In 1993, on a moon lit, warm summer night, I was surfing the Internet attempting to discover what successful sites had in common. I was really hungry to find out the secret ingredient of websites that were making it big.

You see, I was tired of traveling thousands of miles by plane and car. My mind was made up to stop living out of a suitcase. It didn't matter that I had hit a peak in my marketing and sales career by working on projects for best-selling author- Tony Robbins. I was eager to simplify my life, settle down, and work from home.

I began my journey brimming with certainty about achieving my outcome. You see, years earlier I learned from Tony that every successful person has three characteristics. They take certain actions, in a specific order, and on a consistent basis. With that in mind, I knew that selling on the Internet would have it's top producers -like any other field- and all I had to do is get their materials, then read, study and implement the wisdom divulged on each page and in every word.

I was elated to find out that, regardless of all the actions, the order in which the actions were taken, and the amount of consistency employed...that at the core of it all, there existed one essential skill.

Believe or not, there is one skill that virtually anyone can learn, practice, and master (after 1,000 hours) to become successful at selling on the web.

Warning! You may want to sit down before finding out the one skill that contributes the most to the success of website owners who earn boat loads of cash. Contrary to what I believed, it wasn't search engine marketing, pay per click or reciprocal linking.

Don't get me wrong though. Those traffic generation methods are needed. But if you drive a million unique visitors to your site per day, and none of them buy anything, or at very minimum subscribe to your newsletter so that you can follow up with an offer, you won't be able to pay your mortgage, car note, hosting fees, etc.

So what good are your traffic generating skills? Every online company must generate traffic, aka leads/prospects. That's what search engine ranking and other traffic generation methods are meant to do. Good news is learning the one skill all successful website owners have in common will increase your traffic too.

What is the one skill that will enable you to generate more traffic and convert more of your browsers into customers? At the end of this article you'll find a resource box that contains a link to my website, click on that to find out. Deal?

After you've mastered that one skill, the next step is implementing it through multiple online and offline marketing methods. Regardless of what methods you use, I promise that the one skill will pay off big if you learn...

Copywriting. Direct response copywriting to be specific. By now you've heard of direct response copywriting, but have you invested time, capital, and effort in learning and implementing the skill? Chances are if you have, you are enjoying the benefits of using the skill. If you haven't learned anything about direct response copywriting, keep reading to grab some helpful tips.

2 Simple Tips for Grabbing Your Website Visitors By The Lapel and Persuading Them to Hand Over the Moolah Tip #1. Headlines

Headlines are crucially important to the success of your website. Testing has proven that headlines can increase your sales as much as 1900%. The late, legendary copywriter John Caples revealed that fact during his phenomenally successful career. By the way, I define Mr. Caples' success on how many sales were made as a result of his talent as a copywriter. And I can assure you that Mr. Caples' selling success was nothing short of phenomenal. But let me get back to headlines.

According to David Ogilvy, another legendary copywriter, the headline is the most important part of an ad. On average, five times (500%) as many people will read the headline as the actual body copy. That obviously means we must spend a considerable amount of time creating headlines.

It's customary for professional website copywriters to write as many as 100 headlines before deciding on one to use. You may think that would be a daunting task but it's not. All you need are a few headline writing formulas. There are 11 widely used headlines. I'll share 3 with you right now.

The "How To" headline is one the easiest to write for "do it yourself" types. "How To" headlines grab people's attention because of the promise of learning something of value. For example, "How to Put Words Together that Make People Beg to Buy Your Product". Get the idea?

Another headline writing formula that's good for "do it yourself" types is the "If, Then" statement. Here's what I mean. "If you give me one hour of your time for 12 weeks and your promise to take action on what I recommend, I guarantee your online business sales and profits will double -- or you don't pay me a dime". How did that grab you?

The last headline formula that I recommend for "do it yourself" types is the "Specific Testimonial" headline. I don't need to explain why your testimonials should be specific, do I? Okay, I'll give a brief explanation. Better yet, I'll provide you with a vague and specific testimonial headline, then you judge which one influences you the most. Deal?

Vague Testimonial: "Harry Toes is fantastic!" J.A., CA.

Specific Testimonial: "Harry Toes is brilliant... he shared one method that I invested $1,839 in that brought back $33,637 gross profit." Jim Baldy, President, Bald Men's Club, Gaithersburg, MD,

Tip #2 Offer

"I'll make him an offer he can't refuse" - Don Vito Corleone, The Godfather. In 1972, Marlon Brando verbalized what every great marketer must master. Making irresistible offers. A powerful factor in making irresistible offers is taking risk out of the transaction for your prospective customer. Let's face it, nobody want's to lose money and get stuck with a bad product. Taking away that fear will boost your online sales.

Here's an example: "For only $49 you can try out