Whenever you speak with another Internet Marketer you’re probably likely to hear the following questions come up at some point:

Do you have a list?

or

How big is your list?

If your answer to these questions was “no” and “zero,” then this series of blog posts is definitely a place to start. On the other hand, if you do have an established list, there’s always room for improvement. I recommend that you make it a priority to continue to learn strategies for increasing your list size and also increasing the amount of income generated from it.

Having a list can literally be your ticket to earning the kind of income you dream of earning. Many marketers focus on getting to the top of the search engines to build their businesses, but having a list can literally “Google-proof” your income. If, heaven-forbid, you get dropped from the search engines tomorrow, there’s no need to close up shop – if you have a list.

It doesn’t matter whether your business is online or off; having your own list of customers or prospective customers means that you can get them to visit your website, blog, or store on command. This ability to summon traffic on command can keep your income steady through good times with Google and the not-so-good times.

Over then next few posts I will be giving you 101 tips to improve your business by list building .  The tips will be grouped by section, and include tips for list building, promotion, autoresponder copy, and making sales. Ihope that as you read through my posts, many of the tips will resonate with you.  Feel free to grab them and implement them into your business.

The important thing is that you don’t just read these tips — you have to put them into action. Whether you’re just starting with list-building or are an old pro,  applying the tips one tip per day or so,  you’ll soon understand why the fortune is in the list!

I’ll be releasing these bit by bit over then next few weeks – if you’d like to get ahead and have them delivered into your mailbox, just sign up below:

Following on from yesterday’s post I’d like to take a few moments of your time to answer the question:

Why is Jen blogging about her son’s gap year?

Well, I find that my entry into internet marketing followed a very similar path.

For several years, I have been planning on making money online.  In fact, it was probably about 10 years ago that I first heard about this “new way to make money online – called Affiliate Marketing”.  Off and on since then I’ve looked into it but always gotten distracted or gone off at a tangent.  Finally this year I knuckled down and spent time researching how it’s done, what you need to succeed and how to get started.  Call this “Advance planning”, if you will.

Finally in April, I signed up with Alex Jeffreys on his course, handed over my dosh – and began studying and learning.  My first “presence” online is this blog. I have taken some time to settle into my own “style” on the blog – having tried many different things as you’ll see if you scroll through the posts – “life and times”, promotions, “how to”, and so on. Some posts I am now not happy with but I have decided to leave them as it may help other newbies to see my development in years to come!

Since then I have learned a host of things with regard to blogging, marketing, list building, squeeze pages, etc, etc.  Not to mention the “types of marketing” – blogging, affiliate marketing, niche marketing, and several others for which I can’t come up with a “tag”.

I have also done a lot of shopping – sadly not all “window shopping”!  Several times I have followed new launches avidly – as a buyer instead of a marketer.  I have made some mistakes of buying products I cannot use or will not have the time just yet.  I think that there is a whole new world out there that the newbie gets shown and it’s like a magnificent toy shop – so many gadgets, “automators”, work savers, time savers, etc.   I have come to realise that, for me at least, good old honest hard work – or “grunt work” as the Gentle Mentor says, is the only way to go at the beginning.  Then when you have a good idea of what you’re doing and where you’re going, then automation may kick in and help.

In my preparations for making money online I have come across a few (gems that I intend to hold on to.  And the big bonus is they are all free in the first instance.

1. The Simple·ology Course.  This is “The Simple Science of Getting What You Want”.  The first level of the course that takes 40 days – each day there is a selection of video, quiz, experiment, writing, reading.  Very simple and short tasks.  It is designed to help you clear your mind, determine where you want to set your sights and to steer a straight course to achieve it.
2. Alex Goodall’s IMI Organizer .  This is a system using mind maps for organising all those 100s of reports, software, articles, etc that you download and write and then “lose” on your hard drive.  It’s a method for step by step putting an item in a logical place which is then cross referenced by subject, topic and type.  Ingenious!  I’m slowly getting my hard drive organised and, believe me, it’s much easier to find things and has reduced the number of multiple downloads I do!
3. DavidWalker.TV I have been following David’s blog for some time since coming across it while on my course.  A few weeks ago, David offered to give 3 people a one-to-one on how to decide what to write in your blog.  I was lucky enough to be chosen as one of those people and David gave me nearly a whole afternoon – I don’t think he intended to but with interruptions, etc, it ran to that!  I had mentioned that I wanted to home in on Affiliate Marketing so that was what my one-to-one was about.  This really helped me – not only to come up with ideas for blog post topics but to focus my attention from all the available options to this path.
4. The Gentle Mentor – aka Gary Bacchett.  He runs a 3 times weekly “chat room” using the webinar software.  He goes over the basics of internet marketing, highlights useful products, answers your questions, you can show him your screen – using screen- sharing, and much more.  And all for free!

And so my “real” journey begins!  I plan to get my head down – finish the Simple·ology course, finish getting my hard disc “IMI Organized” and firm up the plan for my posts as per  DavidWalker.TV’s brainstorming session.  I’m really looking forward to it!

I’d love to hear how you got into blogging, what your sights are set on and how you are doing in getting there.  Do leave a comment below.  Thank you

My youngest son has just departed for his Gap Year project in South Africa and it has been a hectic time getting everything sorted.

For several years he’s been thinking of taking a “gap” year after finishing high school and before going to university.  First he did a lot of research into what he’d like to do, where, how and who with.  Then he picked a company – asked them lots of questions and finally handed over his dosh for the travel, accommodation, etc.  Advance planning showed his passport was valid but he needed some vaccinations – so he got those under-way.

Then there was a period of waiting, continuing his studies and sitting the final exams.  Finally that was all over – and, yes, he did really well and got the grades to get to the university of his choice.

Now we started the preparations in earnest!

We sat down and listed all the things he was likely to need – camera, backpack, toiletries, clothes, etc, etc.  Then we did some research – window shopping, comparing prices, features, trying samples.

At this point we stopped and took a checkpoint. We looked at the budget and revised the list of “needs” in the light of the available cash!  I can tell you that some things quickly turned into “nice but not essential” in the light of our “research”!

The next phase was actually acquiring the items required and keeping them somewhere safe, all together, so that when it came to packing we wouldn’t waste time hunting for them – or worse, losing them and having to buy a duplicate.

At last, after a few last minute scrambles it was off to the airport with a carload of friends for the great departure!

Good luck, son!

Now, you may be asking:  “Why is Jennifer blogging about her son’s gap year?”

I’ll tell you tomorrow in my next blog post …

Step by Step Guide to Contribute to a Giveaway

Well, I got so many questions to the last post that I thought, rather than answer each individually I would pop up another post to spread the word. Hence this follow up post. Now, if you have other hints and tips or advice about the autoresponder, graphics, promoting, etc, etc, PLEASE leave a comment and we can together build a “How to” on contributing to a joint venture

When you are a contributor to a giveaway you hope for 2 things:

• subscribers
• sales

Subscribers: will be the people who request a gift/special offer through the appropriate squeeze page

Sales: will be when people buy you upsells, special offers, click on affiliate links

But all this needs preparation! Before hand – away from the giveaway, you need to prepare a “package” for each gift/offer consisting of:

• Squeeze page – Advertise your product and have an opt-in box
• Upsell page – Something related that you can sell for a low amount $7-$15/17 works best
• Thank you/Confirm opt-in request page – use a customised one if possible rather than the standard autoresponder one.
• Download page – Be sure to make the download link prominent (or say it’s at the bottom) and put “Unannounced bonuses” here – put some of your affiliate product links with their graphics
• Autoresponder list – I’ll talk Aweber because that’s what I’m using but I’m sure you will be able to translate into your own autoresponder. More of this later.

Upload all this to your server. I tried putting all the gifts in one folder, the thank you pages in another and so on. But it’s quite a jumble, so I think I may re-arrange it to have one folder per gift. Unless I decide to share download pages – more of that later!

Once you have all this set up on your server – test, test, test. You don’t want anyone getting lost, missing your offers, not seeing your graphics, etc, etc. Sign up for your gifts, take the upsell, refuse the upsell, download the product – do the whole bang shoot just to make sure you don’t disappoint your subscribers on the big day.

Then when it’s all ready – look for a well-respected giveaway and sign up as a contributor.

There is a step by step process for adding your gifts. You specify the gift title, copy advertisement, graphic location and squeeze. The copy ad is really important as that is what draws members to your squeeze page, so take a little time to do this for each gift. Then depending on your “allowance”, you may be able to add a OTO and/or text ads. In each case the gift or offer are marked as “pending” until they are approved by the giveaway host.

The OTO is just like your gifts except you set a price for it – again – I’d recommend not putting up something of high value – after all, members signed up for free gifts so haven’t come with their credit card in hand – but they may have some readdies (translation:small amount of “cash in hand” ready for emergencies!). This offer is shown in cycle with other offers when anyone logs in to the giveaway. You will probably see a different one every time you log in. If you don’t want the offer, scroll to the bottom of the page and click the “No Thanks” button – and often you have to click an “OK” button too!

Your text ads are just that – 50 characters to promote a link plus the link. Again, a catchy title and judicious copy make all the difference! The ads are cycled along the top of the login page. If one catches your eye, click on it before you go to the next page – a refresh or back results in a new set of text ads being displayed and you may have to wait a long time for one you saw to come around again!

Above all, keep track of which giveaways you’ve signed up for, the dates, whether you upgraded, which gifts you are offering, etc. Otherwise it can get very confusing. There is software out there to do it. I haven’t tried it yet. When I have I will update this post.

Autoresponder Setup (Aweber)

Since “the money is in the list” you need somewhere to build an efficient, safe, available list. Aweber costs $1 to join for a trial and then from $19 per month. It has really good help pages on how to set everything up, so I won’t give specific instructions here. Suffice it to say – you must have an autoresponder if you are going to sell on the internet! Now, up ’til now I’ve had one list for each gift but that has put me in a quandary when it comes to follow up/relationship building e-mails.

• Do I add all the messages to all the lists? Very time consuming.
• Do I send different messages to all the lists? Also time consuming
• Do I use Aweber’s Campaign Sharing feature? Then you seem to lose any follow-up messages you originally saved to the list.

Well, I have come up with 2 solutions. “Come up with” should be translated to “have been suggested” by good friends and really great internet marketers!

1. Set up separate lists but also set up “master” lists. Either all subscribers or, better, by category of interest of your subscribers. E.G “Affiliate”, “blogging”, “list building”, etc. Then set up an Aweber automation rule to put subscribers both on the gift list and the master list. Instructions for this can be found at
2. Set up one list for all the gifts (with maybe another for the OTO since these customers have bought something from you). Then, on the download page you include a link to ALL your gifts, so you only need one download page and can send everyone there. This serves 2 purposes. Firstly you don’t get duplicate sign-ups if people want more than one of your gifts and, secondly, people love you because you gave them extra gifts and, thirdly, more of your lovely gifts are despatched into the ether – great if you have one stuffed with your links.

At the time of writing I’m having great success in the Ultimate Blogging Giveaway with things set up so I don’t want to change anything mid-flow (remember the test, test, test, bit?) But I’m busily getting my folders sorted on my server, getting the “packages” set up for the next giveaway. The one I’ve chosen is the Ultragiveaway which runs from August 27th to September 3rd – giving you a week to get your “gift packages” ready. If you don’t already have products I’d go for PLR products.

Products

At the time of writing, I haven’t had time to produce my own products – I’m so busy learning the ropes and ins and outs of internet marketing. So, rather than getting bogged down waiting until inspiration comes I have used PLR products. These are Public Label Right products that someone else produces and gives or sells to you. You can then often modify, rebrand, personalise, etc and hey presto, you have your own product!! I get PLR products from giveaways and from PLR membership sites. There are several free sites like Resell Rights Weekly and ProIMSolutions, but one of the best is Jimmy D Brown – you get a whole bunch of stuff for blogging, PLR minicourses and reports all for under $100.

Or you could pop over to the PLR-Giveaway, which never closes it’s doors to contributors and members alike.

The way to use the PLR products has been outlined very well in a blog post by my friend Keith in his blog post “Sell your PLR products”

Finally

Subscribers can start appearing on you lists as soon as your gifts are approved – bear in mind that some contributors will be interested in your products too so you may get some opt-ins even before the launch date of the giveaway.

Have I missed anything? Have you got an efficient way of doing any of this? Do tell!

(Update: Sadly this event has now closed it’s doors. My subscriber list grew by about 100 which constitutes a success in my book! I’m leaving the post here as it’s part of my Internet Marketing Journey.)

The Ultimate Blogging Giveaway is going to be THE event of the summer.

This past week I’ve been learning a lot about giveaways. I did try one JV giveaway back a while and got a whole 5 subscribers! I was disappointed and thought that if this was all one got – I couldn’t see what all the fuss was about! Then Gazzman (aka Gary Simpson) posted his nearly-daily sign-ups and I found them stunning! That giveaway has now finished and I’ve been looking around for another to have a go – but not too soon! That’s when I was recommended to the Ultimate Blogging Giveaway

The winning formula behind every mega successful giveaway event is:

A Reputable Marketer + A Unique “Twist”

Well, What about…

Another exclusive giveaway run by Stephanie Mulac, featuring the HOT, HOT topic of…

BLOGGING!!!!

THAT Equals:

The Ultimate Blogging Giveaway!

And no worries – if you don’t think you
have a suitable gift…
Creation Solutions
Blogging has become darn near universal and people who blog need all types of gifts like:

* PLR Packages
* Article Marketing Tips
* Graphics, Themes & Plugins
* Product
* Affiliate Marketing Techniques
* Video Creation
* And so much more!

You know I’m highly selective these days about
the giveaways I join and promote…

So I encourage you to see for yourself why this event is guaranteed to make all others pale in comparison!

No hesitation on this one – Stephanie’s done it again!

Signup FREE as a Contributor right here:

The Ultimate Blogging Giveaway

If you want MAXIMUM Exposure for minimum “scratch” – I strongly suggest you consider one of the optional upgrades here too:

To Your List Building Success!

This is where I started… so I thought to share it with you too

Make Money Online? Step by Step with Niche Profit Classroom

Niche Profit Classroom 3.0 (NPC3 for short) is an Internet marketing course teaching you how to make money online by following a blueprint for building ’under-the-radar’ content-rich niche websites that don’t look like they sell anything at all but work on autopilot to bring in income. The course takes the form of a membership site which you join and pay a monthly subscription which is currently $67 but you can trial the course for 14 days for just $1.

Make Money Online with Niche Profit Classroom

Niche Profit Classroom 3.0 shows you how to start a business in which you drive organic and free traffic to your websites where you have valuable content and the option to purchase further information products in the form of ebooks. Niche Profit Classroom 3.0 trains you how to create these websites even if you are a beginner. You get full support and software tools to really help you accelerate your learning as well as access to forums where you can ask questions to other Niche Marketing Classroom members.

Inside Niche Profit Classroom 3.0

When you enter NPC 3 for the first time it can be difficult to know where to start – there is so much training and software, and a host of sections that it could be confusing, but Adam has recorded a roadmap video. This introduction video will walk you through the members area, explaining where to start and what to do first.
Typically the best place to start next would be to follow the Acceleration Program which takes you step by step from start to finish of building a niche website, indicating which of the core training videos should be watched at each stage. Read the rest of this entry