Work at home on the Internet: internet marketing and affiliate program help.
Back issues here Issue 262 | Feb 16th 2002

Letter from Phil

ok...so what's inside today? A brilliant new search engine book, a tool to help you find your online niche, drinking too much wine again, and reprint rights for a $1.

You should find something useful and interesting here....

Ok, got to make this a quickie because a Japanese multi-millionaire, his wife, and their interpreter are staying the night with us...and I'm writing this while they've gone on a walk on one of the many mountain trails.

Why are they here? Well I wish I could say we're talking a big business deal, but it's nothing like that. They're just friends of friends and we're just showing them a bit of old fashioned hospitality.

Mind you, it's probably a bit rude for me not to go on the walk with them, so I'd better type quick and be very nice when they get back.

So just a few things today....

1. I've just learnt that Google stopped indexing alt text in the last update a couple of weeks ago.

So, if an image isn't linked, they ignore the text. However, if an image is linked, they include it the same way that they use anchor text.

So you need to go through your site and change any alt text to keyword rich hyperlinks.

Where did I learn this?

In an excellent new search engine book by Sean Burns - Rankings Revealed.

It's incredibly up-to-date, and contains the best and simplest explanation of Google Page Rank and backward linking that I've ever come across.

If you're at all interested in getting your sites ranked high you need to read it.

More on this some other time. But you really do need to read this book. Top stuff.

2. Niche Finder.

The other thing I want to briefly mention is some software called Niche Finder.

It seems like a very useful research tool. You know how I'm always writing about the importance of finding a niche to work....well this software will probably help you find it.

I say probably because I haven't used it yet, but I'm thinking of buying it...so if you use it can you write to me at and let me know if it does a good job.

If I don't hear from you I guess I'll buy it anyway, because as far as I can work out it does most of the keyword research that Site Build It does, at a fraction of the price...showing supply and demand for whatever keywords you're thinking of building a site around.

It looks like it will be a big time saver when building mini sites.

3. Studying salespeople - giving "freebies" works...

I've noticed that whenever I listen to a salesperson at work, I now mentally stand back and analyze their techniques...and I see if I can learn anything to pass onto you.

Take this morning.

I was dragged along to a wine tasting, when I really wanted to be writing this. (and besides, 10am's a bit early for me to be trying 15 or so wines and liqueurs.)

Because I wasn't in the best of moods, and determined not to buy anything because of the high price of the wines, I started studying the salespeople straightaway.

They were good, but over-friendly, coming on as if we were the best of friends. Perhaps the online equivalent of hype.

(mind you, after tasting 9 or 10 wines I mellowed a little and almost did think of them as my best friends).

Towards the end, when I'd spent enough on my credit card to make their smiles and heartiness very genuine, I asked what percentage of people bought.

"at gathering's like this, around 77%," one said.

Wow...imagine getting that kind of conversion rate from your web site!

"is that because you're good at selling, or because it's a lot easier to sell to people who've had quite a few drinks, " I asked.

"Neither. It's because we give people a free gift."

Because I'm naturally a very quiet person, and encourage other people to do the speaking while I listen attentively, I usually manage to get people to tell me more than they meant to reveal...so I learned that the wine company had employed a team of psychologists to help them increase sales.

First they get people to attend with the promise of a "valuable" free gift, which is pictured and hyped up on the invitation brochure and a follow-up postcard they send you.

On arrival you see the free gifts displayed very prominently on a long table at the venue, but no mention is made of them.

Next the salespeople are very warm and friendly.

Then just before they get around to asking you for your order they present you with the gift, which today was a beautifully designed heart shaped blue bottle of German white. The kind of bottle you'd keep long after you've drunk the wine.

The free gift, along with the warmth of the salespeople, makes the "guests" predisposed to buy because they'd feel guilty walking out
with the gift without buying something else.

And because the wine is only sold by the case the company is well ahead.

"So what about the percentage that don't buy?" I asked. "Do you wipe them off your mailing list?"

The answer was no. What they do is work even harder to get them to attend the next wine tasting, and present them with an equally attractive "free" gift at that event.

Why?

Because they've found that virtually 100% of people who get a free gift on a second occasion make a purchase...it seems that people accepting the gift twice just can't say no.

Now have a think about how you can apply this to your web business.

There's got to be quite a few ways.

4. Oh yes, one last thing.

Louis Allport has re-introduced the $1 trial for his very good reprint
rights site.

I've been a member since day 1, and Louis is coming up with new quality products every month. Quite a few people are making big money promoting them.

Here's what I originally wrote about his site a few months ago:

Reprint Rights for $1 if you're quick...

I'm a big fan of buying reprint rights, especially master rights where you can brand the ebooks with your affiliate links and get full professional sales materials for the product.

I've made thousands of $ by buying rights, and setting up mini sites up to sell the products.

One problem though is that everyone seems to be trying to sell the same books, and once a squillian people are selling the same product sales plummet.

Now Louis Allport has come up with a solution, and it's a cracker.

He's set up a Reprint Rights site which he's limiting to just 150 members. These members will get a new quality product every month, which they can immediately brand with their own affiliate
links and resell.

I've become a member, and I don't know how many slots there are left, so if you're interested you'd better jump in today.

The products look top quality. I can't wait for the November one, which is 4 hours of Q & A with one of my favorite marketers focused exclusively on how to make a full time income online with affiliate programs.

Anyway, get in quick. Louis is offering a 10 day trial for just $1 so you can't lose.

ok, that's it for this week. Thanks for reading right down to the bottom :)

Hope you have a great week.