Many people, in a rush to spike sales through the roof, think too big and end up completely missing out on one of the best free marketing opportunities on the net: discussion forums. Instead of focusing on individual sales, they go immediately for ads that promise thousands of visitors, pay-per-click search engines that could potentially expose them to thousands, and even sloppily-produced and sometimes fraudulent spam submission programs.
Even though it is essential to increase your rating with search engines, to purchase pay-per-clicks, and to participate in link exchanges and banner exchanges, discussion forums can often provide an extra, non-conventional sales medium to your campaign that allows you to quickly pull in customers with personal contact and conversational presentations of your product.
You can find these boards by searching for the specific product you sell and then adding the word "messageboard" or "forum" or "discussion forum" after it in quotations. For instance, I sell marketing tools and online business-builders on one of my websites, so when I look for forums to market my products in, I go to google or overture and type in "business messageboard" or "marketing forum." Find as many of these highly-trafficked forums as you can and sign-up. Some of them will require you to confirm it through your email address.
Before you begin actually posting on the boards, you need to lay down some general rules of approach. I would suggest the following methods, but you can decide for yourself what you think is appropriate for your business and situation.
These are my rules:
When I market on discussion forums, I always try to provide more for the board than I take away from it in potential sales. Not only is it ethical, but it's also good business. When people ask questions, I use the expertise I've gained from Internet business-building and marketing to legitimately answer their questions. If I signed up for every board I could find, and then slapped a boilerplate marketing pitch on every site, I'd just get ignored or banned.
I cannot stress enough how important it is to legitimately get involved with the forum community. It is definitely a goldmine for highly-targeted customers and it is possibly the fastest marketing medium on the Internet, but it is also very important to respect that it doesn't primarily serve as an ad host. If you stay low-key and helpful, people will respect your opinion more and will want to see what you have to offer. This is where your signature comes in...
When you create your account for most boards, they will give you the option of creating a signature, which they will attach to the bottom of every post you make. This is the best way to pull customers from messageboards--by alluring them with your signature. Write something catchy or intriguing and then slap a link to your site or email address on it. Remember: the more helpful you are (the more times you post advice/hints), the more times your signature appears... and the more potential hits you'll get to your site.
Next, you'll want to decide when it's appropriate to market outside of your signature. I personally only market in three situations outside of my signature in forum discussions. If a person asks a question about a specific product or service I market, then I'll respond because I'm qualified to do so and because I truly believe they should use my products to achieve the best possible results. If there's a discussion thread where everyone is marketing products and it is generally accepted, I will market my product if a) it is related and b) I have already posted several times on the messageboard. Also, I will market my product whenever there is a forum solely dedicated to marketing your products.
Last, you'll want to decide how much original content you want to post and how much you want to be boilerplate. You'll want to find a healthy combination of the two to avoid being called a spammer or wasting too much time marketing on forums. I personally have several boilerplate ads that I have saved for signature files, ad-only forums, and personal product marketing discussions. I keep them all saved on a word file and I pull them up to copy-and-paste when I'm spending a night of advertising on messageboards.
Discussion forums can drive buying customers to your site faster than any other marketing medium. Do not abuse them, establish a reputation in your forums, streamline the process. . . and your work will come back to you quickly in profit.
Isaiah Hull publishes Work At Home Right Now, a fresh and informative newsletter about making money on the internet and using proven methods to increase your site's traffic and profitability. If you're looking for time-saving and money-saving tools, as well as honest business advice, come by and subscribe at http://www.workathomerightnow.net
Wood Dale Chicago prom limo .. Lockport Chicago limo O’HareYou have permission to publish this article electronically or... Read More
If you desire to succeed in internet promotion, you must... Read More
We get so caught up with internet marketing and "web... Read More
Five Nifty Ways to Make Your Site Sticky!'Stickiness' is one... Read More
If you master these nitty-gritty website promotion tactics, you'll be... Read More
Market my website? Why should I have to spend time... Read More
If you are like most webmasters, your goal is to... Read More
A back-end product is a product that you attempt to... Read More
Let's see here... as of today Google states it has... Read More
Many business owners and online marketing experts focus their efforts... Read More
Good Ideas.They are the stuff that form the foundation of... Read More
Content One of the best ways to encourage website owners... Read More
Learn How To Use These Six Explosive Marketing Techniques To... Read More
When the economy is down, your website sales may go... Read More
1. Start your own internet radio station. It could be... Read More
Let's face it. Getting webmasters to link to your site... Read More
Hundreds of millions of people have spent thousands of dollars... Read More
If you are website owner and you have begun exchanging... Read More
Website promotion Internet marketing is perhaps the most important part... Read More
Ok, now if you've started reading this article thinking that... Read More
This article reveal the same techniques that many Internet marketing... Read More
For the first time internet entrepreneur [newbie] the best ways... Read More
Well I started out with seven, Free and low cost... Read More
Bring those visitors back for more, applauding you and saying... Read More
With all the "How To" articles, and great advice available... Read More
Antigo wedding limo ..Getting a loyal traffic base for your website is an... Read More
Personalized search is a hot topic especially since Yahoo! and... Read More
Yahoo! allows you to set up your own front page... Read More
What is link popularity?The quantity of links in different websites... Read More
Many companies after spending a substantial amount of money on... Read More
1. Give Away An Electronic Information Product The product could... Read More
One of the great advantages of advertising and marketing on... Read More
Promoting your website can seem like a daunting, complicated task.... Read More
Keeping in touch with other sites like Amazon.com, Buy.com and... Read More
Creating a new website is only the first stage in... Read More
Promoting a Website is not an easy task. New Website... Read More
Virtually all website owners concentrate their efforts and energy into... Read More
If you own a website, you definitely want to improve... Read More
Repetition is the key to getting your adverts and promotion... Read More
When the economy is down, your website sales may go... Read More
Everyone likes to read or get a referral about something... Read More
One of the most frequent questions I get asked by... Read More
I think you all know that buying pop ups in... Read More
How to get your business exposed for free!Everybody in the... Read More
First Generation - The Popup Popups, if you're somehow, strangely,... Read More
You own a website and you want more traffic. More... Read More
Web site owners are realizing Jack Humphrey's Power Linking isn't... Read More
Got one? Two? Three?If you have competitors, then you should... Read More
Most webmasters are familiar with the concept of reciprocal linking.... Read More
Here are 10 power secrets to help your website promotion... Read More
Web Site Promotion |