Save Money By Cutting Recurring ExpensesWritten by Joe Bingham
One of greatest things about running an online business is extremely low operating costs it has compared to a brick and mortar business. However, there are still many tools online marketers need. In essence, web hosting, auto responders, list servers, ad trackers, and payment processors are basic tools we use. There are a wide variety of services available for handling these facets of our businesses for us. However, these simple services can add up to hundreds of dollars of unnecessary recurring monthly expenses if we allow them to do so. Auto responder services run anywhere from $15-$30 a month. Paid list servers run anywhere from $25 a month to 1000s of dollars a month depending on your list size. That may sound hard to believe, but trust me, I've researched that topic to death and they can. Ad tracking services rack up additional charges as well, as do payment processing fees. All these together can become quite an expense, depending on what services you use. And while there are free services covering some of these tools, they typically are not as good, don't appear as professional, and are limited on features. From what I see around, however, there are many who don't realize that paying these recurring monthly fees is unnecessary. The reality of it is this. If you have a good web host, that allows you full CGI access, you can buy scripts for these tools at a one time expense and never have to pay recurring monthly fees again. After having gone through process of searching for best services myself, I've always come to same conclusion. I'd rather own a copy of a script that can do these things right off of my own site so I don't have to keep paying others to do it for me. Yes, it may require a slightly more expensive web hosting service, but what's a few more dollars on one monthly bill in exchange for getting rid of 3-4 other monthly bills altogether? As well, to me, it is more professional to run these things from my own site. My auto responders have my domain name in address, not domain name of some auto responder service. Same with my ad tracking. All my links reflect my site, not someone else's. The price required to purchase CGI scripts for auto responders or ad tracking or running a mailing list IS higher than price of ONE month of service through an auto responder, ad tracking,
| | The Doctor's Words Hung in the Air..."No Flying!"Written by Steve Melton
The Doctor's words hung in air creating suddenly a turbulent shocking ride in my life. Wow, those two little words may not sound devastating to you but to someone who earns their living flying airplanes, it's an awesome blow. Just imagine for a minute, your Doctor saying to you… "Steve, you can no longer _____." Fill in blank with your profession. If you are a Doctor, "Julie, you can no longer Doctor". "Josh, you can no longer practice law." "Jon, you can no longer teach." Yes, those two words turned my shock and disbelief to fear. My life was suddenly without warning turned very upside down. Yeah, I spent a few days and sleepless nights in denial and feeling sorry for myself and asking, "What do I do now?" Just as it was beginning to settle down within my industry, still reeling in aftermath of 9/11… Boom! The hammer falls again. It doesn't matter how you lose your job or profession. The results can be devastating. An accident, sudden onset of an illness or company you have dedicated your life to goes bankrupt can produce an incredible amount of turmoil and stress in your life. What do I do now? How do you provide for your family? How do we survive this? The answer for me and perhaps for many of you is Internet. The Internet has always been fascinating. Suddenly it was taking on a completely new life of its own. Like a Siren in distant mist. It's sweet song calling me, luring me by name, seducing me into its clutches. Have I made mistakes? You bet I have, tons of them. You name program, e-book or how to get rich scam. I fell victim to fraud, wasting hundreds of dollars and an incredible amount of time in process. Let me tell you what is turning it all around for me.
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