Effective Internet Marketing - Proven Strategies To Increase Your Income

Effective Internet marketing is a process of using any number of traffic generation methods for gaining visitors to your website. This often includes free methods such as article marketing, social media, forums or video - as well as paid advertising solutions such as Google's AdWords. Your time and budget will initially determine which choice you make - although there are also benefits to using various methods of generating traffic from a combination of sources. This article will outline some of the key points to keep in mind when it comes to effective Internet marketing.

Effective Internet marketing through generating traffic from free sources largely revolves around the concept of giving informative or interesting content in return for visitors to your website. Utilising article marketing is perhaps the most commonly used method of generating traffic in this fashion. It also provides the added benefits of quality back-links for your search engine optimisation strategies - which can be provided through other webmasters publishing your article as well as the initial link article directories allow you to have from your article. While not providing the same benefits in terms of back-links and search engine optimisation, marketing by offering similar content through video is growing increasingly popular. The primary goal behind most strategies employing this method is to create a video that will likely inspire viewers to send it to someone else upon viewing it, potentially resulting in a lot of viewers who subsequently visit your website in a short period of time.

Effective Internet marketing is growing less common through paid advertising services such as Google's AdWords. While it does offer benefits in that you can get a high number of targeted visitors to your website very quickly - it is growing increasingly out of the budget for the average marketer who runs a small business on their own. It is now primarily recommended as a quick way to test how your website performs in terms of converting visitors into buyers, and then make adjustments to increase its effectiveness.

Building a list is an important part of any effective Internet marketing. This commonly involves placing an opt-in form on your site and providing some incentive such as a free guide or sample tutorial video for them to join your subscriber base. Implementing a list is an important method to stay in touch with your website's visitors and keep them interested in what you have to offer.

Any form of effective Internet marketing should be designed to provide you with a high amount of website visitors that eventually convert into buying customers. Using methods to generate traffic from a wide range of sources will allow you to reach as many potential customers as possible, which will ultimately result in a much higher level of income.

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Use Custom Automation Of Your Spreadsheet Reports To Drive Down Costs And Increase Your Profits

Who Needs To Read This Article?

You will find this article of considerable reading value, if you belong to at least ONE of the following spreadsheet user categories: Owners of Small Businesses - Restaurants/Bars, Hotels, Hospitals, Factories, Consultants etc; Decision Makers/Job Holders in Corporations - Materials Managers, Sales/Marketing Analysts, Financial Analysts/Accountants, Project Engineers; And Anyone desiring to make BETTER sense - and use - of data!

Spreadsheet Automation Facilitates EFFORTLESS Data Handling, Analysis & Report Generation!

Sometimes people don't really care about learning(or using) all the "cool' advanced functions, formulas and techniques in the spreadsheet application they use for their work. They just want to punch in their relevant raw data - at any time - and immediately see the computed results generated by the spreadsheet in a manner that can facilitate their important decision making.

At times, they would prefer to click a button that says "Print ABC", or "Print XYZ" report, instead of having to crawl all over the huge spreadsheet(and get "lost" every now and then), to highlight and print different report pages. Using a custom built data entry form to make data entries into 14 different cells in different parts of a table(at the same time/with one click) would, for them, be "heaven" compared to making the entries one at a time.

This article is meant for those individuals/businesses who sometimes experience a need to use their spreadsheets in the (somewhat "impersonal"?) manner described above, to get the results they want. That need would often arise out of their lack of requisite skills to get the spreadsheet to behave the way they want - or limited time to devote towards incorporating necessary automation to make it do so.

In my article titled You Can Increase Your Profits Without Changing Your Prices, I ended with the following summary:

---------------------Start Of Excerpt---------------------

If You Remember Nothing Else, Remember The Following:

1. One good way to maintain and/or significantly increase your profits without raising your prices, is to reduce your Variable Costs(VCs).

2. You can reduce your variable costs by marketing more efficiently (getting more customers at lesser cost, AND maintaining them at lower expense). I once read an article that proposed a new parameter COCS: Cost Of Customers Sold or Served). This could be adopted as a Key Performance Indicator(KPI).

3. You can also reduce your variable costs by innovating more(i.e. developing greater efficiency in your routine internal operations and/or product/service delivery). That way, you would be able to produce/deliver more products and/or services with less effort, in less time, and using less resources. All of these would imply LOWER expenses/costs, leading to INCREASED profit retention per unit of product/service sold.

4. There is saying that: "You cannot manage something, if you do not measure it. Nor can you measure it, if you do not record it". Spreadsheet tracking will help you conveniently implement and sustain the process of monitoring, controlling and/or reducing your VCs. You will need to do this so as to constantly evaluate progress of your VC monitoring/control and reduction initiatives.

---------------------End Of Excerpt---------------------

A DIFFERENT Type Of Automation

The approach to spreadsheet automation that I refer to, is one that seeks to provide functional spreadsheet automation alternatives for ANY spreadsheet user task(s). Typically, solutions like this would require the developer to study existing manual data recording, analysis and report generation systems, then plan - in consultation with users - for incorporation of automation into the spreadsheet to replace them, where possible.

Custom spreadsheet solutions which survive long after the developer has "left the scene", are often those which users accept because they discover it - among other benefits - makes their work quicker and easier to do. That is why the best person to develop such solutions tend to be one who works in that area, and is therefore familiar with the way the manual system operates. S/he would have an "insider's" perspective of the best way to introduce automation other users will readily adopt - even as it solves the identified problem(s).

In effect what I am saying is that companies which get the most value from spreadsheet automation(including using it to avoid expenditure on less adaptable commercial off the shelf applications) will be those which empower their users to routinely generate "in house" solutions. In such companies, you will find that only when the requirement becomes considerably specialised or complex, does the IT department get called upon to develop or purchase software solutions for user departments or functions with significant data recording and analysis needs.

So, (when considering the automation I speak about) do not think about spreadsheet documents containing one or two click-able buttons that allow a user print a page or copy some cells from one sheet to another. Instead, I want you to picture an application(or Entreprise Information System) that customises the appearance of your spreadsheet workspace(to take advantage of maximum screen capital available on your PC), and offers you custom "floating" data entry forms.

In addition, visualise it having dynamic query/report drop menu interfaces, and a variety of custom buttons: for navigation(within and between worksheets), printing, data export (as PDF documents or spreadsheet files), saving, auto-data filtering, auto-charts plotting, auto-backup of files, user login authentication (for documents with sensitive or confidential content) etc.

To experience the type of automation I refer to, you can email FREE demos of sample automated Excel VB driven spreadsheet applications like (1) a Training Tracking Database(TM), (2) a Five(5) Year Income & Expense Monitor(TM) or (3) an Export Packing List & Invoice Generator(TM) to yourself using the file mailer on my website.

How A Well Known Corporate Multinational Used Spreadsheet Tracking/Automation To Repeatedly Cut Spending - And Increase Profits

During my graduate training(while in paid employment), I was redeployed from Guinness Nigeria Plc's corporate headquarters training office(in Lagos) to the Benin brewery training department (in Edo state), where I was assigned the - additional - job of using a custom Lotus macros driven Variable Cost Analysis spreadsheet application to generate brewery reports for dispatch to headquarters.

The assignment was not an accident. Before being redeployed to Benin brewery, I had been involved in "validating" the numerous complex formulas in the custom Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet application during its development. The author - Richard Chambers - was at the time in charge(as Training Coordinator) of training new entrants, and upon discovering my keen interest in learning, often gave me his laptop to "proof" formulas, links etc. It was he who had told his counterpart in Benin brewery(Joe Sheehy) that I could help out with a problem they were having using the application. And I did resolve the problem - resulting in my subsequently becoming responsible for the reports collation using the application.

Variable Costs Control/Reduction was a strategy that worked extremely well for the company. Most memorable for me as a brewer, was the manner in which huge monetary savings/profit gains were made by successfully implementing variable cost reduction initiatives. For instance, a brewing ingredient switch was made to a more readily available local alternative which was many times cheaper, resulting in phenomenal savings and progressively increasing profit earnings even though the price of beer produced was not raised. This practice was routinely applied across the brewing and packaging processes in line with a well thought out plan.

To elaborate further: A one-page Variable Costs Analysis report sheet automatically generated by the custom spreadsheet application I earlier described, was a powerful tool used by top management to quickly assess performances of individual breweries. Among other benefits, the report made it quite easy to realistically compare sister breweries in different locations(even across countries) based on common denominators. Apart from summarising brewing/packaging materials in two groups -

"Over-used/Over-spent"(Losses) and "Under-used/Under-spent"(Savings) - on a monthly basis based on data entered, the program also automatically plotted charts showing trends over a 12 month period.

The visiting head of the technical function only needed to look at the most recently plotted point on the chart (relative to preceding ones) for a Key Performance Indicator like

Cost per Hectolitres brewed(One Hectolitre = 100 Litres), to know if the brewery had stayed within the approved upper limit of spend(plotted as a straight line target across the same period) or not. Discussions would then take place based on identified "Exceptions"(which could be "good" e.g. savings made or "bad" e.g. monetary loss due to materials over-used), and "Actions To Be Taken" to correct or maintain observed performances agreed upon.

Spreadsheet Tracking As A Crucial Element For Business Development

There are ways you can use spreadsheets to record and track materials usages/stocks, product sales, and other business data such that discrepancies will be easily detected when they do occur. The use of spreadsheets when properly done, can help to uncover the cause(s) of "losses" in virtually any aspect of a business operation.

1. The Pareto Principle - Using spreadsheet tracking, you can easily apply the Pareto principle in deciding which of your income sources and expense channels(i.e. products and services sales) to focus on in order to maximize profits. Considering that you are most likely to use the same marketing/sales resources to serve your customers, it only follows that if you focus on your biggest margin selling products/services, you will get increased profits at more or less the same cost.

One Possible Application: Plotting a pie chart based on income contributions from all your products and services(daily, weekly or monthly), and reviewing the automatically computed percentages/visual pie slices, can give very illuminating insight.

The 80:20 Pareto principle is based on Pareto's theory that 80% of the results one gets in a particular endeavour will be mainly due to 20% of areas to which one has applied efforts. In business this principle has been found to be true. Your data, properly converted into appropriate performance indicators, will show you where your largest margins come from. You can then channel more time and effort in that direction.

For instance if a company had five drink brands in the market but notices that Brand A, which has a profit margin of at least twice the others is in greatest demand, they could (a) focus production efforts on that brand, so that more bottles go out to trade (b) Apply Best Practice/Continuous Improvement initiatives that would result in lower costs of producing each bottle of Brand A so that even though the market price remains fixed, the company is able to earn increasing profit margins per bottle.

2. Sourcing Capital - For Expansion or Startup. You can make it easier for banks and prospective investors to back you financially and/or take the decision to buy into your business. Those already running their businesses will know that banks like to see detailed business records that show in real terms all aspects of a business' performance. Without detailed and comprehensive spreadsheet tracking, it might be difficult to show this. Agreed there are software applications that capture most of these. However, sometimes, you want to highlight certain scenarios or trends in a way that an off-the-shelf application cannot accommodate due to the uniqueness of your need. It is in this regard that the use of spreadsheet tracking becomes relevant.

The intelligent use of spreadsheets, combined with the application of the 80:20 rule will help to achieve the foregoing and more. One does not need any expert to start doing these things today. Just take the decision to start keeping daily, accurate records and commit to analysing them. You'll be surprised to find that you will soon become much more aware of how you're doing and what aspects of your business you should focus on more to get better returns for your efforts - and you will be able to confidently supply verifiable/authentic financial data to back up any claims you make about your business performance to bankers or prospective investors.

Deciding What Spreadsheet Application To Use

This would ultimately be up to you. The big "fight" has always been between Lotus 1-2-3 and Microsoft Excel. I started out with Lotus 1-2-3 back in 1993 and learnt Lotus Macros programming(via self-tutoring). I eventually used this skill to develop - in my free time - various custom spreadsheet solutions(that were formally adopted for use in the departments I worked in as a brewer/manager in Guinness), before switching to Microsoft Excel in 2001. Subsequently, I developed my Excel Visual Basic spreadsheet programming skills (also via self-tutoring), because the company had chosen to adopt MS Office during the roll over to year 2000.

I believe using either of these two applications should not pose any problems for implementing your spreadsheet automation ideas. This is because both have always been "friendly", towards making it easy for users to get more functionality out of them by way of custom programming.

You can choose to learn how to do it yourself - or call in someone(an Excel VB Solutions Developer for instance) who knows how. Again, this would be dependent on your purpose, how proficient you are, and/or how much time you have at your disposal. Ultimately, even if someone develops a custom application for you, it should happen with YOUR guidance at every point to ensure that it does EXACTLY what you want it to do, and that you can easily - with your developer's support/coaching - learn how to make modifications to it in future, without needing to call back your developer.

This last point in my opinion is ONE major benefit you must seek to extract, if you choose to engage the services of a developer. S/he should be able to help you develop (in-house) expertise needed to maintain the application AFTER s/he is gone. If you fail to ensure this, all your cost-savings from using the application might end up being spent paying the developer to maintain the application over time in the future!

From this point on, I will refer to only one of the above mentioned applications, because it is my preferred work environment. That is Microsoft Excel. I believe users of other spreadsheet applications will be able to adapt whatever I say from here for use in their own peculiar environments.

Automating Your Spreadsheet Document : What is Excel VB?

Microsoft Excel is a powerful tool for recording, organising/re-organising, analysing and presenting information. By Excel VB, I refer to Excel VBA - where VBA means Visual Basic for Applications(VBA). VBA refers to the highly extensive and flexible macro programming language developed by Microsoft for use in their MS office applications - Word, Power Point, etc.

VBA is therefore different from the Standalone Visual Basic program used(by professional programmers) for developing commercial quality software applications - though it borrows many of the latter's features. Think of Excel VBA as being the standalone Visual Basic software, built into Excel for the benefit of Excel users who are not necessarily programmers, but who are keen to exert more control over the application.

So, Excel VB offers any interested users the necessary tools to make the application deliver more functionality. The final product is still an Excel document, but with extra functionalities added using VBA.

Why Excel Visual Basic - and NOT Visual Basic?

1. I always answer this question by asking the following question: What would be the point of "Killing A Fly With A Hammer"?

Let me elaborate. If a method is available that allows us to achieve the same desired result(s) at LOWER cost, with LESS effort and in LESS time, why should we fail to adopt it?

Certain IT persons insist that developing executable applications using the standalone Visual Basic programming language is "better" as it does not limit the user to a particular user application software environment. I concede that this might be a valid point under certain conditions. However, I point out that there are many users who have peculiar needs that do not necessarily require complex solutions.

A lot of people today simply want to get their data recording, (re)organisation, and analysis for decision making done quicker and with less effort. They also want to spend as little money as possible to do this. In other words, they want a cost-effective solution that gives them independence from the solution provider in the long term - without requiring them to undertake laborious skills acquisition immediately.

This category of everyday users of technology described above are the ones I believe need Excel VB solutions of the type I describe. One expects that some of these users will over time develop an interest in acquiring advanced skills needed to develop their own solutions in future - which is why I also encourage them to do so, possibly via self-tutoring, like I did.

2. Another question I ask, in answering the "Why Excel VB?" question is : "Why re-invent the wheel? "

My experiences(and those of others who favour the use of Excel VB like I do), confirm that to organise, and analyse data for (financial/management) report generation and decision making, you will save hundreds of hours using already in-built, pre-programmed Excel functions compared to a situation where you used Visual Basic proper.

All the functions needed to achieve the above purposes already exist in Excel, so that you don't have to write them all from scratch as would be the case if you were to use Visual Basic.

3.It works even when you lack "In House" expertise

For the purpose of creating custom financial and business management solutions that solve your identified problems, and give you control/ownership, without burning a hole in your pocket, Excel VB offers an amazing variety of possibilities, in the hands of an adequately skilled user.

In addition, an Excel VB developer( who in many cases will tend to be a user turned developer, and is therefore likely to easily see things from your perspective) - unlike a programmer - is more likely to be positively disposed to working with you to ensure the application meets your practical needs. S/he will readily understand that the final application is meant to help solve a real problem(s), and will therefore build it to match those expectations.

It's not enough to have a professional with the technical skills to solve your problem. s/he also needs to have the right attitude and background/experience - else the relationship will not work. This is where an Excel VB resource is more likely to add value to you. Most Excel VB Developers have backgrounds in management, accounting, engineering and other fields, which further equips them to be useful to you in "thinking up" better ways to apply your spreadsheet automation to get the most value for your business. You therefore need to choose the right developer, with the appropriate background to match your needs.

I believe the foregoing are compelling justifications for choosing Excel Visual Basic over Visual Basic.

Get Maximum Returns On Your Investment In Spreadsheet Automation By Developing "In House" Expertise

Organisations can deliberately expose their employees to learning events(or self-help tutorials) on spreadsheet solutions development. Such employees can then be challenged to develop in-house solutions that effectively address the business' peculiar data analysis/report-generation needs as they arise.

A person with proven competence in this area CAN become "notorious" for developing spreadsheet applications, which eliminate drudgery from the process of using MS Excel to handle large amounts of data. Typically, work that takes hours or days will suddenly take minutes or seconds to finish.

The claims I make above are NOT exaggerated. They are in fact based on my personal experiences doing the foregoing (a). As an manager in the challenging, fast-paced manufacturing work environment of a corporate multinational (b). As a solutions developer for individuals and businesses who use MS Excel for their work.

I am keen to encourage individuals and organisations to explore using advanced MS Excel formulas and functions, in conjunction with Excel VBA programming, to develop customised spreadsheet applications that will solve typical problems end-users encounter daily in trying to record/analyse data and generate reports.

The savings - from using your "in house" expertise - in terms of money and man-hours alone, will quickly justify the investment you make in "developing the needed skills" - especially, when you compare what you spend with the cost of purchasing a commercial software application - or even engaging the services of an Excel VB developer.

Summary

The key imperative for most people who handle business data is often "how to use it" to monitor - and where feasible - control performance i.e. they study/anticipate trends in a way that helps decision making towards ensuring REPRODUCTION of desired results, while minimising - or eliminating - undesirable ones.

You CAN transform the way you manage/analyse data(or generate reports) in your business today - and get more usable benefits to the extent that your profits increase. One major step you can take towards achieving this purpose, will be to intelligently use spreadsheet automation to improve data handling/analysis and report generation systems in your business operations - while empowering yourself and/or staff to acquire skills needed to maintain the developed spreadsheet solutions for the future.

Tayo Solagbade is a Data Analyst, Report Designer and Custom Spreadsheet Solutions Developer. He works with individuals and organisations to cost-effectively leverage Microsoft Excel for their data management/decision making, so they can do what they do with less effort, at less cost, in less time and using less resources.

Email to yourself FREE sample Excel VB driven spreadsheet applications such as (1) a Training Tracking Database™, (2) a Five(5) Year Income & Expense Monitor™ or (3) an Export Packing List & Invoice Generator™ and others from his MS Excel Workbook Automation Mini Site: [http://www.excelheaven.v27.net]

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4 Keys to Increasing Your AdSense Income Online

Nothing is as frustrating as watching your Google AdSense revenue trickling in cents; $.10 here $.30 cents there and $.0 cents over there. So much for all the hype about guys making thousands a month with AdSense. Me thinks, thiz Adzenz thing be weird!!

Read this article, Try the 4 facts, and up the wall you will drive AdSense!

Lets face it, if my website traffic is anywhere in the hundreds a day, there is no way under these blue skies I'm gonna make myself enough money over the internet. I read a review of some website with mammoth traffic and they make over $15,000 a month. Heck, Digital Point makes anywhere around $10,000 a month on a 50% revenue share with their contributor members. That is $10,000 being 50% of what is left after forum members have been paid off. "Google pays Digital Point about $10,000 a month, depending on how many people view or click on those ads", said Shawn D. Hogan, the owner and chief technology officer of Digital Point.

Here is the kicker. I don't in my wildest dreams think I'll ever have a website the size of digital point, ever! But I can make 100 small ones. See, I'm just an average Joe trying to make head, tail, or both, whichever comes first; of this internet money thingii. And right now I'm not sure I'm holding onto the tail or neck.

I have been doing some research on Google AdSense and I want to share with you some interesting things. Things that I didn't know about and things I believe if I had known earlier, I would still be having some hair left on my head. (Pulled much of it off trying to double my AdSense to $ 0.40 a day). Anyway, I have concentrated my research on how to optimize my AdSense revenue even before I work on increasing traffic to my 2 blogs.

In my quest, I have learned that the secret to increasing your AdSense revenue lies in mastering four main factors namely:

Creating Relevant Ads

From my Google AdSense account reports, I have noticed I earn much more from AdSense for content ad groups as opposed to the AdSense referral ads and AdSense for search bar. If you have an AdSense account, you know that there are three types of AdSense ads that you can choose to be served by Google on your site. These are AdSense for content ads that are related to your website's general content. The content based ads are the best performers in generating you AdSense revenue and they are definitely your best bet. Make sure to concentrate your efforts to having as many relevant content ads as possible if you want to make the money.

Then there are AdSense referral ads that you can choose for your website. These ads are not related to your website content and will advertise anything from bio fuels to air tickets. These Google ads do not do as well as the content based ads. The main reason being that visitors to your site are more interested in relevant content to what they were looking for in the first place. AdSense referral ads are however second to the content based ads in generating revenue. And that's a distant second from content ads.

The last type of ads that Google offers you for your website is the Google search bar. The search bar ad group is such that a visitor to your website can type the name of what they are looking for in the bar. The bar connects directly to Google search and will bring the visitor to a Google page with several ads related to what they searched for. I have really not experimented on the effectiveness of this ad groups from Google and would not therefore conclusively say they work or don't. It's however worth putting up a search bar at a corner of your page or at the bottom.

From the above three discussed Google adgroups, you will notice that content based ads perform better than the other two. Its not rocket science to figure out why. The main reason however is that people searching the web are looking for particular information of their interest. They are therefore more likely to click on ads that seem relevant to their search. AdSense adcopies are written such that they offer answers to very specific needs and a visitor will most likely click on an ad that seems to answer their quest. And that's all you need them to do to earn your money. Click.

For example, people looking for Movie Downloads will be confronted with ads that offer them all sorts of diverse benefits and types of downloading movies online. Likewise, People looking for Water-for- gas cost saver kits and manuals on their cars will be bombarded with ads that offer increasing mileage per gallon of gas etc. Once again, concentrate on requesting from Google only those ads relevant to your website's content.

Serving Only High Paying Ads

In the real sense, choosing high paying ads from Google AdSense will in effect determine the content you put on your website. In other words, if you want to concentrate on high paying ads, and considering that you need relevant content to earn good AdSense income, then by default you will have to make a website or blog on topics that pay prime dollar for clicks on them. In a nutshell, not all ads pay the same with Google. Since competition for some products is excruciatingly high, the advertisers are willing to pay top dollar for their ads to appear first on Google content based advertising network.

Google AdWords (this is where advertisers bid and create their ads on Google) offer the advertisers an option to allow Google to distribute their ads to other websites within their network besides Google that have relevant content to the ads. This is how you end up with AdSense being served by Google on your website in the first place. Now here is the spoiler, not all ads that you choose will pay as high. Ads for new technology, gadgets and gizmos pay much more higher since the manufacturers are willing to pay as much to enter the market and make their product known. Google ads for such products pay you equally higher dollars per click as opposed to ads for say nail vanish.

I have seen some AdWords bids that start from $5 per click. Other companies and individuals bid as high as $50 per click to maintain the pole position in Google results pages. The revenue principle applying to AdSense when Google serves the ads onto your website is practically the same. On the converse, the highest bid by advertisers is a paltry $0.05 for some products. Which ads would you rather get served with by Google?-go figure.

For you to be able to run high paying AdSense ads, you will need to make a thorough research on minimum bids made by advertisers in adwords. This is not rocket science really. One way of telling a certain area has higher bids is to Google a product you suspect might have high competition among advertisers. Just counting the number of AdWords ads appearing for that particular keyword will tell you much.

A Google SERP (Search Engine Results Page) with a lot of ads appearing on it might indicate that the advertisers on that keyword are bidding serious figures per click on their website.

The higher a particular ad appears on a highly competitive keyword usually indicates higher bids and you may want to consider creating websites in such an area and get it served with AdSense. But also bear in mind that high ad counts also means that it's a highly competitive field and getting traffic for your website might be like pulling teeth...and with a pair of tweezers that is.

It pays to do an intensive research into areas to create websites for AdSense revenue. Since AdSense is served automatically by Google to your website, your only maneuver is to look for very specialized, less competitive, high paying niche areas and keywords to create your website content on. As a rule of thumb, new products are naturally good niche areas to start with; assuming that you catch on the fad soon enough before every man and his dog start selling the same product. Please note that we are placing emphasis on guys that want to use AdSense as their main source of online revenue here.

In most cases and usually why we (me included) make measly AdSense income is that, we create websites in areas of our own interest and then serve AdSense ads to them. Problem is, our preferred areas of interest are not necessarily areas that can make us worthwhile money with AdSense. Research an AdSense area that pays, then create unique content on that, serve the ads and laugh all the way to the bank. Kind of doing things in reverse... banana eating monkey sort of thing.

Positioning And Designing Your Ads

This is an area that I want to approach with a lot of caution. One thing is painfully true, and that is your AdSense ads are not worth the space if they are not optimally designed and positioned. One of the biggest advantages with serving AdSense ads is that Google lets you design and position your ads on your own website. But, which design and positions work best? Just like the offline world, positioning an outdoor advertisement makes all the difference between the ad being seen and it passing as a waste of resources.

Why does placing a TV ad at prime time, for example, cost more than double that of placing it dead in the night or early in the morning? Better still a billboard on an unused highway will not receive as much audience as one in a freeway that has huge amounts of vehicular traffic.

The same principle works with serving ads from Google AdSense. Placement of your ads is everything in getting noticed by visitors to your website and eventually getting them clicked on. Some areas of your website are actually prime real (or is that virtual) estate while others are... well, badlands, abandoned dumb and quarry sites.

Positioning Your AdSense Ads

As mentioned above, you need to know which areas of your website or blog work for AdSense. Research (and don't ask me by who) has shown that an online browser's eye is trained more emphatically on certain areas of a webpage while other areas receive just a gloss-over glance. It is also true that a webpage visitor's eye lands automatically and for the first instance on a particular area of a page and then follows a certain trail of vision on that webpage. Disconcerting, is it?...No, it's actually a nightmare for an advertiser if you don't have those facts.

You might have noticed that, in a Google SERP (i.e. the results page you get when you search a word in Google) ads always appear on the mid top and right side of the page. Fact is that, advertisers on these two areas pay completely different rates. The ads on the top of the page are called sponsored ads, while those on the right edge of the page are called adwords.

The middle top area (sponsored ads) is also much more expensive to advertise on while the right-top side ads (1st to 5th positions) are priced higher than the mid-right and bottom right AdWords areas. Although, this is done through a bidding process, the idea is clear that, if your ad is the first on the top right side of the page, you get hit more than those below you. This is not only exclusive to Google but to most if not all search engines online that run ads on their SERPs.

Ok, let's bring it home. Considering your webpage will be providing other relevant and mainframe content in the middle of the page, you will need to follow Google ad positioning example. For starters, you can try to place AdSense ads at the mid-top of the webpage. The best ad design that works for the top page section is the leaderboard format which stretches the ads across from left to right of the page. Usually about three to four AdSense ads will be served with the leader board format.

The leaderboard ads are available in the ads set up button within the horizontal ads drop down. All this is possible once you get Google to approve your account, you will be able to create your ads there and get a HTML code provided for you to paste to your webpage. Google promotes family friendly websites and blogs and will need to review your website before approval. They discourage websites with adult content; your website should also have well arranged and meaningful content.

Your next prime real estate on the webpage is the far right hand side. This is a crucial area and you might want to place the ads right from the top running downwards as a column. Again, I have experimented on this area with the broad banner ads from AdSense and they fit in like a glove hence bracketing the main middle text. The broad banner format is available from your Google ad set up button in your account under the vertical ads section.

Personally, I select the text-only ads from the create-new-ad button. You have a choice of ad types including texts and images, text only and images only formats. I prefer the text only since it's now accepted that text ads attract more interest than banner and image ads. I think it's something to do with an ad getting to the point as fast and as effectively as possible.

Now, the other available position has been subject to a lot of debate; but there are still some marketers who swear by it. This is the mid-text AdSense ads. These are ads that are placed in between your main text and separated into two, three or four parts depending on the size of the main text. Basically it interrupts the flow of the text after some delivery of information. By text I mean your main page content located at the middle of the page. I cannot deny that locating the ads mid-text really gets them seen by people interested in reading your full content. But there are also visitors that might consider it an interruption to their reading and just pass along. I think this position's effectiveness surely depends on an individual reader and I might want to leave the choice up to you here.

The last AdSense positioning real estate is the end-text position. This is placed at the very bottom of your webpage text. This position is equally important for webpage visitors that have read your content and might see something that catches their eye at the end. It is proven that a visitor prefers a sense of continuity while doing their web searches as opposed to opening one page, closing it and opening another altogether. If your end-text AdSense ads are relevant enough to the content on display, the visitor will most likely sign off from your page by clicking on that last ad. Which I believe is good enough for that AdSense revenue click.

As I end the positioning AdSense discussion here, I might want to mention that caution is necessary to avoid overdoing it by serving too many ads. Your webpage should have just enough AdSense ads to create a wrap around effect to your main text. The webpage should avoid looking like an overcrowded flea market. Usually Google allows you to serve about 15 ads per page but you need not go the whole nine yards with it. Place just enough on each page to make it optimized for AdSense revenue.

Designing your AdSense ads

You will also be able to design the format of your ads within your AdSense account. Google allows you to play around the text of the ads within certain parameters like size, type, nature, text color, borders color, background colors, url color and the shape of their edges. Google also lets you choose how you want your AdSense ads to contrast against your main text by being able to choose the templates among them blend, mother earth etc. Personally I have found blending my ads to the text works where I don't want them to conspicuously stand out.

While designing your ads for primarily the purposes of AdSense income, you may want to consider making them stand out. Take care however not to overdo the colors, otherwise your site will look like its reading the riots act to visitors to click on them or else... The idea here is to softly make the ads stand out but not so much as to distract the reader of the main text. This means you will be doing a balancing act with the AdSense font color, the background and the general shape around the edges of the ad boxes.

My research has shown that choosing a soft AdSense ad background like light grey combined with emphasized text color on that ad's background has a good effect on the click through rates. But grey if your own site's background is white. Grey works best with websites with a white background. Other lighter colors work best with different backgrounds on websites. I guess I'm trying to say that your AdSense background color should just be enough to provide a slight shade to differentiate it from your original website's background. Don't make it scream here.

This might hold true when you visit other websites like hubpages.com which shares its AdSense revenues with article contributors. What they do here is that they serve AdSense ads around your article and if it's a nice piece, you will get decent clicks if not an outright click-riot. I observed that, since their website background is white, they serve their AdSense ads with an ad-background of light grey while blending the top-text ad's background white. Your best bet here is not to take my word for it but to keep on tweaking, testing and turning the ads until you see what works for your website.

High Traffic Levels

This is the devil in AdSense income. The above three aspects of increasing your AdSense income will only work to a certain extent and as far as your traffic goes. As I said this is where AdSense becomes everybody's biggest headache. However if we are to look at this critically, there are a hundred ways to drive traffic to the websites.

Let's assume we have already worked on the other three areas to our satisfactions. We are now more than sure that for whatever traffic we bring to our websites, we will be able to milk the most revenue out of them. I think that is important. No one wants visitors to be making a pass by their website without ever contributing a cent to their revenues online. So optimized they are and out you go for traffic.

I don't want to go deep into this area of bringing traffic to your website but let's just say the methods are many besides writing unique content, writing articles with links to your websites, adwords, contributing in forums among many others. The most important and that which will save you a lot of agony and time is to choose a niche area that has comparatively less competition. Since we started off making websites for AdSense, we might as well ensure that we make websites with content that attracts the search engines, hence traffic.

Choose your niche area well and the search engines will pick you out. Visitors will be on your website like ants to a Popsicle- with the right content. To help you with selecting a niche area, you can use the Google trends keyword tool to measure the competition of a particular keyword. As a rule of thumb, avoid keywords that are crowded. The competition won't do you any good.

There are people out there who have mastered the art of making multiple websites for AdSense revenue. Most of them use the automated softwares that help them develop unique websites in certain niches. An example of good AdSense automated website developer software that is popular in the market is the HYPERVRE [http://increasingAdSenseincome.wordpress.com]. (see below)This software is designed to prompt you generate the most unique sets of keywords and go on to develop unique content. As mentioned earlier, making websites in unique niche areas is the key to getting massive traffic sent your way by the search engines. Well designed and unique website content also saves you the agony of leveraging your website traffic by writing articles, buying advertising space, email lists and all other related headaches to generating traffic.

Concentrate on making websites that attract traffic by themselves, then keep on churning out as many websites as you can using the automated softwares. Within 2 months you will notice your AdSense revenue expanding to unimagined levels. So much for your earlier belief that-nobody can earn more than adcents monthly.

Good Luck

Robert is a successful online marketer. He has written extensive reviews of new products including providing his well researched areas on "how to make online income'. He recommends the HYPERVRE for automated adsense websites development. Follow links to read more Click Here! [http://increasingAdSenseincome.wordpress.com]

Announcing 6 Authentic Ways to Increase Your EBay Income

Others resort to eBay if they need to put away a number of items they no longer want to use. However, for some, it's a very profitable business. To ensure 100% success when doing eBay, here are 6 right ways to do just exactly that:

1. Answer e-mails promptly. Replying to your prospective clients' inquiry, mostly done through email, is a great way to build customer trust. Make it a habit to check your inbox everyday and reply to each email within 24 hours.

2. Allow your customers to pay online. A lot of customers prefer to pay items online, especially through credit cards. You can sign up in a number of online payment service such as Paypal which is proven to be one of the most safest and cost-effective means to pay online.

3. Increase your website traffic. How do you increase sales if you can't increase your traffic? So load your product descriptions and title with keywords. Join affiliate programs, or write articles with appropriate link pointing to you eBay page.

4. Be fair and honest. When writing your product descriptions, be accurate and concise as much as possible. Most of all, don't add hype. This can surely pull down your credibility.

5. Think of the season. Fit your products to the season. So don't sell ear muffs on July or swimsuits on December. However, you have to ensure that you can already stock these items early so that there will be no problems when it comes to shipping.

6. Sell similar products simultaneously. Oftentimes customers would like to buy other products that may be interesting to them. It works well for both sellers and customers. Customers can save postage costs while sellers can keep packing costs just by shipping items together.

By the way, do you want to learn more about using articles like this to drive traffic to your website and increase online conversions?

If so, I suggest you check this out: article marketing traffic.

Increase Your Income From Home Business

This is an overview of the eight steps you need to take in order to start and grow a more profitable online home business:

Find a niche market -- BEFORE you decide what to sell

Write compelling sales copy that attracts visitors

Design an effective site that converts visitors into buyers

Use the top search engines to drive tons of targeted traffic to your site

Tap into sources of cheap and free traffic

Use email marketing to communicate with visitors and convert them to buyers

Grow your business by selling new products to your existing customer base

Harness the power of affiliate programs for hands-free traffic and sales!

Anyone, from newbie to seasoned marketer, can benefit from going through these proven series of steps. No matter where you are in your home based business, it always pays to revisit the basics and make sure you're doing everything possible to grow your home business and increase your income opportunity from home.

I believe strongly in testing. Most email software these days allows you to test absolutely every single aspect of your marketing efforts -- so you can discover exactly what is working and what is NOT. When it comes to your email campaigns, I strongly urge you to test as many different elements as possible:

The email: Be sure to test different email messages to see which one encourages the greatest number of buyers through to your sales letter.

The Subject lines: This is the first point of contact with your audience. Your subject line has to grab their attention and encourage them to open your email!

The offer: Try testing different price points, different bonuses to go along with your main product, different product "bundles" -- as many variables as you can come up with.

The list: Send the same offer to different segments of your list (e.g., your customers vs. your subscribers)

The calls to action: You never know what language is going to get your readers to click on your call to action! Maybe they'll respond to a simple "click here." Or maybe they like more casual language, such as "check it out by visiting..." Maybe they don't need the URL written out for them -- or maybe they do. The only way to know for sure is to test different calls to action -- and see which works best for you!

The Best Timing: Which day of the week yields the best response? And which time of day? Will you get better results if you send on Wednesday at 12:00 p.m. -- or Sunday at 11:30 in the morning? Once again, the only way to know for sure is to TEST. Most email marketing solutions allow you to do this kind of testing. If yours doesn't, it's time for you to start looking for a new software package or service provider.

A responsive email list = more Income for you!

Follow the rules! These are the international laws that outline what email campaigns can and cannot do in order to avoid being labeled as spammers.

At any moment we wish; we can discipline ourselves to change it all. Any moment we wish, we can open a book that will expose our mind to new knowledge. Any moment we wish, we can start a new a campaign. Any moment we wish, we can start the process of business change. We can do it today or next year, but time is the only resource that once lost can never be regained.

You can purchase this best seller "Believe the Dream" at http://emmanuelsodipo.com
Emmanuel Sodipo is a consultant managing several successful online businesses you can download a Free book at http://scrollsolutions.com

Increase Car MPG - 9 Effective Ways to Increase Gas Mileage

There are a lot of methods to Increase Car MPG or rather increase gas mileage, you probably have read or heard all the methods somewhere, since they sound so trivial, you might be ignoring it. Some of them do not work and some of them work, if you just implement four to five of these methods consistently, saving hundreds a year is not impossible.

Tuning up your engine, this does a big effect to increase gas mileage (incorrect fuel ratio, spark timing and plugs can affect the MPG of your car)
Stop turning on the engine when you are not driving and avoid stop you might want to take alternative routes (traffic jam is bad for your emotional state and your car MPG, and indirectly affect your income)
Use a good oil (synthetic oil with a friction that reduces oil additive has been proven to increase car MPG by 10%)
Reduce weight in your car (forbid people to take a ride!!, I mean remove unnecessary objects from your car)
Make use your cruise control whenever it is possible
Reducing resistance while traveling, pay attention whether your tires are properly inflated
Never Use Your air conditioner (I know it is impossible, but you can use it less, right?)
Help your engine overcome the gravity while climbing hill, you only need to close your windows
Can You keep your highway speed at 55-60 mph? It could increase gas mileage by 25% (are you shocked? Everyone knows it is tough)

Do they sound very hard to implement? Increase car MPG by doing them consistently would be tough, you might be able to do it in the first two weeks but after that, I am sure most people will give up.

There is no reason for you to lose hope though, you can increase car MPG with a hidden secret method (actually it is well known), which is to run car on water.

Is it possible to run car on water?

Yes, it is. In fact this technology was invented 80 years ago but it was kept secret because of some political reasons. Today with the power of the internet, people can get the guide easily and enjoy their life, in which they do not have to worry about rising gas price.

Running car on water with hydrogen on demand system can increase gas mileage by 100%, it has been proven. As a matter fact, CNN has interviewed a guy that has managed to convert his car to run on water and save hundreds of Dollars every month.

Amazingly you do not have to spend $1000 instead you only need to spend $150 for a complete hydrogen on demand system. The interesting part is that you can claim your IRS tax refund (for driving a more environment friendly car) and keep even more money in your pocket. What would you do if you can increase car MPG and save money massively?

Are you going to be the next CNN guy that saves thousands of Dollars every year and stop worrying about gas price? Visit Increase Car MPG - 9 Effective Ways to increase gas mileage for the best guide

Chrisitna Lanzaat is a dedicated wife, she successfully turned her husband's car to run on water. To help anybody escape from the sky rocketing gas price and save the earth, visit Run Car on Water to see how she did it.

7 Proven Cost-Effective Ways to Increase the Value of Your Home

Real Estate remains an excellent investment most of the time. If you can afford to purchase home, you may want to purchase a home. Check if you can afford a home every now and then. Land values appreciate over a period of time. Thus, the land values do not appreciate all the time. In an economic downturn, the land values depreciate. Luckily, there are things that you can do to appreciate your real estate property regardless of economic situation.

First, figure out your priority and budget. List the project in priority sequence. Second, watch out on overspending. Look at the market value around your neighborhood. Suppose the market value around your neighborhood comes to $300,000 and the market value of you home comes to $200,000, try not to spend over the potential capital gains ($300,000 - $200,000). In worst case, the seller gets back 40% to 90% on how much you spend to improve the value of the house. Otherwise, you get the maximum capital gains ($300,000 - $200,000). Third, spend on what gives an excellent first impression. This pertains to what you can see as oppose to hidden things. Finally, improve to increase the potential income. Appraiser analyses if the addition would increase income. For example, you added a carport. A carport increase rental income at least $100 per month.

1. Tidy up the property
When the potential buyer drives past your home and your home looks like a garbage dump, the potential buyer just drives past your home without bothering to check the home. So, rake the leaves, clean up the garbage, and take off the weeds.

2. Neat Landscape
A manicured lawn, trees, and flowers bring peace and relaxation effect to the buyer. A great landscape adds $7,000 to the price of home value.

3. Paint the interior and exterior
New paint draws potential buyers and improves curb appeal. Use a different color on windows and doors to provide contrast. And, new paint seems to increase the size of the interior.

4. Tile around fire place or add a fireplace
Build character to your place by tiling around the fireplace. If you are going to add a fireplace, try to use non-gas fake fireplace. Since oil and gas prices increase all the time, buyer stays away from gas fireplace.

5. Hard-wood floors and wood paneling
Wood panel adds warmth for $500 to you kitchen, while Hard-wood floors adds elegance for $1000 to room.

6. Power-wash and refinish wood deck
Power-wash removes dirt, algae, mold, mildew, and stains on the wood deck. Vibrant wood color comes alive when you refinish the coatings.

7. New Carport
It pays to erect a new carport. It only takes four poles and roof. With an erected carport, you can easily convert to a garage by enclosing the carport and adding a gate.

Dennis Estrada is a webmaster of mortgage calculators website which calculate the monthly payment, bi-weekly payment, affordability, refinance, annual percentage rate, discount points, and more.

Article Marketing: Effective Strategy To Increase Website Traffic And Increase Business Income

Is article marketing still an effective strategy to increase website traffic and lead to an increase in potential business income in today's fast-paced technical environment? It can be, if done correctly and in conjunction with some other online marketing strategies.

Put quite simply, article marketing is a traffic generator. It is specifically designed to build an online presence for your website and drive traffic to that website in order to convert traffic to customers. The savvy internet article marketer will develop a strategy to incorporate article writing with video marketing and search engine optimization (SEO).

The key to effective article marketing is optimization. You must understand key words and how they affect the success of your article, and consequently, your website traffic. Maximized articles will ideally contain two percent "key word rich" content that will be published on an articles managing platform such as EzineArticles. These articles go out into the Internet for all time, helping to establish your online presence, add to your credibility, driving traffic to a specific website, and, ultimately, increasing sales, thus leading to an increase in business income.

A successful business marketing strategy will also incorporate the use of video marketing, such as YouTube, along with a Social Media marketing campaign. The success of Facebook and Twitter among big corporation advertising has been phenomenal, so it certainly is understandable that smaller businesses would build a marketing strategy incorporating these options.

There is a lot to learn in the world of article marketing and how to best put your skills to use. There is certainly a learning curve involved while learning the terminology and different strategies. You may experience "information overload" as there are so many directions you can take your marketing strategies. Each internet marketing "guru" has his own idea of what will make you an "Instant Millionaire." Stay focused on your basic internet article marketing skills and realize that you will NEVER wake up one morning with a million dollars and a mansion. It is hard work, and it does take time, but the pay-off is there and you can increase your profits.

Using article marketing is still the most effective, proven way to increase traffic to your website, and increase your business income through your online exposure.

If you are interested in learning what it takes to become an internet article marketer, or if you would interested in learning the proven, effective strategies for building your presence online and increasing your business profits, please visit our website at http://www.realmoneyteam.com

We can teach you the secrets you must know to increase your website traffic and convert visitors into customers! To get three free internet marketing tutorials, please visit our website.

2 Popular Ways to Increase Your Penis Size - Do Either of These Enlargement Methods Work?

Who else wants to take a look at even MORE ways to increase your penis size from home? If you are anything like most of our readers, you certainly want to do exactly that.....and more! But with so many male enhancement methods on the market today, it becomes VERY important to separate the ones that WORK...from those that are simply set up to "work you" out of your hard earned income and energy. Let's look at 2 popular choice for men looking to enlarge their anatomies, and see if there is any truth to their claims. Read on..:-)

Penis Enlargement Pills

Yes, these are the pills you pop to enlarge your penis from home....usually, as advertised, by engorging your member with blood while erect. But do they work you want to know? In our experience, sadly...the answer is NO! (unless you are taking them for sexual dysfunction - which is a totally DIFFERENT breed of drugs, which ARE indeed effective) Most penis enlargement pills are nothing more that herbs, supplements and other ingredients that are purported to dialtate the blood vessels and allow more blood to flow to the penis. While this can conceivably occur, there is NO long term (no pun intended..:-) size gains that occur as a result.

Topical and Trans dermal Patches and Potions:

Does applying a gelatinous cream or ointment on your pelvis enlarge your penis? The answer, unfortunately is a resounding no..:-) While these products would in fact be a dream come true if they worked - the simple truth is that the only thing PROVEN to grow from patches are the bank accounts of the people who are selling them! Again, as we've recommended to MANY men who've used patches and potions in the past, simple and natural male enhancement exercise is a FAR more sound strategy for getting great gains than this is..:-)

As with everything else in the Men's health domain, knowledge is POWER, and information is EVERYTHING!

And remember, with our modern day understanding of anatomy, and the variety of holistic, alternative, natural approaches to OPTIMIZING our bodies in all sorts of ways...it is now common practice for men everywhere, who know how - to systematically improve, build and increase our penis size and do it quickly.

The need for creams, hanging weights and other esoteric methods are not only strange and potentially dangerous - they are also finally completely obsolete and unnecessary.

So while they may be laughing at you behind your back...trust me, they won't be for long! Take a little bit of time and learn how your anatomy works, and how simple exercises and optimizations you can make, everyday can yield a RADICAL increase in your penis size without the worry. I did...and it was the best decision I ever made!!

Effective Ways To Make Money Online In 2011 - 5 Methods You Can Start Using Now To Make Money

It is possible to make money on the internet using various ways. You have to do some research on ways to make money online in 2011 to help you understand the essential steps required. There are advantages and disadvantages of every online business.

The first thing that you should do is consider what you can offer online to make money. You can write articles or design websites for other people to make money. Use your specialty to make money, but make sure you have time to the work. Take your time to check the market of the business that you want to do online to make sure that you have a chance to make money. Below are some of the businesses that can help you make money this year and increase your income to meet all your expenses comfortably.

Freelance work- This requires you to have some skills in a certain things like writing or marketing products. There are many people looking for writers online. Other jobs available include programming, photography, graphic design and creating websites. You need good rating to help you make good money, but this is possible after you have proven that you can deliver quality work.

Use Q & A sites- This allows you to work as an online researcher where you answer other people's questions. These questions can be about anything and includes law, investments, marketing and even homework given to students.

Make your blog- You can use your blog to make money as long as you can generate good traffic. This makes visitors on your websites click on affiliate links and ads there and hence increase your income. People can buy products or order for certain services from your blogs. This is possible when your sites are highly optimized by the search engines.

Online surveys- You can check for legitimate site that offers survey jobs and make some money online. This business does not pay much, but it does not require any training. Be careful not to fall in the hands of scammers.

Tutorial and teaching online- You can apply for a teaching job online. You can make some money by assisting other people in their academic assignments. There are sites that hire tutors for students who want learn various subjects on the internet. They pay to access the information and this creates jobs for teachers and tutors.

Also Pay Close Attention To This: Are you struggling to make real money online? If you are then you need to follow the methods inside mass money makers to start making real money online. It's real easy once you have a proven system to follow. So check out this video on the next page a learn how to start earning a full time income online will working only a few hours per day: Click Here Now!

You Can Increase Your Profits Without Raising Your Prices

This Article Is Based On Proven Real-Life Practice

The ideas, concepts and strategies I advocate for adoption in this article are based on proven practice. In fact, the case study and specific analogies used are based on real-life activities that I personally partook in over a period of six years, as a manager in a large blue-chip multinational brewing company. Read my article titled "Use Custom Automation Of Your Spreadsheet Reports To Drive Down Costs And Increase Your Profits" for additional details of my experiences in this area, while in paid employment.

What you learn from reading the above mentioned article, will hopefully encourage you to seriously explore ways to put the information provided in this article to good use for your business. The principles described below can be successfully adapted to virtually any business operation - be it service or production based.

If you need any help with thinking up ways/means of putting them to use, I would be pleased to help out.

Case Study

"Because its purpose is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two - and only these two - basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and Innovation produce results. All the others are costs" - Peter Drucker

What follows is a bit of a simplistic example, but it serves the intended purpose of providing a basis for the following discussion. The logic on which this analogy is based can be applied to any situation.

African Arts Concepts Limited (a hypothetical company) uses three raw materials, A, B and C in producing their flagship brand Product Z - which sells for N14,000 naira (about $100 equivalent, using a N140.00 Naira to $1.00 US dollar currency conversion rate) per unit - in the following combination:

5 lengths of material A(N2,500.00) + 1 kg of material B(N1,500.00) + 20 pieces of material C(N,2500.00) = 1 unit of Product Z(N6,500.00 Naira or $46.43 US Dollars).

Assume other (say operational and marketing) expenses amount to N500 per unit of Product Z , the Cost Price for one unit would be N7,000.00($50.00) - approximately. That means whenever 1 unit of Product Z is sold, a gross profit of N7,000 (N14,000 - N7,000) or $50.00 USD is made by African Arts Concepts Ltd.

THE PROBLEM (Common To Many Businesses)

Now imagine that a staff of African Arts Concepts Limited begins to over use (and this does happen!) material B by say 0.5kg for every unit of Product Z. The usage cost for(i.e. cost of using) Material B per unit of Product Z produced will become N2,250(N1,500.00 plus N750.00) .

5 lengths of material A(N2,500.00) + 1 kg of material B(N1,500.00) + 0.5 kg of material B(unrecorded N750.00 usage cost ) + 20 pieces of material C(N2,500.00) = 1 unit of Product Z(N7,250.00 Naira or $51.79 US Dollars).

Adding the other (operational and marketing) expenses of N500 per unit of Product Z, would bring the cost price/unit of Product Z to N7,750($55.4 USD), instead of N7,000($50.00 US Dollars). In otherwords, the company incurs an - unnecessary - N750 or $5.4 US Dollars additional cost to produce EACH unit of Product Z.

That extra $5.4 would most likely be LOST because:

(a). African Arts Concepts Limited may not detect it - except they have monitoring systems(e.g. a custom automated Variable Cost Analysis Spreadsheet) set up to alert them to such occurrences.

That batch of Product Z will therefore still be sold for $100.00 US Dollars per unit(a 20% LOSS).

(b). Even if it is detected, little can be done to correct it for batches that would already have been produced BEFORE discovery/correction of the problem.

Multiple Negative Consequences

If continued unchecked, this over usage can quickly cause huge losses: Multiply the N750 naira ($5.4 USD) over usage by say 1000 units of Z produced in a month and you get N750,000($5,400 USD) - lost unknowingly.(That $5,400 USD over usage equates to losing 54 market ready units of Product Z!).

What will typically happen is that at the end of the month, the company would find that they have 500kg LESS of material B left than expected. This would subsequently require them to make an additional unplanned purchase of material B using money budgeted for other purposes - thereby disrupting cash flow etc.

The foregoing is one major reason why some businesses that appear to be doing well suddenly go under, or record low profits/losses! They fail to keep a grip on their real costs of operation. What has been described here is applicable to virtually any type of business - be it service or product based. One only needs to change the items of income and expenditure considered in delivering the relevant product/service.

Question: How Do I Prevent A Problem Like The One Above Happening To Me?

Answer: By Adopting Variable Costs(VC) Monitoring/Control Techniques.

I like to think of Variable Costs, from a lay man's perspective, as those expenses you incur, which can(and do) vary depending on your ability to find cheaper yet equally - if not more - effective ways to do what you do, when compared to your current methods.

To implement a VC Monitoring/Control system, you can follow the steps outlined below - making needed adjustments to suit the peculiarities of your unique situation or need (Note that the use of spreadsheets is integral to the approach I recommend, as it facilitates sustainability of systems set up).

Step 1 : Collate Relevant Data in Spreadsheets : Start recording and analysing your business revenue and daily operating expenses, including variable cost elements such as how much you spend on marketing, transportation, phone calls, materials usage etc. You can easily do this by creating Excel spreadsheets with raw data entry interfaces linked to standard reporting templates(which generate meaningful output from formulas applied to your raw data).

For best results, you might find recording materials usages in the same spreadsheet, with their corresponding prices helps in deriving expenses relevant to materials usages(by simple linking of cells to be multiplied e.g. "Kgs" used by price per kg).

Step 2 : Benchmark Your Process : You will also need to do some benchmarking by obtaining detailed industry data for businesses similar to yours. Using that data, you would derive weighted averages, upper and lower control limits etc. These could then be charted in your spreadsheet using actual data you would periodically post. Your objective in managing your business/process would then be to ensure your Key Performance Indicators(KPIs) fall between the established control limits implying that it is performing optimally.

If during your daily, weekly or monthly recording and monitoring, you then notice any of your charted KPIs deviating outside the favourable range, you would be able to quickly investigate and correct the problem before it goes too far. In the case study used above for example, if a target usage rate of material B per unit of Product Z produced had been routinely recorded in a spreadsheet, and plotted on say a Schewart chart, the CONTINUOUS over usage of 0.5kg per unit would have reflected in the slope of the chart - and therefore led to early detection.

Again, this is a simplistic approach. More effective methods(e.g. automated plotting of a Cusum - Cumulative Sum Deviation chart) can be easily employed using spreadsheets with about the same effort. I cover Cusum charts, and how to use them, in considerable detail in my forthcoming article titled "Simple Performance Measurement/Process Control Tools You Can Use In Your Business".

Question: Okay, That's To Detect/Stop Things Getting Out Of Hand. But HOW Exactly Do I Go About INCREASING My Profits Without Raising My Prices?

Answer: By Applying Practical Variable Costs(VC) REDUCTION Techniques.

As I earlier stated, your variable costs are those expenses you incur, which can(and do) vary depending on your ability to find cheaper yet equally if not more effective ways to do what you do, when compared to your current methods.

By implication therefore, a VC REDUCTION Strategy is bound to make a difference to your bottom line profits.

Adopting this strategy means you will actively encourage/engage in the routine search for quick, easy, practical, inexpensive, and sustainable ways to drastically cut down on the expenses required to make and/or deliver your products and services to those who want them.

The foregoing underscores Peter Drucker's assertion that Marketing and Innovation are the two basic functions in any business which can enhance its profitability. All others are costs.

Therefore To Increase Your Profits Without Raising Prices :

1. Increase Your Marketing (While Reducing Your VC): Find more NEW customers more frequently. But in doing so, think up cheaper and more effective/efficient ways to reach more people who fit your target audience profile. Even if you already have a website, chances are there are still a number of viable ways you could use it to achieve this purpose, that you are YET to explore. Take it from me. I get so so much done at little or no extra expense using my website resources more creatively.

One reason why this is possible is because I have devoted hundreds of hours to learning web design, custom CGI programming and web marketing techniques.

If you actively work to find new customers, you create a growing pool of clients from whom you can generate referrals and repeat businesses resulting in higher sales volumes/turnover. Also, it helps you cover gaps that will occur periodically from client attrition or turnover.

Use Your Website More Effectively: Traditional methods of business marketing and advertising can be quite expensive especially when used for protracted periods. The dilemma of the business owner who seeks increased exposure therefore tends to be, finding a reliable way to stay in touch with(or visible to) her target audience without going bankrupt.

The answer, from my experience lies in learning how to intelligently leverage technology and the Internet to complement the marketing efforts being made offline, in a way that cumulatively lowers overall expenses incurred - resulting in increased profits over time. Read my article titled "Zero Cost Methods To Boost Your Business Marketing and Cuts Your Costs Using Your Website" for tested and proven ideas, methods, tools and resources you can use.

2. Innovate More (By Reducing Your VC) : Actively work to discover and implement quicker, cheaper and easier ways to deliver the same products/services to those who want them. Assume you previously could only turn out 1000 units of your product per month at a cost of $5.00 per unit(to sell at $5.75 per unit). Then following a change in your procedures, suggested by one of your employees - who gets rewarded accordingly :-) - you are subsequently able to routinely churn out 1500 units per month at the same $5.00 cost per unit, the implications for your year end profitability are obvious. Entrenching a continuous improvement culture in your operations will facilitate innovation - to your ultimate benefit.

Use Your Spreadsheet And Accountant

To reduce your VCs, you need to measure, record, analyse and trend your data. Many of the income and expense items you need to capture in your monitoring are likely to be the same ones your accountant/auditor would focus on in helping you prepare your end of year accounts for tax returns computation.

Therefore, at this stage you might find it useful to involve your accountant in generating the spreadsheet you want to use - or even have him give you one s/he uses, so you can adapt it for your purposes.

Justification For Using VC Reduction(Instead Of Price Increases) To Increase Profits

No matter how large your turnover or revenue is, control of your expenses is the only sure way to reasonably ensure your profits are maintained in the face of fierce/increasing competition, and/or market fluctuations. This is especially so, because you cannot raise your selling prices at will - else you price yourself out of the reach of your target customers.

Three(3) Practical Benefits Of Applying VC Monitoring/Control And Reduction Initiatives In Your Business

1. Long Term Affordability Of Your Products/Services - You will be able to price more competitively and still retain good profit margins even when market situations do not favour most other operators. You would have greater customer appeal. More customers are likely to be able to afford you i.e. your VC reduction efforts enable you price your products/service in such a way that they never become too expensive for your clients/customers.

Also, your ability to cut down your expenses without negatively affecting your product/service quality or delivery, will make it possible for you to offer lower prices/rates and depend on sales volume to sustain the same profit margins. The resultant increased customer base, will naturally afford you increased marketing opportunities, Enhanced ability to withstand/survive market place or industry fluctuations and so on.

This is easy to appreciate. A good example of a business that obviously has a competitive edge of this type in the market place is Richard Branson's Virgin Airlines. They offer some of the lowest rates available in the airline industry, often delivering about the same quality of service as their competitors - who may not all necessarily be too pleased about it :-). If Virgin did not have the means of sustaining this practice, while remaining profitable, they would have crashed out of business long ago.

I never get the accountants in before I start up a business. It's done on gut feeling, especially if I can see that they are taking the mickey out of the consumer. - Richard Branson

2. Increased Assurance Of Sustainable/Increasing profits - Which would you prefer: More Revenue? Or more Profits? At the risk of stating the obvious, if you do not control your expenses, your revenue can increase without a corresponding increase in your PROFITS. One does not have to be in a business where billions need to be spent before knowing that this is true.

When two units - instead of one - of a raw material are used to produce 1 unit of your bottled juice, you are spending more to produce that bottle, hence your profit margin for that bottle will drop by the value of that extra unit of raw material used, be it with or without your knowledge.

Whether you know about it or not; whether you measure it or not is immaterial, and will not change the fact that you will earn a lower margin on that product. If that then happens to many products(or a larger number of the same product), you may find at the month or year end, you get a shocking low profit declaration when you(or your accountant/auditor) reconcile expenses, revenues etc for the period.

Things could even fall apart before then. That's when you see a company that gets plenty of business from old and new clients struggling to find money to run daily operations and make salaries payment(cash flow)!

This is why setting up a Variable Costs Monitoring/Control and Reduction System is important. It will help you keep a close watch on all the important measures of your business' operational performance, so that you can easily, discover undesirable trends and nip them in the bud. At the same time, you would be able to intelligently experiment with changes aimed at reducing your operations costs, and monitor their impact in order to decide whether or not make them permanent.

3. Greater Operational Efficiency In Using Labour/Resources/Time : Uncover the invisible costs by using spreadsheet tracking. Some costs are more visible than others. It is those "invisible" cost channels that I refer to here. They are the "potential" profit drain pipes. Do you know how to identify, monitor and control them in your business? Are you sure you're not missing a few critical ones? Often times they are avoidable - should not be there - but because the business owner has no monitoring/control system in place, they build up over time, till they cause BIG problems.

Examples include theft/pilfering by outsiders or staff, materials over usages, idle/downtimes in different aspects of your operations, overstaffing, etc. All these things can - and do - happen. The challenge is for the business owner or decision maker to setup monitoring systems to quickly throw up inconsistencies in the inflow/outflow etc of the concerned items.

Want To REMAIN In Business For The Long Term?

As more and more people go into business for themselves, every owner will have to contend with increased availability of the same products/services in the same market. As has happened in the past, some will have done their operations management so efficiently that they will be able to drop their prices significantly below the market price(or refuse to increase them), and still make as much profit as (or even more than!) their rivals. The latter on the other hand would struggle to match such price drops if their operating costs are higher - possibly resulting in their being forced out of the market.

This applies to one-man businesses as well as corporate multinationals, be they product manufacturers, distributors, resellers or service providers. The only people who don't worry about cutting costs in order to give customers/clients stable or even lower prices, are monopolies(due to lack of competitors) and those who "buy their way" to new business.

For those who play by the rules, your ultimate objective, if your business is to GROW, will have to be to put money in your pocket, that you can spend without looking over your shoulder for creditors(or the IRS - for taxes) and without running out of money to run your business(cash flow). The wise owner will make a habit of continually exploring Variable Cost Monitoring/Control and Reduction initiatives, that will enable successful delivery of larger numbers of products/services at lesser cost, in lesser time, and using lesser resources.

I could go on, but I think the point I've made here is clear enough already. So much thinking/re-organisation will have to be done initially to develop the needed systems. But the process once started, can only get easier. And the positive benefits derivable from adopting this approach will be immediately obvious.

If You Remember Nothing Else, Remember The Following:

1. One good way to maintain and/or significantly increase your profits without raising your prices, is to reduce your Variable Costs(VCs).

2. You can reduce your variable costs by marketing more efficiently (getting more customers at lesser cost, AND maintaining them at lower expense). I once read an article that proposed a new parameter COCS: Cost Of Customers Sold or Served). This could be adopted as a Key Performance Indicator(KPI).

3. You can also reduce your variable costs by innovating more(i.e. developing greater efficiency in your routine internal operations and/or product/service delivery). That way, you would be able to produce/deliver more products and/or services with less effort, in less time, and using less resources. All of these would imply LOWER expenses/costs, leading to INCREASED profit retention per unit of product/service sold.

4. There is saying that : "You cannot manage something, if you do not measure it. Nor can you measure it, if you do not record it". Spreadsheet tracking will help you conveniently implement and sustain the process of monitoring, controlling and/or reducing your VCs. You will need to do this so as to constantly evaluate progress of your VC monitoring/control and reduction initiatives.

Self-Development/Performance Enhancement Specialist ? Tayo Solagbade - works as a Multipreneur, helping individuals/businesses develop and implement strategies to achieve their goals, faster and more profitably.

Email Tayo's FREE Layman's Business Variable Costs Control Systems Awareness Quiz? to yourself (Click Here). It contains seventeen(17) questions designed to get you thinking about possible areas in which you can look to apply spreadsheet facilitated Variable Costs monitoring/control and reduction initiatives in your business.