeted (i.e. ideal prospects), conversion may never occur or take longer than average. For all these reasons I’ve found in my own experience that FaceBook triple F’s are of better quality than Twitter.

But your experience may be completely different…so I suggest you test both social media platforms for yourself and monitor your followers (who they are) as well as conversions.

Good luck!

Profit Makers and Breakers: 10 Things Every Business Owner Should Know

2010-11-29T20:28:00.006-05:00

In my career, I've seen many businesses make good and bad decisions.

I was just talking with my husband yesterday and we were discussing one company that mad a monumentally bad decision that may have not directly affected revenues, but it affected employee morale and team dynamic ... which indirectly affected their bottom line, as employees started to resign.

Looking at various scenarios - whether it's for companies I worked for, or clients I consulted, or when launching my own firm - my decades of real-world experienced combined with an MBA, helps me look at business decisions in a different light and analyze them from different vantage points.

Here are some profit makers and profit breakers for most ALL businesses: large, small, start-up or staple. See if any apply to your company!

Profit Breaker #1. Keeping the 'Corporate Cancer' On Board. Ok, you know the person, the one who may appear to be a high performer, but also has a high level of being insubordinate, outspoken, defensive, and has blatant disrespect for their peers. They respond to most every management decision with hesitation and resistance. They don't work well with others and often is alone in their cube or office 'looking' busy. C-Level management is aware of his or her bad reputation with team members and fellow coworkers, but turns a blind eye, as they're not the ones in the trenches with this individual ...they don't realize the true disruption this person is making to the team and hence is ok with them staying on board because this person seems to be 'a work horse'.

Solution: Cut the 'dead weight'. This person has to go and the sooner the better. It's similar to a 'corporate cancer' which will only spread and affect other areas of the business entity. It needs to be removed with expedience. It may be difficult to carry this out, and you may get some push back from the higher ups. But if you present the '3 R's' (Reasons, Remedy attempts, and Reoccurrence of bad behavior over a specific time period) human resources will see the light and support your decision. Before you actually fire this person, make sure all your ducks are in a row and you've detailed specific moments of their disruptive behavior and your attempts to work with them on correcting it. Of course, working with them will never be a solution because of the innate characteristics these types of people typically have: strong-willed and defensive. So termination is really inevitable. You have to look at it this way, what management message are you sending to the team by keeping someone on board that behaves so badly without any repercussions? Once you remove this person, a huge weight will be lifted from the team and you'll almost immediately see a change for the better with the employee morale and production turnout. You will find a better version of this person without the attitude.

Profit Maker #2. Leverage Content: Develop A Free Report, EZine, eAlert or eBulletin. No matter what business you're in, you need a strong, sure fire way to bring in leads (prospects). Creating free content is a great way to give something and get something in return. You're writing about something you are passionate about ... you're area of expertise. You're offering free, powerful editorial content. And in return, you're asking for an email address from the reader. Creating this type of content isn't just good for acquisition efforts, it's also good for branding and establishing you as an expert within your niche. You can then leverage your free content to build your list (prospect database). Your list is your key to future sales. Growing and cultivating your list through editorial is a proven business model from top online publishers. It's a great way to bond with ... and cross-sell to ... your readers. And this helps create a loyal following, a community if you will, of like-minded followers. From there, the sky is the limit!

Profit Breaker #3. Limited Products or Services. No matter what you're selling, whether it's products or a service (i.e. copywriting, freelancing, consulting) you should always have a variety of price points for customers at every level. Offering front-end products and back-end products gives you room to bring in a customer at a low level and up-sell them. Having only one pricing model or product/service excludes people by interest level and price threshold.

Solution: Think about your target audience and different ways you can serve them. Pick a high, middle and low pricing structure to capture sales at all levels. Then, create products/services that fall into each of the pricing categories. Try not to turn away any reasonable business. Of course, you'll always get the person who wants it all for practically pennies. But losing them is no real loss, as they were probably not a serious prospect anyway.

Profit Maker #4. Market Smarter, Not Harder with SONAR. There are many 'creatively strategic' ways to increase visibility, traffic, sales, leads and buzz. Leverage internet marketing for its speed, reach and cost efficiency as well as look at 'old school' marketing for your local efforts like classified ads, flyers and bulletin boards. Don't be afraid to seek guidance from a professional. Check out my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM for some great, proven, and easy ways to market your company for practically nothing!

Profit Breaker #5. Being Penny Wise and Pound Foolish. It's wise to be cognizant of your finances, but don't make decisions that may save a few bucks now, but will cost you growth and returns down the road. I know one business owner that let the marketing department go - the team that would help bring in new business and create ways to retain current clients - but kept non-revenue generating positions such as several web programmers. When what they should have done was downsize marketing keeping at least one or two people, but also downsize the web team and other areas of the company that weren't profit centers, such as accounting or human resources.

Solution: Have vision and foresight. Realize that it's ok to take calculated risks. When reviewing your numbers, evaluate if the reward is greater than the risk ... and the odds of reaching the reward are stacked in your favor. Look at the big picture and allocate funds and resources accordingly. Also, have a realistic timeline for growth, prospect acquisition and customer conversion. It's not a seller's market anymore. The economy is tough and consumers are watching every nickel they earn and spend, therefore conversion time may be longer than a few years ago. Bonding with your prospects and customers right now is crucial for sustainable profits.

Profit Maker #6. Mix and Mingle. Networking and relationship cultivation are extremely important whether you're an entrepreneur or work for a corporation. Creating a contact list of people that can be influential or beneficial to your business is always a good thing. Take time to go to industry events when possible and attend the social functions. This is where people loosen up and deals are made. Don't be the guy or gal in your room checking emails. Get out there and build relationships. Today's cocktail buddy may be tomorrow's business partner.

Profit Breaker #7: Not Doing Competitive Research Or Market Surveillance. Whether you're a start-up business or seasoned company, it's always advantageous to keep abreast of your competitors. This will help you devise creative and strategic ways to either break into new markets or expand in your existing market. It will also help you with product development, marketing, pricing strategies, and customer service.

Solution: If you're a start-up company, I highly recommend that you research the market you're considering and the audience you want to target BEFORE you launch your business. If you're an existing business, I recommend doing market research at least once per year to make sure you're a leader and not a laggard within your niche. Clearly define what will make your product stand out ... your "USP" (unique selling proposition) ... in the marketplace. Understand your target audience and how to create messages and products that will resonate with them. Don't try and guess what your prospects are thinking. Infiltrate relevant forums. Do keyword research. Find out exactly what your target audience wants. This will ultimately save you time and money down the road with marketing and product development efforts.

Profit Maker #8: Pursue Joint Ventures and Affiliate Marketing Opportunities. Many clients I work with always push affiliate marketing aside as an afterthought effort. Big mistake. Having a carefully thought out affiliate marketing plan in place as soon as possible is a great way to bring in revenues fast. Don't have any products yet? Not a problem. You're mission is to find out other affiliate marketers that have products that you actually believe in and sell them to your list (subscribers, customers, clients). By selling someone else's relevant products to your list you (A) have an instant product line with no overhead and (B) can start creating cash flow without necessarily having your own products developed yet. One caveat is that if you're selling someone else's products, make sure that they don't conflict with a product that you 'may' be thinking about creating for your own list. Because if you do, it will be harder for your own list to make the transition to your product, if they already have product loyalty to your affiliate. So be strategic when thinking about affiliate products to sell to your list. Pick out products that compliment, but are not potentially competitive.

Profit Breaker #9: Not Listening To The Experts! I always tell my clients, heck, I even have verbiage in my consulting proposals that reads, "Full cooperation and support from Client regarding marketing recommendations and/or strategies, swiftness in response to market demand, and a streamlined approval process is needed for best results."

As a consultant, I can't help a client's business if they don't listen to me and implement my recommendations. If your employee or consultant gives you their expert opinion, and you don't listen, then don't wonder why you're not getting optimum results. I hear this all the time from marketing professionals and freelancers. The boss feels that since they're 'footing the bill' they call the shots ... even the decisions that the boss has no expertise in. (Although, some bosses truly believe they excel at most everything and try to do it all!). They just can't seem to let go of the reigns and trust the employee or consultant to do their job. But keep one thing in mind: Every decision has a consequence.

Solution: Bosses, business owners, managers -- be open minded and let go. Sometimes you need to believe in, trust, put your ego aside, and listen to the experts. You know, the people YOU hired with the proven experience, performance, and track record coming out of their wazoo. I know it's hard for you to hand over the controls, but it is critical for ultimate success. You have to believe in the person you hired and their years of experience. If you've done your 'due diligence' before you hired them, then you should take comfort in knowing you've hired the right, capable person to lead your business to greatness. If you don't listen to the expert, then you must be accountable - for better or worse - for 'going rogue'.

Profit Maker #10: Embrace Online Marketing. Online marketing is a quick, cost-effective way to expand your reach and market share. Its immediacy, broach reach, and ability to target specific customers is second to none as far as marketing channels. And there's so many tactics to choose from: online PR, email marketing, banner ads, text ads, search engine marketing, social media marketing, viral marketing ... and the list goes on. If you have a business where you have been sticking to offline tactics such as direct mail, print ads, or even grass roots marketing, then I urge you to test some low-to-no cost online marketing tactics. Put your toe in the water. You may not think Internet marketing is applicable for your particular business or target audience, but you just have to think outside the box. I always say, if you're a creative and strategic thinker, you can whip up some really interesting ways to leverage this channel for profits.

Prospecting for Clients: What Every Freelancer Should Know

2010-11-15T00:13:00.001-05:00

I get literally dozens of emails per week from potential clients (prospects) inquiring about my consulting services.

Some are serious, valid business owners or entrepreneurs who understand that they are at a point where they need expert guidance to help them take their company to the next level. They understand that hiring a consultant is a calculated decision that requires a financial resources and they are prepared to make such a commitment. It is strategic decision that they know will pay off if they follow the direction of the consultant.

Other prospects are simply ‘phishing’. They’re not phishing for personal or financial information, like many Internet con artists out there. They’re phishing for marketing information … as much as they can get for free. They’re not really serious about hiring a consultant, they just play the game of asking for a proposal and seeing how much information they could get gratis.

In tough economic times like we’re currently experiencing, a freelancer or consultant needs to be on their guard. They need to balance their professional proposal writing and prospect relationship management without giving away the farm.

You want to be friendly, professional, courteous, and knowledgeable, but not give specific recommendations until the prospect is a client.

Quick story…

A business owner emailed me and told me he’s heard about me in the industry. That he was aware of my stellar reputation and believes I could help save his company, which was drowning.

He told me he had resources put aside for consulting services but wanted to discuss the details further with me. So I did what I always do with inquiries: follow up by email promptly and schedule an initial conference call to discuss business objectives, resources, past marketing performance, and more.

After our more than 1-hour conference call where we discussed his needs and some ‘high level’ services I thought would be ideal, he asked me to send a proposal outlining our discussion. I prepared a detailed proposal including:
-Bio (more information about me to familiarize the prospect about my qualifications and experience)
-Testimonials (illustrating feedback that highlights my work ethic and performance)
-Objectives (reiterating the prospective goals)
-Overview (my personal synopsis of the client’s website with ‘high level’ recommendations for improvement)
-Potential barriers for entry (identifying the prospect’s deficiencies)-Deliverables (my recommended services to correct said deficiencies)
-Disclaimer (clearly illustrating important verbiage about what is and isn’t covered as well as setting prospect expectations)
-FAQ’s (for information purposes, being proactive to questions prospect may have)
-Costs (rates for a variety business solutions, if prospect doesn’t identify a specific marketing budget)
-Legal information (including contract terms, payment terms, and other important clauses)
-Closing statement (expressing my gratitude for his inquiry and providing contact information).

This is my standard proposal template that is then customized for each prospect. It’s very comprehensive and satisfies virtually all prospects.

Several days later I followed up with an email to see if the prospect had any questions or needed a follow up call to discuss anything that was in the proposal.

I received an email from the prospect saying he needed more information, a ‘marketing blue print’ of what I would do -- this would help him better consider me with the other consultants bidding for the job.

I replied that my proposal was as detailed as it could be. That I identified areas needing improvement as well as deliverables to correct deficiencies. I then mentioned that I was providing a ‘proposal’, not a marketing plan with specific tactics, which is something I would certainly provide once he was a client. I also mentioned if he had concerns about my work performance, to please see my testimonial page, which features many well-known companies that were ecstatic with my services and demonstrated my competency and performance history.

He responded that what he needed was specifics, not high level information. That he did need tactical approaches, now.

My response, after much thought, was that I wouldn’t be a smart business woman if I virtually gave marketing plans out for no cost, they involve time and research. I reiterated that my proposal did answer all his questions but that tactical details would come when he was a client after more thorough market research and the creation of a strategic marketing plan.

He thanked me for my proposal and told me he was evaluating several proposals and would be in contact if he decided to move forward.

Now at first thought, you may be saying to yourself: in such a competitive environment did you make the right decision, you may have gotten the job if you gave specifics?

But after awhile in the professional service industry, you learn how to read people. You can weed out the good from bad prospects. You see, once the prospect mentioned he wanted a ‘marketing blue print’, that was a red flag. Legitimate prospects that ask for my time, know that my time is valuable and are happy to compensate me accordingly for my services. I knew this particular prospects wasn’t serious about hiring me, rather he was desperate and phishing for free information.

I still, however, gave him the benefit out doubt and offered as many conference calls as he needed as well as an in-person meeting (he was local) to give him a level of comfort. But I just couldn’t provide a marketing plan for free. I certainly don’t think he gives free product to consumers, so why would he expect that of me?

The reason: Desperate times calls for desperate measures. And some people feel that they can take advantage of freelancers because the odds are in their favor.

My viewpoint: Stay true to yourself. Listen to your gut. Look at every prospective opportunity with hope, but keep it real.

Your experience and reputation will speak for itself and the RIGHT customers WILL find you. They always do.

Social Marketing Success Secrets

2010-11-09T10:22:00.004-05:00

Social marketing can be fun, build awareness, and be lucrative ... you just need to know a few key elements to help monetize the names and best leverage the interactive relationship you're engaging in.

First, I'd like to explain the flow of information with social media marketing:

Social media marketing is 'pull' marketing. People are getting pulled to your profile page by the information you're posting. This marketing channel is passive and the profile visits are organic. Visits are also uncontrolled by the marketer/publisher. The opposite is 'push' marketing. This would be more targeted and aggressive messages such as email marketing (direct response), where you're pushing your message out to someone who's opted to receive it. These messages are more controlled by the marketer/publisher.

Some may argue that by friending or following (F/F) someone you've sort of opted in to receive their messages that are being pushed (posted) to them. I disagree, as not everyone will be on your profile page every second of the day or maybe not even for that week. Individuals follow many people and checking your page on a frequent basis is unreliable. The frequency of visits lies in control of the F/F, which makes it more 'pull' marketing. With email marketing or enews ad sponsorships, it's a more controlled environment. You're 'pushing' a direct message to your recipient. Sure you're competing with other messages in their in-box, but chances are if you have a good subject line, your email will get opened and read ... way better odds than a profile page visit.

The reason I bring this up is because although many people get excited when they see they have a 500 friends or 1,000 followers, it's more of an ego thing. It goes back feeling popular and wanted. But these F/F's aren't subscribers - that is, they're not people who've opted in to receive a free newsletter from you. Subscribers have given you their email address, and in the publishing industry, email addresses are one of the most important things you can get from a person aside from their mailing address. The email address is the foundation of your list ... of your lead generation efforts. This helps with list building and gets you leverage when coordinating JV, affiliate marketing and editorial deals with other publishers. It also adds names into your sales funnel for email marketing efforts, which ultimately, will help you monetize those names turning a subscriber into a paying customer.

Can a friend or follower be converted into a paying customer without being a subscriber?

Sure, but it's harder to bond with someone when the marketing messages are limited, passive and relying on the prospect to visit your profile page. You're also dealing with maximum character counts and other limitations as with FaceBook or Twitter that will impact the effectiveness of your marketing message.

So I like to advise clients to use social marketing as a tool to assist with, and compliment, their other online marketing efforts and not to put all their eggs in one basket. But there are things you can do to help maximize your returns with social marketing:

Bonding. The whole purpose of social media marketing is to 'connect' with like-minded individuals with a common interest. People follow or friend (F/F) someone because of a psychological reason: they feel like they're getting one step closer to their subject of interest albeit guru, celebrity, or idol. They also feel they're getting the 'real' deal: the inside scope, unedited, raw comments straight from the horse's mouth. So your goal should be to post engaging somewhat personal messages for your F/F's. Don't just upload links to promotions or newsletter issues or basically spam your F/F's. Upload thought provoking comments and interesting informational nuggets. Depending on your list size, pick a few random names a week and send them a personal message through the social media platform. Engage in a one-one-one conversation. Interaction with your F/F's will help develop and cultivate a relationship that will result in bonding. I've found success asking questions and talking to (not at) your F/F's. That's what will keep them coming back to your profile page as well as visit your website for other products you may have or to sign up for your free newsletter.

Branding and Free Advertising. Incorporate your brand (image, logo, tag line) or promotional messages either in the background of your social media profile page or with the use of text or banner ads on your social media profile page. Make the text ad or banner ad eye-catching and link to your website home page, squeeze page (name collection page), or promotional landing page (the link will be determined by your goal and message copy). FaceBook has areas on individual (as opposed to Fan pages) designated for this such as Text boxes, Notes tab, Links, and Profile Badge. You can also upload banner ads. And Twitter allows personalization via their 'Settings', 'Profile' and 'Design' tabs.

Conversion. Remember, although you have F/F's names or links to their profile messages, you don't have direct access to them in a way that will help your business bottom line. For my clients I put together a social media conversion plan, which is a strategic plan to incent F/F's to sign up for the client's newsletter, which allows for the F/F to then move to 'subscriber' status. Moving to subscriber status helps magnify the bonding efforts and also allows the individual to receive targeted messages from the client - whether it's through an auto responder series, ads in the enewsletter, or solo email marketing messages - either way, it's a more effective and expedited way to get those F/F's into your sales funnel for monetization.

Incorporating the above will help you get the most of your social marketing efforts to help grow your business. And if you read other blog posts (http://musclemarketing.blogspot.com/2010/05/you-can-measure-social-media-you-just.html), you'll now know how to measure those results through the '3 O's'.

8 ‘Insider Secrets’ to Profit Acceleration

2010-09-26T14:38:00.002-04:00

Many people often ask me, "How did you do it?"

That is, how did I leave the comfort of a nice, corporate job (and salary, I might add) -- as Vice President of Marketing and Business Development for the Internet's top online publisher -- and launch a new business during a tough economy. And … on top of that … launch a new business on the heels of becoming a mom and taking care of my newborn son and busy household.

Well, in all honesty, starting my own business wasn’t the initial plan. Shortly after my maternity leave was over, my husband and I soon realized that daycare was not a viable solution for us.

You see, I loved my job and didn’t want to leave, making my decision all the harder. But there was no other option, since working from home two days a week wasn’t something being offered. However, as luck would have it, on my last day in the office when I was emailing many industry friends to tell them I was leaving, several people started emailing me back asking me now that I was “available” would I be interested in freelancing for them? “Heck yea!”, I thought. These folks all worked with me over the years in one capacity or another and were all aware of my outstanding reputation for honesty, integrity, timeliness, results, and most importantly: nearly 20 years of direct response marketing experience.

Hence, my “second birth” … the “birth” of my new consulting firm.

Now, launching new business always lends itself to some apprehension. But launching a business during a volatile economy makes it a tad bit more intimidating. However, my business didn't only survive, it thrived. And going on almost two years later, it is still flourishing with several long-term clients (in excess of 6 - 12 months, which in consulting time is almost unheard of), many new clients, and lots of client referrals.

My company has also expanded: from a single person operation to a team containing some of the brightest and most talented individuals in the industry.

In a nutshell, I had taken a company with $0 cash flow and catapulted it to more than a six figure revenue generator in only 10 short months after start up. And you know what … the revenues are still coming in strong.

So, back to the original question, "How did I do it?"

Well, timing sure wasn't on my side. However, I owe the success of my business to a few critical drivers that I'm going to share with you. You can take these principals and apply or adapt them to your own business efforts as you see fit.

1. Market Smarter, Not Harder. This is a no-brainer. Any start up entrepreneur will tell you they have little to no marketing budget. So how do you build your brand and create awareness? It's being a strategic AND creative thinker. And it's also taking something most companies have (that's content) and leveraging it. Using a systematic approach I developed called the SONAR Content Distribution Model TM. SONAR is simply taking your content and disseminating the release of it on the Web in a strategic and synchronized manner. The platforms you're releasing it to is targeted, highly visible, and free. This helps create a momentum in traffic, buzz, and then you help monetize that traffic though lead generation (or sales) via your website. I’ve mentored many clients and former employers of this strategy; written several articles about this; as well as held a 2-day teleseminar; and a book is on the horizon. The main reasons: it’s easy, it’s cheap, it works!

2. Relationship Cultivation. Networking, and tapping into your network, is key when launching a new business OR gaining market share with an existing business. I happen to have a very strong Rolodex of friends, colleagues, and professional acquaintances that helped create a good foundation for my launch efforts. They either hired me, referred me to their colleagues, or advertised my services to their newsletter lists. Always keep relationships open. Touch base with your network. Offer assistance (gratis) if they have questions – not just to those that can be advantageous to you, but anyone in your network that seeks guidance. There are many people that only help out those they feel can do something for them in return, something they see immediate “value” in. Keep an open mind and see the bigger picture. Share your knowledge. People will reciprocate the gesture and it could lead to a multitude of benefits.

3. Strong Work Ethic/Reputation. People that know me ... that I worked for ... or worked with me know my experience – they know what I bring to the table. They also know that I am easy to work with and am committed to virtually any project on my plate. I can multi-task without missing a beat or deadline. It's a strong work ethic that helps people remember you and helps build your reputation in whatever niche you're in. My reputation speaks for itself. And that doesn't just help with new business or referrals, but also helps with getting testimonials from those I've worked with. Those testimonials are invaluable as a marketing tool on your website and in collateral material. Prospects can get a good idea of what to expect from those few "sound bites" about your work. To check out what people are saying about me, click here.

4. Leveraging Social Media. I have fully utilized social media. It's cost effective and casts a wide net. Where else can you get your message out to community of like-minded individuals for zero advertising cost? I've had the most success with LinkedIn.com and other social networking sites, as well as social bookmarks, user generated content sites and doing free press releases (that get picked up by bloggers and online news aggregators). For LinkedIn, which is a professional networking community, I joined several "groups" where my target client would be and started writing relevant and useful articles. Soon, people started contacting me (on average 5 per week) with requests for proposals. I actually had so much success with LinkedIn I spoke on the subject matter at the SIPA Mid-Year Marketing Event in Miami. If you're interested in a copy of that presentation, please contact me.

5. Contribute Content. I happen to enjoy writing and enjoy sharing my knowledge on my blog and newsletter, Precision Marketing. In addition to syndicating my blog's content on the Web, I also reached out to relevant marketing newsletters and magazines and asked about being an editorial contributor or guest author -- providing strong, valuable editorial. I also speak at industry conferences. From these efforts I've gained exposure for my business, built credibility, and got leads.

6. Business Basics. Create a strategic plan. Determine where you want to be in 1 or 2 years and what tactics you're going to do to achieve your goal. Go over your break-even point per month and how many clients/customers it will take to maintain or exceed that point. Keep little overhead. Establish a "true" home office. Share office space. Rent space or time at a business office center. Or get a "virtual office". When you're just starting out, cash flow is vital. If you need to outsource work, look into college interns related to the field you're in or bid out jobs in places like elance.com or ifreelance.com.

7. Confidence is Crucial. I don't just talk the talk, I walk the walk. I can back up everything I say by my experience. Bottom line: I'm extremely good at what I do and I make people money. I know it and the people I've worked for know it (at least the ones that take my advice and implement my recommendations). Confidence comes, however, with being in the marketing world (mostly in New York City) for nearly 20 years. It also comes with being an accomplished professional. Once you have several successful tenures under your belt you know your worth and can set a value for your time. Find your inner strength, but remain humble. Also, realize that there's a fine line between being confident and cocky. Confidence is self assured. Cocky is obnoxious. Be tactful, not tacky. Know the difference and become your own advocate. This is conveyed in all that you do and is transparent to your customers, subscribers and prospects. Despite the oxymoron, you can be “powerfully subtle”.

8. Balancing Act. Any start-up business can be a drain on your life and family. A lot of time and effort goes into launch, maintenance, and client relationship management. Then of course there's the administrative functions like daily accounting, record keeping, and invoicing. Many entrepreneurs try to take on the full weight of the business and burn the candle at both ends. But it doesn't have to be that way. Make sure you set specific time for your work and time for your family. When work is done, leave it in the office (even if your office is another room of your house). Make sure you find balance in mind, body, and soul. The business will be taken care of during business hours. Enjoy time with your loved ones and soon you all can reap the rewards of a successful company.

After all, you work to live, not live to work!

Buzzworthy: Wanna have fun AND earn profits? Then this is for you!

2010-09-09T10:37:00.001-04:00

My friend and colleague, Bob Bly, has a new book coming out titled, How to Write and Sell Simple Information for Fun and Profit: Your Guide to Writing and Publishing Books, E-Books, Articles, Special Reports, Audio Programs, DVDs and Other How-To Content.

And the timing couldn’t be better. Many people nowadays are looking to either change careers or start earning a second income. Bob’s book covers in detail how you could make serious money writing and selling information … even better … this could be done in your spare time and in the comfort of your own home.

You’ll discover how to:
· Come up with ideas for saleable how-to books, articles, reports, and seminars.
· Research, write, and publish effective, practical how-to instructional materials in a variety of formats.
· Build your reputation and a loyal following in your field.
· And earn $100,000 a year or more!

But don’t just take my word for it. To read FREE book excerpts, click here now: http://howtowriteandsellsimpleinformation.com/excerpts.php

This is definitely worth checking out. Happy reading!

Some Of The Best "Brand Marketers" May Surprise You...

2010-08-29T22:58:00.002-04:00

Now, when you think "Kim Kardashian", I'm sure the last thing you think of is a marketing genius. But she, and many other women in Hollywood, are creating business empires as well as global brand awareness of themselves and their hocks all while proving to be quite savvy when it comes to marketing.

Paris Hilton, Jessica Simpson, Jennifer Lopez, and Britney Spears are dominating their specialized fields (i.e. acting, singing, dancing, etc.) as well as the retail market place. And their strategies including multi-channel and brand marketing.

Of course one can’t leave out the “queen of all media” when discussing marketing brilliance. Oprah truly exemplifies “multi-channel marketing” with her print, web, radio and television efforts culminating to die-hard fans that span the globe. In addition to her popular TV show, her webpage (OprahStore) generates sales from clothing and other items for pets, baby, and home. In addition, her show transcripts and DVDs are for sale. The later, which is repurposing her “content”, is something I discuss in my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM.

A recent article in Life & Style cited that Jessica Simpson’s business is projected to hit the “billions” by 2011-12 between her record and ticket sales, clothing, shoes, handbags, fragrances, skin care, hair extension line, and endorsements.

And a recent panel discussion on ShowBiz Tonight addressed how some of these women use their brand management power to go from obscurity to household names. Case in point: Kim Kardashian, who after a salacious sex tape leak had turned an unfortunate situation into a very fortunate situation.

Ms. Kardashian is not only drop dead gorgeous but also one of the most searched women on the Internet – with 49 million search results and 4.6 million Twitter followers. Ms. K’s skincare line, Perfect Skin, even has 7,000+ followers on Twitter … all showing how the Internet (social media, SEM, SEO) has been used to capitalize on her fame. “Brand management” has helped Ms. K obtain lucrative endorsement deals for bathing suits, diet products as well as compensation for personal appearances, modeling, and more.

So how did they do it?

No doubt these mavens have some smart business people around them complementing their own gut intuitions.

But what has also helped was their ability to create and distribute their “brand message” and their “USP” (unique selling proposition) through multi-channel marketing platforms.

They also, either by their own vision or with the aid from their marketing "team" work on product development and product “funneling” (i.e. apparel, fragrances, endorsements) to make sure they cover a variety of selection and price points (another critical key to success, if you read my July 27 Blog Post, Give Your Customers What They Want: The Importance of Product Development, Front-Ends and Back-Ends).

Finally, they deliver their “brand message” through multi-channel marketing platforms, such as infomercials, print ads, TV ads, radio ads, and Web (social media and search engine marketing).

So the next time you think Hollywood is full of vapid, plastic people. Just remember that although some of these folks aren’t MBAs or marketing junkies, they have demonstrated some innate marketing insight to help increase market reach, generate social awareness, increase website visibility, and encourage both sales and lead generation ... ironically the same goals as “genuine” marketers.

9 Hot Ways to Build Your List...Fast!

2010-08-25T17:17:00.002-04:00

Whether you're an entrepreneur, corporation, or publisher - the power of the "lead" is critical in growing your business. Leads, also known as prospects, are typically the entry level point of the sales funnel. A popular business model by many online publishers is to bring in leads at the free level (i.e. free report, free newsletter, free webinar), then add those names to their "list" and usually over the course of 30 - 90 days (the bonding time) that lead will convert into a paying customer. This practice is known as lead generation, name collection or list building efforts.

Today, I'm going to share with you some proven online marketing methods I've used and had great success with at some of the top publishers in America. And bonus ... many of these tactics are little or no cost!

Here's the list, in no particular order:

1. Teleseminar or Webinar. This is a great way to collect names. Promote a free teleseminar or webinar to prospects (that is not your internal list). Remember, this is for lead generation, not bonding. So your goal is to give away valuable information in exchange for an email address. The trick is to promote the event in as many places as possible without incurring advertising costs.

2. Co Registration. Co Reg is another way to collect names, but involves a nominal fee. Co Reg is when you place a small ad on another publisher's site after some sort of transaction (albeit a sales or lead gen offer). So for instance, after someone sign s up to AOL Travel eNewsletter, a Thank You page comes up with a list of sponsors the reader may find interesting as well - other free eNewsletter offers. The text ad is usually accompanied by a small graphic image representing the sponsor. The key here is to pick publishers and Co Reg placements that are synergistic to your publication and offer. Another important note is to make sure you follow up quickly to these names so they don't forget who you are. I suggest a dedicated autoresponder series. Co Reg efforts can cost you around $1 - $3 per valid email address.

3. Affiliate Partnerships. This includes JVs (joint ventures), affiliate marketing, guest editorials, editorial contributions, and reciprocal ad swaps. This tactic is extremely effective and cost efficient. The key here is having some kind of leverage then approaching publishers that may want your content or a cross-marketing opportunity to your current list (note: this only works if you have a list of decent size another publisher will find attractive). In exchange for content or revenue share efforts, you and the other publisher agree to reciprocate either eNews ads or solo emails to each other's lists, thereby sending a message to a target, relevant list for free. Well, if you agree on a rev share, it's free as far as ad costs, but you are giving that publisher a split of your net revenues.

4. Content Syndication. I've written about this many times, but can't stress it enough. Content is king and you can leverage it via my SONAR Content Distribution Model TM . SONAR is a cost effective, yet powerful, method of repurposing and synchronizing content (albeit text, audio, video) distribution into various, targeted channels. And it allows companies, publishers, entrepreneurs ... basically anyone with content on their website ... the ability to ultimately turn traffic into sales. SONAR represents the following online distribution platforms:

S Syndicate partners, content syndication networks, and user generate content sites
O Online press releases
N Network (social) communities
A Article directories
R Relevant posts to blogs, forums, and bulletin boards. SONAR works hand-in-hand with your existing search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing (SMM), and search engine optimization (SEO) tactics.

5. Search Engine Optimization. In order to drive as much organic traffic as possible to your website you need to make sure your site is optimized for the correct keywords and your target audience. Once you optimize your site with title tags, meta descriptions, and meta keywords, you need to make sure you have revised your site to harness the traffic that will be coming. That means adding eye-catching email collection boxes to home page, relevant banners, and obvious links to get to product pages. You don't want to miss any opportunity to turn traffic in to sales or free newsletter subscribers.

6. Media Buying. To compliment your "free" online efforts, you may want to consider targeted, low cost media buys (paid online advertising) in the form of text ads, banner ads, blog ads, or list rentals (i.e. eNews sponsorships or solo emails). You're paying for the placement in these locations, so you must make sure you have strong promotional copy and offer for the best results possible. If you're thinking about buying online ads and want to make sure you get the best rates around, then check out my new ebook, Muscle Media: The Complete Guide to Buying Online Ads For Less.

7. Pay Per Click (PPC). Many people try pay per click only to spend thousands of dollars with little results. Creating a successful PPC campaign is an art - one that I've had success with. You must make sure you have a strong text ad and landing page and that the ad is keyword dense. You must also have a compelling offer and make sure you do your keyword research. Picking the correct keywords that coincide with your actual ad and landing page is crucial. You don't want to pick keywords that are too vague, too competitive, or unpopular. You also need to be active with your campaign management which includes bid amounts and daily budget. All these things - bid, budget, keywords, popularity, and placement - will determine the success of the campaign. And most campaigns are trial and error and take anywhere from 3-6 weeks to optimize.

8. Viral Marketing. Make sure you have a "forward to friend" feature in your eNewsletter to encourage viral marketing. It's also important to have a content syndication blurb in your newsletter, this also encourages other websites, publishers, editors and so forth to republish your content as long as they give you author attribution and a back-link to your site. In addition, the SONAR model above incorporates viral buzz in its strategy, so deploying SONAR will help you increase your website visibility and reach.

9. Polls. Incorporating a poll on your website, or having a poll on another site or eNewsletter (via a media buy or ad swap) is a great way to build your list. It's important to spend time thinking about your poll question - something that a hot topic, controversial, and relevant to the locations you're placing your poll. You want to pull people in with your headline and make the poll entertaining. Your answers should be multiple choice and have an "other" field which encourages participant to engage with your question. I've found this "other" field as a fantastic way to make the poll interactive. Many people are passionate about certain subject matters and won't mind giving you their two cents. Then to show appreciation for talking the poll, tell participants they are getting a bonus report and free eNewsletter subscription (which they can opt out of at any time). And of course, make sure to mention - and link to - your privacy/anti spam policy.

After you kick off your list building efforts, make sure you start tracking them so you can quantify the time and resources spent. This involves working with your webmaster on setting up tracking URLs specific to each website you're advertising on. It also means looking at Google Analytics for your website and corresponding landing pages to see traffic and referring page sources. When deploying social media or SONAR tactics, it's important to look at which sites are linking back to you. You can check this with several free back-link tools such as http://seopro.com.au/free-seo-tools/link-checker/ , http://www.iwebtool.com/backlink_checker , http://www.backlinkwatch.com/index.php . As well as set Google Alerts for related keywords to your marketing efforts. You'll then be notified when someone republishes your content as well as general buzz about you.

Online Advertising For Less: When SEO, SEM and Social Media Marketing Just Aren't Enough

2010-08-02T09:41:00.005-04:00

Using no cost online marketing tactics, like search engine marketing, search engine optimization, and social media marketing are all good strategies, but they’ll only get you so far. And they won’t create you the voluminous traffic needed to really see substantial results, fast.

Any successful online marketer will tell you, the key to a balanced marketing mix is having a variety of tactics that fit your budget and business objectives ... from no cost SEO and SEM ... to paid advertising with banner ads, blogs, text ads, display ads, newsletter sponsorships, email marketing and more.

Plain and simple: When you really want to increase your Web exposure … and sales … you need to cast a broader net using targeted online advertising.

But the question is, how do you leverage this powerful platform without spending a fortune?

The answer is learning the ‘insider secrets’ to buying online ads for less.

Below are some “must know’s” before doing your next online media buy or dealing with account executives:

The Art of the Online Ad Deal
In the process of putting together your online media buy (or “insertion order” as the official agreement is referred to), you will be required to analyze many proposals from different website, blogs or ad networks. You’ll need to ascertain if the rate you are being quoted is cost effective and comparable to industry rates. This is where the “Media Tracking Matrix” spreadsheet comes in handy. I recommend sorting this sheet by ad rate, lowest to highest. So you can see instantly which contenders are out of budget or not.

Keep in mind that when online account ad executives start quoting you advertising rates, many drivers can influence that rate such as the following. And you should be aware of these factors in order to make sure you get the best possible ad rate:

Seasonality. Most Web traffic typically drops during summer months as well as major holidays. Use this knowledge to your advantage and try to get lower rates during these times. You can also pause your ad if it happens to be running during a holiday and have it turned back on after the holiday.
Exclusivity. Find out if your ad is get 100% of the rotations or is sharing that ad space with other advertisers. For instance, one banner ad on a website may rotate and have 5 different messages each time you refresh. This is known as being “fixed ad placement” or “shared ad placement”. If you’re told you have shared placement, find out how many actual impressions YOU will receive.
Site Targeting. Will your ad be ROS (run of site), by channel, by page? Typically, you can drill down your banner ad or advertising message down to a specific page. But the lower your drill the more you will pay for that targeting. The higher you go, the less you pay. ROS is the highest level, so it’s usually the cheapest. Next is usually ROC (run of channel), that is, running your ad within targeted sections of a site. Then there are also specific pages or demographic targeting. Your goals and budget will determine which placement is best for your needs.
Remnant Space. Check with the account executive to see if they have any remnant space (space that they’re having difficulty selling for any reason) or last minute specials. With more popular and high traffic websites, you can get some great deals on remnant space. Make sure to find out the Terms and Conditions.
Termination Right. Make sure your insertion order has a “termination right” or “out clause” (typically 24 – 48 hours). This way, if you see after a week your ad isn’t performing, and you tested other ads, you can end the campaign without penalty and only pay for impressions served.

For more proven, powerful, and money saving ideas for online advertising as well as to boost your ad’s performance, visit http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/products.html. In Muscle Media: The Complete Guide to Buying Online Ads for Less, you’ll learn the tips and tricks to negotiating effective and cost-efficient online media buys. You’ll also learn…

How to create a high-performing (low cost!) media plan
Proven techniques for developing powerful online ads
Best online ad networks (based on unbiased, hands on experience!)
Suggested media allocations for your online marketing mix
Marketing analysis and reporting tips
Media ‘cheat sheet’ with the critical questions you need to ask on your next media buy
Business negotiations 101 (and other tips) when dealing with online account executives
The top questions to ask when coordinating JV, affiliate or publishing ad swaps
The best free web tools for online advertising
And much more!

The key to a successful online media campaign is knowing what to buy, where to buy it, how to gauge performance, and ultimately how to get the best rate that suits your budget.

The big misconception by many marketers and small business owners alike is that media buying, whether it’s online or offline, is expensive.

That is not always the case -- especially if you’re educated about the entire media buying process. So get informed and don’t be afraid to test online advertising. With the right ad in the right place … you’re poised for optimum results!

Give Your Customers What They Want: The Importance of Product Development, Front-Ends and Back-Ends

2010-07-27T13:48:00.002-04:00

Whether you're launching a new business or you're established, product development should be an active part of your strategic business plan.

However, many companies - large and small - oftentimes neglect product development due to internalized myths such as:

·We don't need extra products
·We don't have the time to develop extra products
·We don't have the money to develop extra products

First, let me say if your products are relevant and useful, I believe you can never have too many products. One thing you need to constantly do is "ask" your list (i.e. subscribers/customers/clients) what they want. You can do this in many ways, such as simple and brief surveys or questioners. You can also take the 'idea' of a product and test offer it to your list.

For instance, if you're thinking about offering a copywriting coaching service, start out by measuring internal sentiment. Create a simplified version of this product which has the "essence", like an eBook called, "50 Hot Copywriting Tips". Price it attractively, and promote it to your file. If your file responds well to the eBook, they'll likely respond well to a more comprehensive version of the eBook, whether it involves multi-media components (such as workbook, DVD, CDs) or a personal coaching element. So your eBook would be your "front-end" product (low price point), your kit would be your "mid priced" product, and your personal coaching would be your "back-end" product.

This leads me to my next point - pricing levels. Many companies make the mistake of either having many front-ends products, and no back-end, or visa versa. Here's my belief: Front-ends are relatively easy to create and involve little cost. So there's the myth-buster of "not having time" or "not having money". If it's an eBook, there's little overhead, outside of the gathering of information (editorial time), production and graphics design. And you're saving money by fulfilling it digitally to customers.

However, the product line shouldn't end there. Your customers are going to look for more comprehensive information. And that level of detail will mean a higher price - which they'll be willing to pay for. So if you're not offering them a mid or back-end product - you're actually doing a disservice to your list. They will go to your competitors to buy that information. So why not make sure you have a well-rounded product list with varied price points?

Here's a sample of pricing levels:
1. First level - free newsletter

2. Second level - paid reports, paid newsletters ($1 - $99). Front-End

3. Third level - Bundled products, kits, membership sites ($100 - $499). Mid-Priced

4. Fourth level - Conferences and events ($500 - 999). Back-End

5. Fifth level - Premium service, upscale events ($1000 - $2,999). Back-End

6. Sixth level - Lifetime value clubs, VIP products ($3,000+). Ultra Back-End. This is ideal for your true multi-buyer, loyal, advocate customers ... the Golden Goose!

Now, keep in mind, the aforementioned may not be your business model. You may sell a service or retail item, as opposed to contextual-based infoproducts. But it still gives you an idea about pricing structure and product variety.

Also, if you read last week's issue, you'll know that content is king. So recycle it. Repurpose it. And repackage it. You can take articles, blog posts, webinars, bonus materials, conference transcripts, etc. There's many sources of content that can be re-used for creating product.

What About Going Outside Your List?

If you have a product and not sure how viable it is on the global platform, you can do a few things to test product viability...

1. Use PPC ads to see if there's general market interest. That is, use a "quick and dirty", watered down version of your "real" product. For example, a free or paid (i.e. under $10) eBook. Create up to 5 ads on Google Ad Words. Run them for about 2-3 weeks. Each ad should be different in tone and pitch. Because you don't want poor copy to influence your results. Based on ad clicks and conversions (i.e. leads or sales), you'll have a good idea if there's general interest in your product/idea.

2. Go to eBook market places like ClickBank.com and see what's hot, what's in demand. You can search topics to see what's the most popular.

3. Do your research in related blogs, chat rooms, forums. See what people are talking about within your niche or product genre.

4. Do keyword research. Using Google's free external keyword search tool, check and see what the actual keyword search volume is on your relevant, targeted keywords related to your audience and product.

My suggestion is start out with the 3-2-1 approach. That is, 3 front-end products, 2 mid-priced products, and 1 back-end product. From there, you will define and refine your product development based mostly on demand.

If you're in need of assistance in product development or testing your product's viability, you can contact me at wendy@precisionmarketingmedia.com .

Find Out The Secrets For Buying Online Ads For Less

2010-07-22T23:02:00.002-04:00

Any online marketer will tell you, the key to successful Internet marketing is having a balanced marketing mix, that is, having a variety of tactics that fit your budget and business objectives ... from no cost SEO and SEM ... to paid advertising with banner ads, PPC, blogs, newsletter sponsorships, email marketing and more.

If you're a newbie to online media buying then do I have great news for you!

Discover the best ways to get the most bang for your buck when buying online advertising. Check out my new .pdf eBook -- Muscle Media: The Complete Guide to Buying Online Ads for Less. It’s jam packed with 25-pages of proven, powerful, money saving ideas to buy online media and boost ad performance.

It also contains "must know" insider tips and tricks including:

-Creating a high-peforming (low cost!) media plan
-Proven techniques for developing powerful online ads
-Best online ad networks (based on my personal, unbiased, hands on experience!)
-Suggested media allocations
-Reporting tips
-Media ‘cheat sheet’ with must ask questions for your next media buy
-Business negotiations 101
-Free web tools
-And much more!

Special Limited Time Offer

With every eBook purchase you’ll also receive as a complimentary gift, my comprehensive media performance ‘direct response tracking’ template to help you monitor and track your online campaigns.

Visit http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/products.html now for details.

Building Revenues with Affiliate Marketing

2010-07-14T10:49:00.000-04:00

Affiliate marketing has been a viable way to help build ancillary revenues by having someone else market your products. It's generally cost effective and could involve little work.

You can go about this through affiliate networks, such as Commission Junction or LinkShare, or simply start an Affiliate program on your website and track sales and commissions with affiliate software, such as DirectTrack. Software costs could range any where from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars ... depending on how robust you'd like your features.

But before you start, make sure you know the critical elements to help grow your Affiliate program:

1) Promotion. This is where you're promoting your program on targeted locations as well as recruiting affiliates to market your program. You'll want to make sure you list your program on all the top affiliate directories, networks, forums, associations, bulletin boards, websites, listings and blogs. You'll also want to leverage free classified sites such as Craig's List as well as social media sites like LinkedIn. And of course, don't forget to create a powerful news release on the program's launch.

2) Site Awareness. It will be hard to promote your program to a site that doesn't have a decent web traffic rank or web traffic (visits). If your site has poor traffic, a professional Affiliate marketer will look at it as a lost opportunity. It will only make his job harder. So make sure to deploy SEO/SEM tactics to improve your site's presence before you start your Affiliate program.

3) Online Store. Make sure you know which are your best selling and most universally appealing products. Those are the ones you'd want to have in your affiliate program. You should also have varied price points. You don't want to pick prices too low, as after the affiliate split, there won't be anything left. And you don't want to pick prices too high, as since most of these leads are cold, it will be a harder sell. A good range is $69 - $300.

4) Affiliate Rewards. Decide if you're going to pay out per lead (CPL) or per sale. Decide if you're going to have a flat commission rate OR a tiered system. Do your competitive research and see what other, similar affiliate programs are paying out. Some of the best performing programs on the Web are offering 25% of the product price.

5) Analytics. Make sure you have a robust reporting system. You'll want the ability to track underperformers and super affiliates, and reward OR incent accordingly. You'll also want to know which creatives are performing the best and worst, and of course, how many sales and leads are coming in as well as how long the lead is staying on the file and their life time value (sales).

6) Keeping In Touch. Top affiliate programs often have a newsletter or ongoing communication to keep their affiliates engaged...up to date on latest products being offered, special sales incentives, updates to program terms, and other newsworthy notes.

Affiliate marketing can help with most all of your online marketing objectives ... lead gen, sales conversions, web traffic, branding and buzz. Not having one could be detrimental to your business.

If you need assistance with setting up your affiliate marketing plan, you can contact me at support@precisionmarketingmedia.com.

5 "Power Tips" To Drive Insane Traffic To Your Website

2010-06-22T14:02:00.001-04:00

Okay, so you have a website. Blood, sweat, and tears (as well as cash!) has gone into getting this thing up and running. You've used all your creative juices to get the words just right. And you added some nice graphics to make the site aesthetically pleasing. Now what?

A website is of little use if nobody can find it. It's kind of like having a telephone book ad with no contact information ... it's almost useless.

Mastering organic search ranking has proven to be a fundamental part of the online marketing mix. (By "organic," I mean the "natural," as opposed to "paid/PPC," listing that appears when someone conducts a search on Google or other search engines. Optimal placement is typically within the first 20 listings or three pages.)

Search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO) - the ability to increase your site's visibility in organic search listings and refine the content structure on the site itself - are critical for market awareness and customer acquisition. According to WebProNews, 66.3 percent of searchers click on organic listings before they click on a sponsored link. Even more important, a recent study by CreativeWebsiteMarketing.com indicates that most people who buy online start with a search engine.

Don't let your site get lost in the Internet Black Hole, when there are five simple ways to help boost your website's traffic and optimization.

1. Create online buzz about your site, product, or service.
You can do this by generating online press releases. There are services on the Web, such as PRWeb.com or Free-press-release.com, that do this for free or at a nominal cost. Another idea is to post comments to high-traffic blogs, bulletin boards, chat rooms, or forums.

Do a Web search for top blogs or news forums that are related to whatever it is that you're selling. Go to each site, one by one, and post a comment. (Start a new topic or reply to an existing one.) This helps in two ways: One, you create buzz in the marketplace. Depending on your tactics, your message can even go viral. Two, you get a "back-link" to your site that helps when the site is indexed by search engine spiders.

An important note: Your post should be relevant and genuine. Your comment should be relevant to the question you're replying to, have some sort of value to the readers that view it, and be in the proper area/subject matter on the forum you're posting to. Stay away from posts that are blatantly self-serving. These posts are viewed as spam by forum webmasters and could get you banned from the forum, or at least be deleted.

2. Initiate a relevant inbound link program.
Set up a reciprocal link page or blog roll (a listing of URLs on a blog, as opposed to a website) that can house links from industry sites. Contact these sites to see if they'd be willing to swap links with you - a link to your site for a link to theirs. Again, relevance is key. Search engines shun link harvesting (collecting links from random websites that have no relevance to your site), so these links should be from sites that are similar in nature to your business.

3. Give Web searchers great content and a link back to your site.
Upload relevant content to sites that make such information available to other sites that want to publish it, such as eZinearticles.com, ArticlesBase.com, ArticleDashboard.com or ArticlesFactory.com. This is a great way to increase market awareness as well as establish an inbound link to your site. There is also a syndication opportunity, as third-party sites may come across your article when doing a Web search and republish your content on their own websites. As long as third-parties give your site editorial attribution and a link, getting them to republish your content is just another distribution channel for you to consider.

4. Website pages should be keyword rich and related to your business.
Make a list of your top 20 keywords and variations of those words, and incorporate them into the copy on your site (avoiding the obvious repetition of words). Search engine "spiders" crawl Web pages from top to bottom, so your strongest keywords should be in that order on your home page and sub-pages (the most relevant on the top, the least relevant on the bottom).
You'll want to do the same for your tagging. Make sure your title tags (the descriptions at the top of each page) and meta tags are unique and chock full of keywords. And your alt tags (images) should have relevant descriptions as well.

5. List your site in online directories by related category or region.
This is an effective way to increase exposure and get found by prospects searching specifically for information on your product or service by keyword topic. Popular directories (like Business.com) typically have a nominal fee. But there are many other directories (like Dmoz.org, Info.com, and Superpages.com) that are free.

Most important, before you start your SEO initiatives, don't forget to establish a baseline for your site so you can measure pre- vs. post-SEO tactics. Upload a site counter (which counts the number of visits to your website), obtain your site's Alexa traffic ranking at Alexa.com, or get your site's daily visit average (from Google Analytics or another application) - and then chart your weekly progress in Excel.

Understand that it typically takes two to three months for a site to be optimized... so be patient. You will eventually see results. If you set up your website correctly to harness the surge of traffic, you can monetize the traffic visits for lead generation or sales.

Profit Partners: Maximizing JV and Affiliate Relationships

2010-06-16T10:51:00.003-04:00

The current economic environment is making many marketers look at lost cost ways to drive sales and be a strategic and creative thinker. Now is a great time to look to your competition for opportunities to help grow your list and add extra revenues to your bottom line for little or no cost.

If my clients tell me they want to grow their list or increase revenues WITHOUT spending money on advertising, my advice is focus on leveraging their marketing and editorial relationships with our fellow publishers and aggressively pursuing ad swaps, guest editorials, and joint ventures (JV) or cultivating new relationships. And for the clients that don't have a marketing team, I lead this initiative for them. The idea is to develop synergistic relationships that are mutually beneficial - to look for areas of deficiency in your competitors and think of ways your company can fill the void.

Some tips to keep in mind when looking for potential "profit" partners:
· Do your homework. Find out, in advance, who will be at industry events that you'll be attending. (Check the program for speakers, vendors, and participants.) Sign up for their e-newsletters. Read their promotional e-mails. Maybe even purchase some of their products.
· Look at EVERY opportunity as a way to maximize your company's brand. When you go to industry events, don't eat dinner alone in your hotel room. Go to functions. Mingle. Network. Have a genuine conversation with a potential partner... then, if there's a synergy between your two companies, exchange business cards.
· Before you contact a potential partner, get familiar with his products and target audience and figure out how your company may be able to dovetail with his product line or marketing efforts.
So, once you've made the connection, now what?

Reciprocal Ad Swaps

Assuming you both have e-newsletters, you can test the waters and see how your lists will react by doing an advertising swap. In other words, you run an ad in his e-newsletter and he runs an ad in yours.

To make sense out of the results of that test, you have to know your "opportunity cost" - the "cost" you will incur for running an outside ad to your list instead of your own ad. If you normally sell ad space in your e-newsletter, this cost could simply be the flat rate fee you typically charge. Or, if you know the average revenues an issue brings in, you could calculate the potential "missed opportunity" of letting another ad run to your list on a given day.

You should also agree to share important information with your partner. Before his ad runs in your e-newsletter, point out any creative issues. (Perhaps the copy is too inflammatory for your list. Perhaps it's too competitive.) Provide your partner with your e-newsletter's sent and deliverability sizes, open rate, and ad click rate. Exchanging performance data is critical to a long and mutually beneficial relationship. It has to be a win/win situation for the partnership to work.

Whether your goal is to attract names for your e-list (lead generation) or to make sales, reciprocate in kind. If your partner is letting you do a name collection ad to his list, for example, let him run the same kind of ad to your list. But first make sure his list is approximately the same size as yours. If it's substantially smaller, you may want to hold off on an ad swap with that publisher until he builds his subscriber base. You don't want the initiative to be one-sided.

Guest Editorials

You can also look into doing guest editorials in other publishers' e-newsletters - with an editorial note or byline that links to your offer. This is a great way to get introduced to a new list with the "implied" endorsement of the publisher. His endorsement gives you credibility. And if you provide his readers with good, solid, useful information, they will bond with you quickly.

This is a soft-sell approach that may or may not yield results on its own. But when coordinated with either a dedicated e-mail (if your partner is on board with a revenue split) or an e-newsletter ad the same week, your conversion rate (the number of people who go on to buy your product) will dramatically improve.

Joint Ventures (JVs)

JVs are a quick and cost-effective way to make money with your list even if you have not yet developed any products. With a JV, you have an instant product line with no overhead costs. Your partner will supply the products, fulfill orders, and provide customer support. All you have to do is promote the products to your list and split the net revenues with them. For an even a more turnkey approach, you can sell e-reports through sites like Clickbank.com, where everything is automated.

To determine the viability of a potential JV product, there are several strategic marketing variables to consider. I like to think of them as "PPPGS":

P = Product quality
P = Price point
P = Performance (when promoted to your potential partner's house list, as well as to outside lists)
G = General market demand
S = Subscriber interest (when promoted to your list, as determined by feedback, surveys, etc.)

Remember - you're looking for long-term partners, not one-hit-wonders. So carefully select the people you approach, making sure their products make sense relative to your business...and, together, you can reap the unlimited profit potential of reciprocal marketing!

7 Foolproof Ways to Build Your Business This Summer (Or Anytime!)

2010-06-08T13:49:00.005-04:00

The written word has the power to educate and inform... as well as create buzz about your website, product, or service. That's why with all my clients one thing is common -- I circulate their e-zine articles through multiple delivery channels also known as content marketing which has been refined and developed into a systematic approach via my SONAR marketing method, http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/sonar.html.

Reaching potential subscribers this way helps me increase readership for my clients and, ultimately, revenues. I am a firm believer in leveraging the marketing message too. By circulating it in multiple channels - online, e-mail, print, direct mail, and so forth - I am able to touch prospects through whatever medium they prefer. And for those who like to receive their information through more than one medium, the message is re-enforced every time they see it in another channel. I strongly encourage you to take this multi-channel marketing approach with your own online business.

Here are seven of the best and most cost-effective channels to include in your marketing plan:

1. Paid Search Ads (Pay-Per-Click)
Google and Yahoo are the Titans of the paid-search ad world, with nearly 70 percent of market share. But there are other search engines that have a loyal following, such as Bing (formerly MSN.com) (with 16 percent market share), AOL.com (with 9.6 percent), Ask.com (5.1 percent), Infospace.com (1.1 percent), and Lycos.com (0.9 percent). Pay-per-click (PPC) ads with any of these search engines is a cost-effective way to target prospects looking for your specific product and get broad exposure. You create a text ad, then bid on keywords (the words or phrases your target audience will be searching for) to determine your ad's placement.

PPC paid search ads are perfect for acquiring new customers. That's because leads that come in this way are searching specifically for your information (via targeted keywords). This makes them highly qualified prospects.

2. Organic Search Results (Search Engine Marketing)
Search engine marketing (SEM) has a nominal cost. Annual fees with search engine networks or directories typically range from $25 to $95 per year, but many submissions to top sites like Google, Yahoo, Ask and Bing are free.

Some consumers give organic search results more "credibility" than paid search ads. And because they "trust" the results of an organic search more, they are more likely to click on an organic link. A recent survey by Jupiter Research illustrated that 80 percent of Web users seek organic search results. Their rationale is that organic results are un-biased. The marketer didn't pay for that ad space. So the link's appearance in the search results is based purely on various search algorithms and Web crawlers.

Your goal should be to balance your online presence with both paid ads and organic search results. You should make sure you have keywords in all the right places. That includes your title tags, URLs, and inside the published articles themselves.

3. Banner Ads
Running banner ads on other websites can be another cost-effective part of your online marketing mix. The pricing model for this is typically CPM - a specified price for every 1,000 impressions/views you receive (usually between $3 and $10). Since contextual space is limited in banner ads, your headline and visual elements are critical for success. And of course, your landing page should have strong, persuasive copy.

Your media budget for banner ads will vary by:

-the website you're running (the higher the traffic, typically the higher the banner advertising rate) ad unit size/type (300 x 250 typically performs best, so those are priced higher than other ad units)
-location on website (home page, inside pages) whether the ad is targeted to a specific page or is on every page of the site (a/k/a run of site)
-the time of year the ad is running

Blogs and online ad networks are a cheaper alternative. Their CPMs (cost per thousand) usually ranges between $2 and $6, and they have a wider reach, although some networks may offer a universe of, lets say 20 websites, when only 5 websites are really considered "top tier".

Networks to consider: Advertising.com, ValueClick.com, and FastClick.com.

You can find a full list of sites here: ttp://www.imediaconnection.com/resourceconnection/adnetwork.asp.

Editor's Note: If you'd like to learn more about how to buy online media for less...I just finished writing a 25-page comprehensive eBook where I go into all the tips and tricks to conduct high performance, low cost media buys. If you're interested in purchasing a copy, please email support@precisionmarketingmedia.com and mention "muscle marketing" in subject line.

4. Reciprocal Ad Swaps
Some of your best resources will be your fellow publishers. This channel often gets overlooked by marketers who don't give it the respect it deserves. In the work I do for my clients, I spend a good portion of my time researching publishers and websites in related, synergisic industries. I look for relevant connections between their publications (print and online) and my clients.

Let's say I come across a natural health e-letter about that has a list of readers similar in size to one of my clients, who is a supplement manufacturer. Since many of their audience share similar interests, cross marketing each other products (or even lead gen efforts) can be mutually rewarding.

Swapping ads will save you money on lead-generation initiatives. Since you won't be paying for access to the other publisher's list of subscribers, you can get new customers for free. The only "cost" is allowing the other publisher to access your own list. It's a win-win situation. This technique also opens the door to potential joint-venture opportunities.

5. Co-Registration
Co-registration or co-reg is basically a method of acquiring leads or sales on another publishers' website after another transaction or registration process occurs.
Co-reg ads use a CPL (cost per lead) payment model. You pay for the leads you capture. Your text ad and a small image of your publication appear on a webpage on another publisher's website after a primary transaction occurs. Your ad shares the page with other publishers looking to build their own e-mail lists with free subscriptions to their e-letters or free e-reports.

To make this work, I've found that you need to send special introductory "bonding" e-mails to the people who sign up for your newsletter before they get added to the general circulation. This helps them remember that they signed up for your e-letter. (So when it shows up in their inbox they won't think it's spam.) And it helps increase the potential that those subscribers will convert to paying customers.For more about this channel, check out Andrew Palmer's ETR article about using co-reg to attract customers.

6. Direct MailDirect mail is still a consumer favorite - and another good way to get your sales message out. It can be especially effective used in concert with another effort, such as an e-mail campaign. A recent survey published in DM News indicated that 70 percent of respondents preferred receiving unsolicited correspondence via mail vs. e-mail.

As with any marketing medium, though, you can end up paying a lot between production costs, list rental costs, and mail shop/postage costs. The most costly direct-mail packages are magalogs and tabloids (four-color mailers that look like magazines). However, 6 x 9 postcards, tri-fold self-mailers, and simple sales letters are three low-cost ways of taking advantage of this channel. Note that copy, list selection and geo-targeting an be crucial for direct mail success no matter which cost-effective mail format you pick.

Although 100 percent ROI (return on investment) is what you should aim for, many direct mailers are content with 80 percent. This lower figure takes into consideration the lifetime value of the names that come in from this channel, because they are typically reliable buyers in the future.

7. Print ads
This is another channel that's gets a raw deal. One reason is because it can be costly. To place an ad in a high-circulation magazine or newspaper, you could shell out serious money. But you don't need a big budget to take advantage of print ads. If you don't have deep pockets, consider targeted newspapers and periodicals.

Let's say you're selling an investment report. Try using the Internet to research the wealthiest cities in America. Once you get that list, look online for local newspapers in those communities. These smaller newspapers hit your target audience... and offer a much cheaper ad rate than some of the larger, broad-circulation publications. You end up getting quality rather than quantity.

I once paid for an ad in a local newspaper in Aspen, CO that had a flat rate of less than $500. My ROI on this effort turned out to be more than 1,000 percent. How's that for a positive response rate!

The seven marketing channels I've just described can help you reach more customers... and eventually add dollar signs to your bottom line. So start the New Year off with a marketing bang. By leveraging the seven channels of multi-channel marketing, I'm confident you will be amazed by the results.

Is Your Business Leaving Money On The Table?

2010-05-18T14:41:00.000-04:00

Don't Forget Search Engine Marketing and Optimization!

Many marketers and business owners think they're doing everything they can to get the word out about their company. They allocate their marketing dollars to direct mail, e-mail, banner ads, print ads, and pay-per-click (PPC). They spend much of their time, effort, and money on getting those methods to produce a positive ROI (return on investment). But they're ignoring a major source of potential traffic... which means they are losing loads of potential new customers ... and to me that's leaving money on the table: A HUGE mistake.

I'm talking about organic (natural) search engine marketing and optimization (SEM/SEO). Organic search results are those listings you see on the left side of Google after you type in your search term. You know, those little blurbs with links to someone's website. It's not to get confused with "paid" search, which are the small text ads that typically appear on the right side of the Google search results page. There's usually a subtle line separating these ads from the organic results and have a "sponsored links" headline at the top.

Many marketers think focusing on organic search is "a waste of time." Some think there's no way to monitor, measure, and monetize the results. But they're confused. According to a survey by Jupiter Research, 80% of Web users get information from organic search results. And measuring sources of traffic and visitors is easy with the free Web tool Google Analytics.
Search engines like variety in relevant back links to your website. And one of the best ways to get tons of relevant back links is with a systematic method I develop regarding the synchronized distribution of your content (read http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/sonar.html for more info.).

So in addition to having optimized website pages -- having a variety of news aggregators (i.e. Google News, Yahoo News), social networks, blogs, and directories linking to your site helps give you a heavier weight in organic listing results. Your company will appear more often and higher in the organic search results ... eventually dominating the critical first three results listings. This helps build your organic market presence for little or no cost. And, let's face it, low cost is a good thing.

Using organic search strategies helped increase traffic rank and visits to a health website I launched by 3,160% and 81.5%, respectively, in only three months. In that same time this websitehad a 62.01% rate of converting that organic search traffic into subscribers. In other words, the traffic was turned into sales (or monetized)! That's about 16,000 organic names in three months at virtually no cost.

So search engine naysayers...do you still think SEM and SEO is a waste of time?

You CAN Measure Social Media (You Just Need To Know How!)

2010-05-13T14:16:00.003-04:00

Many people have been using social media because they "think" it's what they should be doing. Afterall, everyone seems to have a Twitter or Facebook account. However, some businesses are putting all this time and effort into SMM (Social Media Marketing) because "everyone else is doing it" and they're not even measuring their efforts to see if all this work is paying off.

Since my background is direct response and PR, I was able to analyze social media goals and apply some fundamental metrics that DR and PR people use.

The Basics
In a nutshell, social media is an interactive platform where people can correspond - via chat rooms, forums, bulletin boards, networks (as in MySpace, Facebook, Classmates, LinkedIn, Bebo), user-generated content sharing (as in Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit), wikis (interactive online encyclopedias), and blogs - with like-minded individuals who share similar interests, whatever those interests may be.

Cutting-edge businesses and marketing-centric companies have jumped on the social media bandwagon to leverage the increased popularity of this phenomenon. Companies large and small got their marketers to create MySpace, FaceBook, or LinkedIn profiles in order to have their fingers on the pulse of the market, correspond with consumers, and create buzz about their products.

I have been on the Web for some time now, dabbling in all sorts of social media activities with content syndication, viral marketing, and online PR efforts.

How have I been measuring my efforts? By using the same metrics that are used to measure a public relations efforts: Outputs, outcomes, and objectives ... or what I like to call the "3 O's."

1. Outputs (measures effectiveness and efficiency)
For our example, I look at Google Analytics for spikes in traffic to the website's I'm doing social media marketing for in the days following the article's publication. I'd look specifically at traffic sources, visits, unique visits, and visit percentages. I'd also look at referring sites and search engines to see whether the traffic is coming directly from social media platforms. And I'd look for an increase in new subscriber sign-ups (leads) during that same time period.

2. Outcomes (measures behavioral changes)
For this metric, I'd look at feedback from customers... e-mails, phone calls, comments posted on my clients' websites member forum. I'd also do some reputation monitoring --by searching the Web for keywords for each of my clients' website, key personnel at their companies, the article title that I may have syndicated, and any top product names associated with their websites -- to see what buzz is going in targeted and relevant chat rooms, external forums, and bulletin boards.

3. Objectives (measures business objectives/sales)
The most obvious and directly related metric is direct sales of the product that are tied to the editorial. Orders generated from an e-mail link or ad link are coded for tracking, so attributing sales to those sources is definitive. If the sales come from a product page on our website where the true "source" cannot be tracked, I'd collaborate with my clients to review the sales that came in during the corresponding dates of the campaign and look for correlations.

Finally, for each of the above, I would compare the current campaign data versus the year-to-date (YTD) average and year-over-year data to clearly illustrate pre- and post- campaign performance. In other words, I'd check out website traffic, unique visits, specific product sales, etc. - all for the same time periods. That way, I'd have an established benchmark against which to measure our current social media efforts.

Social media is a low cost and effective way to spread the word about your company and products, as well as to conduct market research. By understanding the "3 O's" and how they work, you can actually quantify your efforts with hard data... a critical component for any online direct marketer.

Quick Tip: Social Media Measurement Tools

2010-05-07T22:02:00.001-04:00

Think you can't measure social media marketing? Think again. Here are some quick ways to keep an eye on your social marketing efforts...

Google Analytics

-Check the "referring sources page" to see how much traffic was generated by the social media sites you've been active in.-Look at overall traffic to website during same time period of your efforts. If you have a sign up/email form, look for lead spikes during time period of your effort.

Google Alerts

-Set alert for your name, your company name, and keywords in your content. You'll get notified via Alert if content/your messagegets picked up and goes viral.

Backlink Checkers

-Google Webmaster Tools: Check back links going to site during same time period of your effort.-Link Popularity Check: Link popularity analysis is one of the best ways to quantifiably and independently measure your website's online awareness.

Check out free backlink checker tools from iwebtool.com and backlinkwatch.com.

Lessons From An Entrepreneur: The 8 Keys To A Thriving vs. Dying Business

2010-03-28T15:18:00.003-04:00

The 8 Keys to Profit Acceleration

Many people ask me, "How did you do it?"

That is, how did I leave the comfort of a nice, corporate job (and salary, I might add) as Vice President of Marketing and Business Development for the Internet's top online publisher and launch a new business in a tough economy (back in March of 2009).

And, on top of that, launching a new business on the heels of becoming a mom and taking care of my newborn son and busy household.

Launching a new business always lends itself to some apprehension. But now, more than ever, during such a volatile time when many businesses are closing their doors and millions are losing their jobs ... makes it a tad more intimidating.

However, my business didn't only survive, it thrived. And it is still flourishing. I had taken a company with $0 and catapulted it to more than a six figure revenue generator in only 10 short months.

So, back to the original question, "How did I do it?"

Well, timing sure wasn't on my side. The state of our economy over the last few years makes it quite a challenge to get and keep clients. However, I owe the success of my business to a few critical drivers that I'm going to share with you. You can take these principals and apply or adapt them to your own business efforts as you see fit.

1. Market Smarter, Not Harder. This is a no-brainer. Any start up entrepreneur will tell you they have little to no marketing budget. So how do you build your brand and create awareness? It's being a strategic AND creative thinker. And it's also taking something most companies have (that's content) and leveraging it. Using a systematic approach I developed called the SONAR Content Distribution Method TM
http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/sonar.html .SONAR is simply taking your content and disseminating the release of it on the Web in a strategic and synchronized manner. The platforms you're releasing it to is targeted, highly visible, and free. This helps create a momentum in traffic, buzz, and then you help monetize that traffic though lead generation (or sales).

2. Relationship Cultivation. Networking, and tapping into your network, is key when launching a new business OR gaining market share with an existing business. I happen to have a very strong Rolodex of friends, colleagues, and professional acquaintances that helped create a good foundation for my launch efforts. They either hired me right off the bat as some of my very first clients OR referred me to their colleagues OR advertised my services to their lists. Always keep relationships open. Touch base with your network regularly. Offer assistance (gratis) if they have questions. People will reciprocate the gesture and it could lead to a multitude of benefits.

3. Strong Work Ethic/Reputation. People that know me ... that I worked for ... or know my experience, know what I bring to the table. They also know that I am committed to any task on my plate. It's a strong work ethic that people remember and helps build your reputation in whatever niche you're in. My reputation speaks for itself in the industry. And that doesn't just help with new business or referrals, but also helps with getting testimonials from those I worked with. Those testimonials are invaluable as a marketing tool on your website and in collateral material. Prospects can get a good idea of what to expect from those few "sound bites" about your work.

4. Leveraging Social Media. I have fully utilized social media. It's cost effective and casts a wide net. Where else can you get your message out to the masses for zero advertising cost? I've had the most success with LinkedIn.com as well as doing free press releases (that get picked up by bloggers and online news aggregators). LinkedIn is a professional networking community. I joined several "groups" where my target client would be and started writing relevant, useful articles. Soon, people started contacting me (on average 5 per week) with requests for proposals. I actually had so much success with LinkedIn I spoke on the subject matter at the SIPA Mid-Year Marketing Event this past December in Miami. If you're interested in a copy of that presentation, please contact me.

5. Contribute Content. I happen to enjoy writing and enjoy sharing my knowledge. In addition to syndicating my blog's content on the Web, I also reached out to relevant marketing newsletters and magazines and asked about being an editorial contributor or guest author, providing strong, valuable editorial. I also speak at industry conferences. From these efforts I gain exposure for my business, build credibility, and also get leads.

6. Business Basics. Create a strategic plan. Determine where you want to be in 1 or 2 years and what tactics you're going to do to achieve your goal. Go over your break-even point per month and how many clients/customers it will take to maintain or exceed that point. Keep little overhead. Establish a "true" home office. Share office space. Rent space or time at a business office center. Or get a "virtual office". When you're just starting out, cash flow is vital. If you need to outsource work, look into college interns related to the field you're in or bid out jobs in places like elance.com or ifreelance.com.

7. Confidence is Crucial. I don't just talk the talk, I walk the walk. I can back up everything I say by my past experience and future actions. Bottom line: I'm damn good at what I do and I make people money. I know it, and the companies or clients I've worked for (that take my advice and implement what I recommend) know it. This comes, however, with being in the marketing world for over 16 years. It also comes with being an accomplished professional. Once you have several successful tenures under your belt you know your worth and can set a value for your time. There's a difference between being confident and cocky. Confidence is self assured. Cocky is obnoxious. You need to know the difference and become your own advocate. This is conveyed in all that you do and is transparent to potential prospects.

8. Balancing Act. Any start-up business can be a drain on your life and family. A lot of time and effort goes into the launch, maintenance, and client relationship management. Then of course there's the administrative functions like daily accounting and record keeping. But it doesn't have to be that way. Make sure you set specific time for your work and time for your family. When work is done, leave it in the office (even if your office is another room of your house). Enjoy time with your loved ones and soon you all can reap the rewards of a successful company.

After all, you work to live, not live to work!

5 Easy Steps to Increase Website Traffic and Buzz

2010-03-11T12:08:00.003-05:00

On the recent "Content 2.0" teleseminar I did with Bob Bly, I spoke about not having SEO on your website is similar to not having any contact information in your telephone book ad ... no one will find you, which defeats the purpose.

Many businesses, large and small, spend the time and effort to develop a website only to forget to take it one step further by incorporating SEO to the site as well as creating buzz about the site. And what happens is the end result is a nice, pretty site, but no visitors. No traffic. No point to having the site.

But that can all be avoided.

The below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing at Agora Publishing/Early to Rise. I’m republishing it because unfortunately, I see many websites that have all the bells and whistles you can possibly ask for, but it’s lost in the “Internet black hole”.

Check it out…

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Rescue Your Website From the Internet "Black Hole"
By Wendy Montes de Oca

Okay, so you have a website. You’ve spent time and money getting this thing up. You’ve used all your creative juices to get the words just right. And you added some nice graphics to make the site aesthetically pleasing. Now what?

A website is of little use if nobody can find it.

Mastering organic search ranking has proven to be a fundamental part of the online marketing mix. (By "organic," I mean the "natural," as opposed to "paid/PPC," listing that appears when someone conducts a search on Google or other search engines. Optimal placement is typically within the first 20 listings or three pages.)

Search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO) – the ability to increase your site’s visibility in organic search listings and refine the content structure on the site itself – are critical for market awareness and customer acquisition. According to WebProNews, 66.3 percent of searchers click on organic listings before they click on a sponsored link. Even more important, a recent study by CreativeWebsiteMarketing.com indicates that most people who buy online start with a search engine.

Don’t let your site get lost in Internet obscurity. Here are five simple ways to help boost your website’s traffic and optimization.

1. Create online buzz about your site, product, or service.
You can do this by generating online press releases. There are services on the Web, such as PRWeb.com or Free-press-release.com, that do this for free or at a nominal cost. Another idea is to post comments to high-traffic blogs, bulletin boards, chat rooms, or forums.

Do a Web search for top blogs or news forums that are related to whatever it is that you’re selling. Go to each site, one by one, and post a comment. (Start a new topic or reply to an existing one.) This helps in two ways: One, you create buzz in the marketplace. Depending on your tactics, your message can even go viral. Two, you get a "back-link" to your site that helps when the site is indexed by search engine spiders.

An important note: Your post should be relevant and genuine. Your comment should be relevant to the question you’re replying to, have some sort of value to the readers that view it, and be in the proper area/subject matter on the forum you’re posting to. Stay away from posts that are blatantly self-serving. These posts are viewed as spam by forum webmasters and could get you banned from the forum, or at least be deleted.

For example, MaryEllen Tribby (ETR’s Publisher) had the good fortune to interview Newt Gingrich in March. Immediately after the interview, we posted a press release to several online press distribution services. We also uploaded comments about the interview to news-aggregating services, blogs, and political forums (with a back-link to the release posted in our Investors Daily Edge archive).

Within the weeks following the initial interview, website visits and traffic ranking more than doubled and conversion also showed a spike. Three months later, this release is still being picked up by the media and through syndication… and the Investors Daily Edge website is enjoying residual traffic and back-links from this effort.

Year-to-date, these techniques and the others I’m about to go into have helped increase traffic nearly 80 percent with a monetization of more than 150 percent ROI.

Which leads me to my next strategy…

2. Initiate a relevant inbound link program.
Set up a reciprocal link page or blog roll (a listing of URLs on a blog, as opposed to a website) that can house links from industry sites. Contact these sites to see if they’d be willing to swap links with you – a link to your site for a link to theirs. Again, relevance is key. Search engines shun link harvesting (collecting links from random websites that have no relevance to your site), so these links should be from sites that are similar in nature to your business.

3. Give Web searchers great content and a link back to your site.
Upload relevant content to sites that make such information available to other sites that want to publish it, such as ArticleDashboard.com or ArticlesFactory.com. This is a great way to increase market awareness as well as establish an inbound link to your site. There is also a syndication opportunity, as third-party sites may come across your article when doing a Web search and republish your content on their own websites. As long as third-parties give your site editorial attribution and a link, getting them to republish your content is just another distribution channel for you to consider.

4. Website pages should be keyword rich and related to your business.
Make a list of your top 20 keywords and variations of those words, and incorporate them into the copy on your site (avoiding the obvious repetition of words). Search engine "spiders" crawl Web pages from top to bottom, so your strongest keywords should be in that order on your home page and sub-pages (the most relevant on the top, the least relevant on the bottom).
You’ll want to do the same for your tagging. Make sure your title tags (the descriptions at the top of each page) and meta tags are unique and chock full of keywords. And your alt tags (images) should have relevant descriptions as well.

5. List your site in online directories by related category or region.
This is an effective way to increase exposure and get found by prospects searching specifically for information on your product or service by keyword topic. Popular directories (like Business.com) typically have a nominal fee. But there are many other directories (like Dmoz.org, Info.com, and Superpages.com) that are free.

Most important, before you start your SEO initiatives, don’t forget to establish a baseline for your site so you can measure pre- vs. post-SEO tactics. Upload a site counter (which counts the number of visits to your website), obtain your site’s Alexa traffic ranking at Alexa.com, or get your site’s daily visit average (from Google Analytics or another application) – and then chart your weekly progress in Excel. Understand that it typically takes two to three months for a site to be optimized… so be patient. You will eventually see results.

[The above article appears courtesy of Early to Rise http://www.earlytorise.com/]

Content 2.0 Teleseminar (Part 1) - The Day After

2010-02-19T20:37:00.002-05:00

For those of you that attended my teleseminar this week with Bob Bly, Content 2.0: The Missing Piece in the Internet Puzzle to Traffic, Leads, Sales and Buzz, thanks for joining us.

We have gotten inundated with feedback from attendees expressing how great the call was and how impressed they were with the level of expertise and information that was given.

And just in case you didn’t take notes on how to drive website traffic and increase revenues for virtually little effort or marketing dollars … don’t worry. Attendees will receive a transcript of both Part 1 (which was on Feb. 17) as well as Part 2 (which will be on Feb. 24) very soon as well as a bonus message form Bob containing all the free websites and tools that we discussed on the call.

If you missed the call completely … no worries. Bob and I plan on taking these 2+ hours worth of powerful, proven, traffic building tactics and create an eBook which will be available soon for purchase.

If you’d like to be one of the first to be notified when this eBook is ready, please email me at wendy@precisionmarketingmedia.com and put in the subject line “VIP List – Content 2.0 eBook”. And I’ll make sure to add you to our priority notification list.

For more information about the techniques discussed on the call, visit:
http://www.blyteleseminars.com/content2/
http://www.precisionmarketingmedia.com/sonar.html

Start the year off right! Increase website traffic and sales

2010-01-07T18:19:00.004-05:00

Attn: Early Birds.

There's going to be an event like no other. And because of the critical subject matter being covered ... the incredibly low cost ... and the fact that during this turbulent economy many business owners are looking for low cost marketing solutions with big results ... we expect this event to be filled to capacity. So you should take action now!

I wanted my blog readers to practically be the first to hear about it.

This powerful, 2-day, teleseminar will teach you how you can leverage content (from sources you probably didn't even think about) and turn it into increased traffic, leads, sales and buzz.

This event will be hosted by bestselling author, master copywriter, and Internet marketing strategist, Bob Bly, and will be co-hosted by, yours truly.

If you haven't been able to tap into my expertise as your personal marketing consultant -- I urge you to take advantage of this rare opportunity to find out my secrets to helping many of the companies I've worked for make hundreds of thousands of dollars as well as increase market awareness, revenues and subscribers. And all for just $19!

That's not crazy talk. We know how many businesses, marketers, and entrepreneurs are struggling now and wanted to make sure this event was priced to sell ... and no one was left out.

Here's the info...

"Content 2.0": The Missing Piece in the Internet Puzzle to Traffic, Leads, Sales and Buzz. A "Must Attend" Teleseminar Featuring Bob Bly and Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA, February 17 & February 24, 2pm EST.

Click here to learn more and to register http://blyteleseminars.com/content2/

Improve subscriber lifetime value as well as shorten the conversion process

2009-12-20T10:04:00.000-05:00

If you’re having trouble bonding with your subscribers or notice they’re dropping off your file before they make a purchase, consider implementing a proven strategy that helps improve bonding, LTV (life time value) as well as reduces the average sales conversion cycle by about 50%...

…implement an introductory series of emails for your new subs.

These are targeted messages to your “new to files” written with bonding in mind. Its job is to help these new folks buy into your philosophy, get to know who you are and what you do, help them bond with you or your “gurus” and reinforce your credentials – all through the power of editorial.

These emails should be staggered and go over a course of a few weeks. These names should be suppressed from general population and they should preferably not get any promotions during this bonding process.

One caveat, you might want to offer a special “welcome aboard” offer at the end of the series, such as 20% off their first order.

But in addition to your editorial messages, you should help the subscriber develop that “warm, fuzzy feeling” and offer quality content and free bonus reports.

If your email service has the ability to track conversions down to the user level, set it up so that for every user that doesn’t convert in a timely manner (i.e. 30, 60, 90 days), another, targeted editorial message goes out to them automatically – sweetening the offer to convert to a paying customer.

This could plan be modified slightly for each publisher, but the ultimate goal is to let new subscriber develop a connection with the guru/publication before any hard sales offers.
Ultimately, it has been proved that LTV and conversions improved by more than 50% (when group of new subs/cohorts were tracked over a course of time). In addition, the subs that did become customers, converted quicker and stood on file longer than those not in the "intro series" emails.

Cover Your Basis - PPC and SEO

2009-11-16T11:19:00.001-05:00

There’s a great tactic that will help your list building efforts -- both with paid AND organic search.

And it’s not much additional work … if you already have a lead generation landing page you’re using for PPC, you can cover your basis on the organic side with a few additions. Here’s how:

--Start by creating a new URL for SEO purposes using the existing PPC landing page.

--Make sure the new SEO URL is packed with your targeted and relevant keywords (one caveat: before this, make sure you’ve done your research to see which keywords to use and the search volume on each one).

--Add relevant and targeted keywords into the new SEO lead gen page’s tags including: title tag, meta description, and meta keywords. Also, if you have images on the page, make sure to add relevant keywords to those.

--If not already done, drop in the Google Analytics code to this page so you can track page visits/traffic.

After your page is indexed by the search engine spiders (which may take a few weeks), your lead gen page should start appearing in organic search rankings based on the keywords you’ve indicated in your tags.

What will also help your page’s ranking be more favorable is if you can get some backlinks from high traffic websites linking to this new, SEO landing page.

SIPA Marketing Conf. - Presentation on Leveraging LinkedIn

2009-11-16T11:16:00.003-05:00

SIPA’s (Specialized Information Publishing Association) Mid-Year Event was in Miami last week at the Ritz-Carlton.

The event was a great success…from a networking, prospecting, and educational standpoint.
My presentation on Leveraging LinkedIn was also a success. I discussed many tips and tricks to use LinkedIn for events, content syndication, market research, PR, and more.

If you’re interested in a copy of my presentation, please email me (my contact info is in my blog profile).

SEO: Definitely Worth Your Time

2009-10-30T21:16:00.000-04:00

The below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing at Agora Publishing/Early to Rise.I’m republishing it because it’s timely…with the current economy the way it is, marketers are often forgetting about the grass-roots approaches … marketing that is virtually no cost, but just requires time, effort and strategic thought.

SEO often gets a bad rap, because some marketers don’t know how to measure it. But it should always be a crucial part of your online marketing mix.

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Don’t Overlook Organic Search Efforts in Your Online Marketing Mix
By Wendy Montes de Oca

Many Internet entrepreneurs think they’re doing everything they can to get the word out about their businesses. They allocate their marketing budgets to direct mail, e-mail, banner ads, print ads, co-registration, and pay-per-click (PPC). They spend much of their time, effort, and money on getting those channels to produce a positive ROI (return on investment). But they’re ignoring a major source of potential traffic… which means they are losing hordes of potential new customers. Big mistake.

I’m talking about organic search via search engine marketing and optimization (SEM/SEO).
Many marketers think focusing on organic search is "a waste of time." Some think there’s no way to monitor, measure, and monetize the results. But they’re either clueless or misinformed. For instance, according to a recent survey by Jupiter Research, 80 percent of Web users get information from organic search results. And measuring sources of traffic and visitors is easy with the free Web tool Google Analytics.

Search engines like diversity in relevant back links to your website. And one of the best ways to get lots of relevant back links – as I said in my article about the SONAR Method of Content Distribution – is with a synchronized distribution of your content to a variety of sources.
So in addition to having optimized website pages, having a variety of news aggregators, social networks, blogs, and directories linking to your site helps give you a heavier weight in organic listings. This helps build your organic market presence for little or no cost. And, let’s face it, low cost is a good thing.

Using organic search strategies helped increase traffic rank and visits to ETR’s sister publication, Total Health Breakthroughs, by 3,160 percent and 81.5 percent, respectively, in only three months. In that same time period, Total Health Breakthroughs had a 62.01 percent rate of converting that organic search traffic into subscribers. That’s about 16,000 organic names in three months at virtually no cost!

Now tell me… does that seem like a waste of time to you?

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health, and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]

Branding vs. Direct Response: Which is right for you?

2009-10-16T09:29:00.001-04:00

As I’ve written before … several of my real-life experiences influence my blog posts.

A colleague of mine asked how could he leverage a popular email list and drive them (consumers) to a retail store to purchase his product.

My explanation and recommendation led me to explain the difference between branding and direct response marketing.

You see, driving a consumer to a store to “take action” is more "branding". Branding is a form of marketing where a consumer sees or hears your message (albeit email, TV, print ad, radio) and then takes action. The action isn’t immediate (i.e. “direct response”) it typically involves going to a retailer to make the sale (or “convert”).

The marketer has to hope that once the consumer sees/hears the message they remember it. (Advertising studies show that the average consumer needs to see a message 7-8 times before it becomes familiar to them). Then, hope that consumer has enough loyalty or name recognition from that product that when they do go to the retailer to purchase, they don’t get distracted by other competitive products.

Branding is hard to measure. Usually, you tie into the timing of your campaign in to retail sales for the specific product during that same time period and make assumptions.

As opposed to “direct response marketing”, where there is generally one strong message with a compelling offer. One platform (i.e. an email, a newsletter ad, a direct letter, an online ad). You see, it's more controlled … you’re directing the consumer where to go next (i.e. “Click here now”) and your message will be the only one in front of them at that time. In addition, it's quantifiable … easier to measure … looking at metrics like open rates, click through rates, response rates, conversion rates. You can directly calculate your ROI (return on investment), which helps the marketer offset any advertising costs from the profits. Plus, typically direct response marketing overall is more cost effective than branding.

Branding efforts take time, as you have to develop your brand loyalty with the list first to help overall conversions (think of loyal brand followers of well-known products like Nike, GE, BMW, McDonald’s, etc ... these companies spend hundreds of millions of dollars on brand development). Branding is also not as accurate to measure.

For businesses – especially during the current economic environment – unless you’re a Fortune 500 company, the most reliable marketing method in my opinion is direct response marketing.

What smart marketers are doing NOW to bring in leads & cash

2009-10-09T21:09:00.004-04:00

I recently started several discussions in targeted Marketing groups in the popular, LinkedIn professional social network. I asked, “How are you marketing your business during this economy?”

Here’s what I found out…

· Local advertising. Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
“I am using primarily local business-to-business networking in an effort to capture those first dozen or so customers. My web site is optimized to attract hits as well.”

· Word of mouth marketing. Social media (SMO)
“My best marketing tool is wearing my line of jewelry…. I took on social networking a couple months ago, and plan to have a blog also. I am also networking with a travel agent as her most common question is, ‘What do I where on a cruise?’ ”

“As a consultant, testimonials and referrals are very important. I have great clients and the majority of my business in 2009 has been from referrals. I also network at lot through all the major online social networks.”

· Social Media. PR.
“I use are social media, (mainly Twitter, Facebook and Youtube), Press releases, Forums, articles, blog posts. I find that forums are great places to talk to targeted audience.”

· Networking. Leveraging expertise.
“…Definitely local networking is working for me for through various groups as well as the chamber of commerce … I also teach classes and offer my services as a speaker to groups.”

· Event marketing.
“I have been marketing my services through gift bag requests.”

Thanks to all that have taken the time to post comments in the various LinkedIn Groups where I asked this question.

As you can see, most everyone that commented is utilizing low/no cost marketing channels as well as being creative thinkers with their marketing tactics…both proven approaches that I’ve written about many times on this blog and are featured in my SONAR marketing method.

What have YOU been doing to market during t his tough times…let me know!

3 ways to measure your social media efforts

2009-09-26T10:48:00.003-04:00

Many people have been using social media because they "think" it's what they should be doing. After all, it's all the rage. Everyone seems to have a Twitter or Facebook account. But social media may not be the right channel for some businesses. Even more disturbing, some businesses are putting all this time and effort into SMO because "everyone else is doing it" and they're not even measuring their efforts to see if all this work is really paying off.

It's not that they're lazy or sub par marketers, it's just that they may not have a direct response or PR background -- in other words, they're not familiar with how to measure ALL of their marketing efforts ... including social media.

Well, I'm here to shed light on this important topic.

Below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing and Business Development at Early to Rise.

Check it out…Have a question about measuring social media or using social media for profits? Drop me an email!

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Measuring Social MediaBy Wendy Montes de Oca, MBA

If you’re an online marketer or publisher, chances are you’re well aware of the power of social media optimization (SMO). If you’re new to the world of Internet marketing, you’ll be interested to know that this breakthrough method is a truly inexpensive (practically free) way to create buzz about your products, increase traffic to your site, build trust about your company, and boost your sales.

Today, I’m going to show you a simple way to get started in social media marketing – and an easy three-step process you can use to measure how well it’s working.

In a nutshell, social media is an interactive platform where people can correspond – via chat rooms, forums, bulletin boards, networks (as in MySpace, Facebook, Classmates, LinkedIn, Bebo), user-generated content sharing (as in Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit), wikis (interactive online encyclopedias), and blogs – with like minded individuals who share similar interests, whatever those interests may be.

Cutting-edge businesses and marketing-centric companies have jumped on the social media bandwagon to leverage the increased popularity of this phenomenon. Companies large and small got their marketers to create MySpace, FaceBook, or LinkedIn profiles in order to have their fingers on the pulse of the market, correspond with consumers, and create buzz about their products.

Here at ETR, we’ve been on the Web for some time now, dabbling in all sorts of social media activities with content syndication, viral marketing, and online PR efforts.

Recently, we started leveraging the presence of our individual team members on LinkedIn. If you’re not familiar with this site, it’s a network community for business professionals. Users can set up profiles highlighting their corporate experience and areas of expertise.

Edwin Huertas, one of ETR’s search engine marketing specialists, answers select questions on LinkedIn that are related to his area of expertise. He also uploads blog posts about a variety of search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), pay-per-click (PPC), and social media practices. This helps create buzz about ETR (through Edwin’s profile and position at ETR). Plus, he sometimes supplements his posts with links back to relevant articles on our website – which helps drive traffic to the ETR site.

This is a practice you can emulate easily. Simply register as a member of one of the social media groups. Then begin to participate in the discussions. For instance, if a LinkedIn member posts a specific question about SEO, Edwin will try to find an article on our ETR site that addresses that issue. He then answers the question in his own words, but recommends that the member also read the ETR article, which has more valuable information. By answering questions posed by your fellow members (making sure you add relevant links back to content on your website), your posts will begin to generate “free” traffic.

Another site that works well for us is StumbleUpon.com. This site directs Internet surfers to Web pages based on the surfer’s pre-selected categories every time they click on the “Stumble” icon on their toolbar.

You can install the StumbleUpon toolbar on your own computer and recommend articles on your own site. This allows you to give any page a “Thumbs Up” or “Thumbs Down” rating. It also allows you to include a brief description and category for your submission. If you rate your article, it will appear in the StumbleUpon rotation – which, again, means ‘free’ traffic to your site.

Getting started is super-easy. But the key to making social media work for you is the same with any marketing medium: You need to have a way to find out if it’s working.

Although many marketers have been going all out with their social media efforts, most haven’t a clue as to how to actually measure the campaign’s success or failure.

Let’s say Early to Rise just published an article on goal setting for 2009. The article is followed by a related product ad in the ETR issue, as well as by a separate e-mail promotion for a related goal setting product, like our Total Success Achievement program. Product sales are generated from the e-mail and from the ad. Meanwhile, the social media aspect takes over.

The article content is syndicated via RSS feeds, as well as top article directories (like EzineArticles, GoArticles, ArticleBase, Buzzle, and others) and user-generated content networks (such as Digg and Reddit). Readers may also discuss the article on goal setting and self-improvement blogs, forums, and bulletin boards.

So how could you measure the social media aspect of such an effort?
It’s easy. By using the same metrics that are used to measure a public relations effort: Outputs, outcomes, and objectives – what I like to call the “3 O’s.”

1. Outputs (measures effectiveness and efficiency)
For our example, I’d look at Google Analytics for spikes in traffic to the Early to Rise homepage in the days following the article’s publication. I’d look specifically at traffic sources, visits, unique visits, and visit percentages. I’d also look at referring sites and search engines to see whether the traffic is coming directly from social media platforms. And I’d look for an increase in new ETR subscriber sign-ups (leads) during that same time period.

2. Outcomes (measures behavioral changes)
For this metric, I’d look at feedback from our customers… e-mails, phone calls, comments posted on our ETR member forum. I’d also do some reputation monitoring by searching the Web for keywords like “ETR,” the article title, and the product name to see if others were talking about it in chat rooms, external forums, and bulletin boards.

3. Objectives (measures business objectives/sales)
The most obvious and directly related metric is direct sales of the product that are tied to the editorial. Orders generated from an e-mail link or ad link are coded for tracking, so attributing sales to those sources is definitive. If the sales come from a product page on our website where the true “source” cannot be tracked, I’d look at the sales during the corresponding dates of the campaign for correlations.

Finally, for each of the above, I would compare the current campaign data versus the year-to-date (YTD) average and year-over-year data to clearly illustrate pre- and post- campaign performance. In other words, I’d check out website traffic, unique visits, specific product sales, etc. – all for the same time periods. That way, I’d have an established benchmark against which to measure our current social media efforts.

Social media is a low cost and effective way to spread the word about your company and products, as well as to conduct market research. By understanding the “3 O’s” and how they work, you can actually quantify your efforts with hard data… a critical component for any direct marketer.

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]

8 "Must See" Tips For Smarter and Cheaper Online Media Buys

2009-09-17T20:55:00.004-04:00

With the current economy the way it is, many marketers and business owners are opting to forgo online media buys in their marketing mix and spend more time on little-to-no cost tactics such as search engine marketing/optimization and social media marketing.

It doesn’t have to be that way. There are plenty of cost-effective tricks to ensure you’re getting the most bang for your buck when buying online media.

I say, “market smarter, not harder … or more expensive.” Media buying (albeit pay per click/display ads, banner ads, text ads, paid newsletter sponsorships, and email list rentals) should always have a part in your online marketing plan…even if the percentage is small.

Like an investment portfolio, never put all your eggs in one basket.

Having a variety of online marketing tactics, strong creative, and always testing helps put the odds in your favor for meeting or exceeding your overall goals.

Below is an article I wrote while I was VP of Marketing and Business Development at Early to Rise. Now, more than ever, the tips are invaluable! Check it out…

Have a question about your online marketing mix? Drop me an email!
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Muscle Media Buying
By Wendy Montes de Oca,MBA

If you’ve got have a strong e-mail campaign going but you’re looking to expand your direct-response tactics to include online ads, chances are you will do some media buying. Why? Because purchasing banner, text or other display ads can be a very cost effective way to attract customers.

As a multi-channel marketer, many of my responsibilities over the years have required me to buy ad space in magazines, newspapers, radio, TV, and the Web. Along the way, I’ve become an expert (especially with online media), and picked up a few techniques that could save you hundreds, maybe even thousands, of dollars.

But before I explain further, I’d like to point out that there are differences in online advertising.
You can focus your ad to be direct-response-oriented, which includes lead generation (acquiring e-mail names) and product sales. Or you can focus your ad on branding. Branding isn’t direct-response marketing – meaning it doesn’t require an immediate action from the consumer. Its goal, rather, is to build awareness and name recognition of a product over time and help it stay in the minds of prospects. In the offline world, think the battle of the cola giants. In the online world, it’s typically video ads like the ones you see for a new car or truck.

Because results are harder to measure with branding, many online marketers lean toward the direct-response model.

Your job as a media buyer is simply to try to get the best bang for the buck when purchasing media units. It involves allocating money for advertising in various outlets, print or online, and negotiating the actual advertising agreement with the publisher. This agreement is known as an IO (insertion order), and will cover the ad unit cost, size, placement, and other critical components (which I’ll address shortly).

Here are some helpful hints to keep in mind when buying media for your sales campaigns.

Hint #1: Keep up with the industry.
Sign up for free industry trade papers, such as DM News, Response Magazine, and Target Marketing, and as many free e-letters as you can read. One of my favorite e-letters is Clickz.com, because it covers the online marketing world in a comprehensive and dynamic way. I also like mediabuyerplanner.com, which keeps you abreast of the latest media-buying news, and DoubleClick.com, which provides some of the marketing industry’s best practices, trends, and forecast reports.

One current trend is flash banners. These ad units support audio/video use (which engages the viewer and is great for branding), but they are more costly than standard flat (no animation) or animated banners.

Hint #2: Know the ad units.
There are many types of banner ads to choose from: leader boards, skyscrapers, buttons, micro banners, and more. You can find a full list of types of ads, as well as industry guidelines for how and when to use them, at iab.net. All of these ad units are available on most websites, but not every type is effective.

For instance, it has been my experience that leader boards (ads that run horizontally across the top of a Web page) or skyscrapers (ads that run vertically along the side of a Web page) are the least effective. The best placements are typically LRECs – large rectangles, such as 300 x 250 IMUs, at the top or middle of a page or within the content. (IMU stands for Internet Marketing Unit.) Putting an ad inside the body of an article is a great placement, since the reader must breeze over the ad while absorbing the content. A recent eyetracking study by The Poynter Institute supported this observation, indicating that banner ads at the top left of the page, as well as ads close in proximity to the body of an article, garnered the most attention from viewers. This is where you want your message to be!

Hint #3: Master the art of negotiation.
You will be required to analyze many proposals when you’re looking for the right ad space. You’ll need to determine if the prices are cost effective and comparable to industry rates. If you’re looking into buying ad space on CNN.com, for instance, check out the prices for that same ad unit and timeframe on similarly ranked news websites. Also, check out various ad networks to see if any include CNN.com in their coverage. (For more on ad networks, see Hint #7.)

Since many variables can affect ad prices, I recommend starting an "ad unit matrix" to keep track of rates. Break down a spreadsheet into columns for ad unit type, size, placement, website, impressions (how many times the ad unit appears on the website), and CPM (cost per thousand impressions). Click here to se a great tool that easily calculates the CPM for you.

Another factor that can affect pricing is seasonality. Internet traffic typically drops during July and August (because so many people are on summer vacation) and, depending on the industry you’re in, can be slower around the holidays as well. So, when you’re negotiating your media buy, try to get lower rates during those times. If you’re running near a typically slow time, let’s say around Thanksgiving, you may want to pause your ad unit the day before the holiday and the day after so you don’t waste impressions.

To help ensure that you’re getting a comparable rate, check out each site’s traffic ranking and page views to see where it stands in relation to its competitors in terms of popularity and reach. It’s best to get this information from a subscription ranking service, like Nielsen//NetRatings or ComScore – but if you don’t have access to such services, consider the free Alexa ranking website (Alexa.com).

Hint #4: Reporting rules.
Make sure, especially if you buy media from an online ad network, that you have full access to the OAS (online ad server) reporting system. Look for key performance indicators, such as impressions served (ad units that ran), and click-thru rate (the percentage of people who saw your ad and clicked on a link in it). If you are testing various ad units and sizes, each one should have a unique tracking code. If your advertiser doesn’t give you access to their OAS, ask about getting daily or weekly reports from your account executive. These reports will be critical in refining your ad to get maximum results.

As a general guideline, the average click-thru rate for a banner ad/text ad is 0.5 to 2 percent, and the average click-thru rate for a dedicated e-mail (an e-mail ad that a third party sends to their subscribers on your behalf) is 7.5 percent.

Hint #5: Know when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em.
In your insertion order, have a clause that allows you to terminate your advertising commitment without penalty at a given time (an "out clause" or "termination right"). For instance, most online campaigns can be optimized in about a week. If you’re watching your reporting daily (which I suggest you do for the first two weeks) and notice that not many viewers are clicking on your ad, then you should switch to a different ad. If the second ad is not working, you may want to initiate your termination right, end the campaign, and pay only for the impressions you were served.

Not all advertisers will offer this option, but you should certainly ask for it.

Hint #6: There are no stupid questions.
If you’re buying banner ads or other advertising spots on a website, it’s key to find out a few things from your account executive:

Will your ad be ROS (run of site)? Typically, this means your ad will randomly appear on a site’s home page and most (if not all) subpages within the site. This is more cost effective than a targeted ad in a specific section of the site.

Will your ad position be fixed or rotated (shared) with anyone else’s ad? If shared, what percentage of impressions will your ad receive?

If you’re considering buying a dedicated e-mail from a third-party, find out the size of their e-mail list, how often the list gets mailed, the AUS (average unit sale) per subscriber, and whether or not there will be an introduction or implied endorsement by the list owner. (According to copywriting genius John Forde, this can often help boost response rates by 25 percent or more.)

All of these factors will help determine the value of the list and, ultimately, the cost you’re willing to pay to access the people on it.

Hint #7: Be on the lookout for low-cost options.
If you’re targeting a specific audience or a niche buyer, go directly to the website’s publisher for an advertising quote. Cutting out the middleman (ad broker) may get you a better rate. PLUS, it will help you build a relationship with the publisher – which can be advantageous for you down the road.

If your goal is to reach the biggest, broadest audience possible, and you want to run an ad on various websites that have a distinct "channel" or genre (such as entertainment, finance, health, etc.) within the broader subject range of the site, consider an ad network.

Ad networks have an agreement with a variety of popular websites to serve up their ads, and they can sort by website type. Since they typically buy their ad units in bulk from the publishing sites, the networks can pass the savings down to the advertiser and charge a lower CPM rate. Some popular networks include Advertising.com and ValueClick.com. You can find a full list at iwebtool.com.

Just remember to get proposals from more than one network. Some of the lesser-known (Tier 2) networks are looking to make a name for themselves, and may offer better rates. But be wary of "micro" sites, which have little traffic or Web presence. Be sure to ask for a sample of the network’s site listings. I always go for quality over quantity.

Depending on how many impressions you buy from these ad networks, your average cost for an LREC can range from $2 to $5. For blog ads and blog networks, you can often find CPMs lower than $1 or even 50 cents. And if you’re looking to save even more money, ask if remnant inventory is available. Remnant inventory is simply an advertising unit that is not as popular as other ad units on a site and is unsold. Depending on your marketing goal, these ad units may accomplish your objective – and to make them more attractive, networks usually offer them at a lower rate.

Hint #8: Show your poker face.
In this industry, it’s all about confidence and knowledge. If you come across as someone who is savvy to media buying, you’re less likely to be taken advantage of.
Do your homework and follow some of the recommendations above… but your best lessons will happen as you buy.

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.]

"Partner up" for leads, sales, editorial and more!

2009-09-07T20:33:00.004-04:00

Trying to think of new, cost effective ways to grow your list, get added exposure, tap into another market, or increase sales?

Many business owners and marketers completely overlook leveraging editorial, lead generation, and sales opportunities with synergistic “partners” because they are either afraid of the competition or think it’s a waste of time.

I say, “test it out” and see if you have a winning strategy.

If you find the right list to go to, the possibilities are endless and you could forge a long-term, mutually beneficial venture for both you and your “partner”.

And best of all, it’s virtually at no advertising cost.

Below is an article I wrote last year while I was Vice President of Marketing and Business Development at Agora Publishing/Early to Rise. Although the article is a year old, the principals are timeless.

Check it out…

Let’s Get Reciprocal: Maximizing Ad Swaps, Guest Editorials, and JV Opportunities
By Wendy Montes de Oca

Now is a great time to look to your competition for opportunities to help grow your list and add extra revenues to your bottom line for little or no cost.

For example, here at Early to Rise I just completed media buy (i.e., outside advertising purchasing) recommendations for all of our newsletters – Early to Rise, Total Health Breakthroughs, and Investor’s Daily Edge. My advice was to reduce them to help control costs through the end of 2008, as the tough economy continues to impact everyone. But my number one focus is, instead, for each marketing manager to concentrate on leveraging the marketing and editorial relationships we have with our fellow publishers and aggressively pursuing ad swaps, guest editorials, and joint ventures (JV).

The idea is to develop synergistic relationships that are mutually beneficial – to look for areas of deficiency in your competitors and think of ways your company can fill the void.

One potential partner may have a great front-end product (e.g., a low cost e-book) but no up-sell (e.g., a higher-priced related kit containing DVDs, CDs, and workbooks). Another potential partner may have an innovative back-end product but no cost-effective front-end product to bring new customers in the door. Still others may have large, qualified lists but need editorial to bond with their lists. (This frequently happens when marketers collect names through their websites or direct mail, but don’t have a regularly scheduled publication – such as an e-newsletter – to offer people who sign up.)

Some tips to keep in mind when looking for potential partners:

• Do your homework. Find out, in advance, who will be at industry events that you’ll be attending. (Check the program for speakers, vendors, and participants.) Sign up for their e-newsletters. Read their promotional e-mails. Maybe even purchase some of their products.

• Look at EVERY opportunity as a way to maximize your company’s brand. When you go to industry events, don’t eat dinner alone in your hotel room. Go to functions. Mingle. Network. Have a genuine conversation with a potential partner… then, if there’s a synergy between your two companies, exchange business cards.

At this year’s ETR Info Marketing Bootcamp, I noticed that attendees were really taking advantage of all the opportunities to network with each other and the ETR staff…during presentation breaks, lunch time, cocktail parties – whenever and wherever – making the most out of the experience!

• Before you contact a potential partner, get familiar with his products and target audience and figure out how your company may be able to dovetail with his product line or marketing efforts.

So, once you’ve made the connection, now what?

Ad Swaps
Assuming you both have e-newsletters, you can test the waters and see how your lists will react by doing an advertising swap. In other words, you run an ad in his e-newsletter and he runs an ad in yours.

To make sense out of the results of that test, you have to know your “opportunity cost” – the “cost” you will incur for running an outside ad to your list instead of your own ad. If you normally sell ad space in your e-newsletter, this cost could simply be the flat rate fee you typically charge. Or, if you know the average revenues an issue brings in, you could calculate the potential “missed opportunity” of letting another ad run to your list on a given day.

You should also agree to share important information with your partner. Before his ad runs in your e-newsletter, point out any creative issues. (Perhaps the copy is too inflammatory for your list. Perhaps it’s too competitive.) Provide your partner with your e-newsletter’s sent and deliverability sizes, open rate, and ad click rate. Exchanging performance data is critical to a long and mutually beneficial relationship. It has to be a win/win situation for the partnership to work.

Whether your goal is to attract names for your e-list (lead generation) or to make sales, reciprocate in kind. If your partner is letting you do a name collection ad to his list, for example, let him run the same kind of ad to your list. But first make sure his list is approximately the same size as yours. If it’s substantially smaller, you may want to hold off on an ad swap with that publisher until he builds his subscriber base. You don’t want the initiative to be one-sided.

However, on a case-by-case basis, it doesn’t hurt to extend “good will” to a fellow publisher with proven marketing muscle. For example, when Total Health Breakthroughs launched in summer of 2007, I reached out to several industry friends and colleagues, asking if we could run a lead generation ad to their lists to help us build our subscriber base. We had little to offer in return at the time. (We barely had a list of our own.) But, thankfully, many agreed. The THB list grew in no time, and we were soon able to reciprocate.

Guest Editorials
You can also look into doing guest editorials in other publishers’ e-newsletters – with an editorial note or byline that links to your offer. This is a great way to get introduced to a new list with the “implied” endorsement of the publisher. His endorsement gives you credibility. And if you provide his readers with good, solid, useful information, they will bond with you quickly.

This is a soft-sell approach that may or may not yield results on its own. But when coordinated with either a dedicated e-mail (if your partner is on board with a revenue split) or an e-newsletter ad the same week, your conversion rate (the number of people who go on to buy your product) will dramatically improve.

Joint Ventures (JVs)
I’ve got one more idea for you: joint venturing. This is a quick and cost-effective way to make money with your list even if you have not yet developed any products.

With a JV, you have an instant product line with no overhead costs. Your partner will supply the products, fulfill orders, and provide customer support. All you have to do is promote the products to your list and split the net revenues with them. For an even a more turnkey approach, you can sell e-reports through sites like Clickbank.com, where everything is automated.

To determine the viability of a potential JV product, there are several strategic marketing variables to consider. I like to think of them as “PPPGS”:
P = Product quality
P = Price point
P = Performance (when promoted to your potential partner’s house list, as well as to outside lists)
G = General market demand
S = Subscriber interest (when promoted to your list, as determined by feedback, surveys, etc.)

Remember – you’re looking for long-term partners, not one-hit-wonders. So carefully select the people you approach, making sure their products make sense relative to your business…and, together, you can reap the unlimited profit potential of reciprocal marketing!

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]

Increase Sales with List Segmentation/Database Marketing

2009-08-30T21:56:00.004-04:00

Most every marketer knows that it cost more to bring in a new name than leverage the power of an existing customer. That said, in the current environment we find ourselves now in, business owners are taking a closer look at getting the most out of their database ... slicing and dicing their lists in efforts to better monetize it.

The timing is very apropo to discuss how to segment your list and deploy database marketing, or data mining, tactics.

The following is an article I wrote while I was Vice President of Marketing and Business Development at Early to Rise (a subsidiary of Agora Publishing). It was published in the popular Early to Rise daily eNewsletter. It covers this very poignant topic and can not only save you marketing dollars, but also increase the lifetime value of your customers.

Check it out...

Use the Slice-and-Dice System to Get Your Customers to Buy More
By Wendy Montes de Oca

One of the best ways to build your online business is to build your house list of potential customers. But you can also do it by changing the way you market to your existing customers. Today, I want to show you how breaking up your existing customer database can boost your sales.

Data mining, or database marketing, is basically the art of slicing and dicing your own in-house list of names. You do this to help increase the response to your online sales promotions.
You see, once you divide your list of names into smaller groups ("segmentation"), you can specialize your product offers. Then, by targeting your offer based on customer needs, you’ll be promoting products to people who are more likely to buy them. You increase your customers’ satisfaction as well as your potential conversion rates. (The conversion rate is the number of people who not only read your offer but actually purchase the product.) And higher conversion rates means more money for your company.

One proven model is the RFM method. It’s practiced by direct-response marketers all over the world, and is a marketing method we use here at ETR.

"R" stands for Recency, how recently a customer has made a purchase. "F" stands for Frequency, how often the customer makes a purchase. And "M" stands for Monetary, how much the customer spends.

Here’s how you can use the RFM method to help lift your sales.

*Recency
Whether your house list is made up of people who signed up to receive your free e-zine or people who paid for a subscription, you can segment your database according to how long your customers have been with you. Let’s say, 0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-12 months, and 12+ months.

You would look at these groups as your hot subs (newest subscribers), warm subs (mid-point subscribers), and cool subs (those who have been subscribing to your e-zine the longest).
Let’s say your list is made up of subscribers to your free e-zine. Here’s how you use that information…

Because your "cool subs" may have lost their initial enthusiasm for your e-zine, you should cross-reference them with your open rates. If most of them haven’t been opening your e-zine in six, nine, or 12 months, you should consider sending them a special message asking if they still want to receive your e-zine.

But that doesn’t mean you ignore them. These inactive subscribers are a great group on which to test new marketing approaches, new prices, new subject lines, and so on. After all, you have nothing to lose. Your goal for this group is to re-engage them. And since they aren’t responding to your current e-mails, why not use this platform to test?

Your "hot subs" are your newest, most enthusiastic subscribers. They are ripe to learn more about you, your products, and your services. If you handle this group properly, you can cultivate them into paying customers. So you may want to send them targeted offers and messages.
For example, you could send them a special introductory series of e-mails. This special series would introduce them to your e-zine’s contributors and philosophy. It could also tempt them with specially priced offers. Sending an introductory series like this can not only increase the number of subscribers who convert to paying customers, it also increases their lifetime value (LTV) – the amount they spend with you over their lifetime as your customer.

If, instead of subscribers to a free e-zine, your house list is made up of people who paid for their subscription, the same segmentation process applies. You break your active subscribers into hot subs, warm subs, and cool subs. You also break out expirers (those who allowed their subscription to run out) and cancels (those who cancelled their subscription).

Cross-marketing to these lists is usually effective. The expirers often just forgot to renew and simply need a reminder. And just because someone cancelled one subscription doesn’t mean they may not be ideal for another service or product that you provide. If they’re still willing to receive e-mail messages from you, add these folks to your promotional lists.

Once you’ve gotten these otherwise inactive subscribers to open your messages, turning them into paying customers is just a matter of time. Most Internet marketers would have written these people off. So any revenues you get from them are "extra."

* Frequency
"It may seem counter-intuitive," says Michael Masterson, "but in the direct-mail world, the best names you can mail to are people who have recently bought products and/or services very similar to what you are selling. The closer you can get to mailing to those who have bought similar products/services, the greater your response rate will be."

This connects to another important way to break down your house list: by how frequently customers have bought from you. So once you’ve divided your list based on recency, you look at it in terms of your customers’ purchase behavior. First, you identify your multi-buyers – customers who’ve purchased more than one product from you. You then split this list further, segmenting out two-time, three-time, four-time (and more) buyers.

Those who have bought from you most often have proven their loyalty and obviously like the products and service they’ve been getting from you. So if, for example, you’re considering launching a new product with a high price point, these would be your best prospects.

* Monetary
Finally, you look at your list in terms of money.

One way to do this is to divide your list by the amount of money each customer has spent with you. You might, for example, assign a benchmark dollar amount, such as $5,000, $10,000, or more. Customers at that level make up your "premium buyers." This is the group that has the most favorable LTV for your company. These are your "VIPs."

Once you discover who your VIPs are, you can design products or offers specifically for them. Let’s say you have some kind of exclusive – and expensive – lifetime membership club. You would market this to multi-buyers who also fall into your "premium buyer" category.

If you offer payment options to your customers, another monetary way to divide your list is according to the payment options they have chosen: monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc. This will help you determine the initial purchase tolerance of each group of customers and which ones may respond best to future price points.

As you can see, by looking at your customers’ purchasing habits – recency, frequency, and monetary – you can identify the best customers for certain products. And by offering a product to customers who are likely to want it, you can improve your conversion rates.

By using the RFM model and other data-mining techniques, I’ve seen conversion rates double and triple. I’ve also seen inactive subscribers’ open rates surge from 0 percent to more than 30 percent. That’s quite an accomplishment, considering that the average open rate for the industry is about 20 percent.

I’ll go into more details on how to leverage the power of your own in-house list through segmentation in future issues of Early to Rise. In the meantime, if you’d like to learn more about data mining and how to get the most out of your current customer database, I highly recommend an excellent book titled Strategic Database Marketing by Arthur Hughes.

[Note: This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.]