If you are in the internet business, one of the main problem is a start up capital for promoting your website. That will not be a problem to big companies which can afford advertising their websites. But during this tough times even big companies are cutting costs which is very obvious because of the massive lay-offs. So to make things easier and not costly many are looking for an alternative. Software tools offers automating tasks. For instance, before the word processor was invented, there was a typewriter that needs a skill of a typist and a good vocabulary,grammar and spelling knowledge. If you are using a typewriter and doesn’t posses a good skill like those, I guess you will use up a gallon of liquid paper before you finish a page you are typing. But that will not be a problem with a word processor like Microsoft Word which are loaded with macros to correct your spelling, grammar and indentation.
So comparing that scenario to an internet marketer, there are many things that have to be automated to get things done in a short period of time and less expensive. Personally I’m not a believer on those promising software claiming that can make an automated article, build links to your websites so you can rank on the first page of Google, automated friend adder in twitter and similar strategies which are an internet marketers dream. Many people are becoming victims of those promises because most of us wants instant gratification. I can’t blame anybody for that because I myself want things done in an instant. One example I want to share is my experience to a software called Humming Bird which is an automated twitter friend adder. I really wanted to try this software a long time ago but because it was a little expensive and very doubtful if it will work or not, it took me a long time before trying this. Luckily I had a chance to have this software so I was very happy that finally it will solve my problem gaining additional traffic to my blog.
I finally had a chance to add twitter friends without opening my twitter accounts. I have five of them so you see it’s a pain in the ass opening each of them and adding friends one by one. With this software all these things are done “hand-off” so you can do other tasks while waiting for the software to do it’s thing. As days and weeks pass by I realized how ridiculous it is to add friends instantly without a feature to remove all them automatically. I have to wait for the software to remove them one by one which doesn’t work because I can still see them on my twitter account. So those friends I added that don’t reciprocate, I have to manually remove them one by one. Not only that, since the software is using up much computer resources, it is slowing down my PC so I can’t do others things efficiently. I have to wait for it finish.
So what about other marketing software that looks fantastic and promising? I guess it’s for you to find out but what I can only say is “not all that glitter is gold”. Just ask yourself why will they teach you how to find gold or sell you a gadget that can make or find gold? if that is true then they should use it themselves to make them rich. How about you? you can post your comment below if you have any experiences that disappoints you.
Written by Manuel
Manuel Montala was an online entrepreneur who enjoys blogging about entrepreneurship and gathering information for his blog to help budding entrepreneurs. You can also reach him on twitter: http://twitter.com/mmontala
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{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
I totally agree with you there my man. Ever since we started out the business of Buyonline.ph Inc. we talked to several ad agencies both on-line and traditional in helping us brand ourselves, find our target market and of course bring more traffic to our site. They gave us all these packages for increasing our SEO and our word for word search thingy…(i work for an internet company but i do business development and marketing so i dont really know all the jargon) and it will cost us a lot. My team and i put our heads together and we all decided to just blog about through our social networks! Not only do we save a lot more, we can get to engage other people out there and hear out what they have to say. It just becomes more personal and insightful which is good i guess? It’s not instant gratification, but boy we are planting seeds! i hope you can find time to visit us at http://www.buyonline.ph thank!
Blogging requires a lot of time promoting by social network, search engine optimization(SEO) and/or PPC (pay per click) advertising so I guess blogging alone would not do the trick. It needs all those kind of promotion first to gain momentum.
I’ve been researching a lot of the internet marketing industry for the past 2 years, and I must say that I spent a lot of time and also money to educate myself.
If one is willing to learn and EARN, they shall have to pay the price of being an expert of something (e.g internet marketing), there is no shortcut.
Be wary, and at the same time be daring. Commit a lot of mistakes. this ASAP. is the ticket to success.
regarding traffick for marketing. creating good content with profitable keywords (plus not offending the search engines), can be a good way of promoting your product or business for free. Being a masterful in your niche can attract visitors to keep coming back and for them to recommend you to their friends.
If you have the resources to pay for more other ways to gain traffick in a short time, why not. as long as you are confident for the payback. go for it.
@Paul
Yes your are right that we have to invest for being expert on something and should not be afraid of mistakes. The biggest mistake really is not losing money for paying those marketing tools but the lost opportunity. But some internet marketers intent is just to rip us with our money which we should be aware of.
So true. There are a lot of posers, and i think i became a victim in one way or another. but in my mind, these people will not sustain their business in the long run. what i got though is, their marketing strategy is really effective (well, most of the time). if you have a good intention of making business with other people, plus you have the marketing skills of a guru, that’s gonna be awesome.
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