Introduction to Internet Marketing

and how the Big Picture fits together

Are you a generalist or a specialist? an entrepreneur or a technician?

The Internet has room for all, but you need to understand both the big picture and where you stand, what  you are drawn to and what your particular strengths might be.

This is the problem I had when starting, faced with a multitude of voices all saying "do it my way...". How can you discriminate? Possibly through an overview understanding of the business, plus the main approaches that can be taken and an introduction to their leading exponents.

Lets start with an overview of the business model:

Understanding the basic model

The Big Picture is much the same whether you are considering a membership organisation or a purely commercial operation. Mathematically:

Traffic (web site visitors; enquirers)
x 
Conversion Rate % (of enquirers registering, becoming members or buying a product or service)
x
Average Sales Value $ (which may include a "back end" of lifetime sales or membership)
=
Gross Profit, $ (which is not always the objective but is needed in some form for sustainability).

Average Value Per Visitor (VPV) = Average Sales Value x Conversion Rate (both of which you can  increase dramatically for previous customers).

--> so you need to measure, test and optimise each of these for best results, as described below:

1. How to generate traffic to your site
2. How to convert visitors to customers
3. Speciality Niches, specialising in one area and partnering with others, each doing what they do best, e.g..:
• Affiliate deals
• Buy and sell traffic
• Consultancy

John Wragg