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Developing an E-Mail Newsletter

This article, being distributed via an e-mail newsletter, shares why and how Tudog engages in this monthly ritual and what benefits we derive from doing so. The introduction of our newsletter, now in its 55th edition, was part of a marketing strategy launch in 2002 to establish and demonstrate Tudog's expertise. With 55 versions under our belt, we realize we have something to share on e-newsletters too.

The creation of a newsletter is a serious decision because initiating one without the infrastructure and commitment to sustain it can wind up doing more harm than good. Your e-mail newsletter, once launched, will create an expectation among recipients and if you fail to deliver on that expectation it could lead to a backlash as your customers cll your reliability or commitment into question. The infrastructure you need includes content sources, graphic sources, and the e-mail capacity to send the newsletter. The commitment is eased when you create a timetable that details when the content needs to be concluded, when the graphics need to be completed, and when the newsletter needs to be edited and then ultimately sent. In choosing your send date, you need to think about the other newsletters your readers are likely to receive and make sure that you do not become just one more newsletter in their inboxes. We recommend you send it during a time of the month when there is traditionally less traffic. For example, Tudog sends its e-mail newsletter at the end of each month because most of our competing newsletters are sent either at the beginning or middle of the month. We have found that this increases our readership by approximately 20%.

The construction of a successful newsletter has 6 phases. They are:

1. Content
The newsletter you send stands or falls on the relevance and quality of the content you incorporate. If your website is meant to entertain you content needs to be entertaining. If it is meant to educate, your content better be educational. Tudog does not believe in using the newsletter for self-promotional purposes, as we think that readers rapidly grow tired of reading commercials and self-serving material. There are other forums to engage in self-promotion. Your newsletter is a service to your customers and needs to be written from the perspective of what they need, and not from the view of how it can serve you. By having your newsletter serve your customers, it will ultimately serve you too.

2. Frequency
You need to decide how often you are going to issue your newsletter. There are two primary considerations that need to make up the decision. The first is how often your customer base would engage you newsletter. If your sector is flooded with newsletters, you may conclude that there is an excess of reading material and that a quarterly newsletter is appropriate. Conversely, you may notice that there is both an absence of other newsletters and a hunger for information, leading you to conclude that a bi-weekly newsletter would provide you with an excellent opportunity. The second consideration is your internal capacity. You do not want to create an expectation for a newsletter that exceeds your production capacity. How many newsletters you are able to release each month needs to be the underlying driver to the decision how often your newsletter is released.

3. Design
How your newsletter looks is crucial not only because it represents your company, but also because it could determine how people receive the newsletter and whether or not they are drawn to read it. A well designed newsletter includes a clear delineation of all areas of content, integrated, relevant images, and an identity that is consistent with your company's identity. It is important that you view your newsletter as an extension of your company and that its personality is representative of the image you transmit to your sector.

4. Database
Your database is the list of people to whom you send your newsletter. Your list should be extracted from your client/customer base, prospective clients/customers, and your sector influencers. You should make sure that everyone receiving your e-mail newsletter either requested it or has a way to be removed from your list (clearly and easily marked in your e-mail). Your newsletter can be sent via snail mail, but the costs of printing and postage make e-mail a much more realistic and cost effective often. Using e-mail, you are able to send your newsletter as HTML, text, or in PDF format. You should select your format based on customer preferences. Tudog uses PDF after our inquiries indicated that our clients were most interested in receiving our newsletter in that format. You clients/customers may prefer a different format, but it should be noted that the content, design, and frequency are not influenced by format.

5. Marketing
Your newsletter needs marketing support so that it can reach out to a wider audience and better serve your company as a marketing tool. The support it receives can be as simple as being listed on your website (with a sign-up option) to advertising and special attention. Tudog markets its website by permitted reprints of our articles in magazines and other newsletters, drawing attention to the company, our expertise, and that our newsletter offers continuing exposure to the ideas and hints we publish.

6. Testing
We recommend that you test your newsletter before you send it out to your widest audience so that you can benefit from the feedback of your test group and ultimately send out the best newsletter possible. You should select a random group of people (between 50-200) to send your newsletter to, alongside a brief questionnaire asking for reviews on your look and content. Once you have their responses and incorporate some of their comments, you will know your newer version is close to the needs and wants of your target market.

Your e-mail newsletter is an excellent way to reach out to and become meaningful to your clients/customers. Embark on an e-mail newsletter only if you have the resources and commitment to sustain it. Done properly, it is a powerful and continuing tool for exposure and reinforcement of your expertise.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Getting Results from Your Website

With more than 77% of all American adults now online, and more than 175 million Americans using the Internet regularly, the argument that a website is an essential business tool is resolved before the debate begins. If your company isn't taking steps and making a continuing effort to maximize its website it is leaving customers and revenue behind (for competitors to pick up).

Some of the hesitancy in developing and maintaining a good website is derived from misunderstandings of what it takes to make a website productive. This article shares 8 things you can do with relative ease to enable your website to deliver better results. They are:

1. Make Sure Your Website is User Friendly
Whether in an offline or online environment, your target market can't be expected to buy your product if you do not make it easy to find and purchase. Your website can enhance the ease with which information and specs about your products/services can be found, thereby making the decision to buy them easier. Your website needs to (a) open quickly, (b) be easy to navigate and find information, and (c) provide a painless checkout process. If you can meet these three criteria, visitors will enjoy being on your site, and your sales through the site will increase.

2. Give in to Speed
According to some sources, you have about 30 seconds to convince a visitor to your website to stay there and look for what they came to purchase. If your website takes these same 30 seconds to upload, or you have a 30 second flash that is well prepared but devoid of any message (loved by the graphic design folks and marketing people for its creativity and hated by visitors because it takes time and says nothing), then you will lose visitors even before you have a chance to present your benefits and offer. The key to speed is a well designed site hosted on servers that deliver high speed.

3. Know Who Your Site is Targeting
The better you understand your target market the better your website will perform. Keeping in mind that the website is a marketing tool, and that knowing your market is a fundamental of good marketing, it makes sense that your website should be developed with your market in mind. You need to understand how your market behaves not only in terms of buying habits and spending patterns, but also, in the case of effective web development, online. The online behavior of your market will help you construct the site to meet their expectations, needs and preferences. In most cases the market will demand (a) that your site be updates and provide the latest relevant information, (b) that the site enable their inquiries through the latest online technologies, and (c) that the website be convenient to navigate.

4. Know Your Goals
Just as with offline business, "getting more sales" is not a useful goal in that it is vague, overly apparent, and devoid of any market based elements. You need to approach your website with goals and objectives in mind, not only so that the site can be constructed consistent with them, but also so that the maintenance of the site can be executed to support them. For example, the goals of your website could be "present products in an attractive manner that allows prospective buyers to visual their use and benefits". Another legitimate objective could be "to present information on products and the company so as to educate consumers and broaden our customer base". In both instances, the goals are clearly defined, and the websites constructed around them will be designed in architecture and appearance to maximize the success of the stated objectives.

5. Develop a Smart Web Architecture
When it comes to the architecture of your website - where the information is placed and the paths visitors take to get to it - the most critical tool you can deploy is common sense. Most people will look for information in the place where it is most logical for it to be. If you get creative, or want to make a point with your navigation (or the names you give to the information links you have) you will find that most people will leave your site rather than try to unravel the brilliance you are showing through your very clever structure. In other words, people are on your site to get to something, the easier you make it for them to get there, the better your website is. Period.

6. Operate According to a Plan
Like any marketing tool, your website needs to be tied into your overall marketing strategy and needs to be reflective of your company, its products, and the message and image it seeks to communicate to the market. Your website needs to have a plan of operation that detail, through a process and in accordance with steps, timelines, and accountability elements, the milestones for measuring performance and success. The plan needs to include (a) processes and timetables for updates and announcements, (b) your web marketing campaign, and (c) how your site will compete against similar sites.

7. Market Your Website
Like every other aspect of your business, if you do not market what you are doing nobody will know about it or why what you are selling is something they should buy. There are many ways to market a website and, as with Tudog's approach to traditional marketing, we recommend a basket of tactics. These include (a) organic embedding of metatags and other keywords into the content of your website so as to secure a higher natural listing on the search engines, (b) the purchase of select keywords to ensure high search results when these words are punched in, (c) affiliate sites and appearances on other sites, and (d) targeted web ads. These marketing tactics will assist you in driving traffic to your site, as well as serve to raise general awareness for your company.

8. Monitor Your Activities
The Internet offers excellent opportunities to monitor and analyze your activities so that you can be certain that what you are doing is not only working, but maximizing your potential. The web can help you determine how many people are coming to your site, where they are going inside the site, where they came from into your site, and whether or not they made a purchase. You can use this information to determine the efficacy of your navigation, architecture, content, graphics, message and marketing.

Your website, like all other aspects of your marketing, is a window into your company and a reflection of not only how much respect you have in what you do, but also how much respect and commitment you have toward your customers. A professional website demonstrates a professional attitude. Anything less is…well, less.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Getting Your Website Right

The temptation to rush through the creation of your website can force you to compromise on a great many fundamentally important aspects of solid website operation - compromises that you will ultimately need to go back and correct. The trick is to get it right the first time, leaving changing your website for those infrequent times when you change your corporate look or shift your company's message.

There are a number of things you need to consider when constructing your website so as to avoid the costly revisions later on. It should also be noted that many times, despite the good intentions, the revisions you are intending to make never seem to get made, as you become to busy to tend to them. The result then, is that you are stuck with a deficient website.

So what are those elements you need to keep in mind? Tudog has a few questions you should be asking yourself. They are:

1. What is the purpose of this website?
There are a number of legitimate functions a website can serve. For example a website can be set up as a means of disseminating information. It can also be an online example of your company's skills and expertise. Whatever the purpose, you must have it clearly and well defined before you start considering other aspects of website development.

2. What should be my user paths?
The navigation you incorporate into the website with significantly influence the experience your visitors will have, how long they will stay, and how successful they will be in extracting from the website what they wanted (and what you wanted them to get out of it). User paths need to be logical, clear, easy to follow, and categorized in language that is common and typical. You do not want to create links that people cannot understand or send them through a maze to get to where they want to go.

3. How do I want the site to look?
The appearance of your website will greatly influence the extent to which you are able to extract from the website the full potential of your effort. The development of the look of your site begins with the corporate identity of your company. The website should be consistent with this look. In addition, you should consider what "feel" you want the website to have. For example, a financial services website might want a "safe and established" feel, while a technology company might want to demonstrate its technical savvy or communicate its high technology image.

4. How will the site be used?
While you considered your objectives, you also need to consider the objectives of the people who will be visiting the site. There is a need to anticipate the purpose people will have in exploring your site and make sure that you deliver the experience as you understand they would want it. While some of this has to do with the aspects we discuss above, such as site appearance and navigation, it also has to do with the core message of the website and the content you provide.

5. How should the content be presented?
Beyond what content you should provide is the question of how it should be organized. While some of this is taken care of when considering the navigation, much of it has to do with the way pages are laid out and the interaction of text with graphics. Once again, this question is at the core of the visitor's experience, the success of which will determine in the long run the success of your business.

6. What communication channels have you created?
You need to make sure that you are allowing your visitors the opportunity to interact with by providing the ability to email you or call you. Tudog recommends providing as much contact information as possible because we believe that websites with little contact information lack credibility, as if they do not want inquiries. You need to put your company out there for evaluation and you need to do so in such a way that you express confidence that you will pass any evaluation with flying colors.

The creation of a high quality, well conceived website will afford your company the ability to establish and maintain credibility while also serving as an interactive tool for people interested in learning more about your company. What they learn - and what they perceive - has a lot to do with how good your site is. When building your site, ask yourself these 6 questions, and you'll be able to answer the question "how good a site do I have" with the answer "quite good indeed".

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Marketing Via E-Mail

The mere mention of marketing via e-mail conjures up images of unsolicited e-mails offering penile enlargement pills, Viagra, various stocks offerings, and breast augmentation. Derogatorily referred to as "spam", these emails have made it all but impossible to discuss the legitimate use of email as a marketing tool. Yet e-mail can be a powerful tool when sent to people who have either opted-in (indicated an interest in receiving e-mail from a specific sender) or have a direct interest in the information being sent. To exclude e-mail from your online marketing tactical basket is silly. You simply have to make sure you conduct yourself in a manner consistent with the accepted rules of the game - meaning you don't engage in the blind mass sending of e-mails to databases you have not either developed on your own, or purchased from reputable opt-in list brokers.

The successful use of email as a marketing tool can be broken down into 5 components. They are:

1. Database
Once you have determined that you wish to engage in e-mail marketing, you need to decide to whom you wish to send your messages. The selection of a list to purchase should be based on your knowledge of your targeted market and who comprises your most likely customer. Many list brokers have lists they can accumulate based on a variety of demographic information, and some can also provide names based on a history of responding to offers sent via e-mail. The more you can narrow down who it is you want to send the e-mails to, the higher the response rate will be. Another excellent way to gather a viable e-mail list is to build your own. Over time you can gather a list of customer e-mail addresses that will prove to be a tremendous marketing asset, as it is comprised of people who have bought from you already and presumably have an interest in what you sell. You can gather your own list at your place of business and via your website, by offering people an opportunity to sign up to get your emails (which feature special offers and new product announcements).

2. Content
The content of your e-mails should be designed to meet the needs of your audience. As mentioned above, you can use your e-mails to announce new products or make special offers. You can also inform your customer base about new developments in your market, announce special events, or provide opinions (based on the type of relationship you have with customers and the type of business you have). The e-mail content needs to be precise, well written, and engaging. You should make an effort to drive the reader to your website, where the information either continues, or the offer you are making can be purchased.

3. Format
There are two different ways e-mails can be sent and the selection of either is based on the content of the e-mail and how you wish for it to be presented. E-mails sent in HTML format look like web pages and can feature graphics. These are more effective for sales promotions, but some people do not have their e-mail programs set to receive HTML e-mails, meaning that the content will come in without the graphics. Text e-mail messages are useful when you want to relay information and are able to keep your message short and to the point. You can use a link in a text e-mail to send the reader to your website where he/she can view more information in HTML format.

4. Testing
Prior to launching a broad and ambitious e-mail marketing program it is recommended that you test your message with a series of smaller groups to make certain that what you are saying is being well received and that the response rates you anticipate are being met. The tests enable you to make adjustments before you go live in a big way. Not only can this help you sharpen what you want to say, but it will also avoid any large scale errors. Testing should be done to representative groups by taking random selections out of the lists you intend to use.

5. Tracking
The beauty of e-mail marketing is that it allows for the tracking of your marketing program in ways traditional marketing cannot do. The information provided can include how many people opened your message and how many of them responded to whatever offer you included. This tracking not only allows you to judge the worthiness of the program, but also gives you clues into how to improve it.

E-mail marketing is inexpensive and flexible, but should not be overused so that recipients don't become overwhelmed by the volume of e-mails you are sending (and therefore ignoring what you send).

Sort of like direct mail, but with an automatic immediate response mechanism - your website - e-mail marketing is a viable tool that can be leveraged as part of your overall integrated marketing program.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Marketing Your Website

The website is the most dynamic tool in your company's marketing arsenal. It is the dynamic broadcaster of your image and message and the real-time channel for you to communicate with your market. With your website you can reach out to your customers and they too can reach out to you. All of this combines to make the website perhaps the single most important marketing activity your company engages in. This said, the website's primary weakness is that it is also the only marketing tool that itself needs to be marketed. The question therefore is, how do you market a marketing tool?

There are well known ways to market your website - some more effective than others - including search engine optimization, online advertising, incoming links, and others. This article seeks to go back to grassroots marketing, providing 9 ways to market your website through activities you can take to raise awareness and create interest. The Tudog 9 ways to market your website include:

1. Traditional Marketing
We start with traditional marketing because for reasons we do not completely understand, the impulse when dealing with website marketing is to focus on online exposure options. While the online channels are viable and relevant, so too are traditional channels, such as ads in local press, direct mail featuring a special offer, t-shirts and other giveaways, event sponsorship, and even local radio ads. Also make certain your website is featured on all your collateral materials and all your communications, including your packaging and signage.

2. Online Giveaways
The use of digital giveaways can help bring people to your website because they offer a functional tool that users find helpful and interact with often. Giveaways that are placed on a computer desktop, such as calendars, wallpaper and other software clips, not only promote your website to the user, but also present the possibility of a viral campaign by users passing your tool (and by extension your website) to others.

3. Use Bookmarks
One of the key rules of marketing is that once you have initiated a communication that has elicited a response, you hold on to the contact. If you do not have a function that requires the user to provide contact information (not always recommended anyway), the opportunity you provide the user to bookmark your website and the reasons you give him/her to come back could be the only continuity mechanism you have. Providing bookmark options on all your web pages could lead to people saving your website, and coming back.

4. Use CDs & DVDs
Another offline opportunity can be found in the distribution of cds and dvds featuring elements of your website. Once upon a time this was a good way to reach people who did not go online, but in today's environment, where 77% of people are online (and the remaining 23% probably don't constitute your market) the distribution of these discs is more a way to gain digital exposure through traditional channels, encouraging people to visit your website by bring the website (via disc) to them.

5. Provide Useful Information
Almost every person that uses the Internet does so at some point to gather information and if you can position yourself as a source of that information, you will be able to generate traffic to your website. By putting useful information on your site you will be able to draw direct traffic, and by placing articles on other websites, you will both boost your search engine positioning and attract people back to your site.

6. Interact With Online Forums
There are chat groups and forums for just about every topic imaginable, most likely including some connected to your product/service categories. You can create interest in your website by joining and engaging these forums. Be certain to do so genuinely and not as an overt commercial, or you will do more harm than good. You know a lot about what you sell and can offer these forums true value through your participation. That value will become evident and people will begin to ask where your information comes from. At that point you can share your URL. Anything more overt than that will be scene as trickery and could backfire.

7. Publish a Newsletter
One way to keep in touch with people who interact with your website is the publication of a newsletter. This newsletter can provide useful information, serve as an update notice mechanisms, discuss new products/services, and even profile people relevant to your sector. The newsletter will provide position your company as a source of information and make your website attractive to people interested in your content.

8. Publish Books
Similar to articles, e-books serve to position your company as the resource for useful information and, when distributed through other websites, creates for your site external links that help place you higher on search engines. The books also establish your reputation to a degree perhaps a step higher than articles as books are perceived as being a higher accomplishment and a greater offer.

9. Blog
Blogging has become somewhat of a phenomenon, and for good reason. The blogs offer the opportunity for people to express opinions, demonstrate expertise, and develop a following. Your use of a blog to obtain these advantages and channel traffic to your website is rapidly becoming a web imperative.

There are many marketing tactics beyond keyword purchasing and fuzzy search engine optimization practices that drive traffic to your website. If you create a good mix of tactics and execute properly, your website can become a major source of leads and customer interaction.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Navigation - the Key to e-Commerce

The rise and fall and rise again of e-commerce has led many of the former gurus to finally confess that they cannot predict the future course of web based business. While the once held notions that the Internet will render paper money obsolete have themselves become obsolete, there is no real argument against the claim that the Internet is a permanent and growing force in the world of retail.

The continual rise of e-commerce makes having a viable and professional web presence a necessity for retailers of all sizes. The science of selling on the web - just as there is a science to selling in brick and mortar - is based on a combination of being able to drive customers to the products they seek and driving impulsive buys. The challenge is meeting these needs in a way that makes for a pleasant and simple buy experience.

One of the key challenges for e-commerce websites is driving the consumer to the exact product he/she is looking for without minimizing the opportunity to also offer up an impulse by opportunity. Unlike traditional retail, where consumers pass products on the way to their mission purchase, the web delivers the consumer to the product page directly, without providing impulse options until later on in the buy chain. A full 25% of all purchases on the Internet are impulse buys, meaning that the need to make certain the impulse opportunities are presented is critical.

And the way to make sure impulse buys are presented is by making sure the mission product is presented because it is from the mission buy that the impulse options are determined.

The challenge is this; the website has the capacity to bring a consumer within seconds to the product he/she is seeking. This has led to a tremendous demand on the part of the consumer. The effort to meet this demand has led to the development of search functions and the presentation of product by categories. Each of these has their difficulties, as search engines could draw a "no results found" response (driving the buyer immediately from the website) and categories tend to be too broad and vaguely defined to allow one-click access to products.

So what is the key to getting the consumer to their mission product on a website while preserving the option to present impulse options? The answer is navigation.

• Browse
• Search
• User Tagging
• Personalization capabilities (like offer generation and shopper alerts)

• Provides shoppers with a broad view of all available products
• Delivers access to product reviews and product relevant content
• Delivers product update information and personalized shopping alerts on special offers and promotions
• Provides the ability for shoppers to view related or accessory products to the product being viewed (sparking impulse buys)
• Tracks visitor path for the ability to generate and analyze data on user paths, product category efficiencies and buyer product review habits.

Simply stated, navigation is an e-commerce best practice that is currently neglected in favor of flash presentations, crowded homepages, and less than effective merchandising tactics. If the objective of the e-commerce site is sales (which obviously it is) then the task of transforming visitors to buyers is top priority.

Increasing the size of the average buy and the ability to encourage buyers to buy more is critical to the online store success, just as the need to provide a pleasant buying experience (because it determines the rate of repeat buyers) is critical.

All e-commerce sites - of companies small and large - need to delve into the software programs offering navigation suites. It is not only a competitive necessity for e-commerce sites; its ability to drive sales makes it an absolute necessity.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Online Marketing Tactics

Companies selling goods and services over the Internet need to employ web based marketing tactics that serve to draw traffic to their website, improve visitors-to-buyers ratios and increase the amount each buyer spends. The use of the web as a marketing tool is a challenge because Internet users are now much more mission oriented in their web behavior and are less inclined to surf or allow themselves to be enticed into entering a web path that deviates from their intended destination.

The effectiveness of an online marketing program is dependent on the extent to which it succeeds in reaching the intended target audience at a time when the marketing message is relevant to the target. Initially it was believed that the web, with its data mining capabilities, would open up dramatic new opportunities to marketers, but the initial enthusiasm has proven exaggerated, largely because marketers were unclear in how they defined relevant and bombarded consumers with automated marketing messages that proved to have little genuine relevance to the site visitor.

The lesson to be learned from the initial shortcomings of online marketing is that people cannot be fooled into believing something is relevant just because a banner advertisement or window pops up on their computer screen. Nor can we, as professional online marketers, assume that relevancy is determined by the immediate activity of the web user. Not everyone searching a site on telecommunications want to buy a book on the topic. True, they might have a greater interest than someone who never visits a telecommunications website, but that is not the same as relevancy.

The real way to guarantee relevancy is to allow the user to determine what is relevant to him or her at any given moment. It's true that this is being done to some extent by having a presence where relevancy might occur. Still, the challenge to online marketers is to create new tactics or new twists on existing tactics that will serve the interests of online marketers by serving the needs of online buyers.

• Don't wait for the search engine crawlers to find you. Submit the URLs you want listed to the search engines. You'll need to be patient though. The birthrate of new websites is such that it could take a few weeks before your site actually gets listed.
• Keep resubmitting your URL. Even the best search engines only feature about 10% of the web pages out there. With more than a billion pages on the web the task is overwhelming and getting more so every day. Still, the huge number of new of web pages means that the search engines often have to remove existing pages in order to accommodate new ones. By resubmitting on a regular basis you will insure that even if you were bumped, you're back on.
• Choose your search engines. Insofar as you do not want to make site submission a full time occupation, it is wise to select which search engines are most important for your company. In most cases you will elect to submit to the larger, more active engines, but if, for example you are in a specialized category, you may want to register with an engine dedicated to your sector as well.
• Use titles and meta tags. Search engines will rank titles and meta descriptions highly, so this will help you get placed more prominently in search results. Also, your title and description will most likely be used by the search engine in the search results, so make certain what you write is what you want the search results to show.

• Personalize It - you can create a personal and ongoing relationship with your customers through the use of personalization. By providing your customers with a registration option, that comes with a variety of convenience-oriented benefits, you will be able to identify users as they login. You can then use the knowledge of their presence to welcome them and offer a level of personalized assistance. This will allow the consumer the chance to indicate their relevancy as they enter your website, giving you the chance to work in suggested products and impulse buys.
• Merchandise - traditional retailers use a variety of physical elements to promote the sale of goods in their stores. Some of these include scent machines, music, lighting and shelf placement. Your online entity needs to merchandise its goods without the benefit of these subliminal influences. It is therefore essential that you present your products in an orderly and logical manner. Make sure to incorporate sophisticated search engines that provide the consumer with the ability to search regardless of their perspective of the product. Also, when presenting merchandise it is best to offer a photo, as well as in-depth product specifications. Some sites also offer consumer reviews and products of the day. Both of these are effective and useful merchandising strategies.
• Have Good Web Architecture - when designing the architecture of your site keep in mind the consumer experience and strive to construct a site that provides the greatest possible levels of convenience, information and comfort. The way products are presented is only part of the puzzle. You must also pay attention to the user path, the check out and payment process, and the placement of special offers. You are aiming to create a gratifying and enjoyable consumer experience. Design your website to deliver.
• Use E-mail - mail can serve as a valuable marketing tool provided you structure your messages well and avoid engaging in spam. Use your e-mail campaign to develop a relationship with your shoppers, allowing them access to special offers and updates about new product offerings.
• Practice Loyalty Marketing - loyalty marketing is valuable because it creates a bond between you and your customers and gives them an incentive to come back and buy from your website again. Some loyalty programs allow buyers to earn points that can be redeemed at a variety of network-affiliated websites. Other programs allow points to be converted to cash. You also have the option of developing your own incentive loyalty program, although Tudog does not recommend this unless you are prepared to provide extremely attractive rewards. There is a consumer perception of added value in programs that allow for redemption through multiple sites or as cash. The important thing to keep in mind is that loyalty programs show customers that you appreciate their business and they in turn reward you with repeat purchases.
• Develop an Affiliate Network - affiliates serve your site by creating points-of-awareness at various websites of similar or related interests, and can serve to create credibility through association. There are affiliate management services, such as Commission Junction (www.commissionjunction.com) and Be Free (www.befree.com) that can lend exposure to your affiliate effort.

Consumer e-commerce has taken a beating in the last 18 months or so, but just as many pundits exaggerated its potential, so too are they now exaggerating reports of its demise. If you have an e-commerce site, or think adding one to your brick and mortar operation will enhance sales, there is an audience of millions of web users who are still open to responding to your marketing gesture - provided it is compelling, appealing and relevant.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

The Myth of Search Engine Optimization

Google is now an institution. The word can now be used in any grammatical form and has become synonymous with web searching. And what is driving a good portion of its revenues is a mad rush by companies to occupy the first 10 spots (page one) of a search. To this end people are buying keywords, the value of which goes up as demand for the keywords increase, and paying firms sometimes thousands of dollars a month to maintain high search engine placement. It all boils down to lead generation, and it has gotten out of hand.

There are only 10 spots in the top 10 spots. This might seem like a repetitive statement, but it is making a point. For companies to be selling the availability of 10 spots to thousands of companies makes for a mathematical anomaly that all the keyword buying in the world won't be able to solve. The danger of all this madness is that, like with the original internet boom, the SEO (search engine optimization) boom will go bust as more and more companies get tired of spending money for results that somehow always seem to get replaced by excuses.

• Embed Keywords in Your Content - the placement of keywords (words you want your website to be categorized as and words you want the search engines to pick up on) in your page title and throughout your content will allow the search engine spiders to identify your site as you wish to be identified and place your site as part of searches for the words you select. The placement of the most critical keywords in the title tag will result in a higher search placement because the search engines place the title as the clickable link on the search engine results page. Once upon a time meta tags and meta keywords were used by search engines to evaluate content and search relevancy. This is not done anymore, partly because spammers abused it, and partly because the search engines could not figure out a way to monetize it (as they have with keyword purchases). The use of meta tags and keywords within your content is still helpful though in that they are often what is used in the description of your company on the search engine results page. By the way, make sure that while you are creating content that will be noticed by the search engines you don't wind up creating content that is either incomprehensible or irrelevant to your readers. It makes no sense putting all this effort into getting people to visit your site if they can't understand a word of what you've written once they get there.
• Have a Proper Architecture - search engines cannot index pages that are more than two clicks away from your homepage, which is about the same distance the average web user is willing to travel to get at your information. It is therefore necessary to make certain that the structure of your website is constructed to maximize both search engine indexing and userability. In this case the two converge, so it is an easy condition to agree to execute.
• Generate Link Relationships - to some extent, search engines rank according to some estimation of your site's popularity. One of the parameters they use is how many other sites are linked to yours. So you need to develop affiliate and other relationships that link their website to yours. This too is consistent with general good web marketing, and therefore should not arouse too much resistance.

Search engine placement cannot come at the expense of your traditional and online marketing programs. It could, perhaps, be a component of your integrated plan, but you need to make certain it does not take over your other activities. The lure of the search engine - this idea that leads are generated by the lead itself - is very seductive, and the reason why so many companies have forsaken much of their other marketing activity for the full time management of their keyword purchasing and search engine optimization activities.

There have always been preferred places to advertise and there have always been preferred ways to generate leads - and often the only companies able to avail themselves of these top-tier opportunities were those with the financial resources to do so. Just as Time magazine has but one back cover to sell, Google has but 10 top spots for the keywords you want. If you have the means to purchase your place on that page, and you deem it to be a productive use of your marketing dollars, then you should do it. However, if you do not have the resources, and you are nonetheless spending money because some web marketing firm is promising you better placement, you are most likely throwing your good money away. Even with the pay-per-click model, which serves to reduce some of your risk, you are still paying for keyword purchase services and most likely other related services. Without spending real money you are either getting sub-par keywords or you are being placed well after the first three pages - and very few people bother searching after the third search engine results page.

If you don't believe us, google it. You'll see.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Using E-Mail for Effective Marketing

E-mail marketing can be an inexpensive and targeted channel for dissemination of information about your company and its products. Still, as with any aspect of your marketing campaign, if it is not executed properly it can inadvertently create a negative customer experience. E-mail marketing certainly runs some risks, as sales pitches through the email are often seen as a nuisance at best and an intrusion at worst.

Many companies now use the e-mail as a way to maintain a relationship with their customers. This can be highly effective, as it allows the customer to participate in the brand, working toward building a relationship of trust and loyalty.

E-mail can also be an effective tool for driving sales as it can serve as a channel for the distribution of promotional materials and special discount offers. For some products, e-mail also offers a direct sales channel, as links can be provided to customers to enter a website and make an immediate, perhaps impulsive, purchase.

Effective e-mail campaigns have three crucial elements; the mailing list, the content of the e-mail and the follow-up.

The Mailing List

Building an e-mail marketing campaign begins with selection of your mailing list. There are an abundance of lists available, some permission lists and some simply listings of email addresses gathered from industry sources. Tudog strongly urges the use of permission lists only. Sending uninvited e-mail is most likely an unwanted invasion of the recipient's e-mail box and is often seen as a less-than-legitimate business practice. This generates a bad feeling toward the company that will be almost impossible to overcome. Ironically, an e-mail meant to generate a sales lead, had the reverse effect and alienated a potential customer.

The most effective way to build an e-mail mailing list is to offer people the opportunity to sign up for your mailings through you website or through an initial mailing. This gives people the feeling they are being offered an opportunity to participate in the information or offers you are distributing, and will make them receptive and cooperative when your mail arrives.

E-mail Content

• Introduce Yourself Right Away - You'll lose credibility if you try to disguise your e-mail as anything other than it is - a business motivated correspondence. Also, people read the first few lines of an e-mail and then decide if they want to read the rest. So, start your letter with who you are and why you have an offer they can't refuse. If you don't get your offer out there right away, it may never reach its intended audience.
• Use the Subject Line - You can increase the number of people opening your e-mail if you use the subject line to describe your purpose. If people have requested your e-mail or given you permission to contact them, then your company name or product name creates an association. If the e-mail is routinely sent, such as a newsletter, the name of the newsletter would similarly gain acknowledgement and recognition. Don't try to use hyped up sales language in the subject line. It raises suspicion and dooms the email for the deleted items box.
• Keep it Simple - Don't be tempted to make your e-mail too fancy. Remember, people have to download your message, and if it takes too long you'll be addressing a customer already annoyed with you. Also, e-mail does not necessarily lend itself to the types of design elements we may incorporate into print pieces. Keep your e-mails simple and compelling.
• Create Urgency - If you use e-mail too often your letters will turn into nothing more than an electronic version of the junk mail most of us automatically place directly in the trash bin. Use e-mail only when you are announcing something deemed worthy or making a special offer. These serve to create a sense of urgency with your customers, particularly if your special offer is for a limited time only.
• Be Truthful - If you try to mislead people with vague language or draw them into your website and then switch your offer on them, prepare for the worst. E-mail is extremely viral, and any games you play will come back to haunt you. So be truthful. Give all the information your customers need in the body of the e-mail - including product information, price and any add on fees. Then direct the buyer to the exact page on your website where the offer is located.
• Don't Send Mistakes - The e-mail you send becomes a reflection of your company. Make mistakes in spelling or omit something you claim is there and people will start wondering whether you are clumsy and inefficient in all aspects of your operation. Make sure you proofread all e-mails before they go out.
• Put Contact Information - Your e-mail should have a direct link not only to your website, but to the exact web page that corresponds to your message or offer. Do not assume that the link is enough by way of contact information, or that people can collect that information from your website. Provide all your contact information in the e-mail too. That includes a toll free telephone number, an address and an e-mail address, and a contact person, in case they have inquiries.

Follow-up

An effective e-mail campaign can generate response rates that meet or exceed those of direct mail and tele-marketing campaigns. The tactics used for follow-up and to close the deal can assist in converting inquiries driven by the e-mail campaign into hard sales.

Tudog believes that effective marketing via e-mail is achieved through a commitment to the channel and a consistency in its use. This can mean that some e-mail campaigns are followed-up with more e-mail. Still, e-mail, for all its conveniences, is impersonal and one sided. For these reasons, Tudog generally recommends following-up e-mail campaigns with telephone calls. We have found that the calls add credibility to the e-mail and bring an element of person-to-person contact that is critical for a sale to be closed.

E-mail marketing can be an effective and inexpensive supplement to your broader and more direct marketing tactics. The use of e-mail can keep you in front of customers and serve to maintain a dialogue. Just make sure that the exchanges are positive, support your objectives and are consistent with you overall marketing strategy.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Web Design for Maximum Performance

The days of debating the need for a website are over. Every company expecting to be competitive in today's hectic business world needs a website. The options are only with regard to the type of website you have - with e-commerce capabilities or without, with sign in for information or without, with direct contact to key executives or a more general contact us, and so on. These are all tactical issues that should be determined as part of your overall web strategy, which should be developed and designed in order to maximize the performance of your website. The web strategy should be part of your overall marketing strategy, as your website is one of the tools customers and potential customers will be accessing in order to learn more about your company and your products.

• Plan Your Site Out -think of the process as building a physical object, with all the corresponding sketches and planning. The architecture of your site is critical. If people can't find what they are looking for the purpose of your site has essentially been neutralized. Know how all your pages will interact, what the navigational routes are and how you will maintain graphic consistency.
• Introduce and Welcome - welcome people to your website and use your homepage or "About Us" to briefly introduce yourself. Use a few lines to explain who you are and what you offer. Don't expect people to be willing to browse your site to find out the basics.
• Get Naked - Some technology companies keep their websites intentionally vague because they do not want competitors gaining information about their company. This is nonsense. The marketing and sales process demands exposure. The damage a competitor may be able to inflict by the bits of information gathered from your website is offset by far by the sales generated by having clear and detailed information on your website for your customers and potential customers to view. This does not mean you publish secrets. Customers don't need to know your secrets. It does mean you publish what you do, how you do it (in general), and why it is compelling to your customers.
• Design from 3 Perspectives - When you design the website think not only graphically, but also in terms of function and the purpose of the content (what the user will be doing with the content). Then integrate the three.
• Keep it Quick - Most of the time keeping it quick means keeping it simple, but if you can find the way to make it more engaging graphically while keeping it quick then that's a good thing. Remember, people on the net are impatient. So get them where they're going quickly.
• Don't Blink - one way many companies are trying to draw attention to certain content elements on their websites is by using blinking text. While this may give a Las Vegas like feel to your website (is that what you want?), it may also distract and annoy your visitors. Personally, as a design element, we don't recommend it.
• Color Me Light - using dark backgrounds often make a website hard to read and add little to the site. Depending on your targeted audience, you're probably best off sticking to white or light backgrounds and dark text.
• Don't Count on It - it is fascinating that some sites feature visitor counters. First of all, your visitors are coming to use your site, not, in most cases, to see how many other people have. More importantly, unless your pulling in a few million hits a day, you have no idea if the number on the counter is impressing people or scaring them away. Simple solution is to not put a counter on your site.
• Don't Go Font Crazy - while a certain font may look great on your computer, you have no way of knowing how it will look on the user's computer, or even if the user has the same font. While HTML allows you to specify a preferred font and some alternatives (), you probably want to stick to the basics and use fonts that are most common.
• Use Thumbnails - If you can't use small images then you should use thumbnails for your large ones, giving people the opportunity to see the image before deciding if they want to go through the lengthy downloading process.
• Don't Force Registration - it is understandable that you have an interest in knowing who is viewing your site and what information they seek. Still, it is bad policy to required registration before giving out the information. It is almost as if you are telling the customer that there is a condition or price to be paid before you do them the favor of exposing them to your company's sales pitch. Some people will leave your site just on principle. Others will leave because they don't want to fill out the form. In other words, let them into your site, get them acquainted and fond of you and then ask them (nicely) to let you know a bit about who they are. If they are interested in your product they'll gladly give you their information. If they are not, what good is having their information?
• Check for Errors - make sure your site doesn't have any spelling errors, pricing errors or dead links. These sort of mistakes make users wary because they see lack of attention to detail as a sign that you are less than professional. And since so much of web based activity is based on the credibility you establish through your website, it is important that you don't have silly mistakes getting in your way.
• Forget Grammar - writing for the web requires that you be quick and to the point, personal and friendly and, when appropriate, somewhat entertaining. To achieve these you are excused from the normal rules of grammar. This does not mean your language doesn't have to flow properly and be cohesive and correct. It just means that if you use fragmented sentences and the like, you'll be forgiven.
• Check Your Links - if you have links to other websites, make sure they are operational and bring the user to the right place. You should continue checking this on a regular basis just to be sure.
• Wait Until You're Done - if your site isn't completed, don't announce that it's up on the web. All good sites are in a perpetual state of being under construction. Still, it's best to wait to announce your site until you have your first version completed. This allows users to understand your purpose and potential.

The web can be a powerful and versatile weapon in your marketing arsenal. Just as easily it can be a boomerang that causes damage because the website wasn't given the attention and development time necessary for it to maximize its potential. Tudog strongly encourages our clients to integrate their web strategy into their overall marketing plans, so that the website becomes a powerful feature in the company's communications kit.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission

Websites Revisited

The website has undergone a number of transformations. There was a time when the website was an afterthought, thrown together without any genuine understanding of its value, but created nonetheless because it was a business necessity. Soon after, it was understood that the website is an essential business tool, and companies began to give the website the attention and resources necessary for it to deliver on its promise. Recently, there has been a new wave of web apathy, with many companies either failing to update their existing websites, or creating websites that are reminiscent of the day when they were deemed less critical.

What has happened that has caused this wave of apathy? Has the importance of the website diminished as the internet becomes a fact of life? Are there genuine business consequences to having a poorly structured and designed website?

The arguments for a good website are as relevant and critical today as they were 10 years ago when the internet started to gain momentum as a business tool. Certainly the hype of the day back then, which led to some web development companies demanding (and getting) millions of dollars for website development, has led to some disgruntled buyers. The exaggerated expectations of the internet, trumpeted by trendsetters and visionaries, were not completely wrong. Certainly the internet did not replace traditional commerce, but it did revolutionize it, and in this way, much of what was promised has in fact been delivered.

Is there any doubt today that prospective customers check out a website before calling a company? Is there any doubt that information gathering regarding products and prices is a common practice among even the most unsophisticated customers? The fact is, that the website is truly the window to a company and how the website is structured and designed speaks volumes about the company, its marketing approach, how it feels about its customers, and how it approaches business.

It is not an exaggeration to exclaim that a poor website hurts a business, while a good website enhances one. So, if this a business reality, why are there so many lousy websites?

The answer is an anomaly that has long puzzled Tudog. We see it in so many different avenues, including brochures, packaging and others. The reason is that while intellectually company leaders understand the need for premium materials, they don't really believe they make any real difference to them. In their minds, they know how a company looks is a key selling factor, yet they don't really believe it matters for them. It is one of the oddities of business Tudog has confronted, and we are seeing it more and more with regard to websites.

So what are the elements of a website that you need to revisit with an eye toward making sure your website is up to it maximum performance? Start with the following 4 critical components:

1. Content
The content of your website is perhaps the most important component. You need to be certain that your website is communicating your offering in a distinctive, yet simple manner. Also, you need to be certain to provide all the information a prospective customer may wish to learn about you. If you are leaving out specifics regarding who you are, what you do, your track record, or other vital facts, their absence may be perceived by the visitor not as an oversight, but rather as an indication of an intentional omission. This can, and most likely will, harm your chances.

2. Structure
The structure of your website has to do with how the website is laid out and how easy it is for people to pass from one group of information to the next. There needs to be an easy of navigation to your website, otherwise people will abandon it in either frustration or lack of resolve. In either case you have missed a chance to transfer information to someone who was actively seeking to learn about your company.

3. Usability
User-Ability has to do with the logic of your website construction. There are certain natural paths of information and certain links that are better placed through one path as opposed to another. The user-ability of your site, or user friendliness of your site, is important because it will encourage people to spend more time exploring while also delivering the sort after information more immediately.

4. Design
There is no way around it, and as much as you hate hearing it, how you look matters. How you look projects your level of professionalism, your concern for your company (and by extension your customers), and your business savvy. If you designed your website yourself, let your child in high school do it, or farmed it out to an amateur, your website will have the look of the unprofessional job it is. Problem is, so will your company.

The website and its central role in business needs to be revisited. Too many companies have allowed their site to sink into a static template, while far too many others are launching amateur sites thinking they can do the job of a professional. Too much about your business rests on the example your website shows. You may understand this to be true about other businesses. Now you have to understand it is true about your company too.

© Tudog International Consulting 1999-2006 Reprinted with Permission