Pronet Advertising

Marketing Through Giveaways

Neil Patel — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 20:57:28 -0800

Marketing doesn't always have to involve using methods like search engine optimization, email marketing, or banner advertising. Instead of using expensive methods of marketing you can also market your company by giving your product away for free to select bloggers.

One person who recently did this was Alexander Barbara from Sarah's Sweet Fountains. Just last week a 16 inch Chocolate Fondue Fountain Party Pack arrived at my door.

The smart thing that Alexander did was that he targeted bloggers that could write about his company and products. Not only did he send me a Chocolate Fondue set, he also sent other bloggers this. By doing this he is creating evangelists that will always end up talking about him and his company.

This is a great way to market your company!

Are you going to Pubcon?

Neil Patel — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 11:34:57 -0800

If you are going to Pubcon, there is a lot going on. DK, over at Purpose Inc is organizing a fight club, dinners, drinks, and a poker tournament with hot chicks.

Go over to the schedule page for more information. There are events that are going on today as well as the rest of the week.

Email Publishing Now On Docstoc

Neil Patel — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 11:39:05 -0800

Docstoc just rolled out an email feature that easily allows you to upload documents online.

Docstoc now supports email uploading and publishing. Simply email any document (.doc, .xls, .ppt, .pdf) to uploads@docstoc.com, as an attachment, and your document(s) will be published publically on docstoc. Make sure to email docs, from the email account you have registered on docstoc.

Check out Jason Nazar's blog for more information.

Looking to increase your traffic? V7N has a solution for you!

Neil Patel — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 16:31:47 -0800

As we all know, the more links you have coming into your website the more traffic you are going to get. The problem with this is that it can take hours to solicit and obtain links. Luckily V7N has solutions to solve your problem:

You can buy a link from the V7N web directory, which will get you traffic from V7N.com.
You can pay V7N to solicit websites to link to you on your behalf through their contextual link program. If you choose this program, you don't have to worry about spam because they are very careful in which related websites they solicit.

I know this can be a costly, but if you acquire the right links, you should see a good return on your investment. Plus, for a limited time only, you can use the coupon code PRO8 and you will receive 15 to 20% off.

'My Documents' Hits the Web

Neil Patel — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:45:58 -0800

My Documents is something we all use. Whether you have a PC or a MAC, you are probably using some sort of documents folder. The major problem with storing your documents on one computer, is that you can't access them from another computer?

Today, TechCrunch broke the news on a new feature from Docstoc called MyDocs that allows you to store, edit, search, and even skin your files online:

MyDocs is essentially a dashboard for users' documents, not unlike an online version of Windows' My Documents folder. Users can skim through their files as thumbnails, search by keyword, sort each document into online folders, and modify each doc's privacy settings. Most impressive is MyDoc's Preview feature, which allows users to rapidly skim through full versions of their documents using Docstoc's Flash-based Document viewer. In Preview mode, Docstoc displays a list of thumbnails down a sidebar and presents the document itself as part of the main window, allowing users to quickly browse through their documents. In practice this worked surprisingly well - documents opened within a few seconds (oftentimes faster than they would on the desktop), making MyDocs a viable alternative to the traditional My Documents Folder.

Visit Docstoc for more information.

Free ThinkTank Ticket

Neil Patel — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:39:35 -0800

A while ago I wrote about the ThinkTank 2008 and why it is a conference that you have to attend. I know it maybe a bit expensive, so here is your chance to attend for free. Jeremy Schoemaker is throwing a conference where he'll give one individual a free pass, plane ticket and a hotel.

Visit Shoemoney.com if you are interested in entering.

50 Kick Ass Keyword Strategies

Neil Patel — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:54:16 -0800

Aaron Wall and Wordtracker teamed up to release an e-book to help you learn which keywords you should pick for your online marketing strategy and how you can leverage those keywords.

Here are some of the topics discussed:

Employing Your Supporting Cast by Using Similar Words
Influencing The Keywords In Anchor Text
How to Take Advantage Of Plurals On Retail Sites
Sowing Early Seeds For Seasonal Rankings
Mining Ad Placement Data
Chasing The Long Tail

I personally bought the 81 page e-book and highly recommend that you also do the same. Whether you are an online marketing newbie or an expert, there is a lot you can learn from it. For $27 you can't go wrong buying 50 Kick Ass Keyword Strategies.

5 Reasons To Attend Think Tank 2008

Neil Patel — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 20:10:33 -0800

From September 26 to the 28th, a new conference called Think Tank is taking place. If you haven't signed up yet, I highly recommend doing so for the following reasons:

It's not a normal conference - Unlike most conferences, the Think Tank is totally different. It is a full 3 days of fun that take place outdoors in sunny San Diego. Now isn't that much better than being cooped up in a room for 8 hours a day?
There are no speakers - This doesn't mean you aren't going to learn anything, you will probably learn more at the Think Tank than most conferences. The best information is usually passed along through networking at bars or at a dinner table. At the Think Tank you will have tons of networking opportunities.
Fun in the sun - There are going to be tons of games at the conference that will cause attendees to get to know each other, as well as have fun. I don't know all of the activities that are going to take place, but some may be the SureHits Fight Club, hiking, and beach volleyball.
Hot chicks and alcohol - There will be tons of half naked chicks on the beach as well as free alcohol during the conference.
DK is throwing the conference - many of you don't know David Klein, but he is one my favorite people in the whole world. He is a chiropractor that is based out of San Diego and as a profession he helps people with health problems become healthier. He has helped many of my friends with their back problems as well as my parents. He also has tons of great qualities outside of medicine such as being a great networker, entrepreneur, event planer, etc...

Now get off your butt, and go sign up!

Search Engine Strategies San Jose

Neil Patel — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 12:36:22 -0800

Is anyone attending Search Engine Strategies San Jose? If so, leave a comment and hopefully I will see you there.

If you aren't, it isn't too late to register. Click here to register.

How To Get The Most Out of Shoemoney Tools Beta

Neil Patel — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:47:28 -0800

About a year and a half ago I went to Jeremy Schoemaker's house for a few days (aka Shoemoney, aka Shoe) because I heard rumors that the Shoemoney team was making tons of money from the affiliate marketing/arbitrage space. I wanted to learn first hand on how I could do the same.

During my short stay at the Shoemoney house, Shoe gave me access to his teams internal tools, and by the time I came back I had created a additional $1,000.00 per day in PROFIT through pay-per-click arbitrage.

When I wrote the blog post about Shoemoney University, I couldn't go into the details about how I made money because the tools were private. But now that the tools are public, I am able to share what made me successful.

For example, one of his tools is the Domain Marketplace Tool:

At first when you see domains with 900 links, in which 30 are from .edu sites and a couple are from .gov sites, your initial instinct might be to buy and register a ton of them. The key to using the domain marketplace within the Shoemoney tools is to have a game plan on what you are going to do with each domain.

My plan is to basically buy 10 domains at a time from the domain market place. With some of the domains I can quickly determine that I can build a nice site around them. For some of the others I might just 301 redirect them to other existing sites.

The key to redirecting and building new sites is to have the sites up BEFORE you register the domain. The last thing you want to have happen is for Google to index 5,000 Godaddy parked pages.

Or at the minimum you want to have a redirecting script in place.

A simple script that has a array of URLs that you want to promote and rotate between can be used:

$urls= array(
'http://www.mysite.com/',
'http://www.mysite.com/cool-article.html',
'http://www.mysite.com/cool-article2.html',
'http://www.mysite.com/cool-article3.html',
);

$rand_key = array_rand($urls);
$link= $urls[$rand_key];
header("Location: $link",TRUE,301);

I think any decent SEO can see the value in picking up links like that.

Another tool I use is the PPC tool which is simply awesome. With it, one person can do the work of a staff of 20. All you have to do is pick a niche, generate keywords, and then generate ad copy. Upload them to your Adwords/MSN account and repeat. Also the local PPC tools are awesome for doing local PPC.

The cost for the tools during the beta period is only $99.00 per month. If you think that cost sounds like a lot then you must not use any paid tools because in order to get a portion of the functionality of the Shoemoney tools elsewhere, you have to spend AT LEAST $1,000.00 A MONTH.

Also beta users will be locked in at the $99 rate even after the beta program is over and the normal price goes to $249 or more per month.

Lastly, the Shoemoney tools is not for the newbie looking to make money online. Do not think that just by signing up for the tools you are going to get rich, but if you are familiar with PPC and affiliate programs its an amazing tool set.

Online SEO Tools - The Ultimate Collection

Neil Patel — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 10:49:41 -0800

Ann Smarty from Search Engine Journal, recently wrote a great article reviewing all of the SEO tools out there. If you are an SEO or want to be one, I highly recommend checking it out.

Alltop Top's Search Engines

Neil Patel — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 12:01:36 -0800

High search engine rankings is something that many of us dream about and very few of us achieve. To obtain these rankings, in many cases you have to manipulate search results, but what if you could rank high naturally?

Guy Kawasaki brought to my attention that Alltop ranks high on Google for the following terms:

moms: 1 of 105,000,000
twitterati: 1
oddities: 2
egos: 4
lifehacks: 5
celebrities: 6
dads: 7
venture capital: 7
teen news: 10
humor: 11
career: 11
fashion: 13
mac news: 13
design: 14
journalism: 15
startups: 15
green: 16 of 1,120,000,000
gaming: 16
personal finance: 17
gadgets: 22
photography: 25
small business: 25
world news: 28
seo: 28
politics: 29
autos: 29
food: 31

Guy didn't plan on ranking organically for any of these terms or never optimized his site for search engines, but here is how he did it:

Quality content - he tried to add quality blogs into Alltop. By trying to keep his website filled with good information and content, it would ensure that people would come back.
Creating buzz - when Alltop first came out, hundreds if not thousands of bloggers started talking about it. This helped Alltop build its' link popularity at a rapid pace (naturally). Plus, do to the buzz many bloggers wanted into Alltop and once they got in they also blogged about getting in.
Creativity - everyone at Alltop was looking for more ways to drive traffic to the site. For this reason they created Alltop badges, which helped drive traffic and indirectly it also helped with link popularity.
Structure - the subdomain structure used on the website is also helping with rankings. When they initially launched the site, they used a subdomain structure thinking it would be useful for users, but it also helped them with their rankings.
Branding - when Guy Kawasaki makes a speech, he usually mentions Alltop. This has helped brand the website and build more visibility to it.

Overall it seems that the Alltop crew has done a good job at ranking high for some competitive terms naturally. So the next time you want to rank high on the SERPs, be creative and maybe you will rank high like Alltop.

Empire Today : Getting Your Customers to Social Media Market For You

Neil Patel — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 12:18:57 -0800

Sometimes a company can be marketed virally on social media platforms without actually hiring a social media marketer or putting together a social media campaign. Established brands which have a loyal grassroots following, either large or small, sometimes enjoy the benefit of that following establishing an online presence, whether in Facebook groups or Youtube Video channels.

As an example, I'd like to look at a company which is not in the sexiest of industries, but has established a strong brand to be named in the AdAge Top 200 Brands and also become a household name.

Empire Today (formerly known as Empire Carpet) had its beginnings in the Chicago area, offering next day carpet & flooring installation via television commercials. To build their brand, Empire Today established the Empire Carpet Guy character and also a very memorable jingle that sings their phone number ... 800-588-2300 Empire!

(More info on their background from Wikipedia )

If you're from the Chicago Area, you probably know this number by heart. If you're from other US metropolitan areas, the number has probably grown on you over the past couple of years as the company has gone national. Their commercial was featured in the Waynes World movies, on Conan O'Brien & Ellen DeGeneres and even Pearl Jam has played their jingle live in concert. That brand loyalty and enthusiasm has also carried over to the Internet.

Here are some videos which fans and customers of Empire Today have uploaded to Youtube. The videos are not product testimonials or encouraged by the Empire company, instead they represent emotional connections of brand loyalty with family, pets and everyday life.

Child Dancing to Empire Today Theme Song (Almost 2,000 views) :

Family Dog Howling to the Theme Song (Over 3,000 views) :

A quick search on YouTube even shows Chicago television fans uploading the old classic Empire Carpet commercials from the Chicagoland area. Likewise a quick search on Flickr also shows pics of the Empire Today branded bobblehead dolls that the company gives out as promotional freebies.

The end effect, positive social media marketing of the business within Google Video, Youtube and Google Universal Search Results all done for 'free' by the fanbase and brand loyalists of this company.

So, how can your company learn from this example?

First, stick to basic branding practices and incorporate a uniform logo, slogan, message, phone number, web address and even a company mascot in offline marketing practices.
Secondly, connect with your customers and residents in your area via contributing to the community or giving out free promotional items. Remember how Target gave everyone standing outside of the Today Show paper fans to cool themselves in the summer?
Give out free schwag at events that attract videos, cameras and publicity.

Does this work for smaller businesses? How can this work for a web site? Well, I tell you what, it does!

In the online marketing world, Best of the Web has followed a similar path, becoming a staple attendee at industry conferences, giving out great t-shirts, developing a brand image (and mascot), and being overall cool guys. The result is excellent branding and excellent coverage by blogs, photographers and some video coverage. Whenever I come home from a search marketing conference my first thought is to look on Flickr for photos from the conference and in almost every image, someone is wearing a BOTW.org t-shirt!

Now that's a great way to get your customers to market you socially without directly asking or paying them to :)

Weird Asia News Design Contest

Neil Patel — Thu, 22 May 2008 13:34:33 -0800

I was just reading Weird Asia News and noticed that they are having a design contest. If you are a designer and are looking to win a PS3 I highly recommend checking it out. The contest seems like a fun thing to do and it would be interesting to see what type of designs people come up with do to the theme of the website.

For more details on the contest, check out their contest page.

AffiliatePrograms.com Launches New Website

Neil Patel — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:48:17 -0800

AffilatePrograms.com just launched their new website. If you visited the site in the past, it pretty much looked like a directory with a forum. But now with their new design they have made a lot of improvements.

The site now concentrates on making affiliate marketing "simple". A lot of people talk about making money through affiliate marketing, but newbies have a hard time understanding how this is possible. With the new AffiliatePrograms.com, they solve this problem by creating an education section that explains how you can make money though affiliate programs.
Good affiliate programs are hard to come buy. Some pay out well while others don't. Some convert well, and some don't. Through the new AffiliatePrograms.com directory, they breakdown some of the best programs out there and provide details on things like payment structure, commissions, program reviews, affiliate manager's email address, and even payment cycle. This makes it much more easier to find great programs.
If you have questions about affiliate marketing, now you can get them answered on the AffiliatePrograms.com forum. Through their new forum the affiliate community as well as experts are there to answer all of your questions.

Overall AffiliatePrograms.com has made some major improvements and is definitely worth checking out. They are doing tons of cool things such as throwing contests where you could win $4,000 by sharing a picture of your computer setup.