It is generally agreed that to begin promoting (selling) products, you need a few tools. Although not absolutely necessary, you should have a web site. This can take the form of a blog. Popular choices are this site (Blogger), which is part of Google.com. Using Blogger or other similar forms do not require hosting or obtaining a domain name. In other words, there is basically no expense involved to get a web presence.
The other route would be obtaining a domain (more on this later) from places such as GoDaddy, Namecheap and others. Costs per year will range from about $8.00 to $12.00. Following this step is web hosting. There are many hosting companies with a mind-boggling array of prices and features. I would shop for one that offers a either Fantasico or a variation as this makes installing software very simple (1 click). Some popular hosts are: HostMonster, HostGator, BlueHost and JustHosts, all priced at around $4.00 per month, with similar features.
If you go with obtaining a domain and hosting, your best bet will be to use Wordpress for blogging software. There are many themes available for WP (Wordpress) some are free others are premium. Even some premium themes have free versions. Search for themes that are SEO (search engine optimized) enabled. All themes have a variety of plugins (software) providing additional features.
A few words about keywords. Keywords are probably the most important thing to understand as they are critical your success. Keywords are words that the search engines (such as Google, Yahoo and Bing) use to index pages. When you do an internet search, you type a few words into your browser's search field which you believe will retrieve the information you are searching for. The more definite the words or phrase, the more closely the search will match your request. So, if you expect people to visit your web site (or blog) and make a purchase, you will need to include some keywords in your domain or blog name. (If you are trying to promote a diet product, but your domain name or blog does not include some diet keywords, your potential customers will never find you.
There are many keyword tools you can purchase, but Google offers one for free (Google keyword tool). I have used several keyword tools but find Google's to be nearly as effective as the non-free versions. At the very least, use it while you are getting started to keep your costs at a minimum.
That's it for today. In a future post, I will begin to outline strategies for driving traffic to your site.
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