Determine your site traffic with the most popular free ranking sites: Alexa, Compete and Quantcast. Instead of using Comscore many opt for the freely available site traffic rankings sites, here is how they work.

There are 3 publicly available traffic sites: Alexa, Quantcast and Compete. Most in our industry not consider them statistically valid, and we do not rely on them for a variety of reasons including:

• Alexa extrapolates rankings from their data. The data is collected based on those individuals that decide to download their tool in their browser (Firefox just recently added) and Alexa then determines rankings based on their behavior. Anyone can download their utility and they may not control the sample. You may see wild fluctuations month to month due to their methods. Visit Alexa Here.
• Alexa is very similar to Alexa and individuals must install the Compete bar. Visit Compete Here.
• Quantcast has some basic data, however you must implement their code on your site so they can collect information about your site and visitors. This may be the most accurate of the three, so the data may be the most relevant. Visit Quantcast Here.

Each one of these sites is worth looking at as third party verifiers of your site activity.

You may be able to regain part of your marketing spend on pay per click search engines. If you have been defrauded, not by the search engine but by others fraudulently clicking your advertisements, you may be able to get a refund but how?

To learn more about click fraud see our previous article here.

A product that over 4,000 advertisers are using is called Click Forensics to be their voice in the fight against click fraud. You can obtain a free trial subscription here.

It is simple to set up as they walk you through the process. For example to set up Google Adwords they explained the simple steps of:

• log into adwords
• click the upper right tab “Account”
• then the sub link “Account Preferences”
• then choose the “edit” link next to the word Tracking
• then choose the Auto Tag option and hit save
• then you grab the code they request you use and paste before your “body” link, if you do not maintain the code you simply enter your programmers email and the code is sent to them

It was that simple.

You can use their reports to send to the search engine and request a refund on any fraudulent activity. You can obtain a free trial subscription here.

Get the most from your advertising and marketing campaigns, particularly cost per click advertising. Protect yourself from click fraud. There is a new site that is empowering the little guy to assist in auditing and keeping the large networks honest. In all honestly it is not the networks defrauding anyone but those who are clicking on advertisements fraudulently.

The Click Fraud Network is here and the benefits are below. You can join their network for free and keep up to date.

• Create a community of advertisers to pool information, resources and ideas. This is the genesis of the Click Fraud Network. Members can discuss solutions, take advantage of free reports using their patent pending algorithm to track click fraud threat levels. The network will publish the Click Fraud Index, a site dedicated to educating advertisers on industry trends and information. They believe it does take a community to address the issue of click fraud.
• Define the industry standards for what an unwanted click looks like. They believe that there are certain characteristics or attributes that are common to a large percentage of click fraud. They are working with publishers and advertisers to agree on common ground and work together to expose it. Once this is developed it should be published so that the entire community can benefit from it.
• Agree on a format to submit reports to search providers. If they can improve the process of communication between the advertiser and the search provider, they believe that unwanted clicks can be identified much sooner. This process would allow for improved identification of those trying to beat the system as well as a fair forum to be sure advertisers are getting what they pay for.

They provide useful services such as:

Click Fraud Index:

They aggregate data anonymous data collected from our members and aggregated for the purpose of tracking industry trends.

Click Fraud Blog:

Articles and engage in discussion with other members of the Click Fraud Network.

If you are deciding whether or not to join take a look at these stats that they publish, you can join for free The here.

• The overall industry average click fraud rate was 16.2 percent for Q3 2007. This is an increase from 13.8 percent for the same quarter in 2006 and from 15.8 percent for Q2 2007.
• The average click fraud rate of PPC advertisements appearing on search engine content networks, including Google AdSense and the Yahoo Publisher Network, was 28.1 percent in Q3 2007. That’s up from 25.6 percent for Q2 2007, 21.9 percent for Q1 2007 and 19.2 percent for Q4 of 2006.
• Over 60 percent of traffic from parked domains and made for ad sites was click fraud

These stats alone are reason enough to join and read about the Click Forensics click fraud tracking service to determine if you are being unfairly charged for fraudulent clicks.

Videos can make you money? You have seen videos on YouTube that have individuals are using to sell products and services. These videos often provide examples, screen shots, and screen captures in video which capture your movements on the screen as you use the product or show the service.

Simple to Make
These videos are much easier to make than you may think. You do not need to record yourself, however if you wish you can easily use a webcam to record. Most videos are a capture (recording) of your computer screen and your voice as you walk someone through using your product or service. See how easy it is, all the screen recording software listed below have free trials available.

Screen Recording Software and Free Trials

NAME	FREE TRIAL	PURCHASE	REQT’S	FILE TYPES
ACA Screen Recorder	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI
My Screen Recorder	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI, Flash or Windows Media (WMV)
Gold Leo Screen Recorder	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI or Flash
Super Screen Recorder	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI
AimOne	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI or Windows Media (WMV)
Easy Screen Recorder	Free Trial	Purchase	Windows	AVI

Try them all, choose the one that fits your needs the best. Each of the above offer a free trial.

Increase sales with an Autoresponder!

Once someone vistis your site they may never return. However if they find your site interesting they may provide their email but not yet be ready to purchase your service or product. Autoresponders are a simple and easy way to communicate with your leads since it is automated.

Here is how it works, once an email is entered into the system that user receives follow up emails at predetermined times, such as 1 day after they sign up, 3, days, 14 days etc. You only need to setup the autoresponder once by creating the messages you would like to have sent. In each message you put the link back to your site or service and allow this automated system to constantly market your product or service for you. You choose which messages to be sent when.

They provide incredible tools such as 51+ Templates for newsletter and follow up design, web forms so you do not need to code, training guides, videos and free customer support.

You can get started in three steps:

1. Sign up for a 30 day trial here.

2. Add a Form to Capture Website Visitor Subscriptions

Use their form generator, with video tutorials, to create unblockable pop-ups or standard forms that are easily installed on your website without programming experience.

3. Create and Send Follow Up Emails and Newsletters to Opt-in Subscribers

Configure unlimited follow up and newsletter messages with name personalization, click thru and open rate tracking, attachments, RSS, and split testing at no additional cost. Messages can include HTML using their 51+ pre-designed templates, or create your own with the integrated easy editor and images or plain text.

No Risk Offer

Their current offer is risk free for 30 days, if we don’t help build your opt-in list and convert more website visitors we’ll give you a 100% no questions asked refund. Sign up for a 30 day trial here.

The Go BIG Network is an on-line marketplace that connects startups and small business community. The company allows startup companies, investors, advisors, job seekers and service providers to post requests for help on-line and have those requests routed to other members of the Network who can help them.

For a new business or startup the network can prove to be very useful

Create a Member Profile
As a member you can create a free profile. You can also search other profiles of members to learn more about them (and contact them). The site is completely tailored toward the needs of startup and small businesses, the profiles on Go BIG are highly targeted and specific. It’s easy to find an Angel Investor who invests in bio-tech startups in a particular region because their profile is created with the startup.

Make Requests
Requests are just like classified ads. You post anything from requests of “Looking for Funding” to “Jobs Available”. Each Request that is posted can be mapped back to individual member profiles that are interested in that particular request.

When you post a Request “looking for funding” the system can alert all investors on the system who invest in that type of deal. You can customize the types of updates you would like to receive.

Founder

The Go BIG Network was founded by serial entrepreneur Wil Schroter. After starting his first Internet company at the age of 19 (Blue Diesel), Wil grew the company to over $65MM in billings in just five years. At 22 Wil sold his company into a larger ad agency (inChord), joined their board, and helped grow the agency to over $600MM in billings within four years. Wil started Go BIG and obviously has the experience to understand what services are desired.

Go Here to Create a Profile, Network with Others, Find Startup Capital and Angel Investors on the Go BIG Network

ClickBank is an affiliate program that allows you to either sell your own products or promote others. I will discuss selling others products in this how to article.

ClickBank focuses mainly on information products and an easy way for individuals and small businesses to sell their products. These sellers rely on you and others to promote their products. Because of this they offer large commissions, some as high as 75%.

There is an excellent and easy to use tracking system through basic URLs. ClickBank claims over 100,000 affiliates, with over 10,000 products to sell.

It is easy to get started, simply sign up as an affiliate here. Then find products you may want to promote, and a unique link (called a hoplink) is created for you to promote.

As an example, here is what you see within ClickBank:

A unique link is created for you that looks like this: http://longest.tmlcom.hop.clickbank.net/, which you can then cut and paste the into your web page. And they also give you code to create a link such as this: Click Here!

Calculate Commissions
Here is how they calculate commissions, if you are promoting a product that offers a 55% commission:

• Retail Price: $29.95
• Subtract 7.5% + $1 -$3.25
• Net Sale Amount: $26.70
• 55% of the Remainder: $14.69

Therefore, as the referring affiliate for this sale, you would earn $14.69.

Tracking Code
They also have the ability to let you track all your efforts to promote any one product. For example, by using their TID variable you can track a link you place on page X and a link you place on page Y to see which may have a better conversion ratio.

This tracking code is implemented throughout the ClickBank system as “TID” or “tid”. The format of the hoplink URL with a tracking code is located below.
http://AFFILIATE.PUBLISHER.hop.clickbank.net?tid=XXXXXXXX

Sign up as an affiliate here.

Jobamatic allows you to easily and quickly install a job board on your site. You can earn revenue and there is no work on your part necessary, more on revenue below. The job board is fully hosted and free, you can sign up here for Jobamatic.

Fully Customizable
The system is also customizable so it has the same look and feel as your website by allowing you to modify the header and footer. You can also call your own CSS file from your server to assure the look matches yours. Take a look at my site VentureCapitalUpdate here (a new window will open) then compare to the screen shot below or go to the jobs.VentureCapitalUpdate.com to compare.

Subdomain
You can also create a subdomain of your domain and through a CNAME mapping it will have your URL and look as if it is part of your site. For example I set up on my Venture Capital Update site the Jobamatic site http://startup.jobamatic.com/ which is the default. I am now changing the CNAME and it will point to http://jobs.VentureCapitalUpdate.com.

Relevant Jobs
You also create categories to filter through the jobs. Since I have a site related to startups and venture capital I used those categories. After the jobs posted on your site are listed they then list jobs from around the web filtered with the terms you chose for your category.

Revenue?
You decide the price to charge for postings to your site, as well as how long the job postings will run. You receive fifty percent (50%) of the Net Revenue. You will also receive thirty percent (30%) of the Net Revenue received from paid clicks on your page on Sponsored Job Listings. Therefore for each posting you receive 50% of the price you specified as well as 30% of any click throughs on paid listings that are displayed, these are displayed after your search results using the filter described above.

What a great way to create a job board with little to no effort on your part. The job board can have the same look and feel as your site along with a subdomain, and the jobs listed are relevant to your sites content. I think the site and service is very well done. You can sign up here for Jobamatic.

Use Quicken Loans
to learn about refinancing, cash out and simply obtaining a lower interest rate.

At Quicken Loans they have more than 4,000 home loan experts dedicated to getting you into the home of your dreams, and finding the right loan to save you thousands of dollars each year! Your Quicken Loans Home Loan Expert is your Lender for Life. Visit Quicken Loans
to learn more.

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With Quicken Loans
you can learn about all types of loans, first home purchase and obtain the loan you would like.

They provide a purchase guide to buying a home, maximizing your negotiating power, and selecting a home loan that puts you in the driver’s seat.

Learn about home loans and home refinancing, or more acurately mortgage refinance, see Quicken Loans
to take the mystery out of refinancing with these resources. Learn which home financing options are right for you and how the refinance process works.

Cash out is an option to consolidate credit card debt, car loans, etc. Whatever your goal, whether it’s to consolidate debt, get cash to turn your house into your dream home, pay for college, or invest in your dreams, Quicken Loans
can make it happen with a cash-out refinance.

Home equity loans allow you to have a cash-out refinance, Quicken Loans
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Regardless of the tool Quicken Loans
is a great resource for learning as well as obtaining your next financing.

Use Quicken Loans
to learn about refinancing, cash out and simply obtaining a lower interest rate.
At Quicken Loans they have more than 4,000 home loan experts dedicated to getting you into the home of your dreams, and finding the right loan to save you thousands of dollars each year! Your Quicken Loans Home Loan Expert is your Lender for Life.

Visit Quicken Loans to learn more.

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