Marketing Strategies for the Internet
| Category: Marketing Strategy | Date: 2003-09-17 |
Why Do Business On The Internet?
You should already know the answer to this question.
How often is the Internet mentioned on TV, radio and in print?
Real world exposure of the Internet via movies, such as 'The Net' starring Sandra Bullock, and everday exposure by ABC News, NBC News, national magazine publications and your local newspaper have made the Internet a household word.
The news services, each giving their Internet addresses during and at the end of the broadcast, have given the Internet worldwide exposure and acceptance.
People are getting on-line at the rate of over 100,000 NEW subscribers per month!
Right now, ads and web pages have the potential of a worldwide audience estimated in the 50,000,000 range.
And this figure is conservatively estimated to quadruple by the year 2000.
Basics Of Internet Marketing.
Classified Ads
Classified Ads are already making an impact on the real world by putting a lot of newspapers on shaky ground.
They can no longer count on those revenues when it is now so easy to advertise for FREE to millions of potential viewers. The only drawback to the FREE ads is the time and effort that it takes to place those ads. Placement can range from 1 or 2 per hour up to 4 or 5 depending on the complexity and requirements of the individual sites allowing the posting of the ads. But it is, most importantly, FREE Exposure.
You can visit my business site where you will find links to 5000+ FREE classified ad sites. That ought to keep you busy for a while. :-) The address is: http://home.earthlink.net/~hotbiz/index.html
Web Pages
Web Pages are your business store front to the world. Open 24 hours to all the public to deliver your message completely and hopefully, in a manner that will be pleasing.
If your page is pleasing, either they will come back or make that important decision right then to indulge in whatever it is you are trying to market. The advent of Web TV and other related technology is just going to make getting your message out to the public that much easier.
Construction and placement of the site is just part of what will be necessary.
Once your location is established, advertising must announce your web presence. And there are literally, thousands, of free web page promotion sites.
Again, at my business web page, you will find links to 6000+ FREE Web Page Promotion Sites! The address is: http://home.earthlink.net/~hotbiz/index.html
E-Mail
E-mail is the 'life-blood' of the Internet. It is the manner in which everyone communicates. Even though there are some connected people that do not have web presence, that is to say that they cannot view web pages, everyone has e-mail. The most important key to e-mail is this: It Is FREE!
It might cost money to set up a mailing list, the software necessary to bulk mail, acquiring the tools to supplement mailings such as autoresponders, and even an added fee for getting a service provider that will ALLOW bulk mailings. But you can still reach MILLIONS of individual e-mail boxes for under $1000.00! How many real world letters can you mail for that same money? 500? What with envelopes, addressing, return addressing, your actual sales letter, folding and stuffing that letter, sealing the envelope and, oh yes, the stamp. And then you must either walk or drive to the post office!
Marketing potential has not even begun to be exploited with regards to the true nature of e-mail.
The one thing to keep in mind is the whole nasty concept of what is termed 'spamming'.
With regards to e-mail, this refers to the e-mailing of your advertisement message to recipients that have not solicited your information.
Technically, e-mail is free and there is nothing illegal in the action of mailing out e-mail letters. It comes down to the manner in which it is done.
America On Line won an injunction against Sanford Wallace, the owner of CyberPromotions, a company that specializes in bulk e-mailings. Wallace has been involved in many lawsuits all steming from his bulk e-mail practices and usually involving the big commercial on line services like AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, etc. In this latest incident, Wallace had argued his right to free speech but the Judge issued the decision against him.
Primarily, Wallace lost because he indulged in mailings with false return addresses. Apparently in an attempt to eliminate those nasty replies that such mailings can incite, Wallace placed false return addresses as the originating source of the mailings which turned into a nightmare to the actual owner of the e-mail address.
The best way to handle this is to make it very easy for people to unsubscribe from your list.
Make sure you use a bulk mailing service or Internet Service Provider who will handle the mailings for you otherwise you might lose your Internet provider account.
And never reply to a nasty letter in like manner. It is like throwing gasoline on an open flame.
I have managed to send out several thousand letters at a time using my ordinary mail software and so long as I have handled the remove requests promptly, I have not really experienced major problems. Just proceed with diligent caution.
Real World Presence.
Whatever real world presence you do indulge in should now, you must also start to carry your Internet access numbers. Be it just an e-mail address or a Web Page address, URL, all incursions of marketing into real world mediums, i.e., business cards, letterheads, flyers, ads, sales brochures, etc., should contain this important information.
Time magazine and any other publication worth their salt all offer the option of communicating with the editors via e-mail.
What Are The Secrets To Successful Internet Marketing?
Exposure, Exposure, Exposure!
The key for business success used to be location, location, location. But the advent of the Internet has eliminated that criteria. Now the key phrase is exposure, exposure, exposure.
The Web Page that I designed, created and uploaded to my Internet location from Houston, Texas, can now be viewed by 50,000,000 people worldwide.
The key to successful and constant traffic to a given location, will thus be exposure, via e-mail , via ads, via any public forum on the internet and through the Web page itself with constant registration with the directories and search engines of the Internet.
******************************
I trust these comments give you an overview of what must and can be done to establish a commercial presence on the Internet. These concepts are the basics, the fundamentals, that we all have at our disposal.
We must incorporate these basics and tailor them to the given item that is to be placed in market.
1. We want to expose potential customers to that which we have to offer.
2. Once exposed, lead them to obtain all the info that is necessary for them to make an informed decision.
3. And once they decide to make a purchase, make it so easy that they will not shy away or change their minds from having sold THEMSELVES on the idea to purchase.
And with the proper tools in place, such as auto-responders, we can even followup with those that do not purchase. If they showed an interest we must 'work' them until a healthy percentage of these people jump off the fence and make a purchase.
Follow-up e-mail, as I already pointed out, is very economical. We contact a prospect so long as they leave open the door. If they ask not to receive any e-mail from us, then they are promptly removed from our list and we move on to the next hot prospect to come along.
I hope this gives you an 'overall' idea of what must be done to create a strong marketing presence on the Internet.
About the Author
Armando Trevino
Consulting Associates
1805 Taft Street
Houston, Texas 77006
713-524-9830
The very best things in life... are truly FREE. http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4837/index.html
hotbiz@earthlink.net
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4837/index.html
You should already know the answer to this question.
How often is the Internet mentioned on TV, radio and in print?
Real world exposure of the Internet via movies, such as 'The Net' starring Sandra Bullock, and everday exposure by ABC News, NBC News, national magazine publications and your local newspaper have made the Internet a household word.
The news services, each giving their Internet addresses during and at the end of the broadcast, have given the Internet worldwide exposure and acceptance.
People are getting on-line at the rate of over 100,000 NEW subscribers per month!
Right now, ads and web pages have the potential of a worldwide audience estimated in the 50,000,000 range.
And this figure is conservatively estimated to quadruple by the year 2000.
Basics Of Internet Marketing.
Classified Ads
Classified Ads are already making an impact on the real world by putting a lot of newspapers on shaky ground.
They can no longer count on those revenues when it is now so easy to advertise for FREE to millions of potential viewers. The only drawback to the FREE ads is the time and effort that it takes to place those ads. Placement can range from 1 or 2 per hour up to 4 or 5 depending on the complexity and requirements of the individual sites allowing the posting of the ads. But it is, most importantly, FREE Exposure.
You can visit my business site where you will find links to 5000+ FREE classified ad sites. That ought to keep you busy for a while. :-) The address is: http://home.earthlink.net/~hotbiz/index.html
Web Pages
Web Pages are your business store front to the world. Open 24 hours to all the public to deliver your message completely and hopefully, in a manner that will be pleasing.
If your page is pleasing, either they will come back or make that important decision right then to indulge in whatever it is you are trying to market. The advent of Web TV and other related technology is just going to make getting your message out to the public that much easier.
Construction and placement of the site is just part of what will be necessary.
Once your location is established, advertising must announce your web presence. And there are literally, thousands, of free web page promotion sites.
Again, at my business web page, you will find links to 6000+ FREE Web Page Promotion Sites! The address is: http://home.earthlink.net/~hotbiz/index.html
E-mail is the 'life-blood' of the Internet. It is the manner in which everyone communicates. Even though there are some connected people that do not have web presence, that is to say that they cannot view web pages, everyone has e-mail. The most important key to e-mail is this: It Is FREE!
It might cost money to set up a mailing list, the software necessary to bulk mail, acquiring the tools to supplement mailings such as autoresponders, and even an added fee for getting a service provider that will ALLOW bulk mailings. But you can still reach MILLIONS of individual e-mail boxes for under $1000.00! How many real world letters can you mail for that same money? 500? What with envelopes, addressing, return addressing, your actual sales letter, folding and stuffing that letter, sealing the envelope and, oh yes, the stamp. And then you must either walk or drive to the post office!
Marketing potential has not even begun to be exploited with regards to the true nature of e-mail.
The one thing to keep in mind is the whole nasty concept of what is termed 'spamming'.
With regards to e-mail, this refers to the e-mailing of your advertisement message to recipients that have not solicited your information.
Technically, e-mail is free and there is nothing illegal in the action of mailing out e-mail letters. It comes down to the manner in which it is done.
America On Line won an injunction against Sanford Wallace, the owner of CyberPromotions, a company that specializes in bulk e-mailings. Wallace has been involved in many lawsuits all steming from his bulk e-mail practices and usually involving the big commercial on line services like AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, etc. In this latest incident, Wallace had argued his right to free speech but the Judge issued the decision against him.
Primarily, Wallace lost because he indulged in mailings with false return addresses. Apparently in an attempt to eliminate those nasty replies that such mailings can incite, Wallace placed false return addresses as the originating source of the mailings which turned into a nightmare to the actual owner of the e-mail address.
The best way to handle this is to make it very easy for people to unsubscribe from your list.
Make sure you use a bulk mailing service or Internet Service Provider who will handle the mailings for you otherwise you might lose your Internet provider account.
And never reply to a nasty letter in like manner. It is like throwing gasoline on an open flame.
I have managed to send out several thousand letters at a time using my ordinary mail software and so long as I have handled the remove requests promptly, I have not really experienced major problems. Just proceed with diligent caution.
Real World Presence.
Whatever real world presence you do indulge in should now, you must also start to carry your Internet access numbers. Be it just an e-mail address or a Web Page address, URL, all incursions of marketing into real world mediums, i.e., business cards, letterheads, flyers, ads, sales brochures, etc., should contain this important information.
Time magazine and any other publication worth their salt all offer the option of communicating with the editors via e-mail.
What Are The Secrets To Successful Internet Marketing?
Exposure, Exposure, Exposure!
The key for business success used to be location, location, location. But the advent of the Internet has eliminated that criteria. Now the key phrase is exposure, exposure, exposure.
The Web Page that I designed, created and uploaded to my Internet location from Houston, Texas, can now be viewed by 50,000,000 people worldwide.
The key to successful and constant traffic to a given location, will thus be exposure, via e-mail , via ads, via any public forum on the internet and through the Web page itself with constant registration with the directories and search engines of the Internet.
******************************
I trust these comments give you an overview of what must and can be done to establish a commercial presence on the Internet. These concepts are the basics, the fundamentals, that we all have at our disposal.
We must incorporate these basics and tailor them to the given item that is to be placed in market.
1. We want to expose potential customers to that which we have to offer.
2. Once exposed, lead them to obtain all the info that is necessary for them to make an informed decision.
3. And once they decide to make a purchase, make it so easy that they will not shy away or change their minds from having sold THEMSELVES on the idea to purchase.
And with the proper tools in place, such as auto-responders, we can even followup with those that do not purchase. If they showed an interest we must 'work' them until a healthy percentage of these people jump off the fence and make a purchase.
Follow-up e-mail, as I already pointed out, is very economical. We contact a prospect so long as they leave open the door. If they ask not to receive any e-mail from us, then they are promptly removed from our list and we move on to the next hot prospect to come along.
I hope this gives you an 'overall' idea of what must be done to create a strong marketing presence on the Internet.
About the Author
Armando Trevino
Consulting Associates
1805 Taft Street
Houston, Texas 77006
713-524-9830
The very best things in life... are truly FREE. http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4837/index.html
hotbiz@earthlink.net
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4837/index.html
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