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Pointers In Hiring A SEO Company

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Webmasters need to know search engine optimization (at least the basics) before hiring an SEO company. It is crucial that you have some background information about SEO to be able to find the best SEO company and at the same time bring out the best result in the search engine optimization campaign.

How can your knowledge of search engine optimisation help you achieve a better judgment in the choice of an SEO company and at the same time, achieve the best results for your SEO campaign? Here are the benefits of SEO knowledge in relation to hiring an SEO company:

No Black Hats Please

Your knowledge of SEO will help you determine whether the company you are eyeing at are using risky tactics or the so called black hat search engine optimisation techniques. This gives you the chance to focus your eyes on other companies since black hat techniques will only cause your website’s failure.

What Do You Mean By Recommendations?

If you have knowledge of the SEO process, you will better understand the recommendations set forth by your potential SEO Company. You will also be able to evaluate whether the recommendation will deliver positive results to your website.

search_engines_logosFormulate Practical Expectations

If you have background information on SEO, you will be able to formulate realistic expectations in terms of the results. The information erases all over and under expectations. It keeps the balance between what the company is going to do and what you want to achieve. Some webmasters are expecting for an overnight result on their search engine optimisation campaign. This is something that a well informed webmaster would not think about.

Only The Best SEO Company

Webmasters who know the search engine optimisation process are more likely to find the best SEO company. Their knowledge of the process will help them evaluate whether the SEO company they are eyeing at is worth their investment.

Knowledge of the search engine optimization process helps webmasters get ready in hiring an SEO company. It gives more value to the investment they are putting into the search engine optimization campaign. Don’t just jump into hiring an SEO Company with zero knowledge about the process, otherwise, you might be spending your dollars on campaigns that don’t work.

July 25, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Writing Content that Search Engines Love

One of the most important steps to take to ensure that your site is successful is to have a site that is well-loved by search engines. This is actually fairly easy to do—but also fairly easy not to do. It is a known fact that well-placed keywords and keyword phrases on a piece of content will attract search engine spiders. It is also a well-known fact that keyword stuffing—using keywords way too much—will repel spiders and stop them from putting your site on a search engine.

wp-seoSo what is the delicate balance of having just the right amount of keywords and keyword phrases? How do you achieve it? How do you make sure you aren’t overusing keywords? We will go over all of the above to help make your site keyword optimized.

How do I write content that the search engines love?The easy answer is to make sure that your content has several keywords. But how is this accomplished in a natural way, so not as to hurt your traffic from actual human beings? Well, it all comes down to naturally writing keywords into your content. We’ll briefly go over this process.

screenshotgvm2#1: Sit down and decide what your content will be about
If your site is all about sports, figure out what kinds of sports content you’ll put on there. Maybe you’ll write about basketball or golf or football or any other sport. Or if you’re running a music site, you could write content about a particular style of music or band/artist. The point is, make sure that whatever content you write is relevant to your site.

#2: Make a list of keywords that are relevant to your content
So if you’re writing a music article, these keywords could be: Rock, Pop, Country, Rap, R&B, Hip Hop, Guitar.
But try to narrow your list down to 2 or 3 keywords. The first keyword should be a primary keyword(used at least 10 times in a 500 word document). The other one or two should be secondary keywords(used a few times each in a 500 word document).

#3: Begin writing the content.
As you write each sentence, try to think about where the primary and secondary keywords might fit in. Wherever it seems natural, use the keywords. However, you should never try to make them fit where they don’t fit. If it looks unnatural, don’t use them.

#4: Read over the content.
When you read over the content, try to read it like a visitor would. Do the keywords you’ve tried to incorporate in the text distract you from the meaning of the content? Do the keywords seem blatant? If they do, rewrite the content to make it flow more naturally.

#5: Count the number of keywords and plain words
If you have a 500 word piece of content, you’ll want to see around 5-15 primary keywords sprinkled throughout the content—a keyword density of at least 1%, but ideally 3%. Keyword density is the number of keywords divided by the total number of words. A keyword density of 1% in a 500 word piece of content would be 5 keywords, while a keyword density of 3% in a 500 word piece of content would be 15 keywords. Strive for 3%.

#6: If you don’t have enough keyword density, or have too much, rewrite the content.
Rewrite your content as necessary to have enough keyword density.

Why is keyword “stuffing” bad for my site? It is bad for your site simply because search engine spiders have been programmed to skip over sites with excessive keywords. These would be sites with keyword densities of at least 10%. Sites like these are known as spam sites—sites created specifically to earn high rankings in a search engine due to high keyword usage. Before, spam sites would be heavily ranked in a search engine, but not anymore. Spiders are smarter than ever, able to detect spam sites from a mile away.

That’s why keyword stuffing is a bad thing for your site—it will actually keep spiders from visiting. Make sure you do not have a keyword density of much more than 5%. Even 5% is considered too high.

Keeping the above things in mind will help you to build a site that search engine spiders love.

Creating and maintaining a site with content that search engine spiders love is easy as long as you follow the guidelines in this article!

July 25, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

There Is No Such Thing As A Guaranteed Search Engine Ranking

SEOAfter spending the better part of everyday working on optimizing my website, adding content, building links and trying to please the search engines, it makes me mad to check my email and see another company offering guaranteed rankings. These emails often claim that for a certain amount of money they will get your site to rank number one for the keywords of your choice. Just give them a pile of cash and a few months and they will get you that #1 ranking no matter how competitive your field. Here four reasons why no one can guarantee rankings with the search engines…

1. No company can guarantee anything from the search engines except the search engines themselves. There are certainly things that you can do to help your site in the eyes of the search engines. However, at the end of the day there are hundreds of factors that influence your ranking with the search engines. No company can control all of these factors.

2. Search engine optimization (SEO for short) can be a long and grueling process. Sometimes you can see results very quickly. However, more often than not the results take months to show up. This is especially true for markets or keywords that are highly competitive. There are companies out there that spend millions of marketing dollars each year trying to get rankings for certain highly competitive keywords. There is no way that paying a company a few thousand dollars will guarantee that you will rank higher than the big boys.

3. Search engine rankings are based on algorithms that take into account a whole bunch of factors including: inbound links, page content, meta content and the age of the page in question. There are ways to subvert some of these factors and trick the search engines. However, tricking Google and trying to manipulate search results is a very bad idea. If and when the search engines discover your sites deception it is quite likely that your site will be removed from the index. Being removed from the index means that all of your rankings and probably most of your traffic will disappear. Before you try tricking the search engines you need to make sure that you consider the potential consequences of your actions. Can you really afford to get your site banned from Google?

4. Anyone who does search engine optimization on a regular basis should know all of this. Companies who try to tell you that they can guarantee your results either don’t know what they are doing or they are simply lying to you in order to steal your money. Either way, they aren’t the people that you want to trust your business to.

mouIf you need help getting rankings in the search engines, there are lots of reputable search engine optimization companies that are out there. However, you need to make sure that they are up front and realistic with you about the potential for results as well as their methods. In the world of SEO rankings are never guaranteed but hard work usually pays off.

July 25, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Expert SEO: Optimize Your Title Tags For Higher Rankings

Arguably the most important element on your web pages is your title tags. The title tags tell the search engines what your page is about. Applying this free expert SEO by optimizing the title tags of your pages can often generate a quick significant increase to your ranking.

For expert SEO write your tags for humans.

seo-logo2The words in the title tag are what appear in the clickable link on the search engine results page, optimizing them could bring you more clicks too. So write for humans. This is important. Keep in mind while you do your SEO work that the search engines want to be as human-like as they can, and they are getting pretty good at it. If you strive to provide your visitors with what they are looking for as easily as possible the engines will notice.

Title Tags Should Contain Specific Keyword Phrases

How you optimize the specific keyword phrases in your title tags depends heavily upon whom your target audience is and what you are using your website for. For instance, if you use your website primarily to steer business to your local brick-and-mortar store, you would probably want to put your location in your title as well as what you sell.

For example, if your company is “Bills Appliance Repair.,” an appliance repair store in Stockton, California, you shouldn’t place only the words “Bill’s Appliance Store” in your title tag, but instead use something like “Appliance Sales and Service – Stockton, CA”

If your site is primarily for selling widgets online, then forget your location, use keywords in your title about widgets. Do keyword research to find the best phases for your title.

Use a keyword tool to research your title keyword phrases

Business GraphFor truly expert SEO, you should use one of the keyword tools that are available online. I use WordTracker, but there are a number of them to choose from. Don’t guess at what people search for. The only way of really knowing is by using one of these tools. It’s worth the money.

Keep the length of the title tag to 70 characters (including spaces). Search engines often truncate the title after 68-70 characters. This means you can use approximately 6-7 words. This will increase the chance of getting your words to display in the major search engines.

Placing a keyword phrase at the start of the title tag gives it more value as far as the search engines are concerned. Avoid using single word keywords, they are usually very hard to obtain a good ranking with. Use two or more key words in a keyword phrase. The longer keyword phrases are easier to obtain higher rankings with.

Make the title appeal to your potential visitors

Make the title tag appealing to the eye. Make sure you write you title for human eyes. On the search engine results pages your title is the first thing the searcher sees, so make it appealing.

Make the first letter a capital letter, and use lowercase for the rest of the letters in each keyword. You don’t need to capitalize connecting words like “the”, “of”, etc. Humans find it easier on the eyes.

Try to keep title tags as unique as possible: Each page on your site should be unique and so should your title tags. Not only do unique title tags make the site more descriptive and navigable to a person, they also help search engines learn more about your page and site.

Keep your title relevant to your body copy

Write title tags that are relevant to the content on your page. Search engines compare text in the title tag against text content on your page to rate relevancy. If the two are not related your ranking will be lowered.

Another reason to make your title relevant to the text on your page is because if someone visits your site from a search engine, and discovers your title is miss-leading, they immediately click back to the search engine to try the next listing. This is known as a “bounce”, and too many bounces will lower your ranking.

Title tags are crucial in obtaining high search engine rankings. Write a short, concise and attractive description for each of your web pages. Most of your competitors have not expertly optimized their title tags

July 24, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Weeding Through Search Engine Optimization Services

Are you trying to figure out what the difference between different search engine optimization services are on the web? Are you stuck trying to figure out which SEO services you really need and which ones you can do without? Or do you simply want to pick a company to do your SEO work but have no idea who to trust or how to choose the best company for your expectations and price range?

Well, if the answer is yes then you may want to keep reading because there are a few things you should expect from an SEO company before you sign a contract with them. Trying to discern between different search engine optimization services on your own can be confusing, especially if you really only have a basic understanding of SEO. However, there are a few core concepts that you would look for in any business that you should look for in all search engine optimization services as well which will make your final decision much easier to make.

References ;

logosLike any business, an excellent SEO organization should have available references that you can check before hiring them to complete a job. All search engine optimization services should have experience with clients and be able to point you to completed jobs much like a building contractor would.

If you are not offered any proof or at least a free trial to show their excellence then it is time to shut the door and move onto your next option. An online base is not an excuse for a lack of identity.

Honesty & Communication ;-

It is in your best interests to choose to receive search engine optimization services from a company that offers a reasonable time frame for completion even if it’s not the fastest time table.

Chances are that if you are promised a completion time that blows you away it is probably not really possible or likely to happen. If the company is willing to lie about the length of your project what else

Range of search engine optimization services ;-

Search engine optimization services are becoming more diverse and more technical as time continues to pass. It used to be that a few dozen keywords and some minor adjustments could get you top billing, but now any trained SEO worker can tell you there is a great deal of additional work that goes into receiving a high search ranking. An excellent SEO company knows this and will have a variety of services to offer you along with flexible packages for clients who want to mix and match what they need done.

July 24, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

My Good Friend James Tells (His Marketing Story)

I was one of those students who had a good GPA in school. However, it wasn’t because I studied really hard. It was because I had a naturally gifted mind for retaining knowledge by listening. This made it so I rarely had to study for any subject.

That was true in High School, but College was a completely different story. I went from being someone who rarely had study more than 1 hour on a subject, to spending multiple hours studying subjects that had little to nothing to do with my field. I would guesstimate that only 10% of what I learned in college had anything to do with what I used in the job market.

In my opinion, that is a waste of both my time and what was infinitely worse, my money. I have the student loans to prove it.

I was one of those students that only wanted to learn what I needed to know about a subject. I didn’t enjoy learning all the virtually useless details. I didn’t enjoy reading long boring material. Just give me the details I need to know. So I ditched the College experience for a Tech School.

It had its own flaws that I won’t go into here, but I gained a lot more of what I needed to know, instead of the BS courses they force on you in the General Education segment of the college experience. The tech school also had equal amounts of lab and classroom time. This presented a “sink or swim” atmosphere. If you force someone to apply the knowledge they learn, they will either know it or not. In the end as a teacher you will know one way or the other.

You can always guess in exams, but you can’t guess when you must get to a specific result in a lab. Now as far as Self Employment is concerned, I didn’t chase down that path over night. I wanted to get good grades as a student and follow a career path to success. I tried that, but in the end it did not work for me.

I ran into situations where in both major corporations and small businesses my ideas went either un-noticed or un-used. I’m not talking dumb ideas, from someone wet behind the ears. I am talking about good ideas from someone with ample experience in the subject revolving around the ideas.

Most employers would just flat out ignore my ideas. I only had an interest in bettering the business I was working for, but my ideas still went in the trash bin. Then there was the stability of my job. There were times when I didn’t know how long I would have a job. This lead me to believe my best route was self employment.

Through self employment I can point the business in whatever direction I feel works for me. I also don’t have to worry about stability. I know how to diversify my sources of income, and I know how to market a business very well. So I believe that GPA had little to do with my pursuing the self employment path.

It had more to do with my personality. I have never been one of those folks who liked following others. I have always been one of those people who were outspoken, and had that “I’ll forge my own path” attitude. I ignore what others say with those ”you’ll never make it” attitudes. I know I will have even more success that I presently have right now, because I am very driven and I am always striving to reach that next goal. Every time I reach a goal I set the standards bar even higher.

So if you had a rough time in school, or didn’t like school, or never went to college… Don’t worry, because no matter what ideas you have for a business, as long as you put your mind to it, you can accomplish your goals. Just forge your own path, and create your own destiny.

July 24, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Top 10 Article Marketing Strategies

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 1 – Create a Captivating Title

Create a captivating title that draws the reader into clicking on your article link, whether it be from search engine result, syndicated location, or directly in the article directory it is published in. The purpose of this article marketing tip is to get the reader to click on your article link.

If you have a boring title, then why should a reader want to read your article? You haven’t even created an interest from the beginning, so the reader will think your article will be no different. You have to create a title that either interests them because it will show them how to do something they want to learn how to do or grabs at their curiousity because it is a contraversial topic they are interested in.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 2 – Create a Keyword Optimized Title

Create a keyword optimized title that will get the search engine’s itsy bitsy spider’s juices flowing and crawling your content like crazy. It is one thing to get a reader to click on your article, but is another monster altogether to get search engines to spider your content. If you have only a major keyword in the title, then it might get indexed, but you could end up on page 55 of the results since you will be competing with the rest of the websites on the internet.

So it is critically important that you optimize your title to include both a major keyword and some long tail keywords as well. This way the search engine spiders will see that you are not only targeting the major topic or keyword, but you are also targeting a specific topic within that category. In return you will increase your rank on the major keyword and also be able to have a very good rank on the long tail keyword.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 3 – Create a Keyword Optimized Article Body

Create a keyword optimized article body that is both properly formatted and double checked for both grammar and spelling mistakes. This is just a reiteration of the above article marketing tip. In addition to optimizing the title for both the major keyword and long tail keywords, you need to apply the same strategy to your main content of the article.

This doesn’t mean keyword stuffing should be used. You want to include a good balance of the major keyword with other relevant long tail keywords. Try to optimize it so you mention your target long tail keyword in each paragraph. Then mix it up by adding additional keywords that are both relevant to your main major keyword and your target long tail keywords. You want to make certain the keyword density of your target long tail keyword is the keyword with the highest density.

When you do this, as a result of not trying to stuff keywords in the article, using similar words and phrases related to your topic will create a natural linguistic flow. It won’t sound like you are purposely sticking words in the content. It will sound more like a natural conversation between you and the reader as if you were talking face to face.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 4 – Create an Effective Author Bio and Resource Box

Create an effective author bio and resource box that doesn’t toot your own horn. You basically want to create them in a way that has the sole intention of getting the reader to click through to your website.

Have you ever seen those author bio’s that were just one big long “look at me… I am so great… buy my product”? Well that is exactly what you don’t want to do. In fact you don’t even want to try to sell the reader on anything in that box. You want get them to continue reading on, maintaining their interest in your content. This will dramatically increase the click through rate on your article.

If you keep their interest level high, then they are going to want to see what else you have to say on your website. The purpose of that box is not to sell something. It has the sole purpose of getting a visitor to come to your website. Always keep that in mind when you are writing your author bio.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 5 – Do Extensive Keyword Research

This is just an expansion of the tips mentioned above about having keyword optimized content. You need to do extensive keyword research so your article marketing campaign will be effective in both the long and short term time frames. You want your research to insure sustainability in your marketing efforts. You don’t want to waste your time creating an article that will only be effective for a month. You want to create an article that will last for years to come.

This way if you are promoting an affiliate driven website or link then you will continue to see sales from that product on a long term basis. While this is good for long term you also want to keep in mind the benefit of creating a ninja attack on hot trends in the niche you are promoting to capitalize on a temporary increase in traffic.

But while doing that you need to create the article so it will last in the long term. You can always change the product that is being promoted or redirect the link you posted to something else. This strategy will create the most effective use of your time.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 6 – Do Extensive Niche Research

Do extensive niche research so you are targeting the proper demographic of readers in your niche and so you know that you aren’t focusing your niche too narrow. This goes hand in hand with keyword research. While targeting micro niches can be a useful strategy, it isn’t the best strategy to use in article marketing.

You want to make certain that you are getting best and most effective use of your time. You can do niche research that will insure there is enough potential customers to convert into sales to support your efforts in your article marketing.

Now don’t get me wrong… If you are doing this because you just love to write, then knock yourself out. But if your purpose of article marketing is to make money online and not just to create a fan base for your content, then you need to do your research on the niche. While a few people may want to know about “basket weaving with organic materials” there may not be enough interest to drive traffic and create sales. By the way that is a totally made up niche.

Keep the focus of your article on a niche that will have enough demand to convert traffic into sales on a regular, consistent, and long term basis. Preparation is key in article marketing. If you do your research then you will create streams of income with a lot less work. You can still be successful without the research, but I guarantee that you will be wrting a lot more articles to create the same amount of traffic and sales than someone who has done their research.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 7 – Do Extensive Product Research

Do extensive product and affiliate program research to make certain you know what is available to be promoted, and also who your competitors are for the product you are promoting. You want to make certain that you choose a product that will have a good balance of high conversions and high commission payouts.

Obviously if you have a product that has high conversions, then you want to make certain your commission is adequate. If you converted 50 percent of visitors into sales for a $2 commission, then you would have to put a lot more work and effort into promoting it than finding a product that had a $20 commission and may only convert at 25 percent. The key is to find a good balance between the two.

Another important aspect of this article marketing tip to keep in mind is that doing product research will protect your reputation. If you promote a product that is total garbage or a big scam, then that is going to be a direct reflection on the type of person you are. You may be a wonderful, honest and caring person.

However, because you didn’t do your research and the product you may be promoting turns out to be terrible the reader is going to remember exactly who recommended it to them. Sure they will know who the product creator was, but they will also know you recommended to them, and because of that will let everyone they know not to trust you. So it is very important that you research the products you promote.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 8 – Do Not Put All Your Strategic Eggs in One Marketing Basket

Do not put all your strategic eggs into one article marketing basket. Obviously if you focus too much on one specific product or niche, then when that niche or product suffers a setback due to market saturation or consumers loss of interest, then you could see a dramatic drop in your income level.

To protect yourself from experiencing these kinds of fallouts that may be related to things like a major recall on a product or something similar, then try to balance your time between a number of different niches and products within those niches. That way when something like this happens, the effect it will have on you and your income will be minimal.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 9 – Keep the Content Focused Based Upon the Article’s Purpose

Keep the content of your article focused based upon what the sole purpose of submitting the article was. For instance are you submitting the article to drive traffic to a link? Or are you submitting the article to get tons of backlinks to your site?

Obviously you can’t use the same approach for both purposes, so make certain you keep that in mind when creating your article. Higher quality content is more likely to get your article syndicated which will create backlinks to your website. More focused and to the point content will be more likely to create interest and increase click throughs to your website.

Strategic Article Marketing Tip 10 – Keep Your Content High in Quality and Uniqueness

In order to stand out from the crowd of article marketers, you absolutely must create content that is both high in quality and very unique. If you have 10 people writing about the exact same topic and promoting the exact same product or similar products you need to stand out. To do this you have to make certain that your content is unique and that is both accurate and high quality.

Quality articles provide accurate and useful information. This is the whole reason a user clicks on an article. They want to solve a problem or find out how to do something. If your article is vague or doesn’t provide enough information, what reason does the user have to click through to your site or read any other articles you have written for that matter? They don’t. So that is why it is important to keep your content quality very high.

Now if you have two similar articles that are high quality then it will always just be a toss up on which one the reader chooses. Sometime it will mean they read both, and other times it means that they will choose the first one they read and stop. This is where having accurate information comes into play. If you provide the most accurate information a reader will likely visit your site, and already have a sense of trust in you because of the fact that your article was accurate. This will help in creating conversions since people normally buy from people they can trust.

Now take it a step further and realize something else. If your website content is of equal quality of the article, this will create the best kind of traffic for your site. Not only will the visitor probably bookmark your site, but they will talk or blog about it to their friends. So from one good article you create multiple visitors to your site, which means multiple opportunities to convert a visitor into a sale.

July 24, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

My Belief’s On Being Rich

Working 10 to 20 Hours a Week

As much as we would like for this to be the case, it just isn’t possible, at least not initially. Eventually, after you have established a good team of workers you can trust to run things effectively it may be possible. Realistically you are looking at 50 to 60 hour weeks, when you first start out. That is if you expect to make millionaire status in less than 1 year. It is however possible to make really good money working these kinds of hours. Noone ever said you had to be a millionaire. Six figures is a lot of money, especially if it is invested wisely.

Just Selling Other Peoples Products in Already Saturated Markets

This is part of the eBooks, electronics, etc. demographic. Yes you can sell things like that and make good money, more than you would make at your day job if implemented correctly. You won’t become a millionaire from it, because there are just too many people already doing what you are doing. The guy/gal selling you on being a millionaire from this has been doing it from the beginning or at least a very long time. Yet, this is possible after several years of marketing efforts and developing your business have paid off. In this type of market you are still looking at 60 hour weeks for at least a few years. Well that is, unless your pockets are already bottomless pits full of money.

Just From Drop Shipping Products or Re-Selling Wholesale or Liquidation Products

You are going to have to implement a lot of strategies if you are going to sell products. You are going to have use every possible avenue of getting the cheapest products. You will have to sell drop shipped, liquidated, and wholesale products. You definitely won’t become a millionaire in twelve months from this. If you combine all of those strategies, then eventually you could become a millionaire from this. But like I mentioned above it is going to take working long hours and getting marketing efforts to pay off for that strategy to work.

Just Selling Products on eBay

eBay is a wonderful place to sell products, but without your own website also selling those products, you are in trouble. You won’t make enough on eBay to become a millionaire. The reason for this is because just about anything you think of is being sold on eBay. Yes you can find niches to exploit and things like that, but by the time you throw in listing fees, seller fees (ebay store, etc.) and other fees they throw at you, you are making a low income per product. After years of selling on eBay it is possible to reach millionaire status, but it takes a lot of work. The only advantage you have from using eBay is the amount of traffic their site gets. If you know how to leverage that traffic into sales, then yes it would be possible to become a millionaire from this strategy.

By Never Creating Your Own Products

This is more for the information products demographic. You are going to have to create your own products if you plan on making any real money. There are so many re-hashed products out there, that the only way to make serious money is to become a flat out expert in something and put your own spin on that knowledge. In other words, just create a niche out of thin air. I call it the “me, myself, and I” niche. You essentially put a touch on a product that noone else can. Most over night millionaires are made by some original product or idea they created. By over night I mean less than 1 year. So if you think being somones affiliate is going to get you there, you are mistaken. Most products released are first pushed down to the major JV partners in a deal, and they market it to their list. By the time you get around to being able to market it, the market is already close to saturation of that product.

Never Dealing With People i.e. Customer Service

You are going to have to get used to the fact that you will at some point have to deal with people. This will either be by phone, email, fax, or whatever method you have setup to communicate with your customers. This is just going to be part of the job. However, if you present yourself with the right products and right attitude you will have fewer customer service issues. Even though the idea of “AutoPilot” income is marketed like crazy, it is fiction. No income is automatic, you have to deal with a lot of factors to keep that income flowing in. This could be marketing or customer service or any number of other things. Adsense is about the closest thing to automatic income there is, but you still have to deal with things like SEO and CTR when you are doing that.

Just by using Adsense or Similar Programs

It is possible to become a millionaire from adsense, but you are going to have to know what you are doing with SEO, Traffic Generation, and several other factors. It is probably not possible in 12 months. It would probably take a few years to accomplish this task. Could you do this in one year? Anything is possible, but so is winning the Powerball Lottery Jackpot.

By Investing Little to No Money or Time at All

(you are probably on crack if you believe that one)

You are not going to get anywhere without investing something. Money will be the first thing you’ll have to invest. You are also going to have to invest a lot of time in learning about whatever method you are trying to use to make money online. You will have marketers pitching you these turnkey internet marketing systems, but they don’t exist. A lot of MLM marketers love this. They sell you on an idea of unlimited wealth from their “system”. They forget to mention that the only real way you will make money from this “system” is by selling other people on this “system”. Yes you could make money from whatever you are selling, but you almost always have to sell someone else on their system to make any money with it. I can’t speak for everyone, but I believe a lot of people are sick of these types scams. Yes, they may re-label it and call it “Network Marketing” nowadays, but it is just the same face with a different name.

By Not Knowing Any “Techie” Stuff

You are going to have to know about a lot of techie stuff, or you are going to have to pay someone to do it for you. Even if you pay someone, I don’t recommend it. You need to know a little, not a lot about every aspect of your business, especially the techie stuff. You need to know this, because if you lose your know it all techie, then who is going to make that techie stuff work? You don’t have to know all of the techie stuff, but it would pay you to know a little about HTML and web development. If you are doing business on the internet you need to know about how to make payments safe, or how to process payments at all on your site. I could write a whole article on the things you need to know about in this department. Noone said you had to do this work, but at least learn the tools so you know what that techie is doing, in case you have to explain it to a new techie.

By Tyring to Do it All By Yourself


(This is not possible at all)

I don’t know of any one person that has become a millionaire and did it all by themselves. They either had a mentor, or a partner or someone else that has helped them in some way. Even if you could do it all by yourself you are going to be working very long hours to do it. You hear of bloggers and forum owners making an absolute killing from their adsense and whatever else they have wrapped up in their site’s package. But you also hear of them working 12 hour days to keep it going. If you are one of those people that complained about working overtime at your dayjob, this is what you have to look forward to if you try to become a millionaire by yourself.

Figuring Things Out and Aces Up the Sleeves

Yes there are factors that could trump anything I have said in this article, but for the most part it is true. Big gurus will sell you on a pipe dream, and they will paint it up like it isn’t a get rich quick scheme. In the end, it is still a get rich scheme, even if it isn’t quick. If you put a lot of hard work, research and development, and marketing into your business then you will eventually be able to become a millionaire. It just won’t be easy. It is easy to make a decent living from the internet, but it isn’t easy being a millionaire at it.

July 24, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

5 Steps To Planning An Effective Postcard Campaign

Successful and effective postcard printing campaigns have one thing in common – they have a well thought of plan. No matter the size and form, your post card printing can benefit from your planning process because it will help you keep track not only your success but also the areas where your print postcards fail to reach out to your target clients.

5k-PostcardsTo measure the impact your postcard printing can achieve, here are five steps to help you plan an effective post card printing campaign:

Step 1 – Ask questions. Plan later.

Even before you start planning your moves, you have to answer several questions first so you can eventually map out a better plan. Your answers would definitely help you concentrate and move towards one direction – that is to come up with an effective and responsive postcard printing for your target clients.

The most common questions you need to ask: What is your purpose in printing postcards? What do you expect to gain from your print postcards? Who do you want to attract? Who’s your target market? Is your objective to increase sales, or you want to promote brand awareness? Do you need to market your products instead? How often do you need to distribute your postcards to achieve your goals?

These are just few of the questions you need to answer. Remember though to be specific and focus on a particular target market. This way, you’ll be able to set up your post card printing campaign according to your available resources, so you can get the most positive response.

Step 2 – Determine your goal.

It’s time to draw what you would want to accomplish with your print post cards. How do you want to reach your target clients?

Establishing a goal for your marketing campaign can help you assess later on whether your postcards are successful or not. Your goal can help you determine what made you successful, as well as what went wrong with your ad when you are faced with a negative impression from your audience.

Step 3 – Decide on the specifications you need for your marketing campaign.

When it’s time to plan for your requirements, you need to start establishing what type of postcards you’re going to use, what size, and how many. Always remember that the postcards that your target clients see are reflections of you and what you have to offer. Choosing the most suitable postcard print to represent your image can go a long way in determining whether you’ll be recognized and remembered not only for a short time but for many years.

Step 4 – Determine the response time of your target clients.

Not only should you plan for your overall postcard campaign, you also need to determine a period for your target readers to respond to your ad. This can be reflected from your call-to-action. Include phrases such as “call now and get a prize”, “…while supply lasts” or “discounts until March 2009”. This way, you can keep track of how many target clients actually acted on your call.

Step 5 – Lay down the benefits.

Lastly, outline your benefits in your postcard printing. What’s in it for your target clients? What can they get in exchange for their time and effort?

A compelling content relies on the benefits you have for your target clients. An effective postcard campaign can only be successful when there are benefits to gain. At the end of the day, the benefits will convince your target clients to take what you have to offer.

July 22, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Build A Smart Money Profitable Online Business

Are you successful with your Internet business? Better yet, do you think you are successful with your online business? When most online entrepreneurs are asked with these questions, they often brush it off. This is because most of them, who have not yet realize the right way to succeed in Internet Marketing, continue to believe that the mere fact that they have a website is already enough to succeed on the Internet.

money_stacks_textmediumThe truth is, they all end up very upset because they fail to realize the secret behind the success in Internet Marketing.

Having a website is not a guarantee that your online business will succeed. How will you succeed if people will not realize that your business exist online? The key to Internet marketing is to get your business noticed.

An effective way to do this is to build an opt-in list. In fact, most of the people who are already experts in Internet marketing will tell you that building a highly targeted opt in list is the most effective and important tool in Internet marketing.

moneyBasically, an opt in list is a list of email addresses of people who have agreed to obtain any kind of information from online businesses like you. The term “opt in” means that you have their permission to send to them whatever newsletters, brochures, or promotions that you have in your online business.

It is extremely important that you have their permission first before you send them information because unsolicited emails will be regarded as spam, and spamming is an illegal activity in the Net.

Because of the feasibility of building an opt in list on Internet marketing, most of the online entrepreneurs consider it as the most treasured tool online. They need this list in order to get the consumer’s attention and sustain interest.

By creating an opt in list, you will be able to maintain solid contact with your previous buyers at the same time boost your sales because of the fact that you have a sure target market always ready to purchase items from you.

Opt in list is considered to be the most important item in an Internet marketer. In fact, if in case something bad happens like emergencies and catastrophes and they could only save one item, it would be their opt in list saved on a backup disk.

Just imagine how these people value their opt in list. If this is the case, then it must be really something, right?

So, for people who are not yet aware of the importance of building a highly targeted opt in list and would like to know how to build them, here are some tips that could be very useful.

1. Decide on your niche market or your target market.

It is extremely important to know your target market in order to focus on something. It would be really confusing and time consuming if you will build an opt in list with no particular market in mind.

Moreover, having a niche market would bring more focus on your marketing campaigns and would derive better results because you have direct you emails to people who would most likely be interested in them.

2. Be sure that your selected target market is available in the Internet.

The mere acquisition of a niche market is not a guarantee that you can already start building your opt in list. Since, the concept of opt in list is specifically generated to aid in the growth of the Internet market of a particular entrepreneur, it is important to have a niche market that is available through the Internet.

The concept is basically simple, how can you promote your online business if your niche market is not available in the Internet? Hence, it is extremely important to verify if your target market is available online.

3. Verify if your chosen target market is income-generating market.

Building a highly targeted opt in list will just go to waste if your niche market is not generating any income at all.

Try to verify their income-generating potential through the search engines, wherein you will find some paid ads related to the keywords you have searched. This would only mean that if somebody is willing to pay to advertise focusing on the same target market that you have in mind, chances are, you will be able to reap positive results on your target market.

4. Generate solutions to the problems of your target market by using Internet forum.

Creating this type of forum will initiate the underlying solutions that will answer to most of your target market’s problem.

Through their posts and threads, you will be able to identify your target market’s problem and will be able to come up with a great solution. In turn, it will be very handy when you make your opt in list.

Indeed, the success of an online business or Internet marketing greatly depends on the opt in list. It is where the online businesses could come up with newsletters that would allow them to promote their products at the same time create the need for it. In turn, it will generate more income and make more money.

As they say, money is in the list that’s why most businesses consider opt in list as valuable as gold.

July 22, 2009 Posted by | How To Grow Your Business | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment