Weekly Roundup
Each week I spend quite a bit of time reading through other blogs trying to learn new things I can implement on my sites. I'm going to compile a list each week for my readers of what I think is the best of the bunch. Check out what I have found for the week leading up to 7/23/2011.
Blogging
- 69 Tips to Make Your Blog Rock [Jeff Bullas] - tips on optimizing, writing content and promoting your blog that will help your company be found and admired by your customers and prospects.
- 5 Sites to Find Guest Blogging Opportunities [Reviewz n Tips] - do you know where to find guest blogging opportunities? Here are five websites that’ll help you out.
Link Building/SEO
- 9 Ways to Write Better Pitches to Other Websites [Search Engine Watch] - tips on how to write emails to other website owners.
- 10 Reasons to Target the Long Tail [Link Assistant] - find out why targeting the long tail will help drive traffic and convsersions.
- 5 Tips for Optimizing Your eCommerce Site [Daily SEO Tip] - product reviews, testimonials, and unique descriptions will help each product become a landing page of it's own.
PPC
- Should You Buy PPC Ads for Keywords You Already Rank For [Search Engine Land] - how you can conduct tests to check the profitability of doing so.
- 5 Things You Can Do When Adwords Spend Become Too High [WordStream] - find other keywords, improve conversion rates/quality score and more.
Social Media
- 6 Custom Tabs to Increase Interaction with Your Facebook Page [Search Engine Land] - do more to get your fans interacting with your Facebook page.
- 10 Simple Tricks to Optimize for Google+ [SEOptimise] - easy list of things you can do to stand out from the crowd.
- How to Get Comments on Your Facebook Page [Momentus Media] - asking for comments and questions can help.
- Everything You Wanted to Know About Facebook Clickthrough Rates [Smart Insights] - who clicks, average cost, and more.
- How to Benefit from Facebook Groups [Gevril Group] - don't be spammy, but get in touch with your prospective audience.
- 14 Google+ Icons [Web Design Fan] - add one of these to your blog and get new followers in no time.
- 3 Reasons Why You Should Email People Who Abandon Your Shopping Cart Immediately [See Why] - it boils down to more recovery and better service.
- Be Careful When Using Subject Line Personalization [Biz Report] - I prefer to personalize the body of the message.
Conversion
- 38 Call to Action Buttons [Hong Kiat] - don't have a "blah" call to action button, use something from this page to spice things up.
- 10 Site Tweaks that Will Get Visitors to Buy [Shop.org] - it all boils down to making it as easy as possible.
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High Converting Squeeze Pages
The ability to create a quality squeeze page that will convert visitors into subscribers is more of an art than a science. There is no simple formula that is going to work in every niche to get 100% of your visitors to give up their email address. However, there a few things that you can do to create a good foundation that will give you a good conversion rate right from the start. After that it's up to you to test, test, and keep on testing until you find the headline, graphics, copy, and bribe that are perfect for your target market.
Headline
The most important part of your squeeze page is the headline. This is the first thing your visitor will see upon coming to the site so you have to grab their attention immediately. You only have a few seconds before the visitor decides to keep reading or leave your page. Your headline often makes the visitor's decision for them.
So what makes a good headline? The visitor most likely found your page looking for a solution to a specific problem or need. What you want to do with your headline is address THEIR need first, not what YOU are going to do about it. If you need a list of attention grabbing headlines Traffic Witch put together a nice list of 10 different ideas that have worked in the past.
Graphics
You don't want a squeeze page that is all text. Those can work in some situations but the use of graphics can increase the professionalism of your site and increase conversions. You can use graphics displaying your money back guarantee, 100% satisfaction guarantee, colorful arrows pointing your visitors to your opt-in form, icons for your bullet list, or call to action buttons that really stick out to the visitor. If you use pictures, try to visualize where the visitor wants to be, what their solution looks like.
Copy
In my testing the copy is not nearly as important as the headline, but visitors who are grabbed by your headline might need a little more of a nudge before they subscribe. Some people want to watch video and others want to read text. By having both on your page you aren't leaving anyone out and will get conversions from both types of visitors.
You can test the opening image or change up the content of the video. For the text you want to test different bullet points. People aren't going to read through everything you write. They are going to want to do a quick scan of your material and your bullet points have to pull them in.
Bribe
You need to give your visitors a reason to opt-in to your list. Your bribe should solve the problem or issue that caused your visitor to come to your site in the first place. The closer you can match your bribe to what your visitors are looking for the more success you will have.
Opt-in Form
This almost goes without saying, but you need your opt-in form to be above the fold and easy for the user to find. In fact, if you have a long text copy on your page then you need to have multiple opt-in forms so you can capture the lead as soon as they are ready to give up their email address. Test different buttons and text in your opt-in form. Test having a big arrow point towards it.
Speed
Don't use some junk hosting service for your squeeze page. You want to make sure it loads as fast as possible. If your site takes more than a few seconds to load you are already losing possible leads. Why lose out on potential subscribers just to save a few dollars a year on hosting?
If you follow these tips then I guarantee you that your first squeeze page will be above average and you can test your way to a very high conversion rate.
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8 Traits of Successful Online Marketers
Making money online requires a lot of hard work. You aren't going to create yourself a six or seven figure income by working a few hours each day and checking your email. If you are just getting started in the world of Internet marketing then it's going to take a lot of time and effort to start making a healthy income. I've created a list on what you need to focus on if you want to be more successful with your online efforts.
1. Early Bird Gets the Worm - Get out of bed early each day. There are less distractions (fewer emails, phone calls) in the early morning hours so you can be more efficient.
2. Work More - A benefit of starting earlier is that you can finish at the same time and get more done. If you are working efficiently, more hours worked should equal more money.
3. Reflect - When you are finishing working for the day take a look at what you accomplished. What did you learn and how can you do better? Then make a plan on what you are going to do tomorrow and schedule your day. It also helps to jot down any problems that you need to work on solving before you go to bed. "Sleeping on it" can really help you come up with a solution.
4. Make Notes - Ideas can come to you at any time so be prepared to write them down. I used to carry a small notepad to get my ideas on paper, now I use the word processor on my smart phone. It's important that when you come up with an idea you write it down immediately so you can take action when the time is right.
5. Outsource - Know how much your time is worth. Too many business owners get caught up in the details of their business instead of doing strategic planning and managing. You'll never see someone who owns a McDonald's running the cash register, but I see site owners who write every article for their sites. If you can have someone else do a task for less than your hourly rate, then it's time to outsource. The more you systemize the process, the less skilled workers that you are going to need to get your desired outcome.
6. Passive Income - Ideally you want to create products that you can make passive income with. Selling affiliate products is the best way to do this because you don't even have to worry about creating the product, dealing with customer service, handling chargebacks, or anything but referring visitors. If you have a product or service that you are selling, get as many affiliates as possible. You can leverage their traffic to make more sales of your own.
7. Separate Work from Home - If you have a home office this can be tough to do, but shut the door and tell the family you aren't to be disturbed while the door is closed. Focus 100% of your attention on work when you are working, and 100% of your attention on your family when you are spending time with them. If you walk around all hours thinking about work that is a sure recipe for getting burned out.
8. Set Goals - You need both short and long term goals that you would like to reach. What do you want to get done today, this week, this month, this year? Where do you see yourself and your business in five or ten years? The more clearly you can visualize your goals and set a plan for reaching them, the more likely you are to get what you want.
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Finding Related Sites
I have talked about the importance of finding related sites when it comes to buying online advertising, doing niche research, and for finding additional forums that might not be SEO friendly. So today I figured I would offer a comprehensive list to finding similar sites.
Related Modifier
If you search for "related:(domain)" Google will compile a list of sites similar to the one you have already found. This list is compiled by comparing links on pages that also link to the specified page. Some factors in the popularity of the pages containing the links, what position the links are in, sizes, and proximity to the link to the site you are searching for. You can also use this related modifier at Yahoo.
If you enter a domain into Google Trends you will see "Also visited" with ten other sites similar to the one you are looking at.
Amazon's Alexa Toolbar gathers information on it's users. While it's imperfections have been noted on trying to compare traffic of two different sites, it can be a pretty good tool to find related sites. Enter a domain name and then go to "Related Links" and see ten additional sites that visitors have gone to.
A bookmark syncing service that keeps combines your bookmarks from different computers and on different browers, storing them in the cloud. This is also a good way to compare similar sites, seeing what is being bookmarked with the site you are looking at.
Similar Sites uses a Firefox toolbar to monitor users browsing history to improve their results and understand trends.
Another site that gets their information through a Firefox Add-on. The only way to see the results are if you install the it and do a search.
The claim is they take "over 130,000,000 instances of people manually organizing and describing websites and combines this with sophisticated matching and clustering technology." There are also tags under the site so you can search by a tag similarity. It also features two bars for determining similarity and popularity.
There you have it. Seven different ways to find similar sites quickly and easily. Happy searching!
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How to Buy Online Advertising
If you are trying to increase the amount of traffic to your website then you have probably thought about purchasing online advertising. There are a lot of different options to choose from, but how do you know what is going to work best for you?
First off, you need to make sure that you know the terminology so you can figure out what exposure you would be getting for your money. Then it's just a matter of treating your advertising purchase like you would any other buying decision. This means you will only want to work with advertisers that give you stats and numbers that enable you to make an informed decision.
Cost
In order to know what the cost is going to be you have to know how you will be charged. Online there are three different ways to price ads:
- Cost per Click (CPC) - You get charged a certain amount every time someone clicks through the ad to your site. Google's Adwords is a prime example.
- Cost per Impression (CPM or CPI) - It doesn't matter if the ad is clicked or not. You pay a certain amount and your ad will be shown a certain number of times. Normally it's billed out as cost per 1,000 impressions.
- Flat Rate - your ad runs for a certain period of time.
Evaluate
Once you know how you will be billed for the online advertising, you need to know just how many visitors you should expect. That is why you need to look at:
- Traffic Numbers - get statistics on unique visitors and unique pageviews so you can get an idea of the traffic the site receives.
- Relevance - will that site's visitors be interested in what your ad is offering? What percentage will relate to your niche?
- Positioning - the best spots are above the fold and within the content. If you are in the middle of a 125 banner farm in the sidebar or in the footer or a site, don't expect to stand out.
- Size of the Ad - bigger ads allow you to display more information and it gives you a chance to stand out in the page.
Shop Around
You normally check prices from a few different places before making a buying decision right? You have to do the same here. Check similar sites to see where you would get the best deal. You won't be right all of the time on what site is going to be the best fit for your business, but shopping around will help make sure you don't get ripped off.
If you are just starting out with online advertising, then test the waters first. You will be able to get some data of your own on click through rates of different ads, conversion rates from those visitors, and average sale price. With these numbers you can figure out just how much money you will make from the visitors and you won't have to shop around for the cheapest option. Instead, you can go with all options that you think will be profitable.
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How Long Should You Register a Domain For?
If you are going to start an online business one of the first things that you have to do is register your domain name. One key question is how long should you register it for? You might also ask yourself this question for the domains that you already own and are looking to renew. In my experience you should do two things, register the domain for as long as you are comfortable with (I normally go 10 years) and set reminders to check the expiration dates for your domains. Why should you register for the long-term and not just renew every year?
Your Site Could Go Down
If you are going to renew every year, how many months in advance are you going to set your reminder? I had a friend who was ill recently and the doctors had to induce him into a coma for over a week. Needless to say he had other things on his mind for several weeks after that, but imagine if something similar happened to you and your domain was set to renew during that time period. Your whole business goes down and your email addresses are lost.
Worse yet, someone else could come in and take the domain away from you. Even smaller domains have value. Most of them have some sort of backlinks going towards them. Customers might even have them bookmarked. Even if you only get 50 visits per day, if I was your competitor I would gladly come in and take those visitors for the low price it costs to register a domain name.
SEO
I don't know this to be 100% true, but it makes sense. What site is Google or Bing going to value more, a site that has been registered for 10+ years and is registered for 10 more, or a site that was just created and expires in less than a year? Spammers and low-value sites register for short periods of time, established, reputable companies don't have a problem paying $100 to lock up their domain name for the next 10 years.
Those are just two reasons that I register my domains for as long as I possibly can and I recommend that you do the same. Set yourself a reminder with Google, Outlook, or whatever platform you use. Set an alarm every three months to check your domains and make sure they are covered for years to come.
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What is Internet Marketing?
When people ask what I do I normally reply with a simple "Internet marketing." That's not a good enough reply for some though, as they want to know exactly what Internet marketing is. The truth is, Internet marketing covers quite a bit of ground and several different niche areas from affiliate marketing to social networks. There are tons of different ways to market something online, but they can all be boiled down to one thing: aligning people online with a product they want in order to earn money.
Of course, there are a lot of different ways to sell people a product that they want. It doesn't even have to be your product, you can earn a percentage of the commissions by selling products made by other people. It is very easy today to find products and services to promote in exchange for a piece of the action. Why are so many companies so eager to pay you to do their selling for them? Why not!? These companies use the reach of thousands of affiliates to target people that may not have ever heard of their products otherwise. Instead of investing time and resources in hiring someone to sell their product, they can pay a percentage to someone else to promote it without having to worry about wages, insurance, paid time off, etc.
You can also create and sell your own products too, but this takes time. Even if you do think that you have a really great, unique idea and want to spend the hours to put together a product doing affiliate marketing early on can help you test the market for demand and to build a list to market your product to.
List building is key to Internet marketing. If you have a list of lots of emails that you can send target product offers to, then you are going to make a lot of money online. If you don't have a list with a site like Aweber, don't worry. Continue reading through this site and you'll find tons of information on how to get started and then make the most out of the emails that you accumulate.
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Market Research
If you want to build a sound online business then you need a solid base. This base is where you will do most of your work early on in order to ensure success down the road. What is the base I'm talking about related to Internet marketing? Market research. Unless you take time to research markets, you are setting yourself up to fail. It's the MOST important thing that you can do to make sure you are profitable. Market research training isn't difficult and I'll show you everything you need to know to get started with one simple article.
The market research that I do gives me an idea of what kind of products or services the market wants and will actually buy. It also ensures that there are quality products and services out there with affiliate programs I can join. When I am finished with my market research I know whether I am going to actually make money on that niche or not. Obviously if it's not worth my time I'll start over on something else.
So what all goes into the best way to do market research? It can easily be broken down into three categories: Niche, Product, and Keyword. You need all three or else you should move on to another market. I'll give a general overview of all of them below, and provide links to more detailed information later down the line.
Niche Research - Picking the area you are going to focus on. You need to find profitable niches that have plenty of customers that are willing to buy online.
Product Research - What can you sell? If you find products or services that have been selling at a high rate for a long period of time, you can rest assured that you will be able to sell it as well once you generate traffic.
Keyword Research - How many visitors can you generate based off of organic SEO?
The success of your campaign is determined by the three factors above. I've seen people fail because they pick out a niche that nobody is interested in, there isn't a large market for that product ONLINE, or there isn't enough traffic to be had through the search engines. Do the work early on, and you won't waste your time building a site and marketing a product that doesn't stand a chance to make any money. If you do the work early on, then you will at least know that you can make money in that niche and start generating some serious income.
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Niche Market Research
A niche market serves a highly targeted group of customers. Why do successful markets focus on tiny niches instead of creating super-sites? Because sites that focus on a tiny segment of a larger market can be developed and promoted quickly. You can rank a whole lot easier for a small set of keywords than trying to capture a large number of them. Plus, when you get down to the tinier markets there is less competition.
The key to niche marketing is to do your research. You have to find people that are looking for a product or service to solve a problem. Once you know what the audience's problem is, you have to find products that solve hat problem. The perfect niche is one that finds people who are desperate for a solution to their problem and are glad to pay to have it solved.
What do you need to know about a niche and if it's a good one for making money online? The four things that I look for are:
Identify the Audience and their Problem
You want to be able to put together a picture of the members of your niche. Are they male or female? How much do they make in a given year? What do they worry about? Do they have kids or significant other? What do they do for fun and for money? What are they having problems with? What solution are they looking for? Get as specific as possible, that way when you are marketing to this person you can identify with their situation as closely as possible.
How Important is it to Solve the Problem?
You want to find people who are desperate for a solution. If someone has a few dandelions in their yard they might not be in a huge rush to get rid of them. If that same person has spiders infesting their house and biting their children you can bet their is a high urgency to find a solution. The more important a solution is to the audience, the more likely they are to buy something from your site.
Can You Solve Their Problem?
I don't mean that you personally have to be able to solve their problem. Are there products or services out there that do? Can you become an affiliate of those products? Do they pay out a high enough percentage or flat fee to make it worth your time?
Do I Like this Niche?
Some of you might not think it's important to have an interest in a niche as long as it makes a lot of money. I disagree. How are you going to spend hours of your life on something that you have no desire in learning about? Are you going to be able to write articles on the topic if it bores you to death? Pick something you are interested in and it will show in your finished product.
How to Do the Research
So now that you know the questions that you need to ask before deciding if a niche is worth going into, you might be asking how exactly I go about figuring out the answers. There might be other niche research methods out there that I don't know about, but I use these myself and can attest to their usefulness.
Forums - Do a google search for "(your keyword) forums" and check the results. Go into the forums and see if you can find a recurring question from users. If you see the question pop up multiple times, you know it's popular. If you see a thread about a problem getting a lot of views then again, lots of people are interested in the topic.
Yahoo Answers - This is very similar to finding forums. If you go to Yahoo Answers you can find questions from people all over the world. You can dig through the site to find the categories you are researching, or use the search tool to find your keywords. See if you can find a common pattern of questions being asked. Those are the topics that you want to find solutions for.
Google Hot Trends - The great thing about Google is they will tell you what people are searching for most frequently right now. These hot topics are obviously very popular and if you can give searchers a quick solution, then you can generate a lot of traffic quickly. The problem is that a lot of the searches are general in nature and about news topics. Is Bill Cosby dead is an example. I'm not sure how you could make money off of letting people know he's still alive. However the Princeton Review's best party schools for 2010 could generate a lot of traffic if you are targeting 18-23 year olds.
Clickbank - A great method for doing niche research that will quickly allow you to see if there are also relevant products is to search Clickbank. There are thousands of merchants looking for people to help sell their products. You can scroll through the categories or enter a keyword into the search box. A couple of other decent sites built off of the clickbank marketplace are CB Engine and CB Analytics. Those sites both display stats for Clickbank products in a user-friendly fashion.
As you can see, properly researching niche markets isn't all that difficult. With just a little work, you can find profitable niche markets where you can make money.
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Product Research
It doesn't matter if you think you have a profitable niche and you are getting tons of visitors to your site. If you are not selling products or services that people actually want, you aren't going to make any money. Don't waste your time trying to market a dud, do your product research first.
The first step to product research is to decide what kinds of products you are going to sell. Are they going to be physical products or digital? These are two different areas to tackle and while it's best to diversify into both down the line, it's better to start with digital.
Digital Products
This is anything that can be delivered directly over the Internet. The most popular digital product is the ebook, but can also include programs, videos, audio and much more.
The main advantage to digital products are the high commission rates. The merchant does not have a lot of costs to cover and does not have to keep an inventory.
Physical Products
These products actually have to be delivered to your customers home. This can include televisions, video game systems, cell phones, or about anything else.
You want find as big of commission rates with physical products because the merchant has a limited inventory, and has higher costs built in to their products. They actually have to pay people to put the product together and ship it to the consumer.
When searching for digital products a great place to get started is Clickbank. It's easy to signup and there are over 10,000 products that you can choose from. Clickbank makes it easy for you to find products that are selling. There is this thing called "gravity." Gravity refers to the number of affiliates who have earned a commission by promoting a particular vendor's products. The higher the gravity score, the more affiliates that have earned money promoting their products. The problem with high gravity is increased competition, but you at least know people are having success pushing that product.