With the growing popularity of podcasting, publishers and marketers around the world are asking themselves how to monetize this content channel.

Today we’ll be taking a look at how marketers can monetize podcasting through enhanced marketing activities.

While publishers might find it relatively easy to integrate podcasting in to their business models without really “creating a revolution”, the opportunities for marketers really go beyond traditional marketing tactics.

To understand the opportunity we need to understand what podcasting brings to the marketing table: the power of voice, delivered directly to our prospects, customers, employees and partners.

While text might still be the most “usable” format and the easiest to consume, voice itself has the unique feature of being able to express emotion and bring personality in to marketing communications.

For marketers, monetizing podcasting won’t come through ad sales or content sales, but through opportunities to enhance their marketing communications with the power of emotion, delivered directly to their receipients.

Here are just some possibilities for you to consider:

a] PR: Audio press releases, messages from company executives, expert interviews and other industry related material, all delivered directly to the media.

b] Direct marketing: Sales letters and other ad creative, delivered in audio and directly to your prospects.

c] Customer Relationship Management and User Support: Personal messages and greetings from company executives, persoanlized messages to key clients by key account managers, educational content and industry interviews, seminar or conference recordings, product support information and tutorials, …

e] Promotion: Achieving additional company/brand/product exposure by providing podcasts and promoting them via podcast directories and search engines.

f] E-commerce: Audio product announcements and presentations, delivered to prospects that opt-in to receive latest product information. In the case of audio products, podcasts can also carry short excerpts or previews of new editions, thus enticing prospects to order.

g] Branding and Prospect Conversion: Educational content and industry interviews that help shorten the sales cycle or generate/improve company credibility and enhance its brand.

h] Advertising in third-party podcasts

And so on …

In these examples monetization does not come through directly generated revenues, but indirectly through improved sales.

Copyright 2005 Rok Hrastnik

Find out all you need to know about RSS and how to use it to get your content delivered, win back your customers, make more sales and increase search engine rankings.

You may have already received a do not spam list email, seen a web site or even heard a radio advertisement that promises to reduce spam email just by submitting your email address.

Since the federal “Do Not Call List” became law in 2003, it seems logical that a do not spam list exists also. But even though it sounds legitimate, don’t believe the hype or the official looking emails.

According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) attorneys, who are experts at fighting spam email, a national do not spam list registry would not be effective at this time for many reasons.

The FTC says the high risk of a list like this would actually result in more in-box clutter because illegal spammers would use the registry as a “do spam” list. So the FTC is advising consumers not to submit their email addresses to any organization that claims to be creating a do not spam list.

The FTC also says emails and web sites that claim to offer a national do not email list or registry could be part of a high-tech scam to trick consumers into disclosing their email address or other sensitive personal information.

According to the FTC, these web sites and emails may be a way to collect valid email addresses to sell to email spammers. The result could be even more spam for anyone who signs up for the do not spam list.

Or, it could be worse because some scammers have collected information through bogus web sites that mimic those of legitimate organizations, and then use the information to commit identity theft.

If you have already submitted your email address to a national do not email list or registry that promises to reduce the amount of spam you receive, you may be a victim of one the latest email scams on the Internet.

Should you get an unsolicited email claiming to represent a do not email list or registry, an organization to stop spam, or even the FTC itself, forward it to the FTC using this email address - spam@uce.gov .

If you believe you have already been scammed, file your complaint at FTC - File Complaint, then visit FTC - Identity Theft Resources to learn how to minimize your risk of damage from identity theft.

You can choose to ignore a do not spam list email or help the FTC with their efforts in fighting spam by forwarding any suspicious emails to them. The important thing is that you don’t become a new victim of the do not spam list email scam.

Copyright © 2005 Spyware Information.com All Rights Reserved.

This article is provided by http://www.spyware-information.com where you will find free spyware cleaners, downloads, removal software and valuable tips. For regularly updated articles about adware and spyware and protection from identity theft go to http://spyware-information.com/articles_1.html

You have good traffic, but low client sign ups and other sales. Web sites are only as good as their copy. If your Web sales are down, check your copywriting.

Next time you think Web site–either putting up a new one, or wanting to improve yours for more contacts and sales–use this checklist:

1. Replace long paragraphs of copy with short benefit-driven headlines.

Incorporate sound bites or questions your visitor will feel compelled to respond to such as “Follow up or Foul Up?”

2. Make your copy beneath the headlines short and snappy.

Your potential clients come for easy-to-read material. Like you, they are in a hurry, and want free information fast.

3. Put yourself in your targeted visitors’ shoes.

Think, “why are they at my site?” They want two things: 1) free content such as articles or tips about your service or product and 2) how you can solve their problem or challenge–the top benefits you offer.

4. Give your web visitors a lot of free information.

That’s why they come to your site. After visiting you 5-10 times, they are more likely to buy from you. Place a command like “Please book mark this site. We put up new information each two weeks.” Add a new link called “free articles.”

5. Aim your copy at your targeted market.

The biggest mistake we make is not defining our target audience before we write Web copy. When we use shotgun promotion aimed at many groups, we don’t get well known as the savvy expert in our field, and lose visitor’s attention and loyalty.

Choose one audience first and aim your copy at them. You can later add special links for other audiences.

6. Give your visitors a variety of articles, such as an interview or you solving a client’s problem, to post in your “free articles” link.

Put a new one up every 2-3 weeks. Put “NEW!” beside each new article to draw attention to it.

7. Categorize the types of articles you post on your site.

Think about “under 500 words,” “how-to tips,” or “top ten lists.” Help your visitors get to the articles they want and need. Offer your articles by autoresponders too.

8. Present your copy to inform, convince, and compel your visitor to click and buy.

For your coaching services, place links such as “Why Choose your name?” or “On Book Coaching.” or “Coaching Packages.” Include proper headlines on your home page.

9. Keep your language simple.

Even if your audience is a rocket scientist, keep your copy at 10th grade level or lower. Online visitors want short sentences, short paragraphs no more than 4-5 lines. When visitors see a long paragraph, it may look too hard to read and digest. They just click away. Remember they want their information easy and fast.

10. Write a list of 5-10 benefits of your service.

Transfer this into your coaching sales piece on your Web site. You’ll need to include coaching outcomes, their needs, the value they receive, and the main area of focuses you can give them.

Stop long descriptions of you and your mission. Focus more on your Web visitor who came to learn about how she can benefit from your service. Make your reader say, “This is amazing. I want this!”

Judy Cullins, 20-year book and Internet Marketing Coach, Author of 10 eBooks including “Write your eBook Fast,” and “How to Market your Business on the Internet,” she offers free help through her 2 monthly ezines, The Book Coach Says…and Business Tip of the Month at http://www.bookcoaching.com/opt-in.shtml and over 140 free articles. Email her at mailto:Judy@bookcoaching.com

Search engine traffic is the best Traffic a web page can get. By finding and Optimizing for Highly relevant Keywords you can insure a constant stream of Laser Targeted Visitors to your web Page

1 - Brainstorm

Brain storming is a popular method where you simply rack your brain to try and find keywords. Seat down at a desk with a pen and legal pad and write down every keyword phrase you can think of. Don’t judge how good or bad a keyword phrase is. If It comes to your mind write it down. Before you go onto step 2 take the words in step 1 and place them in a spreadsheet and then sort them in alphabetical order

2 - Web Page List

Go to your web site and look at each page. Add all keywords you see to your spreadsheet if they aren’t already there

3 - Web Log List

In your Weblog their a section that shows which keywords people used to find your web page. Add all keywords you see to your spreadsheet if they aren’t already there.

4 - Combine Keywords

Look over your Keywords and see if you can combine them to find more keywords. If you sell Life insurance you may also sell term Life insurance life insurance, universal Life insurance, Paid up life insurance, Missouri Life Insurance and St Louis life insurance

5 - Meta Tags

Go to your competitors site and look at the keyword Meta tag and see which keywords they are using

6 - Ask Your Customers

Send an E-mail to your customers and ask them what keywords they use to find your web site. Maybe even have a contest.

7 - KW Suggestion Tool

Use the overture Keyword suggestion tool
inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

Search Engine Masters Course
A FREE 5 day email course on how your web site can get
top 10 rankings in the other search engines.
http://ewguru.com/free-seo-ecourse

About The Author:
Mike Makler has been Marketing Online Since 2001 When he Built
an Organization of over 100,000 Members

Get Mike’s Newsletter:
http://ewguru.com/newsletter

Weekly Tios and Tricks
http://ewguru.com/tips

Copyright © 2005-2006 Mike Makler the Coolest Guy in the Universe

Everything successful needs to be built on a solid, confident base. Here are some essentials to creating your own profitable ezine.

What is an ezine?

An ezine is an email magazine. They are also known as an online publication or an electronic newsletter. An ezine can be on the subject of anything, and is distributed to subscribers who have ‘opted in’. There are thousands of ezines currently in circulation all over the internet.

What’s the point in publishing an ezine?

Having your own ezine will improve your internet presence greatly. An ezine will also help you keep in touch with your visitors and will give you the opportunity to collect a great number of targeted visitors’ email addresses which you can advertise to. An ezine is also a great way to make a good income by selling ad space. Space in popular ezines can sell for up to $200 for one small ad.

How much does it cost to run an ezine?

Unless you opt for a professional service, publishing your ezine is completely free. All that an ezine costs is your time. Time needs to be spent collecting or writing content for the ezine, putting the ezine together, and distributing it.

What should my ezine be about?

Your ezine can be about anything you like. However, your ezine should be focused on something you know a great deal about and about something you enjoy. This will make publishing the ezine more enjoyable and will make writing content easier. If you have a website, you should consider making the subject of your ezine and website coincide. This will be a great benefit for both your ezine and your website.

How often should I publish my ezine?

You can publish your ezine as often as you like. With few subscribers, I recommend publishing once a month. As your subscriber list grows, you can upgrade to publishing once a week or bi-weekly. The more you publish your ezine, the more ad space you can sell, and so the more profits you will make.

How large should my ezine be?

The size of your ezine does not really matter. So long as it is filled with high quality content, readers will not care how long it is. Make sure it does fulfil what you think your readers will expect though otherwise they will be left disappointed. Also bear in mind that readers may want to download it. If it is too big, it could put people off.

What should I call my ezine?

Make sure that the name of your ezine appeals to those who would be interested. Make the title specific and exciting. Also bear in mind that most ezine directories are listed alphabetically and so ezines beginning with a letter of the alphabet near to the end are often not seen. Try to get the name edge by starting your ezine title with a letter near the beginning of the alphabet.

What day of the week should I distribute my ezine?

This doesn’t matter greatly. I recommend just distributing on whichever day suits you. Bear in mind that a lot of ezines are distributed on Monday and Friday and so if your subscribers have subscriptions to other ezines then they might be receiving 3-5 ezines that day. You could choose a less busy day of the week such as Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.

When should I start selling ad space?

Once your number of subscribers exceeds 1000 is about the right time to start selling ad space. This way, the companies who supply the ads may get good response rates and will advertise again. When you start selling ad space, offer deals to advertisers such as ‘buy ad space for one week and get a second week free’.

And now you’re ready to start your own profitable ezine. Just remember, top quality content + a good subscription rates = great profits.

For more information on this subject or about making money online go to http://www.info-ebooks.co.uk

100s of free ebooks and software products are also available at this address.

Thanks for reading,

William Johnston
(will@info-ebooks.co.uk)

It’s all about location, location, location!

In the past…back in the days when Google was IT when it came to
natural search results…everyone was very focused (or shall we
say obsessed?) on Google page rank.

Now that Google is a public company and the search business has
become competitive (most notably due to the serious search
capabilities now being offered by Yahoo and Microsoft, via MSN),
Google has become much more “private” or secretive about things
like page rank, backlinks, etc.

As a matter of fact, many are of the opinion that Google is now
intentionally displaying outdated page rank and backlink
information on the Google Toolbar in an effort to mask the true
workings of Google and to frustrate the Search Engine
Optimization (SEO) community, which had become fairly skillful at
“playing the Google game”. If this is the case, then Google page
rank fixation is now pure folly.

Another factor that is closely watched by webmasters is the Alexa
traffic rank. This traffic rank is based on three months of
aggregated historical traffic data from millions of Alexa Toolbar
users.

However, the Alexa user base is only a sample of the Internet
population, and sites with relatively low traffic will not be
accurately ranked by Alexa due to the statistical limitations of
the sample.

Alexa’s data come from a large sample of several million Alexa
Toolbar users; however, this is not large enough to accurately
determine the rankings of sites with fewer than roughly 1,000
total monthly visitors.

Generally speaking, traffic rankings of over 100,000 should be
regarded as not reliable because the amount of data that Alexa
has available is not statistically significant.

Who said the emperor is wearing no clothes?

With the questionable current accuracy of two of the hallowed
benchmarks of search popularity, where does that leave us? It
leaves us exactly where we should have been in the first place,
not obsessing over Google Page Rank or Alexa Traffic Rank, but
instead focusing on the most important thing of all…and that
is, what is your position in the listings when a person searches
for your key words.

For both search engines and real estate, it’s all about location,
location, location!

Kirk Bannerman operates a successful home based business and
coaches others seeking to start their own home based business.
Visit his website at
Legitimate Home Based Business for more details.

A favicon is a custom icon that sits next to your web site title in a persons favourite’s menu when they have bookmarked your site, it is an easy way to create an ‘eye drawing image’ to ensure that people always see you link in their favourite’s and should hopefully encourgae them to check out that ‘great site that they haven’t visited yet today!’

This is a quick guide that will provide instructions on how to create one for your site, it really is very easy and will help to create a extra tool to maintain your site in the customers mind.

All it takes is four easy steps…

1) Choose an image that you would like to use to represent your web site. Most people use a small version of their logo but you can use any image that you want. I would advise however that you choose an image that is reflective of your web sites theme and an image that will still remain recognisable when the size is dropped to 16 x 16 pixels.

2) Take your chosen image, which should be as high a quality as you can get, in .JPG or .GIF format and convert your image to the 256 color Web Safe Palette or the Windows 16 color format. This can very easily be done in most graphics packages and as a guideline I would say that the less colours you use the better so as to maintain image clarity and professionalism.

3) Using your graphics package, reduce the image down to 16 x 16 pixels, at this point you need to ensure that you preserve the image resolution. This is a key factor as a larger image that has been reduced can loose all clarity and just become a tacky blob, is this how you want your web site remembered? The key here is to keep perservering until you are happy with the finished icon and it is a great advertisement for the professionalism, and the theme, of your web site.

4) Once you are happy with your completed icon you need to save it as “Favicon.ico”. This is the default name that web browsers, such as Internet Explorer, look for. This file then needs to be copied to the root directory of your web site and then whenever a customer bookmarks your site your image is cached and will display when they use their favourites menu.

This can very easily be tested by clearing your cache and re-bookmarking your site and ‘hey presto’ your new shiny, professional and eye drawing favicon will appear next to your site title and will also appear in the address bar of your browser.

This is just another simple trick that aims to get you ‘thinking outside the box’ when it comes to developing your website presence and reminding your customers to come and re-visit your web site.

Mike - Forum Webmaster at

Online Auction Trader - a community forum dedicated to developing you a sustainable, profitable and long term online income.

Let’s start at the beginning. What is a ‘Blog’ and why would you care?

Plain and simple. A blog (short for web-log), is nothing more than an electronic journal or a diary to enter your thoughts or ideas by using web-based programs.

However, a blog can be so much more than just plain opinion columns or diary entries. It can quickly become a valuable news source in which bloggers (people who blog) link to a number of other news sources and other blogging sites.

Bloggers are the *construction workers* of the Internet. They literally build “Internet highways” that lead readers from one website (or one blog) to the next, offering an extensive variety of information. Journalists and publishers haunt blog sites in search of trends or emerging stories. Others just search blogs for gossip and tidbits to share with their friends.

A blog can also be used to enhance your online business or even your personal site. It can be used to offer tutorials or free content you may not want to include on your regular website.

In fact, a blog can be a website in and of itself! Blogs are designed to be whatever it is you want them to be, giving you complete and creative control over every aspect of it.

Using a blog can be very beneficial to you whether you have an online business or you simply need some sort of *emotional expressive outlet.* And, blogs are extremely easy to create, use and profit from, even if you have never made a blog in your life!

Express Yourself.

Let’s not talk about a profit for a minute.

How would you like to express your thoughts, opinion, point of view, comments, or simply tell the world what you think of e certain topic or issue, or what you stand for?

And how about, simply sharing your thoughts with other people?

People are starting to spend more and more time browsing through blogs and communicating through their blogs rather than with any other forms of online communication.

And that’s because a blog is something you personally own. It’s your own blog. You identify with it. Even if you’ve never designed your own website, this IS your website. This IS your web presence.

Let’s say you’re a teacher, or work at the office, or a mechanic, or whatever you do for a living. You can share your thoughts only with the few people that you work with or hang out with.

But by having your own blog, you can tell the world. Simply, express yourself and be heard by the world. This is how you do it.

How To Express Yourself With a Blog

At the time of writing this article, I created a blog at http://www.blogger.com in literally 2 minutes. I called it, “Blogging For Fun.”

It’s located here: http://blogging-for-fun.blogspot.com/

It’s going to be my blog for fun (as the name implies), non business related - just having fun sharing everyday information with other bloggers.

Then I went to http://pingomatic.com/, and I submitted my blog to all of the “blogging services.”

And now, all I’m going to do is wait until my blog gets picked up and read by other bloggers. Meantime, as I’m browsing through other blogs, I’m going to link to some of them that catch my interest.

Later when I post more of my thoughts and comments, I’ll check these blogs that I had previously linked to, just to see if there was new information posted by those bloggers.

And I’ll even give them my comments in response to their thoughts or comments. Well, that also goes for other people too. As they read my blog, they can submit their comments to me too.

And that’s all there’s to it. A simple online communication. But, ……… you’re communicating with the world.

There are so many blogs today that they have their own search engine. And the engine tracks millions of bloggers worldwide that add millions of blogs each and every day.

O.K.

How Would You Profit With a Blog?

To put it in the simplest way possible … same as mentioned above.

Share information with the world - with one slight difference. “Profit in Mind!”

When you go back to my blog “Blogging For Fun,” you’ll find two links back to my website.

Oooops!

I shouldn’ve told you that.

If you have a website of your own, use your blog to simply send traffic back to your website where you have your products displayed. Post your articles in your blog, overview of your product or service, comments, announcements, your newsletter and whatever else you want to post or however you want to reroute the visitors back to your website.

Or …

If you don’t have a website, the blog IS your website. Use it just like your website. Post product reviews with your affiliate links, banners, Google AdSense and everything else that you would use your website for.

But …

Don’t ever forget one thing - a thing that I learned the hard way.

Don’t turn your blog into a pure sales pitch. A Blog is an online journal. A Blog is best known and accepted as a source of information - a FREE information.

If you’re just promoting the hack out of your latest affiliate/MLM programs and such, you won’t get much sympathy, if at all. As I already mentioned, I learned this lesson the hard way.

Be open and share information with the visitors of your blog, just as I am sharing this information with you.

More and more you show to other bloggers that you just want to share your thoughts and comments with others, more and more of them will accept you as a source and perhaps even link to you.

If just one, I mean just one blogger links to your blog, do you realize what you’ve done?

You have just gained access to a major highway. Other bloggers are linked to that one blogger, who are linked to other bloggers, who are linked to other bloggers, and other bloggers, and other bloggers, and even more bloggers, and …

You get the picture.

You’ll get bloggers visiting your blog that are coming from maybe “20 blogs away” who somehow worked their way through the links into your blog. That means you’ll be getting traffic from who knows where and from who knows who.

And how do you make that traffic a highly targeted traffic?

Be very specific about your subject, and post comments, reviews, articles and such - only on that subject. Link to other bloggers who are following the same subject. They will link to you too and that’s how the story goes.

Let me give you a few profit blogging tips

Tip 1:
You DO want to link to other bloggers who are running blogs on the same subject as you are. Your visitors will see your blog as a resource and bookmark it.

Don’t worry that you might be sending some traffic away to other blogs. You will want the same treatment in return. Your chances for other bloggers to link to you are bigger when you’re providing other resources. Your blog is not a dead-end street.

Tip 2:
When you’re writing an overview about your product that you’re selling, be extremely short and to the point. 2 - 3 paragraphs only. And those paragraphs have to be educational or informative. Inform and educate your visitors. Don’t sell to them.

Spread your overview in many blogs. Shortly cover only one feature of your product in each blog. Tell them what you’re going to talk about in your next blog.

Of course, put a link on some keywords back to your website. Or, at the end of each overview, put your URL and say something like: “If you don’t want to wait until my next blog, you can get complete information at my site” - or somewhere along those lines.

Tip 3:
If you just want to use your blog for promoting your affiliate programs or such, write your personal experience with the program. Don’t just provide the same sales pitch that was provided to you by the website you’re promoting and the one that 20 thousand other affiliates are repeating.

Tip 4:
Don’t use the words “I think” and “should” when writing overviews and informing people about your product or service. They’re dangerous. They will quickly reveal your lack of confidence, experience and expertise. When you know something for sure and you’re very confident about it …. …. …. You will not “think” that they “should” look into it …. …. …. You get it?

Tip 5:
Share information with the visitors of your blog. Inform them. Educate them about your product. But don’t try to sell them anything.

When you open your favorite magazine or a news paper, what do you read and where do you spend most of your time? The section with the content and all the stories, or the advertisements?

Why do you keep on buying that same news paper or a magazine? Because of the information presented in there or because of the advertisements?

You get it?

Your blog is your “news paper” or your “online journal” that other people will want to visit over and over. They will want to come back and link to your blog because of the FREE information you’re providing and not because of your advertisements.

Of course, while your visitors are reading your blog, think of ways how to sell them something or make them click on the link back to your sales page.

Steve Dimeck. Author and Publisher. For more quality articles
such as the one you’ve just read, visit http://www.ogdteam.com -
Internet Marketing information and resources.

Selecting the correct keywords can make or break your website. Potential customers search the web for desired sites, and if your website doesn’t have the keywords they’re looking for, they’ll miss you.

Determining keywords is an art; it’s best to work backwards. What would a customer search for if they were looking for your site? You literally have to put yourself in the consumer’s place and let go of your preconceived notions about what you think your keywords are. You should remember when writing your site that you need to use words that are not only related to your content, but are popular search words as well. This is called keyword optimization, or choosing the most searched keywords related to your content.

Spend some time listing all of the words and phrases that are related to your website content. Get ideas from everyone you can think of and list them all. Visit competitors’ sites and see what meta tags they use. After this research, you are ready to develop your own keyword phrases.

There are several sites designed to assist you in keyword optimization. Here are a few of the free ones:-

The Overture Keyword Tool (http://www.inventory.overture.com ) lists searches related to the keyword you provide. This took is great for expanding your list.

Wordtracker (http://www.wordtracker.com) helps identify keywords that will help your ranking on search engines. Wordtracker also gives you other keyword combinations that you may have overlooked.

The Keyword Tumbler (http://www.keywordtumbler.com) takes your existing keyword phrases and mixes it up to form new phrases and variations that you can include in your meta tags.

A great website is not so great if no one finds it. Remember to research your keywords carefully from the consumer’s viewpoint and then sit back and watch the traffic roll in!

Evelyn Lim is the publisher of a popular newsletter “Mapping You to Success” written for the aspiring home based business owner. She also aims to equip her readers with skills to acquire multiple sources of online income.

The fact that an estimated 40,000 new blogs are being started daily should be of great interest to anybody already in the web hosting business or intending to go into it. Especially those planning to go into the business as affiliates or as resellers because this group of online entrepreneurs are in a very good position to cash in quickly on this amazing growth rate of blogs with hardly any investment necessary.

While it is true that a vast majority of blogs are hosted free, it is also true that many blogs are gaining high traffic so quickly that they are forced to quickly find paid web hosting as they exceed their allocated bandwidth.

The other fact to bear in mind is that virtually all successful bloggers own several blogs. This is significant because it is not easy to own several websites since lots of technical know-how and time are required to maintain a single website, let alone several. This is not the case with a blog that mainly requires content and very little technical knowledge to run very successfully. In terms of business volumes this simply means that a web hosting business that targets blogs is bound to grow a lot faster than the one that only seeks clients from the ranks of traditional websites.

The other significant factor in blogs that should be of great benefit to any web hosting business is the huge traffic that blogs seem to enjoy almost effortlessly.

All a web host entrepreneur needs to do, is to find a way to advertise their web hosting services to this blog traffic. There are several ways of doing this. You can for example look for acceptable ways of creating as many links from the blogs to your web hosting sites as possible. You can even start your very own blog on the subject.

Lois S. is a Technical Executive Writer for http://www.websitesource.com and http://www.lowpricedomains.com with experience in the website hosting industry.