Six Moves Which are Dangerous for First Time Investors

First time investors whether it’s in currencies, stocks commodities or bonds should make low risk investments by using small amounts of capital.

Introduction:

Nowadays anyone that has a computer and has access to the internet and an online bank account has the ability to trade stocks and currencies almost immediately. This has meant that many investors now don’t have to rely on mutual funds or other money managers to manage their investments for them as they can now trade and manage their own investments. Unfortunately, to be a successful investor there is many pitfalls that first time investors should be wary of.

Six Moves which are Dangerous for First Time Investors:

The basic theory of all forex traders is to buy low and sell high however the key thing is to able to recognize whether a stock or a currency is undervalued or overvalued, to read up on technical and fundamental analysis, recognize a diversity of ratios and metrics. The bottom line is that investors should not jump into the markets feet first without careful preparation and study. The

How to Learn Forex Trading

High returns make foreign exchange markets (Forex) a very appealing investment option for some people. The high risk in currency trading can translate into substantial losses for even experienced traders. Learn as much as possible about how this industry works before you consider putting your money and possibly the shirt off your back on the table.

So which marketing method is best for your business ... online or offline marketing?

Of course, the traditional marketing method is offline marketing which is the use of tools like print, television, radio, newspapers, seminars, and others. Meanwhile, the contemporary way is online marketing which is the use of the Internet and cyber technology. But which is better and which provides the best results?

In this report, we are going to discuss how you can successfully market your business, products and services offline. Let's start by taking a look behind the marketing machine and see what happens in offline advertising.

Everywhere you look, technology and the Internet have touched our lives.  From things as simple as staying connected with friends to grocery shopping to even diagnosing issues with our cars, computers are feeding and sending information. Being online is one of the greatest marketing tools that you could use because you are not limited to just your local area, but you have a whole world that you can market your unique product to.

But, even if you have the best website, with the absolute best product that could change the lives of millions of people, folks won't go to your site unless you are actively marketing your site and product offline. Offline marketing is where businesses are made and are still the backbone of any online marketing success story.  While it is true that online marketing can garner you a lot of attention, offline marketing is how you keep those customers coming back for more.

So, what is offline marketing and how is different from marketing your business through the Internet? Offline marketing is an old school way of doing business and is still an extremely viable way of creating buzz about your business.  You do this by:

Placing ads through different mediums like television and radio. Most cable and regular T. V. stations will have custom packages what will fit your advertising budget to create the right commercial. This can be as expensive or as inexpensive as you want it to be, but it generally depends on what market you are in; major markets cost more money and smaller markets cost less. You can also accomplish this by getting involved as a person of interest in your local radio and TV programming.

If you are have extensive knowledge about a particular subject and you have a good personality, you could be a fantastic guest on any type of program! And as often as you are allowed, add little plugs about your business by saying the name and where you are located.

You can also put your ads in print media like magazines, publications and newspapers. Newspaper and print media ads are good since they reach a large audience of people who might not watch TV or have Internet access. You can easily promote your business by paying for a small section where you do an editorial write up of your business.  You could write about how new you are to the community, what you specialize in and where you are located.

You can also add in a special coupon as you talk about your business.  Then, a few weeks later, if the ad panned out, you should continue with a follow up of how business is going.  You can also place a regular advertisement in the paper. If you do the editorial, you probably will get more bang for your buck.

Another marketing tool is handing out business cards. Start by giving them to friends, family and co-workers.  As you start networking your business, hand them to other entrepreneur's that you come into contact with.

Another cheap advertising alternative is posting flyers, tri-folds and posters talking about your business.  You should put your business name, address, phone number, website and a brief synopsis of what your business does or who you cater to.  Always put a coupon on these because that helps bring customers in.

You can also send newsletters through regular mail. This is easily accomplished once you have established a group of clients.  By sending out newsletters, you are informing your customers of what is going on, what is coming in and new promotions you are featuring.

Cheap giveaway items like pencils, pens and magnets with your business information on them is another great way to promote your business. Everyone loves a free pen or something else they can use.  Make sure that your logo, your business name and pertinent information is on the item so they will know who gave it to them. Marketing your business offline is all about making those important personal connections.

Offline marketing is a very old school way of getting the word out about your business and it is completely different than the impersonal world of Internet marketing. Anyway you go, whether you use print, TV or radio to advertise your business is considered an offline method of marketing.

Marketing this way is a viable way in which you can bring customers to your business and will produce results. If you want to be successful in any business venture, then you need know how to use the resources you have to their fullest potential.  That includes knowing how to use the Internet to market online and how to use your real-world network to market offline.

Now let's go over the different resources available to help you expand your knowledge of offline marketing methods. Despite what you may think about online marketers, even the largest corporations in the world still do offline marketing, because it works quite well. Offline marketing strategies formed the backbone of business when these methods were first used.

After all, it has to work, otherwise it wouldn't have been used for so long, right? It's necessary to become familiar with all the different kinds of offline marketing strategies used in the practice in order to maximize your potential and get as many leads as possible for your business. The correct resources for offline marketing are required.

When trying to figure out how best to implement offline marketing, what resources do you have to work with in that regard? Try some of these potential resources:

You might find a lot of business books currently that tell you to focus on online marketing as your primary method of advertising. There are still books out there that have a focus on physical methods of marketing, though. You can find plenty of literature that tells you how to use brick and mortar methods to advertise your offline store, or even an online one.

If you want, there's the option of getting advice from people who are doing it successfully by attending seminars that can teach you how to do it. Once there, you can get expertise and tips from people who have real experience with offline marketing and how simple it is to perform. At a seminar, you can communicate with a real person who has gone through it and can answer whatever questions you may have about the process. There's no need for you to stumble around in the dark, because you can communicate with people who already know how to do it.

Don't just go to a few seminars and think you know everything there is to know, however - get in touch with other people who participate in offline marketing. You might not be able to get this advice from people with large markets to work on, but you can pick up a few tricks from people who are working in smaller markets. If you apply these unconventional techniques, they might even help your business.

Even though there are entirely different schools of thought between offline and online marketing, it might shock you to find offline marketing resources online. There are plenty of websites out there that are chock full of relevant information. You can get help from other people wanting the same thing in online forums.

There are even downloadable ebooks that can give you plenty of offline marketing tips that you can use for your business. You don't even have to pay for this advice, as ebooks are often supplied to you free of charge, making them quite a bargain for free advice. Just download them and read them from your computer, and if you need help that it can provide, just reference it.

It's often very hard to go ahead with offline marketing, especially since the Internet is the new marketplace. However, since there are so many offline marketing resources you can available, there's no reason not to give these methods a try.

Now let's talk about some simple strategies that you can use in your offline marketing campaign. When companies want to expand their audience and get their names out there, they turn to online marketing strategies to get the job done. Compared to traditional marketing, you won't find a more practical or cost effective advertising method. In recent years, however, the trend of Internet marketing has started to fade, and now offline marketing is becoming favorable.

Offline marketing strategies are even being turned to by Amazon, eBay and other online marketplaces, in order to reach out to even more people than before. Amazon now has radio commercials to speak for it, and eBay is turning to television. Offline marketing is experiencing a reawakening of sorts, since a greater number of businesses are turning to it for revolutionary ideas.

If you're considering using offline marketing strategies for your business, it's important to know who you're marketing to and how to do it. You can experience great success with your offline marketing, provided you acknowledge the importance of your audience and know how to talk to them.

Make sure you can see the world through the eyes of the people you're marketing to; find out what sorts of things they like, what they're willing to spend money on, and how much they'll spend. Your website traffic and inventory can give you the information you need to do this. Your customer list is an important and informative way to get this data about your customers.

Once you know about the likes and dislikes of your audience, your plan can start to form. Make sure you know everything about whatever print advertisement you plan on making, including all the details. Don't put anything on the poster that doesn't either personify or idealize your product or inform them where and how to get it; from color schemes to fonts, as well as organization, nothing is extraneous.

You have to get the audience to pay attention to your ad, but make it comprehensible as well. Don't allow your consumers to be confused or turned off by whatever ad you put up, due to either unreadable fonts or befuddling design. Look at your print ad from the point of view of a customer.

There are pre-testing evaluations you can do prior to sending out the ad. With this evaluation, some of your audience gets to see your print ad and tell you what they think. Make sure that they're honest with you about what they like and don't like, and have them tell you why. Inquire as to whether or not the ad gave an instant good impression, or if they understood what you were going for with the message.

Their notes will be critical in figuring out how to make your print ad better. You'll be able to improve your print ad dramatically using their feedback. You have to cater to them, since they personify the audience you're trying to reach.

Once you get your strategy and design done, your offline advertisement can go up. Make sure you get your ads into high traffic areas, or other places that will reach a lot of people at once. As you have considered the thoughts brought to you by the peer evaluation, your ad should be able to get to who you want to reach.

Just keep these simple steps in mind as you continue your offline marketing, and you'll be well on your way to successfully marketing your business.

Ok, let's go over some of the more common offline marketing mistakes, so you can avoid making them. Individuals that own businesses spend much time, effort, and money to create a marketing program that will get the most exposure, and heighten awareness of their product or service. Unfortunately, many business owners find that financial resources dry up, and their overly aggressive marketing strategy has turned away prospective buyers.

If you don't want this to happen to your business, you should develop critical thinking when it comes to marketing

Advertising. What exactly is it, anyway?

Advertising is salesmanship multiplied ... Nothing more. And advertising copy, or copywriting, is salesmanship in print.

The purpose of a copywriter’s job is to sell. Period.

The selling is accomplished by persuasion with the written word, much like a television commercial sells (if done properly) by persuading with visuals and audio.

As Claude Hopkins wrote in his timeless classic, Scientific Advertising:

“To properly understand advertising or to learn even its rudiments one must start with the right conception. Advertising is salesmanship. Its principles are the principles of salesmanship. Successes and failures in both lines are due to like causes. Thus every advertising question should be answered by the salesman's standards.

“Let us emphasize that point. The only purpose of advertising is to make sales. It is profitable or unprofitable according to its actual sales.

“It is not for general effect. It is not to keep your name before the people. It is not primarily to aid your other salesmen. Treat it as a salesman. Force it to justify itself. Compare it with other salesmen. Figure its cost and result. Accept no excuses which good salesmen do not make. Then you will not go far wrong.

“The difference is only in degree. Advertising is multiplied salesmanship. It may appeal to thousands while the salesman talks to one. It involves a corresponding cost. Some people spend $10 per word on an average advertisement. Therefore every ad should be a super-salesman.

“A salesman's mistake may cost little. An advertiser’s mistake may cost a thousand times that much. Be more cautious, more exacting, therefore. A mediocre salesman may affect a small part of your trade. Mediocre advertising affects all of your trade.”

These points are as true today as they were when they were written nearly one hundred years ago!

So the goal then becomes: how can we make our advertising as effective as possible.

The answer is to test. Test again. And then test some more.

If ad “A” receives a two percent response rate, and ad “B” receives three percent, then we can deduce that ad “B” will continue to outperform ad “A” on a larger scale.

Testing takes time, however, and can be expensive if not kept in check. Therefore, it’s ideal to start with some proven tested known ideas and work from there.

For example, if testing has shown for decades or more that targeted advertising significantly outperforms untargeted advertising (and it does), then we can start with that assumption and go from there.

If we know based on test results that crafting an ad that speaks directly to an individual performs better than addressing the masses (again, it does), then it makes little sense to start testing with the assumption that it does not. This is common sense.

So it stands to reason that knowing some basic rules or techniques about writing effective copy is in order. Test results will always trump everything, but it’s better to have a starting point before you test.

So this starting point is the essence of this book.

The ten tips expressed here have been generally time-tested and known to be effective.

But I can’t emphasize enough that when using these techniques, you should always test them before rolling out a large (and expensive) campaign.

Sometimes a little tweak here or there is all that is needed to increase response rates dramatically.

And with that, let’s move onward…


Focus on Them, Not You

When a prospect reads your ad, letter, brochure, etc., the one thing he will be wondering from the start is: “what’s in it for me?”

And if your copy doesn’t tell him, it’ll land in the trash faster than he can read the headline or lead.

A lot of advertisers make this mistake. They focus on them as a company. How long they’ve been in business, who their biggest customers are, how they’ve spent ten years of research and millions of dollars on developing this product, blah, blah.

Actually, those points are important. But they should be expressed in a way that matters to your potential customer. Remember, once he’s thrown it in the garbage, the sale is lost!

When writing your copy, it helps to think of it as writing a letter to an old friend. In fact, I often picture a friend of mine who most closely fits my prospect’s profile. What would I say to convince this friend to try my product? How would I target my friend’s objections and beliefs to help my cause?

When you’re writing to a friend, you’ll use the pronouns “I” and “you.” When trying to convince your friend, you might say: “Look, I know you think you’ve tried every widget out there. But you should know that…”

And it goes beyond just writing in the second person. That is, addressing your prospect as “you” within the copy. The fact of the matter is there are many successful ads that weren’t written in the second person. Some are written in the first person perspective, where the writer uses “I.” Other times the third person is used, with “she,” “he,” and “them.”

And even if you do write in the second person, it doesn’t necessarily mean your copy is about them.

For example:

“As a real estate agent, you can take comfort in the fact that I’ve sold over 10,000 homes and mastered the tricks of the trade”

Although you’re writing in the second person, you’re really still focusing on yourself.

So how can you focus on them? Glad you asked. One way is to…


Emphasize Benefits, Not Features

What are features? They are descriptions of what qualities a product possesses.

•   The XYZ car delivers 55 miles per gallon in the city.
•   Our ladder’s frame is made from a lightweight durable steel alloy.
•   Our glue is protected by a patent.
•   This database has a built-in data-mining system.

And what are benefits? They are what those features mean to your prospects.

•   You’ll save money on gas and cut down on environmental pollutants when you use our energy saving high-performance hybrid car. Plus, you’ll feel the extra oomph when you’re passing cars, courtesy of the efficient electric motor, which they don’t have!
•   Lightweight durable steel-alloy frame means you’ll be able to take it with you with ease, and use it in places most other ladders can’t go, while still supporting up to 800 pounds. No more backaches lugging around that heavy ladder. And it’ll last for 150 years, so you’ll never need to buy another ladder again!
•   Patent-protected glue ensures you can use it on wood, plastic, metal, ceramic, glass, and tile…without messy cleanup and without ever having to re-glue it again—guaranteed!
•   You can instantly see the “big picture” hidden in your data, and pull the most arcane statistics on demand. Watch your business do a “180” in no time flat, when you instantly know why it’s failing in the first place! It’s all done with our built-in data-mining system that’s so easy to use, my twelve year-old son used it successfully right out of the box.

I just made up those examples, but I think you understand my point.

By the way, did you notice in the list of features where I wrote “steel alloy?” But in the benefits I wrote “steel-alloy” (with a hyphen). Not sure off-hand which one is correct, but I know which one I’d use.

Here’s why: you are not writing to impress your English teacher or win any awards. The only award you’re after is your copy beating the control (control being the best-selling copy so far), so take some liberty in grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure. You want it to be read and acted upon, not read and admired!

But—back to benefits…

If you were selling an expensive watch, you wouldn’t tell your reader that the face is 2 inches in diameter and the band is made of leather.

You show him how the extra-large face will tell him the time at a glance. No sir! He won’t have to squint and look foolish to everyone around him trying to read this magnificent timepiece. And how about the way he’ll project success and charisma when he wears the beautiful gold watch with its handcrafted custom leather band? How his lover will find him irresistible when he’s all dressed up to go out, wearing the watch. Or how the watch’s status and beauty will attract the ladies.

Incidentally, did you notice how I brought up not squinting as a benefit? Does that sound like a silly benefit? Not if you are selling to affluent baby boomers suffering from degrading vision. They probably hate it when someone they’re trying to impress sees them squint in order to read something. It’s all part of their inner desire, which you need to discover. And which even they may not know about. That is, until you show them a better way.

The point is to address the benefits of the product, not its features. And when you do that, you’re focusing on your reader and his interests, his desires. The trick is to highlight those specific benefits (and word them correctly) that push your reader’s emotional hot buttons.

How do you do that?


Push Their Emotional Hot Buttons

This is where research really pays off. Because in order to push those buttons, you need to first know what they are.

Listen to this story first, and I’ll tell you what I mean: Once upon a time a young man walked into a Chevrolet dealer’s showroom to check out a Chevy Camaro. He had the money, and he was ready to make a buying decision. But he couldn’t decide if he wanted to buy the Camaro or the Ford Mustang up the road at the Ford dealer.

A salesman approached him and soon discovered the man’s dilemma.

“Tell me what you like best about the Camaro,” said the salesman.

“It’s a fast car. I like it for its speed.”

After some more discussion, the salesman learned the man had just started dating a cute college cheerleader. So what did the salesman do?

Simple. He changed his pitch accordingly, to push the hot buttons he knew would help advance the sale. He told the man about how impressed his new girlfriend would be when he came home with this car! He placed the mental image in the man’s mind of he and his girlfriend cruising to the beach in the Camaro. How all of his friends will be envious when they see him riding around with a beautiful girl in a beautiful car.

And suddenly the man saw it. He got it. And the salesman recognized this and piled it on even more. Before you know it, the man wrote a nice fat check to the Chevy dealership, because he was sold!

The salesman found those hot buttons and pushed them like never before until the man realized he wanted the Camaro more than he wanted his money.

I know what you’re thinking…the man said he liked the car because it was fast, didn’t he?

Yes, he did. But subconsciously, what he really desired was a car that would impress his girlfriend, his friends, and in his mind make them love him more! In his mind he equated speed with thrill. Not because he wanted an endless supply of speeding tickets, but because he thought that thrill would make him more attractive, more likeable.

Perhaps the man didn’t even realize this fact himself. But the salesman sure did. And he knew which emotional hot buttons to press to get the sale.

Now, where does the research pay off?

Well, a good salesman knows how to ask the kinds of questions that will tell him which buttons to press on the fly. When you’re writing copy, you don’t have that luxury. It’s therefore very important to know upfront the wants, needs, and desires of your prospects for that very reason. If you haven’t done your homework, your prospect is going to decide that he’d rather keep his money than buy your product. Remember, copywriting is salesmanship in print!

It’s been said many times: People don’t like