"Starting Smart!"an online e-zine for newbies and semi-seasoned Internet marketers alike.

Issue: November 25, 2003

"How to Install a CGI Script and Increase Web Site Interactivity"

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If you're reading "Starting Smart" because a friend sent this issue to you, get your own copy three times a month by clicking either of these addresses.

http://www.9mistakes-online.com

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http://startingsmart.9mistakes-online.com

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"Starting Smart"
The Ezine for the Online Marketing Newbie

November 25, 2003
Karl Augustine - Publisher

Subscribe Link:
http://startingsmart.9mistakes-online.com

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*Greetings...I hope all is well with you...
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Hello,

Welcome new subscribers, thanks for being here! Without you, none of this would be worth a hoot.

Lots of things going on in my Internet world, having fun as always.

I am in strategy mode somewhat, setting up AdWords and tracking everything. So far so good. I have chosen keywords that have low bids but are very detailed and specific. I am hopeful!

I bought a great new software that is actually a script by Adrian Ling called "Easy ClickMate". It allows you to have more than one product at Clickbank without having to pay the $50 per account fee...I love to save money!

The script Adrian sells has a simple install and his explanations are detailed so this purchase gets my A+ rating all the way. Adrian's a nice guy to, he responded to my email very quickly. (Embarrassingly, I asked Adrian about something that was actually in the manual...yes, developers of products have to put up with guys like me. I can hear them saying "Read the manual!".)

If you are going to sell more than 1 product through Clickbank, get Adrian's script, it is right on the money. I asked a developer and an online marketer that I trust which of the many options were best for this sort of thing. My friend was right again!

Get Easy Clickmate here

Changing gears....

It is that time of year when people seem to get 2 ways...frantic and "nicer".

Strange isn't it? Those people that celebrate the holidays get frantic with all the preparation yet they seem nicer about all the scurrying and rushing around. Kind of odd I think...seems like we should all be a little nicer all year round but things just don't work that way.

I must say, I had a blast at the Brainstorming weekend here in Seattle. Jay jennings (Sonic Memo creator) was great and made it fun. I am looking forward to the next one!

On another note...

I was driving to the gym a week or so ago and came across someone with the "Will work for food" sign at the stoplight. The guy looked bad, really bad. He wasn't foolin', he needed help. So, I gave him the 2 bucks I had with me through the window and he was appreciative and nice. I got to thinking about how incredibly spoiled I am and how lucky I am to have the life I was handed. Bottom line: There's no excuse for whining, being lazy, or unhappy...suck it up and get it done!

Look for Rick Adams' 2nd version of "Costly Online Blunders" coming soon. I am a contributor in this edition, which looks to be great!

Highlight of the last 2 weeks: Finally getting my web copy done for my other book...what an exercise! It takes a while to get it right.

Low point of the last 2 weeks: Finding out that I am only going to get a day or two with my friends on my vacation in Florida. Ah well, I should just be glad I get a vacation huh!

And last and most importantly...

Thanks for being a subscriber to "Starting Smart!"... if you have any questions, suggestions, ideas, JV opportunities you'd like to discuss, etc., email me directly.

MAILTO:karl@9mistakes-online.com

Thanks for being here and enjoy the rest of the issue!

Karl Augustine

"The Regular Guy"

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In this edition...
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*Viral Marketing
*Products every Internet marketer should have
*Featured Article #1: "How to Install a CGI Script and Increase Web Site Interactivity"
*In the news...
* Subscriber Spotlight- New Feature!
*Featured Article #2: "How Many Subscribers Actually READ Your Email?"
*Welcome New Subscribers! Help us grow...
*F*reebie(s) of this issue in the "Starting Smart Community Chest!"
*Copyright and Publisher Info
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*Viral marketing

LOOK: All Publishers and List Owners

Since this Viral eBooks are the subject of this issue, seems fitting to piggyback eh?!

Remember to increase traffic to your site and promote your affiliate links by using 1 of the 2 versions of the min brand-able version of "9 Deadly Mistakes...". One version is for people who have been members of certain affiliate programs for a while and are in programs that have been so successful, that they aren't allowing new applications.

The other version is a trimmed down version that anyone can profit from.

The pdf branding software is fantastic and extremely easy to use, branding the book only takes 1-2 minutes. Send an email now to MAILTO:brand9@9mistakes-online.com to get the 2 brand-able versions and begin increasing traffic to your site and promoting links. In my reply email, you'll receive full instructions and the link to use to brand either book.

Give the pdf branded Mini version of "9 Deadly Mistakes..." away to your list.

MAILTO:brand9@9mistakes-online.com

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*Products every Internet marketer should have...
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*Featured Article:
"How to Install a CGI Script and Increase Web Site Interactivity", by Herman Drost

You may have delayed cgi script installation due the apparently complex
process. Well, I avoided it also for several years, however if you want to
increase your web site's interactivity it's a necessity to know how to do it.
It's not hard to learn and you don't have to be a programmer.

What is CGI ?

Common Gateway Interface or CGI is a program that can interact with an
html form on your web site, and processes the results on your server using
a cgi script. The result generated is a dynamic web page. The cgi script is
written in a language called PERL ("practical extraction and reporting
language").

Uses of CGI scripts

CGI scripts are most commonly used for creating user interaction with an html
form on your web site. Other uses include: autoresponders, shopping carts,
counters, mailing list managers, ad management, surveys, polls, discussion
boards, content management, calendars and click tracking.

There are 100s of free cgi scripts that can be found on the Net. Just do a search
on Google for "free cgi scripts" or visit the resources at the end of this article.

We will create an html email form to collect the name, email address and
comments of subscribers using a secure cgi formmail script. The form results
will automatically be sent to your email address.

Steps to installing your own cgi script

1. Check that your web host supports CGI - your web host will have a cgi-bin
folder installed on the server. The cgi-bin is a special directory in the server
where all the files which require security are kept. This is where you will
upload your cgi script once it has been modified.

2. Download the cgi script - this is a secure cgi formmail script. Spammers
can't access and harvest your email address from this script.

http://nms-cgi.sourceforge.net/formmail.zip

3. Read the documentation that comes with the script - this will give you a
thorough understanding what changes you need to make to have it work
correctly with your web site and server. It will also provide you with some
examples.

Editing your script

4. Open and edit your cgi script using notepad (don't use an html editor as this
can create errors).

5. Remove the html tags from the script (at the top and bottom).

6. Change the path to perl to: #!/usr/bin/perl -wT (this is the first line of the
script to be edited).

7. The section of the cgi script shown below, are the other minimum fields
to fill out in the script (replace the fields in the script you downloaded with
the changed fields in the script below).

# USER CONFIGURATION SECTION
# --------------------------
# Modify these to your own settings. You might have to
# contact your system administrator if you do not run
# your own web server. If the purpose of these
# parameters seems unclear, please see the README file.
#
BEGIN
{
$DEBUGGING = 1;
$emulate_matts_code= 0;
$secure = 1;
$allow_empty_ref = 1;
$max_recipients = 1;
$mailprog = '/usr/lib/sendmail -oi -t';
$postmaster = 'youraddress@yourdomain.com';
@referers = qw(yourdomain.com);
@allow_mail_to = qw();
@recipients = ();
%recipient_alias = ('siteowner' => 'youraddress@yourdomain.com',);
@valid_ENV = qw(REMOTE_HOST REMOTE_ADDR REMOTE_USER HTTP_USER_AGENT);
$locale = '';
$charset = 'iso-8859-1';
$date_fmt = '%A, %B %d, %Y at %H:%M:%S';
$style = '';
$no_content = 0;
$double_spacing = 1;
$wrap_text = 0;
$wrap_style = 1;
$send_confirmation_mail = 0;
$confirmation_text = <<'END_OF_CONFIRMATION';
From: youraddress@yourdomain.com
Subject: Subject of Your Contact Form

(short note here->> )Thank you for your interest. We will respond shortly.

END_OF_CONFIRMATION
#
# USER CONFIGURATION << END >>
# ----------------------------
# (no user serviceable parts beyond here)
------------------------------------------

$postmaster = Who's sending the email
@referrers = Domains that are allowed to host the script
%recipient_alias = Whom the script will send email to

In my form:

[form action="http://www.mydomain.com/cgi-bin/formmail.pl"
method="POST"]
[input type="hidden" name="recipient" value="siteowner"]

You can see how the siteowner variables match up in the .pl script and in my
form. This way, nobody can tell what address the form is being emailed to!

8. Rename your cgi script - name your script something else besides formmail
(ie contactus.pl), as this is the most common name people use. This will prevent
spammers from harvesting your email address.

9. Create your html form (contactus.htm)
Note: Replace [ ] with < > for your form to work.

[html]
[head]
[title]Contact Us[/title]
[/head]
[body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000"]
[form method="post" action="http://www.yourdomain.com/
cgi-bin/contactus.pl"]
[input type=hidden name="recipient" value="siteowner"]
[input type=hidden name="subject" value="Subscribe Me Please"]
[input type=hidden name="required" value="fullname,email"]
[input type=hidden name="redirect" value="http://www.yourdomainname.com/thankyou.htm"]
Full Name[br]
[input type=text name="fullname"]
[br]
Email Address[br]
[input type=text name="email"][br]
[br]
Comments[br]
[textarea name="comments"][/textarea]
[br]
[br]
[input type="submit" name="Submit" value="Submit"]
[/form]
[/body]
[/html]

10. Create a confirmation page (ie thankyou.htm) - this will automatically
thank people for filling in your form. It can be a simple html page with the
comments "Thank you for your interest. We will respond shortly".

Uploading the cgi script and html email form.

Use your favorite FTP program for uploading to your server (I use
SmartFTP.com which you can download for free).

11. Set permissions to 755 - in SmartFTP right click on the script file you
wish to upload, click on Properties/CHMOD and set the permissions to 755.

12. Upload the cgi script - there are two modes of uploading, ASCII and Binary.
Upload the cgi script (contactus.pl) and any txt files in ASCII mode. Upload
the script to the cgi-bin folder. If you don't follow this you will not be able to
execute the script.

13. Upload the html form and any image files like .jpg or .gif in Binary mode.

14. Test your cgi script by filling out the html email form and submitting it.
You should receive an immediate confirmation.

By adding interactivity to your web site using a cgi script, you can expand the
functions of your web site and create a more interesting experience for your
visitors. This will keep them coming back and help you stay ahead of your
competitors.

Resources

Formmail script
http://nms-cgi.sourceforge.net/formmail.zip

Free CGI scripts
Scriptarchive.com
Hotscripts.com
cgi-resources.com

*******************************************
Herman Drost is the Certified Internet Webmaster (CIW)
owner and author of iSiteBuild.com
Affordable Web Hosting Plans from $30/year
http://www.isitebuild.com/sitehosting
Subscribe to his insightful “Marketing Tips” newsletter for
more original articles. mailto:subscribe@isitebuild.com
*******************************************

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In the news...

Google re-thinks their algorithms.

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Note to other online publishers, webmasters:

Feel free to use my previous articles on your website or in your publications. You are required to place the 'resource box' below after the article.**

**NOTE: If you are an affiliate of mine, you may use your affiliate link as well in the dialogue box instead of the http://www.9mistakes-online.com. To become an affiliate visit my affiliate page.

Simply review previous e-zine issues and send email to article1@9mistakes-online.com thru article8@9mistakes-online.com.

e-zine archive

(c) Karl Augustine
http://www.9mistakes-online.com
http://startingsmart.9mistakes-online.com
"9 Deadly Mistakes To Avoid When Starting An Online Business". How much time and money have you wasted? For more time saving and money making tips, get your full copy here => http://www.9mistakes-online.com

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*Subscriber Spotlight- New feature...

If your an e-zine owner and a subscriber to "Starting Smart" and want me to feature your e-zine here, please send me an email (mailto:karl@9mistakes-online.com) with "I'd like to be in the spotlight" in the SUBJECT line and include a link to an issue of your e-zine. I cannot get to everyone, I do apologize.

I'll feature 1 e-zine per issue that will be non-competitive in nature to each other.

I also require that you include in your email to me, one of your online blunders and how much it cost you in time and/or money!

Thanks!

From Mike Steup of ezine-know-how:

" In the online business world today, you need an opt-in list to succeed. The best way to build your list is to use tactics that you know will work well. This means you must take the time to test. I didn't test the resources I used when I first started, and I wasted over one hundred dollars on a marketing campaign that got me 14 subscribers. Needless to say, I have always tested the resources I use since then.

"Testing takes time, but I publish my marketing results in my monthly report series. This will save you time and money because you will already have my results, so you know what works.

You can receive this monthly report by sending an email to

mailto:subscribe@ezine-know-how.com

Visit http://www.ezine-know-how.com

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*Featured Article #2:

"How Many Subscribers Actually READ Your Email?"

By Steve Shaw

Would you like to find out exactly how many of your subscribers are opening and reading the emails you send tothem? This article describes a very quick and simple method that anyone can use to do this, that you'll be able to implement immediately on all the HTML mail that you send out.

Let's look at a simple example of how this vital statistic can benefit you.

Say if you had a list of ten thousand - you send out an email, describing a great opportunity, and let's say, to keep this simple, that you get a 1% click-through ratio. That means only 100 of those ten thousand subs are actually going through to the site - and then perhaps only 1-5% of those actually make a purchase.

That means from a mailing to ten thousand, you could end up with a single sale. Fairly miserable result I know, but we're being pretty conservative here.

But imagine if you could track exactly how many of those ten thousand were opening and reading your email.

You might find out that only 30% of your subscribers (three thousand subs) actually opened the email - which if you measure your CTR against those who actually read it, rather than the number of subscribers you send it to, gives you an improved 3.3% CTR.

Once you're armed with this statistic, you can work in future on improving the number of subscribers who actually read your email. For example, a more intriguing subject line that grabs your subs by the throat and screams 'open me' could double the Open Ratio (OR) for your email, which in turn will double your response rate; and improving the body of your email so that it bypasses as many spam filters as possible, will help it reach many more of your valuable subs.

Do you see how powerful this statistic can be?

So let's look at how you can easily calculate this statistic for yourself, with every HTML email you send out.

It's a simple two-step approach:

1. Firstly set up a tracking URL by doing one of the following:

A. Either set up a special page on your web site - it doesn't have to have any particular content, it's only purpose is to find out how many 'visitors' the page has
received. It's a good idea to set up a special directory on your server, such as 'ezine', and then give the page a unique name related to your email - you could use the date when you send the mailing, such as '10312003.html'.

(If you do a split mailing, for example to test which subject line generates the best open rate, you could set up two pages such as '10312003A.html' and ''10312003B.html'. Get the idea?)

B. Or, if you use an ad tracking script, set up an ad tracking URL. Again, if you do a split mailing, just set up more than one.

2. Then add an HTML image (img) tag somewhere in your html email. Set the height and the width of the image to zero, and set the source (src=...) to the URL of the page/ad tracking URL you've set up on your site. (If you're not sure how to construct the image tag, do a quick search on Google for 'HTML img tutorial', and you will find plenty of material to help you.)

Here's how this simple system works.

- Your email is opened by the subscriber

- The image tag secretly loads the tracking URL that you
specified as the source of the image, generating a 'hit'.

To find out your 'open rate', i.e. how many of your subscribers actually read your email, just check how many unique visitors your tracking URL received.

The most important part however is to put that statistic to good use - work on improving your open rate, and you will see your response rates improving too.

-----------------------------------------
Steve Shaw is the developer of PopUpMaster Pro, which
allows you to add unblockable popups to your web site in
minutes - plus a lot more besides. Find out more at
http://popupmaster.com/

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*Welcome New Subscribers!

For those of you just joining, welcome!

Your time is valuable and I'll do my level best to make this "read" time well spent. I am just a regular guy, just like many of you out there...I stuck with it, and now am having a blast doing what I love to do. Keep a positive attitude and you can do just about anything....seems like old news, but it works and we all can use a little reminding now and then.

Please forward this e-zine in its entirety to any friends or colleagues who you think may find it useful. Or, refer someone by using the button at the bottom of the page.

Thanks for helping us grow!

Here's the link to subscribe:
"Starting Smart" newsletter (http://www.9mistakes-online.com/startingsmartnewsletter.htm)

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*Freebie(s) of this issue

This issue's freebie(s) can be found in the "Starting Smart Community Chest"

Click the link below and use this info to gain access:

*Username is "communitychest" without the quotation marks (" ")
*The password to the Community Chest is in the email I sent to you announcing the online version of the newsletter and in the text version itself.

*The link to access the "Starting Smart Community Chest":

http://www.9mistakes-online.com/members

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*Copyright and Publisher Info
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"Starting Smart" is copyright 2003 by Karl Augustine.
No part of this publication may be reproduced
without consent from the publisher.

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