PARMSTIPS
We hope you enjoy and benefit from tips about gaffs
and newbie styled mistakes most of us make during the struggle it takes to put a footprint on some virtual real estate. As THREE DOG NIGHT observed some 40 years ago...
It ain't easy.
New tips will be added every so often to those below, but if you would like to have them sent directly to your inbox just enter your info in the form below. We never share your information with anyone and you will receive at most a few tips in the mail per month. Before you leave our site please visit our
Thank You
page and help yourself to a variety of valuable
creative tools and PC software programs you
may have not realized you are missing. These
programs are state-of-the-art, they will help to fine
tune your marketing efforts and, most importantly
of all, will help keep your machine running
smoothly, in the pink, in a blink!
Are you infected?
Don't get caught in the wrong place without protection
like our friend Mr. Small Fish caught in the squeeze below.
To start the series off we begin with some generic information about infections your computer may come down with and how to recognize if you are infected.
Here's some of what we know.
As most computer users are aware there are literally millions of malware programs circulating, and new ones are popping up daily. Most all antivirus or anti-spyware software can miss some infections in your computer, e.g. one possibly residing in your unopened email, so how do you know if you are affected?
Here are some clues:
1) If your system slows down drastically you may have a virus
2) If you seem to have browser problems like your browser shuts down or slows down drastically you are probably infected
3) If you notice things look "strange" when you open something you could be infected. If you didn't install something or change your system in some way there would be no reason for any changes since computers don't change things without someone or something like a virus telling them to.
4) If you get an error message at startup you may be infected. Most malware programs launch at startup and can cause these error messages.
5) Some of the sneakiest viruses are spread through e-mail. They sometimes infest your client or contact list and could actually start sending spam mail to everyone. If you begin receiving "message undeliverable" or "Mail Demon" notices, a virus may be sending e-mails out using your addresses.
These are a few of the most common signs of infection. Remember that seeing a symptom doesn't always mean you have an infection, but it's a good reason to run a scan.
Nine- Free- Programs Every PC Should Have
Meat and Potatoes for your PC
Frequently someone has done a bang up job of assembling PC utilities, but always at a price.We found a package of nine (9) key performance enhancers for your PC in a tip manual appropriately called:
by: Ian "Gizmo" Richards. You can grab them by clicking
We applaud, in particular, their cleaner utility. This beauty will identify and, at your command, delete all your stale but resource consuming "stuff" like temp files and cookies which will slow your machine down.
To us Ian's programs work at least as well as Windows software
(take their defragger for example) but seem lots quicker and more flexible.
Critical steps to success.
We know. Large books have been written about broad subjects like achieving success online and this is just a couple pages. But these tips are about what not to do and will save you money.
going broke getting a hard knocks education.
Most people, having heard stories or seen "real people" on Oprah making big bucks just jump in and go for it. They join a few "rags to riches in months" sites and drop a few bucks before they are ready. Either nothing happens or too much happens.
So let’s get back to the subject at hand. The real reason most people fail online is because they don't lay a proper foundation. Without the proper tool kit and knowledge base how could they do otherwise? Almost all success stories will admit to a measure of luck to go with their skill set, but perseverance is the only sure key to success.
Here is a small list of things you need to be successful online. Some people get by with less, some more, but this is a good starter kit.
You'll need at a minimum a domain name, web hosting, an auto responder or service, keyword research tools, webpage templates or designer graphics, and an Internet connection. With the exception of your Internet connection you can get most, if not all of these things, from your web host.
Once these items are in place you can begin a campaign to build an e-mail list. Plenty of list building books are circulating, so grab one, read it and begin building your own list. If the high monthly cost of an autoresponder has been holding you back you should visit HERE to see for yourself it isn’t so. As this site grows they will increase their monthly charge but for the time being it is only $7 per month! And they give you 500 fresh leads to add to your account monthly!
Next you will want to decide on an affiliation or a product you can make money with. You can't make money online unless you are selling something. This is the marketing phase of your virtual empire. After you have decided on a product you need to design an ad campaign. This is where you do your critical keyword research.
Armed with your critical keywords for your product you can now build and optimize your webpage for search engines. One last step (this one is a doozy). You need to build your webpage or website. Lots of books have been written about this so we're just going to skip that subject for now.
You can now begin to generate traffic to your website or affiliate product links. This is where the fun begins. Up till now the cost has been fairly moderate at less than a few hundred dollars, but you have spent tons of your time. Now the equation switches to tons of time and as much money as you can spend. Traffic generation requires a budget whether you use ad words or e-mail marketing or any other form of advertising.
You either have to pay search engines to send you traffic, the fastest way to loose your shirt if you aren't experienced, or pay for direct advertising. Even if you already have a list of potential customers, most people will have to spend some money to prime the pump. The more money you can afford to spend at this point the faster the jumpstart you will get. If you have been building your list you may be in profit right after launch.
Obviously this is a brief sketch, but the order of events is the important thing. Do your due diligence first, not after you have spent a few thousand dollars in advertising to find out that no one's buying air charters to Baghdad.
If you do the background research and correctly identify a good product, at a good price, customers will come. Good luck.
From time to time we run across interesting links. To visit any
of the following links click anywhere the text is underlined.
Cute animals, beautiful gardens, high tech gadgets, jokes (family style), or pictures of the most amazing places on or off the Earth are comming here. Our first link is to the latest generation toy helicopter equipped with GPS tracking. This toy can carry a payload of over 2 pounds. Imagine that! Check back frequently as we will be adding links daily. To see this video just click the hot link below but give the vid a moment to load. It is windy!
This helicopter has six motors!
Below are links to sites which provides articles on all kinds of subjects you might be interested in. For example, on a recent page you can find out how to:
Fix uneven skin tones while working in Photoshop
Tricks to stretch your cell phone battery life
Link to a site which locates pet friendly hotels all over the country
Get a free tax withholding calculator
and lots more in each edition.
Here is the link to this informative web page:
If you are curious about the latest urban rumor check it out here:
Are you into science breakthroughs? Use this link to stay on top:
Or maybe you need a map:
Check on world wide financial changes here:
http://www.moneymorning.com Can you use a good laugh? Here is a little George Carlin on the environment, and The Answer to man's existence. Please be advised, you will be exposed to adult language, adult concepts, and some very advanced thinking.
Here is a bit of magic and an amazing card trick!
Here is what's new in world architecture!
Extreme Safety
If you are a craftsman and use power tools, you can
appreciate the marcels of modern technology,
especially when it comes to your own safety!
This example will demonstrate what's new:
Pure Rookie
This tip is for Internet advertisers.
If you're not one of those you may want to tune out.
If you have been using text advertising for a number of years you're probably aware that most text ads need to be written in plain text format. More and more sites, especially newer sites, now have HTML editors, at least for upgraded members, but this tip should be your first step in creating an ad always.
For the first few months online I was using Microsoft Office Word to write my ads, primarily because I liked the toolbar. When I first began writing ads I was always using word wrap instead of what used to be called a hard carriage return.
I would do a bang up job on the appearance, aligning margins etc., and maybe I would underline or bold a word or two. If the text editor I was dropping the ad into didn't like my bold or italicized words, it just dropped that formating, so I thought I was okay. I forgot about word wrap.
So I wrote my first ad, blasted it out to a few thousand people and eagerly awaited my results. Long story short... nothing. After my second complete flop I wrote the site owner thinking maybe he just shuffled my ads off to the trash can or something.
He wrote me back and not so politely told me my ads look like s**t. Since they looked perfect to me I couldn't figure out what he was talking about. To solve the mystery I joined this site with another username and email address (a very useful tactic for all sorts of reasons) since that was the only way I could get a look at my own ad after it was published. Soon enough I caught one of my own ads and sure enough, it looked like crap.
I was doing several things wrong. First, I forgot about word wrap. As soon as the ad opened in my mailbox it spread across the entire page. My perfectly aligned 5" formating was gone and I was now required to scroll back and forth from side to side of the page to see my entire ad. Nobody does that, so no wonder I got a zero response!
I was also making corrections within the text box after I pasted my ad into the editor. When my changes were wider than the frame the editor would wrap my message within the editor but NOT IN THE AD! I was backspacing to fill in the lines, so when I left the editor the ad looked great again. BIG MISTAKE! What I didn't realize is that, while things looked good in the ad box, as soon as people opened their mail, my ad would spread all over the place again.
I wouldn't read an ad like that and obviously nobody else would either.
So now, although it is a pain in my ad, I transfer every correction back into Wordpad and every time I make a change in the text box I, again, transfer the ad back to Wordpad to make sure my changes don't break any frames.
And guess what? My response rate soared. So if you aren't already using Notepad or Wordpad to double check your ads you should be. If you are taking the time to send your ads in HTML you should still start by writing your ad in a plain text editor and copy that text into the HTML editor on the ad site. Not all editors work the same. Then do your HTML magic on site. Your readership will appreciate the extra effort.
As previously mentioned, if you want to be absolutely sure your ads are displaying correctly you should rejoin your ad sites as a free member with a different email address. The idea that you don't want to waste one ad on yourself pales when compared to the possibility of an error sneaking into your ad. Besides, I personally like the assurance that comes with proving to myself my ads are circulating.
Research first -- spend later or never!
If you are new to the net and eager to make your first buck online...
A word of caution.
You are among masters of the Internet universe. We are talking about people who could sell webbing to spiders, venom to vipers, and lumber to lumberjacks .
You will be exposed to people who spend tens of thousands of dollars to perfect a single ad. The squeeze pages are constructed to suck you in, wet your appetite, and drain your wallet.
The information you are purchasing almost always gets forgotten among the bonuses, instant discounts, never to be seen again one-time offers and bundled packages.
(Remind me again, what was I originally after and what am I purchasing now?)
Consider what it costs to develop an e-book. The only actual cost is the opportunity cost which the author puts on his time to write the book.
As a marketer you don't pay for ink, paper, postage, or product storage. So the difference between an e-book selling for $97 instead of seven dollars is pure profit. The difference in the price is your "perceived value" which is the value created in your mind by the marker for his product. Timing is critical. Successful marketers realize they have only seconds to set the hook before you and your wallet are off to the next ad. So they promise you the moon and usually deliver cheese.
Most honest marketers will tell you that the "content" of their book is less important than the package. Of course the book must have some value. But, (big drum roll) regardless of how unwholesome the refried beans they are selling, you probably won't request a refund. Most people just park the info on their hard drive and move on.
The marker's mission is accomplished while your mission, to make money, goes a few bucks backwards.
What marketers won't tell you is that virtually everything they are selling you is available for free. Yeah buddy. With a little "googling" and the right search phrase you can gain access to the best advice online, often from the very same authors you are considering purchasing your ebook from!
So here's the tip.
Write down the key words or phrases which attracted you to the ad in the first place. If you really don't want to leave the one-time offer a page, minimize it. Use your favorite search engines to investigate the product, author, or keyword phrase. Put free in the front of the phrase and then run the search. Once you have those results, run a search with the same parameters and put scam at the end of the keyword. At least you will know a great deal more about the product after performing this five minute drill. Also, it is always a good idea to know what others who have already purchased the product think about it. At best you will have avoided spending money on worn-out rehashed refried beans.
Time Factor Tip.
This should go without saying, so of course I'm saying it.
If you are looking to earn a living online as an affiliate marketer, you need to practice due diligence before joining most programs. In particular, you need to thoroughly investigate before you hang your shingle on someone else's storefront. When you promote someone else's website you need to be sure you aren't sending your referrals up a smokestack or down a sinkhole.
Smokestack Example
I joined a site which promised to make me wealthy in five years. The price to join
was either $7, $10, or $75, my choice depending on how rich I wanted to be. I was sure I could get at least $10 of value in freebies and advertising so I joined. I am always looking for affordable ad sites. Included in the confirmation letter I received after joining was a severe caution that unless their directions were followed TO THE LETTER their "promise" of future wealth could not be "guaranteed". I call this the
legalese cover your thieving butt disease.
(It is also a way to nickle and dime your new members.)
Immediately after I joined they used the "pay -- it -- foreword" concept to bump up my membership cost another $15. This small additional "donation" was "guaranteed"
to elevate my future earnings way into the millions.
"In for a penny, in for a pound" I said to myself as I paid up.
They next showed me a way to start what they called an infinite traffic loop. I paid an additional $5 for this "secret". It was a good concept, I have to admit, but of course, in order to take full advantage of this three site "miracle" of traffic generation, I had to join 3 more of their sites. I was to use my signup ad credits to advertise my affiliate link to their site and thereby quickly recruit my 10 referrals. Upgrades were encouraged
Next they sent me to a "secret" site where I could instantly fulfill my sole obligation necessary to qualify for those millions they promised me. In order to earn my right to a million bucks my job was to recruit 10 active members within a year. After an interval of about a week the next site they had me go to I was supposed to purchase a package of guaranteed sign ups to any program. The package normally sold for $50 but was on sale for half price. For $25 I was supposed to get 10 sign ups. I was to use the sign-ups to fulfill my obligation to the program OR I could resell them immediately for twice what I paid for them at another "secret" site. So, once again, I followed directions and ponied up more money. I guess this last offer was supposed to prove to me that I had joined a site dedicated to making me money. (Psst, I never got the sign-ups.)
Since this sounded too good to be true I took another look at the whole program.The bad math was what finally turned me on to the scam. If I could buy a package of anything for $25 and turn right around and sell it for $50 why would I do anything else? I would buy and sell "guaranteed sign-up" packages all day everyday,
doubling my money until I was rich. Wouldn't you? Also, why would a person accept
$5 or less to sign up to a program which costs $7 or more to join? As I said, bad math.
My second look revealed that I had $30 invested in this $7 dollar program. When the bad math surfaced so did the fact that about half a million ads I had been running promoting this opportunity had not produced a single referral. While theoretically
not impossible, I had never had such a poor response, so I guess they simply kept
all of my referrals for themselves. The name of the business, by the way, is
ComSupport.biz
(I apologize to anyone who joined this opportunity at my suggestion. The business has since disappeared from the web, taking everyone's money and leaving a bitter memory.)
Sink Hole Example
I joined a straight line mailer. This is an ad site you pay to join and then you can mail on a regular schedule to everybody who joins the program after you. The site also offered an income opportunity which was supposed to be a lifetime opportunity.
Six months after joining I hadn't received a dime but I had invested a lot of money advertising this business, called Viral-List (a Frank Bauer opportunity). The referral cash I earned never reached the payout threshold and six months later Viral-List just up and vanished. As I have learned the hard way, payout thresholds are often deliberately set high enough that few, if any, affiliates ever qualify for a payout.
The sad fact is that in both the above cases I had actually done my due diligence. I looked up these sites as best I could, but I could only find information posted by the site itself. These sites were simply too new for Google to have received feedback
about them from anyone, let alone disgruntled members like myself.
So here are the lessons I took away from these bad trips and a recounting of some of the errors in judgment I made.
Right after joining I hadn't even had the opportunity to evaluate the site and yet they were already asking for more money. That alone is a giant red flag! Then I fell for the oldest ruse around; offer the mark lots more money, payable way on down the road, for practically nothing today. As I mentioned previously, in for a penny... I can't believe I was that gullible.
When everything they suggested resulted in my spending more money, not making any, I still hung in there because I didn't want to forfeit the fortune I had riding on the come line. How incredibly naive! My letters to support went unanswered until the time for a refund had passed. Then, like a bad odor out of a landfill, answers to my e-mails appeared - suffused with bad grammar.
So the ultimate take away lesson is this.
Just as most people who come online to make money fail, so do most businesses.
They may not fail their owners, but they most definitely fail their members. Most new businesses don't last a year without earning something in the way of a reputation, so don't waste your time or money on any site that hasn't been around long enough for some 3rd-party comments from independents to have surfaced. You can join sites and take advantage of the freebies but don't invest any money in brand new sites. All you're probably accomplishing is making your life a little tougher while making someone else's morally bankrupt life easier.
Business, as they say, "ain't no picnic". Be careful not to be someone else's lunch.
All of us need to remind ourselves of this tip daily. It is that important. The Tip: Don't spread yourself too thin! I smirk at myself as I say this because I am the worst offender. For example, I used to join at least one new ad site everyday. On a long day I usually joined several. I joined so many sites I outgrew Microsoft Excel (joke). After joining I would click for enough credits to post an ad. Then I would enter the details of the site into an Excel spreadsheet. After scrambling my columns and rows once too often I gave up on Excel. (Excel’s A to Z sort function left me with alphabet soup occasionally.) While not exactly outgrowing Excel, I did find I needed a more versatile file system to store all my new logins, passwords, affiliate links, etc. ad nauseam. You can download a free file manager specifically designed for marketers if you have that problem. This software sells for upwards of $30 elsewhere but it is free to you after joining the site through the link below: This viral software is rebrandable! Once at the site just scroll down the left of the page past the testimonials to the bonus section. Look to the left again and click on the rebrandable software link. Back to my thread. Every site I join offers a free mailing credit of some amount as a bonus or I don’t join. Also, because every site I join floods my inbox with dozens of e-mails I found that with my ad strategy (the very limited budget, click for most mail credits kind) I had to change my mailbox frequently. I finally got smart and set up a gmail account expressly for INCOMING ads. At the time I wrote this blog I was receiving more than 200 emails/hr. but since Gmail provides unlimited storage bounced mail is no longer a problem. My point is I couldn't service all these sites properly. So I made a rule. My Rule: You need to look at the number of members of an ad site and use this rule of thumb. Each one of us Internet users requires on average six to seven repeat exposures to an ad for the ad to have an effect, if it ever will. So, for example, let's say a site has 300 members. You would need to spend about 2000 mail credits to fish out this pond. By that point you have generated all the interest in your business your ad will get you. Move on to the next site and only come back to your last ad site to check for membership increases. If you are advertising the same opportunity at the same time as a gorilla don't waste your credits. Gorillas are the guys/gals who seem to have unlimited ad credits to burn. They can swamp any site for awhile. If you are clicking for credits you will see who owns the site ad-wise, if anyone does. Even if you upgrade so you don’t have to click for credits you should still click on site ads to get to know your competition. If you find yourself in competition for referrals or opportunities with the site administration, again, don't waste your credits on that same business op. In short, don't wear out your welcome. Once you have advertised your link seven times for each subscriber or member, either move on and delete everything to do with this site to save disk space, or switch your campaign on this site to another opportunity. You can always come back three or six months down the road and you will hopefully find a new batch of members looking for your opportunity.
My Advertising Rule
The focus factor
Have you been online long enough to be thoroughly confused?
After a few months or a year online most marketing people develop the paralysis by analysis syndrome. This means you have probably joined 15 or 20 advertising sites and maybe several "how to" and "marketing" e-mail courses, and possibly a few business building programs.
You have swamped yourself with free information on traffic and tactics and eBay and adwords and adsense until nothing makes any sense anymore.
Information overload has set in. Unless you were born a bookkeeper and are extremely well organized to boot you’re probably beginning to loose track of your logins and passwords. Your inbox is consuming a ridiculous amount of time to clear each day.
You start out each day with a clear set of goals to accomplish but within a few hours you have been sidetracked enough times to have lost your focus. Your plan of attack for the day is shot to pieces.
When you get to this point you need to step way back!
Refocus not just on your daily tasks but on the big picture. When I find I get easily distracted or browse off course it means I am bored stiff one or lost interest in what I'm doing. Now it is time to examine what I'm doing and why.
Here's an example. When I first started online I really didn't have much of a game plan. I decided to take the shot at affiliate marketing. I joined clickbank and picked up a book I liked, set up an ad program based on clicking for credits, and went to work. I clicked on one site until I could place an ad, and then the next site, and another etc. ad nauseam. By the end of the week I had mailed out 1000 ads for my “book of the century”. Nothing. So it went during week 2, 3, 4, and 5.
By now I had mailed over 5000 people and still no sales.
So I took a look around, googled some statistics, and found out something interesting. Conversion rates for the type of ad I was running typically ran in the low single digits per 10,000 emails delivered. So, it turns out, with the small number of ads I was running, I was doomed to failure before I started; I just didn't know it yet.
So if things aren't working out within a month or two for you, you need to re-examine what you are doing. Focus on the big picture when all the little details aren't working out for you.
