| Dear Internet visitor,
My intention is
to help you own a profitable Internet
Home Business.
Here is
Internet Home Business course that will help and guide
you to start off your Home Business on the Internet.
Lesson #26
IN-CONTEXT LINK PLACEMENT
WHAT YOU WILL LEARN
In this lesson, we will explore the
powerful strategy of placing links to individual
products appropriately in the content of your Website.
SFI's New Veriuni Store allows you to link directly to
individual products. In this lesson, we discuss how to
place such links effectively.
TEAR JERKING DRAMA
On a rainy afternoon a few weeks back,
I was watching a rerun episode of the television show
ER. In this episode, Dr. Mark Green had taken his dying
father home to keep him comfortable and to visit with
him for the final hours of his life. There were several
touching scenes of the interaction between this doctor
and his dying father. In one of those scenes, Dr. Green
was sponge bathing his father's back. The father stated
that it used to be his job to bathe Mark, when Mark was
an infant. On its emotional level, this scene
dramatically revealed two adult men becoming aware of
their dependence upon the other at helpless times in
their lives. Meanwhile, on the surface level, the
conversation between them turned to the brand of soap
that Mark's father had used on Mark when he was an
infant.
For several moments this dramatic and
tear-jerking scene brought the brand name of a soap to
the viewing public's attention. It did so at a time when
the viewers were drawn into tender feelings that are
rarely acknowledged in everyday life. It did so at a
time when the viewers were forced to acknowledge that we
are all at times helpless and dependent on the love and
care of others. In effect, this scene equated the brand
name of a soap with the purest of kind of love and care.
It equated this brand of soap as the instrument needed
to express the love and care necessary at both the
beginning and the end of life.
Powerful stuff!
I haven't done the research on this,
but we have to assume that the promoter of that brand of
soap paid a pretty penny for use of that brand name in
that scene in that fashion.
PRODUCT PLACEMENT
From the use of Reese's Pieces in the
Movie ET, to the discussion of Ivory soap in ER, through
the multitude of products featured in the latest James
Bond movie; products have been successfully promoted by
"placement" in the scenes of movies and television shows
for several years now. Any time a character enters a
diner and orders a cola, whether they order a Coke or a
Pepsi, that scene can impact sales of that product for
the entire life of the movie (which winds up in many
people's homes on VHS or DVD after its run in the movie
theaters). Research confirms that sales of the featured
products dramatically increase after a successful
placement in a popular movie. We can expect to see more
and more of this in the future as "product placement"
has proven itself to be an extremely effective marketing
technique.
Product placement is an aspect of the
"branding" strategy. "Branding" refers to making a brand
name and logo well-known and associated with positive
feelings. When product placement occurs in movies,
unless the product is popcorn, candy, or cola (which are
sold in the movie theater lobby), the viewer has no
immediate opportunity to buy the featured product.
Movies lack the capacity to "close" a sale; they can
only make a product seem more desirable when a later
opportunity to purchase arises.
You may have also noticed that most
television commercials are of the "branding" type. While
there are a few commercials that give you hard
information about a product, explaining factually why
you should buy it; most commercials spend their 15 to 60
seconds just trying to make you feel good and associate
that good feeling with their product. They are hoping
you will remember that good feeling next time you are at
the store and see their product.
You may be wondering what this has to
do with Internet marketing. Only the top 50 or so
Websites on the Internet would stand much of a chance of
negotiating significant money for "placement" of
products in their content. So, why discuss it here? We
discuss it here because understanding product placement
lays the foundation for understanding the most powerful
aspect of Internet marketing: in-context product links.
IN-CONTEXT PRODUCT
LINKS
Imagine a middle-class couple who have
decided they want to take up canoeing. They enjoy and
respect nature, like to be outdoors, and want to instill
this enjoyment and respect of nature in their children.
Wanting to learn as much about canoeing and water safety
as they can before their first adventure, they turn to
the Internet to find information.
Marketers like it when behavior can be
predicted. It is very easy to predict the behavior of
this couple on the Internet. They will most likely go to
one of the popular search engines such as Google or
Yahoo! and search for "canoeing." They will then peruse
the sites that come up and look for ones that have lots
of good information about canoeing and are easy to read
and to navigate. If you have a good site on canoeing
that is ranked well in the search engines, they will
likely spend some time on your site.
Knowing what this couple is likely to
do demonstrates the unprecedented marketing power of the
Internet. Those desiring to sell canoes, canoe books,
canoe magazines, canoe trailers, canoe carts, paddles,
life preservers, ice boxes, dry boxes, and related
camping gear want to find this couple--or more
accurately, they want this couple to find their
products. Since this couple's Internet behavior can be
predicted, the Internet becomes the best place to
present these products to them at the time when they are
most interested.
Our earlier discussion above of
product placement in movies and television gives us
insight into HOW these products can best be presented to
this couple and others like them on a Website. The
obvious way would involve straightforward discussion of
products needed, the features of the different brands,
and a link to purchase the promoted brand. The better
way, however, would be to mention the products (and
include the links to purchase them) in context of other
discussions and stories about canoeing. It would be
powerful to have a story about turning your canoe over
one day but your valuables, being safely stored in a
BrandX drybox, were saved. It would be powerful to
describe how you were able to reach that exotic launch
area because you had the right canoe cart.
Consider the following which might
appear on a canoeing Website:
". . . When my wife and I first
decided to take up canoeing, we were lost until we got
our first issue of <a href=http://www.ezinfocenter.com/128498/
Item.vstore?id=170>Canoe and Kayak Magazine</a>. We
would have overlooked many important preparations for
our first trip had we not read a few issues of this
great magazine first."
This example contains a direct product
link to purchase this magazine subscription from my SFI
Veriuni Store Gateway site. The link is very easy to set
up. Just go to your Veriuni Store Gateway (your main SFI
"home" gateway). Then find the product page for your
chosen product. Just copy the URL of that page from the
address line of your browser, and place this URL in your
content within an HTML anchor tag as illustrated above.
You can also link to a specific department within the
Veriuni Store by using this same technique.
For linking to departments, the
Veriuni Store uses a department template page and a CGI
variable to identify the department to display. For
linking to specific products, the Veriuni Store uses a
product template page and a CGI variable to identify
which product to display. In both cases, the CGi
variable is in the form of a number. In both cases, the
variable is named "id."
Thus, to link to a department:
1. Start typing in your Gateway
address as usual, followed by your SFI-ID.
2. Then, after the forward slash, put "Department.vstore"
followed by a question mark and "id=[the department id
number]" (without the quotes). Department.vstore is
the name of the department template page. The value of
the CGI variable "id" tells the page which department
to display.
CGI variables are always identified by
a question mark. After the question mark comes the name
of the variable (in this case "id"), followed by the
equal (=) sign, followed by the value of the variable.
To link to a specific item:
1. Start typing your gateway address as usual,
followed by your SFI-ID.
2. Then, after the forward-slash, put "Item.vstore"
followed by a question mark and "id=[the item id
number]" (without quotes). Item.vstore is the name of
the item template page.
I see that the ID number for the Canoe
and Kayak Magazine page is 170. Since I want to link to
an item, I use "Item.vstore?id=170" at the end of my
URL.
If you were not an SFI affiliate, it
would still be possible to set up a multitude of
specific affiliate agreements on your own, but as we
discussed in Lesson 6 of this online course, it is way
too much trouble to keep up with all of that. The
Veriuni Store takes care of everything and keeps
everything current for you.
Bringing products to life is the way
to sell products. Demonstrating how the products
integrate with and effect real-life situations in a
positive way is the key to creating a need for the
product in the mind of your customer. When you can do
that and provide a link to a sales page for the product
at the same time, you have something really powerful.
The Internet is such a powerful
vehicle for selling products because it can do three
important things at the same time. It can 1) isolate the
target market (those interested in canoeing can easily
find the Website); 2) create a need and desire to
purchase the product (your story gives them a real-life
example of the need for the product); and 3) provide an
immediate means of closing the sale (you can have a link
to purchase the magazine right in the story on your
Website).
The Nutrition Blog we discussed in the
last lesson is also an excellent example. The Veriuni
Store sells great nutritional supplements. You could
include in-context links to these products in the
content of your Health and Nutrition Blog.
ANYONE CAN DO IT
If nothing you have read to date has
inspired you to jump into affiliate marketing on the
Internet with both feet, this should. Just think about
how powerful the Internet has made individuals working
from home with only limited resources. Canoeing may not
be your thing. Nutrition may not be your thing. BUT
SOMETHING IS! We have all had experiences that would be
valuable to other people. All you have to do is write
about those experiences on your Website and
appropriately place affiliate links to the products in
your story. If you are not good at writing or know
little about Website building, there are services
available at Websites such as Millpondproductions.com or
profitpropulsion.com to take your knowledge and convert
it into Internet content for you.
CONCLUSION
An individual working from home with
limited resources can do something very powerful that
even movies and television shows cannot do. You can
create the need for the product and close the sale all
at the same place and the same time. Using the
techniques you have learned in this course, you can
acquire a Website on a subject known to you. Then, using
the techniques you have learned in this course, you can
acquire some ranking for that Website in the search
engines. By placing direct product links to products in
your Veriuni Store in a manner that brings those
products to life, you can effectively sell products and
build an income with the SFI affiliate program at the
same time. These are very powerful tools you have at
your disposal.
WHAT'S COMING NEXT
In our next lesson, we will revisit the
subject of Spam and discuss the "Can-Spam Act of 2003,"
a new federal law in the United States designed to deal
with spam.
by George Little
Copyright (year) Panhandle On-Line, Inc.
License granted to Carson Services, Inc. for
distribution to SFI affiliates. No part of this work may
be republished, redistributed, or sold without written
permission of the author.
For more information on the Internet Income
Course and other works and courses by George Little, see
www.profitpropulsion.com.
For Web Hosting services specially designed for
SFI affiliates, see www.profitpropulsion.com.
Continue To Next Lesson
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