Monetization Magic

Colorado Website Development

10 Ways to Expand Your Brick and Mortar Business – Part 2 of 2

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This post is a continuation of 10 Ways to Expand Your Brick and Mortar Business – Part 1

Meaningful content on the website.  Due to the Google search engine, it is imperative that meaningful content be placed regularly on your website.  That is why most static websites do not rank well with the search engines.  The search engines and your potential customers are interested in what is new and exciting.  If you just have a billboard website that states your name, address and phone number, and your competitor has a website that talks about weekly events, what’s new in the industry, new inventory, new employees and is constantly updating their website, they will naturally outrank you in the search engines.  Ranking is what the industry is all about because let’s face it, if you’re not on the first page or two of search results, most folks will never see your website.  The object is to engage your customer so they see you as a friend even before they pick up the phone or park in front of your business.  People buy from people they know, like and trust.  They want to see people and people in motion on your website rather than just having pretty pictures and text to read.

Google places.  Google places is a free ad for businesses so that their basic information can be found out on the internet.  Optimally, your place on Google places will also have a link to your highly interactive website along with your business hours and a map so that your business can be located.

Host events.  Your business needs to be a hub of activity and the way to make it a hub of activity is to host events.  Invite people into your business.  Host a Chamber of Commerce after hours event, ol’ Cal would often film the commercials at his lot so there was always a new animal to view.  You can also invite people in for free maintenance or checkups to ensure they will not need expensive service later.  For a car dealership, offer to have heater and air conditioning check ups, tire rotation, brake inspection, belt and hose inspection and other easy value added services.  The events you host are done to add value to the customer experience.  When you add enough value, your prospective customer will come to see you as a trusted resource. 

Incredible Offer.  You want to give prospective customers an incredible offer.  For the car lot, it could be a coupon book for discount services or free detailing on their current vehicle.  When you give the incredible offer it is always something they would definitely want and it is in exchange for their name and email.  You will continue to use their name and email to notify them of future events and other items of interest.

Complimentary Products.  Once your customers purchase an item or service from you, they usually will purchase complimentary products to make their initial purchase last longer or to decorate their initial purchase.  In the example of the used cars, complimentary products would include extended warranties, car insurance, supplemental car insurance (like AAA), car washes, car audio, specialty rims, car security, tinted windows, windshield replacement and repair, mobile oil change services, after market part suppliers and apparel.

Digital Products.  Digital products are great because you can make them once and sell them over and over again.  Digital products for a car dealership might include a video of what to check when buying a used car, it could be an affiliate link to a supplier that carries something that is commonly ordered that you choose not to stock, digital products could be tickets to a concert for a celebrity that happens to be coming to town next week that sponsors your vehicles, or sound file of what your cool mufflers actually sound like when installed on your car.  You’re probably laughing about that last one but that is an actual product…and my friend paid $29 for that sound file….still laughing?

Newsletter.  The newsletter is published at least twice a month telling your customers about upcoming new events and information having to do with your business.   You can also tell them funny stories or invite to future events.  For the car business, a newsletter could be used to notify customers of recalls and give them ways to quickly and easily take care of needed maintenance.  Let them know about your shuttle service.

Social Media.  Social media is where you create a community around your business.  You’re still being of service and it helps to create a buzz around your business.  For the car dealer, you might want to list videos of the latest sliding cars due to the ice storm last week, or pictures of the most modified cars.  You could have poll on the upcoming changes in the new car models.  You could have a poll on whether girls or guys like a particular model better than the other.  You would want to take pictures of your live events and post those up on social media for others to see.

If you like what you read in this article and would like to see how you can expand YOUR business, apply for a complimentary Action Strategy Session so that you can have a clear roadmap to take your busines to the next level!  The Action Strategy Session is valued at $297.00 and will give you concrete ways that you can move forward in your business.

10 Ways to Expand Your Brick and Mortar Business – Part 1 of 2

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httpv://youtu.be/QOsLdT4slsk

When I was a little girl, my family moved to New Mexico from New Jersey.  In New Mexico, we only had 3 TV stations and they would only broadcast during certain hours of each day.  The information broadcast on that TV station was selective and even back in those days, what they broadcast was determined by what would get the TV station the highest ratings.  Everyday, I would see a commercial for a used car dealer who was in California and has some of the goofiest commercials I had ever seen.  His commercials often featured his “dog”, Spot.  His dog was often not a dog but would be an elephant or a tiger or some other wild animal.  Sometimes I wondered if people would watch him just to see the day when dear ol’ Cal actually got eaten by his “dog”, Spot!

I tell you this to make this point…Cal Worthington was all the way in California and I was a little girl all the way in the desert of New Mexico…but I knew who he was.  Cal Worthington sold a lot of cars when he ran those commercials.  Eventually Cal passed away.  Many years later, I had an opportunity to visit the great state of California.  When I got there, what did I remember about California?  You guessed it!  I remembered ol’ Cal Worthington and his wild dog, Spot.  I actually passed by the car lot and it was an event to me because I was able to remember all his commercials and the friends I was with at the time remembered him too.

Cal Worthington used TV to advertise his car lot and he attracted customers from the next town, the next county, the next state away.  There are a lot of people in the great state of California and he advertised so well that a little girl all the way in New Mexico (954 miles away) and 30 years later remembered his car lot.  Think about it, he was just another used car dealer and he found away to make his name known to a much broader audience.  Within 10 years of beginning in the business, his dealership was #1 in the nation!  He attracted so much attention that Johnny Carson even had him on the Tonight Show which had a national reach! 

You are blessed because business owners now do not have to purchase TV air time to get our message out!  We are able to rely on the technology that we have at our figure tips and our own ingenuity to promote our message. 

To illustrate how this works, I’ll be using ol’ Cal Worthington’s business to show you how we could expand his business using today’s technology:

Website.  Your website is the virtual hub of your business.  The website could be used to show people the new car models, book appointments with customers to come in a look at a car, apply for car financing so that they could have the convenience of knowing that they were already approved for a vehicle before they arrived and they could just come in a pick out their new vehicle.  They could schedule their normal service appointments, talk to a mechanic live via the website chat feature, order new accessory items for their new car or get a trade in value for their vehicle.

Keywords on the Website.  Using keywords helps the search engines to direct customers to your website.  Cal Worthington’s keywords might have been “Ford”, “dog Spot”, used cars, new cars, Long Beach, CA, and so on.  Today, Cal Worthington dealership still exists and the keywords they use are as follows: 

long beach ford, ford long beach, long beach ford parts, long beach ford service, used ford long beach, new ford long beach

If you like what you read in this article and would like to see how you can expand YOUR business, apply for a complimentary Action Strategy Session so that you can have a clear roadmap to take your busines to the next level!  The Action Strategy Session is valued at $297.00 and will give you concrete ways that you can move forward in your business.

 

YOUR Website Advertising 123 Easy!

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A great way to monetize your website is to sell advertising space.  You can easily create and sell 125×125 pixel ads and place them on your website using nothing more than Microsoft Paint and some HTML code.  You do NOT need fancy software to put the ads on your website.  A typical ad price would be $50 per month for a 125×125 ad.  This is 123 Easy.  If you can cut and paste you can do this!

1.  Create the Ad

Likely the advertiser has their own 125×125 already created and you can simply upload that; however in the event that they don’t, you can create an ad for them and charge them appropriately.

2.  Create the Ad Structure

The simplest ad structure that you can use is a table.  The table contains at least one row and cells.  Each ad image is uploaded into the cell of the table and a link pointing to the destination is attached to the image.  The basic structure code is as follows:

<table>

<tr><td>Ad Image 1</td><td>Ad Image 2</td></tr>

</table>

Calm down!  It’s a little bit of code and the good part is that WordPress will create the rest for you.  You can copy and paste, right?  Simply copy the code above and put it into a temporary post using the HTML tab. Find the HTML tab in the image below:

 

 

 

We won’t be keeping the post, we’ll just use it for a working area for the moment.

Click back on the Visual tab and you will see a basic table.  It will look like this:

Ad Image 1 Ad Image 2

Don’t worry about the size as it will self adjust as we move forward.  Breathe!  The rest is just copy and paste.  Highlight the words “Ad Image 1” in the first cell of the table.  Click on the Upload/Insert button:

Search for the ad you which to insert and then click on the button to upload the image.  Then click on the Insert into Post button.  Once the image has been inserted, click on the image and click on the Link button and type in the destination for the ad image.

If you happen to have 2 ads, simply repeat the process to get the 2nd one into place.  Once the ads are in place and linked, click on the HTML tab again.  You’ll see a lot of HTML code back there.  You created that!  Now we’re going to select all of it (you can hold down the CTRL key and click on the A key if you have a PC).  Next we will copy it in preparation for step 3.

3. Place the Ad Structure Into a Text Widget

Open a text widget and simply paste the code into the lower area.  You will not need a title.  Go ahead and click on the blue Save button at this point.  Open up another browser window and admire your work!  Next, click on each of the ads to ensure that they link to the proper destination.

That’s all there is to it!

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Blogging for Business Growth

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Gone are the days when having a website meant that you had a cute picture of your store front with your business name, address, phone number and hours of operation.  Today’s website needs to include a blog, social network connections, free give-away items, an area to get more information from the business, an area to submit an e-mail from the website, items for sale and in some cases an events calendar.

Does that sound like a lot of hats to wear in addition to your normal day-to-day operations?  Actually, it’s a blessing rather than a curse.  It’s a blessing because you don’t have to do everything yourself.  You are able to hire someone else to do some of the work for you at a reasonable rate.  Other tasks can be created once and automated so that you can get back to the normal operations of your business.

The websites of today can introduce several additional streams of passive and residual income to your bottom line.  The optin area is used to gather names and email addresses for people who are interested in learning more about what you have to offer or perhaps to receive your monthly newsletter.  The email addresses are fed to your auto-responder software to send out communication to your current and prospective customers to let them know key items about your business.

For instance, let’s say you have a heating, ventilation and air conditioning business.  Every fall it starts to get cold and every spring it starts to get warm.  Every month we’re supposed to change the filter in our systems.  What if every summer, your email system automatically began to notify customers that they needed to contact your company to set up an appointment to have their furnace serviced to take advantage of the Early Bird special?  What if every winter, your email system automatically began to notify customers that they needed to contact your company to set up an appointment to have their air conditioner serviced to take advantage of the Spring Early Bird special?

Customers might even choose to schedule their appointments and pay for the service prior to you performing the service.  It’s convenient for them and would remove some receivables from your books.  WooHoo!  Instant cash flow!  I can see your accountant clicking their heals already.

Your blog could be used to educate your customers on the proper way to install a filter or drain a sprinkler system.  It could also be used to let your current and prospective customers that you regularly maintain the local soup kitchen for no charge just because you like to give back to your community.  Your blog gives your business a human touch to an otherwise cold relationship.  If your little business will be doing an exhibit at the local home and garden show, you can let your customers know to stop by and see you to pick up their coupon for one of your services along with something nice to drink.  People like to do business with people whom they know, like and trust.  You may not have time and resources to meet and greet all your customers, so put some systems in place to do that work for you.

Take a look at the website you have today.  If your website is more like an unlit billboard in the night than a fully interactive, systematized money-making machine, consider having an Action Strategy Session with me so that you can begin adding more to your bottom line before your competition gets a hold of this valuable information.  The normal investment for this service is $349.00.  The Action Strategy Session is even priced for today’s economy because you can take advantage of the Take Action Special for $97.00.  You may just find there are 10-15 different income streams that you can take advantage of that you hadn’t even thought about before your Session.  Reserve your time at I’m always happy to help!

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Who Owns Your Website?

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There are currently a lot of internet businesses beginning to emerge in the market place.  In today’s economy, everyone is looking to save a little here, create a little there to keep up with the changing financial landscape.  Not too long ago, some real estate investors would acquire a controlling interest in a piece of property so that when the property was sold, they would make some money during the transaction for having a “controlling interest” in the property without actually owning the property.  I am seeing a similar scenario emerging when it comes to internet businesses.

When a domain name is registered, the name and address of the person is recorded during the transaction.  If you’re purchasing that domain through a software developer, they may purchase the domain for you and then sell it to you for an amount or they may lease it to you for an amount.  Either way, they control the domain.  They also have the ability to lock the domain.  Locking a domain prohibits the ownership and associated hosting from being transferred to another entity without the owner’s consent.  Locking a domain is a normal activity used as a protection so that the website cannot be redirected by someone else.  It is simply a safety mechanism.  Even if you paid the software developer to purchase the website domain on your behalf, if they purchased it in their name, you do not own the website until it is transferred to your name.  Because you do not own the website, you do not control it either.

How do you know who owns your website?  You can search for your website name using a tool called “whois”.   Simply search for “whois” + yourwebsitename as shown in the example below:

Obviously you would replace “monetizationmagic.com” with the website name for which you are inquiring.

Your search should return several possibilities.  Take a look for one that will discuss who owns the website.  It is possible that this information has been obfuscated by a privacy service as well.  If this is your case, you will need to contact the privacy service and prove your right to know this information before this is revealed to you.  This can be a very good thing if you are a high profile individual and someone is looking to extract large amounts of money from you.  With privacy protection in place, they will not be able to easily uncover intellectual assets that are in your name.  Truly, if you have an internet business that makes a lot of money, there are other protections that should be put in place that are outside the scope of this post.

Now maybe you’re completely comfortable with the website ownership; however, you should keep in mind that website “flipping” is becoming a very lucrative business for those who know what they are doing.  Let’s say you have a website in which you have lost interest.  To you, the website is in a good niche and has a nice title but frankly it’s ugly.  It’s kinda of like the ugly, unkempt rental real estate down the block.  What is trash to you may be a mighty treasure to someone else.  Rather than just abandoning it, try to sell it and you may find that you can pocket a nice return on your investment!  Someone else might be able to purchase those ugly bits from you, transform it into something beautiful and then resell it for thousands more than they paid for it!  To whet your appetite, check out the article below that talks about Apple just paying over $4 million for a highly coveted domain name.  (Now why didn’t I think of that!)  If this is something that you might be interested in learning for yourself, check into my class offerings to get you started.

Look for website auctions to be opening right here in the coming weeks!

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10 Ways to Build Quality Links to Your Website

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  1. Write guest posts on blogs that are related to your field. Many bloggers will be glad to allow you to provide some fresh content for them in exchange for a link back to your site. Just contact the blogger and make an offer.
  2. Answer questions on sites such as Answers.Yahoo.com, AllExperts.com and JustAnswer.com. By providing quality advice on subjects related to your site, you link to your pages as related information. Just understand that sites like this frown on website owners simply linking to their sites. You can link when it’s relevant, but you don’t need to say it’s your own site.
  3. Offer testimonials for the sales pages of products you enjoy. Internet marketers love to get them, and most will gladly post an active link or at least a URL to your site in return.
  4. Find other organizations that link to members’ websites to join. For best results, choose ones related to your niche.
  5. Offer to write articles for a fellow blogger or news media organization. You’ll want to voluntarily send them a sample of your work ahead of time so that they get a taste of what you’re offering.
  6. Join and participate in forums. Add links to your site to your signature.
  7. Comment on blogs whose subject matter is related to your site. If you take the time to read the post and write a good, relevant comment, the blogger is unlikely to consider this spamming. Be respectful; keep your link in the space provided for your link.
  8. Sponsor giveaways on blogs. You supply the product, and the blogger holds the giveaway.  You’ll get a link from the blogger, and you could also request that entrants be required to link to your site.  Make sure that the blog is in a related field and readers are interested in what you’re giving away!
  9. Create profiles on popular social networking sites, and link to your site from them. Some of these will be “no follow” links, but when link building, don’t worry about this…just build good, quality links.
  10. Make yourself available for interviews, not only online, but with offline media. Most media outlets have websites, and they often post transcripts of interviews there along with relevant links.

Do you have other ways that you have used that work well for building quality links?  Please do share what you’ve done and how well it worked in the comment section below!  Hint:  This is a great example of a invitation for #7 above!