Need a Profitable Hobby? Collect Pain Points Vol. 1 Issue 5
Shoes, Bras and Dolls - How to Keep Your Evergreen Content Fresh
DECEMBER 2012
More IM Lessons From Your Future Self
Create Videos Without A Camera or Software
6 Diabolical Tricks To Turn Strangers Into Die-Hard Fans
THE CHEESE STANDS ALONE
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Vol. 1 Issue 5
INTRODUCTION 4 The Cheese Stands Alone NEWS 5
YouTube Algorithm Change
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The Science Behind Procrastination Explained in 3 Minutes
IDEAS 21 Need a Profitable Hobby? Collect Pain Points
33 Hype is (not) The Greatest Thing In The World!!!!!
7 Think Your “Like” Count Is Just About “Likes?” Think Again
11 How to Upgrade to the Latest and Greatest Phone Every Few Months (Without Spending a Fortune)
12 How To Set Up an Automated, Bulletproof File Back Up Solution
23 Money Making Ideas Are EVERY Where – Just Ask Disappearing Romney
24 Use Re-Marketing To Get Visitors To Come Back To Your Website
30 How to Quit Your Job and Live in Paradise
ARTICLES 38 How to Write a Snappy Tagline 47 Shoes, Bras and Dolls - How to Keep Your Evergreen Content Fresh
RESOURCES 57 10 Social Media Hoaxes You Fell For This Year
63 Learn a New Skill From A Real Expert
EPILOGUE 66 More IM Lessons From
40 10 Keys To Getting Your Posts Read Using The Magic of Images
43 6 Diabolical Tricks To Turn Strangers Into Die-Hard Fans
52 8 Ways to Create Videos Without A Camera or Software
58 Findery Out Of Beta 61 Mozilla's Popcorn Maker 62 Get Paid to Share Free Stuff
Your Future Self
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INTRODUCTION Be The Cheese
I read an email the other day from Jason Leister about the cheese standing alone. If you're not familiar with The Farmer In The Dell, it's a children's song about people and animals on a farm, but in the end the cheese always stands alone. Sure it's silly, but Jason makes a good point about that cheese. All through school we are conditioned to think that different is bad. If someone wears clothes that don't look like our clothes, or they act or think differently than we do, we make fun of them for being different. Cruel, right? But this is how we're taught. After all, what better way to control people than to make them police themselves? Independent thinkers are scary to the establishment and to big business. If we think on our own, then we realize we don't need their latest gadget or their newest brain washing device. Then we can't be controlled by others because we are now controlling ourselves. In life and in business, strive to be the cheese. Be different. Think for yourself. Find all of those innate qualities you've repressed over the years in the name of “getting along� and conforming to the wishes of others, and reincorporate them into your life. The real you is the person others are going to love following online because you're going to stand apart from the crowd. People need leaders. When you let your true, authentic self shine through, people will be drawn to you, to your charisma, and to your unique views and opinions. You then stand apart and you become the leader. You become the cheese.
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NEWS YouTube Algorithm Change: 'Time Watched' Replaces 'View Count'
Want to score a high ranking with YouTube search? Then you need to make your videos as engaging and watchable as possible. That's because YouTube search is now rewarding high watch times over high view counts. And if you're thinking that simply making shorter videos will help with your rankings, the bad news is that it probably won't. YouTube's main goal in making this algorithm change is to increase the amount of time people spend watching videos. Thus a 10 minute video that retains viewers to the end will likely outrank a similar 1 minute video that also retains viewers. Best bet: Create great videos that your audience loves to watch and share with others. http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2218696/YouTube-Algorithm-ChangeTime-Watched-Key-to-Higher-Video-Search-Rankings
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NEWS 2 New Things For Marketers to Like About Facebook First, there was the bad news: Marketers have recently been experiencing a 540% decrease in organic reach of their Facebook pages. In other words, if you weren't paying to get your page seen, the odds of it being discovered were going down – and rather rapidly, too. http://marketingland.com/facebook-continues-to-tighten-organic-page-postreach-23233
Now there's good news: Page notifications are helping to increase your Facebook page visibility, because users can now receive updates from your brand without fail if they check the box on your page. http://marketingland.com/brands-rejoice-page-notifications-will-help-increasefacebook-reach-25727
And perhaps even more interesting, in yet another update Facebook is now offering a new feature that acts as a news feed for Page content only. http://marketingland.com/tune-out-your-friends-tune-up-brands-withfacebooks-new-pages-feed-26594 6
NEWS Think Your “Like” Count Is Just About “Likes?” Think Again Facebook is not only crawling your private messages – it's also using what it discovers to help determine the “Like data” of a page. Come to find out, “Like counts” aren't so much about “likes” as they're about the other interactions and messaging that occurs on Facebook.
So just what does count towards your Facebook “Like” data? http://marketingland.com/the-formula-behind-the-facebook-like-number-24069
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NEWS The Science Behind Procrastination Explained in 3 Minutes Are you putting something off? Looking for ways to procrastinate? Here's a 3 minute video that will give you insight on why you're prone to self-sabotaging by not taking action.
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NEWS Microsoft Has Introduced Windows 8 And it's nothing like you've seen before. In fact, this new version of Windows marks the biggest changes since the upgrade from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95. Before you rush to upgrade, read “8 Things You Need to Know Before You Buy Windows 8� here... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-rettinger/windows-8-is-here-8thing_b_2022868.html Then if you still want to upgrade without buying a new computer, you can do so here for $40. The deadline to get this price is January 31. http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/buy And if you want some handy hints on how to use Windows 8, start with these: How to Configure Windows 8 Straight Out of The Box (And additional tutorials): http://www.top-windows-tutorials.com/windows-8-tutorial.html The Complete Guide to Using Windows 8 http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-57529213-285/complete-guide-to-usingwindows-8-roundup/ 50 Windows 8 tips, tricks and secrets: http://www.techradar.com/news/software/operating-systems/50-windows-8tips-tricks-and-secrets-1028220
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NEWS Google Mail Introduces Compose Window If you use Gmail, you might have noticed something new. The new compose feature is still in preview mode but you can choose to enable it anytime you like. And when you do, you'll be able to compose an email and reference back to another email at the same time, without having to save and close your draft. Plus you can also insert images in line with your text, drag and drop addresses, see profile pictures in auto complete, and more. http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/gmail-introduces-composewindows-1C6790274
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NEWS How to Upgrade to the Latest and Greatest Phone Every Few Months (Without Spending a Fortune)
Especially useful are the tips and places to sell your gear so you can upgrade, as well as the tips on how to pay the least for phones and service. http://lifehacker.com/5958446/how-to-upgrade-to-the-latest-and-greatestphone-every-few-months-without-spending-a-fortune?tag=upgrades And if you want to get out of your current cell phone contract without paying termination fees, this will help: http://lifehacker.com/5913869/how-to-get-out-of-your-cell-phone-contractwithout-paying-termination-fees
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NEWS How To Set Up an Automated, Bulletproof File Back Up Solution If you haven't already experienced sudden heart palpitations when you realize something is seriously wrong with your computer, then it's simply a matter of time. It's a fact of life that hard drives fail, but you can be ready: http://lifehacker.com/5787572/set-up-an-automated-bulletproof-file-back-upsolution
Paypal Announces Holiday Price Match Through the end of the year, if you make a purchase using Paypal and you then find it advertised at a lower price within 30 days of your purchase, you can receive a reimbursement for the difference.
http://www.webpronews.com/paypal-announces-holiday-price-match-returnshipping-2012-11
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NEWS Obama Shows Us How To Make Content Go Viral The night of the U.S. election, President Obama sent out a photo via Twitter and Facebook along with a 3 word message. The photo was simple – Obama hugging his wife Michelle – and the message was to the point – “Four More Years.” Result? Within 24 hours the photo had been retweeted more than 750,000 times. On Facebook it received 550,000 share and 3.9 million likes, shattering all previous records. (JOHN – Suggest you use this photo: http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/07/tech/social-media/obama-photo-twitterfacebook/index.html ) True, it certainly doesn't hurt to be the President of the U.S. when it comes to getting your content shared. But if you look at all of the top liked and retweeted messages, you'll find they share something in common. First, they are incredibly brief – usually just 3 to 5 words. The longer the message, the less likely it generally is to be shared. And on Twitter, if you push the 140 character limit, it's impossible to get retweets. Second, they aren't asking for anything. They're not asking for a sale, a retweet, a like, etc. The messages are so good and so to the point that they don't need to ask. And third, the messages strike an emotional chord. It might be a celebration, an inspiration, a message of sympathy, etc. They all hit the receivers' emotional hot spots and make them WANT to share it with others.
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NEWS Groupon in a Tail Spin? If Groupon's net loss of $3 million in its third quarter is bad news, then its stock price is catastrophic. Opening at $20 per share just one year ago, you can now pick up Groupon stock for a mere $3.30. If you're a betting investor, now might be the time to buy since everyone else seems to be selling. Then again, it's always possible Groupon will never recover. Time will tell. http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/groupons-deal-worsens-daily145099
Paypal Hires Neurotic Jeff Goldblum Paypal has put together its first national ad campaign, and they've chosen Jeff Goldblum as their slightly neurotic, humorous spokesperson. You can watch the ads here: http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/ad-day-paypal-144496
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NEWS Facebook Users Spending Less Time On Website Is the bloom off the rose? According to Nielson's Top 10 web brands list for September 2012, Facebook users spent 30 minutes less time on the website than they did just 6 months ago. Still, even at 6 hours and 40 minutes per month per person, that's a LOT of Facebook time. And the decline in numbers may be attributable to increased mobile use – in which case it becomes increasingly difficult to calculate just how much time people are spending on the #1 social network. I wouldn't be surprised to see the amount of time people spend on Facebook continue to decrease before leveling off. Think of Facebook as a recreational activity – when people first start something new, they are excited and spend lots of time on it. Once it's no longer new, they often spend less time on it as other things catch their attention. But if it's something they truly like (and Facebook falls into that category for most people) then it can continue to command a least a portion of their attention for a long time to come. http://marketingland.com/nielsen-facebook-users-spending-30-minutes-lessthere-now-than-6-months-ago-26246
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NEWS
Genuine WYSIWYG Blogging - The Next Evolution? The guys behind Blogger and Twitter are at it again, but we're still not entirely sure what they're up to. What we do know is they're creating a new social platform (yet again) that will allow users to literally see the page they're going to publish as they're creating it, with no abstract layer like you get in Wordpress. Sound too simple? Maybe. But then again, Twitter was “too simple,� and look what happened there. http://www.webpronews.com/is-medium-the-next-step-in-blogging-2012-11
Twitter Uses Email to Go Viral Rolling out over the next few weeks, Twitter is going to allow users to share tweets by email, even if the recipients aren't Twitter members. What better way to introduce Twitter to non-Twitter users? http://www.webpronews.com/twitter-wants-you-to-email-tweets-to-your-nontwitter-using-friends-2012-11 16
NEWS Humorous Video: Professional Clickers Make Your Videos Go Viral Millions of clicks are just a few dollars away – and someday we won't even need the viewer: http://www.webpronews.com/these-professional-clickers-are-waiting-to-makeyour-content-go-viral-2012-11
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IDEAS How to Create a Product That Practically Writes Itself The hardest part of product creation isn't creating the product – it's knowing what to put into your product. Whether you're creating videos or writing an ebook, you still need a map of your product to find your way to the finish line (and your payday) as quickly and efficiently as possible. I never recommend trying to just “wing” your product creation as so many fledgling product creators try to do – you'll spend twice as long making a product that's only half as good as it could have been. Instead, start your product creation by using a matrix. At the top of your matrix is your BIG IDEA. This is the main topic of your product. For example, if you're writing a product on how to purchase your first home, that's your subject: “How to Buy Your First Home.” Remember to add a hook to your title: “How to Buy Your First Home Without Getting Ripped Off” or “How to Buy Your First Home Even If You Have Poor Credit.” Now that you have your topic, choose about 10 subtopics. These are the main categories of what you can teach your customers. In our example, your subtopics might be: • Discovering what is most important to you in choosing your new home • Finding the right real estate agent for you • Looking at homes for sale: 10 things you must do
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IDEAS • Avoiding homes with hidden problems • Narrowing the list of prospective homes • Negotiating to get the very best price • Hiring inspectors so there are no nasty surprises • How to get a loan with low rates, regardless of your credit history • How to speed up the loan process • Moving – Tips to make your transition smooth and painless Now that you've got your 10 subtopics, you start creating your product, right? Not yet. You've got one more step, and that's to break each of the subtopics down even further. If you can, make a list of at least 7 to 10 things you want to cover for each subtopic. Trust me, putting in this extra work now will pay off tremendously when it comes time to create your product. You will have your topic, your 10 subtopics, and 7 to 10 items under each subtopic you can cover. Then it's merely a case of filling in the blanks. This takes all the pressure off of you and will likely cut your product creation time in half.
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IDEAS Do You Perform A Service? Then don't try to get new clients. Instead, focus on getting prospects. Think about it – the more prospects you have, the less pressure you'll feel to take a job that you don't really want. Plus you'll come from a position of authority when it comes time to negotiate. Imagine if you HAVE to land a client to pay the bills. You end up selling yourself and your service, basically pushing yourself onto the customer. Sales are lost this way. Plus fees earned tend to be smaller because when you need them more than they need you, you don't have negotiating leverage. Now imagine you have potential clients lined up and you can pick and choose the ones you want to work with. Feel the difference? Not only does it take the pressure off of you – you also no longer have to sell. Plus, you can command higher fees as well.
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IDEAS Need a Profitable Hobby? Collect Pain Points Next time you sit down to write an email or sales letter selling a product, wouldn't it be great to have your prospects' very words that you can then use to sell them? Pain points are those lines you find in emails and on forums where the customer is telling you exactly what is wrong. In fact, you might even think of them as cries for help, because they're in essence telling you exactly where it hurts and why. By collecting these pain points you will know what they want and how to give it to them. And by using their own words you'll build rapport and establish trust because you sound just like them. Here are some example pain points I gathered from an Internet marketing forum today: “I've spent thousands and as yet I haven't made my first dollar.” “Every time I think I've got it right and I start making money, it just fizzles and I don't know why.” “I can't seem to get started and I don't know why.” “I sent out 124 emails, each tailored to the recipient, and I haven't had one person agree to do a JV with me.”
“I think I have marketing ADD – I can't get focused.” “I've been working this system for 4 hours a day for a week, and I only just now made my first sale. $11.21 profit. I sure hope this gets better.” 21
IDEAS “I just can't seem to stick to one thing because every new thing seems better than what I'm currently doing.” “I've written nearly a hundred articles and I'm just not seeing much traffic and no sales yet.” And forums aren't the only place to find these pain points. You can also go to Twitter and search using formulas like these: [your keyword(s)] mad – http [your keyword(s)] frustrated – http [your keyword(s)] help – http So if your topic is making money or marketing, simply insert it where it says [your keyword(s)] This should give you plenty to get started. And remember to hit the forums – they're a pain point goldmine.
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IDEAS Money Making Ideas Are EVERY Where – Just Ask Disappearing Romney As you may have heard - unless you've been living in a cave - Mitt Romney lost the American Presidential election to incumbent Barack Obama on November 6.
On November 11th, some enterprising person purchased http://DisappearingRomney.com/ and made a very simple page that shows how many people are “unfriending” Romney in real time. How did he monetize it? At the bottom of the page you'll see Romney and Obama items you can purchase from Amazon. Here's where it gets really interesting – by November 12th news agencies and bloggers all over the Internet were reporting on this website. In 24 hours Disappearing Romney received more free publicity than most websites get in a decade. As of this writing it's been tweeted 6,118 times and liked on Facebook 57,454 times. The lesson? Ideas are everywhere, you just have to look. And when you get a great idea, jump on it FAST.
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IDEAS Use Re-Marketing To Get Visitors To Come Back To Your Website As marketers we're all familiar with the fact that many visitors don't convert the first time they come to your website. For whatever reason they leave without purchasing your product, even though they might have been keenly interested in buying. If you do manage to capture their email address, you can continue marketing to them. But what if they don't opt in to your list? Unless you do something, you will likely lose those visitors forever. That's why remarketing is such a great idea. Simply by adding a bit of code to your website, remarketing “tags� place a cookie on your visitors. Now when they leave your website, they see ads that are encouraging them to go back to your website and complete what they started. For example, if you're selling a service, your ads would remind them of your service and clicking your ad will send them straight back to your website. These ads will give you a much higher conversion rate than normal because the people viewing them have already expressed interest by visiting your website. As most sales people will tell you, often times making the sales is simply a matter of asking for it enough times until you get that yes. And with remarketing your visitors see reminders of you everywhere. Some of those visitors will return and purchase your product, or at the very least opt in to your list.
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IDEAS There are actually different types of remarketing that you can use: Site remarketing is the example above – your ads keep you in their mind after they've left your website. Search remarketing is targeting search engine users who have searched for the keywords of your choice. Choose your search terms wisely, because some searches are much more likely to result in sales than others. Social media remarketing is like site remarketing – you place a bit of code on shared links within social networks and then serve relevant ads. When your link is forwarded, the people receiving the link also see your ads. What are the biggest benefits to use remarketing? Obviously you stay in front of your visitors after they've left your website. This provides you with a greater return on your traffic – the same traffic yields better results and more sales. Plus you get to try different calls to action. What motivates one person to buy might be different than what motivates someone else. By giving them a variety of marketing messages, the odds increase that one will hit home. You can even segment your website users based upon specific actions they've taken on your website. Thus they are reminded of the same product they looked at, even if you offer dozens of different possibilities. This is yet another reason why remarketing works so well – you are able to zero in on their exact interest and market to them accordingly.
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IDEAS For more information on remarketing (also known as retargeting) read SEOMOz's great introductory blog post: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/retargeting-basics-what-it-is-how-to-use-it
You can also check out the 7 Types of Effective Retargeting from Business to Community: http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/retargeting-secrets-the7-types-of-effective-retargeting-0321855 Or you might read the 6 Types of Retargeting Every Marketer Should Know by Search Engine Watch: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2199676/6-Types-of-Retargeting-EveryMarketer-Should-Know
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IDEAS Great Marketing Ideas Are Everywhere At first glance, you might think that while this Sleep Better video is highly entertaining and engaging, it's also out of your marketing league to duplicate. And while that might be true, you can still do something very similar on a smaller scale.
The 4 minute video by the comedy team Rhett and Link uses a split screen. On either side are virtually the same videos, except that there are difference in each that you're supposed to spot. The video? 4 highly entertaining takes on classic stories. Really, you have to experience it to see what I mean. http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/ad-day-sleepbetterorg145173#1
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IDEAS Now then – what ideas can you take away from this video? First, using a split screen. You might demonstrate a competitors product on one side while simultaneously demonstrating yours on the other side. And yes, this can even work with info product. In fact, I guarantee you've seen it done – one side of the screen is the features of the competitor's product, the other side is your product features. Of course you can only do this if your product does indeed have more features than theirs. Remember the PC vs. Mac commercials? Those weren't actually a split screen, but it's the same concept. Cool guy talking about the mac, nerdy guy trying to compete with the PC. Then there's the “spot the differences” technique: Sure it's old, but it's just as effective now as it was when you were reading the kid's magazine and trying to find the differences between the two cartoons. Why not create a contest – for example, use two different but highly similar infographics to demonstrate your product benefits. Viewers try to tally up all the differences, and then enter their answer into your contest. You then do a drawing from everyone who entered the right answer to determine the winner. The real benefit here is you've got customers intently studying every word of your infographic. Be sure to place your buy now button in there and if your offer is good, you should get sales. BONUS: This could easily go viral, sending you new prospects. One more thing about the Sleep Better video that I'd like to point out – these guys don't mind looking silly. Ridiculous, even. And no doubt that's at least partly why they are so popular. Bottom line: Be real. And if you can get people to laugh with you, so much the better.
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IDEAS Getting Back to Basics Yields Warrior Fast $100 Sometimes we get so caught up in finding the newest, latest, greatest money making scheme that we forget to stick to the basics. That's why I want to share a Warrior Forum thread with you. If you're new to marketing and you're stilling looking for that first $100, you might try what one Warrior is doing. First he found a product on Clickbank that he uses and believes in. Next, he made a squeeze page offering a free report on the same topic, using PLR. Then he searched out conversations on Twitter on his topic and offered free advice. People signed up for his report, he dialogued with them, and they bought the Clickbank product he recommended. Yes, it was that easy. For more details, see his thread here: http://www.warriorforum.com/main-internet-marketing-discussionforum/665710-hooray-ill-give-you-blueprint-just-earned-100-advertisingtwitter.html Please notice in his first post on the page, he outlines what he did to make that first fast $100, and then immediately asks for a new system. In other words, he's got something that's working for him, and he's anxious to cast it aside for the shiny new bauble. Isn't human nature funny? Bottom line, if it isn't broke, don't fix it. Simply find a way to scale it up and do more of it.
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IDEAS How to Quit Your Job and Live in Paradise That's something we dream about, isn't it? Quitting our current lives and living on the beach somewhere. Suntans, cool drinks by the pool, moonlit swims, naps anytime we like... Of course, then there's reality. We could never do that. It's just a dream. It will never happen. We'll never make enough money to pull it off, right? Not so fast. Did you know that the cost of living varies dramatically from one country to the next? For example, monthly earnings that are barely keeping you afloat in New York or Los Angeles could be more than enough to live a very luxurious lifestyle in some tropical far away place. For example, Copyblogger's Jon Morrow left his pathetic apartment to live in the finest resort in Mazatlan, Mexico – right on the beach.
http://www.problogger.net/archives/2011/05/18/how-to-quit-your-job-move-toparadise-and-get-paid-to-change-the-world/
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IDEAS How to Build An Entire Website (And Following) By Using Other People's Information Marketing Charts doesn't come up with a single new idea or bit of information, yet they have a popular website that people use and backlink to constantly. How do they do it? By taking existing research from other sources, pulling out the interesting bits and converting it into appealing charts.
http://www.marketingcharts.com/ So here's the million dollar question: How can you repurpose other people's content in such a way that it doesn't violate copyright law or upset anyone (no stealing allowed!) but makes it highly usable? Or to put it another way, how do you make what other websites have BETTER? For example, maybe you're got a new way to present recipes that makes it far easier for the budding chef to follow and prepare. You could then use recipes from any website – with permission and giving credit, of course – and simply convert their info into your new way of presenting it. (HINT: Infographics are a great way to present ordinary info in a highly engaging, new way.)
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IDEAS How to Break Into A New Niche by Creating Unique Content from Survey Results If you're itching to get into a new niche but you haven't known how to do it – I highly suggest using the survey method. You'll become an instant authority, gain immediate and deserved credibility, and quickly begin building a following. Really, I can' think of a faster way to break into a new niche that doesn't involve creating new products of your own or writing blog posts for a year. Give it a try.
First you create a well-thoughtout survey, and then you compile the results into short articles and longer PDF's. Perhaps best of all, you don't need to be an expert in a niche to successfully do this. Even complete novices can do it – the trick is to know just enough to ask the right questions. And there are added benefits besides creating new content. You... • Gain a better understanding of your future customers • Gain data that's unique and therefore more attractive to bloggers and even journalists • Collect quotes from real people • Gather a huge amount of data for posts and articles • Identify gaps in the niche that need filling • Become an “overnight” authority To discover 18 Ways to Create Unique Content from Survey Results, go here: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2226208/18-Ways-to-Create-UniqueContent-From-Survey-Results 32
IDEAS
Hype is (not) The Greatest Thing In The World!!!!! First, what is hype and why do we dislike it? Hype is short for hyperbole, which means exaggeration for effect and not to be taken literally. For example, if I said that I'm so hungry by stomach is chewing on my backbone, or I'm so starved I could eat an elephant, that's hype. The reason we dislike it is probably because we've been told it's bad. And when it comes to advertising, it can be. For the purpose of discussing hype in marketing, we're going to define it as a promise without proof. Sure you can be enthusiastic about your product and you should be. But every claim you make must be backed up by proof of some kind. If you say that your product reduces wrinkles, show us the photos. If you say it's the best on the market, show us the study that proves it. If you say it turns back time - well, you better have a time machine in that product and a video that shows you walking with dinosaurs. Bottom line: Go ahead and enthusiastically make the bold claims and promises that grab attention – just be ready to back it up with solid proof.
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IDEAS Tracking Open Rates? It's Not Enough If you're tracking your email open rates, then I applaud you. By tracking you're able to see which subject lines are working and which ones aren't. But knowing that isn't enough because after all, we're not really interested in getting emails opened, are we? That might sound like a trick question, but it's not. Getting emails opened is only the first step towards our real goal, which is making a sale. So let's say you test two different subject lines, and subject line A gets opened twice as often as subject line B. Obviously subject line A is the one to continue using, right? Not necessarily. I've see real tests just like this where Subject Line A might get twice as many opens, but it only gets HALF as many sales as Subject Line B. Let me illustrate, just so we're clear: Subject Line A 300 opens, 7 sales Subject Line B 150 opens, 14 sales How is this possible? Subject Line B evidently attracted the buyers, while Subject Line A mainly attracted the curious. As always it pays to test EVERYTHING.
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IDEAS Stop Giving Away The Farm People are a lot like sheep. Or lemmings. If they see the crowd going in a certain direction, they'll follow without even thinking about it. If that means diving off a cliff to their death, they'll do it. Metaphorically, of course. I'm hopeful that no one would really jump off a cliff just because the 50 people in front of them did it.
But if you're an independent thinker, it's good to ask if that crowd of sheep people is going in the right direction. For example, if everyone else is selling a stock, maybe you should buy it. Fortunes have been made with this one strategy alone. Sure, sometimes you'll lose your small investment, but that will be more than compensated for when it turns out you were right and everyone else was wrong. Just ask Warren Buffet. Everyone else is competing on low price? Then charge the highest prices of all and offer the best service. Everyone else is tightening their belt and laying off people? What a great time to expand your business! Everyone else is shying away from buying a home? Now is when you will get the best selection at the best prices. Which brings me to something we all do online to reel in new business – and that's to give stuff away. It used to be that we gave away little tastes of our products and services to entice people. Why not? It can be a good marketing strategy. Unless, of course, EVERYONE ELSE is doing it. Then it becomes a competition to see who can give away more. Result?
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IDEAS Consumers get a pile of stuff they don't look at, don't appreciate, don't care about, and it does them absolutely no good. We all know that the more we pay for something, the more we value it. You got it for free? Subconsciously (or even consciously) we assume it must be junk. So the question becomes, are you going to continue to participate in this endless cycle of giving more and more away for free, hoping that it results in business down the road? Or are you going to carefully tailor anything you give away to add to your bottom line? Remember, no one wants to pay you for something you will give them for free. If you're selling a service and you give them a free consultation of custom tailored advice, why in the world would they then PAY you for what you've been giving them for free? I know, it's a catch 22. You want to give them a taste so they'll come back for more, but you don't want to devalue you or your products and services in the eyes of the customer.
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IDEAS Which is why you want to focus more on telling people WHAT they need to do and not HOW to do it. Because when you show them what they need to do to accomplish their goals, they're now ready for the how-to steps of HOW to do it. Their appetite is whetted. And all you have to do is show them how to pay you. I strongly suggest you pull back from giving away the farm. Let them see your success from the outside looking in, but if they want to see the inner workings, it's going to cost them. In the end they will be far better off for it, because having paid you for your information or services they will then be far more likely to appreciate it, use it and profit from it.
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ARTICLES How to Write a Snappy Tagline You've got a new product or website, but you're stuck for a tagline. Should you spend a lot of time thinking up the best possibility? Surprisingly, no. There is a simple shortcut to writing the perfect tagline that will grab people's attention and let them know immediately that your product is right for them. So what's the shortcut? Believe it or not, it's letting your customer write your tagline FOR YOU. First, a few things you should know about the perfect tagline: It needs to accurately articulate what it is that you are offering, and it needs to position you positively with your target market. It's got to be original. Whatever it is that you're selling, odds are there are plenty of others selling something similar. By being original, you can stand apart from the crowd and get noticed and remembered. It's got to be concise and precise. Memories are exceedingly short and the competition to be heard is getting tougher every day. Now then, keeping those three points in mind, what do your clients tell you about your product or service? Better still, what do they tell you about the problem your product or service fixes? For example, career coach Julie Jansen helps people to find their ideal work. What do her clients frequently tell her when they're in her office? “I don't know what I want, but I know it's not this.� That became the title of her book.
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ARTICLES Another career coach kept hearing, “I don't know what I want to be when I grow up!” She resisted using the phrase at first because her clients WERE grown up and she thought it might offend them. However, once she added it to the top of her website, she immediately experienced a dramatic increase in inquiries. Two young software designers were showing a venture capitalist how their software worked. The investor suddenly exclaimed, “That's so simple, my mother could do it!” Bingo! Their tagline was born. An author wanted to write and speak about male-female communications. With the room full of people, she laid out a scenario in which they were all trying to communicate with the opposite sex but having difficulties. One gentlemen yelled out, “Can't she see I'm watching the game?” And her tagline was born. If your tagline captures exactly how your ideal customer feels, you've got it right. As you can see, you don't need to place pressure on yourself to find the perfect tagline – instead, simply listen to your customers. To learn more, read the book: “POP! Create the Perfect Pitch, Title and Tagline” by Sam Horn.
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ARTICLES 10 Keys To Getting Your Posts Read Using The Magic of Images Sure people come for the content, but first you've got to seduce them with the image. After all, images are the first thing people notice about your page or post. The right image can grab attention and create intrigue, mystery, curiosity and a host of other emotions that wrap their tendrils around your visitor and glue them to your writing. As an added benefit, the better your image is at capturing attention, the less important your headline becomes. A great image with a mediocre headline will almost always lure the visitor into reading your content, while a mediocre headline on its own seldom will. So what can you do to maximize the effect images have on your visitor? Here are 10 keys: 1. Use at least one image per post. Every post should have an image of its own above the fold. And if your post is long, consider adding images into the middle as well to break up your post. These will provide welcome breaks to your readers, as well as enticing scanners to stop and read your content. 2. Look for images that work on a gut level. If your post is about how to prevent a house fire, you might be tempted to post an image of a building on fire. But how much more captivating would it be to have an image of someone experiencing loss – even without a single charred remain in the background? Look for images that play on the emotions, rather than ones that simply illustrate your story.
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ARTICLES 3. Use faces. Studies show that readers pause longer on an image that shows at least one face. If you don't use faces, then look for something provocative or downright spectacular – something that makes the viewer stop in her tracks and want to know more.
4. Use images in your RSS feed. Just like blog posts, an image can make the difference between your writing being read or ignored. Think of the image combined with the headline as your book cover, and your post as the contents. People do judge books by their covers, and they do the same when looking through their feeds. 5. Take the time to get it right. Grabbing the first interesting image you see is seldom a recipe for stopping Internet traffic. If you need to spend as much time sourcing an image as you do writing the post, then do it. It's worth the extra effort.
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ARTICLES And do consider purchasing your images. You can almost always find far better images when you're willing to pay a little bit to use them, and the selection is far more vast and interesting as well. Keep in mind – a bland as toast image could actually HURT your chance to get your post read. Spend a buck or two and get something that leaps off the page and into your reader's imagination. If money is tight, there is a third option, and that's using creative commons photos. They're free to use but you MUST give the proper attribution to the photographer. For example, Flickr has a creative commons area here: http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/by-2.0/ 6. Just do it. Adding images might sound too simple, but the fact is that it will almost certainly increase the time visitors spend on your site. One marketer even reports that adding images has literally doubled the time people spend on her website. 7. Consider taking and using your own photos. If you're a shutter bug, by all means get busy. Using your own photos will personalize your website that much more, as well as building a deeper connection with your audience. 8. Build an entire post around pictures. With the advent of Pinterest, you can now get traffic simply for having great images. So why not try a post that's image dense, such as the most romantic places in your country, or the funniest photos ever, etc. 9. Don't forget to add alt tags to your images. This can help you to rank higher in the search engines, bringing you more traffic. 10. Have fun. Not only is reading an article that contains images more interesting for the reader – it's also more fun for the author to put together.
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ARTICLES 6 Diabolical Tricks To Turn Strangers Into Die-Hard Fans Have you noticed there are some marketers who struggle for years to build a responsive list and only end up with a burnt list of people who won't open their emails? Conversely, you've also witnessed new marketers busting into the scene as complete nobodies, and in no time at all they're commanding lists of mega thousands of eager and loyal followers. So how do they do it? What do the Frank Kern's of the world know that we don't? It really all boils down to one thing – how you craft your content. Whether you're shooting videos or scribbling down your thoughts, there are certain tricks that will make others want to follow your every word and even buy your every product. 1. Don't just tell – show them with stories. Even the shortest of stories can be helpful in captivating your audience and sticking you and your info to their brains like glue. For example, depending on where you went to grade school, you might have been told two different ways to spell arithmetic. One of course is a-r-i-t-hm-e-t-i-c. But the other is “a rat in the house might eat the ice cream.” Which one do you remember decades later? It's the rat mnemonic of course, because that one little sentence tells you a story of a rat in the house maybe eating the ice cream. You only have to hear it once to remember it. More importantly, as Robert McKee says, “Stories are the creative conversion
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ARTICLES of life itself into a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience. They are the currency of human contact.” Stories captivate, increase your open rates and conversion rates, and even hypnotize your audience. Do you want people read your content and follow your suggestions? Then become a master at storytelling. 2. Use cliffhangers and open loops. You're watching your favorite TV show when BANG! One of your favorite characters is shot. Will he live? You don't know, because the show ends and guess what? It was the last episode of the season. Now you have to wait until the start of the next season to see if he lives and to find out who did it. That, my friends, is the classic cliff hanger. There is action and suspense but no closure. It's unresolved. Unfinished. And human nature dictates that we very much NEED to have that closure, so we tune in next season to get it. Of course, we never really do get closure because every episode leaves us hanging in some way – hence the popularity of soap operas, despite the bad acting and ridiculous story lines. So let's say you're writing a series of emails or blog posts, and you end each one with a promise to reveal something in the next. It can't be just anything – it's got to be something that preys on your audiences' minds, making them eager for the next installment. For example, maybe you're dong a series on traffic generation. You outline a method that works well, then promise to show them how one little change can instantly triple the results. Tune in tomorrow to find out what that is. :-)
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ARTICLES Open loops work much the same way, only the cliffhanger comes at the interesting for the reader – it's also more fun for the author to put together. beginning of the content and the answer comes at the end. These are especially great in sales letters and longer blogposts and videos. You might promise at the very beginning to reveal 3 foods that effortlessly melt pounds – and then say something like, “But before we get into that, did you know that there are really easy, simple techniques you can use to burn extra calories throughout your day?” They are compelled to continue reading (or watching) if they want to discover those 3 foods that melt away pounds. 3. Engage the senses. First, use words that activate the senses, such as dazzling and glowing [visual] crackle and sizzle [auditory] fluffy and slippery [touch] delectable and refreshing [taste] fragrant and spicy [smell]. Second, use video. Video engages far more of the senses than the written word, and as a bonus, it can actually be faster than writing. 4. Be funny. This one tends to scare marketers - “But I'm not funny!” they say. The thing is, most people are genuinely funny when they are being themselves. This is not the place to try your stand-up routine or recite jokes you learned as a kid. Instead, it's the time to show your not-so-perfect side, to laugh at yourself, and to find the humor in everyday life. If you need help with this, read “Make 'Em Laugh and Take Their Money: A Few Thoughts on Using Humor as a Speaker or Writer or Sales Professional For Purposes of Persuasion” by Dan Kennedy. I think Dan might also get the award for longest book title ever. Okay, so WHY do you want to be funny? You probably already know the answer – people like people who are funny. They relax when they're in a good mood. They want more of that good feeling, and so they continue to consume your content looking for that feeling. And perhaps most important of all – people buy more and buy more happily when they're in good humor.
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ARTICLES 5. Grow your genuine personality. Whatever your personality is, magnify it and grow it to the point of being bigger than life. People follow bloggers, not blogs. They follow a marketer, not a marketing website. They follow you, or they don't follow at all. Be hot. Have the personality that appeals to your ideal prospect. And then take it a step further and be DIFFERENT. Look at what everyone else is doing in your niche, and then go in a totally different direction. Be contrary not for the sake of argument, but for the sake of shedding an entirely new perspective on a problem or challenge. Don't be normal. Don't be a cookie cutter. SURPRISE people. Do the unexpected. Make them stop dead in their tracks. Shock them. This isn't so hard – just look at what's normal in your niche and then do something else. In fact, if you were to follow only one piece of advice out of this entire article, it would be to see where the herd is going and then call them into an entirely different direction. You won't get the entire herd to follow you, but you will captivate their attention. And those who do follow (and you'll be surprised at how many do) will follow you to the ends of the earth.
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ARTICLES Shoes, Bras and Dolls - How to Keep Your Evergreen Content Fresh I've heard tell of a place in the western U.S. where there is a grove of trees deep in the forest and miles from civilization that is filled with creepy dolls and worn out stuffed animals. You won't see this place advertised and it's extremely hard to find if you've never been there. Yet people make the trek into the wilderness just to see this grove of trees. Why are the trees filled with stuffed toys and cast away dolls? No one knows for sure. Personally I've seen trees filled with shoes. Perhaps it starts with just one pair and grows from there. The benefit to shoes is if you tie them together by the shoestrings, you can fling a pair quite high into the air, thus eventually covering nearly the entire tree with old shoes. Stuffed toys and dollars don't weigh as much, so you've to place those by hand, filling the lower branches and leaving the higher reaches to those with climbing ability or ladders. Then there's the bra tree south of Las Vegas, Nevada. Somehow is seems appropriate to have a bra tree outside of Vegas because contrary to their slogan, you know that not everything that happens in Vegas really stays in Vegas. And again, people trek from all over to see this tree of bras that someone told them about. Which brings us to our topic – evergreen content. People visit these trees in the heat of summer and blistery cold of winter, last year, this year and next year. And that's exactly what you want people to do with your evergreen content, as well. The problem, however, is that evergreen content tends to be
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ARTICLES dry. Just like a description of a tree, it's content that stands the test of time but won't be attracting much in the way of Tweets, Shares, Likes and so forth. No one gets excited about an ordinary grove of trees in Oregon because there are trees everywhere – but they do get excited if those trees are filled with eerie stuffed animals and dolls. So here's how to make your evergreen content so good, people will go out of their way to visit it and tell others about it:
1. Give your posts personality. What makes the trees with dolls, bras and shoes stand out? They are different. They're unique. And above all they have personality. Inject your own personality into your writing to breathe life into it. You might not be able to fill it with shoes and bras, but you can find unique angles and ways of presenting your info that makes it highly interesting and worthy of sharing. 2. Write with your customer in mind. In fact, write as though you are speaking directly to your customer, who happens to also be a good friend of yours. Don't write like a textbook – write like an email between friends. 3. Inject fun into your writing where ever it's appropriate. A little humor goes a long way to keeping your content fresh and memorable. 4. Illustrate with stories whenever possible. People love sharing stories with others almost as much as they love hearing or reading them. 5. Update your content. Dolls fall apart, bras and shoes fade. But because new dolls, bras and shoes are continually being placed in the trees,
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ARTICLES people keep coming. Your evergreen content works the same way. Go back every six months and update your content where ever it needs it so that it's still up to date and completely relevant to all the new changes that might have happened in the last few months. Not only will readers appreciate this, so will the search engines. Remember, Google loves fresh content, but that doesn't mean it has to be NEW content. Updating existing content can help you just as much in your rankings as writing entirely new posts and articles, and it's a lot easier to do. 6. Keep track of your content. You might create an inventory of all of your articles and blog posts. This will help you to stay organized, it will reveal the gaps in your content that you need to fill, and it will show you which content likely needs updating. 7. Do use dates. A common trick in blogging is to not display the date your content was posted. This way an article that's several years old might be mistaken as being new – which frankly could be a bad thing for you. First, if you're not using dates then some visitors will wonder how old all of your content is and whether any of it is up to date. Second, someone reading a 4 year old article on SEO that hasn't been updated might think you don't know what you're talking about, since there have been so many changes since then. Instead of omitting dates, use the date of your last update. If you wrote an article a year ago but you've just gone through it and brought it completely up to date, there's no reason not to put today's date on it. All of the backlinks to that article will remain in place, and your readers will know that your content is current. 8. Do the unexpected. No one expects bras in trees – hence people flock to see it. Surprise your audience and they will tell others to view your content, regardless of when it was written.
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ARTICLES 6 Reasons To Disable Blog Commenting
You can turn your blog comments off or on at will. So the question is, will you accept comments or not? On a positive note, allowing comments sometimes gives you great feedback on your posts. If you have a highly read blog with lots of comments, it also provides social proof to newcomers that you and your blog are popular. But on the negative side... 1. Allowing comments opens the door to spam. Frankly, the majority of blog comments tend to be a waste of time for your blog readers. Some are outright advertisements, and others simply contribute nothing to the conversation. Of course you can install spam prevention software. But some spam will still get through, meaning you now have to invest time locating and deleting those comments or pay someone else to do it for you. 2. Google could ban your Adsense account. If you don't weed out the spam comments, you might be kissing your Adsense revenue goodbye. 3. Time. It takes time to sort through and delete comments. And not just time – it also takes dedication because you've got to do it every day. EVERY day. 4. The tumbleweed effect. This is when you allow comments, but then you don't get any or you only get one from your Aunt Silvia. If you enable comments but get very few, it will appear as though no one is reading your blog. You and I both know that most people who read blogs don't comment, but most blog readers don't know that. They'll assume your blog is unpopular and they'll be less likely to stay themselves.
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ARTICLES 5. Watered down SEO. While a small percentage of comments will help you with your SEO, a larger percentage can actually hurt your chances to get your post on the first page of Google. 6. Loss of control. Unless you're prescreening comments, anybody can post anything. This means your competitor can post lies about you and your products, and those comments could be on there for a day before you see them and delete them . 7. Loss of control 2. Not only can people post negative things about you – they can post ANYTHING. Imagine someone posting that they're about to assassinate someone or blow up a building. Do you think you and your blog will come under investigation? Yes. Of course you'll be cleared in time, but who needs the headache? 8. Loss of control 3. Then there's slander. Someone posts libelous falsehoods about another person or company. Sure, there are laws to protect you. But until things get sorted out, do you really want to endure a lawsuit? Unlikely, but it can happen. 9. The reply catch-22. Someone leaves a great comment and you reply. Or someone asks a question and you post an answer. So far so good, right? But now EVERYONE expects a reply. This is a great way to encourage comments – and it's also a great way to spend your entire day answering replies instead of creating new content. Now then – for every reason to not enable comments on your blog, there is another reason to do so, most of which you probably already know. Bottom line: If you already have comments enabled and you like the results, then don't change. But if you're just starting your blog, or if you're tired of having to act like a blog policeman to weed out the riff-raff, you might do yourself a favor and disable comments. It could result in the best nights sleep you've had in weeks. 51
RESOURCES 8 Ways to Create Videos Without A Camera or Software No camera? No problem. Jay Cut is a free, online video editing service. To use it, you'll need to join their JayCut community. Upload your own images, video, transitions, etc. or use theirs. http://jaycut.com/ Animoto makes really professional looking videos from your pictures and video clips. You can choose from different templates for different looks, and insert written text. http://animoto.com/
Photo Peach is another slideshow program, easy enough for children to use. http://photopeach.com/
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RESOURCES Stupeflix lets you create video montages. Text is easy to add, and you can use more than one audio clip within the same video. http://studio.stupeflix.com/en/ Muvee Cloud is similar to Animoto – putting your photos and video clips into movie form. You can also collaborate with others. http://cloud.muvee.com/ Zimmer Twins lets you make simple animated video stories. http://www.zimmertwins.com/ Xtra Normal lets you create animated, narrated movies by typing in dialogue and dragging and dropping characters and set elements. http://www.xtranormal.com/ Screenr's web-based screen recorder makes it easy to create and share your screenshots around the web. Just click the record button, capture your screen and voice, and share the link. http://www.screenr.com/
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RESOURCES The Most Useful Google Page EVER? Everyday Google becomes more and more like the magic genie who will deliver any bit of info you wish, if only you know how to ask: http://www.google.com/help/features.html Here are two searches you should know how to do by heart:
The related search – to search for website pages that have similar content to a given site, type “related:” followed by the website address into the Google search box. The Fill in the Blank Search - Sometimes the best way to ask a question is to get Google to ‘fill in the blank’ by adding an asterisk (*) at the part of the sentence or question that you want finished, like this: Automobile fatalities occur * times per day. It doesn't always work, but when it does it's a real time saver.
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RESOURCES 181 Google Research Tricks Whether you're researching a term paper or your next info product, this list from OnlineColleges.net will turn you into the super-sleuth of information discovery in no time. http://www.onlinecolleges.net/2012/06/25/181-google-tricks-that-will-save-youtime-in-school-updated/
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RESOURCES Google Maps: 10 Handy Tricks You Should Know Some of these are really surprising if you haven't seen them before. http://mashable.com/2012/08/16/google-maps-tips/#view_as_one_pagegallery_box6973
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RESOURCES 10 Social Media Hoaxes You Fell For This Year Be careful what you pass on to your readers through social media – your reputation and your good name are on the line. And in the future if you find you have indeed passed on false information in any form, immediately apologize to your friends and followers. http://mashable.com/2012/11/05/social-media-hoaxes/
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RESOURCES Findery Out Of Beta You can leave notes anywhere in the world for others to find, and find notes others have left. And now that it's out of Beta, anyone can join Findery without an invitation. https://findery.com
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RESOURCES 3 Ways to Access Websites When They're Down When you try to go to a website and it's down – don't despair. You might still be able to access it by using one of these three techniques: Access a cached page through Google. This one is so simple, yet few people know about it. Go to Google.com and type in:
cache:http://missingwebsite.com Of course you'll want to substitute the actual url into the search term. Search for site in the Internet Archives. Go to http://archive.org/ and type in the complete url of the website you're trying to access. Access an overwhelmed website with Coral Cache. We've all seen the big launch followed by the crashing website due to excessive traffic. But you might still be able to access the site by adding .nyud.net to the end of the domain you're trying to access, like this: http://missingwebsite.com.nyud.net This won't work every time, but it's worth a try.
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RESOURCES Think With Google Who better than Google to do digital research? What's perhaps surprising is Google will share their large collection of research with you for free – you can access it here at their research library: http://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/insights/library/
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RESOURCES Mozilla's Popcorn Maker Popcorn is a video editing and hacking project just released by Mozilla that lets you integrate the web into your videos. You can edit, add and enhance content directly into pre-existing videos. Annotations can be linkable to exterior pages – something that's a premium feature for YouTube users. https://popcorn.webmaker.org/
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RESOURCES Get Paid to Share Free Stuff Share info you like and get paid to do it. Or better still, create your own info products and let others share it for you, thus helping you to reach others, list build and gain customers. http://loyaltepays.com/Home/tabid/38/Default.aspx
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RESOURCES Learn a New Skill From A Real Expert Skillshare is a great place to take short, powerful classes that can have a real impact on your bottom line. Most classes are conducted completely online, and typically take just 2-4 weeks. And you'll find that the instructors are highly skilled in real world knowledge – no theory here. For example, as I write this they're offering: Teach Yourself to Code: One Month Rails (Learn to code in no time) The Art and Science of Storytelling (Important if you sell or write online) Startups Unplugged: What To Do Before Building Your MVP Make the Internet Laugh (Humor sells) And many others http://www.skillshare.com/
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RESOURCES Where to Get Great Online Marketing Graphs Emarketer takes popular research reports such as Pew Internet and comScore, and packages their insights into easy to digest charts. Want to know the latest research, and share it with your readers? Check out these 3 examples: U.S. Online Video and Spending Will Nearly Triple in the Next 4 Years https://www.emarketer.com/Coverage/Video
Are you Speaking Europe's Language? Per User, the UK is Spending 4 Times the Global Average on Digital https://www.emarketer.com/Coverage/WesternEurope 43 Americancs Converted to Smartphones in the Time it Took You To Read This: Are You Ready? https://www.emarketer.com/Coverage/Mobile 64
RESOURCES How to Get Slides From The Conference You Couldn't Attend Maybe you didn't want to shell out the price of a conference ticket plus airfare plus hotel to go to a conference. You might still be able to get access to the slides shown in the presentations. They won't have the narration of the live speaker, but odds are you'll still pick up some valuable information. And it costs nothing to search: http://www.slideshare.net/ And even if you're not looking for a specific presentation or conference, you can still pick up some really valuable tips. For example: 10 Ways to Improve Your LinkedIn Brand http://www.slideshare.net/Andy.Headworth/10-ways-to-improve-your-linkedinbrand#btnPrevious 100+ Word of Mouth Bullet Points from the WOMMA Summit '12 http://www.slideshare.net/jessedee/100-bullet-points-from-wommasummit-byjessedee#btnPrevious You Suck at Powerpoint – 5 Shocking Design Mistakes You Need To Fix http://www.slideshare.net/jessedee/you-suck-at-powerpoint-2#btnNext Incidently, if you use Powerpoint or make Camtasia type slideshows, you'll definitely want to watch the “You Suck at Powerpoint” slideshow. It's highly entertaining and chock full of good information.
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EPILOGUE More IM Lessons From Your Future Self: Last month we imagined having a time machine that would allow you to travel into the future. Once you got there, you met with your future millionaire self to find out what you did between now and then to build such a successful online business. You then traveled back to today and (hopefully) began implementing at least some of the lessons learned from your much wiser and wealthier self.
The first 15 lessons were: 1. Get clear on what you want and WHY you want it. Once you get the goal and the reason for the goal clear in your mind, it's a lot easier to take those steps necessary to attain it. 2. You are smarter than you think. Stop stalling and get started. Now. 3. Motivation comes from within. Waiting to work on your business “when you feel like it” means one thing: Failure. 4. Speaking of getting distracted – STOP IT. Make a plan and work the plan. Find your big picture and only do the things that will get you there. 5. The magic button that creates money out of thin air? Does not exist. If it did, would they be selling it for $97? 6. There's nothing noble about doing things the hard way. Automate and outsource ASAP. 7. Step back. Are you still going in the right direction? Course correct. 8. Stop complaining. Just. Stop. 9. Don't worry about your competition. The vast majority of your competition is mediocre anyway, and you're not stopping until you reach great.
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EPILOGUE 10. Never stop learning. You know enough right now to start, but not enough to sustain your business long term. 11. Face your fears head on. If you let fear rule your life, you'll never accomplish anything new and you'll never experience anything exciting. 12. Making money is simple. You take certain steps, you get certain results. 13. Smart successful people have goals. f you don't write down your goals, you're just playing at building a business - not actually DOING it. 14. Never compromise your character or your good name. Remember, anything placed on the Internet might very well STAY on the Internet forever. 15. Be yourself – you have far more to offer others than you realize. Now then, student of your future millionaire self, here are your new lessons. Use them wisely. 16. If you already have 2-3 excellent products on your computer on how to money online, you likely have enough information to make 6 figures a year. No joke. We're going to figure you don't care for one of the methods but you're fully capable of implementing at least one of the other two. There are literally thousands of people who have already proven this is true – you only need one solid workable system to make real money online. So stop cruising the Warrior Special Offer forum and get busy. Now. 17. Be warned: Others might not understand what you're doing. They might even resent it. They might try to hold you back. They might discourage you. They might be a total energy drain. And they might do everything in their power to stop you. Their motivation? Many and varied, but bottom line your new business is perceived as a threat to them. If they're family, explain that you need to do this and you are not changing your mind. If they are friends, consider placing some distance between yourself and them. You can catch up with them later once your business is rocking – at which time you might be surprised to find out you need new friends because your old ones resent your success. Sad but true. 67
EPILOGUE 18. What you do today will predict what you become tomorrow. Are you diligently moving forward? Or are you putting things off? Choose your habits wisely. I wish I could tattoo that on your hand so you would see it every day. Choose. Your. Habits. Wisely. 19. Stop focusing on the economy or the politicians and just get busy. I know people who spend their days watching economic news and then lament that it's impossible right now to successfully start a business. And I know others who ignore that same news and make news of their own, starting tremendously successful businesses in the weakest of economies. Remember, whatever you focus on gets bigger. 20. It's all about selling. Period. You're either selling a product, a click, a service, or something else, but you are in fact selling. If you are not selling, you are not making money. Focus 90% of your time on the sales process, and that includes getting traffic, converting that traffic to a list, and selling to that list. 21. Content rules. Social networks, applications, software, etc., will come and go, but content has always and will always work because people will always demand high quality content, regardless of format. 22. Don't start with just one product, start with 3. Launching a single product with no follow up plan is a recipe for a few quick bucks and then nothing. Instead, know what you're going to upsell or cross-sell before you even get started. Yes, they can be other people's products. For example, launch your own product and then OTO an affiliate product, then upsell a second affiliate product.
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EPILOGUE 23. Build your own tribe. Pick your corner of the Internet, whatever that might be (call it a niche if you like) and then build a solid and ever-growing tribe of people who know you and trust you as THE GUY or GAL in that niche. Don't worry about those that don't fit your tribe – just focus on those who do and you will always have an income online. 24. Don't buy “stuff with your profits.” That new TV and new car will wait another year or two. Right now invest all of your profits back into your business. This is how people retire in just 5 to 15 years, by reinvesting now to scale up their businesses. Work the numbers. If you're buying traffic for $1 that yields $2, then you are effectively doubling your money over and over again. If you instead invest that money in a new car, that money and it's future earning potential is forever lost to you. 25. Use deadlines. This is your business, not a hobby, so treat it like a business. Think strategically about what needs to be done and write it down, complete with deadlines. Then do everything in your power to meet those deadlines, no matter what. 26. In the beginning, do not take a day off. Focus on your goals daily or they will fall by the wayside. Missing even one day can lead to missing two days, which can lead to missing a week which leads to a month lost. Everyday re-read your goals and do at least one thing that takes you closer to reaching your goal, even if it only takes 20 minutes. It's not about how much time you put in, it's about how much you get done with the time you have, and how consistently you make progress.
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EPILOGUE 27. Forgo all distractions. Hobbies, television, video games, vacations, etc., are all things you can put off for at least your first 4 to 8 months. Set a goal of what you're going to accomplish by a 6 month deadline, and only when you accomplish it can you afford to be distracted. Yes, you've got to get serious about your business – enough monkeying around, it's time to actually DO it. 28. Find a mentor. Or a coach. If you want to accomplish a whole lot more in a whole lot less time with fewer mistakes along the way, find someone who's already doing what you want to do and hang onto their coattails for dear life until you can do it on your own. Yes, coaches cost money in the short run, but in the long run it's one of the best investments you'll ever make. 29. Figure it will take 2-5 years to build real wealth. Look back at where you were 5 years ago and imagine if you had started your business then, where you would be today. Now look ahead 5 years and realize it all begins now. 30. Build a support team. This might simply be a group of 4 to 7 people who get together twice a week on Skype to brainstorm and report progress. Nothing beats having fresh minds looking at your business, or the moral support of being in company with others going through the same process you're living. And if possible, get a couple of more experienced marketers to join your group and act as mentors. 31. BONUS: This one is for the long haul: Have an exist strategy. There may come a day when you want to sell your business, either to start a new one or to retire. By planning for this in advance, you might be able to sell your business for more. For example, be sure to actively build individual lists of prospects, buyers and affiliates because not only will these make you money – they're also tremendous assets when you sell.
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EPILOGUE And give your business a name and brand of its own. If you name it after yourself, it will be difficult to sell unless you find another person who shares your name. And also do everything to solely own that name. Purchase all of the domain extensions available and any variations, along with getting all applicable copyrights and trademarks. Something to think about: Research shows that 80% of pentamillionaires (those with a net worth of $5 million or more) are entrepreneurs who sold their businesses. Imagine you're standing on a time line at the exact juncture where it branches in two different directions. One direction takes you to that million dollar business, and the other direction has you spending the rest of your life just as it is now, with no changes and no big success. You choose which path to take. The million-dollar-future-you is waiting to guide you to that destiny – if you choose. Or you can do nothing, and the other destiny will happen pretty much on its own. Your choice.
Sheriece Strickland Publisher Local Mobile Marketing info@newlocalmobilemarketing.com
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