Archive for December, 2006
Domain Names and URLs – Which Is Which?
Posted by Matt Van Atta in Affiliate Marketing, Website Development Wednesday, 13 December 2006 13:44 2 Comments
One surprising source of confusion when it comes to websites has to do with distinguishing between the domain name and the URL. Because these are possibly the two most fundamental pieces of the puzzle when it comes to the building and maintaining of a website for your affiliate marketing efforts, it’s worth a moment to understand them.
A domain name is the name associated with your website – for example:
affiliateclassroom.com
A URL (which stands for “Uniform Resource Locator”) is a specific web address, of which your domain name is a part – for example:
URLs tie in every piece of content you place on your website. All web pages, all graphic objects, all email addresses associated with the site each have a specific URL. But what ties all the URLs together is the domain name – not so much technologically as in terms of a mental connection in the minds of your potential customers.
Each website has its own Internet Protocol (IP) address, a series of numbers and periods that enable communication between a web visitor’s computer and the website. Names are easier to remember than a string of numbers, however, and while the IP address does the actual connecting work, the domain name enables site visitors to access your site by simply typing the name rather than a bunch of numbers. I could tattoo “69.57.146.48″ on my forehead and still not remember it, but “affiliateclassroom.com” is easy.
What’s most important to you about a domain name is that it is a marketing tool. And given that your business is web-based, the domain name is your most essential marketing tool because it helps define who you are – it’s as important as the business name itself. You want your niche market to establish a connection between the needs of that market and your ability to meet those needs – and the domain name can be the foundation of that connection.
What Do Shawn Collins And A Monkey Have In Common?
Posted by Anik Singal in Affiliate Classroom Events and Products, Affiliate Marketing Tuesday, 12 December 2006 01:12 1 Comment
Absolutely NOTHING! Haha…
So, the inside scoop on that “joke” is that Shawn just sent me a cool 2007 calendar full of monkeys in it – so that’s where I thought of this witty title!
Hope Shawn doesn’t mind.
What I did want to tell you was that Shawn Collins from AffiliateTip and Lisa Picarille from Revenue Today have started a new Blog Talk Show called “Affiliate Thing” and this past Wednesday, they had their first show.
You can listen to the call right away at BlogTalkRadio’s website. For the first show they introduce themselves and talk about what’s going on in Affiliate Marketing.
The next show is on July 13, at 12 PM and they will be interviewing Lily Shen, senior manager of eBay’s US affiliate program. I have met Lily and she’s a great person and incredibly smart. I definitely recommend everyone tune in!
Hurry! Free Teleseminar on Monday 12/11/2006
Posted by Anik Singal in Affiliate Marketing, Website Development Sunday, 10 December 2006 12:41 3 Comments
Did you know that one of the leading companies in our industry – PartnerCentric – offers free software that builds web pages pre-populated with products from their top merchants?
I recently got a close look at this software and it appears to not only be fast and versatile, – it’s completely free. So I’ve scheduled a teleseminar with PartnerCentric to ask them some questions about their Instant Page Builder on Monday, December 11, at 8:00 pm Eastern Time. You’ll also find out how you can win up to $10,000 this holiday season!
We’ve only got 300 lines and almost all of them are gone, so hurry and click here to register:
- Monday, December 11, 2006
- 8 pm Eastern Time
This software definitely looks like one of those super affiliate “secret weapons” you’ll want to try, so click here to register before all the spots fill up!
Ask Anik: “Affiliate Marketing Does Not Allow My Country?”
Posted by Anik Singal in Affiliate Marketing, Affiliate Programs Saturday, 9 December 2006 01:30 2 Comments
We just received a question recently by an AC reader that asked:
“Services like clickbank and paypal don’t allow my country, so can I still do affiliate marketing?”
Our Answer:
This is definitely not the first time we have received this question and unfortunately the answer is not the best one. There is really no “easy” way around a network or service that does not allow your country.
However, yes, you still can do affiliate marketing – you just have to find programs outside those networks.
Let’s not forget that many choose to run their own affiliate programs. For these programs, you can simply contact the site owner or the affiliate manager and explain your situation to them.
Even for those companies that are running their program through a network, it never hurts to contact them. You never know if they have an external solution they can put you through.
Unfortunately the countries that are blocked out are blocked because of a high occurrance of fraud – they have no choice but to try their best to protect themselves and their clients.
What’s a Squeeze Page? – Building an Opt-In List
Posted by Matt Van Atta in Affiliate Marketing Thursday, 7 December 2006 17:52 5 Comments
An opt-in list of email addresses can be the affiliate marketer’s “secret weapon.” With them you have a ready-made, reliable audience for your marketing efforts, including information on new products, email newsletters, special offers, and more.
Best of all, the email addresses on the opt-in list belong to individuals who voluntarily signed up because they want ready access to your content. The larger the opt-in list, the more people to whom you can directly market your products, and – if all goes well – the greater your conversion rate.
So how do you start building an opt-in list?
Easy – start collecting email addresses. (Everyone needs a hobby, right?) One way to do this is by using a squeeze page, a web page intended solely to collect the names and emails of visitors to that page.
Also known at times as a landing page (although many would argue that not all landing pages are truly squeeze pages), the squeeze page brings in visitors through offering information that appeals to the site’s intended target audience.
Say you have a report that ties to a product you are marketing on your site. The squeeze page can provide details on the report and why it’s beneficial to the visitor. It can offer the content to the visitor for “free.”
All the visitor has to do is provide his or her email address, and possibly his or her name as well. (That name could be used as part of the website’s effort to personalize the visitor’s experience on that site, thus making it more appealing. However, if your affiliate business is just getting off the ground, the email address is the nugget of gold on which to focus for now.)
Because the visitor to the squeeze page sought out your content in the first place, chances are that he or she will give you that email address. You can then send those subscribers ongoing high-quality content, such as a newsletter or a product update.
In the process, you establish a sense of trust on which the visitor can make a future purchase either from or through your site. That can be very important given online buyers’ tendencies to visit a site several times before buying.
Need some good examples of squeeze pages? Look no further than your friendly neighborhood Google search on “squeeze page.” You’ll find a number of sites that sell squeeze page-building software and other products – using squeeze pages themselves in the process!
Opinions vary as to what the squeeze page should contain. Some argue that it should contain only the email signup mechanism and the copy to persuade visitors to sign up – seemingly making it more like dangling the carrot in front of the horse. But others believe it’s OK for squeeze pages to include links to other pages that contain information as well as the email signup.
Personally, if I enter a page with next to nothing on it except an email signup, I’m less inclined to sign up than I would be if I could see what else the site has that would interest me. But that’s just me.
Since every audience responds differently, it makes sense to test one type of squeeze page over another, using a script that will rotate two different pages. Make sure you set up two separate mailing lists for each page, so you can see which one pulls the most subscribers.
In fact, how you craft a squeeze page depends on two factors: your understanding of your target audience, and how much content you’re willing to give away without getting something in return.
In other words, you may “squeeze” that email address out of the visitor… but don’t forget to consider the degree to which you yourself may need to be “squeezed” in order to get that information!
For more tips, see page 26 of the March, 2006 issue of Affiliate Classroom magazine.
