The Silent Avatar Speaks

It struck me this week how operating an online business is just like a relationship.

We start out full of enthusiasm and potential for what can be and very quickly we find that what we thought would move us towards out goals just doesn’t seem to be working.

Often times we head off along one path only to find that we reach a “dead end”, and things stall or worse end up moving us away from where we want to be.

So what’s the answer?

Well… just like a relationship  where we go to next is just a matter of choice.

We can throw our hands up and give up in frustration that what we are doing is not working, or you can educate yourself on what will work (based on those that do) if you apply yourself and work with known success formulas.

Online business can be just as fickle, just as frustrating, and just as quirky as a relationship. Knowing and applying what gives the results you want is the key to success, and educating yourself allows you the best opportunity for success.

Of course relationships involve a coming together of personalities, values, and shared common interests and goals, just as operating an online business involves clear goals, sharing information towards a common goal, and creating a distinct personality for your site.

Success is simply a choice. When you fall down you get up. You try something different. You model your business on other successful online businesses. You apply your focus towards what you do want, not what you don’t want.

Get to know how to nurture and grow your business, doing more of what works and less of what doesn’t.

Attaining loyal customers requires freely giving information which visitors appreciate and assists them. It requires letting your visitors know what you have to offer. It requires being diligent to their needs and wants. It requires delivering - even over delivering to win their heart and affections. It requires offering personalised service making them feel “special”. It requires your focus.

Yes.. operating an online business is just like a relationship. You reap what you sow. For some it comes together quickly. For others it takes some time, and all the while you are mindful that if you don’t keep meeting the needs of the visitor, just like a partner, they can turn away from you and look elsewhere. Worse, their opinion of you can be far reaching and seriously undermine your chances of success.

So the key is to have a critical look at what you are doing with your business to guarantee its success.

• Are you giving your online business the attention it deserves?
• Are you mindful of the needs and wants of the visitor you want to attract and keep?
• Are you maintaining a personal relationship?
• Are you asking for testimonials and seeking referrals to encourage others to buy based on the good experience of others who already know you?
• Are you keeping abreast of your competition?
• Are you keeping up to date with the latest strategies to assist with your success?
• Are you providing value for money?

Plan for success - “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”

Just like a relationship if you have a plan for your success and diligently apply your plan which moves you towards what you want you will reap the rewards.

Tags: Business Tips, General by the silent avatar
No Comments »

One of the quickest ways to get your website details out is to add an email signature to your outgoing mail.

And it never ceases to amaze me how often it doesn’t happen! This is web real estate just begging to be utilized.

Every time you send an email you are effectively letting your recipient know about your site.

So what makes a good email signature?

Let me show you a good signature:

You can also use your email signature to let everyone know about promotions you are doing at the time. Just change your tag line to something like.. Click here to view my amazing offer where you can save up to 50% off…”

(for instructions on how to add an email signature using Outlook 2003 click here)

Another option is to use Feedburners Headline Animator as part of your email signature. Feedburner’s headline animator offers a rotating headline from your blog.

You can use the headline animator on MySpace, bulletin boards - in fact anywhere you can use html you can use this nifty animator.

From viewing my Feedburner site statistics I have found this is a great way to get people reading your blog.

Do you use an email signature?

Tags: General by the silent avatar
No Comments »

From Timothy Ferriss website The 4 Hour Work Week comes these startling stattistics.

• 66% of people read email seven days a week and expect to receive a response the same day [18].
• 61% continue to check email while on vacation [19].
• 56% have anxiety if they can’t access email [20].

“Crackberry” was the official winner of the 2006 Word-of-the-Year as selected by the editorial staff of Webster’s New World College Dictionary. Blackberry addiction has been labeled “similar to drugs” in a study performed by Rutgers University; millions of users are now able unable to go more than five minutes without checking e-mail.

According to online surveys of more than 4,000 people, conducted jointly by AOL and the Opinion Research Corporation and reported in 2005:

• 41% of Americans check e-mail first thing in the morning

• 18% check e-mail right after dinner

• 14% check e-mail right when they get home from work

• 14% check e-mail right before they go to bed

• 40% have checked their e-mail in the middle of the night

More than one in four (26%) say they can’t go more than two to three days without checking email, and they check it everywhere:

• In bed - 23%

• In class - 12%

• In business meetings - 8%

• At the beach or pool - 6%

• In the bathroom - 4%

• While driving - 4%

• In church - 1%

Being “e-mailed” (like blackmailed) worse than being stoned?

In 2005, a psychiatrist at King’s College in London administered IQ tests to three groups: the first did nothing but perform the IQ test, the second was distracted by e-mail and ringing phones, and the third was stoned on marijuana. Not surprisingly, the first group did better than the other two by an average of 10 points. The e-mailers, on the other hands, did worse than the stoners by an average of 6 points [21].

Reference: http://www.4hourworkweek.com/ferriss-resources-truthstats.htm#_email

Tags: General by the silent avatar
No Comments »

In my last blog post I spoke about the value of giving good service, and the benefit of giving away something free to your customers or clients.

Today I am going to share with you some tips to reduce customer dissatisfaction and retain customer loyalty.

Often overlooked, one way to reduce customer dissatisfaction is to make it easy for your customers or clients to voice their concerns and complaints.

It seems so obvious yet often times a web site has a contact form, details of phone numbers and mail addresses in which people can very easily make contact with the site owner. However many times I have found it extremely difficult to find the link, and sometimes not at all.

Contact information is a show of credibility and in some way eases the emotion, knowing that their grievance can be at the least delivered or heard.

Many Internet marketing sites and “get rich quick’ web sites fail to address the needs of the customer by excluding completely any means of contact. This in itself would set of alarm bells - wouldn’t you think?

In a brick and mortar business, many, many business fail to advise a means of customer grievance. A simple sign outlining the grievance policy, located where customers could clearly read it, would encourage those who have a complaint to feel comfortable enough to come forward. And that’s precisely what you want.

Rather than recount their grievance to every second person they speak with, you have an opportunity to resolve the issue before it impacts your business.

A good idea is to have a well documented grievance “form”, taking all of the particulars - it shows you are interested in the matter.

Likewise a form on a website asking for similar details is a must. Even better you can add a component to your website to handle all your customer support.

Known as a “Help Desk”, this is an efficient add-on to a website which logs everything under a numbered “ticket”. The addition of system reports enable you to follow up disputes without loosing track, or worse forgetting all about it.

Ensuring your business addresses customer grievances or disputes before they happen will enable you to look at all of the possible reasons why someone would complain, and address those issues before they happen. Or in the event they do happen, you will have a well documented procedure to follow to ensure a satisfactory resolution.

Another way to avoid customer dissatisfaction is to ensure you don’t over-state the benefits of your product. Nothings worse than being led to believe that a product or a service made certain claims, and on those strengths you purchased, only to find out the product/service is far short of the claims. That’s just asking for trouble.

If you’re going to make a claim it better stack up.

By all means use persuasive sales copy, after all - the mere fact you are in an online business requires emotive, benefit driven sales copy. We’re not face-to- face.

Adding a 100% money back guarantee will also go a long way in increasing your sales online. A guarantee to give all their money back if they are not satisfied is as good as a “no risk” transaction, and your site visitors/customers feel a lot more at ease undertaking the transaction = more sales.

Anything less than a money back guarantee I would consider to be unacceptable if you want to do business online. The fact that you have the money before they have the product is the very reason why some people refuse to shop online.

If you have confidence in your product then it shouldn’t be an issue. The chances of someone having to claim on it are very slim.

The benefits far outweigh the negatives.

[Read more →]

Tags: General by the silent avatar
No Comments »