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SITE-SELL! Issue #022
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SITE-SELL! The World's Most USABLE E-commerce E-zine ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >A free, occasional e-zine dedicated to showing you... >... how to SELL on the Net! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ February 11, 2001 Issue #022 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >ALL-TIME FAVORITE SITE-SELL! ARTICLE If a friend forwarded this copy of SITE-SELL! to you, here's our readers' all-time favorite SITE-SELL! article. It's a powerful example of how to makeover your own site to... .... SELL on the Net! :-) http://articles.sitesell.com/bhh/ If you like what you see and want to keep getting more of the same, please visit... http://myss.sitesell.com/s-ezine.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >READER'S CHOICE... Care to see the VERY BEST ARTICLE (according to reader feedback) from each of our OTHER two e-zines?... http://articles.sitesell.com/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >TABLE OF CONTENTS o SITE-SELL! News 1) SBI! Gets A Face Lift 2) Back to Our Roots... Grassroots Internet Marketing -- o Featured Article 1) Testing ProfitInfo's LeadFactory ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~SITE-SELL NEWS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ----- --1-- ----- SBI! Gets A Face Lift In the December edition of Danny Sullivan's superb "The Search Engine Update" newsletter (Issue #115), Danny lists some of the more popular Search Engine tools. Doorway-builders, Position Checkers, Automatic Submitters, Keyword Density Analyzers, Keyword Suggestion Tools... They were all there, tons of them. But there was one catch... big expense. I figured if I were to buy only the MINIMUM I needed to run a profitable e-biz, I'd be out of pocket close to $1,000. And that's only the minimum. And of course, I would still need hosting, a domain name, and all that other good stuff... Danny's article really got me thinking... thinking specifically, of course, of our own COMPLETE solution to e-commerce, Site Build It!. You see, Site Build It! provides all the functionality of well over $3,200 of cutting edge net-software and hosting , for less than 10% of the cost. And, of course, that includes your domain name and your hosting, too! Here's the quick breakdown... https://secure.sitesell.com/build/order.html Just think of it. For just under USD$300, you receive... o Automatic submission and tracking of the SEs o One click "page analysis" that optimizes your pages for top rankings on the Search Engines. o Extensive click-in and click-through reports o HTML and FTP-free one click page-building interface. Who needs code? o Keyword-brainstorming tool o Automated Pay-Per-Click Search Engine Bid and Research tool o Tracking and referral stats o Page hosting and domain name o Online research center o Upcoming e-commerce transaction processing functionality And much, MUCH more! If you haven't checked out SiteSell's TOTAL solution in some time, this is an ideal opportunity to do just that... http://buildit.sitesell.com We even overhauled the site's most popular feature, the Quick Tour Slide Show... http://quicktour.sitesell.com -- You'll notice something new about the site itself, too. It seemed that too often, our support staff was receiving e-mail saying... "I still don't understand EXACTLY what SBI! is or does." We were just too close to the forest to see the trees. Sure, the site was USABLE, but the message wasn't CLEAR enough. So we went to work with a new mission... Make sure our visitors ***UNDERSTAND*** the message. We revamped COMPLETELY, from the Home Page (which simply didn't communicate the BIG GUN of "what's in it for me" well enough), through the 3 Minute Express, to the details in the FAQ... Yes, even all the way to the order page, which did not transmit the value proposition clearly enough. But now, its the TRUE value is crystal-clear... https://secure.sitesell.com/build/order.html ... and as you see, we've switched to a fixed (static) price! -- The "what's-in-it-for-you" bottom line? SBI! is *your* COMPLETE traffic-building income-generating answer! No need to cobble together a bunch of high-priced tools, none of which work together and talk to each other, of course. Visit the site and see for yourself... http://buildit.sitesell.com Even better, *TRY* Site Build It!... SBI!'s "Risk-Free Try It" refund policy provides you with the opportunity to see first-hand how the whole system works... http://buildit.sitesell.com ----- --2-- ----- Back to Our Roots... Grassroots Internet Marketing You may know that my initial foray onto the Internet began with a high-priced niche-investment software called PennyGold (my own creation). I knew I had a great product (because it worked!), but could I create a site that would sell (i.e., convince others), and could I build TARGETED traffic (i.e., attract people with an interest in this niche)?? To make a long story short, the answers to those two questions turned out to be... YES and YES! Penny Gold sold out all 1,000 copies, netting over $750,000 in two years. Not bad for a 1-person operation. More importantly, though, this little experiment proved to me that the Net was the perfect, low-risk, niche marketing/selling medium. It was my experience with PennyGold that led to our first SiteSell product, "Make Your Site SELL!". Recently updated and completely revamped, MYSS! 2002 remains the undisputed champion of selling on the Web... http://myss.sitesell.com/ Of course, you know the rest of the story -- thanks to tens of thousands of happy customers who tell their friends, SiteSell has grown rapidly over the last two years. But "SiteSell the business" is a much different e-business than my very first one. It's vast in scope. It's 99% affiliate-driven -- I believe that we are the only company on the Net that is committed totally to growing through our affiliate partners. As a result, we DO NOT compete with our affiliates. We don't even do anything that could be construed as such. For example, we don't "work the engines"... we don't bid on the Pay-Per-Clicks. What does that mean to us (and you) as Net marketers?... Marketing SiteSell products is not the same as marketing PennyGold or what most SOHOs/small businesses might offer on the Net. And that presented an interesting problem... We need to stay close to grassroots marketing to be of value to you. And that's why we created our very own real-world, test lab... -- I'd like to take a second to introduce a key member of the SiteSell team, Paul Crane. Paul is our Site Build It! Product Manager, as well as "researcher extraordinaire." Paul does much of the background work and preliminary preparation of many of our articles. He also manages the four traffic-building HQs (HeadQuarters) in Site Build It! (Search Engines, Paid Search Engines, Directories, and Pay-Per-Click), keeping the content fresh and cutting edge (deleting out-of-date material and adding whatever is new and important). And he constantly tests our submitting, spider-tracking, index-watching and ranking software so that it keeps up with Search Engine changes. Paul works his usual 9AM to 9PM 7-day a week stint for SiteSell (what can I say, he's a slacker compared to other SiteSell personnel!). And then... He spends his free time building HIS OWN online business. Paul wanted to start an online business based upon a passion of his... fitness and diet. So he's grown, on a part-time basis, a flourishing business which now consists of three related sites. First, he built a substantial content site... http://www.ultimatefatburner.com/ (It didn't start out "substantial" -- it gets that way by "doing just a bit every day," he says.) This site drives traffic to his affiliate merchant-partner and to his own e-book site. It's the first of three sites that make up Paul's business -- and together, the three sites serve as our test lab. By the way, Paul treats this business, which is a very real business that sells a real product (heck, I've even lost some weight thanks to the book!), much like you might... a part-time venture that he'd like to grow until he's sure enough about it that he doesn't need his 9-to-5 job.... HEY, wait a sec! ;-) Paul tests and evaluates all SiteSell formulas and strategies BEFORE we present them to you. -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Ultimatefatburner.com has jumped nearly 400,000 Alexa points since I began to fully implement SiteSell strategies on the Site. Alexa now shows the site's ranking at 88,177 with a visitor score of 3092 visits. Not bad for a little part-time business, started from scratch, simply by following our own advice! -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Part 2 of Paul's business is another content site. He has started to use Site Build It! to build this one... http://www.diet-supplement-review.com/ ... and this site also drives traffic to his e-book site, to his affiliated merchant, and yes, even to the other content site! -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Actually, if SBI! existed when I FIRST got started, I would never have gone through all the hassle of building Ultimatefatburner.com the "old-fashioned" way... html, ftp, Search Engine submitting, etc., etc., etc. (I should add 10 "etcs" here!). I would simply have created this site using SBI!. And I'd be way ahead, since I'd have had the time to focus on building content, which is what people want, right? Diet-supplement-review.com is already one of my top half-dozen referrers. Not bad for a site with only 10 pages (contains several orphan pages used for further testing and experimenting that you won't see until I hook them up). I particularly like the SBI! Analyze It! feature. Interestingly enough, similar pages built on Ultimatefatburner.com with Web Position Gold don't score nearly as well! http://buildit.sitesell.com Plus, there's no learning curve with Site Build It!. Over the coming months, you'll see diet-supplement-review.com growing steadily over the coming months. And as it does, its traffic will go up, up, up, building more and more revenue for me through my affiliate merchant-partners and through direct sales of my e-book. Actually, I think this whole idea was Ken's way of heading off my asking for a raise! ;-) -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Paul sells his e-book from a single-page sales site at... http://www.ultimate-fat-burning-diet-primer.com/ Anyone who visits this site comes from one of the other two, so they are highly targeted, PREsold visitors. Paul's Conversion Rate is outstanding (over 5%), PLUS he generates affiliate income from the other two content sites. By the way, when we launch Site Build It!'s e-commerce capabilities, you'll be able to do EVERYTHING that Paul does AT ALL THREE OF HIS SITES... through ONE single Site Build It! site. But I digress. :-) -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Anyone who sells an e-book (or anything else for that matter) and is not happy with their Conversion Rate needs to read Make Your Site SELL! 2002. It was Ken's original master- piece that showed me how to increase my Conversion Rate from .25-.5% to over 5%. Not bad for a newbie with no credentials, eh? http://myss.sitesell.com -----PAUL's SIDEBAR----- Now that Paul has built up a wealth of experience with this "test lab," we're starting a series of hands on, in the trenches, down-and-dirty approach to what works vs. what completely wastes your time, money, and resources. These articles will be appear in all three of our e-zines (Sales from the EDGE, SBI! XPRESS, and the Five Pillar Affiliate Report). Each article, however, will appear ONLY in the zine that is relevant to the content (i.e., don't worry -- we won't repeat the same article in all the e-zines). For example, if Paul finds an affiliate strategy that builds his affiliate income, we share that with our 5 Pillar Affiliates in the 5P Report. -----PAUL'S SIDEBAR----- If you have not yet joined the 5P Program, please do... even if it's just to receive the "best affiliate marketing newsletter on the Web" according to gurus like Allan Gardyne and Ralph Wilson. It's free... http://www.sitesell.com/affiliateprogram.html -----PAUL'S SIDEBAR----- I know that you likely already receive the EDGE, since most subscribers to THIS e-zine own at least one SiteSell product. So no problem... you'll be seeing my relevant articles in there. For example, the first article was all about the REAL lowdown on link popularity, and how to get the MOST benefit for the LEAST time and effort and dollars. If you do *NOT* own a SiteSell product yet, visit the SiteSell home page and choose the one that best meets your needs and interest... http://www.sitesell.com -- Site Build It! XPRESS (SBIX) is an integral part of Site Build It!. It's what keeps SBI! evergreen. When Paul finds cool new ways to get even more out of Site Build It!, that article will appear in the SBI! XPRESS, which we send out only to Site Build It! owners. -----PAUL'S SIDEBAR----- For those of you not familiar with the XPRESS... SBI! XPRESS delivers news and information about the world of Site Build It!. Filled with timely tips, it's designed to be the up-to-date "power supplement" that helps WWWRING the most out of Site Build It!. We then summarize that content and enter ALL IMPORTANT INFORMATION into the various HQs in SBI!'s Site Central (while deleting whatever is out of date). It's all part of the overall SBI! policy... you should not have to focus on anything that has to do with technology. Not even keeping up-to-date. Because XPRESS does all that for you.. http://www.sitesell.com -----PAUL'S SIDEBAR----- Let's get started with a sample of Paul's real-time, live "Test Lab" articles that will be appearing in our Sales from the EDGE, 5 Pillar Reports and SBIX e-zines... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FEATURED ARTICLE~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ------- ---1--- ------- Experimenting With ProfitInfo's LeadFactory Every successful Netmarketer from here to Timbuktu knows the importance of publishing a regular newsletter. It's Web Marketing 101. But these days, it's getting more and more difficult to convince visitors to subscribe to an e-zine. Thanks to the never-ending deluge of spam people encounter daily, most aren't interested in receiving MORE e-mail. Sad to say, but the novelty of receiving e-mail has worn off. Even if you're doing everything right, like... o offering free e-courses or a FREE e-book as enticements to sign up o using pop-unders in a non-intrusive manner o linking to posted back-issues o displaying your e-zine sign-up form EVERYWHERE o mentioning previous e-zine articles in current on-site articles ... you'll still be lucky to break the 5% barrier. Yup -- 5 subscribers for every 100 visitors. In all likelihood, you'll convert under 2% of site visitors into subscribers. Depending on the amount of traffic you get daily, it may take EONS before your list finally ascends to the magic 5-10,000 subscribers mark. This is the point at which you can realistically expect to see some decent income from your list. So what's a Net marketer to do? Buy traffic? Hmmm... Consider a $100 investment at Overture. At $0.05 per bid, that brings a total of 2000 visitors to your Web site. At an optimal 5% subscription rate, that's 100 subscribers to your newsletter (at a cost of $1.00 per subscriber). At an average (and more realistic) subscription rate of 2%, that's 40 new subscribers at a cost of $2.50 per subscriber. -----SIDEBAR----- Of course, there are other ways to measure the success of your advertising campaigns -- the number of visitors who click-through to your merchant partners, the number who buy your own product, etc., etc. For the sake of this discussion, I'm focusing purely on GENERATING subscribers. -----SIDEBAR----- For most of us, $1.00 to $2.50 per subscriber is simply TOO much to pay. Heck, to build a list of 10,000 subscribers would cost between $10-$25,000. Phew! Forget that! -- So what about BUYING subscribers? That's a good idea. I put the theory to test with Ultimatefatburner.com's Fat-Bustin' eZine... http://www.ultimatefatburner.com/subscribe.html .. and Marty Foley's LeadFactory... http://profitinfo.com/leadfactory/ Marty's service sells single opt-in e-mail addresses generated from the thank-you page of Freedback.com. Freedback.com is a free online service that allows Webmasters to place a feedback form on a Web site without access to a cgi-bin. Cost per e-mail address varies depending on the numbers... o 577-1924 subscribers --> $0.26 pp ($150-499.99) o 2084-4167 subscribers --> $0.24 pp ($500-$999.99) o 4546-6819 subscribers --> $0.22 pp ($1000-$1499.99) This extends all the way down to $0.165 per subscriber when you purchase between 30,304 and 60,606 e-mail addresses (at a cost between $5,000 and $9,999.99). Wow! -- Of course, the real questions are... 1) How effective is this as an advertising method? 2) What is the REAL cost per subscriber of this service? I decided to start at the low end of the scale, buying 577 subscribers for $150 (as a bonus, all first time customers receive an extra 100 free subscribers just for trying the service). One of the strengths of LeadFactory is its ability to deliver leads *directly* into your newsletter system through an existing form field, rather than forwarding them to you to enter manually. Since LeadFactory can easily deliver 100+ subscribers per day, this is a very nice feature. Unfortunately, this time LeadFactory bungled the sign-up process. Instead of delivering addresses directly into the system through my existing form fields, it sent me a list of 80 names to enter manually into the system. When I complained, Marty promptly fixed the problem himself, and supplied an additional 200 subscribers to my order as an apology. The remainder of the campaign continued without a hitch. Subscribers so far? 877 + 10% padding = 964! Not bad. The actual number of unique subscribers according to my system? 883 --> 6 more than promised. -- OK, now it's evaluation time for this experiment. Two months and 4 e-zine issues later (post campaign), how do things measure up? Well, out of the total of 883 subscribers, 87 have unsubscribed, or 9.8%. What I have left is 796 subscribers at a cost of $150. That's just a hair under $0.19 per subscriber. Let's suppose that I hadn't received those 200 bonus subscribers. I would have received 677 (give or take a few) subscribers for $150. With a 9.8% unsubscribe rate, I'd be left with 611 subscribers -- at a cost of about $0.245 per subscriber. -----SIDEBAR----- Of course, I have received quite a few "spill-over" visitors from this advertising campaign -- as people tell friends and relatives. So the real cost per visitor is somewhat lower. -----SIDEBAR----- In comparison, it costs anywhere from *3 to 8 TIMES* as much to build subscriber lists by simply buying traffic. And I KNOW each subscriber has visited my site, and received at least one of my e-zines (most people will read at least one of your e-zines before they unsubscribe). In short, I know they got my message. -- For me, buying subscribers has been a worthwhile endeavor. However, that's not to say it will the same for everyone. Here's a couple of caveats BEFORE you consider paying for a single subscriber... o Make sure your e-zine is of SUPERIOR quality. If you are running a ton of ads per issue, dump them. If you don't have something to offer subscribers, you'll only be wasting your money and their time. o Focus on a LONG TERM relationship with your subscribers. Don't pitch, pitch, pitch your products -- instead start building the all-important trust. Remember, if you do this properly, you'll have all the time in the world to sell effectively to your subscribers. o Take special care crafting your e-zine's DESCRIPTION. Make sure a subscriber knows EXACTLY what it is she'll be getting in her mailbox. If you mislead her, she'll unsubscribe in a flash, and you'll be out of pocket. So take your time. Here's the description I used for Ultimatefatburner's e-zine... ---------------------------------------- "Ultimatefatburner's Fat-Bustin's eZine delivers diet reviews and weight loss news, inspirational articles and cutting-edge supplement reviews... in tasty, bite-sized morsels." ---------------------------------------- See how the visitor knows exactly what she's getting? o Most services will usually display your listing along with many others and allow visitors to select the ones they wish. You may choose the option to have your listing "pre-selected" so that a visitor signing up for a different e-zine will have to manually "de-select" your e-zine in order not to receive it. Do **NOT** do this -- not only will you waste your money, but you WILL be accused of spamming (and in a way, you are!). o Because LeadFactory delivers single opt-in subscribers, set up an autoresponder so that all e-mails that enter your system (I use Aweber.com) receive an immediate confirmation. Otherwise, people will forget very quickly that they've signed up for your e-zine. And that means spam complaints. Bottom line? ProfitInfo's service and support was nothing short of outstanding. The service delivered above and beyond what it promised. If you have a good newsletter, and if you have the previous safeguards implemented, give Marty's service a try... http://profitinfo.com/leadfactory/ -----KEN'S SIDEBAR----- I've known Marty for quite a while -- he's one of the GOOD GUYS who insists on delivering quality for the dollar. So I'm not at all surprised at Paul's great experience. And by the way, we don't receive a penny for recommending Marty. We check out a lot of services -- we prefer not to say anything about them, rather than say something bad. But Marty's service is solid... as is he. :-) -----KEN'S SIDEBAR----- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~SITESELL PRODUCTS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Site Build It! "Build income through content." http://buildit.sitesell.com http://quicktour.sitesell.com Make Your Site SELL! 2002 "The definitive work on making any Web site SELL!" http://myss.sitesell.com Make Your Knowledge Sell! "Turn knowledge into income -- sell your brain on the Net." http://myks.sitesell.com Make Your Price Sell! "Price with complete confidence & double your Net profits." http://myps.sitesell.com Make Your Words Sell! "Want to sell MORE? Become an e-persuader." http://myws.sitesell.com Make Your Net Auction Sell! Going, going, GONE! Get into the Auction Action! http://mynas.sitesell.com SureFire Premium Processing "Premium Processing for Premium Companies" http://surefire.sitesell.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Back issues available at... http://www.sitesell.com/site-sell-backissues.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TO UNSUBSCRIBE To unsubscribe, go to the following URL and enter your e-mail address. If you use more than one e-mail address, be sure to enter the same one that you used when you subscribed. http://www.sitesell.com/unsubscribe-ss.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ WANT TO CHANGE THE E-MAIL ADDRESS AT WHICH YOU RECEIVE THIS? http://www.sitesell.com/change-email.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Written by Ken Evoy, M.D., President, SiteSell.com Inc. (c) copyright 2002 SiteSell.com Inc.