Saturday, January 28, 2006

Making money over the internet: A 5 step formula By kannan Balakrishnan

Making money over the internet: A 5 step formula

Getting rich is the dream of many. And internet is a good medium to get rich fast. But one have to do a great deal of homework and consistent effort to get rich. In this short exposure Kannan Balalakrishnan, the great Indian writer tells about the five step procedure to make money using internet.

Step1. Have a basic knowledge about internet.
Internet is a vibrant medium. It is also highly dynamic and evolving. What is selling today may be considered garbage tomorrow. So anybody planning to do an internet business should have a basic knowledge about internet, its evolving trends and the possibilities.
Step2: Get a business idea:
If you think that you have ingenuity, originality and enough time, you can workout your own business idea. Or if you are ready to research a little you can get enough articles discussing original business ideas. If you are a butterfly on the internet, you can adapt the idea from a successful business site (of course without infringing the intellectual property rights) and make your own variations of it. If you are still lazier you can approach a consultant for the purpose. The important thing is that you must have an idea.
Step3: Work out the idea to minute detail.
An abstract idea like “I should have a site selling books” will not fetch you money. So many things have to be decided upon. What content you should have on the site, how you interact with customers, how do you prevent frauds, how do you advertise your site and so on. Another very important thing is the user interface .In all these things a consultant may be of help to you, but if you want to learn and innovate he may be a hindrance too. This phase is a little time consuming, but it lets you weave dreams about your business. Also it is advised to document your design dreams. because these forms the blueprint of your business.

Step4. Implement the business:
Once you have the complete idea of a web business you must start implementing it. If your site permits you can go for an incremental implementation, starting with a minimum set of features and adding new features gradually. This will help you to start earning from an early stage. The advertisement can go side by side. In many phases you may have to get external help or advice.

Step5 Constantly improvise.
As I have said earlier trends in internet are changing at a rapid phase and if you do not make changes in the interface and working style of your site will not be liked by people. So you must constantly watch competing or similar sites and evolve your site over time. The feedback from the users is a good indicator in this regard. Also you must be willing to diversify ,expand and even divert your business according to market forces and user needs.

I would like to get your feedback regarding this article. Please feel free to mail me your opinions.

Kannan Balakrishnan is an Indian writer. He maintains a blog http://www.wbforu.blogspot.com which contains his articles as well as articles of selected authors on web business. His email is kannanb@post.com. He also gives advice on internet business related matters

Thursday, January 26, 2006

Making a cool business website : five great ideas by Kannan Balakrishnan

Doing business over the web has many advantages. First of all you have got a round the clock business. Secondly your business is no longer confined by your location. But what I consider the greatest thing of all is the freedom you enjoy. You can work and earn from the coolness of your home. No superiors, nobody to ask you questions: a really free bird you are. In this article I will try to introduce the concepts of five kinds of websites you can easily design. The Ideas are so general that anybody can adapt it to your taste and improvise. Your creative talents and imagination can implement these ideas with an unlimited number of variations, giving you a wide range of opportunities. I do not discuss techniques of generating traffic and building an income from these sites. That will be told separately.

1.Place or location sites
Tourists all over the world are eager to get up-to-date information on places they want to visit. People of a place are generally anxious to know about things happening around them. So if you can make a site on a particular location, your neighbourhood or a place nearby or even a distant place likes London it will be a good idea. Only thing is that you should search for and find useful information which is not available elsewhere. Generally such sites have a static part and a dynamic part .Static part deals with content that change slowly, while dynamic part deals with events and even creative thoughts that are updated frequently . Using a good combination of both can help you win the hearts of many. We discuss place sites in a separate article

2. Fan sites: Sites centred on great personalities is attracting many people. The main advantage of these types of sites is that you do not have to go out for information. A good search on internet will often result in thousands of sites about the personality. Then what is your job? You have to arrange the information in your own way that people find the content you provide more interesting and well organised. Also you can interpret the facts in your own way and arrive at interesting conclusions. If the person is alive options are much more wider and a little research may make your site unique. Again the many ways of generating income from a fan site will be discussed separately.

3. Theme sites: These are more general than the first two. Here we concentrate on a particular theme and build a site around it. The theme can be anything, like chess or fashion or movies or anything imaginable. You can provide interesting facts about the subject, History of the theme, current status, interviews, controversies and what not!! As I have mentioned earlier this is a place you can display your ingenuity and original thinking.

4. Trade sites:
Trading has a long history. Everybody wants to buy or sell something. This is the relevance of trade sites. These sites provide a global market place for buyers and sellers. You can choose any type of item to sell and allow people to add items to your site. This will be initially free but later a fee may be imposed. Trade site can be constructed in a variety of ways, and closely related are matrimonial and job sites. Again the options are limited only by your imagination.

5. Community sites.
Often people of a community or institution or company ,want a common place to interact and exchange ideas. Also there may be many people and institutions who constantly interact with this community. The official website of the community will have always limitations. Imagine the barber nearer to your company trying to interact with the employees through the official website. So an unofficial website of the community have high potential of attracting viewers from and outside the community. Selling and buying inside the group is also a possibility. Again possibilities and variations are endless.

In this short exposure I have tried to identify five areas where you can build a website with minimal expertise. Your comments on these topics are always welcome. Also if you want help or consultancy in building a profitable web business feel free to contact me.

Kannan Balakrishnan is an indian writer who specializes in computers internet and related areas.

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Planning A Winning Website By Matthew Coers

Planning A Winning Website


Before you begin to build a site, you need to determine the purpose of your website. Your primary objective when you are planning your site is to be able to identify what you want visitors to do when they visit your site. In other words, what is your site’s purpose? Generally speaking you will want your visitors to take one of the following five actions:

* Purchase a product or service
* Provide contact information
* Download a white paper, datasheet, or other promotional materials
* Join your newsletter
* Click on advertiser’s banners or affiliate links

There are other goals websites have, but these are the primary five goals most any site has. I have built over 100 websites – everything from consumer oriented e-commerce sites to B-to-B corporate sites to municipal management systems and intranets. Regardless of size or scope, the single biggest mistake I see managers make over and over is trying to make their sites do too many different kinds of things. You should establish your site’s primary purpose, and make everything on the site revolve around that goal.

When a site is properly focused on it’s primary purpose, visitors understand intuitively what it’s about and are not left with the feeling that they are being “gamed”, or worse that the site is irrelevant to them. They are also less likely to become confused about what they are supposed to do if they are ready to take the next step with your company.

That means that if you are trying to collect names and email addresses of potential clients for your consultancy, you shouldn’t waste valuable real estate on your homepage discussing your “corporate vision”, you should be concentrating on establishing your expertise and demonstrating the knowledge your potential clients are looking for. Likewise, if you are supposed to be selling products on your website, then forget about trying to appeal to investors. Investors will be most impressed with a retail site that effectively converts visitors into customers, and you’ll make a lot more money in the process.

This doesn’t mean that you don’t have multiple goals for your business. This simply means that your site should focus on its primary purpose, and that purpose should be directly related to revenue-generating activities.

Once you have identified your site’s purpose, you should take the time to write out the general path you would expect your visitors to take through your site. Think about it from their perspective. Some examples of this are:

Example 1

The visitor comes into the site and sees that my site is a retail seller of electronic devices. I plan to have several items featured on the front page of the website that represent the major product lines that I carry. The visitor can select one of the featured items, or select a product category from the navigation bar. Once the visitor selects an item, he or she is then given a detailed description of the product and a price. By clicking the “Buy Now” button, the visitor is taken to the shopping cart system where he or she is given the option to continue shopping or check out.

This site’s purpose: Sell Electronic Devices

Example 2

The visitor enters the site and sees that we are a manufacturer of aftermarket automotive parts. We do not sell direct to the public, and our target audience is retail auto parts stores and other resellers such as auto mechanics. Therefore, we begin our site copy with an overview of why our parts are more attractive to retail customers and how we can help retailers become more profitable by carrying our product lines. The visitor is given the opportunity to do one of two things:

1. View a catalog of our products
2. Obtain more information on how to qualify for our “preferred retailer’s program”

If the visitor decides to get more information, then he or she is taken to a form that collects contact information and sends that information to our business development staff. If the visitor elects to view the product catalog, then he or she is given access to our product catalog in PDF format. The product catalog has the telephone number of our business development staff on every page.

This site’s purpose: Give retailers a reason to call the business development staff

Example 3

The visitor enters the site and sees that I provide freelance graphic design and copywriting services to companies in the St. Louis area. The visitor is given the option to view my online portfolio or view a partial client list. Each page of the site gives the visitor the opportunity to fill out an online form to receive a free 1-hour marketing consultation. If the client fills out the form, it will send their contact information to me via email.

This site’s purpose: Obtain leads via the online form

Clearly, the businesses in the three examples above are in completely different industries and have totally different objectives. The one thing they have in common is that each of them views their website through their customer’s eyes, and each has a clear objective in mind.

* Site number 1 wants to sell electronics
* Site number 2 wants to attract resellers
* Site number 3 wants to obtain contact information

In conclusion, you should identify one action that you want your site visitors to take, and make the entire site focused on channeling visitors to take that desired action. If you ever feel inclined to put something on your homepage or in your navigation system that isn’t directly related to your site’s primary purpose, then you are about to redirect visitors away from a revenue-generating activity and into something that doesn’t help your business. Remember to Focus, Focus, and Focus.



About The Author

Mr. Coers specializes in helping entrepreneurs build effective web businesses. His website, www.profitchoice.com contains useful articles and "how-to" guides to help organizations build their brands and sell more effectively.
article Source: http://articlejunction.com

Tuesday, January 03, 2006

Write Articles And Captivate Your Readers by Sintilia Miecevole

Write Articles And Captivate Your Readers by Sintilia Miecevole

To get your name out there, write articles and allow them to be freely reproduced (with a resource box pointing back to you.) A well-written article can:



- help build your profile



- draw traffic to your site, and



- help build a database of clients through associated e-courses or newsletter.



How do you write the article? You can come up with the content - How do you grab those readers and make them come back for more?



As you can construct and edit an article (it has a beginning, middle and end; and you can check the grammar and spelling); if you want to WIN readers - think about what they want to know.



Put your readers first. Give them what they want and they'll be queuing up to read anything you produce.



A blueprint for writing articles that captivate your readers - whatever the topic - is a follows:



== 1. What Do Your Readers Want ==



You may know what they want because you're an expert in the field. If you don't know the subject well, you'll have to research. Look for forums on your topic and see what people are discussing. What are the problems? Can you provide an answer?



== 2. Start With An Attention-Grabber ==



Work on your opening. Try to avoid trite questions like "Have you wondered why people find it difficult to lose weight?" It's dull and it's not targeting the person reading the article - what do they care about the difficulties "people" have losing weight? They care about THEIR weight problem!



The opening paragraph should give the reader that warm "Hey, this is about me!" feeling. - "This could be the answer I've been looking for..."



Example: "Diet gurus make it all sound easy: to lose weight, all you have to do is expend more energy than you take in. Huh! If it were that simple, the "Big People" stores would be out of business. For those of us tired of diets, gyms and dull group meetings, there is a back-to-basics way to tackle this. It won't cost you a fortune or leave you feeling deprived."



== 3. Write As You Speak... Then Edit! ==



The sample opening above illustrates the importance of the tone used in your article. You need 'meat'to make it worth reading.



Write your article in a natural style that's akin to normal conversation. If the first draft is too informal - fix that when you edit. Readers may want facts, tips, and strategies, but they want entertainment too! Let your personality shine.



== 4. End On A High ==



Most articles fizzle out! Writers often don't know how to end on an upbeat note. They either stop dead or come up with a trite ending like: "So what are you waiting for? Get started today!"



The beginning and the ending of your article are the parts that make the biggest impression. Creat a feeling of anticipation... and leave them feeling satisfied (or excited) when you finish.



Offering advice to help solve a problem gives your readers a reason to feel optimistic about themselves. Don't make promises... but offer hope. If you are giving hints on marketing or business, sum up the benefits. Experiment with using a humorous quote, or giving readers a specific action to get them started. Be creative.



Here's a final tip: create a cheat-sheet. Divide it into beginnings/middles/ends and add more strategies as you think of them. (For example, using the tips in this article, you might write: ENDINGS - end on a high, offer hope, use funny quote, suggest action to get started.)



Do this, and you'll be cranking out articles everyone wants to publish!



Writing information on http://www.okwriting.com with your Host, Sintilia Miecevole is waiting for you. You'll have resources at your fingertips from writing, book compositions, novels, biographies, speech and thesis to resumes, essays, software and more. Go to http://www.okwriting.com for your exciting writing experience. You'll be glad you did!



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