If you own a small shop and you are not offering your products on the Internet to everyone, well then shame on you really. It seems it is your loss and your Internet Competitors gain, who will inevitably be offering to your current customers locally. Why? Well because that is where your customers are and the Internet knows no bounds and barely flinches as it reaches customers and consumers across regions, countries or half way around the world.

How hard is it to offer your wares on the Internet? Not very, indeed it might be the simplest thing that you do all year. Why not build a pay site for your company website and offer some of your unique products on your Internet website? Perhaps you can feel a void or have some niche products you can offer. With a little work you might add 10% to your current sales, maybe more, who knows. But one thing is for sure if you do not do it someone else will and you will be losing sales you could have had.

Will Internet marketing work for any business? Certainly, it works for large corporations as well as many of the smallest home based businesses. Internet marketing does not have to be difficult and you can start out at any speed you want. If it is working well you can add to it, if not you have a place to send your customers to educate them, so you really have nothing to lose.

Why should you get involved in internet marketing? Perhaps you have been online for awhile, you’ve looked into a few online business opportunity schemes, and you wonder, do I really want to get involved? Everything you’ve seen either looks too good to be true, or too complicated to ever get a handle on, or it just downright looks like a scam.

If you are like me, you don’t want to be involved in a scam online. You are leery of pie-in-the-sky promises. Yet when you read the latest issues of the most popular offline magazines, you see that the future really is online.

So what do you do?

Let’s look at the offline (brick and mortar) marketplace. What types of things make our economy happen? What types of things make money? What types of things are actually useful to other people? Where do we spend our money?

We spend our money on houses and cars, on food and clothing, on entertainment and vacations. We buy workout memberships, massages, carpet cleaning and plumbing services, and education and media. We spend our money on things that have value to us. Generally these are things---goods, in an economic sense. Or they are something that someone does for us, to make our lives easier---services is the economic term here.

We generally don’t spend our money on fly-by-night types of things. We stay away from pyramid schemes and offline scams. We might gamble, but we call it entertainment.

So why should the internet be any different? It is not!

Real people are spending money online for the same types of things that they spend it on offline. You wouldn’t guess it based on the number of solicitations we all receive for get-rich-quick schemes online.

But let me ask you this. Who is making money on the get-rich-quick schemes? The people who buy into them, or the people who you buy them from? That really should be a no-brainer.

The need to have a business on the internet.

Do you believe that most of the entrepreneurs could generate 200% income of the sales after they have their own business website on the internet?

Do you believe that Internet is the FIRST medium to generate profitable business?

First Lesson:

I have a friend, who opens a business for house-gate-making and everything related to the security grills and so on. His business was not doing very well even though he was the only one who owned and offered such business and services in his area. He also spend a lot of money for printed advertising through newspaper, unfortunately the business was still discouraging, and getting less responses from the customers.

Right after he developed a business website, and advertised it on the Internet and also newspaper-written together the URL for his website, just like his wish was granted to get a better income for his business. The customers increased faster, and they came unlimitedly to get the service. That would be a proof on how a business with the website could give you better impression for your business & of course your income.

Second Lesson:

My friend was a novelist in a famous publishing company in KarangKraf. Before this, the sale for his novel was slower. During the first printing, it took a long time to be sold out.

After she had promoted his novel on the Internet, now he can smile heartedly because people are rushing for his novel. Not even the newly published novels, but also the previous ones, people are still looking for them to buy.

Just take a lesson from 2 stories written above, we can see the impact of having business on the Internet. It would be very profitable & advantageous.

THE FAILURE OF THE BUSINESS ON THE INTERNET

Before I start explaining how to develop business website on the Internet, let me explain why we always find failure in making internet business.

1. We Know, But We Don't Act

Can you solve my riddle?

There are 10 chicks that are being seen by a few eagles on the sky. 8 of those realize that they are seen by the eagles, and within anytime the eagles could catch them. Thus, the chicks wish to hide somewhere from becoming the prey of the eagles. The eagles somehow fly to the group of chicks and catch them. How many of them are safe?

The answer would be none of them are safe even though the 8 chicks WISH to hide. This is because the chicks have just wished to hide, meaning that they are just planning. But they haven't done the ACTION of hiding yet, it is just the PLAN.

What the story above relates you?

You are wishing to start doing your business on the Internet, but you haven't set the ACTION. You just set the WISH.

The successful people are those who set actions after the plans, and they made it not only by day-dreaming. This is one of the points why people always fail to setup their business on the Internet. THIS IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN US AND THOSE SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET. THIS IS THE ONLY POINT. BELIEVE IT. They act and apply everything the learnt from their readings & experience into their real life. It is not because of our marketing methods are wrong or whatsoever.

You wish to start your business, but you do not act for it, just like starting to learn how to realize the wish. You do not try to learn any simple business methods from the Internet (which is in English Language of Course) that explain the secrets of the Internet business. You do not set the starting point to learn how to start doing business just by reading those useful & informational articles. Of course, it is clear here that you do not need to attend any workshops to know how to have business on the Internet because those successful people, most of them just read the books and articles from the Internet, and right after that they set-up the action point.

** Please do not think that the web development task is a hurdle for you. I will tell give you the solution at the end of these articles later.

Actually I just put the number for every single failure causal for the Internet Business. Obviously, it does not need to be numbered, because it is only one MAIN REASON. This is because I want to show to everyone; that is THE ONLY MAIN REASON OF FAILURE for us to start the business on the Internet.

HOW A BUSINESS ON THE INTERNET RETURNS YOU PROFIT?

You are walking inside a shopping mall; there are a lot of shops that sell any kind of goods. As a visitor, and of course a buyer, you will be walking inside the mall to find for the items you are looking for. Once in a while you might see other item that attracts you. You might be buying it because you like it, although you are not planning to get it at first.

You could also see the advertisements that are placed anywhere inside the shopping premise. You would see item of new arrivals, placed by the owner of the shop in front of their shops on the display part to attract the interest of the customers like you.

Ok, now you have imagined that happens? And now I bet that you could feel how the situation would be, right? Now, please read through and compare with the other information below

THE WEBSITE IS THE SHOPPING PORTAL

On the Internet, a website is just the same as a shopping mall that you always go for shopping, as I explained above. Inside of the mall there are a lot of shops selling various kind of product that are needed by every visitor.

The visitors on the Internet do not have to waste a lot of energy to walk here and there looking for the items they want. They just need to sit down on the comfort chair at their own place, and click here and there to see whatever items they are interested for. They can ask in details from the enquiry/contact form provided inside the website.

You can also advertise other people's products inside your website on the Internet by charging them the fees to place the advertisements. You can place it anywhere you like.

Briefly, I would conclude here THAT YOUR BUSINESS WEBSITE ON THE INTERNET IS JUST THE SAME CONCEPT AS HAVING A SHOPPING MALL IN A REALITY WORLD. IF YOU HAVE A BUSINESS WEBSITE, IT IS CONSIDERED TO BE THE SAME AS HAVING THE HIGH-VALUE OF THOUSANDS RINGGIT SHOPPING MALL COMPLEX.

Affiliate marketing is getting bigger and bigger each and every day. So what is it? Affiliate marketing is basically advertising another person's product. So why would you market someone else's product? Well owner's of products pay affiliates a percentage of each sale that the affiliate makes them.

For example, one of the products I am an affiliate of is the rich jerk. The rich jerk is an informational product that explains how to make money online through various different methods. Each time I sell this product, I get 75% of each sale. The product costs about $49, so I make about $34 each time I sell the the rich jerk's informational product.

So basically I am making money without having to create my own product or deal with any unsatisfied customers! It is a great deal for both sides. The owner of the product makes money basically doing nothing and I make money without having to deal with any of the stuff that goes along with having my own product.

So how do you know that you are getting credit? There is special tracking code in a link that you are provided that tracks every time you make a sale.

There also companies that act as middlemen between product owners and affiliates. Two of the more popular ones are clickbank and commission junction.

Affiliate marketing is a booming new business and people are making millions of dollars a year when they don't even have their own product.

One of the biggest turning points since I began Internet marketing has been my discovery of the online forums (or discussion groups or bulletin boards as they are also called).

There are 4 major reasons why people use forums

1) You can get free advice. For example

ask about any aspect of marketing ask for opinions about a product before purchasing or about a business opportunity or affiliate program you plan to join ask for a site review

2) You can discover new products, ideas, tips, tools3) You can make contact with others, and possibly set up joint ventures. You will find many helpful people and many of the top names posting at forums.

4) Site promotion.

When you make postings you can include your signature or a link to your site. If you have provided helpful answers or useful information readers 'may' decide to visit your site.

There are techniques to turn 'may' into 'will very likely', which you will see in the next tip.

tip: 2 You should never openly use the URL that an affiliate program provides for you.

You should link instead to a page on your own site which then leads to the affiliate program.

The reasons ?

1. On this page you can provide your own introduction to the product or service you are promoting. This can include, for example:

- additional detail not available in your posting or advert
- your own personal experience
- a review of the benefits

2. You can provide links to the rest of your site in case your visitor is not interested in that affiliate product.

3. Your own site traffic statistics will indicate the response to your advert in addition to any stats provided for you by the affiliate company.

4. You can submit the page to search engines.

5. With the real URL visible there is a risk that the reader removes the suffix (agent code) so that you do not get registered as the affiliate agent

6. If the affiliate operation becomes discontinued you can inform and divert visitors at your own website, rather than have them visit a non-existent page.

It is very easy to see why internet bulletin boards and message boards are so popular. The main reason is easy access for anyone with a computer. This is also the main reason why they should be taken with a grain of salt. The anonymity of this avenue of communication adds fuel to the fire. The fact that anyone in any part of the world can register under any alias they choose and be anyone they want is potentially dangerous. This is not to say that there are not “real” people posting and giving feedback that is well intended. What is important to recognize is that “not everything is always as it seems” and this is never more apparent than on these internet sites. There seems to be an acceptance of credibility of the written word over the spoken word.

As a contractor who was performing estimates and proposals to clients I often felt that the potential customer thought of me as someone who was “trying to get them” in some way. There is a negative perception of contractors that is a given in today’s society. With this in mind I took many of the points I would try to make in my proposal and put them in writing and on company letterhead. What happened is that after I left, the customer would read all the documents and believe what I had written more than if I had simply stated the same information as part of my proposal. This same logic transcends to internet message boards as well. The readers of these boards often are taken in by the information and accept much of the postings and information as valid and true. This is where the danger lies. Many of these boards are public and once you have typed a post or response and hit “enter” on your keyboard it is live for everyone to see for eternity.

The first problem with this is the unsuspecting user who upon logging on to the internet performs a search on a particular field or profession. Very often because of the amount of information that is compiled on these sites they appear high on the list of searches. The user then logs on to the site to find out as much information as possible. For example, if they were to enter a trade or profession type site that has many forums of information immediately at their fingertips to research.

Once inside the site they can find enormous amounts of information that the rest of the general population can also access and contribute too. Very often, without knowing, the user takes in the information, studies it, digests it, and accepts the information as true without even knowing who or where the source for the information originated from. This is where many innocent people can get taken advantage of. Suppose you are a person who is considering starting your own business and enter one of these sites to get information and are considering using your savings to invest. Why would you take advice from people you can not identify with or even know their identity?

Going further, suppose you merely needed advice, again why would you seek advice from anonymous sources? With all the outlets to get sound advice from why are people relying on information received through anonymous posts made by people who can pretend to be anybody they want? There once was a fellow who used an identity as a contractor who gave advice on how-to’s. The way he would get answers was to search the internet for answers by others and then post them as his own! It is sad to say that this person had nothing better to do but to him this was a hobby or source of entertainment. What is dangerous is that there were folks who bought into his responses and acted on his replies. Now imagine the impact that this person had on an unsuspecting user who was influenced by this “knucklehead.” Caution should be exercised before believing everything you read on the internet. While the internet can be such a valuable tool it can also be an extremely dangerous tool.

The next part that puzzles me is why people would seek advice and counsel from those they have never met or know really anything about. If this were a doctor you would want to have heard references, if it were a contractor you would request references, if it were a product you would want testimonials and reviews. So why do people continue to believe what they read on these sites at face value? From my experience, the most successful people rarely contribute to these sites because they are actually too busy with their businesses to spend hours replying to posts that rarely make them any money, if any at all. It seems to become a hobby to the folks who participate day after day. I am sure somewhere they are developing a 12-step program for internet pretenders and posters.

The reason most of these people have time is for many reasons that may include, no job or a part-time job, not happy with family situation, a want to belong to something, it is free, and many more that basically fills a void for the individual. If I am the person considering entering a field to invest my monies I want to know who is giving the advice and are they successful. Why would you want advice from an anonymous source that isn’t successful? Why would you think of chasing a dream of owning your own business and then seeking the advice of a part-timer who can’t even make a go of it full time? You shouldn’t, yet everyday I see this happening all over the internet. We have given a power to these anonymous people that they should not have as they could destroy lives with their misinformation. While there is unbelievable amounts of beneficial information on the internet there is also much misinformation that can potentially be damaging.

Another item that is negative about these sites is the culture that exists. Because people are not face-to-face and are typing responses instead they seem to say things they would not dare in person. When someone has too much alcohol to drink they are often referred to as having “beer muscles” in comparison it seems because no one is immediately in front of the person typing they get “internet muscles” and form am arrogance to make statements they otherwise would not. What is disturbing about these folks is that their ignorance and poor conduct becomes representative of the group as whole. An example of this would be if two people were to disagree about a certain topic and instead of a good hearted debate and dialogue they began to degrade each other and possibly start name-calling and swearing. Now the person who is performing the search stumbles on this behavior they may perceive that this is the norm for this profession or group, thus putting a very negative spin on that profession. This can cause more damage to the reputation of groups of professionals that are working everyday towards credibility and acceptance than people realize.

The last disturbing item is that many people use these sites for cheap leads and advertising. Because they are free to post on many “flea-market” vendors enter these sites and will give a perception that they are a company that they may not be. For example, I know of one vendor who has a line of product that he sells from a family home. He does not own a car and travels his town in a golf cart! He enter these sites to pedal his wares to unsuspecting people who take him at face value and believe he has a lab, warehouse, and business that is a multi-million dollar company. The truth is that he really lives on a shoestring and often needs to collect money up front to be able to manufacture the orders placed thus causing supply and distribution problems to the unsuspecting public. Without the internet this person would not even own a business however, with the internet you can create a new identity all the time. The problem is that the internet breeds this type of behavior and culture.

At the end of the day I know that the internet has made my life and many others easier and more productive. It is a shame that these bulletin boards can not be truly used, 100% as a tool to give and get true information to better ourselves and our businesses. It is because I am skeptical about all things and do not have habits that cause me to believe everything I see, hear, and read that keep me grounded. This is not so with everyone and just like in society there are those out there who look to take advantage of and prey on the weak and innocent without a care as to who they hurt. We see on the news more often how the internet has effected many lives in a negative way, we should all use caution when surfing the internet and participating on bulletin boards and message boards with decisions that may impact our lives!

Security is as much a social issue as a practical or technical one. Some security problems are a direct result of business hostilities. Information that is valuable to a business may also be valuable to competitors or disgruntled employees. The removal or sabotage of that information may also be valuable to a competitor. Other problems are caused by the electronic equivalent of joyriding, a random sort of malice, which is nonetheless annoying and perhaps fatal for a business.

More serious security issues include spam and other kinds of unsolicited mail. While only an annoyance to individuals, spam can become a serious drain on resources once it starts infiltrating a business. The unwanted mail has to be forwarded along the company network, where it can take up disk space and use computer power that could be put to more constructive uses.

Another concern is the use of company resources for illegal activities. Chief among these is reading or distributing Internet porn and advertising pyramid schemes. Companies with permanent Internet connections are particularly vulnerable to these kinds of activities. Without adequate security, computer-literate users may find it easy to create non-existent user accounts, which can be used to abet illegal activities with relative impunity.

Then there is threat of hacking attacks from outside. Hackers may decide to joyride into a commercial system just to prove they can. Less often, they will target a company or organization if the organization has annoyed them in the some way. In either case, solid security is essential. More worrying, hackers can use a company's computers as a warehouse for illegal information and make it look as if the company, not the hacker, is responsible for the appearance of the information. Computer-savvy employees may sometimes be able to intercept private email and disgruntled ex-employees may hold a company hostage, threatening to destroy all their records if their demands are not met.

With over 48 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 using the internet on a regular basis, it’s important for responsible parents to ensure that their kids are protected from dangerous online predators and inappropriate websites.

For most of us, it is impossible to physically monitor everything our children do online, as we simply do not always have the time to sit with them while they research homework topics, play games, and socialize with online buddies. It’s important to let kids use and experience the internet, as it’s a great place to learn and discover. On the other hand however, the web is full of unsavory sites and dangerous predators just waiting for a curious youngster to come their way.

The best way to protect children from the dangerous side of the web while still allowing them the freedom to explore and enjoy all the good things the internet has to offer is to use Parental Control software. This special software handles the internet monitoring for you, and can easily be customized and set to reflect your household rules and family values.

There are two ways protect your kids online with the help of parental control software: Either get a good internet computer security suite that includes some parental control features, or get a specialized product that is designed to provide a total “blanket of protection” against all internet security threats that target children online. If you opt for the latter, Net Nanny is the product of choice.

Internet Security Suites with Parental Controls

Several internet security software companies incorporate parental control elements into their “all inclusive” computer security suites. Also known as Internet Security Suites, these excellent products offer protection from computer viruses, spam, spyware, and hackers as well. Most of the security suites that offer integrated parental controls utilize a technique called “web filtering”. Web filtering allows parents to block access to a built in set of “blacklisted sites”, which are known to contain inappropriate material and/or attract a lot of predators. Parents can also add their own prohibited sites to the blacklist, thereby controlling what sites can and cannot be displayed.

Panda Platinum Internet Security and f-Secure Internet Security are two examples of excellent security suites that include web content filtering software. F-Secure Internet Security includes the added benefit of a “web timer”, which allows parents to block internet access altogether during certain times

Whether on or off line, customers in today's marketplace want quality products and information in a quick and easy manner. I’ve typed it before and I’ll type it again, the internet’s main benefit is that of speed and convenience. Therefore e-business, which uses the internet as the core for business dealings, can help make a company more customer-friendly in addition to many other things, such as creating a more efficient exchange of information and/or products and services.

1. Removes Location and Availability Restrictions
Users need not be in the same physical location as an e-business and the exchange of information and transactions may take place at any given time, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week and from any location in the world with Internet access. A physical location is restricted by size and limited to only those customers that can get there, while an online store has a global marketplace with customers and information seekers already waiting in line.

2. Reduces Time and Money Spent
In e-business, there is often a reduction in costs required to complete traditional business procedures. Many of those same traditional business approaches can be eliminated and replaced with electronic means, which are often easier to carry out as well as easier on the pocketbook. For example, compare the cost of sending out 100 direct mailings (paper, postage, staff and all), to sending out a bulk e-mail. Also think about the cost of paying rent at a physical location opposed to the cost of maintaining an online site.

3. Heightens Customer Service
With e-business customers receive highly customizable service, and communication is often more effective. There is far more flexibility, availability and faster response times with online support. For example, think about the speed of e-mail inquiries and live chat as opposed to getting on the phone, especially when that business is closed for the day. There is also a faster delivery cycle with online sales, helping strengthen the customer/business relationship. The internet is a powerful channel for reaching new markets and communicating information to customers and partners. Having a better understanding of your customers will help to improve customer satisfaction.

4. Gives Competitive Advantage
The internet opens up a brand new marketplace to businesses moving online. Competition via the internet is growing as the internet itself grows and waiting too long to move online may cause you to lose your place in line entirely. Easy access to real time information is a primary benefit of the internet, enabling a company to give more efficient and valid information and helping to gain the competitive advantage over those that are not online.

Although there are risks associating with e-business, as with most business decisions, there is also the risk associated with the inability to adapt to the changing times. Change is inevitable in today’s marketplace and should be embraced with open arms and open sites!

By and large, the biggest problems faced by ecommerce software is search engine visibility. The problem arises as the result of major search engines being unable to crawl the entire contents of a shopping system. A major contributor to this problem is the use of what is known as session id's.

Session id's are used by ecommerce software for the purpose of tracking visitor activity, populating shopping cart contents, and other uses. A session id usually appears in the url of a product page of an ecommerce system in the form of a string of letters and/or numbers which follow an ampersand, question mark, or a short identifier string such as "sid". Examples of what a session id might look like in your address bar include the following (in these examples, the session id is denoted as abcdefg):

a) www.yourstore.com/products/productid=123&=abcdefg

b) www.yourstore.com/products/productid=123?=abcdefg

c) www.yourstore.com/products/productid=123&sid=abcdefg

A session id is a variable which is unique to to the visitor and time of the visitor's visit to the ecommerce system. The session id is a unique string of characters and is never repeated - it uniquely identifies each "session" on the web site. Two different visitors to the web site constitute two unique sessions. Additionally, the same visitor visiting the web site on two separate days would likewise constitute two unique sessions.

A session id cannot be dropped into the address bar of a browser and result in the rendering of a particular product page. The pages viewed by the visitor to the web site do not physically exist on the server, instead they are dynamically generated on the server side, rendered and served to the client (visitor) machine as viewable html.

This is the root of the search engine problem. As the pages do not physically exist on the server, and the url of each page rendered contains a unique session id which cannot be replicated, the search engines cannot find (or crawl) the catalog of the ecommerce system. The result of this is that the use of session id's virtually eliminates your entire catalog from the index of the search engines, as if your catalog does not exist.

This, of course, can have a drastic affect on search engine visibility, traffic, and rankings. For example, if you are selling blue widgets, but the search engines cannot see that you are selling blue widgets, a search for "blue widgets" on a major search engine will not turn up your web site. As over 85% of all online transactions have their genesis in a search query, the amount of traffic, and therefore sales, that you are missing as a result of the use of session id's is self-evident.

There are lots of ways to create revenue from your web site including creating ebooks. But everyone has to start somewhere. Use these seven tips to get started making your web site pay you back for your investments of time and money:

1. Find a Niche

Look for something about your business that's special--different. You can use that special difference to help promote your business with increased customer awareness and loyalty. People tend to find products and services interesting that are unique. They talk about them and tell their friends about them.

2. Prepare to Put In the Time

I dislike being the one to tell you. But you are going to have to put in the time necessary to see the rewards. Despite what many self-proclaimed gurus will tell you, there really is no instant way to make money on the net. Successful web businesses know they reap the benefits as a result of constant development, refinement and hard work.

3. Get Real, Market and Advertise

Whoever told you "Build it and they will come." lives on the set of "Field of Dreams" starring Kevin Costner. Anyway, know your customers won't just come to you. You have to go get them. Use and test online/offline methods to see which works best for you. Then synch them all together. i.e. make sure all your print materials have your website address on them.

4. Be Real!

People will respect your honesty. Your credibility will grow along with your profit line as they see you do what you say. Promise only what you can deliver online and write your content using clear, short, yet friendly language. The better your site visitors can understand what you offer, the more they will pull out their wallet and make a purchase.

5. Make Your Customer Service Sing!

Whatever business you operate it cost you valuable time and money to get new customers. Don't throw them away with poor online service. If a prospect emails an order or an inquiry, respond as quickly as possible. Courtesy and efficient service wins relationships and maximizes any potential for sales.

6. Provide Premium Content

Invest in your website with premium content and update regularly. Set aside some time monthly to update your website. If you don't have the time to update yourself, hire a web service company to do it for you. Contact webmaintenance@arrowproduction.com for an affordable web maintenance quote. A stagnate web site reflect poorly on your business. Even if you just change a few headlines, testimonials, fresh article or report. Customers who return will want something new to examine. Reward them with premium frequently updated content.

7. Maintain Your Professional Image

Make sure your website reflects the same quality and professionalism you have in your company. Things that detract from your website and company's image are poor graphics, sloppy text, and poorly aligned pages. Be sure to leave white space – don't fill every spot with a message. It will confuse your visitors. Invest in the construction of your website. It will pay you back with loyal visitors and customers. Build a cheap-looking, unprofessional site and it will reward you with visitors that don't take you seriously. Want to know more about maintaining your professional website image? Read: Top 5 Mistakes that May Drive Your Visitors Away In Less Than 2 Minutes.

You have no idea that there is an army of people out there who are interested in creatively marketing their own website. Do some sleuthing!

Take your time and look at the names of those who post comments that you feel you may be interested in. Record their names! Take some informative notes! Analyze their statements.

When you feel that the time is right, think about how you will approach them. It is a given that these people are interested mainly in, “what’s in it for me.”

That shouldn’t be a problem for you. What is your motive for approaching them in the first place?

Be sure you know what it is that you want. Don’t waste their time. Time wasting always works against you. Later on down the line that is.

Show your creative side and for heavens sake remember, money doesn’t always have to change hands. Offer them access to something valuable that you may have. How do you know they will be interested in what you have… didn’t you do your homework?

Clearly, you too can also send out creative messages on blogs. Making inviting and informative comments that will focus on the area you are particularly interested in.

Please don’t forget to include a signature file. One that will obviously point back to your website. This will have a positive two-fold impact:

1. It will improve your search engine rankings.

2. It will also drive a whole lot of traffic to your site.

Pay close attention to this next option. You should seriously consideration creatively designing a website that has a “total self-marketing concept.”

By “total self-marketing concept” I simply mean a website that is mainly built and designed around a marketing theme.

For instance, a prominent type of “total self-marketing concept” in websites is the use of forums. They are easy to build, but you should be creative in the conception stage.

An important piece of advice, don’t be too stiff in the design stage, let loose, and have some fun building the website. And the people who come aboard will have fun too.

In addition, how about a social network type of website, or even search engine optimization. Talk with people, do some networking first. Don’t just rush out of the blocks with only your thoughts on the project. Allow some time for this project to marinate.

Another great idea would be to be a part of a gigantic “group giveaway”. Obviously it would be a “themed” event. We don’t want to be giving the shop away willy-nilly.

No…there has to be a method to the madness.

Here you would contact others in your particular niche and stage a “pooling” of resources. You must be certain that there is some benefit to all who chose to participate.

There are several holidays coming up throughout the year. Focus your “pooling” around the holidays. I am 100% sure that your customers would very much appreciate the giveaways.

This final idea I really love. I find it exciting, and exhilarating. If I had the time and the money, I would focus on this alone, just for the enjoyment.

Market your business using pay-per-click advertising.

Earlier on I said that I love to do this. I am forced to admit though; I am no good at it. That doesn’t mean that I can’t love it.

Pay-per-click can be very effective for targeted, low cost traffic. Guess what? Its very quick too. You should try it, if you are anything like me, you’ll love it too.

First, open an account with Google Adwords. Then test out some advertisements for as little as one-cent-per-click and see how you do. You must creep before you walk. Ease yourself along, don’t give the shop away.