Why Do Direct Sales Companies Disallow Online Advertising

Today, I received an email from a fairly large company that recently turned to direct sales…asking me to remove a banner on my website. The banner was purchased by a rep of that company and she paid Linda to have that banner placed on my site. The banner makes no mention of the actual company name.

Of course, I was kind of irked that the person from this company (or supposedly from this company - how am I REALLY to know?) contacted me to remove the banner because it violated their consultant agreement. The consultant bought an ad from us and we delivered.

So, I wrote back and suggested that she contact the consultant who can then ask us to remove the banner. I haven’t heard anything back and Linda still hasn’t taken the banner down over 12 hours later. So, I don’t know what’s up…but I really don’t think it’s up to us to make these judgments, do you?

BUT…the main point of my rambling post is that, why do these direct sales companies get so hung up on net advertising? These are the companies that fall behind when they restrict their reps this way. Let’s face it, a majority of the people that go for these direct sales opportunities are moms and they want to work from HOME. They don’t necessarily want to tote their wares to party after party each night, just to make a few bucks. The Internet provides a terrific opportunity, so why do these companies waste it?

Even Pampered Chef moved into the 21st century and gave their reps websites and allowed them to advertise. I’m sure they would say the benefits have been monstrous.

I guess the company in question from the banner fiasco had a rep email spamming and so they nixed all the Internet advertising. How shortsighted, especially for such a large company (if you have kids - believe me, you have their products in your house) who should be able to see this. I guess I can understand the fear about email marketing and limiting that somehow, but how does somebody advertising on a website pose a problem like that?

I dunno..this ground-floor opportunity may be moving to the basement and it’s flooded and cold down there.

An Internet Based Mom’s Guide to Marketing is Now Free

It was a huge decision, but I’m glad I made it. I poured a lot of sweat and tears into the 132-page manual for moms to market their websites…but I’ve decided to make it free. I have seen so many moms talking on boards or even emailing me and saying they want to buy the ebook, but aren’t sure they can afford the $20 I was asking for it. Well, if I can give that mom a headstart, so she can see how investing $20 here and there for her business can drastically increase her profits…my job is done.

To get the ebook, you have to be subscribed to the newsletter…and if you’re already a subscriber, you will get a download link on Monday, so please don’t resubscribe. We will try to filter out duplicate subscriptions…but there is a chance you’ll get a couple copies of the newsletter on Monday if you subscribe twice.

You can find the information at WAHM-Internet-Marketing-Guide.com

An Affiliate’s Dream? Directory Generator from Armand Morin

I know a few people who have made a decent amount of money, just by creating a directory of products filled with their affiliate links. They optimize the pages for search engines and then funnel the traffic to the affiliate products.

I have always thought this was hard and kind of tedious work. I love creating content and engaging in interesting discussions when I write for the web. But I have to admit, I’ve always been curious about using this approach to affiliate marketing.

Well, something has piqued my interest further. Armand Morin has announced his Directory Generator last night. Directory Generator allows you to create extensive website directories where you control the contents of the directory.

Directory Generator also allows you to integrate Amazon products with your affiliate link…and integrates AdSense and Websearch too. It comes with some great bonuses, including Armand’s very own keyword tool. He told me about this tool in Chicago and said he would never sell it…but it seems he’s now giving it away for free.

Be Careful with "Nicknaming" Your Website

I know a lot of people will shorten their website name or reduce it to initials when talking about it. Internet Based Moms is often affectionately called “IBMoms” (if you can be affectionate with a website - LOL).

Well, long ago I purchased the domain name IBMoms.com to protect that name and to ensure that anyone entering that into their browser can find the site. I haven’t thought about it much since, but glancing at my site stats I see 63 referrals from IBMoms.com just this month (redirects to main website)…so the name is getting out there. If I didn’t have that domain name, people might be totally lost.

So…that $7.85 investment has certainly paid off! My visitors didn’t get lost. Do you have a nickname for your site and do you own that domain name? You may want to lay claim to it now.

Traffic Secrets Success Story - Watch it in Action

As if you aren’t already tired of hearing about Traffic Secrets and John Reese…but I’m putting my money where my mouth is, and I have started a new blog that you can follow along if you want to see a Traffic Secrets Success Story in action. With hordes of people proclaiming that anyone who bought the program is stupid, I think I’m up to the challenge of proving them dead wrong.

So, here’s what it’s all about:

I’ll take you through the various DVDs and CDs and then let you follow along as I put my plan into action. An XML, My Yahoo and Bloglines feed is available for this new blog…so you won’t miss a thing.

Go to Traffic Secrets Success Story now…you’ve already missed 5 entries.

So What about Pricing Your Information Products

Certainly, there has been some heated debate about this lately, but I just want to talk about the average Joe or Jane who makes information products. How much should he or she charge?

It really bothers me when I see people tell others that they shouldn’t charge more than $10 for their expert information. And it upsets me even more when authors believe people who say this. The most important thing to remember is that the person who doesn’t think your information is valuable is NOT your target customer. So forget about them. There are plenty of people willing to pay what your product is worth.

What you want to focus on is the value of the information you are providing to your customer. How much money can they make in a few months from using your product or how much could they save? If your product has nothing to do with money..you’ll still need to evaluate it’s value. Will your product boost their self image; will it allow them to drastically increase their enjoyment of their hobby? What does it provide and how much is that worth to your customer. Certainly, it’s more than $10.

And realistically, it’s easier to find 10 people to pay $30 for your product than it is to get 30 people to pay $10. Do the math and make sure it’s worthwhile for you.

The Incredible Hulk Hits The Net

I wrote about this in my newsletter a couple weeks back, but after traveling the net today…I really see that there is a seriously problem with bad behaviour on the net. It’s like people become a whole new “invincible” person when online and they often engage in very innapropriate and abusive behavior to their fellow human being. 150 pound men suddenly take on 6 foot 2 giants that weigh in at 300 pounds. Although it makes for a good soap opera, it really is just plain old bad behavior.

I was just surfing around today, minding my own business and came upon a number of forums where people were just out and out attacking each other…calling each other names and insulting each other in any possible way they could. I even got caught in the whirlwind after making a somewhat innocent post that was attacked. I attacked back, but I quickly apologized. I’m all for debate…but I’m not for personal attacks.

(And side note: If you think I’m talking about Fred who posted at Im4Newbies - if you followed the link in my last thread….Nope…not talking about him. I would have said everything I did right to his face.)

So before you post another message on a board, or before you send another email…just think…is this really me? Would I say this to this person’s face? If the answer is no, save the message in a text file and come back to it later.

The ‘net will be a nicer place and you’ll be a much more likeable person. Now, have you ever turned into the Hulk online? “You wouldn’t want to see me angry” either, but we gotta maintain some decorum.

John Reese - Traffic Secrets Backlash

Okay, how could I have an Internet Marketing blog without mentioning John Reese and his Traffic Secrets? The whole thing has created quite a roar as many slam John for creating such an expensive program and others who step up to defend this 34 year old, who has been marketing online since prior to the Internet.

Here’s just a few discussions and comments of note (you’ll get my 2 cents worth at a few of them):

> At IM4Newbies : The Calm after the John Reese Hurricane - Differing viewpoints on the marketing campaign that John set up. Watch out for Fred…he’s a piece of work. LOL

> At Self Starters Weekly Tips : What is it with these Gurus - My friend Patty (Hi Patty!) questions the price of the product which retails at nearly $1000.

> KellyMcCausey.com : Affiliate Program Rebate Offers : What Does it Mean for the Future? - She doesn’t name names, but the dates make me think I know what she talking about.
> At Marketing Tools Review : Clash of the Titans - Hock asks why John doesn’t cater to the “little guy”

> At Associates Programs: $1,080,496.37 not a bad day! John Reese Thoughts/Comments? - Some praise and some lashes at the BRILLIANT sales copy (IMHO).

> At HowtoCorp.com: Congratulations, John - A little praise and then some criticisms of the canned emails sent out by a number of big guys.

> From Marcus Allen: Traffic Secrets Review - Negative review from someone who has reviewed the program. Much of his negativity rests on the fact that a lot of the information is for newbies. Come on, this happens with ALL marketing products.

> And on Internet Based Moms - Ooooooh….wait…nothing. John forgot to reach the Internet Marketing work at home mom crowd and his program went virtually unnoticed in the large work at home mom community.

Like the whole launch process or not, John has written up an informative PDF report outlining all the details: How I Made 1,080,496.37 on the Internet in Less than 24 Hours…without Spending One Penny on Advertising

Well, I just got my course today, so I’m off to study. I have filled out my goal sheet, which says I will have 25K visitors per day to Internet Based Moms in 30 days. I’ll let you know how I do. WOWEEEEEEEE!

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