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Developing a successful Internet marketing strategy is the key to your online success. Your strategy not only involves your marketing and promotional efforts, but your web site will also play an important role.

You must develop and implement both short-term and long-term marketing strategies to bring a continuous flow of targeted traffic to your web site.

Developing a powerful strategy is a very important part of your success. However, unless your web site is specifically designed to sell, your efforts will be useless. You must look at the entire picture before you begin.

Short term marketing strategies are those that bring you a temporary boost in traffic. Although these techniques are very important to your over-all plan, they are only a temporary traffic source and must not be solely relied upon.

Short-term marketing strategies include:

Purchasing Advertising

This form of short-term marketing includes ezine advertising, banner advertising and classified ads. Although it is important to occasionally purchase advertising, it is short-term and will produce short-term results.

Bulletin Boards

Although sharing your expertise at popular bulletin boards can provide you with a boost in traffic, it is a temporary boost. It will not continue to produce results. Most boards only display a certain number of posts and the rest are archived.

Search Engines

Obtaining a high ranking in the Search Engines is a never-ending battle. You may have a top ten ranking one day and the next day your site may disappear. It is very important to submit your web site to the Search Engines, but trying to keep a top ten ranking is very time consuming — your efforts may be better spent on more effective marketing techniques.

In order to create a steady stream of targeted traffic to your web site, you must also market for the future. Long-term marketing techniques are those that will continue to produce results even years down the road.

So what are some of these long-term powerful techniques? Here’s a few to get you started:

Opt-in lists

Ask for your visitor’s name and email address. In return, provide them with a valuable publication, a free course or some other valuable information. By continuously building your opt-in lists, you’re creating a long-term database of potential customers.

Freebies

Give away something of value engraved with your name, business, product or service. Your freebie might be software you’ve created, a free ebook, or even a free course. The key to creating a long-term marketing freebie is to allow it to be freely distributed. If your freebie is good, it will quickly saturate the Internet and continue to circulate eternally.

Content

Provide the Internet community with free content. Content comes in a variety of forms such as articles, tutorials, tips, reports or whatever you’d like. Allow your content to be freely published in ezines and web sites. Content is a highly sought after commodity and can provide you with a great deal of free exposure for years to come.

A solid Internet marketing plan will include everything from your ad to your thank you and follow-up letters. Each process in your plan must perform a specific task.

1. Your short-term marketing strategies will drive traffic to your web site in intervals. Each time you place an ad, your traffic will increase. After a few days, your traffic will drop off.

2. Your long-term marketing strategies will drive a steady stream of traffic to your web site. Your traffic will continue to increase over time.

3. Your ad must draw your potential customer’s attention and create curiosity. It must lead them to click through to your web site.

4. Your web site will then take over and provide further information, while leading your potential customer to your order page.

5. Your order page will be packed with all of the benefits your product has to offer and call for action.

6. Your marketing plan will continue to be implemented by closing the sale with a thank you letter.

7. Your final step will be to send follow-up messages in the future to provide good customer service and introduce new products.

A marketing plan is an absolute must. If you have no direction, you’ll travel in circles and ultimately never reach your goals. Plan your work then work your plan. You may be pleasantly surprised with the outcome.

Copyright © Shelley Lowery

About the Author:

Shelley Lowery is the author of the acclaimed web design course, “Web Design Mastery” (www.webdesignmastery.com) and “eBook Starter - Give Your eBooks the look and feel of a REAL book” (www.ebookstarter.com)

Visit www.Web-Source.net to sign up for a complimentary subscription to eTips and receive a copy of Shelley’s acclaimed ebook, “Killer Internet Marketing Strategies.”

You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook, or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author bylines are included.

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The internet is a fantastic place to promote your skills and accomplishments. You can pay a large sum of money by coming up with banner ad or pay per click plans to “get the word out” or you can go the budget way and market yourself smartly without spending nary a dime. I’ll leave the money plans for another article, instead let’s take a look at smart ways for you to promote you or your product online for little or no money!

Who said you have to have a marketing budget to promote yourself? Well, many companies do, but they are in the business to sell you something [namely, their marketing plan]. If you have the money to spend on marketing then go for it. If not, then you must examine cost effective ways to get your name out there. Here are some of my personal favorites:

Write Articles - Yes, just as I am writing this article in hope that you are reading it, you can do the same and submit your missives to leading article directories. A well written article of medium length [500-750 words] can go a long way in attracting interest by others. If you are new to the game, write the article and give it to a friend for their review and critique. Once you make your changes, find article directories you can join and start submitting. Make sure your resource box - the information at the end of the article - effectively pitches your product or you personally. Enjoy the resultant [and free!] links back to your site. Submit on a regular basis and you will reap the added traffic to your site resulting in more business for you.

Join Forums — I run several message board communities and with my two largest ones — the Corporate Flight Attendant Community and the Aviation Employment Board — I permit members to add a link within their signature to their personal or business website. Many of my threads are indexed by Google and picked up by people all over the world. Thus, the right person at the right time can click on a thread and see valuable links to other sites of interest. Not every forum manager permits this practice, however. I guess I am just a nick guy! [wink]

Post on Craig’s List — Craig Newmark started his “list” more than a decade ago to serve the San Francisco community. Years later his site is still going strong with well over one hundred cities across the globe featured. People from Atlanta to Auckland and from Zurich to Zimbabwe now have access to a site that allows them to pitch their products, display their resumes, or sell their very souls. The site is still free unless you are posting a job opportunity or real estate information under a few, select cities.

Your Website — You do have a website, right? Oddly in this day and age I am meeting people who do not. I hear all kinds of excuses: it is too expensive, too time consuming, too difficult, etc. Heck, if you are going to “play” the internet you must be properly equipped to participate. Quit making excusesfind a way to get online and do it today! At the very least your DSL account probably provides a page or two where you can design your personal page and upload it to the internet. Oh, you are still using dial up? Yikes!

As with any marketing campaign you must stay on top of it at all times. What I mean is this: however you choose to proceed, you must continually monitor and adjust your plan to maximize its effectiveness. No going on auto-pilot here: you must take charge of what you are doing to reap the rewards. If you do, you can gain a lot of exposure - and work - without expending a huge amount of money.

Copyright 2005 — Matthew Keegan is The Article Writer who writes on a variety of topics including: advocacy, automobiles, aviation, business, Christian themes, family, news, product reviews, travel, writing, and more. Samples from his portfolio are available right online.

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Selling an item or service through the internet can be a grueling task, without question. And most internet marketing techniques either don’t work, or have been overused. Marketing through self-promotion is a new, innovative way to sell your products, while at the same time advertising your skills. Providing your customers with information about yourself and your background can put them at ease with their impending purchase, and assure them that you care about their best interest. This fresh internet marketing technique may just be one of the best sources currently available.

One way to utilize internet marketing through promoting yourself, is to regularly participate in online communities. These can involve discussion groups, chat rooms, or message boards. Any forum where you can interact with the public is a great form of internet marketing. As you regularly visit these online areas, you will get acquainted with your peers, as they familiarize themselves with you and your business.

Another great internet marketing technique is composing informational articles on subjects that you are interested or skilled in. The end of the article should include a byline, and short bio about you. Adding your web site address is also a helpful marketing tool. Submit the articles to numerous e-zines and article directories for even more internet marketing power.

Have you ever wanted to be a teacher or professor? Why not teach an online class devoted to your area of expertise? Chat room classes have become a favorite on the web, and now an outstanding marketing source. A chat room can easily be installed on your web site. Before each class begins, be sure to tell your students about your education, background, and business. This method of internet marketing is exceptional, because it allows for continuous interaction and a commitment to learn more about the subject at hand. The more that you promote and market yourself, the more others will want to know about your business and goals!

Scott has his own website to help you find the best home based business ideas and opportunities so you can work at home at: http://www.Pennies4You.com

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