In this article, I am going to talk about a social networking site that is loaded with rich prospects. Not yet as popular as MySpace or Facebook, Gather.com is a social networking site that is any Internet marketer’s dream. In its own words Gather is a ‘place where informed, engaged people share perspectives on everything” Consider the following about Gather.com

• At least 75% of the members have a college education
• A majority of the members fall within the 30-60 age group
• More than 80% of the site members enjoy a $50000 annual household income
• These members enjoy spending

These well placed citizens on Gather.com would constitute quality traffic. Can you ignore it? Of course you can’t. So your first step is to visit gather.com and register for a free account.

After signing up, you can head to ‘My Gather’ and create your member profile. You can then post an article or comment. You can also browse around, read other people’s articles, and share images. You can join groups that appeal to you and also invite other friends or associates to join.

Since your intention is to generate traffic, you must make your profile attractive by posting quality articles that are interesting to read. You must ensure that your headlines are catchy with relevant tags.

When you post your articles, you can also include links, images and lay them out to look pleasing so that you get a lot of highly targeted visitors who click the link to your website and can convert into customers.

Gather.com is a social networking site, and as such, you can promote yourself. You can network with members who are in your target market. Get your friends also to join gather.com and rate your posts - highly.

You can ask people to recommend your posts and share it with others by bookmarking it on del.icio.us or ‘digging it.’ If you have any free stuff to offer, mention this at the end of your article with a link. This can get you heavy traffic.

Commenting on other popular members’ articles particularly if they are in your niche can get you lots of highly traffic.

Gather.com is also a great place for pay per click advertising and paid ads. So cash in on this little known social networking site to attract these prosperous members to your website.

Like Gather.com, there are other social networking sites that can also be effective in getting you highly traffic. Social media marketing is here to stay. By using the web 2.0 websites and blogs wisely, there are a lot of benefits to be gained, apart from the obvious ones.

Popularity: 87% [?]

I’ve already shown you how press releases can help in search engine optimization in my last article “How To Increase Your Page Rank In No Time“. But the truth is that a weak press release won’t get you anywhere. In order to get the most out of your online press release, you have to make sure it’s written effectively.

Do You Really Have Something To Say?

One of the main reasons why some press releases don’t work is because they don’t have anything important to say. Remember that a press release is a mix of article and advertisement- it should kindle consumer interest without sounding overtly promotional. Maybe the sleek new design of your website is exciting to you, but is it what other people want to read about? Will it ultimately drive traffic your way?

Here are some questions you should ask yourself when writing your press release:

1. Is my excitement worth a press release? Some things that you can definitely issue press releases for are product launches, poll/survey results, newsletter launches, seminars, classes, books, awards or high profile endorsements
2. Is it strong? A press release has to be written in a clear, strong manner particularly the opening. Ideally, people should grasp the gist of your press release from the headline and opening paragraphs. They should also be sufficiently interested to read on.
3. Is it newsworthy? Remember that you are sending these out to media outlets so your press release has to answer the five ‘W’s of journalism- who, what, when, where and why
4. Is it focused? A press release is not a 300 page essay- in fact, it shouldn’t run for more than one page. Make sure that your content is crystal-clear and to the point.

Content Is Key

It’s rather obvious that the content is the most important part of your online press release. A weakly-written press release will make zero impact on your website traffic. Similarly, a press release on something nobody is interested in won’t help you either. Many people spend days perfecting their online press release before they send it into cyberspace. Others shell out big bucks to hire press release services to do the writing for them.

If you’d rather write your own press release, you’re already at an advantage. You’ll be able to write truly original and unique content which will set your release apart. Remember to use the right keywords. Keywords are as important in a press release as in articles or website content. Make sure you use them coherently and don’t crowd them in one area. Using them twice in the body of the article and once in the opening line should be enough. Make sure that your headline is striking and grabs attention. It’s also a good idea to use anchor text in your press release.

Popularity: 94% [?]

There are product launches happening all the time on the internet. But how would this benefit you when you don’t have a product or a website? Let me show you how.

People are looking for digital products all the time in the form of ebooks and software every single day. Naturally, marketers are smart enough to see their opportunity to earn a huge income making these products available and developing new ones on an ongoing basis. Added to this, the product is launched in a big way. Marketers don’t wait for the product to win on its own merit. They promote a new product even before it launches.

If the marketer is well established, and enjoys a good reputation in the market, it is possible to have the product sold out even before its launch. People associated with the marketer like joint venture partners, affiliates, etc. go all out to promote it, getting richer in the process. Here’s how you too can profit from someone else’s product launch.

Each time a product is launched, which is about 5-6 times a month you can promote it in a few easy ways and enjoy the results. You need to move quickly when you spot the opportunity. This brings us to the first step - finding the product launch. You can find this through popular JV networks and other sites where marketers announce their launch. You can use Google to find them. Where necessary you can sign up for a membership without paying anything.

Internet marketing product launches are usually announced at least a month before the actual launch so you must act soon. The moment you spot an announcement for a launch, sign up as an affiliate. Hopefully you have a ClickBank account - if not sign up for one right now. An account with PayPal, Paydotcom etc. also helps so that it enables you to take part in as many launches as possible.

Keep a track of the launches. After you sign up as an affiliate, you’ll be ready to grab your share of the profits through your commission.

Here’s a tip - you can cash in on the high amounts of traffic that the website launching the product will receive on launch day. Lots of people type the domain name of the website directly into their browser and go to the site. Now that you know this, how do you use the information? Here’s the trick. The fact is, a lot of people tend to type in variations of the website URL. What you need to do is register these domain names with the most obvious variations and direct them to your affiliate link for the product being launched. This converts to easy commissions on the day of the launch.

Popularity: 30% [?]

If you have heard of the Internet marketing business for quite some time, then you already know that niche marketing is one of the most popular methods of making money online. Best of all, this market is nowhere near saturation because of the ever-increasing demand for quality information.

So let us quickly look at how you can select a niche that pays.

Choosing THE right product from a hot list of products is probably the most difficult thing for a marketer. Coming up with an idea that sells is something that gives jitters even to the experts. Here are a few things you can do to improve your chances.

Keep your eyes open: The first thing to do is to spend some time surfing the net. Look at ads on websites. What products are they selling? Visit blogs and look at the “paid sponsors” section. Watch the news and read papers. See what products are being offered on the market right now. Search for a keyword and see what comes up in the search engines. Visit websites like google.com/trends or wordtracker.com and look up the demand for keywords you like. Watch TV and find what products are selling hot. Market research is vital to finding the right niche.

Look inwards: What ideas do you have in your head? Are your ideas already on sale? Explore new ideas and new angles of old ideas. Can you come up with a better idea and beat your competition?

Turn to ClickBank: Just as their tag suggests, ClickBank is the world’s biggest marketplace. So, they have a finger on the pulse of the market. If it is selling hot, it will be on ClickBank. Visit their website and click on “Buy products”. This will open up a large category of products. Clicking on any of these categories will take you to the sub-categories of that category. Click on any of the sub-categories and see what kinds of products are selling in that niche. Read through the sales pages of these products and discover their USP. This will give you a good idea of what you should select.

Once you have identified your niche, half of your business structure is in place. But you need to build the other half too.

The power of niche marketing comes from the fact that the market consists of consumers looking for a particular product. Even if you develop a product, you can’t succeed till you shine a torch on the fact that you are the best in your field. You need to reach out to people.

For this, it is essential that you know your target audience. Knowing who you are marketing to, makes it easy for you to channel your energy and marketing $$ only on that section of people.

For example, take a car dealership. The first thing you have to decide is where the dealership is located. If it is in New York, chances of consumers coming from Seattle to buy from you are less. So, narrow your focus to people within a 50-mile radius. This increases your chances of clinching a sale.

Defining your target audience helps you to:

• Maximize your profit by targeting a defined market. Your efforts will no longer be like a shot in the dark.
• You can optimize your search engine accordingly, so your customers can easily find you.
• You can offer solutions specific to your niche.
• This makes it easy for you to develop new ideas for supporting products.
• It is easier for you to dominate the market if you know the dynamics of your niche.

This should give you a good idea of how to develop a niche and become the expert of your field.

Now that you have the product, it is time to market it. Niche marketing can be done in two ways: Membership websites and websites with no up front charges.

Membership websites obviously ask for a fee upfront, before they give members access to their site. This is a recurring income business model where members keep renewing their subscriptions if they are happy with the product you offer.

Websites without an up front charge are a little different. They offer the cake free of cost and tell members to pay up for the icing. If you like the cake well enough, you will pay for the icing.

Popularity: 38% [?]

Internet marketing lets you make thousands of dollars in as little as thirty minutes without any training at all. You don’t even have to worry about high initial investments. In fact, you can set up multiple streams of income with no cost or low cost methods. To get started it takes a mindset that believes this can be done. After that, it is smooth sailing.

You know what keywords are. Google search is based on keywords typed by people looking for information. Keywords have multiple crucial roles to play in the success of an internet business. But for someone who wants to make money online without a website, keywords have an even more important role to play.

Search engines experience hundreds of millions of searches each day and these can be repetitive for the same keyword. Some keywords have a consistent demand over a period of time. But there are others that become high-demand from time to time. This can happen for various reasons. During these times, there’s a spike in the keyword’s demand. If you are smart enough to identify it, then you have found your unlimited internet goldmine.

The idea is to make the most of those keywords that see a sudden spurt in demand. Did you ask why? Here are the answers:

There’s a high buzz factor with these keywords. When you catch them at their peak, you can enjoy no cost viral traffic. traffic in internet marketing is sales, which in turn leads to profits.

You can expect a spike in some keywords when there’s a great new product or when there’s something so newsworthy that everyone’s using the keyword to know more. What you can do is cash in on this and make a huge income either from affiliate commissions or Google AdSense or - both.

To actually find these keywords, you can use a Google feature called Hot Trends. It shows you what keywords people are using on Google search. You can see searches that are suddenly popular highlighted in this feature, along with deviations in the normal trend. You also know in what context the keywords are being searched with all the relevant information like location, etc.

From this list you can pick at least ten that have the potential to make you a profit. Here you must identify two types of keywords - revenue keywords and information keywords. Revenue keywords are the product related ones where people are likely to buy. So what you do is create an ad around that keyword on AdWords generate traffic to the affiliate program promoting the product. Find out how much competition there is and the number of existing ads in Google AdWords for the keywords. Choose the ones where there are hardly any AdWords ads. Next, find a website that has this product with an affiliate program. Sign up for the affiliate program and create an ad around the keyword for the product. Enjoy your commissions. And keep monitoring the keywords.

This entire technique will not take you more than thirty minutes. Surprised? With the information keywords, people are after information. But you can capitalize on these also to get you AdSense income.

Check out the whole package at Project Quick Cash with all the techniques. Do it now.

Popularity: 27% [?]

Web 2.0 is the latest buzzword in Internet marketing. Not surprising at all, considering what a goldmine it is in terms of all the benefits an Internet marketer can draw from it. Basically, web 2.0 is a platform that allows people to connect, interact with the website and with each other and share information online. Therefore, web 2.0 encompasses all those online communities like blogs and social networking websites like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, video sharing websites like YouTube, social book marking sites like Del.icio.us, Digg, StumbleUpon etc. You get the general idea. Now the question is, how do you get the web 2.0 to give you a steady rush of highly traffic? That is the focus of part 1 of this training series.

Every Internet marketer loves free-traffic. This has become a huge possibility, thanks to web 2.0 sites where users have a high level of interaction, passing around information to each other.

As a result of this, there are hundreds of niche topics and markets people tend to be a part of. And just because of this, the web 2.0 social networking sites have become a goldmine for Internet marketers.

You have a huge market to which you can market your products and services, and not spend a dime towards this effort. Your first task is to find the most popular web 2.0 community-based websites where you are allowed to insert your URL. This will help people who want to share your information, making your URL more visible as it gets passed around and this, in turn, brings back highly traffic to your website.

You will be amazed at the number of marketers who are still not using the power of the web 2.0 to get a lot more traffic than even the search engines can turn up.

So create your free account right away with the following top ranked sites, and start building your community, with links that point to your main website.

• YouTube
• Squidoo
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• MySpace

There are several more, and we’ll talk about them through this training series. Creating a profile on these sites is quite easy and all you need to do is spend around fifteen to twenty minutes on these sites every day.

Savvy marketers also increase their page rank with the search engines by creating multiple user profiles for related topics. Once this is done, they link these profiles to each other.

On most of these sites you will find a Forum or a discussion board that allows its members to discuss any topic. These are highly influential locations where members share stuff. Social networking sites allow you to belong to different groups or networks within the site.

Web 2.0 sites are great places to share viral videos, which are a very effective marketing medium online. Millions of viewers see and share videos that appeal to them, thus spreading the marketing message and driving traffic to your website.

Social networking sites let you feature links to your website and blog. For any Internet marketer, one-way links and traffic along with high search engine page rankings are crucial to their success. Web 2.0 helps achieve all these, free of cost.

To find out more ways to leverage web 2.0, watch for my next article on “How To Turn Customers Into Raving Fans Before They Even See Your Site”.

Popularity: 21% [?]

Before I answer why you need a squeeze page, lets talk about what a squeeze page is. It is a really interesting list-building tool. In fact, squeeze pages have brought about an amazing change in the way Internet marketing is done. They play a vital role in increasing traffic on your website. If you design your squeeze page well, you will directly benefit in multiple ways.

A squeeze page is like a prelude to your website and is used to attract your visitor to sign up and make them want to be on your list. The main elements of a squeeze page are

• A web form that your autoresponder will use to sign you visitors up automatically so that more information can be sent to them as promised.
• An attention grabbing headline
• Interesting content that is very relevant to your main website with brief info helping your visitor to sign up quickly.

Your squeeze page must be as simple as possible so that you can get your visitors to respond right away. It is okay to offer something for free, like a report or an ebook for signing up with their email address and name, so that you can send them the download link via email with their consent.

Here’s what you do:

Squeeze page title (what will the sign up do for me)

• What info will I get
• How it will help me
• How will it benefit me

SIGN UP form

That’s it. With a squeeze page, you can get your visitor’s email address so that you can build your optin list - which is your goldmine. It is a must have strategy for every Internet marketer because it helps you get your visitor’s permission to send them email so that you are not treated as spam. Of course, you also allow them to opt out of your list whenever they want.

You can use your autoresponder for double optin subscribing. After your visitor subscribes on the squeeze page and goes to the confirmation page - it redirects them to the information they wanted or alternately, onward to the free report you offered. For each website you own, a squeeze page is essential if you are serious about building unlimited optin lists.

But let me share a secret here with you. Sometimes, your visitors are clever enough to see the html source code of your squeeze pages and find the URL of the web page that will follow. Rather than wait to sign up and be led to the information they are eager to see, they try and directly access the URL. You can avoid this by encrypting the URL for the information page.

In fact, an even better way to send the information for which your visitors signed up is by email. By this, you ensure that your visitor signs up with an authentic email id. If it is an invalid email id then you simply don’t send the info to them! If they try to bypass the squeeze page, then they don’t get the promised information. You can be pretty sure that someone who is keen on the information and really interested will not find signing up a big ordeal.

Popularity: 15% [?]

All Internet marketers maintain a meticulous action list of the important activities involved in running their business. But there are some crucial mistakes that must be avoided and we have carefully compiled this list. These can make all the difference in making sure your business flourishes. In fact, you might like to even print and use this as a ready reference checklist. Here it is:

• If you are running a particular promotional campaign do not group all the keywords in your list. For example if you short-listed fifty keywords for this promotion split them into smaller subgroups with related keywords. You could even have separate landing pages for each of these subgroups, enabling your focussed traffic to find it easier to navigate. The more specific you get, the more the chances of your niche market reaching you.
• Do not forget to use square brackets around your keywords and key phrases. By using square brackets you can get your ad noticed easily when this particular keyword is searched for.
• Do not set your keywords with Google AdWords and leave it at that. Constant tracking is necessary to know which keywords are profitable. This will help you drop the ones that are not. You can also reallocate your promotional dollar to focus on those that bring in results.
• Do not ignore grammatical errors, dead links and complex web pages. Just imagine visiting a sloppy website where links lead to a 404 error page - it’s the best way to lose a customer. No one has the time to browse around a website that is complicated and ill maintained. Links must point to the intended web pages, audio and video clips.
• Do not underestimate the importance of using reviews as a promotional method. Reviews make you appear as a fair unbiased marketer who prefers to be honest. As an Internet marketer you will obviously use forums and blogs - so make sure writing reviews is a regular activity. And enjoy the sales that pour in.
• If your traffic is not targeted, you cannot have consistent sales and you cannot track your activity. Be wary of traffic sources you did not target - like pop unders, free links etc.
• Not making an action plan is the worst mistake an Internet marketer can make. You cant set up a website, run a Google ad and relax hoping things will take care of themselves. When your customer places an order, they must be directed to your autoresponder. When your visitor asks a question, they must be directed to your frequently answered questions page.
• Do not analyze every how-to ebook or report you read too deeply. The time could be better spent on actual practice and experimentation. In many instances learning is better through action.
• Do not lose focus on the system you have set up after a lot of research. It is necessary to be organized and stay through with what you plan until it runs on autopilot.

It is not unnatural to want to respond to every new strategy that is promoted or launched in the market, but then there will never be an end to it. What is listed above is just a partial list.

Popularity: 21% [?]

Expert internet marketers know that lists are the foundation of their online marketing business. I have put together some critical tips to cost effectively build your email lists - use this as a checklist to enable you collect focused email addresses at every opportunity. 

• Make sure that each and every one of your web forms includes an email list opt in box, whether it is to do with registration, information requests or ordering products.
• Ensure that your website URL appears on all official stationery, promotional material, newsletters etc. You’d be surprised at how many people will immediately visit your link to know more and be ready to optin for email communication.
• While browsing your website your visitor must be able to optin from any page of your website.
• If you use direct mailing methods or paper forms offline, make sure your customers are requested to give their email addresses. At offline events it is standard practice to have a “Visitors book”. Have your visitors write down their email in it so that you can be in touch with them.
• Each and every paper that goes out to your customers and contacts must include an email request. Use every possible way to get hold of email addresses to build your lists - when you respond to customer questions, your invoice, etc.
• An effective way to build your list is to look at your current list. When you mail them request them to tell a friend or refer you to someone. Since these people receive the message from someone they know already, they are receptive to signing up with you! In turn, these people can refer you to others. Not only do you get an authentic list but also an endorsement. Provide a link that your optin list can forward to their contacts and grow your list.
• Be honest about the frequency of mailers you intend to send your optin list before they sign up so they know what to expect. If you send too many mailers too often, you’ll just get blocked.
• Solicit feedback from your subscribers so that you can design your messages according to what they want. If not, they will simply use the ‘unsubscribe’ option and that’s the end of the relationship.
• Your optin list is looking for value when they sign up with you - so make good use of your autoresponder to keep in touch with them with useful stuff.
• Remember that every interaction with a prospective customer is your chance to grow your list. Use ethical ways to build your list.

As you experiment with different methods you will learn different ways to succeed. List building is an activity that never stops as long as you are in business!

Popularity: 20% [?]

Most online marketers sign up with affiliate programs at some time or other. Chances are quite good that you have, too, before you launched your affiliate program and decided to recruit your own affiliate army. Have you noticed how some affiliate managers regularly connect with you while some go silent after that first automated welcome note?

This sort of thing can easily make an affiliate gradually ease out of the program and join another one where there’s continuous support and communication. It is necessary to at least maintain a once-a-week contact system with your affiliates so that they are always motivated to keep promoting your program and stay active. Here are some ways:

• Start an affiliate blog. Your affiliates can subscribe to this blog via an RSS feed that will update them as new posts are added. Post news about any important news about Internet marketing that appears useful and interesting. Provide links to websites where free ecourses or ebooks are being offered so that your affiliates can keep themselves in tune with what they need to know. Post success stories that are inspiring on the blog. Allow your affiliates to comment and participate.
• Have a monthly newsletter. This is a great way to be in touch with your affiliates and can also serve to keep them active. Announce contests and bonuses on the newsletter and list the winners of the previous months. This can be inspiring for others to strive to win.
• Each time you intend to add a product, create a buzz among your affiliates through teasers. By allowing them a preview, you can help them get prepared by getting ready with their content to suit the new product. They in turn can start the teaser campaign or viral marketing among their customers and subscribers. This will help make the product launch successful.
• While passing on information to your affiliates, consider what works best. Some affiliates prefer teleseminars, which they can attend from the comfort of their own location. Teleseminars also help in training affiliates about marketing, product features and benefits and other vital info. These calls can be recorded and a link to this posted online on your blog and your affiliate library, so that those that missed it can access it. This can also be very useful to new affiliates who keep joining.

Keeping a free line of communication between your affiliate army and yourself is very crucial to maintain loyalty as well as enthusiasm. When you take care of your affiliates, they will tell others and this will encourage them to sign up as well.

Popularity: 15% [?]