I was just looking at the array of tools that I use for my online presence a minute ago, all of which I LOVE, and was thinking that much of them one could consider a luxury for those who are new to internet marketing.
I thought I would write this top 5 (which aren’t actually in a formal order really) of tools and alternatives that are free so that any guys new to internet marketing could join in the fun that we all have online.
If you are new to internet marketing, you may not understand what some of these tools do, or where they fit into the general scheme of things, so I highly recommend bookmarking this page for future use, cos these little bad boys are quite a collection.
Top 5 FREE alternatives for those new to Internet Marketing
Screen Capture Software – One of the best ways to share information online is by having an online presentation. I do a lot of screen capture videos to explain exactly what it is that I am doing in an over the shoulder look at my screen while I do it. The industry standard for screen capture software is Camtasia (which is really quite expensive, but really, really good) but there are a couple of free alternatives that are definitely worth a mention.
BB Flashback Express – Great piece of kit which really works well. It’s only downfall, I find, is that it records in a non compressed format (so recordings take up a lot of space on your hard disk). Tbh, it is the software that I use as it is just as good as any other.
Jing – A smaller screen capture software than its elder brother Camtasia, which I use for still image screen capturing, can also be use to record 5 minutes of video. I don’t personally use it for that, but I know a lot of people who rave about it. (I think I just like to waffle for longer than 5 mins at a time ;p)
Blogs – It’s no secret, but for the guys who are new to internet marketing, it will become apparent that the main arsenal of your internet action plan is more than likely going to revolve around websites. The best and easiest way of having and maintaining a website is to have a blog, although they are cheap to run, there are free alternatives.
WordPress.com – The best blogging software on the planet is WordPress. You could say that I am biased, but then so is every other marketer that I know then. WordPress eats up the competition (in the self hosted version) but you can start a blog using, for all intents and purposes, ‘WordPress Lite’, at WordPress.com (don’t look for WordPress Lite by the way, just start a new blog at WordPress.com). The reason I suggest using this software, for those new to internet marketing, is because at any later stage, when you want to move on to the bigger, badder self hosted version, you can simply export all of your conent and upload it to your new site. (If you want to learn how to set up the bigger, badder version I did a training which shows you how to do all of it – How to set up a self hosted WordPress blog)
One other idea that you might want to take to heart and try out, bearing in mind it is not something that I do, is to start a blog on a niche specific site. The example of a good platform that springs to mind, taking into account that I am in the internet network marketing niche, is Better Networker. If you start an account there you can post videos that you make (using your new screen capture software ;p), post articles and write a blog. The thing that I believe is good about doing things that way is that you will get better exposure straight from the off, as your content will be posted in a public space. When setting up a new blog it can take some time to get much traffic to it, so best post it where the traffic already is 
Social Syndication – It’s no secret that I love TribePro, but what with that twinned with Onlywire, can prove to be quite expensive (esp if you want to syndicate everyone in TribePro like I do), and it is not always necessary when you start. Now, getting your content syndicated across the internet is great for your rankings and SEO, but when you start you may not want to spend out on easy ways to do it.
On the smaller syndication end, yet a cool little tool is SocialMonkee. With the Free version you can submit your URLs to 25 different sites (thus creating 25 backlinks) all in one quick shot. If you are new to internet marketing I highly recommend SocialMonkee to give your content a bit of credibility when it comes to the search engines.
In fact I wrote a post detailing the difference between the two and that shares a bit more information. Find it here – 25 Backlinks a Day for FREE
Auto Responders – Now, I’m going to be honest here and let you know that I have not trialled the alternative here so can’t give you a recommendation on it really, I’m just letting you know that there are free alternatives out there, and the one that I’m going to give you looks good from the outside.
For those of you new to internet marketing and don’t know what an autoresponder is, quite simply put, it is an email management service that will let you send out emails to your own database in a variety of different ways. Fortunes have been made with email marketing and I firmly believe that once you understand how to get peoples’ email addresses out of them, you will want to learn how to build a relationship with your list, using email.
The industry starndards in this department are Aweber and GetResponse. I personally use Aweber as there are a whole host of integration type stuff that you can do with it, but I just Googled ‘best free autoresponder’ and, apart from the terrible sales video, ListWire‘s list of features looks pretty good. Let’s just say that if I were looking for a free autoresponder service this would be the one that I would trial first.
Capture Pages – You will find that often when selling something online, especially as an affiliate marketer, all of your ‘pages’ will be set up for you. There will more than likely b, a funnel (capture page, sales page and follow up emails) all ready to go, which you simply need to drive traffic to.
If you want to become a good internet marketer and stand on your own two feet, you are going to eventually need to know how to set some of this stuff up. You can pay people to do it for you, in all honesty, but it is always useful to understand most parts of stuff. You don’t necessarily need to become an officionado, but I do recommend understanding the processes.
The new to internet marketing route that I would suggest though, if you don’t have any money to invest, is to build up your ‘presence’ on a network like Facebook. Facebook ‘Pages’ provide an amazing online solution for pretty much any business. Take a look at my page for instance (which is an ongoing project) The4thMarketeer. What you have here is the opportunity to create a collection of tabs that can teach your visitors about your subject, show training videos and also collect their email information.
When you look at internet marketing this way round, you start to think, ‘why on earth do I need a blog or website anyway?’ One CRITICAL factor that you must keep in mind is that if you are using someone else’s website, for instance Facebook’Remember, you do not own the site and it can be taken down at any point without your say so. You could build up a Facebook presence over 3 years and wake up one morning and no longer have a business because Facbook have changed their TOS perhaps, or any such like. Always best to have your own site and be completely independent. That is not to say don’t have a dominating Facebook presence, just have a place of your own that you can call home.
Here’s a training that I did on how to set up a Facebook Page, but I was just using an app this morning (you will understand when you watch the training what I am on about) called Static IFRAME tab, which appears really quite simple to use and also gives you the option to add multiple tabs.
New to Internet Marketing? – The Lowdown…
The simple truth of the matter is, and something that I really love about the modern world, is that everything is out there for you, and in this case it costs you nothing. Using the tools that I have given you above, you can create an international brand based around what it is that you DO. You can chisel out your own space in the world and educate people in what you know, and all you need is your computer and time (and effort too).
The world really is your oyster! Let’s link minds and start building the future that you want and make the world a better place for all.
If you don’t know what to sell, I recommend starting here
Vive la Resistance
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