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The Promotion World Informer
Issue #63 March 29, 1999
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This issue of the Informer is sponsored by:
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Contents Of This Issue:
- Editor's Notes
- Cool Quotes
- Friendly Advice from the Editor
- Promoting Ecommerce Sites
- Sponsor Message
- Banner Ads That Work
- The Discussion Board
- How NOT To Promote Your Site
- A Small Request
- Misc. Information
=========================== Editor's Notes ======================
Hi there everyone,
How would you like an extra 25,000 banner impressions? For free, I might
add? Impossible, you say? No, not really. I have just set up a contest
at Promotion World whereby I will choose one webmaster each month to win
25,000 (a $218 value!) banner impressions across the popular LinkBuddies
Banner Exchange Network at <http://www.linkbuddies.com/start.go?id=100041>
All you have to do is place a link to Promotion World on your website, and
you will be entered into the contest. Full details and an entry form can
be found at <http://www.promotionworld.com/contest.html>
By the way, now is a good time to sign up! There aren't many people entered
this first month. You have a pretty good chance at winning if you enter now...
Whatever you do, I recommend you check out the LinkBuddies Banner Exchange
Network. It is my favorite banner exchange out there, and offers many excellent
features! They also give you 500 credits free for joining...
<http://www.linkbuddies.com/start.go?id=100041>
Enjoy the issue!
The Informer is sent only to those who have expressly requested it.
If you no longer wish to receive it, simply follow the simple
unsubscribe instructions at the end of this newsletter.
============================ Cool Quotes ========================
Why is there never enough time to do it right, but always enough
time to do it over?
- Unknown
But what... is it good for?
- Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM,
1968, commenting on the microchip.
History, although sometimes made up of the few acts of the great, is
more often shaped by the many acts of the small.
- Mark Twain
Download all the past Cool Quotes by sending any email to
<mailto:quotes@promotionworld.com&> Enjoy!
================= Friendly Advice from the Editor =================
This article is all about signature files... again!
Okay, okay, so signature files is a subject that has been brought up
many times in marketing newsletters, and probably many of you
aren't too happy that I have decided to "waste" some more space
here with it.
So why am I bringing up such a basic subject yet again? Because
some of you still haven't "got it" when it comes to signature
files. I receive many messages each day that simply include the
name of the sender, with no website address, much less a full
signature! Sometimes I really want to visit the senders website,
but can't because I can't find a URL!
If the message does include a signature file, it is often very
poorly done.
Either those messages are from beginners, and haven't seen the
many articles on the subject yet, or they are "experts" who just
tune out when yet another writer talks about "those things".
Well, this time, don't tune out.
Let me tell you that signature files are amazing promotional
tools. In my personal opinion, they are one of the best traffic
generating methods out there.
Some of the ways you can use signature files to draw traffic:
1. Include them at the end of your every day email
communications. You would be surprised at the number of people
that actually click through... I myself quite often click through
URLs in signature files.
2. Write articles and submit them to large, high quality
newsletters. I do this on a regular basis and it brings in a large
portion of my traffic. I know one fellow who had his article picked
up by a large newsletter, and within a day he had received over
1,000 visitors to his website. That was a nice evenings work, if
you ask me!
3. Post to discussion forums and email discussion loops with
relevant, helpful messages and, of course, include your signature
file. Posters to my own discussion forums have reported large
amounts of traffic as a result of getting involved. Just remember
to check the posting documentation first, as some discussion
forums don't allow signatures.
Those are just a few ideas, but unless something is very wrong
with you, you should be convinced of the necessity of having a
good signature file. Now, to get down to the important stuff: How
to create your very own signature file.
All signature files should include:
- Your name
- Your email address
- Your website address with a short, compelling description
You may also want to include:
- A dividing line to separate your signature file from
your message
- A free offer to entice people to your site
- Subscription instructions for your newsletter, if you have one
- A short quote to grab people's attention
- Your company name
- Your phone number
Ideally a signature file should be kept to under six lines.
That may sound like a lot, but believe me, when trying to write a
good file it can sometimes be a little tricky to edit it down so
that it still looks good.
Here is an example signature file for a make believe website called
"Beetle Zone", which sells beetle raising products.
_____________________________________________________
John Smith mailto:johnsmith@beetlezone.com
For beetle collectors of all ages, visit BeetleZone for a
FREE sample of our new, nutritious beetle feed!
-------> http://www.beetlezone.com <-------
This is my idea of an excellent signature file. Very simple and
to the point. It contains what is important, the name, email
address and URL. It also contains a well written "hook", using a
free sample as a drawing card. It has been my experience that
"free" sells very well.
Make sure to keep your lines under 65 characters each, as they
might wrap around on different sized email readers. If it did
that, it wouldn't look anything like the way you intended it.
Now you have seen some reasons to create a compelling signature
file, and are probably eager to get going. Go for it! And then
remember to use it. Most of the major email programs have a way
for your signature file to be automatically attached to all your
outgoing email.
Till next week,
Joshua
Editor/webmaster/ad sales guy/everything else at Promotion World.
<http://www.promotionworld.com>
======================= Feature Article =======================
Promoting Ecommerce Sites
By Trevor Smith, FirstShopping.com
Consumers are showing more and more interest in online shopping, and the
number of e-stores is growing at a tremendous tare. Promoting an online
store is more difficult than promoting a non-commerce site. To be
successful the webmaster must do more than generate traffic, be must
also convince surfers to open their wallets as well. Here are some
useful tips on generating traffic and making sales for an e-commerce
site.
Site design should be the first consideration, even more so than
promotion. Under no circumstances will a consumer spend money at a
poorly designed site. Simplicity should be the rule of thumb when
designing an e-store. The site should have virtually no outside
advertisements; the entire contents of the homepage should be visible
with little scrolling needed/ and the graphics should be simple and few
in number.
In order for an e-store to be successful, the master design must also
be easy to navigate. The most successful e-stores are designed like
directories, with the home page providing an easy to understand list of
products or product categories, much like the table of contents of a
book. If one chooses to display images of products, they should be
thumbnail size and not displayed on the homepage. The pages should also
load quickly. Online consumers demonstrate little patience and will
often move to another site rather than wait on a slow loading page. In
order to ensure fast loading one should choose only a reputable, high
quality service provider, and graphics should be minimal.
Once the site is designed, one must look for the most effective
promotion techniques. Submitting to the major search engines is a good
first step, but is likely to produce only limited results if not done
properly. Each engine has its own unique submission process, and one
must be careful and patient when submitting. Multi-submit services do
not customize information for their customers and are generally
ineffective. A second step is to look to specialty engines, cybermalls,
and shopping directories. These mini-portals are becoming very
popular. Some require payment to be included, whereas others are free.
One should have a clear understanding of how much traffic a listing will
generate before actually paying to be listed in a fee-based
mini-portal. Following submission directions is critical. Sloppy
submission requests signal lazy site managers. In most cases the
webmasters of these sites review all submission requests and will not
list sites which have ignored the submission guidelines, regardless of
quality. Submissions that are excessively promotional, rather than
descriptive, are often ignored by mini-portal webmasters. A third step
to take when promoting an e-store is to seek out mention in e-zines and
newsletters. There are thousands of newsletters on the web with
webmasters willing to mention quality sites free of charge, all one
needs to do is ask. Another effective method of promotion is to use
traditional advertising such as newspaper ads.
Some promotion techniques should be avoided. Unsolicited e-mail, known
as "spam," should never be used under any circumstances. Also, banner
exchanges should be avoided as they have notoriously low click-thru
rates, and they increase page load time. Banner exchanges also make a
site look less professional. Finally, banner advertising should be
purchased only if it can target a specific audience or interest group.
These tips provide only a basic outline of how to help ensure success
in promoting your e-store. Regardless of what you sell or how you
choose to promote your site, you must keep in mind that your site, and
its appearance, represents the quality of what you have to sell. If you
take the time to show the consumer what he wants to see in a well
organized, professional manner you will be successful.
Trevor Smith is the webmaster of FirstShopping.com,
an online mall at http://www.firstshopping.com
======================= Sponsor Message =======================
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On GoTo.com, there are no wasted impressions; you only pay for the targeted
click throughs you receive. Plus, on GoTo.com, you set the price you want to
pay for each targeted click through. The price per click you choose lets you
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Check out what other people are saying about GoTo.com:
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To find out more about advertising on GoTo.com, click the link below. From
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http://www.goto.com/d/advertisers/p/generic/?o=22&Promo=promoworld_D
====================== Banner Ads That Work ======================
Banner Ads That Work
by Jennifer Johnson
A friend recently asked me, "What do you know about designing a banner that
can get a great click-thru rate"? That's one of the magic questions, isn't it?
What can we do to ensure our banners will generate visits to our sites?
There are lots of things that one can do when designing a banner to make it
more "clickable"; attention getting colors and language, aiming for small file
size to enable it to download faster, etc. but in my opinion, the biggest
factor affecting click-thrus and overall effectiveness of a banner ad campaign
has nothing to do with the banner itself. (Yes, you read it right.) In my
mind, WHAT the banner looks like isn't nearly as important as WHERE you place
it.
Let me clarify myself before we go any further. I'm not speaking of where a
banner appears on a given page, in terms of layout - what I'm referring to is
where you as a site owner decide to purchase (or barter) banner ad space on
the Internet.
You might be thinking, "But I've got a *great* product. Everyone's going to
want to visit my site and check it out." Unless you're giving away free
chocolate wrapped in a $20 bill, don't be so sure of near-universal interest.
Not many products or services I know of appeal to men, women, and children of
every age. That shouldn't discourage you, however; all that statement should
do is motivate you to find your target market. What kind of people would be
interested in what you have to sell? Ideally, you should have done this before
you even began work on your site, but not everything happens the way it
"should". If you haven't identified your target market yet, you should spend
some time right now determining what group of people would be highly likely to
buy your product or service.
Now, back to banner ads. Once you've determined your target market (assuming
you already have a good banner), you need to find out where these individuals
"hang out" on the 'Net. What sites are popular with the type of people that
are your potential customers? Determining the answer to this question and
securing banner ad space on the sites you've identified will, in a large
measure, determine the effectiveness of your banner ad campaign. If you still
aren't sure if or why this is true, let me use an example to illustrate my
point:
Let's say you've come up with the ultimate cat toy: a robotic, radio
controlled mouse with faux fur that emits a tiny "Eek!" and plays dead after
being pounced upon by a cat. You've done extensive research and it tested
through the roof with felines and their owners. Now it's time to make your big
move. You buy banner ad space on a mega web site that averages 6 trillion page
views a day...and you wait...and you wait. The hits trickle in, but nothing
like you were expecting. Why?
Imagine the average visitor to the mega site. Do you think every visitor is
going to be a cat owner? Out of all the cat owners, do you think every one of
them will be interested enough in your toy to click on your banner? Probably
not. What may be closer to the truth is that one or two out of x number of
people will decide to click and the rest are more than likely saying something
like, "Ma, c'mere and look at this cat toy this joker is trying to sell. It's
like the dang 'Six Billion Dollar Mouse' or sumthin'".
Now, imagine instead that you had discovered a site called "Pampered Pets that
are Spoiled by their Adoring Owners" (I said "imagine", didn't I?). This site
doesn't get anywhere near the traffic that the big mega site does, BUT the
traffic it does get is very, very similar to *your* target market. So, for
every x number of times your banner is shown, you might get tons more click-
thrus on this small site than you would on the mega site. Chances are, the ad
rates on the small site will be considerably cheaper as well.
I think you get the picture. Let me end with a couple of clichés: bigger is
not always better; to get your banner's CTR pumped up, you need to think
location, location, location.
PromotingYourSite.com
<http://www.promotingyoursite.com>
Free info on how to effectively design and promote your site. Join the "Rate
My Site Newsletter" (delivered 3-5 times/week) by sending any email to:
ratemysite-subscribe@listbot.com and find out how to submit *your* site for
other webmasters to review. Contact Jennifer directly at:
jennifer@promotingyoursite.com.
===================== The Discussion Board ======================
This week's quote from the discussion board:
"Hey everyone,
Found some really neat online tools for your website:
Doctor HTML -- http://www2.imagiware.com/RxHTML
This widely-acclaimed program will scan your web pages for HTML errors,
check for spelling mistakes, verify your hyperlinks, and provide other
information useful for fine-tuning your Web page's performance.
HTML Formatter -- http://www2.imagiware.com/toolchest/format
Having trouble editing your HTML page? The HTML Formatter will re-arrange
your text and HTML into an easy-to-read layout which makes editing much
easier.
HTML Squisher -- http://www2.imagiware.com/toolchest/squish
Once you're done editing your Web page, don't waste bandwidth (and your
visitors time)...squish the page down to the the smallest size possible.
Check these sites out!
Jim Conley II -- Gen. Promotions Forum Moderator
Accept and process credit cards in your business! Visit Advanced Credit
Systems at http://www.acs-cvp.com for
more information! "
Visit the message boards to comment on this quote or just to catch
up on the other exciting discussions going on!
<http://www.promotionworld.com/discus/>
Don't forget to stop by and receive a free review of your site! All
you need to do is review two other sites, and you will have a number
of experts giving you their opinions.
================= How NOT To Promote Your Site ==================
How NOT to Promote your Site
by David Handlos
Spam. The slang term for bulk/junk electronic mail(named after a Monty
Python skit, you'd have to see it to get it). Spam is rampant on the Web,
it floods your inbox weekly, even daily. Get-rich quick stuff, promotions,
and even fake virus warnings. These messages can be annoying, they can be
rude, these messages can even be... yours?
Usually spam is easy to point out in your mailbox, but the exact definition
of spam can be pretty elusive. Sometimes messages, poorly written and sent,
can be defined as spam, even if that is not the original intention. One
good idea sent out via email can be labelled as spam, and branding the
sender for life. Having a reputation as a "spammer" is probably one of the
best ways NOT to promote your site.
Am I excusing all the junk mail that we get in our box daily? No, I detest
it as much as anyone. My inbox gets about 200 junk messages daily. If it
wasn't for my filters, I wouldn't get anything read. But there is a fine
line you should watch for when sending mail, and avoiding a lot of trouble.
EXAMPLE:
I was witness to this little email drama last month. I received a message
from another webmaster, who was requesting a reciprocal link. This is
acceptable. In fact, it's recommended for promotion.
However, I wasn't the only one he sent a message to. Instead of mailing one
person at a time, he composed a message and sent it to at least 70 people
at once. The list of email addresses was longer than his actual message!
This is where I drag out the fine line. This isn't strictly spam, but many
find a message like this a bit annoying.
Soon after, I received several messages from another person. He had
received an email like I had, and now was sending messages to the entire
list, asking people to visit his site, buy books from his affiliate
program, etc.
THIS is called spam, repeated messages with blatant ads. One of the
recipients even contacted the guy's ISP, and his site was deleted as a
result.
Basically, be careful of what you send, and how you send it. Most web
hosting companies bristle at the mention of spam, and are getting tougher
about taking the offending person off of their service. Having the
reputation as a junk emailer may not only drop the traffic to your web
site, it may get your site dropped to boot.
Happy promoting,
David Handlos
David Handlos <mailto:webmaster@crosslinkz.com>
Crosslinkz: Your FREE Web Directory!
<http://www.crosslinkz.com/>
Website promotion, email, chat, and awards, all for free!
========================= A Small Request =======================
If you enjoy reading this newsletter each week, why not tell a friend
about it? Even better, why don't you recommend The Informer on a
discussion list? After all, you wouldn't want to keep all this free
information to yourself.
Just tell 'em all to subscribe by sending a message to
<mailto:informer@oaknetpub.com> with SUBSCRIBE in the BODY of their message.
======================== Misc. Information =======================
To comment on the issues covered in this week's newsletter, use the
appropriate forum on our Discussion Boards.
<http://www.promotionworld.com/discus/>
Browse the archives at <http://www.promotionworld.com/informer/archives.html>
If you are looking for some good advertising deals, you might like to
consider Promotion World and the Informer as places to advertise.
<http://www.promotionworld.com/sponsor.html>
To subscribe put SUBSCRIBE in the BODY of an email to
<mailto:informer@oaknetpub.com>
To unsubscribe put REMOVE in the BODY of an email to
<mailto:informer@oaknetpub.com>
I appreciate all your mail with your comments and suggestions!
<mailto:webmaster@promotionworld.com>
Newsletter Credits:
Joshua Reimer, Editor
<mailto:webmaster@promotionworld.com>
<http://www.promotionworld.com>
Jennifer Johnson, Feature Writer
<mailto:jenny@promotingyoursite.com>
<http://www.PromotingYourSite.com>
John S. Rhodes, Usability Specialist
<mailto:john@WebWord.com>
<http://www.WebWord.com/>
Hayden Mitchell, Search Engine Specialist
<mailto:hayden@webthemes.com>
<http://www.webthemes.com>
David Handlos, What Not To Do Specialist
<mailto:webmaster@crosslinkz.com>
<http://www.crosslinkz.com>
And now for the mandatory legal stuff:
This newsletter is copyright 1997, 1998, 1999 Joshua Reimer. No part may be
reproduced in any way without prior permission.
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