In anticipation of an upcoming launch of Jeff Walker's Product Launch Formula 2, I told my list that I was going to offer a solo mailing to one of my lists of over 120,000. This immediately started a flood of emails asking how they could order early... something that I anticipated. The second flood of emails asked how I had managed to build such a huge database. Rather than answering that second question in individual emails, I decided to answer it with this article. First of all, I should point out that I've been in business online since late-1996, and have been slowly building my lists almost since the very beginning. So, I didn't accomplish this overnight. Still, I know that you can build a huge list rather quickly if you use the right techniques. Here are some of my favorite list-building techniques: 1) Put a sign-up form on every page of your websites, except for direct sales pages where it would interrupt the flow too much. Next to that sign-up form, give a powerful reason why they need to join your list, and ask them to take action. Next to the sign-up form, assure them that you will protect them from spam. Also post a few testimonials as proof of the value your newsletter provides. 2) Write information-packed articles and distribute them everywhere appropriate. I've written over 850 information-packed article on the topic of Internet marketing. Those articles demonstrate my expertise, share useful information, and bring visitors to my websites ready to join my lists. I believe in sharing a lot of cutting edge information in my articles. Many people only drop hints, but I'm not afraid of sharing too much. The reason is that knowledge grows exponentially, and since I'm constantly learning new things, I can never teach you everything that I know. Since I don't fear running out of useful information that you will value, my articles are genuinely helpful, and that generates lots of loyal subscribers. 3) Write information-packed, inexpensive ebooks and then allow affiliates to sell them for most of the profit. I create a steady stream of ebooks - largely expansions of my articles - and then I set up affiliate programs where affiliates earn as much as 100% commission. Money is a great motivator for getting others to send you lots of new "paying" customers and subscribers My favorite tool for setting up these "ebook traffic magnets" is Sid Hale's Rapid Action Profits script. This script allows you to set up a system where an affiliate earns INSTANT commissions which are paid directly to their Paypal accounts. High commissions are a great motivator for people to send you new potential subscribers. When those commissions are paid instantly to affiliates who often have cash-flow problems, it's like pouring gasoline on a fire. You'll find Sid's Rapid Action Profits System at: http://TheRealSecrets.com/RapidActionProfits/ 4) Run pay-per-click campaigns... when the math makes sense. This is something that I don't see a lot of my competitors doing. However, when I know that my conversions rates or backend profits are sufficient, I often run pay-per-click ads... sometimes even for free items. With pay-per-clicks, you need to closely monitor your results. You also need a good idea of the lifetime value of a new customer or subscriber. To me, it makes perfect sense to lose a dollar to gain a new highly qualified subscriber. If you're paying attention, you'll notice numerous Internet marketers who run promotions where they pay a dollar or more for referrals who simply opt-in to a list. I essentially do the same thing when using pay-per-clicks. With pay-per-clicks you reach new subscribers who may not already be on a dozen other marketers' lists. 5) Use free giveaways where appropriate. I contribute to, and help to promote free giveaways, when they are well managed and the quality is high. I've built large lists doing this and have a friend who got over 5000 subscribers from one of his first giveaways. I've written about how I do that many times before. The key with free giveaways is that you need to offer a gift of high enough value that your new subscribers instantly bond with you. You still have to develop the relationship, but your gift should start it on a positive note. Many people who participate in free giveaways offer "absolute garbage." Once their new subscriber downloads their free "gift" and look through it, they HAVE to feel insulted. My rule is to always offer a gift that's good enough to sell. I was humored when, in one recent giveaway, I contributed resale rights to one of my new ebooks, along with a rough website. Before the giveaway was even over, at least one fast-acting individual had my ebook set up using the Rapid Action Profits script mentioned in number three, above. 6) Give away free viral ebooks. Write ebooks on topics that you know a lot of people are interested in. In those ebooks recommend specific solutions to problems, and include affiliate links to buy those products. Make some of those links rebrandable. If the ebooks are filled with lots of useful information, AND they have links that can be rebranded, then you have an ebook that should go viral. People are incentivized to spread it! In these ebooks, offer some type of a free bonus... perhaps an audio recording, or a template, or free piece of software, but require readers to visit your website to get this bonus. On your site, require them to register, or join your mailing list, to get the freebie. If the original ebook delivered tremendous value, then the new potential subscriber will have no objection to joining your list. If the free ebook offered marginal value, then they have to assume that your other "gift" will be more of the same, and so they won't subscribe. For creating viral ebooks, I recommend using the "Viral Document Toolkit" a next-generation PDF brander created by David Schwartz. The Viral Document Toolkit allows you to easily create rebrandable documents where you can specify links, and text that can be rebranded. You can even specify rather large BLOCKS of text as rebrandable... and even rebrand hyperlinked images! You create a rebrandable ebook, and then pass along the ebook (with most parts locked, but some parts changeable) along with the rebrander tool, to your subscribers, website visitors, customers, etc. Since they can profit from changing the ebook, they happily spread it, and in the process build you a huge list. You'll find the Viral Document Toolkit at: http://ViralDocumentToolkit.com David finished testing the Viral Document Toolkit software March 1st, 2008, so you'll be using a tool that 99.9% of your competitors will have never seen. VDT is actually so revolutionary that NO ONE other than a few of David's closest friends have even been allowed to touch it, until now. If you make your new viral ebooks good enough, you may be pleasantly surprised to see your competitors promoting them ;-) 6) Take massive action and do it immediately. One of my secrets to building my database so large is that when I'm shown a new tool or technique, and it passes "the common sense test," then I put it to immediate use... provided it doesn't distract me from something more urgent that I'm already working on. Many of my contemporaries, and subscribers, complained about having no list as long as five years ago. Many of them still use that same excuse for why they've not made any real business growth progress. I'm not sure why this is since all of the techniques that I, and that many of my mentors use, are so simple... and even obvious! The key is not to over-analyze things. That traps you into "paralysis by analysis." Instead, get into the habit of doing while others are still "thinking about it." My friend, Dr. Joe Vitale, taught me that "money loves speed!" I've just shared with you some of the techniques that I've used to build a massive subscriber database. Of course, I can't cover every technique that I use in this short article. I will close by sharing that part of the key to growing your list is actually retaining the subscribers after you get them. To do that, you merely need to deliver tremendous content telling them how to solve their most pressing problems. Simple - right?
Friday, November 7, 2008
Five Kinds of Successful Online Businesses
If you're seriously considering starting an online business, it makes sense that you would want to choose something that's going to do well right from the start. When you're investing time and money in your business, it would help to know if you're setting yourself up for failure or for success. Here are five different kinds of online businesses that have proven to be a hit with customers. Perhaps you can find your perfect business idea here too. Health and Weight Loss Everyone either wants to lose weight or wants to improve their health. We're a society that wants to take care of our bodies and if we look good at the same time, that's all the better. If you want to start an online business, you might want to focus on ways to help people lose weight or simply to improve their health. You can do this by offering fitness and health related products on your website or perhaps by offering eBooks that will help them make better health decisions. Try to find something that relates to a question or a concern a person has about their health - and then you have a viable and profitable business plan. Beauty While it used to be that beauty was something that only women talked about, that certainly isn't the case any longer. That said, women are still the consumer group that is much more likely to invest in makeup and skin care products, though men too are looking to improve their appearance. With anti aging face products, both genders can begin to reclaim their youthful appearance, which will help them feel more confident in any setting. Selling high quality makeup products and helping customers with their choices is a great business plan, as it allows customers to have the department store experience from the comfort of their home. Exercise and Sports But weight loss isn't the only concern with it comes to health for customers. Exercise and sports are other areas where you can make a profit with your online business. For example, selling sporting equipment or products related to sports fans is still a big business. When you work with the team and their product line, you will be able to access thousands of fans who want to support their team with licensed products. Fashion Of course, fashion is still a hot seller, no matter where you are. If you can present high quality fashions on your website, you will attract not only the teenaged sector, but also those in their twenties and thirties - of both genders. Look to celebrity and gossip magazines to show you what's hot and what's not and then look for a vendor that sells the same or similar items that you can them turn around to sell for a profit. Low Price Goods No matter what you choose to add to your website, if you can sell products available on other sites for a much lower price, you are going to do well. This goes for fashion, beauty, exercise, sports, etc. If you can find high quality products that can be sold at much lower prices, you will draw in many more customers than you could have with higher priced goods. For example, if you can find a way to sell organic goods and clothing for much cheaper than healthy food specialty stores, you can help those that want to be healthier, but can't afford the higher prices of other stores. No matter what you choose, try at first to think of things that you yourself might want to buy online - chances are good that you're not the only one.
Tips to Get a Google Adsense Account
To whom it may not familiar with Adsense, It is a Google’s marketing program which allows website/blog owners to generate income from displaying relevant Google ads on their websites. AdSense matches the content of the website to ads within their AdWords program and displays the relevant ads on the website. The website owners will get income from their website visitors clicking the ads. And there are some success stories from people who profiting and earning thousand dollars from Google Adsense So how you can get those kinds of ads displayed in your website? Basically you have to register you website/blog and get Google’s approval. But unfortunately not every request will get approved. I have a tip for you based on my experience obtaining approval from Google in my first try, here are the steps: 1. Set up your blog with www.blogspot.com. Blogspot is a Google own blogging service. Make a certain theme for your blog and make sure that the theme is a marketable theme. 2. Put several relevant contents to your blog. Google loves contents! If you choose “health” as your theme, then you can write anything about health. But let me remind you, you have to write them in English. If you think you can’t write and not really confident with your English, don’t worry about that. You can find relevant contents in free articles directory such GoArticles.com and Ezinearticles.com but don’t delete the author names and their links (usually available at the bottom of the articles). Don’t take credit on their works. 3. If you have put some relevant contents, wait about two or three days. When you edit the layout or format of your blog, it will appear an offer from Google to apply for Google Adsense account. If the offer does not appear, just visit www.google.com/adsense and register there. Believe me, your Adsense account approval will send to your email address in several days and start make money with Google Adsense.
Making Money Online Secrets – Tips To Running A Successful Online Business
What ever kind of business you choose to operate from your home is totally your decision, but there are some things that you would have to do to assist you in being successful. While thoughts and hopes of a higher standard of living comes to mind for allot of individuals who choose to start their own online home business, they often don't remember that it is at the end of the day a business. Managing an online home based business often gives individuals the huge misunderstanding that they could dictate every area of the businesses' operations but while there are several aspects in which they are totally in charge of, clients and customers would also have an input on many of the other functions. Making money online secret #1 - The first things you need to run a home business successfully is you must have a schedule. It might be very easy to stay up late look at a movies and then repeatedly press the snooze button the next morning on your alarm clock, but when it comes to dealing with customers over the telephone phone you really don't want them to think that their morning call woke you up from a deep sleep and while the idea of having plenty of free time might be very appealing and taking the occasional nap the during the day might be attractive, try to keep regular working hours, this is very important to any online home business. Making money online secret # 2 - Try to ensure that your office is only used for office related activities, not only would you receive a tax benefit for carving out a special space that would be used only for work, you would also have the feeling of readiness for work when you step into that room in the morning. Similarly, when the work day is finished and you leave your office you should have the feeling of reaching home. You would want to keep friends and family distractions away from the office just as you should also keep work distractions away from the rest of the home. Having a professional approach in all business activates when in your online home office would defiantly help your image as an online home business owner. If you can't afford to have a separate phone line for the business, try to answer the telephone in a business like manner during working hours. Making money online secret #3 - Promotion and Marketing is very important to your business; it does not matter if the business is online or offline. Chances are that you don't have a sign hanging at the front door of your home that tells passers by that you are open for business. The only way anybody will know that you are open for business is through promotion, advertising and marketing. Building a well organized and informative website is very important if you want your customers to navigate easily and get all the necessary information on your products, it should serve as a sales pamphlet that includes information about your experiences, your business and your products. Including contact information on the very first page is a crucial to getting more business and customers, you should also have a form available for visitors to answer questions or to send requests for information. If you would like to know more on this topic check out Dotcomology the art of making money with your home business.
www.wealthplatform.blogspot.com
www.wealthplatform.blogspot.com
Internet Secrets – Making Money Online
If your business is not offering its product/service online, then you are surly living in ancient times. Companies today have realized that in order to remain competitive, they have to reach todays' customers who do business mainly on the internet. Running a business online means that you have an international audience. And having a worldwide audience means that your business is up and running seven days a week twenty four hours a day. While your customers in United States are sleeping, those in Japan would defiantly be awake. An online business never goes to sleep; customers are always visiting night and day. Because of this, your online company must be staffed all the time in order to keep a close eye on potential sales and new customers. When managing an online home business, communication is vital. Using instant messaging and email as a type of communication between your staff and yourself will surely have great benefits. There are also several different types of technologies available such as the VoIP which gives you the ability to communicate with your staff and business partners from any place on the planet. But since you and your business associates live in totally different time zones it is very important to set up certain times of the day when you can talk with them concerning different issues and updates that your company faces day after day and what they should to do deal with it. You should ensure that they follow your schedule and instruction. Meetings are also very important for online home businesses. Having Meetings will inform you of the issues effecting your staff and issues that your company might be facing. To save effort and time, internet businesses can meet online in conference rooms. This will get rid of the need for manual preparations and physical space. One of the biggest secrets to making money online is brand promotion! Yes, brand awareness is very important even though you're business is on the Internet. Brand building means providing fast services, great products and great experiences to your clients. Yes, you will surly want all your clients to have a good experience. Remember, news spreads quickly online. If you have just one visitor who has had a bad experience with your business and then spreads a bad rumor, chances are your companys' name will be destroyed. Remember that your site is the face of your online home business and should not be a secret. Making money online would mean that your business must keep up with current technological advances. In designing your sales page always remember to keep navigation at the top of your head. Potential customers will not want to visit a hundred different web pages simply to buy one item. Surviving online is tough, Every single day there are millions of businesses going online and even more people setting up online businesses. Ultimately, the key to being successful in any endeavor is to totally love what you do. Remember, not everybody gets to affect lives every day on a global scale. If you would like to know more on this topic check out Dotcomology the art of making money with your home business.
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