John Dilbeck Musings

Until now, Site Build It! was for the “Do it yourself” crowd.

I’m part of that demographic and I love building websites of all sorts, but that’s what I do.

There are many thousands of us who want to learn all the skills that are necessary to build a successful, profit-making website around which we can build our business.

But, there are many millions who are part of the “Do it for me” crowd.

Maybe you are one of them.

You already have a business and you want a website that actually brings new customers and clients. You want your site to add to your bottom line, not subtract from it.

You know how to run your business and now you want to find someone who can build a website that gets results.

You already hire specialists in other areas, including your lawyer and accountant. Maybe it’s time for you to hire a specialist who will work closely with you to build a website that promotes your business and attracts new prospects to your business.

Where will you find a specialist who knows how to do this and won’t charge you more than its worth?

SiteSell Services now offers very attractive packages that include hosting using the un-matched Site Build It! system and a specialist who will work closely with you to target your niche market and build a website that will work for you night and day.

SiteSell Services is brand new, but it is based on a decade of proven techniques and technology combined to build websites that produce results.

From the SiteSell Services page:

Build a professional Web site with SiteSell Services, using a process and tools proven by tens of thousands of people. Each page is aimed at pulling in Web site visitors. More Web site visitors means more new business.

Your SBI!-built site will work. Built from the ground up, you reap the benefits of 10 years of SiteSell experience, all packed into a truly professional site.

Don’t waste your time and money. You deserve a website that will work for you.

Why don’t you spend a few minutes and see if SiteSell Services is what you’ve been looking for?

Act on your dream!

JD

Are you a lensmaster on Squidoo?

If you are, I’m inviting you to join a new social networking site for Squidoo marketing, where our goal is to help each other do a better job of creating lenses that are used for marketing.

Want to increase the revenue you earn from your lenses? Come and talk about them. Attract new visitors. Learn new techniques and share your own.

Want to become a Squidoo lensmaster?

Everyone is an expert on something. Squidoo provides an easy way to build one-page websites called lenses that you can use to focus attention on a particular subject that you know and love.

It’s free, and Squidoo even shares any revenue they earn from your lens with you. There are many of us who get a monthly deposit from Squidoo into our PayPal accounts. I just got a deposit into mine a couple of days ago. You can, too.

Are you an expert on something?

Build your own Squidoo lens and tell the world. It’s free, of course.

Then, come join us at the Squidoo marketing community.

We’ll help each other become better lensmasters.

Act on your dream!

JD

In late December 2007, I created a new social networking site for Murphy NC 28906 on Ning.com.

If you live in, visit, or want to know more about Murphy, NC, come join us at the Murphy NC 28906 social networking site.

You can customize your profile, write a blog, discuss topics related to Murphy, NC in our forum, meet and get to know fellow residents, upload photos, and much more — all for free!

Anyone living in, visiting, or wanting to know more about Murphy, NC is welcome. Come join us today.

There are several ways you can promote your business on Merchant Circle: the contents of your basic listing, any items you post to your blog, coupons you create, photos you upload, and the bulletins posted on your directory listing page.

I just learned about Merchant Circle a few days ago and I’ve jumped all over using their system. You can see the profile I’ve created for Dilbeck Marketing on Merchant Circle. I’ve taken the time to use most of the tools and love their system.

(Your business is listed at Merchant Circle, right? If not, you can create a professional looking online listing for your business with our easy to use tools. Free! - MerchantCircle.com.)

There are probably other things you can do at Merchant Circle that I haven’t discovered in the less-than-a-week that I’ve been a member of the site.

What you may, or may not, already know is that every time you blog, create a coupon, upload a photo, or post a newsletter, these things are added to a newsfeed for you, automatically.

At the top-right of your listing, you’ll see “Subscribe to blog and coupon feed” followed by an orange chicklet that says “RSS/XML.” This is a standard news feed that can be syndicated on many services and can be read by anyone using a news feed aggregator or a news reader. Even without sending emails you are broadcasting to the world - potentially.

I’ll write a post later to explain more about making use of this. For now, suffice it to say that you can blog in one place and have it automatically republished in multiple places. This makes it very powerful for getting your news out.

If you don’t know anything about RSS, let me suggest that you read What is RSS?.

One place you may want to syndicate your feed is at Squidoo.com.

To do this, you’ll need to be a member.

Are you an expert on something? Build your own Squidoo lens and tell the world. It’s free, and you may even earn some money from it.

Of course, you’re an expert on your business, so join Squidoo and create a lens about it. It’s worth the effort to learn how to build free lenses on Squidoo, and it’s a perfect place to syndicate your Merchant Circle news feed.

For example, I’ve created a Squidoo lens about Merchant Circle and I’ve syndicated (re-published) my news feed and Merchant Circle’s news feed on that lens.

Also, as part of that lens, I’ve created a list where you can add a link to the Merchant Center listing for your business. I will be syndicating that list on some of my other websites, so you’ll get free advertising just by adding your link to the list. If you don’t understand, just comment on this topic and I’ll see what I can do to help you.

Act on your dream!

JD

So, once you get your listing set up on Merchant Circle, what else can you do to increase the likelihood of being found by a potential customer?

(Is your business listed at Merchant Circle? If not, you can create a professional looking online listing for your business with our easy to use tools. Free! - MerchantCircle.com.)

First, tell people how to find you here.

For example, my listing is located at:

http://www.merchantcircle.com/business/Dilbeck.Marketing.828-837-2901

I’ve used the custom URL feature to shorten this link to:

http://member.merchantcircle.com/dilbeckmarketing

This custom URL is much easier to pass along, put on business cards, and show in your advertising.

You can create your own custom URL by logging into your MerchantCircle account and then clicking Listing Configuration in the left column. When you click it, several other options will be displayed below that heading. Click Manage Links and then enter what you want in your Custom URL edit box.

You should be careful when you do this if you plan to advertise this URL. Make sure it is something that describes your business and is something you can live with for the next few years.

Remember, if you change this at any time, all advertising you previously did using your former custom URL will be wasted.

This is something you want to think about before implementing. Don’t do something hastily that you’ll regret later.

Also, while you are there, you can enter up to four links to other websites and blogs. Just enter the name and URL of the link and Save. If you have less than four saved links, it will automatically create a new empty listing. Add as many as you want - up to four - and save each time. In a couple of minutes, you’ll have additional backlinks to your websites and blogs from a highly-ranked and high-traffic site.

After you enter what you want in your custom URL box and/or link boxes, don’t forget to save it.

Act on your dream!

JD

First, if you’re not listing your business on MerchantCircle, why not?

Create a professional looking online listing for your business with our easy to use tools. Free! - MerchantCircle.com

Truly, even if you are not a highly skilled web designer or webmaster, you can use the tools provided by MerchantCircle to promote your business and the products and services you offer. It won’t take days, weeks, or months, either! You can get started in a few hours and can continue promoting your business as long as you want through posting to your blog, creating coupons, and publishing newsletters.

This is the kind of business promotion that every owner or manager of a small business should jump onto. It’s free, effective, and easy to use. What’s the downside?

Act on your dream!

JD

I won’t try to tell you about Kevin Anderson. Others knew him better and will tell the story with more knowledge and feeling than I can.

Kevin was a true online marketing pioneer and the founder of Cognigen Networks.

Jack Spirko wrote about the loss of Kevin Anderson on his blog, and some of the top Cognigen agents are expressing their feelings about Kevin and all he did for us.

If you do anything related to online marketing, you should read Jack’s article. If your company offers replicated websites for affiliates, you should read the article.

Kevin, you will be missed by lots and lots of good people.

Don’t wait to act on your dream!

JD

For the last few months, I’ve been looking at quite a few social networking sites. Some are friendly to business and others are not. Each has its place.

I really don’t have a lot of time for just socializing, but when I do, I tend to go to MySpace.

I like to combine my socializing with work, so I’m continuing to look for business social networking sites that offer a variety of features for meeting new people, talking to friends, advertising my products and services, blogging, and joining groups of like-minded people.

There are a couple I’m almost ready to recommend, but not quite yet. I want to spend more time on them before I make up my mind.

I’m not going to recommend something to you that I’m not going to use myself.

Today, I ran across a business social networking site I’d never seen, and I found it while surfing one of my favorite traffic exchanges.

Take a look at APSense.com and see what you think.

You can join for free and have almost full access to all the features of the site.

Here’s part of how they present their service:

Apsense in a Nutshell…

Apsense is a social network where people come together to share their business. We enable users to share their business through networking, discovering and creating quality business content. The development of new networks and constant exchange of information is happening everyday at Apsense. We are changing the way people build their businesses online.

Meet other business individuals…

In its purest nature Apsense is a web 2.0 enabled social network. We promote the exchange of business networks by providing tools for users to easily communicate, create interest groups and even build their own private social network. Ultimately our goal is to make it simple for you to connect with other business individuals.

Find valuable business contents…

All contents on Apsense, from business blogs to business discussions to product and service listings are collectively rated by the users (that would be you). Top rated contents are pushed to the top of our content listings so you can find the most popular and trusted business information quickly. So if you are looking for valuable business information online to help you build your business, don’t waste time searching for it anywhere else!

Create your own business contents…

While all types of contents on Apsense are being viewed and rated by the users, these same type of contents can also be created by you. Why create your own contents? Everyday millions of people are searching for contents related to your business by using search engines and web 2.0 enabled websites like Apsense. So by creating your contents on Apsense, you are enabling millions of people to find contents about your business. For us, content is your business interests, your products & services, your business experiences, and anything else you would like to share about you and your business.

I’ve only had a couple of hours to look over the site, and I’m impressed with it.

I’ve joined a couple of groups, started one of my own, started building my business website on Apsense, and will be creating a new blog there in the next day or so.

Of course, my group is about Site Build It and I urge you to come join APSense.com, add me as your contact, and we can help each other present our businesses and offers.

Now, if you’re a relative beginner to this sort of thing, I want to ask you, please, do not spam everyone with your advertising. There are places where advertising is appropriate, and places where it isn’t.

Get to know people. Participate in the discussions. Learn something new. Teach someone something you’ve learned.

Don’t just start posting ads everywhere! That’s not what social networking (business or not) is all about.

Have some class, don’t be crass!

Come on over and join APSense.com. It’s free, and you can take your time to decide if you like it or not.

There are a couple of upgrade options, but frankly, I haven’t even looked at them or the affiliate program, yet.

I’m too interested in the system they’ve set up, and too involved in learning how to use it, to even think of any of the ways to spend or earn money there.

If you do join and add me as a contact, please don’t spam me. I want you as a friend, and not someone I would rather hide from, or block.

Let me know what you think about Apsense and other social networking sites. Are they effective and a good way to spend your time? Or, do you think they are a big time and energy drain?

Act on your dream!

JD

The more I participate at Squidoo.com by building lenses and adding those lenses to groups, the more I see pages on Squidoo referenced in my traffic stats on various sites I have.

What?

I mean that Squidoo is sending an ever-increasing stream of traffic to my sites, blogs, and forums.

Thinking about that, I took a little time this morning to create a new Get A Free Marketing Site lens on Squidoo.

Then, I found several related groups and submitted my new lens to them.

This morning, my lens is ranked at over 180,000. I’m guessing it will jump to about 30,000 or less in the next 24 hours. Then, who knows where it will end up.

To make it a bit more interesting, I added a Plexo module where you can vote for your favorite marketing book on the lens, and I added an RSS feed for marketing articles from 21st Century Articles, my article directory specializing in business, communications, technology, and self-improvement articles.

If you don’t see your favorite marketing book on the list, please feel free to add it.

I have been getting tens of thousands of page views to my Get A Free Marketing Site suite of marketing tools at LinkScout, and I know it has been worth the time and effort - and money - I’ve invested in it.

Therefore, I feel confident in recommending it to you, too.

Act on your dream!

JD

PS. I also recommend that you start building as many Squidoo lenses as you need to promote your business, talk about your hobby, or write about anything in which you are interested. It’s free, and you may well get paid by Squidoo. I earn a small check from them every month, and that’s a lot better than buying advertising, in my opinion.

If you have a blog on just about any topic, you should create a related lens at Squidoo, and don’t forget to use the RSS module to syndicate your blog feed.

It brings me more visitors, and I’m sure it will work for you, too.

I recently realized that I’ve neglected an important part of my marketing efforts and I know I’m losing business as a result.

I bet you are, too.

Are you trying to sell your products and services to visitors who may visit your site just one time? If so, how much business are you losing when your visitor doesn’t buy right then?

You can do one simple thing to increase your conversion ratio: entice your visitor to subscribe to your newsletter and/or an email series that describes the benefits of the product or service you are trying to sell.

If the visitor subscribes to either of these email follow-up series, then she has shown at least some interest in what you have to offer.

Now, instead of one chance to make the sale, you have multiple opportunities to educate your prospect about the subject, to elaborate on the benefits provided by the product, and to build more of a relationship with your subscribers.

Even if you don’t make the sale eventually, you will have built some measure of goodwill if you provide quality information in your follow-up messages.

I’ve just started an Autoresponder marketing and building your lists series on JohnDilbeckAndFriends.com. I would welcome your thoughts and comments there.

Act on your dream!

JD