How To Convert Your Blog To Email

If you look at the right sidebar of the blog you'll notice that I've just added a subscribe form. Now this is not just any old subscribe form because it does something special. You see, when I add a new blog entry those who've signed up via this form will automatically get an email telling them of the new article without me doing anything. In other words, the subscribe form on my blog works much like an RSS feed.

Now you're probably wondering why I've added this type of form to my blog since people can get blog update notices via the RSS feeds already available. The answer is - because a lot of people don't use RSS readers.

So how can you add a special form like this to your blog?

There are 2 ways:

1. You can use a free service like feedburner.com


2. You can use a paid service like aweber.com

Now I won't go into the details of setting up a form via a free service since I used my aweber account to generate my form. However I will tell you why I went with aweber rather than a free service.

• As a respected online responder service I know aweber will make the mailings can-spam compliant. The others may also be can-spam compliant but I don't know that as a fact.


• I have control of the subscriber list. I can email them, delete them, move them, etc. With a free service I may have access to the list so I can move it but I can't do anything else with it.

Now if you choose to add a blog to email form to your blog aweber has a video to help you get it set up. Unfortunately blogger.com has changed since the video was made so here are the 2 important things you'll need to know when you set up your form.

1. If you're using the new blogger you won't see a site feed as shown in the video. You'll need to get a site feed and I used feedburner.com to get mine. You can then enter your feed address created by feedburner.
   


2. To add your form you no longer have to edit the blogger html template. You can simply use the add page element feature to add the code to your sidebar.

To learn how to automatically send email updates about your new blogger posts to your blog subscribers watch this video.

And for those of you hosting your own WordPress blogs, you can read the instructions for setting up the broadcast feature for your blog here.

To Your Success,
Susan

Feel free to leave a comment and share your thoughts about this tip here.

Tags: blog, email, broadcast blog updates, convert rss to email

"Are You Boring?"

If you're writing classified ads, articles, blog posts and emails and still not making any sales or getting anyone to join your list the reason could be ...

You're boring! Well, not you personally but rather your writing.

I know you don't want to use a lot of hype or make false claims but still ...

You do want to get your stuff read.

In last week's tip item #6 said, "Focus on your headline because your headline is…an ad for your ad. It's your headline that convinces people to read your advertising or not."

Let's expand that item to include things like articles, blog posts and email. In other words, when writing an article or blog entry, focus on your title. Likewise, when sending an email, focus on your subject line. Titles and subject lines are what gets people to read your articles and open your email.

Let's look at a couple of examples to see what I mean.

Say you write an article about the importance of sleep while trying to lose weight. You could write a title like:

"The Importance of Sleep To Weight Loss"

Now if someone is looking specifically for the importance of sleep to weight loss and yours is the only article they find then you've got a reader. But what about all those who are just looking for a good article on weight loss and they come across an article titled:

"Lose Weight Sleeping More"

Don't you think more people will stop to read the article?

Now what if you're sending out an email about a new product you're hoping your readers will buy. You and 10,000 other online marketers are flooding everyone's inbox and you're all using the same subject line:

"Would You Turn Down 10,000 Subscribers?"

How many of these emails do you think are going to get opened and read?

So why not shake things up a little and use a different subject line like:

"Have Your Own Giveaway Next Month" or
"Why The Big Boys Hate Giveaway Manager 2"

Think more people will open those emails?

And when they do, don't disappoint them by offering the same pre-written sales letter.

The important thing to remember when you're writing titles for your articles and blog entries and the subject line for your email is to think like a marketer and not like an author. You've got to grab the attention of your potential reader. If you don't then you won't make any sales.

To Your Success,
Susan

P.S. Leave a comment and let me know what you thought of this tip.

Tags: article writing, blog post, email, get people to read your article, get people to read your blog, get people to read your email

"What You Should Know About Advertising"

According to wikipedia.com, "Advertising is a form of communication whose purpose is to inform potential customers about products and services and how to obtain and use them. ..." And while this is a good definition there's a shorter one every online business person should have etched into their minds ...

"Advertising is salesmanship. ... The only purpose of advertising is to make sales."
Claude Hopkins, Scientific Advertising

When you write an ad, you're not writing to win an award or to create a work of art. Your ad won't be judged on how good your grammar is or how clever and amusing it is.

Your ad has 1 purpose ... to sell. And it's only good if it does.

When you try to sell a product, a service, a membership or you're trying to get people to join your mailing list, you're advertising.

Over the years there has been a lot of advertising copy written and tested. Here's a list of:

10 Basic Techniques Proven To Make Effective Ad Copy

1. Focus on your reader - not yourself. Those reading your ad want to know "What's in it for me?" A good ad tells your readers why they should try your product, service, etc.
   


2. Emphasize benefits, not features. The difference between a benefit and a feature is - a feature describes a quality of what you're selling while a benefit tells what a feature means to them. In other words, don't say things like, "XXX autoresponder service has a 96% delivery rate" say something like "Get more of your email delivered to improve your sales. XXX leads the industry in delivering your messages and the more email delivered means more sales for you."
   


3. Push your readers "Emotional Hot Buttons. "Remember, people don't like to be sold but they do like to buy and they buy things based on their emotions. To know their "Emotional Hot Buttons" you must know your readers and even more importantly, you must know what they really want even if they don't. In other words, if your selling a service you know your ad readers are looking for don't just promote the standard benefits. Drive the sale by emphasizing how this service is less expensive or more dependable or easier to use, etc. because saving money, being reliable or easy to use are the real reasons they'll chose 1 service over another.
   


4. Incorporate proof and believability in your ad. You must make sure your readers will believe your ad because if they don't they won't buy. Things that make an ad believable are:
   
   Honest and truthful statements
   Testimonials of satisfied customers
   Facts and research findings that support your claims
   A picture of yourself
   Awards and good third-party reviews
   A refund policy
   Celebrity endorsements
   


5. Have a Unique Selling Proposition (USP). Your USP is what separates you from the rest of those selling the same thing. While price, quality, service and bonuses are 4 of the most stressed USP's there are others. In fact, your USP could be something all your competitors have but don't mention. For instance, say you're advertising aWeber and your competition is promoting the standard benefits of unlimited campaigns, reliability, templates, ease of creating forms, training videos and customer support so you point out that aWeber allows you to mail to multiple lists or to track your click-thru rate with with the click of a button. The fact that aWeber provides these things no matter who sells the service isn't important. The fact that they didn't point it out and you did is.
   


6. Focus on your headline because your headline is…an ad for your ad. It's your headline that convinces people to read your advertising or not.
   


7. The more you tell, the more you sell. While most newcomers to marketing think long sales copy is boring and won't sell, the fact is long sales copy outsells short ads. However, the long sales copy must not be long and boring or long and untargeted. Long sales copy must be relevant and targeted. A long ad written for a targeted market of experts won't be read by novices and vice versa.
   


8. Write To Be Scanned. This goes with the last tip because most will scan your ad before reading to see if it's of interest. If you've got some white space, nice margins, short sentences, short paragraphs, sub-headings, a benefit list and emphasized words or phrases with bold, italics or color you make your ad more inviting to read plus it will be easier to catch the interest of your targeted market. And while some may decide not to read the ad and leave, others will go back to read the ad and others may order after they've only scanned the ad.
   


9. Follow the structure of AIDA. AIDA stands for:
   
   Attention - Grab their attention with your headline
   Interest - Keep their interest with compelling sales copy
   Desire - Capitalize on your customers' desire
   Action - Tell your customer what to do with your call to action
   


10. Use takeaway selling to increase the urgency. People tend to buy faster when they know the offer is limited. Limiting the quantity, imposing a deadline for orders and putting a limit on parts of the offer like the bonuses, guarantee or price tell people they need to act now rather than later.
    
    When you use takeaway selling there are 2 important things you should do:
    
    1. Tell them why the offer is being restricted.
    2. Enforce the restriction.

Remember, good advertising is written to do 1 thing - sell. It isn't always grammatically correct, it talks about benefits, not features and sells on emotion. It paints a compelling picture and irresistible offer that forces your prospect to act and act now! If it doesn't, then you drop that ad like a hot potato and go with one that does.

To Your Success,
Susan

P.S. Please feel free to leave a comment about this tip.

Tags: advertising, how to write good advertising, writing good advertising, writing good ad copy, effective ad copy

The World is in your Hands.

Welcome To Your WiFi Internet!
"Those who fully grasp how this technology is going to forever change the Internet, as well as the entire world, will realize that there is nothing to stop them from generating a monthly pay check well into the multi-millions of dollars!"

Ken Stewart, CEO ItsYourNet, LLC.

ItsYourNet has aligned itself with a WiFi (Wireless Fidelity) InternetService Corporation.
After more than five years of coding and field testing, this Corporation has developed a Wireless Internet technology so dynamic that we believe it is destined to become the sole surviving:

Internet Service Provider (ISP) worldwide.


Here's why...With opening as a publicly traded company, the ability to broadcast the Internet connection signal via repeater towers from one central NOC (Network Operations Center), broadcast to distances of 30-miles without degradation of the signal, transmit through buildings, forests, and up to 20 feet underground, maintain a T-1 connection both UP and DOWN without degradation from the amount of simultaneous users connecting, and having managed to secure the signal with better than 256-bit SSL encryption where no firewall hardware is required, we believe this WiFi Corp. will quickly become one of the fastest growing Corporations in the history of the Internet, and quite literally, will be able to make the statement;


"There are two types of people in the world...Those who are connected to the Internet through our network...And those who have still yet to connect to the Internet for the very first time.

Investment capital was secured in 2003 with seven USA-based Investment Bankers*

Testing of T-1 service (Flat Terrain Testing) has been 100% successfully completed. Competitors can't develop comparable technology without 3+years and billions invested.

Service is expected to go live in Texas, California, Washington state in 2008**
Mountainous terrain signal testing soon to be scheduled for WA, OR, CO, & B.C. The WiFi Corporation plans blanketed WiFi coverage of Canada & USA Within 12-months of North American opening, plans for worldwide WiFi service begin. Asia is slated for opening 2009.

We hope you're grasping the big picture here!


To be ready for when connectivity reaches your area, Join our 2-TierFree Affiliate Program now, and start building your list of subscribers TODAY! Imagine Having An Always On Wireless T-1 to T-3 Internet Connection...In Your Home Or Office...While Walking Down A Street... While Driving Down A Road...While Camping, Golfing, Hiking... Or Crossing Country In A Plane...Whether you're interests are the ground floor purchase of stock or you plan to build an empire that pays you every month, you will not find any opportunity that has as much to offer as The Future Of The WiFi /Wireless Internet does. ItsYourNet, LLC's strategic alignment with this WiFi Corporation anticipates providing up to $4.00 of the anticipated monthly fee paid back to the Independent Members of our Free Affiliate Program, thus giving you the ability TODAY to introduce this to the masses, positioning you with the ability to create a dynamic monthly residual income for yourself, and even better, enabling you to create a database of subscribers that you will be able to introduce to the WiFi era.
Dennis Lambdin
http://livneasy.net/

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Submit your site to be featured here.

"Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Basket"

You've probably heard this old idiom, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket" and know what it means - don’t concentrate all your assets or resources in one thing or place because you risk losing everything all at one time.

For internet marketing the more popular way of stating this idiom is to say, "Diversify." In other words, after you've mastered 1 form of advertising, go on to another or when you've started making money with 1 product or service add another. And the reason behind these types of statements is simple. If you concentrate all your efforts into 1 form of advertising or on 1 product or service then you risk losing all your income if that form of advertising or product is removed.

Now I'm sure my parents told me these words of wisdom at 1 time or another but the first time I heard the words and actually understood what they meant and how they should be applied was when an investment advisor said them to me. His advice was about how not to invest the money for my employee 401K. He said, "If you invest your 401K in the company you work for then your gambling 100% of your income and retirement income in that company because they pay your wages, manage your retirement program and all your 401K investment earning will come from their profits. Do you really want to put all your eggs in 1 basket and have 1 company responsible for everything? If something happens to them, you lose everything."

At the time these words were said I was working for the oldest and largest phone company in the world. It had been in business since the 1800's and had always been a growing and profitable business. However I am a very cautious gambler and since investing is a form of gambling to me, I decided to take his advice and invest in other things. As it turned out, this proved to be a wise decision since the phone company was later broken into smaller companies and the 401K investment stocks turned into stock for whatever company the employee then worked for. The smaller company I worked for started going through some very rough times and I saw the stock value go from over $40 a share to around $1 a share in a matter of days. Since many employees had put their eggs in one basket, you can only imagine the deep depression and anxiety that filled the workplace.

After the experience above, I am now a staunch believer in that old idiom and have used it to make many business decisions. Not only do I diversify my advertising methods and sources of online income but I also use it when choosing my online services.

As you know there are many places online that offer package deals like; domain registration and hosting, hosting plus products to sell and complete business packages with hosting, products and autoresponder services. I've joined a few of these memberships and used them because they're usually a good deal. However I've never used only the services from a single membership site for my entire online business because that would make my entire business dependent on one membership site.

And not being totally dependent on one source of services has saved my business several times. The last time was just this year when I had to move my list from a membership site autoresponder service to another.

In this particular case the membership site offered complete business packages with hosting, products, autoresponders and several other things. When I joined I couldn't afford to pay a lot for everything I needed to start my business so this membership seemed like a great way to get started. And it was!

However, I still followed the idiom's advice and used the services that cost the most (products and autoresponder) from the membership site and bought the less expensive service (hosting) elsewhere. Then when I started to make some money I invested some of it by finding other suppliers for my products. This turned out to be a good decision since the products from the membership site recently changed and I could no longer use them the way I had designed my business.

Now losing my autoresponder service was a big blow to my business however it didn't bring my entire business down. I still had my site and my products and could still make sales. I moved my list and put new forms on my sign up pages and had my business back on track in a couple of days. Imagine how long it would have taken had I needed to move my site and find new product suppliers!

When you're first starting your online business it's easy to fall into the trap of relying on one service or membership site to take care of your business. They have it all, provide good service and offer a great savings. And using them to get started is fine. However, as soon as you can, start diversifying where you get your services. When you're making money online don't risk losing it all by being totally dependent on one provider.

To Your Success,
Susan

P.S. Please leave a comment and share your thoughts about this tip.

Tags: don't put all your eggs in one basket, idiom, risk, risk losing it all, diversify

April 2008

This month we have Kathryn's site at http://www.heresthemoney.com/. Kathryn is 1 of our newest friends and she said she would appreciate any and all constructive comments. So let's welcome Kathryn into our Circle of Friends by giving her a helping hand with her site.

FriendsWhoCare subscribers can have their constructive comments along with a link to their site added to this blog entry by submitting your comments here. (You must log in). If your not a FriendsWhoCare subscriber you may add your comments by using the comment link below.

Tags: site review

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Review Comments

Hi,

My thoughts about Kathryn's (heresthemoney.com) site:

I would like to have known more about her (even a picture) and probably some testimonials. Maybe if I had something leading me into the site. I know this is a squeeze page, but in the back of my mind even though it says it's free. I felt pressured, seemed to much like a sales page; maybe I've become skeptical over time from reading too many hyped up pages. I think the best squeeze pages offer some valuable information, and are in someway related to the product or service you are trying to promote. It shouldn't be trying to sell but instead capturing the name and email address. Kathryn's page does create some curiosity and it may very well do what she designed it to do; it just didn't grab me. I want to feel like I know someone and have some confidence I'm not giving my email address to just anyone.

Darell
DJ's Fast Start Marketing
http://www.ebooklisting.net/

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This sales page is probably a good example of the many sites offering to make us a lot of money for free, but the main heading reminded me immediately of a Chris Rock Live (for TV) gig in which he went on at length about the difficulty black people have, amassing WEALTH in the United States. The main point of his attack was the vast difference between getting rich, and being in a position to be regarded as wealthy.

The biggest problem of this sales page will be getting anybody to believe that there is an EASY system that pays a LOT, FAST and for FREE, so even if this is an affiliate site, it should be discarded immediately for a well written Splash Page which would find interested people who could then be sent the relevant information.

Secondary problem is that clicking on the JOIN HERE link takes you to the relevant page, which includes a link to read their Terms and Conditions, and that page includes a link to PROGRAMS! Unsurprisingly the first program listed Profit Track #1, says it's the only one you will need to PAY for.....till you see that the second one, ProfitTrak #2 also says the same thing! Kathryn, I think you would be better off joining and promoting Marketing Pond!

Syd
When was the last time you listenedto a good book?
http://29812.leisureaudiosales.com/

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While we've received only 4 review comments for Kathryn's site they have all been good ones. I agree that the size of the font is small and hard to read and would suggest also making the headline in a bigger font. Also, adding some information about who you are, your contact information and some testimonials from current members would add credibility. It was also pointed out that the Disclaimer link at the bottom opened in the same window and there was no easy way to get back to the Home page. This is true for all the links at the bottom of the Home page so I suggest you either provide a link to your home page on each of them or have those pages open in a new window.

In addition, I noticed that your site has a powered by ... link at the bottom. I clicked the link and went to a different site. Although the link was an affiliate link and you could make some commission from a purchase, I suggest you open that link in a new window also.

This page reminds me of many of the landing pages for MLMs and downline builders in that it doesn't give any specific information. Unlike those pages, yours has a join button rather than a "request more information" type button. Since some many may not join because they don't know what you're offering you may want to set up an autoresponder series giving a little information about your program and highlighting the benefits. You could offer that on your page as an alternative if someone doesn't what to join or in a exit pop-up when their leaving.

While I like the clean design of the site, the words didn't make me either believe you or curious enough to want to join. Again, like other MLM and downline landing pages you may want to add some audio or video to your site to peak the visitor's interest. If you don't want to use audio or video then some compelling sales copy that your visitors can relate to may be enough. The thing is, while your want to be short and to the point you still need to invoke some type of emotion in your site visitor (curiosity, greed, trust, etc.)

Hope the comments help.

To Your Success,
Susan

Rules To Have Your Site Reviewed

All FriendsWhoCare subscribers are invited to submit their site to be reviewed here however their are a few rules.

To have your site reviewed:

1. You must be a FriendsWhoCare Newsletter subscriber. All subscibers are allowed to submit as many of their sites - 1 at a time - to be reviewed here plus they get to submit a free classified ad every week for our classifieds and a free access to our Circle of Friends area where they find many free ebooks, videos and online resouces. If you aren't a FriendsWhoCare subscriber and would like to become one you can join us here.
   
   
2. No affiliate or network marketing links - you must own and be able to change the content of the site. Sites and blogs hosted on free hosting services and free social networking sites are allowed.
   
   
3. No adult content sites, no sites that download malicious software and no sites promoting hate or anything illegal are allowed. All sites are reviewed before they are posted.
   
   
4. If a site is reported that it is no longer available or it violates the above rule I will re-review the site and if necessary remove it.
   
   
5. Review sites are posted in the order received and no more than 1 will be posted each month. Because I can not control how many sites are submitted during a month that means sometimes a site may be posted the month after it was submitted while other times it may take longer. When you submit your site I will send a response that it has been received and give you an approximate date for when it will be posted.

To submit your site to be reviewed go here and login.

To Your Success,
Susan

The Rules To Be A Featured Site

All FriendsWhoCare subscribers are invited to submit their site to be featured here however their are a few rules.

To have a site featured:

1. You must be a FriendsWhoCare Newsletter subscriber. All subscibers are allowed to submit as many of their sites - 1 at a time - to be featured here plus they get to submit a free classified ad every week for our classifieds and a free access to our Circle of Friends area where they find many free ebooks, videos and online resouces. If you aren't a FriendsWhoCare subscriber and would like to become one you can join us here.
   
   
2. No affiliate or network marketing links - you must own and be able to change the content of the site. Sites and blogs hosted on free hosting services and free social networking sites are allowed.
   
   
3. No adult content sites, no sites that download malicious software and no sites promoting hate or anything illegal are allowed. All sites are reviewed before they are posted.
   
   
4. If a site is reported that it is no longer available or it violates the above rule I will re-review the site and if necessary remove it.
   
   
5. Featured sites are posted in the order received and no more than 1 will be posted each week. Because I can not control how many sites are submitted during a week that means sometimes a site may be posted within a few days while other times it may take longer. When you submit your site I will send a response that it has been received and give you an approximate date for when it will be posted.

To submit your site to be featured go here and login.

To Your Success,
Susan