Traffic Building Look out for the potholes
You finally have your website published and you are as proud as any parent would be of a new addition to the family. Well, nearly as excited. You cannot wait for visitors to flock to your site and to gulp up everything you have to offer them. You expect to hear the cash register ringing all the time. You expect to sit back and watch the money roll in. After a while you cannot help but acknowledge that nothing is happening and that you are probably the only visitor to your website. Sounds familiar?
The above scenario is all too common on the internet and most successful webmasters started their first website anticipating huge results that never happened. They only started to become successful once they realized that the internet is not a get-rich-quick scheme but that building a successful website takes time, dedication and hard work, like any other business.
As soon as you realize your website is not getting traffic you reach a crossroad – You can take the straight and narrow road that requires more work, but that will take you to your destination, or, the broad road that seems easier to travel on but is actually only a mirage.
Many internet marketers make the mistake of taking the broad road, the easy road. It looks easy at first glance but turns out to be a road leading to nowhere. A typical case of good from far but far from good. Taking this road often involves doing business with dubious sites promising you huge amounts of traffic in exchange for cash. Money that you can often not afford to spend but feel obliged to spend thinking it is the only thing you can do to get people to visit your site. It is the same as a musician giving free tickets away to his concert in the hope that people will buy his album once they have heard him. Actually it is worse. It is more like a musician paying someone to get people to visit his concert. He does not really know where these people come from and are not sure at all whether he will sell any albums to them. If he does sell some albums then he normally does not even make enough money to reimburse himself for his initial investment in getting people to his concern.
This may sound a bit dramatic but is happens every day when internet marketers start getting desperate for traffic. There certainly are sites out there that will deliver the traffic at the right price. Problem is that it is not the type of traffic you need. You may end up getting many “hits” but don’t be surprised if you get no sales as the people clicking on your site are often poor people in third world countries that get paid cents to click on sites but will never buy anything on the sites they visit. Sad but true. By the way, never subscribe to sites that offer to click on your Google™ Adsense™ adverts in your website. Such clicks are fraudulent. Google™ will find out about it and you may be banned from ever using their tools again.
There are many schemes out there designed to trap desperate webmasters. As a rule, do not spend any money to obtain traffic when you just start out. There is an enormous amount of valuable and free information on the internet that will help you to grow your business. Read up as much as possible on the internet and if you feel a need to invest money at a later stage in legitimate programs like Google™ Adwords™ you will be able to make an informed decision.
Remember that if something sounds too good to be true that it normally is too good to be true. Stay on the straight and narrow road to become a money maker and build a successful home based business.
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/6/1/Traffic-Building--Look-out-for-the-potholes/Traffic-Building--Look-out-for-the-potholes.html
Monday, May 7, 2007
Make Money Online - Helpful advice on how to start
Make Money Online - Helpful advice on how to start
You are probably reading this article for only a couple of reasons:
1. You do not currently make enough money and need to make more money on a part-time basis without compromising your full-time job. You do not have a lot of time available to make more money.
2. You are not happy in your job or do not like working for a boss. You are looking for an alternative way of earning money, preferably full-time but with something that you can start on a part-time basis. 3. You are already trying to make more money and have tried many different business opportunities but with no or very little success. You realize you need help.
If you can associate with one or more of the above-mentioned reasons for reading this article then please continue reading.
There are millions of people all over the world that do not like what they are doing for a living. Maybe it is the job itself, a rude boss, or not earning enough money to have a decent standard of living. Whatever the reason(s), most people find it very difficult to make a new start.
We are all creatures of habit that dislike change and value safety and security. Starting a business often takes us outside our comfort-zone. We need to build our confidence, not only in ourselves but also in any new opportunity that we are considering.
This can be achieved by:
- Learning as much as possible about any new opportunity.
- Having the possibility of doing it on a part-time basis as a trial to see whether it is any good.
- Spending as little money as possible on any new business opportunity. You don't want to add more stress to your life by spending lots of money (that you can't afford to spend) on things that may not work at all.
Many people consider the Internet as the ideal way of making more money. I agree with them. Problem is that most people actually lose more money on the Internet than make money. There are millions and millions of ecommerce websites on the Internet and it is estimated that at least 95% of these websites are losing money every month!
Why do I like to do business on the Internet?
a. It allows me to have an international business, potentially reaching many millions of people all over the world.
b. Like most people I do not enjoy face-to-face selling. With the Internet there is no need for face-to-face selling. No fear of being rejected by customers or insulted by people having a bad-hair-day.
c. I can make money 24 hours a day. Even while sleeping someone can be buying a product or service on my website.
d. I can run my business from anywhere in the world, as long as I have a computer and access to the Internet.
e. Once my business is setup it basically runs on autopilot. That does not mean I do not need to work on it. It means I do not have to spend eight hours every day working on it. One or two hours should be sufficient.
f. It allows me to have my own business with unlimited earning potential. Whatever I put in I can get out. The sky is the limit and I am not working to make my boss or company rich.
Fact of the matter is that it is becoming more and more difficult to ignore the massive ecommerce potential of the Internet. Whether you are selling products or services online or have any other type of business, you need the Internet to promote your business as more and more consumers are doing online searches to find what they are looking for. Does not matter if you are a plumber or an electrician, you will need the Internet more and more in the future to promote your business.
O.K. We have established that the Internet offers us a huge potential to make more money, part-time or full-time. We have also established that most people are not actually making any money from the Internet.
Where do we start?
We start by learning as much as possible at our own pace without forcing anything. Remember that knowledge is power!
I recommend that before you do anything on the Internet that you join a suitable company as an affiliate or join a network marketing company. The point is not whether you want to pursue a
long-term career as an affiliate. The important point is that you can join most affiliate programs for free and receive very valuable information and training for free. In addition, you can actually make a lot of money while learning! This, in my opinion, is the best, safest and easiest way to start.
Many companies that offer affiliate programs do their best to offer their affiliates as much training and support as possible. Why? It is in their best interest. The better advice, training and support they give you the more money you will make for them.
Remember that as an affiliate you do not need to buy or sell anything. You only need to get people to promote the company you are an affiliate of. All sales resulting in your referral will earn you a very nice commission, normally anything between 20% and 50% of the sales price. That is not bad at all! Many companies will even give you a free affiliate website that you can promote.
What is the catch?
The catch is that it is not always easy to promote a certain product or service. People do not automatically visit your affiliate website. This is where the training comes in. If you can succeed as an affiliate for a company you can succeed with your own Internet business in the future. There will be no need to pay expensive school fees. As with many other things in life, it takes time to become a money maker and build a successful home based business but it is certainly worth it.
To your success !
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/5/1/Make-Money-Online---Helpful-advice-on-how-to-start/Make-Money-Online---Helpful-advice-on-how-to-start.html
You are probably reading this article for only a couple of reasons:
1. You do not currently make enough money and need to make more money on a part-time basis without compromising your full-time job. You do not have a lot of time available to make more money.
2. You are not happy in your job or do not like working for a boss. You are looking for an alternative way of earning money, preferably full-time but with something that you can start on a part-time basis. 3. You are already trying to make more money and have tried many different business opportunities but with no or very little success. You realize you need help.
If you can associate with one or more of the above-mentioned reasons for reading this article then please continue reading.
There are millions of people all over the world that do not like what they are doing for a living. Maybe it is the job itself, a rude boss, or not earning enough money to have a decent standard of living. Whatever the reason(s), most people find it very difficult to make a new start.
We are all creatures of habit that dislike change and value safety and security. Starting a business often takes us outside our comfort-zone. We need to build our confidence, not only in ourselves but also in any new opportunity that we are considering.
This can be achieved by:
- Learning as much as possible about any new opportunity.
- Having the possibility of doing it on a part-time basis as a trial to see whether it is any good.
- Spending as little money as possible on any new business opportunity. You don't want to add more stress to your life by spending lots of money (that you can't afford to spend) on things that may not work at all.
Many people consider the Internet as the ideal way of making more money. I agree with them. Problem is that most people actually lose more money on the Internet than make money. There are millions and millions of ecommerce websites on the Internet and it is estimated that at least 95% of these websites are losing money every month!
Why do I like to do business on the Internet?
a. It allows me to have an international business, potentially reaching many millions of people all over the world.
b. Like most people I do not enjoy face-to-face selling. With the Internet there is no need for face-to-face selling. No fear of being rejected by customers or insulted by people having a bad-hair-day.
c. I can make money 24 hours a day. Even while sleeping someone can be buying a product or service on my website.
d. I can run my business from anywhere in the world, as long as I have a computer and access to the Internet.
e. Once my business is setup it basically runs on autopilot. That does not mean I do not need to work on it. It means I do not have to spend eight hours every day working on it. One or two hours should be sufficient.
f. It allows me to have my own business with unlimited earning potential. Whatever I put in I can get out. The sky is the limit and I am not working to make my boss or company rich.
Fact of the matter is that it is becoming more and more difficult to ignore the massive ecommerce potential of the Internet. Whether you are selling products or services online or have any other type of business, you need the Internet to promote your business as more and more consumers are doing online searches to find what they are looking for. Does not matter if you are a plumber or an electrician, you will need the Internet more and more in the future to promote your business.
O.K. We have established that the Internet offers us a huge potential to make more money, part-time or full-time. We have also established that most people are not actually making any money from the Internet.
Where do we start?
We start by learning as much as possible at our own pace without forcing anything. Remember that knowledge is power!
I recommend that before you do anything on the Internet that you join a suitable company as an affiliate or join a network marketing company. The point is not whether you want to pursue a
long-term career as an affiliate. The important point is that you can join most affiliate programs for free and receive very valuable information and training for free. In addition, you can actually make a lot of money while learning! This, in my opinion, is the best, safest and easiest way to start.
Many companies that offer affiliate programs do their best to offer their affiliates as much training and support as possible. Why? It is in their best interest. The better advice, training and support they give you the more money you will make for them.
Remember that as an affiliate you do not need to buy or sell anything. You only need to get people to promote the company you are an affiliate of. All sales resulting in your referral will earn you a very nice commission, normally anything between 20% and 50% of the sales price. That is not bad at all! Many companies will even give you a free affiliate website that you can promote.
What is the catch?
The catch is that it is not always easy to promote a certain product or service. People do not automatically visit your affiliate website. This is where the training comes in. If you can succeed as an affiliate for a company you can succeed with your own Internet business in the future. There will be no need to pay expensive school fees. As with many other things in life, it takes time to become a money maker and build a successful home based business but it is certainly worth it.
To your success !
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/5/1/Make-Money-Online---Helpful-advice-on-how-to-start/Make-Money-Online---Helpful-advice-on-how-to-start.html
Affiliate Programs The advantages of being an affiliate
Affiliate Programs The advantages of being an affiliate
I am a strong believer in the value of affiliate programs and believe that the best way to start an internet business is to become an affiliate of another program or to join a network marketing company. Why? To learn as much as possible from your sponsor(s) and make use of all the free advice and tips you will receive from them.
When you are eventually ready to start your own business you will already have a lot of experience and knowledge (that you obtained for free!) that will give you a huge advantage and save you a lot of money and time.
By the way, there are many very successful internet marketers that earn all of their money through affiliate programs and network marketing programs.
If you find a great affiliate program where you can make a lot of money and you decide to stay with the company instead of starting your own new business then good for you! If on the other hand you want to start a new business of your own then you would have at least learned a lot from the affiliate program, and hopefully made some money as well in the process.
The biggest mistake people make is to jump all the time from the one affiliate program to the other without taking the time to learn and understand the program and system. There are many programs on the internet. If you are going to leave what you are busy with every time you think you have discovered a better program then you will never learn anything.
Take your time to learn and be patient. I can assure you that you will not become an overnight millionaire following any affiliate program. Like any other business it takes time to build a successful affiliate business, even with the support and training you may receive.
I tend to look at things very logically. If something does not make sense to me I rather avoid it.
Consider the following:
You develop a great product that you want to sell for 10 on your website. It might have costed you thousands of dollars to develop and many many months of hard work with no income while you were developing your product. You are finally ready to launch your product. Since you are only one person with one website you realize the need to establish an affiliate program where you can have hundreds of affiliates promote your company and get thousands of people to buy from you. In order to get affiliates interested you must pay them between 20% and 50% of your sales price or gross profit.
I don't know about you but the above scenario looks like a lot of very hard work without any guarantee of success. The thought of it certainly does not get me excited.
Now consider the following - You join the above company as an affiliate and earn say 50% commission on all sales. You do not need to buy the product and have no investment in the company. You can start to sell the product from the 1st day you become an affiliate and make a lot of money. In fact, the company will make 50% and you will make 50%. You have no risk and can walk away from the program anytime you wish. What a pleasure! This is what I like the most from affiliate programs.
Remember that not all affiliate programs are good. Many of them only offer products that you would not want to give away for free to your mother-in-law. Furthermore, the support program and training offered is not always top quality.
I do not know about you but I cannot promote any product or service that I do not understand or do not believe in. You should always be able to sell the product to yourself. If you would not buy the product because you do not believe in it then please do not promote it to other people as the best product out there. You will sleep a lot better at night!
Remember, if you want to become a money maker with your own home based business, ultimately it is up to you to make a success of the program.
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/2/1/Affiliate-Programs--The-advantages-of-being-an-affiliate/Affiliate-Programs--The-advantages-of-being-an-affiliate.html
I am a strong believer in the value of affiliate programs and believe that the best way to start an internet business is to become an affiliate of another program or to join a network marketing company. Why? To learn as much as possible from your sponsor(s) and make use of all the free advice and tips you will receive from them.
When you are eventually ready to start your own business you will already have a lot of experience and knowledge (that you obtained for free!) that will give you a huge advantage and save you a lot of money and time.
By the way, there are many very successful internet marketers that earn all of their money through affiliate programs and network marketing programs.
If you find a great affiliate program where you can make a lot of money and you decide to stay with the company instead of starting your own new business then good for you! If on the other hand you want to start a new business of your own then you would have at least learned a lot from the affiliate program, and hopefully made some money as well in the process.
The biggest mistake people make is to jump all the time from the one affiliate program to the other without taking the time to learn and understand the program and system. There are many programs on the internet. If you are going to leave what you are busy with every time you think you have discovered a better program then you will never learn anything.
Take your time to learn and be patient. I can assure you that you will not become an overnight millionaire following any affiliate program. Like any other business it takes time to build a successful affiliate business, even with the support and training you may receive.
I tend to look at things very logically. If something does not make sense to me I rather avoid it.
Consider the following:
You develop a great product that you want to sell for 10 on your website. It might have costed you thousands of dollars to develop and many many months of hard work with no income while you were developing your product. You are finally ready to launch your product. Since you are only one person with one website you realize the need to establish an affiliate program where you can have hundreds of affiliates promote your company and get thousands of people to buy from you. In order to get affiliates interested you must pay them between 20% and 50% of your sales price or gross profit.
I don't know about you but the above scenario looks like a lot of very hard work without any guarantee of success. The thought of it certainly does not get me excited.
Now consider the following - You join the above company as an affiliate and earn say 50% commission on all sales. You do not need to buy the product and have no investment in the company. You can start to sell the product from the 1st day you become an affiliate and make a lot of money. In fact, the company will make 50% and you will make 50%. You have no risk and can walk away from the program anytime you wish. What a pleasure! This is what I like the most from affiliate programs.
Remember that not all affiliate programs are good. Many of them only offer products that you would not want to give away for free to your mother-in-law. Furthermore, the support program and training offered is not always top quality.
I do not know about you but I cannot promote any product or service that I do not understand or do not believe in. You should always be able to sell the product to yourself. If you would not buy the product because you do not believe in it then please do not promote it to other people as the best product out there. You will sleep a lot better at night!
Remember, if you want to become a money maker with your own home based business, ultimately it is up to you to make a success of the program.
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/2/1/Affiliate-Programs--The-advantages-of-being-an-affiliate/Affiliate-Programs--The-advantages-of-being-an-affiliate.html
Exchanging Links Get the right sites to link to your website
Exchanging Links Get the right sites to link to your website
Why is it important that other sites link to yours? It can be seen as a sort of confirmation that one site values the content of another site. When you find a site on the net that is useful because it has good content that you are interested in you normally save it as a favorite. The same principle applies to website links. The more sites link to your site the higher the perceived value of your site on the net and that has a direct impact on your site’s ranking.
There are many sites on the internet that exist for only one reason and that is to show webmasters how they can improve their search engine rankings by using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques. I do not want to comment too much on SEO sites except to say that although there are some very good SEO sites on the net I have found most of them to have no value at all. However, one thing that most SEO sites agree upon is the importance of having incoming links to your site in order to improve your site’s rankings in the search engines.
I am often surprised at how many people follow the advice of SEO sites on how they can improve their site’s ranking in Google™ without even considering what Google™ has to say on this topic. Nevertheless, Google™ is very clear on the importance of incoming links.
Take the time to read the “Webmaster Guidelines” issued by Google™. You can find these valuable guidelines at www.google.com/support/webmasters and then click on “Webmaster Guidelines”. They are very clear.
In principle, links should come from sites with content that is relevant to your own site. It can be similar or complementary. These sites should link to your site because they find your site’s content valuable and consider it to be useful for their own visitors
There are mainly two ways of soliciting links from other webmasters:
The one is by looking for sites with content that is relevant to your own site and requesting these webmasters to post a link to your site. You normally need to give them your site’s title, website address and a short description of what your site is all about in order for them to consider adding your link on their site. It is normal that they often request you to first post a link on your site linking back to their site (and provide them with the link address to verify you have placed the link) before considering linking to yours. Many of these sites will invite other webmasters on their home page to link to their site or inform other webmasters that they are open to exchange links (called reciprocal links) with suitable sites.
The above method is the correct method of getting other webmasters to link to your site. I like to refer to is as the straight and narrow road – Not always easy and certainly time-consuming but the best method.
The second method that webmasters often use to get other sites to link to them is to visit so-called “link farms”. These sites normally place adverts like: “Get thousands of other sites to link to your site for the low price of only 10”, or “Exchange links now with thousands of other sites”, etc. Sounds good? Sure it does. It is the easy way. However, it is not the correct way. The intention of these sites is to mislead the search engines by creating the impression that your site is very popular. Companies like Google™ are fully aware of these “tricks”. They will know if you get your incoming links from link farms and these type of links will certainly not help your site’s credibility as far as search engines are concerned. Avoid link farms at all cost!
Please note that not all webmasters are prepared to exchange links. Some of the very popular sites receive so many requests to exchange reciprocal links that they either refuse to post any new links or insist that your site must have a certain Google™ page rank before they will consider exchanging links. Some of these sites will even charge you a monthly fee for having your link on their site. Do not get discouraged. There are many good websites that will gladly exchange links with your site at no cost.
In case you are wondering, Google™ ranks website pages from 1 up to 10, where a page rank of 10 is an indication that Google™ considers it as very important. Most website pages on the internet do not have a page rank at all. It takes time to get a page rank. It can take years to get a high page rank. There are many sites that offer a free page rank checker. I can recommend www.prchecker.info. Try to exchange links with sites that have a high page rank, at least higher than your own website’s home page. Having incoming links from “important” sites are always an advantage.
Lastly, it is easy to check how many sites are linking to your site. Once again there are many sites that offer this service for free. I can recommend www.webmaster-toolkit.com.
Do not try to convince too many sites to exchange links with your site. Take your time and do not force anything. Having excellent content on your own site is the best incentive for any webmaster to link to your site. Do not make the mistake of chasing after links while neglecting the content of your site. Remember, Rome was not built in a day. It takes time to become a money maker and build a successful internet home based business.
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/4/1/Exchanging-Links--Get-the-right-sites-to-link-to-your-website/Exchanging-Links--Get-the-right-sites-to-link-to-your-website.html
Why is it important that other sites link to yours? It can be seen as a sort of confirmation that one site values the content of another site. When you find a site on the net that is useful because it has good content that you are interested in you normally save it as a favorite. The same principle applies to website links. The more sites link to your site the higher the perceived value of your site on the net and that has a direct impact on your site’s ranking.
There are many sites on the internet that exist for only one reason and that is to show webmasters how they can improve their search engine rankings by using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques. I do not want to comment too much on SEO sites except to say that although there are some very good SEO sites on the net I have found most of them to have no value at all. However, one thing that most SEO sites agree upon is the importance of having incoming links to your site in order to improve your site’s rankings in the search engines.
I am often surprised at how many people follow the advice of SEO sites on how they can improve their site’s ranking in Google™ without even considering what Google™ has to say on this topic. Nevertheless, Google™ is very clear on the importance of incoming links.
Take the time to read the “Webmaster Guidelines” issued by Google™. You can find these valuable guidelines at www.google.com/support/webmasters and then click on “Webmaster Guidelines”. They are very clear.
In principle, links should come from sites with content that is relevant to your own site. It can be similar or complementary. These sites should link to your site because they find your site’s content valuable and consider it to be useful for their own visitors
There are mainly two ways of soliciting links from other webmasters:
The one is by looking for sites with content that is relevant to your own site and requesting these webmasters to post a link to your site. You normally need to give them your site’s title, website address and a short description of what your site is all about in order for them to consider adding your link on their site. It is normal that they often request you to first post a link on your site linking back to their site (and provide them with the link address to verify you have placed the link) before considering linking to yours. Many of these sites will invite other webmasters on their home page to link to their site or inform other webmasters that they are open to exchange links (called reciprocal links) with suitable sites.
The above method is the correct method of getting other webmasters to link to your site. I like to refer to is as the straight and narrow road – Not always easy and certainly time-consuming but the best method.
The second method that webmasters often use to get other sites to link to them is to visit so-called “link farms”. These sites normally place adverts like: “Get thousands of other sites to link to your site for the low price of only 10”, or “Exchange links now with thousands of other sites”, etc. Sounds good? Sure it does. It is the easy way. However, it is not the correct way. The intention of these sites is to mislead the search engines by creating the impression that your site is very popular. Companies like Google™ are fully aware of these “tricks”. They will know if you get your incoming links from link farms and these type of links will certainly not help your site’s credibility as far as search engines are concerned. Avoid link farms at all cost!
Please note that not all webmasters are prepared to exchange links. Some of the very popular sites receive so many requests to exchange reciprocal links that they either refuse to post any new links or insist that your site must have a certain Google™ page rank before they will consider exchanging links. Some of these sites will even charge you a monthly fee for having your link on their site. Do not get discouraged. There are many good websites that will gladly exchange links with your site at no cost.
In case you are wondering, Google™ ranks website pages from 1 up to 10, where a page rank of 10 is an indication that Google™ considers it as very important. Most website pages on the internet do not have a page rank at all. It takes time to get a page rank. It can take years to get a high page rank. There are many sites that offer a free page rank checker. I can recommend www.prchecker.info. Try to exchange links with sites that have a high page rank, at least higher than your own website’s home page. Having incoming links from “important” sites are always an advantage.
Lastly, it is easy to check how many sites are linking to your site. Once again there are many sites that offer this service for free. I can recommend www.webmaster-toolkit.com.
Do not try to convince too many sites to exchange links with your site. Take your time and do not force anything. Having excellent content on your own site is the best incentive for any webmaster to link to your site. Do not make the mistake of chasing after links while neglecting the content of your site. Remember, Rome was not built in a day. It takes time to become a money maker and build a successful internet home based business.
http://www.articleworld.com/articles/4/1/Exchanging-Links--Get-the-right-sites-to-link-to-your-website/Exchanging-Links--Get-the-right-sites-to-link-to-your-website.html
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