Native Fauna

By Peggy Champlin

 When we consider the many ways to market our businesses, we usually think about these types of online strategies:

* posting a blog entry

* sending an ezine or newsletter

* article marketing

* using Google AdWords

* search engine optimization (SEO)

* creating more incoming links to our web site

There’s a key strategy that’s more important than any of these. To be effective, they need to be done consistently over a period of time. Not one of these strategies will help your business if you focus on it once and then move on to another strategy.

So the most important aspect to marketing your business is to develop a system - a routine that helps you implement your chosen strategies consistently over time to yield the results you’re looking for.

As an example, I’ll share my weekly marketing routine. It includes several, but not all, of the marketing strategies listed above.

* Monday: Post a blog entry.

This adds content to my site, and since my blog software automatically “pings” several dozen blog directories, links to the post on my site will be created in these directories. Also, I’ve set up a system that emails each blog post to my subscriber list, so this one action is leveraged in several ways.

* Tuesday: Submit an article.

I use a service that submits my article to hundreds of article directories and ezine publishers. And the article is usually a slightly modified version of the blog post from Monday, further leveraging that content.

* Wednesday: Add a message to all appropriate autoresponders.

I have various prospect and customer autoresponder lists. Often, we set up autoresponders with some initial messages, and broadcast messages to them when we have an announcement to make. But that leaves long periods of time when we’re not communicating with the people on these lists at all. So Wednesday’s task is to add a new message to the end of as many autoresponder series as appropriate. This message might sell the “original” product to a prospect list, or cross-promote another product to a prospect or customer list.

* Thursday: Build joint venture or affiliate relationships.

This task could be creating a new affiliate resource or touching base with a JV partner. It could include research or initial contact with a potential JV partner. Or it might be writing a new JV partner agreement. The point is to support and build better relationships with those who have agreed, or might agree, to help sell my products.

* Friday: Post comments on selected blogs and forums.

Using a list of blogs and forums with topics related to my business, find some posts where I can add a useful comment. I also use Google Alerts and some software to find additional appropriate blogs and forums to post comments to. This practice is beneficial in two ways. First, people who read these posts and find my comment valuable may decide to click my link and visit my site. Second, these links pointing to my site are helpful for SEO.

Currently, I’m implementing this weekly calendar myself, but clearly much of it can be done by an assistant or outsourced.

You may very well design a different set of marketing strategies for your business than I have for mine. In particular, mine are all online strategies and you may have offline marketing strategies as well. The point is to create a system that encourages you to be consistent over time in implementing your strategies or they just won’t work well.

Peggy Champlin’s web design business has been providing a full suite of services and products to help small companies build their businesses online since 2002. Visit Success With Ease to subscribe to our list and receive an article like this every week.

Identify Your Online Marketing Assets for More Profits
By Ron Richardson

 That’s both costly and inconvenient. With online marketing of information, your ‘inventor’ of products can fit on the thumb drive in your pocket. Even if you sell actual deliverable products, you can have those sent from a reseller and have plenty of room at home and not worry about the shipping, handling or customer service.

Since your products don’t take up space, it’s easy to forget just how many ‘assets’ your business owns. You need to keep an ongoing list of the ‘assets’ for your Internet marketing efforts. Not only do these have an economic value, but you want to know what’s available and have it organized for your convenience.

It’s too easy for files to get lost on the hard drive and linger instead of getting revised and back on the market. Keep everything in separate folders or files and then make a back-up on a regular basis. It only takes one computer meltdown to lose your entire business in a flash.

Here are a few prompts to use in listing your online marketing assets so that you stay well organized:

- EBooks - custom written, original product or collaboration.

- PLR Products - articles, eBooks or courses that you own rights to resell

- Articles and reviews related to your niche

- Video or audio products that are marketed separately or with eBooks

- Customer list of buyers

- Prospect list of people who ask for more information

- Product reviews and testimonials from satisfied buyers

- Recommendations from influential people in your niche market

- Sales letters, squeeze page copy and ad copy from successful campaigns

- Graphics and logos identifiable as the ‘brand’ for your site

- Opt-in pages and forms from successful campaigns

These ‘assets’ have a monetary value, but they’re nothing until you ‘monetize’ them for online marketing. By keeping track of your marketing assets, you discover what’s most profitable in your niche and what isn’t. Make the most of your assets and you’ll get more income with fewer useless files (the electronic equivalent of the packed garage!).

Once you find the assets that are bringing you in the most profits, you can focus on automating them, and then move on to next and the next. When you realize how easy it is to keep your assets organized, it will become a walk in the park.

Treat your online business like a ‘business’ and you will see profitable returns, from loyal customers, for years to come.

Ron Richardson is the editor of Business Opportunities Newsletter. Subscribe Free ($67 value) & get free ad

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