eAction

Whoa, I thought I was going to dash off a short answer to online marketing, and it has turned into a long one. I hope it’s helpful to you. I would appreciate hearing from you if one or another method has proved really beneficial to you.

Online marketing is one area where we can always learn from one another!

If summer is your slack time because there are no customers, make it your learning-new-methods time. When everyone goes back into fall’s fast pace you’ll be ready for them.

Yesterday a new writer friend asked, “How do you get your web site seen?”

It is an old-old question that online entrepreneurs of all kinds grapple with most. I’ve tried a number of methods, and toss most of them aside. Those who have read this as an ezine subscriber for a while, may remember how I’ve been enthused about this or that, and after a while reported that I was dropping that marketing method. Some I haven’t bothered to mention, because I checked into them so briefly, or simply didn’t think they were messed with my approach.

So - you can try;
plastering all the free classified pages with your ads
start your own classifieds page and email all who use it
put your ad in your email signatures
list your site on all the search engines and directories you find
placing ads in ezines
placing banners on others’ sites
networking (making friends for sake of sales)
direct mail campaigns by email (and also off-line)
offer free brochures and reports with links to your site
positioning at the top in search engines by tweaking your keywords
offering what you have in terms of what people seek
join safe lists and email you ads away like crazy
join surfing programs and hope frenetic surfers will stop to explore your link
sending out press releases
put your media kit on your site
become a public speaker (and sell books, etc. from table)
write articles about your site theme, and link back to site
put up a huge media event that gets you in the news
put feedback forms on site pages
get visitors to your site to give email address, and regularly email them
join network groups/sites, and work at turning new acquaintances into customers
prepare good business cards and scatter everywhere
phone every contact you make, and phone them again and again
form joint venture partnerships with others for mutual gain
offer current customers rewards for bringing others in
purchase potential (warm) leads from others
swap links with related web sites.
write short helpful articles and submit to ezines and website WITH your site ad
visit forums and make friendly, helpful posts with your link in your signature
list stuff to sell on eBay and link to your site
publishing an ezine or blog and listing it on RSS sites
[Do a search on Google or SearchIt! There’s plenty more!]

All of the above will work to some degree or another. It depends on how much you invest of yourself, and your money. Just remember that fee-based services are NOT necessarily better.

The marketing/business model I have the highest regard for right now, is to build a content-rich site and friendly site, using keywords that potential customers are using to look for your kind of product or service, and making sure those are used well in my web pages and also in the meta tags.

Then a mix of publishing an ezine/blog (or two), listing on directories, and exchanging links, writing short articles for publication in other magazines and web sites, offering free e-books (with links), and selling on eBay (with links), and of course, making friends wherever I get a chance.

If only I could remember to hand out business cards when I meet new people in person!

Before I start my eBay selling, I’m preparing some web pages about the products with links to my other sites, AND I’m sending a test package to someone so I can find out how well my item will withstand the postal process, and if it will run into problems at the border.

I’d hate to find after a sale that my aloe vera plants can’t get over the border, or that they die if they’re in a box that many days.

I’ve been hinting that I’m turning my back on a certain business model that I’ve worked into my routines for a number of years. Well, I’ve cut the apron strings,
and though I haven’t got to deleting all my pages and links related to it, my surfing programs and efforts are over.

Just about. One main central place holds out hope that I can get a one commission cheque if I wait until their accountant is back from holidays in early August. I haven’t deleted that one yet, but I’m assuming all my other downlines are now rolled up to Paul, my upline.

May you prosper, Paul!

Some of my downline members who are subscribed to the ezine edition of this may be a bit surprised if they haven’t checked their admin areas in the last few days. But I trust you will find Paul helpful and that you will do better with someone who is prepared to give this more time and attention than I was able to do.

My reasons? I just realized in the last few weeks, that the direction Doug Williams was taking these programs called for full attention and participation, and more efforts than I could spare time for. He’s weeding out lazy and non-progressive members, and it was just time I decided whether I was in or out.

It has been quite freeing to realize that now I can try eBay selling without sneaking it into my surfing times. I am also giving my publishing and novel-marketing more enthusiastic effort, which was my first goal in the first place!

But I will not forget the lessons I learned in marketing from Doug, and I’ll find ways to incorporate some of them in my own business ventures.

P.S. I’ll continue with blog/ezine, but my emphasis will continue even more boldly, on involving God in our businesses, and operating on higher moral standards.

You may have noticed; all this year I’m focused on the seed and harvest concept in a business person’s life. The very foundational principles that determine whether we succeed or just struggle on and on indefinitely.

When God wanted a family He sowed his Son. He gave His Son an assignment to purchase our redemption on the cross. When Jesus was resurrected from the dead, He became the first of many sons and daughters by faith, whom God would adopt into His Great Big Wonderful Family.

As we look into the Bible we see others investing deliberately for the purpose of gathering certain results. For instance, Elijah asked the widow at Zarephath to invest her last bit of flour and oil to make him some bread. In return, he promised that her supply would not run out until the Lord sent rain. Sure enough, her flour and oil never ran out the whole time.

When Job prayed for his three miserable comforters, he himself was blessed with ten times what he had before.

But some folks give away of themselves and their time and talents like a dribbling water fountain. It may make people around them kindly disposed toward them, but if they give their investment of themselves no purpose - it is sure nothing purposeful will happen to them.

That purpose is the focus and the faith that what you are doing is going to bring results. Specific results.

Which brings us back to the importance of spelling out your goals and breaking them down into steps or levels of progress.

It has been my personal experience that when I add on some “good” activity, and just squeeze it in here and there, hoping for something nice to happen to me, that good activity tends to fizzle out. When I draw up an agenda, and schedule time in to work at particular specific tasks, I do accomplish measurable results. When those are done I can move on to the next step or level.

Sometimes friends marvel at how organized and self-disciplined I am. On the other hand, I marvel at how much I lose out when I relax my self-discipline and roll with the flow. I’ve seen first-hand how much more effective and happy I am when I’m focused and following my plan. Really, I need to do more of it.

This may be the slow tortoise’s route to financial success, but I’m confident it will be more lasting and fulfilling in the end. I don’t know about you, but I’m going to be still more focused and purposeful in all that I do in my Bouquet of Enterprises.

Do you need a list of local businesses to contact so you can offer your services? Or are you looking for a certain business and need directions to their location? Google now serves up local.google.com/ or local.google.ca/ You get names, addresses, phone numbers and street maps to get there. Also web addresses if those businesses have one. It’s like an enormous Yellow Pages for all of North America, and most parts of the world!

We got back last night from Winnipeg, where I did my best to help Dad and my brother build a swing for their back yard.

Dad has built at last 20 of these a few years ago, usually out of scrap lumber. He sold them, tipped them on a truck and delivered them. Only, Dad is older than he was back then.

So I was very glad to see my brother Ernie take a day off work to see this project got done. I was especially impressed with his gracious, respectful attitude to Dad, deferring to him for decisions, but applying his strength to cut, screw, and lift, or whatever.

Later at break time, he opened his briefcase, and when I asked about his work, he gave me a quick collage of the range of responsibility and decisions he makes. He has really turned his job as foreman of all the diesel mechanics at Jade Transport into a great place for him.

Besides that, he cheerfully showed me a yellow sheet proving he is a member of Actra, for he’d had a bit part in a movie recently. He got about $200 for merely driving a truck a few feet.

How can you tell when you are in the wrong job or place for you?

Because you subconsciously dread being there, you’ll;
arrive late,
find ways to leave early,
gripe about the smallest changes,
complain to co-workers,
and make mistakes.

Your attitude will become sour, and unless you have tremendous self-control, everyone around you will pick up on it, and reflect a resentful attitude back to you. This adds personality conflicts to your troubles. Stay there long enough, and they’ll become as permanent as your wrinkles.

What do do when you wake up in the wrong place?

First, check whether you are there by assignment. That means you need to get a grip on your attitudes, because God wants you to bless and help someone else there. It might turn out to be the right place for you after all.

Second, the friends you make in that impossibly hard place, can become lasting ones, and the keys to the right place for you. Do not discard people because they are connected to a your wrong place.

Third, determine to excel even there. Do your best, and do it as if for God. This is the most likely to swing open doors to your right place.

If you are not diligent, and don’t treat people right, you are not ready yet (nor worthy) for the right place for you.

For a good Biblical example, read the story of Joseph in Genesis chapters 37 and 39 to 45. He found himself in some very bad situations, but he excelled, treated people right, and eventually, one of them gave his name at the right moment, so that Joseph could be promoted to the highest and best place in the nation.

How can you tell when you’re in the right place?

It will probably look like the wrong place at first, but you will;
feel excited and challenged by your work,
will be glad to put in over-time,
find it easy to help your co-workers,
and you’ll have a tremendous desire to excel and exceed everyone else’s expectations.

So the keys to turning your bad place into a great place?

Easy. Solve problems for others. Work at it as if it is your great place, and try to make others to prosper. Your main key is Ephesians 6:8; any good you do for others, God will do back for you in greater measure!

…even if only for a few days, go to another place and see how others live and work. It might give you a fresh perspective on your own place in life.

I trust you are enjoying the blessings of summer. May you get just the right amount of rain, and the right amount of sunshine, and the grace to appreciate both.

I’ll keep this part short, because the feature has grown longer today.

Just a personal note, Dad and I are driving to Winnipeg this weekend.

Despite Dad’s age (89), weight (200 lbs), diabetes, and arthritic knees, and that a lot of news and complicated concepts go over his head, he can still do many things. It makes him feel important that my brother has asked Dad to come and build them a swing like he used to build a lot a few decades back. I’m sure he can do it too!