Time Management In Internet Marketing

by Jude Wright

Time Management in Internet Marketing is a big deal! There is so much information to keep track of, so many ideas to research and so many tasks to do. Unless you practice some sort of time management, you will soon be overwhelmed by it all.

Having a plan in place, and periodically looking at that plan to make sure it's still viable, will you get to the point you want: To Make Money!

Streamline your online tasks by using some of the following ideas:

1. What tasks can you do that will contribute the most to your bottom line? Which will make you the most money? Those tasks should be your first priority - your "A" List. For instance, advertising in an ezine or doing work for a client - anything that could bring immediate income.

2. What things can you do that will bring you income in the future? Perhaps writing articles or visiting forums. These are the things that would be on your "B" List of priorities.

3. Now write down all the tasks tht you do that are wasting your time. These tasks are time consuming and don't really contribute to your bottom line. Perhaps you are reading email that you aren't interested in or surfing sites "just for the heck of it." If you have these on your "To Do" List, take them off!

4. Do you do too many favors for other people? There is a fine line between helping others and doing so many "free" tasks for other people that you can't get your own work done. Networking, and helping others, is important, but don't neglect your own necessary tasks to do them.

5. What do yo HAVE to do for your business? These would include things like bookkeeping, website maintenance, answering email to customers and clients - the things that every business has to do to stay in business. If you are truly overwhelmed by all the administrative tasks, hire someone to help you. For instance, you can hire a Virtual Assistant or even your own husband or teenager to do some of the more mundane tasks.

Use the above ideas to streamline your business. Incorporate your own ideas. Analyzing your "true" priorities "before" starting on your list of tasks for the day, can free your mind from the "overwhelm syndrome."

Always look to your bottom line - your profits. Leaving the high priority tasks to the last means you will be paid last.


Time Management In Internet Marketing

RSS and Internet Marketing

The original concept of RSS came from Netscape (way back in the day), where the intention was to provide a way for users to customise their own homepages with links to websites that were of interest specific to them, similar to bookmarking and favorites websites.

The application of RSS to internet marketing was a new and unexpected development to RSS technology developers. Since readers are given the option to add RSS feeds to their own aggregators, those who are interested in particular products and services available on the internet can now be notified real time. Marketing becomes more specific to interested people and not a hit-and-miss operation.

Medium to big-scale companies who intend to use RSS for marketing their products and services should consider linking up with email account providers, (e.g. Gmail, Yahoo, MSN); networking websites (e.g. Friendster, Multiply, MySpace); websites of newspapers and television network websites (e.g. New York Times, CNN). Smaller companies can also look at networking websites as well as personal blog websites (e.g. Blogspot) and websites of clubs and organizations that would probably make use of their products or services e.g. a fishing supplies store can look for the website of their local fishing club for possible RSS marketing.

Clearly, RSS is an innovation in worldwide web information management as well as online marketíng. We can expect better RSS technology in the not-so-distant future as its popularity increases among users and website owners alike.

The 6 Most Common Reasons Why Web Sites Fail

Every year there are literally hundreds of thousands of web sites that fail to work out. The majority of these sites fail due to one of the six reasons we are about to cover. If you can avoid making these six big internet marketing direct response mistakes you will be ahead of the game.

1. Capturing Info.
The first and most biggest reason why Internet marketing web sites fail is because they fail to capture the name and email address of their visitors. On even the best sites 95% - 98% of all visitors will not initially buy your product.

To help higher your conversion it is mandatory that you collect the names and email addresses of your visitors. To do this simply put an opt in page or pop up that will ask your visitors to join you mailing list or ezine list. To help persuade them into doing this offer an e-book or e-course that is relevant to the subject you are discussing. Now you can continually market to these potential customers when ever you feel like it.

2. Poor Product Selection.
The second reason many internet marketing web sites fail is because they are selling a product that nobody is interested in or has a very low demand. Often times the products maker will tend to think they are the customer. Just because the creator is interested in the product does not mean that others are willing to pay for it.

Before any product is made some tests should be done to see if there is any demand for the product. To do this you can simply go to Goggle and type in the subject and see if anyone is using the PPC ads on the right to promote a similar or related product. In the Internet marketing world some competition is good.

If you know that others are making money in your niche you can bet that people will be willing to buy your product as well. Another thing you can do is start a blog and simply give people a poll or even better yet have them join your list so you can communicate with them directly.

3. Lack of Objective.
The third reason most internet marketing web sites fail is because the site does not have a clean and clear objective. So many direct response marketing sites are loaded with mistakes in the design. To help make your site more efficient take a look at one that you know is. See what they are doing different and make adjustments to your site. Once you have tested all you have to do is add more traffic.

4. Plain
The fourth reason most internet marketing web sites fail is because they don't stand out. Your site will have to grab the attention of your visitors. You generally have about ten seconds to do this. If you cannot get them interested that quickly you will most likely loose them forever.

One test you can do is this. Load up your site. Now load up your competitors. What instantly grabs your attention on their marketing web site? Now take this information and try to do something similar on yours. It is vital that you site stands out and grabs the reader by the eyeballs and sucks them right in. Making your internet marketing web site stand out is vital above the fold. Focus on that first part of your page and then the rest will start falling into place.

5. No Traffic
The fifth reason why most internet marketing web sites fail is due to lack of traffic. We really won't go into much detail on this one since it is a very large subject. Some of the things you can do to get free traffic are to write site relevant articles and submit them to the article directories and write site relevant press releases about products in your niche as well as your site.

If you are willing to spend a few dollars to get your internet marketing site some traffic you can try your luck at PPC. Your best bet is using Google AdWords. This may cost you a little due to the saturation that Google has in most of its keywords. Another alternative may be to use several lesser known PPC sites to try and achieve the same effect.

6. Sales Copy
The sixth and final reason why many internet marketing web sites fail is because of their sales copy. Copy writing is an art. If you are not a fairly experienced copywriter or good with words by all means don't try and write your own copy.

A professional copywriter may end up costing you thousands of dollars but if you know that your product will sell you are much better off going this route. If you do not know what you are doing you may spend weeks if not months testing and tweaking your copy until it sells well. If this is the case I strongly suggest reading a book or two on the subject.

So there you have it, the six most common things that will cause your internet marketing web site to fail. If you take the time to avoid these mistakes you will be leaps and bounds ahead of most others. It sure is not easy to get your page running to its best potential but the rewards are sure worth it.

Why is internet marketing important to small tourism operators?

Internet marketing is a business imperative because the Internet is an irrevocable and unstoppable trend.

Even though you have a traditional "brick-and-mortar" tourism business or a concession within a resort, you'll lose valuable customers without an online presence. People routinely search for goods and services especially in travel with their computers instead of visiting travel agents. If your tourism business isn't on the Web, customers will likely choose another company to do business with.

Also, online advertising is cheap. Adverting in the magazines or a trade show is seriously expensive, especially if you want an ad that has any presence on the page. An ad in an Internet directory is generally free, and you can put links directing customers to your Web site for more information. And because you can provide customers with a wealth of information, they no longer have to pick up the phone to get their questions answered.

Although you don't need a Web site to register your site in an online directory, your marketing efforts will be much more effective if you have your own site. The first thing to do is register a domain name. The name of your business was usually seen as a good place to start because it can help build your brand and will be easy for customers to remember. However in reality keywords from the tourism industry are more important, especially if you don't yet have a recognizable brand.

Before you commit, give your domain name serious consideration; the name you choose will be your company's online identity for years to come.

If you haven't already, you'll need to build a professional Web site. You can use templates provided by your Web host, hire a Web designer to develop your site, or use software to design it your self.

The difficult part is rising above the crowd and differentiating yourself from your competition. This is where a well thought out Internet marketing plan can help. Here are the main components of any good online marketing plan:

Registering your site with search engines and directories

Optimizing your site for search engines

Sponsoring search engine keywords

Building a database of customer email addresses

Sending email newsletters

Buying online ads

If all of this still seems like mumbo jumbo, you should be reading more! Alternatively drop me a line here in Fiji and I can explain some of the ways this can be done step by step.