How Targeted Marketing Can Save Your Business

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?"

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!

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

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?

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

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?

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!

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

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!

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 in record time - such as books by Michael Masterson and Bob Bly- there's a proven formula that works every time no matter what the actual "thing" is you're launching. In a nutshell, its coordination and synchronization of multi-channel marketing efforts all culminating around a specific time period (i.e. certain a day of the week).

These efforts include:
--Staggered emails. These will go to your list and other synergistic lists (affiliates, JV partners, friends, industry contacts) and aim to build anticipation and create a pent up demand. Qualified people that demonstrated an interest before the launch can be your "hot list". These names will then have potential to be your top buyers for related products.

--Social media. Putting posts on blogs, bulletin boards, forums. Recording a video of yourself and posting it on YouTube. Ultimately, creating messages that have the potential to go viral and create buzz around your launch.

--Pay per click. Bidding on your relevant keywords and having a mechanism and offer to collect names and build your hot list.

--Online PR. Getting your message out quickly and cost effectively. The release will get picked up by blogs, 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.

--Editorial and Article Syndication. Write articles for print and online media about the topic that ties into your launch. These should have some useful and newsworthy information that would be appealing to the readers and encourage click through to whatever your call to action is.

All of these efforts build up slowly, and create momentum and online traction to the day of your launch. You're basically creating market demand, traffic and buzz about your product or offer.

Is Co-Registration Worth Testing?

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!

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!

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!

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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

How To Segment Your List For Better Performance

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 performance. 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

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.