Dear Friend,

The free party on the Web is over.

Big businesses are finally sinking their teeth into this marketplace. This market is rapidly maturing. Like the old saying goes, 20% of salespeople make up 80% of total sales.

Or, 20% of Web Sites will generate 80% of sales. And if you have a great idea, a big business will either buy it...or more likely copy it. Either way, be prepared for more competition. Remember these trends as you prepare this year.

"The pessimist sees the difficulty in opportunity. An optimist sees the opportunity in difficulty."    -Abraham Lincoln

You will need to be a Web optimist to survive, because the challenges are just starting...

Trend 1. Third-Party Content Syndication

By one estimate, there are over 200 million Web Pages online.

If this is true, how come it is so hard to find the good ones when you are looking around?

Because few people know how to write or present their ideas, their offer. And this weakness is causing a glut of dead Web Sites.

The problem is simple; people are taking advantage of this free printing press called the Web. But they are not good writers. They cannot organize their ideas into a simple presentation.

Worst of all, they are forced to be something they are not - content creators.

This is where third party syndicated content comes in. If you could deliver updated information to your clients, increase your credibility, and focus on your own marketing, how much would it be worth to you?

Targeted content of good quality can be delivered as a traffic generator. The Reader's Digest model will prevail on the Web; the new Reader's Digest will supply content to Web Sites.

Good content will be syndicated out like an online Reuters Information Service. For a set fee you will receive updated, excellent content. This will minimize updating costs and make for a better experience.

Suggestions

1. Use framed Web Pages instead of links. Search the Web for good articles that don't compete with what you are offering, but provide good content for your audience. Offer to develop a good funnel of leads in exchange for featuring their articles.

The power of frames is in target marketing without having to redo Web Pages, or rewriting Web Sites. While most people use it to steal other's content, what would happen if you used it to offer access to an audience?

Instead of LinkExchange, think Content Exchange, with a twist; the lead generating mechanism is not some flashing banner, but good writing addressed to a specific audience. And all you need to do is get permission to share their page from your site. Use this as a marketing tool.

2. Offer to let other people customize your framed Web page to their specifications. Define how many links you can each have. Frames are an excellent way to integrate content from different Web Sites. (See Case Study below)

3. Check out how you can get customized content delivered to your site. Reuters ( www.reuters.com ), PR Newswire ( www.prnewswire.com ), and Yahoo ( www.yahoo.com ) already have programs you can tap into, depending on your budget.

SPAMAZON.COM Amazon.com is caught sending unsolicited email to MCSNet customers. While they handled the controversy quickly, 10,000 customers received an email, even if they never were a customer of Amazon.com. Where did they get their email addresses ?

Even better, create a grass roots Reuters service for excellent content. Or take advantage of the following.

Case Study: The Web Success Journal

Imagine if you could post just a few pages at your site, personalized and including links within your site. Combine that with up to date, cutting edge content on how to market, design a Web Site, educate, generate leads, and make more sales.

Welcome to my newest venture, opening in two weeks, called the Web Success Journal. Working closely with my friends and business inspirations, ADNet International (much more on them in the next trend), I will be delivering ongoing content for any Web Success Member who contacts me.

This content will appear to be at your site, personalized to your business. The page is built around three frames and a focus on targeted content. The top frame holds the title, the Web Success Journal, and links to the five sections of this journal.

On the left hand frame is a "Presented By" title, with your name and business, along with 4 links. You can customize this to your needs or I will do it for you. On the main page will be an ongoing study of business on the Web. There will be a password protected section for the latest content, including a fantastic way to put audio reports on the page. There is nothing like this online, and you will gain access to updated, excellent content delivered to your Web Site.

The goal is to make this a lead generator for you; I am also working closely on joint ventures with more serious partners. If you are a Member, you already know this; it is called the Web Success Ring. Hosting the Journal at your site is just one of the new benefits of being a member.

It is simple. I have created a frame based page; you host up to 4 pages on your site. One page is customized to you, with prominent links in the left hand frame.

Visit http://webletter.net/success/example.html in two weeks. I'll show you an example and a way you can take advantage of this.

Trend 2. Web Business Suites: Bundle Your Efforts into a Bigger Package

Think of your Web Site in terms of how it can be bundled with other, related Web Sites. Microsoft's Office took the market by offering everything you need with one purchase.

Online, this is happening again. What is happening is bundling, and merging of services, between apparent competitors. For example, I use a few of the online financial services, including the Wall Street Journal and Fidelity. At the Wall Street Journal's site ( www.wsj.com ), I found an alliance between the Wall Street Journal, Smart Money, and Barron's. Sign up for their free membership, and you gain access to all three.

Together they deliver perhaps the most comprehensive package of personal-finance and stock market information available on the Web. This bundling is happening everywhere. Search engines are mixing into small groups; search at Excite, and you get asked if you want to search at a sister search engine. You should do the same for your business. Bundle your products now.

Why Bundling Your Products/Services With Others Makes Sense

Let's get this straight; no one wants to work together. We just have to.

Look around you. Your car is composed of parts made mostly in Asia; they are put together under different names to sell the product.

Computers are another example. They all have fancy names, and the components are made by just a few suppliers in Asia. You are buying the same thing with a different shell and power.

Many businesses are merging their products, services, and marketing with companies that were once considered competitors. This is not the days of a local business scratching out a living among a fixed population. To broaden your reach, you have to extend your hand in business.

Microsoft Buys HotMail Basically, they bought 9 million email addresses and will integrate it into their MSN Network. Look for more big companies buying lists in the future.

Look at the following signs of intelligent business:

Alliances: General Electric Trading Partner's Network ( tpn.geis.com ) is an example. They took an alliance and put it online, making it more cost effective to trade and work together.

Co-Branding: Branding is for big business. Merge the delivery system with the technology and you have a good fit. Fidelity and Quote.com give this to Fidelity's customers. If you place a trade, you receive much of your information from Quote.com's database. Instead of recreating the wheel, Fidelity bought access to Quote.com's information.

Suggestions

1. Make a list of all business, industries, and markets related to what you are selling. Where can you find the right combination of content to wow all your customers, and generate leads?

2. Each business suite has to be thought of as a lead generator. Who will get the inquiries and who will follow-up?

I have found it best to find a good product for your market, approach the party and ask for an article, and see if they have a dealer's program.

Remember, it is leads, not just traffic; how many people contact you and are they qualified to buy?

The trickiest decision is the way to track and close the sale. If you can generate a number of leads, let's say for dentists, charge a per appointment or a per lead fee. If you can offer someone else's product to your customers, offer to joint venture and present the product to your people. Then split the sale price; make sure to use this approach only with products that have sufficient markup to make it worthwhile for both parties.

Let's face it, selling cheap retail products online is not easy; volume business is still a tricky proposition on the Web, although computer related products are a definite exception.

3. Enhance your reputation by bundling your services. If you sell search engine training, you could bundle this with an online marketing program, an ISP, a Web Designer and/or Provider, autoresponders, and a company offering credit card services to small businesses.

You would provide a turnkey solution, and could either pay each party for their part of the bundle, or charge a per lead fee. The key is to find people you can work with.

4. Set up mini storefronts for your bundle and test. This is a small, 5 page Web Site to mix your two offers. Just create a good entry page and include the content you both already have.

Cowles / Simba Predicts Small U.S. Internet TV Market Cowles/Simba's Internet Television Report predicts a meager 3 million or so users by 2001; that is less than 10 percent of the current market. Is WebTV really the future ?

Case Study: Hits To Sales

The best example I know of online for this trend is Hits To Sales ( www.hitstosales.com ), created by ADNet International. They have the technology, called ActiveEdit ( www.activeedit.com ), which they use to automatically update content at their sites.

They took this technology and integrated it into one of the finest online magazines I have seen. They did this in less than two weeks. They contacted me for some articles, Jonathan Mizel of www.cyberwave.com, Marlon Sanders of www.higherresponse.com, plus a number of other experts.

The content is unbelievable; their ability to update it and present it shows the power of a publishing system. What they did was bundle great content and deliver it simply.

By cooperating, both of us benefit. I generate content, they generate the delivery, the publishing. Sounds familiar doesn't it? A writer goes to a publishing house and asks to be printed. Or a writer makes a submission for a magazine. The publisher prints it. I hope to be an important contributor to their efforts, and they have already contributed to mine.

Trend 3. Local Yahoos Dominate Local Advertising

Syndicated content will be at the center of successful local advertising. It is often said that 80% of money is spent within 50 miles of home. The Web has to bring itself out of the international promise and down to the local reality of business.

Successful local advertising will seek to partner with a number of local information providers. Pay for their content through syndication, throw in a few national columns and a Web educational angle, and you might have an appealing offer to a local audience.

This is the model of local advertising. Credibility has to come from local content. Internet efforts like CitySearch and Yahoo will have difficulty reaching outside of the big cities.

Visit their sites and you get listings of businesses; what we need are recommendations. Many local directories exist - up to 8 per major city - but this will be reduced to the two or three who provide the right information.

To extend their reach, they need to develop trust and a following of a local audience. You cannot do that talking about the Internet. Content that deals with issues close to home, mixed with the international scope, will provide the catalyst.

Microsoft's Problems with Government What will regulation mean to Microsoft? Likely, not much; Microsoft could easily pay the $1 million a day fine and not loose a hearbeat. They have the customers, no matter what browser they use.

Suggestions

1. Get a local writer, or journalist, to act as an editor of local content. You will find many news feeds for national and international news.

Contact the local newspapers and find one that can feed you the information, for a price. Local television stations are looking at the Internet as a place where they can get a piece of the classified ad pie dominated by print media. The means to get the news already exists, can you integrate this into a Web Site that really serves the local community?

2. Read local "Best Of" issues and find the best businesses. Offer to feature them at your site; if they have a Web Page, offer to feature a page of their content at your site. Give them links and use this to generate traffic and advertising revenue.

3. Target journalism students in college and see if you can get one to work with you. Make this an internship, paid or not, and use the energy of someone trained to assimilate information and take advantage of it.

4. Search for online information resources; integrate all this automatic information into your Web Site.

Trend 4. Free Internet Access and Secured, Direct Email

People are signing on for Internet access at $10/month and maybe even $5/month just to be left alone in the volumes and volumes of excellent information (and dribble) on the Web. If they had a guide who asked them what they wanted, and targeted advertising to them while helping them find their way around, you would have a grateful customer.

Watch for the Web to emerge like television in the 1960s; free access in exchange for advertising. You may get free Internet access in exchange for demographic information.

Eventually someone will figure out that free access in exchange for the right to offer you products is the model. Look how popular free email is (also, how low maintenance).

If Microsoft could afford to pay the Justice Department's threat of a $1 million a day fine, they could afford to offer free access in exchange for customers. It would be like buying a mailing list, something they did with their recent purchase of Hot Mail (9 million email addresses).

Internet access does have its cost; customer access also is a cost for business. Many companies will pay for direct email access; not as many customers will pay for Internet access.

Watch for small payments in addition to your cable bills; Comcast, PrimeStar, @home, and many others will forge the dream of the Interactive TV Internet. These lists will be protected and exclusive.

Internet Access is an asset untapped by most major companies. The money is in interested eyes, not dialup accounts.

AOL a Favorite of Stock Analysts Despite its problems, AOL is still proving to be the favorite among newcomers. Stock Analysts predict a great year for this company, one of the few to survive the recent technology stock sell-off.

Suggestions

1. Tap into the advantages that WebTV offers, but beware the promise. There are several ways to sell WebTV set top boxes, but projections are pointing to only 600,000 users via television/cable in 1998. Given 50,000,000 or so current users, that is not a large group of customers.

2. Target your local ISP. I contacted one in Chico, CA., who is adding 250 customers a month. He can barely keep up with demand (this is not just for the City of Chico). His concern is to get them to pay for a year. Match the needs of advertisers with these local ISPs.

Think of it, $200 a year is the price of their access. If you paid the fee for qualified customers, you could end the ISP's problems and sell access to a huge list of customers, voluntarily.

Trend 5. Customer Profiling: Filtering What You Want to See, When You Want It

Push Media has dwindled as people realize it is like spam; they get flooded with news stories that they may or may not want to read.

The real goal of the online world is to create a customer filter, or profile; information on demand is more powerful than information thrown at you.

If you have signed up for any financial service, you have experienced customized information. Choose your news, weather, headlines, and special interests; they deliver it to you instantly. Try out the Wall Street Journal's Free Interactive Page (for a one month trial); you will see how easy it is to customize your own information.

WebTV has a program called Explore; it is a personal Web page that is organized around category and preferences.

Suggestions

1. Target customers by setting up an automatic page for them. This is not as difficult as it sounds; I have seen someone set up this effort in about two weeks, with little cost. You went to his site and got local news, weather, links, plus the ability to select a variety of search engines on your page.

Every time you went to the Web, you went to your page, which you could easily change. This was all done with basic CGI scripting, the kind you can find anywhere. And there are programs that already exist to create this, you just have to adapt them. Best of all, most of these scripts are free, or shareware.

2. Use the space on this Web Page for your targeted advertising as well. Give them what they want on their own customized page, and put your ads, direct email, and telemarketing into your efforts. This is the Web Lead generating model. Banner ads, mailing lists, and targeted offers can be achieved when you know what they want, and how badly they want it.

Be sure to include email customer service to cover any questions and to discover who are your interested shoppers. This kind of information is invaluable.

Some of 1997's Top Stocks: Gainers                               Losers

Yahoo    Mindspring    Amazon.com

+511% +499% +235%

Quarterdeck    Spyglass    Netscape

-61% -61% -57%

Trend 6. The Birth of Direct Email and the Death of Spam

Bulk email dies with a whimper.

The courts will not stop it. Direct email is just like direct mail. It may be "free", but it is time consuming and comes with many headaches. Not just for the recipient, but for the person sending it.

Bulk email will die of bad cold calling. Law suits will not stop it; like any other mania, once thousands do it badly, the market only responds to the few who do it well.

It is free right now. That is, if you do not count your time. But it will not be free for much longer. Why would anyone give free access to their customers?

Those few who succeed will not do it for free; they will likely pay $2,000 or so to get started. But they will develop the lists that most of us will buy. Those getting $49 CD-ROMs with a million addresses will join the wealth of dead Web Sites in a quiet moving to the rear as big business comes online.

Think you will have open access to AOL's customers forever? Not likely.

The truth is, the survivors will make amazing money. A bulk emailer who invests enough time and direct marketing savvy will still clean up.

The direct email lists are being built on the bulk email of today.

Web Design Made Simple A Web Site can be delivered in three ways: one column, two column, or three column. Whether using frames or tables, this is all we have. It is how you use the space that matters.

Suggestions

1. Discover bulk emailers who are now selling their tested lists. A number of companies spam, and then sell access to their lists. A few of them have good lists, so be careful.

Ask if their list is filled with people who want to hear from you; discover what offer was sent to this list. They should offer you a few examples.

2. Start small in targeting your market. Buy or barter for a small run at a list, and if it is a good one, then stick your money into it. I know a list of Web Masters that appears to cost 20 cents a person, but to test to the list can cost as little as $250.

That is not an expensive list, if it responds to my offer. And if it doesn't, I still follow the rule of market testing; don't spend more than $500 on any test. Try to spend as little as possible, so you can poke around and find the best place for your offer.

3. Direct email is best done by driving people to your Web Site. People will visit a Web Page more than just an autoresponder. I like to mix the two; they can always request my autoresponder at the Web Site. This builds credibility.

Since you should drive them to your Web Site, make sure the list is safe. Your business rests on it. Or put the site up at a place where it is not likely to get shut down for your testing.

I know 5 businesses marketing this way, and few if any get complaints. You should take the cautious approach they take.

As they say, 100 emails a day is better than a blast of one million supposed addresses. The goal is to get interested eyes, not to blast your message throughout cyberspace. After all, did you think that CD-ROM with 50 gazillion email addresses is worth anything? If it was, why would it be selling for $49?

Quality, not quantity, is the rule. A qualified list is better than a free, random, unqualified list.

Who Says Malls Don't Sell Product ? Don't tell that to Viaweb ( www.viaweb.com ); they claim to have moved about $60,000 a day through their stores in November/December, with a peak day of over $105,000.

Bonus Trend 7. Conditional Marketing

People come to your Web Site with a few specific ideas. So why do most Web Sites bury them in so many choices? Everyone says that your audience needs information, tons of reports, and content, content, content.

Meanwhile your customer visits and gets so overwhelmed, they forget why they came in the first place. Keep things simple and focus on your offer. Give them an entry point and don't try to sell the entire pie in one visit.

Suggestions 1. Set up two or three conditions for commerce at your site. If you are selling consulting services, then give a conditional link. I.e., "If you click here, you will discover more about consulting."

The link is the action. What is the benefit if they click there? How can you get them to act?

2. Give them a headline that leads to something they want to discover. Focus on just 3 reasons people visit your site. (Check out my new design at www.inetdesign.com; I don't list all the technical mumbo jumbo, I want them to talk with me on the phone. Information at this site led to more confusion than leads.)

Intuit is taking an amazing approach. They are using their software to develop leads for financial professionals. So if you visit the Intuit site, you will find a lead generating mechanism for financial services. What better place to find leads for accountants, attorneys, real estate appraisers, banks, financial planners, insurance, and every other form of financial planning than the leading consumer software.

4. Focus on your offer; make it as brief as possible. Sum up everything in two sentences. Keep your questionnaires brief; ask people what they would consider spending.