by Michael Ginzburg http://www.PromoClock.com

You've heard of email marketing, but it isn't what it used to be. With today's abundance of spam and even opt-in email solicitations, your messages are competing against hundreds of incoming messages daily. How are you ever supposed to stand out?

**There are 2 main problems with email marketing today.** --------------------------------------------------------- The first problem is that your email messages are hardly even opened. Even if your headline is compelling, chances of your email message being read are close to nil. People are becoming increasingly skeptical about kind of message attached to what used to be best subject lines.

The second problem is that most website visitors don't even sign up to opt-in mailing lists anymore. Even those who are interested in your website content are just plain scared to give over their email address to a website they do not know. People are concerned that their email addresses will be sold to third parties and that their "unsubscribe" requests will never be honored.

Is there a way around these problems or is email marketing dead? The answer is simple… Desktop alerts. Desktop alerts are messages that are sent directly to Windows® Desktops instead of being delivered to email inboxes. Desktop alerts are answer, because they solve both email-marketing problems.

First, they bypass email inbox and appear directly on desktop. No more competing again hundreds of incoming messages - your messages claim desktop all to themselves, virtually guaranteeing they are read and remembered.

Second, users do not need to give over their email or other contact information in order to subscribe. All they have to do is simply download a small application. If they ever want to "unsubscribe", they just simply uninstall alert application.

You can automate all of your business processes, and with a professionally done web site, you can have a 24/7 salesman handling most of work for you.

The downside is that business is becoming more and more competitive. Especially if you are marketing affiliate programs, you can be competing against thousands of others to sell your products or services.

Before you begin your web site, and before you make a sale, you need to make a plan. Below are six steps you can take to give you competitive edge in your small business.

1. Choose a customer Now I'm sure you may think I have it backwards. Maybe you think you should choose your product first.

The problem with choosing your product first is that you may not have a market to sell to. You want to make sure you have a market to sell before you choose products you are going to sell.

You want to do your research.

The easiest way to do this is to visit sites that can give you information on demographics. Demographics are pieces of information about different groups you can use to create your market.

There are many sites you can use to gather this type of information, but here are three to help you get started:

http://americandemographics.com/ http://www.freedemographics.com/ http://www.consumerinternetbarometer.us/

Now these sites will give you information primarily on US markets, but there are plenty of sites you can use to find information on countries outside US. The secret is to narrow your search terms. For example: international demographics, or internet demographics.

2. Choose a product Once you have a market in mind, then you want to choose a product.

You have several options here: affiliate programs, resell rights, or create your own.

Now I won't get into pros and cons of each because that's not what this article is about.

What you want to do here is make sure that you choose a product that matches perfectly with your market.

You can search for above terms in a good search engines to find what you are looking for.

3. Make it an offer your customer can't refuse Once you have a market and product in mind, it's time to craft your offer. Regardless of what type of product you choose, you'll have competition.

The secret here is to create something of value to add to your product. It should always be something no one else has. It could be a free report or ebook, or some additional software.

What's important is to make your offer so valuable your visitor won't want to go somewhere else to buy product.