Knowing how to make a website is essential if you want to make a website, either for business or just for fun. There are many sites online that will explain to you how to do so, but few of them offer a good solution for a beginner. They all seem to need some form of pre-knowledge of many of the factors involved, and they make it look a lot easier than it actually is.

Sure, anybody can create a website that looks passable, but how do you make a website work for you to make money or to get visitors? These are the two reasons for anybody making a website. No matter who you are, or what the site is to be used for, it will meet one of these two criteria.

First it must get visitors: otherwise there is no point in having one. Even if you just want the site to run your hobby, or keep in contact with your family (better with Facebook!), people have to visit. If you also want to make money from it, then you still need visitors, but you have to persuade them to buy. That means keeping in touch with them: you have to collect the names and email addresses of your visitors and then keep in touch with them, making them special offers, providing information, until they eventually buy.

It takes the average person 7 – 8 exposures to your product before they decide to buy it. That’s what advertising is all about: to get these exposures until the prospect finally makes a purchase. However, back to the website.

Most sites that show you how to make a website don’t tell you that once you create a website you have to make it work. It’s like buying a car. You don’t just buy a car, sit in it, and it takes you to where you want to go like a cab does. You have to learn how to drive it. Once you have learned, then you can drive it. However a website is not like that even. Why Not? Because it doesn’t come with all the bits and pieces needed to make it work. These are extras!

Here are the things you need to make your website work to make money for you:

A Web Host

The host provides you with the web space for your site. That’s just like a large directory on which you can place your files, such as your web pages, graphics files, products and so on. Your host also provides the means by which you can connect to the World Wide Web.

A Domain Name

Your domain name is the name of your website: the bit that comes after http://www. You need it before you can create a website and put it on the web. You can choose from those still available, and then register them with the DNS (Domain Name Service). Your domain name will cost you around $10 a year – you never own it, you just hire it with first refusal every year, though you can pay for it for some years in advance. You will also need keyword software to enable you to choose the best domain name for your site.

Site Building Software

You will need an HTML text editor. HTML is the language used to make a website what it is, and most HTML editors offer wysiwyg functionality, so you don’t have to know HTML, and just type in what you want. However, if you want to link to other pages on your site or to other websites, or if you want to add graphics and anything else other than plain text, you will need to know some HTML.

Email Service

You will need an eMail service with your site. Nobody will buy from you if you are using a free eMail service to run your website!

Autoresponders

Unless you want to be writing and sending eMails manually all your life you will need software that can do it for you. An autoresponder can send an email to people requesting information, take orders, deliver orders for electronically deliverable goods, send invoices and receipts, thank you notes and acknowledgements, and also parts of weekly or monthly courses you might provide to your subscribers, who will hopefully become customers.

Shopping Cart

If you are selling goods, even eBooks or software, you will have to provide a means for a customer to order them. You will also need a product catalogue if you sell more than one item.

Payment Processor

You will require a means of accepting credit and debit card payments. If you can’t do that, then shut up shop now and don’t even start.

Traffic Analysis

You will need software to analyze your traffic and find out what your most popular pages are, what keywords bring most visitors and what pages most visitors leave from without buying. You can them improve these pages to keep visitors on your website where you want them.

Other Software

Other software or tasks needed to create a website that works properly include Search Engine Optimization, to make sure your web pages are listed as high as possible on Google and other search engines and once you become more advanced, audio and video software to jazz up your website, graphics software, a blog to market your website and a lot more.

All of these are essentials that you will have to purchase and will have to learn how to use when you set out to create a website. It is possible to get free versions with your cheaper websites and hosting services, but some of these can lack the functionality to make them look really professional and persuade people to buy from you or continue to visit your site.

If that all frightens you then you are right to be scared, because you are going to have to learn how to use them all. However, there is an answer that can allow you to avoid all these, because there are systems online that offer you a website with all of these extras integrated with it. Some are truly integrated with the site so that all you need do is to add the text, while others offer all of these components for you to use to make a website, but you have to learn how each is used separately.

While the latter offers you more latitude in your website design and functionality, the former allows you to create a website from scratch without knowing the first thing about the subject. With these, you can make a website by choosing templates and filling in the blanks. A bit like painting by numbers really!

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Online Business Coach and Internet Marketing Strategist Gabor Olah helps baby boomers create profitable online businesses that they love. Would you like to learn the specific Internet marketing strategies that get results? Discover how to increase your visibility and get found online by claiming your FREE gift, $1K A Day Formula, at ==> $1Kadayformula.com

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Don’t think email marketing is now too hard as more autoresponders insist on double opt in. You can still market effectively to your customers only you hve to be a bir more creative.

Personally, I welcome email marketing becoming harder because the more effort that has to be put in will make those ‘lazy’ or wannabes simply drop out. Into that gap the inventive professional approach to email marketing will thrive.

I want to show you the impact of the new rules and how to deal with them and let’s start with the double opt in.

If you use any of the major shopping cart providers like 1shoppingcart (ISC), they now have, mandatory double opt in and they did this because of being blacklisted by SPAMHaus organisation. This was caused by one selfish, unethical person using ISC’s ‘Tell a Friend’ script to send out thousands of Spam messages. The consequence was that email sent via 1SC servers was being classified as Spam by many ISP’s. 1SC agreed to make all email sign ups double opt in so as overcome this problem. What does this mean to you?

Double opt in means that anyone joining your list is sent an email asking them to confirm that it really was them that signed up and they want to join. This method produces a better and more responsive list BUT reduces the numbers. Take your pick because there are a few different reasons for this, including forgetting to confirm, changing their mind, or not really understanding what they are being asked to do. What can you do?

I am a firm believer in telling your customers and prospects EXACTLY what to do. On my website I have a video of me telling people exactly how to confirm that they want to subscribe to our lists. The video allows me to actually show them what to do, and how to do it and anyone signing up to my list is directed to a web page where I show them the exact email they’ll receive and how to click on the link.

This is simple…but very powerful and by using it on several of my lists I have achieved a confirmation rate of over 90% – and that’s virtually unheard of.

5 key tactics to use now Your aim is to get your email through and read by your customers and prospects. Yes it may be getting harder, but these tactics will help you win out over your competitors:

1) Brand your emails so they stand out from the crowd Give your emails a brand name or title so as soon as people see that name they know who it’s from and what to expect.

For example, one list I have with my partner Neil Travers is the Junior Soccer Coach Newsletter ‘Tip of the Week’. Now that doesn’t really have impact so we went to ‘Junior Soccer Coach – Inside Tactics’ and further refined it to ‘Inside Tactics’ and that is now our ‘brand’ name for the free tip of the week.

2) Send out a reminder for all of your emails. Your first email is your regular email and you must follow up with another one that briefly reminds them of what you have just sent or to direct them to read a copy online or on your Blog.

That second email must give them a REASON to go and find/read your earlier email. How? Give them a teaser of the information your newsletter contained, maybe a free gift or how it can help them…use the biggest benefit.

3) Always, always, run your messages through a SPAM checker It’s essential because it will tell you if your email is likely to be classified as spam or not. If it is spam, then you will know which words you need to change.

4) Your subscribers need to be kept in touch with regularly. I receive better responses to my promotions when I am regularly emailing people in that niche.

Coincidence? No, because more contact with your list means you are building a relationship with them, and so they are much more likely to buy from you.

5) Build smaller targeted lists Smaller, targeted, lists are by far more responsive to you and your offers. I would rather have 250 highly focused names on a specific topic than 5000 names on a generic one.

I want people who are positively interested in my specific niche. Your first sub list should be of buyers, people who have already bought from you, and then people who have bought from you more than once. Build sub lists of topics within your particular niche, as your next step.

For example; in our football newsletter we might ask subscribers to email us for more information about a specific topic such as under 7’s or girls football. We would add these people to a sub list with its own autoresponder series. Then target these prospects with specific offers relating to their enquiry.

Use these 5 tips to help you make your email marketing more effective, and to ensure it gets through to your customers and prospects.

Is Email Marketing Dead? I have been told that since 2004 and I not only don’t believe it, I have proof that it is one of the most effective marketing tools you can use. Email is here to stay and I use it on a daily basis for:

• Keeping in touch with clients and customers
• Sending out information updates
• Providing a monthly ezine
• Mini courses
• Eclasses
• Tips
• Sales promotions
• Recommendations
• Autoresponders
• And more

Does it still work? Well, I am in regular contact once a month with over 20,000 people just by email and that enabled me to sell out in just 48 hours a webinar I set up. Want more? Well in just 30 minutes I wrote an email that brought in 42 sales in the first 36 hours for a Chinese cooking ebook. Yes, it works! That certainly proves to me that email is still a powerful sales tool, but in a more competitive market you need to have an edge.

Here are 6 tips you can use to increase the power of your email marketing.

1. Ask your subscribers to filter your email. I always ask people to filter my email into a special folder for email they want to keep; or ask them to apply a color filter so when my email arrives it changes color and stands out. Make sure you tell them how to filter it in both your thank you and first email and give details for the most popular email programmes.
2. Send out a ‘Gentle Nudge’ Email People get lots of emails, and there is a chance yours will get lost in their spam filter. You can avoid this by putting your message or ezine on your website so people can view it there. It’s goo idea to also ‘remind’ your list of a new posting on your website as they may not have got, or deleted, your original email.
3. Respond to confirmation requests If you have signed up to any newsletter or ezine you always get asked to confirm you want to receive it and are a genuinely ‘live’ person. This avoids junk mail reaching you, and you can turn this to your business advantage. I always reply to confirmation requests because these people have taken the trouble to set up the filtering process and it will be on their primary email account; which means they will look at it on a regular basis. This way I get to build a relationship with them, which then results in more sales.
4. Use double opt in to build highly targeted and responsive lists I’ve used this method to build a highly responsive list of buyers in one niche I operate in. I emailed them first about a product I was launching and to find out more they had to email me back. Once they took that action I then asked them to confirm their request. Yes, this meant I reduced the overall number of people on my list BUT the people who were on it were eager for the information. The result? 31% of that list bought the product. .
5. Use S-P-A-M- filters to check your email before you send it out There are some words that will trigger a reaction in many email filters so avoid that and use an email checker before you send out your messages. This increases the chance of your email being received and you can find filters by just searching on Google.
6. Use additional methods to deliver your information Emails are an important part of your marketing mix, and you can also hook into alternative methods to actually put your message across. You could try, as I have, sending an email to your offering an mp3 recording or PDF report to download. Offering a PDF report means you can offer a lot more information, including graphics.

The great thing about PDF’s is that people tend to keep them longer than emails so you have a longer presence with them. Using an MP3 gives you a VERY easy way to send information out. All you need is a microphone plugged into your PC then record your information and upload it to your website. Then just email your list telling them it is ready to download.

And finally…… Emails are very far from dead, or even sick, but they still remain a very effective way to grow your business online.

NOTE:  The following is a guest post from one of my favorite internet marketing mentors.

Why I Love Affiliate Marketing – Part 5
By Jimmy D. Brown of “Affiliatenaire”

The word “overhead” is not a favorite among those who run businesses of any kind.  Nobody likes the expenses of operating a business.  And nobody really talks about them much when it comes to promoting all of the “money-making” products and services online.

But, don’t kid yourself, there’s a lot of overhead.

That brings me to the fifth reason why I love affiliate marketing…

  ** You don’t need a big budget to make it work **

Do you have any idea how much money is spent running an internet business? There are monthly fees for…

* Autoresponders
* Hosting
* Management
* Advertising
* Scripts
* Much more

There are regular fees for…

* Licensing
* Outsourcing
* Support
* Customer Service
* Maintenance
* Development
* Recruting
* Much more
 
It’s not uncommon to spend tens of thousands (even hundreds of thousands) of dollars in operational costs — which is fine if you’ve been in business a while and are making the bucks. However, if you’re a newcomer, it can be taxing on your budget!

     SIDEBAR:  I paid one girl over $30,000 last year
     just to oversee one small part of my business.
     No one talks much about it, but there ARE a lot
     of expenses involved before you get to the
     “bottom line” of profit.

BUT, with affiliate marketing, you don’t need a big budget to make it work! You can simply use a variety of free and low-cost marketing methods to generate clicks to your affiliate link.

That’s why I love affiliate marketing.

You don’t need a big budget to make it work.

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Jimmy D. Brown is the author of “Affiliatenaire“, teaching you how to create big-time affiliate commission checks in only 1-3 hours each week.  Discover how you can get cash in the bank without a website, experience or even an idea!
Visit “Affiliatenaire” here!

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