Archive for January, 2008

If you sell products online, here’s a question you need to answer: How do your customers know your products are the right ones for them?

One way is to take a super successful idea from Amazon’s website, and let your customers review the products you offer.

I can tell you from personal experience that I pay more attention to customer reviews than almost anything else when making a purchase (and I bet you do, too.)

For example, if I want to purchase a book on beekeeping, Amazon returns 2,396 results. How am I supposed to pick out the right book for me out of 2,396, when I can’t even glance through them?

Easy. I look at the customer reviews.

If it weren’t for them, I’d be too confused to make any purchase.

But with the reviews, I feel like I’m getting real, unbiased info from people who have actually ordered and read the book.

So what are you selling? Healthy snacks? Pet supplies? Info products?

No matter what it is, you can let your customers leave reviews on the products they’ve purchased by using the service at http://www.powerreviews.com.

Power Reviews can capture and display customer reviews that are integrated into your online store.

Not only can these customer reviews convert more of your traffic into buyers, it can potentially also attract more traffic in the form of shoppers looking for unbiased reviews to help them in their buying decisions.

Wondering if it really works?

The University of Nebraska did a study that showed reviews increased sales by 36%. You can read the details here:

http://www.powerreviews.com/social-shopping/clients/casestudy.html

Customer reviews are essentially word of mouth advertising, and we don’t need a study to know that’s been working for centuries.

Here’s a no brainer way to build a successful site: “borrow” a super-successful idea from one market and use it in another market.

Here’s a great example…

You’ve heard of MySpace, right?

(If not, you’re not on the Internet, which means you’re not reading this

So…

Why not…

MySpace for pets???

Check out http://www.petbrags.com

Pet lover’s can create their own pet’s webpage for free, including photos and video.

There’s a great community “feel” to the entire site, including blogs, forums, groups and chat.

And the site is child friendly and safe. The owner monitors content, welcomes new members, and watches out for children.

If the site gets enough users and traffic, monetizing it will be no problem.

In fact, Pet Brags could become a multi-million dollar site.

And it’s not even an original idea!

So, what successful ideas can you “borrow” from other industries to use in your own niche?

Makes you think, doesn’t it?

As you go through your day, keep asking yourself…

How can I apply this (whatever you’re reading, seeing, thinking, hearing) to my business?

Write down the ideas, no matter how silly.

Keep up the process, and I’ll wager that within a month (if not sooner) you’ll have at least 3 million dollar ideas yourself.

Determining the pricing for a membership site is one of the most difficult parts when creating a membership site. While there is a definite relationship between what you provide (quality counts!) and how much you can charge, the perceived value of your product is also very important in determining how much you can charge.

In most cases you can charge more than you think. Don’t undervalue your offering because of self doubts or fear of failure. Look around and see what others in your market are charging for their product. Seeing what has worked for others is the best market research you can do. Pricing too low can kill your site, because your offer is perceived as low quality. At the same time, you don’t want to price yourself out of your market either.

Picturing the pricing structure of your site and related offerings as a funnel can be very useful. The top of the funnel, the large, wide, open end, is your entry level offer. This is normally a very low price offering, designed to bring people into your site. You want to provide a basic but valuable service to start with. Maybe you will target beginners with a two week trial for $3.00. What you actually offer will depend on your niche.

Once you have them in your funnel you can offer them something else: an upgraded membership, access to additional content, exclusive services…for a higher price. Again, what you offer will depend heavily on you what your niche is. The point of the funnel is that as your members upgrade, you can offer higher priced services and products to a targeted audience.
Instead of a trial membership you may wish to offer several different membership options at different price points. For example: a one month membership at $9.99, a three month membership at $24.99 and a yearly membership at $99.00. You can then tailor a funnel to each group.

Having these different prices available will help convert people into customers. Someone who may not be able to afford a lump sum payment of $99 will be glad to pay the monthly fee of $9.99. And someone who doesn’t want to be charged monthly will go ahead and make the lump sum payment, just to get it over with.

The number and type of services and backend offerings you can sell to your members is limited only by your ingenuity. If you are hesitant about an offering, why not offer it as a special and see how it works.

Should You Have an Affiliate Program for Your Joint Venture Project ?

You have affiliates for your business; why not put them to business for your joint venture project, too?

Affiliates are already enthusiastic and skilled at selling your products. They’re familiar with your target market and they already have systems in place to drive business and sales. When you incorporate your affiliates into the promotion of your JV project, you’re expanding the reach of your project and increasing the potential profits.

Additionally, if your partner has affiliates for their business, then you’re potentially increasing your reach and opportunities exponentially.

So what materials do you give your affiliates to motivate them to sell your JV project?

• A link back to your site and some form of advertising, such as a banner or side bar.
• Detailed information about your product, including its selling points, what makes it different from other products, and its value. If possible, provide them with testimonials from your customers.
• Ad copy, free reprint articles, email promos, free brandable reports, which affiliates can brand with their own link, and even a free e-book.
• Make sure to let your affiliates know the strengths and selling points of your partner, too. That way they can use the information in their own marketing tools and methods.
• A special website where they can send customers to help differentiate your JV product from your other products.
• Consider giving them an extra incentive to really promote your JV project. Potential incentives could be a contest. Give the affiliate with the most sales a cash incentive and you’ll really boost sales.

The more tools you give your affiliates the better. Make sure to keep in touch with your affiliates for the duration of the promotion and give them tips on how they can improve their sales conversions.

Some business owners go as far as to provide their affiliates with a separate joint venture website template and full sales copy for their product on a warm-up page. This may be worth the extra effort if you believe it will boost sales.

The more excitement you build around a joint venture partnership, the more potential profits there are. Your affiliate team can be one of the best tools you have to create this high level of excitement and anticipation for your joint venture project, and they can be the key to real profits. Don’t forget them!

Keyword Elite is a keyword research tool that teaches you how to make money with your website by using keyword lists. It shows how to find low cost and high traffic keywords, how to create a keyword list, how to analyze that list and how to know what the competition is doing in regards to those keywords and phrases.

Keyword Elite Review
Have you ever heard someone say they make a lot of money on the Internet and hardly do anything? Pay per click ads, such as Google Adsense and Adwords, is one of the biggest ways they do it. Keyword Elite helps to find keywords that are popular search terms to help bring visitors to your site.

This software will show you how to generate high paying keyword lists. This can make you bundles of money without working you to the bone. Keyword Elite makes building a 1,000 word list in a matter of a few minutes easy.

It will show you how to find those hidden keywords that can generate money yet few people know are there. It shows you how to create content on your website that has the focus of these keywords, but doesn’t overload it with those phrases. With just a click you can create article web page templates and great content from keywords and what can be learned from Keyword Elite.

This software is full of projects that can help you increase your Adsense income like you would never imagine. You are constantly given new information on how to have continued success with keyword lists.

This software is very user friendly. So many of these types of software are hard to install, follow and use. Not this software. It’s a piece of cake all the way around.

If you’re looking to increase income from your site, I highly suggest looking into this Keyword Elite Software. Without visitors a website will never make any money, but with Keyword Elite, you’ll know the phrases that will bring lots of targeted visitors and increase sales too.

End of KeywordElite Review