Developing Your Marketing Strategy

Developing a marketing plan is an essential part of your eBook's success. You must develop and implement a strategic plan that includes both short-term and long-term strategies in order to succeed.

Short-Term Marketing Strategies

Short-term marketing strategies are those that bring you a temporary boost in traffic. Although these techniques are very important to your over-all plan, they are only a temporary traffic source and must not be solely relied upon.

Advertising

Purchasing Advertising is an absolute essential part of developing a successful Internet business. You must be willing to invest in your business if you sincerely want to succeed.

If you're looking for a low-cost, yet highly effective means of advertising your products and services, Google AdWords may be your answer.

Google AdWords provides a simple way to purchase highly targeted advertising, regardless of your budget. Unlike other sites selling banner ad space and pay-per-ranking, AdWords provides advertisers with highly effective text ads that are displayed with the search results. Studies have shown that highly targeted keyword advertising produces an average of four times the industry standard clickthrough rate.

Google, one of the premier Search Engines, receives over 29 million searches each day. Their popularity most likely stems from the speed and accuracy of their search results. Needless to say, placing your text ad with Google Adwords will be a highly effective way to advertise your products and services.

It is a well-known fact that text ads perform much better than banner ads. What better way to target your audience than through a popular Search Engine? Your potential customer is there for a reason -- they're looking for something. When a Google visitor types in their keywords,
they are almost instantly presented with their search results. On the right side of the results are colored text boxes containing targeted advertisements that match their search terms.

When you place your ad with AdWords, you will have the ability to select a list of tightly targeted keywords including all of the following:

• Keyword Matching - Shows your ad when a search includes your selected words.
• Phrase Matching - Shows your ad when a search includes your selected phrases.
• Exact Query Matching - Shows your ad when a search contains your exact keywords and no others.
• Negative Keyword Matching - Will not show your ad if a search contains certain words you select.

This unique targeting technique will enable you to create a highly targeted ad campaign and test your ads with a high rate of accuracy. What's more, you can even target your ads to a specific country or language.

The great thing about advertising with Google AdWords is that you will have complete control over your ad and how much you'd like to spend. You can open an account with a credit card with no minimum deposit required. Once you place your ad, it can begin running almost immediately.

Their advertising rates are very reasonable. The amount you spend on your advertising campaign will depend on two factors: (1) the number of times your ad is displayed and (2) the position, one through eight, in which your ad appears. The advertising rates are as follows:

• Position 1 - $15 per thousand ads shown
• Position 2 - $12 per thousand ads shown
• Position 3 - $10 per thousand ads shown
• Position 4 - 8 $8 per thousand ads shown

The position of an ad is determined by how well it is performing. Ads with a higher clickthrough rate will receive a higher position and in turn will cost more.

In order to increase your clickthrough rate and spend less money, try to select keywords and phrases that specifically target the product or service you're offering. Avoid using common words, as these will use up your ad displays very rapidly. Instead, select words that specifically target your product or service. For example, instead of using a general keyword like 'software,' use a keyword that focuses on a specific software such as 'FrontPage.' Or, a little less focused, 'web design software.' In addition, make sure you use your keyword phrase (search term) as the title of your ad. This will increase your clickthrough rate considerably.

When you set up your account with Google, make sure you use a different ad for each search term. Not only will this increase your ad's relevance in the search results, but it will also increase your clickthrough rate.

Once you place your ad, you can easily track your ad's response rate and make adjustments instantly. This is a great, low-cost way to find out which ads are performing the best.

Google AdWords provides Internet marketers with a cost-effective alternative to banner advertising. If you want to increase your traffic and sales, give AdWord a try -- you'll be glad you did.

For further information, visit Google AdWords:
http://adwords.google.com

For further information, see the 'Purchasing Advertising' section.

Forums (Discussion Boards)

Participating in forums that target your potential customer is a great way to share your expertise and make more sales. Although blatant advertising is prohibited, most forums will allow you to include your signature.

Search Engines

Listing your eBook's sales page with the top Search Engines and Directories will provide you with some additional traffic. However, ranking within the top twenty or thirty search results is very difficult. You may want to consider paying for a higher ranking. There are many Search Engines that will enable you to bid on keywords and pay a specified amount for each visitor you receive.

Long-Term Marketing Strategies

Long term marketing strategies are those that bring you a steady stream of targeted traffic over time. These strategies will continue to produce results even years down the road.

Opt-in List (Ezine)

An ezine, also known as an email magazine, online publication or opt-in list is simply a newsletter available via email and/or online.

Having your own publication will enable you to build a list of targeted potential customers.

Developing your own list of targeted potential customers is the absolute most important marketing strategy you can use.

No matter what strategies you're currently using, if you're not collecting the email addresses of your potential customers, you're literally guaranteeing your failure.

Opt-in lists provide you with the ability to create a targeted list of potential customers in which you can advertise on a continual basis. You will have a direct line of communication, which will increase your sales considerably.

The key to creating an effective opt-in list is to provide your subscribers with quality information. The best way to do this is to provide them with a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly ezine. An ezine is a newsletter or publication that is sent to subscribers who have chosen to receive your publication.

In order to build a database of potential customers and start collecting email addresses, you'll first need to set up a mailing list. This mailing list must enable your visitor's to submit their information and subscribe them to your list.

There are many free list services that will enable you to set up a mailing list. However, they are not recommended, as they will not enable you to personalize your messages with your subscriber's names. By simply personalizing your publication with your subscribers' names, you will increase your response rate considerably.

The following programs are list management scripts you can run on your server:

AutoResponse Plus - Complete list management including unlimited lists, HTML or plain text mailings, MySQL database, customizable auto-personalization of messages, automatic removal links, unlimited folow-up autoresponses and more.

Building Your Subscriber Base

There are many powerful ways to build your subscriber base. However, for this article, we will only focus on the "best" ways.

Your Website

Place a subscription box on every page of your website. Make sure you don't overlook this powerful means of gaining new subscribers. Your visitors will enter your website from many other pages other than your main page. They may never even visit your main page, so make sure your subscription box is visible on every page of your website.

Incentive Subscriptions

This powerful means of obtaining subscribers entails offering your visitors a free gift in return for their subscription. This free gift may be a free eBook, software, or report. This method of obtaining new subscribers will increase your subscription rate immensely.

Download free eBooks that you may use as incentives here.

Writing Articles

Write informative articles and allow them to be freely published. By writing articles, you can significantly increase your subscriptions. The key to using this method effectively is to include your subscription information within your bylines.

For further information in regard to writing articles, see the 'Write For Publicity' section.

Free Ebooks

Create a powerful free eBook and allow it to be freely distributed. Place your subscription box on each page. Your eBook will have the potential to be viewed by millions of Internet users.

Creating and developing an opt-in list is an absolute must. You must take every opportunity to promote your publication and gain new subscribers. The more subscribers you have, the more sales you'll make. Make sure you don't overlook this powerful method of making sales.

Free Trial

A great way to increase your eBook sales is to create a trial version of your eBook and freely distribute it. This will provide your potential customers with a sample of your eBook and encourage them to purchase the full version.

Writing Articles

Writing articles is one of the most effective strategies you can use to increase your eBook sales. Write articles that target your potential customer and allow them to be freely published.

For further information, see the 'Write for Publicity' section.

By creating and implementing a balanced marketing strategy, using both short-term and long-term strategies, you will increase your sales considerably.