Barry's Internet Marketing Blog

barry0912 answers:

Considering your budget, have you thought of training one of your existing employees in Internet marketing and simply having someone work in-house continually on developing strong search engine optimization strategies and the like?

Ultimately it would give you more control over how you want to develop your campaign since they would already understand your company’s needs and targets more thoroughly than an outside contractor would.

EMarketSchool has a great training program where you can learn in a few hours each week, so that whoever you might choose can (at least in the beginning) continue their current projects as well.

Http://www.eMarketSchool.com

barry0912 answers:

Preferably both, though Excel is a must – you’ll have to read and make a lot of metrics and analytics and those are made with Excel

barry0912 answers:

The title insurance is the Lender’s policy that protects the lender from any liens on that property. The Owners policy is for you, the owner to protect you from any liens that may show up on the property. For example, if in 10 years the county finds that someone else owned part of your land and owes money on it, you would be responsible to pay that if you didn’t ave an owners policy. It’s def worth it to get it.

barry0912 answers:

You are correct in your assumption of what title insurance provides. Before a title insurance firm will provide insurance, they will perform a search of the condition of the title covering the property in question. Contact a local title insurance provider and explain to them what you propose to do, and they will advise you accordingly, as to what liens may be against the property.

barry0912 answers:

Hi Kevin…most shelters will offer low cost vaccinations as well as spay/neuter services for both dogs and cats

Here’s a list of California locations for cats you can search through to find a shelter nearby you: http://www.lovethatcat.com/stca.html

barry0912 answers:

This is a great program, but please don’t act like it is the answer to “excuses”

The closest clinic to me is 70miles! Now luckily I can afford my local vet bills, but if I just couldn’t see traveling that far….it’d cost me that much in gas to reach the place!

I’m just saying….this isn’t going to help EVERYone and it isn’t going to stop the lame excuses for not caring for a pet.

Now…why can’t petsmart have this too? Why can’t they travel to smaller towns for vaccinations? That would help a lot more as well!

barry0912 answers:

“If you build it, they will come” is not necessarily true on the Web. Putting a website up is one thing, but getting visitors to come to your site is another. The process becomes even more difficult if you have limited resources to market your business.

Here are some shoestring marketing ideas that can help you get the visitors you need at the least cost possible:

1. Create the best content you can with the best products you can possibly offer. Your content is your best advertisement – if visitors love your content, then they will go back and spread the word to others.

2. Make it easy for users to recommend your site. Viral marketing is very important — and easy to tap on the Web. But give your users the tools. Get a Recommend this Site script from websites such as cgiscripts.com and similar directories of scripts. Some even go as far as giving incentives to those who recommend the site to their friends. If only 10 people go to your site, but these 10 people invite 10 more – that’s additional traffic that you get for FREE!

Recommend Site Scripts (various) http://php.resourceindex.com/Complete_Scripts/Website_Promotion/Recommend_Site/
Big Nose Bird Recommend this Site http://bignosebird.com/carchive/birdcast.shtml
CGI Resource Index http://cgi.resourceindex.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Perl/Website_Promotion/Recommend_Site/
Hostscripts http://www.hotscripts.com/PHP/Scripts_and_Programs/Site_Recommendation/index.html

3. Rank well in the search engines (organic search results, not the pay per click). SEs can be a big source of traffic. The key is to create the best content in your niche. If you have good content, other websites will gladly link to you and offer your site as a resource to their audience. Check the on-page factors and be sure to get linked from authority sites in your topic area.

If you are going to read only one piece on search engine optimization, I suggest you read Brett Tabke of WebmasterWorld.com’s “Successful Site in 12 Months with Google Alone: 26 steps to 15k a day.” http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/2010.htm

SEO for Google http://www.powerhomebiz.com/052006/google.htm
SEO for Yahoo! Http://www.powerhomebiz.com/052006/yahoo.htm
SEO for MSN http://www.powerhomebiz.com/052006/msn.htm
Tying It Together: SEO For The Big Three http://www.powerhomebiz.com/052006/seo.htm

4. Send out press releases. While outfits charge as much as $650 per release, there are free press release submission places on the Web. Press releases allow you to (a) attract media attention; (b) get more back links to your website without sending each website an email request; and (c) get more visibility especially if your press release gets in Google News or Yahoo News.

Http://www.prleap.com/sign_up.html

http://i-newswire.com/

http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/

http://www.pressbox.co.uk/cgi-bin/links/add.cgi

http://www.pr.com/press-releases

http://www.prfree.com/

http://www.clickpress.com/releases/index.shtml

http://www.theopenpress.com/

http://www.przoom.com/

http://www.prweb.com

http://www.newswiretoday.com/

http://www.free-press-release.com/

5. Submit articles. Write articles and submit them to websites accepting author submissions. You get exposure for your business; establishes you as an authority in your field, and allows you to get backlinks for your website. If 50 websites publish your article and it contains a link back to your website, then you easily get 50 links from a single article. The more links you have, the greater your chances for increasing your search engine rankings.

Here is a comprehensive list of where to submit your articles http://answers.yahoo.com/question/;_ylt=AhzreGmnCUicOoyedqypscUjzKIX?qid=1006022407481

6. Improve your conversion. Getting visitors is one thing; getting them to buy your products is a whole different story. Read the article “10 Ways to Convert Visitors to Buyers” http://www.powerhomebiz.com/072005/conversion.htm for tips on how to improve your conversion rates.

7. Post a link to your site for free where it is allowed (always read the Terms of Use). Examples are:

Craigslist http://www.craigslist.com
Google Base http://base.google.com
Classifieds for Free http://www.classifiedsforfree.com/…
Text Link Exchange http://www.txtswap.com/
Recycler.com http://www.recycler.com/
Yahoo Classifieds http://classifieds.yahoo.com/
US Free Ads http://www.usfreeads.com/

barry0912 answers:

You may take different approaches to effective marketing, but the objective remains clear: to communicate with your prospects and customers.

The best marketing strategy is, therefore, to communicate regularly with your prospects and customers.

This is the reason why all Internet Marketing professionals provide an Opt-In form, set up Newsletters, Auto Responders etc. To be able to build a rapport and relationship with prospects and customers.

It has been proved that

* It takes an average of 7 communications with a web site visitor to convert him / her into a buyer.

* People who engage in regular communications with their prospects and customers increase their sales multi-fold.

* Happy & satisfied customers can become your best customers giving you repeat business time and again.

Creating a hunger for the information that you provide can covert to hunger for the product or service that you provide.

Good Luck.
–
Joseph Ponnou
http://www.internetmarketingtoolsntips.com

barry0912 answers:

Internet marketing using blogs and webpages or article marketing or a combination of all three

barry0912 answers:

I would have to assume you have prior experience in running Internet cafes as well as different countries in Africa.

I believe the best strategy would be to either:

1) Establish a small chain of Internet cafes in your home base. Then to get master franchisees in the other countries. These master franchisees would have a more thorough and deeper understanding of their country which will allow them to tweak your cafe to suit the different markets and regulations in their countries.

2) Get a franchise from the US or some other country (maybe Singapore or UK) and make yourself the master franchisee for the whole of Africa. Then you make sub-master franchisees for the other countries. Again for the reasons mentioned above.

3) If you have investors with deep pockets, you can buy established Internet cafes or Internet cafe chains in the different countries and centralize management in your home territory.

My recommendations are based on some principle i abide by:

1) Don’t re-invent the wheel. Just tweak it. Hence my recommendation to just get an established franchise or to acquire existing cafes.

2) Leave the local marketing and operations to competent local people who have deep knowledge of the territory. You cannot hope to match their knowledge simply because they have their roots there.

Good luck and i hope you succeed.

Ps I’m available for consultation haha