How can we combine traditional marketing methods with online marketing strategies?

While running a search on “What to Sell Online”, I came across this post by Ray Edwards. Essentially, it highlights steps on what aspiring online marketers should do to find a product or service to sell online.

Product surveys, personal interests and data analysis are some of the methods advocated by Ray. Granted, these are all traditional marketing research techniques commonly utilized by marketing gurus. They are thoroughly effective for either 1) Large corporations with a huge marketing and distribution budget or, 2) Brick and mortar small businesses with customers within an X-mile radius. Ultimately, these are great if you are answering the “What to sell” question.

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Whilst working on optimizing our website content and incoming links, the importance of outbound links is often overlooked. However, I’ve reason to believe that the quantity and quality outbound links are one of the factors used in search engine ranking algorithm. Let me illustrate this with my own experience.

My own experience with outbound links

Having conquered search engine optimization for several niche keywords (with low traffic volume), I turned to something more challenging. I wanted to search engine optimize one of my blogs for a keyword that had greater competition and a higher traffic volume.

As this blog was initially created out of personal interest, no SEO techniques were used on the existing content. Thus, the first thing I did was to optimize the content using the techniques highlighted in Building a Niche Blog for Top Search Engine rankings, with the exception of incorporating outgoing links.

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(Putting the 30-day challenge into practical use – Part 2)

On my previous post, I highlighted some of the methods I used to get top search engine rankings for What Sells Online! In How to Generate Ideas on What To Sell Online, I revealed some of the ways to get ideas for potential niche keywords. Finally, in Putting the 30 day challenge into practical use – Part 1, I discussed some ways anyone can use to nail down several niche keywords they could work on.

Now that you have your list of niche keywords, here’s what you need to do next:

• Use niche keywords to write good content
• Post your content on a Web 2.0 site or blog
• Search for relevant affiliate products to promote
• Get your niche blog listed on top of search engine results
• Other methods to draw traffic to your niche blog

a. Using niche keywords to write content

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There is no doubt about it: The ability to draw traffic is the key to online success, no matter what you are selling online. With top search engine rankings, you are able to capture potential buyers who are specifically searching for your product or service.

Ever since launching What-Sells-Online.com, I’ve been trying for top search engine ranking for the search results of “what sells online”. A bulk of my traffic came from my articles posted on Ezinearticles.com, many of which were listed on the first 2 pages of Google’s search results.

Eventually, I was able to get top search engine rankings with these strategies:

1. Post articles linking to your site on Ezinearticles.com

It seems that Google has an affinity for high PR websites such as ezinearticles.com. Thus, new articles on this site optimizing specific keywords will easily get a first page ranking. If you have just started a new
website, it helps to have an article (not duplicated on your blog or website), posted on Ezinearticles.com (or other popular article submission sites).

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Reading the JohnChow.com2007 Blog Income Report indicates that we don’t necessarily have to sell stuff online to make money. Working on a blog, with the right publicity, traffic generation techniques and some writing skills on the right topics, are some of the key ingredients for success.

Of course, all these do not come free. I’m certain that at some point or other, John Chow had to work hard to promote his blog before the money came pouring in. And, if you review his Blog Income Report for 2006, there is actually a significant difference in the income he’s getting. Apparently, according to this report - How Top Bloggers Earn Money-John Chow dot Com Income Report-August 2007 – John Chow had only started with a few hundred dollars of income in the first month. To me, this small amount is
great, as it indicates the effectiveness of his traffic drawing methods. Apparently, he started with only $3,440.66, which then grew to a whopping $27,240.83 at the end of the year.

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I’ve been busy over the past 3 weeks with several things:

1) Developing a website for a restaurant

2) Listening and analyzing all the pod casts and presentations from the Thirty Day Challenge

3) Putting into practice the keyword-finding tactics explained in my previous post

Fortunately, I’ve managed to complete all of the above, and with time left for Christmas shopping and preparations!

Today, I’m going to share my findings for the 3^rd item – identifying potential keywords that COULD be used to sell affiliate products online. You’d want to find keywords that aren’t already too competitive to optimize. In a nutshell, these keywords should fulfill the following criteria:

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In my previous post, How to Generate Ideas on What to Sell Online, I explored the various idea sources of possible product niches. Looking at what people bought, talked about, asked about or researched on, pretty much sparks off your imagination on how you can fulfill their needs.

Now that you have an entire list of product ideas, your next step is sieve out those with too much competition. Essentially, the key to a successful online product is the specific KEYWORDS used and optimized in a blog, sales page or website. The strategy here is to find niche keywords with some volume of searches and low competition from other websites, especially web 2.0 websites.

How do we do this?

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While looking for a guide to nail down what to sell online, I came across the Thirty Day Challenge training from Caroline Middlebrook’s website. With a sign-up, I gained an invitation to pod casts and audio recordings of the tutorials which were delivered each work day over a period of 30 days.

Days One through Three of this online training course were primarily focused on places to get ideas on what to sell online. While the trainers do not specify which products specifically would make money online, they make a good attempt in providing tips and tools for users to figure this out on their own. Holistically, the coverage of the entire 30-day program encompasses:

• Market Research
• Build Traffic
• Conversion Strategies
• Creating a Product

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One of the most inspiring methods I’ve found online is the potential of Blogs as tools to help us sell
online. While blogs have become tremendously popular, this channel of self expression has been successfully turned into a money making tool.

Most money making bloggers often utilize blogs as publicity and promotional tools for their other products. However, with the stiff competition from the millions of blogs online, each of them fighting for attention, bloggers have to work hard to carve a niche for themselves. They need to be creative in their traffic generation strategies.

Pay per click advertisements are often a source of side income for these blogs. While this money making channel may seem puny at the beginning, large volume of incoming traffic has the potential to help the blogger earn thousands of dollars.

A recent great example of this is Shoemoney, who recently shocked the Blogosphere by revealing the outrageous income he is generating from Google Adsense alone. He raked in a whopping $132,994.97 just for the month of  August. This was generated from 125,175 clicks, about 1% of the 13 million page impressions. (Oh, apparently Google Adsense income is just his side income. His blog is
actually his publicity tool for other products that he sells online.)

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Visiting trade shows is obviously one of the possibilities anyone would look at when seeking for products to sell online. I’ve been to several of these, with the latest being the April 2007 Global Sources China
Sourcing Fair in Hong Kong.

Logo from Global Sources

As fashion accessories and lingerie were amongst the products I was considering to sell online, China was then an obvious source. This country is synonymous with contract manufacturing, with thousands of factories selling millions of items across the world. Global Sources is, of course, great with their  marketing abilities.

I had received an attractive Global Sources brochure, and was just thrilled at the idea of meeting hundreds of China suppliers under one roof.

I was about to be disappointed. The following were the reasons why:

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