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This is a guest post by Lindsay Stordahl. Lindsay is the author of That Mutt a Dog Blog and the owner of Run That Mutt a dog running service out of Fargo, ND. She also happens to be my girlfriend. I hope you enjoy.

I work with dogs almost every day, and I see several others in passing. It’s so common for dogs to be out of control that most people expect dogs to bark, jump, pull and never sit still. I really notice when a dog is calm, responsive and under control. I’m trying to make a point to compliment these dog owners on their dogs because they are rare. And trust me, these dogs aren’t naturally well behaved, their owners have worked with them. I can tell a lot about a person by looking at his or her dog.

But along with “rude” dogs, lately I’ve noticed the same with people. I’m talking about professionals who work in customer service and do not deal well with people. I wish I had kept track of all the managers, bankers, customer service representatives and receptionists who were impolite, impatient and uninterested in me as a customer in the last two weeks. I don’t see why it’s so hard to be polite to an average customer. After all, I am probably paying them for their service.

I realize the majority of people hate their jobs nowadays, but you’d think employers would set higher standards for their employees and really be on top of how the customers are treated. After all, nothing sells a product or service better than word of mouth from satisfied clients. Treating customers and potential customers well is probably still the best marketing tool out there.

It’s so rare to deal with a customer service representative who genuinely cares about me that when it does happen, I really remember that person and their business. I’ve been making a point to genuinely thank them and of course continue using what they have to offer.

I try to show appreciation for readers of my blog by offering the best information I can, visiting and commenting on all of their blogs, giving opportunities for feedback and giving away free stuff. I know I could do more.

If you are a blogger, think about what it feels like when you contribute genuinely decent comments to someone’s post and then you never hear from him or her. That person didn’t even bother to acknowledge your comment. Are you going to visit that blog again? Maybe, but you might think twice before leaving another comment. What about the blogger who does acknowledge your comment?

Remember to keep your customers in mind. After all, where would you be without them? Have you had a recent bad expierence with someone in customer relations? Have you gone out of your way to make someone known lately?

This is a guest post brought to you by Shaun Connell, webmaster of Make Money, a free resource for those who want to make money online and think outside the “money box.” Find out what the money box is by visiting the site. If you would like to be a featured guest poster go to the guest poster page to learn more.

Every once in a while I stumble onto an analogy that just sticks in my mind. The analogy illustrates a concept or technique so well I can’t help but constantly refer back to the analogy.

For a perfect example, Seth Godin’s analogy in The Big Red Fez did the trick. I can’t think about internet marketing without instantly thinking of his illustration that demonstrated how you can get your visitors to do exactly what you want them to do.

So what was this amazing analogy? Before we discuss it, let’s do some internet marketing 101 for a refresher.

Back to the Basics

We’ve heard the basics a billion times and there’s a reason: mastering internet marketing is found in mastering the basics. Internet marketing tricks and “secret strategies” can be helpful, but they must never be seen as anything but compliments to the two “make money online” basics: writing great content and building links. Everything else is just icing on the cake.

Building the links is for generating traffic. Writing great content is for getting your traffic to take the actions you want them to take. Traffic without content that convinces your visitors to take action is simply a waste. Unless your visitors click ads, sign up for newsletters or check out your sales page, you might as well have never had the traffic. Unless your traffic takes action, you can’t make money.

Keep it Simple, Stupid!

So, what’s the easiest method of getting your traffic to do something? By making it hard to not do it. Your website/blog design should be showcased around the fundamentals of what your visitors should instantly do.

Remember, this is a business. Any page that doesn’t directly make money through readership is nothing more than a “squeeze page,” with its entire purpose to:

1. Build Trust
2. Funnel Traffic

This brings us back to the analogy by marketing genius Seth Godin. How should you organize your design and content? Simple:

Think of your visitors as a bunch of monkeys. These monkeys are at your website for a reason: they want a banana. If you want them to find the banana, just give it to them. On every page it should be obvious what the banana is.

So What Do You Do?

The Internet provides marketers with the greatest opportunity ever known to marketers: the ability to literally hand an eager audience information that they can monetize. They’re coming to you, so feel free to offer them relevant information that you can monetize.

If you want your visitors to subscribe to your newsletter, consider putting the opt-in at the bottom of every post. (Better yet: think about having your website store special cookies so that only those visitors who haven’t already signed up for it will see the opt-in field.)

If your main monetization strategy is AdSense, put it up under the left-hand side of the title, with the text wrapping around the ad.

If your main monetization strategy is an affiliate program, wrap up every post and article with a relevant affiliate link.

In the end, just think about what you want your visitors to do in an ideal visit. Now make sure they can do what you want them to do. Give the monkey a banana, and make money while you’re at it.

This is a guest post written by Shaun Connell, the webmaster behind the free internet marketing resource “Make Money“. That link is the banana. Click it. You know you want to.