The Silent Avatar Speaks

Last post I spoke about securing your downloads for your ebooks, audios, or software. You will read in the post that I settled on DLGuard to do the job.

I also said that when I installed DLGuard I would let you know my verdict on how it installs.

Well.. here’s what I found when I installed it….

Its dirt easy!

DLGuard comes with an executable file which guides you through the whole set up process. It’s as easy as following the steps. The only action you take outside of following the steps is:

1. Setting up a mySQL database, and
2. Deleting your “install” folder” when you have finished
3. Creating your autoresponder list
How easy is that?

After installation you simply point your browser to the admin url and login with your username and password.

The interface when you log in is not overly slick, but then sometimes basic is good (it saves confusion).

My task was to secure an 7 audio products and 7 physical products, using PayPal as the payment processor, and integrated with Aweber autoresponder.

So.. how easy was this to do?

Setting up the audio downloads was easy. Again, when you “add a product”, the screen guides you through the process (just fill in the appropriate blanks). Selecting the payment processor was as easy as selecting it from a drop down box.

Working out how to add a “physical” product which requires shipping was a little trickier, and try as I might to search the form I couldn’t see any reference to how this was done, so I contacted DLGuard support and had an answer the same day.

By adding the text ” — This item will be mailed to you” in the download URL field, DLGuard bypasses the need to give a download link and instead prompts for a delivery address. This is done through the “PayPal Advanced Options” – “Extra PayPal Codes”, and inputting the following: “no_shipping=2″

Integrating Aweber was a simple task of logging into the aweber account and creating a new list.  This list name (yourlistname @aweber.com) then is input in the “Aweber Automatic Sign Ups” field.

When someone purchases from you their details are automatically added to your aweber list.

So as far as I am concerned, this little piece of script that works behind the scenes to secure downloads is a real gem. I can set the download time and the number of attempts before those accessing the download link are “locked out”.

The beauty of DLGuard assigning the number of download attempts goes a long way to stopping files being passed on during the access time. DLGuard won’t stop those who pass on the download to their friends, but it does offer a first line of defence against pirated downloads.

I’m giving it two thumbs up!

Check out DLGuard here

I’m the Silent Avatar and I have spoken

Tags: Tools For Your Business, Web Design, Web Development by the silent avatar
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I know it’s been awhile since I last blogged. I’ve been overseas, had surgery in Thailand, moved 4 times, and only now getting back into the swing of things. It’s been a hell of a 6 months. When I get a spare minute I will share some of the stories from an Internet Marketing perspective about my travels.

Until then… I’ve been asked to create a website for a company who sells digital media (self hypnosis MP3′s), so part of my design of the site is checking out what options are available for securing digital downloads.

Of course undertaking a search of download software or download scripts is the first part, but the more important part is finding out how the available products perform, looking at price relativity, and ease of installation.

I tend to give a lot of credibility to the comments made through forums. Reading comments can generally give you a pretty good feel if the product does what it says it does, or falls short in any areas. Posters are usually ruthless with their critism, and generous with their praise.

After looking at the available options to secure downloads, I ended up selecting DLGuard. It’s got a lot of great features and the price is adffordable (and you have licence for two sites)

I’m not going to rattle on here about what DLGuard can do – just go to the page a have a look at the features, and when I install DLGuard I will post here how I went installing and how it performs.

Click Here! to go to DL Guard Home Page

I’m the silent avatar, and I have spoken.

Tags: Tools For Your Business, Web Design, Web Development by the silent avatar
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Did you know your mailing list is the lifeblood of your online business?

Well hell yeah! you say

The old adage “the money is in the list” cannot be true enough. If you had a targeted list of prospects to contact each time you have a new product, you’ll be able to save a lot of effort by marketing it to your existing list of targeted prospects.

Statistically, you have a better chance of making a sale to an existing customer, than trying to sell to someone who hasn’t brought before.

You can build a targeted list of prospects who are interested in your products by offering them a relevant download on your website.

To give you an example, let’s take a look at apple.com. When you download the free iTunes and Quicktime software from their site, they will ask you to fill in an optional name and email form so that they can send you offers on songs that you can purchase via — guess where — iTunes!

In reality, you don’t need to offer such a “heavyweight” downloads such as full-feature software like iTunes – you can attract prospects just as well with some quality freebies such as a simple report, a free wallpaper, and so on. The important thing is that your download offers enough value for the prospect to be willing to give away his/her own email address to get it.

However, slapping together a simple download and putting a link on your website won’t be enough to attract qualified prospects. You’ll have to do some homework in order for your lead-generating mechanism to work well for you.

First, place your download form prominently on your website. Preferably, dedicate a page to it and link to that page from every other page of your website. That way, there is no way your visitors cannot find the download page, and when they do, you’ll get some of them converted into your prospects!

You’ll need to put some effort into promoting your download. Explain and elaborate on the benefits of the download, and why your visitors should download it. You might think why would anyone want to pass on a freebie, but most of your visitors would be too lazy to take the effort to download it because most of their downloads just sit on the hard disk collecting virtual dust. It is hence important to show your visitors why they should download your freebie.

Tags: Internet Marketing, Traffic Generation by the silent avatar
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