Here are some tools and services I recommend. For some of these I have affiliate relationships, for which I get a fee for referrals, and I wouldn’t recommend anything I didn’t believe in and use myself. It never costs you any more to get the service through these links and it helps support me spending time checking out cool and useful tools and services.
Shopping cart:
Web Marketing Magic (a private label version of 1ShoppingCart):
www.webmarketingmagic.com/app/default.asp?pr=9&id=78775
Cost: $99/month if paid yearly
I have used this shopping cart for many years and it has served me well.
- It takes credit card payments and PayPal (once you set them up and connect them);
- It stores, protects and delivers your digital products so that only buyers can download them;
- It tracks ads to show you what part of your marketing is working best;
- It sets up and manages affiliates so you can track when partners or friends refer people to you so you can thank them or send them a referral fee;
- It allows you to create time- or quantity-limited discounts and product bundles;
- It allows you to sell monthly subscriptions or memberships;
- It can break payments up into several pieces (three payments, for example, as opposed to just a one-time payment) to let people pay over time;
- It lets you create a buyer’s list of emails and physical addresses;
- It easily handles refunds;
- It can send a series of automatic email follow ups to decrease customer service issues, cement relationships with your customers and to offer other products and services.
I wouldn’t have a business without an online shopping cart.
Web hosting and domain name site service
Siteground
http://www.siteground.com/friends.htm?referrer_id=43859
Cost: $3.95/month
My favorite hosting service.
They provide:
- A free domain name when you sign up for a hosting account
- Free tools to create your website and tutorials to teach you how to use the tools
- Great service
- They will help you if hackers get at your site
Email management systems
Aweber
Cost: $19 and up depending on the number of people on your list; you can start a trial for $1
These email management systems will help you build your online business by easily capturing and allowing you to follow up with people who are interested in your work or offerings.
They can also help you from running afoul of spam laws since you can set up what is called “double opt-in” for people joining your list. This means that once they give you their email address (and name often), they will be sent a confirmation email to ensure that the email address they used is real and that no one else has put them on the list without their permission.
It turns out that people who double opt-in to your mailing list are also more likely to buy things you offer, perhaps because they are more committed, even by just taking those two actions of entering their information and confirming.
You can also see who opens your emails, who clicks on links in the email and other useful statistics (like which of two different subject lines gets people to open your email more).
AWeber is said to get higher deliverability rates than many email management services.
Constant Contact
Cost: $15 and up depending on the number of people on your list; you can start a trial for free
I also use this service, as it is the one with which I started and it has some advantage over AWeber I still want, namely the ability to import lists easily, which AWeber makes more difficult.
Conference line service
Instant Teleseminar
http://instantTeleseminar.com/productInfo.asp?x=781496
Cost: $67/month
I use this service to do individual and group coaching calls and to record them.
I have used this service for years, after ditching the free service I used when it let me down in crucial moments (didn’t record when I had promised people a recoding of the calls I was making).
It lets you:
- See who is on the phone and mute them or turn up their volume;
- Let people dial in by phone, Skype or listen in via the web;
- Listen to a replay;
- It automatically records a backup recording even if you forget to record the call;
- It can show your slides;
- It can autoplay your previously recorded calls.
Webinar hosting and registration service
Easy Webinar Plugin
http://billohanlo.cszinc.hop.clickbank.net
This is a plugin that goes on your Wordpress site that hosts and helps you market your online webinars. You can host them live or do replays. It has a nice setup shell that makes it easy for your and your participants to manage reminders and view the webinars.
Opt-in/lead magnet and capture page service
LeadPages
https://avenue81.infusionsoft.com/go/lpagp/a883
The easiest service to use to set up magnet pages for people who are interested in your products or services.
Create a valuable giveaway, set up the page to offer the giveaway on Leadpages, link Leadpages to your email service (AWeber or Constant Contact or any other one you have) and you are done. You can set up Thank You Pages and Leadpages will even deliver your digital giveaway. They have many types of pages and they are constantly testing to discover which pages convert best. They also let you set up A/B split tests so you can discover which wording and designs attract and convert the most people on your pages.
Membership or Course Hosting site
Kajabi
http://www.kajabiapp.com?kjba=2405003e
I use this service to host most of my courses (I have created over 20).
It is easy to use.
Kajabi (weird name, I know) lets you:
- Easily upload any course or membership content (video, audio, PDFs, Word files and posts);
- Release content at a specified date or at a specified time after the person joins the membership site or course;
- Let people download your content (or not, as you choose);
- Organize and rearrange content
- Create different membership or course access levels
- Easily add or suspend members or course participants
- Link registration to your shopping cart for automatic course login credential creation