Traffic Exchange Tips

I got an instant message today from one of my downline folks at TS25. She was concerned that her upline sponsor had been changed and sent me a copy of a message from a person claiming to be her sponsor. I assured her that I was still her direct upline sponsor, and told her that the message that she had received was spam. It was a blantant attempt from someone, probably in her syndicate (not her upline), who wanted her to join his site and post an ad for TS25. It was unsolicited information about another program wrapped in the guise of advertising TS25.

Is this spam?

I would classify it as such. First, the guy lied. He wasn’t her upline sponsor. Second, it wasn’t about how to better use TS25 or how to improve the syndicate position or anything like that. It was a cry for a new member for his own program.
There are ways to avoid spamming when contacting downline members and still advertise your program.

How?

Simple you offer help. Build a relationship with your downline members and it will pay off big in the end. Ask folks what their interests are. See if you have anything in common. But above all, if they’re new the online marketing world, teach them the ropes. Give away your best secrets and perhaps they’ll follow you to the end of the earth. Seriously.

Tony Tezak, who recently retired from this game, was one of the best downline managers in the business. He knew how to take care of the folks that he recruited and made lots of money in return. Why? Because people trusted him and relied on him to give them the right information and to lead them into quality opportunities.

But you can advertise in these helpful messages and not upset your downline or the program owner. Use your signature line! Your name, a link to your site, and your email address is usually quite effective.

Another great way to advertise in a message to your downline is by using the “P. S.” People often read these first. Why? Because they’re curious about what was so important that you needed to add a post script.

Here’s what I mean:

P. S. For more information about the traffic exchange industry, subscribe to Hit Exchange News.

That P. S. isn’t a blatant ad, it’s a link to an alternate source of information. It works great for me because I write a column there. So, it’s a win-win situation. My downline member gets more important info and I get readers who may enjoy what I write and then visit my sites. See how great that works?

There are so many ways to advertise without spamming. Be creative! And remember when writing to your downlines, offer value first by way of information. Then, they’ll be more open to what you want to present.

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Pat Marcello really hates to be spammed and avoids spamming others. Learn more about what’s going on in the world of online marketing at OVBlogger.com.

For more than a year now, I’ve been pushed toward the Firefox browser by friends and business associates. I tried it then, but wanted to keep my lovely Maxthon. To me, Maxthon was the greatest tabbed browser going. It was compatible with all IE sites and functions, and it was fast. I loved it and touted its advantages in most of the forums I belong to, against mounting attacks to the contrary. I never could understand what everyone saw in Firefox.

I mean, you couldn’t move tabs from place to place for one thing. That drove me batty. And everytime you wanted to open a new tab, it seemed the browser would open a whole new window instead. And then there was the time factor. Let’s face it, we traffic exchange enthusiasts used tabbed browsers to save time! Firefox just didn’t cut it.

Then, about two weeks ago, everything just started to fall apart. Suddenly, my Maxthon was picking up all kinds of adware and spyware. I had to scan with Spyware Dr. every night and found lots of stuff. Plus, it seemed that there were suddenly more framebreakers, more pop-ups, and it just drove me into the arms of that OTHER browser.

Yes, it’s true. I’m now a Firefox convert. Sigh. It’s very hard to reverse a Marcello decision.

But I have to tell you that for starters, I scanned my system with Spyware Dr. after the first day and was totally surprised. I found… well, NOTHING. OK, so I waited a whole week. Still nothing. Wow! was all I could think.

OK, so it’s slow. Not to worry. They have better extensions for Firefox now than in the past, too. Fasterfox takes care of that. It now loads almost as quickly as Maxthon, but the difference is negligible.
And my biggest peeve–the tab issue–has also been solved by another extension called “Tax Mix Plus.” It really gets those persnickety tabs to behave. You can move them, tell what to open when, and it even comes with a session manager so that if you have to close your browser for a thunderstorm (as we Floridians often do). You can boot Firefox up and voila! Session manager will ask politely to open your last session. It’s great!

So, after all the wailing and gnashing of teeth from my dearest friends and boon companions, all is well in the land of traffic exchange surfing once again. Firefox is now my browser of choice and you should look into making it yours. Sorry Maxthon. I spread the gospel, but now, I’m afraid that Firefox has just won the game.

Every traffic exchange and program on the planet gives you a URL to promote. You may not be interested in promoting every one, but you may still want to have that URL in a place that’s easy to find.

 Why is that?

Well, if you belong to traffic exchanges, most of them have downline builders, right? So, even if you don’t belong to a dedicated downline builder, you’ll still need your usernames and affiliate links at some point and it’s great to have it at your fingertips.

My solution is to build a table in Word or any other word processor with that capability. You need only two columns. The first column is for the program or traffic exchange’s name, and the second is for the affiliate URL.

I also list my banners in their respective blocks. However, when adding a banner, I color it blue. You can color it magenta. It doesn’t matter. Just so it sticks out as being different from the affiliate links.

Other URLs I might add for the same program might be shortcuts, as with TinyURL.  Or tracking links, as with LinkBrander. And, I color them differently, too. You’ll be amazed at how big a difference coloring links is. It will save you lots of time in the long run. You won’t have to read the whole URL to see what it relates to, only choose the right color.

Beside these URLs, I often add descriptions. For instance, I belong to Marlon Sanders’ affiliate program, and he has umpteen products to sell. So, next to each of my affiliate URLs, I describe the product it relates to.

Then, save your document and drag it to your desktop. Each time a program asks for a URL or you need it to plug into a traffic exchange for advertising or for the downline builder, it will be right at your fingertips. Voila!

I’ve been using this system for almost three years and it works very well for  me. Try it. I hope it works well for you, too.

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Pat Marcello writes books involving tons of research and knows well how to organize. See her monthly marketing tips at OVMarketing One-Tip News.

In the past few months, I’ve been asked to participate in a couple of surveys from traffic exchange owners. If you belong to those exchanges, you’ve probably received those emails, too. What did you do with them?

Some of you may ignore them or forget about them and never go to the site to complete the questions. Heck, some folks don’t even respond to or read email from exchange owners at all. Though I’m no traffic exchange owner, I’m sure this is frustrating. Owners take the time to come up with questions they feel are important to us; the least we can do is take part.

Surveys are a great way to speak your piece! Plus, when the owners compile the data they receive from these surveys, the end results are usually well worth the effort of having filled them out.

For instance, at Traffic Roundup, Bobby and Stephen asked what we’d like to see. I wanted the number of times surfed put back on the surfbar. Well, there must have been more than a few who answered likewise because Voila! There it was, almost the next day.

Tim does great things with surveys over at StartXchange, too. He’s given us text link surfing, some very rewarding “credits won” pages (with the most credits of any exchange online), and he added a forum. The forum is really cooking, too.

And at ClixMatrix, Steve Sartain asked about the multi-level referral system, whether or not people wanted it to continue. Apparently many did because it’s still in place.

But my point isn’t to applaud these owners, though I do, it’s to show you that by taking just a few minutes to fill out these surveys, we all come out winners. Next time you see a request for filling out a survey, I hope you’ll do it. Surfers rule, you know. And only the best exchange owners care enough to find out what we want and then, give it to us. Are they cool or what?

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Pat Marcello always fills out surveys. See her at OVEditing.com