CGI: 5 CGI Scripts You Must Use to Turn Your Site Into a Powerhouse

5 CGI Scripts You Must Use to Turn Your Site Into a Powerhouse

Written by Marc Goldman

HTML is great. But what really makes your site super powerful? The Backend or repparttar

processes running in repparttar 107137

background that make everything on your website really click. And what powers repparttar 107138

backend? CGI Scripts. Some of you may know what CGI scripts are and others may not. CGI scripts are repparttar 107139

key to creating interactive websites that automate your online business. Instead of getting too technical about scripts, lets talk about 5 powerful CGI scripts that every website should have if they have any desire to conduct E-commerce. Number 1: First off, you must have forms on your website. You should be utilizing forms for everything including retrieving demographic information from your visitors to processing credit card orders. You can also use forms to send contact information so that your visitors do not have to use email to contact you. The beauty of forms is that not only can you retrieve repparttar 107140

information you request, you can also include hidden fields to be submitted with each form so that you know certain information like what website repparttar 107141

visitor came from, their IP address (useful for fraud protection) and much more. Some form scripts even let you send autoresponses to repparttar 107142

submitter. So, for example if someone fills in a form to sign up for a newsletter, you can send them an automated reply thanking them for their submission and including basically anything you want without having to lift a finger. Number 2: The next script every site should be using is a "recommend it" script. This is a script that allows your site visitors to recommend your site to their friends and contacts. Do not underestimate repparttar 107143

power of this little tool. The recommend it script on our site at http://www.goldbar.net/recomm.html brings in tons of traffic and prospects that we may never have gotten on our own. The power of referrals should never, ever be underestimated. It is far more effective to have someone recommend your site to their contacts then it is to advertise. I use repparttar 107144

Master Recommend script from William Bontrager, available for free at: http://www.willmaster.com Number 3: Affiliate Software. Without a doubt, one of repparttar 107145

best investments you can ever make if you have your own product or service is in affiliate software. While usually not cheap it is by far one of repparttar 107146

best methods of growing traffic to your site and exploding your sales. Many people advocate using a 3rd party affiliate company such as Commission Junction to manage their affilate programs. This is fine if you are a big company with a huge budget to WASTE on administrative fees and obscure technical charges. But, if you are a small to midsized company and you want to utilize repparttar 107147

awesome power of a strictly commissioned salesforce sending you traffic and sales, you would be crazy to not consider purchasing affiliate software and installing it on your own site (or having it installed for you). Some affiliate scripts are so advanced that you can click one button on repparttar 107148

administrative interface and send all repparttar 107149

months commissions to a check writing program and have repparttar 107150

checks printed out and all you will have to do is sign them. Number 4: Follow Up Autoresponders: Without a doubt, everyone

Clever Profit Growth Software

Written by Jim Daniels

Are you truly using technology in your web business? Before you answer yes, stop a moment and consider how many promotion or marketing tasks take place at your website without you lifting a finger.

Perhaps your site signs up new opt-in subscribers for you while you sleep. If so, that's ONE automated task. Maybe orders are accepted securely without your intervention. That's TWO. But can you keep counting?

If you have a little trouble going beyond that, what follows will help you.

As you probably already know, perhaps repparttar most powerful of all applications on repparttar 107136 Internet is repparttar 107137 CGI script. CGI stands for repparttar 107138 "Common Gateway Interface". It is a standard for interfacing external applications with information servers, such as HTTP or Web servers. If you have a website, more than likely you already have cgi based software running at your site. But your profits could probably benefit greatly from a few more.

Now don't worry, I'm not going to go into a long, boring explanation of how to install cgi scripts. I'll save that for repparttar 107139 techhies. Instead, I'll simply share a wide variety of scripts that are ideal for small business owners looking to grow website traffic and sales.

(Note: If you're not at all familiar with CGI, http://www.cgi101.com/ is a great place to learn about how it works. Remember, if it all seems too confusing, fear not. Using CGI can be as simple as picking out a script and having someone else set it up!)

Anyway, on with repparttar 107140 scripts...

Automark http://www.superscripts.com/scripts/automark.html

Automark is a cgi script that will automatically pop up a "bookmark" suggestion box for first-time visitors to your website. While this can be accomplished using straight javacode, this script will not annoy regular visitors by popping up repparttar 107141 window every time they return. The first time a new visitor hits your "target page" repparttar 107142 bookmark window pops up, but never again. This is a great way to get your site bookmarked by more visitors.

MailNow http://www.mailnow.co.uk/

MailNow allows you to provide web-based email to your users. Its web-based email product provides unlimited addresses for multiple domains. A free email account is a great giveaway that ensures constant repeat visitors to your site.

Master Subscriber Pro http://willmaster.com/master/subscriberpro/index.shtml

This program automates joint ventures with other ezine publishers. Using this script your visitors can subscribe to an unlimited number of ezines without leaving your website to do so. Locate a few ezine publishers with traffic comparable to yours and you'll all increase your new subscriber signups!

Protect It http://www.cgi-world.com/protect_it.html

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