MKLINK Internet Marketing Tips

Hi Dad.

Just spent an hour on the phone with Virgin, being bounced from pillar to post at Virgin Media.

A few things may amuse you :

They finally found my account!!!!

I was told numerous times before - having given my address that I wasn’t the account-holder my wife was,
they finally agreed that actually there is in fact an account held by me as well.

Given that this is the first time in months that they’ve even found my details, I was actually quite
pleased. All the other calls ended up in madness, from which I am still recovering.

Latterly, I was told to write to head office - at a different address to that of last time(Matrix Court)

When I told them of my dismay - having already waited 2 weeks for my last letter had to be replied to,
they put me through to another department, to start explaining all over again.

They accepted that the service was withdrawn last year but that they had continued billing me since
September when I asked the account to be shut down.

Apparently, it was my fault.

Having rung them several times about unauthorised payments, written to them without reply and spending half a day last year arranging

for something called a MAC address to be transferred to the other provider didn’t count as asking for the account
to be stopped. Despite the fact that their records showed that the account was stopped in September last year.

Having explained my situatio, they have agreed to re-imburse 6 months x £18 which is the maximum they are permitted
and will be posting me a cheque. The remainder, I have to write to at yet another different address, namely :

VIRGIN MEDIA

PO BOX 238

WYTHENSHAWE

MANCHESTER

M22 0WJ

I asked what my account number for reference in the letter was but unfortunately couldn’t give me my account number due to
data-protection. Despite explaining patiently that it was my account and that they were speaking to me on the phone number that
they have on file and that she had undergone security checks to ascertain that I am in fact me, the polite lady still wouldn’t divulge

my own account number.

Instead, she took me to a website to login - provided me with a username and password and enabled me to get my account number
via their online billing section. Why she couldn’t then have simply told me given that she gave me far more sensitive information
viz password and username I don’t know!!!

Should I BOTHER writing to the Ba*****s for the sake of £30 ish?

I need a lie down.

mk

I’m not really much of a football fanatic but I did follow the England team and saw them losing on Sunday : 4-1 to Germany.

There are lots of arguments and theories about it but one fact is that we didn’t have a great defence.

But WHAT IF we had 50 players whilst Germany just had 11???

Of course that’s against the rules. But Your web marketing isn’t restricted by these rules. And yet MOST PEOPLE just have 1 website.

Insane!

This leaves you very exposed to losing your search engine rankings and if nothing else you’re never going to maximise your visitor traffic this way or ring-fence your competition.

What if you had 10 websites? Or 20? Or 100?

Now the web has it’s own “rules” and there’s stuff you should know so you don’t get penalised for spamming.

Tomorrow(Wednesday 30th June 11am) I’m running a complementary webinar about how to use multiple sites to effecitvely multiply your web business and beat your competition.

So if you HAVEN’T done so already,
Reserve your spot now at:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/126018105

See you there!

Mike Knight

p.s. If your PC doesn’t have sound enabled, you can dial in as usual.

I’ll be running a weminar next Wednesday about Microsites and how you can use them to uotperform, outsell and outmanoeuvre your competitors. Register now at : https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/126018105

See you there!

mk

The Introduction of Google ‘Caffeine’

What?: Google Caffeine is the name for Google’s new web indexing system which is now in operation.

Why?: The content of the Web is growing in size, variety, and complexity, and Google perceives higher expectations among its users relating to being able to find the latest content, and getting their own contributions published sooner. ‘Caffeine’ has therefore been introduced so that updated, new content can be indexed and shown faster. It is estimated by Google to show 50% ‘fresher’ results than before Caffeine was introduced, and that a larger collection of content can be displayed (in search engine results). Links to new, relevant content e.g. web pages, blog or forum posts, can be found sooner after their publication.

How?: Google indexes web pages differently than before. The previous batch / layered system of indexing meant that there were layers to Google’s index which were updated at different rates. In order to update one of the layers the whole Web would have to be analyzed, which caused a delay between when pages were found by Google, and when they were delivered / displayed in search engine results.

The new ‘Caffeine’ system analyzes the Web in small chunks, and updates the index system globally on a continuous basis, speeding up the time it takes for new content to be displayed in search engine results (if it is relevant to the search query).

A Point to Remember About This Change

It doesn’t affect your web page rankings, or the current guidelines for getting your pages found i.e. Google hasn’t changed its algorithms, it has changed the way it finds and delivers content to Google users in the search engine results.

Want help?

Go to http://www.mklink.com/getstarted/ now…!

mk

Get More tips at http://www.mklink.com/getstarted

Website Feedback Widgets
We all have websites that tell the whole world how good we are.

But do we LISTEN to our prospects & clients?

No! Mostly, we’re too busy SELLING. Or trying to.

As I keep harping on, most people have a website with a terrible conversion rate because their website simply lists what they do (rather than giving the information that clients want) and the only call to action is usually - “call us” or “email us”.

But the challenge with that is that you’ll only EVER get people contacting you
that are ready to either buy online or want a sales pitch.

Typically 1% or 2% max.

That leaves 98% of the potential money on the table.

Everyone else that may be interested in you or your services and products simply won’t contact you until they’re ready - and by that time they’re probably not on your website anymore because it might be months down the line.

(Did I ever mention to you the 8 second rule states that you have 8 seconds or less to engage your visitor? It’s a very good yard stick to work to.)

I call it a “Pay Up” or “Pi** Off” type marketing.It’s rubbish.

It leaves no third option.
Would you walk into a pub, see someone you fancy and ask to marry them?

Of course not - you’d get to know them and find out what they like
and what they want. It requires LISTENING.

And yet I could - modesty aside - walk into a pub, ask 5,000 people to marry me and someone would say “Yes”. Now I’m not good looking, charming or even a ladies man, but there will be a percentage of the population that are :

Depressed.
Lonely.
Drunk.
Think it’s a laugh.
Bigamists.
Mentally disturbed.
Whatever!

The fact of the matter is that it’s a numbers game but it’s not efficient and yet THIS IS WHAT EVERONE DOES WITH THEIR INTERNET MARKETING ALL THE TIME!!!

Marketing is communication.

Communication is listening.

So Turn your Website into a “Listening Post”.

When someone leaves your site - you’ll NEVER know what they would have
wanted. Unlike like a bricks ‘n mortar shop, when you could ask them! But now we can ask online as well, with some clever software that adds a ‘widget’ to your website and asks people for feedback.

Exit surveys - slightly more intrusive - can achieve this as well.

Essentially you can turn your website and emails into a “listening post”.

There are various companies that offer this service - e.g. Kampyle and
can charge from £30 to £300 per month(ish).

(I built my own basic one - it’s on my homepage. Feel free to ask for details. Nevertheless, it still tracks what people are saying, as well as recording where they came from, which keyphrase they used etc - handy for some quick feedback analytics)

Anyone who uses Ebay knows the value of having a decent feedback score so one of the uses of these widgets - as well as getting a useful insight into what their visitors are thinking, is the ability to build up feedback and also have that feedback displayed on their websites - thus adding social proof i.e. credibility.

The upshot of all this? MKLINK can help you ‘Listen’ better…

Find out what we can do for you today at http://www.mklink.com/getstarted

Speak soon,
Mike Knight - MKLINK.

I was doing some research the other day and looking for a landing page of Chris Cardell because I’ve been on his courses in the past and wanted to check something he might be doing so I could learn from it.

His PPC campaign must have stopped running for a bit because I couldn’t find it. So I typed Chris Cardell straight into Google.

Then Chris Cardell Scam came up as a possible match - so out of curiosity I clicked on it and came across this link http://brianclegg.blogspot.com/2009/12/clever-advertising-or-fraud-you-decide.html

I receive loads of marketing stuff from Chris and the newspaper cutting I thought was excellent. I’ve been trying to find a printer for ages that can do stuff like that.

Yes, if you look very closely you can tell it’s mass produced but then that’s great. Show’s he knows what he’s doing.

What I don’t understand is why people that don’t know what they are doing and have never tried any of his stuff decide that it’s a good idea to slag him off. In fact it annoys me because I teach some of his principles to my clients and with good effect.

Some people are really upset that he’s sent them a newspaper clipping with a post-it note. Get a LIFE!

Chris has had a very positive impact on my career and given that I’ve generated over  £40 million of additional revenue for my clients, I’d say that’s a result.

Now for anyone reading this thinking I have some affiliation with Chris, I don’t. I’ve been on several of his courses and have stopped memberships to others as is my want. I don’t think he even likes me particularly as I contacted some Cardell members in a private members’ forum with  a view to getting some co-operation and possibly business and guess I overstepped the mark a bit.

In the big scheme of things I don’t think he cares too much because he focuses on what works and doesn’t get hung up on what doesn’t and I hugely respect that as I have problems separating the two and take failures and criticism too much to heart.

Anyway, that’s it. Chris’s stuff is good and I’m very grateful for what I’ve learned. Yes, you can learn some of his stuff elsewhere and that’s what I choose do these days but most people - like myself - were unaware of any of this stuff until they’ve been educated.

I recently decided to become qualified as a chartered accountant to demonstrate I’m not a total business moron and you could argue I could have learned it all on my own. But I can assure you having a teacher makes life much easier and business is all about efficiency. People who don’t get that are whingers with no results to back them up.

If you’ve not tried his stuff - don’t slag him off. If you haven’t tried his methods - don’t slag him off. If you don’t know what works and what doesn’t - don’t slag him off. In a nutshell - if you don’t know what you’re talking about (and most people I see slagging him off don’t have a clue), don’t slag him off!

Focus on your OWN game of golf & find out what WORKS.

Mike Knight

I appreciate that this next piece of internet marketing
advice won’t be for everyone.

But it has certainly helped me get where I am and
lots of other online personalities as well.

One of the biggest challenges I face is my personal
time - Or lack of it. Same with you in your business
probably.

So I have to be very efficient with my time.

One of the most efficient ways to communicate with
lots of people - at the same time - is via webinar.

Teleseminar  = Seminar  via the phone.
Webinar  = (Tele)seminar via the Web.

If you’ve not been on one before then essentially
it’s a teleseminar which people can access online
and therefore see other media  i.e. images or
powerpoint presentations - that kind of thing.

People can still phone-in to a webinar as well if
they’re on the move.

Now, the neat thing about webinars is that you can
have hundreds of people on them - and it doesn’t
cost a penny - apart from the few dollars a month
license fee.

No travelling, no fuel, no hotel rooms, no hiring
expensive conference facilities, no hassles!

And - with the savings - you can reward prospects,
clients, employees or suppliers for turning up -
or simply save your money.

So let’s say that you own an IT company.

You can run weekly training classes - by webinar
and very cheaply and efficiently ensure your clients
are using your software/hardware properly and to
their best advantage.

Or you could train up a team of sales reps across
the country for your large car dealership franchise.

It’ simple!

Simply email your list what the webinar is about and
how it will benefit them.

For a Law firm - it might be about changes in UK Law
which affects landlords or businesses etc.

For an accountancy practice - it could be details
about new tax updates.

For an exclusive club like university alumni it
could be the year’s speaker engagement.

participants register for the webinar which starts at a
particular time/date. Emails are automatically sent before
the webinar to remind people about access codes and
the URL to visit at the right time.

Then, when you’re presenting the webinar - with 2 to
2000 people on it, you can ask questions, mute people,
unmute people, take polls, show diagrams - play music
- whatever is appropriate for your business!

And finally, you can record the whole thing so that
people that missed it can watch it later or listen
to it as a podcast.

How powerful is that?

Once again, it’s another things that very low cost, easy
to use and hugely undervalued by businesses meaning there’s
opportunities abounding because most people are missing
a trick…

If you’d like some good, straight help with your web marketing
then the best place to start is to take a risk free trial of our
services today at http://www.mklink.com/getstarted/

Speak soon,
Mike Knight - MKLINK.

http://www.vouchercodes.co.uk/

But a wicked site that could save my members’s money…

mk

Another useful site :

http://mashable.com

Get More tips at http://www.mklink.com/getstarted

You Can find out how well your competitors are doing - on EBay!

In fairness, it’s most useful to people that sell stuff online - because
you can literally see how well your competitors are selling.

But…as a business, you BUY stuff don’t you?

Well, if you can see that people selling the stuff you either want to
buy or invest in are struggling then you can expect better prices and service.

After all - it’s simple research.

How do you do it?
Simple - you checkout the lifetime feedback ratings. Even if you don’t
have a specific competitor you wish to check out, you can simply search for
the products that you are looking for and see who the key players are.

The trick is to make sure that you can see the amount of feedback being given about specific product types over a long period.

If you can see that the rate of feedback has dropped then - all things being equal, the ebay seller is simply selling LESS of that item over time.

You can of course measure this against other sellers and see if there is a pattern.

It’s a bit like looking at the growth-rings in a sawn off log - you can see the tree’s rapid growth years and years of slow growth.

Naturally, there are some items that are seasonal and need to be factored in (common sense)
but if you are selling widgets and feel as though you have been struggling recently - or indeed booming then this is a quick and dirty way to see how everyone else is getting on.

The one good thing about Ebay of course is that it’s great for makret research, price testing, consumer feedback etc - simply because it has the sheer volume of traffic.

Far too many people I speak with feel Ebay is for selling junk or that it’s ‘beneath’ them somehow. It’s a big mistake I feel as you can use Ebay a lot to develop your business
- without ever buying or selling anything necessarily.

Would you like more marketing tips and some real, practical help from a company that’s been doing this since 1998 and generated over £40 Million on behalf of it’s clients?

Register today at http://www.mklink.com/getstarted

‘Till next time,

Mike Knight - MKLINK