My Money Blog

What is Social Marketing and How Do you Use it?

Posted on 26. Sep, 2009 by Casper.

Social networking is becoming the quickest way to connect with friends, family and colleagues. It is also the easiest way to meet new business contacts to help further one’s career, or even to search for personal service needs through personal contacts and network contacts.

This also ties in with the world of social marketing. Social marketing is a relatively new field in the internet marketing world. This tool (used on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn) is growing exponentially daily in the online marketing field. Here retailers and affiliate marketers can spot updates to their sites and blogs, and provide continuously updated feed links for subscribers and followers. Subscribers will appreciate the updates from their favorite affiliates and marketers; this creates brand loyalty and continued sales, as well as word-of-mouth. One of the most important aspects in business is word-of-mouth; in the social marketing world it is instant.

Social marketing sites abound with free information. Or, to get started quickly networking with some of the best, do a Twitter search for social marketing, affiliate marketing, online sales, word-of-mouth internet business etc. There is no end to the leads, friends, customers, and business partners one can find on one of these sites. LinkedIn is also essential; having a free account there is priceless and helpful in social networking and marketing.

Marketing a business is fundamental to sales and growth. The internet world is becoming the world. Any successful business venture will have to join the ranks of social networking and marketing in order to keep up with the latest trends and consumer needs. Begin a social marketing campaign today; it is free and fast! There is work and persistence involved, yet the results will be worth it and quickly realized with steadfast work.

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Three Video Marketing Ideas For Affiliates

Posted on 25. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Video is the new content of choice on the internet. Millions of people everyday are watching videos through websites like YouTube, Vimeo, Seesmic, and others like them. These videos can be on just about anything from video diaries, personal webcam shows, clips of movies, music videos, and how-to’s.

For affiliates the use of video is a major asset for increasing commissions. In fact, because of recent technologies in digital video cameras, software, and ease of editing and uploading videos, creating videos to market your affiliate program is relatively easy. The only question remaining then is what kind of videos should affiliate marketers create?

Demonstration of products

A surefire way to sell more affiliate products is to show a video of you using the product. This creates a level of authenticity with the viewer. A lot of times people will be surfing for information on a particular product. When they see your video, using and explaining the product, it helps them make a better decision to buy it. They can then use the url you embed within our video or click thru to your website.

News updates featuring product or company

People love to hear what new products, or improvements, are being released. This is especially true in the electronics and technology field. Video updates of news about a particular product you are promoting will help people choose whether or not to buy the product from your website.

Short 15 Min. Shows

Everyone wants to be a star. Video websites like YouTube give you that opportunity. You can have your own video podcast, or 15 minute show, where you can talk about issues in your niche, new products, interview guests, show live demonstrations, or anything else your imagination can dream up. The key to the success of this type of video is to be original. Don’t just follow what someone else is doing. Be unique.

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Using Viral Marketing

Posted on 18. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Viral marketing can best be described as “create and forget”. In the most simplest of terms, viral marketing is a way of promoting your product through the buzz created by other people spreading your materials around for free. You don’t have to be involved in any of the marketing process except for the initial creation of the content that is being virally spread through the internet.

Viral marketing is great for any type of online business. With the current technologies available to affiliate marketers, network marketers, service providers, consultants, and informational product sellers, viral advertising is not only something that can be used easily – but it should be used.

The key to doing this is having the right viral materials in place that create a marketing buzz about you, your product, and your expertise. Within these materials are links to your website, other information, and affiliate links that people will see and click on.

Create A Killer Marketing Buzz With These Viral Marketing Techniques

1. Free Ebook

Get your viral campaign started with a free ebook that other can give away. This shouldn’t be a 10 page mini-book, but a hefty 40 to 50 page ebook full of great information that people will want to give away.

2. Free Email Series

Next to an ebook, a 7 to 10 part email series is a great way to spread your website links around virally.

3. Video Segments

YouTube.com has opened up a whole new opportunity for viral marketing. Not only do you get more of a personal touch, but your video has the potential to be seen by millions on a daily basis. Other marketers can also embed the video code from YouTube, Google Videos, and Vimeo to their own site for increased exposure.

Viral marketing creates almost instant buzz about your product and services. Whatever topic you are marketing using viral marketing in your ad campaign will greatly decrease marketing expenses while increasing profits at the same time.

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5 Free Gifts For Rapid Opt-In List Growth

Posted on 13. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

In the Internet marketing toolbox, few strategies are more powerful than having your own opt-in email list. With a consistent weekly, or monthly, list you are able to send out your information directly to the subscriber’s email inbox with your affiliate links and reviews in it. The trick is to grow a healthy list of subscribers that are both responsive and loyal. How do you do that? Offer them quality free gifts to entice them to sign up and also to keep them there. Here’s a list of 5 types of free gifts to rapidly grow a successful opt-in list.

Grow Your List With A Free Ebook

The idea is to offer value in your freebies. Offering a 7 page ebook isn’t much of an enticement. Plan on having a good 30 to 40 page ebook that has some real value in it. If you offer good information the subscriber will stay and not just unsubscribe after they have downloaded your offer.

Grow Your List With A Powerful Email Course

Instead of creating a multi-page ebook, a multi-part email series that deal with a very narrow topic are also a powerful way to grow your email list. The trick is to offer some information that is not found anywhere else.

Grow Your List With A Free Video Series

Offer several short, how-to videos on a particular topic. These could be interviews or step by step tutorials.

Grow Your List With A Free Trial To Membership Site

Membership sites are wildly popular because they offer consistent, updated information. However, they come at a monthly cost. By offering a free month, or even two, for new subscribers will not only grow your list, but potentially your monthly income.

Grow Your List By Offering An Exclusive Subscriber Only Membership Site

As stated already, membership sites hugely popular. If you have the time, and resources, you could create a subscriber only membership site that is free as long as they subscribe.

Growing your list is a powerful way to earn more income on a consistent basis. Use these five tips for rapidly growing your email list.

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Five Mistakes That Will Defeat Your Email Marketing Efforts

Posted on 12. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Email marketing can be one of your most powerful forms of advertising your site. It can also hurt your marketing efforts if not done correctly. Many, trying to make a quick dollar, use less than ethical approaches to their email. A well rounded email campaign requires much thought and avoiding some common mistakes.

Make sure you have permission.

The biggest form of complaint people have, whether real or not, is that you sent them your newsletter, or ad, without their permission. Use an email service that will allow you to have a double opt-in for new subscribers. This way there isn’t any excuse as to how they got your email. A double opt-in requires more work for the new subscriber but is worth it to the publisher for less SPAM complaints.

Include good content.

A lot of email marketers forget that the reason people subscribed to their email list in the first place was for good content. If you provide information that can be found elsewhere, information that is out of date, or any attempts to just getting them to spend money, you will lose your subscribers.

Don’t publish more than once.

A week that is. There is a big misconception that if you send emails everyday with a new product review, or recommendation, that you’ll earn big money everyday. The opposite is true. People will leave… in droves. Set a strict, non-conditional, policy with yourself that you will not publish more than once a week.

Using very weak email subjects.

The only thing someone will see of your newsletter within the first couple of seconds is the subject line showing up in their inbox. If that is weak they won’t open it. Take time with the subject of each email you send to make sure it gets the best opportunity to be read.

Too much design.

HTML emails are great for snazzy looking newsletters, but can also distract the reader. If you use HTML keep the design to a minimum. A header graphic, bold headings and sub-headings, a sidebar with a few graphics is ok, anything more and it’s overkill.

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Affiliate Marketing Success with Social Media

Posted on 09. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Social media marketing is the newest form of advertising that affiliate marketers can take advantage of in promoting their affiliate sites and products. No matter what niche your site is in, there is a social network for it. Getting started with social media is not something to take lightly however. If you’re going to market affiliates through it, there are some success tips you might want to keep in mind.

1. Start Slowly

Don’t automatically begin throwing all your affiliate links at your social networking friends. This will label you as a social spammer and you will be blocked. Start slow in your social campaign and begin interacting rather than dictating.

2. Add Value

As you start to add friends and followers to your networks you start to gain influence when you add value. Places like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social networks thrive on information. By keeping involved with people you follow, or are friends with, and adding solutions, and valuable content, you are gaining authenticity and your links will be clicked and less intrusive.

3. Cloak Your Link In Information

Blatant, outright affiliate links are not going to be looked at in a very good light. The best way to earn affiliate commissions through social media is to place your links in articles or blog posts. This way people know you aren’t just trying to make money off them.

4. Be Consistent

Nobody likes a hit and run social networker. The quickest way to make yourself irrelevant is to join some networks, participate, disappear, and them come back again a few weeks, or few months later. Whatever credibility you built up has now since disappeared and you will more than likely find your follower numbers way down.

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5 Successful Landing Page Tips For Affiliate Marketers

Posted on 08. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Affiliate marketing, while a quick and easy way to get started with earning money online, is also a highly specialized form of marketing. There are several techniques and strategies that you can use to promote your affiliate products online, but very few work better than using a landing, or squeeze, page.

A landing page is mostly used in affiliate campaigns that utilize pay-per-click marketing, but should also be used with email marketing, paid ads on websites, and article marketing. Think of it as a place where you funnel all your traffic to distribute to other parts of your marketing campaign.

One of three things should happen once someone visits your landing page. One is they opt-in to your email list by signing up or a free download or video. Another would be to directly click to the merchant site for a direct sale. The last would be that they click to a blog, or listing of articles and information. Without one of these three things happening your landing page isn’t doing its job.

5 Successful Landing Page Tips For Affiliate Marketers:

·    Open With A Compelling Headline – Catching the visitors attention as soon as they visit your site will pull them further into your page.

·    Develop An Emotional Sub-Heading – Most people miss this part, but you want to create an emotional pull after you capture their interest with the heading.

·    Make it personal – Affiliate marketing isn’t an anonymous form of marketing anymore. Keep the copy on your page personal in nature to build rapport and trust.

·    Use a testimony or two – Let your visitors see reaction, recommendations, and praise from other customers.

·    Ask for a response – Affiliates usually use a “Click here for…”, but what really works is to come out and ask. Ask them to download your free gift, ask them to click to the merchant, and ask them to visit your blog or articles.

Successful affiliate marketing starts with a successful landing page presence.

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5 Power Tips For Advanced Article Marketing

Posted on 08. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Article marketing has been the leading form of marketing on the Internet for quite a long time now. Experts all agree that creating content for your website, or providing that content for others to use, is their most powerful traffic generating technique. Affiliate marketers, network marketers, and service providers all use article marketing as their main traffic source.

With that said, there is a problem with article marketing. Everyone is doing it. Through the millions of articles that are written each year, you have to find a way that will push your article to the top of the ‘must read’ pile so it isn’t buried and lost. Here are five powerful tips to boost your article marketing efforts.

1. Have A Different View

Create your own content instead of re-writing the same old stuff over and over again. Spend time brainstorming new ideas, opposing views, and different techniques for doing things. Different always gets attention.

2. Use Bullets and Numbers

Reading on the Internet is all about skimming. Very rarely do people sit and read a large, blocky article with only paragraph after paragraph. Time is limited so articles that are built around lists and bullet points will be read more than others.

3. Use Twitter To Get Readers

Article marketing is more than just writing the article. It’s also about getting people to read it. Twitter is a great place to drive people to your newest article. Websites like EzineArticles.com allow you to automatically update your Twitter feed when your newest article is accepted.

4. Have Clear Resource Box

The main point for article marketing is to get fresh traffic to your sit. This is accomplished with an author’s resource box at the end of the article. Instead of writing a huge bio, just keep it very basic, to the point, and very clear.

5. Be Consistent

Article marketing takes time and effort, but the rewards are well worth it. Stay on top of those rewards by keeping consistent in your writing new fresh content. Continually write 5 to 8 articles per week and you’ll see a steady rising in the visitors your website receives.

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Twitter Safety Tips – Keep Yourself in Safe Zone

Posted on 06. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Twitter being sought by many as social networking site, there are hundred of thousands of people around the world registered as users. The site Twitter is used to interact with the people around the world. In the process of interaction, there are few important points to be kept in mind for safety; a reason is not interaction will have security. People with bad intention in this world are many. With use of internet increased many folds the cyber crime has also increased alarmingly.

The very vital point in your interaction is keeping the limits; limits in terms of personal information that one can share with whom and up to what limit. Here are few tips on sharing your personal information on twitter.

Don’t put too much of personal information on your profile, the section in twitter where the user can put personal information. The profile section of the user at Twitter is open to all users of Twitter. The information in profile section can be shared on Twitter. Too much of personal will invite trouble for you as already said some users on internet have wrong intention; they are here to create trouble.

Twitter is a site through which you are given chance to interact with your near and dear ones. Better continue interacting with those only whom you know that’s the safest way to be on Twitter. Following people that you know in real life will keep you in a safe zone.

When on Twitter you will come across many people trying to interact with you, whether the one who is unknown to you have good intentions is not confirmed. In such a case responding to such an unknown person is inviting trouble (not always) as you will move in an unknown zone where you are not sure of the person on the other side.

It is very essential to keep Twitter feed private, permission to view it should be given to those only whom you know very well At Twitter it is more of a behaving in public; users around the world community known and unknown allowed to interact. Hence you should behave on Twitter as if behaving in public.

Keep your tweet such that you are not in an embarrassing situation if your parents go through it. Things on Twitter should be under control.

In short, in this not so kind world you keep yourself safe, by not subjecting yourself to the unsafe zone that’s the key to safety.

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Affiliate Marketing Secrets For Free Advertising

Posted on 04. Aug, 2009 by Casper.

Advertising your affiliate marketing products can be a frustrating, endless stream of money lost. Many affiliates get so discouraged because of the money they are losing in advertising costs that they eventually give up. This doesn’t have to happen.

There are several ways for affiliates to advertise their affiliate links, websites, and products absolutely free. These methods are actually, in most cases, more effective than the advertising strategies that are costing you hundreds, even thousands, or dollars each month. They do require some investment in time, but over the long stretch your time investment will go down, but the rewards continue to climb.

1. Be Active in Forums

One of the great things about the internet today for affiliate marketers is the opportunity to interact with others in websites like forums. Join several that are within your niche and begin asking and answering questions. You get traffic to your site by people clicking on the link to your affiliate site in your forum signature.

2. Trade Links With Other Website Owners

Take some time to search out other website owners that have sites on the same topic as your product. Write them an email requesting to exchange links with them. They put a link to your website on their front page, or other relevant page,  while you do the same for them. It’s win/win situation and is most of the time accepted.

3. Comment on Blogs

This is basically the same as participating in forums, only now you are leaving comments about blog posts. Commenting about the post or add other relevant information will lead others to your website.

4. Write Articles and Submit to Directories

The biggest form of free advertising of them all. Writing short 250 to 400 word articles and submitting them to article directories has been, and will continue to be, a very effective form of free advertising. You can link to your site in your author’s resource box and even within the article with relevant keywords.

Don’t waste any more money trying to advertise your website with methods that you have to pay big money for. Use these free advertising strategies for affiliate marketing to keep costs down to zero.

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