A Habit, An Addiction Or Both?

This month's poll question was, "When you go online, is checking your email the first thing you do most of the time?"

100% of those who voted said, "Yes."

There were also some comments.

• "yes - it's usually the first thing that I do."
  
  
• "Yes, email is the first thing I check when I get on my computer.Every time!!! I have a 'thing' about mail. I'm not able to drive pastmy snail mailbox either! I pick up snail mail and then check myemail!!"
  
  
• "and then it's "which email account do I check first?"
  
  
• "Of course, because I have to look for your mail! :)"

Of all the comments received however, Mitch had the best since he shared the secret of how your email should be read.

• "I check it, skim it actually, but only for a message from someone who may be on my list. Everything else is put on hold until I finish my work pertaining to my sites, etc. Trying to read all that mail is a huge time waster. I think it's why many folks never make it on-line. They get distracted joining one new thing after another and never have the time to implement any of it. They kill their own success. Any mail after a couple of days should be deleted. It takes away any attempt to 'catch up' which isn't going to happen. There is no doubt, another one covering the same thing that just came in." Mitch

Now I want you to read the last comment again and this time pay close attention to the second paragraph because Mitch is right on target.

Breaking the habit of reading your email first is hard since we adopt the misconception at a very early age that we must check our mail immediately or we'll miss out on something important. As a child we ran to our parent's mailbox to get the mail in the hope that someone had sent us something.

As adults, however, you know that your mail consists of bills, advertising and occasionally a personal card or letter. You learn to collect it, sort it and fill it accordingly.

Then you go online, get an email account and revert back to your child like dream that someone is going to send you something good and you must read everything immediately. This is especially true when you get your first email account and not much email.

When you're only getting 10 or fewer emails a day it doesn't take much time to read them all and it may even give you some pleasure knowing that at least 10 people know your email address and want to send you something.

But soon hundreds of people know your email address and all of them want to send you something. Some of them may even be sending you multiple emails every day. Suddenly you realize that your inbox is filling up and you need to keep it cleaned out. Nobody wants a cluttered inbox!

At this point it's time to apply your snail mail method of checking and filing your mail to your email inbox. Like Mitch, you need to see if there's an email from a subscriber or a customer that requires an immediate response and then leave the rest of them alone until you've finished your assigned business task for the day.

To help you sort and file your email you may want to set up some folders and have your email sorted automatically. Most email readers allow you to create sub-folders and will automatically sort your incoming email.

If possible, you should create a folder just for your subscribers, customers, affiliates and jv partners. This will help you identify the email that requires an immediate response.

You may want to create 1 or more folders for some ezine mailings since the you always want to read them. (Like mine, I hope!) Others may be routed to a generic type of "read when there's time" folder since these senders only send "good stuff" occasionally.

As for the rest of your email, these can wait until you "really" have nothing else to do since you're probably just going to delete them anyway.

Once your email is sorted you must learn to only read the "really important" ones at the beginning of your work day. The "really important" ones are those from your subscribers, customers, affiliates and jv partners because they are the ones helping you with your business.

As for the rest of your email, read them according to the priority you have given the folder where it's been filed and only after you have finished your planned task.

After a few days you may find that you're getting a large backlog of email in some of your folders and unsorted email. Then, again at the end of your work day, you should spend a couple of minutes to do some massive deleting since you will never have the time to read it all. Sure you can skim the headlines and check some of it. If you find something good then keep it but I am betting that 99.99% of it will go straight to the trash.

Here are a couple of questions to help emphasize how important it is to not read all your email when you first logon.

1. When are you the most productive, at the beginning of your workday, the middle of your workday or at the end of your workday?
   
   
2. Of all the email you check when you first logon, how much of it was worth reading and how much went straight to the trash after you'd wasted your time checking it out?
   
   
3. How hard is it for you to stop reading your email before you've looked at all of them?

Many find that reading email is like an addiction because once they have read one they want to read another and then another and then ...

So as much as I hate to say it, if reading your email is the first thing you do when you go online, stop!

Stop wasting your most productive time with the mindless activity of reading all your email and undermining yourself and your business.

To Your Success,
Susan

Where In The World Are You?

Last week I was reading 1 of my favorite blogs and thought "Wow, what a great idea!"

As a FriendsWhoCare reader you already know we publish a little information for my subscribers like where your site is located and your ads.

Unfortunately we don't get much of chance to know much about you. So this week we're going to change all that and start getting acquainted with each other. We'll start by telling each other where we are located.

And I'll even give you 2 incentives for sharing your location.

1. You may find you have 1 or more FriendsWhoCare Members living nearby.


2. You can include a link to your site or blog.

So post a comment and tell us where in the world you are located. Please include your first name. Your last name is optional. And definitely include a link to your site or blog.

In case you don't know how to make a link in a blog comment here's a simple example:

-----

Hi,
I live in Fort Scott, Kansas.
Susan Carroll

The code for the link looks like:

<a href="http://www.friendswhocare.us/join.htm">Susan Carroll</a>

Just replace the link with your own and my name with the words you want to show in the browser.

-----

See how easy it is.

So please post a comment with your location and let's start learning a little about each other.

To Your Success,
Susan

Free Advertising Tools

Free Advertising is all over the internet but much of it is ineffective and may be wasting your time! So what do the informed readers of the "FriendsWhoCare
Newsletter" use?

Today we've introduced a new page at FriendsWhoCare.us to help you find some good, free advertising resources and even share yours. It's called "The Best Free Advertising" and it's where you can find out how we get traffic to our sites.

Take a look. And if you don't find your favorite free advertising method please add it.

Right now it's totally free to add your favorite free advertising secret.

To Your Success,
Susan

5 Things I've Heard And Always Remembered

It seems there are quite a few blog memes (a game of blog tag) going around the web. Because I’m always up for a new game and this one sounds like fun, let’s start our own game of blog-tag at FriendsWhoCare.

Here are my 5 things I’ve heard and always remembered:

1. “If you're going to do something do it right the first time.” My mother said this to me so many times I think it must be stamped onto my forehead. I don’t think she meant it in a bad way but rather was her way of saying, keep trying until you master it and then keep doing it the right way.
   
   
2. Walt Disney once said, "If you can dream it, you can do it." These words inspire me to keep trying even when I’ve failed at something several times.
   
   
3. When I had a job, a maintenance engineer friend told me “If it's not broke don't fix it.” This sounded like good advice to me.
   
   
4. “Chocolate may not make your problem go away but it will make you feel better.” This is something I said and believed before it was scientifically proven. I said it so many times to my kids as they were growing up it’s probably my fault they love chocolate as much as I do.
   
   
5. When my youngest daughter got married and moved out she called 1 day and asked a question I’ll never forget, “Why didn't you warn me that it was so hard being grownup?” Since no one warned me, I didn’t know I was suppose to warn her!

Now, it's your turn. Post your 5 things you've heard and always remembered on your own blog.

Gaida Rodgers, Pam Triick, Manoj R. and Leeuna Foster ... Tag, you're it!

Let's have some fun,
Susan

Tag, You're It!

It seems there is always something new to learn and a few days ago I learned about blog memes. And while they may not be new to you I'd never heard of them before.

So what is a blog meme?

Simply put, it's an idea that is shared and passed from one blog to another blog. The most common form of a blog meme is a question that is asked on 1 blog and answered on many other blogs.

The way a blog meme gets started is 1 blogger will ask and answer a question on their blog and then "tag" other blog owners. Those who have been "tagged" then put the question and their answer on their blog and then "tag" other blog owners. There is no set rule on how many bloggers may be "tagged" however, 5 and 7 seem to be the favorite numbers for the current blog memes being circulated right now.

Now there are some rules for participating in a blog meme and they are:

• Don't "tag" a blogger that you don't already have some kind of prior relationship with.
  
• When you "tag" someone you must name those you are "tagging" and provide a link to their blog in your meme post.
  
• If you're "tagged", don't just "ignore" the tag. Always respond to the blogger tagging you.
  
• Unless you have a really good reason for not participating, you should always participate in the meme.
  
• When you participate you should provide a link and a trackback to the person who tagged you.
  
• If you know who started the meme, you should provide a link and a trackback to the originator of the meme.

Because Blogger doesn't provide trackback capability and many bloggers don't use them you can post a comment on both the originator's and the blogger-who-tagged-you blogs with a link to your meme response.

The reasons for participating in a blog meme are fairly obvious and they are:

1. Increased exposure and visibility for all the blogs involved.
2. Increased link popularity.
3. Increased traffic.
4. Another reason to post.
5. It's fun.

Blog memes work across all niches. Just make sure the questions are fairly quick and easy to answer and try to make the topic interesting or fun. When you name your meme you should think in terms of "headlines." Remember to include the names and links of those you're "tagging" and either a trackback or a comment to those you "tag." To get a better response from those you "tag" you should email them to let them know they've been "tagged" and either provide an incentive or explain the advantages for passing on the meme.

Blog memes are a fun form of viral marketing. They can spread across the internet as fast as email chain letters except a blog meme carries the link to your blog with them.

Because memes are fun and I have a blog, I am going to start 1. Read "5 Things I've Heard And Always Remembered" to see my meme and see if you've been "tagged."

To Your Success,
Susan
post tags: blog meme, blog tag

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day From
FriendsWhoCare

Hope you find your pot of gold soon,
Susan
PS To add this message to your site simply copy 1 line of code and paste it inside the
<body> ... </body> tags.

<script src="http://www.friendswhocare.us/irishgreeting.js"></script>

More About What's Stopping You?

This week's tip was about the invisible barriers we build that hold us back from reaching our desired goals.

Because thinking you know what you can and can not do before you start something is one of those barriers and is a big factor in how well you will succeed, I would like you to watch a video another online marketer shared with me.

I hope this video will make you think twice the next time you tell yourself you don't know how or can't do something.

Don't give up on YOU.

Believe in yourself.

I do and and have high hopes for your success.

To Your Success,
Susan

PS If you would like to share this video with others just paste this code onto your site.

<script language="javascript" type='text/javascript' src="http://www.susancarrollhome.com/cansucceed.js"></script>

What's Stopping You?

"If you always do what you've always done,

you'll always get what you've always got."

—Author Unknown

If you're trying to do internet marketing you must believe the above quote... at least to some degree.

You're tired of going to the same job year after year. You're tired of living paycheck to paycheck. You dream of having enough time and money to enjoy your life and family.

So you enter the world of internet marketing where all you have to do is get targeted web traffic to your offer and convert visitors to buyers.

It sounds easy doesn't it?

But then you discover the real truths:

• You need your own web site.
• You need to build your own web page.
• You need to build your own list.
• You need to automate.
• You need to get traffic.
• You need to write good copy to get conversions.

And the list goes on and on and on...

And since you don't know anything about what's needed to do internet marketing you start learning. You read. You study. You take notes. You try to learn as much possible so you can achieve your dream of having a successful online business.

And then ...

You Put Up An Invisible Barrier that stops you and your business dead in it's tracks.

What is the invisible barrier that's stopping you?

It's different for different people.

• Some stop before they ever get their own site online because they think they're not ready to build a web page or don't know how to upload one to a host.
• Some stop when they need to build a list because they don't know what to say in their messages or don't know how to put a form on their site.
• Some stop when they need to automate a task that is taking so much of their time they can't do anything else because they think they can't make an automation tool work or upload a script.
• Some stop when it's time to drive traffic to their site because they think they don't know how or they don't have the money to pay for traffic.
• Some stop when their first sales page attempt doesn't perform well and they think they can't write good sales copy.

And the list goes on and on and on...

If you've built your own invisible barrier that allows you to see what's possible but is stopping you from achieving it you need to ask yourself 2 questions.

1. Why have you built a barrier to keep you from having your own successful online business?
   
   
2. What can you do to tear the barrier down?

The most common answer for the first question is - FEAR. You're afraid of actually performing the task that needs to be done. You doubt your own capabilities and think you'll either not be able to do it or you won't be able to do it right.

The second most common answer for why you've built a barrier is - You Don't Want To Do It. Sure you want a good site that gets lots of targeted traffic and makes a ton of sales but you don't Want to do what it takes. You know what must be done but look at it as a task that you Must do - not a task that you Want to do.

So how do you tear down the invisible barrier you've built? It's not easy because you have to change how you look at yourself, your business and the tasks that need to be done.

To make your invisible barrier come crashing down and to open up all the opportunities that lie before you have to:

• Discover your own inner strength and determination to become successful. You have to believe in yourself even when others think it's a waste of time and call you a fool for trying. When you need to do something you've never done before you have to learn what you can and then try it. Maybe you'll do it right and maybe you won't. If you get it right, congratulate yourself and remember how you did it so you can do it again. If you don't get it right then learn from your mistakes and keep trying until you do. Be glad you're becoming an internet marketer and not the first person who attempted to fly. And keep reminding yourself that you are not happy with what you've got and want more. Let those who don't understand and support you keep getting what they've got while you drive yourself to a better place.
  
  
• You have to change your way of thinking about the tasks you must perform. Don't look at them as jobs that must be done. Instead look at them as things you want to do. No one does the things they don't want to do in a timely manner or to the best level possible. But, when you want to do something you do it as soon as you can and put all your energy into it. And that's how you must face every internet marketing task - as something you want to do.

Does it sound almost impossible to tear down your invisible barrier? It's not because you've done both of those things before. You just don't remember.

When you were small and learning to walk do you think you actually wanted to learn to walk? It's doubtful. What you really wanted to do was to get somewhere to do something and walking was the task you had to learn how to do to make it happen.

Did you walk the first time you tried. Some do but most don't.

Did your family encourage you to try again. Probably, but then they didn't know why you were trying, did they? Had they known you wanted to chase a ball out into the street or go visit the neighbor's dog by yourself they may not have been so encouraging. And after you learned to walk did you family still encourage you to walk everywhere you wanted or did they try to stop you? We all know they tried to stop you and that you kept trying until you were old enough to understand the reason for the barriers they put up.

The barriers you've put up that are stopping you from having a successful online business are your barriers. You built them and you can tear them down. All you have to do is find that inner strength, desire and determination you had as a child and use it to do something different and achieve different results.

To Your Success,
Susan

Are You Affected By The New DST

Beginning in 2007, Daylight Savings Time (DST) in the US and Canada will start three weeks earlier on March 11, 2007, and end one week later on November 4, 2007, resulting in a new DST period that is four weeks longer than previously observed.

Depending on where you live and which time zone you have selected, it is possible that the time zone settings for your computer's system clock may be incorrect during this four week period unless certain updates are applied to your computer.

While the change in daylight saving time applies to U.S. and Canada, the change may impact customers based outside North America.

Rather that repost all the information about who is affected by the new DST, I am giving you the link to a Microsoft article that identifies who needs to update and provides the tools they have developed for their customers to address the DST change.

When I downloaded the updates I did find that I already had the XP update since I have automatic updates turned on. However, there is an update for Outlook users and it had not been automatically downloaded.

You can go here to read the article and update your software if necessary.

http://support.microsoft.com/gp/dst_topissues#A1

To Your Success,
Susan

An Easy Way To Dress Up Your Site

Do you know what Yahoo.com, Google.com, MSN.com, Clickbank.com, Paypal.com, htmldog.com, Mozilla.com, EzineArticles.com, GoArticles.com and Microsoft.com all have in common?

I'll give you a clue.

Look at the page url in your browser's address bar. It's way up at the top of your browser.

And if you happen to be using a browser that has tabs like Explorer 7 or FireFox and have several tabs open then look at the tab for this page.

Do you notice anything?

Hopefully you see an image with the letter "B" for Blogger in front of the url.

That little picture is called a favicon and favicons are used by many of the better known sites to help you remember them.

Another great things about favicons is that they not only show up on the browser but these little guys also show up in your Favorites or Bookmarks list. So when someone adds your site to their favorites, instead of getting lost in the other hundreds of listed sites, your site stands out.

Now making a favicon isn't difficult. The big things to remember are:

• Favicons must be 16 pixels by 16 pixels.
• Favicons use 24 bit color.
• Favicons must have a file type of .ico

There are 2 easy ways to create a favicon from 1 of your images.

1. The do-it-yourself Method
   
   Get a free copy of Irfanview, it's 1 of the free resources inside our member area. (It's listed under Website Help.)
   
   After it's installed open Irfanview and turn on it's screen capture. (That's under the Options menu.)
   
   Then using your text processing program like Word or your favorite html editor, insert the picture you want to use on a blank page. If you want the picture to be surrounded by a color other than white change the page color.
   
   Do a screen capture. (That's Ctrl plus F11 for Irfanview.)
   
   Crop off all the extra stuff around your picture.
   
   Resize the picture to 16 x 16.
   
   Save the picture as file type ico.
   
2. The Use-A-Tool Method
   
   There is a Favicon Creator tool that does all of the above steps for you.

After you have the favicon created you simply add this line of code between the <head> and </head> of your web page.

<link rel="shortcut icon" href="favicon.ico">

You can name your favicon anything you want as long as you remember to put the .ico extension on it and you can have the favicon anywhere on your site as long as you put the correct path to the file inside the "favicon.ico" quotes.

After you save your page upload it and your favicon.ico files to your host.
Now you've just made your site stand out from the crowd in your visitors' sea of bookmarks.

So have some fun and dress up your site by creating your own favicon.

To Your Success,
Susan

PS Using a tool to create your favicons can really save time so you'll be able to create more. Then you can use different ones for different pages on your site if you like.

To get more information about the tool mentioned in today's tip Click Here.

This Is Your Wake Up Call

It's time for all internet marketers and internet marketer wannabes to Wake Up.

We are not in the 1990's any more. What used to work then just doesn't cut it any more.

We've crossed over into a new millennium. It's now the year 2007 where lizards sell car insurance, you can lose weight by having prepared meals shipped to your home and kids know more about what's going on than their parents. (OK kids have always thought they knew more but now they sometimes actually do!)

And if you've been sleeping or not paying attention you may not know that the internet and internet marketing have changed. No longer can you put a page online, optimize it with a few keywords and expect to get a decent ranking in any of the search engines. You can't entice people to join your "Make A Million Overnight While You Sleep" program by running an ad or using pay-per-click. You can't put your free affiliate page in a traffic exchange program and expect to make sales or get others to join under you.

It's time to wake up because none of these and most of the other things internet marketers used in the 90's work any more.

Why am I telling you this?

Because the 2 problems every internet marketer has and work on every day are:

1. Getting traffic
   
   
2. Getting conversions

And every year the "experts" comes out with a new way to solve the problem.

Do the new ways work?

Yes, most of them do. At least they work for awhile if you use them properly.

Over the last few years in the internet marketing niche we've had:

• Giveaways
• Free Membership Sites
• Lock-in Your Price Sales
• 100% Affiliate Commission

Now if you are awake can you answer this question?

What is the 1 thing all of the items in the above list have in common?

If you guessed affiliate programs you are 75% correct. (The 100% Affiliate Commission products don't usually have a managed affiliate program.)

If you guessed 1 time offers you're getting closer since all of them can have a 1 time offer however this option is not always used.

If you guessed getting signups then you're right on because very single one of those things was used to build somebody's list.

If you guessed "appealing to the visitor's greed factor" you are also correct. No one wants to buy anything, not even us. Everybody wants something for nothing. And if someone has to buy what you're offering the first time they see your site then it better be a really good deal that either saves or makes them money.

If you guessed "leveraging" you were also right. Every one of these items depended on having the information about item advertised by the receiver.

But you're not in the internet marketing niche so you think none of this applies to you?

If you're selling information, no matter what niche you're in, think again because it does.

Let me repeat myself. No one wants to buy anything. Everyone is looking for free information.

It's true that none of the above listed techniques may work in your niche however the reasons behind them are still valid.

You've got to offer good information and appeal to your site visitors' "greed factor." Give them a taste of what you're offering and then stay in touch with them so you can share additional information. Once they know and trust you they may then actually take your recommendation and buy something.

You've got to use leveraging to get word about your site out. The internet is a big ocean and your site is a very small minnow. Without the help of other minnows your site is lost in the middle of nowhere. So make your site known by having others help spread the word.

The successful internet marketers in the new millennium know they must stay awake and watch how the internet and it users are changing. They know they can't depend on what's working today to work tomorrow. To solve the problems of getting traffic and making sales the successful internet marketers know they must continue to learn and develop new solutions.

To Your Success,
Susan

5 Changes That Affect Clickbank Affiliates

Are you a Clickbank affiliate?

Clickbank is 1 of the oldest and easiest affiliate programs to get into and their database contains more than 10,000 products for a variety of niches.

Many vendors use Clickbank to manage their affiliate program because of it's low cost, it handles all their affiliate payments and there are thousands of affiliates.

So it would seem that Clickbank offers what both vendors and affiliates need.

However we all know the internet and it's users are always changing and some of these changes affect how things work. So today let's discuss some of the changes that have affected Clickbank affiliates.

5 Changes That Affect Clickbank Affiliates

1. Since just about anyone can become a Clickbank vendor there are many newcomers now selling products through its affiliate program. Unfortunately many of them don't know how to set up a good sales letter so there are some mediocre or poor converting sales letters. And badly written sales letters mean a lower sales conversion rate - even for a really good product. So read the sales letter before you decide to promote a product.
   
   
2. As I've stated many times, building your list is an important part of having a successful online business and Clickbank vendors know this too. As a result many of the sales pages in some categories are now opt-in pages rather than sales letters. Vendors know that many will not buy the first time they read a sales page but may buy at some future date. Unfortunately, Clickbank does not provide inserting affiliate links into opt-in mailings so when someone signs up and later buys, the affiliate doesn't get the credit. (Some vendors do provide for inserting your affiliate link into opt-in mailings as an additional affiliate resource however you must sign up for their affiliate program in addition to being a Clickbank affiliate.) If a vendor is using an opt-in page as the sales letter and doesn't provide insertion of your affiliate link into the mailings as an additional resource then they - not the affiliate - makes the sales and the affiliates lose the commission.Again, read the sales letter before you decide to promote a product.
   
   
3. Getting Clickbank to send you a check has become harder. It used to be that you had to have a minimum balance (you could select $25 as your minimum) and wait 6 weeks to get your Clickbank commission check however Clickbank has altered both the buyers' payment methods and it's terms for sending checks.
   
   Clickbank now offers buyers a PayPal option for purchasing products. This is good and has increased sales however ...
   
   The new terms for sending checks now state that in addition to having the minimum balance and waiting 6 weeks -"ClickBank will withhold the first check to be issued from your account until the payable balance contains sales made with 5 or more different credit card numbers, including at least one Visa card, and one MasterCard in order to be eligible to receive a check. PayPal and e-check purchases do not count toward the minimum." (Taken from Clickbank.com)
   
   That means you could easily sell over your minimum balance and wait well over 6 weeks to get paid. For this change I have no answer except to sell more products and keep waiting.
   
   
4. Many affiliates do not use redirection for their affiliate links. Clickbank has tried to help with this problem by changing the format for the affiliate links since many browsers were chopping off the affiliate information at the end of the link with the older format. Still, redirection to your affiliate link is the best practice.
   
   
5. Browsers keep changing and the new IE 7 is causing problems for Clickbank affiliates according to many who post on the Warrior Forum. It seems that IE 7 comes with cookies turned off and Clickbank affiliates depend on cookies being turned on to get their commissions. You can read about the problem here:
   
   http://www.warriorforum.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=132050
   
   There's not much we can do for this problem except to either instruct IE 7 users to turn on cookies or wait for Clickbank to change their method of handling affiliate links.

Even though I am primarily a reseller I became a Clickbank affiliate when I first started and have made money through their affiliate program. And before these changes I was making money by both using automated services to post ads and by selecting individual products that I liked, had good sales letters and had good Clickbank "Rankings."

Now there are some new problems with being a Clickbank affiliate. As for me, I intend to remain one, at least for awhile, and give Clickbank some time to save itself by making some necessary changes. However you need to be aware of these changes so you can make the same decision for yourself.

To Your Success,
Susan

"I Think I'm A Clone Now"

I hope you got a laugh from the video!

The tune is a parody of one of the more popular songs from when I was growing up and describes how I sometimes feel.

For instance -

When I created our free membership area there were a few others around. But now there's a ton of them and more are popping up every day.

Then I started doing "Just Because" sales since everyone was having some kind of a sale. And although I was hoping to do 1 or 2 a month there are now "Seven Bucks", "Crazy Weekend Deals", "Frugal Friday" and many more weekly discount sales.

Hay, I think I've been cloned now!

And although these free memberships and weekly deals are getting greater in number many are still very successful.

Why?

Because while the idea behind them may have been cloned they all took a different approach to develop their sites and pages. They all have their own USP - Unique Selling Position.

And many times that's all that's necessary to get new members or sell more products - repackage the offer so it's different.

Whether you're into affiliate marketing, selling digital products or have your own product or service you've got to have your own USP. If your affiliate sales are down maybe you need to create your own pre-sell page to get them interested and it's a great way to get potential customers to sign up for your list. If you're reselling digital products you can do either pre-sell pages or package products to create your own bundle offer - or both.

The important thing to remember is - cloning an idea, marketing model or just about anything is OK if, and only if, you add your own USP to it. When you and 5 thousand others use a carbon copy clone sales page or ad you're setting yourself up to fail.

To Your Success,
Susan

10 Graphic Design Mistakes And How To Avoid Them

Designing and developing attractive landing pages, sales pages, squeeze pages, etc. has got to be 1 of the hardest parts of having your online business.

There are so many things to consider like:

• Should you have a header graphic and if you do, how big should it be?
• What colors should you use for your backgrounds and text?
• How big should your images and fonts be?
• And the list goes on and on.

Wouldn't it be nice if we were all graphic web designers or could afford to hire 1?

Unfortunately we're not so today I am going to do 3 things:

1. List 10 graphic design mistakes
2. Give you a Free PDF report that explains them in more detail, shows examples and gives some information on how to fix them.
3. Throw in a couple of extra tidbits of information.

First the list:

10 Graphic Design Mistakes:

1. Header image is too large.
2. Page colors are either too bright or too washed out.
3. Too many colors on the page.
4. Too many types of fonts.
5. A dark background behind the text.
6. Using too many scripts at the same time causing browsers to sometimes slow down or even freeze.
7. Not using enough "white space."
8. Not using a watermarked or patterned background correctly.
9. Message font size is too small.
10. Offer is not clearly identified.

Second the Free report:

Inside this report you'll find more information about each of these 10 mistakes, examples showing some very well done sites and recommendations on how these sites could be improved.

Get it here: http://www.friendswhocare.us/ebooks/top10.zip
(You'll need to unzip the file and use Adobe Acrobat Reader to view the report. You can get WinZip FREE and Acrobat Reader FREE if you need them.)

Third - a couple of tidbits of information:

• On page 5 of the report there is an example of a “rounded corner testimonial/text box." You can grab this picture out of the report for your use by: 1) Putting your cursor over the picture and clicking the left mouse button. 2) Right click to save the image to your clipboard. 3) Open your favorite WYSIWYG web page editor (I use FrontPage). 4) Paste the picture onto a blank page.You'll find that the box can be adjusted to any site you need and you can use an image editor like Irfanview to put your text messages on it and then add it to your site. (Irfanview is listed as a free resource inside the members' area - under Website Help.)
• There's a recommendation on page 4 to use glassy or gel buttons. Here's where you can make some for free:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Having a good graphic design for your site is important because that's how your page viewer judges your site. You want it to be easy to look at, easy to read, professional looking and effective. And by avoiding the 10 mistakes listed above you'll be 1 step closer to achieving these things.

To Your Success,
Susan

6 Ways To Avoid And Filter Spam

1 of the complaints I hear a lot about is the amount of email people get - especially the unwanted kind.

Well I hate to be the barer of bad news but ...

If you're going to have an online business then receiving a large number of emails daily is 1 of the things you'd better be prepared for.

Signing up for ezines, reports, special deals, free giveaways, traffic exchanges, membership sites, updates, etc bring in a lot of legitimate email. (Not to mention the email you'll get from your subscribers.)

And after you've joined a few lists, had your site up for awhile and kept the same email address for a couple of years you'll also notice a greater number of "not-so-legitimate" email.

And we're not talking about an extra 5 or 10 -
We're talking about "Hundreds" of email messages to your inbox every day.

Now I can tell you that when you're a 1 person business having to clean out the "junk" and wade through the good stuff can really eat up your time. Time you should be using to build and grow your business.

So today I am going to offer you a few suggestions on how to save some time in handling all that incoming email. I don't claim to be an expert at how to receive less "spam" or how to get off of mailing lists or even on how to effectively filter all your incoming email. But since I don't pay for any mail filtering services I've developed a few techniques to help avoid some spam and filter some of it out of my inbox.

6 Ways To Avoid And Filter Spam

1. Never ever post your email address as a clickable link on your or anyone's web page. Clickable email address are gathered by email harvesters who then sell them to anyone wants them. So unless you're really looking for dates, body part enlargement pills, a loan or cashing in on someone's hidden money in some foreign country I'd recommend you not post your email address as a clickable link. Instead, encrypt your email address. You can find a free tool, SpamStop, inside our members' area to help you.
   
   
2. When you identify an email message as spam don't click any of the links it contains - not even the unsubscribe link! While a lot of spam does not contain an unsubscribe link, much of it does appear to have 1. The problems with clicking the links are: 1) It may or may not unsubscribe you from that list (since they sent you unsolicited email you can't trust them to unsubscribe you) and 2) It validates your email address as a good address and puts you on a more expensive list to be sold. So instead of getting less unwanted email you'll probably start getting more.
   
   
3. When you create your contact information for your site use something other than "admin" or "webmaster" as your name in your email address. Because these names are commonly used many lists are created by gathering domain names and then attaching "admin@" or "webmaster@".
   
   
4. Most web hosts allow you multiple inboxes and have 1 already set up for your use. The 1 that's already created is your default inbox and will receive all the email sent to your domain - no matter what name is used. If your site allows you to have more than 1 inbox create another inbox for your contact information email address. Then all your legitimate email will go to that inbox. When you check your default email inbox you may find that your site is receiving a lot of unwanted messages you'll have to delete it but you don't need to read it.
   
   
5. Try using the built in spam filters for the mail service you're using. Recently I switched to Outlook 2003 and it has many new features to block junk e-mail (spam). The most notable feature is Microsoft's Junk E-Mail Filter. There are 5 key features in Outlook® 2003 to help you combat spam:
   
   * Junk E-Mail Filter
   * Safe Senders List
   * Safe Recipients Lists
   * Blocked Senders List
   * AutoUpdate
   
   I keep my filter set to low so the messages identified as Junk will be saved in the Junk Folder. That way I can save the legitimate ones before I delete the rest. And every time I identify a valid email I add it to the "Safe Senders List." While this filter is not 100% effective it does identify between 95% - 98% of the junk and move it out of my inbox. For directions on how to use Outlook 2003 go to http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/HA011590551033.aspx
   (Yahoo and other mail services also provide spam filters. Try turning it on for a week and see if it will work for you.)
   
   
6. Whether or not you use the spam filter provided by the mail program you're using you will still want to set up some personal mail rules for directing certain messages to specified folders. Since I get a lot of unwanted email to my web site's default email inbox I've set up a rule to send it all to my deleted email folder. To do this I have it catch all email to my site "friendswhocare.us" and then defined the exceptions (the valid email names I don't want deleted). And of course you can set up rules to send mail from specific senders to a special folder rather than have them deleted. (You'll still have to add these senders to your "Save Senders List" because the junk/spam filters usually run before your rules.)
   
   You can watch this video to see the easy way to set up rules in Outlook. ( You may have to click the Play button twice to get it to start.)
   
   

While the above suggestions will keep most of you unwanted email from getting to your inbox, some will still make it through. Also you will still have to clean out your Junk or Bulk folders. So here are a couple of shortcuts on how to delete email quickly.

2 Shortcuts for Deleting Email (Outlook)

1. If you have a lot of unwanted messages grouped together then you can delete them all at once by:
   
   * Click on the 1st message to be deleted
   * Hold the Shift key down and
   * Click the last message to be deleted
   
   All the messages - 1st, last and all those in between should be highlighted so when you click the delete button they will all be gone.
   
   
2. If your unwanted email is scattered throughout your inbox you can use the Ctrl key.
   
   * Click on the 1st message to be deleted
   * Hold down the Ctrl key and
   * Click on each of the messages you want deleted
   
   All the messages you have clicked on should now be highlighted and you can delete them all by clicking the delete button.

Yahoo and other email services usually have you check a box to mark messages you want deleted. Look around and somewhere they usually provide a place where you can "check all." If most of your messages are to be deleted then "check all" and uncheck those you don't want deleted before you click the delete button.

When you're first starting you may not be getting much email and be tempted to look at some of the unsolicited email. But after you've been doing business online for awhile you'll discover that not only do you not have time to look at it but that it also steals much of your precious online time. So take some steps to avoid getting spam and learn to use your email program. You'll be glad you did.

To Your Success,
Susan

A "Black Hat" Marketing Trick Exposed

One of the things I've noticed lately as a reseller is the number of packages I get that include a file with unadvertised bonuses. Now I would normally like to find something extra either for myself or to include in the packages I sell however these bonuses are not "totally free" products.

No, instead these "free" bonuses are not digital products at all. Rather they are icons and open a web page when clicked. And while there is a free product offered on the web page it requires I join someone's list to get it.

Now while I know that the extra bonus wasn't advertised and it is free if I choose to sign up, I don't consider it completely "white hat," maybe "off-white," "gray" or even "black." But definitely not "white" since there's a one-time-offer with every sign up and the giver is hoping I'll not only join someone else's list but also buy the OTO so they can make a profit.

Call me old-fashioned but when I get a free gift inside a cereal box or an extra pair of sock when I buy a package of socks the store doesn't ask me to give my name and address to anyone. If I have to send in my information to get the gift the manufacturer states on the outside of the package that there's a coupon or certificate inside - not the gift.

By including these clickable icons as free bonuses inside a resale package the package originator gets something extra from the reseller than the original agreement. The originator sold the package, made a profit and passed those rights onto the reseller. However by including a file with clickable icons the originator is hoping to make some money off the reseller's sales.

As a reseller I know product creators are hoping to make some money from their recommendations inside an e-book but now they've found a way to try to make money from those who buy but don't read or read but don't buy the recommended product.

Pretty slick, uh?

OK, I'm through ranting and now I am going to tell you how they create those clickable icons. Not so you can do the same thing but to help you save a little of your precious time when your at your computer.

You see, you can create clickable icons for the sites you visit frequently and place them on your desktop. Then when you want to visit 1 of those sites you can simply use the icon to open a browser window and have it already be on the page you want to visit. Think of it as a way of having several "Homepage" settings for your browser.

So here's how to create a clickable icon for a web page:

1. Open your web browser and go to the page you want to open when you click the desktop icon your going to create


2. See the icon in the address bar? Explorer users, it's the Explorer image to the left of the url. FireFox users, it's the picture of a piece of paper to the left of the url.
   
   
   


3. Place your cursor over the icon on the left of the address bar.


4. Now holding the left mouse button down, move your mouse over to you're desktop and release the mouse button. (If your browser window fills your screen then you'll have to reduce it's size before your can "drag and drop" the icon.)


5. Once you've created an icon for your desktop you can move it anywhere you want by simply using drag-and-drop.

Although using these icons won't save you hours every day they will save you a few seconds since you won't have to open a window and then use 1 of your "Favorites" or type in the URL. And these seconds will add up over time.

To Your Success,
Susan

Know Your Rights

Recently a subscriber sent the following:

"I have been looking for some good quality 'How -To' ebooks to give away or sell. My problem is I am still confused about all the different 'Rights'. I was wondering if you might write an article explaining all the types of resale rights and what they are." Monte

Well this seemed like a simple request since I figured all the types of resale rights would be defined online. And even though I thought I knew the correct definitions I immediately did some searches on a couple of the "big" search engines just to make sure.

Also since most of us who are in the business of reselling are also affiliates I thought I'd go ahead and include the definition of affiliate marketing.

The following definitions are from http://en.wikipedia.org/.

"Affiliate marketing typically refers to this Electronic commerce version of the traditional agent/referral fee sales channel concept. An e-commerce affiliate is a website which links back to an e-commerce site such as Amazon.com. When the readers of the website click on the link, they are connected to the e-tailer and if they purchase something the affiliate receives a small payment (depending upon the e-commerce site policies), usually a percentage of the money the customer spends."

***** SIDE NOTE *****
There have been a few new twists to affiliate marketing since this definition was written. Affiliates can now sign up for programs where they earn a set amount for click-throughs (AdSense type ads) and sign-ups ("Death of Internet Marketing Report".)

Also, depending on the site you become an affiliate for you may earn anywhere from 1% - 100% of the money spent. However, if you must send traffic to a web page through a link that was given to you then you are doing affiliate marketing and are not a reseller even if you make 100% of the money.
***** END SIDE NOTE *****

Reseller
"A reseller is a company or individual that purchases goods or services with the intention of onselling them rather than consuming or using them."

***** SIDE NOTE *****
Although this is a good definition many of us reselling services and products also use or at least try-out the service or product before we sell it. And sometimes we even buy the product or service with the intention of using it first and then start selling it later because it's a good product that can help others.
***** END NOTE *****

Now before we get to the actual definitions of the different types of resell rights you must know that these are general definitions. Many resale products come with a license that define exactly what rights are included. And when the rights are explained in some file that is included in the resale package those are the rights you have and should follow.

Normal Resell Rights"Normal resell rights mean that after you buy the item you will be allowed to sell it to your customers."Master Resell Rights"On the other hand, when you acquire master resell rights, not only you can sell it to your customers, but your customers also have the rights to sell it and pass on the resell rights."

Branding Rights
I couldn't find a definition for this 1 so I'll include mine.

Branding rights means that you have the right to put your information within the product. This information is usually restricted to your name and website or your affiliate links.
You do not have the right to change the content and to ensure that you won't, you are either given a copy of the product with your information included or you're given a tool that will only allow you to change those things that are allowed to be changed.

Private Label Rights"Private label products or services are typically those manufactured or provided by one company for offer under another company's brand."
...
"The concept has recently been extended to written text. The web is now awash with articles known either as 'Private Label Articles' or 'PLR (private label rights) Articles'. These are bought and sold in large volumes in order to quickly populate websites to attract traffic from search engines. The articles are presented as though created specifically for the site concerned. There is also now software available to automatically generate unique permutations of these articles."

***** SIDE NOTE *****
When you have private label rights for an article, report, e-book, web page, etc. it means you have the right to put your name on it as if you were the one who created it. You also have the right to make changes to it before you put your name on it.
***** END SIDE NOTE *****

Give Away Rights
A product with give away rights means you can give the product away without requiring someone to pay for it. Now some products will come with both give away and resale rights while others may say they must be given away and can not be sold. A product that can not be sold can be used as an gift when someone signs up for your list and as a bonus for another product since you are not requesting payment for that particular product.

Now you'll notice that none of the above definitions except the 1 for give away rights include any information about pricing, bonuses, membership sites or auction sites. That's because those things are pretty much up to the reseller unless a license has been included that defines exactly what the reseller can and can not do. Some licenses will state a recommended price while others may state a minimum price. Some licenses will not mention it being used as a bonus while others will state that it can or can not be used as one and others will state that a minimum price must be paid for the main product before it can be given as a bonus. The same is true about membership sites. Some products can be included, some can't and some say it must be a paid membership site. Most older products don't mention auction sites however because action sites have become a popular place to "advertise" ebooks most newer products with licenses don't allow you to place the product on auction site.

***** SIDE NOTE *****
The primary reasons for not allowing products to be placed on auction sites are:

1. It devalues the product because there are no quantity limits on ebooks.
2. Auction sites are popular with those who are actually selling bootlegged products. (They either don't have any right to sell the product or they are violating the license agreement.)

***** END SIDE NOTE *****

1 last thing about resale rights products. Many resale rights products now require you to register your product before you start selling it and can revoke your resale license if you don't.

Although there are several types of resale rights understanding the general and most popular definitions of them isn't too difficult:

• Resale Rights - sell product
• Master Resale Rights - sell product and resale rights
• Branding Rights - include some of your information in product before you sell or give away but don't change content
• Private Label Rights - include your information and can change content before you sell or give away
• Give Away Rights - product can or must be given away free of charge

The really important thing is -
If a product comes with information defining your resale rights - no mater which term they've used - then you must use that information as your guide when you sell or give away the product.

To Your Success,
Susan

How To Make Your Tables Stand Out

How To Make Your Tables Stand Out

One of the things you've got to love about having a website is wondering how your site will view in the many browsers that are available. And if you're like me you probably check your site using your browser and only check how it looks in 1 or 2 others occasionally.

But the 1 thing I've noticed in checking my sites is that tables, primarily the borders of the table, don't view the same way across all browsers. And because I don't know how to write CSS code the only way I knew to fix the problem was to either remove the borders or use borders that were close to what I was trying to do.

For example, if I was trying to get a table with a red border, depending on the browser I'd see:

Explorer

FireFox

Well yesterday I found a way to fix the border color problem without using CSS

To make colored borders for your tables that will look the same on Internet Explorer and FireFox (the 2 most popular browsers) all you have to do is:

1. Create your table.
2. Define the background for your table to be the color you want for the table's border.
3. Define the border size for your table to be 0.
4. Use the "cellspacing" attribute for your table to determine the border size.
5. Change the background for the cells of your table to be the color you want.

Here's the code for the table holding the tip title and if you're using FireFox you'll notice that it has a "nice" red border:

<table border="0" cellpadding="10" cellspacing="3" width="390" id="AutoNumber7" bgcolor="#FF0000"> <tr> <td width="80%" bgcolor="#FFFFCC"> <p align="center"> <b>How To Make Your Tables Stand Out</b></td> </tr> </table>

And this is what the above code means in English:

1. Define a table with:
   border size of 0
   cellpadding of 10 (that's the empty space around the content
   cellspacing of 3 (that sets the size of the border seen)
   width of 390 (this one is in pixels but you can use percentages)
   id is the table's name bgcolor of #FF0000 (background is red)
2. is the first table row
3. Next we define the column as: width of 80% of the table cell background color of #FFFFCC (that's light yellow)
4. Formatted the cell's content.
5. Ended the column, row and table definitions.

The above is an example of a single celled table but you can use this method to define tables with multiple rows and columns to get a nice border around your table and each of the cells.

Now if you're using an HTML editor like FrontPage to create your web pages you will have to do some HTML editing to make your border show up because many HTML editors insert some code and you'll have to remove it in order to see your border.

So after you've created your table and cells check the line that defines the table. It's the line that starts <table ...

If you see code similar to this:

style="border-collapse: collapse" bordercolor="#111111"

you'll need to remove it.

Using the above method to define your tables and cells can help make your site look the same for many web browsers. So give it a try.

To Your Success,
Susan

It's Easy To Get Confused

Over the last few days I've been getting a lot of email about a new report "The Death of Internet Marketing." And before that there was the report "The Death of AdSense."

And these types of reports aren't new. A couple of years ago many were proclaiming that "Email Marketing Is Dead" and "Popups Don't Work."

But as you know, email marketing isn't dead and many, in fact most of the well-known names of internet marketing still use some form of popup. If either of these things didn't work do you think people like Mike Filsaime, Jim Edwards, Yanik Silver, Ewen Chia and Doug Champigny would waste their time with them?

You also know that AdSense is not really dead - it's now just harder to use spam sites and and ads to make money with it.

So why do people write these types of reports and make these statements?

Well there are many reasons and here are the 2 biggest:

1. They capture your attention and get you to do something (usually sign up on their list).
2. They often provide you with good information about how the internet is changing.

Are these reports worth reading?

In many cases they are worth reading. Not because the headline is absolutely 100% true but because they provide some information on how things are changing.

Now last night I skimmed "The Death of Internet Marketing"
report and can tell you that much of the information in it is valid. However, does the author of the report think internet marketing is really dead or dying? No - he is pointing out how some of the latest trends in internet marketing that we've seen over the last few months have made it harder for everyone, even the "big names of internet marketing" to make sales. According to the author he wrote the report because, "I really wanted to address problems in our industry." ... "But most importantly, I wanted to open your mind to new things and trends coming that will save your Internet Marketing Business. I do feel that people that continue to play this game with the old rules will find their online careers cut short and short lived."

So far for every change that has occurred in internet marketing there have been at least 1 or more ways for the ethical internet marketer to adapt and survive. You know email marketing isn't dead even with the spam filters, complaints and laws because legitimate business people have adapted and use methods that will get their mail through most of the time. As for popups - sure the old style is blocked but now there are many other methods to get that added message up. Is AdSense dead - of course not. It's just been changed to try to make it more appealing to those doing a search. And internet marketing? Again quoting from the report on it's death, "To every door that closes, another door opens. So Internet Marketing is not dead."

So the next time you read a statement about how something is dead or doesn't work don't be confused. Just remember, the internet is constantly changing. There are new laws being written, more laws being enforced and new technologies being made available all the time. And it's because of all these things that what worked 5 or 10 years ago or even 5 to 10 months ago may not work today but there are ways for the legitimate online business
person to survive and grow.

To Your Success,
Susan

Stop Losing Visitors To Your Site

Last week 1 of my favorite subscribers, Gaida from http://www.7daystoprofitsmastery.com/Reports, asked the question: "How do i do a redirect...?"

It seems that many of her site visitors were going to "reports" rather than "Reports" and she was losing visitors to the famous "404 Error Page." Remember, capitalization does count in file names.

Because Gaida was an active subscriber long before I wrote the tip, "6 Ways To Re-Direct Your Web Page To Another Page" and she forgot and because you may have either forgotten or not been reading the newsletter in June, 2005 this tip is 1 of those inside the members' area.

When you read the archived tip you'll see that the 6th method includes the links to 2 free tools you can use to create the re-direction code for you.

Oh, you want a fresh piece of advice and not be sent off to read an archived tip?

Then how about this?

2 Good Reasons To Use Redirect Links

1. To hide your affiliate links in email advertising.
   
   It's a well know fact that many people will not click an affiliate link that looks like an affiliate link and some of those who do will chop off your affiliate information just to keep you from getting paid. Some will even replace your affiliate info with their own.
   
   
2. To send site visitors who misspell your page address to the right place on your site.
   
   If you have a page that has something unusual in it's spelling like
   * capital letters, hyphens, numbers or abbreviated words,
   * a file name with possible different spellings for the same word or
   * a name with some common misspellingsthen create some redirect links.

Remember, you don't want to lose visitors to a "404 Error Page" because every visitor you lose means you've lost another potential customer or subscriber and a simple redirect link may be all it takes.

To Your Success,
Susan