2. Less is more--Use just enough description to make your prospect want what you offer. This is really tough part; part where people mistakenly think that more is more. Classified ads are not meant to give extensive details about your product or service. Highlight 1 or 2 key points and call it good. Focus on making these selling points more attractive rather than including too many selling points, which leaves no room for push.

3. Demand action--Tell your prospect what to do: order, call, write, email, subscribe, buy, visit, don't wait. Don't make your reader decide what to do next. Tell them what to do! Remember, people respond when their interest is peaked. After you have made your prospect want what you offer, move in for kill and demand that they take immediate action.

4. Contact information--Always include several ways to buy in your contact information. I know, I know. This takes up some of your valuable selling space, but you should do it anyway. What if someone wanted to buy from you, but it was too difficult for them to get Internet access? It's worth it to include your phone number or address for those who have not yet embraced age of technology.

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Case in point, companies like Virtumundo, Inc. (they are a pioneer in performance based market) are now willing to charge nothing upfront in many cases for an advertising campaign and to just do a revenue share with you on back end; this is typically 20-40% of your SRP, will vary depending upon your goods and/or services. And, they will do a test campaign prior to a full-bore campaign to make sure that response rates will be worth their investment.

Another key benefit to any business that wants to leverage shifts occurring in performance-based marketing is its inherent ability to be highly targeted. You can tie a marketing process (campaign) to web site, newsletter or pay per click search engine (Overture and now via Google's Ad Words Program) with specific demographics that are highly qualified and targeted. Contrast this again with traditional print medium where you can target to a certain extent; but not like performance-based marketing. Consider an add again (for example) in sports section of USA Today - it will clearly deliver a sports enthusiast, but not a male who plays tennis that lives in Western US, etc. And, better targeting will always deliver better results, assuming all other issues are on a level playing field.

Search Engine Marketing still a Mystery to Many

I hate to say it but most of web sites we analyze still don't have basic HTML fundamentals (Title, Keywords, Description) in-place so their sites can/will be indexed (reviewed by an automated bot/software agent) properly. Their title is wrong (don't repeat your company name), there are too many keywords (you want 8-12) or wrong keywords and description of company is either poorly written or reads like yet another "mission statement" that has been developed by CEO/CFO and three Senior VPs. This is basic block and tackling marketing and should be setup properly when a web site is designed.

Be prepared to deploy some marketing resources for quality Search Engine Marketing - it's fiercely competitive for web site rankings; you've got 3-5K web sites coming online every single day of week and many are trying to drive market awareness via S/Engine ranking. What's a rule of thumb of what to pay for standard S/Engine Marketing Services: i.e. Title/Description Development, Keyword Analysis, Content Rewrites, etc.? Costs can vary tremendously, depending on your market segment, web site size, what type of services you outsource, competitive issues, etc. Generally expect to pay $3-6K for a basic 3-4 month campaign and then some modest fee for ongoing maintenance (say $200-500.per month). There are alternative sophisticated S/Engine processes that cost much more than this, but these are typically suited for companies that have a good sized marketing budget and or a large web site that necessitates a different approach.