2. Each product has it's own standalone web site. The site consists of a sales page and an order page, that's it, that's all. (Traditional pages such as contact us, about us, products and services, tech support, news and events etc. just don't exist on Virtualselling sites) These sites are dedicated to pure sales copy.

3. Each site consists of a lengthy sales letter. This sales copy is similar to offline traditional direct mail piece you may have received at home or in your office. The copy is usually written in second person, and invites you into a metaphor or story. All of these letters will have an overwhelming number of testimonials followed by a "better than 100% guarantee" before giving you 5-10 chances to order. The approach is obvious but psychology is sound.

4. There are usually only two buying choices for visitor. The primary purpose of these sites is for you to buy product or service by completing sales transaction. If you leave page you will be greeted by second objective, capturing your email address. A free offer, report, application or other valuable information will be exchanged for your email address. If a Virtualselling site doesn't convert you into a customer you can be sure that you will receive a series of sequential email marketing messages designed for this particular site or perhaps another of owners products.

5. What ever is offered to you in exchange for your email address will be "Viral" in nature. It's expected that you will distribute copies to as many people as possible in your sphere of influence. The owner is hoping that you become what Seth Godin called "a sneezer" in his book Ideavirus. The valuable information will have a large number of links back to web site with goal of driving new traffic and original visitors back to repeat sales cycle.

6. The offer is strongly contrasted with value of product and bonuses. I've seen books sold for $5.00 and services sold for as much as $10,000. Any product or service can be sold if sales copy can be written well

Compare this partial list of VirtualSelling characteristics with your web site. Can you actually say that your fancy graphics and interactive animated pages convert traffic into customers? I'M NOT RECOMMENDING THAT YOU ABANDON YOUR TRADITIONAL SITE, I'M SUGGESTING YOU SUPPLEMENT IT WITH SITES DEDICATED TO SELLING DISTINCT PRODUCTS AND SERVICES. When you have a VirtualSelling site, a site that sells, drive traffic to it and measure results.

If purpose of your small business site is to build "Brand" then continue to build a traditional information site. If you want to engage, enroll and compel customers to do business with you online today its time to set sail with a VirtualSelling site.

Make sure your business doesn't miss boat when it comes to selling online.

Number 4: Make Your Marketing More Accountable.

Because your marketing is targeted and is designed to elicit a direct response from your prospects, you know exactly how well your marketing is working. You can also do very precise cost anaylsis for new customer acquisitions. With database marketing, your calculations of your ROI will be much more precise. This will allow you to eliminate ocstly and ineffective methods of marketing you may be using. ab

Number 3: Improve Communications Internally Between Your Marketing People And Product Development.

This ties back to number 10. The efforts of marketing people will assist product development people in their decisions about what new products to develop. The analysis will also provide areas of improvement for products. The fact that it is marketing staff that is gathering and analyzing this data will help them to communicate better with technical people. This will help marketing people better understand products and thereby improve their ability to market these products. When there is close cooperation between marketing aspects and technical aspects, a company flourishes. One of best examples of this was App;e Computers during early days of MacIntosh!

Number 2: iMprove Customer Care.

This one is really important. The happier and more satisfied your customers are, more likely they will buy from you again. This goes back to whole trust issue. You satisfy a customer and they will trust you explicitly! Because database marketing is so interactive, it makes it almost impossible not to satisfy your customers, as long as you use information you are collecting in a positive and constructive manner.

AND THE NUMBER 1 OBJECTIVE THAT DATABASE MARKETING WILL ACHIEVE FOR YOUR BUSINESS IS THAT IT WILL COORDINATE THE DIFFERENT ASPECTS OF HOW YOUR MARKETING AND HOW THEY AFFECT THE INDIVIDUAL CUSTOMER.

This means that, when it is done effectively, database marketing will allow you to PERSONALIZE your marketing efforts. You cna quite literally tailor your marketing to each customer. In Web Street Journal, we will show you how to do that.

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