It is the ultimate goal of any sales marketing strategy: to be the biggest name in the business, the one that people immediately pull up in their mind when they think about an expert in the field. Of course everyone wants to be that guy whose name is synonymous with knowledge and expertise, but very few achieve it.

The following anecdote illustrates an important point: A customer comes in for an appointment with the head of a very well-known marketing agency. His first question is: aShow me some results. I hear youare the best, but I havenat seen proof.a

The head of the marketing department, the guru of word-of-mouth advertising that heads up the company, answers, aEasy, how did you hear about our business?a Of course, the customer immediately realizes that word-of-mouth marketing is the companyas most successful strategy.

There are two sides to the coin when it comes to being known as an expert in your field. First is being the best so that people automatically think of you first. Or, you can sell yourself so that people think of you first. The end result is really the same.

Now, how do you achieve this goal? It may not be the easiest thing to do, but you can learn how to develop the kind of reputation that will bring customers calling. What all the best-known experts in any given field have in common is that they have learned this trick.

Perhaps they aren’t the most skilled at what they actually do, but they know something else: how to brand yourself as the expert so prospects will call you. They have learned, from training or from another master in self branding, the intangibles of controlling how people see them.

The first rule of branding yourself an expert is to act like one. In marketing, itas important to act like you have something to sell. If you are able to get your advice to people on the internet or through e-mail, they may find that they like what you have to offer and will turn into loyal customers.

Confidence and self branding can give you an edge in any field. By making a name for yourself, you can create a situation where customers and clients come to you, eliminating the need for you to go out and chase them. Needless to say, this will be a huge advantage to your business. Successfully branding yourself as the expert is the key to building a business, so get started today!

Pay per click marketing is now a billion pound industry that involves completely different skills and techniques to be successful compared to natural search engine optimisation, so if you have a limited budget how do you decide which approach is right for you?

At Commercetuned, we realize that both organic SEO and PPC are two key parts of any online marketing strategy, and should be used in tandem. Both have their pros and cons - review our pay per click advertising page for full details of the advantages of this approach. Ultimately, however, organic SEO will prove more cost effective than PPC advertising, and so would be the first choice for those of you who cannot afford to utilize both methods. The reasons for this are as follows:

• With pay per click marketing you always pay for each visit you receive, so when your daily or monthly budget runs out, the traffic from search engines to your website stops. Through a natural search campaign you only pay for on-page optimization work and then monthly link building to achieve the best results.
• Natural optimisation results in a far greater exposure across all search engines than pay per click, (unless you run multiple PPC campaigns, which can prove time consuming to administrate and expensive) as we optimise our clients sites for all search engines to increase the targeted traffic to your website
• Natural SEO is always content based, and involves detailed analysis of search engine user behaviour. A campaign will inevitably fine tune your website copy to provide the information that people are looking for, whereas pay per click campaigns do not require improvements to the websites, and therefore do not enhance your site for all users.
• While the risk is minimal, there is the potential for click-through fraud with pay per click traffic, especially with some less established PPC vendors (with less sophisticated tracking tools). With high natural search engine placements your competitors can click on your listings all day long and it won’t cost you a penny
• Statistics show that people favour websites that rank highly in the natural listings over those in the sponsored listings, as they appreciate that the site is there on it’s own merit and through hard work, rather than payment, although admittedly some users don’t know the difference between free and paid results [Source: De Vos & Jansen, February 2007].
• Organic results were viewed most often - 98% viewed these results, while only 31% of sponsored results on the right of the page resulted in visits.
• The split of organic to paid links on a search engine is approximately 4 to 1. [E-consultancy, Online Marketing Benchmarks, 2003]

So why use CommerceTuned for your natural SEO campaign?

We’ve been optimising websites for over 7 years, long before pay per click campaigns were even a “twinkle in Google/Yahoo’s eye“. Search engine algorithms do change over the years and we constantly adapt our approach and our techniques to make sure our clients remain at the top of the listings, but the fundamental core for what makes a good SEO campaign remains the same; correct website focus, optimised code and copy, and a quality link building campaign. Our results speak for themselves.

We’ve done natural search engine optimisation on over 100 websites and can confidently predict we’ve got experience in your sector. We are 100% transparent in all the work we do so you’re never in the dark, and we are fully accountable when it comes to the service we offer, which is an affordable, fully managed optimisation account to best promote your products, services, and brand.

Search engine optimisation is still regarded as some as a “shady industry”, so why not take the guesswork out of it and contact us, we’ll happily talk you through what the campaign would comprise of and all the costs involved.

1. Gain an advantage over your competition. You should find one benefit your competition doesn’t offer and use it as your main selling point.

2. Design your e-zine so it creates multiple free advertising streams. Ask readers to forward it to people they know, offer ad trades, etc.

3. Allow your visitors to subscribe to an update e-zine. Anytime you make changes to your web site they can receive an informative e-mail.

4. Focus your articles on information the targeted readers and e-zine publishers want. They will get published more often, which means free publicity.

5. Use problems to attract online traffic. Find a common online problem and use your web site to solve it. People will visit and see your ads.

6. Have an informative FAQ page at your web site. may have; this will help improve your sales ratio.

7. Improve your negotiation skills. This’ll improve your business because you’re always negotiating ad swaps, supply prices, joint ventures, wages, etc.

8. Beat your competition by giving away a similar product or service that they charge for. It could be add on products, warranties, servicing, etc.

9. Build a larger online community by giving your visitors bonuses for participating on your message boards or chat rooms. Try free products, ads, etc.

10. Instead of starting an affiliate program, start a referral program. Give people discounts and free products for referring people to your site.

100 years is not a very long time considering the age of evolution of civilization.100 years is not very much time considering these giant companies making their fortune and promising you their never ending business empire in coming centuries. Do you think these companies will vanish in near 100 years?

In the past 100 years, however, the business world has practically been turned upside-down. The MOR vacations business has accordingly discovered new ways of advertising and new places to advertise. As a result, we are seeing rapid growth like never before.

It all happened with the invention of print and visual media. At the rate we are growing in the modern world, the distances in the world is shrinking rapidly. With increasing usage of internet and print media the new horizon of business as well as their advertisement is emerging.

It used to be in the past that it was quite easy for your average guy to operate a resort business with a few loyal clients who kept his business going by word of mouth. Word of mouth is now one of the most ineffective methods of advertisement in our global business community. With your MOR vacations business, advertising is everything. People on the Internet will decide to patronize your resort based solely on the advertising they see. To stay competitive in the businesses world, figuring out where to advertise your MOR vacations business is an absolute necessity.

Of course the visual media is the best medium for this. Since most of the people are watching TV many hours a day, the importance of TV can not be neglected. No doubt you have to pay hefty amount to the TV channel but it definitely and promptly enhance your business. Ones you are establish, your business is all up for years to come.

Another great way to advertise is through print media like newspapers and magazines. They remain popular favorites with readers and have the ability to reach millions of people. People are notorious for channel surfing when commercials hit, causing them to miss your ad completely. But an ad in print cannot be avoided. It also carries more weight and leaves a more lasting impression on the reader than a brief television ad.

These days many people use internet frequently. As the time is passing by the internet user people will increase rapidly. Like the newspaper too here the ad remains for many days and to the advantage here advertisement is very cheap and covers wide across the world. So your MOR Vacations business can go international within a short time span. Signboards are also effective but this will restrict your resort business to the places where you have kept those advertisement boards. MOR Vacations business can be advertised effectively through Radio as well. With each passing day the number of radio listeners as well as the channel number is increasing. Radio is a very strong medium and it too is very cheap to advertise your business. If your mobile service provider is lenient advertisement of resort business can be put through the SMS also. Conducting surveys about the products including some home based business is also a good idea to advertise. But it has a restricted coverage and is effective when you advertise your MOR Vacations business in posters, Newspapers and other mediums also in same time.

But you canat be a flash in the pan. People may be hooked by your catchy advertising, but if they realize that you canat back up the advertising with a quality product they will abandon you. The two critical parts are a good advertising campaign and a quality product or service at the core.

This the second part of my article entitled “Five Questions That Will Bring New Ideas For Your Business”. Do you want more ideas to benefit your business? If so, continue answering the next five questions.

The first five questions were: 1) In the next seven days what can I do that will fill in the blank 2) Regarding marketing strategies, which of them are being used successfully in your industry? 3) What would be five new ways to attain new customers? 4) How do I make it really easy for people to help me and who do I know that could really help my idea take off? 5) For only $10, how could I wow blank?

So without further ado, lets begin with Question six: How could I automate XYZ?

I asked Armand Morin one time, “Where do you get your ideas for all of your products?”

He laughed and said; “It’s easy. I’m lazy, so if something in my business is taking up too much time then I ask myself how could I automate it? Ninety percent of my ideas for products come from recognizing what is draining my time. I really just want to automate everything.”

This is a powerful question, that even the big internet marketers obviously ask themselves. How could you increase your productivity by automating XYZ?

Moving onto question number seven: How could XYZ be simplified?

Have you ever bought your own product and gone through the process your costumers would be doing? Is it a complicated process? So many times I’ve had to go through a horrible process just to buy a product I was interested in.

This happened to me recently actually. I was trying to purchase a server, a new dedicated server. The process the company was trying to make me go through just to purchase made me so frustrated that I ended up giving up and choosing a different company.

So they need to ask the question: How can they simplify the purchasing process for my customers?

You should really think about this question too. By doing so, you will spark a whole bunch of ideas about different processes you can use in your business.

Next question - number eight: Could a new product solve one of the problems experienced by my target market?

Alex Mandossian created a phenomenal piece of software, a phenomenal tool called the Ask Database. For those of you who have it, use it. Constantly ask people what products they’re having. Find out what problems they’re having and solve them.

A creative thinker is always on the hunt for problems because your future depends on solving problems. If you can solve problems for somebody else, you’re always going to be in demand.

Another place I want you to go - write this website down because it is extremely powerful when it comes to finding problems - www.Answer.Google.com.

When you go there, I want you to click on the category that is most applicable to you and your business, and find out what questions people are asking. Those questions are problems.

If you see a common question coming up, that’s a clear indication that many people are probably experiencing the same problem. That presents a need for a product to help solve that problem.

So constantly ask yourself the question: Are there problems my target market is experiencing and how could I solve them with a new product?

Question number nine: Alex Mandossian brought this question up at a recent Big Seminar - How can my current products or services be residualized?

This is the best senario, constantly getting paid every single month, or whatever time frame you lay out. You should be looking at how you can get paid more than once, over and over again. Instead of having to find new customers, you will be benefitting and leveraging your existing customers.

Make sure you ask yourself: How can my current products or services be residualized?

Final question, the last thing I am going to leave you with is; with the products and services I have now, how could I increase their value?

Thinking in the customers favor and frame of mind is really going to get a whole bunch of ideas popping into your head.

When you do that, you’re going to start to generate all kinds of great ideas that work and benefit the customer. And the more you benefit the customer, the more they’re going to come back to you, the more they’re going to spread the word, and the more revenue you’re going to be able to generate from your existing customer base.

That one question helped me get a 100% satisfaction from my very first seminar. Before anybody stepped in to that room, I asked myself: How can I increase the value of what I’m currently offering? And the people who came to that seminar got bonus after bonus after bonus. By the end, they were so wow’d with the experience of being at the Idea Incubator, that I had all of them coming up to me saying, “When is the next one? When is the next one? When is the next one?” And now they’re evangelists.

Heck, at the Big Seminar they were spreading the gospel, if you will, of what a great time they had and what great value they got at that Idea Incubator seminar.

By asking myself how could I increase the value of my current offering, I now have a group of individuals praising my event. This only happened because I asked myself that question and put forth the effort to do so.

When you do that, it just opens up a whole new opportunity area for you, your products, and your services.

That’s it!

I hope you got as much out of this information as I did.

When your stuck for an idea, may the light bulb go off!

1. You could offer your visitors a discount on all the products you sell if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

2. You could offer your visitors a free ebook if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

3. You could offer your visitors a free subscription to your private web site if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

4. You could offer your visitors a free advertisement in your free e-zine if they subscribe.

5. You could offer your visitors a free tangible gift if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

6. You could offer a free automatic entry into your contest or sweepstakes if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

7. You could tell your visitors that you offer original content in your free e-zine.

8. You could tell your visitors to read a sample issue of your free e-zine on your web site.

9. You could offer your visitor’s free software if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

10. You could offer your visitors a free sign up to your affiliate program if they subscribe to your free e-zine.

11. You could offer your visitors a free web service, like free e-mail, if they subscribe to your free e-zine.c

12. You could publish some of your current e-zine subscriber’s testimonials on your web site.

13. You could publish any positive reviews you have received about your free e-zine on your web site.

14. You could tell your visitors what’s going to be published in your next e-zine issue.

15. You could tell your visitors that they have the right to republish your e-zines content on their own web site if they subscribe to your free e-zine

16. You could publish a list of well-known famous, or respected people that have subscribed to your free e-zine.

17. You could tell your visitors what a subscription to your free e-zine is worth in dollars.

18. You could tell your visitors all the major benefits of subscribing to your e-zine.

19. You could tell your visitors how many people have already subscribed to your e-zine.

20. You could tell your visitors that a subscription to your free e-zine is only available for a limited time.

Bulk email marketing is a method of reaching and communicating with current and potential customers. Over the last decade, bulk email marketing has become a big business. Various studies have reported that an average bulk email campaign yields a one to two percent response. One of the plus points of bulk email marketing is that it less expensive than traditional bulk postage mail. There are a few disadvantages to bulk email marketing.

For starters, to grasp the benefits of bulk email marketing one has to realize that it has many similarities to a TV commercial aired during prime time. Many viewers ordinarily turn the sounds of their Televisions low during commercial breaks. Others turn it off completely while still others leave the room. But because of the huge audience reached many a TV commercial ends up generating lots of sales and profits. One can easily enjoy the same benefits of TV commercials from their bulk email marketing.

If you are a marketing savvy guru, then you may feel comfortable writing your own email campaign. Email content in a bulk email internet marketing campaign is concise, to the point and easy to read. Content that is too lengthy runs the risk of losing the interest of your audience.

It is a good point to address the recipient by first name. And finally, the subject line should be short and to the point. Complaints about unsolicited emails from a large number of Internet users may result in blocking your account by the Internet service provider (ISP).

Since spammers do exist, there must be a market in spamming. If you believe this method will work for you, and that there are enough people out there not using spam blockers, then go ahead and try the unsolicited bulk email route. The response rate will be very, very slim, but it might be enough.

Some Wordpress upgrades are due to serious problems.  THIS one is not.  Don’t upgrade if you don’t need to.  Some are finding the catagories wiped out and they now need to rebuild the tables by hand:

http://blog.cumps.be/wordpress-26-upgrade-fix-missing-categories/

They promise you the world with each new guru off but the truth about making money online is kept from you because it takes hard work and commitment - as any business does. The only true path to success is to form or get a plan or blueprint and take the action needed to go from start to finish.

The slightest problem seems to not only blow most people off course but makes them give up altogether! The lack of plan means that there is no drive forward so any problem at all can derail them. So where does it all go so badly wrong?

It’s so hard to keep focussed - You take a decision and decide on a new plan to profit with every good intention to see this one through. Then you hear the message that “you have mail” and the latest guru offer has arrived and you simply must buy it or lose out on a fortune! The old plan is now forgotten and all the work you’ve done on it wasted as you download new pdfs and watch more videos that lead you to a new path. You stay on this new path until the next offer arrives. It’s time to make a change and focus on your future rather then filling the coffers of the next guru.

We train without learning - Many gurus offer online training and seminars that create an instant buzz and the feeling that you too can acheive such results but since the training is focussed on them and their acheivements and not on you and your plans they fade very quickly.

We don’t fully understand and the doubts make us give up - If you’re trying to follow any plan that you don’t fully understand then you’re bound to have doubts. These doubts eat away at your confidence so that the slightest setback is magnified out of all proportion. For example, you see your first sale as a failure because it’s not 100 sales. If only we were given the full true picture that things take time so that we could have more realistic expectations then we may not give up so easily.

We don’t invest the necessary time and effort - In one word that means that we don’t take action! Action is what will drive us forward, step by step to success. Even if you feel frustrated or feel like you’re losing ground you must power through and keep taking action or you are bound to fail again.

Stop! It’s not your fault! Everything you’ve been told about affiliate marketing and making money online is wrong! It’s time to put the cons and scams behind you and take control of your online future.

It’s actually surprisingly simple to find a route map to success.

1. Choose a product to promote - I’m going to recommend one but feel free to choose something else.

2. Read it and then read it again. Take lots of notes to ensure that nothing gets missed.

3. Break down the plan into a detailed task list - This approach means that nothing will be forgotten or missed out.

4. There are many different approaches you can now take. Either start at the top of the list, start with some easy tasks or tackle them in a mixture of the other two. The important thing is that you keep going and get those tasks crossed off.

5. Do a task whenever you have time. This approach will make you very efficient.

6. Just keep going and then have a big push to finish the list.

7. Take the time out to celebrate the first sign up to an autoresponder and that first sale and other landmarks.

So the data has been checked.  The search counts shown on the Google External Tool are DEAD ON ACCURATE!  Ed Dale says so.  So get some keyword research done while the getting is good.   Al that way down to 16 searches per month.

That’s a very SWEET substitute for the loss of Overture/Yahoo counts.