Your Questions About Email Marketing Templates

Jere answers:

It doesn’t look like Microsoft produce one out of the box as it is a specialised market.

Your best bet would be to look through the sample templates and then copy tables/forms/queries from each and merge them into one database.
Potentially though it could be a big/painful job because of different styles etc.
You would also need to setup database security straight away to meet confidentiality rules.

You may be better off looking for a ready made solution using google:
patient database software

that brings up several packages.

If you want to discuss this offline then you can use Yahoo email (see my profile page) to email me without displaying your email address.

Jere answers:

The word is SEO and it may be that your site is not designed so that it reads well with the search engines. Keyword meta tags are no longer counted by the search engines. Body content is. And if the site is a template and database driven, your links cannot be followed. There can be many issues.

The website is built. Good! You want the world to see it. Great! But how are you going to achieve that? Even if you do get visitors in the initial period, it is necessary to make sure that they do continue to visit the website on a regular basis. In other words, it is necessary to convert a onetime visitor into a regular guest. Here are some tips for winning the website traffic:

Interactive website – a great way to get new content: It pays to update and put fresh content on your website regularly. This can be done if the site is made an interactive one. The viewers should get something in return for spending time on your website. An interactive website will help in viewers seeing something new every time they pay a visit. What’s the use of visiting a website only to find the same old content on a website. Stale content is something that does not go down well with the audience. Updates are like magnet that attracts the visitors. The higher the frequency of updates, the stronger is the force of attraction. A website can be made to look fresh in the following ways:

Virtual communities: Try to build a virtual community. This can be done by having blogs and discussion boards/forums. Providing such kind of platforms helps in keeping the interest of the visitors. It also provides fresh content for your website. Interaction also helps in building a strong bond between members which is ultimately beneficial to your website.

Keep a special column that will contain regular feature updates: Try maintaining a column, which can be regularly updated. Such column can be a message from the chairman’ desk informing about the latest trends. Or it can be one of the employees of the company who writes about serious issues pertaining your industry in a humorous vein. It can also be a column where you answer emails received from the common masses that contain queries related to your field. For e.g. If a car manufacturing company maintains a website, it can start a column where experts answer queries of the public. This can be something as small as tips for increasing the mileage of the car.

Hold chat sessions: This is a great way of increasing the traffic to your website. Try to bring in the top shots from your industry for a chat or an interactive session with your visitors. Make sure that it is held for free. This is a sure shot method of attracting web traffic. For e.g., if your website is dealing is based on movies, you can invite a well known critic who can chat on the topic ‘Techniques for reviewing a movie’ now that is something which will attract the eyeballs.

Create Blogs: Blogs are a great way of bringing traffic to your website. It is an in-thing that is generating a great buzz in the world of Internet. Having a blog may just provide that extra reason for visitors to visit the website. Blogs also provide a platform for the visitors to share their thoughts with like-minded people.

Free stuff works: Everybody loves free stuff. If your website is able to provide visitors with free stuff, it will provide all the more reason for them to keep on visiting your website. The free stuff need not be of great monetary value. It also need not be tangible. For e.g. If your company is involved in manufacturing chocolate cookies, may be you can hold a workshop on how to manufacture a cookie sauce. Alternately you can dole out free t-shirts with your website and company logo printed on it.

Collect Feedback: One can collect feedback by making polls and online surveys a regular of the site. Everybody loves to have a say and polls and surveys are just the right medium for hearing the common man’s voice. It also makes the site far more interesting and interactive. It can be also useful for knowing the public’s thought on issues pertaining to the industry or the firm itself. For e.g. If a car manufacturing company has recently launched a new car model, it can hold a poll asking the general public its opinion on various aspect of the car.

Eyes and ears of your industry: A website can be made as the announcement system of the entire industry. If a news pertaining to the industry has been leaked or released, it can be made known on the website of the company. This will persuade people to keep on returning to the website because it is offering them latest industry updates. For e.g., many a times financial experts are aware of the amendments that are likely to be made to the taxation law. If the firm is an association of accountants, they can then use their website to make people aware of the likely amendments.

Treasure trove: Make the website a treasure trove of information. This can be done by listing articles, which is relevant to the company’s industry. The company can also offer articles that are an information mine for those interested in making a career in the industry of which the company is a part. For e.g. If an advertising agency has a website, it can include articles on how to make a career in the field of advertising world or may be a list of career options available in the field of advertising.

Promote the site: One has to promote the website if one has to have any chance of standing in the competition. There are two ways of promoting a website – online and offline.

ONLINE PROMOTION: A website can be promoted online in the following ways:

Search Engine Optimization: If you have not made your site search engine friendly, then do it now! It plays a very important role in attaining higher rankings in the search result. It is common fact that people do not go beyond the first two pages that are displayed in a search result. Hence SEO is important in attracting traffic to the web.

Add new features: Keep adding features which are suggested by the visitors to the website. For e.g. If there is a constant and an increasing demand for an opinion poll to be added, then try to add it to the website. This not only increases the web traffic but also shows that you care for the readers of your website. This helps in building goodwill for your website. The goodwill in turn will help in the formation of loyal readers. Also make sure that the added site features are publicized through all possible media.

Allow reprints: If people ask for a permission for the reprints of the articles that feature on the website, give them the permission to do so. But a little caveat. Ask them to give a link to your website on their pages. This will not only please the said people but will also help in increasing the traffic to your website.

Post your website on relevant newsgroups: Make sure that the URL of your website is posted on relevant newsgroups. For e.g. If the website belongs to an advertising agency, it should make it a point to post on newsgroups which relevant to the advertising world.

Keep Posted: If there are people who have registered themselves with your website, make sure that they get regular emails telling them about the articles that have been posted or any other relevant material. Showcase the articles in such a way that they are tempted to visit your website for reading the rest of the articles. This will help in increasing website traffic.

OFFLINE PROMOTION: Offline promotion can take place in the following ways:

Include Website address: Try to include the website address in all possible modes of communication. Letterheads, envelopes, bills, cash memos are some of the places where the address can be included.

Include it in your sponsorship deal: If you are sponsoring any event of program make sure that the banners also include your website address. This will make sure that your website address is read by many people.

Redirect members: Many times organizations get phone calls from the general public. Most of the phone calls are queries asking for some or the other information. After providing with basic information they can be asked to visit the website for a detailed information. For e.g. If a bank gets a call from a customer asking for the interest for a one year deposit, they can be given the information and can be asked to visit the website for further information.

Empathy for the visitors: One should empathize with the visitors. It requires a little effort on the part of the webmaster to keep his site in such a manner that it is a visit to your website turns out to be a pleasure-filled experience. This will not only help in attracting new visitors, but it also ensures that the loyal readers do keep visiting the site. Here are some tips for maintaining the website:

No technical problems: Just imagine a visitor clicking on a hyperlink of your website only to find that no the page does not exist any more. Be sure that he will be pissed off and you will lose a visitor forever. Hence it is necessary to make sure that they are no broken links. Similarly make sure that the page is not suffering from any technical glitches.

Tell a Friend: Make sure that articles of your website contain a link that can be used by the visitor to send an interesting article found on your website to a friend. In other words, make your site forward friendly. The ‘ tell a friend’ option is a great method to get new visitors to your website.

Secure the site: It is important to provide the visitors with a feeling of security. People are often wary when it comes to doing online transactions and finance related procedures. A site can be said to be secured if they are having a lock, which appears on the bottom right panel of the monitor screen. Make sure your site features that lock.

Observe the competition: It is necessary to keep a close eye on the competition. If their website is attracting more competition, ponder upon the factors which might be helping them and try to apply them to your website.

Navigation friendly: Make sure that the website is easy for navigation. A difficult site may put off the visitors. It should also not have too many links. Similarly a sitemap should be provided. It makes the site search friendly for the user and wins his approval.

Jere answers:

I recommend one of these: http://www.hosttell.com/

Powweb is on a 50% sale – $3.88/month ($46.56/year), and you get a free domain from them.

They support Javascript, and include these E-Commerce solutions:

ZenCart
ZenCart truly is the art of e-commerce; a free, user-friendly, open source shopping cart system. The software is being developed by group of like-minded shop owners, programmers, designers, and consultants that think e-commerce could be and should be done differently.

OsCommerce
osCommerce is an online shop e-commerce solution that offers a wide range of out-of-the-box features that allow online stores to be setup fairly quickly with ease. It is an e-commerce framework solution that not only remains easy to setup and maintain, but also makes it easier for store administrators to present their stores to their customers with their own unique requirements.

CubeCart
CubeCart is an eCommerce script written with PHP & MySQL. 100% template driven, XHTML & CSS valid, plug and play shipping/gateway/affiliate modules, tax by state/zone or country, multi currency support, email marketing, inventory stock control, sell digital & tangible goods and more.

Jere answers:

You need to get paid hosting with e-commerce included.

I recommend one of these: http://www.hosttell.com/

Powweb is on a 50% sale – $3.88/month ($46.56/year), and you get a free domain from them.

They include easy, one click install of these E-Commerce solutions:

ZenCart
ZenCart truly is the art of e-commerce; a free, user-friendly, open source shopping cart system. The software is being developed by group of like-minded shop owners, programmers, designers, and consultants that think e-commerce could be and should be done differently.

OsCommerce
osCommerce is an online shop e-commerce solution that offers a wide range of out-of-the-box features that allow online stores to be setup fairly quickly with ease. It is an e-commerce framework solution that not only remains easy to setup and maintain, but also makes it easier for store administrators to present their stores to their customers with their own unique requirements.

CubeCart
CubeCart is an eCommerce script written with PHP & MySQL. 100% template driven, XHTML & CSS valid, plug and play shipping/gateway/affiliate modules, tax by state/zone or country, multi currency support, email marketing, inventory stock control, sell digital & tangible goods and more.

Jere answers:

Here’re features of PHPKode Newsletter software, I tried this application, works great!
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