Getting Started Online THE RIGHT WAY Guide - Part 2 of 4

This Getting Started Article is in 4 parts.
This is Part 2 of 4
To view Parts 1, 3 and 4 please do an Author search on Go Articles for Natalie Williams
The full, hyperlinked version of this article can be found at http://www.GettingStartedOnline.com

They might be interested in humor books, or other appliances. She would have these items for sale on her website. But also, she would join affiliate programs for humor books and appliances and place those on her website.

Then she could put another link in her listing that says something like:

"For more information on
my free ebook and item for sale,
please see my 'About Me' page"
(hyperlinked to the About Me page)

Her 'About Me' page would have a link to her website where she will entice them to subscribe to her newsletter. Whenever she has a new product, she could announce it in her newsletter.

Create a Custom About Me page
http://www.AboutMyAuctions.com


PayPal: Don't ask, just do it!
This is the bridge to jump off if all your friends are doing it. PayPal is the number 1 online payment acceptance company on the internet. Especially through eBay, almost everyone uses it and allows it for payment of an auction. Not only that, but PayPal allows you to add your website in their "PayPal Shops" area for free. I get at least 100 hits to my website a week from PayPal. No, that's not the highest number, but it's completely free advertising. That's 100 people seeing and hopefully joining my website that would of otherwise never found me.

Open a PayPal Account Now (Free)
http://www.paypal.com


ClickBank.com
ClickBank is for people who want to sell other peoples products and also for YOU to sell your product when you're ready and have one for sale. For now, we'll concentrate on becoming an affiliate for others.

When people create a digital product, such as software or ebooks that they want to sell, they want to recruit other people to sell it for them. So they will offer a commission to those people for promoting and selling the product. This allows YOU to fill your website with things to sell, without having to own the product, track sales or ship it. Now, this is good ONLY if you stay within the theme of your website and stay away from banners! Please do not throw up a bunch of affiliate links that have nothing to do with each other. It will not work!

ClickBank handles the payment process of digital products. So you can go through ClickBank and find the products you want to offer for sale and place these affiliate links onto your site. When people click these links, if they purchase the product, ClickBank completely handles the transaction and mails you a check twice a month.

Open a ClickBank Account for Free
http://clickbank.com/signup.cgi?r=cidiconosa


Buy your Domain name and open a Hosting Account
If you are dead set on going the free route on this one, please stop reading now, I cannot help you. Free website/Free Hosting=Unprofessional nightmare, Pop-Ups, unreliability, and no control over your site. I cannot stress the importance over this. If you are determined to be a success on the internet, you need your own website.

Depending on the type of site you want, your monthly fees will vary. Usually between $14.95-$49.95 per month.

Two great companies for this are Small Hosting Plans and Mini Website Maker. They cater to small and home based businesses and give you everything you need.. A domain name, hosting account, website template, customized business logo, shopping cart, website editing program where you can make changes to your website through the web browser and free technical support.

If not Small Hosting Plans, be sure to ask your hosting service if you are on a Unix or Windows server and if you are allowed databases. These are important.

http://www.SmallHostingPlans.com

http://www.MiniWebsiteMaker.com


Gather necessary software
(In my hyperlinked version, there are links to free software for the items below)

Web Site Design Software
Image Editor
Word Processor
eBook Creator
Email Program with Auto-responder capabilities

Create a website with free resources
and an opt-in subscriber list

Here's where your creative mind comes in handy. If you do not know how to create a website, it is imperative you learn. Yes, you could pay someone to make a site for you, however, to be successful, you must be constantly updating the site, adding affiliate links as you join, etc… and you cannot depend on someone else to be updating your site for you. You must become fully involved in the whole process. The more you can do for yourself, the less expensive this whole thing will be.

Again, I recommend Mini Website Maker, http://www.miniwebsitemaker.com

Write articles yourself. Review other products, ebooks, etc and add your affiliate link to the article.

Put an opt-in subscribe button on every page of your website. Gathering people's email addresses is one of the most valuable tools. It may not seem like much at first, a name here, and email there… but it is an integral part of your newsletter campaign later on. You may want to password protect a tempting portion of your website until the person adds themselves to your subscriber list. Or offer a freebie if they subscribe, like an ebook or contest entry.

Join affiliate programs that match your theme

Join affiliate programs that compliment your sites contents. Don't put links to office supply products if your website is about entertainment. There are SO MANY affiliate programs you can join, it's silly to waste space on things that are not relevant to your site. If someone came to your site because you offer free jokes and comics, do you really think they are going to veer off and purchase some copier paper simply because you have a link to it.

DO NOT PUT AFFILIATE BANNERS ON YOUR SITE. Repeat that 3 times, memorize it. Banners do NOT work. At least not like people think they would. Even without the statistic to prove it, I can tell you personally that I cannot stand to visit a website only to have an annoying flashing banner drawing my eyes away from what I'm trying to read. I don't EVER click a banner, I simply scroll the page to where the banner is not visible to me anymore.

There are literally thousands upon thousands of affiliate programs to join. You really never need to sell your own stuff with all the other opportunities out there. So once you have your theme, visit these websites and choose affiliate programs to compliment your theme. Since my website concentrates on assisting people to learn how to sell online, I join affiliate programs such as "Website software", "Auction learning ebooks", Auction Tools software", "Small Business equipment", etc… Important!! BEFORE you start joining affiliate programs, download the APO Spreadsheet (Affiliate Program Organizer) http://www.cidicon.com/sellerstools/FastAffiliate/downloads/apo.xls.

Every time you apply for an affiliate program, fill in the information on this spreadsheet. This is imperative because you will join hundreds of programs, and you will never be able to keep track of all the usernames, passwords and URL's on your own.

I now have over 200 vendors with whom I have accounts. If you think you need only 3 or 4 accounts and you will make money… keep thinking.

Ok, now that you have the APO Spreadsheet on your computer, here are some places where you can find affiliate programs. Now don't think you have to apply to all of them right now. I STILL apply for affiliate programs on a daily basis and add them to my website. If I see a product I like and think my website visitors would like it, before I put it onto my site, I first check to see if they have an affiliate program, join it and then put the product on my site, using my affiliate link.

Note: There are basically 3 different ways to find affiliate programs to join.

1. Through websites that offer you links to affiliate programs of other companies. You would sign up for each affiliate program separately through the companies website.
(Affiliate Portals)

2. Through websites that offer thousands of affiliate programs by joining their site. Therefore you would have one log-in for as many different affiliate programs that you join off their website.
(Affiliate Network)

3. Through the company's website that is actually offering the affiliate program
(Affiliate Programs)

The affiliate programs you will need to seek on your own, because there are literally thousands and thousands of companies that offer affiliate programs for their own products. The links I am providing are to the portals and networks where you can browse categories to find the affiliate programs you'd like to join.

Here are a few

Refer-It
Commission Junction
2-Tier
ClickXchange
AssociatePrograms
ClickBank
Affiliate Match
LinkShare
Site Cash
Be Free

Again, try the online hyperlinked version for links to the above.

Write a free ebook within the subject of your theme
Add your affiliate links

Is your theme about entertainment on the internet? Write an ebook about the "Top 100 Joke Sites" or "The Best Match Making Sites". Add all entertainment affiliate links in your ebook along with your website address and contact information.

Now give this ebook away like mad. Free for everyone. Be sure to put in the ebook that they have 100% resell or give-away rights, so they too will give it away. Push it enough and you can have thousands and thousands of your ebook all over the internet all filled with your affiliate links. Are you beginning to see how this can be profitable?

Submit the ebook to free ebook sites.

When I suggested to someone to write an ebook in his spare time, he said he would type the title and start the table of contents and then get stuck. Problem: How to you type a table of contents when you haven't even written the book yet? How do you know what is in it and which chapter each piece of information would be in. Never try and come up with a title or table of contents before you write a book. Just start writing. I know, you're saying "Write what?". I wish I had the correct answer for everybody, but I don't. All I can tell you is when I decided to write this ebook, I just opened up Microsoft Word and started typing. Later, I printed what I had, added things, deleted things and proofread. I decide where to add which affiliate link, where to add links to related websites, etc. Then I do it all over again. Eventually, I will have a whole book. Then I compile it into an ebook.

You may want to look at Extreme eBook Creations. Their package gives you ebooks on subjects about writing and promoting ebooks as well as the actual eBook creator software for free.

Write an ebook to be sold, within the subject of your theme.
Add your affiliate links

The same as before, however with this ebook, try to add something of extreme value that would push a person to purchase the ebook, such as a whole package of eBooks with resell rights, or a free vacation certificate. Let the potential buyers know they can resell all of the ebooks one-by-one or as a whole package. Or they can use the package as an incentive to sell another of their products.

Another way to add value would be to include other free eBooks with the purchase of yours, or something else free off your website.

List the ebook on eBay. Experiment with different pricing and listing options.

When I offered my 1st ebook for sale on eBay, I started at $4.00 and with a regular .30 listing. I sold about 30 of these.
Profit = $120.00 - .30 listing fee

The next time I listed it, I upped the price to $7.00 and paid extra to have my listing in bold print. I sold about 20.
Profit = $140.00 - 2.30 listing fee

Then I got really bold and upped the price to $9.00 and put the auction on a Featured Plus auction ($19.95 listing fee). I sold around 30 of those.
Profit = $270.00 - 20.25 listing fee

Even bolder, I went to a $14.99 price and put the listing in a Featured Home Page ($99.95 listing fee). I only sold 9 of those, so I barely broke even.
Profit = $134.91 - 99.95 listing fee

I decided to stay with the $9 price and Featured Plus. It not only generated the most profit, but more people saw the auction and even if they didn't buy the ebook, they sometimes went to my "About Me" page which contains information about my website or they would buy one of my other auctions.

With the right auction title on my listing, I can get up to 500+ people look at my auction. A great deal of them visit and join my website and likely purchase my product off my website other than through eBay, saving me the final value fee eBay charges. I say likely, because there is no way for me to track if the person first saw my auction and then came to my website and purchased.

This Getting Started Article is in 4 parts.
This is Part 2 of 4
To view Parts 1, 3 and 4 please do an Author search on Go Articles for Natalie Williams
The full, hyperlinked version of this article can be found at http://www.GettingStartedOnline.com