Blackberry’s new Phone – Blackberry 10-  should launch co-branded with Amazons’ Kindle brand. I would name it Blackberry Kindle. I’m sure Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos has thought of this. This device would be an instant hit in the U.S.

This deal makes sense because RIMM would have a device that users would actually desire and Amazon would be able to further promote their eco-system of content into the new Blackberry platform.

The problem with Blackberry is that it is very difficult to consume content other than e-mail on it; And most users already have their content tied to one of the top 3 content eco-systems – Apple, Google & Amazon. So RIMM partnering with one of these 3 eco-systems is a logical step. However,  Apple and Google already have a smart-phone Platform. It makes all the sense in the world to tie Blackberry and Kindle brands together.

Bottom line, a deal between Amazon and RIMM requires less investment and guarantees a greater return than the alternative of trying to accomplish a smartphone / eco-system device independently of one another.   

Companies in Miami use Information Technology consultants for various reasons. Some common uses include:

• IT consultant to help assess and implement a new system.
• Expert advise to get a  website or web store running.
• Process analysis and improvement.
• Help develop a custom database.
• Setup a cloud solution, network and server for a new start up.

An IT Consultant can help you make the right choices when it comes to investing in technology and infrastructure. Also, a knowledgeable consultant can help you save in terms of immediate investment and help you pick the correct layout to allow future growth.

Some important pointers to consider when selecting a Consultant include:

• Years of experience.
• Level of confidence the consultant conveys when discussing a topic.
• Experience on the business side not just the technology side.
• Understanding of your industry.

Bottom line, hiring the right IT Consultant can help you save money and avoid common pitfalls the occur when you invest in technology that will have a long term impact on your business.

IT companies in Miami offer various levels of service which typically include hardware and software support. We, at Helpnet, offer additional services that traditional companies do not. This includes:

• - IT Consulting
• - Cloud Migration
• - Network implementations
• - Software development
• - Web development

Why are these additional services  important? Because typically companies do not operate more efficiently just by having the right support team in place. A company also needs strategic direction for their IT infrastructure and investments.  These strategic decision are the ones that prepare and help the organization arrive at future growth. Some strategic moves include:

•  - Develop software that is tailored to a unique business model.
• - Migrate line of business applications to the cloud.
• - Integrate applications from various departments to work as one.
• - Prepare the organization and business model for the mobile era.

Bottom line, not all IT companies in Miami are prepared to provide the level of service that a business needs to operate more efficiently and produce growth with technology.

Contact us @ 305-408-3072, if you are looking for a solution or a system that will help your business in Miami operate more efficiently and generate more opportunities.

With Samsung selling in the range of 75 Million phones worldwide per quarter, and Apple selling 25 million, Blackberry’s forecast of selling 12 million phones next quarter does not sound as great.

Three of the most precious assets of the blackberry brand are: hardware design, BBM, and secure email. Hence, these three features should not be  removed from the new upcoming Blackberry 10 platform. That said, the ideal new QNX Blackberry 10 phone needs to include:

• An iPhone like touch screen with no physical keyboard
• Full Integration with Amazon Content Eco-system
• Access to most popular Android Marketplace applications
• 8MP camera
• 4G internet
• BBM
• Secure e-mail
• A price point of $99.  

The amount of memory in the device is something that can continue at the 8GB point, with the option to upgrade to 64GB. The upgrade would be done via the memory expansion slot. We believe, manufacturing the Blackberry 10 with a de facto 8GB, is actually a competitive advantage for Blackberry. This  reduces inventory and manufacturing costs associated with producing various memory models. Furthermore, it allows to introduce the phone at a competing price point of $99, without incurring in the additional costs of more memory. At the same time, this gives the customer the option to upgrade their phones memory at their own discretion.

IT support needs in Miami are evolving. The evolution will continue to accelerate as local Miami companies continue to invest in moving their business to the cloud.

Traditionally, small businesses in Miami need help and support installing and resolving issues with software applications and hardware devices. However, as applications move to the cloud, the need to install local applications and  the potential for software issues are minimized. We say minimized, because issues always arise with the use of technology and basic configurations are required to setup a user to access a cloud based application; but it is significantly less work when compared to all the setup that is traditionally required.

The move to the cloud also has an effect on hardware replacement. One of the biggest cost of replacing hardware is in the transfer of data and re-installation of applications. As data and applications move out of the office and into the cloud, hardware replacement becomes lest costly for small businesses, because re-installation and data transfer is minimized. 

Our prediction, at Helpnet, is that the cloud will accelerate the adoption of the new hardware and decrease the cost of IT support for small businesses in Miami.

That said, most software applications are still not cloud ready. Furthermore, there is a huge investment required on behalf of software development companies to convert their traditional software applications to cloud based applications.

Bottom line, moving to the cloud will help companies adopt new technology and at the same time reduce the cost associated with IT support.

Call us @ 305-408-3072, if you need an IT support company in Miami or help in migrating your company to the cloud.

We, at Helpnet, believe that Blackberry 10 developers will seek, from day one, cloud sync functionality for all content. At some point, consumers as well, will seek the ability to sync all of their content on the cloud regardless of device type. Finally, corporate users will seek the capabilty to securely access and share, not just their email, but all of their business content. Only if, and when Blackberry 10 pulls this off, will RIM survive and become a relevant smartphone maker.

In other words, as a user I need my: docs, pics, videos, music, email, calendar, and books accesible from all devices and browsers. This means any tablet, laptop/desktop, or smartphone regardless of the manufacturer. In essence Blackberry 10 needs to become a cloud platform not just a smartphone. And by the way, all of this syncing needs to happen seemlessly without the user having to connect a single cable.

On the corporate side, content needs to be shared and accesible amoung all authorized users; not just calendar and email, but also docs, spreadsheets, videos, and other corporate data. The cloud needs to extend to include sharing the same content among multiple users and the capability to restrict sharing with a corporate security policy. This is a feature that both Google Apps and Apple iCloud lack.

Bottom line, if Blackberry 10 acomplishes this cloud ecosystem, it will definetely become a competing platform that will survive and possibly even surpass Apple iOS’ and Google Androids’ dominance. RIM might even become the preferred smartphone / cloud platform. Unless this transformation happens, we predict that, within 3 years Blackberry will become completely irrelevant both at the consumer and corporate level.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is important because it helps potential customers to find your company when searching a topic that your company offers. Typically a company does a search on one of the top search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, and Ask.

SEO is an ongoing tasks that requires maintenance. Some important steps to consider when doing SEO are:

1. Identify and make a list of your keywords. The keywords are the words that your potential customers would use to search your products or service. When it comes to keywords it is important that you do your homework. This way you know what to ask and expect from an SEO firm. You can use tools such as http://www.google.com/trends to identify potential keywords.

2. Make a list of your on-line competitors. These would be the companies that appear on the first page when you do a search using the keywords identified. You can learn a lot from your competitors, such as: keywords used, services offered, and a general idea of their on-line SEO strategy.

3. Get an SEO firm to Search Optimize your site using the keywords that you determined.

Important pointers an SEO expert should follow on your site:

1. Optimize your website code.  It is important that your website is optimized so that your website loads fast and without errors. I great tool for  indicating what needs to improve on your site is http://pagespeed.googlelabs.com.

2. Write a Keyword-Rich Page Title. Write a descriptive title for each page — rich in keywords you want people to find you with — using 5 to 8 words. Remove as many “filler” words from the title (such as “the,” “and,” etc.) as possible, while still making it readable. This page title will appear hyperlinked on the search engines when your page is found. Entice searchers to click on the title by making it a bit provocative. If you specialize in silver bullets and that’s what people will be searching for, don’t just use your company name “Acme Ammunition, Inc.,” use “Silver and Platinum Bullets — Acme Ammunition, Inc.” The words people are most likely to search on should appear first in the title (called “keyword prominence”). Remember, this title is your identity on the search engines. The more people see that interests them in the blue hyperlinked words on the search engine, the more likely they are to click on the link.

3. Write a Description META Tag. Some search engines include this description below your hyperlinked title in the search results. The description should be a sentence or two describing the content of the webpage, using the main keywords and keyphrases on this page. Don’t include keywords that don’t appear on the webpage. The maximum number of characters should be about 255; just be aware that only the first 60 or so are visible on Google, though more may be indexed.

4. Include Your Keywords in Headers (H1, H2, H3). Search engines consider keywords that appear in the page headline and sub heads to be important to the page, so make sure your desired keywords and phrases appear in one or two header tags. Don’t expect the search engine to parse your Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) to figure out which are the headlines — it won’t. Instead, use keywords in the H1, H2, and H3 tags to provide clues to the search engine. (Note: Some designers no longer use the H1, H2 tags. That’s a big mistake. Make sure your designer defines these tags in the CSS rather than creating headline tags with other names.)

5. Position Your Keywords in the First Paragraph of Your Body Text. Search engines expect that your first paragraph will contain the important keywords for the document — where most people write an introduction to the content of the page. You don’t want to just artificially stuff keywords here, however. More is not better. Google might expect a keyword density in the entire body text area of maybe 1.5% to 2% for a word that should rank high, so don’t overdo it.

6. Include Descriptive Keywords in the ALT Attribute of Image Tags. This helps your site be more accessible to site-impaired visitors (www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG20/glance/) and gives additional clues to the search engines. The ALT attributes do help get your images ranked higher for image search (see #12 below).

7. Use Keywords in Hyperlinks. Search engines are looking for clues to the focus of your webpage. When they see words hyperlinked in your body text, they consider these potentially important, so hyperlink your important keywords and keyphrases. To emphasize it even more, the webpage you are linking to could have a page name with the keyword or keyphrase, such as 32GB-iPhone.htm — another clue for the search engine.

8. Make Your Navigation System Search Engine Friendly. You want search engine robots to find all the pages in your site. JavaScript and Flash navigation menus that appear when you hover are great for humans, but search engines don’t read JavaScript and Flash very well. Therefore, supplement JavaScript and Flash menus with regular HTML links at the bottom of the page, ensuring that a chain of hyperlinks exists that take a search engine spider from your home page to every page in your site. Don’t set up your navigation system using HTML frames (an old, out-dated approach); they can cause severe indexing problems. Some content management systems and e-commerce catalogs produce dynamic, made-on-the-fly webpages, often recognizable by question marks in the URLs followed by long strings of numbers or letters. Overworked search engines sometimes have trouble parsing long URLs and may stop at the question mark, refusing to go farther. If you find the search engines aren’t indexing your interior pages, you might consider URL rewriting, a site map, or commercial solutions.

9. Create a Site Map. A site map page with links to all your pages can help search engines (and visitors) find all your pages, particularly if you have a larger site.

10. Develop Webpages Focused on Each Your Target Keywords. SEO specialists no longer recommend using external doorway or gateway pages, since nearly duplicate webpages might get you penalized. Rather, develop several webpages on your site, each of which is focused on a target keyword or keyphrase for which you would like a high ranking. Let’s say you sell iPhones. In this case: write a separate webpage featuring the keyword “4GS iPhones”, “3GS Iphones”, etc. You’ll write a completely different article on each topic. You can’t fully optimize all the webpages in your site, but for each of these focused-content webpages, spend lots of time tweaking to improve its ranking, as described in point #10.

11. Promote Your Local Business on the Internet. These days many people search for local businesses on the Internet. To make sure they find you, include on every page of your website the street address, zip code, phone number. Create a free listing for your local business with local search engine tools such as Google Places, Bing Local, and Yahoo! Local.

12. Promote Your Video, Images, and Audio Content. Google’s “universal search” displays not only webpage content, but also often displays near the top of the page relevant listings for images, videos, local businesses, and audio clips. Therefore, consider creating such content appropriate to your business and then optimizing it so it can be ranked high enough to help you. For example, if you were to get a top-ranking, informative video on YouTube (www.youtube.com) that mentions your site, it could drive a lot of traffic to your site. Since Google and other major search engines consider the number of incoming links to your website (“link popularity”) as an important indicator of relevance, more links will help you rank higher in the search engines. Google has a measure called PageRank that reflects the quantity and quality of incoming links. All links aren’t all equal. Links from trusted, popular sites help your site rank higher than links from lower traffic sites.

13. Submit Your Site to Key Directories. A link from a directory will help your ranking  and get you traffic. A directory is not a search engine. Rather, it is a hierarchical listing of sites sorted according to category and subcategory. Be sure to list your site in the free Open Directory Project (www.dmoz.com), a link in this directory will help you a lot. Yahoo! Directory (dir.yahoo.com) is another important directory. Other paid business directories that might help are About.com and Business.com.

14. Submit Your Site to Trade Organization Sites and Specialized Directories. Some directories focused on particular industries, such as education or finance. You probably belong to various trade associations that feature member directories. Ask for a link as it may help boost your PageRank.

15. Write Articles for Others to Use in Websites and Newsletters. You can dramatically increase your visibility when you write articles in your area of expertise and distribute them to editors as free content for their e-mail newsletters or their websites. Just ask that a link to your website and a one-line description of what you offer be included with the article. This is an effective “viral” approach that can produce hundreds of links to your site over time. You’ll find lots of information on how to do this from the most popular article marketing site, EzineArticles.com. When you create a free membership account, they begin sending you instructions and ideas each week.

16. Issue News Releases. Find newsworthy events and send news releases to print and Web periodicals in your industry. The links to your site in online news databases may remain for several months and will temporarily improve traffic to your site and increase link popularity. Use a online news release service such as PR Web. Placing your website URL in online copies of your press release may increase link popularity temporarily. 

17. Begin a Business Blog. Want links to your site? Begin a business blog on your website, hosted on your own domain. If you offer excellent content and regular industry comment, people are likely to link to it, increasing your site’s PageRank. Consistency and having something to say are key.

18. Become Part of a Social Media Community. You should be aware of four types of social media: (1) blogs, (2) social networking sites, (3) social bookmarking sites, and (4) forums. Don’t be upset if the distinctions between types of social media tend to blur. Social media help promote your site by sending direct traffic, producing links to your site, and generating awareness. Some of the best online communities for business include Facebook (www.facebook.com), LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com), and Twitter (www.twitter.com). In addition, you may want to participate in a social bookmarking community in which members share with each other information about websites, articles, or news items that they like (or don’t like). These include Digg (www.digg.com), Delicious (www.delicious.com), StumbleUpon (www.stumbleupon.com), and Google Bookmarks (www.google.com/bookmarks/). Search engine spiders troll these sites looking for links to something new and relevant. You can usually place a link to your website in your profile, but the biggest gain comes when other people mention you (which generates traffic to your site), link to you (which increases your PageRank and brings traffic), or bookmark you. One important reminder, don’t join a community to spam them or talk incessantly about your business. Like any community you must listen, comment, and make a genuine contribution for the good of others. Don’t hog the conversation. Otherwise, your self-serving links and comments will hurt your reputation.

19. Participate in Online Forums and Discussion Lists – “old school” social media. The Internet offers thousands of very targeted e-mail based discussion lists, online forums, and groups made up of people with very specialized interests.

20. Promote using traditional media. Don’t discontinue print advertising that you’ve found effective. But be sure to include your URL in any display or classified ads you purchase in trade journals, newspapers, yellow pages, etc.

21. Develop a Free Service. It’s boring to invite people, “Come to our site and learn about our business.” It’s quite another to say “Use the free kitchen remodeling calculator available exclusively on our site.” Make no mistake, it’s expensive in time and energy to develop free resources,  but it is very rewarding in increased traffic to your site — and a motivation to link to the site! Make sure that your free service is closely related to what you are selling so the visitors you attract will be good prospects for your business. Give visitors multiple opportunities and links to cross over to the sales portion of your site.

22. Publish an E-Mail Newsletter. While it requires a commitment of time, creating a monthly e-mail publication is one of the most important promotion techniques. It could be a newsletter (“ezine”), list of tips, industry updates, or new product information — whatever you believe your customers will appreciate. This is a great way to keep in touch with your prospects, generate trust, develop brand awareness, and build future business. It also helps you collect e-mail addresses from those who visit your site, but aren’t yet ready to make a purchase. You distribute your newsletter inexpensively using e-mail marketing services such as Constant Contact .

23. Aggressively Ask for E-Mail Sign-ups. If you want to get subscribers to your e-mail newsletter, you’ll need to work hard at it. Include a subscription form on every page of your website. Promote sign-ups through free whitepapers, e-books, or other products. If you have a local business, ask customers to sign up for your e-mail list to get “special Internet only offers.” Also ask other businesspeople when they give you a business card if you can send them your e-mail newsletter. While only the e-mail address itself is necessary, I always ask for a first name also, so I can personalize the newsletter and the e-mail subject line with the recipient’s name.

24. Send Transactional and Reminder E-Mails. A transactional e-mail is sent to an existing customer to initiate, remind, confirm, or thank the person. Be creative. If you keep careful records, you can send e-mails to customers on their birthday to remind them to return to your site. Subscription confirmation e-mails can also mention several popular products. You might remind customers that it has been three months since their last order and ask if it’s time for a refill. Thank you for your purchase e-mails can offer a coupon to bring your customer back for a future sale. Use your imagination, but don’t pester your customers. You’re there to serve them, not the other way around.

25. Send Offers to Your Visitors and Customers. Your own list of customers and site visitors who have given you permission to contact them will be your most productive list. Send special offers, coupon specials, product updates, etc. They often initiate another visit to your site. If you have a regular newsletter, you can include many of these in your regular e-mailing.

26. Announce a Contest. People like getting something free. If you publicize a contest or drawing available on your site, you’ll generate more traffic than normal. Make sure your sweepstakes rules are legal in all states and countries you are targeting. Prizes should be designed to attract individuals who fit a demographic profile describing your best customers.

27. Devise Viral Marketing Promotion Strategy. So-called viral marketing uses existing communication networks to spread the word exponentially. Word-of-mouth, PR, creating “buzz,” and network marketing are offline models. The key to the best viral marketing, however, is create something that generates buzz and is so cute / fascinating / fun / bizarre that it gets passed by viewers to their friends via e-mail and social networks — thousands of times — so that it propels more and more people to your website, and, hopefully, helps enhance your brand, produce sales, and ultimately boost profits. Internet marketers often seek to launch viral campaigns on Digg (www.digg.com) or YouTube (www.youtube.com). Digg is a social bookmarking site with such power, that if enough people “Digg” you, you appear on the Digg front page and receive a huge number of visitors in a few hours. If your video goes viral on YouTube, you could get tens of thousands of visits to the site you promote in the video. However, viral marketing is difficult to do well.

28. Advertise in an E-Mail Newsletter. Some of the best buys are small text ads in e-mail newsletters targeted at audiences likely to be interested in your products or services. Many small publishers aren’t sophisticated about advertising and offer very attractive rates. More effective (and more expensive) is to send out an appropriate solo e-mail to the targeted list’s subscribers. These often get a good response.

29. Begin an Affiliate Program. Essentially, a retailer’s affiliate program is a CPA program that pays a commission to other site owners whose links to the retailer’s products result in an actual sale. The goal is to build a network of affiliates who have a financial stake in promoting your site.

30. Purchase Pay Per Click (PPC) ads with Google AdWords and Microsoft AdCenter. This strategy is way down the list, but it is vitally important. Most Internet businesses will want to explore using Google AdWords to drive targeted traffic to their websites. These PPC ads appear on the search engine results page, typically both above and to the right of the organic or natural search engine results. Since they are keyword-driven, they can be quite relevant to what a searcher is trying to find. Your ranking in this list of paid text ads is determined by (1) how much you have bid for a particular search word compared to other businesses, (2) the click-through rate on your ad, and (3) your Quality Score, which reflects the relevancy and quality of your ad and the landing page it points to. PPC ads can be a cost-effective way to get targeted traffic, since you only pay when someone actually clicks on the link. But I strongly recommend that you study this carefully and expect a learning curve before you invest large sums of money in PPC advertising.

31. List Your Products with Shopping Comparison Bots and Auction Sites. If you’re an online merchant, you’ll want to consider this. Shopping bots compare your products and prices to others. Some work on a PPC (Pay Per Click) basis, others on a CPA (Cost Per Action) basis, perhaps with a listing fee. Bots to consider include mySimon (www.mysimon.com), BizRate (www.bizrate.com/), PriceGrabber (www.pricegrabber.com/), and Shopping.com (www.shopping.com). Shopping sites that include comparison features include: eBay (www.ebay.com), Yahoo! Shopping (shopping.yahoo.com), and Amazon Marketplace (www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=1161232). You pay to acquire first-time customers, but hopefully you can sell to them a second, third, and fourth time, later on.

32. Rent targeted, commercial e-mail lists. The last website promotion technique I’ll mention is renting targeted e-mail lists. We abhor “spam,” bulk untargeted, unsolicited e-mail, and you’ll pay a very stiff price in a ruined reputation and cancelled services if you yield to temptation here. But the direct marketing industry has developed targeted e-mail lists you can rent — lists consisting of people who have agreed to receive commercial e-mail messages. These lists cost $40 to $400 per thousand or 4¢ to 40¢ per name. Do a smaller test first to determine the quality of the list. Your best bet is to find an e-mail list broker. Realize, however, that due to the high cost of renting lists, many businesses won’t generate enough businesses to justify the cost. Run the numbers before you invest.

Useful links and videos

• Google Webmaster tools (www.google.com/webmasters/) 
• http://www.seotoolset.com/tools/free_tools.html
• http://www.webpagetest.org/  - test page recommended by google labs
• http://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleWebmasterHelp#p/search/1/jK7IPbnmvVU
• http://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleWebmasterHelp#p/u/22/vLp9Qf99DCI
• http://www.submitserve.com/directory-submission/
• http://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleWebmasterHelp#p/search/2/h3Jup5R1MGY
• http://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleWebmasterHelp#p/search/26/B3zmP0W26M0
• http://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleWebmasterHelp#p/search/31/VyQsNGW-kD8
• http://www.seodriven.com/search-engine-optimization/on-page-optimization.html
• http://www.linkmarket.net/
• http://www.allaboutsite.com
• http://freewebsubmission.com/
• http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/11/anatomy-of-search-result.html
• http://www.trellian.com/swolf/
• http://www.alexa.com
• http://www.noblesamurai.com/about.php
• http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/9875/20-Tips-to-Get-Your-Content-Seen-on-Facebook.aspx
• http://www.dmoz.org/

CPM (Cost per Thousand of impressions) is a common measurement used in television, radio, and traditional print advertising. Pay per Click (PPC) is a model that was born with online advertising. Search engines, such as Google, use PPC to charge per click on ads. On-line media companies (i.e. Google, Bing, Yahoo) use both CPM and PPC to sell on-line advertising.

The issue:

The issue with CPM and PPC is that they are not based on results. Hence, it is completely possible to invest thousand or millions of dollars in advertising without a positive return on investment. This issue becomes more relevant as click fraud and web-site traffic fraud become a common issue in the on-line advertising industry.

Web traffic fraud or click fraud is a real issue that has not been resolved possibly  because on-line media companies and their networks make serious money.

Click fraud occurs in several different ways:

Budget Attack: is designed  to deplete your daily budget and create space for competitors at a lower rate.

Most Pay per Click models work based on your bid per click. The higher your bid, the more probable you will appear in the top spots. So after a daily budget is reached, the ad is removed from the search engine. And with less competitors, the biding dollar amount is minimized. It does not bring direct revenue to the competitor, except that he can increase your cost of acquiring a new customer and lower his.

Click Farming Attacks:  This occurs when websites which run the ad try to generate maximum revenue by clicking on the ads in their website. They can even engage third parties to do this (incentive click traffic). This is really hazardous for the advertiser as he loses money for the clicks received on his ads without this translating into additional sales and revenue. This type of fraud is a real issue in Facebook.

Conclusion

Click fraud is a real problem and quite common in today’s online world and if you are a small business owner, then you need to be aware of it in spite of what the big search engines say -trying to minimize web traffic click fraud. Be aggressive and proactive in protecting your ad campaigns from being attacked by those who make small fortunes. Google and the likes have tried to address these issues by including a cost per conversion in their Google adwords. However, they have falling short of completing this task.

Cost Per Acquisition on the other hand is a method of advertising whereby the advertiser only pays when an advert delivers an acquisition. Moreover, CPA is very effective for an advertiser to pay because they only pay when the advertising has met its purpose.

The reality is, large on-line media companies do not want to get involved with assuming the risk related to the offer – they don’t have to, and will only consider CPA offers when talking about top Level Brands with a long relationship with them and huge budgets.

Some on-line media business models have already implemented advertising programs which in essence are based on a Cost per Acquisition. Examples of this are “Living Social” and “Groupon”. Basically, they sell your product at a 50% discount and split the 50% received with the business promoting the product. This models gets customers in the door and creates a prospect for future business. There is no up front cost. Your cost is basically the discount on your product.

At Helpnet we believe that as small business advertisers become educated and begin to demand advertising based on CPA, it will  become the standard model for online advertising.  Everything else is a dead model.

Interesting articles:

• http://techcrunch.com/2009/06/26/facebook-click-fraud-101/
• http://webtrafficfraud.com/
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_per_action
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/06/22/facebook_click_fraud/
• http://humandmt.com/living-social-and-groupon/
• http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/money/article/top-10-reasons-your-website-is-losing-sales