Webmaster Papers








The Power Is In The Pipes: How To Get Maximum Leverage From Your Website


What is the most important part of your online business?Many people would say: "my website". And that'sunderstandable ? it's the most visible part of an internetbusiness.

But the real power in your online business is email. It'sthe ability to reach your database of contacts at the clickof a button. The efficiency of your email pipeline willdetermine how much money your business makes.

Your website is just a way of building your mailing list -by collecting the email addresses of your visitors.

In fact, we're not talking about one list, but several.Here are the lists that I maintain ? they're all people whoat one time or another have visited my websites:

- people who have bought my products- people who have signed up to receive my articles- people who have joined my affiliate program- people who have signed up for my email course- people who have joined my newsletter

So why are these lists so important?

Because most of your visitors won't buy on the firstcontact. Statistics show that most people will need to seeyour message 7 times before they make a purchase. So ifyou're not collecting the email addresses of your visitors,you are losing out on a lot of sales.

But there is one list in particular that is like gold. It'syour list of previous customers. These people arepredisposed to buying from you. In fact, some businessesmake 80% of their sales from previous customers.

All well and good - but what do I do with these lists?

Here are some ideas:

- announce your latest product to your customer list

- announce your latest product to your affiliates list

- send your latest article to your articles list

- announce your latest product in your newsletter

- publish your latest article in your newsletter

- announce 'related' products to your customer list

- send your latest article to your affiliates list so they can use

it to promote your products

For each list that you manage you will need (1) anautoresponder account or an autoresponder script and (2) away of capturing your visitor's email address.

(1) Autoresponder Accounts

An autoresponder account gives you the ability to manage alist without installing software - it's all done on aremote website. Most autoresponder accounts will give you:

- an email address for subscribing- an HTML form for subscribing- seven or more follow-up messages- a confirmation email to you every time someone joins- the ability to broadcast messages to your list- the ability to personalize your messages- database of your prospects- online stats

Here are some sites that offer autoresponder accounts:

http://www.aweber.com/

http://www.getresponse.com/

http://www.responders.com/

http://www.proautoresponder.com/

http://www.www.roibot.com/

http://www.infogeneratorpro.com/

http://www.replypro.net/

http://www.auto-responder.co.uk/

Now, autoresponder accounts cost between $17 and $20 permonth. And with most autoresponder services you can onlymanage one list per account. So if you are managing 5lists, that quickly adds up to a hefty monthly bill.

But there are a few services that allow you to managemultiple lists with one account. Here are some of them:

http://www.rapidreply.net/http://www.ezmailpro.com/http://www.autorespond-it.com/http://www.1automationwiz.com/http://www.royal-responder.com/

(2) Capturing Email Addresses

The most popular way to get new subscribers to your list isa 'subscribe form' that pops up when your website loads. Iget 25 to 30 new subscribers a day using this technique.The HTML code for the subscribe form usually comes withyour autoresponder account.

Another way to invite visitors to join your list is an'alert box'. An alert box is a small gray dialogue box thatpops up when someone visits your website. It usually sayssomething like: "Please subscribe to my Newsletter. 5 FreeeBooks when you join". It's impossible to ignore an alertbox - you have to either close it or click OK to continue.

Alert boxes have two advantages over subscribe forms.Firstly, there's no form to fill in, so it's much easierfor people to join your list. People who have switched froma subscribe form to an alert box report 3 to 5 times asmany subscribers.

Secondly, alert boxes capture only "real" email addresses -the email address from the visitor's client browser. Youend up with very few Hotmail and Yahoo addresses, whichmeans you'll have a much more responsive list. For moreinformation about alert boxes, visit:http://www.optinlightning.com/

So to sum up, use your website to build several optinmailing lists and you'll have a private audience of peopleyou can market to over and over again - it's the key torunning a successful online business.

------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Southon has been writing for the Internet for over 3
years. He has shown hundreds of webmasters how to use this
simple technique to build a successful online business. Click
here to find out more: http://ezine-writer.com/
------------------------------------------------------------

RELATED ARTICLES


Content Management
More and more businesses are recognizing the importance of content management when it comes to their websites. Website content is more important than ever before, and as the Internet matures and changes, it is likely be become even more important. Many smart companies are beginning to make their website content the centerpiece of their Internet presence.
Earning From Your Website
Before you start building your site, ask yourself "WHY?". Why did you decide to build your own web site. How are you going to earn money? Creating simple homepage will not get you any money at all nor you receive lots of visitors. Your website must be the part of your business. It also must be the part of your business plan.
The Cost Of A Web Site
Just starting out, you can start with a simple informational site, which is all most need initially, and build up to a fuller site (e-commerce and/or interactive) when you can afford it.
Remember This When Building A New Site - Beginners Guide
I recently helped my mom to launch a website (www.mom2me.com) to publish some of her recipes and it was probably the best wake up call I have had this year. It dawned on me that I actually do not know nearly as much as I thought I did. In fact it was evident that some things are best left to the experts.
Ecommerce for Beginners
Like most average persons, I wanted some extra money to supplement my regular income. I had considered a part time second job at times, but hated that option because it would take me away from the family, make me more tired and probably just pay minimum wage. I also wanted to be able to work from home.
Preventing Repeat Form Submission Using PHP Sessions
We've all seen those messages on some websites warning not to click a button more than once or negative consequences, like paying a bill twice, may result. Sometimes we can cause these problems by hitting the back or refresh buttons. In this article I will explain a methodology whereby a site can ensure each form is submitted only once, thereby demonstrating that such warnings are unnecessary and, depending on the nature of the problems caused, worth repairing immediately. Let's begin by taking a look at the process we are studying: Form Submission. As pedantic as it may seem, it will be worthwhile to detail each of the steps in this process: Visitor requests a page from the server which has a form on it.Server retrieves form and sends to user.User enters data on form and submits to server.Server processes form data and returns resultant page. The scenario we now need to analyze is when the user re-triggers a previous form submission process. What we need to find or create is something which changes during the form submission process which does not depend on the specific form being submitted and which we can tell changed. That was a loaded sentence which fully details our solution, so let's break it down. Find or create something which changes during the form submission process,does not depend on the specific form being submitted, andwe can tell changed.
Why a CSS Website Layout Will Make You Money
Although CSS layouts have been around for years, they haven't become so commonplace until recently. This was basically due to limited browser support (especially from Netscape 4) - nowadays though, CSS 2.0 (which introduced positioning) is compatible with over 99% of browsers out there (check out the browser stats over at http://www.thecounter.com/stats/2004/August/browser.php).
Why to Have a Website for Your Company
After having decided to start a business, the next thing that arrives in your mind is How to market the Product/Service? How to create a brand? How to recruit people? How & where to advertise? etc? Next is creating departments like Marketing, Operations, Advertising, Branding and Human Resource. You need some way to represent each department?
Web Success Secret - Keep Your Visitors Interested
Visitors to your site come looking for information or solutions to their problems. They will remain there if they find what they are looking for. Otherwise there is always that Back Button to the search engine to click another site.
1 Simple Solution to All Internet Marketers about Their Website Design Needs
It is an undeniable fact that not everybody is keen and knowledgeable to create an above average looking website. It is also true that it is something learnable, but it might take a certain learning time span in order to grasp the minimum ability to create an over than average website. Everybody from any field, regardless of their objectives, realizes that a website presence is extremely essential for a bigger exposure, and pretty much common to see buyers chasing after the cheapest and the least time consuming offers.
Nonsense! Why Do I Need a Website?
"I don't sell anything online, I don't advertise online, in fact I don't really even know how to use a computer... why should I pay for a website?"
Make Your Own Brand!
There are millions and millions of websites on the Internet. You NEED to be different in some way from all of them! If you could get a visitor to your website, that means nothing. Only returning visitors must be counted. When they return the second time, "branding" starts to occur. Huge companies advertise not because they want to provide you with information about their product. They do that because they're trying to "brand" its name and image. Actually, it is the brand you are paying the money for when you buy something from "Adidas", "Nike" or "Coca-cola". People will actually be willing to pay for the brand they know, so make it as bright and memorable as possible. However, it is useful to remember that too complex logo will definitely slip out of peoples' minds.
Effective Webdesign
The Basics
Setting Up A CGI Script On Your Web Site
Before you set up any scripts you will need some information about your server. You can get this by e-mailing your web hosting provider. It's good to have these on hand before you try to set up a script. You may not need all of the information for each script, but some of the larger scripts demand more information to work. The information you may need is:
Getting One-way Inbound Links: the 5 Major Strategies
With search engines putting a damper on direct reciprocal links, the hunt for the elusive one-way inbound link is on.
Whats Your Business Online Attitude?
This article was prompted by some customer support work I was involved in for a private members site. One of the paid subscription members wanted someone to look over his website and give an opinion of what we thought of its design.
Website Imperatives and Solutions
When you take a look at the most visited sites on the internet, what hits you in the face? Change, growth, new content. In a sense, a search engine is the perfect web site. By it's very nature, it grows and changes continuously and moment by moment adds new content. But, most of us are never going to build a Yahoo or a Google. The competition at that level is horrific.
How to Maximize the Value of Every Visitor to Your Website
While most marketers are beginning to understand the critical importance of maximizing conversion rates, few are tracking or working to maximize another critical measurement of website effectiveness.
Topics to Add When Creating an Alternate and Modern Medicine Web Directory
Alternate medicine finds its own place in the hearts and minds worldwide and has a separate following to back its existence. There are many subcategories that could be added to the modern and alternate medicine website directories. Although the list below is not exhaustive it is a good start. After looking at multiple directories in the web that just places everything into one big category "health related websites". I thought it's time to present some categories in this vibrant segment of the web; there are lot's of websites in this category which need a separate home in the directories. Even in the High PR and traffic rich directories finding the right websites gets tough by browsing the whole category. For your reference a single line definition obtained from wikipedia is placed under each category.
User Interface Design: Key to Achieve Best Web Development
From early days of www, the Internet sites that are added day by day are increasing tremendously. When you will consider this pool of web, may be they are about computers, industry, entertainment, search engines, fashion, organizational or even individual, all of these sites are concerned about one major part of web development apart from the logic or programming efforts behind it is 'User Interface Design'.