a whopping 82% of businesses failed due to poor cash flow management skills followed closely by starting out with too little money. Business leadership is about taking financial responsibility, conducting sound financial planning and research, and understanding the unique financial dynamics of one's business. Before even starting a business, show your plan to your accountant and get their counsel. What a concept! Asking for the advice of someone who sees the bottom-line realities of business day in and day out; someone who sees the birth certificates, successions, and autopsy reports of thousands of business entities. It just makes good business sense. But many people will ignore this advice and eventually meet with business disaster. [Word of caution: don't rely on just one opinion. Get at least two or three opinions from different accountants to get a more informed view].
The third business failure factor profiled in the report, and a critical one, was Marketing. Over 64% of the businesses surveyed in the Marketing category failed because of owners minimizing the importance of properly promoting their business followed by ignoring their competition. Again, as a business leader, you must be able to effectively communicate your idea to the right people and understand their unique needs and wants. Leadership is all about taking initiative, taking action, getting things done, and making decisions. If you're not doing anything of significance to market and promote your business, you are most likely headed for business failure. I recommend every time you get up in the morning, jot down 5 new things you can do to promote your business and go DO them! If you can't think of anything to jot down, I highly recommend reading Jay Conrad Levinson's book, Guerrilla Marketing, which has oodles of useful information and tips on promoting for small business.
Know your competition. Leadership is also about providing value to people. If your main competitors are all providing a better quality and lower priced product than yours, how can you possibly create any value? Either you harness your strengths to provide different benefits such as speed, convenience, better service; lower your price and improve quality; create a different product for an unmet demand; or get out of the game.
Finally, one of the most important reasons why businesses fail is due to poor management. In the Management category, 70% of businesses failed due to owners not recognizing what they don't do well and not seeking help, followed by insufficient relevant business experience. Not delegating properly and hiring the wrong people were major contributing factors to business failure in the Management category.
Don't make these mistakes
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Monday, October 29, 2007
More from Internet Marketing Center
If you don't know Derek Gehl, I suggest you get to know him now. He is a tremendous source of valuable information and he speaks from experience. Here are some tips from his latest email to me
4 Tips to Squeeze Every Cent of Profit From Your Pay-Per-Click Marketing
By Derek Gehl
I love pay-per-click marketing! There are few forms of online advertising that offer such complete control over where you spend your advertising dollars.
But despite the ability to control Google Adwords and Yahoo! Search Marketing gives you over your ads -- how much you spend on them, where and when they appear, etc. -- I'm constantly meeting savvy Internet marketers who are wasting tons of unnecessary money on their pay-per-click campaigns because they are either...
a) Making "okay" money from their campaigns and too lazy to do the work to make them really successful
-- or --
b) They just don't know any better!
No matter how you're doing with YOUR pay-per-click efforts, here are 4 tips that you can start applying today to fine-tune your campaigns and boost your ROI.
Tip #1: Keywords... keywords... keywords!
Even if your business targets an extremely narrow niche market, your campaign should begin with at least 100 keywords.
I have yet to come across a niche market for which we couldn't find that many keywords for the initial round of testing. In fact, the majority of businesses I deal with start in the range of 500-1000 keywords!
If it sounds like a huge challenge to come up with that many keywords, don't worry.
With tools like Wordtracker and Google's Keyword Evaluator, you don't have to come up with the keywords on your own. All you have to do is identify a core list of keywords and then let technology do the work for you.
Now, is every single one of those keywords going to make you money? Nope! Some will bomb horribly.
But I'll talk about how you deal with that in a second...
Tip #2: Never stop testing new ads
When you first start your pay-per-click campaigns, you should be writing at least five different ads for each keyword group.
Note: a "keyword group" is a cluster of closely related keywords that say exactly the same thing, in slightly different ways.
For example, a keyword group for a site promoting a bed and breakfast in El Paso, Texas could include:
El Paso bed and breakfast
El Paso bed and breakfasts
Bed and breakfast El Paso
Bed and breakfasts El Paso Texas El Paso BandB
BandBs El Paso
B and Bs El Paso
B and B El Paso Texas
B and Bs El Paso Texas El Paso bed and breakfasts
B and B El Paso
El Paso Texas bed and breakfast
Bed and breakfast El Paso Texas
... and so on.
(As you can see, the variations between each keyword phrase are very slight.)
Once you've written your five plus ads for your keyword group, run them all at the same time. Keep them going until you get enough impressions to determine which one is the winner -- and then roll out the winning ad across the entire group.
Congratulations... you now have a winning ad!
But don't stop now... continue to work on your ads and try to come up with one that will beat your current front runner. If you beat your winning ad, roll-out the new ad across your keyword group and then try and beat that ad.
Then keep on repeating this testing cycle indefinitely, to ensure you're always running the best possible ad you can.
Tip #3: Design targeted landing pages for each keyword group
Nothing will turn a visitor into a customer faster than a message that tells them exactly what they want to hear. So, if I have multiple keyword groups that target different themes, each ad should be driving visitors to a landing page with salescopy that reflects the theme of a single keyword group.
For example, if different themes an El Paso bed and breakfast owner could try targeting might be:
"family friendly bed and breakfast el Paso" or "el Paso couples bed and breakfast"
The first ad could lead to a landing page that emphasized all of the great family activities available in and around the bed and breakfast, while the second one could talk about how great the same bed and breakfast is as a romantic getaway.
By testing out different themes like this, you can see which theme gets the most sales and focus more of your PPC dollars there!
Tips #4: Detailed tracking
If you want to get the most bang for every PPC buck you spend, then simply tracking the overall effectiveness of your campaigns won't do. You need to track the effectiveness of every individual keyword if you want to crank every cent out of your PPC efforts!
Like I said in Step #1, you will be starting your campaign with hundreds of keywords. But not all of those keywords will be profitable. It's your job to weed out the unprofitable ones right away.
There are four different keyword performance scenarios you will encounter:
1. Keywords that aren't driving any traffic
After you've tested a few different ads to confirm these keywords are ineffective, get rid of them. They're useless. Even though they're not costing you any money, they are cluttering up your campaign.
2. Keywords that are driving traffic -- but no sales
This is where a lot of your wasted PPC dollars go! If you find this happening to you, look at your ad and make sure your landing page relates back to the keyword.
Does the landing page meet the expectation your ad creates? If yes, then get rid of the keyword. It's only costing you money.
3. Keywords that are driving traffic and opt-ins -- but no immediate sales
If you are a savvy marketer, chances are you have a good autoresponder sequence that builds a relationship with your subscribers and eventually converts them to sales.
If this is the case, I would keep these keywords. The ROI is not immediate, but don't worry -- it will come!
In fact, if you are trying to sell a higher-ticket product through PPC without much success, your entire marketing campaign may be more effective if it's based around driving leads to an opt-in form or squeeze page and then working up to the sale as you establish a relationship with your susbscribers.
4. Keywords that are driving traffic and sales
Obviously these are the keywords we want to keep... but status quo is not enough!
You need to track the conversion of each individual keyword. Some will convert higher than others, which will ultimately dictate how much you can bid on those keyword and still remain profitable.
In other words, if I have a top performing keyword and I am not ranking in the top 3-4 positions, I may want to spend more to increase the position, my clickthrough ratio, and sales.
So there it is! Four strategies you can apply today. If you are already doing all of these, great!
4 Tips to Squeeze Every Cent of Profit From Your Pay-Per-Click Marketing
By Derek Gehl
I love pay-per-click marketing! There are few forms of online advertising that offer such complete control over where you spend your advertising dollars.
But despite the ability to control Google Adwords and Yahoo! Search Marketing gives you over your ads -- how much you spend on them, where and when they appear, etc. -- I'm constantly meeting savvy Internet marketers who are wasting tons of unnecessary money on their pay-per-click campaigns because they are either...
a) Making "okay" money from their campaigns and too lazy to do the work to make them really successful
-- or --
b) They just don't know any better!
No matter how you're doing with YOUR pay-per-click efforts, here are 4 tips that you can start applying today to fine-tune your campaigns and boost your ROI.
Tip #1: Keywords... keywords... keywords!
Even if your business targets an extremely narrow niche market, your campaign should begin with at least 100 keywords.
I have yet to come across a niche market for which we couldn't find that many keywords for the initial round of testing. In fact, the majority of businesses I deal with start in the range of 500-1000 keywords!
If it sounds like a huge challenge to come up with that many keywords, don't worry.
With tools like Wordtracker and Google's Keyword Evaluator, you don't have to come up with the keywords on your own. All you have to do is identify a core list of keywords and then let technology do the work for you.
Now, is every single one of those keywords going to make you money? Nope! Some will bomb horribly.
But I'll talk about how you deal with that in a second...
Tip #2: Never stop testing new ads
When you first start your pay-per-click campaigns, you should be writing at least five different ads for each keyword group.
Note: a "keyword group" is a cluster of closely related keywords that say exactly the same thing, in slightly different ways.
For example, a keyword group for a site promoting a bed and breakfast in El Paso, Texas could include:
El Paso bed and breakfast
El Paso bed and breakfasts
Bed and breakfast El Paso
Bed and breakfasts El Paso Texas El Paso BandB
BandBs El Paso
B and Bs El Paso
B and B El Paso Texas
B and Bs El Paso Texas El Paso bed and breakfasts
B and B El Paso
El Paso Texas bed and breakfast
Bed and breakfast El Paso Texas
... and so on.
(As you can see, the variations between each keyword phrase are very slight.)
Once you've written your five plus ads for your keyword group, run them all at the same time. Keep them going until you get enough impressions to determine which one is the winner -- and then roll out the winning ad across the entire group.
Congratulations... you now have a winning ad!
But don't stop now... continue to work on your ads and try to come up with one that will beat your current front runner. If you beat your winning ad, roll-out the new ad across your keyword group and then try and beat that ad.
Then keep on repeating this testing cycle indefinitely, to ensure you're always running the best possible ad you can.
Tip #3: Design targeted landing pages for each keyword group
Nothing will turn a visitor into a customer faster than a message that tells them exactly what they want to hear. So, if I have multiple keyword groups that target different themes, each ad should be driving visitors to a landing page with salescopy that reflects the theme of a single keyword group.
For example, if different themes an El Paso bed and breakfast owner could try targeting might be:
"family friendly bed and breakfast el Paso" or "el Paso couples bed and breakfast"
The first ad could lead to a landing page that emphasized all of the great family activities available in and around the bed and breakfast, while the second one could talk about how great the same bed and breakfast is as a romantic getaway.
By testing out different themes like this, you can see which theme gets the most sales and focus more of your PPC dollars there!
Tips #4: Detailed tracking
If you want to get the most bang for every PPC buck you spend, then simply tracking the overall effectiveness of your campaigns won't do. You need to track the effectiveness of every individual keyword if you want to crank every cent out of your PPC efforts!
Like I said in Step #1, you will be starting your campaign with hundreds of keywords. But not all of those keywords will be profitable. It's your job to weed out the unprofitable ones right away.
There are four different keyword performance scenarios you will encounter:
1. Keywords that aren't driving any traffic
After you've tested a few different ads to confirm these keywords are ineffective, get rid of them. They're useless. Even though they're not costing you any money, they are cluttering up your campaign.
2. Keywords that are driving traffic -- but no sales
This is where a lot of your wasted PPC dollars go! If you find this happening to you, look at your ad and make sure your landing page relates back to the keyword.
Does the landing page meet the expectation your ad creates? If yes, then get rid of the keyword. It's only costing you money.
3. Keywords that are driving traffic and opt-ins -- but no immediate sales
If you are a savvy marketer, chances are you have a good autoresponder sequence that builds a relationship with your subscribers and eventually converts them to sales.
If this is the case, I would keep these keywords. The ROI is not immediate, but don't worry -- it will come!
In fact, if you are trying to sell a higher-ticket product through PPC without much success, your entire marketing campaign may be more effective if it's based around driving leads to an opt-in form or squeeze page and then working up to the sale as you establish a relationship with your susbscribers.
4. Keywords that are driving traffic and sales
Obviously these are the keywords we want to keep... but status quo is not enough!
You need to track the conversion of each individual keyword. Some will convert higher than others, which will ultimately dictate how much you can bid on those keyword and still remain profitable.
In other words, if I have a top performing keyword and I am not ranking in the top 3-4 positions, I may want to spend more to increase the position, my clickthrough ratio, and sales.
So there it is! Four strategies you can apply today. If you are already doing all of these, great!
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Internet Marketing Course
"Attract Stampedes of FREE Traffic From Google Review Of Derek Gehl's "Search Marketing Labs": Attracting crowds of qualified buyers with a top ranking in Google, Yahoo, and MSN just got a whole lot easier... and cheaper. The term "search engine optimization" used to be synonymous with difficult and expensive. Not any more. Because thanks to Derek Gehl's latest release, you do NOT need to be intimidated by terms like "keyword density" and "optimization" anymore. And you certainly don't need to outsource your search engine traffic campaigns to third-party experts for exorbitant fees of $3,000-$10,000!
There's absolutely no guesswork. First, Derek gives you a series of online videos that walk you through the baby step basics of getting your website search engine ready. Then, using the same clear, no-BS teaching style, you'll be shown how to apply the very same advanced SEO strategies that Derek and his team have used to secure a Top 5 ranking in Google for 3 years running... ... And beat out over 294 Million competitors including many multi-million dollar corporations! And then, just in case you need some extra hand-holding, you'll have unlimited access to Derek's very own in-house SEO expert in a secret discussion forum, where you can ask unlimited questions about your specific search engine campaign! This alone is EASILY a $1500-$3000 value -- but Derek's giving you unlimited access to his private SEO expert for the next 30 days for just $2.95. To get all the details, visit http://www.marketingtips.com/backstage-pass/t/830448 When Derek first launched his "Search Marketing Lab" approximately one year ago, I didn't pay much attention. My mistake. Because today, he's got testimonials lined up around the block -- all regular people who started with ZERO or mediocre traffic, who attract 5,000 to 40,000+ visitors every month using these secrets. The majority of SEO books, courses, and seminars you'll find out there are a waste of money, not worth the paper they're printed on, because they're not kept up-to-date. But since "Search Marketing Lab" gives you the same SEO strategies that Derek's currently using on his own site (www.marketingtips.com), which is reported to attract over 1.8 Million visitors every month, you can be sure you'll be the first to know when there's a major search engine change… ... And the first to PROFIT from Derek's hard won SEO research, newest optimization techniques, and late-breaking developments. I recommend very few SEO resources to my clients. But this tops my list. And the $2.95 Trial that Derek is giving away right now is a steal. To get yours before he shuts it down... |
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Google Webmaster Tools
This is an informative and very useful site put out by Google to help better understand how the Google bot interacts with your website.
http://www.google.com/webmasters/
It’s Googles way of giving site owners the information that they need to be successful.
Enjoy
Mark
http://www.google.com/webmasters/
It’s Googles way of giving site owners the information that they need to be successful.
Enjoy
Mark
Income University
Here is an appropriately named website that I have referred many happy people to.
http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_8
Give it a try and report your success stories on this blog soon!
Mark
http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_8
Give it a try and report your success stories on this blog soon!
Mark
Google Cash Machine
Here is one of the original and still one of the best resources for you to examine.
http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_10
This has been consistently one of the very best programs for beginners. Give it a look.
Mark
http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_10
This has been consistently one of the very best programs for beginners. Give it a look.
Mark
Sitesell
One of the things you will eventually learn about internet marketing is the importance of having your own website and knowledge of how to promote it.
http://www.sitesell.com/mlc1.html is an excellent starting point to learning how to create a successful website, market it AND most importantly...MONETIZE it. (MAKE MONEY)
Ken writes, "You have almost certainly seen the false promises of Web hosting ads. Their marketing mantra, the lure, is "get a site up cheap and quick-and-easy." Beyond the flashy, widespread advertising of old-fashioned hosting is the cold, impersonal 99% failure rate. "
That's right...99% failure rate! Don't be a statistic. Learn to do it right the first time. Visit
this site http://order.sitesell.com/mlc1.html and get started with a web presence that will succeed.
Later,
Mark
http://www.sitesell.com/mlc1.html is an excellent starting point to learning how to create a successful website, market it AND most importantly...MONETIZE it. (MAKE MONEY)
Ken writes, "You have almost certainly seen the false promises of Web hosting ads. Their marketing mantra, the lure, is "get a site up cheap and quick-and-easy." Beyond the flashy, widespread advertising of old-fashioned hosting is the cold, impersonal 99% failure rate. "
That's right...99% failure rate! Don't be a statistic. Learn to do it right the first time. Visit
this site http://order.sitesell.com/mlc1.html and get started with a web presence that will succeed.
Later,
Mark
Affiliate Marketing 101
There are so many different Affiliate Marketing programs on the internet it is hard to investigate them all. But that is our goal here at Affiliate Marketing.
Stop here http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_27 for your first lesson.
More soon,
Mark
Stop here http://www.2click.com/idevaffiliate/idevaffiliate.php?id=17237_27 for your first lesson.
More soon,
Mark
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