Using Facebook To Market Online
Facebook users number ~750 million—more than any other social media network. The success of Facebook in attracting consumers is undeniable, and its importance as an advertising platform is growing.
How are the top advertisers doing with their brand presentation on Facebook? Access these training videos for FREE !
1. Introduction To Facebook
2. Create The Facebook Account
3. Your Facebook Profile & Account Settings 
3a. Update to Your Facebook Profile
4. Your Facebook Friends
4a. Update to Your Facebook Friends
5. Your Facebook Wall
6. The Facebook Newsfeed
7. Facebook Fan Pages Vs Facebook Groups
8. Your Facebook Fanpage & How To Create One
8b. Update – Creating Iframes in Fan Pages
8c. Update – Overview of Fanpage Changes
9. Growing Your Fanpage
10. Your Facebook Group & How To Create One
11. Growing Your Groups
12. Privacy Settings
13. Various Marketing Methods On Facebook
14. Adding badges to your Website
15. Adding An Opt-In Form To Your Facebook Page
15a. Update to Adding An Opt-In Form To Your Facebook Page
16. Intro To Facebook Ads
17. Facebook Ads Dos And Don’ts
18. FB Ad Creation
19. How To Add A Contact Form To Your Page
20. Pimping Your Fan Page Profile Image
21. Your Vanity URL
22. Adding A Contact Form With Captcha Image
23. Customizing Your Facebook Fan Pages
A Personal Gift from Google Today
Philippines Independence Day 2010
Don’t you just love Google when you get welcomed by its customized logo (Google Doodle) of important country holidays?
Today, Google.com.ph joins the Philippines 112th celebration of Independence Day. This is the second year Google has bestowed this gift to over 90 million Filipinos and IT IS VERY PERSONAL to me. This day also marks a new beginning and new hope following the recent proclamation of the new leaders of the country. President-elect Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III., won an overwhelming victory and carried a banner campaign of “Hindi Ako Magnanakaw” (I will not steal). In a way, this gives me the “hope for another cleansing” that the Aquino name proudly fought for in the past.
We all want CHANGE and we want ACTION. Vice President- elect Jejomar Binay, a winner by example carried the campaign banner of “Ganito Kami sa Makati” (This is how we are in Makati). Binay is yet another success story of “action speaks louder than words”.
Independence Day 2009
We will not see a better team of government leaders for many years to come. Google Doodle significantly gives sparkle to this new hope in the hearts of all Filipinos online today.
Lesson 6 of Freelance Career Guide
Sketch Your Business Structure
Today, we will go through an actual example of the business system that you can use. You are very fortunate because what will be exposed here is the latest business model that internet marketers use today. Not only it is bringing significant income from every niche available online but it has totally redefined “online business”. See the diagram below:
Just note for a minute that the goal of this post is to give you an idea how to sketch your business structure, I will be leading you to various information that will help you establish a certain mindset. We will discuss the first box in our diagram called “Landing Page”. By learning about it, you will be able to get the importance of a well-defined business structure. We will call this the Landing Page System.
First, what is a landing page? A landing page is a page designed to get names and email addresses. Usually, however, a squeeze page is usually a smaller type of landing page, which usually has an opt-in form in sight when the page loads. Another common word that is often used to describe landing page, is “squeeze page” (or “lead capture page” in some circles). It is important to recognize that all successful marketers use these. If you plan to sell a product over the Internet, you will want to use one, too, rather than relying on sidebar opt-in forms and unfocused pages that do not convey a single point and a single call to action.
Every landing page contains the same parts and is focused on a SINGLE goal – getting the visitor to become a subscriber or buyer. These parts are as follows: an opt-in form (or sales prompt), a brief or lengthy introduction, a picture of the list/product owner, the signature of the list owner, and a call to action (or multiple calls to action).
If you are one of those who would rather use ready-made template pages to minimize the risk of not doing it right, click this link to get the most compelling squeeze page templates .
Determining which model will work best for you can simply only be done through testing. While many boast a conversion and attribute it to the shortness of their introduction (many will be one short paragraph), otherwise will boast a high conversion rate because they use lengthy, thorough, and compelling copy.
The landing page system provides a uniquely powerful system through which you can derive profit from multiple streams. This article will briefly discusses some of those different streams – and how you can manipulate them.
Let’s start with the landing page itself: all traffic is sent to the landing page. From there, it will have a number of options, depending on what you have given them. Many marketers suggest that your landing page should always be an opt-in form. Others will suggest that it should simply be a sales page.
Whether it’s a free newsletter or a product for sale, the landing page system you create should include a “one time offer,” which will compel them to take action – subscribe, buy, etc.
Once they subscribe or buy, the landing page system you create should then re-route them to a thank you page, which opens up more means through which you can up-sell. One quick way to up-sell is to simply include advertisements on your thank you page for related affiliate products or for your own products. Here, again, you will want to give them a one-time offer.
Also, if you haven’t yet asked them to join your mailing list, this is where you should do it – on your thank you page. Once they opt-in to your list, you now have a whole new option you can use in conjunction with the landing page system to generate revenue.
One such option is selling ad space in your newsletter or e-zine. The more people you have reading your newsletter, the more you can generally charge for ad space; however, you will want to avoid overselling to your list to ensure your advertisers actually make money.
Your next option is to endorse a product as an affiliate. You can tell your subscribers how someone has just created a brilliant product – and you can offer it to your subscribers through an affiliate link. You may even want to use other products you have has bonuses to give them something extra.
The last and most profitable way in which you can generate revenue through your newsletter is by creating and selling your own products to them.
It is important to note that you don’t have to use all of these means to generate revenue; however, the more you use, the more you earn in general.
What You Need Before Getting Started
Before you get started building your landing page, you will need a number of things to a) make your offer actually have a point; and b) facilitate the creation of your landing page.
One thing you absolutely must have before you get started is an auto responder. Without any auto responder, you are tossing potential bags of money in the garbage. Rather than creating a relationship with customers and potential customers – and giving yourself the opportunity to attempt future up-sales — you’re allowing them to leave and never return.
In addition to an auto responder, you will need to have an actual offer that people want to buy. You may want to develop a product, such as an E-Book or a piece of software.
If you don’t have the skills to do either, you can always hire a professional to do it for you through Elance.com or Guru.com. You will then either want to sell this product and attempt to get subscribers from your thank you page – or you will want to get subscribers by offering the product for free (which is what many Internet marketers now do).
Another thing you absolutely must have before you get started is a check out service. You may want to consider Paypal, Clickbank, 2 CheckOut, AlertPay . All of these services will allow you to make transactions quickly.
Another thing you must have before you get started is a set of graphics, which usually includes a graphic header, a check out button, background wallpaper, and a half-decent picture of yourself. You can probably provide the picture of yourself, but you might want to hire a professional to do the rest.
Another thing you will need before you can get started on your landing page is some way in which to create a realistic signature. http://www.vletter.com is probably your best bet; but, if you’re on a budget, try http://www.fiverr.com/ where everyone is willing to do everything for $5. Can you believe that?
Planning Your Landing Page Theme
Perhaps the most important part of creating a landing page is planning your landing page theme. How you select your theme, of course, will all depend on how you plan to generate traffic.
If you decide to generate traffic through search engine optimization, planning your landing page theme will entail finding phrases within your niche which have a high demand (aggregate search value) and a low supply (small amount of competing sites) and then creating multiple landing pages, each which is optimized around a different phrase.
If, on the other hand, you decide to generate traffic through pay per click (PPC) programs, such as Adwords, planning your landing page theme will again entail tuning a number of different pages to fit the keywords you are purchasing.
This is actually where most people fail when they create a landing page: they don’t tune it to fit a specific audience. For instance, in the case of a squeeze page for a newsletter, they might start a newsletter about toys, but they only create one landing page and send all traffic to it. This is a big mistake.
Chances are, if you create a quality product or newsletter, it can benefit a number of people. So why not communicate the exact benefits they will derive from subscribing or buying?
If, for instance, you have a newsletter about Legos and toy blocks, so you group it under the loose heading of “toys,” a visitor who is looking specifically for information about either Legos or toy blocks will click off your page if they don’t see the direct connection to the exact topic for which they were searching.
Instead, you will want to setup a page centered around Legos and a page centered around toy blocks. On each page, you will want to communicate the specific benefits to joining the list for each of those groups of visitors.
Going one step further, in addition to planning your landing page theme, if you are creating a landing page for a newsletter, you may also want to segment your list, so you can send information specifically about Legos to those who request it – and information about blocks to those who request it.
How to Write a Landing Page that Sells
Most people have no (or simply the slightest) idea how to write a landing page that converts. Instead, they slop together elements that they have seen used in other landing pages – but usually do not put them together in the same way the owner of the successful landing page did.
One major problem is copy. And that’s fine. Not everyone is going to be an excellent writer – never mind a copywriter. But as someone selling a product or trying to build a list, it is important that you know your strengths and weaknesses – and that you either spend the time to overcome them or hire someone else to do it for you.
With copywriting, for instance, it is important to use a mix of compelling sales points with powerful psychological triggers. Most people who create a sales page miss either one or both of those elements. For instance, they might concentrate so much on building hype that they don’t actually explain what solution they are providing – and for whom they are providing it. If I don’t have a specific problem that your product solves, why would I buy it?
Now, if they fail to sprinkle in psychological triggers, such as “scientifically proven,” “guaranteed,” and “shocking,” no one will feel compelled to continue reading, as the benefits will have a low or average perceived value.
There are other important things you must take into consideration when writing a landing page that converts. For instance, it is important to build a compelling case for a time-bound offer. This doesn’t mean you have to invent fake deadlines and constantly revise them each week. This is a good way to guarantee your complete loss of credibility in the shortest amount of time possible. However, when planning your copy, you will want to make sure that you constantly urge the reader to act immediately by inserting a number of “calls to action,” as I’ve mentioned previously. You may want to consider using fly-ins or pop-ups to create more urgency– or to make a time-bound offer. Perhaps you can use a countdown to build urgency (i.e., when someone arrives at your landing page, they have five minutes to purchase the product at the lowest price).
If you’re creating a squeeze page, you might want to employ slightly different tactics. Rather than building a compelling case with multiple triggers and calls to action over the course of 1000 words, you may want to simply condense that all into a compelling headline and one paragraph of “benefits.” For a completely free-to-join squeeze page, you more than likely wont have a considerable amount of resistance to joining, unless the visitor:
a) Doesn’t see any benefits; and
b) Suspects that you will sell their email address to spammers.
Both of these problems are relatively easy to overcome. In your headline, simply state the exact benefits they will receive for joining – as always, mixing in psychological triggers.
In your first paragraph of copy, give them a compelling reason to join now (i.e., the price might go up, the list might become private, you’ll get this amazing report).
To overcome the second problems, simply include a short line under your opt-in form that explains that you will not – under any circumstances – spam them or sell or give away their email address and name.
Tips on Increasing Your Landing Page Conversion Rate (for newbies – conversion rate refers to sales)
There are three major ways in which you can create your landing page conversion rate. All landing pages created by professionals usually include these three elements at a few others.
The first way in which you can increase your conversion rate is through personalization. This is usually done in two ways: the first way is by providing a photo of yourself. The second way is by adding your signature to the bottom of your landing page. This radically increases visitors’ trust. Most people who resist buying products online do so because they’re weary of getting scammed by a faceless liar, who wont be around when they need help or when they need to return the product.
By adding your picture and signature, you can significantly increase a gain in your visitors’ trust. ☺
Another way in which you can increase your landing page conversion rate is by using black text or a white layout. Regardless of what anyone tells you, this is one of the easiest ways in which to make your page look professional, rather than pathetic or desperate.
The third way in which you can gain trust is by offering something for free. This is generally what you will do if you’re using a squeeze page to generate leads: you’ll offer a free report or five-day course – and then use that to generate leads, which you will later up-sell or generate revenue from via affiliate sales. Why is this technique so effective?
Quite simply because it allows them to judge your work and ideas before they actually have to pay for them. Additionally, it builds trust. In addition to these three general ways in which to increase your conversion rate, you should always guarantee a product. If you sell through Clickbank, you actually wont have a choice. But if you’re using Paypal or some other check out (Credit Card processing) program, you will want to make sure you clearly state that customers can return your product for any reason within a given period of time after the purchase.
Driving Traffic into Your Landing Page
Driving traffic into your landing page – it sounds easy, doesn’t it? Well, it’s not. And no matter how great your landing page is, it wont matter if no one ever reads it. Furthermore, if everyone in the world other than your target audience reads it, it also wont matter. This is why you need to find media through which you can drive targeted visitors to your landing page.
One way in which you can drive traffic to your landing page is through natural search engine optimization. This is the slowest process, but it is also one of the best ways to ensure a continually increasing stream of traffic over time.
Generating natural search engine traffic generally entails getting links to your site. While reciprocal linking was once the best strategy, experts now believe that major search engines are devaluing reciprocal links in favor of one-way links and triangular links (which search engines can’t really detect).
Another way in which to get natural search engine traffic is by optimization your website for certain key phrases. You can do this by creating pages that specifically focus on one keyword on your given niche. You can then set the page extension to that keyword and optimize the content at a 1.5% density for that keyword. You will also want to use it in header and title tags.
Now, in addition building natural search engine traffic, you will want to consider using pay per click advertising. You can do this by opening an account with Google Adwords. As mentioned earlier, successful Google Adwords campaigns do two things: they group keywords into multiple, small, related groups – and they send leads to multiple, tweaked landing pages.
This means you will have to start with some careful keyword research; and you will then have to alter your landing pages to match that research. These are some of the most commonly used tools for driving traffic to a landing page; however, they are not always the most effective. Both of those methods can be effective, but they both usually have rather high barriers to entry and require a lot of work.
Luckily, you do have another option: human connections. And this is where most Internet marketers fail. They don’t realize the power of human connections because they are so caught up in the idea of making transactions and collecting massive checks without having to deal with customers and clients.
One quick way to get traffic through human connections is a joint venture. You can enter into a joint venture by compiling a list of possible “partners” — or people who might be able to assist you in some mutually-beneficial way. This list might include other list owners in your niche, site owners in your niche, and experts.
There’s only one important thing you should keep in mind when contacting joint venture partners – and that is to make it as quick, easy, and beneficial for them as possible. If they have no incentive for doing it, they probably wont even reply to you. And if it isn’t easy, they’ll accept other joint venture offers over yours.
Another way in which you can drive traffic to your landing page is through blog and forum posting; however, it is important that you do not spam, as many businesses do. Instead, actually participate on the forum, provide people with something of value; and, after a while, post your product in your signature – and try to network with people on the forum who work in similar fields.
I have written about Planning a Business Blog and Business Blogging for Non-writers hoping to reiterate the need to have a blog. It takes sometime for search engines to pick up on a blog page based on keyword search. The older the posts are, the more effective you can market online because you can just update your most-visited old post with a link to your landing page. But if you write an entirely new blog now, you have to fight for a keyword to rank high in Google results.
You can download Squeeze Page 101 here for free.
Yikes! Google Ads on my WordPress.com Blog
This morning, I looked out from my window, saw drizzles gently playing with the wind. There isn’t much sunlight but it’s not gloomy either. Thought to myself, this is a perfect time to enjoy a cup of coffee. So I did, and as if time is not gold, I slowly opened my laptop to write a new blog about online reputation for freelancers. Little did I know, a surprise was waiting for me…
As my homepage downloaded, I scrolled down toward the end of the latest post and got shocked when I saw Google banner ads at the bottom. Shocked as in HAPPY? Oh no, sir – shocked as in SCARED! Didn’t I just say here that we are not allowed to monetize our blog at WordPress.com by way of integrating Adsense and other banner ads? Holy shhh… what are these Adsense ads doing here? I opened all my other posts and they all have Adsense at the bottom!
Why I am shocked? WordPress can take down my site and I do not even have a backup. Besides, I honestly did not put the Adsense here. While in a state of panic, my first solution was to contact WordPress’ 24/7 Support to ask for advice. But before I can do that, I decided to just change the WordPress Theme under the Appearance tab. I just hurriedly picked a new theme and then when I saw the the Adsense gone, I relaxed a bit and continued to choose the Theme of my preference.
Which brings me to a thought… could it be a WordPress Adsense account? Yeah, whose Adsense account would it be? If it was, then it means I panicked for nothing…. and as of this beautiful day with cool winds and drizzles at my porch – I am a bona fide freaking idiot. Can someone please lighten me up and say there is good news to it? That my blog has picked up some good traffic that’s why WordPress placed the ads?
P.S. My self-hosted business hub is just a week old. Can you be kind enough to click here and visit http://WebContent-Manager.com
Thanks!
Lesson 5 of Freelance Career Guide
Still on Phase 2 – Set your G-O-A-L
- ORGANIZE Your Business System
There are 2 types of business systems:
□ System A, for product owners
□ System B, for affiliate marketers
If you have created your own product, then let’s not waste time tweaking and changing. Obviously, you have already spent much time trying to perfect your product. Unless you stop tweaking, it may never get into the market. You see… I know all about it, I am the queen of tweaking… 
Setting up your business system has a lot to do with how you plan to sell your products. Where will you find your customers? Where do they hang out? In golf clubs? In trade fairs? The same concept applies to online customers. A quick way to find them is through web directories. Browse through the Categories and instantly, your customers are listed with contact details.
Product owners can learn a great deal about Internet marketing simply by studying successful Internet marketing campaigns. Download the eBook for Internet Marketing Crash Course. If your business offers products and services in a particular niche consider entering relevant terms in popular search engines and studying the websites of some of the highest ranking businesses. This can provide you with a great deal of insight into what these business owners are doing which may be contributing to their success.
Examining everything from their website design to their search engine optimization strategies and even the content on their website can help you to determine why they are more successful than you. You should also consider how they are marketing their website which may include banner ads, affiliate marketing programs or other types of advertising. Armed with this information you can take the opportunity to implement changes to your own website and marketing strategy which may help you to gain a greater degree of success. Care should be taken to not copy anything directly from your competitors but to rather try to emulate their degree of success in your own way.
Seeking out a consultant in the Internet marketing industry with an excellent past record of performance is also very important. This is so important because consultants who have had a great deal of success in the past will likely have a great deal of success while assisting you as well. Past performance is considered to be one of the best indications of future performance. This does not mean that new consultants are necessarily going to perform poorly but there is some risk involved in selecting a consultant who does not have a great deal of experience or who has not performed well in the past. You can feel much more confident putting your Internet marketing campaign in the hands of a consultant who typically generates the type of results you are looking for in your own Internet marketing campaign.
Once you have evaluated consultants on the basis of experience and past performance, it is time to start considering price. Considering price early in the process of seeking a consultant may cause you to be influenced by price over performance. Some consultants may be incredibly affordable but if they are not capable of producing the desired results, it may end up being a complete waste of money. However, once you have narrowed your list of potential consultants down to a few qualified candidates, it is definitely time to start comparing prices. Once you are confident each of the candidates on your list is well qualified, choosing the least expensive candidate is worthwhile. However it is important to note all of the fees involved to ensure you are making an accurate cost comparison.
If you plan to have an automated online system for selling your products, you can check out eBay, Clickbank, Commission Jucntion, and Linkshare.
eBay’s first Entrepreneur Of The Year awardee, Francis Ochoco is currently giving away his courses for free (as of time of writing). Grab it now while it’s free, Click Here! A few basic information to learn from this eBay guide book:
- How to earn a passive income by selling info products (even after the new eBay digital rules).
- How to build a “dynasty” similar to “WalMart” by building a lucrative wholesale/retail business on eBay.
- How to do joint ventures on eBay.
Clickbank is a markeplace purely for digital products. If you are selling software or information products, you can start by registering a Vendor account. Purchase an automated system software where you can have an army of affiliates selling for you. Click here to own Clickbank Master Affiliate selling system on autopilot. You can be up and running in just a few minutes, just upload, login to your admin panel to add your details and you’re good to go.
See also Affiliate Marketing for Beginners or Pitfalls To Avoid in Affiliate Marketing
Planning a Business Blog
There are many important attrubutes to a successful freelance business blog. Anyone wishing to start a business blog should consider the basic components from the moment you start planning for it. Unlike a social blog, the author merely writes for personal expression and recognition rather than for the intention of generating business from it. Many social blogs turn into business blogs as opportunity presents itself.
One thing about blogs, the possibilities are boundless in time and territory. The components of business blogs are:
1) Subject and objective of the articles
2) SEO-friendly composition of articles
3) Article marketing strategies
4) Directory submission and traffic generation
5) Squeeze page links and list building
6) Auto Responders and media communications
7) Products and services to sell
8) Loyalty programs for repeat sales
9) Customer value update programs
Detailed study courses for the above list are available to you FREE. Bookmark and visit this site anytime you need to do a little research. Download eBook or continue reading the general tips on how to make your blog site SEO-friendly.
SEO Tips for Bloggers by Proson Cheng :
1.) Use less graphics as possible with your blogs. Images help increase readership but don’t over use them. Perhaps 1-3 small images (150-200 pixels) on your blogs with external storage. Instead of uploading to WordPress engine, use an external folder or directory to store your images.
2.) Use minimum number of Flash elements. Flash animation is a great way to impress your visitors but search engines as of today are still having the trouble of indexing the flash animations. So you should minimize their usage.
3.) Add an extra plugin for “related post” to keep your visitor clicking items on your site. Simply help readers and search engines find out more about your blog site.
4.) When adding image, make sure you use a descriptive alt tag in your image for HTML coding.
5) Always link your inner pages with the most importance web page you want to be optimized for the search engines. For example, your HOME page. Search engines rank web pages instead of sites. So you should link blog posts and inner pages with your home page.
To learn more, here are some of the quality eBooks that you can download for FREE:
- 10 Free SEO Tools
- Advanced SEO Techniques
- Blogging For Cash
- Newbies Guide to Online Fortunes
- Fundamentals of Article Marketing
- Conquer Article Marketing
- Dominate the Web 2.0 Market
Business Blogging for Non-writers
In my previous blog, we talked about the first step in pursuing your goal which is to “generate your product/ service”. Due to a number of email feedbacks received, I feel the need to clarify a bit further. I used the word, GENERATE to indicate a broader scope compared to “create or produce your own product”. “GENERATE YOUR PRODUCT” simply means “identify what to sell to a target market”. Selling your own product is ideal but as a newbie, you need to be kind to yourself – stay focused on marketing and stay away from the problems of payment collection, product shipping, retail store operation, etc.
The best place to talk about your product is through your blog page. The major search engines, Google, Yahoo, and MSN love to index blogs into their free search rankings simply because the website gets constantly updated.
However, here’s where many blog owners go wrong: They start their blog-out right and post on a regular basis. But, too often, they give-up before they build-up any type of following.
Typically, you need 50, 100, even 200 posts to see any decent search traffic. The search engines then see that your blogs has been abandoned and aren’t as interested in it as much as before. Positions you did claim are given to the competition.
Of course, you may have given-up on your blog for good reason. Just like most of us, you just don’t have time to post to it… and you may not be a professional writer. As for my own case, this free WordPress account is just a great way to share my thoughts and inspire other freelancers. For one, there is no commercial goal here because we are not allowed to directly generate sales at WordPress.com (but can get away with a few affiliate links once in a while
So this is what I did. I got a very low-priced web hosting at Globat.com. It’s less than $5 a month and with a purchase of domain name, I only invested a total of $67 for one year. Let me just say that the only limitation that I have encountered so far with this cheap service is its inability to upload a file over 10mb (image or video). You can post a large file on free sites like YouTube and just embed the link to your website.
For this amount of $67, I was able to have the luxury of “freedom” to do what I want with my website, work on the SEO, and take the first step to online business. I still use the WordPress software as my engine since I have fallen desperately inlove with it. WordPress all the way! Use FREE WordPress themes to save on having to pay for web design service.
Look at your website as “your first store” where you need to carefully choose the category of the product or service for it. What kind of customers do you want to come to your store? You have to make up your mind and be firm about it because your meta tags/keywords and anchor texts will all depend on this important decision. In fact, all your succeeding plans and investments will all depend on it.
What to write
A non-writer like me can simply offer personal evaluation of the products that I wish to sell. For example, I want to sell a certain “user-friendly plugin”. Now, as a user of both WordPress.com and WordPress.org, I can write about the difficulties of having to host my own WordPress theme as a non-tech person due to the necessary plugins that I have to search for, download, then upload, then install and activate. As a solution, I will then recommend my affiliate product which is the plugin software.
You can’t go wrong because this is your blog article and you are entitled to your evaluation. On a more formal tone, it is called a “product review”. As more and more people find your reviews to be credible, you will attract loyal buyers of your products or affiliate products.
You can get more tips here http://www.webcontent-manager.com
