The Contemporary Web Traffic Guidebook by ALPHAONETIMEMEDIA LIMITED - HTML preview

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Chapter 5

Advertising Through Ezine

Another powerful strategy that can help send out your message to thousands of subscribers at the cost of a few hundred dollars is advertising through ezine or emagazine. It’s one of the quickest methods to build your business and effectively expose your presence online.

Hundreds of list owners online can help you advertise on their newsletters and send your message to thousands of people. A paid solo ad amounting to $600 dollars can be sent to 60,000 subscribers. This promotion can get you 890 specifically targeted visitors, around 480 new subscribers and 25 new customers. Well worth the investment, right?

The key to paid advertising is knowing your numbers, which equates to determining how much both customer and subscriber are worth to you. This data will ultimately help you decide the advertising sources that will bring in profit. Consequently, the higher your visitor value, the more advertising opportunities become available to you.

This is where ezine advertising come in, which is one of the best paid advertising sources you can find online that provides precision-targeted traffic, since you are tapping into a specifically targeted resource of readers. Ezine subscribers express interest in particular subjects and ask to hear more about them.

 There are different kinds of Ezine ads to choose from, with each having its own specific function. Let’s go through them.

  • Solo Ad – This is an email sent to every person on the mailing list that contains your offer. It is a powerful method since it allows you complete control over the process. You decide what to put on the subject line, create the email body and everything else in the process. This gives you the influence on the people who are open and respond to your message. And since a solo ad is totally dedicated to your message, you get a much higher response, which makes it the most effective type of Ezine ad.
  • Sponsor Ad – This is found within the ezine at the top, middle or bottom along with the main content, and is considered as the second-highest most effective ad. A top sponsor ad takes the very top space of the newsletter, which is basically the very top of the email. Generally, top sponsor ads perform better than middle sponsor ads and bottom sponsor ads.
  • Classified Ads – Similar to the ones found in the newspaper, classified ads are, in most cases, made up of three to five lines of text, which comprise a headline, ad body and a call to action that includes a link to your website. These ads are inexpensive, but garner much less responses from readers. Given a choice, I’d prefer using solo ads and sponsored ads since they are generally more effective.

Aside from all this cool stuff, you can also get thousands of dollars worth of free advertising. All you have to do is submit exclusive articles to ezine that’s within your market. This technique requires a little more work, but is highly effective, and it allows your article to be in front of thousands of readers for free.

 To find potential ezines to publish your articles, one of the best sources is found here: http://directoryofezines.com/

This directory allows you to search for thousands of different ezines, which can be sorted by category, number of subscribers and more. You also have the option to filter your ezine searches according to your preferred category that accepts article submissions.

This powerful technique can get you all the exposure and traffic you need just by submitting an article, as opposed of being charged hundreds of dollars to advertise on an ezine. These website can help you find related ezines to your business:

http://new-list.com/

 http://ezine-dir.com/

http://ezinelocater.com/

However, it should be noted that the Directory of Ezines is much more effective since you’ll be able to search directories based on category, number of subscribers, ad types and so on, so you could directly target the market you are in. This even allows you to search newsletters that accept articles to publish, making it very powerful and highly effective.

Ezine advertising can instantly put your message in front of thousands of specifically targeted subscribers. Having a short list of subscribers or even having none at all is irrelevant, since advertising on ezines automatically taps into other people’s list, which can number in tens of thousands. You should be aware that there is a huge number of ezines online that allow marketers to publish ads on their newsletters, instantly accessing their base of subscribers for a couple of hundred dollars. Personally, that’s a very sweet deal.

However, there is a drawback. If you decide to advertise with a newsletter that’s nonresponsive, you could lose your money. And if your squeeze page and offer doesn’t convert, you will definitely lose money. The risk is there, but there is a fantastic upside as well. A responsive newsletter with a good ad that converts could easily multiply your investment up to tenfold, or even more. Like with all businesses, there is always a risk, but the rewards can make it worth taking. And once you master this technique, you can use it regularly to drive massive traffic to your website. Furthermore, if you find the best newsletters to place your ads, you can automate your traffic systems and lead generation for easier marketing.

To further enhance this technique, you can make deals with newsletter owners where you can get discounts, but pay in advance to advertise for six months on their newsletters. This creates a system that automates your traffic generation that will continue to work for you and give you a consistent lead flow.

Now that we know ezine advertising can be a huge source of traffic that can be converted to income, let’s go through the motions of the process on how to successfully advertise on ezines. The first step is to find the best newsletter to place your ad in. We’ve mentioned that the most efficient way to do this is by signing up on the Directory of Ezines website, where you can search for the best ezines to place your ad fit for your market. However, you can also find other options by searching on Google and typing in your <your keyword> + <newsletter>. So if you’re into stock trading, type in “stock trading newsletter.”

Normally, you’ll find a link on the website that says “Advertising,” which is an indication that they allow it on their newsletter. But keep in mind that an absence of this link is not necessarily a deal-breaker, since you can still work out a deal with the publisher once you contact him directly. The key here is to find high-quality newsletters with a large subscriber base, which should number in the tens of thousands if you want the best results.

Now that you got that locked in, what you need to know is those newsletters you must stay far away from. If you find a website that says something like, “Send your message out to 600,000 subscribers for only $25,” this is definitely a red flag. You must look for high-quality, professional-looking and established websites that have a large number of subscribers.

Once you’ve found ezines that you think are good, you need to sign up by creating a Gmail account. By subscribing, you’ll determine the quality of the ezines being published and this can help you select the best possible option to place your ads. After you’ve selected one subscribed, you need to check on a few things:

  • How often they send out emails – Emails should be sent out on a frequent basis. If they do it once a month, it’s not very active, thus not favorable to your marketing plan.
  • Quality of the newsletter – Newsletters should provide valuable content. You must also check the density of their ads. Too much of it is not a good sign.

Going through the process will help you weed out the bad ones and identify the best potential newsletters to place your ads. When you contact the owner, mention something specific about their ezine by pointing out a particular article that you enjoyed reading. This builds a rapport with the owner.

If they offer an ezine advertising service, ask for their rates and confirm if it’s the same as those published on their website. If they don’t have this service, inquire if they accept third-party ads. What you should do next is ask them to check out your ad or email if their subscribers would respond well to it. This also builds the kind of rapport that will help you know what the publisher knows best about his subscribers. They’ll be able to tell you if your ad is fit for their newsletter and gather the needed response by giving insightful advice. Once your ad is in place, it’s time to track the results of your ad.

Tracking is important to determine which traffic sources convert and which do not. This tool will help you know how many people click on your ad link, how many people subscribe and how many actually pay for your product or service. You can use any traffic software to do this.

For high-converting solo ads, you must have total control over the email copy, deciding on what to place on the subject line, the body, everything. You have two options to do this: going for a long email or a short one. But to get a higher rate of response, traffic and conversion, a shorter ad or email is ideal, with getting people to click on your link as your goal, so it is suggested that you send them to your squeeze page. This goes the same if you’re paying for traffic. To maximize the volume of traffic your getting, shorter emails get the most amount.

The main goal is to get people to your website and let your website do the rest of the work. If you’re getting a one percent profit from what you paid for your ad, you can opt to put the process on autopilot. You can do this by going back to the newsletter publisher and setting up a deal that can let you advertise on a continual basis, like once in every six months. This is a great deal since the publisher will have a guaranteed income for the next six months. Paying in advance is ideal to give you an opportunity to work out a discount. When done the right way, you can build your business entirely from ezine advertising. Everybody wins.