Before I share my point, here’s a major update regarding this blog:

1. I am too busy on my recently launched site (not related with online marketing) so you will just see me write a new post twice or at least once a week. To make up for it, I’ll make sure to give you articles that is really informative and worthwhile.

2. I’ve been asking my other website’s visitors about their biggest problem on their online business and generating traffic comes on top of the list. So I’ll be posting more on this topic and probably would change the whole structure of the site accordingly.

I think that’s about it…now on with the topic – The New FTC Guides Governing Testimonials and Endorsements.

If you haven’t read about it yet, here’s a link to the FTC’s site: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

Before moving on, I just want to say that what you are going to read here are just my personal opinion. This should not be taken as a legal advice. I am not a lawyer and neither know a lot about laws (I’m not even based in the US!).

Before taking any suggestions, you should first approach your lawyer. Plus, if you do not agree with my site’s TOS, please leave this site now. : )

Whew…a very boring paragraph to read right? But you’ll be seeing a lot of those in the near future so you just might as well get used to it.

I assume that you have read the new guide on the link I gave you above, if you haven’t or is too lazy to click and even glimpse on it (like most people do), you can continue reading…just don’t take it out on me if your business get busted later on.

As you know, these new rules will greatly impact all online businesses that have testimonials (results-driven and income claims – yes, now you can’t use the most effective type unless you include a disclaimer that states the average typical result of  your buyers) and those that are doing endorsements and any product referrals.

Here’s what I have to say:

1. Testimonials.

If you are one of those that do use “specific” results-driven testimonials or post income claims/ proof, you should consider changing it. Unless you want to put a disclaimer after each testimonial stating the average typical result of your buyers which, for most if not all, is pretty embarrassing.

Here’s why:

No matter how good your products are, your average result will always be really really low. A really high quality product with an income proof of $5,000 per month and with customer testimonials showing a result of $1,000 in the first month, may have an average result of $00.01 or probably less.

And it’s not because the claims or testimonials are fake, its because a lot of buyers (we’re talking about 80%+ here) will not finish reading it, will not even follow the information, and will not take any action at all. I’m guilty of it…and I know you are too.

For example, this “Buffettology” book that I purchased two years ago. I haven’t finished reading it until now. I remember reading the first chapter but after that, I just put it in my pile of unfinished books. Why did I bought it? It’s because it’s the current “craze” way back then.

How many ebooks, books, e-courses, etc. do you have in your hard drive? How many of those you actually finished reading and took action til the end?

My solution:

Use other type of testimonials. The one’s that are pretty general and doesn’t convey your customer’s results like “Hey Ricz, I really love your product. Looking forward to purchase another one from you.”

If you really want to use “results-driven” and income claims testimonials, you just have to find a way to state the disclaimer and reveal what your average “typical” result really is in a way that it doesn’t devalue your product.

2. Endorsements/ Recommendations

FTC wants you to fully disclose to your website visitors the real relationship between you and the products you promote/ endorse/ recommend. If you earn any compensation from it (commissions, paid reviews, etc…), you need to tell them. Transparency is key.

My Solution:

This one won’t really affect your sales if you do it right. If you’re targeting other niches (not the make money online/ internet marketing niche), you don’t have to worry about it at all. Of course, disclose to your website visitors that what they are clicking is your affiliate link and that you are receiving a payment from recommending it. Non-IM guys won’t really mind it at all.

If you are in the make money online/ internet marketing niche, find a way to make them buy from you and not from other sources. You can do this by offering high quality bonuses that complement the product your promoting. The only way that they can get these bonuses is when they get the product from your affiliate link.

To reiterate, please don’t use this as a legal advice. Always consult your lawyer regarding this and don’t think that you can get around with this new rule. Do your best to always comply!

I would love to hear your opinions about this new rule. If you have something in mind, you can freely do so by replying below. : )

Others who read this post also read:

• August 31, 2009 -- Getting Ideas For Your First Info Product (1)
• August 25, 2009 -- How To Become An Expert In Your Niche (1)
• August 10, 2009 -- Don’t Be Sold! (1)
• August 1, 2009 -- How to Write a Sales Letter That Really Sells (5)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)

I finally have the time to write a new post! Our country has been hit really hard by Typhoon Ondoy and it needs all the help it can get. For those who wants to donate, you can do it here = Donate Through Kerygma.

On with the topic…Article Marketing 101

Before I teach you the fundamentals of writing a really good article, I’ll give you its importance first.

Why Write To Article Directories?

1. Your link or website URL will be advertised by the article directory in exchange for a short article. Depending on how much traffic does the article directory receives, you could get a lot of targeted visitors back to your site.

2. If your articles are published on article directories, most especially the most popular ones, you will be perceived as an authority in your subject. This builds up credibility and trust with your visitors.

3. These article directories allow other webmasters to republish your content on their site, provided that they include your bio box with it. Here is an example of a bio box:

Having your articles reprinted with this bio box on it will give you two benefits:

• This gives you backlinks to your site, which is good for SEO
• You will be leveraging on the traffic of the sites that have republished your article – the more visitors that site gets, the more traffic to your site

Now that you know the power of article marketing…let’s move on how to write your very first article.

Before you write your articles, make sure that is based on a really good research. The first thing to do is find out what people are searching on the net. There are several free tools out there that will do this job. Just Google search “Keyword Research Tool”.

Google Keyword External Tool being one of my favorites.

Don’t skip on this important step. Without research, you will be like shooting in the dark with your articles. All you have to do is collect a small keyword list that will serve as your guide in writing the article.

Writing Your Article

Article Headline

The most important part of your article is the headline. Make sure that your articles have a catchy headline that will increase the curiosity of the website visitors.

When writing your headlines, include your keywords on it. The ones that you collected a while back. Let’s say your niche is about weight loss.

And “Weight loss program” is one of your keywords…

Your title can be “The Best Weight Loss Program”…this is not the best title out there but it should kill those other articles that are not optimized at all.

When inserting the keyword in a headline, make sure that the exact keyword is included…without any modifications in it. Don’t insert any word in the middle, even “and”, “with”, etc…

Also try to insert the keyword as close to the beginning of the title as possible. Google gives more weight to these words, it’s called “Keyword Prominence”.

Don’t be limited to your article titles. Make use of the allowed max characters for it. Make it interesting. As for our example, we can make it more catchy with “The Best Weight Loss Program For Busy People” or something like that.

Other Techniques To Spice Up Your Article Headline

• Use the “How To” Formula – “How To Be Effective In Any Weight Loss Program”
• “Top 10″ Technique – “Top 10 Things To Look For When Choosing The Best Weight Loss Program”
• Creative Use Of Numbers – “How I Lost XX lbs. in XX days With This Weight Loss Program”

Don’t limit yourself with these examples. Try out other stuffs. Be creative!

To wrap it up, when writing your headlines, make sure that it shows a big benefit that the readers will receive, how much convenience they will get when they read your article, and has a catchy element that increases the readers curiosity.

Writing Your Article Content

There’s no faster way to finish an article than actually starting to write it. There’s so many marketers out there asking how to write an article or where to get the content if they don’t know a bit about the topic. If you want to find some techniques on how to get your article content ideas, check my post at Where To Get Your Website Content.

Additional Place To Get Your Website Content:

• Gutenberg.org – this is a site full of public domain literature, these are writings that no longer have any copyright protection on it. This means you can use these for republishing and put your name on it as if you are the author, much like private label rights but completely free.
• ExpertVillage.com – site full of how-to videos. Just convert or transcribe it into a written output.

You don’t have to write an award winning article. Just use ordinary English terms. And you don’t have to write a very long post (500 words and up), 300-400 words would do.

You want your readers to click on your link inside your bio box so don’t leave them with too much information.

Contrary to what several article marketers say about keyword density percentage, you don’t have to focus on that much. Having your keyword on your article title is enough for Google to find it.

However, there’s no harm on being on the safer side so try to include the keyword on the introduction and conclusion of the article.

This should be enough for now. I’ll discuss how to write a bio box with high CTR on my future posts and other article marketing techniques that I use on my sites.

Article marketing is also known as “bum marketing” because its really that easy (and its free). What you need to do now is write your very first article with catchy headlines and properly structured content and submit it to article directories (focus on ezinearticles.com first).

For a list of the best article directories, visit my other site here: Internet Marketing Tools and Resources.

Others who read this post also read:

• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• September 13, 2009 -- Internet Viral Marketing 101 (2)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)
• September 5, 2009 -- Instant Back-End Product Creation (1)
• September 3, 2009 -- Email Marketing 101 (0)

If you’re having a hard time getting additional traffic, then you should try out other ways of increasing the income you get from your online business. I’ve already talked about one method on one of my post which is creating back-end products and adding it to your sales funnel.

Today, I’ll tackle another method which is one of the easiest ways to make more money online in your business without directing additional traffic to your site – split testing.

The Magic of Split Testing

Split testing is very easy to do and most of the time you can do it for free (I’ll show you a free method later on). Split testing, as the name implies, takes the traffic from your site, split it and drive it into different variants (in this case your webpage) that you want to test.

What pages of your site should be tested?

You can actually test any page that you have in your site that requires an action from the visitor – this can be a simple click on a link, opting in forms, or getting them to buy your product.

Most Important Pages To Split Test:

• Opt-in Page – page where you have your opt-in form. This is where people type in their name and email address in exchange of the information you promised.
• Sales Page - your sales letter. Where you advertise your product and entice people to buy it.

Two types of split testing:

• A/B split testing – the simplest way of testing. Compares the performance of two different versions of a page. This is what I’ll discuss further on this post.
• Multivariate testing – Tests the content variations on multiple areas or parts of your web page. One page with multiple testing points.

A/B Split Testing

This type of split testing compares the performance of two different versions of your webpage.

This test equally splits the traffic you get from your site and directs it to the two versions of the web page you want to test. Version A – the original page (we call this the control version), and Version B – the page where you made some changes.

You need to use a split testing tool to do this. There are several tools and softwares that offer split testing capability but the one I use is Google Adwords Website Optimizer which is free if you have a Google Adwords Account.

If you don’t have a Google Adwords Account yet, you can sign up here. Don’t worry, you don’t have to run an Adwords Ad campaign to use its tools. Follow the instructions below to get to the website optimizer A/B split testing tool page.

1. Log-in -> Select tools tab -> more tools.

2. Select website optimizer from the set of tools.

3. Create a new experiment.

4. Choose A/B Experiment

5. Follow the instructions and complete your first split testing experiment.

This split testing tool will track the performance of each version and will tell you which of the two has a higher conversion rate.

What elements to split test?

• Content – heading, sub-heading, P.S., call to action, etc…
• Layout – position of your opt-in form, call to action, etc…
• Colors – background, font, borders, etc…
• Sizes - font, heading, sub-heading, etc…

After putting up your first testing experiment, you need to forget about it for now. Remember that you need a significant number of traffic to really determine the winner. I suggest you select the winning version after having at least a hundred conversions.

Split testing is an ongoing process. Strive to increase your conversion rate by 1-3% per experiment. This way, you increase your income without the need for additional traffic.

Others who read this post also read:

• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• August 31, 2009 -- Getting Ideas For Your First Info Product (1)
• August 25, 2009 -- How To Become An Expert In Your Niche (1)
• August 22, 2009 -- Making Money Online Is Not Just Finding the Right Opportunity (1)
• August 17, 2009 -- Getting Out Of The Newbie Stage (0)

You decided to try out making money online, you browsed the internet then BOOM! Suddendly a truckload of opportunities came banging in your door.

There are too many exciting opportunities online. With all of these stuffs, where do you actually start your money making online venture?

How does a person who just tried making money online decide what to do next? This is really difficult, most especially to newbies. More than a hundred opportunities will be presented to you, and all of these will promise you the same thing – you will make money online within the next few days, weeks, or months if you just give them $9.95, $17, $27, etc…

With these amount of opportunities, how can you make sure that you will get only the best ones? Several newbies never got their website and product up because they are stucked on this step. Some have been scammed, some have been intimidated. You just need to be careful in choosing the starting point of your online business.

Here are 10 steps you need to take in order to find that starting point or the opportunity that you’ve been searching for.

How do you find real “Making Money Online” Opportunities:

• Study and Learn – research and learn everything you can! You can start with the free 4-month subscription of my newsletter. I made it for the purpose of teaching you what works, what opportunities you should really try out and what opportunities to look out for in the future. The newsletter will save you hundred hours worth of research, filtering out all the crap and trash online.
• Invest – only put money on things that will really help you grow your online business. Those that are related and can help you achieve your goals. On my newsletter, I only put the best of the best online stuffs so you are guaranteed to receive the most value out of your investment.
• Learn the art of searching the internet – this doesn’t mean by just typing in the information you want to search on search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN). If you master the art of searching the internet, you will know its language and the exact keyword to search in order to find the precise information you want to appear on the list.
• Look for good, high quality information products – there are hundreds of these, and most of them are FREE! Start with my other website here – Internet Marketing Products. Again, only find those that are related to your goals. As always, be careful. Do not just buy into marketers selling huge internet marketing packages of ebooks for pennies. Most of these are just wasting your money and your time.
• Join in forums that are related to your business – as what I’ve talked about on one of my posts, Saving While Making Money Online, forums are a gold mine of information. Find ones that are active like Digital Point Forums and Warrior Forum.
• Know that not every opportunity is “your” opportunity – do not just jump into every opportunity presented to you. If you see that there are a lot of people being successful on it, it does’nt mean that the opportunity is also for you. Read the second bullet point, Invest, again!
• Find things that you really enjoy doing – what’s your passion? Find the things that you are really interested at and specialize in that area.

Knowing where to start and finding the right opportunity doesn’t mean that your success online is guaranteed. You have to dive in! Once you know your starting point, take action and aim, and jump to it.

Others who read this post also read:

• August 26, 2009 -- Internet Marketing For Newbies – Saving While Making Money Online (2)
• August 22, 2009 -- Making Money Online Is Not Just Finding the Right Opportunity (1)
• August 8, 2009 -- Why 95% of People Fail In Making Money Online (0)
• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• September 16, 2009 -- Where To Get Your Website Content (1)

On my last post, Getting Ideas For Your First info Product, you learned where to look for ideas on your very first info product. This product will form your front-end promotion and is the one where you will focus your marketing efforts. As also mentioned on  Looking in an Internet Marketing Guru’s Mind post, you need a solid sales funnel to really bring in the dough.

Back-end offers are high quality, high priced products that are immediately offered (one-time-offer back-ends) or offered after some time to those who bought your front-end products.

Why Create Back-End Offers:

• This instantly doubles or even triples your income without additional traffic
• People will look at you as an expert – back-end offers will give you more credibility (this depends on how you choose your back-end offer, I’ll teach this later on)
• Back-end offers are easier to sell than your front-end products since the people seeing the back-end offer already bought from you

Before integrating your back-end offers with your front-end products, you need to make sure that everything is in place and that your front-end is really doing well in terms of sales and conversion. Here are some back-end product ideas to give you a head start.

Back-End Product Ideas:

• Seminars
  • This is a live event that is either hosted by you or other internet marketers (you being one of the guest speakers)
  • You can offer free tickets as your back-end or the recording of the event itself.
  • Will boost your credibility, include photos of you and with other well-known internet marketers
• Workshops
  • One of the highest priced back-end products
  • Very limited slots – workshops are in-depth, hands-on training, much like personal coaching but with limited time to each attendees
• Teleseminars
  • A live training event that can be accessed via the internet or telephone
  • Usually focused on one particular topic
• Personal Coachings
  • A personal or over-the-phone consultation
  • A one-on-one session with a buyer
• Continuity Programs
  • Those that have monthly recurring fees
  • This can be newsletters (physical or digital), membership sites, audios or videos of the month, monthly softwares, etc…
• Softwares
  • Tools that can complement your main offer
  • Can integrate with the membership site model – this is when you charge your customers a monthly fee for the use of the software
• Home Study Courses
  • Your all-in-one solution package with audios, videos, manuals, softwares, and so on that tackles your main offer’s content in great detail

You can choose one from the list above or create your own if you already have one in my mind. Your back-end offer can also be a combination of these. After knowing what type of back-end product to create, the next question would be how to create it? The list below will show you how (don’t worry if you’re just a beginner, you can easily create your back-end product – see option 3)

Instant Back-End Product Creation:

• Option 1 – Teleseminar -> Home Study Course Package
  • When you host a teleseminar, record everything on it
  • Have the audio and video recordings transcribed
  • Gather all the recordings and transcriptions and package it to create a Home Study Course
• Option 2 – Workshop -> Membership Site
  • Launch a monthly workshop and record everything as well
  • Transcribe the recordings and add content, if needed, and upload it all to a secured member’s area
• Option 3 – Interview Experts In Your Field -> Membership Site or Home Study Course
  • This is for those who are only starting out
  • Find experts in your field and interview them
  • Make sure you mention your intention of doing the interview
  • Record the interview, have it transcribed and put it on a membership site (if you’re planning to do an interview every month) or packaged it with a home study course

There are no limit on the types of back-end products you can offer. Creating back-end products should not be hard at all, just extract that creative juices of yours and start brainstorming on ideas that you think will fit and boost the overall value of your front-end offers.

Others who read this post also read:

• August 31, 2009 -- Getting Ideas For Your First Info Product (1)
• August 26, 2009 -- Internet Marketing For Newbies – Saving While Making Money Online (2)
• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• October 3, 2009 -- Article Marketing 101 (0)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)

“The Money Is In The List”, that’s what almost all the internet marketing gurus say and you will hear it as long as you are doing online marketing. It may be a cliche, but this is really the truth. Having a big list is a major advantage to internet marketers when it comes to promoting their products or someone else’s products.

Several courses out there focus on how to build a big list…but having a big list WILL NOT give you any money online if you don’t communicate well with it.

Email marketing is one of the best free online marketing methods. However, you have to know some things in order for it to work right.

Here are some basic email marketing tips to get you started:

Avoiding Spam Filters

Email marketing is getting harder and harder these days as the information technology grows – with all the spam filters and certain restrictions of major ISPs. So having a knowledge of what triggers a spam is a really good arsenal to take along on your internet marketing journey.

1. Don’t send unsolicited email.

Unsolicited emails will most likely end you up with a major complaint and so prepare to get hit by your ISP really hard. You don’t want to ruin your reputation because of a single mistake would you?

Only send emails to people who really want your information. These are people who signed up in your opt-in form and gave you their contact information.

2. Avoid spam filters that several ISPs use.

The filters being used by these ISPs isn’t perfect. It’s only a system after all. Even if you send non-spam emails to people who opted in with you, it will likely end up being not delivered because of these spam filters.

The system have no way of accurately checking if your email is a spam or not. It targets the words you use in your emails as well as the subject line. Every system has a flaw, so is these spam filters. Sometimes, it takes a word completely wrong and mark it as a spam, even if it isn’t.

There are hundreds and thousands of words that are technically considered as “spam” words so I can’t tackle it in this post. You can, however, search for free email score sites and have them check and give your emails a score.

One example of this site is this – http://www.mailingcheck.com/spamassassin-score/.

Make Your Subject Line Stand Out

No matter how good your email content is, it will not be read if it doesn’t have a captivating subject line.

Treat the subject line as your main headline in a sales page. Make it interesting enough to get your subscribers attention. Read through some emails that you have in your inbox. Take a note of those subject lines that really get you want to open it.

One thing you have to avoid is to write a subject line that will mislead your subscribers. Do this and see your unsubsribe statistic shoot up fast.

Create A Well Structured Email Body

This is your chance to get your subscribers to do the action that you want them to do. Aside from making the body of your email informative and interesting, it should have a good structure.

Write the body of your emails as you are writing a sales copy. Include an intro, a body, and a conclusion with a strong call to action.

These are just some of the things that you should do in order to communicate well with your list. The most important step you should do consistently is to deliver high quality information with your list regularly (don’t just send hard-pitch emails!). Mixed it up with your promotions.

Email marketing is not just about making money, it’s about making a long-term relationship with your list.

Others who read this post also read:

• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• August 31, 2009 -- Getting Ideas For Your First Info Product (1)
• August 25, 2009 -- How To Become An Expert In Your Niche (1)
• August 10, 2009 -- Don’t Be Sold! (1)
• August 1, 2009 -- How to Write a Sales Letter That Really Sells (5)

You’ve done choosing your target market, finished researching it, and have chosen a niche that is profitable and unsaturated. Now, you’re ready to create your first info product!

You think the researching part is over? WRONG!

A niche marketer knows that a seemingly lucrative market may not be what it seems after doing product research. After finishing this step, you will find out your target market’s “true potential” – its value may be a lot less or a lot more than you originally thought.

Product research is one of the critical steps you should take as a marketer as it could dramatically increase your chance in dominating your chosen market. This will uncover hidden profitable niches within your chosen niche. Niche that are with  less competition but the same profitability.

Know what your market wants!

Where to get your info product ideas:

• Online Methods:
  • Amazon.com – gives you detailed search results and allows you to browse by subject, watch product trends, sort by best selling titles and more. Look for the best selling titles and subtitles of your chosen niche. You can check the preview of the book you like to based your product on and take note of its table of contents.
  • Magazines.com – provides top categories and ranks titles. Check out the best selling magazines and check its contents. What titles are doing good? Is there a niche within your target niche? Do your research!
  • Community forums – participate in forums within your niche. Know what people are looking for. What problems do they want to be solved? Make sure that the forum is active and has many members.
  • Short Course Catalogs – this is a great idea for upcoming trends. Look for online class directories like “The Learning Annex” and look for courses that are selling fast. You can also look for seminars and events as well.
• Offline Methods:
  
  • Magazine Racks or Stores – look for related magazines in your niche. See if it’s been around for some time. Check for its contents and read the articles. This can give you an idea on your product’s topics.
  • Book Stores – just like magazine stores, check for the best selling books on your local book store. Take note of the nature of how these books were titled and how you can use it to your product.
  • Passionate People - open your radar when someone talks about your niche passionately. This people can be found at parties, at seminars, or at conventions. Listen to how they talk to each other. What are the common problems they’re having and where are they spending the most bucks.
  • Television Programs – watch programs that have general interest topics. TV programs are driven by trend so watch out for something like “The next fastest growing hobby in the US” or “The next big thing in your market”.

Focus on creating one product at first. You can add some bonuses if you want, to increase its value. Bonuses such as products that can complement what you have to offer based on what you have researched.

You now have a wealth of information in your arsenal. Use it to construct your marketing plan and create an info product that will surely sell.

Others who read this post also read:

• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• August 25, 2009 -- How To Become An Expert In Your Niche (1)
• August 10, 2009 -- Don’t Be Sold! (1)
• August 1, 2009 -- How to Write a Sales Letter That Really Sells (5)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)

Most internet marketing products focus on how to make money online. If you bought an ebook or any internet marketing product, then you know already that inside each product, there’s another recommendation you need to buy in order to reach a specified income level.

Although there are some exceptions, finding the right product for someone who just learned internet marketing is not that easy. I don’t mean that you can be rich with no money invested, there’s some who made it…but its a really rare case. What I can teach you is how to cut the cost and save while making money at the same time.

How to Save and Make Money Online At The Same Time:

• Don’t buy a product impulsively! This might be common sense, but internet marketing newbies fall easy to this trap. A crappy product can sell like hotcakes if it has a killer sales copy. I know…I’ve fallen to a dozen of these craps. Ask yourself first if the product is in line with your goals and would really help in your business.
• Stay Focused! Before starting your online business, you should have created a plan and commit yourself to act on it. Don’t be diverted away from it. Don’t jump from one idea to the other!
• Check offers at http://www.warriorforum.com. If you don’t know warrior forum yet, this is one of the most active forums that are for internet marketers. This is where the gurus meet. And this is where the best and cheapest offers can be found!
• Find a bonus first before purchasing a product! Almost all internet marketing products or services have a bonus package set up by affiliate marketers. If the product or service is a high quality product, there’s a lot of bonus packages to choose from. Just Google search = “<product name> bonus”
• Subscribe to top internet marketers or the “gurus” list. I know, it really is a hassle to be in an internet marketer’s list. Being bombarded with a lot of emails a day is really irritating but some of the best bonus packages are given by them! Here are some top guys I know that really gives the best bonus packages:
  • Howie Schwartz – Google SEO and black hat traffic products
  • Eric Rockefeller – Affiliate marketing Products
  • Matt Callen – Bundled bonuses (usually softwares and membership)
  • Ian Del Carmen – Bundled bonuses (usually internet marketing related products, sometimes with rebates)
  • Anik Singal – Bundles bonuses that complements the product being sold
  • Simon Hodgkinson – Bundled bonuses (softwares, ebooks, memberships)
  • Calvin Wong – Internet marketing softwares and rebates
  • Adeel Chowdhry -Rebates, internet marketing softwares and products
  • Dave Guindon – Softwares, scripts, memberships
  • Ewen Chia – Bundled bonus, ebooks, videos
  • Mark Ling – Audios, interviews, teleseminar recordings
• Try to buy the product with your affiliate link. This is a technique that I learned from Derrick, a top internet marketer. Some affiliate programs and networks allow this. Some don’t. Read the merchant’s rules, terms and conditions if this is allowed or applicable. Try to use a credit card that is different from what you put when you signed up.
• Save on monthly costs by looking for lifetime or one-time fee memberships. There are a lot of these out there. The best that I found (starts with the cheapest) are listed below:
  • Resell Rights Mastery (Free) – http://www.resellrightsmastery.com/
  • Resale Rights World ($27) – http://www.resalerightsworld.com
  • SureFireWealth – http://www.surefirewealth.com
• Before buying the product, try to close the page of the website. More often than not, it will have a pop-up offering you discounts, trials, or other free offers.

This might not help you from making money onine but this will surely cut your online business expenses and add a lot of value to a product that you’re interested to purchase. Save and make money online at the same time!

Others who read this post also read:

• September 7, 2009 -- Where Do You Start With All These “Making Money Online” Opportunities? (0)
• September 5, 2009 -- Instant Back-End Product Creation (1)
• August 22, 2009 -- Making Money Online Is Not Just Finding the Right Opportunity (1)
• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• October 5, 2009 -- 3 Ways To Spice Up Your Sales Letter (0)

Want to be an “expert” to make a lot of sales online? Or you just want to market and brand yourself to have more exposure?

Either way, here are some steps you can follow to become an expert in any niche:

1. Find some forums in your niche and establish yourself as an expert.

Help people out. Don’t just reply, open new threads for each topic you want to tackle. Reply and post with excitement and don’t limit the content you give. Bring all you know in a forum and people will start to follow you and look up to you as an expert.

2. Flash your proof or evidence whenever possible.

When you email your list or members, include pictures of you at a marketing event. If you have a picture with a very known expert in that niche, show it to them as well. Tell them how you and a certain someone met, conversed and established a partnership.

Share your stories of success to your subscribers. Don’t just tell them that you earned this amount of money in this amount of time, tell them how you did it and how it worked. Show some proof by including statistics and income statements. You can also put this in your blog. Which gets us to number 3….

3. Create a blog with your name

Get yourself a domain name. Just like this blog of mine, RiczSabido.Com. Send your list or newsletter subscribers to it often. If you have a product of your own or have an upcoming product launch, post it on your blog as well. By doing this, you are also marketing and branding your name.

Make sure you also place photos of yourself and with other well-known experts on your blog. Strive to create a community of marketers around you by encouraging people to post comments on your topics.

4. Use a redirect tool when promoting your products or affiliate products.

When you have a domain with your name, you can promote while embedding your name on the links. For example, if your product URL is www.my-resources.net, you can brand your name with it using a redirect tool (a software or a script). Instead of www.my-resources.net, you use www.yourname.com/recommends/productname.

This is powerful and can give you a lot of great benefits. People will easily remember you because of it and most of the time, they will check your site after seeing the product you promote (this always worked for me.)

5. Associate yourself with “gurus” or well-known people in your niche.

Go attend some seminars, mingle with them and establish a relationship. You need to be genuine here. Offer assistance, hear them out, share them your thoughts, and so on…Treat them to a lunch or dinner. Remember, you’re making a friend here, not a business partner. Nurture relationships first then the partnership or business will follow!

Becoming an expert in your chosen niche isn’t that hard. It just takes time and a lot of relationship building. In today’s business, it’s not what you know that really counts, it’s who you know.

Others who read this post also read:

• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• August 31, 2009 -- Getting Ideas For Your First Info Product (1)
• August 10, 2009 -- Don’t Be Sold! (1)
• August 1, 2009 -- How to Write a Sales Letter That Really Sells (5)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)

Finding the right opportunity isn’t enough to succeed in making money online. Yes, it starts from there, but you need other essential factors to guarantee your success – the path you choose to take, your set of skills, talents, knowledge, and experience.

Your chance will greatly increase if you have all these but if you want to keep and hold that success for a very long time, these factors may not suffice. The internet marketing and online business world changes much faster than its offline counterpart. The techniques that you learned just a few months ago may not work that effectively if you implement it today.

Increasing Your Chance in Any Given Opportunity

1. Expect To Fail

Every successful business owners embrace failures. It’s part of their plan.

Failures are there to teach us to become more successful next time. Before you succeed online, expect a lot of things to happen. And that includes failing. This is a learning curve that every people trying to make money online go through.

Making a sale online is a numbers game. It takes a certain number of traffic to your site to make that first sale. That’s why knowing the conversion rate is essential for us marketers. We welcome those who didn’t make a purchase because we know that it will bring us closer to the one who will buy. You expect to fail because you know that success is just around the corner.

Several people who try to make money online get easily frustrated when their first business fails. You need to understand that opportunities are everywhere, but not all are capable of grabbing one. Finding your opportunity is a great start. However, it will take some time before you can fully take a hold on it.

You may slip sometimes, may fail and start all over again. But remember that now you have this experience to make you more capable in grabbing the next opportunity that will come.

2. Obtain Business Skills and Knowledge

You don’t need to go to school and obtain a business management degree. Educate yourself. Do your homework. Read books, search the internet for free information. It’s all there.

Having a business background is not necessary to succeed in making money online, but make it a part of your future growth. Set time aside for studying and reading business books. It won’t hurt.

3. Prioritize

Learn how to prioritize doing the more important things. Things that are going to make you money.

Several internet marketers’ focus too much on things that they think will build their business but these things don’t give them money. Instead of doing things randomly, practice to do the things that will generate income to your business.

Spend most of your time getting traffic to your site, on creating content, looking for joint ventures, building backlinks, and so on. Spend more on tasks like these, create a system and make sure that you stick to it.

4. Don’t Put All Your Eggs In One Basket

Spread your risk. You can choose the opportunity you liked the most, but build it around a structure that can surpass the change of seasons and the passing of time.

In advertising and marketing your business, use several different methods and channels to secure long term success. Don’t rely on just pay per click traffic or search engine “organic” traffic. Try other stuffs but avoid getting too spread out.

5. Learn Continuously

The only way you are going to stay ahead of the group is by keeping up with new trends and techniques. And you can only do this by learning continuously.

Invest in programs, seminars and courses that you know will help your business and make you more money online. Always read ebooks and articles, be updated with the news related to your business. Participate in online communities and ask questions.

As I said before, being in an online environment is like riding in a bullet train. What you knew a few months back is useless today. New products, new techniques and new ways of doing things will not stop coming. Stay educated and be updated. Don’t get left behind!

Several internet marketers will claim that their product is all you need to make money online. It’s your job to choose a system, know how to use it, integrate it into your online business and stick to it.

One’s failure can discourage anyone. Equip yourself with the right tools and mindset. Know that failure is essential towards success. And I guarantee you that making money online is easier than you think.

Others who read this post also read:

• August 17, 2009 -- Getting Out Of The Newbie Stage (0)
• August 8, 2009 -- Why 95% of People Fail In Making Money Online (0)
• October 12, 2009 -- My Take On The New FTC Rule Concerning Online Marketers (1)
• September 16, 2009 -- Where To Get Your Website Content (1)
• September 9, 2009 -- Split Testing Basics (2)