ADLANDS'
DIGEST
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on
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Bogdan
Fiedur, Publisher
mailto:
Bogdan@softfornet.com
Vol.
1, #182, July 03, 2000
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Topics in this issue:
Sponsor Message
Word from Publisher
Success Story
Featured Article(1)
Featured Article(2)
=====================
C o n t i n u i n g D i s c u s s i o n s (1)
=============================================
Featured Article(1)
1.Quest For Help
~ Bob Cortez
N e w P o s t s (4)
==========================
1.)Don Wetmore
~ Interrupt
2.)Bartek Rys
~ Staffing for your business
3.)Harvey Segal
~ Free Resource: Your Own Search Engine
4.) Henryk Bartnicki
~ Converting a free trade board into your very own web site!
A l e r t S e c t i o n (0)
=======================
Site Review Responses (1)
==========================
1.) http://www.gototmr.com/AcneAnnie.html
~ Kelvin Brown
Site Review Requests (1)
===========================
1.)http://www.createabookbysue.com
G u e s t A r t i c l e (1)
================================
What are you telling your visitors?
By Paul Easton
Joke of the Day
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
================== Word from publisher ====================
Greetings All
Welcome 143 new subscribers who joined list since last mailing.
----===(*)===-----
Again I'm running out of success stories and if you don't send
me any, I will have to publish my own. :)
See below for guidelines.
----===(*)===-----
If you think, you have an interesting success story to tell, please send
it to digest as usual and indicate as such.
At the end of year I will create web page and will invite everybody
to vote for the "Success Story Of The Year"
Best voted story will receive one FREE year of advertising
in the form of small button at the bottom of each AdlandPro page.
AdlandPro receives 450,000 page viewings , 75,000 unique
visitors each month.
To be eligible for the prize, this story has to be from your own
experience.
See existing success stories here
http://www.adlandpro.com/archives/success4.htm
BF.
==========Success Story=============
From: "Chris Gozdzik" <diviningmind@diviningmind.com>
Hi Bogdan and the List,
Well, after that last prompt I decided to write my little success
story. It all started during my visit to Poland in 1997 when my old
passion and interest in dowsing and alternative healing reached the
peak. I contacted some manufacturers of dowsing equipment and went on
to create a business plan. I knew nothing about the business on the
Internet, so I asked a friend of mine to design a web page for me. It
took a long time to get my front page - he was very busy. I decided
to learn it myself - it took me several weeks to create my first
"masterpiece", but it was all mine! Then the advertising part came
in. I went through the usual for a novice - FFA links, free ads,
rented a "safe" e-mail list and almost got kicked out of my server.
You should've heard my heart pounding when I got my first order! This
is the greatest feeling for a new business operator. I signed up with
several discussion groups on similar topics and gained a bit of
respect - this helped a lot when I learnt to use signature files! I
subscribed to several ezines on the subject of online marketing,
including this one, and started employing some new strategies. Little
by little my position on the search engines went up and the customer
list grew bigger. Then there was my listing on Yahoo, that brought
new traffic, I started accepting credit cards and started my own
newsletter and mailing list, the recent addition was my own affiliate
program. My site doesn't get a lot of traffic, but the conversion
ratio is very good. I get a lot of repeated business - customer
service is the number one priority. This leads to satisfied and loyal
customers and the best kind of advertising - word of mouth. I get
about 60% of traffic from search engines and the rest from reciprocal
links on other sites and affiliates. Advertising is still my biggest
concern - it's a bit more difficult to get through to your target
market in such a very narrow subject. My plans - just started working
on my second domain/website; I'd like to develop a portal
website/link directory related to dowsing, alternative healing, etc.
with lots of free resources for visitors. I'm still looking for a
script that would run it. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
In conclusion - I base my business on honesty and trust and
responsive customer service. Whenever possible - I try to apply the
principle: promise less, deliver more.
Take care!
Chris Gozdzik
"Dowsing Tools with a difference"
http://diviningmind.com
==========F e a t u r e d P o s t(1)=============
From: "Bob Cortez" <bobcortez@tqm-online.com>
Subject: Quest For Help
In issue #181 "Mark" <mark@calibrecomputing.net>
wrote:
>Growing Net Sales on a SMALL Budget. Can it be done?
In response to a similar question on the LinkExchange Digest I
posted the following which I hope Adland readers may profit from
as well:
While there are many snake oil salesmen that will "guarantee" you
they have *The* formula to online success... it just ain't so.
This is not an off the rack environment. It is custom, made to
fit, and no two projects are exactly alike. That's why people
pay me big bucks to help them develop a unique answer to this
very question <VBG>. But because I enjoy a challenge, and in the
spirit of contributing to this great community, I will give you a
general outline of how I approach Internet projects:
1) Begin with your intended audience. For existing 'brick and
mortar' businesses it is tempting to assume that your audience
online will be the same as off line. Your online audience will
have a different demographic, different behavior, different goals
and expectations. They will respond to and react differently.
You really need to 'get inside their heads'. You need to know
what they like and do online, what are the other sites they visit
and why. What motivates them to buy in general, and specifically
what motivates them to buy your product from you. (Beyond price
and quality)
2) Say hello to your prospect. Before you go any further, write
the first two paragraphs of your web page. Based on the
information you have from the first step answer the question from
your prospect: "What's In It For Me"? (WIIFM) Nothing else you
do will make any difference what so ever if you don't answer that
question correctly, succinctly, and immediately. Write like you
talk. Write like you know them. Answer the question and invite
them to keep clicking and reading.
3) Identify the players. With any product or service, there are
complimentary and competing offers. There are players that have
access (or want access) to the same audience you are looking for.
Look for opportunities to cooperate. Get involved in their
communities. Subscribe to their newsletters. Understand and
participate in ever widening circles of influence surrounding
your target core audience, your product, and your industry. Be
sure to look at all of the available resources, web sites,
newsletters, directories, chat rooms, etc... Always keeping your
focus on your target.
4) Get out of the way. Make it easy for your customer,
prospects, and partners to talk to you and to each other. The
strength of the internet is communication, be a facilitator and
let your network work for you. Create an email discussion list,
host online chats and discussion boards. Create a directory of
useful, related sites. Liberally announce and support the
success of others. Ask what you can do/offer/be to help them
do/offer/be what they desire.
5) Make it easy to buy. The easier you make it to buy, the less
you have to sell. If you can deliver your product electronically
via email or download that is best. Accept every payment you
can. Have an absolute no questions asked money back guarantee.
Remove as much doubt and skepticism as you possibly can. Make
your offer safe and risk free.
6) Get beyond testimonials. Testimonials are great, but
references are better. Ask people to allow you to use their name
and contact information as a reference. Invite prospects to post
to your discussion board or email discussion list with their
questions and concerns.
7) Give them more than they expect. If you can give a free
sample, or provide a 'try before you buy' type of offer, then do
it. Offer plenty of free information and post articles from
others. Become *the* source of information for your audience as
it concerns your general business area and niche audience.
8) Don't waste your time and money. I know I'll take a lot of
heat for this one, but I'm going to say it anyway: Don't blow
your budget on Search engine optimization and banner advertising.
Yes, you need to submit to the top six search engines/directories
and directories specific to your industry. Yes, you need to make
sure they are keyword relevant and properly formatted.
Participating in free banner exchanges like Link Exchange is
helpful (no more than one per page). But if you have the money to
spend, you will receive a better return on the investment from
advertising in or sponsoring email publications such as this
(targeted to your audience) than you will with search engine
optimization or purchased banners.
9) Get off line. Most people get online for specific reasons.
They may not even be thinking of your product or service when
they are online, so they won't search for you or click on that
banner :-) You need to reach them when they are thinking about
you. Go back to step one and think of where you can find that
person off line. Where do they go, what do they read, what do
they do. Send press releases, post flyers, submit articles,
speak to groups, get in front of your audience everywhere and
anytime you can. (I wrote an article "Time To Get Offline" that
can be adapted to many businesses, available by auto responder at
mailto:offline@tqm-online.com )
10) Get others to carry the load. Start an affiliate program.
Make it easy for people to recommend your product, service, site,
and newsletter. Reward referrals and support others. Make
others feel a part of your success and encourage active
participation in that success.
In closing I would like to say that the biggest mistake that I
see internet businesses make is being one dimensional. Content
sites without e-commerce. E-commerce sites without content.
Brochure ware sites without content or e-commerce. The Internet
is a wonderful multi faceted, multi dimensional medium. To be
truly effective, every site needs to incorporate as many of the
dimensions and facets as possible to present a well rounded and
complete experience to their users.
I hope you find this helpful and informative, even if it isn't a
point by point blueprint to success.
Bob Cortez, President
--------------------------------
Total Quality Marketing, Inc.
http://marketing.tqm-online.com
----------------------------------
*************************************************
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==========F e a t u r e d P o s t(2)=============
From: Robert L. Dowdell<info@scentsuality.com>
Subject:Web Site Intrusion
I would imagine that the following story will be of interest to other
web masters!
I am Robert Dowdell and the president of Suntrio, Inc., the holding
company for www.scentsuality.com. The site is
now 7 months old and now
beginning gain a good following. We have a monthly newsletter which is
receiving a good response and now beginning to repay the many hours of
marketing effort. In addition to running the site I am a consultant
cosmetic chemist and also provide a service through the web site for
customer questions on skin care and general cosmetic inquiries "Ask Bob"
which is now proving to be a popular area on the site.
**********Submission follows***************
This story of a recent experience with our site
http://www.scentsuality.com may surprise a few
webmasters!
After a most enjoyable evening out a couple of weeks ago, we returned
home and as usual looked at our statistics to see who had been
visiting the site. After reviewing the referring URL's a couple of them
looked unusual, so I clicked on one to go to the source. Imagine my
astonishment when up comes my site BUT with another name in place of
scentsuality.com at the top of each page. I displayed the page source
and there was our name still listed in the comments of the page. They
had even replaced our copyright notice with their own name.
I printed out the pages and the source and then checked the Internic
registration for the URL and tracked down the webhosting company for the
renegade site. They did not have the shopping cart area of their site
working at the time of the intrusion.
We reported the matter to the authorities immediately and have been very
impressed with the help and advice from the FBI. After a couple of
meetings with them we were re-assured that the "Web Site Intrusion"
would be fully investigated. The fact that we were able to print out all
of the cloned pages and supply them with the precise location in South
Florida and IP address of the Intruder will I am sure help...
It just goes to show that you have to be pretty vigilant. The experience
has given us even greater confidence in our hosting organisation
CNIWEB.net and our merchant service provider ECHO, Inc, who have given
us tremendous support 24/7. After a previous hosting shambles in Utah,
it is refreshing to be working with such professionals.
The investigation is ongoing and I will update the discussion group as
to any further developments of interest.
I would be very interested in learning of any reader's similar
experiences and any suggestions to help prevent a repeat of it!
Regards,
Robert L. Dowdell
--------------------------------------------
http://www.scentsuality.com
Romantic Gifts, Elegant Lingerie, Gourmet Gifts and Aromatherapy Skin
Care.
-------------------------------------------
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======================N e w P o s t i n g (1)========================
From: "Don Wetmore" <ctsem@email.msn.com>
Subject: Interrupt
A major cause of lost productivity each day is unwanted
interruptions. In my short article entitled, "Interrupt
Interruptions", I discuss how to take control of and reduce
wasteful interruptions. It's free for members of the List.
To get yours, email your request for "interrupts" to:
ctsem@msn.com
Dr. Donald E. Wetmore-Professional Speaker
-----------------------------------------
Free Time Management Tips Newsletter:
Visit our Supersite: http://www.balancetime.com
-----------------------------------------
======================N e w P o s t i n g (2)========================
From: Bartek Rys <rysb@eol.ca>
Subject: Staffing for your business
Hello AdLanders
I found a great site on the net I think you might want to visit if you are
looking for personnel in the areas of Sales, Marketing, Telemarketing and
Customer Service. Also if you're looking for companies that might have a
product or service your business needs they will find it for you. If
you're looking for a marketing company they might be what you need.
The url is http://www.thinkbdm.com.
ThinkBDM.com is a resource for Job, Staffing, Product, Service, Business
Development solutions and more, dedicated almost exclusively to the areas
of Sales, Marketing, Telemarketing and Customer Service.
The site is currently under construction but the most important sections,
have been completed.
Also, I'm looking for a good counter which can provide me with the
following:
- No user count on a page (I don't want my visitors to see the number of
hits)
- Multiple-page capabilities (I want to know the stats for all my main
pages)
- Graphic display of page hits (I would like to see graphs when I go to
their site to see my stats)
- Unique IPs (Will not count hits from the same IP within a period of 1-5
hours)
Thanks in advance to those who can help me with my counter search and check
out http://www.thinkbdm.com they will help your
business grow.
Bartek Rys
======================N e w P o s t i n g (3)========================
From:Harvey Segal mailto:hsegal@supertips.com
Subject: Free Resource: Your Own Search Engine
I've just installed at my website my own
personal search engine, a kind of mini AltaVista,
that allows visitors to search through all
of my site and tells me what they are looking for.
I can use this information to dramatically improve
my marketing efforts as explained in the article at
<http://www.roibot.com/w.cgi?R237_adl>
You may think such a tool would cost you thousands
of dollars and require man weeks of programming.
Here's a surprise.
Atomz is a free service and can be installed easily in
a few minutes !
Regards,
Harvey Segal
------------------------
<www.supertips.com>
------------------------
======================N e w P o s t i n g (4)========================
From: Henryk Bartnicki<hbart@zg.onet.pl>
Subject: Converting a free trade board into your very own web site!
Hello Bogdan,
Hello Adlanders,
Greetings from Poland!
As I always look forward to hearing from you and I enjoy Adland Digest so
much for all those discussions and help, I would like to share with you
something I created, or recreated today. O.k. I am quite sure that I am not
the first to notice the value of trade boards for promoting our online
endeavours, whatever they are. But I noticed that some free trade boards
look more or less as the web pages themselves, with many banners, gifs,
animations, texts and links.
As I have been creating, so far, my web pages myself, and the results are
not always -;) satisfactory, I am always on the look for a simple yet
professional tools letting me quickly create really professional sites of my
own.
I am sure that InsidetheWeb free trade boards give you, not only a perfect
tool for promoting your online activity, but also let you convert their
trade boards into your own, personalized web page. Are you an internet guru?
Have a look at it and please let me know your opinion. Are you a newbie? I
really recommend it. Have a look as it costs you nothing. If you like it,
you can have your own trade board in a few minutes and you can modify it in
the way you like.
Could it be of any help? I hope so!
Best regards and prosperity to your bizopps.
Henryk Bartnicki,
---------------------------------------------------------
BH NETwork, 67-106 Modrzyca, Poland
http://www.insidetheweb.com/mbs.cgi/mb707532
--------------------------------------
========= Site Review Request (1)===========
From: Sue mailto:Smporter@aol.com
Hello Bogdan and fellow Adlanders:
I am writing to ask that my URL be included in your Site Review. I have
been
running my children's personalized book business for a few years now but
just
brought it online this March. I would like to add pages that contain things
of interest to my visitors, like monthly or weekly specials, a parent's
page,
and so much more but of course these things take time and I've got to find
some of that! Anyway, I would greatly value your opinions.
The URL is <A HREF="www.createabookbysue.com">www.createabookbysue.com </A>
BTW...thanks for your wonderful newsletter. Some people want their MTV, I
want my Adland Digest!
Kindest regards from a stay-at-home DOT COM MOM,
Sue
========= Site Review Response (1)===========
From: kelvin brown <cashinsite@yahoo.com>
In issue 181 Dan Adams wrote.
>I would
>greatly appreciate it if you and the readers would take a look and
>give me your honest opinion.
>t's at my new domain http://www.gototmr.com/AcneAnnie.html
Hello Dan,
This is a response to your post about http://www.gototmr.com/AcneAnnie.html
The items that I would change for better search engine
response would be to add more info to the Title tag.
Should be able to get a full keyworded sentence.
Next I would change the description so that it started
with Acne Annie (keyword) instead of short story. This
improves your keyword relevance with search engines,
by placing your most important words first. It begins
with the letter "A", some SEs might return alpha sorted
results. This is highly true of people that might just
want to create a link to your page. A before S.
Last for now, you should add the "alt" tag, as
discussed in Adland Digest #181, to each of your
images.
Kelvin Brown
-------------------------------------
Directory of Webmaster Resources
www.domainsubmit.com?adland181
-------------------------------------
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===================G u e s t A r t i c l e (1)=====================
What are you telling your visitors?
By Paul Easton
Recently I was out surfing the search engines,
looking for high-ranking sites, on different
keywords while doing some work for
another company.
While having a look around I also contacted a
couple of sites looking for some information
about their products. Was I looking to buy? Not
right now but I was interested and I did
bookmark some web sites to review later.
At the same time I made some judgements about
the sites I was looking at, like:
Would I feel safe buying from this site?
Does it look professional?
Notice I am not saying does it have lovely
graphics or suitable content, although this
would make a visual impression. By the way you
can produce professional graphics for free, in
minutes at http://zyris.com
I am looking for easy on the eyes, easy to
follow information. One of the sites was a
programming site for scripts to automate tasks
on-line.
Some of the ideas were very good but the
information was in a newspaper like column
style. Ever tried to scroll up and down pages
on-line and try to read them? it doesn't work.
Am I saying you need to have a site
professionally designed and spend a lot of
money? No, any home user can produce a
professional web site that sells.
What I am saying is copy the people who do it
right! Like eboz
http://eboz.com
Lots of free help, easy to read, simple to
navigate, low on graphics.
Here I will visit again.
Also to top it off I contacted the owner by
email about a possible product. He did
everything right, he answered all my questions,
I got
an answer with in 48 hours and he addressed me
by first name, making me feel Important. This
is a person I would pay money to!
And on the subject of paying money, most people
are looking for the free answer to a successful
web site. I believe in the concept of "You
get what you pay for"
However, sometimes you get more than you pay
for. An example of this is Internet marketing
Challenge or IMC
http://www.marketingchallenge.com
This is a subscriber site for marketing your
web site. Of the subscriber sites that I have
joined, this one has provided more real
effective help
that is not available elsewhere.
Plus the forums they have for answering every
question and web site reviews, are worth more
than any other service available!
Do I gain anything by recommending this site?
Yes the satisfaction that you will get the
right information, the first time! If you
haven't
paid for help, do it right the first time, IMC
is the one to join!
Does you site look like these? It should, all
your visitors know about you is what's on the
computer screen, First impressions count!
Hope this has helped you out today
All the best,
Paul Easton
mailto:paule@100PromotionTips.com
----------------------------------
Power Promotion Plus-Free Newsletter,
Learn the secrets of Web Site Promotion
and get Free Award Software to do it!
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for more information
----------------------------------
======================Joke of the Day=====================
Taken from Joke a Day
Two mathematicians, Joe and Richard , were having dinner in
a restaurant. They were arguing about the average
mathematical knowledge of the American public. Richard
claimed that this average was woefully inadequate while Joe
maintained that it was surpassingly high.
"I'll tell you what, "said Richard, "when I get back from the
bathroom we'll ask our waitress a simple calculus question. If
she gets it right, I'll pick up dinner. If not, you do, okay?"
they agreed, but once he'd left Joe called the waitress over.
"When my friend comes back, " he told her, " he's going to
ask you a question; you should respond "one third x cubed'
no matter what the question is; got that? There's twenty
bucks in it for you." She happily agreed to the gag.
Richard returned from the men's room and called the
waitress over. "The food was wonderful," he stated,
"incidentally, do you know what the integral of x squared is?"
The waitress looked startled, then pensive, almost pained.
She looked around the room, at her feet , made gurgling
noises, (Joe was starting to sweat) and finally said, "Umm,
one third x cubed?"
Joe beamed in relief as an astonished Richard paid the
check and a clearly irritated waitress muttered under her
breath, "... plus a constant."
========================================================
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