When most people think of search on the internet they think of Google.  And In fact Google will find MOST things for you.

But there are parts of the internet that Google won’t find for you, and services that you don’t know about. And these can be critical for your success.

For example you need to know about how often different keywords and their synonyms are searched for. Google won’t tell you that.  However to succeed in a competitive business you need to know how potential customers are searching for your products.

You Need Searchit

Search it is a tool which has been developed by SBI the best web solution for small business.

Search it is a free service that links to many specialised search services on the web.  It can help in of many phases of  your online business

• business planning
• niche selection
• keyword brainstorming and evaluation
• domain name selection
• Sourcing images and content
• spying on your competition
• finding suitable blogs and directories to link with

In fact Searchit is a suite of thirty or so search tools that can help you in all aspects of your web business.

Best of all it is free. Why, because it shows how a well constructed website, like those hosted by SBI needs to be backed up by careful research if it is to get any traffic from the web.

Get your copy from here

Download it, read the advice and save it as a bookmark.  You’ll find yourself using it on a daily basis as you plan, build and expand your business.

I have no affiliation with Traveling Vineyard  I’m sure I don’t qualify as I don’t reside in North America.

However many of my colleagues on various social networks are consultants for Traveling Vineyard.  I am sure there is some collective wisdom about the program that can be shared, outside of the hurly burly of  the programs downline.

As a start I’ve devised a 5 minute survey for current and past consultants of WSAH. Really i’m looking for an indication of what marketing mehods are being used and which are the  most successful.

http://www.vinodiversity.com/ttvsurvey.html

It’s free to fill in. I promise not to abuse your email address or an any way compromise your business.

You can remain anonymous. I will publish the general results on this website and send a more detailed report to survey participants - no promises of amazing breakthrough secret methods to explode your downline, just some advice from those who are succeding.

I will also use the results as part of a guidebook to wine based affiliate programs that I am preparing.

So, if you’d like to participate just go over to

http://www.vinodiversity.com/ttvsurvey.html

and get started.

I’ m sure that we will find some ideas to share which will benefit  your home based wine business.

I have no affiliation with WSAH.  I’m sure I don’t qualify as I don’t reside in North America.

However many of my colleagues on various social networks are consultants for Wine Shop at Home. I am sure there is some collective wisdom about the program that can be shared, outside of the hurly burly of  the programs downline.

As a start I’ve devised a 5 minute survey for current and past consultants of WSAH. Really i’m looking for an indication of what marketing mehods are being used and which are the  most successful.

http://www.vinodiversity.com/survey.html

It’s free to fill in. I promise not to abuse your email address or an any way compromise your business.

You can remain anonymous. I will publish the general results on this website and send a more detailed report to survey participants - no promises of amazing breakthrough secret methods to explode your downline, just some advice from those who are succeeding.

I will also use the results as part of a guidebook to wine based affiliate programs that I am preparing.

So, if you’d like to participate just go over to

http://www.vinodiversity.com/survey.html

and get started.

Why have a website that shows your business to the whole world when your potential customers are just around the corner or perhaps in the next suburb?

Well that’s the way the web works. There are many ways you can home in on the best prospects for your local business.

Suppose you are a consultant for a wine business such as Traveling Vineyard.  You can organise tatsing for people in your own neighborhood or perhaps city-wide.  But you need a flow of prospects to be exposed to your offer.  How do you find them?

Sure, the company gives you a “website” but does it work? Does it give you a steady flow of potential clients? See  this article to see why you need your own content based website.

There is a better way. You can have your own site to build and diversify your wine based business.  A free Local Business Masters course is available. It can be downloaded so you can print it off and read it at  your liesure.  There’s even some nifty advice about how you can print it off without wasting lots of paper. The course  takes you through the process of building a content based website for your local business.

You can do it yourself, build it while you are enrolled in a ecommerce course or get an expert to set one up for you. You don’t need to know about complex coding languages, but you do need to do some thinking about how your potential clients use the internet and how they will find you.

Behind the banner below is some information that will give you some information about where to start on the great adventure of launching your business into cyberspace.

Squidoo is a rapid way to increase your reach on the web. You create a minisite (lens) about some small niche.

In that site you can

• Link back to your main site
• Capture leads
• Make a little money on the side via affiliate programs

Squidoo allows members to create Lenses.  These are one page sites devoted to a small niche, say “wine tasting parties in Austin, Texas or the “emerging wineries in the Grand Valley Region of Colorado”

How to Build Your First Lens 

Ready

Choose a topic that you know something about. That way you won’t have to do much research and you wont damage your credibility by making a boo–boo.

You should also prepare a short outline about what you want to say. Squidoo lenses are like all other pages on the web - if they don’t have something to say then they will be rarely visited and certainly won’t induce people to click through to your main site.

Make sure the topic is related to your main business. You want to attract readers who may interested in becoming customers.

Aim

Go over to Squidoo and sign up for a lens. It’s very easy, quick and free.

Chose a name with hyphens, its easier for humans and search engines to read.  So use ‘wine-bars-in-austin-texas’ rather than ‘winebarsinaustintexas’ the address of your lens will be www.squdidoo.com/wine-bars-in-austin-texas

You can opt to take any cash you earn or donate to charity. Actually it doesn’t matter as you can change your options later. Lenses are very easy to update, both in content and settings.

FIRE!

Now you are ready to go. 

Once you have registered for your first lens you will be taken to the editing page for your first lens. The instructions are fairly clear, but there is a bit of learning to do at first.

Don’t get too hung up on what you do first up. It’s very easy to edit your lens.

You will use mainly Text Modules to start with. There are dozens of types modules but a good lens needs only a few.  If you don’t understand what a module is about just skip it. You can come back and add it later if you wish.

Use the Guestbook module.  Feedback from your readers is extremely valuable, and it makes your lens look alive.

If you have an existing blog you can display the contents of your blog on your lens.

Write clearly and check your work for misspellings and typos, remember you are trying to build credibility.

It is a good idea to finish with a text box with a short message including a link to your main site for further information.

In your first lens you will be prompted to insert a bio. make sure you mention your major business with a link of course. A photo adds credibility.

Maintaining your lens

You can log in to your dashboard from time to time and check on the stats etc for your lens(es)

If your lens is doing well add a module or two from time to time. Fresh lenses rank better. 

If you lens is not doing well you can tweak it a little but don’t waste too much time on it. You may be better just leaving it and starting another lens from a different angle. You can have as many as you like.

Link to your lens from appropriate places on other lenses, blogs and websites you have.

Check the referrers stats on your main site to see if your lenses are generating any traffic for you.

I call these websites “cookie cutter” websites. They are rolled off the production line looking exactly like  all the other cookies. They are then ‘personalised’ for each consultant as www.companyname.com/johnsmith

I strongly recommend you build your own website.

What’s wrong with cookie cutter websites?

These websites do no harm in themselves but they represent a waste of an opportunity. Your own website can be used to process your prospects into customers or a downline. 

Cookie cutters  attract very little traffic on their own but they must be promoted.

How does Google see a cookie cutter site?

Remember what business Google is in. It provides a service for searchers by sending them to quality information, not generic sales pitches. It makes its money by giving millions of searchers what they want - information, and exposing them to advertising along the way. Cookie cutter websites don’t contain useful and unique information. In short Google would lose its customers if it shared them with you.

Companies give their consultants cookie cutter sites for several reasons

• they look smart
• they cost virtually nothing to replicate
• the consultant may lack the skills to build their own site
• they are a useful way to recruit more consultants
• they are a convenient way for the company to track sales and pay each consultant
• consultants who use them are locked in to the company

Ok, it looks like a good deal for the company and so it is. That’s why virtually every MLM uses cookie cutter sites.

So why don’t I like them?

Firstly I don’t think the personalisation works. I am not convinced by a photo on the corner of the landing page and and an ‘about me’ page that is obviously just someones name plugged into a company template. To ad insult to injury many of theses about me contain further sales blurbs.

More importantly the pages capture all of your leads for the company, not you. You might be able to use the leads to sell stuff from the company, or as a downline for the company but they are not your leads. Consider what might happen if the company goes bottom up - a not implausible scenario. Your downline and your customers will disappear, or you’ll have a task to retrieve them.

A cookie cutter site will not get you the biggest and best source of the best leads - search engine traffic. People who find you because they are interested in what you have to sell are much better than people you accost in the street. These people only come to you via search engines, and the search engines will only send them to you if you offer unique content. Cookie cutters don’t churn out unique content

Finally these sorts of sites reinforce the idea that you can just put up a website and people will just come running to your door. It just will not  happen that way.

A website with my name on it?

Many companies suggest you register a domain with your name, say www.john.smith.com, and then redirect it to the cookie cutter site. This is marginaly better, it is more convenient for your selling campaigns, but most of the problems of a cookie cutter site are still there.

The best solution: build a website that is unique, that you own and control.  It takes more effort, but it is worth while in the end.

The Hows and Whys of Affiliate Programs

• One of the most popular methods of making money on the net is via affiliate programs.
• If you own a website or a blog you are a publisher.
• Advertisers or merchants have products for sale.
• There may or may not be a program in the middle eg Commission Junction who manages the relationship between the publisher and the merchant.
• If you are a publisher you can make money if a visitor to your site clicks on a link and goes to the advertisers site and makes a purchase you will receive a commission on the sale. In some cases you will be paid just for the click, in others you get paid only on sales.

Pros and cons of Affiliate Programs

Affiliate programs are quick and easy to set up and they can make you a considerable amount of money. But most likely you will only get a trickle of money unless you optimise the process, from getting the prospects on to closing the sales.

More information

Affiliate Masters Course Cover

Learn about Affiliate programs with this Affiliate Masters Course

Wine Related Affiliate Programs

See this information and recommendations about affiliate programs you might like to join. It will help you select appropriate programs for your site or blog.

This site aims to help you sell wine online, just like it says in the title.

Many people are trying. What works for you? As this site develops we will distil some of the best ideas, advice, tools and programs.

I am not attracted to glossy ads or overdone websites.  The theme of this blog is quite simple.  It aims to convey information, not be  feast for the eye.

Bottom line is I want to help your bottom line.