If you are a marketer in conventional brick-and-mortar market, use the
marketing 4 P's:

1. Product - You need to determine your product characteristics, e.g.
specifications, packaging, benefits

2. Price - What is the right price for your product in your market?
When you consider the market, you will need to consider not just the
customers, but also the competitors.

3. Promotion - Your promotion tactics will involve decisions around:
a) Advertising - Which media mix, e.g. banners, postcards,
pay-per-click, magazines, should you advertise on?
b) Sales Promotion - Are you going to offer any special deals, e.g.
volume / seasonal discounts?

4. Place - Here you answer questions on how you will bring your
product to your clients? Is it through retail, wholesale? Drop
shipping for physical products and downloading for ebooks are
distribution strategies popular among internet marketers.

If you want to build wealth as an internet marketer, you need to go
beyond the marketing 4 P's and deploy the 5th P. What then is the 5th
P of the internet marketing mix? It is the Process. You must be
wondering "What is so special for internet marketing that Process
becomes a 5th p of the marketing mix?" Let me explain what the Process
accomplishes for you.

Today's technology allows you to automate and/or outsource the
complete process of converting 'cold' visitors of your website to
cash generating clients. With that process in place, you can dedicate
all your business time and resources to generate targeted traffic for
your website.

What does such a process typically consist of? We will discuss two
scenarios. In the first scenario, you are a marketer of one or two
specialty products (e.g. a unique travel product). In the second
scenario, you are the owner of an online store.

FIRST SCENARIO: Marketing one or two specialty products

Here, the first step is a 'squeeze page'. This page stimulates the
curiosity of the visitor about what you have to offer. Typically, the
visitors need to enter their contact details, including their email
address, if they want a fuller taste of your offer. That converts the
visitor into a lead. This also helps to screen tire kickers.

The second set of steps are accomplished through what are called
'autoresponders'. As the name suggests, an autoresponder is an
automatic email, sent by an IT system. These automatic emails can be
programmed to be generated based on factors, such as where in the
sales cycle your lead falls, and/or the time elapsed since a given
event. These autoresponders take the leads through the complete sales
cycle of Awareness --> Interest --> Desire --> Action.

A comprehensive process will supplement your autoresponders with
follow up calls made by sales people who are professional closers.
With much of the hard sales done by your automated process, such a
human touch seals your deal very easily. This is because now your lead
is really hot. His/Her only doubt is if this is a deal for real. The
friendly and caring human touch of your closers eliminates that doubt
and seals the deal.

SECOND SCENARIO: Marketing an web-based store

Your process needs to be more automated here. Normal consumer goods do
not have a complex sales cycle.

Do NOT use a 'magnetizer' page here, as you run the risk of driving
away an impulsive consumer looking for a last minute buy. A shopping
cart is an absolute must. So is an easy purchasing process using major
credit cards, debit cards and electronic checks. Autoresponders will
quickly send confirmation emails to your consumers when they buy from
your internet store.

If you want to be successful in web marketing, you need to focus your
energy and resources towards bringing traffic to your website.
Leverage on the strengths of an automated process. And, if need be,
outsource it. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact
me at responsiblebiz@gmail.com