| LED Digest 1969: Sea Change |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Reg. from a Trusted Leader pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest post, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. May 12, 2005 Issue #1969 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== The Enemy is Always Present ==-- ~ Kathy Wilson Anderson "Evil thrives in darkness." --== Merchant Account for Infrequent Transactions ==-- ~ Nancy Schettler "I used ProPay.com, and was quite pleased with their services." --== Problems with Web Design ==-- ~ Ken Evoy "Small business web hosting is about to change dramatically." ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== Traffic Stats from RSS Feeds? ==-- ~ Tom Aman ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Kathy Wilson Anderson Subject: The enemy > I wanted to share a recent request received by someone wanting > me to develop a custom toolbar for them. I publish it here so you > get an idea just how low some people want to go. (Money seems > the root of this evil.) - Marty R. Milette, LED 1968 Why is the name of this person who is looking for such a deadly e-bomb deleted from this post? As long as people like this are protected they will be able to subject the rest of us to their nastiness even more. Evil thrives in darkness. When brought to the light it shrivels and dies. I invite you to publish the name and email address of this person so that those who wish might send their thoughts regarding his / her plans directly to the target. Love, Kathy Wilson Anderson http://www.under-one-roof.net -------- new post - new topic --------- From: Nancy Schettler Subject: Merchant accounts > I would like to be able to take credit cards... I would > only need to do this 20 - 25 time a year and total > amount of the sales could only be $500 - $750/yr. - Mark Roberts, LED 1967 Before I got my own merchant account, I used ProPay.com, and was quite pleased with their services. With ProPay, you enter all the credit card data online, so you don't need any expensive equipment. Just the basic old-fashioned imprinter (what stores fall back on when their terminals fail, or during power outages). You will also need the little paper slips to go in it. Something you may want to keep in mind: what will show up on the customers' credit account statements? You may not have an official merchant name. I think with ProPay it showed up as your email address. For your customers who are not comfortable with the online world, this will make them suspicious. And if they initiate a chargeback, even though you have proof of the transaction (the imprinted signed copy of their card), ProPay (and possibly others) will charge *you* a fee. So be sure to write your phone number or other contact information on the credit card charge receipt that you give your customers. Or make it a point to tell them how it will shop up on their bill. You can at least *hope* that they will remember! You will also need to consider the tough reality that if you cannot actually charge the card at the time of purchase, you will get some unpleasant surprises later when the occasional card is declined. It's pretty much the same deal as a bounced check, except that you have no way of contacting the customer again, unless you get a phone number. I understand that it is illegal in some places to ask for the phone number, but most people understand, when you explain why you want it. I've accepted credit cards at craft shows for about 15 years now, using just an imprinter, and probably get 1 or 2 bad transactions a year. Not nearly enough to justify the cost of a fancy system that will insure that the card is good at the time of purchase. Oh - one more thing - if you do go the imprinter route, do yourself a favor and keep it out of sight! That way nefarious people won't know ahead of time that you can't check if their cards are good. Nancy Schettler A Well Dressed Kitchen www.awelldressedkitchen.com -------- new post - new topic --------- From: Ken Evoy Subject: Web design Sorry I missed Rick Gortatowsky's post about "Plug and Play webs" (LED 1964). We've been doing exactly what he describes as being under development for years. Based on all we've learned from 20,000 Web sites, the majority successful beyond the dreams of any other "Web host" (I hate using those two words in connection with our business because it's not the important part of what we do)... The entire current FTP-CGI-SEO-ETC. way of SMALL business Web hosting is indeed going to seem as old-fashioned as DOS in 5 yrs. Technology and SEO and "all that stuff?" It has to disappear from the view of the small business person. Even the Webmaster can be far more efficient if s/he does not have to fight this heavy layer. This really is the future of small business Web hosting. It is NOT easy. Even with our own product, it is never quick and easy to build any real business. But you CAN remove all the technical and tedious barriers -- that is what technology CAN do so well. You CAN empower people to focus on BUSINESS. And YES, there still remains certain problems that must be overcome. In fact, [the] post (LED 1967) by Beth Earle identifies the single biggest weakness... > Most people aren't very good writers. We've corrected that statement to... "Most people THINK they aren't very good writers." So they THINK they can't write. But... The truth is we ALL communicate every day. We just have to unlearn what school has "taught" us about writing. I've taught my 16 year old how to write, and based upon that and using SBI!, she now owns the most highly trafficked site in the world about the tropical island of Anguilla. Folks love her site. She started when she was 14 years old and will turn 17 in a few months. ANYONE can write. Well, within reasonable limits. I turned what I taught my daughter into a book that we sell online. It's an important a skill for anyone to acquire. As a courtesy to fellow LED readers, from whom I have learned more than I've shared, I've posted this to a special free download URL for the next 3 days -- I'll pull it down after May 14. The entire rationale of the book is explained at its sales site... http://mycps.sitesell.com/ But I've set it up for you free at... http://www.sitesell.com/led/mycps.exe (self-extracting zip file) (Please respect that this is a special courtesy for fellow members of this community only.) The second problem Beth Earle identifies is more important... > Even if they do write well, most people who run small- to > medium-sized companies are too busy running their > companies to do anything except that." Yes, but I do not look upon this as a problem. This is an OPPORTUNITY for those who CAN create EFFECTIVE Web sites. For example, as mentioned, my daughter earns substantial income by referring traffic to local businesses in the Caribbean island of Anguilla through her anguilla-beaches.com site. Now... The real estate agent there knows she will never have the time to build content. And she has already paid for three very expensive sites that build zero traffic. So she is delighted to partner with my daughter. And that is just ONE monetization model. Once your Content builds Traffic, once those visitors are PREsold by the high-value information, there are many Monetization models from which you may pick and choose, depending on your time and inclination... http://buildit.sitesell.com/sbi-businesses/index-monetize.html How powerful is the C-T-P-M approach of Site Build It!? How much traffic and trust does it build? Well, my daughter's site not only is the #1 trafficked site for Anguilla... a vendor just offered the agent (that my daughter recommends) a 14-acre parcel of land with a value in the millions of the dollars, for her to sell. That is simply unheard of. Now THAT is PREselling. To answer Beth Earle's next question... > Are the plug and play interfaces going to edit copy, both > for readabiity and search engine performance? THAT is exactly the central concept of SBI! -- it takes you through the process of writing for both engine and human, providing step-by- step tools and help that eliminates the need for tech knowledge. Beth hit BOTH nails on the head... You must meet the needs of both human AND spider visitors. More about the very real fact that many small businesses do not have the time and/or the inclination to build their own sites... As always, in a finely tuned capitalistic system (and the Internet certainly provides that fine-tuning), what one group does not want to do themselves, others spring up to offer the service. So... Beyond entrepreneurs filling in the gap, Webmasters are also "getting it" and using SBI! to help their clients succeed. They can now deliver SUCCESS, not just a gorgeous, professional site. Of course, beyond that,the majority of our clients DO, in fact, do it themselves. So it takes all kinds, but one way or another, when there is a better way to do something, it filters into the hands of those who are ready to capitalize upon it. Rick Gortatowsky's post is spot-on from the big picture. SMALL business Web hosting is about to change dramatically. Larger businesses will need, for the foreseeable future, custom programming and all the other special bells and whistles (like we at SiteSell need). But the vast majority of small businesses (solo proprietors and 1-5 employee businesses)? Nope. Get ready for a sea change. And enjoy MYCPS!. There are zillions of books on the Net about how to write to SELL, but not how to PREsell. And THAT is the real key to online success for the small business person and his/her Webmaster. All the best, Ken Evoy ==== BILLBOARD =================================== From: Tom Aman Subject: RSS traffic > I have no way of measuring the number of page views an > aggregator site that uses our .RSS feeds realizes... And I'm > not seeing much activity on those images, so the aggregators > appear to be caching them. - Michael Martinez, LED 1968 Michael, I am not knocking the use of RSS feeds although I do admit to having serious reservations about their value. There are lots of claims made for the value of having such a feed but I have never seen these claims backed up with any numbers. In responding to my post, what you are really saying is that you don't really have any hard numbers about the value of your feeds, either (you said they are "a good source of generating inbound links and traffic" but don't give any numbers to indicate how "good"). I know that the feed document contains some content but, unless that content is the whole story, the viewer must end up visiting the feeding site for the feed to have any real value. Hits by Web aggregators are not of any real value unless subscribers to those aggregators are actually viewing that feed. Your comment about the reason for "not seeing much activity on those images" is based on an assumption that they are cached by the aggregator. What about the alternative assumption that the lack of activity is being caused because the feed is not being viewed? Unless you know for a fact that the aggregators are caching the images, that seems to me to be just as valid an assumption. I am not trying to start an RSS war here, I would just like to see some hard facts from anyone who can make them available. If a feed works for you, great, but creating and maintaining one or more feeds involves a fair investment of time and effort and, for some, it becomes most important to know if the return is worth the effort. As has been discussed in previous issues of the LED, knowing and understanding your Web stats are an important part of managing and knowing the effectiveness of your site. I would think that the same is true of managing and knowing the effectiveness of an RSS feed. Tom Aman Aman Software http://www.cyberspyder.com amant, cyberspyder.com ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by pair Networks: pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains Copyright 1995-2005 Orange Wheel, LLC. 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