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    Are Amazon Business Mentoring and Training Programs Really Worth It? Are Amazon Business Mentoring and Training Programs Really Worth It?

    Are Amazon Business Mentoring and Training Programs Really Worth It?

Are Amazon Business Mentoring and Training Programs Really Worth It?

Amazon is one of the largest online marketplaces for selling products to consumers. In 2014 over 40% of the 5 billion items that Amazon sold were from 3rd party sellers.  A 3rd party seller is a merchant that sets up a seller account on Amazon and uses Amazon’s platform to promote and sell their products and services.  It is fairly easy to set up a seller account and is only $39.99/month to maintain a seller account on Amazon.  While it is a relatively simple process to set up a seller account, there are many things that can affect your ability to make a lot of sales, or will make you more vulnerable to other sellers hijacking you listings.

As a seller, you become more experienced, and begin to learn the tips and tricks that will improve your sales or increase your profits, mostly through trial and error.  However, during this learning period, you will be leaving potentially thousands of dollars if income on the table while you figure out what increases sales and what doesn’t.  This difference can be even more noticeable in markets that are more competitive because it takes that much longer to get your product noticed and rise in the ranks until your product is on the 1st page of the Amazon search results for your keyword. It takes even more time to eventually land in the #1 position for your main keyword.   In many cases, timing can be an issue… especially during the high selling season, so learning the success tips as you battle for position can cost you even more income.

With many of these potential […]

By |October 5th, 2015|Internet Business|0 Comments
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5 Things You MUST Know Before You Begin Designing Your First Web Site

This is an article I wrote years ago… I find that it still applies to today’s online world.

In today’s world, if you are in business, and you want people to take you seriously, then you need a website. The common response to needing a web site is to just throw up a couple of pages about who you are and what you do and then hope for the best. Unfortunately, because everyone and their aunt does that, your website tends to look and feel like everyone else’s, and your results end up being less than stellar in their performance. Before you put your first page out on the Internet, it is important to have a well-planned Internet Business Strategy. To improve your chances of receiving more exposure and business for your website, you should know these 5 important things before you ever begin to design your first web page.

1) Who is your target audience?
This isn’t just the generic term like “my target audience is people with money to spend”, but who is your target audience really? What are their likes and dislikes? What kind of words and phrases are their “hot buttons”? What are their fears, and what kinds of problems do they have? What services to they require in addition to yours? If you don’t have an answer to any one of these questions, then you don’t really know your target audience enough to target your website specifically to them.

2) What makes you different than anyone else in your field?
You are a unique individual and have your own special way of serving your clients. Why would someone want to do business with you instead of your competition? Remember, people buy experiences along with […]

By |June 3rd, 2015|Website Development|0 Comments
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Top 3 Reasons Why You Should Use Live Chat

With all of the tools and tricks available on websites today, the ones that many website owners tend to overlook are the ones that don’t seem like they have an immediate affect on the bottom line. Live chat can seem like it would be used mainly as a customer service tool, however it has huge benefits in adding to the bottom line of what a business brings in as well. Using live chat addresses several of the things that stand in the way of a 1st time visitor purchasing anything or taking any other action on your website.

1. Strengthens your connection with your visitors

Live chat allows visitors to feel more comfortable with your web site and your offering because with a real person on the website, they can get their questions answered immediately. Any objections or hesitations can be dealt with in a very personal manner in a way the best written sales letter can’t do. Live chat adds a personalization feeling to each person that engages in it. This kind of service also can assist the visitor with navigating the website, or assisting with filling out the order forms.

2. Allows instant phone to phone connection between the website visitor and the website owner

Some chat programs allow the chat person to connect the website visitor to a sales representative. This is a powerful feature, especially for lead generating sites that allows the business to funnel their website visitors to their higher closing sales reps. THe way this works is the chat person asks the visitor for their phone number and through the software, connects their phone number with the pre-programmed number of the business. The software rings both phone numbers and when each party […]

By |December 2nd, 2013|Internet Business|1 Comment
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How Would BtoB Service Oriented Businesses Market Their Services Online?

Business to Business (B2B) service oriented businesses tend to have different marketing needs compared to (Business to Consumer) B2C and product oriented companies.  As a result, their online marketing efforts take on a slightly different focus than the other type of businesses.  So how would a B2B business approach online marketing online?  Below lists a few different area on how a service oriented business would focus their online marketing efforts to get the most return on investment.

 

1) SEO – Search Engine Optimization

This is still a very effective method to get more exposure for and traffic to your website therefore generating more leads for your business.  Ranking for specific keywords is powerful because you are able to specifically target your marketing based on the keywords people use to find your services.  If they come to your website from the search engines using your targeted keywords, you can be certain they are interested in your services.  Once they get to your website however, you still have to convert the visitors into leads and customers.  There are many web conversion tactics that are outside the scope of this article that you can engage in which will increase your percentage of ‘converted’ visitors on your website.

 

2) Social Media

Social media is a very powerful way of connecting with your target market.  For B2B businesses, it is very imperative to know which networks will work best for your because not all networks are the same.  In my experience, I have found that while Facebook can be a great resource for generating leads, it depends upon the type of business you have and who your target audience is.  For more BtoB service oriented businesses, LinkedIn is usually a better solution because […]

By |April 15th, 2013|Marketing|0 Comments
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5 Things You Can Do To Increase The Local Traffic To Your Website

I get questions all the time related to getting more traffic to your website.  However, the key isn’t getting more traffic, it’s getting the RIGHT kind of traffic.  For businesses who depend on local traffic, online marketing is still effective if done correctly.  A business owner must have a unified online strategy to be able to take advantage of all the different marketing venues from social media to strategic blogging and everything in between.  So what are some things that you can do that will increase the traffic to your website as well as allow each marketing activity to build upon the other?

All of the methods I mention below will assume and take into account that you have already done appropriate keyword research and know how your target market uses the search engines to find you and your products/services.

Here are 5 things you can do that will increase the local traffic to your website:

1) Submit your website to the Google Places.

Google places is a feature of the Google platform that allows local businesses to place themselves on the maps that you see presented in the search engine results that show you where the local business are.  This service is free and just requires you to enter the information.  Make sure that when you do enter the information, all of your information is current and you are using the researched keywords in your places title (the one that makes the most sense to use in relating to your business) and fill out as much of the information as makes sense on the form.  On a side note, put a picture on your website of your business and in the alt tag of the picture, put […]

By |February 20th, 2013|Internet Business|1 Comment
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3 Ways for Business Consultants to Generate Additional Revenue From Their Website

Business consultants have a powerful means of creating additional revenue streams for their business….  Why?  Because their main asset is their knowledge and experience, and they can use their main asset to take advantage of the information age.

Information is in high demand and service professionals and consultants are positioned very powerfully to benefit in this new age.  Many of these professionals already have most of the basic foundation set up and it is just a matter of a few tweaks and minor additions to their business processes and online strategies and they can create additional revenue streams.

1) Create webinars for income or lead generation.

The first way of generating revenue is to create attendee funded webinars and replay them.  Webinars are easy to create now with the current technology and easy to record.  The necessary steps required to create this revenue stream includes developing a landing page to sell webinar seats, collect payments, perform the webinar registration and manage the mailing list signup.  This can be done in a one step with a customized script.  Once this process has been set up, it is easy enough to reuse it for future webinars.

Once you have recorded your webinar, you can easily use a webinar replay service that allows you to schedule automatic replays of your recorded webinar in a webinar format.  This type of revenue and lead generation is best used with somewhat evergreen topics so you don’t have to redo your webinar constantly.  Webinar  content that is based on the latest news is obviously not a good candidate for this particular strategy.  In that case, you would need to plan to give regular live webinars.

2) Sell ebooks and/or DVD courses

Your information can easily be transferred […]

By |December 11th, 2012|Internet Business|0 Comments
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