We do not recommend that you rely entirely on search engines to drive traffic to your website. However, it is a good idea to optimize your website for the best possible ranking. There are hundreds of factors that affect your ranking in the search engines. The search engine companies (Google, etc.) keep their ranking algorithms secret, so improving ranking is largely guesswork. Fortunately, through experimentation and observation some of the things that affect website ranking in search engines have been discovered. The following is a list of several of the major ones.

These things improve your ranking:

• Size of your website (the bigger, the better)
• Having content (i.e. text) on your website that is relevant to the search keywords
• Number of other legitimate sites linking to your website (the more the better)
• Age of your website (the older the better)
• Frequency of updates to the content of the website (the more frequent the better)
• Having the search keywords in your domain name
• Having the search keywords in the web addresses of the web pages
• Having the search keywords in the title of your web page (the title is what appears at the top of the web browser when you are on a particular page)
• Having the search keywords in headlines throughout your website
• Having properly written (i.e. standards-compliant) computer code
• Being listed in dmoz.org and dir.yahoo.com

These things penalize your ranking:

• Over-optimizing your website (too many keywords in text, etc.)
• Linking to other sites from your site — especially “bad” sites

If your website is lacking in any of the above elements that can improve your search engine ranking, please get in touch with your account manager. We can update your website to align with the above criteria so that you have the best possible chance of ranking high in the search engines.

1. Find Outlook Express on your computer and launch it (open it). You will usually find Outlook Express in the “Programs” menu under your “Start” menu.

2. If this is the first time you are using Outlook Express, it should automatically go into a “set-up wizard” (a “wizard” is a program that walks you through the steps necessary to complete your set-up). If your Outlook does not automatically take you into the set-up wizard, you can get to it by clicking on the “Tools” menu at the top of your window, and then select “Accounts…” When the Accounts window pops up, click on the “Add” button and then select “Mail…”

3. The first screen of the wizard asks for your name. This is the name that people will see when they receive an e-mail from you, so type it exactly as you want others to see it.

4. Click on “Next” at the bottom to go to the next screen. On this next screen you will be asked for your e-mail address. Type in your complete e-mail address and then click “Next.”

5. This next screen will ask for your mail server settings. For the incoming mail server, use “mail.your-domain.com” where “your-domain” is your own domain name. For example, if your domain name is magimpact.com, you would use mail.magimpact.com as your incoming mail server.

For your outgoing mail server, use your local ISP’s (Internet Service Provider — the company that you use to connect to the internet) outgoing mail server. You should have received the outgoing mail server information from them when you first signed up. If you do not have it, call them and request the information. If you cannot connect to your local ISP’s outgoing mail server, see our trouble-shooting article.

6. The next screen will ask for your login information. Use your full e-mail address for the Account Name and carefully type your password into the Password field. Passwords are case-sensitive, so make sure you make uppercase letters uppercase and lowercase letters lowercase. Select the “Remember password” option if you do not want to re-type your password every time you check your e-mail.

7. Once you click “Next” you should see a screen that says your set-up is complete. Click “Finish.”

8. If you are setting up multiple accounts on the same computer, just follow the above procedure for each account.

If you have any questions or need any assistance with setting up your e-mail accounts, please contact your account manager.

There are many ways to drive traffic to your website - search engines, online advertising, print advertising, viral marketing, etc. But there is one often overlooked low-cost method that is especially effective at driving interested individuals to your site on a regular basis: marketing e-mails.

A marketing e-mail is an e-mail mailed out to your e-mail mailing list on a regular basis. Such e-mails contain information that is of value to the people on your list and include content that promotes your brand or your goods and services. It is different from SPAM in that the people on your list have requested to be on your list. They have subscribed to your mailing list because you have something of value to send them. This is called an “opt-in” mailing list, and it is totally acceptable to send regular mailings to such a list.

One example of a marketing e-mail is a “Fact of the Week” e-mail containing some interesting tid-bit related to your industry. This is e-mailed out once a week and includes mention of something you have for sale that ties in to the interesting fact for that week. For example, if you own a jewelry store, you could send out an interesting fact about legends regarding emeralds, and then mention that all your emerald jewelry is on sale that week.

Another example is a weekly e-mail that is sent out with tips on how to use a product or service that your customers have recently purchased from you. For example, your customers that have bought digital cameras from you can receive weekly e-mails explaining various features of digital cameras and how to best make use of these features to improve photography. Such an e-mail can include mention of camera accessories available for purchase that relate to each weekly tip.

If you have a business that sells to other businesses who in turn resell your services to their customers, you can send out regular e-mails containing tips to help them increase their sales. E-mails that offer genuine and easy-to-follow help are much appreciated by the people on your mailing list, and they build loyalty for your company. Additionally, any increase in sales for your agents leads to an increase in sales for your own company, so everybody wins.

In addition to offering your customers something of value, marketing e-mails also drive traffic to your website. Usually only part of an article is used in the e-mail - just enough to get the reader interested. Then the reader is directed to your website to read the rest of the article (which they can access with a quick click on a link in the e-mail). After they are done reading the article on your website, they will hopefully be interested enough to browse around your site and find other things of interest to them. And if your website is designed well, this can lead to increased online sales or more leads generated.

Another benefit of marketing e-mails is that they regularly remind your customers that you are there and that you have goods and/or services that they need and want (see our article about the “Three Times Rule” for more information). Sending out regular mailings can have a significant effect on your income, and e-mail marketing is one of the most cost-effective methods of achieving this. This can have a significant impact on your bottom line.

So if you have a well-designed website that just isn’t producing the results you expected, take a look at how much regular traffic you are getting (contact your Account Manager for a free report of your traffic statistics). If your traffic is not at an adequate volume to produce the results you want, consider starting an e-mail marketing campaign to bolster your website’s effectiveness. Your Account Manager can work with you to create a successful marketing campaign.

A large part of the secret to success in advertising is what we call the “Three Times Rule.” In order for advertising to be successful, you need to repeatedly reach your potential customers with the same message over and over — at least three times, and preferrably more.

What this means is that instead of taking out one large full-page newspaper ad and running it once, you are better off buying three smaller ads and running the same ad three times in a row. If you are running radio ads, you are better off running shorter more frequent ads rather than longer ads less frequently. In direct mail, you can cut your mailing list to one-third its size and do three mailings to the same list instead of just one large mailing.

The basic theory behind the “Three Times Rule” is that the world around us is so cluttered with advertising that you have to keep repeating your message over and over before it makes an impression on your target audience. If someone notices your ad once, they probably won’t remember it because they will be bombarded with hundreds of other ads before they take any action regarding yours. But if they keep seeing your same ad over and over it starts to make an impression on them and they start to remember it. Then when it comes time to make a purchase, the ads that have hit them most often will be at the top of their minds, and you have a much better chance of getting an interested customer.

This is one reason why e-mail marketing is so effective.  You can keep sending your message to your customers repeatedly on a weekly or monthly basis for very little cost.  You can keep reminding them that you are there and that you have goods and services that they want.  If you include information in your e-mails that your customers find useful or entertaining, they will continue reading your e-mails and repeatedly getting your message.   This translates into more business for you.

As the volume of spam being sent out into the Internet has increased, so have efforts to combat it. Most of us benefit from these spam prevention measures, but there are also occasional incidental problems that can occur resulting from barriers put up to block the transmission of spam.

One of the common problems about which our clients contact us regarding their e-mail service is an inability to send outgoing e-mail. In most cases this is caused by the client’s local Internet Service Provider (ISP) blocking their outgoing e-mail as a spam prevention measure.

SOLUTION: CONTACT YOUR SERVICE PROVIDER

If you are having difficulties with your outgoing mail, there are several things you can do to get around any block imposed by your ISP. The first is to contact your ISP and ask them to help you set up your outgoing e-mail using their outgoing mail server (also called an SMTP server). They should be able to walk you through the set up and fix any problems you have with sending out e-mail. If you use your ISP’s outgoing mail server, please note that it is completely separate from our system, and we are able to offer only limited assistance regarding your outgoing mail since we do not have access to your ISP’s server configuration. Using your ISP’s outgoing mail server is, however, the recommended set-up because it offers the most direct route to the Internet.

ALTERNATE SOLUTION: USE OUR SERVER

If your ISP is unable or unwilling to help you set up your outgoing e-mail through their server, you have another option. We have set up our own outgoing mail (SMTP) server that you can use. By using the following settings you can usually bypass any blocks your local ISP is imposing on your outgoing e-mail.

Use the following settings for your outgoing (SMTP) mail server:

Outgoing Mail (SMTP) Server: mail.[your_domain].com
Outgoing Mail (SMTP) Port: 465
Selected: “Server requires a secure connection (SSL)”

In Outlook Express, the Mail Server setting is on the “Servers” tab of the Account Settings window, and the other two settings are on the “Advanced” tab. Other e-mail software will have similar settings that you should be able to easily find and change.

If you have any trouble getting this set up, please feel free to contact your account manager for assistance.

To get started, use one of the options on the right-hand side of this page. You can type in a topic of interest into the “search” field, or click on one of the links under “Latest Blog Entries,” “Categories” or “Archives.” We are continuously adding new content, so please check back on a regular basis for new articles.

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We encourage you to get involved in the discussions in this blog by submitting replies to the posts (click on the “comments” link beneath the article where you wish to comment) or by e-mailing your Account Manager.

If there are any additional topics you would like to see covered in this blog, please let us know.

Thank you.