Just My View

Following on from my previous post I just can’t believe how much time one has to spend to keep things tidy and secure given the amount of spam and other nasties one has to endure.

Everyday ones email inbox needs to be purged of all the trash that seems to flow in, it doesn’t matter how good your filters are the rubbish continues to find a way through.

To follow this I have had to carry out a major upgrade on my forum adding several mods so as to keep the spam posters and forum bots away.

And today I have had to upgrade my virus protection software on all three computers I use regularly…

All this takes time, time that I shouldn’t have to waste just to keep my system in order, to top off my otherwise “fantastic” day I have just completed the short walk to my letterbox, yes letterbox, my real world one out front of my house and what do I find?

My letterbox stuffed to the brim with “Junk Mail” with not one piece of legitimate mail amongst it.

aRRRRRGH!!!

Today I was relaying to a good friend my extreme frustration with Spammers that are bombarding my forum just to get a back link and I was expecting a little sympathy at least…

But alas no, he came back to me with this quote:

Don’t tell your problems to people, eighty per cent don’t care; and the other twenty per cent are glad you have them.

- Lou Holtz

It’s great to have good friends that care…LOL

Having spent some 14 days away offline recuperating in a hospital bed after an operation the changes in the Online Marketing field during this time became very evident this morning when I logged in to check my email.

We are now experiencing a whole new line of promotions, nothing is even remotely similar to those offered just two weeks ago…my how the market changes.

It is reminder as to how fickle the market is and how hard it is to get longevity out of a product or service, unless you constantly update and or add a new twist to what you are offering then you will become yesterdays news very quickly.

Clearly you can see why there are so many joint ventures at the moment, gather together a group of high profile names, all with reasonable size lists and build the hype for a period, then launch and cash in before moving onto the next promotion. This is considerably easier than doing all of the work yourself and I cannot blame people for doing this.

My real concern is for the little guy with a great idea that unfortunately doesn’t have the right connections or know how to turn their product into a winner, I am sure that there are plenty of them out there but they lack the opportunity or exposure to make a success of it.

Often they say that only the fit survive but I would really like to see some more encouragement given to those needing a little help but unless they are already part of the in crowd their chances are not good.

Just my two cents today.  

Whilst doing a little brainstorming this morning in regards to a project I am working on I came across this fantastic quote.

“If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”
George Bernard Shaw

Does someone want to exchange an idea with me?

Marketers both Online and Off often forget the simple things and a great article I read today served as a reminder, maybe it will prompt you as well.

Ten Tips for Marketing to Existing Clients and Customers:

No doubt you’re familiar with the adage about a bird in the hand being worth two in the bush. Well, this old saw is especially appropriate when talking about customers. But you’ll have to adjust the math: On average, finding a new customer costs five times as much as keeping an existing one!

That’s reason enough right there to start marketing to your existing customer base. Here are 10 expert strategies for motivating your customers to keep them coming back.

Talk to them. How you communicate with your customers isn’t that important; what’s important is that you do it! Stay in touch with email newsletters, mailings, or a blog…

Read more courtesy of AllBusiness.com

Research, We all do it at some time…

Be it just rifling through some online sites doing some price checks on an article we wish to buy or something more in depth relating to a new niche that we may be interested in, then becoming distracted from the task is a real possibility.

How many times have you set out in a specific direction only to find yourself well off track in no time?

Frequently I bet, Honestly there is far to much information available these days all simply accessed at the push of a button, some of it is not necessarily top quality but it is “FREE”

Maybe it’s time to consider outsourcing some of my research so I can get some real work done…

We have really got it easy in comparison to those that have gone before us, particularly the original offline marketers but still we complain!

Oh how life changes…

I had set aside some time today to have a little clean up in my office.

I had a few things piled up on my desk that needed sorting and filing and a bunch of other items that demanded my attention.

I was all pumped up and ready to go but I thought I would read the “Quote for the Day” first…

And this is what it said,

“If a cluttered desk is an indication of a cluttered mind, what is indicated by an empty desk?”

- ANONYMOUS

I think I will review my plans…My desk looks great, LOL

I was talking with a friend earlier that designs and markets Adsense ready websites…this is not his only line of work but however it has kept him busy for a period.

He commented that the demand for pre-made Adsense sites has gone from being very strong a few months ago to far less now.

Now that people have started offering “firesales” it tends to liquidate the market for everyone else.

I responded, I understand what you mean…

The hype surrounding Adsense and the Goldmine that it is initially sent people in their droves to set up Adsense sites, mostly very poor examples and they forgot through all of this one very important thing.

Online and Offline businesses are the same, without customers you have nothing…so unless you can drive good solid targeted traffic to your Adsense site you will be disappointed because your revenue will be nil.

It’s the old Build it and they will Come theory, except they don’t!

Consequently because of this many have lost interest but like everything it will return in the future and have another run just like fashion does.

Just My View today.