You can also offer a money back guarantee so that people will feel confident about buying from you.
You can write a clear, concise paragraph to direct your prospects to your order form so that you can minimize the chances of them getting lost. First, you will want to check that people can find your order form easily and hassle-free. Eliminate any chances of that to maximize your profits! Convincing your prospects to purchase from you is a hard job, but have you ever thought that you're making the process twice as difficult for both parties if your prospects are convinced but don't know how to buy from you? No matter how good you are at convincing your prospects, they won't buy if they find the process cumbersome. Is your order form secured using encryption technology? You would want to look into SSL for this.
As a conclusion, it would be very pitiful if you sold hard and sold well to a prospect and something goes wrong when he or she is ready to pay. How about after sales support? Who do they contact when they have problems after purchasing? Alternatively, you can add customer testimonials, your contact information, address, and so on to boost your prospects' confidence. Also, do you offer multiple payment options? Some people may feel comfortable paying via Paypal, some may only want to pay with their credit card and others might want to send a cheque. On the other hand, you will want to prove that you are a credible merchant. The more options you offer, the better your chances of covering your prospects' desired payment method.
Make them feel safe about buying something from you, a total stranger to them on the other end of the Internet. After all, it wouldn't make any sense to sell hard to a prospect only to find that they won't be able to pay you when they want to. You can also reduce the chances of losing prospects by putting a prominent link to your order page from every other page on your site.
Saturday, 11 July 2009
Building Your Mailing List with Downloads
A mailing list is the lifeblood of your online business.
However, slapping together a simple download and putting a link on your website won't be enough to attract qualified prospects. First of all, you must place your download form prominently on your website. That way, there is no way your visitors cannot find the download page, and when they do, you'll get some of them converted into your prospects! Also, you have to put a little effort into promoting your download. You can actually build up a targeted list of prospects that are interested in your products by offering a relevant download on your website. You might think why would anyone want to pass on a freebie, but most of your visitors would be too lazy to take the effort to download it because most of their downloads just sit on the harddisk collecting virtual dust.
Preferably, dedicate a page to it and link to that page from every other page of your website. The important thing is that your download offers enough value for the prospect to be willing to give away his/her own email address to get it. You will have to do some homework in order for your lead-generating mechanism to work well for you. It is hence important to show your visitors why they should download your freebie. For example, let's take a look at a very good example -- apple.
Com. When you download the free iTunes and Quicktime software from their site, they will ask you to fill in an optional name and email form so that they can send you offers on songs that you can purchase via -- guess where -- iTunes! In reality, you do not need to offer such a "heavyweight" download such as a full-feature software like iTunes. Explain and elaborate on the values of the download, and why your visitors should download it. You can attract prospects equally well with some quality freebies such as a simple report, a free wallpaper, and so on.
The old adage "the money is in the list" cannot be true enough -- if you had a targeted list of prospects to contact each time you have a new product, you will be able to save a lot of effort by marketing it to your existing list of targeted prospects.
However, slapping together a simple download and putting a link on your website won't be enough to attract qualified prospects. First of all, you must place your download form prominently on your website. That way, there is no way your visitors cannot find the download page, and when they do, you'll get some of them converted into your prospects! Also, you have to put a little effort into promoting your download. You can actually build up a targeted list of prospects that are interested in your products by offering a relevant download on your website. You might think why would anyone want to pass on a freebie, but most of your visitors would be too lazy to take the effort to download it because most of their downloads just sit on the harddisk collecting virtual dust.
Preferably, dedicate a page to it and link to that page from every other page of your website. The important thing is that your download offers enough value for the prospect to be willing to give away his/her own email address to get it. You will have to do some homework in order for your lead-generating mechanism to work well for you. It is hence important to show your visitors why they should download your freebie. For example, let's take a look at a very good example -- apple.
Com. When you download the free iTunes and Quicktime software from their site, they will ask you to fill in an optional name and email form so that they can send you offers on songs that you can purchase via -- guess where -- iTunes! In reality, you do not need to offer such a "heavyweight" download such as a full-feature software like iTunes. Explain and elaborate on the values of the download, and why your visitors should download it. You can attract prospects equally well with some quality freebies such as a simple report, a free wallpaper, and so on.
The old adage "the money is in the list" cannot be true enough -- if you had a targeted list of prospects to contact each time you have a new product, you will be able to save a lot of effort by marketing it to your existing list of targeted prospects.
Sunday, 21 June 2009
Improve Usability of Your Website
Ensure that your site loads fast if you do not want to lose visitors.
Most internet users will leave a website if it doesn't load completely within 15 seconds, so make sure the creme de la creme of your website is delivered to the visitors as soon as possible to retain their attention. The longer a single line of text is, the greater the line-height of each line should be. Make it easy for visitors to find content that they want on your site. Some sites have 10-pixel-tall text in Verdana font; while that may look neat and tidy, you have to really strain your eyes to read the actual text. There is nothing more effective in tarnishing your professional image than broken links, so be very careful about that.
The first method is to make sure the typography of your content is suitable. If you have thousands of articles on your site and a certain visitor wants to find one single article from that pile, you have to provide a feasible means to enable visitors to do that without hassle. Be it an SQL-driven database search engine or just a glossary or index of articles that you have, providing such a feature will make sure your visitors can use your site with ease. If you have large blocks of text, make sure to use CSS to space out the lines accordingly. Here are some tips to improve the usability of your website to ensure it serves its functions optimally.
Last of all, test each and every link on your site before it goes online. Also, make sure the font size of your text is big enough to read easily. No matter how brilliant your website design is, if it is hard to reach the content of your site then your site is as useful as an empty shell.
Most internet users will leave a website if it doesn't load completely within 15 seconds, so make sure the creme de la creme of your website is delivered to the visitors as soon as possible to retain their attention. The longer a single line of text is, the greater the line-height of each line should be. Make it easy for visitors to find content that they want on your site. Some sites have 10-pixel-tall text in Verdana font; while that may look neat and tidy, you have to really strain your eyes to read the actual text. There is nothing more effective in tarnishing your professional image than broken links, so be very careful about that.
The first method is to make sure the typography of your content is suitable. If you have thousands of articles on your site and a certain visitor wants to find one single article from that pile, you have to provide a feasible means to enable visitors to do that without hassle. Be it an SQL-driven database search engine or just a glossary or index of articles that you have, providing such a feature will make sure your visitors can use your site with ease. If you have large blocks of text, make sure to use CSS to space out the lines accordingly. Here are some tips to improve the usability of your website to ensure it serves its functions optimally.
Last of all, test each and every link on your site before it goes online. Also, make sure the font size of your text is big enough to read easily. No matter how brilliant your website design is, if it is hard to reach the content of your site then your site is as useful as an empty shell.
The Importance of a Sitemap
- Navigation purposes A sitemap literally acts as a map of your site.
If your visitors browses your site and gets lost between the thousands of pages on your site, they can always refer to your sitemap to see where they are, and navigate through your pages with the utmost ease.
- Organization and relevance A sitemap enables you to have a complete bird's eye view of your site structure, and whenever you need to add new content or new sections, you will be able to take the existing hierarchy into consideration just by glancing at the sitemap. Through this way, you will be able to keep your website easily accesible and neatly organized for everyone. There is no need to get the "big picture" of your site by reading through each page, and by doing that you will be saving your visitors' time.
- Conveying your site's theme When your visitors load up your sitemap, they will get the gist of your site within a very short amount of time.
- Site optimization purposes When you create a sitemap, you are actually creating a single page which contains links to every single page on your site. From the above reasons, it is most important to implement a sitemap for website projects with a considerable size. By highlighting the importance of having a well constructed sitemap, you will be able to tailor your own sitemap to suit your own needs. Imagine what happens when search engine robots hit this page -- they will follow the links on the sitemap and naturally every single page of your site gets indexed by search engines! It is also for this purpose that a link to the sitemap has to be placed prominently on the front page of your website.
A sitemap is often considered redundant in the process of building a website, and that is indeed the fact if you made a sitemap for the sake of having one. As a result, you will have a perfectly organized site with everything sorted according to their relevance.
If your visitors browses your site and gets lost between the thousands of pages on your site, they can always refer to your sitemap to see where they are, and navigate through your pages with the utmost ease.
- Organization and relevance A sitemap enables you to have a complete bird's eye view of your site structure, and whenever you need to add new content or new sections, you will be able to take the existing hierarchy into consideration just by glancing at the sitemap. Through this way, you will be able to keep your website easily accesible and neatly organized for everyone. There is no need to get the "big picture" of your site by reading through each page, and by doing that you will be saving your visitors' time.
- Conveying your site's theme When your visitors load up your sitemap, they will get the gist of your site within a very short amount of time.
- Site optimization purposes When you create a sitemap, you are actually creating a single page which contains links to every single page on your site. From the above reasons, it is most important to implement a sitemap for website projects with a considerable size. By highlighting the importance of having a well constructed sitemap, you will be able to tailor your own sitemap to suit your own needs. Imagine what happens when search engine robots hit this page -- they will follow the links on the sitemap and naturally every single page of your site gets indexed by search engines! It is also for this purpose that a link to the sitemap has to be placed prominently on the front page of your website.
A sitemap is often considered redundant in the process of building a website, and that is indeed the fact if you made a sitemap for the sake of having one. As a result, you will have a perfectly organized site with everything sorted according to their relevance.
How To Have Websites Built For You The Cheap Way
Have you ever seen those advertisements in newspaper classified ad sections that offer a 5-page website at $500? These companies are established companies with physical locations, therefore they have to increase the amount they charge to pay off some overheads: office rent, designer's wages, advertising costs and so on.
All this can change if you know where to find the best deals, the best designs for the lowest price. Think about it, if you only need 5 simple pages to present some simple information, why waste hundreds of dollars for it? Just spend a little time to sit down and do it yourself. The best way to do this would be to go to elance. Another route you can take is to design your website yourself. You'll be able to design your own sites even if you do not know a single line of HTML code with the help of WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) programs such as Microsoft Frontpage, Macromedia Dreamweaver and so on.
There, you can post the abstract of your project and get thousands of freelancers to bid on your project, so you will surely get the best deal. On the other hand, they will be able to design images with quality similar to those of designers from big companies, so it's a "no-brainer" choice. On top of that, you will be able to choose the designers based on their experience, past transactions and ratings, so your value for money is secured. Com.
Normally, if you want to have professional designers custom build your site, you must be prepared to dish out at least a few hundred dollars. Here's a rough guide: First, you must understand that it is a rip off to get companies to design websites for you. However, choose freelancers with care. Therefore, it would be wise to find freelance designers who work from home. These people are often working from home so they do not have a high operation cost like that of a company.
All this can change if you know where to find the best deals, the best designs for the lowest price. Think about it, if you only need 5 simple pages to present some simple information, why waste hundreds of dollars for it? Just spend a little time to sit down and do it yourself. The best way to do this would be to go to elance. Another route you can take is to design your website yourself. You'll be able to design your own sites even if you do not know a single line of HTML code with the help of WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) programs such as Microsoft Frontpage, Macromedia Dreamweaver and so on.
There, you can post the abstract of your project and get thousands of freelancers to bid on your project, so you will surely get the best deal. On the other hand, they will be able to design images with quality similar to those of designers from big companies, so it's a "no-brainer" choice. On top of that, you will be able to choose the designers based on their experience, past transactions and ratings, so your value for money is secured. Com.
Normally, if you want to have professional designers custom build your site, you must be prepared to dish out at least a few hundred dollars. Here's a rough guide: First, you must understand that it is a rip off to get companies to design websites for you. However, choose freelancers with care. Therefore, it would be wise to find freelance designers who work from home. These people are often working from home so they do not have a high operation cost like that of a company.
Good Design Practices
Use scripting languages to handle or manipulate data, not to create visual effects on your website.
Keep your text paragraphs at a reasonable length. Make sure your website complies to web standards at www. They make your site load very slowly and more often than not they are very unnecessary. Also, scripts are not supported across all browsers, so some visitors might miss important information because of that.
If a paragraph is too long, you should split it into seperate paragraphs so that the text blocks will not be too big. If you think any image is essential on your site, make sure you optimize them using image editing programs so that they have a minimum file size. Use CSS to style your page content because they save alot of work by styling all elements on your website in one go. Heavy scripts will slow down the loading time of your site and even crash some browsers. Make sure you have clear directions on the navigation of your website.
Your website is where your business resides -- it's like the headquarter of an offline company. W3. Org and make sure they are cross-browser compatible. The navigation menu should be uncluttered and concise so that visitors know how to navigate around your website without confusion. Avoid using scripting languages on your site unless it is absolutely necessary.
This is important because a block of text that is too large will deter visitors from reading your content. Hence, it is important to practise good design principles to make sure your site reaches out to the maximum number of visitors and sells to as many people as possible. Reduce the number of images on your website. If your website looks great in Internet Explorer but breaks horribly in Firefox and Opera, you will lose out on a lot of prospective visitors.
Keep your text paragraphs at a reasonable length. Make sure your website complies to web standards at www. They make your site load very slowly and more often than not they are very unnecessary. Also, scripts are not supported across all browsers, so some visitors might miss important information because of that.
If a paragraph is too long, you should split it into seperate paragraphs so that the text blocks will not be too big. If you think any image is essential on your site, make sure you optimize them using image editing programs so that they have a minimum file size. Use CSS to style your page content because they save alot of work by styling all elements on your website in one go. Heavy scripts will slow down the loading time of your site and even crash some browsers. Make sure you have clear directions on the navigation of your website.
Your website is where your business resides -- it's like the headquarter of an offline company. W3. Org and make sure they are cross-browser compatible. The navigation menu should be uncluttered and concise so that visitors know how to navigate around your website without confusion. Avoid using scripting languages on your site unless it is absolutely necessary.
This is important because a block of text that is too large will deter visitors from reading your content. Hence, it is important to practise good design principles to make sure your site reaches out to the maximum number of visitors and sells to as many people as possible. Reduce the number of images on your website. If your website looks great in Internet Explorer but breaks horribly in Firefox and Opera, you will lose out on a lot of prospective visitors.
Wednesday, 17 June 2009
Generating Revenue With Good Planning
Divide your site into major blocks, ordered by themes, and start building new pages and subsections in those blocks.
For anything to work well, care must be taken to make firm, workable plans to execute it and the same goes for website designs. For this very reason, the advertisement blocks on your pages need to be relevant to the content, so a themed page fits that criteria perfectly. For example, you might have a "food" section, an "accomodation" section and an "entertainment" section for a tourism site. Gradually, the webmaster will not be motivated to update it anymore and it turns into wasted cyberspace. With a well thought out website design, you will be able to create a site that generates multiple streams of revenue for you.
Hence, start tapping in on this lucrative stream of profit right away! As Internet becomes more widespread, advertising on the Internet will bear more results than on magazines or offline media. You can then write and publish relevant articles in the respective sections to attract a stream of traffic that comes looking for further information. In fact, may websites turn into online wasteland because they are not well planned and do not get a single visitor. When you have a broader, better-defined scope of themes for your website, you can sell space on your pages to people interested in advertising on your page.
You can also earn from programs like Google's Adsense and Yahoo! Search Marketing if people surf to those themed pages and click on the ads. The crucial point of planning your site is optimizing it for revenue if you want to gain any income from the site.
For anything to work well, care must be taken to make firm, workable plans to execute it and the same goes for website designs. For this very reason, the advertisement blocks on your pages need to be relevant to the content, so a themed page fits that criteria perfectly. For example, you might have a "food" section, an "accomodation" section and an "entertainment" section for a tourism site. Gradually, the webmaster will not be motivated to update it anymore and it turns into wasted cyberspace. With a well thought out website design, you will be able to create a site that generates multiple streams of revenue for you.
Hence, start tapping in on this lucrative stream of profit right away! As Internet becomes more widespread, advertising on the Internet will bear more results than on magazines or offline media. You can then write and publish relevant articles in the respective sections to attract a stream of traffic that comes looking for further information. In fact, may websites turn into online wasteland because they are not well planned and do not get a single visitor. When you have a broader, better-defined scope of themes for your website, you can sell space on your pages to people interested in advertising on your page.
You can also earn from programs like Google's Adsense and Yahoo! Search Marketing if people surf to those themed pages and click on the ads. The crucial point of planning your site is optimizing it for revenue if you want to gain any income from the site.
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