Archive for July, 2008

Whether you are a consumer or a business owner, most of us will use a merchant account service. When you make an Internet purchase with a debit, credit, or gift card most stores require a merchant account to process your electronic payment. The merchant account allows buyers and sellers to use and accept non-cash payments for goods and services.

An Internet business can not take cash payments, but they can take checks. However, they will be losing a lot of potential customers by accepting only check payments. It is also safer for the consumer to use a credit card when purchasing on the Internet.

For new businesses, I highly recommend Google Checkout for your merchant account services. Google Checkout is a checkout process that you provide on your web site to enable your customers to buy from you quickly and securely, using a single user name and password. For a small business, Google Checkout is particularly advantageous, because it helps legitimize your brand.

With Google Checkout, there are no monthly, setup, or gateway service fees. When a purchase is made they charge the merchant 2% + $0.20 per transaction. However, If you advertise with Google AdWords, you will also be eligible for free transaction processing for some or all of your Google Checkout sales each month. For every $1 you spend on AdWords each month, you can process $10 in sales the following month for free through Google Checkout.

If you aren’t an AdWords advertiser, learn more about AdWords and sign up to earn free transaction processing with Google Checkout. The more you spend to promote your business through AdWords, the more you save on transaction processing fees with Google Checkout.

A merchant account service is critical for a successful business. It is a low risk way to make and accept payments electronically. If you are trying to establish your own business, you should make it a priority to have a merchant account . This will give you the proper payment processing options for the convenience of you and your customers.

Do you want to succeed in business? Life? Parenthood? Marriage? Friendships?

Obviously, all of us would quickly say YES! Such a dumb question for someone to ask us! I didn’t ask the question to make any of us look dumb, but to get our thoughts on the right track.

Certainly, we want success in all areas of life. My suggestion is that you select outstanding advisors to help you when faced with tough decisions in every area you face, particularly where you are about to make big decisions without knowledge or experience.

We are primarily concerned about business decisions in these discussions; however, some of us go into business the same way we go into marriage…no experience…no training…no education…poor role models …and then we are expected to bring happiness to another person to whom we are now married.

Usually, we try to do this by changing the other person into what we think they should be, while they are trying to do the same to us. It does not work! Most of us will never change! We don’t want to change for one thing and if we did, it would already be done.

ADVISORS are extremely important. You must have them to be successful. There are 4 important Persons you need to select BEFORE you begin your business:

LAWYER ACCOUNTANT BANKER INSURER

• Your order form should be easily found
• Make it hassle-free to complete.
• Minimize the chances of them getting lost.
• Put a prominent link to your order page from every page on your site.

Make people will feel confident about buying from you. An easy way, to do this, is to offer a money back guarantee. Also, make it easy for your customers to contact someone if they have problems after purchasing.

Additionally, you can add customer testimonials, this will help them feel safe about buying something from a total stranger on the other end of the Internet.

In short, it would be very sad if you marketed and sold well to a prospect and something goes wrong when they are ready to buy. Eliminate problems and maximize your profits!

Yesterday, we discussed how to Create an E-Mail Distribution List in Outlook. Today we explain “Bcc” or Blind Carbon Copy.

“Bcc” allows you to send an e-mail without showing everyone the e-mail address of the recipients. It also is the polite thing to do. This way you’re not inadvertently sharing a person’s e-mail with a group of people they may not know, by including them in a mass email. You can also use the “Bcc” field to quietly notify a third party that a message has been sent.

Use of “Bcc” for long lists of addresses is important for two reasons:

1. It protects the privacy of those to whom you send a message, and
2. It makes forwarded e-mail less confusing to read

When using “Bcc” add your own e-mail in the To: field to ensure yours is the only address shown.

All e-mail programs support “Bcc”, but it may not be the default option.

• In Outlook 2007, click “New” for a new e-mail, then under the Options Tab click the “Show Bcc” button

• In Outlook 2003, click “New” for a new e-mail, then click the little down arrow to the right of “Options” and select “Bcc”.

Once selected, “Bcc” will be available for all new e-mails.

Here are some suggestions for using the different fields when sending e-mail.

• To: Add recipients who you are directly communicating with. There is nothing wrong with a list of e-mails, as long as there is no problem with each recipient being able to see the other recipient’s e-mail address

• Cc: Known as Carbon Copy. Use “Cc”: to send a copy of the e-mail to recipients not required to participate in the communication. It allows the To: recipients to known that someone else is also receiving the e-mail

• Bcc: Blind Carbon Copy is where you put e-mail addresses that should not be seen by other recipients.

Create an E-Mail Distribution List in Outlook

Do you send email to the same people over and over again? Instead of typing out the recipient’s names, create a distribution list.

1. Go to File
2. Click New
3. Click Distribution List
   The Distribution List window will open up.
4. Give a name to the list, then press “Select Members”.
   The Select Members window will open up.
5. Double Click on the names you wish to add.
6. After the contacts have been added to the members field click OK.
   This will close the Select Members window.

If you wish to add someone who is not on your contact list:

1. Press “Add New” in the distribution list window.
   The Add New Member window will open.
2. Enter the name of new member in the Display Name field.
3. Enter the e-mail address of the new member in the E-mail Address field.
4. Press OK and the new member will be added to your Distribution List.
5. Save and Close the Distribution List window.

When you want to e-mail this group just type in the name of the List rather than each recipients name.

When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally to serve its purpose. Here are four important rules of thumb to observe to make sure your website performs well.

1) Do Not Use Splash Pages

Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like “welcome” or “click here to enter”. In fact, they are just that — pretty pictures with no real purpose. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the “back” button! Give them the value of your site up front without the splash page.

2) Do Not Use Excessive Banner Advertisements

Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable website real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant links into your content, and let your visitors feel that they want to buy instead of being pushed to buy.

3) Have a Simple and Clear Navigation

You have to provide a simple and very straightforward navigation menu so that even a young child will know how to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus or multi-tiered dropdown menus. Also, make sure that your visitors can access any major pages from your site from any other page in your site. If your visitors don’t know how to navigate, they will leave your site.

4) Avoid Using Music on Your Site

If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site, reading your content, you will want to make sure they’re not annoyed by some music looping over and over on your website. If you insist on adding music, make sure they have some control over it — volume or muting controls would work fine.

Following these rules does not guarantee your site will be a success, but it will give your visitors a much more pleasurable experience.

You don’t have to be a brain surgeon to know the obvious. Unfortunately, there is sadness to how easily folks are suckered. Led astray. Betrayed. So easy, yet often it’s only hindsight that wakes us up. Certainly, it’s NOT going to happen to you.

Is it a franchise? Starting a business from scratch? Buying a business that is already successful? It doesn’t really matter. There is NO GUARANTEE for you to start or continue a business successfully. Sometimes there are underlying assets; or connections; or special knowledge; or lots of money (that you don’t know about!)

Are you getting the picture? You must DIG DEEP into the past history of any business you plan to own. It may not even be a business. You could even be thinking about getting married (you really need to look hard!) Marriage and business have some of the same basic issues. You have to work very hard to make either of them successful.

Just don’t go into business too quickly. Do I need to give the same advice when it comes to marriage? Both can be the most wonderful decision you have ever made or it can be the WORST decision you have ever made. I’ll pray that you do your homework and due diligence before you JUMP!

My own experience tells me I’m giving you good advice. You are taking on a PARTNER when you enter your own business. Don’t think so? If you borrow any money from the bank (this is your FIRST partner!) Your family is your SECOND partner (you will either be happy or sad) and will either make your day or give you grief from the git-go. Everyone has to AGREE that you are doing the right thing.

Back to the franchise. Too many folk think that buying a franchise will guarantee their success. Nothing could be further from the truth. As a matter of fact, I have owned 2 different franchises in my career. Both were losers. I lost money. A bundle of it. Just know that it is not automatic! Too often there are underlying reasons for somebody’s success.

A few more ideas to think over BEFORE you step on a mine field…..

BUSINESS TIP: LISTEN! You may not like what you hear, but it may just be the very best advice YOU NEED….none of us are as SMART as we often THINK….try a little “humble pie” before you end up with a big black crow. TEST,TEST,TEST the details for hidden manna from above……

Here are Five Ways to get Web Traffic at Low Cost

When it comes to making money from your Website there is one rule that must be obeyed. That rule is that you must be able to generate a steady stream of Visitors. It stands to reason that you will not be able to make any money if no-one arrives at your site to see what you have to offer.

This has been the demise of many a fledgling online business. They have tried but without success. It is a fact that you require money to advance an income generating Website. It is also the fact that it takes capital to make money. And this is where many have failed. They have not had the cash to invest in getting traffic to their site.

HOWEVER

Generating traffic to your website does not take a huge bundle of cash if you know how to go about it.

It is true that the ‘Big Guns’ can drive huge amounts of traffic to their online businesses by investing very large amounts of money on sophisticated advertising campaigns and the many different marketing schemes available and even by using gimmicks. For them this is definitely worth the money they spend after all this is what has got them to the point they are today – with high volumes of traffic and huge profits they have become online Mega sites.

But don’t be discouraged. You don’t have to spend mega bucks to succeed if you don’t have the necessary resources. Sadly there have been many people who have ‘lost the very shirt off their backs’ because they have depended on using high cost ways of promoting their website when they really could not afford it.

This does not need to be the case as there are several ways to generate traffic to your website without spending the fortune that you can’t afford or do not have. Here are 5 Ways to Generate Traffic at Low Cost.

These methods could vastly improve your website traffic statistics. If only a small percentage of visitors convert to becoming clients it works well especially if your traffic is way beyond your present levels.

1. Get Good Quality Links pointing to your site: Well how do you do this? – Exchanging links is still a useful method. It is very rare that you come across a site that has no link to another site. Exchanging Links enables web-masters to expose their site to the net more readily and thus ensuring that their site comes to the fore in the public eye. Perhaps a more desired linking method these days is One way Linking. This is where you encourage other good quality, high ranking websites to link to your site. One excellent way of doing this is submitting your site to as many Directory sites as you can. There are usually several Directories in most niche subjects.

Most online marketers are willing to exchange links and Directories will usually accept your submission but a VERY IMPORTANT factor is that you link to ‘relevant’ sites i.e. ones that fit with what you are promoting. It will be detrimental if you link with a company promoting ‘pig food’ if you are trying to sell high quality jewelry or if you submit your site to a Directory promoting ‘belly dance costumes’ if your niche is gardening. Your traffic will not appreciate that.

It is important that linking sites have a common purpose, a continuity in the provision of information or a service that interests their target traffic. If you ignore this factor the Search engines won’t like it either and you will fail to make any headway.

One of the key benefits of linking strategies is that the Search engines put a high significance on your linking popularity. They see all the ‘back links’ and consider you to be an important site to be reckoned with. As a result they increase your ranking and you move up their listings. As you move higher in the rankings your site will be seen by more surfers and you will get more ‘organic’ traffic that doesn’t cost you anything.

2. Write Your own Articles and Submit them to E-zines – If you search the internet you will find many online encyclopedias and e-zines which allow you to submit articles for free. If you cannot write yourself there are my freelance writers who, for a small fee, are willing to write articles for you. However if you want to save money you can write them yourself.

Once again it is important to stress that any article you write should coincide with the theme of your site. Everyone has expertise on something – write about what you know. If you do this those that read your articles will ‘feel’ your knowledge and will eagerly visit your site. It is a good idea to write articles that contain guidelines or tips on the subject matter of your website. Write an interesting, information packed, article and they will be hurrying to your site for more.

All that you need to do then, and this is very important, is to provide a resource box at the end of your article that links them back to your website. You could write a little about your site or you could simply place a link.

3. Traffic Exchange – What is ‘Traffic Exchange’? The principle of traffic exchange services is that a website set up for the purpose receives submissions from web-masters that join the network. The person who submitted the website then earns credits by browsing other member sites on the exchange program. These credits then allow the web-master to have his site viewed by other members in the system. This means that all of the sites involved have an increases in the number of visitors to their sites.

There may be a cost involved but very often these web exchange sites are free. Generally traffic exchange programs are used by small business owners who are working on a low budget and need free or low cost advertising. And they can be a good source of traffic if used correctly.

There is a note of caution however. You should choose carefully which traffic exchange site you use. It has been said that the usefulness of some of these programs is doubtful as sites are forgotten by many people once the time limit is up. Also some say it is risky to use these as it can get you banned ~from some advertising packages and some traffic exchanges use forms of advertising that are banned. However if you choose carefully there shouldn’t be any problem.

4. Create a Newsletter – Your first thought might be that this sounds like hard work. It is true that you do need to use a lot of articles to successfully build a Newsletter. But contrary to what you may think this is not difficult.

There are many websites and copywriters who are more than eager to provide you with free articles. Their only stipulation is that you place their name at the foot of their article. Your Newsletter brings you more traffic and gives the copywriter more advertising.

Your letter gets passed around and as it does more and more people become aware of your internet presence. Producing a Newsletter is great as, when folk sign up, it builds an ‘opt-in’ emailing list of interested parties who can revisit your site time and time again.

5. Online Communities and Forum Memberships – Joining these sites does not cost you anything but your time. You share your expertise and knowledge on your website – why not with online communities and Forums. As before, choose Forums that deal with the same niche or subject as your own website.

Publish your two cents worth and amaze other members with your knowledge about your particular subject. This has the effect of building your reputation. Then as your reputation grows so does the reputation of your website. Your Website eventually becomes known for the honest and reputable business that you have known it is all along. It will then begin to be trusted and visited by many relevant visitors who, because they have come to trust you will take advantage of what you offer.

So there you have it. Five very useful ways to increase traffic to your site. On Ebooks in Abundance I am using all five strategies to great effect. Why don’t YOU Start today, don’t delay and you will definitely see your business grow.

ShopRMall.com Launches Custom Experience
for iPhone, iPhone 3G, and iPod Touch

ShopRMall.com launches what could potentially be a new trend in mobile commerce, a new site that allows shoppers to browse and purchase products directly from their iPhone.

Charlotte, NC, July 17, 2008 — ShopRMall.com, a shopping portal that offers direct links, coupons, and special offers for online stores, has launched iphone.shoprmall.com, an iPhone/iPod Touch version of the ShopRMall.com web site. The new site includes daily coupons and specialoffers along with easy access to over 1,000 name brand and specialty stores, all from a familiar iPhone interface.

Stores in ShopRMall.com include The Apple Store, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Fingerhut, JCPenney, Overstock.com, Staples, Amazon.com, Bowflex, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Brookstone.

This is not ShopRMall.com’s first foray into the mobile realm. In 2001, Eric J. Katowitz, a professional multi-platform engineer and graphic designer with Cire Web Site Design & Hosting, along with his cutting edge team of experts, launched mobile.shoprmall.com for various mobile devices and cell phones, including those running the Blackberry, Palm, and Windows Mobile platforms. That site is a coupons only version that allows users to browse the latest special offers, but not purchase products directly.

ShopRMall.com and Cire Web Site Design & Hosting, owned by Cire Computer Productions, Inc., an e-commerce technology and interactive services provider, offers what could potentially be a new trend in mobile commerce. The keystone of this trend is the ability to allow shoppers to browse and purchase products directly from each merchant’s online shopping web site via their iPhone or iPod Touch.

You are about to begin a journey into the future. It matters not where you have been in the past. All of us are on the same track toward home. However, watch out for the turns in the road. How you arrive at your destination is the key.

What am I talking about?? It could be marriage! A new job or position within your company. Maybe you’re taking a trip or vacation. Maybe you have just decided it’s about time that you owned your OWN BUSINESS. Everyone seems to think owning your own business is the key. Make lots of money and arrive on the golden road to happiness.

TRUE OR FALSE?? Only time will give you the answer. DO I TAKE A PARTNER? Over these next few weeks my articles will take a look. Some of the pros and cons. Stay with me.

Have you ever looked at the beautiful home on top of the ridge? Could have cost a cool fortune to build. Maybe a million $$$ or two? Did you see the beautiful cars driving up the road? Parking in front of the house? Big circling driveway? A Mercedes in front? Probably Moms’ car! Dads’ BMW behind followed by the sons’ Jaguar sedan. Little sister has a red convertible with all the goodies. WOW!!

Something to get excited about and wonder…IF that could just be MY home sitting on the next mountaintop ridge. Big white columns across the front porch. Fancy cars out front. Country club membership. Golf club privileges. Vacations on the newest cruise ships. On and on we can build pictures in our minds about the future we’d like to enjoy. If you don’t like to drive, add a chauffeur too. Cellular phones, videos and color TV’s in the car for keeping up with the latest news and movies. Our imagination could dream for days on end.

Do I know anything about all this stuff?? YOU BET! I have spent the last 40 years in the real world of business! You can benefit from my experience as we share ideas together. Every week I want to bring you helpful thoughts to consider BEFORE making some of the same mistakes I did. Fortunately, I have made some good decisions too…I’ll share them with you also….stay tuned!

Business Tip: Dreams can turn into YOUR reality. Just remember that LIFE is a JOURNEY, not a destination. Yes, our GOAL is the PLACE we are trying to reach. Our CHALLENGE is answering the “HOW TO” get there! Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Take your time. Better late than sorry. LOOK before you LEAP!