Bija Life & Business Coaching and Development

Bija Coaching For Your Business & Life Success 

Creative Marketing For Effective Use Of Your Advertising Dollars

How many of you are looking for marketing or want new customers? How many of you do both online and offline sales? Do you consider yourself to be active in networking and referring business to others you meet? Do you feel you use your advertising dollars for the best placed ads?

I think that often the problem is finding the right marketing venue that works for your business. There are so many websites, magazines and newsletters out there that it can be overwhelming to someone new in business and it can be very frustrating even sometimes for those of us that have been in business for quite some time.

Many lower level executives think the advertising/marketing industry holds a poor grasp of the business issues confronting organizations such as theirs, according to the latest study from Forbes.com and Euro RSCG Worldwide. Most of the 9,000 senior executives polled agreed that advertising is an important driver of corporate success. In fact, 72
percent think advertising and marketing can have a substantial influence over the way the market perceives their company; while 62 percent feel their advertising and marketing programs have a substantial impact on sales. But when it comes to effectiveness, the
respondents were split -- about 42 percent felt that "the advertising industry seems to have a poor grasp of the business issues confronting organizations like mine", while just under 40 percent think "external advertising and marketing services bring a valuable perspective to our advertising and marketing issues."

You have to remember that there are 812,000,000(!) human beings are now online worldwide (Internet World Stats, September 2004) and so online marketing is something that can be really quite confusing.

Electronic advertising is one of the biggest gaining areas that large and small companies are using today. It's a very important feature for any company if it's used correctly. An
effective Web Marketing Campaign that would bring the rate of return visitors up, and house sales at an increase. Emitations.com, was looking to efficiently market new products and promotions to her loyal, yet demanding customer base. To appeal to these demanding consumers, she needed a convenient and appropriate communication
vehicle. Emitations.com now publishes a weekly newsletter to communicate with customers and prospects.

The newsletters that I am talking about are a great improvement from the text-based emails that were individually prepared and emailed, as they are now using a great HTML software program to manage their campaigns. Sometimes creating these emails and managing the mailing lists are too time consuming and you don't get the professional look that you want as well. If you can't look as professional then why bother, right?

But if you use your tools correctly - you can keep your customers coming back for specials, educational benefits and so much more. Also you don't have to just build your email list online. If you are talking to someone offline why not ask them if they'd like to get your email newsletters. As long as you always provide them with an out, if they
say yes you could turn them into a customer. Email marketing is one of the lowest cost advertising tools you can use today.

Another great tool is networking with others. Networking is on of the biggest keys to the puzzle of business. Network can be a noun or a verb. It can be a group of people that exchange information or the act of exchanging information, contacts and experiences with others for a professional or social purpose.

Our American society does not encourage individuality as a general rule, and there for it does not teach us how to network. If you were to ask ten different people what networking is - you may get as many as ten different answers. One person's definition of networking probably depends upon their use of this important personal and professional activity or lack of use as I’ve seen more often. Networking is about making new friends, finding a new job, developing your current career, exploring new career options, obtaining referrals or sales leads, or simply to broaden your professional horizons, as it is important to focus on networking as an exchange of information, contacts or experience.

In any industry or career level networking helps you make connections in a personal way and build relationships of support and respect to discover and create mutual benefits. It is a skill set no serious professional businessman or women of the 21st Century can be without. The keys to networking are to make sure you introduce yourself, have a purpose for networking, make it easy for others to find you/your business, and of course when appropriate exchange business information and be prepared. Many people jump right to exchanging business information. If you were looking for a top-notch dentist or surgeon where would you look? Would you trust the testimony of a good friend, or the size of a phone book ad? To be able to sell new clients, you must be able to benefit from current clients. To be able to get referrals you must be able to make the connections needed to get the referrals. If you do not engage your networking community – you’ll never be able to gain their support. If you don’t think you can network with others effectively – then you should rethink starting a business for yourself. Poor networking can ruin your reputation.

Your reputation is your business credit. Your networking partners are your business equity. When you have great equity in your home and you need home improvements it is always much easier to get a loan. When you need business – and you have great business equity in your networking community – it is easy to fill the time slots, to sale the orders, to raise the level of your business success.

Good networking partners will provide you with referral clients because of the equity you’ve built with them through time. These supports will be a strong foundation to increase the value of your business. But never forget to send your gratitude to anyone and everyone that you network effectively with, in writing. Personal Communication is the single biggest strategy in building your business. One thank-you is worth a mint. When you get a referral, when a client allows you to use them for a testimonial, remember that in order to continue to grow your business equity you will need to communicate to them the gratitude.

Learn to improvise and improve. When capital is low, it’s the smart business owner that uses a variety of plans to hold down marketing costs. Share newsletter space with great partner companies. Trade links with other websites that offer services or products that work well with your overall structure, not just to trade links. A good online friend may not be a great marketing partner. Offer great “freebies” on your website to keep your visitor’s coming back. Always offer an opt-in email for news and updates and use this as an effective low-cost advertising tool. Offer incentives to current and prior customers to keep them coming back. Learn to focus on your target market, and only advertise where you’ll hit the bull’s-eye. When in doubt, follow your gut instinct.

© 2005 BIJA Coaching

About The Author - Barbara Lindahl-Christensen is the owner of BIJA Coaching. A life and business coach she assists people in making successful changes in their lives, and develop a balanced rhythm. Barbara has been a freelance website developer for eight years, and can help you to get your business online with many different solutions, as well as she can assist you in creating successful marketing strategies.

Barbara Lindahl-Christensen is a founding member of the IAC. As a Life and Business Developer and Marketing Guru, BIJA helps clients from all walks of life to create successful life and business paths. BIJA offers web design, coaching, domain registration, printing and so much more to bring you success. Visit BIJA at http://www.bijacoaching.com

For a Free Guide to Marketing Your Online Business – send a blank email to onlineguide@bijagroup.com

Copying of Contents, in whole or in part, is permitted provided that author by-lines are kept intact and unchanged. Hyperlinks and/or URLs provided by authors must remain active.

Affliate Marketing to bring your website more revenue

Affilate Marketing can sometimes bring you more money that you think. When my office was down while I was moving, I still had a check come in for my business. Thank you Affilate Marketing. One of the biggest things you need to think of when looking at what does your website offer your clients. If you sale candles perhaps you would want to sign up with an affilate that sales home decor. You also have to understand that if you don't have a good marketing plan to get people to your website - the affilate program will not work for you.

There are a ton of Affilate Programs out there - even the big bad Walmart has one now. If you are a PrePaid Legal distributor you could add Legalzoom.com as an affilate... and offer your clients a way to create their own legal documents. Affilate Marketing is a win-win situation if used properly. You want to make sure that your surfer is converted into a sale one way or another.

One big problem out there right now is actually Spyware. Many affilates are losing up to 40% of their revenue to illegitimate affilates that entice users to download free software in exchange for being served advertising. Once loaded onto your desktop - these free application often replace ads, redirect links and disable existing browser cookies. So when you sign up for these companies that are going to get "you" advertising - they may also be taking your revenue.

So if your interesed in Affilate Marketing thing about your business as a growing tree. You have all of these branches - advertising, design, technology, products, costs, and anything you can do to balance out the outgoing money to keep your tree growing is the trick. This is just one way.

Barbara
FFN Co-leader

Twelve Tips for Successful Opt-in E-mail Newsletters ~An Opt-In E-newsletter is Quick, Personal, and Inexpensive

Do you keep in touch with your current and previous clients? What about those prospects you've been meaning to contact? Do you feel a little awkward calling them “cold”?

Having your own opt-in permission-based electronic newsletter might be the answer you're looking for.

An opt-in e-newsletter is one of the most effective marketing tools you can use, because it is quick, personal, and inexpensive. Many small businesses are using e-mail newsletters to introduce themselves to new customers and to communicate with existing ones. By sending useful information on a regular basis, you can maintain constant contact without being annoying. In addition, an e-mail newsletter can enhance your credibility and increase sales.

Below are 12 tips for running a successful e-mail newsletter campaign.

1. Never purchase, trade, or borrow an e-mail list. This is the cardinal rule of e-mail marketing. Sending e-mail to someone who has not specifically requested to receive your mailings (opted-in) is almost always regarded as “spam.”

2. Make signing up and unsubscribing easy and visible. Put your form, or a link to your form, on your home page. Or, ask customers if they would like to sign up when you speak with them. You may only want to ask subscribers for their e-mail address, first name, last name, and perhaps one or two other questions to target your mailings, such as their interests.

3. Use double opt-in registration. There are two standard methods for online registration: single and double opt-in. With single opt-in, a subscriber enters his or her e-mail address and is then automatically registered. Double opt-in is the preferred method for e-mail newsletter subscriptions because it requires confirmation.

4. Link to your privacy policy. Place a link to your privacy policy near your list sign-up form. This policy should describe how you handle the information you collect and how people can contact you in case they have any concerns or questions.

5. Send a "Welcome" message to each new subscriber. Once someone subscribes, send him or her a welcome message immediately. Include a description of what they will receive, how frequently they will receive it, and how they can unsubscribe.

6. Keep accurate sign-up records. Sometimes, you or your Internet service provider will get a spam complaint from one of your members who forgot that he or she subscribed to your list. Keep accurate subscription records, including the web site address from which members signed up and the date.

7. Ask your members to opt-in again if you are using an older list. If you have not sent a mailing to your subscribers for a while, ask them if they want to continue receiving your messages. Request that they opt-in to indicate they want to stay on your list by sending you an e-mail, clicking a link, or visiting a web page.

8. Remind people that they subscribed. At the top of your messages, include a standard header each time you send a mailing. A short note such as, “Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter. Here is our latest issue”, can make a big difference in reminding your subscribers that you are sending them something that they requested.

9. Avoid certain terms in your subject line and message text. Don’t use misleading subject lines. If your subject line contains words or terms that are frequently used by spammers, there is a good chance people will delete your message without reading it and/or file a spam complaint.

10. Include your physical address and phone number. Put your phone number and postal mailing address in your message. This gives your readers an opportunity to contact you by phone to place an order or inquire about your services. New federal legislation requires physical addresses on commercial e-mail messages.

11. Send your mailings regularly. Unless you keep in touch with your subscribers frequently, they may forget they signed up to receive your mailings. By sticking to a schedule, your subscribers begin to anticipate your messages.

12. Reply promptly to each inquiry or spam complaint. When and if you receive an inquiry or a spam complaint, respond to it as soon as possible. For spam complaints, include that persons’ subscription information with your response.

Following these simple suggestions will help you retain your subscriber base, which is fundamental for a thriving electronic newsletter or outreach campaign. HBM

Copyright 2004 by Raj Khera, MailerMailer LLC

Try BIJA's Free Trial for your Newsletter! Go to http://www.agirldesign.com/webmarketing.htm and click on the "Sign Up Today For Free".

Bija Life & Business Coaching and Development

Bija Coaching For Your Business & Life Success 

Building Better Website Conversion

What happens when email recipients click on a link in your campaign? Do you have a website that works as hard as your email copy to convert clicks and visitors to customers?

An effective email marketing campaign is a powerful tool to drive additional traffic to your website. Establishing your credibility as an expert, highlighting your great prices and value, etc. can all be accomplished via email, and can create a click. However, many companies fall short once that click is made.

The idea, surely, is to encourage the site visitor to take some further action. Measuring the number of those 'actions' is your 'conversion rate'.

The foundation of your strategy to convert website visitors to leads/sales should be rooted in two key elements: your specific goals, and your understanding of the target audience.

It's funny, but many of the companies I talk to have developed a website for no real purpose. Sure, at the time there was some sort of rationale - "you need one these days, don't you?" or "our competition has one, so we must keep up". Unfortunately these reasons provide no guideline for the creation of a site. Nor do they contain any criteria for measuring success.

To compound the problem, they give no real consideration to the needs, desires, and characteristics of their target audience. In my opinion, this has led to the plethora of un-navigable, poor content, zero conversion websites that seems to be the standard for corporate America. Harsh? Maybe. But if you fall into this category, you'd better do something about it ASAP because the web is here to stay.
So what do you do?

First, I'd suggest that you carefully consider and write down your specific goals (And I know Jessie loves Goals!) for your website. These should be written remembering that your site is a corporate resource that must provide an ROI, just like any other corporate resource. To simplify matters, there are 3 common goals that you might want to consider:

* To generate leads
* To generate on-line sales
* To generate qualified referrals

Now stop for a moment. Was your current site built based on any of these objectives? How is it performing? (Just FYI, the typical (poor performing) website has a 1-3% conversion rate of visits to action, whereas successful sites convert 20- 30% of their traffic.)
Typical secondary goals include:

* Building credibility
* Establishing expertise within a certain industry
* Projecting a credible image
* Building your database of newsletter, or other, email subscribers

You can also use the Web to provide cost effective customer service (through the use of knowledge bases), create communities (such as chat rooms and forums), and as a delivery method for what used to be printed material (say goodbye to Kinko's).

With a clear understanding of your primary and secondary goals, you are ready to consider what you know of your target audience. Consider demographic information - sex, age, etc. But also think about their needs and desires. You'll use this information to craft emotional calls-to-action, and provide compelling offers.

Hopefully, your target audience is somewhat homogenous. This leads to the creation of a highly targeting (and highly converting) website. If your target group is diverse, you might want to consider creating multiple websites - especially if you have different products that attract different groups. At first glance, this option might seem cost-prohibitive, but we have found that the difference between a 3% conversion rate, and a 25% conversion rate can often justify the extra expense of creating multiple sites, and provides a return-on-investment after just a few months.

With a well-understood target audience, you can go about creating a look and feel, messaging, calls-to- action, and offers that are comfortable and compelling.

In part two of this article, we'll discuss:

* Structuring your site for maximum conversion
* Writing effective copy
* Creating compelling offers and calls to action
* Improving your graphic design to create affinity and credibility

This incredible information comes from Mat Greenfield, who is the founder and CEO of Faster Marketing, a consulting firm that specializes in developing high-conversion websites.

Let me help to get your email marketing campaign up and running for free! Just click on this link - Bija Email Marketing -
to create & send eye-catching email campaigns in minutes! You'll have a FREE account for your business for 60 days with up to 100 emails! Give it a try. FREE can be fun, and there are no credit cards required to sign up.

Also if you visit my web design and development site - A Girl Design - you can sign up on our Web Marketing Page to get our Free Resources for Marketing Your Website!

And when you visit Bija Coaching - Bija Coaching - check out our Small Business Support Links to get your free meta tags for your website and much more. There is a lot going on with Bija!

Barbara Lindahl-Christensen - BIJA
Your Business Support Soul-utions!

Bija Coaching For Your Business & Life Success 

The Diva Journey

As you sit and think about the path that you have been sent on in this life, how do you see it? Are you walking with all of your friends and your dog? Are you walking alone, in silence? Are you able to walk at all? Or are you just standing there wondering where this path will lead you to, not willing to take the chance to walk at all?

Many of us seem to be unwilling in life to journey down the path set in front of us. Yet, that doesn’t seem to stop us from being a part of the journey. Each day still comes forth. Each year passes with the seasons changing from Winter onto Spring, from Spring onto Summer, from Summer onto Fall and then once again turning back to the Winter again. So whether or not you take active participation in this journey, you are a part of this path.

You've been told the only way to achieve success, is to believe in yourself. Now I want to show you that the real key to success is to believe it others. To access the ability to see the full cycle and that by changing your direction - can offer you more happiness, more success, more health and a life that will be remembered!

The ONE book you NEED to succeed took 1,000 of years to be able to be published...

a 4 year journey of my own to delve into the possibilities ...

Six months to write and the courage to share the secrets with you!

The wealthiest person in the world, without internal substance, is still lacking. Still living with a void in their life. Through exercises, and working through step by step pieces of the puzzle, you can find the torch to light your path in the darkest hours. Together in this book we will work on creating a better world, a better universe, a better life path for all of us.

Take The Diva Journey!

The beautifully written, much-needed guide by Barbara Lindahl-Christensen

"...what a fantastic book! I felt so empowered and partnered in the path that it was hard to put it down -- even though I knew that it was a journey, I wanted it to be super speed!!!", V.C.

Are you ready to take the Journey?

The life that you are living, the body, mind heart and soul you now enjoy -- truly it is NOTHING in comparison to what you could have if you had heard the stories, read the instructions and used the guide to true living!

One book will change everything you do for the rest of your life ... and change your world forever!
"The Diva Journey" is out in soft bound for purchase online or via phone order.

To order online - click here