The Most Powerful Niche in the World and How You Can Always Profit from It – Internet-Marketing
The Most Powerful Niche in the World and How You Can Always Profit from It
There is one piece of software that is always going to be purchased like hotcakes regardless of how the market is. No matter if it is a recession, no matter if most people experience a "slow" market. It is not even new. It is what made the industrial world what it is today, and it all started with a man called Henry Ford.What For did was to implement the use of the conveyor belt in a large scale, and later this automation process was then one step further when robots where invented. This completely revolutionized the way we all live.Boring, hard, repetetive tasks where now being completed with tireless metal slaves, and big money was made because the robots don't require rest or even a salary.So what does this have to do with you and your business? Invent the robot again! Well, sort of. The niche that I am talking about is automation software. Because, you see, this is a robot of sorts, and they have excised since the boom of the Internet, and there will always be a market for it. Internet marketing fads and trends always bring new tasks to be performed.If you can make help a marketer make this time consuming tasks a breeze he will save time and money, so he'll buy it. Take blogging for example. When the big blogging trend started, and marketers all over the world saw the opportunity to get indexed fast by the search engines they all jumped on the blog craze. Smart people began developing software to autopost, auto-ping, auto-this and auto-that, and yes, these small pieces of scripts and software made people a lot of money.Same thing happened several years ago with autosubmitters. Buy a piece of software and it will optimize your page for the search engines and submit it to hundreds of them. See, another robot saving time and money for a lot of people.More examples? Recently several sites has begun offering article-pulling software that takes articles from directories and inserts them in templates, another time-saver. There will always, always be a need for automation software and it will always be in high demand.So there you have it, an ever-hungry audience with money to spend (since they are making money and what you sell to them can save them time and make them even more money). That, and the fact that man is lazy by nature.So the next time you see a marketing trend, find what you could do to cash in on by automating it. Make yourself a blue-print and send it of to the freelance sites. Have it built for you, and write, or have someone write, the killer-copy for your product. Do you smell the money yet?Markus Wahlgren is the creative writer of Sparkle Media. He has put together an unbiased site about Forex Investments at Duraprofit.com
Review: Russell Shortos The Island At The Center Of The World
Review: Russell Shortos The Island At The Center Of The World
Up to now the preponderant view held by many historians is that Dutch contribution to American history and particularly to that of New York has been one of irrelevancy. As we no doubt realize, the winners write history, and unfortunately, whatever the losers may have contributed, it seems to be lost or forgotten in the shuffle.Fortunately, during the past thirty years and thanks to the translation of many Dutch records that have been recently discovered pertaining to the early colony of New Netherlands, a different picture has emerged. It is this new perspective that author Russell Shorto has vividly and brilliantly captured in his latest gem of a book entitled, The Island at the Center of the World.Shorto devotes considerable ink in defending his thesis that the success of Manhattan as a commercial center, or New York, as it was renamed after the British takeover, did not begin with the English but rather had very deep roots in the early Dutch community. It was in fact in the late 1640s that the city of New Amsterdam under Dutch rule began its rise to become North American's shipping hub. Furthermore, one of the key actors who played a pivotal role in the community was, up to now, a long forgotten visionary, Adriaen van der Donck, who often found himself, locked in a power- struggle with Peter Stuyvesant. The latter has always been more recognizable than the former, particularly due to the fact that it was he who surrendered the Dutch colony to the British.What was very little publicized up to now was that van der Donck had being heavily influenced by the more progressive thinking of some of Europe's most enlightened thinkers as Descartes, Grotius, and Spinoza. It is the freedoms espoused by these thinkers that van der Donck believed in. Eventually, they would find root in the Dutch colony, ultimately becoming the foundation of many of the democratic principles forming the basis of the American cultural, economic and sociological psyche. On the other hand, Stuyvesant, who lacked the same formal education as van der Donck, was stuck in his old tyrannical concepts and narrow- minded prejudices, which effect was to stifle the aspirations of the inhabitants of the Dutch colony. It is fortunate for the USA that the theories and beliefs of van der Donck won out.As a side note and to indicate the extent of the Dutch influence on American culture, Shorto also reveals such interesting tidbits as what settlers emigrating to the Dutch colony would bring along with them, the derivation of words such as cookies, cole slaw and Santa Claus, that can all trace their roots to the Dutch colony of New Netherlands. We also have an overview and some fascinating insights as to what actually transpired between the Dutch and the English at the time the latter took possession of New Nederland.Shorto's animated characterizations of individuals and events is consistently enlightening entertaining, informative and balanced, all of which make for a powerful analysis of events that have had an unbelievable influence on American culture, political and economic institutions.The review was contributed by: NORM GOLDMAN EDITOR OF BOOKPLEASURES_______________________________________________________________Norm Goldman is editor of the book reviewing site, Bookpleasures.com and is also editor of the travel site, www.Sketchandtravel.com.Norm is a regular contributor to many book reviewing sites as well as travel sites.Norm and his wife Lily are a unique couple as they meld words with watercolors focusing on romantic and wedding destinations.They are always open to invitations to visit romantic and wedding destinations in New England, Florida and New York.
A World Outside The US – Internet-Marketing
A World Outside The US
With the exception of myself and a small handful of very remote and isolated journalists, no-one today bothers writing about the growth of the web. It's old news, and we already get it. Today's buzz is more about reaping the benefits of what's already there. Global business is now the norm, and the world is our marketplace.Those of us who are fortunate enough to be making a living writing and selling software have the luxury of riding on the very crest of the wave of good fortune. The whole Try Before You Buy concept allows us to send our software across the whole world quite literally in minutes, and users from almost every part of the globe can download, try and hopefully buy our products. If our business deals exclusively with downloads and avoids working with physical media, then we have nothing to worry about with getting our products from A to B, and no packaging, shipping, customs or tax issues to keep us awake at night.But the reality is somewhat different, and the vast majority of websites selling products or services online are doing so almost exclusively with the US market in mind. If you truly want to sell your products to the rest of the world, chances are that you'll need to make some changes.Change the way you think!The very first step is the most important, and requires a change in attitude. The world extends beyond the US borders, and to assume that the rest of the world follows the same norms as the US is wrong. A potential buyer may not speak English as their main language, may have no access to US Dollars, and may not have, use or want to use a credit card.Assuming you'd still like to sell your products to a buyer like this, you have to consider the practicalities. Setting up a link to an online currency converter is child's play, and there's no shortage of options to choose from. Doing so not only reassures the buyer that you take international considerations into account, but also makes the buying process easier for them. And making it easy sells.Make sure that you provide this information before the actual order page. Many people's first question when a product catches their eye will be how much it costs, and they shouldn't have to go searching for it. Again, make it easy.The same principle should also be applied within the software itself. If your application deals with different currencies for example, then you shouldn't assume that the user will automatically want the US Dollar as their base currency, or even that they will want to use the Dollar at all. And I'm assuming that you have already included the Euro, haven't you? Many users will be unfamiliar with the concept of sales tax, and other countries have different names, such as VAT in the UK, and GST in Australia.Regional variations in numerical formats are also important - most countries outside the US don't use the MM/DD/YYYY format, and many will use a comma for a decimal symbol, and a period for the digit grouping symbol.If your icons and interface are non-standard, then make sure they're clear to all users. There's a reason for sticking with the standards and familiar icons, and that's the fact that they have become instantly recognisable to most users, all over the world. If you're going to use something a little more original, make sure that other people will understand the symbols and images that you use. Having a US stop sign might not mean as much to someone who's never actually seen one before.What about your web forms?But even once your potential buyer has found your website, understood how much your software costs and even decided to buy it, the battle may be far from over. If you've ever tried ordering from an "international" store on the web, and you live outside the US and Canada, you'll already know how frustrating the process can be, and how the dreaded web forms can often make the process near impossible for us to work with.I've tried to buy products from sites that don't have Finland listed in their pull-down menu, that demand a State and/or County even when I don't live in one, and don't leave enough room for my phone or fax numbers.Even though my wallet, bills and bank statements are all full of Euros, there are still (at the time of writing) a huge number of sites that allow me to pay in everything from Algerian Dinars to Zambian Kwacha, but still don't consider the EURO a real currency. I'd suggest they wake up.And even the more flexible forms that allow all these options may still fall over when it comes to shipping costs. I can enter my delivery and credit card addresses in Finland, but when it comes to choosing my shipping option, I frequently have US POSTAL SERVICES and US FED-EX DOMESTIC only. More than once this has resulted in my simply giving up and looking elsewhere. Wasted opportunities don't get any easier to avoid!If you use a third party to handle your sales, then make sure you use one with flexible options. I use SWREG, who can handle everything under the sun, including fax, phone, online, check, international money orders, direct payment and more. Can yours?And if your software involves a large file download, then you have to consider the many users around the world connecting at a theoretical 56 KBPS, who simply cannot even consider downloading a 15 MB file. If you want to reach those people, then you have to make it easy for them. Even if you don't want the headache of burning a CD and mailing it yourself, there are services out there that can do this for you, and their prices are very reasonable. Make it easy.If you don't want their business - let them know!But ultimately if your business cannot or will not adapt to the rest of the world, then I have one humble request. Please make it clear from the start. I've filled out so many of your long forms, only to find out at the very end of the process that you can't deliver to Europe.Amazon is considered by many to be one of the world's most successful online stores, yet even they are guilty of these sins. Assuming I don't mind paying the shipping, I can order books and software through their US website. But when I go to software downloads, and add these items to my Shopping Cart, everything is fine until it comes to checkout time. At this point I get a message informing me that they do not offer digital downloads to my country. Go figure - and ask yourself why they waited until that moment to tell me.I've also filled out other long forms and received an email 24 hours later explaining that you don't normally ship outside the US; but if I will pay an additional $35, you'll send your $30 product direct by courier.And when your international user has already downloaded, installed, used and admired your software, falling at the final hurdle is a very painful and frustrating process.The irony in writing this article is that while preaching the concept of internationalism, many of the ideas I suggest for achieving it are aimed primarily at US developers. But it's not only the US developers who need to expand their views.The ability to reach across the globe is yours for the taking. But if your software, website or ordering options aren't up to the task, then you're throwing away a whole world of opportunities. Think international. Be seen, be sold.Copyright 2004 Dave CollinsAbout The AuthorDave Collins is the CEO of SharewarePromotions Ltd., a well established UK-based company working with software and shareware marketing activities, utilising all aspects of the internet. http://www.sharewarepromotions.com and http://www.davetalks.com.This article may be used freely in opt-in publications, RSS feeds, printed material and websites, provided that the full and unedited resource box (About the author paragraph) is included and all links remain active. A copy of the issue/material or a link to any online posting would be appreciated but is not equired. Send an email to dave@sharewarepromotions.com.