Get More Clients Online

Source for syndicating articles

Q:  Can you recommend a source for syndicating my articles. I am a run a web design business.

Nicole

A:  Hi Nicole--

I'm happy to!  The service I use to syndicate my articles is www.GetMoreClientsArticles.com, which costs $37/month as of this writing.  This service will get articles out to thousands of article banks and publishers.  I've been using them since 2005 and can say without any reservations that this service is single-handedly responsible for my success.  My articles have appeared in print, in highly trafficked blogs and website, and in ezines with large numbers of subscribers. 

They limit you to 8 articles per month, but I've found that this is all I have needed to get traffic back to my site, and quite frankly, I'd have difficulty writing a larger number of high quality articles.

If you want to offer this to your clients, they'll need to purchase their own account.  You won't be able to run their articles through your account, as each account is limited to one author.

Here's another post I've made about how to successfully write articles that you might find useful:

How to Write Articles That Will Increase Traffic to Your Website

And, if you want to fully understand how I use article marketing to my advantage, check out my teleclass recording, Article Marketing 101: How to Drive Droves of Clients to Your Website Audio Download and Transcript.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com. 

Managing Social Networking

Q:  Isn't it overwhelming to manage all the social media outlets? I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and I blog several times a week. How do we manage all of this and do it effectively in order to generate traffic and business? I know this is a very broad question, but I have a few different websites and am getting overwhelmed and I think, spread too thin. Any ideas?

Margie

A:  Hi Margie--

It is very easy to get overwhelmed quickly with social networking.  Here are a few key points that might help you:

1. Pick 1-2 platforms that your target market uses. So many business owners spread themselves too thin by participating in several social networking sites. I've discovered that you could easily devote your entire day to this endeavor and never accomplish anything else. Pick the best platform that will get you in front of your target market and stick to it.

Here's how to find your target market on Twitter and Facebook:

Social Networking: 7 Strategies to Finding Your Target Market on Twitter

Social Networking: 10 Steps to Finding Your Target Market in Facebook

2. Work the platform. No marketing strategy will succeed unless you pay attention to it. In order to successfully use social networking, you need to work your platform every single day. Ideally, this means devoting 30 minutes each day on activities like seeking new friends/connections/, commenting on other people's profiles, updating your own profile, and notifying your connections about your current activities.

Here are some ideas to help you with your status updates.  This article was written with Twitter in mind, but the ideas will work for any social networking platform:

10 Secrets to Using Twitter to Attract More Followers and Get More Clients

3.  Use tools for automation and management.  My two fav tools at the moment that help me stay on top of social networking are Seesmic Desktop, , and Nutshell Mail.

4. Be patient. Rome wasn't built in a day, and you won't see results of your efforts in a day, either. This is a slow and steady process, much the same way that face-to-face networking is. You've got to be out there building relationships and helping others before you're going to see your social networking goals realized.

For more detailed tutorials, downloadable audio, and how-to articles to implement any of these strategies, consider a membership to OnlineBizU.com.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

Help for in-home tutoring business

Q: I have a one-on-one in-home tutoring business and I would like to attract more clients. What are your recommended strategies?

Sina

A:  Hi Sina:

1.  Website. You don't say whether you have a web site, nor whether it is parents hiring you for their children or if you work with college students.  Regardless of your customer base, you should invest in a web site, as both types of customers will look for help online.  I'd actually start with a blogsite, rather than a web site.  You can read more about those in my article, 7 Reasons Blogsites Attract More Visitors and Help You Get More Clients Online.  You'll want to tailor your language on your site to the appropriate target market.

2.  Email marketing system.  You need to purchase an email marketing service to help you capture the names and email addresses of your visitors in an opt-in box.  I use and recommend GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com.  Then, you can begin to market to these prospects.

3.  Client attraction device.  You need to offer an ethical bribe, what I call a client attraction device, that is appealing enough to your target market that they will gladly part with their name and email address to get what it is you're offering.

4.  Followup autoresponders.  Create 2-5 followup autoresponders that go out over the next few weeks to the prospects who have signed up for your list and offer them more resources that you have available or begin to upsell them to your products and services.

5.  Stay-in-touch strategy.  In order to keep you top-of-mind with the prospects on your list, you need to "reach out and touch them" regularly via a regular email newsletter (weekly is best) or regular blogging (at least 3 times per week).

6.  Free valuable content.  Put the articles that you write for your ezine or blog on your site to help your visitors and prospects realize that you know what you're talking about and are an expert.

7. Local search marketing.  Being able to be found by local customers is important regardless of your location.  I'm not sure if you live in the U.S. or elsewhere, but if it's outside the U.S., you still may be able to glean some valuable tips on local search from this article: 7 Strategies to Drive Local Traffic to Your Website.

For more detailed tutorials, downloadable audio, and how-to articles to implement any of these strategies, consider a membership to OnlineBizU.com.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

What is PHP and website loading?

Q:  What is php and website loading?
Ravi

A:  Hi Ravi.  PHP is a web site programming language to create dynamic web pages.  I don't know much more about it, since I'm not a programmer, but you can read more about it here in Wikipedia.

In terms of website loading, I'm assuming you are referring to the time it takes a website to show up in your browser.  Generally, faster is better, as you don't want your visitors to lose interest as they're waiting for your site to load and then they leave and go to another site.

Here's a great tool to use to analyze your site's download speed, Web Page Analyzer.  They will also make recommendations on what you can do to your site to increase the download speed.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

Should I buy an email list?

Q:  Can you obtain clean/opt-in email addresses for a targeted zip code from reputable provider, if any?
Ashok

A:  Hi Ashok!  Never, ever, ever buy email addresses from anyone for anything.  There's no such thing as clean or opt-in email addresses.  If the person who owns the email address did not specifically give his/her permission to be on your list, then it's spam. Period.  And trust me, if someone is annoyed enough at you for "spamming" him, he can make you life an utter hell by telling your domain host, your web host, and your ISP that you're a spammer.  If the only "proof" that you have that this person requested to be on your list is from a list that you purchased, that will not serve as proof at all, and  your registrar, ISP, and web host can shut you down and make you go out of business.

The best way to build a list is to have an opt-in form on your own site and use an email marketing program (I like www.GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com) to help you capture these opt-ins.  Here's an article from my blog that will also help build your list:  15 Proven Strategies to Grow Your List. 

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

How do I convert ebooks to audio?

Where can I obtain low cost software to convert my ebook to audio?
Ash

Hi Ash--

I'm not aware of any way to directly convert an ebook to audio without you (or voice talent that you hire) reading it into an audio recording program.

However, there are two free audio recording programs available for download:

1.  Audacity is sound recording software for Windows-based computers.  You can also use this to edit your audios

2.  Garageband is a software application that allows users to create music or podcasts developed for Mac computers and is included in all shipments of iLife.

And, if it helps to upload the text of your ebook into a teleprompter for easier reading for recording, you can download one free of charge here.

Lastly, if you need to store your audio and embed a player for the audio into a webpage, you can do that from www.GetMoreClientsAudio.com.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

Do I really need an email marketing program?

Q:  Why use an e-mail marketing system instead of just sending out e-mails to your clients?

Daisy Curtis

A:  Great question, Daisy!  There are numerous reasons:

1.  Excessive amounts of email sent in one day from your personal email account may result in you being labeled a spammer and blocked from sending any emails at all and/or loss of your ISP account.  Most ISPs won't disclose what is "excessive."  However, when you breach those limits, they typically don't give you a second chance and you have to find another ISP.  With an email marketing program,  the only limits you face are based on the nature of the package your purchase.

2.  List management.  When you send emails from your email program (Outlook, Thunderbird, etc.) the people on your list don't have the option of automatically opting-out of receiving emails or changing their email address.  Instead, they have to email you to do that manually.  This is a PITA for both you and your recipient because it takes extra time on both ends to make that happen.  With an email marketing program, typically an "unsubscribe" or "update" link is automatically appended to the bottom of each broadcast so that a recipient can opt-out/update account details through the email marketing service interface.

3.  Blocked emails.  Most email marketing services work diligently with major ISPs and spam-blocking services to ensure that their email is always considered spam-free and gets through to the recipients without a problem.  However, unless you want another full-time job <g>, you probably don't have the resources or the time to do that yourself.  Buy the services of a reputable email marketing program to make sure that your recipients always get your email.

4.  Determining your open rate. When you send out emails through your email program, you have no idea who or how many people actually got and opened the email or clicked on any of the links inside.  As you start tracking the success of email promotions and broadcasts, these figures become more and more important as you test new subject lines and content.  A reputable email marketing program lets you track stats like these, and more.

5.  Legal protection.  It's so easy now for a disgruntled recipient to label you a spammer and report you to your ISP, your web host, and your domain registrar, which may result in the loss of your domain, your hosting account, and your ISP.  A former client had this happen to him and experienced a 3-month loss of business while he tried to rectify this situation and regain use of his domain name so that he could republish his web site.  When you use a reputable email marketing system and set your list to double opt-in, you have a greater degree of protection against these kinds of losses because most email marketing programs track the time. date, and IP address of anyone confirming an opt-in to your email list.  Therefore, if someone claims "I didn't subscribe to your list," you can tell him/her all the details of when they did opt into your list.

The email marketing service I use and can highly recommend is GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com for all of my email marketing.  There are others that are less expensive, but I know how hard aWeber works to help its clients maintain list integrity and email deliverability.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

Internet Marketing for Authors

Q:  For the long term I want to provide UK authors and publishers with a variety of internet promotional services.  At present I am setting up a number of niche book-related websites.  How do I build my number of visitors to these sites?

Paul Mason
SuperBiz.co.uk

Hi Paul--

Rather than setting up a number of niche book-related websites, all of which will take a great deal of time to promote, I would suggest that you pick a target market and put all of your efforts into promoting one site to one target market, i.e. internet marketing for UK non-fiction authors, for example. Then, once you have success in that target market, use the same strategy to promote yourself to other target markets.

Traffic generation for this kind of site follows the same formula that I've given many times before:

1.  Sign up with an email marketing service (I use GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com).

2.  Create a client attraction device to get visitors to sign up to be on your list.

3.  Stay in regular touch with your visitors via an ezine and a blog.

4.  Take the articles you have created for your ezine and blog and get them on article directories.  I use GetMoreClientsArticles.com for this.

5.  Add these articles to your web site and repurpose your articles into press releases, social networking posts, podcasts, videos, teleclasses, etc.

6.  If you don't yet have a web site, develop a basic blogsite that speaks to your target market by explaining the benefits of working with you or hiring you.

7.  Become active on 1-2 social networking sites frequented by your target market and post updates with relevant info that they can use.

8.  Once you have enough articles written, start to repurpose these article into info products that you can sell.

For more detailed tutorials, downloadable audio, and how-to articles to implement any of these strategies, consider a membership to OnlineBizU.com.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

How to Get 95% of My Clients Online

Q:  Exactly what do I need to have on my website (including links to blogs etc.) to be able to function as my 95% marketing machine. List the things: autoresponder, PracticePaySolutions, etc. whatever it is.
Diane DePould

A:  Hi Diane--

Here's what you need on your website to help you get 95% of your clients from Internet marketing:

1.  Understanding of your target market.  Do you have a target market profile written?  If you know to whom you're writing when you create marketing content, marketing becomes so much easier, and members of your target market will readily respond when you write to them, as they will readily identify themselves.

2.  Email marketing system.  You need to purchase an email marketing service to help you capture the names and email addresses of your visitors in an opt-in box.  I use and recommend GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com.

3.  Client attraction device.  You need to have an ethical bribe, what I call a client attraction device, that is appealing enough to your target market that they will gladly part with their name and email address to get what it is you're offering.

4.  Followup autoresponders.  Create 2-5 followup autoresponders that go out over the next few weeks to the prospects who have signed up for your list and offer them more resources that you have available or begin to upsell them to your products and services.

5.  Stay-in-touch strategy.  In order to keep you top-of-mind with the prospects on your list, you need to "reach out and touch them" regularly via a regular email newsletter (weekly is best) or regular blogging (at least 3 times per week).

6.  Free valuable content.  Put the articles that you write on your site to help your visitors and prospects realize that you know what you're talking about and are an expert.

7. Traffic generation strategy.  I use article marketing and syndicate and publish all the articles I write to GetMoreClientsArticles.com, which helps me drive traffic back to my site.

For more detailed tutorials, downloadable audio, and how-to articles to implement any of these strategies, consider a membership to OnlineBizU.com.

Got an Internet Marketing question?  Ask it here: AskDonnaGunter.com.

Chameleon Headsets, Part 2

I posted recently on this blog about buying a Chameleon headset.  My tip then appeared in a recent edition of SpeakerNet News and I got several questions about which model I purchased.

I purchased the Model 2002 binaural headset.  You have to pick the kind of cord (what the headset will connect to) and I chose the 1102 cord, which is the one connecting to a 2.5 mm headset jack found in my cordless phone.  I also picked up some replacement foam ear pads and wind screen pads for the microphone of the headset.  Lastly, in order to have a mute feature on the headset, I purchased the mute inline switch 1201, which was a snap to connect to the cord of my headset.

If you prefer only one earpiece, you can purchase the monaural headset from this same vendor.

I received great customer support from Adam at Ear2EarHeadsets.com, so if you purchase one of their headsets, tell them that Donna Gunter sent you. :)