Poor Richard 12
#012/17-July-98
POOR RICHARD'S WEB SITE NEWS
Geek-Free, Commonsense Advice on Building a Low-Cost Web Site
Editor: Peter Kent
Top Floor Publishing
IN THIS ISSUE
- Beginner's Column: Don't Use Music At Your Site!
- Submission Programs
- Simple Online Transactions
- Netscape Changes the Domain Name Rules
- To Advertise, or Not to Advertise, That is the Question
- Three Real-Life "Advertising" Campaigns
- Poor Richard's Web Site in the Press
- Reading Back Issues
- In Future Issues
**** IF YOU FIND THIS NEWSLETTER USEFUL ... FORWARD IT TO FRIENDS AND COLLEAGUES ****
Beginner's Column: Don't Use Music At Your Site!
The World Wide Web, we're often told, is a multimedia system. Unfortunately, it's not true. The Web works way too slowly to be a real multimedia system. Despite this fact, you've probably visited Web sites that play music when you arrive. I was at one the other day that had some information I really wanted to read, but I was forced to listen to this really irritating synthesizer version of the old "Man From Uncle" theme tune. I've no idea why the author thought this was necessary, beyond the fact that he _could_ add sound.
Music at Web sites can be really irritating. One of the main problems is that the visitor cannot stop the sound without adjusting his computer's sound settings. So if you place a sound file at a Web page, you're forcing people to make a choice. These are the possible decisions:
- a. I like/don't mind this music, so there's no problem continuing reading.
- b. I hate this music, but I want to read this page, so I guess I'll just put up with it.
- c. Damn, this is really irritating, I'll adjust my computer's volume ... or
- d. Damn, this is really irritating, I'm leaving.
Only one of the four options is a good one. So think carefully before you add music to your site! I haven't yet seen one site on which the music really adds something useful or entertaining, so ask yourself; why am I adding this music, and is it really providing a benefit for the user?
I'm not saying there's never a reason to have music at a Web site. It all depends what you are doing with it. The example I give is CDnow; http://cdnow.com
You won't hear any music when you arrive at the CDnow site, despite the fact that this company is the world's leading online music retailer. In fact you won't hear _any_ music at their site ... unless you request it. They have around a quarter of a million sound clips available. They just think it should be the visitor's choice whether or not to hear them.
By the way, in most cases the music I've heard is stolen; it's unlikely, but you just could be sued. The larger the site, the more likely you are to be sued. And although it's not common right now, you can expect it to become much more common as the music industry begins to crack down on piracy.
Submission Programs
Want to submit your Web site or individual Web pages to the search engines? You should submit to the major search engines -- sites such as Yahoo! -- by hand, but you may want to consider a submission program or service to help you with the rest. The following is a list of submission programs I've run across recently:
007 Submitter
http://www.007software.com/
AddWeb & AddWeb Pro
http://www.cyberspacehq.com/addweb/
Hurricane WebPromo
http://www.theoffice.net/webpromo/
HyperHits
http://webmastertools.com/
Net Submitter Pro
http://softwaresolutions.net/netsubmitter/
Promotional Spider
http://wg.rnet.com/nort/spider/
Register Pro Promotion Spider
http://www.registerpro.com/spider_info.html
Submission Wizard
http://www.submissions.com/
SubmitWolf PRO
http://www.msw.com.au/swolf
WebPosition
http://www.webposition.com/
Web Promotion Spider Professional Version
http://beherenow.com/spider
The following two are a little different -- they're designed to help software publishers announce their products at shareware libraries across the Internet:
AddSoft
http://www.cyberspacehq.com/addsoft/
Shareit
http://www.msw.com.au/
By the way, I believe that all of the above programs are for MS Windows. I haven't been able to find any submission programs for the Mac. Am I missing something? If you know of any Mac programs, please let me know and I'll mention them here in the next newsletter.
Simple Online Transactions
I've had several people ask me recently how to set up a simple online order system. Many people are unsure of the various components that are required, so I've decided to describe how I take orders at my Web site. In some cases I've discussed various components before, so in such cases I'll refer back to the earlier edition of the newsletter (which you can find in the archive).
--> Step 1: The Shopping Cart
I've discussed this issue on a number of occasions, so I won't go into too much detail. I use a shopping-cart system called Hazel. This system saves the transaction information -- the person's name and shipping address, the credit-card number and expiration date, and so on -- in a text file at my Web server, then sends me an email message telling me an order has been taken. For more information about shopping cart software, see editions 2, 3, and 4 of this newsletter in the archives:
http://PoorRichard.com/newsltr/archive.htm
For a large list of shopping-cart services and programs, see the Special Report page:
http://PoorRichard.com/freeinfo/special_reports.htm
--> Step 2: Download the Data From the Web Server
I have to transfer the order information from the Web server to my office computer. This may be done using a special form -- some shopping-cart programs and services provide a secure Web page from which you can download the data. In an earlier issue I also discussed how to set up your own secure Web page to transfer files securely. See ...
http://poorrichard.com/newsltr/002.htm#sec
The data file created by Hazel is a comma-delimited text file, so I can quickly and easily import the file into a database program. This is a very important feature of a shopping-cart program -- the format in which the data is saved should allow for database imports. I think personally believe this to be a critical feature ... evidently some shopping-cart designers seem to disagree with me!
--> Step 3: Import Into Access
I'm using Microsoft Access to save all my transaction data. It's not the easiest program to learn to use ... but then I haven't been able to find any other programs that will do everything I need yet which are easy to use.
I created an Access macro. When I double-click the macro, it imports the order file I've downloaded. I then view the data to make sure it looks okay -- that the buyer provided all the information I'll need to process the order.
Creating macros really isn't terribly hard, but if you don't know anything about Access it may take you a while to figure it all out. Perhaps you can find someone to help you set up a database and create a macro or two. Someone who knows how to use a database program should probably be able to do everything you need in an hour, two hours maximum.
--> Step 4: Export to PC Authorize
I created another macro to export the information into another text file, this time in the format used by PC Authorize. PC Authorize is the program I use to process credit-cards. Setting up an import template takes ten minutes or so, and once created it allows me to import the data very quickly each day.
--> Step 5: Process the Credit Cards
I open PC Authorize, and import the text file that I've just created. Then I click on a button, and PC Authorize dials into the credit-card network and processes the cards. For every card that is approved, PC Authorize prints a receipt (which I send with the book).
This is a great little program; it's really fun to use. What makes it so great is that although I've been working with computer programs for almost 20 years, this is the first program I've ever worked with that actually takes money from someone else's bank account and moves it into mine! By the way, for those of you who don't process credit cards and are wondering what proportion are approved ... I've found that the vast majority go through okay. Over the last few months I've been getting around a 3% failure rate. But sometimes the problem is an incorrectly entered expiration date, or perhaps the buyer didn't realize the card was over limit. If I email the buyers and let them know, a number will provide new information -- a different expiration date or another card number. There's around a 50% chance that a bad order will eventually go through.
--> Step 6: Print Labels
For every order that goes through, I need a mailing label. This is where it gets just a little clunky. The version of Access that I have has a bug that stops it printing mailing labels. Instead I create a report -- the macro that exports the data to PC Authorize text file creates this report at the same time. Then I click on a button at the top of the report, and the report is opened in Word for Windows. I press Ctrl-~ in Word for Windows, and a macro I've assigned to that keystroke sequence runs and cleans up the formatting in the report, removing tabs from it.
Then I open my LabelWriter program. LabelWriter is a little label printer connected to my computer's serial port. I select the first mailing address in Word for Windows and copy it to the Clipboard, then click a button in LabelWriter and the contents of the Clipboard are pasted into a mailing label and printed. (I've just discovered that I can shorten this process; CoStar, the company that made my label printer, now has a program that prints directly out of Word for Windows; all I'll have to do is click a button in the Word for Windows toolbar.)
That's it. I've processed the credit cards and printed a receipt and malign labels. It's not terribly high-tech; if I was processing a hundred orders a day I'd probably want something a bit more sophisticated. But I process three to five orders a day, sometimes a few more, so it's a pretty quick and manageable system.
--> Costs
How much does a system like this cost? Here's a quick rundown.
Shopping-Cart Software
Prices for these systems vary greatly, from nothing (see iCat's free system: http://www.icat.com/ ) to $thousands. Take a look at my special report on shopping-cart systems to get an idea of what you'll have to pay:
http://PoorRichard.com/freeinfo/special_reports.htm
One way to cut costs here is to use a dumb form, a simple feedback form that doesn't have all the features of a shopping-cart system. This may work okay if you are only selling one product, but it's a problem if you have multiple products.
Credit-Card Merchant Account
Prices vary tremendously, but if you look around you can find a good deal. I signed up with Costco, a warehouse club that has a special Business membership (what they call their Executive Membership) with a variety of special features -- including low-cost merchant accounts. The annual membership is $100, though I already had a $40 basic membership, so the real additional cost to me is $60 a year, $5 a month. If you sign up with Costco just for the merchant account, then you might think of this $100 as an $8.33 monthly fee to use the credit-card service, which is still lower than the monthly fee many credit-card merchant accounts charge. (Costco's credit-card program does not charge a monthly fee.)
It costs $25 to sign up for the credit-card account, which is a relatively low fee. Then there are per-transaction fees, which are also relatively low: 1.89% plus 25 cents for transactions in which you cannot swipe the credit card. (However, note that there are sometimes additional fees, in Costco's program and with all other merchant-account programs; for instance, there are fees for voice-authorization, for transactions not using "address verification," and so on.)
You can find information about the Costco plan here: http://www.costco.com/
Database Program
This is a bit of a problem. Most people have a free database program available; most computers these days come with a copy of Microsoft Access. The real cost is figuring out how to set up the databases and macros; it took me several hours, as I hadn't worked with a sophisticated database program in a number of years.
PC Authorize
I picked PC Authorize because it was a Windows 95/NT program that would allow me to import a text file. Some of the other programs either won't run in Windows, or won't import text files. Whenever you sign up for a credit-card merchant account you'll be offered various hardware terminals (which I simply didn't consider, because I wanted an all-software order-processing system), and software. But you generally don't need to use the products you're offered; you can buy elsewhere. Costco's merchant-account program had a deficient software program, so I bought PC Authorize directly from the publisher, Tellan, and paid $358, including shipping:
Of course before you buy a product elsewhere, you'd better check with the company providing the merchant account to see if the product will work with that credit-card network.
Label Printer
There are several label printers available. I have a CoStar LabelWriter, for which I paid about $140. It prints wide labels, which include a return mailing address at the top.
It can take a little while to set up a simple, low-cost system like this, but once it's up and running it's very quick and easy to work with.
One more thing that may have occurred to you; how does a small company -- one or two people -- process orders while they are out of the office for a week or two, on vacation for instance? Ah, well, maybe I'll cover that in another article soon.
Netscape Changes the Domain Name Rules
On Thursday of this week Netscape Communications announced the release of its latest browser, Netscape Navigator 4.5 beta. (If you've been on the Internet a few years you probably remember when beta releases happened every few weeks -- things have slowed down a little!) This new browser contains a feature that's bound to upset a lot of people ... in fact I'm not too happy with it.
The feature is called Smart Browsing, and although I can see that it might be of benefit to many users, it radically alters the way in which domain names typed into the Location box work. In prior versions of Netscape Navigator, if you type a single word into the Location box and press Enter the browser would assume that the word was a domain name, and try to connect you to the appropriate .com domain. For instance, type PoorRichard into the Location box, press Enter, and Navigator tries to connect to www.PoorRichard.com or PoorRichard.com.
Smart Browsing works differently. If you type PoorRichard into the Location box of 4.5, apparently the browser checks a list of keywords stored at the Netscape server. If it finds PoorRichard listed, it looks for the associated Web page, and then transfers that page. If it can't find PoorRichard in the list of keywords, it searches a search engine instead, and then displays the results. (I haven't downloaded 4.5 yet, so I don't know how it actually handles PoorRichard ... let me know, someone!)
Smart Browsing is an optional feature that can be turned off, but as software publishers know well, if a feature is on by default the majority of users will _not_ it off. That means for most users, and for all of us who run Web sites, the rules have changed. What really irritates me about this is that millions of users are now used to a completely different browser behavior, and this is going to lead to a lot of confusion and -- even worse, from our point of view -- lost visitors.
This is more of a problem for site owners who have registered what I call "keyword" domains, which I discussed in an earlier newsletter:
http://PoorRichard.com/newsltr/004.htm#begin
In that newsletter I mentioned the site that had registered t-ball.com. They were getting traffic from people who simply typed t-ball into the Location box, just to see where it would take them. Now it will take them to either a different site altogether, or to a search-results page. One might argue that such keyword domains are unfair anyway, but still, what about people who have well-known domain names, used by people who want to reach their site ... people who will now be diverted elsewhere?
We're going to hear many, many complaints about this not-so-smart Smart Browsing feature, and as it's a beta feature it may eventually die. I've got my voodoo doll out, and it's stuck full of pins already.
To Advertise, or Not to Advertise, That is the Question
As you know, this newsletter is both free, and free of advertising. There are times at which I've considered accepting advertising, though. However, I'm not sure about two things. First, is it worth the trouble? At present this newsletter has around 3,500 subscribers. It's a long newsletter, so it could probably carry a couple of ads. How much could I charge? I've seen specialized newsletters charging as much as a cpm (cost per thousand) of $40. That would be 3.5 (thousand) * $40 x 2 ads = $280. Umm, well, tempting. Twenty six issues a year, that's $7,280, enough to take a sizable chunk out of the print-run costs for one of the books I have planned for next year.
Of course I'm not sure that I could sell all the spaces; I suspect not. On the other hand, the newsletter's subscriber list is growing very fast; about 170 people have subscribed just in the last couple of days. As the number of subscribers grows, the income per ad goes up.
The other issue is this. How do subscribers feel about seeing an ad or two in a newsletter? Do they feel very strongly about it. It is, after all, a free newsletter, so I suspect that most wouldn't mind (let me know if you feel strongly either way!).
I haven't yet decided whether I should start selling advertising. While I'm thinking about it, though, I am going to run one ad in this issue. In fact you might think of this ad as part of an article, an example of another way to promote your own email newsletter (and as I always say, no Web site is really complete without an email newsletter).
The following ad is from NEAT NET TRICKS, and is part of an ad swap. I'll run an ad from this newsletter, and the publisher of NEAT NET TRICKS will run an ad for Poor Richard's Web Site News. No money changes hands, but we both benefit.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
| A light-hearted (not too technical) collection of computer and |
| internet tips twice monthly. That's NEAT NET TRICKS. Subscribe |
| free with email to majordomo@majordomo.net and indicate in the |
| message body 'subscribe neatnettricks' (without quotes.) |
| Or, visit the web site at http://bounce.to/jteems |
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -By the way, if you haven't started your own email newsletter yet, consider that all the "big boys" have them. I'm currently writing a book called "The CDnow Story" with Jason and Matthew Olim, the founders of CDnow ( http://cdnow.com/ ), so I've heard about the techniques they used to compete with companies that were blowing millions of dollars. (They began their business in their parent's basement; they currently own one third of the online music business, and grossed $10m in the last quarter.) One of the techniques they use is an email bulletin that they send out to 800,000 people every couple of weeks. Think about it ... that's over 20 million individual advertising blurbs every year! The cost is negligible when compared to just about any other form of advertising or promotion, so they'd be foolish not to use email. You should, at the very least, consider it.
Three Real-Life "Advertising" Campaigns
Sorry, I've done it again. In the last issue I promised to run an article comparing three real-life "advertising" campaigns. (Only two of the campaigns used paid advertising ... the third is ... well, that's the surprise.)
Anyway, it's going to have to wait for the next edition. I wanted to run the information related to the new Netscape Navigator developments, and I was running out of space, so I've decided to hold that article until the next issue.
Poor Richard's Web Site in the Press
- "In a word, wonderful!" wrote Helen Heightsman Gordon, Ed. D., in The Midwest Book Review Internet Bookwatch. "In two words: I'm impressed. Best-selling author Peter Kent delivers all that his subtitle promises, and more."
- Deborah Lynne Wiley had this to say in a recent edition of Online Magazine: "Experience keeps a dear School, but Fools will learn no other... Perhaps reading this book will help."
For more reviews, and many readers' testimonials, visit ...
Poor Richard's Web Site is in many bookstores, and can be ordered by others; it can also be ordered on-line, through the mail, by fax, or by phone.
See ...
Order direct from the publisher, and you'll get a 100%, 1-Year Guarantee. If the book doesn't help you set up a low-cost yet effective Web site, send it back for a refund!
Reading Back Issues
If you need to refer to back issues of this newsletter, you can find them at the following location:
http://PoorRichard.com/newsltr/
In Future Issues ...
- Three "advertising" campaigns compared
- The Poor Richard Web Site Makeover
- Getting the Word Out about your Web site
- Setting up an email mailing list for newsletters, bulletins, product announcements, etc.
- Processing orders while you're out of town
- More on promoting newsletters
- Secure servers: why you want one, how they work, who has them
- Mail-merge programs and mailing list programs
- A quick way to inform Web sites when you change your URL
- Are people cheating at the award sites?
- Charging purchases to the buyer's telephone numbers
- Electronic press releases _do_ work!
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(c) Copyright 1998, Top Floor Publishing
All Rights Reserved
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