If you recall, I ended the last lesson with
a promise to discuss how to get Internet
traffic.

I'm going to keep that promise, but before
I do, I want to make sure you understood
how important it was to get the right kind
of traffic.

Traffic for traffic's sake is pretty useless.
In fact, it is the booby prize in Internet
marketing.

In the 'old days,' people used to brag about
how many hits they got to their site each
day. Talk about a useless measurement! Then
they got more sophisticated and would brag
about how many unique visitors came. An
equally useless number by itself.

If you're running a web site for a business
purpose, what matters is how many visitors take
ACTION and in business the only actions that
matter are a purchase or a lead generated (an
opt-in). That's it!

There is one other VERY important and frequently
overlooked thing to consider about traffic.
Before you invest a lot of time and money and
effort and creativity in driving traffic to
your site, make sure that's it's traffic you
can do something with!

---  All traffic is NOT created equal

Before we even talk about specific Internet
traffic, let's talk about prospects and
markets.

I urge all people contemplating starting
a business to study the market they plan
to sell to BEFORE they make another step.

Here are some of the key questions you
should ask yourself:

1. How many buyers are there in my target market?

2. Where do these people congregate and how can
I reach them? Can I reach them at all?

3. How responsive is this market to direct
response advertising?

4. What is the back end potential (i.e.
after I sell them the first item, how easy
will it be to sell them more items and
at progressively higher price points.)

5. Who are the success stories and big players
in this marketplace? Why are they winning?

6. Who are the losers and the companies
on the way down? What are they doing wrong?

7. What's are the hot trends in this market right
this minute?

8. What was hot a year ago, five years ago,
ten years ago, twenty years ago? (You ask this
question because, surprisingly, things that once
worked in a market can often be brought back
profitably to a new generation of buyers.)

9. What needs are going unmet in the market
right now?

10. What are the pet gripes, secret dreams,
and dark fears of buyers in this market?

When prospective students come to me with
the common challenge of "I don't know what
to sell." I always give them the same assignment:

Pick two or three markets you know well
as a consumer or enthusiast and study them
inside and out. If you do your research
thoroughly and answer the questions I listed
above, product ideas will jump out at you
and grab you by the throat. You don't have
to 'invent' them.

But BEFORE you run off and create a product
to meet an unmet need and want in an existing
market, make sure you have answered questions
#1, #2, #3, and #4. In short, is this a market
worth serving? Is it big enough? Are they repeat
buyers? Are they responsive buyers?

In the world of leisure sports, golfers are legendary
for their insatiable demand for new equipment
and new methods.

In contrast, all a tennis players needs to be
happy is a steady supply of tennis balls
(a commodity), a pair of shoes (a commodity)
and a single favorite racquet which they
tend to stick with.

As a small operator on the look-out for a
highly responsive group of buyers with big back
end potential, who would YOU target?

Bottom line: Before you knock yourself out
in search of Internet traffic, take the simple
"System" test above and make sure the traffic
you're seeking is worth fighting for.