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A couple of days ago, Lynette Chandler posted about an interesting discovery she made in the Q&A section of PC Magazine.

Apparently, Neil J. Rubenking, the software expert at PCMag was asked for advice on avoiding spam when giving out email addresses. Part of Rubenking’s shocking answer included the following quote:

“When you buy something at a small, lesser-known online store, there’s a decent chance they will sell your address to spammers.”

and

“Sign up for a newsletter? Your address could certainly get sold.“

Reading Lynette’s post, I was rather peeved. Not at her, of course, but at this guy’s assignment of blame on the little guy, when most of us truly experienced know that it’s not Kate’s Pretty Bows (made up name, of course), operating out of Kate’s basement that is selling information. It’s the BIG companies with their 40-page long terms and disclaimers.

As I wrote on Lynette’s blog:

“That’s quite an assumption [on his part]. Morals and ethics aside, I don’t think most smaller online retailers are aware of or would know how to get into the lucrative opportunity of selling personal information. It’s the big companies that know and do this, unless they explicitly state they don’t.”

So, what do you think? Whose really selling our information here?

This Saturday’s Sweetie Saturday Report is going to include 26 ways to use the words on your pages to improve response rates, but let’s just talk about three things you can do right here, right now.

1. Get to Know Your Target Market & Craft Your USP…Over and Over AGAIN!

To many, the concept of a target market seems pretty simple and it’s something we often define for our business as soon as we start it. More people struggle with the concept of USP, but give it a bit of initial thought when they start their business and then leave it at that.

If you gloss over these two concepts for your business, it will be much harder to promote your business and to sell your products and services. The best converting sales copy creates a real connection to your reader and it’s tough to connect if you don’t really understand them.

If you can only connect on a superficial level, you can expect mediocre results. If you know what makes your target audience tick, you can connect on a deeper level and expect better results.

Not only should you strive for understanding of these two things on an ongoing basis for your business, you should also realize that for EACH PIECE of marketing material you produce, you have a slightly (or sometimes dramatically) different target market and USP.

For example, if you sell baby products - your target market for your breast pumps will be different than for your baby formula products. If you’re a life coach - your target market for your self-guided workbook will be different than your full-service higher-end coaching offerings. Every product, every article, every blog post has a different target. Understand that and you’ll get more out of your offers.

2. Tell Stories

Relate to your audience by telling relevant stories. Again, your readers will react more if they feel a connection to you or your company. Stories can also make abstract ideas more concrete. Tell your own personal stories, share case studies. Stories can be painful stories with happy endings, they can be humorous or whatever is appropriate for your particular offer.

Blogs are the perfect place for stories as are sales pages, emails and anywhere you attempt to connect with your readers.

3. Make Offers - ALWAYS

Although effective selling can be subtle, it should never be completely passive. Always make an offer to your readers. If it’s a sales page, offer them the product and give them compelling reasons to buy it. If it’s an email, you can tell them about a product, a free offer or whatever you’d like - but give them the direction to do SOMETHING. If it’s an article, guide them back to your website to sign up for a free report, newsletter, etc. If it’s a YouTube video, give them a call to action in the context of the video.

If you take the time to create all these promotional materials for business, it seems silly to just hope or expect readers to make it back to your website. It doesn’t always have to be a hard sell or even for a paid product - but get your audience used to taking action, so they’ll do it when it really counts.

Just a few ideas for now (I’ll be back with 26 ideas on Saturday). These 3 may be new to you or maybe not…but if you’re not doing them, try them out, you might be surprised.

My apologies for neglecting this…I can’t believe it. Until now, we still haven’t announced the winner of the Free Custom Product Design Pack from Silicon Post.

So, I won’t keep you waiting any longer. The winner is:

Laurie Berenson or Park Ridge, NJ USA

Congrats to Laurie and thanks to everyone who entered and waited so patiently.

Laurie, to claim your prize, email news @ internetmarketingsweetie.com with “Custom Product Pack” in the subject line. You must claim your prize by May 22, 2008.

If you’re a Sweetie Saturday Report Club Member, I just sent out a new update via email. If your email disappeared into that vast cyberspace filled with lost emails (SIGH!), here are the details:

If you haven’t downloaded April’s Recurring Revenue Report yet, now is the time. It will be replaced late tomorrow night with this month’s report.

This month’s report is “26 Ways to Turn the Words on Your Website into Sales” - the written report and audio will be added to your account just in time for your wake up on Saturday morning.

Coming Soon! I’ve been telling members that I’ve been working hard on increasing the value of their membership EVEN MORE (it’s only $9 per month so far…but I want to do MORE!). Because of that, June’s report will have an extra supplement entitled “Essential Biz Notes” and will come at no additional charge for EXISTING members.

These “Essential Biz Notes” will include suggestions and strategies on a variety of online business topics each and every month. The notes will include my observation of trends and point you to resources to help you make the most of your online marketing.

But Important: It will only continue to be $9 per month for existing and up-to-date members only…the price for the report club is expected to rise in June to reflect the additional Biz Notes newsletter.

Yep, a second edition of Wednesday Words from You today. This is a great quote from Product Launch Expert, Jeff Walker.

The power of the list cannot be underestimated…and of course, I’d love to give you a hand to realize the same.

Just a quick note to let you know that the Early Bird Discount for the Email Marketing Reform School ends tonight. This special offer entitles you to $50 off personal one-on-one guidance to improve your results from your newsletter and email marketing. Click here for all the details.

If you need help:

Building your targeted list

Communicating more effectively with your list.

Selling more to your list.

Streamline your email marketing process and streamline your routines.

…it’s all included and I’m here to help you every step of the way.

Classes start Monday and I’m really looking forward to getting started. Click here to get started.

You might recognize that gal below to the right. That’s Vera Raposo, a local gal and a long-time student and friend of mine. Several years ago, she looked me up after reading an article about me in the local newspaper and asked me to give her some tutoring help with her website. She was just at the beginning of her online career at this time, but boy has she come a long way.

She’s actually a Platinum Member at Outsourcing Sweetie, which means she works with my own personal team to get a huge chunk of her work done each and every month. She recently wrote to me a couple days into April to tell me:

“Ta-da! I did it.

Actually I’ve made $1000 in the first five days of this
month alone, I’m thrilled!

A huge part is working with OS (Outsourcing Sweetie) and
focusing on planning things out and getting work done when I
had the chance as I was running to many appointments.

If you ever want to do an interview with me for OS or
anything else you need I’ll be very candid and would love to
share.

I’m so thankful that I never gave up, thanks Alice, you’re
really a great person and I feel so happy to have met you.

And guess what?? I haven’t touched eBay in a year and I feel
so FREE!!!”

Obviously, I’m absolutely thrilled for her and proud of my own team at the same time for doing such a great job. I have taken Vera up on her offer of an interview and we’ll be recording and transcribing it this week.

I will make that interview available to my readers here at some point, or if you want to be the first to know when it’s ready, just join us for a $10 sneak peek at Outsourcing Sweetie. If you’ve been trying to get more done without so much darned work, you’ll be glad you did.

If you had only one way of communicating with your prospects, what would you choose?

Would it be your blog, a website, email, podcast…? Be sure to say why, cuz well, I’m nosy.