The Reasons For A List
September 30, 2009
It’s funny, this business we’re in.
You build a list because you learn that it’s what you MUST do if you want to be able to make money on demand.
So people sign up to your list. Some will buy what you’re promoting, some will read and delete, some will not read and still some will email you and say “Stop send me this crap!” – LOL.
Have you experienced that too? Anyone with a list does – even those who send out ALL good content.
So let me ask you. Why do you have a list?
There’s quite a few reasons…such as, delivering content and sharing knowledge, promoting products, or both. And even as a mechanism to inform your customers of updates, etc.
But at the end of the day, in the internet marketing niche anyway, the ultimate GOAL of a list is to make money. Plain and simple. For most of us, anyway.
I bring this up because I am on a lot of lists. Some with excellent content, like Internet Marketer Duncan Carver. I have been on his list for years and I can tell you that he puts out some fantastic information. And interestingly, there’s no advertising in his emails (at least, not in the emails I get from him).
So does that mean he isn’t looking to earn some money from his list? Well, when you get his email, normally you are directed to read his articles on his blog. And on his blog are…advertisements. So his method isto keep the emails clean and get clicks from visitors to his blog. I’m sure it works nicely for him too 
Then you have those lists that are PURE pitch emails. Every one you open has something to promote. Anything wrong with that? Maybe. That is a personal preference, whether those types of emails bother you or not.
There’s 2 schools of thought for these types of lists. Get off those because they are a waste of time. Or, sign up to them and study the emails, subject lines, etc. And both are viable.
For me, I am signed up to DOZENS of these lists. But what I do is send ALL of them to one email address (not my main one). Then once every month or two, I will take some time to see what catches my eye. What makes me open one email over another. Then learn what they do. Works for me.
And finally, you have those “mixed bag” type emails. You know – a couple of content mailings, followed by a couple of pitch emails. Or, perhaps a nice combination of content/pitch in one email.
This third category is where I have been through most of my emailing days. Try to give some content, promote products and start again.
For a long while, that worked very well for me.
But I noticed a change over the past year or so.
I have noticed a drop in sales, and a rise in complaints. I know some of this is directly related to the economy this year. But I think it also relates to the amount of people coming on line today, compounded by the magnitude of marketers and their competing lists. We’re all “sharing” lists (for the most part). Trying to be unique in all the noise.
No longer does giving away good, quality information guarantee more sales or longer retention. Our market has gotten very impatient, and very distracted by all the “shiny new objects” being thrown around daily.
And here’s something else I noticed. Based on talking with many of my on line marketing friends with lists, it seems that the more they simply promote, the more money they make. Plain and simple.
Many have made a conscious decision to drop the content in their emails and just pitch. They save the content for the blogs (which, when you think about it, is what you SHOULD be doing). Hey – Google loves fresh, quality content. Why send it in an email when you can add it to your blog? Makes sense, right?
At this point, it has now become my own conscious decision to do the very same thing – content on my blogs, pitches in my emails (except in a very few of my lists targeted in other niches or my “Premium Service” clients).
There. I said it. My emails will now be largely pitching products and services while my content will go here or my other blogs.
The nice thing about this is the fact that unsubscribing is easy. I have come to the conclusion that the bulk of my lists were built to make money. So, that will now become my focus.
Hey – I gave away good stuff for years. And my sales declined. So I no longer believe that good, quality content all by itself is what will make people “know, like and trust” you, leading to more sales. It’s simply showing them more products that make you more sales.
Onwards and upwards!
Product Creation Crash Course – Lesson #2
September 4, 2009
It’s time for your second lesson in your Product Creation Crash Course. I hope you found lesson one informative and that you are ready to get started researching topics for your new information product.
This is one of the most talked about subjects in Internet marketing and can be like the search for King Solomon’s mines.
The good news is it really doesn’t have to be that difficult and you can find profitable niches with ease it just requires you to think slightly outside the box.
This step is the exact method I use to find profitable niches and is pretty easy to do!
The first thing you need to do especially with your first product is find a niche that interests you.
This is not always the case and there will be plenty of profitable niches that you do not really interest you at all, but with your first product it is a good idea to find a niche that you have some sort of interest in. It will make the job easier for you.
If you are having difficulty thinking of a good niche that you have interest in, the best thing to do is think about your hobbies.
Just think of things that you enjoy doing like cooking, playing computer games, fishing, DIY, Ebay, collecting stamps etc…
The other thing I should mention here is try not to spend too much time thinking about this as it can prevent you from taking action!
Ok, so once you have got your niche the first thing you need to do is see if it is profitable and people are looking for it!
Remember don’t spend too much time on this just think of something you have an interest in and move on to the next step.
The next thing you need to do is determine how many people are searching for your niche.
To do this you will need a good keyword tool like the one found here: http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com
There are many more that you can use and you can find them by doing a quick search for “keyword tool” in your browser. But for this course we will stick with the one above because it’s fast, free and easy.
Now, perform this test. Go to the link above and type in your main topic, for instance dog training. When you click the button you will see a list of the top keywords on that topic plus how many times the words have been searched for.
By performing this search you will be able to get a good idea if the niche you are interested in is a popular one with lots of people looking for products related to it.
Keep in mind that your niche search results should have more than 1000 searches per month at the very least 500. This is a rough estimate, but it will still give you a good idea of weather or not you should move forward in that niche.
If you did the test above you’ve seen that the top main phrases associated with dog training are:
- free dog training tips
- dog training collars
- in home dog training
- dog training collar
- dog training tips
At least at the time I am writing this. Result will vary.
So you should now do the same with the topic of your choice and pick the top 5 phrases that are being most searched for in your niche.
If you followed the above steps and your niche has less than 500 searches per month then you may want to find another because it may not be worth putting the work in to creating a product on that topic if there are so few looking for it!
So if you have a very small niche, try and think of another niche with more search results.
Once you have found a niche with a decent amount of search results move it time to move on to Step 3 where we will find out if your niche will make you money and we will cover that in your next lesson.
12 Steps to Hordes of Traffic
September 3, 2009
If you’re like me, you will definitely love the idea of attracting hordes of visitors to your websites.
But if anyone has ever told you that can get all the website traffic you want WITHOUT any work being done, then you’ve been shamelessly lied to 
If you want more visitors to your website, here’s a 12-Point “check-list” that could make all the difference for you 
But, before I begin, I urge you to read this letter till the end and there’s a BIG surprise waiting for you (hint: a shortcut?)
#1. Make sure your website is promoted every month! – Continuous exposure and search engines will start “liking” your website.
#2. Do not use “black hat” or “grey hat” tactics to trick the search engines. You may get permanently banned from search engines.
#3. Strategically choose the right “mix” of promotional activities (I’ll tell you more about this later).
#4. Get One-way “Back-Links” from other websites to boost Your Search Engine Rankings and Positioning.
#5. Write 4-5 new and original articles every month and distribute UNIQUE versions to leading article directories.(Don’t know how to write? There’s a shortcut for that below as well!)
#6. Write and distribute a Press Release about your website every month. Search engine robots are always lurking around these sites.
#7. Try to get “back-links” from other people’s Blogs and Forums in your niche. Post comments to Blogs and replies to forum threads.
#8. Start writing content for other Blogs. These are not just comments but entire ‘Posts’ for other blogs. Of course, you’ll be allowed to get a back-link for this effort.
#9. Bookmark every article, blog post, video, webpage on your site as well as the URLs of other sites where your content is appearing on all leading bookmarking sites.
#10. Create your profiles on leading social networking sites like Squidoo, Hubpages and so on. Keep them updated with new content every month.
#11. If you are not using VIDEOS, you are leaving too much on the table. Create promotional videos about your product, service or website and distribute to all leading video portals like YouTube, Google etc.
#12. Boost your credibility and bottom-line by getting leading “Authority” sites (wiki sites) to display a link to YOUR website. Add your unique content on high pagerank sites like WetPaint, LittleWiki etc.
Phew!! That’s a lot of “work”… and imagine you doing all these ‘arduous’ tasks each and every month!
Personally, I don’t want to do this… I guess nobody wants to break their head either every month.
And, who wants to do all these when there is an effective “shortcut”?
Many marketers don’t the time, resources or even the “know-how” to get all these ‘back-breaking’ tasks done.
Well… here’s the “secret” shortcut to hire a virtual team of professionals who not only do all these “tasks” for you, but do it well!:
Check it out for yourself. Let a team of highly trained professionals utilize their expertise, resources and time in promoting YOUR online business. Just image how much your sales will increase with all the extra traffic you’ll be getting.
Hope this helps.
How I Saved 80% On My PPC Costs…
September 1, 2009
Over the past year or so, I have noticed some changes regarding a few of my websites/products and traffic that can only be attributed to keywords and relevance.
What do I mean by that?
Well, keyword research and page relevance is something I never paid close attention to in the past. As a result, I would usually end up paying way too much for my PPC campaigns and have an extremely high bounce rate on my sites.
That meant spending a LOT more per sale than I should have been.
But really…who has the time to do the proper research for all of that? I sure didn’t.
When my partnet Jim took on the PPC part of my business, he showed my just how much I was tossing down the drain in those PPC costs.
He took some of the campaigns I started and ignored from an average of $0.47 per click (on various keywords in the IM niche) down to an average of $0.09 per click.
That alone is about an 80% savings.
What this did was allow me to drive as much as 80% MORE traffic for the same amount of money.
How was this accomplished?
Simply – good, solid keyword research, writing relevant ad copy and making it all tie together on my landing pages (the free ones and the paid ones).
http://www.centralnetmarketing.com/KWElite
So what’s the downside to all of that? Frankly, the time involved in researching the very best keywords for your target site. Identifying which keywords had the right amount of searches, and the right amount of competition.
At first, Jim was doing this manually – and for free – using the Google Keyword Tool.
Yes, it is a useful tool. But once we discovered this OTHER wonderful tool, man, it made life so much easier.
http://www.centralnetmarketing.com/KWElite
There’s something to be said for automation…
There’s something to be said for tools that make your life easier.
Now Jim spends his time on much more valuable things, such as the new Adwords course he is creating. More on that later…
If you are someone who balks at spending money on tools because there are “free alternatives” out there, then you can stop reading here. This isn’t for you.
But when you talk to some of the most successful people on line, in almost 100% of the cases, they will tell you that tools to automate mundane tasks are a MUST (along with outsourcing).
Brad Callen’s Keyword Elite 2.0 is the next generation to an already proven tool. I wasn’t sure he could take an already great tool and make it better…but he has.
Stop wasting your time…and start profiting more.
http://www.centralnetmarketing.com/KWElite
To Your Success,
Michael Ambrosio
P.S. More on Jim’s Adwords Course coming soon, but what I can say is so far, he has 47 videos in this package (mostly 3 – 5 bite-sized minutes). I am not sure when it will launch, but I DO know we will need some reviewers.
So, if you take advantage of Brad’s Keyword Elite 2.0 right now, I will personally create an account for you for Jims Adwords product. The same guy that reduced my PPC costs by 80%.
Think of what you can do when you use these two products together…
Just send me an email with your receipt and you’re IN!
http://www.centralnetmarketing.com/KWElite
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