---- "JUST GIVE ME WHAT I WANT" ----

by Joe Robson

Dear Webmaster,

Please excuse the formal greeting but I couldn't find your name on your Website.

I buy quite regularly on the Internet, and I was drawn to your site by one of your ezine ads. Your book 'How To Build The Perfect Website' seemed just the thing I was looking for.

Boy did you make it difficult for me!

I may not know much about site building, but I do know one thing. If it's my money you're after, you're in danger of starving to death!

When I visit your site, please identify it's purpose. I find a headline on each page is a great help but you obviously disagree The fact is there were so many things on offer, I wasn't sure whether you specialized in anything in particular.

And why didn't you tell me who you are? I didn't expect a full biography but a contact name and email would have been more reassuring than webmaster@. It's so impersonal and adds to the distrust many of us have about Internet marketers.

And why you, and so many others, seem terrified to list a phone number mystifies me. I can only assume you're afraid of being swamped with complaints about poor service and sub standard goods. I may be wrong of course, but I know many others feel the same way. It re-assures us you see.

It was only because I was distracted by a spilled cup of coffee in my lap, that I waited around for your page to load. Even a 'no brainier' like me knows that graphics should be optimized for fast loading.

In fact I would advise kicking them off your site altogether.

They certainly did nothing to add to my experience. And those animated banners gave me a migraine!

I'm known as a very persistent person, and it's just as well I am. It took me ages to find the page I wanted. It was the navigation. The buttons were in different places on each page.

And they weren't identified very well. I clicked on 'Products' 3 times before I found the specific book I needed A site map would have helped, but you didn't seem to have one.

Unless it was the navigation problem again. I get impatient and easily confused you see. And so does my computer.

It's system isn't exactly bang up to date, but I've never been able to justify the cost of upgrading it. Even though it's only 3 years old it couldn't quite handle some of the 2nd millennium technology you employ. Of course you may not mind losing the 'old fashioned' visitors, but there are lots of us around.

Another thing that confused me was that my printer couldn't print out your information. It was your tutorial on 'Professional Site Design' that I found particularly interesting. The page looked really attractive with it's white text against a blue background. Because I found it impossible to read on screen I decided to print it out.

I don't print the background colors, so when I came to read it later the white text didn't show up on the paper. Why is that?

Anyway, I thought I would write to you and offer a piece of advice that all successful on-line and off-line marketers have apparently known for many years.....

FIRST give me what I want. THEN I'll give you what YOU want!

Oh, by the way. About that nauseating music.....

Do you play requests?

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Joe Robson is author of Make Your Words SELL! co-authored by Ken Evoy. Joe and Tom Glander are Co-Founders of The Newbie Club which is bulging with revolutionary Internet and PC Newbie tutorials. CLICK ON OVER to http://www.newbieclub.com and look at their very professional Affiliate Program. It's BIG! Joe's Copywriting site is at http://www.adcopywriting.com

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