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Your Web Tip of the Month from:
Our several years of intense Web experience have taught us that the Internet is a lot like the wild west. The sheriffs are few and far between. It's easy to get hoodwinked or shot in the back – figuratively, of course. You can lose your, um, shirt. Jumping into the Internet today is a lot like a tin-horn walking into a western bar and asking a poker dealer, "How do ya play this game, mister?"
Not only are there phishing scams, Nigerian princes (and their many variants), spam, adware, and viruses, but there are other insidious pitfalls as well. Here are a couple of examples from our personal experience that may save you some headaches and money.
The "free trial"
A while back, against my better judgment, I signed up for a $1 trial for seven days to check out a
company's Web statistics software. Before the seven days was up, I needed to contact the company's technical support. An email
entered through a form on the site was not answered. Ooops! Phone calls rolled over to a voice mail asking for a phone number
for a call back. Not a good sign! Emails and phone calls demanding cancellation of my trial subscription were ignored as well.
The result? I started getting $29.95 charged on my credit card which took two months to resolve. The moral of this tale is to
never, ever, give a credit card number for a "free" or nearly free trial. After all, if it really is a free trial, they don't
need your credit card.
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Web Design Partners is now offering a $50 referral fee! The new site
must be at least $850 in value, and the referral fee is paid when the site
goes on line.
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"Too Good to be True" Offers
As web designers and practitioners of the black art of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) our
inboxes are flooded with "advice" on how to get higher ranking on the search engines. This "advice" generally leads to a sales pitch. No matter what business you're in, you get these too, and you know what I'm talking about.
Here's a real-life example I got earlier this week. I received an offer from an SEO firm that stated they could get our sites on page one of Google, MSN, and Yahoo! They showed how they had done just that with their site. I checked one of their key phrases and they were right – they were on page one Google. The only problem was, literally nobody ever searched using that key phrase! What good is a page one ranking for an obscure key word that no one ever searches on?
"It works, But…"
Some time ago, we received a promotion for software that would automate the tedious and time-consuming
process of submitting articles to article directories. (If you've been reading these tips for some time, you know that article
submission is a good way to generate valuable back links to your Web site.) Since there was no free trial (Note to self – if there's
no free trial, move on!), we bought it. Did the software work as advertised? Yes. Was it more tedious and time-consuming to use
than our manual process? You bet your sweet mouse it was! We got our money back on that one.
So when you "walk into the bar" of the Internet, have your pistols loaded, and keep your credit card in your pocket because the "dealer" has a pair of aces in his sock.
This Web Tip is provided by Web Design Partners.com. We hope you will also take time to visit our online stores:
Welcome Baby Gifts.comPlease contact us if you need changes or updates made to your current web site. Your visitors want to see fresh new material and offers each time they visit. This is another, very important way to achieve your Internet Success.
Janet and Phil
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Janet and Phil Winter
Web Design Partners
"Your Business Never Looked So Good"
Phone: 770-664-0848
Fax: 770-664-0895
Web Design Partners.com
janwinter@mindspring.com
philwinter@mindspring.com
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