Notification of publication would be greatly appreciated, and if possible, a copy of relevant ezine or newsletter. Please send notification to: mailto:webmaster@online-wealth.com

---------------------

The good thing about ezines is there are a lot to choose from; bad thing about ezines is also there are a lot to choose from!

If, like many others, you subscribe to many ezines, sheer number coming at you can be daunting. Every day, every week, day in, day out - whew! What to do? How did I get myself in this fix, in first place? I was spending so much time reading, categorizing, printing and filing a mountain of ezines, our home office was beginning to look like a used paper factory! Sometimes, I'd wonder if I was turning into an ezine junkie!

"That's it!" Sherry says one day, "YOU gotta do something about this monkey on yer mind! Today already! I can't find door to bathroom, fer Pete's sake." She glares at me...I looked around - it wasn't quite that bad, but I could see her point.

So, I did.

First off, I took more notice of SUBJECT line of every email, instead of just eagerly, madly, desperately, clicking on every one. Pretty soon, I found out that ones that were ALWAYS IN CAPS were of little or no use, so I didn't bother reading them any more. Those that included ezines were quickly consigned to UNSUBSCRIBE basket.

That still left a heckuva lot of ezines!

Hey, that SUBJECT line is pretty cool - why not scan through all of those first and see which ones *really* grab me? Which of them are really talking to *me*?

So, I did.

Hmmm, this is interesting, some of those SUBJECT lines are really vague, or outrageously pompous, or unrelated to my interests, or just plain dull. Tap, tap, click, click - gone. Oh, what a relief! The UNSUBSCRIBE basket was growing and my fingers were flying!

"You've still got a long way to go," Sherry says darkly, as she fills up another garbage bag of ezine litter.

Sherry was right: That cut things down a fair bit, but still not enough - I could FEEL Sherry's eyes boring through me as I then reviewed each ezine. Nervously, my finger hovered over mouse button - TD (To Delete) or Not TD, that's question?

Hey, is there a Table Of Contents I can look at and perhaps find out if there is something that *REALLY* grabs me? Maybe I should scan that first?

So, I did.

I would appreciate notification of where it was used, and if possible, a copy of ezine or newsletter that it was used in. Please send notification mailto:webmaster@online-wealth.com

-----------------------

For quite a few months now, I've been - well, not inundated but - receiving a number of emails urging me to take advantage of interactive facilities such as LiveHelper, HumanClick and like.

At first glance, such a tool should be very useful, thinks I...and I mention this to Sherry, musing about whether people visiting our websites would feel same way. Sherry, after much prodding, tears her eyes away from her monitor and replies, "Well, dear, I'm really not all that sure..." and slips back into her near-catatonic state as she concentrates on next batch of emails pouring in.

"Well, y'know, when you go inna store, y'know, you expect some-one to talk to you, right...sort of like to help, y'know?" I stopped, momentarily nonplussed, for I suddenly realized *that* doesn't happen anymore in stores anyway, as Sherry's almost-glazed eyes swept over me like a laser beam and then back to monitor.

Recovering quickly, I says, "OK, lookit, ferget about stores - they're dinosaurs anyway, only they don't know it yet - but, onna web people want *interaction*, they *want* to be told what and how to buy, right? Riiiight? At least, that's what *we're* told, right, in all those ezines, OK!" I look at Sherry fiercely, willing her to unglue her eyes from screen.

Her face suffused, She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed turned her radar on me, fixed my position finally and gritted through her teeth, "Why don't you find out, dear? Why don't you just ASK THEM?" As she finished and calmed down, she smiled sweetly at me now, and repeated, "Run a survey or poll, on our main site, then you *might* have some idea!"

Brilliant, I thought. Organize a poll to find out what our visitors really think about those tools before we go to trouble of trying them out! Hey, maybe such a poll would even tell us whether there is any acceptance of concept, out there anyway?

"Fantastic, yer a genius", I shouted as Sherry went back to her screen and I set about designing suitable survey questions and form. A day or so later, it was all done, with poll sitting on three of our domains. The questions I was putting to all visitors were essentially: