Posted by: Andy on June 22nd, 2007
Category: General eBusiness
Viewed: 1,373 times
It’s easy to list the advantages of running a home-based business: low overhead, no commute, and creating a more flexible lifestyle.But when you live and work under the same roof, there are also are a number of disadvantages to contend with. Here are some tips to help you. Emergency funds Don't begin your business with delusions of overnight success. You'll need funds to tide you over while your business grows and becomes profitable. Put some money aside to tide you over until you do start earning revenue. Cash flow It's not enough to simply watch your cash flow — the money going in and out of your business — you've also got to manage it. This means looking to the future, planning and scheduling your projected cash inflows and outflows, billing quickly, staying on top of money owed you, and paying attention to the money that goes in and out of your business. Customer contact 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. These methods remind your clients and customers that you're around when they need you. You can even call them to let them know about a sale, a new service you are offering, or just to ask if there's anything else you can do for them. Handle the receivables You work hard for your clients, and you deserve to be paid for the work you do. Never feel guilty about asking for what you are owed. Always be firm but fair, and you will engender respect and loyalty in your customers. Watch the expenses One common pitfall for new home-based entrepreneurs is running out of money early. Get expert advice on subjects like minimizing taxes, forecasting your startup costs, and having enough cash in the bank.
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Posted by: Andy on June 19th, 2007
Category: Reports & Resources, Research, Search Engine Optimization, Internet Marketing
Viewed: 1,472 times
If your hosting company is having performance problems and your website is down it will have a negative effect on your Google rankings. "If the host is down when Googlebot tries to access your pages, then those pages may disappear from the index until Googlebot can crawl them again."
Here is information from Google
WEBSITE MONITORING SERVICES
How often does your site go down? Checkout these moitoring services.
Host Tracker
http://host-tracker.com/
Free account monitors 2 URLs in a 30 minute interval and includes weekly reports
SITE UPTIME
http://www.siteuptime.com/
Free account monitors 1 URL in a 30 minute and 60 minute interval and includes monthly reports and email alerts
WEBSITE PLUS
http://www.websitepulse.com/
30 Day Free Trial
DOTCOM MONITOR
http://www.dotcom-monitor.com
30 Day Free Trial
INTERNET SEER
http://www.internetseer.com
30 Day Free Trial
Tags: Google, Hosting Problems, Website Down
2 Comments »
Posted by: Andy on June 8th, 2007
Category: Search Engine Optimization, Internet Marketing
Viewed: 1,992 times
Google has updated their quality guidelines with information for webmasters who wish to avoid “getting in trouble” with the world's largest search engine.
Avoid hidden text or hidden links .
Hiding text or links in your content can cause your site to be perceived as untrustworthy since it presents information to search engines differently than to visitors. Text (such as excessive keywords) can be hidden in several ways.
If your site is perceived to contain hidden text and links that are deceptive in intent, your site may be removed from the Google index, and will not appear in search results pages. When evaluating your site to see if it includes hidden text or links, look for anything that's not easily viewable by visitors of your site.
Don't use cloaking or sneaky redirects .
Cloaking refers to the practice of presenting different content or URLs to users and search engines. Serving up different results based on user agent may cause your site to be perceived as deceptive and removed from the Google index.
Google's aim is to give our users the most valuable and relevant search results. Therefore, we frown on practices that are designed to manipulate search engines and deceive users by directing them to sites other than the ones they selected and that provide content solely for the benefit of search engines. Sites making use of these practices may be removed from the Google index, and will not appear in Google search results.
Don't send automated queries to Google .
Google's Terms of Service do not allow the sending of automated queries of any sort to our system without express permission in advance from Google. Sending automated queries absorbs resources and includes using any software (such as WebPosition Gold™) to send automated queries to Google to determine how a website or webpage ranks in Google search results for various queries.
Don't load pages with irrelevant keywords.
"Keyword stuffing" refers to the practice of loading a webpage with keywords in an attempt to manipulate a site's ranking in Google's search results. Filling pages with keywords results in a negative user experience, and can harm your site's ranking. Focus on creating useful, information-rich content that uses keywords appropriately and in context.
To fix this problem, review your site for misused keywords. Typically, these will be lists or paragraphs of keywords, often randomly repeated. Check carefully, because keywords can often be in the form of hidden text, or they can be hidden in title tags or alt attributes.
Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content .
Duplicate content generally refers to substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely match other content or are appreciably similar. Mostly, this is not deceptive in origin.
Google tries hard to index and show pages with distinct information. This filtering means, for instance, that if your site has a "regular" and "printer" version of each article, and neither of these is blocked in robots.txt or with a noindex meta tag, we'll choose one of them to list. In the rare cases in which Google perceives that duplicate content may be shown with intent to manipulate our rankings and deceive our users, we'll also make appropriate adjustments in the indexing and ranking of the sites involved. As a result, the ranking of the site may suffer, or the site might be removed entirely from the Google index, in which case it will no longer appear in search results.
Don't create pages that install viruses, trojans, or other badware .
Sites that exploit browser security holes to install software (such as malware, spyware, viruses, adware, and trojan horses) are in violation of the Google quality guidelines, and may be removed from Google's index.
Avoid "doorway" pages created just for search engines , or other "cookie cutter" approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content .
One of the most important steps in improving your site's ranking in Google search results is to ensure that it contains plenty of rich information that includes relevant keywords, used appropriately, that indicate the subject matter of your content.
However, some webmasters attempt to improve their page's ranking and attract visitors by creating pages with many words but little or no authentic content. Google will take action against domains that try to rank more highly by just showing scraped or other auto-generated pages that don't add any value to users.
Tags: Google
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Posted by: Andy on June 5th, 2007
Category: e-Commerce, Reports & Resources, e-Business Basics
Viewed: 1,425 times
Enhanced search, ratings/reviews, and the ability to zoom and spin product photos are among the features online retailers can add to make consumers more loyal. The "Top 100 Online Retail Satisfaction Index" published by ForeSee Results advises online retailers to implement Web 2.0 enhancements based on the needs of their individual sites.
"Think about satisfaction, it's a combination of what you get and what you expect," said Larry Freed, president and CEO of ForeSee Results. "Satisfaction is set by demand, promotion, and marketing; once a consumer hits a site, expectations are molded. Retailers need to understand the expectations of consumers continue to increase."
When consumers are satisfied with a particular online retailer, "satisfaction leads to loyalty and future purchase," according to the report.
Consumers look at more factors than price, according to the study. Offering the lowest price isn't always the best strategy; it increased overall satisfaction for only 5 percent of the top 100 online retail sites. "Site experience and brand, if improved, will have the biggest payback to retailers," said Freed. "On the opposite side we have price, generally the lowest of any other elements."
Customer satisfaction with online retailers drives not only loyalty, but positive word of mouth. Satisfied customers make recommendations to friends, family, and colleagues. The retailers earning the highest-likelihood to recommend scores were Netflix.com, QVC.com, and Amazon.com. QVC.com recently capitalized on its word-of-mouth recommendations by adding user reviews and ratings to its commerce site.
Retailers that don't allow consumer ratings and reviews, or editorial reviews, on their sites risk letting consumers go elsewhere for the information and transacting with another commerce site, according to Freed. "Those that get reviews are generally more satisfied and apt to purchase than those who did not," he said.
Reviews and ratings are known to aid a site's success, but retailers must be careful not to manage postings too closely. "Word of mouth and product reviews can go bad if they become over-run by marketing departments," Freed said.
The Top 100 Online Retail Satisfaction Index uses methodology of the American Consumer Satisfaction Index (ACSI), developed by the University of Michigan. ForeSee Results collected data from over 20,000 respondents who had visited the top 100 online retail sites within the previous two weeks, but had not necessarily made a purchase.
Tags: Online Retailing
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Posted by: Andy on June 5th, 2007
Category: e-Commerce, Research, Pay Per Click
Viewed: 1,629 times
Google Checkout™ is a checkout process that you integrate with your website, enabling your customers to buy from you quickly and securely, using a single username and password. And once they do, you can use Checkout to charge their credit cards, process their orders, and receive payment in your bank account.
Currently, Google Checkout is only available to merchants in the US or UK.
Canadian buyers can use Google Checkout to purchase products.
Google Checkout and AdWords
Online shoppers often start with a Google search. Their search advertising program, AdWords, helps customers find you through targeted text ads that appear beside Google search results. Now you can add the Google Checkout badge 
to your AdWords ads, which highlights your store and tells potential customers that shopping with you will be convenient and secure.
For every $1 spent on AdWords merchants get $10 of payment processing for free.
Google Checkout On Your Website
If you use a shopping cart from Miva, ShopSite, osCommerce, or other Checkout-supported carts, they've already completed the integration work for you. You can start offering Google Checkout in minutes. If you don't have a shopping cart but want to sell individual items on your website simply add the provided HTML code to display Buy Now buttons next to the items on your site.
Chargebacks
Google Checkout merchants can sell with complete confidence. Checkout proactively identifies and filters out fraudulent transactions, and under our Chargeback Resolution policy, Google evaluates all chargebacks you receive and, whenever possible, fights them on your behalf.
Google Checkout Fees
Beginning January 1, 2008, when you use Google Checkout™ to process your sales, you'll only be charged a low 2% + $0.20 per transaction. With Google Checkout, there are no monthly, setup, or gateway service fees. These standard, non-promotional fees may be updated from time to time.
Taxes
You're solely responsible for specifying your own tax rates. If you don't specify any tax information, Google Checkout will not apply any taxes to your orders.
Our Opinion
Google Checkout looks very promising, but, until it is offered to Canadian merchants we will have to keep recommending PayPal for online credit card payment processing.
Tags: Google Checkout, PayPal
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