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Multiple Income Streams From Niche Markets
Multiple income streams; exciting words, but what does it mean in every-day English? In the world of Niche Markets in Internet business, multiple income streams simply means having more than one source of income. This is achieved by making money from more than just one online business. Each different web site would generally be a different business. They could relate to each other, but not necessarily. You could have businesses that have nothing to do with each other. Both methods are quite successful. Let's examine different scenarios. How to market unrelated products? In the offline world, we are quite accustomed to seeing a little bit of just about everything sold in department stores, from razor blades to baby clothes to fashion dresses to living room furniture to washers and dryers, and so on. Is this how it is done in the online world? Absolutely, but it is not the only method. Mega Internet stores have evolved in such a way that to compete, you must be huge, and have tons of money to finance the operation, including the cost of the ever-changing web site. The competition and horrendous costs leave no room for the little guy, so he has to find another way to do business. Enter the newcomer, looking for a way to make a living on the Internet. Seeing he can't compete selling a large mix of hard goods and soft goods, he can decide on a "niche" product to market. A niche product simply means specializing in one key product, or just a few related products. This concept applies to both hard goods (items that must be shipped), as well as to downloadable information products. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities, and it means a whole different way of conducting business. Specialization is often achieved using mini-sites that sell only one product. The mini web site might have from one to five pages, but usually just a single page. Your information product that you want to sell needs a web site, hosted by a web hosting provider that provides you their service at a reasonable cost. Let's assume you started selling your product, and after a few months it is bringing in some income. It might amount to $1,000 up to $3,000 per year. That's not too bad, and is worth keeping, but certainly not enough to make a living with. This is where the concept of multiple income streams comes in. During the months that your business is building, you could be looking for other ideas. You find one that excites you, and more importantly you do the research and discover a good potential for attracting customers. So you go ahead with a second web site. You have now achieved multiple income streams! Over time you have other great ideas. Actually, you are now up to four web sites with different ideas. Two of them are related information products, and the other two are hard goods. All four are successful. Each one separately does not make enough to live on, but the combined four bring you in respectable dollars. But how are we controlling our costs? This is important to do, seeing we have the cost of some advertising as well as the web site costs. We found it necessary to build a customer list for each different product, and periodical emails are sent to your list. All these costs can become quite extensive, almost prohibitive. So, what do we do? How can we maintain our buinesses, yet keep our overhead down to where it isn't cutting hugely into profits? One critical aspect to look at is your hosting and to look for a web site hosting service that includes all or as many tools that you need in order to do some serious Internet business. The tools aren't all you need to consider. Sure having a hosting service that gives you an autoresponder is certainly a huge help. But, we have four sites here to market and at the average rate of $24.95 a business, that's close to $100 a month, a pretty steep bill especially if you are just starting out. Now we are looking for a host that will provide all the tools we need to run our businesses, plus we want one that will allow sub-domains in case we have closely related businesses. Can we get it all at one low and affordable price. In addition to the tools we need and the overall hosting package we need for FOUR businesses, we are all about multiple income streams, so let's see if there is a way to benefit (PROFIT) from the hosting company as well. Many hosting companies now offer an affiliate program where you can earn a commission by referring a business and gaining customers. That's pretty much a given, however the KEY is to ensure that the commission is recurring and not just a one time commission. Not sure what I mean about recurring income? Check the link out below for more information on recurring income streams This is all great but the question now "Is there really a hosting company out there that will give me all the tools, let me host multiple sites for one reasonable price AND on top of that let me build another income stream?" The answer is yes and you can read my review of Recurring Income Streams and how a company called "ThirdSphere" is an excellent example. At the same time you can learn the difference between Multiple Income and Recurring Income Streams. Read about it here: http://www.bestaffiliateproducts.com/thirdsphere.html Having Multiple Income Streams using Niche Marketing is mandatory in today's Internet Marketing world?that is, if you want to make any serious money. Internet Marketing today has become much too competitive, and the newcomer has very little chance of breaking in. Niche Markets, each with their own web site and relevant content is THE best solution. Niche Marketing is the hottest topic on the Net today. Niche Marketing is featured on my web site at Best Affiliate Products, and you can learn much more about it there. I'll see you soon, in Niche Country. Fred Farah - Copyright 2004 Best Affiliate Products and Niche Market Strategies
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Overachieving Your Way to Super Affiliate Stardom Internet business is a bit confusing especially if you're not really knowledgeable at it. You will also be left completely blank, asking yourself as to what type of online business is best for you. Why don't you try affiliate marketing business? Your Own Affiliate Program What better avenue to drive high quality and targeted traffic to your website than through your very own affiliate opportunity! Choosing the Right Affiliate Program Requesting information on an affiliate program is an open invitation to receive never ending submissions to your email account. It can be overwhelming to look at. You may feel as if you have been invaded. It can frighten a person into hitting the delete button very quickly. HOW DO YOU SORT THROUGH AND MAKE SENSE OF IT ALL? How do you know which programs really work? Following is a list of things to think about prior to choosing an affiliate program. Is It Possible To Make A Living Being An Affiliate Marketer? It may sound cliché but it is worth repeating. Affiliate marketing is one of the best ways to earn money online. This internet business involves a revenue partnership between a web merchant and one or more affiliates, whereby the publisher or affiliate gets a commission for referring clicks, lead or sales to the merchant's website. Once you are an affiliate marketer, then you are in business. Successful Free Affiliate Programs Affiliate programs are the latest money making tools available on the Internet. While there is definitely not a lack of options available, there is a lack of good options available. How to Choose an Affiliate Winner The idea of using affiliate programs is to produce extra income and in the process attain total financial freedom. More and more people from all over the world are looking for a real winner. 5 Deadly Mistakes That Affiliates Make - A Quiz Some people are making big money with affiliate programs-some are not. With a little research I have discovered that the people that are not cashing many checks are making the same five mistakes. Why not take a short quiz to see how you rate? Do you qualify as a novice, average, or super affiliate? Try this true and false quiz. You might learn something! Is There an Affiliate Free Lunch Program? "Everything worthwhile has a cost... Whenever you think you are getting something for nothing, look again-someone, somewhere, somehow is paying for it. Behind every free lunch there is a hidden cost to be accounted for." Edwin G. Dolan Set Up Winning Web Page To Be Powerful Selling Tool - 5 Ways to Help Affiliate Problems The Internet is powerful selling tool. Never before has been easier to start a business, be able to reach out to literally millions of potential customers and make your business succeed. Preparation - the Way to Success I have two questions to ask you. One. How much time do you spend marketing your affiliate programs? Two. How much time do you spend preparing to market your affiliate programs? Why Arent You Making a Ton of Cash as an Affiliate? 5 keys to you becoming a successful affiliate: Internet Tip of the Week: Reality Check Every time you turn around it seems you see another affiliate program which promises you vast riches. They give you all the sales material you need, and even throw in a free web page. How can I loose, one might think. Everything is all set up for me, and all I need is get a bigger PO Box to handle all the checks that will roll in. Your web site will be carried by the search engines, you have the "pre-written" ads ready to go - how can you lose? Affiliate Program Marketing: 10 Significant Sharp Ways To Increase Your Affiliate Commissions Millions of people sign up for affiliate programs, but have no clue on how to promote and market them effectively to generate piles of cash. Are Your Affiliate Programs Eating Away Your Money And Time So many times I have heard this. So many examples I do remember. People have left the internet business after being disappointed with their so called affiliate programs. 10 Things WalMart Teaches About Affiliate Marketing We already know about wal mart because of their ads in local papers, on billboards, on the radio and TV. So finding a local Wal Mart is easy, and so should it also be easy to find your web site. Although you may not need to use radio and TV advertisements, you should still use offline promotion such as business cards or direct mail. Naturally, you want other web sites to put your billboard ad onto theirs. So that's our first lesson on how Wal Mart can teach us effective affiliate marketing. Now let's visit a Wal Mart store. Once we arrive at Wal Mart, we enter a huge parking lot. Your web site must also enable a lot of visitors. If your site is on a slow server, you may be losing customers. That's lesson #2. As soon as we enter Wal Mart, we are welcomed by a Wal Mart greeter. This greeter not only welcomes us to the store, but also offers help in pointing out where to find what you're looking for. That's lesson 3a and 3b. Your site should welcome visitors and provide navigation to all the products and services you offer. You can do this by simply including a graphic on your page that says "Welcome, Click Here to find what you're looking for" and have that link go to your site map. Beyond the greeter is a wide path that branches out to different areas of the store with banners overhead that tell you what you can find in those areas. Your site map should consist of main links, as well as sub-links to corresponding pages. Now we get to lesson 4, that each page of your site needs to have a topic, a main header, that defines what each page is about, as well as provide links, pathways to corresponding pages, because you'll notice that Wal-Mart arranges their store to group products that are similar. The hardware section is near the automotive center, housewares are near food items, lawn and garden items are near the hardware and pet supply areas, etc. But you can still get from one area to another. As you browse the shelves, you see more than one type of item. If you're in the grocery section; for example, you'll see many different types of beans. Canned beans, dry beans, even beans from different companies. That's lesson #5. You should offer your site visitors more than one choice. If your site offers auto loans, for example, offer your visitors new auto loans, used auto loans, even auto refinancing loans. And, you may want to offer them more than one choice for each type of auto loan. Afterall, visitors came to your site because they are shopping around... so let them shop and choose from multiple options. Just remember not to stick cheese products in your automotive section! Another thing you'll notice as you browse the shelves, which leads us to lesson #6... although the shelves are stocked full, it's still easy to pick out your favorite can of beans. This is because the shelves are stocked neatly and orderly. The ads you put onto your site should also be neat and orderly. Mixing in tall banners with short banners and having banners for totally different products and services can make shopping your site more difficult. For example, if you have a page about auto loans, you wouldn't want to put a tall auto loan banner right next to a short casino banner. Instead, put a tall auto insurance banner next to the tall auto loan banner. As you roam the store, you frequently encounter employess who can help you find items. This goes back to lessons 3a and 3b. Each page of your site should have a help link to your site map, or you should have a site search. Since Wal Mart makes it easy to find an employee to ask for assistance, that leads us to another lesson: Does you site offer customer service? Can visitors click on a button to ask you questions before they make a decision? Or do they simply exit your site? Lesson #7: How many times have you heard announcements in Wal Mart? They frequently announce specials over their public address system. We are not suggesting that you force visitors to endure slow loading sound files. But you can make sound an option. To see how you can use this marketing option, go to www.geocities.com/pulsarmarketing We have an example there on how you can offer your visitors the option to hear your audible promotion without forcing them to listen and making your pages load slow. All you have to do is create a wav sound file, and launch it by using a graphic or text link such as: "Click Here to listen to our promotion". The personal touch of a person's voice on your site can help increase your conversions. But don't force the loading of sound files. Instead, use the method we recommend at the URL below: www.geocities.com/pulsarmarketing Another thing you can do to tell your site visitors about specials or new products and services your site offers, is to offer them a free subscription to your newsletter. Now that we've toured Wal Mart and we're ready to make our purchase, we know our way to the checkout counter because Wal Mart makes it easy for us. That's lesson #8. Your site needs to make it easy for visitors to purchase. If you do not provide any of your own products or services and strictly use affiliate programs, you need to make sure your relevant banners and text links are at the top of the page, clearly and readily visible, to the people visiting that page. When we arrive at the checkout counter, besides asking us if we want paper or plastic and if we will be purchasing with cash or credit, the cashier asks if we found everything we needed. That's lesson #9. Make sure you offer your site visitors more options when they checkout. And, once again, if you do not directly sell your own products or services and you strictly use affiliate programs, you can offer your site visitors two links to click on: One link that opens the offer into a new window so the person may continue browsing your site after they are done applying or buying from your sponsor, and another link that simply goes directly to the sponsor in the same window. Think we're done learning from Wal Mart? No. After we make our purchase, and even after we go home, there's lesson #10... the return policy. If you sell your own products or services, you need to assure your visitors that you stand behind what you sell, and make your return policy very clear. If you do not sell your own products and services, does your site have a way for customers to resolve problems, or to ask pre-sale questions? If not, you may lose customers to sites that do provide online customer service. How I Started My Own Work At Home Internet Business With Very Little Investment! Have you always wanted to work at home? Have your own business? Didn't think it was possible? No more commuting in traffic (plus gasoline prices right now are ridiculous). No more "business attire" (work in your jammies) and no more Corporate America breathing down your neck. I didn't think it was possible. I had always been a pessimist. Didn't think I could do it. Didn't have the knowledge or skills required. Promoting Affiliate Programs through Personal Recommendations Publishing articles online is a highly effective way to increase affiliate revenue. In the current marketing environment, it is increasingly important to differentiate yourself. Consumers have become savvier and are increasingly suspicious of pure shopping websites that send them to another site to complete product purchase. Furthermore, you may capture a consumerâ??s purchase once, but they are not likely to return to your site. Instead, they will simply return to the retailer you referred them to complete a purchase. Mining For Gold With The Best Affiliate Programs And Hitting Pay Dirt Colin McDougall tinkered around with affiliate programs earning a few dollars, nothing much to write home about, even had his own e-commerce site, known as the man's mall. In theory that site was supposed to offer all sorts of gadgets for guys. Colin created the site with the concept "build it they will come" but in reality no one did. Like so many dot.com ventures, it was a huge disappointment, lots of hard work and no pay off. Looking for Success as an Online Affiliate? Its All in the Numbers If you have been a home based business entrepreneur for any length of time at all you know by now that there are certain immutable laws that govern success. You know the following: How To Start Your Own Affiliate Program 1. Why Start Your Own Affiliate Program? |
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