Some Information to Know About Facebook Ads

While many are already using Google's pay per click product AdWords, Facebook.com also offers a way to reach out to current and potential fans in order to grow your brand and sell your products or services.  Facebook has grown in leaps and bounds over the years and today shows real promise in helping businesses and organizations reach vast amounts of online users.  Whether you are already using Facebook Ads or are interested in this powerful tool, here are some tips on how to maximize this endeavor.

Looking to Generate Leads

Besides making an immediate sale, many businesses always look to generate leads to sell complex products and services- with Facebook Ads, you can do so effectively.  For instance, while Pay Per Click is an excellent way to drive traffic to your site which then can lead to someone filling out a form, the downside is that many users don't necessarily want to spend time entering lots of information.  With Facebook you can make entering data into a form a much more efficient process.  Facebook offers "Connect with Facebook", this is a piece of code that you can either put on your external website or at your Facebook fan page where a person that is a member of Facebook can click on "Connect with Facebook" and verify that they would like to send you their personal information  (effectively filling in your form instantaneously).  Generally speaking, there are people that don't mind filling out a form or sharing their personal information with you, they just don't want to spend the time entering it.  Since Facebook already collected personal information once, it can be passed along to you- of course with the users approval first.

Benefits of Facebook Ads Compared to Pay Per Click

While pay per click charges you every time a person clicks your ad, with Facebook, you only get charged once.  For instance, if a person clicks your ad and then becomes your fan, you can then build awareness over time, sending them coupons and other exciting offers- all built off of this one click.   Also as mentioned above, you can target users meeting your demographics more easily with Facebook and more importantly serve specific information depending on the demographic- using the above example of serving up a different tab to a new visitor or a fan of your page.  Finally, Facebook is a great way to build a loyal brand over time.  Engaging your community is what helps Facebook stand apart from search engines and can lead to not only a direct viewer of your ad purchasing your product or service, but friends of that viewer that have learned virally of your brand.

To be Continued…………

READ MORE - Some Information to Know About Facebook Ads

Your Own Business!

So You Want Your Own Business!

There are many reasons for wanting to start your own business, and most of us get to this point. Which one of the following applies to you?

• Freedom from daily routine.
• Doing what I want when I want.
• Improve my living standard.
• I want creative freedom.
• I want to fully use my skills, knowledge and education.
• I have a product/idea/service that people need.
• I’ll have more time with the family.
• I won’t have a dress code.
• There are good tax breaks for business owners.
• I’m a Type B person and work best alone.
• I want to be my own boss.
• I want to make the decisions.

Now granted, every one of the above is a good reason for wanting your own business. The rub is, that not many people think the process through – step by step. There are 7 phases to business planning. They are:

1. Investigation Phase
2. Planning Phase
3. Start-up Phase
4. Operating/Monitoring Phase
5. Problem/Challenge resolution Phases
6. Renewal/Expansion Phase
7. Selling, Transferring, Retirement Phase

We’ll cover all of the above in my next few columns as a “Business Basics” refresher, but for today let’s take number one.

In the Investigation Phase you take a look at yourself and also your business options. There are careers that are suited to personality types, so the first thing you must discern is “Which personality type am I?”

Duty Fulfillers
This is an introverted personality who is serious, quiet, thorough, orderly, matter-of-fact, logical, realistic, and dependable. They take responsibility, are well organized, know what should be accomplished and work steadily toward it disregarding distractions. They are careful calculators, and 20% of this group become accountants.

The Mechanics
These are also introverts and are cool onlookers. They are quiet, reserved, observing, and analyzing life with a detached curiosity and have unexpected flashes of original humor. They’re usually interested in cause and effect, how and why mechanical things work, and in organizing facts using logical principles. They usually are craftsmen, mechanics, or handymen with about 10% becoming farmers.

The Doers
These people are extraverts who are good at on-the-spot problem solving, don’t worry, enjoy whatever comes along, are adaptable, tolerant, and generally conservative in values. They tend to like mechanical things and sports, and dislike long explanations. They are best with “real” things that can be worked, handled, taken apart, or put together. About 10% of this type go into marketing or become Impresarios.

The Executives
These are another extravert group and are hearty, frank, decisive, leaders in activities and usually good in anything that requires reasoning and intelligent talk, such as public speaking. They’re usually well informed and enjoy adding to their fund of knowledge. They may sometimes appear more positive and confident than their experience in an area warrants. They’re sometimes called “judgers” and “thinkers” and 21% of this group become legal administrators.

To go into each personality type would be far too complicated, but to give you an idea of the roles that personality types could fall into look at the following list. Beside the categories we covered in depth here are some simply broken down into Introvert or Extravert Personality.

Introverts choose careers that satisfy being:
• Nurturers
• Guardians
• Artists
• Scientists
• Protectors
• Idealists

Extraverts are usually:
• Performers
• Visionaries
• The Inspirers
• Givers
• Caregivers

The second part of the Investigating Phase is looking at your business options. When choosing the business you want to start consider the following:

• Do you like to work with your hands or brain, or both?
• Does working indoors or outdoors matter?
• Are you good at math, writing, puzzles, blueprints, installing things or fixing things?
• What interests you? What are your hobbies?
• Do you like to work alone or as part of a team?
• Do you like to plan things, or go to events?
• Do you like machines, computers?
• Do you like to drive or operate equipment?
• Do you like to travel, collect/display things, give/attend shows, or take pictures?
• Are you small, large, strong?

Make a list of your likes and dislikes. Keep a diary of things you do that relate to business and rate each entry from 1 to 5 based on your interest. Then prepare a list of your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and concerns. After doing all that, you should have a list of candidate businesses that are right for you. Then you can make a list of the “candidate businesses” and rate them from 1 to 5 based on your own chosen criteria.

Some criteria could be is it feasible, low in cost to establish, meets my objectives, will make money, there is a “niche” market of existing customers, or it will produce residual income to name just a few.

By the time you’ve accomplished all that, you should seriously consider visiting the local chapter of S.C.O.R.E. or your own mentor to use as a sounding board for your plan. Next week, if I haven’t dissuaded you so far, we’ll cover the Planning Phase.

READ MORE - Your Own Business!

4 Easy Tips To Increase Your Sales Page Conversion

Do you know most Internet Marketers fail to make money online because their sales page lack of certain tiny things? It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out how to convert your sales page into a money making machine.

Here are 4 tips to increase your sales page conversion:-

1) If you plan to make money online selling software products, always give away a free demo that becomes increasingly useless over time.

Take WinZip, for example; if you don't purchase the full version, it slowly takes longer and longer to use it. This is a good model for demo software products. Only give out a limited product that becomes less useful over time without the upgrade. If your software is good and people just love using it, they will definitely upgrade it thus make money online for you just like that.

2) If you list the benefits of a given product, you will want to use good images as bullet points.

For instance, using clear, fast-loading check marks or "x" marks can significantly improve your sales page conversion rate. Additionally, you will want to pay attention to the colors you use. Red and blue usually work best. By doing this simple trick will easily make money online for you as your sales page looks more like written by a professional person.

3) One good way to increase your conversion rate on your sales page is to add a picture of yourself in the top right corner.

This piece of personalization will help pre-sell your visitors by letting them know that a real person is actually selling this product, rather than some nameless entity or pen name that is used to cover up someone's identity. Visitors who read your sales page will be more likely to buy from you just by applying this tip.

4) One effective way to increase conversion rates on sales pages is to scan your signature, save it as a .jpeg or .gif; and then use it to "sign" your sales page.

If you do not have a scanner, you can also purchase a natural handwriting program, such as v-letter, to do this task for you. Simply seeing a real signature will make visitors more likely to buy and you easily make money online.

As you can see, by showing the professionalism design in your sales page, your conversion rate will be much higher than before. Also, by applying any of the tips given, you will make some serious money online so check your sales page and make necessary changes right away.

READ MORE - 4 Easy Tips To Increase Your Sales Page Conversion