Saturday, June 24, 2006
One Stop Web Support Newsletter #33 On Its Way
The latest issue of One Stop Web Support Newsletter is scheduled to arrive early Sunday morning, June 25. This newsletter contains:
- Featured article—Improving Bland Copywriting with Dead Characters
- Recommended website tool: Trafficology
- Recommended auction tool: Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay
- Special guest article by Jim Cockrum—How I Grew My Mailing List to 50,000 Readers
- Success quote by Henry Ford
If you haven't signed up for my newsletter, you can do so at www.onestopwebsupport.com/newsletter-signup.htm. And I'll make it worth your while if you do. I'll give you $250 worth of free gifts for signing up!
Jeff
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Asking the Right Questions
If you're not getting the responses you're looking for in your business, maybe you're asking the wrong questions.
One of my daughters, Becca, is a statistical analyst in the Air Force. While she visited home this past week, she related one of the most frustrating aspects of her work. She said that a lot of higher ups who ask for analyses inadvertently get in the way of the answers they're looking for.
She used the example from everyday life to demonstrate how this happens. Let's say that a runner experiences sore feet while running. The runner's problem is sore feet. But instead of asking how to solve the soreness, the runner immediately assumes that they need to replace their shoes. So the runner addresses the problem of sore feet by asking what kind of shoes to buy.
Those shoes may be perfectly fine. The solution may be as simple—and as inexpensive—as a pair of arch supports. But by superimposing an assumed solution over the question, the runner effectively bypasses all simpler solutions and locks themselves into a more expensive one.
Becca says she sees this all the time. Higher ups request analyses with their assumed answer already built into the question, or with a question that doesn't directly address the problem. She has become quite adept at helping them dig down to the real question. But sometimes people are simply adamant about doing the analysis based on a faulty question that leads to either an ineffective answer or an inconclusive one.
How does this affect your small business online? All of us often do the same thing. We address a problem by assuming a solution instead of pursuing one. I'll share an example on Monday of how Becca pointed out an area where I was doing just that, and how she redirected me in a better direction.
Jeff
If you're not getting the responses you're looking for in your business, maybe you're asking the wrong questions.
One of my daughters, Becca, is a statistical analyst in the Air Force. While she visited home this past week, she related one of the most frustrating aspects of her work. She said that a lot of higher ups who ask for analyses inadvertently get in the way of the answers they're looking for.
She used the example from everyday life to demonstrate how this happens. Let's say that a runner experiences sore feet while running. The runner's problem is sore feet. But instead of asking how to solve the soreness, the runner immediately assumes that they need to replace their shoes. So the runner addresses the problem of sore feet by asking what kind of shoes to buy.
Those shoes may be perfectly fine. The solution may be as simple—and as inexpensive—as a pair of arch supports. But by superimposing an assumed solution over the question, the runner effectively bypasses all simpler solutions and locks themselves into a more expensive one.
Becca says she sees this all the time. Higher ups request analyses with their assumed answer already built into the question, or with a question that doesn't directly address the problem. She has become quite adept at helping them dig down to the real question. But sometimes people are simply adamant about doing the analysis based on a faulty question that leads to either an ineffective answer or an inconclusive one.
How does this affect your small business online? All of us often do the same thing. We address a problem by assuming a solution instead of pursuing one. I'll share an example on Monday of how Becca pointed out an area where I was doing just that, and how she redirected me in a better direction.
Jeff
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Can Small Business on the Web Benefit From an "Internet Tax?"
I've talked a couple of times lately about the so-called future "Internet Tax." This "Internet tax" involves future charges by major ISPs to individual websites for "premium connectivity."
Although such fees would be unpleasant, I don't believe they'll not necessarily mean "the end of small business on the Internet" as many have claimed. But I haven't even touched on the possible benefit of such an "Internet tax."
Benefit? How could there be any possible benefit from paying for the free traffic we now receive online?
It's simply this. Right now, the Internet is glutted with get-rich-quick schemers. These schemers are attracted to the Internet as a medium for business because it offers extremely low overhead compared to starting a brick-and-mortar store or a direct mail business.
They can easily start hundreds—or even thousands—of totally worthless parasite businesses online and have it cost them only a couple of bucks each. "So what," you might think. "How does it hurt me if someone wants to set up junk businesses?"
How do these businesses hurt you? These "businesses" are sometimes coming up in the search results ahead of you and stealing your traffic. If you have a website of any size or reputation, they are wasting your time with a deluge of link exchange requests that you have to sort through every day. If you're paying for Google AdWords or Yahoo! Search Marketing, you're paying money out of your pockets every day to fund their deceptive misuses of Google AdSense.
Now imagine if these parasites had to pay not just $10 a year each for their 1,000 sites, but a couple hundred dollars each for each site? They suddenly have to plan for some actual expenses instead of being able to count on making back the pittance they're putting out. They might have to actually—gasp—provide a useful service or product for people instead of making money by schemes that take money and traffic away from hard-working business owners.
It would be nice to clear all this deadwood out of the Internet, wouldn't it? And that's just what the kind of Internet tax that looms down the road would do. If you run your business like a business and not like a scam, you should be able to absorb some connectivity fees. But if you rely on low overhead to create an army of automated, no-value sites, you'll have to pay more than they're worth just to keep them running.
And that, my friends, would be a good thing.
Jeff
I've talked a couple of times lately about the so-called future "Internet Tax." This "Internet tax" involves future charges by major ISPs to individual websites for "premium connectivity."
Although such fees would be unpleasant, I don't believe they'll not necessarily mean "the end of small business on the Internet" as many have claimed. But I haven't even touched on the possible benefit of such an "Internet tax."
Benefit? How could there be any possible benefit from paying for the free traffic we now receive online?
It's simply this. Right now, the Internet is glutted with get-rich-quick schemers. These schemers are attracted to the Internet as a medium for business because it offers extremely low overhead compared to starting a brick-and-mortar store or a direct mail business.
They can easily start hundreds—or even thousands—of totally worthless parasite businesses online and have it cost them only a couple of bucks each. "So what," you might think. "How does it hurt me if someone wants to set up junk businesses?"
How do these businesses hurt you? These "businesses" are sometimes coming up in the search results ahead of you and stealing your traffic. If you have a website of any size or reputation, they are wasting your time with a deluge of link exchange requests that you have to sort through every day. If you're paying for Google AdWords or Yahoo! Search Marketing, you're paying money out of your pockets every day to fund their deceptive misuses of Google AdSense.
Now imagine if these parasites had to pay not just $10 a year each for their 1,000 sites, but a couple hundred dollars each for each site? They suddenly have to plan for some actual expenses instead of being able to count on making back the pittance they're putting out. They might have to actually—gasp—provide a useful service or product for people instead of making money by schemes that take money and traffic away from hard-working business owners.
It would be nice to clear all this deadwood out of the Internet, wouldn't it? And that's just what the kind of Internet tax that looms down the road would do. If you run your business like a business and not like a scam, you should be able to absorb some connectivity fees. But if you rely on low overhead to create an army of automated, no-value sites, you'll have to pay more than they're worth just to keep them running.
And that, my friends, would be a good thing.
Jeff
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Can Corporate Greed Crush Small Business on the Web?
As I related last week, there have been recent moves that could change the face of the Internet in future years. These moves could let major ISPs offer better visibility and connectivity to websites that pay them for this service and leave websites that don't pay with slow and unreliable service.
I expressed my disdain for the all the hand-wringing this news brought last week. But let's take a closer look at the reality of this situation. Can this kind of system actually destroy small business' access to the Web?
I became quite familiar with a small town in Western Iowa a couple of years ago while my son attended the college there. When he started school, a big WalMart had set up on the outskirts just long enough ago that the downtown businesses were feeling its effects.
Going-out-of-business signs went up in window after window of the small drug stores, hardware stores, and clothing stores that lines the streets. All small business in the town had been crushed, so it seemed.
But as I made more trips to that town over the years my son attended there, I saw a gradual change. The empty storefronts in that downtown ghost town started to fill again. Only this time they filled with businesses for which WalMart presented no competition.
Downtown became alive again with tanning spas, antique shops, specialty businesses of all kinds. In the span of a couple of years, that downtown went from desolate to bright and lively once again.
I don't wish to diminish the anguish that many of those old-time business owners faced as their long-time businesses crumbled. Nor do I wish to celebrate WalMart. I find a lot in their business tactics that turn me off. But I just want to point out that entrepreneurs find a way to adapt.
I'm sure that some of the business owners who closed their businesses retired. Some moved away. Some resigned themselves to working for someone else. But a good number of those business owners simply started over with new businesses that were immune to changes that WalMart had brought.
So will the payment of "connectivity fees" destroy the opportunity for people to start a business on the Web? I think not.
A true entrepreneur is resiliant and resourceful. A true entrepreneur doesn't have to have business conditions always stacked in his or her favor in order to succeed. A true entrepreneur will find a need that customers need filled and will find a way to fill it—no matter what the business conditions may be.
Which is all the more reason to become a true entrepreneur.
Jeff
As I related last week, there have been recent moves that could change the face of the Internet in future years. These moves could let major ISPs offer better visibility and connectivity to websites that pay them for this service and leave websites that don't pay with slow and unreliable service.
I expressed my disdain for the all the hand-wringing this news brought last week. But let's take a closer look at the reality of this situation. Can this kind of system actually destroy small business' access to the Web?
I became quite familiar with a small town in Western Iowa a couple of years ago while my son attended the college there. When he started school, a big WalMart had set up on the outskirts just long enough ago that the downtown businesses were feeling its effects.
Going-out-of-business signs went up in window after window of the small drug stores, hardware stores, and clothing stores that lines the streets. All small business in the town had been crushed, so it seemed.
But as I made more trips to that town over the years my son attended there, I saw a gradual change. The empty storefronts in that downtown ghost town started to fill again. Only this time they filled with businesses for which WalMart presented no competition.
Downtown became alive again with tanning spas, antique shops, specialty businesses of all kinds. In the span of a couple of years, that downtown went from desolate to bright and lively once again.
I don't wish to diminish the anguish that many of those old-time business owners faced as their long-time businesses crumbled. Nor do I wish to celebrate WalMart. I find a lot in their business tactics that turn me off. But I just want to point out that entrepreneurs find a way to adapt.
I'm sure that some of the business owners who closed their businesses retired. Some moved away. Some resigned themselves to working for someone else. But a good number of those business owners simply started over with new businesses that were immune to changes that WalMart had brought.
So will the payment of "connectivity fees" destroy the opportunity for people to start a business on the Web? I think not.
A true entrepreneur is resiliant and resourceful. A true entrepreneur doesn't have to have business conditions always stacked in his or her favor in order to succeed. A true entrepreneur will find a need that customers need filled and will find a way to fill it—no matter what the business conditions may be.
Which is all the more reason to become a true entrepreneur.
Jeff
© 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 Jeff Baas, One Stop Web Support
