Spam. You’ve all heard of crazy pink meat in a can, but what’s it got to do with Internet? Well, it’s also namesake for a major problem in World Wide Web-unsolicited junk email. Problem! We’re talking serious pain in butt both as a waster of time, space, and money. It is estimated that around half of all email received on Internet is this sneaky illegal attempt at selling fake consumer goods, pornography, and a whole plethora of ‘helpful’ services. It’s taking up half of all email on Earth, and it’s costing businesses’ billions in wasted time, as well as filling personal email accounts to limit so important messages aren’t received. It seems everywhere there’s a leap in technology for humanity, there’s also a group of people who want to stretch realm of criminal activity to another level.

The good news is that as it’s such a prominent problem, ‘good guys’ have made it a main priority on their ‘To do’ lists. Software has been created to block Spam and is being updated constantly. Recently Bill Gates, richest human on Earth and self-made mogul of software masters’ Microsoft spoke of his aim to eliminate Spam by year 2006. Obviously a lot of people would be quite appreciative if they could achieve this goal.

Publishing Guidelines: This article may be freely reproduced electronically or in print. "We share what we know, so that others may grow."

"If you have knowledge, let others light a candle to it." - Margaret Fuller

(That's a metaphor, btw).

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HOW TO BRAND/MARKET YOURSELF AND YOUR BUSINESS ON A "SHOESTRING BUDGET"... OR EVEN FOR FREE (UP-DATED)

by Craig Lock

(Please excuse my long title!)**

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to use Internet and he won't bother you for months...or perhaps even years! (Sorry men... however, I presume this principle also applies to our women-folk!).

Here are some tips in writing some articles to "spread word" about your business, as an internet marketing strategy... and especially on smell of an oily rag"...

Me write an article! Yes, you can, because you know more about YOUR business than anyone else on this planet. And most importantly, I don't believe that you have to be a "pro" writer to write good articles.

HOW TO GET STARTED?

To "kick off"... Firstly pick a subject that YOU KNOW - a topic that pertains (nice word that!) to your area of business. You are "expert" in it. Then write to HELP others by sharing your unique knowledge or experiences. I believe, it's BEST MARKETING TOOL available.

And (can I begin a sentence with "an and" - yes)... You DON'T have to be a good writer to write articles.

My advice is just find your "natural style" by writing as you speak; as practicing writing in your "natural style" breeds confidence. Then submit your articles to ezines and announcement lists, like Article Announce, Free Content, Publisher Network, Article Xpress, FreeEzineContent, Free-Reprint-Articles, Netwrite-Publish-Announce and Article Publish. Those above are ones we mostly use. Here is a list of seven ("lucky") of more prominent Yahoo.com Article Announcement Groups:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aabusiness http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ArticlePublisher http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Free-Content http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Free_eContent http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Free-Reprint-Articles http://groups.yahoo.com/group/netwrite-publish-announce and finally, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/publisher_network/

First you have to subscribe to these lists (check out others, as well some others, like Topica lists under GOOGLE search engine).

We find this marketing method by far most effective means of getting traffic to our various sites (and one thing then leads to another)... and best of all form of BRANDING your business in cyberspace costs nothing, but a little time and effort!

Lately, all our marketing has been done through writing articles based on my experiences and knowledge (in internet marketing, writing, money and self help) and submitting them to above-mentioned article announcement lists.

Often from there they get picked up by ezines with large readerships - from 10000 ...to even ones with millions of subscribers. True! These big ezine publishers are continually looking for new and quality content, particularly ORIGINAL and valuable material that can help others.