Traffic Floodgate Blog

Anecdotal evidence suggests that websites with good videos convert better than websites with long sales letters, but that websites with bad videos lose customers faster than an eye blink. Here are my last 10 tips for using video properly to keep visitors at your site.

Video has been around on the Internet since broadband connection became commonplace, but its purpose was strictly entertainment. More recently, it has begun appearing as a substitute for printed User Guides and as either a substitute for, or addition to, the traditional website sales letter.

It’s the author’s firm opinion that a well written and complete printed User Guide is far superior to a video and that those who use video as a substitute for writing a guide are just being lazy. Once you’ve got the software, adding a commentary while demonstrating the product is dead simple. And the results are (usually) simply awful.

But … video to sell a product, to demonstrate its features, that’s a different story. After all, they’ve been doing it with television commercials for years. Even so, some commercials are stinkers. Here’s the last 10 tips to make sure yours aren’t:

21. Choose the images and people in your video carefully

You have to always keep in mind that this video is representing you and your company. Make sure that images and people you use are pleasant and professional. Also you want pleasant images and people because that is what people will be most interested in watching. Try to use fairly neutral accents. Also don’t talk too s..l..o..w..l..y. People can listen much faster than they can speak and slow speech is a turn-off.

22. Get ideas from commercials

Television commercials are amazing sales tools. You can use ideas from these creative advertising spots to help you develop a good video. You can get some amazing ideas that other companies pay top dollar to advertising executives to create. You can also see some really bad examples to avoid. Just be careful of one thing. A TV commercial is not a failure because you don’t like it. It’s a failure if either you don’t remember the product or if it would make you actively not buy the product.

23. Try to keep costs low

Creating a video has gotten more cost efficient with all the tools available to the average business person, but you still need to be careful. It is easy to get carried away and end up blowing your whole marketing budget on making a video.

24. Scope out other internet videos

You can get a lot of ideas online from others who are using videos to sell their products. Look at top ranked websites and see what they are doing to drive in sales.

25. Understand the power of video

Video is a very powerful tool that has the ability to really boost your traffic and sales. Make sure that you see everything that video is capable of doing for you.

26. Use emotion

One of the greatest things about video is you can finally convey emotion to your consumer. Part of selling is a passion for the product and you can really get this across in video.

27. Take full advantage of all the attention you get

When you add a video to your website you will be getting more traffic and you need to capitalize on it. Make sure you website is up to par and can turn visitors into sales.

28. Keep it simple

Keep everything simple and do not abandon everything you already know about creating online content. Follow the same rules you did when creating your website.

29. Don’t over sell

You do not want to push customers away by being too much of a sales person. Avoid the desire to yell out about the great price and to tell the consumer they must buy. Don’t be pushy, be persuasive.

30. Show, not tell

One of the best things about video is you can show the consumer why they should buy instead of telling them. There is a lot of power behind showing instead of telling. Showing is convincing. Telling risks bringing out the cynic in your audience.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that websites with good videos convert better than websites with long sales letters, but that websites with bad videos lose customers faster than an eye blink. Here are my second 10 tips for using video properly to keep visitors at your site.

Video has been around on the Internet since broadband connection became commonplace, but its purpose was strictly entertainment. More recently, it has begun appearing as a substitute for printed User Guides and as either a substitute for, or addition to, the traditional website sales letter.

It’s the author’s firm opinion that a well written and complete printed User Guide is far superior to a video and that those who use video as a substitute for writing a guide are just being lazy. Once you’ve got the software, adding a commentary while demonstrating the product is dead simple. And the results are (usually) simply awful.

But … video to sell a product, to demonstrate its features, that’s a different story. After all, they’ve been doing it with television commercials for years. Even so, some commercials are stinkers. Here’s the next 10 tips to make sure yours aren’t:

11. Keep your video professional

Nothing does more to turn off a consumer than a bad quality video. You want to present your video in a professional way that tells the consumer that you are a professional and not some novice trying to sell junk. Your video is representative of you and your product, so keep it professional.

12. Do not overwhelm the consumer

While you want to provide a good overview of your product, you do not want to throw so much information at the consumer that they tune it out. Keep it simple and stick to the basic facts for the best presentation that won’t chase away the consumer. One of the problems you face is that nearly all products seem complex the first time you use them. Don’t overwhelm your prospect with everything your product can do. Stick to the main features.

13. Tailor the video to your target market

You need to always keep the consumer in mind when creating your video. Do not use complex language that your target market would not understand. At the same time do not talk down to them or otherwise treat them in a way that is not appropriate for the market you are in.

14. Get creative

While you want to keep your video simple, you still want it to be exciting. Get creative and come up with ideas and slants that will sell your product in a compelling way. You want to present a video that is going to be fun to watch. Think outside of the box.

15. Place it wisely

Where you place your video on your website can mean the difference between success and failure. You want to make sure that you put it where it will be seen. It should get prominent placement. If you’re selling by video, your visitors expect to see it front and center.

16. Stick with one basic message

You want to make your video very precise. You need to find a single, powerful message and create the video around that one message. Nothing will confuse the consumer more than a video with multiple messages. You can make other videos with different messages, but it is important that each video has only one message.

17. Do not forget to edit

I am sure that anything you write gets edited. The same needs to be done with video. You need to watch it and make sure it flows and makes sense. You need to make sure that it comes across the way you wanted and that it is overall a good video that people would want to watch. Get others you trust to critique it for you.

18. Test your video

You want to try out your video and keep tabs on how well it is doing. You will need to come up with testing methods that allow you to see if consumers are watching it all the way through, getting enough information from it, enjoying it and most importantly, that it is influencing sales.

19. Give options to the consumer

The consumer should be able to fast forward, rewind and adjust the sound on the video. You want to give the consumer these options so they can feel that they are in control. Additionally, you want the consumer to be able to replay the video and adjust the sound so they can hear it clearly.

20. Change your video on occasion

You should have a few different videos to present. You want to try out different videos by changing them from time to time. You may find that one video out performs the others by doing this. Make sure all your analytics are in place.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that websites with good videos convert better than websites with long sales letters, but that websites with bad videos lose customers faster than an eye blink. Here are my first 10 tips for using video properly to keep visitors at your site.

Video has been around on the Internet since broadband connection became commonplace, but its purpose was strictly entertainment. More recently, it has begun appearing as a substitute for printed User Guides and as either a substitute for, or addition to, the traditional website sales letter.

It’s the author’s firm opinion that a well written and complete printed User Guide is far superior to a video and that those who use video as a substitute for writing a guide are just being lazy. Once you’ve got the software, adding a commentary while demonstrating the product is dead simple. And the results are (usually) simply awful.

But … video to sell a product, to demonstrate its features, that’s a different story. After all, they’ve been doing it with television commercials for years. Even so, some commercials are stinkers. Here’s 10 tips to make sure yours aren’t:

1. Demonstrate how to use your products

A video can be a great way to show how to use a product that may be a new idea or something that people may wonder how to use. It gives the consumer a look at how easy it is to operate and how well it works. Furthermore, it encourages reassurance. “I can do that!”

2. Give a complete and accurate picture of what you are selling

Make sure that you cover every aspect of your product in your video, particularly including the problem the product is designed to cure. Your customer can relate to that. TV commercials do it all the time. Also make sure to include important points, like how to order, guarantees and other important information that the consumer should know.

3. Convey how important the customer is to you

Make the customer feel important. Use phrases that say you care about the customer and that you are selling them this product because you know it will benefit them and help them.

4. Demonstrate the unique qualities of your product

You want to highlight why your product is better than other similar products on the market. You need to highlight the unique features and aspects of your product. This is standard marketing, but something easily forgotten in the process of creating a sales video.

5. Put testimonials in your video

Testimonials are very effective, especially when a consumer can actually see the person giving the testimonial. Gosh, a real testimonial from a real person. Again, contrast with TV commercials. How much more are you convinced by a real life endorsement than by someone who’s obviously an actor getting paid? This is a great way to boost the consumer’s confidence in you and your product.

6. Back up your printed information with the video

Make sure that your video and your written sales pitch match up. Your video should be a good guide to what you have written on your sales page. It should not contradict it or add in information. When you update your product, update both the video and the printed matter.

7. Use every aspect of video

Video gives you the ability to really reach out to a consumer. You get the ability to speak to them and appeal to them in a personal manner. Make sure to take advantage of being able to let the consumer hear and see what your product is all about. Speak naturally and practice until you don’t sound nervous.

8. Make it compelling

It goes without saying that in marketing you can’t sell anything unless you grab attention. With video there is more than just grabbing the consumer’s attention, though. You have to engage them and make them want to sit and watch the whole video. Give hints that what’s coming next is really exciting. Watch the TV news. “In this bulletin, a family of five escape death from a downtown mudslide. But first, the mayor urges people to save more.” You watch the mayor, because you’ve been hooked by the mudslide.

9. Think hard about how your video is presented

You need to consider things like how big the screen is and how loud the sound is. You also should consider if the video should play automatically or if the consumer needs to initiate it. These can be important factors in how successful your video marketing is.

10. Reuse old video to make something new

Do not throw out old video footage. Save everything you do. You may be able to revamp it into a whole new video that turns into an amazing sales tool.

You can make a lot of money as an affiliate marketer for other people’s products. Or… you can be left wondering why, despite all your efforts, no one has purchased this great product through your link. Here’s eleven more things you need to have right.

Increased Website Traffic

Be Diverse but Uncluttered
By all means promote more than one affiliate program, but in the same general area. The should solve the same (or better still) closely related problems. Be honest in your review of why one product might be better in Situation A and another product in Situation B. Don’t clutter your site with links to affiliate programs all over the place. Opt for a moderate number of links to related products.

Try to Fool Them and They’re Gone
Be honest in all your dealings. Make sure that your readers know what type of links they are clicking on and what they can expect at the other end. Otherwise, they will unsubscribe quicker than you can blink.

Keep Adsense Off Your Affiliate Promotions
Adsense is a shotgun. It needs thousands of pages, each bringing in a trickle of income. Affiliate marketing is a laser. You’re aiming at a very specific target with a very specific aim. Sell this product now and other related products later. Don’t mix the two.

Don’t Overdo It
Don’t over stretch yourself by taking on more than 4-5 products at the same time because you also need to find time to research and analyze the products before actually marketing them.

More Targeted Traffic 

Track, Test, Improve
If the affiliate program comes with a tracking device or package, use it to keep a tab on the most active and least active links. Use the knowledge gained to improve both this and future affiliate programs.

Be Community Active
Join forums and community groups related to the problem that the affiliate products are aimed at solving. This helps you talk about your business and advertise it but most importantly helps you see the problem from the consumer’s viewpoint. Then target your solution to the problem. Don’t just be a salesperson or you will get yourself banned.

Become an Editor
Ezine popularity shows no sign of waning. Anything well written and passionately presented is always of interest to someone. Start your own and build a loyal subscriber base. They will take your recommendations seriously and your affiliate profits will soar.

Sell in Only One Third of Your Emails
Always send out at least two emails with free content to your subscribers for every one that is promoting an affiliate product for which you will get paid. Never promote a product that you haven’t either researched thoroughly, tried yourself, or both.

Knock ‘Em Out with Your Sales Page
A strong sales page is essential to sell your product. From the viewpoint of making sales, it’s more important than the product itself. Look at your sales page as if you were a prospective user. Does it make you want to buy? Remember, a good sales page sells product, a good product minimizes refunds.

Don’t Sell, Pre-Sell
Pre-sell your visitors by giving an unbiased review of the product. Naturally, it has to be a positive review, but otherwise you wouldn’t be selling the product, would you? Pick up on two or three really great features and expand on them.

You’ve Got One Chance to Get Their Details
Turn your visitors into prospects by including a sign up form on your review page. The steps involved should be they read the review, sign up to get something for free which, ideally, complements the product you want them to buy and then they get redirected to the merchant’s page (with your affiliate link, of course) automatically. To learn everything there is to know about getting an unstoppable flood of traffic to your website, visit:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com

You can make a lot of money as an affiliate marketer for other people’s products. Or… you can be left wondering why, despite all your efforts, no one has purchased this great product through your link. Here’s ten things you need to have right.

More Website Traffic 

First, Identify Your Target Audience
Start with the basic premise of identifying potential customers before actually selling your affiliate product. Deciding who are the people you would need and are likely to buy this product will save a lot of wasted time and effort.

Construct Your Website for the Target Audience
You must have a website. Don’t just try to direct traffic to the merchant’s product website. But don’t first invest in constructing a website and then try to figure out how to get your audience to visit it. Know your audience well and then construct the site to be attractive to them. Much of your competition will be lazy and will use the exact same sales pages as all the other affiliates. Be different.

Buzz Your Website
Become interested in what is “in.”. Then rather than setting up a website about your favorite hobby, which might not have broad appeal, cultivate your interest in those things that are hot and happening and find related products to promote. Become a specialist in them and then create websites with automatic buzz!

Increase Website Traffic

Think Positive, Be Realistic and Stay Focused
Think positive but don’t get caught up in the online hype, expecting to become super-rich very quickly. Remain focused on one thing at a time. Being positive is good, but setting realistic goals is vital.

Get Your Knowledgebase Right
You can cripple your business by not expanding your knowledge. Become an expert in both the product you are promoting and the problem it’s designed to solve.

Use Adwords Cautiously
Set your budget cautiously and don’t overspend. But this powerful marketing tool can be used wisely both to earn more in commissions than its PPC costs and to work out what key words will get you traffic and what is just too competitive.

Be Your Own Author
If possible, write your own ads, articles and reviews rather than using the ones supplied by the publisher’s affiliate programs. This way, you will set yourself apart from the other affiliates and will come across as genuine.

Match Affiliate Programs
Do not under any circumstances cross promote unrelated material. If you want to promote a new affiliate program on dog training, don’t do it on your photography website. Some of your photographer subscribers might want to train their dogs, but for most it will simply destroy your credibility.

Build Your List
Capture your visitor’s details before passing them on to the affiliate product’s sales page. Give away content, such as a subscription to a newsletter. Follow them up. Keep them involved. Their long term value to you will be huge.

Targeted Traffic Driving
Imagine yourself as the person who has the problem this product is designed to solve. This will give you insight into how they will look for the solution. Do the things to ensure that you are the one they find. To learn everything there is to know about getting an unstoppable flood of traffic to your website, visit:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com

I was reminiscing with a friend over lunch the other day about the old Reader’s Digest marketing campaign. Many years ago. You’d get a letter saying that you may already have won a prize and you responded by sending back a card that you put a sticker on to find out about your prize and also order a set of condensed books, delivered one per month. The funny thing was, getting the condensed books was optional. The Digest assured you that you might already have won the prize even if you didn’t order the books (but there was a bonus gift if you did.)

It became a standard joke. I remember a comedian telling his audience how he’d cut short his vacation and rushed home because his wife told him he’d got a letter from Reader’s Digest telling him he might already have won a prize.

My friend wondered how something like that could ever have worked. It was expensive designing those letters with the peel off sticker and all and expensive mailing them out. It was all snail mail then. Stamps and everything! What was to stop 90% tossing the letter and 99% of the remaining 10% ignoring the condensed books and just exploring the possibility of winning a prize? The prizes were substantial cash payments and the Digest even paid the return postage.

Well, they were no fools at Reader’s Digest. They knew it was all about traffic, engaging their audience and creating a buzz.

They got their traffic through mailing lists that started out broad and became focused by concentrating subsequent mailings on those who attached the sticker and returned the letter (sort of like a double opt-in), engaging their audience (their letters were quite fun to read and you were being asked to take an action reminiscent of getting a reward sticker at school) and when a comedian gets a laugh just by referring to your campaign, then you’ve got buzz.

It’s exactly the same in the on-line world. You start off with relatively broad traffic which you funnel through your double opt-in squeeze page, you engage your audience with giveaways, good content, insight and humor. And you create your buzz through forums, social networking and by getting others to promote you and your products to their lists.

Embarrassingly, I had to admit to my friend that I carried around a box of unread Reader’s Digest condensed books through three house moves before finally throwing them out, still unread. I hate condensed books. But I still wanted to know if I’d already won a prize.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Phil Lancaster is recognized as one of the leading experts on getting new websites indexed and ranked quickly and then driving free, targeted traffic to them. To get his very latest resource and learn everything there is to know about getting an unstoppable flood of traffic to your website, visit:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com

If you have a website, then its lifeblood is traffic. If you are selling your own product, you need more website traffic to turn a percentage of visitors into buyers. If you are selling someone else’s product as an affiliate, you need to constantly increase website traffic to offset dwindling conversions as the product cools off. And if you have created a high quality content site in order to display Adsense, Chitika or other context sensitive advertising units, then the more website traffic, the more clicks on your ads.

Here are five surefire tips to increase your website traffic:

1. Writing articles is a win-win-win situation. The ezine editor gets content, the reader gets valuable information and you get backlinks. And it’s not hard, just tedious. Go through everything you’ve written down as part of creating your website and, if applicable, producing your product. This is your area of expertise and others will benefit from it. And it’s original. Highlight separate topics and bring like topics together. Associate relevant keywords with each topic. Pick a keyword and write a headline based on it. Use three to five relevant topics as your content. Finish off with a resource box like mine at the end of this article. Rinse and repeat until you’ve got several articles. To get more website traffic, submit them to the high Google PR, low Alexa Rank article directories listed at:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com/articles/bestdirectories.html

2. Create an account at http://www.trailfire.com. Find four other sites, blogs or articles on the same or a similar topic as yours, but who are not direct competitors, and link them and your site together in a “trail.” Include your best keywords in each review. Google loves these “fire trails” and with luck will rank yours highly for your chosen keywords.

3. An oldie but still a goodie. Create several unique (very important – you will get deleted if they are the same or even too similar – you might even need to create separate accounts) advertisements at http://www.craigslist.org across different regions in the Small Business category, using your best keyword as the anchor text linking back to your site. Craigslist has a Google Page Rank of a whopping 8!

4. Every time you create a website, you should add a Wordpress blog to it. If you’re using cPanel, it’s a very simple process. Click on Fantastico, then select Wordpress blog, new installation and follow the simple process through. Do a Google search on Wordpress theme (free if you like) pick one that appeals and follow the instructions to change the theme. If you don’t, your blog will look like a million others. And what to post to your blog? Why, the articles you wrote in Tip 1. Try to post one a week, and watch your traffic go up.

5. Include a keyword based anchor text link back to your website in every blog entry plus keyword tags. Tempt your blog visitors with a free e-book or other valuable information. Make sure that http://www.technorati.com/ is included in your blog’s ping list. (Click on Options:Writing:Update Services to maintain your Ping List.) Then when you post, the Technorati spider will list your blog post on their huge PR8 site under each of your tags.

Future articles will expand on each of the topics covered in this article as well as introduce new ones, all with the single purpose of getting more website traffic for you.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Phil Lancaster is recognized as one of the leading experts on getting new websites indexed and ranked quickly and then driving free, targeted traffic to them. To get his very latest resource and learn everything there is to know about getting an unstoppable flood of traffic to your website, visit:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com

I’ve decided to put the Traffic Floodgate release back by a few days, to Wednesday, May 14. I’d been thinking about doing this anyway, because I wanted to check out and write up a new technique I came across, but the decider was when my web host decided to take the new Traffic Floodgate website off the air. Why? Because I used their SMTP server (which I’m allowed to do) to send an email to one of my opt-in lists of several thousand people. The email was fully can-spam compliant, containing my name, physical address and 1-click unsubscribe link. Unfortunately, my mailing system/autoresponder sent out more than 500 emails in an hour which broke a rule in the terms of service which I admit I’ve got a bit vague about in the 5 or so years since I signed up and so the site was suspended. Two or three emails to the help desk later, they had a look at the email, agreed that it wasn’t spam and said the site was now unsuspended. Except that it wasn’t! Someone forgot to flick the switch? Whatever, it all happened over Easter, so I ended up being down for several days. What a pain. Lesson learned. I’ve now set up a mirror site, on another host, so the longest I can be down is the few hours it takes to propagate a DNS redelegation. I’ll add this detail to my Short E-Book on building a website. Imagine this happening to you the day before a launch.

What’s this got to do with traffic cops? I reckon there’s a similarity. Traffic cops, or rather their bosses (and ultimately the politicians) don’t have the will power or resources to tackle the real causes of the road toll, poor driver education, driving attitudes, bad intersectional control and so on, so they pick the easy targets and mount speed cameras where they’ll punish a mom who exceeds a low speed limit by a couple of miles per hour dropping her kids off at school. Where’s the parallel? I get hundreds of emails every day that are clearly spam. They are offering to enlarge my private parts, get rid of my body fat and arm me with a fake degree to go with my fake Rolex. Is there a physical address? Hardly. An unsubscribe link? You’re joking. But does anyone do anything about them? No, it’s too hard. But let a legitimate internet marketer try to increase website traffic (sorry, I had to get one keyword into this post) and either they’re down on her or him like a ton of bricks for sending out too many, or sending them too fast or, heaven forbid, using obscene words like “money”, “marketing”, “opportunity” or worst of all, “FREE.” The result is that 80%-90% or more of the people who’ve actually asked for this information, never get it.

On the good news front, the new Traffic Floodgate website sat in the Google sandbox for only 2 days. The secret? A link from a high PR site that I own. Why’s it good news? I’ll make links from this site available to any Traffic Floodgate customer for the same purpose.

The Traffic Floodgate Manual details 10 traffic streams. Each one is designed to increase traffic to your website, but they also have a multiplier effect. As I say in the manual, 100 + 100 + 100 = 300, but what we’re looking at is 100 x 100 x 100 = 1,000,000. With one million website visitors, the hard part is over. A well structured site with a good offer and a high conversion rate and payment and delivery automation will bring in the big dollars. And all of these are covered in my Short e-Book series: 10 Steps to Create Your Own Internet Business, offered free to Traffic Floodgate Manual owners. All you have to do is register for the pre-launch at:

http://www.trafficfloodgate.com.

At 9.00am on Wednesday May 14, 2008, Traffic Floodgate will reveal a new, secret 10-step system that creates an unstoppable flood of traffic to any website.

Register for the pre-launch now and you’ll not only get a massive 60% off the launch price, but just for registering you’ll be given, absolutely free, all 10 titles in the famous Short E-Books Series: 10 Steps to Launch Your Own Internet Marketing Business. There’s absolutely no obligation. You get to keep all 10 e-books just for registering, whether or not you take up the offer to get Traffic Floodgate at 60% off the launch price.

Register now at http://www.trafficfloodgate.com

To Your Internet Marketing Success,

Phil Lancaster
www.trafficfloodgate.com

P.S. My Short E-Books Series: 10 Steps to Launch Your Own Internet Marketing Business gives you everything you need to get your IM business up and going. Then all you need to lift it into millionaire’s row is traffic, traffic and more traffic. That’s where http://www.trafficfloodgate.com comes in. It’s the encyclopedia. It’s more than the “must have” reference work. It’s a Paint-By-Numbers Formula. Just follow its 10- Step system to an unstoppable flood of traffic.