[thelist] RE: spam?

ANDREA STREIGHT astreight at msn.com
Tue Oct 12 20:50:37 CDT 2004


Alex:

I really sympathize with your plight, one we probably all are in, or are 
clients are in.

If there were a fast, easy way to drive traffic to a web site, and generate 
tons of cash, nobody would work at McDonald's doing slave labor for peanuts. 
Or wait tables for $2.12 an hour, or whatever the scumbag restaurant 
industry is currently foisting on unfortunate servers, as if the "tips" as 
so spectacular, they don't need even minimum wage.

Or work at gas stations, which, at least certain cheezy companies like 
Mac/Big Foot (yes I'm nutty enuff to name names), don't even give their 
employees any break during an 8 hour shift: no lunch break, no smoke break, 
no place to sit down and relax for a few minutes.

Not to get off topic, but the grim reality is that marketing is hard work 
that can pay off big, but the most important thing is improvement, obsessive 
progress toward being the best.

There is no Magic Bullet I know of, despite fanatical "get rich quick" scams 
out there, to be financially successful quickly on the web. Nor is there 
anything like that in any advertising, direct marketing, sales, or anything 
else.

There are good marketing advisors, books, web sites that generously, mostly 
freely, provide very good information in abundance: how to increase web 
usability, enhance web credibility, improve web text, SEO copy, prestige 
design techniques, etc.

I have not gone to your site to analyze for usability, credibility, 
scannability, etc. But few web sites are truly excellant, relative to the 
many poor sites out there. No offense, I'm not condemning web developers or 
designers. There is a lot of junk mail, junk television, junk radio, junk 
commercials, junk billboards, junk blogs, and junk web sites.

Are you clear on what makes an outstanding, better than average, highly 
usable and credible web site? Using "you-oriented copy" not "we-oriented 
copy"? Not using too many buzzwords? Not having dense blocks of text, but 
splitting it into scannable chunks? Plenty of outbound hypertext links?

I wish it was simple, easy, and quick to generate millions in webs. Not 
being sarcastic. I share much of your frustration and exasperation. If I was 
a lot smarter, maybe I could be more helpful.


Steven Streight
STREIGHT SITE SYSTEMS
Web Usability Analysis
Web Content Writing
Online & Direct Marketing

astreight at msn.com

www.vaspersthegrate.blogspot.com  *Web Usability*

www.streightsite.blogspot.com  *Mentally Correct Marketing*

www.ArtTestExplosion.blogspot.com
*Experimental Computer Art*

www.stcsig.org/usability/newsletter/0408-user-observation.html
*latest published online article* 


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