if only Network marketers could spend the amount of time they spend promoting other products to promote their own businesses and services.

Then perhaps Network Marketing organizations would go broke, and New ideas, businesses or even start-ups would thrive and flourish.

Is self Motivation, Loyalty and Discipline dead? Or are we just naturally insecure and gullible to promises of a likelihood fortune through promises and assurances from third parties?

If I walk up to my friends, family and even strangers, and tell them about my products, services and its benefits. Imagine the potential market and awareness, I can create?

But we don’t do that, do we? I suppose not, we surely are very insecure about our own business or services, Or perhaps its an oversight?

Thought provoking isn’t it?

Do you promote your businesses and services to your friends, family or even strangers?

Let me know how you promote your businesses and services. I currently only use business cards. Perhaps I can learn a thing or two from you my readers.

Yes she is..The time magazine (March issue) had an interesting coverage on Investing in Africa with a case of a bank in Togo “Ecobank”. Ecobank employs 11,000 people and has 620 branches in 26 countries with an excellent balance sheet of $8 billion dollars, and not only that, it actually makes money in the current world economical crisis; it made a whooping 32% profit in 2007 amounting to $104 million dollars and its up 47% this year.

Why is Africa the perfect destination for investment today?
1. Africa’s average annual growth from 2004 to 2008 according to the IMF is more than 6%, which is better than any developed economy.

2. According to the world bank Africans living on $1.25 a day or less dropped from 59% to 51% from 1996 to 2005, and has decreased further.

3. According to the February Issue of AllAfrica Journal, two Oxford University economist by the name of Collier Paul and Witney Schneidman wrote in an advisory to President Obama during his campaign and I quote “Africa, usually the poorest performing region in the world economy, is now likely to be among the best performing”.

I could go on and on with references, which beats the point.  It seems that Investors from China are the only investors actually flocking to Africa for business opportunities. This is acknowledged by the fact that trade between Africa and China has grown to an average of 30% in the past decade, topping $106 billion last year.

The rest are busy either saving Africa from poverty and sickness through pumping money into ineffective aid programs or watching Africa with Scepticism. This needs to change, as Africa is open for business.

Do you think, Africa is the best place to invest now?
Let me know through your commentaries.

In my previous entry, I covered Internet shops in Nigeria and how disappointed I was at the fact that there aren’t many to cover.

To Run a successful Online Shop in Nigeria, requires an in-depth understanding of the Market and its Consumers. I learnt this the hard way in the past 5 years or so. The Nigerian consumer behaviour and the market dynamics is very different from what you would experience in the USA or even in the UK.

Havent said the later, Are Nigerians really ready to Buy things online?

The good news is, Yes, Nigerians would buy from a local shop that does it right and have a personalised approach to selling the items to them. Here is how to develop a successful online local shop in Nigeria for Nigerians.

The Product

The product you want to sell must be at the right price. The product must be available, cheap in comparison to local shops and of good quality. When choosing a product to list, ensure that the product cost price + the logistic cost is less than the cost of the product in the shop.

Your ultimate formula in determining whether a product is worthy of listing is
PRODUCT COST PRICE + LOGISTICS COST PRICE <=  LOCAL SHOP PRICE

Not all your products would make you a profit,  Products that would allow you to break even would support the selling of your inventory to reach your profit goals..

Do’s
1. Product Inventory: Ensure you have a supplier that can deliver your listed inventory at the right price regularly.
2. Product Description: Ensure that your product description in thorough, you don’t want to spend time answering questions about the listed product rather than just selling and providing after sales support.
3. Promotions: Always have weekly promotions even if it means selling it at cost price, that would allow you to lock in customer loyalty over a long period of time.

Dont’s
1. Lose Focus: if you want to sell electronics, don’t start listing under-garments and prepaid cards, stick to your niche and create another platform for the other products. Product Listing overload is not for the Nigerian consumer.They get confused easily.
2. Over Price: Don’t sell your products for more than the selling price at the local shop. No Nigerian consumer would buy a product for as little as 1 kobo more than the price they would get it at their locality.
3. Don’t choose a product that would not break even.

Most Nigerian consumers if not all, would not patronize an online shop for convenience. They would rather patronize an online shop for the pricing of its product. Hence having the right product at the right price would surely ensure a success.

Payments
Methods of payments in Nigeria has been a problem for a while, but the good news is internet banking, bank deposits still work fine. If you can afford the GTB Interswitch, do get them, but they are highely unreliable. The Most reliable way to accept payments in an online shop in Nigeria is through bank deposits, and bank transfers.

Logistics
Shipping your items within Nigeria is quiet cheap. The best approach would be to have special arrangements or contracts with the logisitics companies so that you would be able to lock in the cost of shipment with them.

There are a few local courier services like

Citylink Courier Nigeria Ltd
Air and Sea Freight, haulage, warehousing, parcel express, cargo handling and clearing etc.
Website: http://www.citylinkcourier.com

City Flex Express
Total logistics solution
Website: http://www.cityflexexpress.com

DHL Worldwide Express Int. (Nig.) Limited
Website: http://www.dhl.com.ng

The Identity
Your shop identity plays a very important role in getting customers to patronize you. No Nigerian would patronize a shop that has no identity. There are two ways to solve this problem, the personal approach or the corporate approach.

The personal approach entails writing a detailed page about yourself and putting down all your contact details. This type of identity declaration creates trust.

You do not need a registered company to start an online business in Nigeria, but if you can afford a registration do so, and there comes the corporate approach, where you introduce your company with all the details about your company.

Sales Platform
The sales platform is where you sell the products in your inventory. This involves a little investment on your part. You would need to get a Domain name for your shop and also a hosting account to host the domain name.

Example of opensource shopping cards are Opencart, Oscommerce and Zencart

There are many reliable web hosting and domain registration in Nigeria that would help you in setting up an opensource shop for as little as 6,000 Naira a year. One example of such companies is Nairahost, which is a leading provider of web hosting and domain registration in Nigeria.

Security
Security is also a very important and crucial component to ensuring the success of your online shop. To begin with, I would encourage the buying of a SSL Certificate to secure the transaction process. Consumers feel more comfortable shopping in a shop that has an SSL Certificate, in fact most consumers would not purchase products from a website that has no SSL Certificate. Most Hosting providers would install it for you for free after purchasing it.

Shipping and Returns Policy
This is the section of your website where you explain your policies regarding the shipment of purchased products and the kind of warranties your product has. This is a must as it creates a confidence in your listed products.

Marketing
Don’t spend money advertising on Google or Yahoo or even any advertisement network, this advertisement networks would not be able to deliver your advertisement to Nigerians, and it would be way too costly, for you to convert  enough sales to cover the cost of the customer acquisition through this channels.

So what should you invest your marketing budget on?

a. Search Engine Optimisation
- Ensure that your shop is searchable in major search engines, this is a must, there are a few SEO experts in Nigeria, that would charge a reasonable fee in ensuring your shop is search engine friendly and your content are properly indexed in search engines.
b. Paid Review Blogs
- There are many popular Nigerian blogs that would make a coverage on your blog for free, but many would do a thorough coverage at a fee.
c. Specific Blog ads slots
– Some Popular Nigerian blogs have a space for advertisement, like mine, you can enquire from the owners on how you can get your shop advertised by them.

And Lastly consistency, weekly promotions, regular newsletters to your existing customers on your new products and renewing the domain on a yearly basis would ensure that you not only become successful running an online shop in Nigeria but a profitable one.

Consultation

I provide free consultation on internet solutions and business systemization, but I charge on the implementation stage, if required of me. But  I would happily guide you through the setup of your online business for absolutely free. So Feel free to use my contact form if you are interested in my free consultation.

Google is now an ICANN-accredited registrar of domain names.

According to a hint by Garett Rogers who experimented some GMail codes, there is a possibility that Google is introducing, a powerful way for anybody who owns a domain to utilize GMail as a mail server, not just a client. This I think is a possible battle, against the fruitlessly msn introduced Windows Live Custom Domains under its Windows live ideas project.

There is also a rumour that Google is thinking of venturing into domain and web hosting, which points to the direction of another possible competition with Yahoo yet again, after its victory over Web Search engines.

The question is, how far would Google go, to secure the king of the internet title?

What would be Google’s next step?

Last time i blogged about an alternative to withdrawing paypal for malaysians. I said Virtual Bank card was a good alternative. Now i withdraw what i have said. They do have a bad support. I would post my experience with them as soon as possible. Please dont say i did not tell you.

I was reading Elliots back’s blog recently and I came upon a very interesting post, he had on the secrets of optimizing adsense. Well he actually tripled and double his income simultaneously with that technique.

Well below is his testimony, and advise.

Over the last week, my clickthrough rates have more than tripled. My daily earnings keep rising and rising–this week is twice last week’s earnings. You’d think there are secrets of the Adsense masters to get more clicks, more traffic, more impressions, and better cpc. Well, there are no secrets–just a few types:

Color: Choose colors that coordinate well with your blog layout. For example, all of my google adsense ads have no colored borders and match the background color. This is important–don’t alienate your readers.

Position: Position really is everything. You need to put your ads where they can be seen–on the top, the left, or the right, and always above the fold.

Variety: There are at most three ads on the site: one link-ad underneath the meta part of a single post, the all-generic sidebar ad, and on select posts, an ad block. It’s good to have several distinct types of ads on your site. Visitors that might ignore one may click on another!

Audience: You need to make sure you’re putting ads on pages that see heavy traffic. So, I use a wordpress plugin to tag a post with an < !–ADSENSE–> block and automatically insert my advert. That way I can specifically place an ad where I want it on a highly-trafficed post. Another thing I do is automatically append an adsense block on a post with very little content. I may also introduce ads in my feeds.

Doing these basic things has improved the profitability of my blog considerably. Don’t be afraid to experiment with Adsense, or be aggressive. Just don’t scare off readers.

Well most of the stuff in his tips, are already implemented on my blog. I guess we all learn by experimenting. If you havent implemented any, please experiment it. It really works.

Let’s find out the truth about MLM in Malaysia. This free report covers:

Note: I am not promoting this guy products, i am just encouraging you to read his article. He explained all the concepts with a sincere approach. More of the need to know. Thus its really a good read, especially if you are looking for certain answers in relation to MLM. Personally i do not participate in MLMs, because of some personal reasons, but nevertheless it worth reading, honestly

Interested in Downloading the E-BOOK ? CLICK HERE.

Well thats some good news, i just hope it comes free, and easy to use. And not forgetting the ability to merge with any bank account globally.
And besides i love the competitive world. You have my support Google, Go for it
Source: WALL STREET JOURNAL

Google Inc. this year plans to offer an electronic-payment service that could help the Internet-search company diversify its revenue and may heighten competition with eBay Inc.’s PayPal unit, according to people familiar with the matter.

Exact details of the search company’s planned service are not known. But the knowledgeable people say it could have similarities with PayPal, which allows consumers to pay for purchases on Web sites by funding electronic-payment accounts from their credit cards or checking accounts. Some consumers like PayPal for the security it offers, since it allows them to share their banking or credit-card numbers only with PayPal without having to divulge the information to merchants.

Spokespeople for Google and PayPal declined to comment.

For Google, Mountain View, Calif., a payment service could represent a significant expansion beyond online advertising, which generated 99% of its $3.2 billion in revenue last year. Online-payment providers typically generate revenue by taking a commission on each transaction.

Depending on the exact details, Google’s move could potentially threaten eBay’s successful PayPal service, which generated $233.1 million, or 23% of eBay’s revenue in the first quarter. PayPal has been widely adopted by buyers and sellers on eBay’s auction marketplace as a way to pay for purchases. Recently, eBay has been trying to expand PayPal’s presence as a payment system for other Web sites. In the first quarter, 71% of PayPal’s revenue came from eBay auctions, the company says.

“It could be a pretty big negative for eBay if it happens,” says Safa Rashtchy, Internet analyst at Piper Jaffray. Mr. Rashtchy said he believes Google is also working on a classified-listing service, which also would compete with eBay, San Jose, Calif.

The moves would highlight the growing rivalry between the two Internet companies, even while eBay itself is a big buyer of Google’s online ads. For example, many eBay sellers now also sell through their own Web sites, to which they attract shoppers by buying search-related ads on Google.

Google has offered a hint that it might set up an online-payment service. Its Web site says the company will eventually allow consumers to pay to view videos online. But Google to date has not provided any details of any payment-service plans. Google currently accepts credit-card payments for some services, including advertisements and customized research.

Rumors about a new Google payment service escalated following a panel discussion at a Piper Jaffray Internet conference on Thursday. At the conference, Scot Wingo, chief executive of ChannelAdvisor, a Morrisville, N.C. e-commerce consulting firm, said he believed the payment service would be launched soon. In an interview, Mr. Wingo said he based his statement on questions from retailers with which his company works. Mr. Wingo said the retailers have asked him whether ChannelAdvisor would support the service, which some believe goes by the code name Google Wallet.

During the discussion, Patrick Byrne, president of online retailer Overstock.com Inc., recalls saying, “Yes, this Google Wallet sounds like it might be great. But is all this public yet?” In an interview, Mr. Byrne says he has not had any “substantive discussions” with Google about a payment service.

Beyond a possible additional revenue stream, an electronic-payment service could give Google more insight into the effectiveness of its core advertising service. Google might be able to better track whether users who click on search-related advertisements make purchases from the advertiser.

1. Make a Promise

2. Prove It

3. Ask for Action

4. Leave Everything Else Out

–

If you review failed ads, you’ll find that almost all of them miss one of the 4 points. Some won’t make a strong promise. Some won’t give proof. And many just don’t ask for action.

There are a few minor points like how to win attention, and how to close effectively, but if you remember and follow this 4 point formula while creating your marketing message, you’ll be able to sell a lot more of your products!

There are a number of ways traditional software vendors can participate in the open source software community. They circulate around open source licenses, such as the GNU General Public License (GPL), and how to leverage open source software as a marketing tool.

A sophisticated marketing application of the GPL is the dual license. The dual-license approach is not typically one integrated license. It is a business policy that permits a customer to choose one of two licenses: either a typical commercial license or an open source license such as the GPL.

Free option always good for customers

Providing a free option helps software marketers in a number of ways, including improved customer awareness and faster adoption, enormous advantages
in competitive positioning, and a virtual knock-out punch to competitor pricing power. Both government and industry IT procurement managers are saving hundreds of millions of dollars using open source as negotiating leverage to obtain price concessions from traditional software vendors. Does that help the dual-license vendor? Absolutely.

But there is more good news for savvy open source software marketers: The dual license creates no business complications for customers exercising the software in a trial project. In essence, the dual license equates to a money-back guarantee, delivering a large advantage over highly supervised trial licensing practices. Rather than putting the open source vendor in competition with in-house development projects, the dual license provides a natural segue to a commercial license and cross-selling of support and services. It helps, of course, for the open source vendor to have a consistent and clear commercial software license and service agreement ready for such an event.

Open source vendors need to highlight their marketing advantages and overcome some disadvantages. For instance, many government procurement agencies are not familiar with open source business models or strategies of any kind. It is difficult for them to take seriously any company that provides their product free of charge and makes money primarily on maintenance, updates, consulting, or enhancements (or redistribution in the case of the dual license).

In addition, proprietary vendors employ sales and marketing people who work hard every day to develop relationships with potential government and corporate buyers. Open source software projects, on the other hand, are often mis-characterized as the primary domain of pony-tailed introverts more interested in returning a system call than returning a telephone call.

Open source vendors need to promote their strategic advantages, such as labor- and system-saving from server consolidation on the Linux platform. OSS has major advantages of stability and security versus the traditional software model of proprietary patches and feature bloat. OSS has the advantages of ongoing availability and support of past versions versus the traditional software model of end-of-life and forced upgrades. OSS has advantages of enormous installed bases and world-wide developer talent versus the traditional software model of thinly spread customer support and a revolving door of developers.

Open source creates change, not only from legacy software, but also from legacy marketing. If you are a software vendor with the opportunity to use an open source strategy, it helps to understand how open source licensing can work. Below is an example of how the GPL applies to the Linux operating system software.

An example of open source licensing

The scope and limits of open source licenses become critical questions when formulating open source business strategies. Because of the popularity of GPL software like Linux, MySQL, and other open source programs, developers naturally have concerns about the boundaries of the GPL. They may wish to distribute their work along with other GPL programs but retain the proprietary status of their code and implementations. Users likewise must stay within the license parameters of the software they use, both proprietary and open source. There are many facets to open source licensing.

Many developers, users, and business managers, are unclear about what constitutes a derivative work, and for good reason. The software subject matter is complex, and there are different, somewhat elaborate tests within the U.S. district courts. We know in practice, that in the case of Linux, any program, (a browser, for example), that runs in the User Space of Shared Memory is not ordinarily considered a GPL derivative, (provided it uses standard system calls).

Changes to the Linux kernel and any modules that run in the Kernel Space of Shared Memory may be presumed to be derivatives. Statically linked binaries, for example, are presumed to be Linux derivatives. Static linking makes binary modules part of the executable; they are linked prior to the kernel being loaded. Potential exceptions to the GPL are generic drivers and standalone binary modules (which don’t modify the kernel). Dynamic modules, (including drivers), are loaded and unloaded at runtime, ie: dynamically linked. They extend the Linux kernel without recompiling and rebooting.

There is a strong argument that dynamically linked binary modules are not Linux derivatives. One caveat however: Binary-only distributions running in either the User Space, or running in the Kernel Space that appear to be outside the scope of the GPL, could still be considered GPL-derived works if they are contrived to circumvent the GPL by leveraging minor coincidental changes to the kernel.

Analysis under these types of guidelines is important to determining whether a work, in the above example as related to Linux, constitutes a derivative or not. Case-by-case interpretations correspond to circumstances like the license used, the application of the work, and the scope of the modification. Runtime libraries, client libraries, license types like LGPL, and similar material factors concerning their application, should be reviewed by an experienced software licensing attorney.

While there are a number kinds of open source licenses, the GPL is the most widely used. If you are developing original works to be distributed as open source, the license you select merits careful consideration. Developers who incorporate open source to solve larger problems should understand and record the type of upstream licenses that apply, such as GPL, LGPL, Revised-BSD, Mozilla, Creative Commons, and others. Other factors include what is being changed, if anything, and how the programs interoperate.

Why regular audits are a good practice

Users of open source, even if not distributing modified GPL binaries, should routinely audit their servers and clients to determine what open source programs are being used and whether they are being used within the scope of their respective licenses.

Traditional software vendors need to recognize the shift taking place is driven not only by successful open source projects, but also by the rapid and broad adoption of open source in the customer marketplace. The numbers behind open source adoption are compelling. Linux in both the United States and Asia is the fastest growing operating system ever. As measured by hostnames, Netcraft reports that the Internet has grown 26.1 percent over the past 12 months, over 67% percent of it served up by open source Apache servers.

According to Netcraft, “the number of servers using Secure Sockets Layer encryption has grown 56.7 percent in the most recent 12-month period” (April 2003 to April 2004), demonstrating an explosion of use of the internet for business. Unlike the hype at the peak of the dot-com boom, the current growth is based on sound demand in a frugal purchasing environment. Traditional software marketers should pay quick and fast attention to these changes, get educated about open source licensing, and fully evaluate the addition of open source strategies to their product marketing portfolios.

John Koenig is the founder of Riseforth, Inc., consultants to software, service, and open source vendors and users. Additional information on open source strategies and investment is available at www.riseforth.com, or contact him at (650) 726-7775 or by email.