By Marlon Sanders

Whether you use Netscape, Internet Explorer,
Eudora, Pegasus, Microsoft Outlook, or some other
program to send and receive email, they all allow
you to set up what is called a signature file or
sig file for short.

This sig file is added automatically at the bottom
of every email you send to your friends and business
contacts. All you do is customize your email program
"Options" and pre-define the signature file you want
to use.

I'm not sure about the other programs but I do know
that Eudora allows you to have multiple signature
files so you can actually create one for each
product you promote through an associate program!

For example, you can create and use a signature file
that promotes "The Amazing Formula That Sells
Products Like Crazy" from www.amazingformula.com

All you do is use this line as your signature file:

Best Wishes,
Your Name

Do you know the Amazing Formula?
www.amazingformula.com/cgi-bin/t.cgi/XXXXXX

(Of course you change the six XXXXXX to your
six digit Reseller ID first before you save the signature
so any sales you make from the signature file can be
tracked and credited to your account.)

A secondary signature file can be created that
promotes the "Push Button Letters Software" program
from http://www.pushbuttonletters.com

Best Wishes,
Your Name

At last, fill in the blanks, click a button,
and out pops a sales letter 100% customized
for your business, product, or service!

Click here for your sales letter:
www.pushbuttonletters.com/cgibin/t.cgi/XXXXXX

When you're sending an email to someone all you
need to do is figure out which signature file will be
the most suitable and select that one. This allows
you to target your signature file promotions.

If you're not sure how to set up your signature file
for the specific type of email program that you are
using just open the program then go into "Help"
and type in the search term "signature".

You'll find full step by step instructions to use.

In Eudora you just open your mail program then
choose TOOLS > SIGNATURES. Then when your
signature option opens up just "Right Click" on
the left and choose "NEW".

You can create your signature, choose SAVE
and then name it relevant to the product you
are promoting.

Next time you send an email and you want to
add a signature file that promotes "Push Button
Letters" just get ready to send the email and then
from the top left you choose "Push Button" (or
whatever you named the signature file) and it
will be automatically added to your outgoing email.

Other places you can post your new sig files:

In addition to email, if you make helpful posts in
discussion forums and newsgroups, you are usually
given a place to list your web site address and a
5-7 word description. You can place your "Do you
know the amazing formula?" tag line there.

In the resources chapter of the "Associate Program
Marketing Handbook" there is a web site that allows
you to search 250,000 online forums.

A secret few people know...

There are ways to search message boards and forums
by the topic or key word of post. That way,
instead of just monitoring a few forums the whole
Internet is your playing field. This is covered in the
"Resources Chapter" of the Associate Handbook.

With this knowledge, you could spend 1-3 hours a
day just making posts using this promotion method,
depending of course on your topic.

OK, let's discuss specifics on how to do it.

Here's an example of how you put your tagline in
most online discussion forums.

Just be sure you don't spam forums, mailing lists
or discussion boards with commercial posts. The
proper approach is simply to give intelligent
answers to the questions other participants ask
and list your reseller URL and a brief
description. That's it.

Placing pure commercial posts or hyping products
in discussion boards can get both you and the
associate program owner in trouble. Don't do it!

Listen up: Do NOT post your reseller URL in
newsgroups. Only use your autoresponder address.
Why? Because if you screw up and offend someone,
chances are they'll do whatever they can to get
the actual associate program site shut down.

People in newsgroups don't screw around so make
SURE you always follow the posting rules.

I encourage you to post your reseller URL in
forums and discussion boards. But not newsgroups!
It's against our reseller program policy and may be
for other programs as well.

Newsgroups are dangerous and not for beginners.
It's fine and even encouraged for beginners to
participate in online forums. You're much more
welcome there.

When you scan down the posts in the forums, you'll
see people asking all kinds of questions and
requesting resources. You make a helpful post
answering their question and then type in your URL
and tagline in the place provided. That's it.

The KEY to a post that gets you lots of hits is
the subject line. You are always allowed to give
your post a title. Here's an example of how to
type in your subject line.

I like to post a subject line that promises valuable
information. Think of something that will make
other people want to read the post.

Here are some examples of subject lines I have
used:

"I made $1,300 from 2 ezine articles"
"6 traffic tips"
"Killer 3D graphics in under 5 minutes!"
"Free online secured ordering"

Please understand -- these are ONLY for my
various products.

I can't possibly cover the wide variety of products
you may be reselling for other companies. But I can tell
you that you'll get some excellent headline ideas
by reading the titles of articles on the cover of
Cosmopolitan magazine. Study those and it should
come easy to you.

Beyond that, all you do is place helpful posts in
online forums. You can post brief tips that
CONTAIN USEFUL INFORMATION. Do NOT under any
circumstances post an ad for a product. Always,
always, always post valuable information and then
refer to your free report in your SIG line.

I don't care what product you're selling --
computer software, a dating service, or bananas to
Eskimos. You can always come up with
problem-solving tips for the target audience.

How to track your posting results

In the Associate Handbook chapter on how to
eliminate long reseller URL's, I give you a free way
to track your advertising results. You can also use
a commercial tracking service. See the resources
section for more information.

The subject line of your post determines most of
the response to it.

Be careful of a practice called cross-posting.
This is where you write one tip or article and
post it to multiple forums. This is generally
frowned on.

However, you can write these tips quickly with
practice. So write different tips and rotate them
to different forums. You could place a tip in one
forum. Then 3 to 6 weeks later place it in another
forum.

Or just write fresh tips. What you can and cannot
do depends greatly on the forums you are posting
to.

A routine for making sales every week

Develop a list of 10-50 forums that target your
market or different markets for the same product.

Then every day write a tip or two and post to
several forums. Get a system going and track
results. You will soon learn what works and what
doesn't.

Two routes to success

Route 1: Respond intelligently to questions that
are asked on the board. Include your url in the
space provided. You can do posts like this every
day and create a regular income. You can make the
rounds to 5-20 forums daily.

Route 2: Create canned posts that are tips and
post them. They should contain valuable
information and NOT be a pitch for a product.

If you post an obvious pitch for a product, you're
going to get fried! DO NOT DO IT. What you do is
post valuable information and include your sig
line or your URL in the space provided. If people
like your post, they will check out your web site.

THE KEY IS A SYSTEM. YOU DO IT REGULARLY AND
CONSISTENTLY. A ROUTINE. Hit and miss does not
work. Get a system. A routine. And do it all the
time without fail.

Here are examples of several of my canned posts
from the old days when I used this method:

6 free traffic tips:

1. Buy banner ads on smart clicks and let their
system select for you the most responsive
categories of web sites to promote on.

2. Go to those web sites and exchange links. Use a
CGI program to automate this.

3. Submit 500-word articles to targeted ezines.
There are a number of lists of ezines for free on
the web.

4. Run ads in targeted ezines. You must track your
results with affiliate tracking software. That way
you know where you orders come from. The same
suggestion applies to #1.

5. Start your own banner exchange on a 2 for 1
basis and use the 50% free inventory for your own
promotions.

6. Make posts in targeted forums once a week.

For more information and other cool tools, go to:
(my tracking url would be posted here)

Marlon Sanders

Here is a post I added to a forum that was not in
response to a question. Sometimes if I have neat
ideas or find a cool resource, I pass it along in
a post in several forums. If I come up with a
killer subject line, this always generates sales.

In this post, I shared a few cool ideas:

Two Cool Email Tricks & 1 website

Hi,

If you use Eudora Pro to manage your email, here
are two tricks that can save you tons of time and
make you money.

If you don't use Eudora, maybe other members will
post how to do the same things in Pegasus, Outlook
98 and other programs.

I recently discovered that I can access all
folders in Eudora (where I file my mail) using any
word processor. In your word processor, just
locate Eudora and the folder you want to open.

Click on it and presto chango -- instant access!

Once you open the file in your word processor, you
can search for any info you want. For example, I
have visitors to my web site sign up for a free
ezine. They fill out a form that gives me their
name, address, phone and other important info.

When they click the submit button, I automatically
receive the info via email. I use the filtering
feature to identify those emails by the subject
line and transfer them into my responses folder.

If I want to access all that info, all I do is
pull it up in my word processor. Pretty cool, eh?

By the way, if you'd like to set up a form like
this at your web site without CGI techie stuff and
without spending a dime, just visit:

www.freedback.com.

I have a sample at my website when you click to
subscribe to my ezine. I use the form to QUALIFY
prospects.

In addition, you can set up your own autoresponder
in Eudora by saving any document as stationery
(Select File, then stationery.) Then select
"Tools" and "Filters."

Under actions select "Reply With" and select the
name of the stationery file you saved.

As long as you can provide helpful responses
or come up with some cool tools to share with
other people in the discussion forums that you
frequent then you can use the methods outlined
in this article!

Best wishes,

Marlon Sanders

For 22 other ways to get more traffic and
sell more associate program products grab
your copy of the Associate Handbook today!

Just go to: http://www.howtoresell.com

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