Saturday, January 06, 2007

Traffic Exchanges

The main essential ingredient needed to make money online is to get a lot of traffic. This is true whether one is selling their own products or doing affiliate marketing. Traffic exchanges can be a excellent way to get a large amount of traffic to a website. Traffic exchanges work on a credit system. Members of an exchange earn credits for every site they visit and use those credits to get visitors to their sites. One big drawback of traffic exchanges is that the sales conversions rates from them are very low. There are a couple of reasons for this. First of all the traffic from most exchanges is not targeted to any categories. Secondly the traffic from these exchanges is from other website owners who are mainly interested in getting credits and traffic to their own sites and usually aren't very interested in the sites they visit while using the exchanges. There are couple of good ways traffic exchanges can be used to make money though. First of all traffic exchanges are good for using lead capture pages. Frequently those who use exchanges to promote multi level marketing programs can be successful because of the lead capture pages that most of those programs use. Secondly since users of traffic exchanges are trying to get traffic and visibility for their sites any site that has to do with website promotion and traffic will do well.

There is one exchange in particular that I like to use. Traffic swarm is more targeted than most exchanges. When you sign up for trafficswarm you select categories of sites you have interest in. Secondly traffic swarm isn't just an exchange it's a whole network of other websites. When traffic swarm lists your the links show up on many of the thousands of other sites in the traffic swarm network. Traffic swarm also has their own search engine that's also on many other sites in their network that will show your links in the results of searches. There is also a pro membership that traffic swarm offers which increases the level of traffic. Traffic swarm is an example of "viral marketing". Which means that the more you use their system the more traffic they will send to your site.

The ads that are put on traffic exchanges are very important. Ad titles and descriptions that are compelling will help increase sales conversions and get more clicks. The ads should be very specific about what the website that is being promoted is about and include clear benefits of the website or program to the exchange surfer reading the ad. Traffic exchanges can be used successfully with the right website and ad to create more traffic and sales and are an exellent resource for promoting a website on a shoestring budget.

2007 Freelance jobs in programming and coding

If you have programming skills you should try to put them to good use by freelancing – there are plenty of websites offering projects and freelance jobs that could be perfect for your knowledge. Finding freelance jobs in programming and coding is not as difficult as it may sound – winning them, however, is another thing. Here are a few tips that should help you earn more money online by constantly winning freelance projects:

Create a good portfolio – as with any freelance job, having a good portfolio is the start of a successful Internet business. Start by doing some work for free, for yourself or for friends. Once you are confident enough with your programming skills, create a few samples of your work and maybe upload them on a website (you can download a free web template here and upload it on a free hosting site, if you wish).

Start off with competitive pricing – even if you have a nice portfolio, most of the freelance jobs in programming and coding are accessed on auction-type websites, in which you bid on a project. At first, before your rankings grow, you should offer to do work for 50% of what you would normally charge.

Offer a free sample – this is the winning move whenever you wish to secure a project. If you want to make money online by doing programming work, you need to risk some of your time and present your potential clients with free mockups of what they are after.

Be prompt and polite – respond to your client's requests ASAP. Also, don't forget to be polite – many people skip greetings and signing their name in a message – don't!

Freelance IT programmer tips

The single most important thing about being a freelance IT coder is to secure enough projects on a monthly basis so that you can rely on a constant income from your online job. A good online IT programmer job may pay as much as any regular coding job, maybe even more if you manage to find good clients. However, success does not come straight away – you need to sharpen your coding skills and build your reputation as a reliable and prompt freelance IT programmer. Many coders who are extremely talented in programming have a hard time putting together a nice portfolio website because they lack the aesthetic sense that is vital when creating a nice looking site. We recommend that you make your life easier and simply use a free web site template that already has a strong visual presence and an attractive look and feel. You will notice that your reputation of being a great freelance IT coder will increase dramatically once you are able to show your clients exactly what you did in the past. You can look for clients on specialized forums and discussion boards or by joining a freelance website and competing on auctions and projects. You can also develop your own freelance IT programmer website and get leads this way, bypassing all the competition.

Friday, January 05, 2007

A Long Expected Remedy Clickbank's New Tracking System

An essential factor for success in affiliate marketing is the ability to track and test your results with a service that ClickBank tracking successfully supplies. If you can identify through ClickBank tracking which ads are producing the most sales, as well as who is clicking on them, you can make the most of your affiliate program.

As an Internet entrepreneur, you want to make as much in profits as possible. ClickBank publishers enjoy access to over 100,000 affiliates. Most importantly, ClickBank tracking affords you the ability to monitor your affiliate program and assure that the proper commissions are meted out.

In this age of information and technology, web users prefer to browse the Internet anonymously. This means that affiliate programs have more difficulty tracking the associations between their members and the general public. ClickBank tracking uses a form of cookies to distribute a database of user information throughout the web.

ClickBank tracking is also called the hoplink system. ClickBank tracking records cookies on a consumer's computer. One cookie can hold several records of affiliate referral relationships. Each time a consumer is referred to a new affiliate, the existing cookie is updated by ClickBank tracking.

ClickBank tracking works automatically. Each time a consumer goes to a new merchant, ClickBank tracking goes into effect. The ClickBank tracking server sends the consumer a referral cookie and redirects the consumer to the affiliate site. This new destination is called the merchant's landing page. The location of the landing page, which accepts inbound affiliate referrals, can be set up through the ClickBank tracking settings.

ClickBank tracking works the way it does because of two parallel architectures. The first, or original, architecture is the regular ClickBank tracking/hoplink system. ClickBank tracking has received some criticism for this original architecture's penetrability and inflexibility. Consequently, an enhanced ClickBank tracking/hoplink system came out that works in parallel with the original ClickBank tracking system. ClickBank tracking has hence been improved thanks to the range of new features that elevate security and the effectiveness of the affiliate program.

ClickBank tracking is supposed to encapsulate even more data that will allow for detailed reports of real-time affiliate referral stats and even merchant conversion rates. ClickBank tracking also supports referral links to several landing pages at the merchant's site. Best of all, ClickBank tracking features complete customer service. ClickBank tracking manages sales and commissions automatically and you don't need to have any special equipment or programming knowledge to benefit from ClickBank tracking.

All you need to do to get underway with ClickBank tracking is set up an account. Like any other affiliate program, ClickBank has certain regulations. The next step is to set up a “pitch page” and a “thank you page.” To participate in ClickBank tracking, you need to test all of your links to ensure they are working properly. As soon as you are approved and pay the activation charge, you are on your way to checking your ClickBank tracking results. From here, all you do is set up your affiliate network and see where ClickBank tracking takes you.

By now, you should feel comfortable with ClickBank tracking and how it works. If you feel ready to increase your profit shares, get started with ClickBank tracking. Should any questions remain about the success or viability of ClickBank tracking, research ClickBank tracking further online. Get ready to make the most of your affiliate network with ClickBank tracking!

Outsourcing Call Centers

Large global corporations have already begun to outsource from India and the Philippines. The relatively low cost of manpower makes these countries a very attractive base for sourcing cross-border IT-enabled services. India has been the largest provider of software engineers to silicon valley. And the benefits provided by such global corporations are very helpful to the economy of these countries. The Call Center Industry is now considered a major source of employment in the Philippines, a nation with virtually millions of English-speaking people.

The usual time difference between America and these countries make outsourcing an advantage, since most companies like to have customer care and support available round-the clock. Some 85% of Fortune 500 sales and marketing executives are outsourcing more key marketing services and 90% of these companies report that it has made them more competitive. However, since the increase in outsourcing, these companies received more complaints about Indians with heavy accents handling customer calls. This is due to the very big demand of English-speaking agents and scarcity of capable ones.

Outsourcing used to be just a trend but is now a staple practice in growing companies that seek cheaper and more efficient investments with high returns. Market analysis researches highly recommend an increase in the companies outsourcing to answer the continuing strategies needed for cost-efficient and effective marketing and customer relations. A company hires an agency that will hire college-educated agents, capitalizing mostly on the expertise of an individual. The continuing drive to outsource has contributed to unemployment, because companies save more money with Indians and Filipinos on their payroll than with Americans who are covered by a very strict labor code implementation.

Agents in Call Centers work in shifts and are trained to be oriented around the area where their clients are located.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Trade Show Displays that Cost You Less

Trade shows are known for their efficacy in presenting the products and services of a company. Even if there are many marketing tools that you can optimize to advertise your business, still trade show displays remains to be the top choice when it comes to improving one’s business identity. But you should know that trade shows will never be successful without quality business trade show displays.

Trade show displays are very cost effective in marketing your trade show exhibits. It is through the trade show displays that you’re able to introduce to your prospects what you are offering. Because of this, trade show displays has become one of the most sought-after tools in advertising.

Trade show displays can be very useful in communicating to your prospects. The displays are the attention-grabber to which your prospects can identify you during tradeshows. If you’re planning to attend a show and would like to use trade show displays, this article may enlighten you.

You want to make an impression. But you want to get cost-saving deals on trade show displays, isn’t it? If that is what you want, then take advantage of the cheap trade show displays that are available in the market.

What are cheap trade show displays? Why should you use cheap trade show displays? How can you get one? Cheap trade show displays are the alternative for those who want to spice up their exhibits with good-quality displays but don’t have the budget to suffice their needs. Cheap displays allow you to get the best deals in making the most of your trade show exhibits. It’s the best way to attract trade show attendees especially if you lack the budget to acquire a high-impact display.

There are varied ways that can be exercised to get a hold of budget-friendly options on trade show displays. The foremost option is to make use of the rollup displays for they are lightweight and easy to transport. The second option would be the table top display which is smaller than the usual type of display. It is light and inexpensive. The third option is to choose a rental display. Other options include used trade show displays or teaming up with an exhibitor who’s also attending the show.

Joining trade shows would cost you a lot of money. So if you want to minimize the expenses in promoting your exhibit, you should choose business trade show displays that are easy on the pocket.

Getting Affordable Prices for Flyer Printing Services

Flyer printing services are widely offered these days. Since the introduction of the internet and e-commerce, many establishments in the field of printing have emerged to accommodate the growing demands for quality printing services. In addition to this, many printing services are now being devised in order to further accommodate the ever-growing need for quality prints.

However, even with such technology, high printing expenses can sometimes become inevitable. So, do you want to lessen your printing expenses? Well, of course you do, everyone does!

In order to lessen your expenses, you will need to know different flyer printing prices offered by different printing institutions. Flyer printing prices are usually included when you ask a printing company quote.

Printing quotes contains a set of information that usually includes the type of printing service and the type of printing media that will be used to print your flyers. These two are among the factors that can greatly affect the prices for flyer printing.

Different printing services use a different printing process. And each process are also using different printing machines that has different set up, maintenance and operational costs.

As for the type of paper; each printing paper, depending on its quality, which also depends on its ink absorption capacity and glossiness, has different prices. Most of the time, if a paper is of high quality, it usually costs more expensive. However, there are many printing papers in the market that are ideal and high quality flyer papers but can be affordable.

And now back to the printing quote. You can mainly get printing quotes in two ways. You can either go directly to the print shop or visit them in the web.

You can gather different printing quotes from different printing institutions with the same type of flyer printing service. You can also ask for samples. When you have enough quotes and samples from companies, compare each quotes and samples with one another.

See which of the quotes are affordable for you, while basing the quality of your flyers using your flyer printing samples. By doing so, you will be able to find a suitable printing company that can guide you with all your printing needs without making you pay tons of money.

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Oregon Personal Injury Lawyers

Personal injury is the bodily harm caused to a person because of someone or something. It can also mean invasion of a personal right like false imprisonment, causing mental suffering, any kind of harm, disease or death by another person. Personal injury law deals with protecting of those individual’s interests who have been victims of recklessness, negligence, inaction or malpractices of others. It also includes defective drugs, medical malpractices, worker’s compensation and product liability.

Personal injury law is also known as “Tort Law”. Oregon personal injury law is covered under the Tort Law, and some federal laws relating to damages and Insurance. People declaring to have sustained personal injury can claim for compensation for any financial loss, mental tension, and physical pain including permanent disability of death of a dear one. For establishing a claim, it would be very helpful to take the support of a good lawyer who would be able to prove that: 1) the person being accused is truly responsible for causing the personal injury; 2) the compensation claimed is suitable for the damages incurred. Personal injury claims may also result from a dispute with the insurance company regarding the payment.

A personal injury lawyer would be able to help in all the legal proceedings relating to the personal injury case. The lawyer would legally assist the client in determining how much the claim is worth and also help in getting sufficient claim from the insurance company. Oregon Law requires that insurance companies should pay the attorney fees for personal injuries less than $5,500.

It is very important to have a qualified attorney to deal with personal injury cases. There are certain aspects to be considered while choosing a good attorney: get someone who has specialized in personal injury cases; choose someone who has experience in dealing with insurance companies; the attorney should have sufficient experience in dealing with similar cases; choose someone who is professional about the contract, the fees, answering your queries, keeping you informed and updated; and so on.

A majority of Oregon personal injury lawyers cover most counties and cities in Oregon. Personal injury lawyers take fees only if the client manages to recover the money that is claimed. They take a percentage of the amount that is recovered from the settlement. There are many personal injury lawyers in Oregon. They can be located through yellow pages or advertisements of law firms. Information is also available in the Internet.

Business Lawsuit

Today, even a minor business disagreement can lead to a lengthy and expensive business lawsuit. Contractual disputes can often lead to disagreements that cannot be resolved through any means other than a commercial lawsuit. If you do find your company involved in a business lawsuit, you may face the additional frustration of having to wait months or years for the settlement that you deserve. If you are involved in a business lawsuit to protect your brand name, business reputation or company assets, you certainly don’t want the court case to last longer than your business.

Commercial litigation can grow out of any business dispute, including such common problems such as:

 Issues related to debt collection
 Bankruptcy
 Disputes regarding contracts
 Shareholder litigation
 Issues related to antitrust actions
 Consumer fraud allegations

When you find yourself facing a business lawsuit, you need experienced business law professionals on your team. Many companies worry about the cost of pursuing a business lawsuit, but many attorneys will work on a contingency basis. That means that the attorney’s fees are paid out of the settlement your company is awarded. However, settlements can often take years to actually materialize. If your company cannot wait years for a settlement, lawsuit funding can be an important resource.

In many cases, a company can use the settlement money from a business lawsuit to repair the damage done by the initial business problem that led to the lawsuit, or to actually grow the business or expand into new markets. If you are involved in a business lawsuit, and your business needs operating capital, you may be tempted to accept a low-ball offer from the defendant. If your company is involved in a business lawsuit for some time, it may seem simpler to capitulate and accept a smaller amount of cash right now than wait months or years for what you are really entitled to receive.

The good news is you do not have to settle for less than you deserve. A business lawsuit advance can give your company the working capital it needs today. By taking an advance against your business lawsuit, you and your lawyer can negotiate from a position of strength since immediate cash ceases to be a problem for your company. You can now wait out your opponent, and once the defendant sees that you are not eager to accept a small offer, that defendant may be less enthusiastic about dragging out the lawsuit. Once you send the message that you are negotiating from a position of strength, the defendant will often be willing to resolve the case in your favor. If not, you will have the working capital necessary to continue to operate your business while you and your attorney pursue a just verdict in court.

Just as you want to be careful in selecting a lawyer for your business lawsuit, you will also want to choose a financial partner who is experienced in financing business lawsuits. A business attorney has the business law expertise needed to win your case, and a financial partner who understands business lawsuit funding can get you the cash your business needs. LawMax is the leader in advancing funding against commercial lawsuits, and LawMax has experience helping companies receive the money they need while they await their day in court.

LawMax shares the risks of your lawsuit, offering advances against the projected settlement of your case. You do not have to repay your cash advance until and unless you win your case or reach an out-of-court settlement. If you do not win your case and do not receive a settlement, you owe LawMax nothing. Once you do win your business case or reach an out-of-court settlement, your LawMax advance is re-paid from the proceeds of the settlement.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Who is Minding the Family Business?

Family owned businesses in Canada and the United States have comprised a major portion of the job market and economy for decades. What does the future hold for North American family owned businesses? As the population ages and the beginning phase of a large population of Northern Americans begins to retire, what will the face of the future business economy look like?

Family business succession planning is essential to the employment market and economy of both Canada and the United States. The next two decades will see many North American family owned businesses being listed for sale or passed along to family members to run the family operation. All too often we hear reports on the decline of a family owned business once it has been passed on to the children. Sometimes the failure relates to the new family CEO not understanding the passion and commitment that must be present to succeed in business. Succession planning is critical to the stability and financial security of any business as the present day CEO retires, sells or passes on the business to a family member.

Many CEOs of family owned businesses have a personal interest in seeing the company remain owned and managed by the family. This requires planning and careful consideration to ensure that the family can maintain the company and additionally the family legacy. Likewise, this plan is critical to ensure that the founding owner can achieve the necessary personal financial security to enjoy retirement. Lack of planning can result in the loss of retirement, financial security, loss of the family legacy. In addition, without a plan, the possibility exists that estate tax or gift taxing could be incurred if the business is inappropriately transferred to a family member. An ESOP (Employee Share Ownership Plan) can help to ensure the continued viability of the corporation following the retirement of its current management.

A well design ESOP clearly defines the objectives for the succession plan. An ESOP may include some of these key factors: how to attract and maintain the necessary skilled employees, how to outline long term corporate goals, and how to involve employees in stock ownership and other incentive plans. Employee ownership usually carries the additional benefit of higher employee motivation and morale, a vital component that all corporations need in today’s business economy.

Mortgage Marketing Online Vs. Offline

Many mortgage originators debate whether to market on-line or off. But the real question should be which marketing methods and strategies work best on-line, and which work best offline? Let's take a closer look.

Direct Mail & Telemarketing

Direct mail campaigns can be expensive with all the printing and postage costs, so use a combination on-line / offline promotion with these.

Begin by fine-tuning your postal mailing lists, then use targeted mailings to borrowers for special promotions over mass mailing everyone general reminders; smaller mailing can reduce your costs. Then for your larger mass mailing, use postcards, black/white printing or other less expensive means. While you are designing your direct mail, make sure to add your web site's address (URL) so your prospects can go on-line for even more marketing and sales opportunities.

Then on-line, market with interactive devices like forums or blogs, asking for comments/feedback from your readers. Offer downloads: reports, ebooks, etc to build relationships with your potential mortgage customers. These can either both be free to entice visitors to your site, or carry price tag and develop additional revenue beyond the mortgage transaction.

Establish telemarketers to get more leads for your on-line and offline marketing. Don't' worry about "getting the application" necessarily. Just get lead information for follow up, then put the prospects in a system where they will receive regular mailings.

Websites and Email Marketing

Websites today cannot be static HTML sites. The days to set it and forget it are over for all practical purposes. Sites that are gaining readership and converting to leads are ones that are interactive and constantly changing, like blogs.

Whatever you have, make sure to set up an auto-responder form to capture leads for an on-line mailing list. (This form can do double duty and ask for postal mailing addresses, too). Then conduct regular email marketing campaigns targeting particular mortgage needs in conjunction with your offline promotions.

Benefits and Disadvantages

Benefits of on-line marketing - Get more for your marketing $$! Ability to update your content instantly and change your target market overnight.

Disadvantages of on-line marketing - Email spamming is not allowed & many forget they sign up and report you as a spammer; keeping up with SEO (search engine optimization) is an art, as the search engines change their algorithms and requirements daily at times; technology - what work today may not tomorrow, so you need to keep up - not always easy time-wise or money-wise with software and learning systems.

Benefits of offline marketing - People get to "keep" something and often do, refer to it years later and showing their friends, etc.

Disadvantages of offline marketing - Higher printing and postage costs.

So the next time you are debating whether to market your origination business on-line or off, ask yourself which marketing methods and strategies would work best on-line, and which would work best offline for your particular items for sale. Then nix and match accordingly.

Monday, January 01, 2007

POS Scanners

Looking for a way of speeding up the check out process in your supermarket? Point of sale, or POS, scanners will help you a long way. Having barcode or label scanners will take the product and price information and send it directly to the computer and take the money from the customer. These scanners are not just useful in a supermarket or a restaurant, but are also very popular in libraries and companies where they are used to read employee or book information.

An important type of barcode scanner is one that uses CCD technology. This technology was widely used in many retail outlets and involves scanning by pressing the scanner on the barcode to feed information into the computer. But its inability to read from round surfaces has resulted in the development of laser-operated scanners, which pick up barcodes from the surface of products even from a distance. With the advent of omni-directional laser scanners, more and more dealers are opting for those barcode readers that send out laser beams in different directions and pick up the barcodes on the products in a matter of seconds.

A large array of barcode readers is available in the market; there are also different connections like USB, Bluetooth, cordless, and keyboard wedge readers. Handheld scanners and wireless scanners have increased efficiency levels at point of sale to a large extent, and customers no longer have to queue up for many minutes while the cashier checks out their items one by one and comes up with the bill in a long and laborious process. The latest barcode scanners are even extremely cost-effective in that they don’t need any software; they simply need to be plugged in to read barcodes and labels.

Metrologic, Datalogic, and Symbol are some of the major manufacturers for barcode scanners wireless barcode readers. Each of these companies has more than a dozen varieties of scanners that are tailored to the needs of supermarkets, industries, retail outlets, restaurants, and libraries for small-scale and large-scale businesses.

Many online marketers are earning a lot of money strictly selling other people’s products as an affiliate. They never own their own information produc

Many online marketers are earning a lot of money strictly selling other people’s products as an affiliate. They never own their own information product – they just drive targeted traffic to a site and earn a commission for each sale.

So what are the pros and cons of launching an Internet marketing career as an affiliate versus a product owner? As an affiliate, you don’t have to worry about the product creation phase or the expenses involved in setting up your systems for shopping cart technology, list-building, and other aspects of Internet marketing.

But a major drawback is that you aren’t in control of the product itself. You have to scour the ‘net to see if there’s a product you feel confident promoting. You can do this through ClickBank and other third party affiliate networks, but you’re always going head to head with competing affiliates for a piece of the Internet marketing pie.

As an affiliate, you can’t control the sales copy or bonus items. If the product owner fails to provide good customer service, it could damage your reputation as the one who referred the visitor to the site in the first place.

As a product owner, you’re chained to the entire process from start to finish. You have to develop a unique idea, create a product or pay to have it created using an outsourcing service, and then get everything up and running if you want your Internet marketing venture to be a success.

You also have to recruit an army of affiliates and provide an ample toolbox filled with strategies they can use to help promote your site. But you retain control over the details of each site and can test and tweak sales copy for higher conversions and deliver any sort of product or bonus that you feel is worthy to your customers.

Is one particular choice better than the other for the Internet marketer who is considering all of their options? They each have their attractive qualities and their drawbacks.

In fact, most marketers do a combination of both. They’ll create their own information product in the form of an eBook and then hyperlink recommendations back to affiliate products that they promote.

This increases the profitability of each product they create and generates even more passive income each time the eBook is promoted by an affiliate for the product they own.

Sunday, December 31, 2006

Printer Calibration

Calibrating a monitor is necessary for screen displays, which in turn replicate what is printed on paper. Calibrating a printer makes it certain that a print job is coherent with what is reflected onscreen.

The fundamental action in printer calibration is to calibrate the monitor. The correct driver for the printer has to be simultaneously ensured. The printer driver gives the necessary assistance through controls for fine-tuning the general color from the printer.

This is adequate for the type of color one wants, based on one’s requirements. Two common means for further printer calibration are visual and mechanical. At times a more exclusive and precise choice is to utilize a hardware device that can read the output from the printer and make the desired modifications. For most normal users, visual calibration or the application of generic color profiles for the hardware is enough.

The basic visual calibration process entails the use of test images with an extensive variety of tonal values. Tonal values comprise a number of color bars, photographs, and blocks of colors. They can be visually corrected with onscreen and print colors. Preferably, one should print a test image, then contrast and modify the grayscale and color outputs in the controls a printer offers.

In both the cases of visual and color management software, target images offer a variety of color and grayscale for the purpose of calibrating monitors, printers, scanners, and digital cameras. ICC profiles are a suitable means of confirming coherent color. These files are particular to each device on the system.

They provide information on how the device generates color. With printers, the perfect job is to generate detached profiles established on numerous arrangements of ink and paper. This impacts the manifestation of the printed substance. For more accurate color management requirements, one can use color management software to expand routine ICC profiles for any device.

Basic Rules of Scam Baiting

Scam baiting is the practice of pretending interest in a fraudulent scheme in order to influence a scammer in many possible ways. The purpose of scam baiting might be to waste the scammers' time, embarrass them, cause them to reveal confidential information which can be passed on to legal authorities in the hope that they will be prosecuted, or simply to amuse the baiter. The scam baiting process is very much useful and successful if done with basic rules.

The goals of scam baiting carry the pleasure of baiters and their readers. To that end, a general status symbol among scam baiters is the collection or display of a photographic "trophy," a picture apparently taken of the scammer, typically while holding custom made signs, or in odd poses with exact props (such as placing a fish on one's head). Other trophies could include documents such as oaths and the pseudo legal documents, taken as the 419 scamr as a step forward towards a hopeless goal.

There are handfuls on common sense basic rules, which a scam baiter should follow:

1. The first rules is to have a good anti-virus software running on your system all the time and do keep the virus definitions ready. This is must for any computer which has internet connection but it is most significant for the scam baiting.

2. Make sure you don’t believe in anything, which a scammer tells you until you know it is true. In case scammer tells you “here is my photo” you could argue it isn’t. If on Monday the scammer tells you its Monday, check the calendar. It’s possibly Tuesday.

3. Next you should make sure that you do not give any real personal information to the scammer. This needs to be very obvious. Any actual personal information carries your real name, real address, place of work, real bank account number, and personal e-mail address and so on.

4. Remember you should never go to meet any scammer in person, regardless of their location given. As most scammers are just nothing more than pretty cheat artists, there had been many cases of muggings, kidnappings and also murder of people who had gone to meet with 419 scammers. Please do not do it.

5. And the most important rule is, you should never involve directly any innocent third parties in your scam bait. No matter how much you may hate you boss or your ex-spouse, don’t take revenge through this. You should not take on the identity of any real person existing or do not send a scammer to meet with any real person.