But such models are so crude they often mislead when applied to your site. A CR of 2% may be nifty (or a disaster, if more was expected). However good it is, it is still only an average. It gives a useful picture only over long term. It says nothing about today. Or right now. Or about what your next visitor will do.

Turn this other end to. Given a CR of 2%, how many sales can you count on in your next 100 visitors? 2? No. I said, "count on," and answer is none.

Say you make 20 sales on your first 100 visitors today. But not a one off next 900. Still, 20 sales in 1000 hits is a CR of 2%.

There is no way you can say your next visitor will buy. Or will not. Come up with a way to do so, and you'll be a millionaire right quick.

You simply do not know what your next visitor will do. But you probably hope he or she ...

Buys - Terrific

Returns to buy - Great news

Returns to buy again - The key to success

Tells a friend who visits - Very nice

Your list will differ. And there are other actions you may want your visitors to take. For example, sign up for free information of interest, delivered by an autoresponder over time. This often brings people back to buy. And if you can get them to set a bookmark, this may do same.

The Secret To Improving Your Business

You can not afford to risk losing even a single visitor. Period. The big boys counting sales in millions and hits in billions can safely ignore a bunch. You can not.

Accept potential value of every single hit as unlimited. Then act in every way to draw them. And never ever turn even one aside.

Obvious, don't you think? But look about on Web and you'll often see visitors not encouraged or even turned away. Then, of course, look to your own site and be certain you are not making such blunders.

Bob McElwain, author of "Your Path To Success" and "Secrets To A Really Successful Website." For info, see

Another thing you need to be aware of is amount of "fluff" or packing that surrounds real subject matter. Often there can be several pages on main idea and several dozen pages of near useless information to make it appear bigger.

I recently purchased a report of just 19 pages. It contained just one dubious idea that could have been presented adequately on about half an A4 sized page. The rest of it was pure packing and completely useless twaddle. The cost? I hate to admit it - $39.95 US. Ouch!

I have even heard of some training manuals on offer claiming that they contain five hundred pages (plus) of "cutting edge" information. You would think that represents a lot of information. It was certainly advertised as a "definitive" web-building and traffic steering "master" tutorial. I later learned (from another source) that pages are only printed on about one-third of available space and that font size would be very beneficial for extremely sight impaired readers. That makes it a very expensive tutorial. I'm pleased to say that I didn't buy that one.

You need to be wary of these things.

Part 2 of this article contains further hints which will enable you to detect whether an offer of increased website traffic will be worthy of purchase or not.

If you enjoyed Part 1, don't miss Part 2.

Part 1 and Part 2 of this article are covered by copyright. However, both parts may be freely used providing there are no changes whatsoever to content and following resource box remains intact.

This information has been presented by Gary Simpson, author of personal development manual - "How to Stop Wasting Your Time and Start Getting What You Want." Gary can be contacted by email at Gary Simpson. You can visit his Motivation and Self Esteem for Success website at www.storesonline.com/site/motivation.

PS: If you think this information might help a friend from falling prey to these dubious practices you can send them a copy of this article (or any related parts) or direct them to website URL above. Let's get word out and put a stop to this.