Tag Archives | internet marketing

One of the first problems new online marketers have is getting overwhelmed with the onslaught of information that is available online. The hard part is finding the right advice without being deceived and consequently buying every new product that claims instant success.

Internet marketing is based on doing a few core things really well; getting a good handle on the basics is what will make you successful no matter what the latest fad is.

These things can be learned, namely generating traffic and pre-selling affiliate products.

These two concepts if learned well, will be enough to let you quit your day job, its happening everyday. There are over 10,000 products currently available all over the internet that allows affiliates the opportunity to earn commissions. The internet marketer that can generate traffic to an affiliate website, pre-sell the visitor on a product or service (who then clicks through to the merchant website and purchases the product) will ultimately earn handsome commissions.

The key to being a “work from home business” success is finding the right roadmap, so you don’t waste all your time with trial and error. Repetition and persistence are the keys. Many new internet marketers simply give up when they don’t see immediate results – massive traffic or sales. You must put value in the process of whichever program you follow, and the end result will be profitable.

So what is blogging really all about? First off, let me tell you that it’s a lucrative business to blog and that blogs are easy to set up and manage. Imagine getting paid to write about subjects that interest you, whenever you want, wherever you are! The flexibility involved allows you to maintain your blog at your own pace, and with Internet cafés easily accessible all over the globe, even your vacation won’t get in the way of your blogging… Or should I say: even your blogging won’t get in the way of your vacation?

In this article, let’s take a look at the profitability of a blog and set up one of our own, free of charge! Interested? Read on!

First, you need to get yourself a blog. There are several options – host a blog on your own domain or get a free one. For starters, let’s talk about the free blogs. You can obtain one at http://www.blogger.com or the newer (and better!) http://www.wordpress.com. WordPress is a free blog engine that is robust and infinitely expandable.

Blogger is actually owned by Google, so it will be detected by Google’s radar faster and you will be indexed more quickly. WordPress.com, however, is a relatively new option so I have no comparison on the speed of getting indexed by search engines. However, WordPress is better in the sense that it has more advanced features such as Trackbacks and Categories. You can also manage your sidebar links more efficiently (more about this later).

Get a free blog at either Blogger or WordPress. Then, familiarize yourself by publishing your first post on your blog and tinkering around with the options and templates.

Here are some words to start expanding your blogging vocabulary:

Permalink – Permalink stands for permanent link, which is a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) that leads to an individual post that you make in your blog.

Trackback – When you post about someone else’s blog post elsewhere, your post will show up in their “trackback” section. This feature, however, is not available with a Blogger account.

Pinging – Blogging seems to be paired with pinging almost every time either one is mentioned nowadays. Pinging is actually the action where a certain aggregator is notified whenever your blog is updated, so that the aggregator may show the newest post of your blog on their website. This is a useful way to gain traffic, which I’ll discuss in a future article.

Content

Next, let’s look at the type of content that’s suitable for your blog in order to make it profitable. You need to understand that there is no fixed scope that your blog should have, which means you can write about whatever you’re interested in. Mind you, the difference between a profitable blog and a non-profitable one is the way you write. What would you prefer: reading your university professor’s lecture notes or the latest novel by your favorite author? People prefer to read “light” items most of the time. When they check out your blog, they are not only looking for information, but they are also looking for information that they can access easily.

So, to attract more visitors as well as to keep your current readers coming back for more, it’s very important to add a personal touch to your blog posts. This can be done by simply imagining that you’re talking with your personal friend. An extra bonus for your readers would be a great sense of humor, so try to add funny comments in your articles where relevant.

Another important point is to avoid addressing your reader as a plural unit. Don’t write as if you’re preparing a speech. Instead, write as if you’re having a conversation with a single person, an equal friend, because this will make your reader relate to you more easily.

Besides that, it’s also very useful to establish your own personality through your words. We’re very curious creatures, so naturally your visitors would want to know as much about you as the information you’re offering them.

Having a distinctive personality in your blog will make a world of difference between your blog about gadgets and all the other blogs about gadgets out there. This is a lot like creating your own brand name, where people immediately remember your blog’s name when they need information about gadgets, just like how people immediately think of McDonald’s for fastfood or Nike for sportswear.

There will be more on the subject of content the next time.

When word gets around about your command of blogging, others who need to know about blogging will start to actively seek you out!

It’s All About Your Belief


If you are truly serious about growing rich on the Internet, you must be willing to pay the price!
Are you:

 Prepared to make the necessary sacrifices in order for you to achieve your goals?
 Are you willing to spend long hours in front of the computer so that you can reap the rewards in the end?
 Do you have the guts to persevere all the way even though negative people around you laugh at your dreams?

 Are you willing to provide value for other people and put aside the ‘what’s in it for me’ mentality?
 Are you willing to think big? Are you prepared to run your online business like a CEO rather than a part-time venture?
 Do you BELIEVE in yourself?

What the mind can conceive, you will be able to achieve. So you must be able to visualize yourself as a success and go all the way.
Most important of all, you must BELIEVE in yourself… because no one is going to believe in you if you don’t.

To Your success!

Here is a four-step process that anyone can follow to become successful online:

Find a skill

The easiest way to make money online is to „sell‟ a skill. This skill could be any form of service that you can provide to help other marketers save time, save money and save effort.

Here are a few examples:
 Writing – you can become a ghostwriter, copywriter or blogger and sell your skills to other marketers.

 Graphics Design – you can create powerful E-covers for E-books or graphic banners for mini-sites.

 Technical – you can help people if you are good with programming (e.g., script installation, testing and website setup)

 Networking – help other people to recruit affiliates for their product launches.

If you want to develop the winning mindset, make sure you work hard by serving others first even if the pay is low or you are required to sacrifice time (and sometimes, money) in order to develop your skill and build your clientele.

Create Your Own Product

After you develop enough expertise with your skills, you can turn your skills into a product.
The most important thing to remember is that your skill must be something that brings value to others. If you can bring value to others and monetize it, others will most probably want to learn from you as well.
Once you teach others how to monetize their skill, you will have a product that will impart your expertise to others. For example: a product that teaches people “how to make money with copywriting.”

Create A Business
Once you are able to combine all your products together and develop your very own system, you have a business running already.
The important thing to remember about a business is that you must have a holistic approach when it comes to business building.

Don’t just focus on your primary skill alone. Try and outsource other tasks to other people. For example, if your strength is in writing, your business must not only include writing but many other aspects such as graphics, tutorials and even a helpdesk to help you answer questions.

At the end of the day, you need a complete system to market your business.

Automating Your Business

If your business is taking up too much of your time, the best thing you can do is to try and automate your business by letting others run it for you.

Basically, you still maintain ownership of your business (and revenue, of course). But what you must do is to train up people who are capable of running the business for you. By the time your business is successful enough to be automated, you can hire people who are smarter than you to run it for you.

The tradeoff is that you have to pay them a lot of money, but the best thing you have is more free time. When you buy people’s time with your money, you effectively remove the shackles that your business has on your time and you can use that time to invest into another business.

Remember the golden rule: Think BIG and think long term.

You have probably received countless emails with signature files. A signature file is the file at the end of the email that adds extra information. Some people use the signature file to include their name, title, and company name. Others personalize it with their favorite quote. Whatever your desire, you can make a signature file that works for you.

A signature file is an easy way to market your business. Setting up your signature file with your website address lets everybody you write to know about your site. This is an easy way to market your site and its products without incurring any extra cost.

Take time to come up with a good signature file if you are using it for advertising. Don’t forget to put your website and contact information in your signature file. Add information that makes the person who receives the email care about your site or product. For example, if you are marketing a site that is designed to make money for others, add a line about the money they could be making now.

A signature file can also include a text picture. Pictures are generally useful for capturing the attention of the reader, but use caution so that the picture doesn’t get in the way of the message.

Don’t forget to place a direct link to the product you are promoting. This seems obvious, but often people make the mistake of providing a website address in their signature file without taking the time to link to a specific product.

Used wisely, signature files can be an effective way to gain business. They can be used with any email program. If you haven’t set one up yet, what are you waiting for?