I had an idea.

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you probably know my kiddo is a horse NUT.  The last 4 years I’ve mostly bought horse stuff. She spends hours making up stories for her horses, and building them houses/beds out of whatever she can find. I thought this year it would be nice to get her a doll house. (and if her horses moved in, well… that’s ok too)

Since I’ve been buying horse stuff, and not so much doll stuff I didn’t really know what was good, or even what was out there.

I went to Amazon and searched for dollhouse.

I wanted to find out what kind of dollhouses are out there, just feeling around, gathering information to help me make a decision.

I had to make decisions.

Plastic vs. Wood?

Big vs. Small?

These are the types of decisions I’m making at this stage, just trying to figure out what’s going to work best in our home, in her room.

So I finally got closer to a decision. I thought I’d go with the Fisher Price Loving Family Grand Dollhouse.

I had to choose which one I wanted.

There are a few different options ~ depending on what you want to spend, and what you want included in your Loving Family  dollhouse.

So I went to Amazon and searched for Fisher Price Loving Family Dollhouse.

This brought me all the choices I had within that exact product.

I’ve got a couple choices:

Now I have to decide whether I want to have all the “stuff” included or if I just want the dollhouse now.

You see… I don’t have my credit card out yet. I am not ready to buy yet. I’m still looking, searching for information. While at this level I might buy, but I had to sit it out and think about it a little bit more lol.

Now I’m ready to buy.

The next time I went to Amazon I was ready to buy. It was nearing Christmas (in fact, it was last Saturday), and I was ready to order the dollhouse.

I put Fisher Price Loving Family Dollhouse Superset in the search box at Amazon. I knew exactly what I wanted. I’d finished doing my research. I was ready to buy. I put in the search box exactly what I wanted. I don’t want a bunch of options, in fact, the fewer things that come up in that search the better for me right now. I just want the one thing. I want that specific dollhouse, so I can hit add to cart and be done.

Let’s Review:

Step 1: Information

In the information gathering step I wanted to see everything available to me so I searched a very broad word: dollhouses. I was given many different options and types of dollhouses to begin narrowing my search.

Step 2:  Some choices made and I’ve identified the dollhouse I want

I’ve decided I want the Fisher Price Loving Family Dollhouse. Now I just need to figure out which option I want. To do this I put in a more specific ~ brand related keyword. This gives me all the options available for the specific dollhouse I’m looking for.

Step 3: Final choice is made

I finally decided I wanted the super  set. I wanted all the furniture and the extras already there so she could just sit down and play with it.  With my decision made I’m ready to buy. I put a very specific keyword in the search box so I will get exactly what I’m looking for: Fisher Price Loving Family Dollhouse Super Set.

That’s how the buying cycle works ~ people start with an idea, they do searches to refine their decisions and key in on exactly what they want. YOU as a marketer want to target the keywords that people are looking for at the end of the cycle. You want your page to be the one that comes up when they search Fisher Price Loving Family Dollhouse Super Set, because that’s when you’re going to make a sale. When they have card in hand and are ready to hit the “add to cart” button.

I hope this helps clarify the buying cycle and helps you understand why it’s easier to make sales when you’re targeting specific products.

This is where the story should end. But it didn’t.

This is where the post should end I suppose, however, the story doesn’t end there. When I finally got ready to buy the super set dollhouse they had jacked the price up over 50 dollars and I was not paying that for a little tiny dollhouse. The process pretty much began again, except I started looking at bigger dollhouses ~ ones that Barbie would fit in, since she actually asked Santa for a Barbie (you know the hair one, with the vanity and hair dryer ~ oh heaven help me). Anyway… I finally decided on and purchased one of the larger dollhouses ~ but the process was the same. In fact, I went back to searching dollhouse once I saw the price was so jacked up ~ I decided if I’m going to pay THAT much, then I’m getting a big dollhouse for the money.  From the dollhouse keyword I narrowed down my options until I came to the KidKraft Savannah Dollhouse ~ and hit add to cart.

Now, you’d think that’s where the story would end, however it doesn’t. Yeah, this is my life we’re talking about here. Last night I got an email saying the Savannah is out of stock ~ even though they took my money for it. They offered to sell me a “more expensive” model they had in stock. I didn’t really like that model so I went searching all over the web last night trying to find the one I wanted. It seems everyone in the world is out of stock of this dollhouse ~ it’s like the 2010 Cabbage Patch Doll.

I have to say I had worked myself up pretty good about this through the night, and I was kind of ready for a fight. Especially since yesterday I checked Amazon and they were still saying the Savannah was available and had jacked the price up 80 dollars more than what I’d spent on Saturday for it. (yeah, that’s crazy).

I checked all around trying to find one I could buy somewhere else, to no avail. I looked at another model that was bigger and more expensive and it was sold out as well. So finally I went and looked at the one they were offering me from my daughter’s eyes, and I think she’ll love it. It’s a little garrish for my taste, but it’s not for me, it’s for her.

Excellent customer service turned my experience around

I got on the phone with customer service, still pretty unhappy about the whole mess. The customer service rep was VERY polite. Extremely helpful, and absolutely apologetic.  The wonderful customer service rep repaired a lot of damage. I was ready to leave feedack, and reviews on Amazon… until I got on the phone with that customer service guy.

So one last marketing lesson in this post.

Customer service MATTERS. I was mad. I was ready to go out there and tell people on Amazon, twitter and facebook exactly what they had done, and how mad I was.

Good customer service stopped that from happening. Now I will wait until Hanna’s dollhouse gets here. We’ll put it together, and see how she loves it, and then I’ll write a review ~ about the product ~ not about the company that I felt screwed me.

That’s a huge difference ~ and something you should keep in the forefront of your mind during every interaction with your customers.

OK. So there you have it. A walk through of the buying cycle and a quick lesson on the benefits of awesome customer service.

If you’ve got questions feel free to leave them in the comments section and I’ll do my best to answer them.

No related posts.

New changes to this site will be coming in July ~ unless I get too antsy and just can’t wait that long ~ which is definitely possible.

Here are some of the new changes to expect:

1. New blog design (woo hoo ~ I’m super excited about this one!)

2. New podcast

3. More videos ~ both screencast, and more personal videos from me

4. A more clear focus for content ~ don’t worry I’ll always be here to help make internet marketing simple enough for everyone to take action.

In fact, that’s what the biggest change is going to be ~ clarity about that being what I’m good at and really ramping THAT up. So expect even MORE of that!

One new change that has already happened but I haven’t really mentioned is I’ve created a new blog exclusively  about Squidoo. I love Squidoo and I have a LOT of readers that are working on Squidoo. As this blog moved onto other strategies for internet marketing the Squidoo questions, and news felt out of place.

So I gave them their own home where we can talk and learn all about Squidoo all the time! yay!

Squidoo Christmas Cash Blog ~ come on over and join us if you’re working on lenses ~ there’s not much content over there yet, but I’m excited to bring over some of the tutorials from here as well as write new posts inspired by YOUR questions. So ask away!

With that being said…

I need a favor.

I really really want to focus on creating content, be it blog posts, podcasts, videos, free reports that are exactly what YOU need and want.

I’ve created a quick 3 question survey and I would really appreciate it if you could fill it out. It’s the best way for me to keep giving you the content you need and want. There’s also a comment section after the questions if you want to add something of your own.

Fill out the survey here

I will be giving away 1 30 minute brainstorming session to someone who fills in all 3 questions on the survey.  This time I remembered to ask for an email address so I can get in touch with you if you win.  (See I learn from mistakes too)

Speaking of  my coaching   services. That is something that will be changing in July as well. Starting July 1st there will be a fairly substantial increase in my rates for coaching.  I love being the “cheapest” person out there, but it isn’t the greatest way to run a business. Don’t worry ~ I’ll probably still be the cheapest person out there, but the prices will increase.

If you’ve been on the fence about getting some coaching, this month might be a good time to do it before the rates go up.

You can check out my coaching services here:

Blog Coaching

Squidoo Coaching

I look forward to reading your replies to the survey ~ and hopefully working with you this month.If you have any ideas or thoughts about what you’d like to see show up here on this site please feel free to email me, can’t guarantee I’ll use them… but I’d love to hear!

I’d also really LOVE to hear what kind of clarity you’ve experienced in regards to your business, and what, if any, changes it’s brought about for you!

Let’s talk about it!

Keep taking action.

No related posts.

It’s a huge distinction, and when you get there it can be amazing! I rarely if ever buy products just because of the sales letter/sales process. I generally buy products now that I need to work the internet marketing strategy that I’m working, make it easier/make it quicker. Don’t get me wrong, I still go through sales letters, and click their links and follow their sales funnel just to see how they’re doing it, and if it would have worked on me.

There comes a point in time when you mind switches from consumer to marketer. When that happens you might as well forget about ever seeing anything through your consumer glasses ever again. TV is not the same, a trip to the grocery store is never the same, and an online sales page will never look the same to you again.

While this can be very annoying to family members, it’s when you’re business will really start to take off. You’ll begin to notice everything around you. You’ll start to think about why they did that that way, why did they put that there, why did they say that, why did they use THAT font! Because believe me, in the real brick and mortar world, nothing is done without a purpose and usually a lot of money invested in testing. While all this wondering is great, it will seep into just about every area of your business as well. You’ll start remembering things you’ve seen. You’ll start implementing sales funnels that had you to the point of clicking the buy now button. You will become an internet marketer ~ not just someone trying to make money online.

One of my favorite shows is “Shark Tank”. It started last season and in case you don’t know, these small business people come in front of these “sharks”. The sharks are millionaires who have money to invest in small business, and will look at your proposal and may or may not invest in you and your business. My poor husband hates to watch this show with me. At some point in the show I am invariably yelling at the TV.

Last week a guy came on. He had a pretty cool idea about a netflix type thing with ink cartridges for your computer. I HATE running out of printer ink so I was all about it. His entire business model was selling online. The whole process was automated through his website. VERY COOL for me! He goes on and on with his presentation. He didn’t have the numbers they were looking for, and we could all tell the sharks were going to say no. I’m thinking ~ ok, they’re going to say no, at least take advantage of the fact you have all THIS publicity and tell me the name of your DAMN WEBSITE!!

He didn’t. Well, let’s just say my rant went on for a while. How on earth can someone get on national TV to talk about their online store and not give the DAMN ADDRESS??? Before you say he probably couldn’t there have been plenty of other people who have given their web address on the show ~ and of course when you go to the site it has crashed from the load (but that’s a whole other rant lol).

We did end up finding the site, but hello I’m an internet marketer and I know how to find things. Why would you waste that opportunity for your business?

Anyway… this is what I mean ~ everything you watch and see becomes colored by your marketer glasses. The takeaway for me and my business was no matter where you are always take advantage of what is available to grow your business.

There will come a day when you can walk through a “perfect sales funnel” (which simply means the path a marketer takes you on to walk you to the sale), and instead of looking at it from the viewpoint of whether or not I’m going to buy this you are looking from the viewpoint of  OMG this would totally work on me. Then you write down the steps and you figure out how you can put it into action in your own business.

This happened to me last night.

I was on twitter, and saw this tweet.

TWITTER: No One Cares? | Alex Mandossian’s Blog http://bit.ly/57ZlEW

It was actually a retweet someone had done from the tweetmeme button at Alex’s blog. Here’s where the process starts.

1. Alex Mandossian is a trusted name. I like his stuff and wanted to see what he had to say about twitter. I clicked the link

(right there the funnel has begun, and I’ve taken the action he desired me to take ~ I clicked through to his blog)

Turns out it’s a guest post by Jeff Herring (the article marketing guy) It’s a short post. It appears the purpose is to get me to click the link in the article. I didn’t click the link (right away).  I read the article and the comments and everyone was talking about doing twitter by talking about LIFE. I kept thinking, what they heck? That’s not gonna work. So he created curiosity, not only in the post, but in the comments and I went back and clicked the link.

2. Click the link to the next step in the funnel ~ which happens to be an EZA article.

This is so smart of him because Jeff Herring is THE article marketing guy ~ that’s what he teaches, and what he does. How to use EZA to drive traffic and make money.

The article was really good and as I suspected there was more to life than I thought!! It made a lot of sense and was done in a way that made it memorable and easily implemented.  I read the whole article all the way to the resource box because it was that interesting.

3. Resource box. This is where you’re choosing what you want people to do ~ send them to a sales page, get them to your site, get them on your list. Jeff chose getting them on his list (which is always smart) Here’s his resource box.

To learn more about how to leverage Social Marketing tools for waves of traffic and more, get your FREE Instant Access to our Social Marketing Video Training Series when you visit http://SocialMarketingBlueprint.com/7laws.

Look at that ~ more FREE content, deeper learning, and in another format. This guy’s a genius! Well needless to say I moved to step 4.

4. Clicked through to the opt in page. Do I sign up or not?

Here’s the real conversion rate we’re looking for. Will people do what you want them to do at this point? Will they pull out their wallets or their email addresses?

Well with all the great content he’s already given me ~ although it was cursory so I had an idea of how it works, but I don’t have all the details ~ heck yeah I’m going to fill in the blanks!

Now I’m on yet another of Jeff Herring’s list.  I immediately got my pdf download, I also had immediate access to the 4 videos he promised me, it all worked like a chanp. Now Jeff is free to contact me at will because my name is now a double opt in on his list.

I have to say it was getting really late, and I was enjoying the process more than I wanted to read more information last night, but I did bookmark  the videos (which is my least favorite way to get info) and I put reading the pdf and watching the videos on my calendar for today.

I highly recommend you click the link from that tweet and then walk through the process. Try to keep your eyes in marketing mode instead of consumer mode. It doesn’t matter if you sign up for the videos or not ~ if you’d like more info about how to use twitter effectively I’m sure they will be of great use, if not, then don’t. We’re looking at this from a marketing perspective, not a consumer perspective. When you’ve gone through the process come back and let’s talk about it.

I’d love to hear from you on a few things.

1. Did this sales process work on you? Why/why not?

2. If you hadn’t had your marketer’s glasses on would you have even seen it as a sales process?

3. Where did the process “break down” if it did for you.

4. What could you develop from this process that you could implement in your own business?

5. Anything else you want to comment on?

Looking forward to the conversation!!

No related posts.

I decided to put together a list of keywords for some of the better niches I found from the list.

I will only be selling 20 of each list. That way it won’t get too saturated if everyone uses the lists.  This also lets me keep the price very low. I will continue to add lists to this page as I get them done.

Ride on Toys: 

• This is the first of the lists I will be offering. It has 169 related and relevant buying keywords.

• The list also includes the SOC ~ or level of competition. The keywords rank from 0 to 125 which is in the yellow zone but will be fine toward the end. There are only 3 yellow keywords ~ the rest have an SOC of 45 or less.

• The global search volume is also included for each keyword.

• The ad cost is also included. This is the amount an advertiser would pay to publish an ad on this keyword. You can usually count on your money per click being a little less than half that number.

The list is in CSV format ~ which means you will need excel or some sort of spreadsheet program to open it.  You can probably use open office or google docs to open if you need to. I can not provide support for opening these files. When I went to open the file it automatically opened with excel.

• I have also included a list of general keywords that have domains available. I’ve listed the domain type that are available for each keyword as well as the search volume for each. I have also provided a list of possible words to use to create a unique domain name using the keywords.

So what’s it gonna cost you?

$10.

Once you pay you will receive an email with the download link in it. The download link will say click here to download.  You will probably see a box that asks if you want to open or save the list ~ go ahead and save it somewhere on your computer where you’ll be able to find it. Once you’ve saved it to your computer you will need a program to open zip files ~ win zip is a good one if you don’t have one already. You have to open the zip file and then you can open the CSV file (the keyword list).

There are only 20 3 copies available so when they are gone they are gone.

A new keyword list is available!

Hand Tools

This keyword list includes:

• 113 targeted, relevant,  buying keywords
  
• SOC (level of competition) All keywords are well within the green range in Micro Niche Finder, with the highest SOC being a 50, and the lowest being 0.
• Global search volume ~ in exact match (ranging from over 8000 monthly to around 100 monthly searches. Over 1/2 the keywords have over 500 monthly search volume)
• Ad cost for adsense is shown
• Some domain names available and some ideas for creating domain names yourself.

The list is provided in CSV format. You will need some sort of spreadsheet software to open the document. You can get open office if you don’t have excel and it should work.

When you purchase your list you will receive an email and it will have your download link in the email. Simply right click and save it someplace on your computer where you can find it again. You will also need an unzipping software as the whole bundle is zipped. You can use winzip if you do not already have a program for unzipping.

Price: $10

Again I’m only selling 20 copies of this list and then I will pull it. If you want one, grab one while they’re still available. I’ve had a lot of interest in topics more “manly” hopefully this will work well. I will continue putting these lists together and adding them as I get them done.

No related posts.

photo credit: urbanwoodswalker

I LOVE Walmart. It’s a niche marketers dream. I had to pick up a few things and I thought I would make a list of as many niche ideas as I could find along the way. (mind you I didn’t go through the whole store ~ these were just the ideas that came up on my way to get what I needed ~ there’s a million more if you just open your mind.

These are just ideas ~ brainstorming, a place to start. Is there viable niches in any of these ideas? Hell I don’t know. Maybe.  Do some digging and find out. Then let me know how you did.

1. Decorative crosses
2. women’s sweaters
3. books
4. children’s books
5. christmas books
6. winter coats
7. massagers
8. christmas gifts
9. kids toys
10. ride on toys
11. christmas decorations
12. yard decorations
13. angels
14. pots and pans
15. small appliances
16. wine
17. car parts
18. scales
19. kids crafts
20. paint/craft brushes
21. file cabinets
22. safes
23. twilight
24. faucets
25. gift wrapping
26. showerheads
27. candles
28. blankets
29. storage
30. glassware
31. quilts
32. bathroom accessories
33. shower curtains
34. pot holders
35. cutlery
36. knives
37. placemats
38. plates
39. hair care
40. picture frames
41. kitchen gadgets
42. cannisters
43. bakeware
44. sink accessories
45. food storage
46. closet storage
47. plastic storage
48. hand tools
49. vacuums
50. kids bedding
51. painting supplies
52. tanning
53. welcome mats
54. fashion rugs
55. curtains
56. wicker baskets/baskets
57. mattresses
58. tables
59. luggage
60. office furniture
61. bunkbeds
62. lamps
63. tv stands
64. sleeping bags
65. athletic accessories
66. flags
67. wine glasses
68. coffee makers
69. flower pots
70. mobile electronics
71. floor heater
72. space heaters
73. camping accessories
74. tents
75. flashlights
76. strollers
77. high chairs
78. cribs
79. car seats
80. baby blankets
81. play yards
82. baby clothes
83. baby music
84. baby safety
85. baby travel
86. diaper bags
87. movies
88. kids movies
89. box sets (tv shows)
90. wii games
91. hawks
92. cotton
93. mailboxes
94. garden tables
95. horses toys/care/riding
96. cows
97. combine
98. grills
99. patio furniture
100. garden accessories
101. trees

If you’ve ever said I don’t know where to start ~ count this list a place to get started. Just pick ONE and start digging around ~ see what you come up with. Do a little  niche keyword research and see if it’s worth getting into.

No related posts.

photo credit: andy_carter

The only way you can get it wrong is by not getting started.

I want you to go back and reread the statement.  Go ahead~ I’ll wait.

This is so true. The only way you get it wrong is by not getting started, not moving forward, not publishing something.

With that said, there are some things you can do to make it go better, but remember this is a marathon, not a sprint. You can always course correct along the way, and one bad post, keyword, whatever doesn’t ruin the whole thing. So just take ACTION… TODAY.

Today we’re going to look at choosing keywords for a niche blog.

What is a niche blog?

When I talk about niche blog I’m talking about a relatively big site, maybe 50 to 100 posts. Each post will relate and be relevant to the overall topic of the blog.

The purpose of the blog:

Create specific keyword targeted posts to drive traffic to not only the blog overall, but to the specific keyword targeted page. From that page you can sell a product or get adsense clicks.

Where do I start?

Do you have a problem you deal with? Do you have a hobby you love? Do you have an activity you love to do?

My suggestion is to start digging there.I suggest this because it will be much easier writing content (and there’s a lot of content to be written) on a topic/subject you have some investment in. Whether it’s curing a pain you have, or telling people how to do a specific activity that you love to do, or overcoming some problem. All much easier when you have an interest.

If you don’t want to do that or you can’t think of anything my favorite thing to do is go to an affiliate network (commissionjunction.com, shareasale.com, linkshare.com) sign up and start looking around. You’ll find there are merchants (stores) that want you to promote their stuff. You will find a lot of these merchants are pretty specialized, and sell one niche of things or target one problem solving area. This is a fantastic way to get an idea to get the ball rolling. There’s no right/wrong way to do this ~ we’re just getting ideas here, we’re brainstorming what we can build our niche blog about. You have to have a place to start the treasure hunt for keywords right? Why not start with a topic/idea that you know has an affiliate program.

This is very similar to what we did at Amazon looking for ideas for Christmas cash lenses ~ only now we’re looking for a bunch of related keywords ~ and we want a whole niche of stuff to look in ~ thus looking at a whole store instead of one product.

So let’s look at an example:

I love to bike. (If you haven’t checked out my biking blog stop by. Road to Bike Across Kansas) (this is not a “niche blog” it’s more of an authority type site ~ just so you can see the difference)  Since I love biking I thought I’d look around and see if I could find any biking keywords that might make a good niche site.

I want to make sure I’m looking for buying keywords so let’s try putting something about bikes for sale in the keyword tool.  What I’m doing is looking for a niche from an idea.

My idea is selling some kind of bike. Now let’s see if I can find a real niche within that idea.

I had an idea (selling some kind of bike) and from this search I found a few possible niches.

vintage bikes
mountain bikes
road bikes
children’s bikes
beach bikes

All of these are possible niches I could do a whole niche site on. The next step is to see if they are viable or not ~ which simply means is there enough keywords out there to make a whole niche site around? Let’s see.

It seems the mountain bike niche will provide us with plenty of keywords.

*** An aside *** When I’m searching for keywords for niche sites I look for search volume above 300 (and this is really kind of an arbitrary number I made up for myself, but it has worked for me) ~ but realize you really can’t do this wrong. As long as you find some keywords that are related and relevant you can always add more/fix it later. If you find a keyword with no competition, but it only has 30 or 50 searches a month go ahead and put it on the list. For every keyword your site ranks for the more authority it will have and the easier it will be to rank for keywords that are more competitive than we would normally pick. For that matter if you find a keyword that has lots of searches but is a little higher than  you would like in the competition area go ahead and put that on the list too ~ as time goes by and your site gets bigger you’ll be able to rank for more competitive keywords. You can just put the tougher ones at the bottom of the list. ***

Now we just need to find out if the keywords that are showing up in the keyword tool  are going to be within the range of competition that will make them doable ~ when I say doable, I mean make it easy enough for us to rank in the search engines for them.

Let’s take a look.

In that video we’ve gone through and checked the level of competition for some of the keywords coming up in the adwords keyword tool. So for my mountain bike niche I checked hardtailed mountain bike, specialized mountain bike, Giant mountain bike ~ all of which were good when it came to competition.

I checked the competition by taking the PR of each of the 10 sites on the first page of google and adding them together. I’m looking for a number below 30. I want to do this for all the keywords I can find related to my topic. YES… it can be time consuming doing it by hand.

I also show at the end of the video how much easier all this is with Micro Niche Finder. You can check the level of competition right from the search page, save your keywords in a project folder and print the whole list out once it’s complete. VERY helpful tool to get and will make the process much faster and easier.

When I find a keyword that fits the competition level I go ahead and write it down.   I want to make a list of keywords that are directly related to my main niche idea.

For example: my niche is mountain bikes for sale. I want to stick with specific types of mountain bikes, and keywords that are specific to mountain BIKES. I don’t want to veer off into mountain bike parts, or mountain bike shoes, or mountain bike clothes ~ just mountain bikes. That’s the niche and I want to stick to it.

I may take a look at any of those other things and they may be viable niche sites on their own ~ but I’d have to do the necessary research to find out. I don’t want to dilute this niche site with keywords and information that is not directly related to mountain bikes for sale.

I hope this makes sense and I’d be happy to answer any questions you have, just ask them in the comment section.

You know your business only grows when you take action so I thought I’d add an action step to my posts to help you get moving.

Today’s Action Steps:
1. Brainstorm some possible niche ideas.
2. Look to see if your ideas have related keywords.
3. Check for search volume on your specific niche related keywords.
4. Check competition for your keywords.
5. Write down the good ones and start a list of niche related keywords.
6. Try to come up with at least 30 ~ better 50 or 75 niche related keywords and write them down or gather them in a project folder at MNF and then print them out

In my next post we’re going to look at choosing a domain name for this niche site of ours so stay tuned.

No related posts.

Keywords and Buying Cycle

When people come online they are generally coming in search of information. They have an interest in something and want to know more about it. This is the interest phase. They will not be purchasing during this phase.

The second step of the buying cycle is the research phase. This part of the phase they are looking for more detailed information and are really interested in this topic and want to know more.They will not be buying in this phase either.

The last phase is the purchasing phase. This is where they have made a decision and are looking to purchase what they were only interested in and researching previously.

Let’s take a look at an example. Seeing as Thanksgiving was yesterday and I have a great personal example of choosing the “wrong” keywords ~ we’ll use the example of deep frying a turkey.

Someone in the interest phase may google “frying a turkey”. They are looking to find out if this is something they even want to do.

Second stage research ~ they may have decided they’d like to try to fry a turkey and want to know how. They may google something like “deep fry turkey instructions”.

Third phase ~ they may google “deep fry turkey cooker” (or something similar).

A year or two ago I did a lens on how to fry a turkey/deep fry turkey instructions.

Here’s my stats for the last week.

That’s a lot of traffic. A LOT of traffic. I’m getting traffic from a lot of different keywords too.

I must be making a killing … right?

Wow ~ pretty cool huh? Well guess how many sales I’ve made from all this traffic?

0 ~ yep. 0. Not one sale.

In fact, of all this traffic I have only received 74 click throughs in the last 7 days, and only 34 of them were actually to amazon.  (the rest were email, favorited, and facebook postings).

So … I hope this is hitting home. It’s NOT all about traffic, it’s all about targeted traffic. It’s all about hooking up with your reader when they are ready to BUY, not when they are ready to get information.

Do you think if I had researched and built a lens on a keyword like this I might have done better?

Do you think the people searching for the bayou classic fryer are looking for information or are they looking to buy a cooker so they can fry the turkey?

I think they’re looking to buy.

While it was exhilirating to see those kind of numbers on my lens, it was quite disappointing when I saw such a low clickthrough rate ~ but I know what the mistake was. I hope you see the mistake as well, and avoid it yourself in the future. I obviously did a good enough job choosing the keyword ~ it had tons of search volume, and had low enough competition I was able to get it to the top of Google search listings. What I MISSED was the keywords were NOT in the buying stage.

How can I fix this?

I can’t change the lens as it is ~ it is what it is. But I can add some lenses to the campaign, some lenses that target more buying keywords. I can then link the new lenses to this one via the featured lens module and lensrolling. At the bottom I might ask a question (in the featured lens module) asking them if they are ready to get started and link to the lens where they can buy the stuff.

Between that and optimizing the new lens for more targeted buying keywords I could get enough traffic to make some money from this campaign ~ next year. well… Christmas is coming. I could probably get that working by then.

Here are a couple good posts I’ve found that talk more about the buying cycle. This is crucial, (as you can see from my mistake) so take a little time and read them.

Understanding the Buying Cycle

Search and the buying cycle

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In niche marketing, no matter which particular strategy you’ve chosen keywords are well… key.  This stands true when it comes to choosing a domain name as well. The domain name you choose is like the first way you show google what your site is about.

Choosing a domain name is not hard, but there are some things you want to try to keep in mind when deciding, and of course it’s a little different depending on which strategy you’ve decided to follow, so let’s go through them and get an idea of how to choose a domain name for each niche marketing strategy.  (mind you ~ these are guidelines ~ please do NOT let this trip you up and keep you from getting started ~ something is ALWAYS better than nothing)

First though, let’s talk about what domains you should use, as it’s always a question.

.com
.net
.org

top three in that order. Get them if you can. They work the best in search engines, and give people assurance that this is a real site.

I know .info is cheap ~ (just FYI they renew at full price the next year), and yes, I have used .info in the past, and they rank ~ it takes more work to get them there and keep them there has been my experience.

Keyword sniping:

As you can tell by the title of this strategy keywords are crucial to this strategy. You must have your exact keyword in the domain name. When I was studying with my coach on this method he told me it was fine to have extra words at the end or beginning of  the keywords, but that was a couple years ago and I think times have changed.  I believe there is a little boost in the rankings for having the exact and only the exact keyword in your domain name.

Ex.  keyword is: crock pot replacement parts ~ domain name would be: www.crockpotreplacementparts.com

What do you do if you can’t get that?  Try to get the .net or .org. Can’t get those? Then I’d look for another keyword unless it is just too perfect then I’d try the .info ~ but really ~ there are a million keywords out there, I’d stick to one that fits the criteria.

Microniche Sites:

Same criteria as above.

Niche Blogging:

This is where it gets a little different. You are going to be writing a bunch of posts on related topics, so you want to pick a keyword that has good search volume, low competition, but ALSO encompasses the rest of your keywords.

Ex. If you are doing a site all about crock pots ~ cooking, crock pots, parts etc ~ you wouldn’t want to choose crock pot replacement parts as your domain keyword because it’s too specific. You would want to find something that is more general to use ~ but it still needs to be a “good keyword”.  Best crock pot fits the bill. With good search volume, and well within the guidelines of competition. (now whether that’s available as a domain name or not is another issue ~ but you get the example)

Something general enough to encompass all the keywords you will be talking about in your site, but still a good keyword.

*** I am using the exact same search volume and competition criteria for these keywords as I use when I do Squidoo lenses.  Just FYI.

Niche domination:

Again, because you are targeting specific keywords you want the exact keyword you are targeting in your domain name. Even if this is for Squidoo ~ you still want it to be the same. If you have to start using extra stuff in your url to get the domain name you might want to rethink your niche, because other people on squidoo are doing it too ~ there’s plenty of niches out there ~ why not pick one where you don’t have to compete.

Authority Blogging:

This one gives you the most leeway. You can really choose anything niche related or even your name. This is a long term project, and you’re building your brand more than a keyword. Your content will be what you target your keywords to.  So whatever sounds good/works good for you is what will work.

ex. problogger.net, entrepreneurs-journey.com, roadtobikeacrosskansas.com ~ whatever your topic, you can choose your domain name.

When you’ve decided on a domain name go ahead and grab it cheap for your new site.

Hopefully I’ve made choosing a domain name a little more clear. If you have questions ~ please ask them in the comments section. Let’s get started!

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Thank you.

I opened my inbox and there is a comment. For some reason it hadn’t published yet (probably so I could easily put it here!) I hope this person doesn’t mind me sharing the comment and I’m going to give a little bit of advice on what could be done differently to help her improve her ranking in the search engines, get traffic and get more sales. Since this is her actual comment I don’t think she’ll mind me sharing with the class ~ since she was gonna anyway.

10 Things She Could Do Differently

1 Let’s start with the comment itself. If you’re going to share your niche/product you might as well get a quality link out of it! She could have used the name/url fields in the comment area to create a clickable link to her lens. She could have also used html within the comment to create a clickable link using her keywords as the anchor text.

2 Speaking of keywords. I’m assuming the keyword you are targeting is the one you’ve used in the url. The keyword “delonghi esam3300 esclusivo magnifica super-automatic espresso coffee machine” has NO search volume. This is the exact point I was trying to get across in the how to find product name keywords post.  You don’t want to use the whole product name as given on Amazon if it doesn’t have search volume. There are plenty of related keywords for this product that would have served your search engine optimization better.

3You’ve got the related pages still showing (the box in the sidebar that talks about other delonghi lenses) you want to take that out. You want people to click YOUR links, not onto someone elses lenses. (This is true for product lenses ~ there are times the related pages is useful and I would leave it on, but not for this purpose.)

4You have no title in your intro module. It’s one of the most important places Google will look to figure out what your lens is about. This is called on page SEO. It’s what Google looks at to see if it wants to pick YOUR lens to be a source of information on the first page of the search results when someone puts that keyword in as a query. You’ve GOT to tell Google exactly what the page is about, and that’s easiest done by using your keyword in your module titles.

5Don’t ask for marriage on your first date. The first piece of content you have is the best place to buy your product. It’s best to provide some information/content before you go in for the sale. At least a little bit. This is where it’s good to talk about features this product offers. It’s a $750 coffee pot. What makes it worth me spending that much instead of $25 on a Mr. Coffee machine?

6 You’ve got the price showing on your buy now area. If I’ve heard some cool stuff about this coffee maker, say on TV or in a magazine. You can BET they didn’t tell me how much this sucker costs. I see that at the very top of your lens, before I know why this thing is so very good I’m like “oh hell no” click. Bye. I’m gone.  Talk about how much they are saving instead of how much they’ll be spending. They will at least click through to amazon to get the price. They still may say “oh hell no” to this $750 coffee pot, but Amazon may have a “you might also like this” pointing to a $200 coffee pot which is more in their price range, they buy ~ you still get credit for the sale. GET THEM TO AMAZON.

7 You’ve got most of the elements of the lens here ~ but no content. Your video is there, but it’s just there ~ you don’t say anything about what they’re going to see, or learn or why they would even want to click the watch button. You’ve got to take them by the hand, and talk to them ~ like you would talk to a good friend. Would you send this video to a friend for them to watch without any reason why they should watch it?

8 You’re not using your keywords in your lens titles.  It’s very important to use the keyword you are targeting in your lens module titles. This is one of the big ways Google learns what your lens is about and decides it’s a great resource for someone who wants to learn more about this coffee maker.

Check this post on the 6 things you should be doing to get google love.

9 The content you do have sounds like it was copied directly from Amazon.com.  It’s really important to write these the way you would talk to a friend.

I happen to have a lens on a similar delonghi coffee maker ~ let’s see the differences between our features module content ~ just to compare. We can of course talk about this element of content writing in the comment section:

Here’s yours:

Here’s mine:

Two key points to get from this is

1. Speak conversationally, people want to feel like they are getting a real recommendation from a real person.

2. Don’t give them everything ~ you want them to click through to get more information.

10 Your lens is really pretty ~ you’ve added some additional elements that make it look nice.  Here’s the thing. You don’t want people to stay on your lens. You want them to click through.  I wonder how much time you spent on the testimonial graphic, and finding the other pretty graphic pieces you’ve added?  I wonder if that is time best spent?

While the testimonial thing is nice to look at ~ it’s kind of difficult to read and there is no place where you’ve encouraged them to read any more of the 56 testimonials for this machine.  I can’t stress enough how much reading testimonials will push a “maybe” into a “yes”. Use them ~ and use them to get people to the sales page.

11 Lacking a strong call to action ~ whether it’s a visual call to action with the orange box or the big arrow module at the end. You want to have a strong call to action ~ click her to get this.  Click here to save over $500.  Click here to get free shipping.  It’s nice to have one toward the top of the lens, and again at the end. I see the spotlight modules not really as a call to action, but as a great place to features something really cool about the product.

10 Things I like about this:

1 You’ve taken action.  All the little stuff can be tweaked and fixed and this lens can do fine.

2 You’ve chosen a great product ~ good price point, lots of good reviews.

3 You’ve started your blog ~ I love the theme by the way.

4 You’ve used the table of contents ~ there are some new advantages to this. (better if you have kw in the module titles)

5 You’ve used your tags well.

6 You’ve used video to really let them get a taste of what this machine can do.

7 You’ve used the subtitles quite well to further explain what you’re going to talk about.

8 You used your product keyword/link right at the beginning of the intro module.

9 The content in your intro module is good.

10 You’ve taken action ~ oh did I say that one already? It’s the most important one and deserves to be said twice. It’s the key to this. The first few can be rough, figuring out all the intricacies of SEO can be tough, but the more you do it the better you get and the easier the process gets. But you have to take action for that to happen!

10 Things you can do now!

Is this lens a total loss? OH HELL NO!! This lens is far from a loss.  Here are some basic steps you can take to tweak this lens and have it in tip top shape in no time.

1 Identify a better keyword. One that has plenty of search volume and minimal competition.

2 Use the new keyword in your module titles, and within the content of your lens and the other on page seo stuff that’s necessary.

3 Tweak the features content ~ make it a little more conversational. Think girlfriend over coffee kind of chat.

4 Add at least one  call to action. It’s best to include 2. One toward the beginning and one at the end. You can use the visual call to action and then the “big arrow” module for the bottom works well.

5 Make sure you link back to amazon encouraging them to look at more features and more reviews.

6 Try to make your links to the product WITHIN the content you’ve got, not right at the top of the module. That’s both for Google and for  your reader.

7 Add a little more content around your non text modules ~ reason why to watch the video or what they’re going to see etc.

8 Add a guest book!!! It’s like a wrap up area, where you can say thanks and ask for input about the product.

9 Turn off the related lenses. (it’s in the intro module, there’s a tab you click and then click the off button)

10 Start linking to the lens using the new keyword as your anchor text in the link.

I’d love to see the newly modified lens ~ please feel free to share it if you want.

The top half of this lens is very similar to what I do when I do lens reviews. Of course a personal lens review is more in depth, and I give suggestions to help solve issues as well, and it’s specific to your lens, topic and keywords. If you think this might benefit you,  you can order a lens review by clicking here.  The 2 for the price of 1 deal is still on.

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I understand all this can be somewhat confusing, and let’s try to get a little clearer about it.

Yes. You want a product specific keyword. But it doesn’t have to be exactly the product description posted on Amazon. I have looked at the same product on multiple sites and the product name/title is different on each site ~ so this is not a hard and fast product name ~ it’s a place to get you started.

Today I did a video that walked through finding a product at Amazon, realizing it had no search volume and then finding a keyword that would work to still promote that product.

Here’s the video:

Here’s the text version of the video:

Step 1. Go to amazon and find a product. I went to the watches category, and just looked around. I’m looking for a product with a price point over $200, and some GOOD reviews ~ more the better.

Step 2. I found a watch I wanted to check out. It only has 3 reviews ~ I like lots more than that, but you can’t beat the price point, so I decided to test it.

Step 3. Take the whole product name and put it in the google keyword tool (or micro niche finder). Click the exact match button (top right hand side of the screen of google kw tool ~ mnf is set to this as default), and check how much search volume the exact keyword gets.

Step 4. The keyword has not enough info ~ which means not enough search volume.

Step 5. Start looking through the other keywords that came up with it for keywords that are related to your product and have over 1000 searches. Look for something with the brand name, or specific model in them ~ the more specific the better. ** This may end up taking you in a completely different direction than the one you came from and THAT’S OK!! Go with it ~ this is research, go where the facts take you.

Step 6. Found another possible keyword ~ went back to Amazon to look and see if I could find a decent product to promote with the new keyword. Looking for price point over $200 and good reviews ~ the more the better. If you’re doing this on MNF ~ click the new keyword and then click the search amazon link and it will take you right there.

Step 7. Found a produc that fit my requirements and matched the keyword I found.

Step 8. Go to Google and check out the competition. Using the SEO for firefox tool to show me the PR of each site on the first page, I add up the PR ~ 30 or less total 3 or less average is a go. If you are using MNF click the SOC button (far right) and see what comes up ~ I look for SOC of 20 and under.

Step 9. If the competition fits my requirements I call it a good keyword and start making a lens. I will use the new keyword as the lens url, title and do all the other on page seo I need to do to get some google love.

That’s it. The key here though is to find keywords that HAVE SEARCH VOLUME. It’s pointless to grab the words written on Amazon for the product name and use them if no one is searching for them.  Rearrange them, try different portions of the keyword, check other words that come up in the search ~ find something completely related to a product, but it MUST have search volume.

If you have any questions please ask them in the comment section ~ I hope this helped clear up some confusion surrounding product related keywords.

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