Use Multimedia To Increase Sales

The Power Of Audio And Video

Hello everyone, as I promised last week I have a real juicy newsletter for you this week. I am going to be looking at the power of using multimedia (audio and video) to increase your sales!

As you may (or may not!) know, I have been producing video and audio in different forms for almost a year now. You can use audio and video for just about anything; let’s do a quick brainstorm:

– Audio Books
– Video Reviews
– Video Tutorials
– Audio Reviews
– Interviews
– Ebay Store Welcome Message

As you can see from the list above there are a lot of potential uses for audio and video.

In the past audio and video was frowned upon due to the large file sizes and long download time. Now, in the broadband age web users no longer face that problem and more and more are choosing to download audio and video. So why not get a piece of the action!

I’ll show you an example of how I have used video in the past. You have no doubt already seen people promoting products using a review and a link to the product at the bottom of the page, well why not use video instead – a picture is worth a thousand words!

Click the link below to see my video review. (it opens in a new window)

http://imguides.com/membership_riches/membership_riches/membership_riches.html

Now that’s just a simple video that took me twenty minutes to put together, you don’t have to be a pro (as you can probably tell going by my video!) anyone can do it.

You don’t even need a big fancy sales page, just send people to your video and I can assure you they are much more likely to watch a video review than read a long page of text.

All you need is a Microphone/Headset, I got a cheap £29.99 (about $55) Mic and it works without any problems. I then use Camtasia to record the screen and produce the video in flash.

That’s only one example of using video and audio instead of the usual methods. Everywhere you look you will be able to see audio and video appearing. If you watched my video to the end you will have been redirected to the sales page, even Jason James has recorded a personal audio message for you.

Personalising your sales pages with audio is a great touch; it turns you into a “real person” rather than just another web page!

The above methods are both great methods for increasing sales, but how about increasing the value of a product you already sell?

Turn your E-Books into Audio Books and add an extra $20 to the price!

Audio books are great; people can transfer them to a CD, I-Pod, MP3 player and listen to them at their leisure. I know a lot of people that actually listen to audio books in the car whilst driving to work. If you have written an E-Book then you would be crazy not to offer it in Audio format.

Simply read the book out loud and record yourself at the same time. Audio books are slightly different than videos; you do need a certain type of voice to narrate audio books. With video the voice isn’t as important as you can look at the pictures but with audio books all you have is the audio.

That’s why I get a professional actress to narrate my own audio books for me, it sounds much better than me rambling along sounding like a Yorkshire farmer trying to read a novel 😉

Incidentally, in 2007 I will be launching a number of audio and video services. These will include custom video work as well as offering professional voice over services. So if you have an E-Book that you would like turning into an audio book by a professional actress then do get in touch with me. The site won’t be launching for a few weeks yet but I will be happy to help you, leave a comment or use the contact me link at the top of the page.

That’s just about it for this week’s newsletter, I hope you enjoyed it and I look forward to hearing your thoughts and seeing your videos!

Thanks again,
Dan

How To Utilize Your Auto-responder

How To Utilize Your Auto-responder

Greetings everyone, I hope your November is going well. This week’s newsletter focuses on making the most from your auto-responder (or mailing list) by using follow up emails.

As usual something happened to make me think about this subject in detail. As you may know I run an affiliate program for my Auction SOS software product. An affiliate of mine kindly added an Auction SOS promotion to their follow up sequence earlier this month. Yesterday the affiliate made two sales earning them a respectable $47 – for doing nothing!

This wasn’t a one off promotion, the affiliate added the promotion to their auto-responder series to send out after x number of days. All it takes is a quick email with the affiliate link included and that affiliate is on a nice little earner every month via my program, just for typing out a single email.

Let me quickly take you through how this works from an affiliates point of view, step-by-step:

1. Affiliate set’s up a message sequence using the auto-responder to send out an email promoting product x
2. Affiliate set’s up the auto-responder to send out the email 10 (or whatever you choose) days after the user signs up for the newsletter
3. Affiliate sits back and counts the money every month!

That will take you at most 30 minutes, after 30 minutes work you can be earning a nice income on auto-pilot via your auto-responder! If you already have an auto-responder then why not try and put it to the test, you don’t have to use the Auction SOS affiliate program, find a product that will suit your list and promote it to them via your auto-responder sequence.

Imagine if you get 10 new subscribers every day (which is very manageable), after 10 days each of those subscribers receives the email promoting “product X”. That’s 10 people each day clicking on your affiliate link, all on autopilot.

10 people a day may not sound like a lot but it’s 70 clicks a week, over 300 clicks a month. If your product has an average 2% conversion rate that’s not a bad return for doing no work is it?

Why do you have to stop at promoting one product though? You could send out another offer after another 20 days, then another and another and so on. Each offer making you a nice little income each and every month on autopilot.

Thanks for reading and as always I hope you put the information to good use, let me hear some of your success stories! Remember that you can always leave any comments that you may have about this weeks article, I enjoy reading them – good or bad! (Just try and keep them clean ;-))

Regards,
Dan

How YOU can become an expert in any field

How YOU can become an expert in any field

Hello everyone, welcome to another article. This article has been inspired by something that happened to me earlier on this week. It also has something to do with that sexy little banner that you can see to the right of your screen 😉

This week I will show you exactly how easy it is to become an expert in your field!

There are experts in all walks of life, you will see experts every day on the TV, Radio or in your daily newspaper, experts are like tourists on a sunny Yorkshire day – they are EVERYWHERE!

But how did they become experts and what benefits are there in becoming an expert?

The experts you will see on the TV will have no doubt studied for years and years on their chosen subject to become an expert in the field. Over the years they become respected experts that everyone wants to know, their word is gospel, when they speak people listen!

Imagine if Sir David Attenborough walked into the room now and told you that a new species of Rhino had just been discovered, I can guarantee that you would listen to his every word and that’s the most important part of this article. I think I will make it bold just to emphasize it a bit more 🙂

When experts speak, people listen!

That’s great but what does this have to do with us? More than you would think actually, on a lesser scale all of you reading this now have the power to become an authority figure in any field you have chosen.

Any of you reading now have the knowledge available to become an expert in your field. Everyone, and I do mean every one of you has something in your head that others would love to know. We all have hobbies and interests, all you need to do is document these and get people to read them, and before you know it people will be looking to you for guidance and advice.

I will use my own experiences as an example. A couple of months ago I began posting these articles from my blog onto a popular article website. After my articles were reviewed and posted on the website I was able to display the “Expert Author” image on my websites. (As you can see at the top of the page)

Displaying this image automatically gives confidence to you the readers, and more importantly potential customers. It proves that you are not some cowboy that doesn’t have a clue about the subject and it instantly gives confidence to your subscribers.

So what are you waiting for, start writing your reports and guides then you can become an expert in your field and start to reap the rewards!

****End Article****

Just a quick sidenote this week. A lot of you will have downloaded Internet Explorer 7 this week via the windows update. My initial impressions are quite good as a user, but as a Webmaster they are not so good, infact they are downright terrible.

A lot of my sites are starting to display incorrectly in IE7, I emailed Microsoft about this and their reply was:

“Dear Mr Thompson,
Thankyou for contacting Microsoft with your concerns.

We have reviewed the websites listed and can confirm that your problem lies with your code. Your HTML code is no longer valid as Internet explorer 7 now only follows code that has been written to W3 standards.

This standard has been used for over 5 years now and all webmasters should be now following the W3 guidelines.

Thankyou for contacting Microsoft
Regards,”

So by the looks of things a lot of us are going to be very busy changing our websites to comply with the W3 coding standards, which I’m sure you will agree is a massive pain in the a*** 🙁

……….
…………….
…………………….

OK, I made all of that up but I bet for a split second there that you believed me. You believed me because you perceive me as an expert in the field and you would believe what I told you, even if in this case it is a load of rubbish! Have a read through the “email” again and you will realize how crazy it sounds, but you still believed it for a split second because it was me spinning you the tale!

That really is the end of this weeks newsletter, I hope you enjoyed reading it and I promise I won’t make up any fake emails next week but I hope I managed to get my point across.

As always please leave any comments you may have!

Thanks,
Dan

My Digital Dispatch Vs EW Portal Vs DL Guard

As an eBook seller on eBay I am often asked how my eBooks are delivered instantly, as soon as payment is made. The answer I give them is always the same, I tell them that I use a delivery script that runs via my website. This sounds like a really complicated process, I mean come on, how can something on my website be delivering my eBay products, and how on earth does it know when a sale is made? Surely something like this would cost thousands to buy and require a genius to set it up…right? WRONG! Believe it or not delivering your digital products instantly is a piece of cake and won’t cost you thousands. All you need is a “script” that handles the delivery for you. If you are unsure of what a script is, think of it as a piece of software, but this software wont run on your home PC, it will run on your website hosting package. This allows the script to run 24/7 even when your PC is switched off!

These scripts use IPN (instant payment notification) technology; this means that as soon as a payment is made, the information from the transaction is sent directly to your script. The script then takes that information and processes the order for you, if everything is correct the script then delivers a download link straight to the customer’s email inbox.

So now you know the basics of how these scripts work, let me talk you through the advantages and disadvantages of the three most popular auto delivery scripts; My Digital Dispatch, The EW Portal and DL Guard. Let’s begin with My Digital Dispatch.

I am going to look at the following areas when reviewing the software:

1. Ease of Installation
2. How does it work?
3. Security Features
4. Other Features

My Digital Dispatch (MYDD)
www.mydigitaldispatch.com

Price: $67
Supports: PayPal, eBay, Website Sales
Installation Time: 5 Mins

Installation.
If you are familiar with installing scripts then you will be very familiar with the MYDD installation process. You are required to set up a MYSQL database and then input the database details into the config file, once you have added to relevant information into the config file you simply upload all of the files to your web space and follow the onscreen instructions. The whole process shouldn’t take you any more than 5 minutes and even a PC novice shouldn’t have any problems.
However, even if the installation process is too much you can have this installed free.

How does it work?
MYDD supports the PayPal payment processing system and uses PayPal’s IPN technology, this allows you to deliver your items via your website and via eBay, as long as the customer has paid using PayPal. MYDD uses the item name to identify the product, so if you are selling a product on eBay and the item title is “How to identify spoof emails” then the item name in MYDD must be exactly the same or your item won’t get delivered. This is fine, but what if you want to change the item title in eBay? Unfortunately that means that you also need to go and create a new item in MYDD, it won’t take you more than 5 minutes, but if you have a lot of items then this could be quite time consuming.
As well as working with eBay, you can also use MYDD to deliver products from your website. Creating a simple PayPal button allows you to do this, all you have to do is make sure that the “item_name” variable matches the item name in your MYDD control panel. Unfortunately at the time of writing MYDD doesn’t have a shopping cart feature to support multiple product purchases, but who knows what the future holds?

Security Features
One of the main security features of MYDD is the ability to recognize what currency the buyer has paid in, if the buyer pays less than the set price then MYDD will see this as a fraudulant transaction and won`t deliver the download link. This prevents any sneaky buyers trying to under-pay for your items! MYDD also sends out encrypted, expiring download links to your customers. Encrypted download links reduce the chance of your download URL`s being shared out to non-payers! This feature could be crucial if you are selling high value digital items.

Other Features
Insert affiliate code plug-in, Email template customisation, one click plug-in installation, transaction log, free 6 months hosting if you have installation problems.

EW Portal
www.ewportal.com

Price: $74
Supports: PayPal, eBay, Website Sales
Installation Time: 5 Mins

Installation:
Like MYDD the EW Portal requires you to set up a MYSQL database on your hosting account, once you have set up the database you need to upload all of the files to your web space. After uploading the files you simply follow the onscreen wizard to complete your installation. This is almost the exact same installation process as MYDD, however the EW Portal doesn’t require you to edit the config file, the script automatically edits the file for you.

How does it work?
Again, much like MYDD. The portal works in conjunction with PayPal and PayPal`s IPN technology, however that is where the similarities end. The EW Portal identifies the items by the item number (the item number in the control panel NOT the eBay item number!) and not by the item name. This means that you don’t need to change the item details in your control panel even if you change your items name in eBay. All you need to do for eBay delivery is insert a tiny piece of invisible HTML code into your listing, this tiny piece of code lets the portal identify which item has been sold and which item should be sent out to the customer.
Like MYDD the EW Portal also works seamlessly with your website. The EW Portal generates unique PayPal buttons that can be placed on your website. This is done in the same way as MYDD for single item purchases, however the Portal also has a shopping cart feature that allows you to sell multiple items via your website.

Security Features
No longer do you have to worry about people stealing your download links and illegally downloading your products. Each link generated by the EW Portal is encrypted and can be set to expire after “x” number of clicks or “x” number of hours. You are also able to track each link in detail from your control panel. You can see what time the link was sent out, where it was sent, how many times the link has been clicked and the IP Address of the person that clicked on the link, it also lets you lock the download link to an IP address for increased link security. The portal also uses “File Fetch” technology to protect your download pages, this means that even if someone finds your download page there is no way of them downloading the product unless they have paid you first, you can see an example download page below, please feel free to try and steal the product!

http://www.ewportal.com/fetchdemo.php

Other Features
Affiliate System, Manually issue links, Anti-fraud Shopping Cart, Mailing List, Coupon Generation, Secure download pages, full email and HTML template customisation, support for offline goods, real time sales statistics, real time customer data, IPN log and automatic receipt generation.

DL Guard
www.dlguard.com

Price: $127
Supports: PayPal, eBay, Website Sales, 2Checkout, Clickbank, Stormpay, e-gold, PayDotCom
Installation Time: 5 Mins

Installation:
Like the other 2 scripts DLGuard requires you to create a MYSQL database before you begin the installation process. Once you have set up the database you have 2 options, you can either do a manual installation, or you can use some software that takes you through the process using a “Wizard”. All in all the installation time for all 3 products is fairly similar.

How does it work?
Like the other scripts DLGuard uses IPN technology, however DLGuard doesn’t just support PayPal. DLGuard takes a leap ahead of its competitors by offering seamless integration with five payment processors as well as PayPal. Obviously this is a huge advantage if you are planning to use a payment processor other than PayPal. As well as working in conjunction with eBay, DL Guard also works on your website and just like the EW Portal it can be used for multiple item purchases. The multiple item purchases are all handled via the built in shopping cart.

Security Features
Like the other scriptsl, DLGuard allows you to send out encrypted, expiring download links to your customers. If you don’t want to run the risk of your emails being caught by a Spam filter you could also choose to send your customer to a secure download page to download their product. As you would expect these features are available to you no matter which payment processor you are using to accept payments.

Other Features
Membership script, issue bonus items with products, shopping cart, secure download pages, auto responder integration, full template customisation, product summary screen, detailed reports and statistics, easy backup of product and customer information.

Conclusion

Thanks for reading this far, I hope you enjoyed it! I’m sure you are capable of making your own mind up about which product is the best for you, below is a table that should help you compare the features of all 3 scripts.

	MYDD	EW Portal	DLGuard
Price	$67	$74	$127
Instantly delivers links	YES	YES	YES
Free Installation	YES	YES	YES
Link Encryption	YES	YES	YES
Link Expiration	YES	YES	YES
Secure Download Pages	NO	YES	YES
Built in Affiliate Link	YES	NO	YES
Shopping Cart	NO	YES	YES
Customisable Templates	YES	YES	YES
Built in Affiliate Script	NO	YES	NO
Built in Membership Manager	NO	NO	YES
Create customer database	YES	YES	YES
Multiple payment processor support	NO	NO	YES
Has affiliate program	YES	YES	YES
Support forum.	YES	NO	YES
		More	More

Are you a Cookie Stuffer?

Where do you stand on cookie stuffing?

Hello there and welcome to another weeks newsletter, this week I am heading over to “the darkside” to look at an un-ethical technique that was brought to my attention a couple of days ago.

The technique is known as “Cookie Stuffing” and is used by affiliates (and some adware applications) to plant affiliate cookies on a users PC without them actually clicking on an affiliate link.

The technique is outlawed by a lot of major affiliate companies such as Commission Junction and Linkshare, however there are still lot’s of very successful affiliates using the methods on the two networks.

Why do CJ and Linkshare allow this?

Simple, because it makes them more money! For every affiliate transaction that occurs the affiliate management company (CJ, Linkshare, etc.) take a percentage of the sale. Cookie stuffing means that more sales will be credited to affiliates, which equates to more money for the affiliate companies but less profit for the vendor.

For example, let’s say that I used cookie stuffing on this very page. I could stuff this page with an eBay or Amazon affiliate cookie. If I got 500 visitors to the page, that would mean 500 “clicks” on my Amazon/ebay affiliate link.

All of this would be done in the background without you knowing. So why is this so bad – let’s take a look.

The main complaint from affiliates that don’t use the cookie stuffing method if that there commissions are being stolen by these “stuffing” techniques. The cookie stuffers cookie would overwrite any genuine cookie that had been created by a legitimate click on an affiliate link. Meaning if the cookied user was to make a purchase, the cookie stuffer would get the commission instead of the legitimate click!

Earlier I also mentioned adware. You may have heard of “Zango” and “180 Solutions”, these applications will install on your PC, usually without your knowledge and will plant affiliate cookies on your PC when you visit a certain website or “hit” a particular subject.

These companies have been reported in the past for cookie stuffing but again it is still widely believed that the applications are stuffing cookies illegally on your PC! (Do a search for Zango/180 solutions cookie stuffing and see what you can find!) Whilst they are still making the affiliate companies’ money (CJ, Linksahre, CB, etc.) the trend looks set to continue.

I fear that this worrying and lets be honest – unethical to the extreme, method of making affiliate sales could result in a vendor backlash! If a vendor is offering 50% commission on a product to affiliates, how long will it take them to lower the commission percentage to make up for the amount of money they are losing from cookie stuffers?

Where do you all stand on the cookie stuffing debate? Should you use un-ethical methods if it brings you results or is it really not worth risking your affiliate account to make a quick buck?

Let me know your thoughts!

Thanks for reading,
Dan

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