A country club on the fringes of London has been the meeting place for all sorts of powerful and interesting people from all over the world for the last two days.
They included political figures like Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell, business leaders from Sir Richard Branson to Jean-Bernard Levy of Vivendi, media bosses like the BBC's Mark Thompson and Carolyn McCall of Guardian Media Group - and even royalty in the form of Prince Charles and the crown princes of both Spain and Norway.
Who could attract such a crowd? Google, of course. Its annual Zeitgeist event is becoming a rival to the World Economic Forum in Davos for movers and shakers who want to know where the most powerful business on the web is heading.
On the final afternoon, even a few journalists were allowed in for what seemed like a routine demo of products that many of us had already seen - like Google Squared, the "structured data search" which might blow Wolfram Alpha out of the water when it launches, or Gmail Video Chat, which is already out there for anyone to try.
Then, without warning and just as the journalists were in danger of nodding off, two billionaires slipped quietly into the room, and we all perked up. Eric Schmidt, Google's CEO, and Larry Page, the firm's co-founder, had come to answer our questions..
No, Larry Page revealed, he hadn't tested Wolfram Alpha yet, though his co-founder Sergey Brin had tried the computational knowledge engine - and, of course, any competition was welcome.
Google Video Chat was better quality than Skype and yes, "quite significant" numbers of people were using it - this was Eric Schmidt's response to my sceptical query about the product. Others wanted to know whether Twitter, now increasingly seen as a "breaking news" service by its users, was forcing Google to focus on real-time search.
Larry Page said that speed and relevance were Google's watchwords - the company even gave out stopwatches to its employees to stress that message - but he didn't seem too worried about Twitter.
One subject on just about everyone's mind, however, was privacy. A German journalist appeared particularly concerned that her house could be seen on Street View - to such an extent that Eric Schmidt seemed eager to deal personally with getting it removed.
Street View is just one issue which is helping to crystallise the concerns of both consumers and regulators about the threat which the search giant might pose to privacy. But Larry Page, in particular, seemed determined to prove that he wouldn't let the business be shackled by such concerns.
To the journalists, and later to the whole Zeitgiest crowd during an onstage chat with Eric Schmidt, he enthused about a couple of Google geo-location products: Latitude and an Android application called Tracks, which tell your firends where exactly you are.
And, when asked about EU pressure to reduce the length of time that Google holds on to data, he had a clear riposte. That sort of policy, he explained, could make the data less valuable not just for his company, but for anyone wanting to predict events like a flu pandemic by examining patterns in searches over a long period: "I don't feel the public as a whole and the regulators have engaged in enough of a debate to know what the issues are."
Faced with the prospect of more regulation, guess what? Google thinks that that's a really bad idea. "Historically, when markets get regulated, the rate of innovation slows dramatically," Eric Schmidt told us."We don't think that's a good outcome - we think a better outcome is for us to use good judgement. We take what we see as the consumer interest as our guiding principle."
Google's billionaire bosses are amiable fellows, willing to engage with journalists on just about any issue. But as their company reaches into every corner of our online lives, they are bound to face more questions about how they wield their power. Telling the regulators that Google knows best what's good for consumers may not wash.
mercredi 20 mai 2009
samedi 9 mai 2009
There's money to be made from blogging - uh, right?
Late last month Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton's notoriously inept campaign pollster, published an article in the Wall Street Journal asserting, "There are almost as many people making their living as bloggers as there are lawyers. Already more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers or firefighters."
Penn's lunacy, buttressed by the claim that almost half a million Americans used blogging as their primary source of income, prompted howls of derision from bloggers.
"Fantastically bogus and clueless," Mickey Kaus wrote on the Slate website.
But as the ranks of print journalists dwindle, and the army of Lilliputian opinioneers swells, wouldn't it be nice to know if there is money to be made blogging?
I have been monitoring the career of ace Washington Post reporter Rick Redfern, a cast member of Garry Trudeau's "Doonesbury" comic strip, whose transition to Internet journalism has been rocky at best. Are there gold nuggets buried in the digital dross?
There is a small aristocracy of early-adopting bloggers who have become successful online publishers, such as Markos Zuniga of Daily Kos or Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo. If you can get a media giant such as New York Times Digital or the Atlantic magazine to pay you to blog, good on you. There are well-read academic bloggers such as Harvard economist Gregory Mankiw, who blogs for free. He writes textbooks, he has a nice day job -- it's all good, as the kids say.
Then there is everyone else. Millions of them.
The website Technorati pegged bloggers' median annual costs at $80 and the median average revenue at $200. Bloggers with advertising spent a mean of $1,800 on their sites and harvested bigger bucks, about $6,000 a year. Enough to feed a family of four. Mice.
How do you make money? By driving traffic to your website.
Penn's lunacy, buttressed by the claim that almost half a million Americans used blogging as their primary source of income, prompted howls of derision from bloggers.
"Fantastically bogus and clueless," Mickey Kaus wrote on the Slate website.
But as the ranks of print journalists dwindle, and the army of Lilliputian opinioneers swells, wouldn't it be nice to know if there is money to be made blogging?
I have been monitoring the career of ace Washington Post reporter Rick Redfern, a cast member of Garry Trudeau's "Doonesbury" comic strip, whose transition to Internet journalism has been rocky at best. Are there gold nuggets buried in the digital dross?
There is a small aristocracy of early-adopting bloggers who have become successful online publishers, such as Markos Zuniga of Daily Kos or Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo. If you can get a media giant such as New York Times Digital or the Atlantic magazine to pay you to blog, good on you. There are well-read academic bloggers such as Harvard economist Gregory Mankiw, who blogs for free. He writes textbooks, he has a nice day job -- it's all good, as the kids say.
Then there is everyone else. Millions of them.
The website Technorati pegged bloggers' median annual costs at $80 and the median average revenue at $200. Bloggers with advertising spent a mean of $1,800 on their sites and harvested bigger bucks, about $6,000 a year. Enough to feed a family of four. Mice.
How do you make money? By driving traffic to your website.
dimanche 3 mai 2009
Web tool 'as important as Google'
A web tool that "could be as important as Google", according to some experts, has been shown off to the public.
Wolfram Alpha is the brainchild of British-born physicist Stephen Wolfram.
The free program aims to answer questions directly, rather than display web pages in response to a query like a search engine.
The "computational knowledge engine", as the technology is known, will be available to the public from the middle of May this year.
"Our goal is to make expert knowledge accessible to anyone, anywhere, anytime," said Dr Wolfram at the demonstration at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society.
The tool computes many of the answers "on the fly" by grabbing raw data from public and licensed databases, along with live feeds such as share prices and weather information.
People can use the system to look up simple facts - such as the height of Mount Everest - or crunch several data sets together to produce new results, such as a country's GDP.
Other functions solve complex mathematical equations, plot scientific figures or chart natural events.
"Like interacting with an expert, it will understand what you're talking about, do the computation, and then present you with the results," said Dr Wolfram.
As a result, much of the data is scientific, although there is also limited cultural information about pop stars and films.
Dr Wolfram said the "trillions of pieces of data" were chosen and managed by a team of "experts" at Wolfram Research, who also massage the information to make sure it can be read and displayed by the system.
Nova Spivak, founder of the web tool Twine, has described Alpha as having the potential to be as important to the web as Google.
 Developers say Wolfram Alpha can simplify language to remove 'linguistic fluff' |
"Wolfram Alpha is like plugging into a vast electronic brain," he wrote earlier this year. "It computes answers - it doesn't merely look them up in a big database."
Learning language
The new tool uses a technique known as natural language processing to return answers.
This allows users to ask questions of the tool using normal, spoken language rather than specific search terms.
For example, a relatively simple search, such as "who was the president of Brazil in 1923?", will return the answer "Artur da Silva Bernardes".
This technique has long been the holy grail of computer scientists who aim to allow people to interact with computers in an instinctive way.
Dr Wolfram said that Alpha has solved many of the problems of interpreting people's questions.
"We thought there would be a huge amount of ambiguity in search terms, but it turns out not to be the case," he said.
In addition, he said, the system had got "pretty good at removing linguistic fluff", the kinds of words that are not necessary for the system to find and compute the relevant data.
 Searching for 'Blair Bush' could give a different result... |
Simple text
However, he said, most users tend to stop using structured sentences fairly quickly.
"Pretty soon they get lazy, and they say 'I don't need all those extra words'."
Instead they tended to use "concepts" similar to how most people use search engines today.
But Dr Boris Katz of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a natural language expert, said he was "disappointed" by Dr Wolfram's "dismissal of English syntax as 'fluff'''.
For example, he said, suppose someone asks ''When did Barack Obama visit Nicolas Sarkozy?"
"Here, understanding the sentence structure is important if you want to be able to distinguish cases where it was Barack Obama who visited Nicolas from cases where it was Nicolas Sarkozy who visited Barack Obama," he said.
 ...than searching for 'Bush Blair' |
"I believe he is misguided in treating language as a nuisance instead of trying to understand the way it organises concepts into structures that require understanding and harnessing."
Dr Katz is the head of the Start project, a natural language processing tool that claims to be "the world's first web-based question answering system". It has been on the web since December 1993.
Like Alpha, the system searches a series of organised databases to return relevant answers to search queries. However, it only uses public databases and runs on a much smaller scale than Alpha.
Dr Katz said it answers "millions of questions from hundreds of thousands of users from around the world" on topics as diverse as places, movies, people and dictionary definitions.
It is also able to compute answers from several sources in a similar way to Alpha.
Web companies have also harnessed natural language processing.
For example, Powerset uses technology developed at the Palo Alto Research Center, the former research laboratories of Xerox.
The company is attempting to build a similar search engine "that reads and understands every sentence on the Web".
In May 2008, the company released a tool that allowed people to search parts of Wikipedia. Two months later, it was acquired by Microsoft.
Dr Wolfram said he has been working on Alpha for several years. However, he imagines that it will continue to evolve.
"In a sense we are at the beginning," he said.
samedi 2 mai 2009
What Is The Cheapest Ecommerce/online Payment Service?
For an ecommerce design the first criteria is to identify the market, the competition and the business goals. Accordingly the website can be developed. E-Commerce web design is much more than just putting the company brochure on the net or adding an internet shopping cart to the existing product catalog. You will find many sites on the web that can help with ecommerce and have great web design information.
When designing a ecommerce web site the specific goals have to be identified, determine how best to meet the goals depending on the budget and then find which software to use and services to commission to design the web site.
A business web site can:
• Generate leads. One can pre-sell one’s business services and products to generate telephone; email or online form leads from customers.
• Generate sales quotes. Solicit or generate automated quotes that will generate a customer sale or lead.
• Generate advertising revenue. One should display online content and free services.
• Generate customer traffic. This can be done through search engines and business directories to pre-sell products. Traffic is then redirected to the main web site or product web pages.
• Provide a store front with an ecommerce shopping cart. A catalog that is fully automated with customer purchases and communications processes.
A website may be like a traditional store. But there are more considerations with ecommerce web site design than with a traditional store. The eCommerce website design has to be customer friendly and present a professional image, have a good sales copy and should make it easy for the customer to make the desired response. It should be search engine friendly. Most customers go through search engines like Google, yahoo, MSN, so the strategy should be to generate search engine traffic. For that a search engine optimization expertise is needed.
There are thousands of web site tools like shopping carts, content management systems, payment processors, online bulletin boards and advertising management tools. Some are cheap, others are expensive. Costs are important considerations for any e-Commerce web site design solution. It is possible to purchase web site tools and services by subscription. There is no need to make long term commitments with subscription software or services.
There are a few website design options. You can do it by yourself with web design software like Microsoft FrontPage or outsource the entire web site development to a web design company. If you want to design by yourself then you can buy website templates, web design software and do it or you can buy web solution services. You can also consult a consultant. As with any other business, this also has risks. You have to clearly know your objectives, have enough business knowledge to evaluate web service suppliers and business tools and maintain a positive cash flow.
Earn Money Online With Affiliate Marketing
Many individuals are going into online businesses and online marketing which is known as Internet Marketing (IM) to make money online to supplement main income or depending on IM as a primary source of income.
Why? Because internet marketing offers a lot of benefits! Listed below are some of them:
1.The world is your oyster, you can market your products to anyone who is on the internet. This equates to a wider market base which means more profits.
2.It is much cheaper to set up a business on the internet than it is to set up an actual business establishment.
3.You do not need to have your own products to get started in internet marketing, Many people make a healthy income by just selling other people’s products. This normally requires setting up an agreement with an online retailer or merchant, and once its done, you can immediately start making money by selling the merchant’s or the retailer’s products.
The method of selling other people’s products online is know as affiliate marketing, it is the fastest growing way people make money online. By definition, affiliate marketing is an agreement between both the internet marketer (who wants to sell products) and the online merchant or retailer (who has products to sell)
To start making money online with affiliate marketing, one simply has to sign up as an affiliate with a merchant offering affiliate programs or join an affiliate network where they have many affiliate programs in different categories that you can pick and promote. One such popular network is Clickbank. Many of these affiliate networks are free but some requires you to pay a nominal membership fee.
Some affiliate programs or network will require you to submit your website’s address and description as a verification that your website is active and relevant to their products. Others do not require this verification process and you are free to choose the affiliate program you want to market.
The merchant normally provides his affiliates with banners, text ads or special html codes (linking to the merchant’s site). The affiliates with then place these on his website and earn commissions when targeted traffic or sales are directed to the merchant’s web site.
How do youmake money online with affiliate marketing? It depends on the type of affiliate marketing program you’ve signed up for. Most affiliate marketing programs compensate their affiliates in different ways:
Pay-per-click (PPC), pay-per-sale (PPS), or pay-per-lead (PPL). In pay-per-click affiliate marketing, the affiliate is paid whenever he directs traffic to the merchant’s site. PPS and PPL affiliate marketing programs work rather differently. In PPS, the affiliate only gets paid when his referral converts into an actual sale. In typical PPS affiliate programs, the affiliate would usually get a commission for each conversion. PPL affiliate programs work the same way, although affiliates are paid a fixed fee whenever his referral converts into a lead for the company.
Some affiliate marketing programs are two-tier programs, wherein the affiliate is also allowed to recommend other affiliates to the merchant. In such affiliate programs, the affiliate would not only be paid for the traffic or sales that he would direct to the merchant’s site but also for the traffic or sales directed by the affiliates who signed up with the program through his recommendation.
Yet another way of earning more profits with affiliate marketing is through residual affiliate programs. Residual affiliate programs are affiliate programs where the affiliate gets paid a number of times for as long as the merchant keeps the customer the affiliate has referred to his site. One form of residual program gets the affiliate paid a commission every time the referred customer purchases something on the merchant’s site. Another form of residual affiliate program gets the affiliate paid a percentage every month for as long as the company keeps the referred customer.
There are many ways one can make money online and affiliate marketing is the most popular method. How much money you can make also depends on your internet marketing and SEO skills. I will be covering the two topics in future articles.
jeudi 30 avril 2009
Product to Sell On eBay
Do you have a product to sell on eBay? Most people believe the only way to make great money on this huge online auction site is by selling unique items like cars, antique clocks, or signed authenticated Babe Ruth baseball cards. Well, that’s just not true!
The vast majority of success stories feature regular, average people who had a product to sell on eBay and then sold their stock, often one item at a time, over a period of time. The truth is, you don’t need to have an “incredible” product in order to succeed!
What you do need, however, is good, solid information on how to sell something on eBay. There are tons of pages of information out there on how to do this, but the truth is much of this information doesn’t work, or is so outdated that it’s no longer valuable or useful.
What you need is fresh, up-to-the-minute information, tested and proven by others, about how to sell something on eBay.
If you are one of those people who thinks they don’t have a viable product to sell on eBay, don’t worry! There are a ton of ways for the average person to connect with distributors who would love to help you out with quality items you can put up for bid. These items come from around the world and many of them have a markup value that all but guarantees you a tidy profit when the item sells.
10 Tips On How To Sell Your Product
It’s not just about the product you know.
I realised maybe there was going to be a problem with my ability to run a decent business when I found that I was buying more products than I was selling! So I vowed to not buy the next product that I saw advertised, and stop to analyse why I wanted to buy it instead.
I used to think a good product sells itself. Well, it doesn’t. Others have sold the same products I tried selling with far greater success.
Here’s what I’ve learnt.
1. It’s all about marketing. Would you buy glue that doesn’t stick very well? What if you put the same product on the back of little pieces of paper and call them post-its? What about an anti-bacterial solution that isn’t strong enough to kill germs on furniture surfaces? No? What if the seller changed it to an antiseptic mouthwash that cures bad breath and called it Listerine?
2. Target your audience! You may win some new converts by trying to get as many people to see your products as possible. But if you have a limited budget, it helps to try to market to those who are already looking for your kind of product. Notice most ads have very positive, hyped up words that target hopes, dreams, greed etc? You are selling a want, not a need. You have to turn the want into a need.
3. Give a call to action. Do not let them just read the advertisement and move on.
4. Give a free gift, or bonus.
5. Notice most ads have very positive, hyped up words that target hopes, dreams, greed etc? You are selling a want, not a need. You have to turn the want into a need. Can’t expect to sell millions of products by saying please buy, you don’t really need it but have pity on me, I have 12 kids to feed. Please, please please. Help me.
6. Learn to face rejection. I hate this part. I’d really rather not even try. But then, I’d have failed before I’ve even started. Oh, and learn why you got the rejection and how you can change that into a yes, rather than blame the grumpy lady who told you off.
7. Articles are to entertain first, not to provide information. You have to write what the customers want to read, not what you want to write. They can find information very easily these days.
8. Sell yourself. It’s all about you. The seller. You make the product look good and convince people why they need it too. Your reputation is at stake as well. I always thought a model’s job was to look good. It isn’t. I learnt it from America’s Top Model. The model’s job is to make the product look good.
9. It’s all about building up a relationship. Robert Kiyosaki uses himself to teach his lessons and sell his products. People buy Rich Dad Poor Dad because of him. He always said he was a best-selling author. Not a best-writing author!
10. Keep bugging them. Get an email contact or something. Send regular updates. Eventually they will buy something. Don’t spam though. Turns people off. And if emails keep bouncing, it may be an abandoned account. Don’t waste your time.
Karen Cheong believes we all have it in us to be rich - ridiculously rich. We just need to learn to unleash the potential.
mercredi 29 avril 2009
How To Sell A Website
If you have an existing website or domain name you no longer need and wish to sell it to an interested buyer for a one-time profit, or if you're a speculator looking to build a steady source of revenue by buying and reselling valuable domain names, this helpful guide will explain the steps you need to take to ensure a quick, easy and profitable sale.
Establish a Reasonable Price for Your Site
* How Much Can I Get?
Before you sell, it's a good idea to know how much the domain is worth. Market prices for domain names can run from a few dollars to thousands of dollars for premium names. The domain name "Loans.com", for example, sold for $3,000,000 just a few years ago. The key to deciding whether or not to sell a domain name you own is to determine its worth to you if kept and, alternatively, how much a buyer is willing to pay. You may have heard rags to riches type stories of cheap domain names resold for hundreds of thousands of dollars. During the good old days of the Internet boom this was possible. However, things have slowed down considerably since then and there it is very rare to hear of a domain name sold for more than $10,000. However, while big deal domain sales do occur less often in today's domain market, selling domain names can still be very profitable. Short, catchy, top level domain names are selling for upwards of $5,000 on the domain aftermarket. Other longer, but still usable, names may be worth hundreds of dollars.
* Pricing is relative
Relative to your desire to sell, the type and timeliness of bidder inquiries (individual or corporate) and how well the sale price is negotiated should be considered. Don't try to fit your domain name into some 'proprietary pricing model'. Every domain name is applicable to a different target market. Determine who your potential buyers are before determining your asking price so you don't over or under estimate that price. Most names (~85%) sell for between 15%-40% of the asking price. Exceptions to this trend:
1. Fantastic names - Truly great names can command what a seller requests, unless that amount is unreasonable.
2. High asking prices - Names that have ridiculous or greedy asking prices rarely sell. Important!
3. Poor names - Names littered with hyphens, adult names, "4"s for the number "four", "2"s for the number "two", "U"s for the word "you", etc. Don't waste your time listing names like these. They rarely sell.
* Determining The Site's Worth:
Selling virtual real estate is a lot like selling physical real estate. Just like with the housing market, website homes (also known as domain names) can be purchased for a low cost, remodeled and decorated to look very attractive to potential buyers, and sold for a considerable profit. To understand how this works, first consider that you were in fact selling an actual house built on land instead of an abstract entity on the web. It would be impossible to price your home without doing extensive research to determine its worth. You'd need to take many factors into consideration, such as: size, landscape, curb appeal, the value of other properties in the area, the current buying market, and perhaps the biggest factor location, location, location! You'd never dream of arbitrarily assigning a sale price to your home without having some idea of its worth and what buyers might be willing to pay. If you under-price your home, you could be missing out on a substantial profit opportunity. However, if you overprice your home, you might not be able to sell it at all. That's why it's so important to have all the facts before putting your home on the market and the same holds true for selling your virtual home on the web.
Establish a Reasonable Price for Your Site
* How Much Can I Get?
Before you sell, it's a good idea to know how much the domain is worth. Market prices for domain names can run from a few dollars to thousands of dollars for premium names. The domain name "Loans.com", for example, sold for $3,000,000 just a few years ago. The key to deciding whether or not to sell a domain name you own is to determine its worth to you if kept and, alternatively, how much a buyer is willing to pay. You may have heard rags to riches type stories of cheap domain names resold for hundreds of thousands of dollars. During the good old days of the Internet boom this was possible. However, things have slowed down considerably since then and there it is very rare to hear of a domain name sold for more than $10,000. However, while big deal domain sales do occur less often in today's domain market, selling domain names can still be very profitable. Short, catchy, top level domain names are selling for upwards of $5,000 on the domain aftermarket. Other longer, but still usable, names may be worth hundreds of dollars.
* Pricing is relative
Relative to your desire to sell, the type and timeliness of bidder inquiries (individual or corporate) and how well the sale price is negotiated should be considered. Don't try to fit your domain name into some 'proprietary pricing model'. Every domain name is applicable to a different target market. Determine who your potential buyers are before determining your asking price so you don't over or under estimate that price. Most names (~85%) sell for between 15%-40% of the asking price. Exceptions to this trend:
1. Fantastic names - Truly great names can command what a seller requests, unless that amount is unreasonable.
2. High asking prices - Names that have ridiculous or greedy asking prices rarely sell. Important!
3. Poor names - Names littered with hyphens, adult names, "4"s for the number "four", "2"s for the number "two", "U"s for the word "you", etc. Don't waste your time listing names like these. They rarely sell.
* Determining The Site's Worth:
Selling virtual real estate is a lot like selling physical real estate. Just like with the housing market, website homes (also known as domain names) can be purchased for a low cost, remodeled and decorated to look very attractive to potential buyers, and sold for a considerable profit. To understand how this works, first consider that you were in fact selling an actual house built on land instead of an abstract entity on the web. It would be impossible to price your home without doing extensive research to determine its worth. You'd need to take many factors into consideration, such as: size, landscape, curb appeal, the value of other properties in the area, the current buying market, and perhaps the biggest factor location, location, location! You'd never dream of arbitrarily assigning a sale price to your home without having some idea of its worth and what buyers might be willing to pay. If you under-price your home, you could be missing out on a substantial profit opportunity. However, if you overprice your home, you might not be able to sell it at all. That's why it's so important to have all the facts before putting your home on the market and the same holds true for selling your virtual home on the web.
How to Sell a Product
- As well as getting good product information to the right people it is important to translate the product's features into benefits for the customer, thus make it easier for them to buy.
- During your presentation confirm that your prospect will want or need your product. (See closing a sale.)
- Most successful products and services are bought not sold. They are bought by people who have a need and believe the product or service will satisfy that need. However, purchases of this sort are a result of marketing, not "Selling."
- Selling a product rather than just offering it for sale almost always involves an emotional component.
- Spread your product information in any of the following ways: person to person, by representatives, dealers, salesmen, radio, T.V., word of mouth by customers, mail (in various forms), distribution at trade shows, seminars, telephone, fax, computer networks, product packaging, retail storefronts, space ads, and the internet.
- Good product information, including retail packaging, is important. The product information should be informative, true and complete. Ideally, it should give the prospect all the information they need to buy on the spot.
- For most prospects who are selecting from amongst products without assistance clear and easy to understand information as described above is important. When selling a product one on one to a prospect, translating the information to benefits is even more important.
- Lots of salesmen and sales managers don't like to admit that sales can be completed by product information. They like to think it is their personal charm, intelligence and determination that closes sales. For the most part, that is bunk. Not only can sales be made by product information, most sales are.
- The previous statement is more true today than in the past because of the proliferation of "Big Box Stores" and other forms of product sales without the benefit of inter human relationships. However, when a salesperson is involved, relationships are in fact more important than product knowledge, and sales persons who determine the clients needs in both product features and emotional needs will always win out over product information alone.
- Advertising, merchandising, and marketing are support functions for selling. Selling is the goal of these support functions.
- Sales can only be increased by:
- Selling more of your existing products to your existing customers - which probably means new sales methods.
- Adding new products.
- Adding new customers.
lundi 27 avril 2009
How to Sell Anything to Anybody
This technique puts the customer in a position to feel good about the product or idea being purchased. It is an example of a "core" presentation and does not include the introduction or the closing.
Steps
1. Ask the buyer to tell you about the last really good experience they had when making a similar purchase.
2. Watch the customers eyes and note which direction the buyer gazes.
3. Listen to the buyers story. Note which kind of sense phrases the buyer uses (i.e. felt, saw, heard).
4. Validate the customers story by saying a certain phrase (i.e. "That's a Great Story"). Stress the core of the phrase and "verbally punch" the words Great Story to make them stand out, slightly. Create your own phrase that works with your own presentation or use this one.
5. Present your product making sure to hold the product, brochure , etc. in such a way as to direct the customers eyes to the same position they were in while they were remembering the previous good experience (step 2).
6. When the customer gazes where the product or brochure is being held say to the buyer "I've got a Great Story to tell you about this [product or service you are selling]". If the buyer used a phrase that included the word "feel" you might say " I "feel" you'll like this Great Story about this [product or service you are selling]. Try to re-use words that the buyer used when telling you about their good experience.
Tips
* Establish rapport with the buyer prior to Step #1. This can be simple introductions but must include enough rapport building as to make Step #1 flow naturally in the conversation.
* Mirror the buyers physical state and vocal pattern. If the buyer stands with their hands in their pockets put your hands in your pockets. If the buyer scratches their head with their left hand wait 5-10 seconds and scratch your head with your right (mirrored) hand. Don't be too obvious, remember you are trying to make the buyer comfortable.
* It's OK to create your own phrase. It must sound natural coming out of Your mouth.
* If the customer said they "felt" something in their story you might touch or lightly bump the customer with the product or brochure at the very moment you use the phrase in your response. ( Don't be obvious )
* Make sure to follow up with your "Great Story" and Close the Sale.
Steps
1. Ask the buyer to tell you about the last really good experience they had when making a similar purchase.
2. Watch the customers eyes and note which direction the buyer gazes.
3. Listen to the buyers story. Note which kind of sense phrases the buyer uses (i.e. felt, saw, heard).
4. Validate the customers story by saying a certain phrase (i.e. "That's a Great Story"). Stress the core of the phrase and "verbally punch" the words Great Story to make them stand out, slightly. Create your own phrase that works with your own presentation or use this one.
5. Present your product making sure to hold the product, brochure , etc. in such a way as to direct the customers eyes to the same position they were in while they were remembering the previous good experience (step 2).
6. When the customer gazes where the product or brochure is being held say to the buyer "I've got a Great Story to tell you about this [product or service you are selling]". If the buyer used a phrase that included the word "feel" you might say " I "feel" you'll like this Great Story about this [product or service you are selling]. Try to re-use words that the buyer used when telling you about their good experience.
Tips
* Establish rapport with the buyer prior to Step #1. This can be simple introductions but must include enough rapport building as to make Step #1 flow naturally in the conversation.
* Mirror the buyers physical state and vocal pattern. If the buyer stands with their hands in their pockets put your hands in your pockets. If the buyer scratches their head with their left hand wait 5-10 seconds and scratch your head with your right (mirrored) hand. Don't be too obvious, remember you are trying to make the buyer comfortable.
* It's OK to create your own phrase. It must sound natural coming out of Your mouth.
* If the customer said they "felt" something in their story you might touch or lightly bump the customer with the product or brochure at the very moment you use the phrase in your response. ( Don't be obvious )
* Make sure to follow up with your "Great Story" and Close the Sale.
How to Sell Yourself (and Why Your Career Depends On It)
To get ahead in life, you need to be in the business of selling. If this statement makes you cringe, it is probably because the word “sales” evokes images of annoying telemarketers and pushy car dealers. Relax, though, as this article is about a product so wonderful and special you should have no qualms in selling it. The product? You.
There are endless situations in life where the key to success is the ability to sell yourself to others. In your career, the ability to convince an interviewer that you are the best person for the job is critical. When it comes to relationships, your ability to show your best qualities can be the crucial factor in clinching a date with the girl or guy you want. When you think about it, if you cannot sell yourself as a person to others, you are going to have a difficult time selling them your ideas, your wishes, your needs, your ambitions, your skills, and your experience.
Despite the necessity of being able to sell yourself to others, for many people like myself it does not come naturally. Introversion, shyness, and lack of self-worth are just a few of the obstacles that can potentially get in the way. To overcome such obstacles, I suggest focusing on the following:
Be Sold on Yourself
This is the first, and perhaps most important, aspect to successfully selling yourself to others. Unless it comes naturally, this is probably also the hardest. Being sold on yourself comes down to this: you must be aware of your own self-worth. This means you believe in yourself, have faith in yourself, and have confidence in yourself.
Being sold on yourself is not something that usually happens overnight. For many years, I did not like myself. I can, however, personally attest that it is possible to change your life and gain a sense of self-worth when there was once none. If you struggle with your sense of self-worth, here are just 3 ideas that may help:
* Live in such a way that you would want to be friends with yourself
* Find some time to reflect on what you like about yourself. If this seems hard, start with the smallest of attributes.
* Don’t do anything that will give you cause to feel ashamed later.
Have a Saleable Package
This article is predominately about letting others know about the inner contents of your package. That being said, there is no getting around the fact that people judge others based on their appearance. Some questions you may consider asking yourself are: am I looking after my appearance to the best of my ability? Are my clothes appropriate for the image I wish to project?
Be Positive and Enthusiastic
Can you remember the last time you received poor customer service? Did the person look bored, disinterested, and as if they wanted to be anywhere but that place? Don’t be that person. Positivity and enthusiasm can both be developed, but once again it takes work. Here are a few tips to help you:
* Look for the best in people
* Associate with positive people
* Care deeply about something
* See life as an adventure
* Smile
Be Real and Authentic
Rather than being about who you appear to be, selling yourself is about letting others know who you are as a person. For this reason, lies and half-truths are a recipe for disaster later down the line. By telling the truth, you will earn both trust and respect which, in turn, will help you build a great reputation. Not only that, it will make you feel good about yourself. The last thing you want to do is sell yourself out by compromising your values and principles.
There are endless situations in life where the key to success is the ability to sell yourself to others. In your career, the ability to convince an interviewer that you are the best person for the job is critical. When it comes to relationships, your ability to show your best qualities can be the crucial factor in clinching a date with the girl or guy you want. When you think about it, if you cannot sell yourself as a person to others, you are going to have a difficult time selling them your ideas, your wishes, your needs, your ambitions, your skills, and your experience.
Despite the necessity of being able to sell yourself to others, for many people like myself it does not come naturally. Introversion, shyness, and lack of self-worth are just a few of the obstacles that can potentially get in the way. To overcome such obstacles, I suggest focusing on the following:
Be Sold on Yourself
This is the first, and perhaps most important, aspect to successfully selling yourself to others. Unless it comes naturally, this is probably also the hardest. Being sold on yourself comes down to this: you must be aware of your own self-worth. This means you believe in yourself, have faith in yourself, and have confidence in yourself.
Being sold on yourself is not something that usually happens overnight. For many years, I did not like myself. I can, however, personally attest that it is possible to change your life and gain a sense of self-worth when there was once none. If you struggle with your sense of self-worth, here are just 3 ideas that may help:
* Live in such a way that you would want to be friends with yourself
* Find some time to reflect on what you like about yourself. If this seems hard, start with the smallest of attributes.
* Don’t do anything that will give you cause to feel ashamed later.
Have a Saleable Package
This article is predominately about letting others know about the inner contents of your package. That being said, there is no getting around the fact that people judge others based on their appearance. Some questions you may consider asking yourself are: am I looking after my appearance to the best of my ability? Are my clothes appropriate for the image I wish to project?
Be Positive and Enthusiastic
Can you remember the last time you received poor customer service? Did the person look bored, disinterested, and as if they wanted to be anywhere but that place? Don’t be that person. Positivity and enthusiasm can both be developed, but once again it takes work. Here are a few tips to help you:
* Look for the best in people
* Associate with positive people
* Care deeply about something
* See life as an adventure
* Smile
Be Real and Authentic
Rather than being about who you appear to be, selling yourself is about letting others know who you are as a person. For this reason, lies and half-truths are a recipe for disaster later down the line. By telling the truth, you will earn both trust and respect which, in turn, will help you build a great reputation. Not only that, it will make you feel good about yourself. The last thing you want to do is sell yourself out by compromising your values and principles.
samedi 25 avril 2009
Comment vendre avec efficacité sur Internet
Jongler avec les taux de clics, le nombre de pages vues, les indicateurs divers et variés qui donnent la fréquentation d'un site ... tel est le job du webmarketeur. C'est notamment ce que fait Édouard Guilhot-Gaudeffroy, directeur associé de Golden Market.
Au départ, rien n'indique une web agency de grande renommée. C'est au fond d'une petite rue de Montreuil que l'on finit par trouver les locaux pourtant bien agencés de Golden Market, une web agency de haut vol, spécialiste, comme le dit la plaquette "de la rentabilité sur Internet". Rentabilité sur Internet ? C'est un des maîtres mots de la maison, qui assure ne facturer des sites "que s'ils sont rentables et s'ils apparaissent les premiers dans les moteurs de recherche", et le credo d'Édouard Guilhot-Gaudeffroy, son directeur associé, qui manie avec beaucoup d'enthousiasme les concepts complexes liés au webmarketing. "Par nature, je suis un webmarketeur" affirme Édouard Guilhot-Gaudeffroy.
UN RÉFÉRENCEMENT OPTIMAL
Webmarketeur : le mot est lancé, pour une fonction parfois complexe à définir, et qui est en constante évolution. Est webmarketeur, celui, ou celle, qui combine et utilise les concepts du marketing, avec les techniques spécifiques d'Internet. Le webmarketeur a pour objectif de faire vendre le produit ou le service mentionné sur le site, avec le plus grand succès possible et une fréquentation optimale du site sur une cible donnée.
Pour cela, le webmarketeur jongle avec plusieurs indicateurs, comme le nombre de pages vues par internaute, le nombre de pages vues par visite, les taux de clics et le « page rank », un indicateur dans la barre Menu de Google, qui donne des indications sur la notoriété d'un site. « On peut distinguer deux types de Webmarketeurs », analyse Édouard Guilhot-Gaudeffroy. « Le premier type de Webmarketeur, qui fait du webmarketing que je qualifierai de simple, s'attache à avoir un bon référencement sur les sites: il s'agit de savoir combien de fois un site apparait dans les premières pages des moteurs de recherche, avec des mots-clés pertinents qui permettent un bon référencement ». Apparaître dans les premières pages, voire dans la première page d'un moteur de recherche est le signe d'un bon référencement et que le webmarketeur a bien fait son travail pour que le site soit privilégié dans les recherches des internautes. À ce stade, le webmarketeur doit définir des mots-clés et une arborescence de recherche qui permet de rendre visible le site pour les internautes.
MODIFIER LE BUSINESS MODEL DU CLIENT
Mais le webmarketing, du moins tel que le conçoit Édouard Guilhot Gaudeffroy, va bien au-delà d'un simple travail de référencement. « Le webmarketeur doit pouvoir influencer la stratégie marketing du site pour lequel il travaille: il doit par exemple, pour un site, être capable de décider s'il faut un forum, modéré ou non; savoir s'il faut du Flash, des flux vidéo, en streaming ou non. Bref, le webmarketeur va plus loin que les questions de référencement, et va être parfois capable de modifier le business model du client pour lequel il travaille, On intervient sur l'aspect stratégique du métier du client pour optimiser son site Internet.» C'est ainsi que, suite à sa réflexion comme Webmarketeur, un site d'apprentissage dans le domaine du bâtiment envisage de mettre en place des modules d'e-learning dans son apprentissage.
Il n'existe pas, selon Édouard Guilhot Gaudeffroy, de formation spécifique pour être un bon webmarketeur. Beaucoup de curiosité d'esprit, le sens de l'analyse, de la méthode, le goût des statistiques et de la recherche, permettent selon lui d'être un webmarketeur dans le vent.
samedi 18 avril 2009
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