Archive for January, 2010

Here’s a question that I answered lately from a person named Pokey that is new to affiliate and Internet marketing:

Pokey:

I am new to affiliate marketing. I haven’t even started with a program. The problem is, I don’t have money to spend on programs. What are the best free sites? And how can I get started? Anything would help…

ME:
Pokey,

Here is what you should do. Since you do not have much money I would start a blog. I love helping people and I would charge you nothing to help you set one up. I also can easily make you a free template and banner to get started because you need something that is unique. Ok, that’s the easy part. Here is the work.

1. Sign up for an affiliate program. I would do Google Adsense because even though you are starting out making a small amount, you will at least be making some money and that will spur you on to greater heights.

2. We’ll put the Adsense ads on your blog.

3. We will write at least 40 original, fresh articles based on what your niche is. One of my niches is electric bikes. There are millions of them and you need to consider if you are interested in the subject matter before you start writing about them. Also you need to consider whether or not there is a NEED for what you are writing about. If you are going into a niche make sure there are others into the niche because if nobody is in that niche chances are that there is no money to be made there either.

3. Post the articles as you write them. Do not post them all at once because Google likes to see growth over time.

4. When you post, make some of the postings long and some short. SEO experts have determined that posts with about 1200 words with pictures and video from Youtube are for some reason subscribed to the most through RSS feeds.

5. Get an RSS feed from Feedburner.

6. Find a mentor that knows some of this stuff.

7. Buy books on Amazon on Internet Marketing and learn as much as you can.Never stop learning and educating yourself.  People who don’t have much money have book collections smaller than their TV’s.   I’m not talking about romance novels either, I’m talking about How to books and books on business and finance.

I know this is a lot, but you want to have a fast start. I have so much more I could tell you, but I have to run

God Bless!
ELMO
Ellistrated Websites

To get some really good advice for anyone just starting out in Internet Marketing and Affiliate Marketing you should really listen to Mark Ling.  For a young guy he really knows his stuff and he has a site (of which I am not affiliated with in anyway) called Affilorama – Learn How to Build an Affiliate Business.  The reason why i like to highlight Mark and his business is because I followed his advice onbuilding my first affiliate business.  Anyway, check out his site, it might help you out.

Here’s a clip of Mark Ling at Affilorama:

ELMO

Some of you may be very well versed in using different types of advertising on the Internet. Most of the material that I have read out on the Net tells you to use mainstream advertising like Google Adwords.  However, in my ventures out into the cold cruel world of Internet marketing I have stumbled upon a sub culture of people called ‘Bum Marketers” that have thrown some pretty cool ideas that most people wouldn’t consider using.

Bum Marketers try to use the cheapest and easiest ways to sell affiliate products or their own wares over the Internet. Usually, they try to use legitimate “White Hat” techniques that get pretty quick results, but every now and then they will try to use techniques that aren’t so SEO friendly.  You really have to watch out for some of the methods  that  these people use to market their business on the Internet because you can really get red flagged on some of your pages by Google if you aren’t careful.

One of the methods that they use is to purchase links from directory selling sites.  in some cases , you can go to a link selling site, purchase anywhere from 50 to 200 links from sites that have page ranks of 5 or 6.  Now. this idea used to work pretty good because you could get 50 links from sites that had page ranks or 4 or more and it would really help you.  A couple of years ago, though, Google initiated a new algorithm that said “If the sites that are linking are not relevant, then we (Google) will ignore those links to your site. So, if you have a website about radio controlled cars, Google wants to see sites that have some sort of relevance to that type of site link to yours.  in other words it would be better to have another site about radio Controlled Cars Accessories link to your site instead of a site about the mating call of the flat footed platypus.

Now some of these sites that can get links to yours are getting pretty sophisticated about this and they will find relevant links to your site, but you will really pay good money to get those limnks too.

One of the methods that they use concerns a company that costs $9.00 to use a month.

This article will continue in a few minutes…..

I just came across a great video marketing company that can really help boost your business on the Internet.  I used a site called Jivox to create a short advertising video in just about no time.  Actually, from start to finish it took me 20 minutes, but I had to create an account.  The actual time I spent setting up the video was completed in under 10 minutes.  I9t is really an incredible tool to help your business get noticed on the Web.

Now, some of you may be thinking, well, gee, that is such a short video,  However, you really don’t want an advertising video to be too long because unless you really have something that others want to hear, chances are that the person watching the video won’t watch the whole thing.  So, when it comes to video advertising, it is best to keep it as short as possible.  Anyway, check out Jivox’s website at www.jivox.com

Elmo

To read the rest of this article come back later…  It is currently being updated!

If your business isn’t doing so well, then take heart you can always learn to be a better marketer.  As a matter of fact, if you have money you can always hire somebody to do the marketing for you as demonstrated by the online travel service Expedia.  It looks like Expedia was experiencing a slump due to the economy but instead of complaining about it, or worse yet running to big momma government to look for a bailout, they hunkered down and got smarter and changed direction.

As reported on the marketing news site BrandWeek , Expedia had a significant drop in their online sales and traffic, as seen here in this chart:

But you really gotta hand it to Expedia, they launched a very smart advertising campaign. extolling the virtues of having all kinds of traveling choices that you can tailor your particular needs and lifestyle.  From reading the BrandWeek article the company hired an ad firm that brought a brilliant commercial to the airwaves which very slickly showed the versatility and ease of using Expedia.

To see what I’m talking about watch the video here:Expedia – Girl’s Weekend

I just got finished reading a great report by a man that has been in the computer game for quite some time.  Brett Tabke has been involved in the development of computers and their systems dating back to the Commodore 64 of the 1980’s.  In 2008 he published a definitive report on how to prepare your site for the Internet or for Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Following his advice might well save you a ton of money because you can get all kinds of traffic from the search engines organically (versus paying for ads) wherein people can easily find your listing in the top 10 or 12 spots in search engines for a particular keyword.  this report really spells out the good, the bad and the ugly of SEO in preparation for your site to be found.

The best part is, he has published all of this FOR FREE and I have taken it and formatted it so that it is in Adobe format ( Of course, I have placed links to his incredible site Webmasterworld in the report so that he gets all of the credit.  I just corrected typos and pout it in adobe format.

NOTICE: I have not posted the e-Book yet but it will be on my site very soon. So stay tuned to my site and blog and I will get it on there ASAP.

Anyway, the really bad news about all of this is that as the distinguished Mr. Tabke points out you should really work out an initial goal of having one hundred pages of fresh and unique content for your website.  When I originally started my Electric Bikes -N- Scooters site Mark Ling, the owner of Affilorama of which I used to subscribe to, advised me to build at least 40 pages of content.  So, the bad news is there is a lot of WORK that you have to do if you really want to get noticed on the Internet.

As Thomas Alava Edison said,  ” The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.”

However, anything can be accomplished if you set a schedule for yourself and set a course of action.  I have a personal whiteboard in my office that I use as a compass and a guide.  Every week i have a list of goals and projects that I want to accomplish and as I knock out each task, I cross off each item. This is real important because actually being able to see your goals or targets getting knocked off MOTIVATES you big time, and if you can put down dates of completion, then you will find that you are accomplishing a lot more than you would without this system.

Anyway, here is a Youtube clip with the famous Mr. Brett Tabke:

I know that most of you have probably heard this subject before, but as we know, things on the Internet do not stay the same for very long.  You can use marketing techniques that have been used in the past, however, you need to keep pace with changes in the Internet environment.  You can offer people free reports for their email addresses but that just doesn’t seem to motivate people to take action like it used to.

I have noticed on the Internet lately, that some individuals are offering free physical books that they will send you in the regular mail if you give them their email and physical addresses.  I have also seen people offer online video courses in return for email addresses as well.  So, I guess the days of offering a simple report are becoming less than significant, largely because everyone is doing it.

There are several techniques that I see Internet gurus using these days and the one thing that you can get from them is the idea that if you give away something of REAL VALUE you will draw much more interest than somebody that is just giving away a report in order to get an email address.  you must give away something that has a very high perceived value to attract and motivate clients and customers.

Watch Facebook and Myspace to see How NOT to do it.

I see so many people on Facebook making massive  mistakes that are common to most Internet marketer wannabees that I almost feel like it is the flood or something.  What I mean to say is everyone I bump into in social media sites is trying to sell you something IMMEDIATELY!  They no sooner get into two or three seconds of talking to you or sending their message, and they are delivering a message about buying or joining something.  I have had every type of communication you can think of, from chatting to personal messages and within two or three seconds there is a sales pitch of some type in there.  It is almost like taking someone out on a first date and asking them to marry you before you even get to the restaurant or movies.

You are moving too quickly.

You have to think of marketing in terms of   the people that you are trying to deliver the message to.  First of all, are they hungry for what you have?  Do they really need it and are they motivated enough to plunk down some of their hard earned cash?  Second, why should they buy from you?   If they don’t know you, then why should they trust you?  Time is a great equalizer in business, because if you have been around for awhile and people get a chance to know you, you will have a much better chance of having your marketing efforts pay off.

This is because people like familiarity.  McDonalds does a lot of business for several reasons, but one of the reasons it is so popular is because it has made itself a part of the American way of life.  They actually have made commercials that tell you that they are a part of American culture.

Don’t believe me?  Check this video out:

Please Stand By for The Rest of This Broadcast…….

One of the problems that exists with most of the people that start an Internet business is that they get confused as soon as they start dabbling in this medium.  It is very easy to do because there are so many options and ideas about what to do on the Internet that it is very easy to get distracted.  By education, I am an education technologist and my primary function in this capacity is to use technology, the Internet and tools like PowerPoint to educate people. I can honestly say that learning and teaching on the Internet is very hard because of all of the distractions and as I said before, there are tons of things to distract you from focusing on what you want to accomplish using Internet tools and the medium itself and if you aren’t very careful, you will not get a thing done.

Another problem with doing business on the Net is that you will get bombarded by Internet Marketing Gurus that will try to sell you their very expensive wares.  They will write courses (usually nothing more than e-books) with information that thy got from books that they purchased from a book store.  One big time Guru actually tells you on his videos that he does this.  He purchases books through Amazon.com, highlights the material from them that he thinks is the most important and then hires someone from eLance.com or Guru.com to rewrite the material for him. (Completely legal, buy the way.)

Actually, I can tell you exactly how he does this by using bullet points if you really want to know.

1. Go to Clickbank and look at a subject that has a lot of competition Reason: If enough experienced guys are doing this then they must be making money.  Going into a small niche is hard to market.  In a personal case that he highlighted,  he picked eBay! as the subject of his information product ( or course as he called it) which had a load of people selling products based on eBay!
2. Go to an online book store and pick a bunch of the top selling books on the subject.  If you are smart, you will buy them used on Amazon for a lot less than you would pay for them anywhere else.
3. When you get the books, take a highlighter and highlight all of the stuff that you think is pertinent to your info product.
4. Go on eLance.com or Guru.com and hire someone to rewrite the material that you highlighted.
5. Send the highlighted books to the individuals
6. When the individuals that you hired send you the material that is rewritten make sure that you pay them.
7. Add some good graphics that you can reinforce your points in the material with.  Graphics are good because people can relate to them better and in my humble opinion, they make the course look a lot better.
8. After the material has been rewritten put it into Adobe Acrobat format. (.pdf file)
9. Create a sales page for your product.( More on this in another episode…)
10. List the info product on Clickbank for affiliates to pick up.  make sure you pay a large commission 50% or more. Reason: they will be much more motivated to sell your product.  If you sell an info product for $50.00 you will still get $25.00 a sale.  Just imagine if you have thousands of motivated sellers out there pushing your product and you don’t have any printing or shipping costs because this is a digital product. (Clickbank only sells digital products, anyway.)
11. Create easy methods methods for your affiliates to sell your products by making banners and links for them to use.
12. 12. Sit back and reap the profits….NOT!!  Start working on your next project because as we all know……

IF YOU ARE MAKING MONEY FROM ONLY ONE SOURCE OR DIRECTION THEN YOU SHOULD NOT BE SLEEPING WELL AT NIGHT! ( From the famous marketer, Dan Kennedy)

Here is a video series on how to create information products:

OK,  I am going to deviate from my usual post this time so that I can bring you a piece of advice that you just can’t live without.  Namely my timeless and wonderful advice that you just can’t do without, I want you to know.  I will be addressing my usual post on internet marketing techniques this week in an effort to educate all of you IM wannabees. If you haven’t had the chance to read my last episode on the subject just click here: Internet Marketing Techniques Part 4

Part 5 will be out shortly, so be patient will ya?

The Internet is really a strange place.  People seem to do some pretty weird things in this new age of information.  As a matter of fact, America is the Information Nation because of the fact that a couple of centuries ago a bunch of us got together and told the tomes of history that we were fed up with people that had control buttons on our lives.  We wanted a government that kept its grubby hands out of our business as much as possible and we wanted FREE ENTERPRISE!  You know, the ability and freedom to go on down to the court house and file ( not beg, mind you) for a business license that we could have in our hands in just a few days.  Most countries  you have to wait years to get a license to do any type of business.  England, Germany, France, India you name the country, they will tell you about all of the crap you have top go through to start a business.

Anyway, this freedom is great and we all love the crap out of it, at least those of us that understand world history, do.  But I have to admit, in the last couple of years people have very easily been able to start and run businesses on the Internet that have been spectacular.  Look at that group of kids that started that video sharing site in their garage with just credit cards and then sold it to some sorta search engine for billions of dollars. WOW!  You really have to appreciate the age we live in.

Now, we are into some definite weird crap that I just have to scratch my head at.  Actually, it has been going on for over 10 years now, but who is really paying attention to that, right?  I noticed it first when I was in a chat room years ago and I accidentally hit my caps button.  Yes, I remember that day well.  One of the people said something to me I’ll never forget.

“Elmo, you are shouting.”

OMG!!! I’m shouting with my caps key locked on.  Now, when I mentioned to the person on the other end that I just happened to lock it on by accident, they told me it was improper internet protocol to do so.

Well, being a natural pain in the gluteus maximus I kept right on typing with the caps on.  I said,

“YA GOTTA BE KIDDING!”

“No, please refrain from shouting at me.”

“I’M NOT SHOUTING AT YOU, I AM JUST USING MY CAPS!”

” The fact that you are using your caps and an exclamation mark shows that you are shouting at me.”

“OK IS THIS BETTER?”

“Is what better?”

“I”M NOT USING THE BLASTED EXCLAMATION MARK ANYMORE.”

“No, because you are still shouting at me.”

“WELL, I THINK YOU ARE USING A CONDESCENDING TONE WITH ME”

” How do you figure that, Elmo?”

“BECAUSE OF THE WAY YOU ARE TALKING TO ME LIKE I AM SOME SORT OF REBELLIOUS CHILD”

“No comment.”

“BITE ME.”

“What did you say?”

“I SAID, B-I-T-E ME. BY THE WAY, I WAS SPELLING AND YELLING THAT TIME.”

“Come again?”

” BITE ME.”

“Go ahead, say it one more time.”

” BITE ME, BITE MY MOMMA, BITE MY WHOLE *@&%$# FAMILY!”

It was at that point that the administrator kicked me out of the room.

Well, things have only gotten worse with people on the Internet because they now have all of this power.  Not only do they have power, but they are getting their 15 minutes of Andy Worhol fortified with vitamins and Viagra fame.

Don’t believe me?  Check out this guy. He almost got his own reality TV show for making this clip:

Stay Tuned for the rest of this post I am writing it as we speak…er type…Whatever!!!

We are now into the swing of things in this new year of 2010 and we can now put away our Christmas lights and start focusing on our New Year goals and resolutions.  For those of you that really want to know, I have a goal to lose 25 lbs.  I actually started pursuing my dream back on December 12th when I attended an outdoor walking event, here, in Lexington.  At the event, I was introduced to an Internet site called the 50 Million Pound Challenge.  I have since set my goal and consistently worked toward it for almost a month, an I have only missed 3 days at the Gym due to important scheduling that I just couldn’t get around.  The results so far:

1. My blood pressure is down
2. I am sleeping much better and therefore I have much more energy
3. My clothes fit me much better
4. I have lost 8 lbs since I started on December 12th

If you really want to know how I set my goals and gain the motivation to do this stuff, you may want to refer back to my article in last weeks post: Take Massive Action.

OK, a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that one of the weapons you will need in your arsenal is great content.  Gone are the days of unsophisticated search engines that merely look at how many times a keyword is used on a page. As I mentioned in my article, the Internet game is getting very, very sophisticated and if you really want to make a difference and some money on the Internet you really have to have high quality content.  I told you several reason why you are going to need this content and you should really go back and read that article if you have not already:Deliver Information of Value to your Audience

The question that usually comes up is, “Hey Ellis, how do I go about creating great content that people are going to actually want?”  Well, it is very easy to do so, but I want you to think about a concept that has been around for a long time.  In the Bible somewhere it states, “There is no new thing under the sun.”  Being a teacher of history for the last 9 years, I can honestly say that the statement is pretty true. Almost everything we have and learn is something that has been thought up before, experimented with and regurgitated into newly arranged information or ideas.  Notice I said “arranged” not created.  Take the Internet, for example.  The Internet is just an upgraded version of the Pony Express if you think about it.  Instead of using horses to deliver information , we are using fiber-optic cable.  Instead of  sitting around the campfire to listen to the village story teller spin a tale, we now have TV.So as you an see, basically we have very similar innovations and ideas that have been built upon and modified from one generation to the next.

Well, content is the same. There is no new thing under the sun.  Don’t worry about creating 100% original stuff because it ain’t gonna happen.  Now, am I going to tell you to copy stuff and put it on your blog or Website?  NO!  Google and the other search engines hate duplicate content and they will zap you every time for it, but what they do like is fresh content.  In other words, you can take information that is already out there and rewrite it into your own words and the search engines won’t be bothered by it at all.  As a matter of fact, here is an easy way to get fresh content for your site in a step by step fashion:

1. Go to the library and check out a few books on the subject that you are writing about.  Actually, you can go to Amazon and buy whatever book you need used which is what I would recommend.
2. Scan the books for the core information that you will need to write about. If you bought the books, you can use a highlighter to mark the most important parts of the information you will need.
3. Rewrite the information into your own words or go to Guru or Elance and get someone to rewrite the information for you.
4. Go to the Google Keyword Tool
   
5. Do some research on Keywords and see which ones that you can use for your writing. Only pick a couple of keywords or phrases for your page or blog post.  Don’t use too many.  (For information on how to use Google’s keyword tool, watch the video below)
6. After you have rewritten the information, post it to your blog or website.  Do not post several pages at once!  Google loves to see growth over time, so try to post only 500 to 600 words at a time. If you are writing for a blog, try to make a series out of it so that people will want to comeback and read the next post.

Remember the rule, you can always rewrite what others have written IF you put it into your own words.  As a matter of fact, if you are using several different information sources like the Internet, books and articles from magazines then you can really load your site up with dynamite content.

Come back later today and read the rest of this incredible article because it is being written and updated right now!

I am throwing out another blog post because I think I have something important to say, I want you to know.  I think one of the greatest things on the Internet is You Tube.  Now, I understand that you enjoy watching ridiculous stuff on there that’s funny, because I do it too.  There’s nothing more hilarious than watching a cat getting thrown from a fan( Providing that no harm was done to the cat. I am an animal lover, but gee, sometimes they do stupid things that you just have to laugh at.) . Don’t believe me?  Watch this:

Well, here is another tip for you.  You can learn an awful lot about how to do Internet Marketing, Time Management, Success Principles or whatever by using You Tube to educate yourself. However, there are a lot of people on here selling their expensive wares and courses, so watch out.  They will sometimes tell you just enough to get you to want to buy their ebook, course or whatever.

I’m not saying to not buy their stuff, because some of it is good information, but there is a lot of it out there that is a rip off and a mere regurgitation of books that these folks bought from Amazon.  Yes, they buy the books related to what they are writng about and rewrite the material and then sell it as a course for much more than what you would have paid in a book store.

However, there are many marketing and success gurus that are very worthy of attention and you can get a lot of material from them on You Tube.

My favorites are:

1. Dan Kennedy – My favorite
2. Jim Rohn – Great speaker and funny too
3. Seth Godin – Believes in giving away free stuff
4. Zig Ziglar -  Zig has been around forever
5. Jeff Johnson -  Has a large amount of You Tube stuff to watch on Internet Marketing
6. Gary Halburt -  Ad copy expert
7. Dave Kamanski – How to use Video
8. Dave Ramsey -  Christian financial counselor  you can listen to his show on his Website – archived

I have others that I watch and listen. you have to constantly learn from people that are success oriented.  Education is always an ongoing thing that never ends if you want to be successful.

Peace Out

Mark

P.S. I got the “Peace Out” thing from from Kip in Napoleon Dynamite. See? You really can learn important stuff from You Tube!