Webjugate

If you were looking for a person, let’s Say Ben Smith, on the internet how would you start? You might start by putting “Ben Smith” into your internet browser. But which Ben Smith would you find? Because of the way your internet browser works, you would find the Ben Smith that knows how linking affects internet page ranking. Here’s where this could get really technical, but I’ll try to keep it all in layman’s terms.

Whether you are doing a people search like the example above, looking for education reviews or surfing for anything on the internet, the top results you get back are going to be the ones with high value links. High value links are really just links to other websites which have a high page ranking that relate to your web site. At the same time though, you don’t want any competing links. Adding competing links, like links to a website that sells the same product that you do would be a bad thing to do.

So how do you find good links? The most obvious way would be to use your own keywords, and do a search. Then simply pick the top ranked sites that use your keywords (Of course be careful not to pick your competition). It really is just as simple as that.

Starting up your internet business as a member of an affiliate program is an exciting thing due to all of the possibilities and potential this industry has. By becoming an affiliate marketer, you can finally gain complete control of your financial destiny. However, in order to create an income from affiliate marketing programs, you must learn how these programs work, discover how to generate traffic, and ultimately how you will use these products to make you money. Now, if you have not joined an affiliate program as of yet then now is the best time to learn. If you are already part of an affiliate marketing program, you now simply need to learn how to increase your sales and revenue. Consider these following tips and how they can work for you.

Tip #1 - Email Autoresponders

Email autoresponders are great because they send e-mails and updates automatically to people who have visited your site and displayed some form of interest in your products. The majority of people that visit your site will simply leave never to return again. They might forget your address, what they were looking for, or any number of other things. However, if you use an autoresponder to gently remind them every couple of weeks about different products and services, you will convert those lost potential customers to actual customers. Of course, everyone won’t buy from you, but you will increase the ratio significantly. However, be sure to only include individuals in your autoresponder who have opted to receive e-mails from you.

Tip #2 - Information

You need to make sure that you provide visitors with enough information regarding your products that they feel comfortable making a purchase. If customers have any questions that are not answered on your website, they will not buy until they do have those answers or will simply forget about it and move on. Don’t let this happen to you. Instead, make sure you provide information about all of your products. Give your visitors a good overview that answers all frequently asked questions, provide excellent photos, and allow the product to sell itself. If you provide enough information you will also save yourself a lot of time answering e-mails.

Tip #3 - Increase Traffic

Another thing you must do to increase your revenue quickly is to get more links on the Internet that point to your website. The reason this is important is because the more links you have, the higher your web page will be returned in the rankings, and the more traffic you will receive because of it. Also, when you have links scattered about the Internet, more people will run across your link and pay your website a visit. You can have your link included on other websites, in forums, blogs, ezine articles, and basically in any part of the web you can think of where another website will post it.

Michael Turner reveals step-by-step how you can increase search engine traffic in his free 7 part mini-series. Grab it now at http://www.powertraffictactics.com/

Conversions - they’re a crucial factor in affiliate sales. While it’s good to have wonderful, informative content and an environment where your site visitors share ideas and information, you’re most likely in this for the economic benefit. And that means you need not only to interest visitors in the site’s affiliate merchants, but do all in your power to see that the sale is completed.

Here are a few ways to help the conversion rate of sales - the percentage of qualified buyers who began the sales process who ultimately complete the sale:

Before signing up a merchant, be sure that the merchants is offering products that are appropriate for and desired by your visitors, and that the actual products are of high quality.
Prepare product reviews and comparisons for your site that help the visitor learn about the product category as well as individual products and their attributes.

Get site visitors to contribute product reviews as well as reviews of their sales experience. Post them and use them to identify patterns and trends, both good and bad, with your affiliate merchants.
Don’t be shy in contacting merchants whose sales practices have been called into question by your visitors. If they are serious about their business, they’ll want to make positive changes - they have many other customers who will be likely to have the same reaction.

Make sure the links to products are on pages with highly relevant articles, reviews and information.

Ask questions and test their shipping with special requests
Go through the merchant’s checkout process yourself and see if it’s onerous or straightforward. If you’d drop off before seeing the words “sale confirmed”, it’s likely they will too.

Karen Kari’s articles and more information on the affiliate business can be found at:

http://www.affiliatebandit.com

http://www.advertisingcellar.com

http://www.billionfreeads.com

Having recently worked on several eCommerce websites in a row, I wanted to mention a few issues that should be considered if you are planning to sell anything online. Although I have a current favorite eCommerce package, I’ve attempted to make these helpful hints independent of any particular software.

Pictures

Many software packages only have the built-in ability to handle one picture per item. If you want more pictures, make sure you have some sort of work-around in place.

Also, some of the more popular software packages require that each picture have the same aspect ratio. In other words, they all have to be a square or a rectangle that has the ratio of 2:3, etc.

Your best bet, if your software is like that, is to just use the defaults of your camera. A typical digital camera takes pictures in a 4:3 ratio. Just make sure you take all your pictures with your camera oriented the same way. In other words, all horizontal or all vertical.

A workaround, if you don’t want to take all your pictures oriented the same way, is to add some “white space” to each picture. In your specific case, you might need to use some color other than white, so it will blend into your website well.

Your best bet is to know the limitations of your software prior to taking all the pictures. That way, you can work within its limits to achieve the best results.

Inventory Control

Are you going to have more than one of the exact same piece of merchandise in your store? If so, you will need some sort of inventory control. Your website will need to track how many of an item you have in stock. It will need to subtract stock when it is purchased, and remove the listing when the item is out of stock.

Payment

There are plenty of payment options out there. Obviously, you can take credit cards numbers directly and process those with your local bank. If that is the case, you will need a secure web server so that the credit card data is encrypted.

The alternative is to use a service like PayPal or 2CheckOut. Both let you take all the customer information except the payment info. Then you pass the user out to their site, and send them back to your own site once you’ve paid.

Shipping

There are several different ways that you can calculate shipping. The first, and most accurate, is exact cost by weight. Several shipping companies will let your web site communicate directly with theirs to get accurate shipping costs based on zip code and weight.

The downside to this one is that you have to keep track of how much all your products weigh. Also, if you have lightweight items, it might be somewhat irrelevant.

Another alternative is a shipping table. This can be based on either weight or cost. You determine weight or cost ranges, and base your shipping costs off that. For example, up to 5 pounds could cost $5 to ship. Then, up to 10 pounds could cost $7 to ship. Up to 15 pounds could cost $9. And so on, to whatever maximum weight or cost you want to ship.

What if someone goes over the maximum? First of all, one option is to set the maximum to some absurdly high number like 999999 pounds. Then you won’t have to worry about them going over that maximum. However, there’s still the possibility that their shipping will cost way more than estimated.

There’s two basic options I suggest. One, you can simple send them an invoice stating that they need to pay XYZ more for shipping. Make sure this accompanies a warning on your website that orders costing (or weighing) over XYZ dollars (or pounds) may be subject to additional shipping fees.

The alternative, and my favorite, is to simply pay the extra cost yourself. Ideally, once you have to worry about a situation like that, the person has already ordered tons of merchandise from you, and would appreciate a break like that. It can definitely make a good impression.

Make sure you keep a running total of how much you’ve charged for shipping vs. how much you’ve spent. If, after six months to a year, you see that the numbers aren’t quite lining up, tweak your rates.

Although there are other methods for shipping, those are the most popular two, and certainly the easiest to maintain.

Conclusion

Are these the only concerns when setting up an eCommerce site? Certainly not, but they are some of the most common. If you have any specific questions or concerns, feel free to contact me with those questions.

Tim is the owner and senior web designer at T&S Web Design. His company has developed and maintained website for dozens of small businesses and organizations. Tim also maintains a blog with free website advice for small business owners, GetASiteOnline.com.

In affiliate marketing, there are many ways in which you can
increase your earnings and maintain the account that you have
worked so hard for already. Most of the techniques and tactics
can be learned easily. No need to go anywhere and any further.
They are available online, 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. One
of the more important ways of increasing affiliate marketing
bottom line and sale is through the use of product
recommendations. Many marketers know that this is one of the
most effective ways in promoting a certain product. If the
customers or visitors trust you enough, then they will
definitely trust your recommendations. Be very careful in using
this approach, though. If you start promoting everything by
recommendation, your credibility will actually wear thin. This
is seen especially when recommendations are seemingly
exaggerated and without much merit. Do not be afraid to mention
things that you do not like about a given product or service.
Rather than lose any points for you, this will make your
recommendation more realistic and will tend to increase your
credibility. Furthermore, if your visitors are really interested
in what you are offering, they will be more than delighted to
learn what is good about the product, what is not so good, and
how the product will benefit them. When you are recommending a
certain product, there are some things to remember on how to
make it work effectively and for your advantage. Sound like the
true and leading expert in your field. Remember this simple
equation: Price resistance diminishes in direct proportion to
trust. If your visitors feel and believe that you are an expert
in your niche, they are more inclined to making that purchase.
On the other hand, if you are not exuding any confidence and
self-assurance in endorsing your products, they will probably
feel that same way and will go in search of another product or
service which is more believable. How do you establish this aura
of expertise? By offering unique and new solutions they would
not get anywhere else. Show proof that what you are promoting
works as promised. Display prominent testimonials and
endorsements from respected and known personalities, in related
fields of course. Avoid hype at all costs. It is better to sound
low key and confident, than to scream and seek attention.
Besides, you would not want to sound unprofessional and have
that thinking stick to your potential customers and clients, now
would you? Best to appear cool and self-assured at the same
time. And remember; prospects are not stupid. They are actually
turning to experts and may already know the things that you
know. If you back up your claims with hard facts and data, they
would gladly put down hundreds, or even thousands worth of money
to your promotions. But if you don’t, they are smart enough to
try and look at your competitors and what they are offering.
While recommending a product, it is also important that you give
out promotional freebies. People are already familiar with the
concept of offering freebies to promoting your won products. But
very few people do this to promote affiliate products. Try to
offer freebies that can promote or even have some information
about your products or services. Before you add recommendations
to you product, it is given that you should try and test the
product and support. Do not run the risk of promoting junk
products and services. Just think how long it took you to build
credibility and trust among your visitors. All that will take to
destroy it is one big mistake on your part. If possible, have
recommendations of products that you have 100% confidence in.
Test the product support before you begin to ensure that the
people you are referring it to would not be left high and dry
when a problem suddenly arouse. Have a look at your affiliate
market and look at the strategies you are using. You may not be
focusing on the recommendations that your products need to have.
You plan of action is sometimes not the only thing that is
making your program works. Try product recommendation and be
among those few who have proven its worth.

Before I get started on this article, I’d like to say goodbye to the
phrase, at the end of the day, because, at the end of the day, the phrase is still there, taunting me. I don’t want to say it anymore and I’m sick of hearing it, quite frankly. Lately, whenever I hear someone use that phrase, I almost burst out laughing. And I don’t want to do that. That would be rude. So, instead, I stifle the laugh and work hard to not smile. If I smiled they would wonder why I’m smiling. They know they didn’t say anything funny. (Is she laughing at me? Why, yes, I am, because,
at the end of the day, I’m sick and tired of that phrase.) So I don’t even smile.

**Sigh**

Okay, back to Customer Service Flops at a Restaurant!

On a Saturday, I wanted to get out of the house to do some writing, to get a
change of atmosphere and to perhaps be inspired by different surroundings.

I headed to Borders Books, but they didn’t have enough tables; all were taken.
(They’ve had room for more tables for a few years, but haven’t figured that out
yet! Or maybe they have, but they don’t want more tables to clean.)

So I went to a place called Corner Bakery. This is an old-fashioned-inspired
place owned by a local chain of restaurants. While the other restaurants owned
by the chain are sit-down places, Corner Bakery is a walk-up style restaurant
where you order your food at a counter, pay for it, and then take it to your
table. All they keep on the tables is salt and pepper, so customers have to
get everything else they need from a service area. The service area has ice,
a soda machine, iced tea, water, napkins, cutlery, sugar, milk, and anything
else you would need (except, of course, for salt and pepper, because, as I said,
that’s all you find on their tables).

I asked the woman taking my order if they served their tea in pots, and she
replied that she didn’t know what I meant. So I asked another employee, who
said they did not have teapots. (Border’s does!) They knew I was there for here
(not to go), but my tea was served in a take-out cup. I also ordered something
to eat. They handed everything to me over the cash register. I set it down while
I put my change back into my wallet, and then I looked around for a tray.
(I recalled using a tray every other time I was there.) I didn’t see any trays.

So I asked the two employees behind the counter if they had any trays. They both
said no. Hmm. What happened to the trays? Well, one employee said, when they
remodeled the kitchen and ordering area, they got rid of the trays.

So I had to pick up the items I purchased, bring them to a table, then go back
to the service area to get flatware, napkins, etc., and bring that back to the
table.

Being a tea person who likes to have her tea just so, next, I brought my
take-out tea cup to the service area for milk and sugar. After pouring some milk
in the cup and breaking open a sugar packet, I deposited the used sugar packet
in the garbage slot conveniently located on the counter of the service area
(just like Starbucks!). Then I grabbed a spoon, stirred the tea, and looked
for a basket or container to place the used spoon. I didn’t find any such
container, so I shrugged my shoulders (in my mind, anyway) and left the spoon
on the counter of the service area (not like Starbucks!).

Then it was back to the table again. After a couple minutes I realized that the
tea was still extremely hot, and I wanted a spoon. (Of course! I should have
carried that spoon back to the table with me!). As I got up from the table
to go back to the service area, my hip hit the table, spilling sugary tea on
the table and on the pen with which I’m writing. Great! So along with the
spoon, I grabbed more napkins to clean up the mess.

A tray would have made the whole experience so much easier! What do people who
dine at Corner Bakery do when they have their young children with them?
Tote the kids back and forth between the front counter, their table, and the
service area, carrying as much as they can hold, until they get everything
they need?

So my message to Corner Bakery is:
Make your customers’ lives easier when they come to your restaurant: bring back the trays!

At what businesses have you experienced improved or poorer customer service
(or other business decisions)? How did that affect your decision to repurchase?

What changes is your business considering? Will the changes make a real improvement
that your customers will recognize for the better?

Because, you know, at the end of the day, businesses need their customers
to come back and buy again!

© 2006 Borgeson Consulting, Inc.

Glory Borgeson is a business coach and consultant, and the president of
Borgeson Consulting, Inc. She works with two groups of people:
small business owners (with 500 employees or less) to help them increase
their Entrepreneurial IQ, which leads to increased profit and
decreased stress; and with executives in the
“honeymoon phase” of a new position (typically the first two years)
to coach them to success. Top athletes have a coach; why not you?

Click here for Borgeson Consulting, Inc.

This article was originally published in The Business Express, Borgeson’s
free monthly ezine. You may subscribe by clicking here:
Ezine.