Rating: Poor

4. Banner Advertising

This is an "old school" advertising strategy that I have been testing again now that prices are lower. And early indications are that there is a solid reason for still-declining prices of banner advertising. My own click-through rates been less that 1% so far, with a few exceptions. But I do have some decent size banner ad runs planned for coming months at some busy, targeted sites. Time will tell if I'll continue with this strategy. If you DO want to try banner advertising, ask site you plan to advertise at what average click-through rates are and what banners perform best. That may get you up to two or three percent. If that will take you into profit, give it a whirl. But most small and home businesses may be better served using one of five advertising methods remaining.

Rating: Fair

5. Opt-in list rental

There are plenty of companies that will rent you email addresses that have opted in to receive commercial email. And if recipients are not being paid to read messages, that is they are genuinely interested in offers they signed up to receive, this strategy can be profitable. The problem is you'll pay from ten to twenty cents per address and mailing to a list large enough to get results from can be quite expensive. But if your budget can handle it, you can generate some great trageted traffic.

Rating: Good

6. Paid Search Engines Submissions

While I highly suggest submitting to all major search engines that are still free (AltaVista, Lycos, Google, HotBot, DMOZ and Direct Hit) this article is about "paying" for advertising. And there are two paid search engine services I have had very good luck with...

a. Inktomi's Search/Submit at $30 a year, which gets your URL into AOL, iWon, MSN and Looksmart directory within 48 hours.

b. Yahoo! Business Express and sponsored site listings. The business express service costs $199 for non-adult sites, and gets you Yahoo! consideration. While $199 is a little pricey for some small business owners, a good listing at Yahoo! brings quite a bit of extra traffic. Once you are listed, consider taking advantage of "sponsored site" offering for an additional monthly fee. I am sampling this currently and it paid for itself within first few weeks. My results may decline as more sites are added into sponsored sites area but I'll keep an eye on things.

Rating: Good

7. Pay per click search engines

This advertising model offers a way for you to bid on search terms and pay only when someone clicks through to your site. I've been advertising with www.goto.com and findwhat.com using this method and have had decent results. It's easy to control costs and your visitors are targeted precisely.

If you are not in a super-competitive keyword arena you can do well with pay per click engines. For example, if you sell web hosting, good luck getting traffic for less than a few bucks a click. But if you have a smaller niche, this strategy represents a great opportunity and is worth trying.

And if you DO find that this model works well for you, more than 75 additional "Pay per Click" search engines can be found at Alan Gardyne's super-duper directory... http://www.payperclicksearchengines.com

Rating: Good

8. Personalized Email Series

Here's one that many marketers don't talk about much. It's actually a secret weapon among many of big name marketers. You offer a freebie at your site and when your visitors claim it you are not only added to your opt-in list they are added to a series of personalized follow-up messages that you pre-program. If you write a powerful and effective series this marketing strategy can be one of your top sales producers.

Rating: Excellent

9. Ezine Advertising

Still one. Some people think I recommend ezine advertising because I have an ezine and I'm trying to sell my own ad space. On contrary, I've been trying NOT to sell my ad space for last few years. That's why my own rates are so high! I can run my own offers or affiliate offers and make much more than I can selling ad space. Many other ezine editors are finding same thing. While this has resulted in rising ezine ad costs over last few years, one fact remains... ezine advertising is still one of most effective ways to get targeted traffic -- cheap. Just visit an ezine directory and search for ezines in your niche market. Subscribe to a bunch and start reading them. Look for larger circulation ezines that have a good following. If you like content then thousands of other readers probably do too. Place an ad and you'll make a profit, nearly every time. Top sponsorships work best if you can swing it.

Rating: Excellent

Repetition isn't new, of course. P.T. Barnum, maybe best marketing mind world has ever seen, used this concept back in late 1800s. One of his ads had one line repeatedly saying....

TWO LIVING WHALES TWO LIVING WHALES TWO LIVING WHALES TWO LIVING WHALES TWO LIVING WHALES

You can't help but take a quick look at Barnum's ad and know he has TWO LIVING WHALES on display.

Advertising man and author Kenneth Goode, in his 1932 book, "Advertising," wrote--

"As a matter of fact, greatest of all advertising tricks is that of persistently pounding away at same suggestion while still keeping appearance of freshness of idea."

And Walter Honek, a mail-order genius who wrote 1994 book, "My Amazing Discovery," said:

"Do not hesitate to repeat key words and phrases. Repeat them as often as necessary."

Repetition is hypnotic. It's what good hypnotists use to install their suggestions in your mind. Their repeatedly saying "You are getting sleepy...." is said because, heard enough times, you WILL get sleepy.

The same thing can happen in your writing. Consciously choose to repeat your main points. Don't be afraid to re-say something. The more you repeat your basic offer or basic reasons to buy, more you will influence reader's unconscious mind.

Repetition is hypnotic.

Repetition is hypnotic.

Repetition is hypnotic.

Just ask Robin Williams.

Or my girlfriend.