ANNOUNCE> Growing Mindshare Workshop

[Thomas P. Copley]

GROWING MINDSHARE WORKSHOP:  OUTREACH FOR YOUR WEB SITE

The 1990s have been a virtual gold rush period for Web site growth.
Individuals, businesses and organizations have flocked by the millions
to establish a presence on the Web.  However, having a Web address is
little or no guarantee that visitors will come, and even less so that
they will ever return.  Each site owner struggles to get _mindshare_.
Mindshare is that ephemeral quality that causes Web surfers in large
numbers to think of your site first when it comes to the content that
you offer.  Without mindshare a Web address is little more than a
mining claim without the mine.

The Growing Mindshare Workshop:  Outreach for Your Web Site is a six
week workshop conducted entirely by email and the World Wide Web
(WWW).  It will help you to achieve a favorable mindshare for your
site.  Visitors to your site are either there on a mission to find
information that you offer, or else have arrived there accidentally.
Both groups are important, but require different approaches in order
to enhance mindshare.  Serving the former requires careful structuring
of your site in order to permit rapid access.  Reaching the latter
involves increasing the chances that random visitors will hit on your
site again and again.

This workshop will provide a hands-on opportunity to learn about
specific strategies and methods for developing, improving, and
maintaining mindshare. Topics that will be covered include:

  * Positioning your site for maximum advantage on search
    engines, portals and indices.  Ethical versus questionable
    tactics.

  * Setting up <META> tags using standardized approaches such as
    the Dublin Core.  How to avoid index spamming.

  * Understanding how XML-based search engines work.  Near-term
    and future potential will be explored.  How to index site
    maps with Resource Description Framework (RDF).

  * Advancing mindshare through promotional activities.
    Advantages and disadvantages of display advertising,
    reciprocal links, affiliate programs, publicity, etc.

  * Gaining visibility for your information in an environment
    where content is increasingly being made open.  To charge or
    not to charge, and if so how much or how little.

  * Making your Web site configurable and adaptable to changing
    needs through database publishing and effective interface
    design.

  * The ins and outs of transactions processing.  Understanding
    credit card processing, micropayments, and electronic data
    interchange (EDI).

  * Analyzing server log statistics in order to maximize Web site
    effectiveness.

The cost of the workshop is $35 US. **

How to Sign Up

A six week session of the Growing Mindshare Workshop is scheduled to
begin Monday, November 2, 1998 and will end Friday, December 11,
1998.

To sign up for the Growing Mindshare Workshop, please send an email
message to the address:

    majordomo at arlington.com

and in the body of the message, place

    subscribe grow

In order to gain maximum advantage of the Growing Mindshare Workshop,
it will be necessary to have either an up-to-date version of Microsoft
Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator.

Thomas P. Copley, Ph.D., has successfully taught several online
courses.  These include the Dynamic Duo Workshop (now underway), Tune
in the Net Workshop, first offered in 1997, Make the Link Workshop,
introduced in 1995, and the Go-pher-it Workshop, begun in 1994.  He
has been actively involved in online teaching for more than a decade,
and has been a consultant to Apple Computer, Inc.  He is also one of
the founders of the Electronic University, and has been on the faculty
of Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and Washington State
University.  He is co-moderator of the online-ed mailing list.

   ** NOTE:  While Make the Link, Tune In the Net, and Dynamic
   Duo Workshops are not prerequisites for the Growing Mindshare
   Workshop (GMW), all three provide complementary information
   that may also be of interest to many participants in GMW. A
   discounted price for GMW is available to past participants in
   these workshops, or to those who now wish to take them.

________________________________________________________________
THOMAS P. COPLEY                           tcopley at arlington.com
Growing Mindshare Workshop       www.bearfountain.com/arlington/