Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Hi –

 

I’m working on launching a new business and I’m a bit stuck on my website and some of the technical details.  I know what I want to occur on the website – but I’m getting a little overwhelmed on the details. 

 

I have three ‘actiony’ items that I want to occur from my website:

 

1)  Sign up for my newsletter.

 

In exchange for signing up for my newsletter, I will send subscribers a free ebook.  I know there are several email services out there such as Constant Contact, Vertical Response, iContact, etc.  I assume these providers will handle the confirmation of the opt-in, etc. – but how do I get a copy of the eBook to the person who just subscribed?

 

2)  Participate in discussions. 

 

I’m thinking that I can set up a blog on wordpress/blogger and use this to facilitate discussion.  What I don’t understand is will the blog be part of my website (and thus useful in SEO?) – or is the blog something separate all together and only connected to my website through a link?

 

3)  Sell my product.

 

The product I’m selling can be thought of as an eBook in that is consists of mainly text with some graphics (which were designed using Adobe Illustrator and are currently in PDF files).  In order to use the product – some of the pages need to be printed, but otherwise it is mostly a guide as to how to use the pages that get printed. 

 

I’m not quite sure how to format my product for delivery.  I’m thinking I can convert it all to a pdf and send via email as an attachment OR send a link to a website where the information is hosted.  I think using a link to a website would  reduce ‘sharing/copying’ of the product between people (which is good), but it also seems like a more complicated and costly solution?

 

I also want to deliver the product electronically and automatically when payment is made.  I’m thinking of using paypal for paypal payments and/or to accept credit cards for those without a paypal account.  So is it paypal who will send out the product electronically – or do I have to have something in my website to accomplish this once paypal tells my website that payment has been made?

 

I believe this model of sell an ebook, sign up for a newsletter, and blog is very common and probably not that complicated – is there any one-stop solution out there for this that is reasonably inexpensive?

 

Any feedback on pluses / minuses or other solutions on my above thinking would be greatly appreciated!

 

Tanya

Tanya,

All you need is a good email marketing software. You have two options:

1. Use Email marketing program for Sign-ups and Free downloads, and use Paypal or similar payment program to deliver your product. Paypal can send an email with download link soon as a payment for the product is received.
   
2. Use an All-in shopping cart to manage all the above tasks. I have never used one before, simply because I love the freedom a separate email system gives.

Icontact is a pretty cheap and basic email program you can use. MailChimp works fine as well. Great thing with an email program is that it'll manage your sign-up lists properly. Not to forget autoresponders and easy to install sign-up forms for your site.

H

Hersh -

 

Thanks for your input.  I'm trying to get a good list and/or set of requirements to give a web designer, but want to know a bit about what I'm talking about before putting together my requirements.

 

Tanya

Tanya,

Lemme try once again :-

1) Newsletter sign-up --- Okay, you have to understand that when you use an email program like Constant-Contact ( or anything similar), once a visitor signs-up, he/she'll an get an automatic reply. Now, the double opt-in process involves, first, the filling of the sign-up form, and then the visitor gets an email asking him/her to confirm by clicking a link in the email. Soon as that confirmation link is clicked that person would be added to the list attached to your sign-up form. In this case its a Newsletter subscription list.

The crucial part comes here-- Most email programs will give you an option to send a welcome email automatically as soon as the new members are added to the list. This is a standard email that you write when you configure that list/sign-up form. You can use this email to welcome your new subscribers, and, attach the link to your free ebook( where its hosted and available for download). An alternative step could be writing an autoresponder email to deliver the ebook. But that's just delaying what can be done with the welcome email.

2) Setting up a Blog:- Okay, you can set up a blog on your website.It can be part of your website if you want. So, your blogaddress will e using your domain address, i.e. www.youtsite.com/Blog, or. www.Blog.Yoursite.com.

Wordpress is the most popular option. And its free. There are thousands of themes available for free and the core Wordpress is of course free with all the regular updates. If you are that keen, you can get your web-designer to customize any theme you like, to your website's colors and branding.

Now, I reckon the first point has pretty well explained the ebook digital delivery method. As I said, Paypal also has a digital delivery system you can use. Most payment processors have such options. Its only a basic thing.

I hope its a bit clearer now.

Hersh

Thanks - That is a great way to describe it.  I somehow was under the impression that I would send my eBook out when they filled out the subscribe form on my website - but the way you described it makes perfect sense.

I think I'm just a bit nervous about jumping in - but my sister had some good advice for me over the weekend - she said sometimes in this circumstance its better to just 'fire, ready, aim' - basically she was telling me to just get going on something - even if you don't have all the details worked out etc.  You can always hone in on your aim!

Tanya

Tanya,

Yeaps please JUST DO IT!

Keep me updated, I would be really keen to follow your success story.

And ya of course, gimme a shout if stuck.

Hersh

blog = wordpress (free)

newsletter = aweber

book delivery = clickbank.com

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I would implement wordpress. You can do SOOOO much with wordpress it's not even funny. Wordpress started out as a blogging platform but now is a full blown content management system. You can use it for just about anything. Use it for a website, blog, ecommerce, and more. Best of all It's free!

As for newsletters, I personally use aweber.com. It's priced great and has a lot of easy to use functions.

For ebook delivery, the easiest option would be ejunkie.com. At $5 a month you can easily send you ebook download to your subscribers with the optin to have the download link set to a download limit or to expire on a preset date.

If you have any questions, let me know via PM.

Jerry

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There's an ebook in my link that can help you with that, but essentially, you will have to have your file on your web host first before you can deliver the ebook to your subscribers.

Plus, you'll need the squeeze page and download page.

Thanks for the information!

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