UWSAG talks to Hong Gao Qiang
of GalacNet

GalacNet is a free web service company running their own connections and servers, GalacNet receives up to a million unique hits to their cluster of sites every year .

Here is what he has to say about starting and promoting a business on the internet.

UWSAG: "As one who has been extremely successful as an online marketer, please tell us how you got started using the Internet as a marketing tool."

Hong: "Marketing on the internet is very much like traditional marketing in a way. Where many people mistake that when they stream a banner towards a certain network and getting certain amount of hits is an effective way of market, I feel that brand sense is much more important.

How I started using the internet as a marketing tool was after I have decided on a name and image for my organization, GalacNet.

The basics to market online is to have a simple name, make sure its easy to remember and of course don't tie it up to a specific task. With GalacNet we can engage with all forms of IT and web related businesses. But where 'somethingHost' would tie the company to only providing hosting services.

UWSAG: "What are some of the online ventures you are involved in?"

Hong: "GalacNet, which was born from from the revenue I generate from selling products on eBay."

UWSAG: "How long did it take your first online venture to start making a profit?"

Hong: "It would roughly take 3 to 6 months if you are fast enough to cover your cost of running. But some can take up to 1 or 2 years.

Where after the 2nd or 3rd Year its Judgment day."

UWSAG: "How did you learn about what it takes to succeed?"

Hong: "There is no formula to success. You have to be determined in what you do and have a clear vision in your goals."

UWSAG: "What specific types of online tools are you using successfully?"

Hong: "The best tool for marketing successfully is yourself.

I am sure you have seen a lot of tools like Auto Search Engine submitters and similar related tools. But still to market your business successfully you have to go get down and dirty and start doing the job.

Find out where you will get the targeted people of your product or service and then start going there and do promoting.

There is no why that clicking a button would make your campaign successful overnight."

UWSAG: "Do you do all of your business online, or do your online marketing efforts supplement your off-line business efforts?"

Hong: "Yes most of our promotion are on-line base because of our targeted market. No point giving a cabbage to a monkey when what it wants is a peanut."

UWSAG: "What mistakes have you made?"

Hong: "Attached a Straight Cable to a Cross Cable link on my switch. Hehe ^_^

There are other mistakes that were more costly, which come in forms like wrong program investment. Once I got the programmer to make a CPC and CPM engine for our sites, which it turned out to not even cover the programming cost, and not to mention the maintenance cost. We have since stripped the engine down.

There are of course countless others. But what matters is we gained the insight and experience from each mistake and became stronger."

UWSAG: "What major mistakes do you see other Internet entrepreneurs make?"

Hong: "I have seen 5 free hosting companies and 1 commercial hosting company fail just this year alone..

The first mistake was that they did not plan effectively on how their business will be running and did not calculate their resource VS revenue balancing.

Second, lack of determination. We see a lot of people posting 'Sell our clients' post recently, many gave the excuse of going to college or maybe 'got tired' statements. Where many only have been running for a few months. The end statement, they have lost interest in what they have been doing and clearly given up.

So, DON'T GIVE UP! It took Amazon.com 3 years to make a profit ;) I don't see why we can't wait for a few years too."

UWSAG: "Are there any other tips or suggestions you would like to give others that want to profit from the Internet?"

Hong: "Don't over-resource. Manage it so that you would only have a little bit in access and not buy so much that you end up paying for things to idle."

UWSAG: "What do you feel are the basics of a good business site design policy?"

Hong: "It must have a feel of your business.

A corporate site must look corporate.

A commercial hosting site must look commercial ( and not folded with ads ).

And a free hosting site must look non-commercial.

Which gives the reason why GalacNet is designed in this way."

UWSAG: "Should a business site show accountability, and if so in what manner or listed with certain affiliates. ie BBB , BBBonline, BBBTorch?"

Hong: "Your own company name should give the users the assurance. If it needs to relay and depend on another name or brand to hold its worth then isn't it just a leech on the skin? Eating off the other brand name instead of making its own creditable.

Its nice to have some recognizable names beside your company in the start but you must be able to show people that it is actually standing on its own and not holding up because it is tapping on another.

UWSAG: "Concerning Web site Search Engine placements, do you feel networking allows the business site a higher search order compared to meta wording?"

Hong: "I totally agree. I have submitted some of GalacNet's sites to a few major search engines and then that's it. I strongly believe that getting those 'spiders' to find you would be more effective than trying to find them yourself.

The Meta tags only notify the spider what the site is about but doesn't make it come to you.

Get many links throughout the internet and then set the 'trap'."

UWSAG: "Thank you very much Hong for volunteering your time for this interview."

To learn more about GalacNet visit their site at http://www.galacnet.com/ for free services such as hosting, forums, instant program sign up, and script activations like phpBB, phpNuke and many more.