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Ten Common Internet Marketing Mistakes, Part 1

Guest post by: Deborah Young

Article Overview: What makes you sit up and take notice of some Internet marketing ads while totally by-passing others? A well constructed ad can be worth its weight in gold, so this two-part series looks at some mistakes to avoid as you prepare advertising copy for your next Internet marketing campaign.

Ten Common Internet Marketing Mistakes, Part 1

As part of your overall Internet marketing campaign strategy, advertising placed on social networking sites and in pay per click campaigns can be a great way to help build a list. Just look at your own personal experience. How many online ads do you view in a day? What makes you sit up and take notice of some while totally by-passing others? A well constructed ad can be worth its weight in gold for making money online, especially for a home based business, so let's take a look at some mistakes to avoid as you prepare advertising copy for your next Internet marketing campaign.

Deceptive Offers and Discounts

Does the offer in your ad match the one on your site? If not, you're not only on thin ethical ground - you may be on a legal precipice as well. Don't "bait and switch" or make outlandish offers in your ads that don't match up with what you're actually offering on your web site. Keep to the moral high ground.

Inaccurate Ad Copy

Give your reader a good idea about where they'll end up if they click on your ad. Teasers are all well and good, but ultimately you don't want to disappoint the reader by showing a title, text or image that doesn't make it crystal clear who you are or what your product is. A disappointed lead not only won't buy your product, they'll be left with a bad taste in their mouth from the experience. Police yourself as strictly as Google polices its advertisers. The user is king and your ad should treat them with respect.

Irrelevant or Inappropriate Images

While it may work for beer commercials on television, it's probably not best to show a picture of a bikini clad model in an ad for industrial widgets - or even books or video games. Not only is it somewhat deceptive, confusing and inaccurate, it flies in the face of advertising guidelines set forth for many sites. If you're selling widgets, show a picture of a widget - preferably with the widget highlighted in some compelling way.

Capitalization of Every Word

Capitalizing every word in the ad title is totally appropriate. So is capitalizing proper names and the first word of a sentence. Follow standard rules for capitalization and you'll be fine.



Capitalization of Entire Words

Is what you're saying REALLY THAT IMPORTANT? Alright, there are a couple of exceptions to this rule. Is your business name normally presented in all caps? Are you using a discount code or an acronym? All of these are good examples of when it's OK to make free with the capital letters. However, this really is a case where less is probably more.

Work from home entrepreneurs who use common sense and courtesy as their guide can't go too far wrong in creating quality Internet marketing ads. In Part 2, we'll review five additional Internet marketing mistakes: spelling / grammar / slang, inappropriate targeting, relevance, politically incorrect language, and symbols and numbers in place of words.

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Article Tags: advertising guidelines, bad taste, beer commercials, bikini, campaign strategy, campaigns, google, home based business, inappropriate images, making money online, marketing campaign, moral high ground, pay per click, personal experience, polices, precipice, social networking sites, teasers, widget, widgets
Referred by: http://jaykubassek.com



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