Here’s a ridiculously easy business you can run from Facebook using Facebook groups. It won’t take you much time, and it can net you a tidy little profit each month.
Better still, you can create as many of these as you like. Grow them big enough, and you might make far more than $1,000 a month, too.
Plus, you can either do it yourself, or outsource the work – it’s up to you.
Here’s how it works:
First, create a private Facebook group. This is going to be a free group, and you can do it for any niche where money is spent.
For example, if you’re in the IM niche, you might title your group something like:
Shortcut copywriting techniques for non-copywriters
Easy and fast SEO for non-SEO people
Latest and hottest ways to get tons of traffic to your offer
Techniques for doubling and tripling your conversions
Simple methods for building massive emails lists fast
Etc.
You can populate your groups with free WSO’s, from Facebook itself, as bonuses to other people’s products and so forth. You’re offering a tremendous benefit for free, so it’s not going to be difficult to get members to your groups.
You might even limit the number of members you take, since that will make it seem much more exclusive and valuable.
For content you’re going to do one or more of the following:
Write your own content
Hire outsourcers to write the content for you
Get guests to write your content for free
Use high-quality PLR. Not junk, just the good stuff
Whatever content you use, be sure to break it down into brief daily posts.
All you need is short snippets of content because the members will do the rest of the work for you. They’ll ask questions, respond to questions, give opinions, and so forth.
So now the big question is… How do you monetize this?
There are three ways:
First, promote your own products. You’ve got to do this in a very soft, non-pushy way. Done right, you’ll make plenty of sales without turning anyone off.
For example, you might answer someone’s question, then refer them to your product for even more info.
Second, promote other people’s products (affiliate products) using the same method.
Third, if you don’t want to sell products or you want to make even more money, you can sell advertising on the timeline.
If you think about it, you’ve got a highly targeted group of people who are super focused on this one area of interest.
Basically, you have a terrific prospect list of active, interested people.
Let’s talk more about getting advertisers. These advertisers would LOVE to convert your members to their deal.
It’s important to limit your ads
Limit your ads to just one per day, and call them the “Sponsor of the Day.”
Of course, advertisers can book as many days as they like.
Post the ad in the morning and keep it as the pinned post for the rest of the day.
Charge maybe $50 to display the ad for a day, which compares favorably to solo ads.
If you sell all 30 days of the month, you’ve made $1,500.
Only allow that one ad per day, and don’t let your members post affiliate links.
Now find advertisers
How do you find advertisers? Many times your best source will be from within the group itself. You can also let your email list know about the opportunity, and you can offer your ad slots to anyone who is in your niche and has a product to sell.
I recommend starting one group and learning the in’s and out’s of running this type of business. You’ll need to invest perhaps 15 minutes each morning for adding content and answering questions, and then check back 3 or 4 times during the day.
Perhaps one of the easiest ways to make good money online is to go to webinars.
Will you go to webinars? Here are some guidelines.
Here’s how it works, in a nutshell, to go to webinars to make money: You choose a date and topic for your webinar, promote it, give great information on the webinar and then promote a product at the end. It’s like one big informational sales letter. You begin by giving away a great deal of awesome info, and you close by offering them even more information and/or a service or membership they can use to implement what they’ve just learned.
Many affiliate markets go to webinars to promote a product or service. You may have a skill that others want to learn. Or you can interview an expert who has the skill (or information) people want to learn and then you go to webinars as a platform and share that information.
Steps to ensure your webinars generate income
1. Make the webinar an experience with good content.
1. Your webinar should be an experience giving good content and not just selling. There is so much I can say about this, but it might all boil down to the following: Do NOT be boring. As you put your webinar together, think about your customers and what they want to learn and experience. Make it interesting, exciting, full of good content, and fun. Plan to show major enthusiasm for your topic, and answer questions. Remember that they can leave the webinar any time they like, so make sure it’s worth staying for.
2. Provide great tools for your audience
2. Provide great tools and if you’re partnering or using affiliates, provide great blog posts and emails. Send emails so they can drive as much traffic as possible to your opt-in page and provide a good variety. You don’t want every affiliate sending out the same email, since they begin to look like spam. Instead, consider helping each affiliate to write a unique email tailored exclusively for their list.
3. Create a quality registration page
3. Spend time on your registration page and make sure it is good quality, This is the page you and your partners or affiliates will be sending traffic to, and it’s ‘do or die’. Prospects decide whether or not to sign up for your webinar based on what’s on the page, so spend a little time fine-tuning it to produce the most sign-ups possible.
4. Create slides for your webinar
4. In creating the slides for your webinar, try to have a new slide every minute or two with one or more important points on it. This keeps the webinar moving and interesting.
5. By yourself or with a partner
5. You can do the webinar by yourself or with a partner. The nice thing about having a partner is you can have a give-and-take of information, and add in bits that the other might overlook. Of course, whoever the expert is will do most of the talking, but the second person can ask questions and add a different dynamic to the call.
6. Time to promote your webinar
6. Promote the webinar but don’t begin promoting any more than a week in advance because frankly, people have short memories. As the webinar gets closer then promote it more often with increased urgency.
7. Send reminders & save your seat
7. Send reminders the day before the webinar is the time to send the first reminder, preferably in the early evening. On the morning of the webinar send the second reminder, and the third reminder 30 minutes before it begins. “Did you forget?” Is a great subject line for the last-minute email you send out. Also remind them that there are far more people signed up than there are open webinar slots (assuming this is true, which it usually is.) Suggest they get on the webinar early to ensure they get a “seat.”
8. Start on time
8. Start the webinar on time and don’t wait for stragglers, you’ll just irritate those who bothered to show up on time.
9. Some of your best stuff & over-deliver
9. Give some of your best stuff, over-deliver and seriously, you want to majorly over-deliver, because the more you give then the more your listeners will want to know. If you hold everything back then not only do you run out of things to talk about but your listeners also wonder if you know anything at all.
10. Inserting teasers
10. You want to tease about your product or service. Seriously, while you’re delivering great content you will also be inserting teasers here and there for the pitch that comes at the end. For example, you’re telling them how to do “a, b and c,” and of course they’ll need “d, e and f” which you don’t have time to cover here but you’ll give them a chance to learn all about it at the end of the presentation. Do something like this: Your webinar is on traffic, so you teach several basic methods on the call and allude to the many advanced techniques they can also use as soon as they know how to.
11. It’s about the audience and not about you
11. Remember, it’s not about you and that it’s about your audience. If your webinar system allows questions to be typed in (such as GoToWebinar) then the person who isn’t doing the talking can keep track of the questions and make sure they get answered. Here’s a great trick: Imagine you are a new listener hearing you for the first time. Think and ask yourself, what would I want to know? and What isn’t clear? or What questions might I have? Always keep your listeners in mind, and even periodically check in with them to see if they’re following what you’re teaching.
12. Make your offer deliciously irresistible
12. Make your offer deliciously irresistible and the entire webinar should flow nicely into the offer you’re making, and the offer itself should be as irresistible as possible. Pile on the benefits and make it clear what this will allow them to accomplish, and back it with a super strong guarantee. Place the URL of the order page on the screen and tell them exactly what will happen when they order.
13. Give a bonus to the first “x” number who grab your offer because this is a great way to get them off the fence and moving fast. Depending on the price point and the number of listeners you want to limit your special bonus to the first 10 to 50 people who sign up.
14. Wait to the end for questions will help maintain the pace
14. Stay on when your webinar portion is comple so you answer questions and give order updates. Remember, if one person has a question then there’s a good chance others have the same question. Plus you can be there in case they have a problem ordering. Now as the orders come in, update the listeners on how many of the bonuses are already gone. This provides proof that others are buying and they should as well. You might even close out the webinar by letting them know you’re confident the bonuses will sell out this evening.
15. Be sure to follow-up with an email
15. Follow-up and send an email thanking them for attending and reminding them of the URL to order if they haven’t already.
16. Post the replay
16. Post the replay online for a few days and inform all those who did not attend to listen to it before you take it down. The possibility of getting sales from a replay, for your customers who couldn’t attend or lost internet connection or a hundred other reasons, is very good.
It’s fairly common to make several thousand dollars from one webinar, depending of course on your offer and your listeners.
What if you don’t have a product to promote, then you’ve got a couple of options:
1. Choose an affiliate product and ask the product owner to do the webinar with you and splitting the profit between the two of you. Half the money may be better than little or no money.
2. Make your product a series of teaching webinars and sell them too. These are additional webinars that they pay to attend to learn the rest of what it is you’re teaching. Record them and get transcriptions, and now you’ve got a product you can sell on future webinars.
In my opinion, I go to webinars as a great tool to teach and to sell but the real question is, are webinars for you?… If so then these tips will help you get started on the right track!
I see new marketers all the time who have a goal of $100,000 per year or even a million dollars per year. And how are they getting their traffic? They’re happily submitting articles, writing blog posts, and commenting on forums and blogs for their home business ideas.
Now, if your goal is to earn an extra $1,000-$2,000 per month, then these methods are great. But if you want to earn far more, you’ll want to change the way you get traffic.
Use SEO, PPC, and Social Media
No one that I know of is making large sums of money using only these methods. Instead, they are doing either SEO, PPC, Facebook Ads, or creating their own products and affiliate marketing programs.
I will say there are of course always exceptions to the rule. If you’re really good at a particular marketing strategy like blogging, or direct sales using Facebook chats and other social networking engagements AND you sell products that can pay you high commissions, it IS possible to build a 6 or 7-figure income with free marketing.
Faster Options For Someone Getting Started
But for the average person, paid advertising can be a faster path to the higher income tiers. Either way, choose a strategy that works within your current budget. Commit to learning how to execute that strategy at the highest level possible. If you are in the online marketing game to make a serious and life-changing income you must take a leap of faith and begin.
Success is great, but failure is EASIER! Come on… I know you can do it. Read about these 9 ways to be certain you’ll fail in internet marketing service so you can make necessary changes quickly. Here’s how:
Being Filled With Doubt
1. Be filled with doubt. Cultivate it at every step, looking for reasons why you will fail. Why your business plan won’t work, why effort is fruitless and hopeless. People who are successful want that success. They dream about it, breathe it, and live it in their minds over and over before it happens in real life. When successful people feel doubt trying to creep in, they stamp it out faster than a cockroach in their kitchen. No wonder why they succeed. If you’re going to fail and fail big, you’ve got to be sure you’re filled with self-doubt. Self-doubt from the time you get up until you fall asleep at night.
Whatever you do, do not listen to or read positive messages, do not become enthusiastic, and try your best not to be happy. Just sit in the corner quietly with your milk and a giant box of cookies (or your beer and burritos. Don’t come out of that corner until you’ve convinced yourself that you’re a big fat failure who will never succeed at anything. Remember, negative self-talk is crucial to your failure. If you let positive self-talk creep in, you may accidentally succeed, and then where would you be?
Being A Slick Willy
2. Be a vacillating slick willy. Don’t stick to one plan. Do NOT make any decisions. Do not move in one direction – move in all directions at once. Buy every ebook and program out there on how to be successful online, and then don’t even read them. If you do read them, bounce from one to the next without doing anything. Change your mind every week on your course of action. When you’ve mastered this, begin changing your mind every day. Aim to change your mind hourly, because this is the pinnacle of failure.
Here’s the monkey mind chatter to strive for: “Should you do this or do that or do this and that or that other thing or what about this hey I could do the thing over there but whoa, what’s this? Maybe I should do this – what do you think?”
Go ahead and second, third, fourth, and fifth guess yourself silly and until your mind is numb and all you can do is veg out in front of the TV. Above all else, do NOT make one plan and stick to it – that’s the kiss of success and you do not want that.
Turing Your Obstacles Into Failures
3. Turn your obstacles into failures. Those stupid successful people are always taking their obstacles and turning them into triumphs. When their new website isn’t cutting it, what do they do? Fix it until it’s making sales, or start over and find a way to make it successful. That’s crazy! And it’s also more work, and who needs that? If you should accidentally actually DO something like building a new website, hope that it just sits there and gets moldy. That way you can heave a big sigh and say that “you tried” as you drown your sorrows in hops at the local pub.
Above all else, when you run into an obstacle do NOT take a step back and decide on your best course of action – this often leads to success. Do not decide that if this way didn’t work, there must be a better way. And do not tell yourself that you just found one way that doesn’t work, and you’re that much closer to finding a way that does work. Instead, throw up your hands, say that your Internet Marketing service doesn’t work because it’s all just a big scam, and give up.
Reinvent The Wheel
4. Reinvent the wheel. If there is already a proven method for accomplishing something, ignore that method and go invent a new one. For example, there are all sorts of ways to successfully drive targeted traffic to websites, and these methods are used every day by millions of online marketers. Do NOT use these methods! Instead, invent an entirely new method. This will take up lots of your time and probably lots of your money, too.
Plus the odds of it working are minuscule to none, so you’re almost guaranteed to fail. See how easy it is to avoid success? Simply thumb your nose at anything that’s proven to work and strike out to find an entirely new method to fail. (I have this traffic idea, by the way, which involves 3 dairy cows, a radial antenna, and a photo of a Topeka Taco Stand – I’ll let you know how it works out.)
Delusions of Grandeur
5. Indulge in plenty of delusions of grandeur. Your product is going to be the biggest thing since the iPod only it’s going to be BIGGER because even the tribesmen of the rainforest will be buying this up faster than blow darts and you’re going to get so much free publicity that Oprah is going to do a 1-hour prime time special just on you and your product and cripes, even your own MOTHER will love it, and she hates everything!
Whew. In your quest for Internet marketing service failure, feeding these festering frenzied fantastic feats of glory will take up a major share of your time. After all, if you’re daydreaming you’re not working. You’re also not looking at real-world issues. Issues of whether or not there is actually a demand for your new discount concrete billy bob beer and crumpet party statues. One of the fastest ways to fail is to devise a product no one but your desires. Then spend your time daydreaming about the fortune you’re about to make.
Besides, this is all about failure. What are you dreaming about making fortunes anyway?
Be Careless and Don’t Proofread
6. Be careless. Sure your ghostwriter just submitted the new product to you – just go ahead and launch it without reading it, right? Of course! How else are you going to miss the glaring error on page 42 or the fact that she omitted the entire key section people are dying to read?
Look, if you attend to details and make sure everything is in order prior to launch, you might actually be successful. So when your programmer sends you that new software, don’t check it, don’t click any links and do not test it. Just assume it’s good enough and start selling – you may do enough damage to your reputation to ensure future failure on a permanent basis.
Binge-Watch Netflix or Endless Video Games
7. Be lazy. Go watch TV, stay in bed, play video games, whatever. Just do NOT go to work on your business because you might actually accomplish something. Pity all those successful people who spend hours upon hours working on their business – no wonder why they are confined to making money, getting accolades and being successful. If they only knew how easy it is to fail they would just stop accomplishing stuff.
Drunk and/or Sick
8. Be sick. That’s right – how can you succeed if you’re sick all the time, right? So go ahead and eat that junk food. Stay up all night. Drink until you puke. And above all, do NOT exercise. Exercise is shown to increase your health in a thousand and one different ways, including making you THINK better.
And if you’re thinking better, you’re probably realizing this entire article has been utterly ridiculous – after all, you already know how to fail. Everyone knows that. And while it does take some effort to fail, it’s well worth it. How else can you lay on your deathbed one day, wishing you’d achieved your goals instead of being a doubt-filled, vacillating, failure-seeking, wheel reinventing, delusional, careless, lazy, sick, almost-was Internet marketer?
Do The Opposite of the Opposite
Yes, there is a #9 – and that’s to go do the OPPOSITE of all the opposites I just wrote about. Success isn’t hard – you just need to get busy NOT doing all the things we’ve just covered here.
Over and over we hear how to succeed, how to achieve our goals and dreams, and so forth. And yet, somehow most people are falling far short of those goals and dreams… Let me refresh a thought about Seinfeld The Opposite episode?
Seinfeld “The Opposite”
Now, why is that? Perhaps it’s time to do the opposite. In a famous episode of Seinfeld, George Costanza was a perennial loser who one day decided to do the opposite of what he would normally do in every facet of his life. Result? Success!
Contrarian Investing
Another example is contrarian investing – that is, going against conventional wisdom to buy when others are selling. And selling when everyone else is buying which has been known to build fortunes. And this holds true not only in investments but also in real estate.
Another example of the opposite working: Over and over we’ve been told to do affirmations to improve our outlook and our outcome. Result? If we do them a million, billion, gazillion times, they absolutely do work. But who wants to repeat the same phrases over and over 50 times a day? Not me.
Make It A Positive Question!
Now I hear that if we simply rephrase our affirmation as a question, we only need to say it a few times here and there for it to work. So instead of saying, “I’m a success. I’m a success. I’m a SUCCESS!” we now ask ourselves, “Why am I so successful?” “Why am I so prosperous?”
Go ahead and try it and you will see that it feels different than simply telling yourself you’re a success. Powerful, isn’t it? “Why am I so successful?” That’s because by asking the question, you are telling yourself to find all the reasons why you are successful. In other words, rather than you just hearing words over and over, you are now actively participating in the process. You are also putting your subconscious mind to work helping you find the answers. What a difference!
Stay Tuned For Tomorrow
I was going to write an article tomorrow on how to be successful, but I think I’ll scratch that. Instead, I’m going to write about how NOT to be successful, and we’ll see what happens. My tongue is firmly planted in my cheek as I write this, so let’s have some fun!
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s installment where I share with you “9 Ways to Be Certain You’ll Fail in Internet Marketing”… Be sure NOT to come back tomorrow to check it out, ok! 😉
Here are 6 affiliate marketing websites mistakes that are easy to fix yourself before sending to your email list. So you don’t have your own product yet and you want to make some money promoting affiliate products. If you promote affiliate products via email, there is a better than even chance that you are making at least one of these mistakes. And it’s costing you money. Imagine if every time you promote a product, you make more money. Doing this with no more effort because you stop making these mistakes – wouldn’t that be worth exploring?
1. Promoting A Product Without Knowing Much About It
Just because other people are promoting a product doesn’t necessarily mean that you should, too. If you don’t know what it is that you’re selling, it makes sense that you’re going to do a lousy job of promoting it. “Hey, buy this product because other people are buying it so it must be good.” What kind of a recommendation is that?
That’s why you want to either get a review copy from the merchant prior to launch, or buy the product yourself. Then spend time actually using the product. Pick out 3 to 5 things you love about it and highlight these in your promotion.
BONUS:
By reviewing the product prior to promoting it, you’ll discover if it’s something you want to stake your reputation on. After all, if you recommend a shoddy product, your list isn’t going to be happy and your reputation will take a hit. Promote enough shoddy products and you’ll need to change your name and build a new list.
2. Using The Same Promo Copy Everyone Else Is Using
It’s the day of the big launch and you copy and paste the same email a hundred other affiliates are sending to their lists. Do you really think your readers aren’t on some of these other lists as well? When they see you’re just a cookie cutter of everyone else, they’re going to recognize your emails as junk and hit the delete button. Even if they are interested in the product, they’re going to find other affiliate marketing websites to purchase it from. Someone who’s already used the product and can give them the insider’s perspective on what to expect.
When you write your own emails, you stand completely apart from the crowd. While the cookie cutter emails are being ignored, yours are getting read and receiving clicks. Write your own promotional emails with your own unique personality and slant. Be sincere and believe in what you are saying. You will outperform other affiliates with lists larger than your own.
3. Not Adding Value from your affiliate marketing websites
Always think of what you can add to the product to produce more value. For example, you can add a product of your own as a bonus, or do a coaching call for everyone who purchases. You might start a mastermind group. Teaching the buyers to implement what they learn in the course, Or even create a new product to give them as a bonus (which you can then sell to others.)
Always think about how you can add value to your affiliate marketing websites. Many times it can be as simple as adding a 10-page report or 5-minute video. A how-to-do something step-by-step that is called for in the product. And be sure the value you add is directly related to the product you are promoting. If the product is how to grow magnificent roses, then a report on the best places to buy rose fertilizer. That would be perfect match, while a video on how to plant asparagus wouldn’t make a lot of sense.
4. Sending Nothing But Affiliate Offers
If you want your emails to get open and read, you’re going to want to mix a good share of content. Include good content in your promotional emails. No one likes to be sold to over and over again, yet everyone enjoys getting news, how-to’s, and insider advice from a trusted friend. Be the friend, and make sure at least 2/3rds of your emails contain great info. This will build a relationship between you and your readers and also get your promo emails open and read.
5. Hard Selling Instead Of Pre-Selling
As an affiliate, your job isn’t to sell the product – that’s the sales page’s job from your affiliate marketing websites. Your job is to get your readers warmed up to the idea of what the product can do for them. When you do that 2 things happen: First, they click the link in your email that leads to the affiliate marketing websites sales page. Remember, you’re selling the click, not the product. And second, when they click that link they are interested, eager, and possibly even excited to discover more.
6. Not Being Memorable
We touched on this earlier when we spoke of delivering lots of value to your list in the form of content. When you’re known for delivering value, your emails are much more likely to be opened and read. But just having great content isn’t always enough to make you stand apart from the crowd. You also need a hook: Something that makes you memorable to your readers so that each time they see an email from you, they remember exactly who you are and why they should open the email.
If you’re like most marketers, you probably assume you already stand out because you know how different you are from other marketers – but do your readers know this? From the day they join your list, you should in some way differentiate yourself. It could be by using a nickname, such as Mr./Mrs. Overdeliverer. Or it could with your own brand.
If you have another profession, you can use that as your hook. One fellow I know was a school teacher and he still refers to himself that way even though it’s been years since he stepped inside a classroom. Another marketer is known as being unorthodox (to say the least) and yet another is known for his hair and his barefoot running. These are all hooks or associations that make them stand apart in their subscriber’s minds from all the other affiliate marketer websites sending them emails.
Employ some of these hard-fought lessons in your own marketing, and you’ll save yourself years of trial and error, and quickly get on the fast track to higher profits in your affiliate marketing business.
I have a bucket list of ideas and activities that I would like to complete. We all have a bucket list in our minds of “someday I’m going to do that”. Some people actually write down their bucket list and maybe even tape it to the bathroom mirror or they will put it on the refrigerator door with a magnet. I have a summer bucket list and a winter bucket list. The summer bucket list is definitely longer.
What is a bucket list?
A bucket list is a list of activities or things that you would like to accomplish in your life. You want to do the items on your list before you get too old to do them and before you die. It is really simple, take a piece of paper and write down five, or ten, or twenty things. Things that you want to do but, for whatever the reason you can’t do it right now. Maybe age or lack of money, or you need more education, or more experience is needed.
Start simple first.
I understand that actually writing something with a pen or pencil is kind of old school. If you want to put it on your iPhone, tablet, or computer, that will work too. Let me mention here that there is something special about actually physically writing it on paper.
Writing on paper adds a dimension of reality and something tangible you can see and feel that is different than electronic notes. Compare reading an ebook to holding a real book in your hands. The experience is different. It’s got gumption. Now write or type maybe 30 – 50 (or as many as makes you happy) ideas of things you want or wish, hope or desire to do or have in your lifetime. There are no limitations except for your imagination.
Organize your list.
Now you have your list of 100 things, and you can start to organize them into groups. This will make it easy to find them. You might have categories like a summer bucket list or a winter bucket list. Which countries would you travel to? Family vacations, or learn to do this, or acquire this particular skillset and get certified. Example: you want to scuba dive shipwrecks around the world but you have never scuba-dived in your life. Well, then you will need to learn how to scuba dive.
If you are like me, you might have to get in better physical condition before donning a wet suit. That would be quite the sight right now. Picture a seal trying to put on his own skin. If there are easier things in a grouping, put them at the top so you can do that first. This will empower you and give you confidence, and you will feel in control of your future and your destiny.
Take action immediately!
Let’s recap. You created a big, crazy list of outrageous things you want to experience. You organized them into groupings and the easiest things to accomplish are at the top. Now you need to take action immediately by figuring out what you have to do to do the thing. You might need to start a savings account specifically for that. Or sign up for a gym membership and get in better physical shape. Travel? Start researching all the things required to travel like getting a passport, luggage limitations for flying, and what documentation you need with you, and how to keep it safe.
Save the date.
Everything is ready. You have put together a game plan and know what you are going to do and the things you need to execute the plan. Time to look at the calendar and decide how long will it take to save the money, get in shape, orchestrate travel details, and finally the best time of the year to go. Put a great big “X” on the calendar and SAVE THE DATE. Choose the soonest date you think you can and write it on the calendar! Look at your bucket list every day and especially the first/ next item on the list because that is your future. That is YOUR dream! Don’t let anyone steal your dream.
Live Your Dream!
Look at your list every day! Work toward fulfilling the requirements of your next item on the list. Believe that you can do it and that you will do it and in time, you will be smack dab in that place living your dream. You are awesome! If you can dream it, you can live it.
Trying to find an affiliate marketing program that works and makes money is no easy task. Every time you turn around, there’s another guru offering a high-ticket item that will save the day and put a fortune in your pocket. But will it? The thing about selling information to Internet marketers on how to market is that they are effectively creating their own competition. Training others to do exactly what they are doing is making them rich.
Now, if you were going to train YOUR competition to compete against you and try to take away your business – would you tell them everything? No way. For that matter, would you be tempted to tell them things that were – shall we say – not exactly true? Possibly. Here are 4 common myths the “experts” would love for you to keep believing.
Long vs Short Sales Copy – Myth 1
Long sales copy always out pulls short sales copy. Not true – if you’re selling a low ticket item ($5 to $30) then short copy will often out pull long copy – especially if you state the price UP FRONT rather than trying to hide it at the bottom. If you’re selling more expensive products, then long copy does out pull short copy.
Video vs Written Copy – Myth 2
2. Video sells more than written copy. Not true – split testing of squeeze pages shows that the pages without video nearly always out pull the ones with video. Moreover, sales pages with just video and no copy tend to not do as well as sales pages with copy and no video. And a combination of the two really needs to be split-tested, because it could easily go either way. Don’t assume video sells – depending on the product and the video itself, it can hurt as much as you think it might help.
Split Test Everything – Myth 3
3. You should split test everything. Yes, as we just mentioned split testing is great – but only so long as it doesn’t slow you down. When you’re just getting started, the last thing you need is to delay your actions until you’ve split tested everything down to a science. Better to roll out that sales page today and begin making sales now than to wait until it’s perfect. Do split test, but don’t make it a priority. Taking action, rolling out new products and building your list should be your priorities. Get the money coming in and then focus on improving your systems.
Affiliate Marketing – Myth 4
4. Affiliate marketing is the way to go. Think about this – do you want to compete with a hundred or a thousand other affiliates to sell a product? Or do you want to sell your own unique product that no one else on the planet can offer? By creating your own products, not only do you eliminate the competition, but you also build a relationship with your customers. Your customers who have gotten to know you, trust you and love your products. And once this happens, then you can sell them all the affiliate products you like.
Never be afraid to question anything anybody tells you – including me. And always look at the possible motives that might lie behind a word of advice. As my grandfather used to say, “Follow the money!” If someone is teaching you how to compete with them, odds are they’re not only omitting key information – they may also be leading you astray.
Remember the life you dreamed about in your youth? The dream of being a famous rock star, astronaut, or movie star. My American dream was pretty typical for someone growing up in a mix of lower to middle-class America. I just wanted to have nice things like a nice house, a nice car, a nice boat, etc., etc., which seemed so simple back then.
What Happened To The Dream?
My question is, what happened to my American dream and what happened to your American dream? We weren’t warned of the dream stealer in our youth, so we didn’t know how to protect our dream. It wasn’t taught in the public school system that we should hold on to and pursue our American dream, and don’t let it go. Nope, just a list of do and don’ts, be here at this time, blah, blah, blah.
Day by day, as we get told our limitations, busy with our particular flavor of hobby in school whether it is sports, academics, or arts, we repetitively see or are told the costs to pursue that endeavor. We have been counseled and prepared to go to school and get a job.
Choose Your Career
As you go through school, there is the perpetual question to you, “what do you want to do when you grow up and get a job?” Or what is your career choice? Or, if you are good at English you can be a secretary or my personal favorite, an administrative assistant. and so on. Whatever you happen to be naturally gifted at there is a career for you doing that.
Now you are grown up and you have done your best to follow all the guidance of teachers, professors, and mentors you grew up with and had influenced your life decisions and now you are wondering, “what happened to my dream”?
Day by day your dream life has slipped away. A little here a little there, this is how it happens. You think that you will make so much money, and maybe you do. You get your paycheck after all the deductions that they didn’t tell you about when you were growing up.
Where Did The Money Go?
Things like taxes, health insurance, uniforms, laundry, health savings account, short-term disability insurance, long-term disability insurance, and more. You look at your paycheck and ask, WTF happened to my money? That is one example of how the dream stealer gets you.
Get Your Dream Back
What is a person to do to get their dream back? Work longer hours? Get another job? That can help in the short term but, will wear you down in the long term. Go into business for yourself, right? Be your own boss, make your own hours, and eat lunch at 11:00 am because that is when you are hungry, right?
Take The Next Step
Where do you start? Business takes money to get started. Business takes time to get going to before you make money. May or may not need employees depending on the business. All the legal paperwork, acquiring a location, advertising, website, and social media can build you up or take you down.
You have to make that decision for yourself. If you want to get the life you dreamed about as a kid and kick the dream stealer out of your life then you can begin today. Whatever you decide will be a great decision. Today is your day and you can make it great.
What’s the easiest way to make money online, without having to create a product or a sales page? Affiliate marketing, of course. 🙂 Most affiliate marketers are doing it all wrong.
So, why is it that most affiliate marketers never make nearly what they could make? Anyone has the potential to make HUGE money in affiliate marketing, yet 90% or more of affiliates make a pittance (I’ll wager the number is closer to 98%, in fact.)
Think about this: If you earn an average of $50 on each sale in a sales funnel you promote, and you make 6 sales, you’ve made $300. Sounds good, right?
But guaranteed, there is someone else who made 600 sales and walked away with $30,000.
Why did they make 600 sales when you made just 6?
There are reasons why a handful of affiliate marketers do amazingly well, and everyone else barely makes a profit.
And marketers who understand this will always have a tremendous advantage over marketers who don’t.
1: Build a Relationship
I know you’ve heard it before, but are you doing it? People buy people, not products.
If you want them to open your email and click your link, or visit your Facebook Group and click a link, you’ve got to have a RELATIONSHIP with your people.
This is so simple to do, yet few marketers take the time.
Start with a blog post that is all about you, and then send new opt-ins to the post so they can get to know you. Make the post silly, funny and most of all REAL. Talk about the stupid stuff you’ve done, the mistakes you’ve made, where you live and so forth.
You have a strange. or interesting hobby
Do you have a strange hobby or unusual taste in food? Include that. Maybe you have 17 pets, talk about them. Are you one of those people that like to work until 3 in the morning and sleep until noon? Mention that.
Reveal the real you. Not the details people don’t want, but the ones that amuse and interest. You’re looking to make a real connection, not give a resume. Tell them how the dream stealer got you.
And above all else, don’t make your life seem like a series of magnificent accomplishments. No one is going to relate to someone who turns everything they touch into gold.
But they are going to relate to the time you bought Bitcoin when it was worthless and sold it just before it took off, or the time you thought you could fly and jumped off your uncle’s barn into the manure pile.
And don’t stop with your ‘about me’ page, either. Use this relationship building in your lead magnet, your emails, your other blog posts and so forth.
Be something about yourself
Always inject a little bit about yourself. Not so much that you bore people, of course, or make everything seem about you. But just enough to keep it real.
Think about relating an event to a friend. Arerselfn’t you going to give your own perceptions of what happened, as well as tell about how you got out of your car and stepped in the mud puddle just before your big presentation?
Use this same method of personal, one-on-one friend communication with your readers as well.
Post on your blog as often as possible, and we’re talking every day or two. Encourage your list to subscribe to Feedburner or the equivalent so they know when you add a new post.
Your readers will realize you’re a real person who isn’t out to pitch them a new product every 5 minutes. And they’ll gladly read your sales emails much more readily when they know there is a real live human being who is sending them these messages.
2: Use Your Own Voice
How many emails do you receive that say something along the lines of, “Buy this product – this product is the greatest product ever – you will be sorry if you miss this – so rush right over and buy it now.”
Yeah. Same old stuff, over and over again.
There is a marketer (or maybe several, but I’m thinking of one in particular) who sells MASSIVE quantities of this exact type of emails as a swipe file to new marketers.
Like a brand-new marketer couldn’t write their own 25 word email that basically says, “GO BUY THIS NOW!”
People are TIRED of getting these emails. You’re tired of getting these emails. I’m tired of getting these emails.
Same phrases, same message, same B.S.
If you’re not going to stand apart from the crowd, then you’re going to have to share the same crumbs they’re getting.
Instead, take 30 minutes and write your own promotional email in your own voice.
No hype. Sincere and Honest
Forget hype. Be sincere. Be honest. “Hey, this product isn’t for everyone. I don’t even know if it’s for you. But if you have this problem, then maybe this is your solution. Check it out and decide if it’s right for you, because I know it’s worked like crazy for some people. And it’s on sale right now, too.”
I’ve written emails where I basically tell people not to buy something unless they really really want it or need it. “Don’t buy this if you already know how to do xyz.” “Don’t buy this if you’re not going to be doing this type of marketing.” This is only for people who want (fill in the blank.) It’s like I’m trying to talk them out of it, which paradoxically often results in more sales, not fewer.
No trickery
But the point isn’t tricking them into buying; it’s to be honest. Because you know what? That latest, greatest product you’re promoting ISN’T what everyone on your list needs. Some of them, sure. The rest of them, no.
The first time I got an email like that, I bought the product without even reading the sales letter. True story. I was just so happy that someone wasn’t ramming a sale down my throat, that I jumped at the chance to buy it.
Weird but true.
My point is, be you. Be honest. Talk to your readers as though they are your best friends and you don’t want to lose your best friends by acting like a carnival barker who is here today and pulled up stakes (vanished) tomorrow with their money.
3: Email a LOT
This is the one where people like to argue with me, and I understand that.
You’ve heard over and over again that you shouldn’t email too often, or you’ll upset your subscribers, right?
After all, every time you email, there is the potential that a subscriber will hit the unsubscribe button.
Have you considered what the potential is when you DON’T email? Nothing. No opens, no clicks, no sales… not even any relationship building.
Do you want people to open and read your emails? Then send out those emails EVERY DAY.
Here’s why:
First, almost no one will see every email you send out. Let’s say you’ve got a sale on one of your products. Don’t you think your readers might like to know about it? But if they miss the one and only email you send that lets them know, then they’ve missed out on the discount and you LOST a sale.
Email at different times
Second, send emails at different times. I opened someone’s email just yesterday, decided I was VERY interested in the new membership he was selling, clicked the link and discovered it was no longer available.
What happened? This particular marketer only sends out emails at 1:00 a.m. my time, so I don’t even see most of his emails in the avalanche of mail I get before I wake up.
Third, if you’re sending email once a week or once a month, your readers are forgetting who the heck you are. And when you finally do send an email, they think it’s spam.
Fourth, if you mail more often, you will make more money. Don’t take my word on this, just do it for one month. Send out one email per day, every day, for 30 days. Put a promotion in each one. See if you haven’t made more – a LOT more – money during that time period than during the previous month.
And by the way, I’m not saying JUST send out a promotion in each email. Make sure you have some content in there as well, even if it’s just an amusing anecdote.
4: Think of affiliate marketing as a BUSINESS
This isn’t a hobby, nor is it an add-on for an additional income stream.
Even if you go on vacation, be prepared to send out an email every day. Schedule them in advance or write them on vacation. Either way, affiliate marketing to your list is a business that you can’t just jump into when you need cash and forget about the rest of the time.
You don’t have many support issues, since the product owners handle this. No need to worry about creating products, sales pages and so forth. You don’t have to drive traffic unless it’s to build your list bigger.
With so much you don’t have to do, there’s no reason not to focus your time and energy into building relationships with your list and promoting to them every single day.
Affiliate marketing can be some of the easiest money you’ve ever made, if you put in the time and effort to make it a real business.
