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Title: Publish Your Way To Web Site Traffic
Author: Richard D. Bailey
E-mail: rbailey@clientbydesign.com
Web Address: http://www.ClientByDesign.com
Word Count: 1474 including resource box
Character width: 60
Category: Business/Marketing
Article Begins
Publish Your Way To Web Site Traffic
By Richard D. Bailey www.ClientByDesign.com
Besides using search engine traffic, It is possible to
generate a steady stream of website traffic by repackaging
existing marketing collateral and content that might be
collecting dust or virtual dust on your desk or hard drive
and giving it away free.
If you're wondering why anyone would want to give away his
or her work for free, it's called viral marketing. Some
readers will download your ebooks or reports and then send
them to friends, family and associates, especially if you
invite them to. Client By Design has successfully used
this method of traffic generation to pull thousands of
visitors to our site and our client's sites.
Just think of it as distributing your business card or
catalog to targeted visitors and then getting others to
give you referrals at no cost. This can lead to enormous
amounts of visitor traffic, phone calls and orders.
FINDING CONTENT
You might be sitting on a goldmine of information that your
site visitors need. Whether it's unused or just some older
information in digital form (word docs, text files, notes,
power points, etc or unwritten work) you probably have a
lot of shareable info that you can repackage to either sell
or give away.
If you took time in the past to write or compose it, it
probably has greater value than you realize. So revisit
your "my documents" folder or sift through some of your old
files and look for original info: old newsletters,
articles, research reports, product catalogs, etc that you
feel would still have relevance to web site visitors today.
Ebooks and reports can have a few pages, as little as one
to five or as much as 200 or more pages of info depending
on the message delivered.
DISTRIBUTION FORMATS AND READYING DOCUMENTS FOR
DISTRIBUTION.
Method 1: The self-executable ebook route:
Self-executable ebooks are compiled software applications
that readers can use without meeting any additional
requirements. A reader can simply launch (open) an ebook of
this type and begin enjoying it right away without needing
to download anything else.
These ebooks are popular because of their interactive
capabilities, compact file size and ease of distribution.
You can compile a full color ebook of magazine quality,
with full color photos, compress it and end up with a file
small enough to be sent by email.
Be advised, though, that it's not a good idea to send exe
files through email, unless they're zipped since anti-virus
programs and even some ISPs will block or delete them. In
fact, it's probably best to send the user a link where they
can download the file themselves, until anti-virus and
blockers become more sophisticated.
If you know how to make web pages, you can just use your
favorite html editor to create web pages with useful
interactive content. Once created, save the files on your
hard- drive. Be sure to include an introduction, table of
contents, graphics and links to your web site (if you
have one) and contact information so your readers can
contact you for more info, interviews or more ebooks.
Once your pages are complete, you will need to compile your
files into standalone format with an ebook compiler. While
there are quite a few compilers on the market, I have found
two to be extremely useful. I use Ebook Generator or Ebook
Creator to generate ebooks or reports.
One neat branding feature, both share, is the ability to
create splash-screens that come up, once your files have
been opened. These screens can hold a special thank you
message, logo or some other notification that you want
readers to see.
Ebook compilers are powerful tools that will help you get
your ideas or info distributed online in a short time.
Visit: http://www.clientbydesign.com/ecovers.html to learn
more about these products
Method 2: The PDF route:
If you don't know anything about html or creating web
pages, you can type your documents with a word processor or
desktop publisher, add some nice graphics and then convert
your documents to PDF files. PDF stands for portable
document format and is a widely accepted standard for
content distribution. PDFs are easy to distribute via
download or email, depending on size and look great, if you
create your original documents the right way.
To open and view PDFs, your readers will need to have Adobe
Acrobat Reader installed on their systems. Acrobat reader
is free and available for download on the web. It also
comes pre-installed on most new PCs or comes distributed
with just about any commercial software purchased these
days. In other words, it would be rare for anyone to
not-have acrobat installed on his or her system.
I use Win2PDF (www.win2pdf.com) to handle my PDF
conversions. It's real easy to use, since all I have to do
is select it as my printer and print to it when I'm ready
to create my file. It converts my document into a PDF and
saves them to my hard drive ready for distribution. There
are also more expensive and even some free software that
you can use to create your own PDFs, including Adobe
Acrobat (a PDF creation tool) www.adobe.com
Tip It's a great idea, to include your web site address
or product/service links in your PDF (perhaps as a footer
on every page) so readers can contact you for more
information, order products or to download more
ebooks/reports. Your readers will be able to click on your
links from directly within your document and, if they are
on the Internet they can visit your web site(s) to view
more resources or to buy more products.
WHAT TO INCLUDE
Regardless of the method you choose to publish with, you
should:
1. Include copyright information (example: © 2002-2003
Richard Bailey).
2. Include information regarding permission or NOT to
reprint or redistribute your materials.
3. Include a table of contents for long documents.
4. Include your contact information (email, web site url,
phone, etc).
5. Give credit where credit is due for any materials that
you include in your ebooks, if you didn't write the materials
yourself.
6. Never break copyright laws - theft of other people's work
is downright wrong and can lead to severe legal penalties.
If you are in doubt, just contact the author to get
permission to quote or use their material.
PROMOTE AND DISTRIBUTE YOUR EBOOK
Now that you're ready to get your ebook out to the public,
you will need a way to promote and distribute it.
The best method is to setup a web page that collects the
user's contact info and then, once they submit the form,
you can take them to a download page or you can send an
email download link via auto-responder.
Note: The auto-responder method is my method of choice
since some spam (unsolicited email) weary site visitors
and also a few frauds will type phony email addresses to
get your free download. With auto-responders they won't get
anything unless they give a valid address. Plus, as an
added bonus, you will have their contact info to follow-up
with after they have downloaded your ebook. Use this info
to invite them to subscribe to your newsletter or to get
more products. Just be reasonable, not pushy and don't sell
or give away your visitor's info, that's the fastest way to
a bad reputation, so always give explicit instructions on
how to cancel (opt-out of) future email notices from you.
Be sure to encourage readers to forward your download link
or a copy of your ebook or report to everyone they know or
anyone interested in the same topic. Just tell them not to
send to strangers.
Imagine selling products this way via free referral
marketing. Or imagine putting just the first chapter of
your ebook or document in a free download and having
hundreds or thousands of people requesting to see the rest
of your work or to learn more about your products or
services all because of one free download. It could happen.
Be sure to promote links to download your ebook or report
in your search engine, banner ad and other marketing
efforts
As you have read in this article, you can reuse, repackage
and publish your content and then give it away.
To learn more about going the extra route of distributing
and selling ebooks and reports online and also how to
create audio ebooks in minutesinstead of weeks, please
send email to esdinfo@clientbydesign.com
or visit
www.clientbydesign.com/instant-audio.html
About the Author
© 2003 Richard D. Bailey - Client By Design About
the author: Richard Bailey is an Internet marketer
and entrepreneur with over 7 years of Internet selling
and marketing experience. His coaching and consulting
company, Client By Design, LLC develops client-customized
methods and technology to attract customers.
http://www.clientbydesign.com