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This PageLimitless Marketing Ezine - April 7th, 2004
ISSN: 1525-8459
PUBLISHER: Willie Crawford - willie@williecrawford.com
2345 Whispering Pines Blvd, Navarre, Florida 32566
Phone 850-939-5794
Featured In Corey Rudl's Secrets To Their Success! Site.
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This has been a busy, but very productive week thus far. Let
me share with you just a few things...
First, here's a tip to speed up your website...
I wasn't very happy with the load speed of my workshop website
at: http://InternetMarketingHowToWorkshop.com
While looking
for solutions to speed up the site, I discovered the tool at
http://www.websiteoptimization.com
They have a tool where you
enter your website url and it does an analysis of your page. It
tells you how fast it loads with different types of connections and h
ow to improve the load time.
After looking at the times for my workshop website, and talking
to several people who told me that it took waaaayy too long to
load for them, I decided to speed it up. However, out of curiosity,
I compared my page to the seminar websites of several other
well-known marketers. My page was actually smaller than most
of theirs :-)
A few emails confirmed that some of my friends/clients had
looked at other seminar websites and simply given up because
they took so long to load. So I knew I was likely losing some
visitors this way too.
One of the solutions I looked at was webpage compression. I tried
some software that compressed the webpage until it was 1/7th
the size. The page basically downloads in the compressed format,
and then uncompresses as the browser renders it. That speeded
up the download, but left some surfers looking at a blank screen
until the page both downloaded and uncompressed.
I dropped into a few of my favorite online discussion forums and
asked my friends there to test my compressed page. Feedback
from those on slower connections told me that compression was
NOT the way to go. Several designers told me to just use layered
tables.
With layered tables, you can have the first table that loads only
contain the most important parts of your page... such as your
headline and stuff "above the fold." Then tables that load
subsequently, can contain other parts of the page. The net effect
is that the page takes the same time to load, but since the
visitor sees and starts reading the stuff in the first table, he
doesn't notice the rest of the page loading in the background.
My friend Frank Deardurff, who is teaching at the Internet
Marketing How To Workshop, set the page up this way in about
30 minutes. At the same time, he touched up some of the photos
on the page, giving them a uniform look and making some of them
smaller. It's great knowing people like Frank, who just a few
minutes after the first email, had the revisions done, and the new
page was ready for people to look at :-)
I also asked how many of you wouldn't mind more frequent but
smaller issues, since I come across so much "stuff" to share with
you during the week. EVERY single person who provided any
feedback said smaller but more frequent issues was a great idea.
I received a lot of positive feedback, so that's the plan.
The other thing I'll mention in this editorial is my free,
weekly Saturday networking and brainstorming calls. We'll have
another one of these this week and YOU are invited.
The call will be from 11AM - 12:30 Central Standard Time.
It's a great chance to ask questions and just discuss internet
marketing in a small group setting. Register by sending a blank
email to my autoresponder at: willie3-56875@autocontactor.com
Then send me questions you'd like to make sure we cover
on the call.
We also review 3 websites during the Saturday brainstorming
session, so it's a great chance to get some feedback on how to
improve your website. Just submit your site for consideration
after you register.
*** I have posted the MP3 recordings from a few of these calls
online. You can listen to them online, or download them and
listen offline at your convenience. You'll see that we share a
lot of great information. Listen to or download the MP3's for
free at: http://WillieCrawford.com/calls.htm
If you haven't already registered for the Internet Marketing How
To Workshop, do so today. You'll be able to lock in a great
airfare, and learn how to finally build an online business that
affords you and your family a very comfortable lifestyle!
Register now at: http://InternetMarketingHowToWorkshop.com
Since the hotels are filling up fast, I have tracked down some
excellent, inexpensive nearby hotels for workshop attendees.
If you'd like that information, you can grab it from my
autoresponder at hotels@williecrawford.com
Today's feature article is actually a re-release of one I did a
while back. I revised it a little. In talking with and reading
email from a lot of new subscribers, I felt it was time to share
the wisdom of this article with them. It's called "All Aboard
The Hype Train," and can save you a lot of grief!
Feel free to pass this article on to friends or run it in your
publications :-)
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Copyright 2004 by Willie Crawford
Are you not achieving the level on on-line success that you
desire? Are you not making enough sales for the products and
services that you promote? Are you having trouble finding that
program that's going to give you that BIG break? Are you still
looking for that "silver bullet?" If you answered yes to all or
most of the above questions then your problem may be that you are
riding on the "hype train."
What exactly is the "hype train?" It's a term I coined to
describe the ride taken by people getting pumped up (excited)
about every great product they read about. They haven't yet found
that product that's making them incredible riches. They jump from
product to product searching frantically for that one product.
They jump from car to car on a train that's taking them nowhere!
You need to be aware of how the hype train works so that you
don't get on for the most futile ride of your life!
The success of the hype train is fueled by a number of human
faults. The biggest one that I've noticed is what's termed the
"herd mentality." This is very noticeable in the "internet
marketing" arena.
Humans are reassured when they see others doing the same things
they are doing, or doing things that they are contemplating.
That's part of why testimonials work in advertising. We are not
sure that we are about to make the correct decision, but we get a
"warm fuzzy" when we see those we believe are savvy individuals
making the choice we are contemplating.
If those we follow are making good choices, that can be good....
it saves us the trouble of doing all of our own research.
Where the herd mentality gets us in trouble is when we let fear
of missing out cause us to take action. If we read about a new
product or service and get involved because we fear that
hesitating will cause us to totally miss out, we often make bad
decisions.
We fail to reason that if a product or service is really that
great, the demand will still be there tomorrow and we do have
time to "sleep on" the decision. If the market is so limited that
thinking about it for a day or two will cause you to lose out,
then you should probably pass anyway!
As we contemplate our decision to get involved in promoting a
product or service, hype often rears it's ugly head.
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I define hype as things designed to get us so excite about a
product or service that we don't examine it objectively. Laws and
standards often keep the hype from being blatant lies. Instead,
the positive points are emphasized and the negative aspects are
never presented.
An example of this is when an affiliate program manager tells of
the affiliate making $10,000 a month. If he fails to mention that
this affiliate is not "average" and gives the impression that
many, many affiliates are achieving this income level, then it's
"hype."
Hype is used in the internet marketing arena and many others
because it works. People have to see the "potential" in an
opportunity. If an affiliate program manager spent a lot of
effort emphasizing that most affiliates never make any sales, he
would get very few signups. It doesn't matter that the reason
most affiliates for many programs never make any sales is that
they never do anything to promote the product.
Those drawn to the hype often enthusiastically embrace what
appears to be a really promising product or service. As soon as
they get on the train and get settled in for the ride, they look
over at another car and see another business opportunity that
they can't afford to miss. The herd mentality kicks in and they
jump into the next car. As the train chugs along these people
jump from car to car.
All of this unfocused activity rarely produces significant
results and the person soon dozes off to sleep.... tired and
disillusioned. He awakens day after day and continues his frantic
jump from car to car never seeing how unproductive it all is.
How do you avoid taking a ride on the hype train?
You take a hard look at any product or service that you are
thinking of promoting. You look for real value and long-term
potential. You confirm that it's not just a product that in a
week will be old news and will have left a lot of disappointed
purchasers in it's wake. You acknowledge that the true path to
earning a decent living on-line is marketing products and
services that deliver real quality and value.
Delivering real quality and value produces repeat customers, and
this gives you a steadily growing income.
Now that you are aware of the hype train, you can avoid the ride.
You can ensure that you don't help finance a train that only
leads many to terrible train wrecks. Now you can look for that
gravy train that is on the true track to long-term business
success. It's at the same station, you just need to make sure you
get on the right train.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Willie Crawford has been teaching others how to build an on-line
business since late 1996. Frequently featured in radio, magazine
and newspaper articles and interviews, Willie teaches the average
guy what the top marketers are doing but seldom talking about.
Willie provides detailed how to information in his newsletter,
through his personal coaching, and at his annual how to workshop.
Register now at: http://InternetMarketingHowToWorkshop.com
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