Blogging is a concept that started in late 90s. It used to be a way to comment an existing webpage, an opportunity for visitors and readers to react or voice out one’s opinion on the said page. What started as a single-sentence commentary has evolved into pages of personal take on just about anything and everything under the sun. As it continues to move forward, online advertising has tapped into the blog’s potential. Here are 5 reasons why you should use blogging as an Internet marketing tool.

1.Blogging is simple. The simplest way to get your piece on the net is through blogging. No skills are necessary… an average adult can read and type, or at least click a mouse. It’s like having a virtual piece of paper and you just write your ideas, experiences, new products, and hope that the truth behind your articles comes out and entice your reader to also try your product. If you have a PC and an Internet connection (who doesn’t?) then you can blog and advertise.

2. Blogging is authentic. In this day and age where advertising saturate our lives, we question the credibility of promoters’ claims. However, in blogs, real people share their real-life experiences, unscathed by paid advertising. Reading blogs about first-hand product use is like talking to people about their first-hand experience. You definitely want to buy a tried and tested product.

3. Blogging is free. Because blogging is yet to be proven as a mainstream online advertising media, most sites see it as something to augment current marketing tools and thus offer it for free. Any opportunity for free webtime is definitely a bonus especially to businesses that are starting up. Needless to say, paid blog pages can generate more income for your seriously growing business.

4. Blogging builds credibility. As you get more and more into writing your experiences on a particular product or industry, your readers come to realize that they can depend on your posts for their own information needs. As such, you become an expert on it; as a consequence, more readers visit your site and more bloggers link to your blogs. As companies and professional organizations notice the growth of your readership base, they may soon get in touch with you for advertising on your blog page, or make you an affiliate, which pays for every referral generated from your blog site.

5. Blogging builds your market. Unless you are a Hollywood star, chances are, only your Mom reads your posts. Mom has a lot of friends, so she lets her friends know how interesting your blog site is. But you need not depend on Mom to increase your readership base. Look into the following ways to build your market through blogging:

-By using your e-mail. Today, blogging is overcoming the e-mail’s popularity in quickly and effectively reaching and expanding a market. In this age of speed and quick access, logging in and downloading e-mail is simply taking longer than clicking into a blog site. Let them explore your site by using a short e-mail message as teaser to your blog site. If your e-mail is on an entirely different subject, use your e-mail signature to give a link to the site.

-By using subscription. An easy way to get your readers e-mail is to give them an opportunity to subscribe to your blogsite. Keep some exclusive information for your subscribers to entice readers to subscribe and give their e-mail address. Just be responsible in using their e-mail address, as the last thing you want is a comment on your blog that you are a spammer.

-By understanding your readers. Conduct a simple survey for your readers to understand their profile and advertising preferences. Ask consumers to give you feedback on a post, an ad link, or a trial that you shared. In this way, it is like interviewing your readers without the commitment and intrusion of a face-to-face interview.

-By joining a blog network -A network of blogs maybe a collection of blog sites that share the same industry, interest, readership base, payment mode, etc. Consumers find credibility and convenience in clicking one link to several real bloggers about a single subject. Clearly, more bloggers are better than one.

-By using RSS. RSS is the fastest growing technology on the Internet today. As such, having RSS feeds to your blog is definitely another means of generating awareness for your readership base. Having a variety of feeds can add interest to your blog site.

Give your business a boost by effectively using blogging as an Internet marketing tool.

When you’re surfing the Internet, scanning newspapers, or browsing through your mail—you’ve probably discovered one disturbing denominator. There’s usually nothing enticing you to read the rest of the content. So you move on.

And unfortunately, so will the prospects viewing your messages…

If you’re an entrepreneur, consultant, author, speaker, or the Big Kahuna of your company—the most important marketing asset for you to work on is your headline.

Why? Because headlines have the power to draw people into your message. It grabs attention, creates interest, and can halt them in their tracks.

It’s no surprise that people are busy and suffer from information overdose. You must stand out from the pack if your message has any chance of getting read. And nothing increases your odds better than a “go-for-the-jugular” headline.

Here are seven Quick and Dirty headline types you can use to draw people into your website, letter, media release, article, flyer, ad, or invitation:

1) The “How-to” headline: one of the most duplicated. People are always interested in how to get, make, or do something. Examples would include…

“How to get all the dates you want”
“How to cure cancer”
“How to the make the best Sloppy Joe”

2) The “Benefit” headline: probably the most popular. People love to find out what they get. Especially if it’s free. Let me see…

“Lose 30 pounds in 30 days”
“Free oil change for life”
“Our fish swam in the ocean last night”

3) The “Invitation” headline: the type people enjoy the most. People love to get invitations—especially to big events. It also makes them feel special because only a certain percentage ever gets an invitation. Here are some…

“A special invitation to mingle aboard our new 35-foot yacht”
“Oprah invites you to her Big Birthday Bash”
“Free speech consultation if you’re one of the first five to register”

4) The “Fear” headline: one of the most effective. Sometimes a benefit headline isn’t enough. Some people won’t take any action unless they stand to lose something. Let’s look at a few…

“What to do during an IRS audit…”
“Only nine albums left at this special price”
“Warning: Seven signs your mechanic is ripping you off!”

5) The “Offer” headline: hits you point-blank. If you have an offer so irresistible only a moron would refuse—this would be perfect in your headline. Let’s see…

“Get nine CDs for a penny”
“Invest $100 in my pyramid scheme and receive $1,549 in bonuses”
“Register for my marketing bootcamp and if you don’t triple your income within one year—I’ll refund your money and give you an extra $500.00 for your trouble”

6) The “Intrigue” headline: simply seductive. You give enough information to tantalize their tastebuds, but not enough to award their appetites. Ah…

“What the Bush Administration didn’t want you to know…”
“When dawn never arrived…”
“The seven year itch…”

7) The “News” headline: great for news or media releases because it sticks with the facts. Grabs attention immediately because of the similarity to media headlines. I got some…

“Woman loses shirt in stocks marries oil baron”
“One-armed man dominates swim meet”
“Odd couple sisters trade desperation for diamonds”

With a compelling headline, you reduce the chance they’ll skip your message and increase the odds of making sales. Which is why you’re in business.

Headlines are the most important part of a print ad.

In fact, David Ogilvy, famous ad man and author of Confessions of an Advertising Man, has said that four out of five people only read headlines. Nothing more.

And if people DO choose to read the rest of the ad, they make that decision based on the headline.

That’s a big job to put on the shoulders for what amounts to a few words.

But before you start despairing over your headline-writing skills, take heart. There are several “headline types” that have proven to sell products and services over and over again. Below are four of the most powerful and the easiest to implement.

1. How to. Everyone loves a how to headline. How To Quit Smoking in 30 Days Or Your Money Back. How to Write a Novel in 30 Days. How to Lose Weight Fast.

Why do these headlines work so well? Because they promise a solution to your customers’ problems. Why else do so many nonfiction books have how to in the title? If the how to is addressing a need, you feel almost compelled to pick the book up and look at it. Or, in the case of marketing materials or articles, this same natural curiosity can entice you to keep reading to discover the answer.

Keep in mind the better the benefit, the more likely you’ll catch your customers’ attention. (The benefits in the above headlines are quitting smoking, writing a novel in a month and losing weight. All of these can be powerful benefits.)

2. Question. These headlines ask a question (obviously). If you want this headline type to work, it better ask a question that your customers want an answer to. Are you spending too much on your car insurance? Will your marriage fail? Will you know what to do if you’re in an accident?

Whatever you do, don’t ask a question that only your business cares about. Something like: Do you know what our company has been up to lately? Again, focus on the benefit for the customer.

3. Top ten reasons. Okay, it doesn’t have to be ten reasons or even the top reasons. But just as everyone loves how to headlines, they also love top ten reasons.

Four headlines that work. Five ways to fix a broken toilet. Seven warning signs that your house may be making you sick.

Again, the customers see the benefits immediately. Plus, they know exactly what they’re getting — so many reasons for something.

4. Testimonial. This headline uses your customers’ words to sell your products or services. This works because people see proof up front that your product or service does what it’s supposed to do. If used correctly (meaning people believe it really is a testimonial from a real customer and not something fabricated) then this can be a very effective strategy.

If you choose this headline, put it in quotes so it’s obvious it’s a testimonial. And use the customers’ words as much as you can to make it sound authentic. Whenever possible, get permission from your customer to use his/her name. You may even want to consider adding a photo as well.

(For more headline and copywriting tips, see Robert Bly’s book The Copywriter’s Handbook.)

Creativity Exercises — Write those headlines

Get a stack of paper, find a couple of pens (I’m partial to gel colored pens) and let’s start brainstorming.

Start by making a list of all the benefits of your product, service or business. (Benefits, not features. Benefits are what your customers will get out of your product.)

Put that sheet of paper aside. Now pick a headline type and write it on top of the paper. For instance, Question headlines. Underneath start writing as many different types of question headlines you can think of. They don’t have to be pretty, they just have to be a question.

Come up with at least 50 of them. Don’t let your brain or pen stop until you do. No matter how painful. If you get stuck, go back and look at your benefits list and pick a different benefit.

I practically guarantee by the time you reach headline number 50, you’ll have written at the very least one pretty darn good headline. You might have even uncovered a brilliant one.

Try this same exercise with all the headline types and see what new ad concepts you uncover.

Why pay for advertising that does not yield sales?

Before you part with your cold hard cash, consider various ways to increase and maximize your conversions. The term conversion simply represents the number of website visitors that take the action that the web publisher desires. In most cases, conversion refers to an individual browsing a website and purchasing the product(s) or service(s) being sold. The idea is that a browser has been converted into a buyer.

What if you could increase the number of people that visit your site to customers who purchase or take action on your site by 1 percent. What would a 1 percent increase in conversion mean to your bottom line? Even on low ticket items, a 1 percent increase in conversions can be potentially staggering when considered over time.

How do you increase conversions?

Obviously the copy is critical in converting a ‘browser’ into a ‘buyer’ and while a webpage should be optimized for search engine spiders, search engine optimization should not be at the expense of web surfers. Webmasters must balance search engine optimization with sensible copy that calls the website visitor to the appropriate action.

What about advertising?

Keyword advertising can be very effective. In order to increase the conversion of keyword advertising, create continuity between your keyword and your landing page. Use the same words in the ad as in the landing page. Keep in mind that landing pages do not have to be part of a websites normal navigation. Webmasters can customize landing pages to cater to a specific audience, advertisement, or search term.

Ultimately, the goal is all about ROI or return on investment–publishers aim to make more than they spend. For every dollar you spend in advertising, you want to make a profit of $ 2.00 or better. That means in many cases you will need to monitor any changes in sales and web traffic, and determine what specific actions are resulting in the sales increases.

When evaluating advertising campaigns, consider whether the results will be long term or short term. Long term results from a short term expense could involve a website design. Short term results are generally things like ezine advertisements that result in sharp sales spikes that don’t generally last.

Consider whether the expense is a one time cost or ongoing. Equally important, determine whether you can reliably track and measure the results of the advertising campaign. Can the results be reproduced by spending more money?

Targeted advertising will convert at a higher rate than non-targeted advertising. It is critical that advertising be targeted, so that you can maximize your conversion and increase your ROI.

On the other hand, if you have a low conversion rate, spending money on advertising is not likely going to produce significant results or a high ROI–so before you part with any hard earned cash take a look at your conversion rate.

Why pay for terms that are not converting?

Monitoring is critical to any advertising campaign. As a webmaster, you have a whole host of tools that allow you to track the actions that your visitors take. Use these tools to analyze and test theories that relate to conversions. When determining areas of low conversion, evaluate weblogs. Look at the abandon rate by viewing single access web pages. Use cookies to track the actions that browsers on a website take, do they return and purchase at a later date? Another option is to track customer actions using javascript that is embedded in the website’s webpages.

Pay particular attention to what keywords result in traffic, and what keywords result in actual sales. Anyone can purchase traffic with the keyword phrase “free money” but how many of those who click are going to take the desired action on your webpage? Keyword terms that are closely related to the product or service being sold are going to have a higher conversion. It is important to filter phrases or keywords, that do not convert or result in unrelated traffic (due to synonym use).

What about the landing page?

When designing the landing page think about the action you want and emphasize it; remove all other distractions from the webpage. The landing page should be designed in such a way that the website is driven to the action you wish for them to take.

Unique URLs or special landing pages can be instrumental in tracking an advertising campaign’s success. They are also helpful when you conduct split-testing sending users to different web pages, and then tracking the actions that result.

What common problems result in poor conversions?

Poor web site design can result in a low website conversion. Websites should explain the product or service that you are selling in simple terms. The website navigation should be intuitive, and it should not be difficult to locate what visitors are looking for. Avoid vintage web graphics that are of low quality, or fonts that are unreadable. Avoid color schemes or font size that alienate web visitors, colors should be used to highlight important points. Webmasters should avoid small font sizes or fonts that are not easily readable.

While some items are easy to measure, others become a little more nebulous, it is difficult to know whether enhanced graphics will increase sales, but they should be considered when evaluating a poor conversion rate.

It began as another meeting with a potential client. She started writing eight years ago for a company and today holds three administrative positions as well as being the chief copywriter and editor.

I displayed some writing samples and she loved them.

Then I got a chance to look at a direct mail campaign they were sending to their database. It consisted of sample post cards, invitation cards, four-color flyers, door hangers, and a bulletin leaflet all stuffed inside an attractive 9″ x 12″ graphic-intense envelope. And there was a single page cover letter: which was the weak link.

Why is that? Because it was lacking so many important elements of a killer direct response letter.

Your letter must be the strong link in your direct mail campaign. It has the power to double, triple, or quadruple sales for the same postage. It has the ability to paint compelling pictures and persuade your reader to take action. Nothing else in your campaign can match your letter’s power to convert prospects into customers.

Let’s make your letters produce more money. Let’s take a critical look at that company’s cover letter:

1) No headline – just a company logo and a mission statement in reverse text on company letterhead. And nothing else.

You must write a “grab ‘em by the throat” headline in all of your marketing campaigns. It’s the ad for your letter. It works similar to a first impression. Its job is to compel people to read the next line. It has to scream, “Hey, buddy! This is important. It’s for you. Read on.”

2) A plural salutation. Never write, “Dear Friends… Dear Partners… or Dear Members.” It screams of a mass mailing and not a personal letter. And you know where those type of letters end up?

3) No benefits. The copy was laced with features which spoke about the company and their products. How important they were. But not even a hint about what the prospect was going to get.

4) and 5) No offer or any sense of urgency. The letter stated the products they were selling. Take it or leave it. Not very exciting or does not motivate people to buy.

Even if she had written:

“Sale! Take 15% off your grand total if you order within the next 10 days” …she would have created an offer with some urgency.

6) No call to action. Most people aren’t thinkers. They have a herd mentality. And they need to be led. Really.

If you believe people will automatically call you and give you their credit card number just because they read your letter – you are sadly mistaken. You must lead them by the hand into each step of the ordering process. This erases any doubts of what to do next.

7) No guarantee. This is a major reason many companies are losing sales.

This direct mail company has a 30-day return policy for their standard products, but none for their custom print jobs. (Except in cases of a printing or production error.) Nevertheless, anything that reduces risk should be mentioned anyway to ease prospects’ fears and anxieties.

No premium. Since a good portion of their database for this campaign is usually strapped for cash—a gift can mean the difference between making a sale or hearing silence.

9) No post script. The P.S. is an excellent place to restate the benefits, tease them with a surprise premium, or paint the picture of deeper benefits not previously mentioned.

In short, it was a boring cover letter lacking any punch. There wasn’t anything that would excite a prospect to act. Can you imagine how much money they’re losing?

But you don’t have to follow their example. You don’t have to make the same mistakes. Because you now know some of the killer secrets of a succesful direct mail letter.

Use these tips today to strengthen your letter and watch your response rates soar!

If you’re in concurrence with over 90% of all business owners—Ads don’t work! They’re expensive, a low ROI, and all they do is fuel ad agencies to churn out more ridiculous rubbish.

So why do most ads fail to bring in sales?

Simple. If you browse the ads in your local paper, just about all of them talk about themselves:

This is our business name;
This is our logo;
This is what we do;
This is how long we’ve been in business;
This is our product/service; and then usually,
Call us now so we can sell you something.

Yeesh!

This is nothing more than making announcements. Just like scanning the Yellow Pages. And the prospects that do reply are the 1% who are shopping for your product at that time.

But what about the 99% browsing your ad who aren’t interested? They’ll scan your ad each week till they’re blue in the face and never respond.

And why not?

Because you’ve failed to connect with your audience. And convince them you’re the only business that will solve their problem. You’ve got to position yourself as the definitive expert in your field. Otherwise, your ads will bleed your promotions budget.

How to transform your ads into Money-Machines…

If you’re placing ads in your local publication – flyers, newspapers, magazines, coupon books, post card mailers, or through a website – here are three types of ads that will generate more revenues and customers:

1) The “Advertorial.”

Ads generate huge revenues for the publication they run in, but people don’t buy the publication to read ads. People are looking for specific information. I don’t know any subscribers who purchase a magazine mainly to view ads.

People are looking for interesting articles, news, product launches, interviews, how-to information, and so forth. And the way to structure your ad is to format it as an editorial.

Give away useful hints and tips that relate to your target audience. Contribute valuable advice. Send them to your website for more useful helps and hints they can forward to their friends.

Your ad should:
Grab attention;
Generate interest;
Create desire; and,
Move your reader to action.

This is the opposite of what ad agencies do for you. They sell you the idea of getting your name, logo, and killer graphics to display their skillful artwork. And then you must cross your fingers hoping the more times you run their ad, the more people call.

This may be effective in certain situations, but I’m betting you have too much business savvy to leave your company’s new customer acquisition to chance.

Here’s the next type…

2) The “Open Letter.”

This is an ad that looks like a letter. It contains a salutation and reads like a warm letter from you to a friend. Because it doesn’t look like an ad, it gets immediate attention.

Imagine writing a letter to your best friend inviting her to a celebration. You want to tell her all the details, or maybe omit some. You want to inform her who’s showing up, what to dress, and maybe hint at what to bring. You want to excite her with some of the event activities. And you want to give her the RSVP information.

The secret behind your letter is to compel her to show up. And it’s the same with your ad. You must compel your prospects to respond. Your ad should include some, if not all of these components:

A photo;
A benefit, intrigue, or fear-of-loss headline;
A salutation;
A grab-them-by-the-throat lead-in;
A conversational/bucket brigade flow;
Compelling reasons why they need your product/service;
Useful tips and facts;
The cost;
The offer;
The guarantee;
The call-to-action;
A signature;
A post script; and finally,
Your contact information.

And here’s the third type…

3) The “Classic Direct Response.”

This is the textbook direct response advertisement. On the strength of this ad, you want people to call, visit, send-in, go to your URL, snip out your coupon, jump at the offer, or book you. In short—you want a direct response.

It’s a huge mistake to think this ad will get the entire readership responding. Believe me, that’s not what you want. You want to target your ad toward a specific market.

You also want to disqualify time-wasters, tire-kickers, and brochure collectors. You’ve got to cut through the clutter and quickly hook qualified leads. And then compel them to contact you—and not your competition.

Important checklist before running your ad:

Does your ad attract the right audience?
Does it capture their attention?
Have you created desire?
Have you positioned yourself as the expert?
Can you show great value?
Have you given them a reason to act now?
Have you initiated urgency?
Did you include your contact info?

In conclusion…

These three types of ads will do more for your advertising dollars that any ad agency’s “being creative for the sake of being creative” nonsense. You probably don’t have the budget to experiment with creativity. You’re banking on instant results.

So try these three ad styles instead of trying to build your brand and image. Your brand and image will grow when more of your products are in the hands of consumers. Or when your customers absolutely rave about your service.