Jim's Marketing Blog

Marketing tips and ideas to help you grow your business

Avoid toilet paper web design

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Marketing is all about developing trust.  This is why I am always totally amazed, when I see an apparently legitimate company, using the exact same ‘toilet paper web design’ as used by online criminals, scammers and con artists!

What is a ‘toilet paper web design’?

I coined the phrase ‘toilet paper web design’ a year ago.  It refers to that ugly, hard-sell design style, where web pages are fairly narrow BUT REALLY, REALLY, REALLY LONG!  They just roll on and on like a long narrow roll of toilet paper (hence the name!)

Usually, these over-long pages use lots of different font colours and font sizes, plus pictures of expensive cars, piles of money or sometimes both!  There’s way too much use of underlined words and highlighted text – they look like a total mess!  Some even show fake copies of financial records and fake testimonials about whatever scam they are trying to fool you into signing up for.

They then end with a super, limited offer; for you to get a ‘bundle’ worth 299.99, for just 24.99!  The bundle is either membership of something or a photoshop image of a box, which looks like a 1970’s soap powder box!

Legitimate businesses should use legitimate marketing!

When someone visits a website, they immediately form their all-important first impression of that website and the person or business behind it! If they see you using the same online marketing style as a scammer, you are really in trouble!  Your image will be warning them NOT to go within a mile of you – that’s not good for your marketing!

Unbelievably, some of the most common users of toilet paper web design are legitimate business coaches, trainers and consultants! This con artist template is fine for con artists.  However, if you have a legitimate business with a legitimate product or service, it’s crazy to try and emulate what criminals do.

Whenever I have spoken to legitimate businesses, who use the toilet paper web design approach, they always say they did it after either reading some ebook or after seeing a site that claimed to be successful, using the same approach.

An ebook can be written and posted to the Internet in minutes and a scammer will never admit their site is not working!  They usually have dozens of sites and rely on each one finding enough vulnerable people to make a small profit!

If you know a legitimate business that’s using this approach – point them to this article and help them avoid being wrongly associated with Internet scumbags!

Jim’s Marketing Blog Update

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My week old marketing blog!

I just wanted to say a BIG ‘Thank You!’ to those of you who are recommending jimsmarketingblog.com to your friends and contacts. Although I only launched the blog less than a week ago, it has already passed the visitor target I set for it’s first month.

A lot of the traffic we are getting has come from your recommendations and those of you who have linked to the blog from your website or blog.

Thank you!

First impressions count – even online!

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How many times have you heard that; “first impressions count”?  Well, it’s true – first impressions count for a great deal – especially in marketing.  This is because, the first impression a business or a person creates with a potential client, is what forms the foundation of their relationship with them.

If that relationship is built on a bad foundation, it will fail.  After all, no one buys from a person or business that they have a ‘bad feeling’ about.

For example

I was contacted online last week by a total stranger via my Twitter account.  This person’s initial message to me wasn’t an introduction or even a simple hello – it was a full on sales pitch!  What was this person trying to sell?  I have no idea!  I just deleted his message as soon as it was clear what he was doing.

Approaching a total stranger with a sales pitch, instead of a friendly introduction, demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of how sales and marketing works!

Affiliates beware

Sadly, this kind of shoddy marketing is used by the huge majority of small, online businesses.  I get emails on a daily basis from strangers who want me to become ‘an affiliate’ of their latest ‘wonder product.’  Even though these people have not bothered to call me or build a relationship with me, they expect me to attach my good name to their business and product – neither of which I know anything about!

If you want to make a stack of sales online or offline, make sure YOU focus on creating a great initial impression in the mind of your target market!  Then, ensure that everything you do builds positively upon that strong foundation.

By the way, you can contact me on Twitter any time.  My username is @jimconnolly