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I-BIZ TIPS - Monthly E-Mail Newsletter
*Providing Tips on Making the Internet Work for your Business*
A Free Service of Tech Direct, Inc. – Ruth Rainey, Editor
<http://www.techdirect.com> - <mailto:IBIZ@techdirect.com>
Number 5
You are receiving this online publication as a result of your
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If you find this issue of I-BIZ Tips helpful,
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TOPICS
Tip 1: How Users Read On The Web—-They Don’t
Tip 2: Microsoft Versus the Department of Justice
Tip 3: Super Sales Tips
Tip 4: Marketing Your Web Site (International Web Site
owners)
Tip 5: How Do Cybersurfers Find Web Sites?
Tip 6: Browser Wars Got You Confused?
Tip 7: InternetTrak Research
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Topic 1: Is Your Web Site Delivering Content that Works?
Content is King on the World Wide Web (WWW). This concept has
been proven time and time again by sites that educate and
entertain the estimated 42 million WWW users. As a business
person, what type of content should your web site provide?
Before you develop one word of content, decide on the goals and
objectives for your Web site. Since a Web site is just one
strategy in your overall marketing plan, assess how the Web site
will fit in with other Marketing strategies.
Now that you know what you want the site to achieve, here are some
guidelines to follow in developing the content to meet your goals:
* Focus your content to your target market(s).
* Succinctly tell how your product or service addresses the needs
of this audience.
* Provide the information that the viewer needs to make a
decision NOW (they may not return).
* Call the viewer to action NOW and simplify the process with a
form.
* Make your solution or call to action easy-to-find -- Don’t hide
it under layers of information.
IMHO, the marketing element that is most frequently missing on a
Web page is the Call to Action: As a result of visiting your
page, what do you want your visitor to do? Make sure that action
moves your marketing plan forward. For example, the first two
choices may be the goal of many Web sites but they won’t obtain
any results.
- Browse around and skim your pages
- Bookmark your page?
- Fill out a newsletter subscription form
- Download demonstration software
- Order your product online
If you have synchronized your Web site to your Marketing Plan, you
can easily answer the question: What do I want the visitor to do?
Now go back and look at your Web site and evaluate what you are
asking your visitors to do. (Ask people who are not in your
profession to evaluate this for you.) You may be surprised that
you have not asked your visitors to take any action or the action
that you are eliciting is not your real goal.
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Topic 2: Is a Web Site Your Small Business’ Salvation?
If you listen to the commercials on TV, putting your small
business on the World Wide Web is a great business decision:
* There is the Rubber Eyes sun glass company that failed as a
retail product but succeeded on the Internet.
* The surf shop that took orders from around the world.
* The art gallery that added a second location (the World Wide
Web) and received over 470 visitors the first night.
While these are commercials that are designed to get you excited
about the Internet they may be setting unrealistic expectations in
the minds of new Web site owners.
* I should get 470+ visitors the first night.
* A Web site visitor will order products from any site — not
just companies with name recognition.
* A particular Web hosting service will automatically generate
traffic for your site.
Unless you enjoy brand name recognition you first need to prove
yourself to a Web site visitor. Don’t expect this to happen on
the Internet without establishing a rapport with each prospect.
Visitors will evaluate your company by:
* How quickly you respond to a request
* The content and presentation of your email message
* How easy it is to deal with your company
* The credibility and reliability of your information
* Security procedures
* Follow-up procedures
* Quality of sales materials
While the idea of running a business with no personal contact with
customers, other than email, is appealing to many business
people, I for one have found that this does not happen. Customers
want to know that there is a trustworthy professional business
person on the other end of the Internet connection. Make sure
that you meet and exceed their expectations.
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Topic 3: Why You Should Offer a Free Email Newsletter
How many bookmarks do you have?
How many of these sites do you go back and visit?
If you are like the majority of Web surfers, you bookmark
interesting Web sites everyday. But unless you are looking for a
specific site, searching through your bookmarks is like searching
for a needle in a haystack. Unless you see a site mentioned in
print or they contact you via email, snail mail or fax, there
is a good chance that you will never visit that site again.
So how do you get your message in front of these new business
prospects again and again? The answer is an email newsletter.
Email is the simplest form of push technology. Once you identify
a visitor’s interest in your subject matter, keep the dialog or
conversation going on a regular basis. This is not only an
excellent way to share knowledge and information on your products
and services but it establishes credibility for your on-line
business.
So while a visitor many not find their way back to your web site,
an email newsletter is a great way for you to get your message
out:
* Tell past visitors about Web site changes and new products and
services
* Specials on products or services
* Keep the visitor up-to-date on information that he/she
requested
* Establish credibility for your on-line business
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Topic 4: Seeking Out Your Competitors
Before mapping out your Web site design plans, seek out your
competitors and evaluate their Web site strategy. A thorough
analysis of their attempts may be just what you need to provide
more appropriate content and value.
* Visit Directories such as Yahoo and see who is listed in your
business category.
* Determine your competitors’ main keywords.
* Search by your three main keywords in Search Engines (Excite,
Lycos, AltaVista, Webcrawler, etc.)
* Find the URL for a company or other URLs for the same vertical
market. <http://www.websitez.com/>
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Topic 5: Misc. Tips
Tip 1: How Users Read On The Web—-They Don’t
<http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html>
Writing style has a lot to do with attracting and keeping a
visitor’s attention. What works on the Web isn’t necessarily
what works in sales letters, brochures and white papers. Fine-
tune your writing style for greater success on the Internet.
How do you assimilate Web site content? Do you read every
word? Many readers will read the subtitles, topic sentences
and highlighted text to discover your message. Evaluate your
site using these methods. How much of your message comes
across?
Reading on-screen is difficult for many readers. The following
are often mentioned as reasons why visitors hit the back
button:
* Not enough white space -- text that extends from the left to
the right edge of the screen
* Colored text on busy backgrounds
* Long paragraphs
* Pages that scroll endlessly
* Lack of subtitles in the text
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Tip 2: Microsoft Versus the Department of Justice
Find out more about the $1M a day fine that the Department of
Justice is levying against Microsoft.
<http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/story/story_1371.html>
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Tip 3: Fine-Tune Your Sales Skills with Entrepreneur's Special
Report: Super Sales Tips
<http://www.entrepreneurmag.com/specialreport/supersales.html>
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Tip 4: Marketing Your Web Site Internationally
A three-part series of articles by Bill Dunlap
Part I: <http://www.clickz.com/archives/072997.html>>
Part II: <http://www.clickz.com/archives/080597.html>
Part III: <http://www.clickz.com/archives/081297.html>
If you are a European company, be sure you are listed in these
resources:
European Search Engines, Directories and Lists
<http://www.netmasters.co.uk/european_search_engines/>
Search Europe
<http://www.searcheurope.com/>
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Tip 5: How Do Cybersurfers Find the Web Sites They Visit?
When Cybersurfers were asked how they found out about the Web
sites that they visit, they indicated:
71% - Used Search Engines
9.8% - Asked friends and relatives
8.5% - Used newspapers and magazines
8.4% - Used links from other Web sites
8.1% - Arrived from browsing or surfing
3.6% - Used TV
3.3% - Used printed Internet directories
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.
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Tip 6: The Browser Wars Got You Down?
A collection of recent articles on the release of Internet
Explorer 4.0.
Top Tips for Internet Explorer 4.0
<http://www.cnet.com/Content/Features/Howto/IE4tips/>
Internet Explorer 4.0
<http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/story/story_1304.html>
Battle of the Sumo Browsers
<http://www.cnet.com/Content/Reviews/Compare/Browsers4/>
TechWeb on Internet Explorer 4.0
<http://www.techweb.com/wire/news/1997/09/0997IE.html>
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Tip 7: InternetTrak Research
According to the latest InternetTrak research -- sponsored by
Ziff-Davis and Roper Starch -- the number of people using the
Web has doubled in the last year. From 20 million to 42
million. Meantime, the number of American computer users
remained steady -- at just over 100 million.
Latest results of InternetTrak's ongoing study of U.S. Web
users reveals why. Web users consistently report the more they
surf the Web, the more they want to know about surfing the Web.
As a result, their interest in PCs and computing products
increases. And their interest in mainstream media declines.
Web users surveyed are spending more time:
Watching computer/tech TV shows (up 11%)
Reading computer magazines (up 8%)
And less time:
Watching other types of TV shows (down 13%)
Watching videos (down 9%)
Reading weekly news magazines (down 8%)
Reading newspapers (down 5%)
Reading business magazines (down 3%)
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Topic 6: From our E-Mail Box
We’ve received several email messages asking for the names of
*opt-in* mail lists as a result of our article in the August issue
of I-BIZ Tips. Here is a resource list of opt-in email sources.
We have not used these services so we urge you to do your homework
before employing their services.
Bonusmail: <http://www.bonusmail.com>
Direct response e-mail communication from Intellipost Corp.
Bulletmail: <http://www.bulletmail.com>
Target your market by e-mail in a net-appropriate manner.
The Direct Email List Source: <http://www.copywriter.com/lists/>
Web directory of 1,000's of voluntary and opt-in e-mail lists.
Emailannounce: <http://www.emailannounce.com/>
Advertise on any or all of the 30 weekly Email Announcements.
Htmail: <http://www.htmail.com/customer.html>
Direct e-mail advertising - without spamming!
NotifyMe.Com: <http://www.notifyme.com>
Internet Advertising for Highly Qualified Leads by Ersys, Inc.
PostMaster Direct: <http://www.postmasterdirect.com/postdirect/>
Choose from 3 million email addresses in 3,000+ categories.
Targ-It: <http://www.targ-it.com/>
Targ-it's claim is "100% opt-in e-mail lists".
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Question: I am getting email from many foreign countries. Where
can I find a list of country codes with their corresponding
country name? For example, user@abc.com.za What does the za
stand for? (South Africa)
<http://www.ics.uci.edu/pub/websoft/wwwstat/country-codes.txt>
Feel free to contact us with comments on our newsletter or article
topics that you are interested in seeing in I-BIZ TIPS. Email
comments to: <mailto:owner-ibiz@techdirect.com">.
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