Exciting Affiliate Marketing Ideas That Anyone Can Use

Selling and marketing someone else's service or product online is called Affiliate Marketing.

It can be difficult for novices to start with affiliate marketing, but useful advice is out there to help you get started and succeed.

Here are 16 tips to help you achieve success.

 

1. In order to increase your income, you must increase the number of subscribers to your site. Split testing is an effective way to determine best methods since it offers different web pages to different groups.

2. One way to improve the success of your affiliate marketing efforts is with a blog that you update on a regular basis. 

Blogging allows you a forum in which your customers can be informed about various products.

3. Use emphasis tools when you are creating text for your website. Emphasize a word by bolding or italicizing it. This can improve clarity and direct the focus of the reader.

4. Make several different links throughout a site, but then create a central hub. You should look to have a structured page that offers a good variety of products and services.

5. One interesting way of doing affiliate marketing for your site is taking advantage when it comes to image searches. 

Adding relevant images to your website can drive up interest in your content by exposing your website outside of text searches alone.

6. Find something that can serve as your niche and will give your site a unique quality. This detail should have the power to attract site visitors to your website in search of your products or services. 

The visitors then usually end up checking out other parts of your sites which eventually sends it up the search engine rankings.

7. Determine who comprises your intended audience, and how to most effectively entice them to visit your site. 

When you know your target audience, you can have an easier time gearing content specifically to drawing them in.

8. Deciding what direction to take your website and business can be a daunting task. Eliminate sites slowly until you are down to just one, which would be the one you go with. 

Before creating a website, find a niche that suits your business and personality. Marketing your website will be easier when you have a definite goal.

9. Any service or product benefits from catch phrases promising that it provides instant gratification. 

Highlight how easy it is to submit an order, how quickly the order will be shipped, or the short amount of time it will take to notice results from using the product or service you are offering.

10. The internet has made doing business an anonymous affair. This is an especially effective tool for small and independently owned businesses who rely on personal selling and relationship marketing to create customers for life.

11. Try adjusting content and content delivery so that customers feel like they’re in control. This is important today in a marketing world full of spam and unwanted opinions.

12. Add content in the form of a blog or forum to prevent your website from becoming boring or irrelevant. 

Feeding the search engines original content is key. Without it, your site will drop in the rankings. 

Adding a blog is an easy way to add fresh content consistently.

13. It is vital that you track your numbers closely. This could include website traffic, sales, refunds, conversion, referrals, and just about anything that could be measured. 

By keeping track of these vital statistics, you will be able to plan future changes and additions to your website based on past experience.

14. If it seems like a hassle to offer many different payment options, just remember that every one you set up is going to increase your number of sales.

It may seem acceptable to only accept credit cards, but it is smarter to allow people to use checking accounts and online systems like Paypal.

15. Incorporate a “chat” option within your website so that visitors can exchange information and interact together. This really allows you to play to the social context of the Internet.

16. To do well at Affiliate Marketing, a marketer has to do research and attack the situation with dedication. Choose a trustworthy admirable online mentor.

People who know how to effectively market on the Internet often provide free tips or online tutorials. You should thoroughly research your endeavour before deciding it is something you will stick with over the long haul.

It may start slowly, but it is definitely worth the time you put into it.

12 Top Tips For Affiliate Marketers

Affiliate marketing is a great way to make money online. It involves promoting products or services and getting a commission when a purchase is made via your referral. 

Here are 12 of my best affiliate marketing tips.

1.   Focus on relationships first

Affiliate marketing is all about trust. When a friend recommends a product to you, you listen. 

Not so much when just any old Joe does. In fact, if you’re like me, it makes you skeptical.

2.   Focus on building traffic next

More traffic means more eyeballs and therefore more people who will potentially buy the product(s) you promote. 

Make your traffic count by building trust first.

3.   Choose products that help your reader solve a problem or address a fear

These are excellent products to promote as readers are more likely to spend money on them.

4.   Promote wisely

Promote products you can genuinely recommend, preferably because you’ve used it yourself, or because you can confidently promote it based on solid evidence that it’s a good product.

5.   Promote products you are already using

When I started this blog, it was a no-brainer to sign up as an affiliate with Bluehost since that’s the hosting company I was already using myself.

Food blogger? What’s your favorite cookware? Write a post about it. 

Craft blogger? What’s your favorite crafting tool? Write a post about it.

6.   Review your old posts and look for affiliate opportunities

Have you ever mentioned a product, perhaps in passing, that you use? Maybe you didn’t even think about it at the time, but is there an affiliate program for it? 

Find out (just google “affiliate program [product/company]“) and update those posts with your affiliate links.

7.   Think of what your readers will realistically buy

You have to know your audience. If your blog is mainly about living frugally, they’re probably not going to buy luxury products.

8.   Think of how much your readers will realistically spend

When I was writing my ebook, I was stuck on pricing. I asked around for opinions.

Surprisingly, a number of people suggested I price my ebook at $47! The idea behind this was to price according to value, not size. But in my mind it was crazy.

My network was composed of a lot of stay-at-home mom bloggers, many deal bloggers and my collective audience was comprised mostly of people without a whole lot of disposable income.

I knew there was no way anyone was going to pay $47 for my 30-page ebook.

9.   Don’t just promote products that don’t cost a lot

If there is a truly useful product that’s on the pricier side, it can still be worth the promotion even if only a few people buy it.

If it’s a product of exceptional quality and a good investment (i.e. KitchenAid Mixer), or if it’s a product that’s unique, specialized or one-of-a-kind (and you’ve used it yourself), go for it.

10.   Think of when your readers will realistically buy

Maybe you should avoid holidays (when people are away from their computers, like July 4) or maybe you should target holidays (like the day after Thanksgiving), but know the difference.

11.   Promote products within a post, not just in your sidebar

Include your personal experience with the product. Your own photos of yourself using the product are excellent.

12.   Be honest

Talk about what you like a don’t like. Be fair and build trust. It will serve you well later.

Sarah Staar has a new video training course on affiliate marketing. She has given me permission to Give Away a complimentary copy to all my readers.

CLICK HERE to get your free copy

4 Ways to Use Twitter Lists

Whether you are using social media for business or for personal use, there is a need for organization.

Google Plus has circles. Facebook has Interest Lists. Pinterest has boards. Twitter has Twitter Lists.

There are many ways you can use Twitter Lists – it’s really the only way I can use the platform.

It doesn’t matter if you are following 100 or 10,000 people, using Twitter Lists will help you use the fast-moving platform. Here’s how -

1. You can segment who you are following.

Lists make it easy to know who you are following for what purpose. You can set up a list of your influencers so you don’t miss their tweets or you can set up a list for potential clients you are following to build that relationship.

These lists can be public or private, so if it’s competition you’re following, the world doesn’t have to know.

2. You can organize who you really want to follow.

When you add someone onto a list, you will see all of their tweets. I know there are some people you follow just to follow or you followed back out of obligation.

For example, I have a private list of people who I want to keep up with and never miss out on. People on this list are industry leaders, celebrities and friends.

Another example – I have a client who’s a professional athlete. We have lists set up to follow his college teammates and pro teammates along with one for media outlet.

Lists are a great way to keep up with the follows you love most.

3. You can use lists as a lead generation tool.

As I mentioned above, your lists can be public. If they are, other people can subscribe to them, meaning they can follow that list as well.

This is a GREAT opportunity to generate leads. Here is one way you could do this – create a list of industry-related people who put out quality content.

Share it with the message “Love my content? Subscribe to my _________ list & see who influences me!”

As people subscribe, add THEM to a private list of people who appreciate obviously appreciate your work and start communicating with them.

Build that relationship. Answer their questions. You’re generating a lead as you go.

4. You can keep up with people that you don’t necessarily want to follow.

Yes, that is right. You can add people to a list without actually following them.

Until you hit Twitter’s magic number (which is around 2,000 followers), you have to watch your follower/following ratio.

If it gets too out of whack, then Twitter will not let you follow anymore people until a certain number of people follow you back.

This is a great way to follow people who you know will not follow you back. 

For example, celebrities. I would LOVE for Jimmy Fallon or Aaron Murray to follow me, but I know they won’t.

There are on a list for me to keep up with but not actually follow.

You can get super creative with Twitter Lists. How are you using them?

Mandy Edwards

How to create headlines that would make Dr Evil proud...

Let me ask you a question... What was the last headline you clicked on?

It may have been an email title.

It may have been a blog post.

It may have been an article.

It may have been a Facebook share.

Now let me ask you — WHY did you click on this headline?

The answer is that there was something about the headline itself – that intrigued you.

Or made you laugh.

Or made you curious.

Or aroused curiosity inside you.

Being able to create zippy headlines to use in blog posts or marketing emails – is a very POWERFUL skill to have.

But now — it has suddenly become 1000 times easier.

Let Chris Farrell show you in this 3 minute video.

And to see the Portent’s Content Idea Generator for yourself (yes I know it’s a strange name) — click here

25 Habits Of Happy, Healthy, Successful People

Who among us doesn’t want to be a happy, healthy and successful human being? 

Still, it can be easy to lose your way, which is why I’ve compiled a list of habits you can use to help reach your goals.

So what is it about happy people that makes them the way they are?

Below are just some of the ways they separate themselves from the rest of the crowd.

1. They don’t hold grudges.

2. They think outside of the box.

3. They go by a routine and make exercise a part of it. It takes practice to develop healthy habits and stick with them. Once you do, your internal foundation will be strong.

4. They have a supportive tribe, thereby not wasting time with negative or toxic people.

5. They don’t care about what other people think. Does a tiger lose sleep over the opinion of sheep?

6. They don’t people please.

7. They see difficult and challenging situations as opportunities for personal growth.

8. They consider handling rejection a skill and are resilient.

9. They make time for themselves. Whether it’s getting eight hours of sleep every night, finding 15 minutes to read the newspaper in peace or an hour to go to the gym, they make it a priority — just like everything else. When you take care of yourself, you have a bigger impact on others.

10. They are spiritual. This doesn’t necessarily mean religious. It could mean setting aside time for reflection through yoga or meditation.

11. They practice deep breathing.

12. They know there isn’t such a thing as “having it all,” and they’re happy about that. Wouldn’t the world be a boring place for them otherwise?

13. Fear doesn’t hold them back. They’re ready to take risks.

14. They know how to say “NO,” and don’t hold back. These people have learned to set boundaries. Plenty of them.

15. They learned a great deal from other people whom they admire. Either they had a great mentor, or they took note of how those they aspired to be like handled various situations.

16. They follow their inner guidance. Not only do they have a vision, but they follow it.

17. They give without expecting anything in return.

18. They aren’t pretentious or conceited.

19. Passion is what drives them. They authentically believe in what they’re doing.

20. They don’t complain.

21. They live by their core values in both their professional and personal lives.

22. They’re happy to swim against the tide.

23. They finish what they start.

24. They don’t compare themselves to other people.

25. They want YOU to succeed, too.

Old School Marketing in a New Cyber World

The old school ways of marketing may have fallen to the side... However, those principles are still alive and kicking.

Marketing is the act of trying to persuade people to purchase goods or services from your particular business.

In the beginning, the channels of media that were used were print such as; catalogs and newspaper or magazine advertisements and in broadcast such as; radio or television advertisements.

This type of advertisement has been very effective in the past. However, now in a world of connectivity at your fingertips marketing has become a bit more complicated.

Now, advertisers are incorporating this effective old school way into the new world of cyber marketing.

Blogs, social media posts, videos, and websites have now replaced print and broadcast. 

However, even in a new cyber world, marketing is still basically the same principles.

The Four P’s of Old School Marketing

These “Four P’s” are as follows:

1. Price
2. Product
3. Placement
4. Promotion

Following these four P’s were very successful in the non-internet world of marketing.

They created a customized need for the product by emphasizing or deemphasizing certain portions of their product or service, making the customer feel like they, personally, needed to purchase the advertised item or service all while being company-centric.

That’s why some companies, such as Crisco, for example, do not have to spend any money on advertisement. 

They built a name for themselves long ago and are now trusted, which means they just coast on through. 

These four P’s have been replaced now that we are in the age of technology.

The Six C’s of Today’s Cyber Marketing

These “Six C’s” are as follows:

1. Consideration
2. Consumption
3. Contact
4. Conversation
5. Contact
6. Community

These six C’s are centered around the consumer. With the reaches of social media, it is easier than ever to establish contact with your consumer, communicate with them in a more personal way than could be done ever before and build a community around them.

Consumers want to feel valued and appreciated, especially for being loyal to a product or company.

Social media allows for both positive and negative conversation which can help with marketing (by consumers link sharing or leaving good reviews) or can help the company to maybe fix or change some things that will make their customers happier.

The whole reason behind all of this is to make loyal customers that are going to, essentially, sell your product or service for you by recommendations.

Modern Day “Permission” Marketing

Permission marketing is a simple way to allow consumers a choice as to whether or not they want to be advertised to.

If they have an interest in your product, they can come to you. This is a very effective way to market, not to mention, probably the most inexpensive.

Simply by requiring a consumer to like and share your social media pages or asking them to join your mail list before they can get full access to your site’s content, gives the consumer more control.

More choices. If a person is very much into what you are selling, they will have no problem completing these tasks. 

If they do not want to, they don’t have to, they just cannot receive an entry to your contest or giveaway or read all the valuable information posted on your website.

Consumers, these days, appreciate this approach to the alternative type of marketing.

Old School “Interruption” Marketing

Just as the name implies, interruption marketing is the act of interrupting the consumer to sell them your product.

Ways interruption marketing is used is through television and radio commercials, as well as, everyone’s favorite middle-of-dinner telemarketing call.

These tactics interrupt the consumer who is watching their favorite show, listening to their favorite music or eating a meal with their family.

Many times consumers have zero interest in what these advertisements are for and sometimes it even turn them off from a particular product or company.

Not to mention that studies have reported that for the amount of money spent on this type of marketing versus its effectiveness, it is considered a complete and total waste.

Push Marketing

Push marketing is also known as outbound marketing. This type of marketing includes telemarketing calls, advertisements via television, radio and print, as well as unsolicited junk mail, either e-mail or standard mail.

This goes hand in hand with interruption marketing. The modern consumer does not care for this old school form of marketing.

They do not have time for such things and they can begin to come too often and in too much of a volume that consumers begin to just ignore it all together.

It has become extremely ineffective and probably loses more customers than gains new ones.

Pull Marketing

Just like push marketing goes hand in hand with interruption marketing, pull marketing goes with permission marketing.

Companies with this consumer-centric approach simply make themselves and their products easy to located in an internet search and allow the consumer to come to them.

This is considered inbound marketing. Companies can utilize many avenues to achieve pull marketing such as; blogs, social media outlets (such as Facebook or Twitter) and of course an informative, helpful and well-designed website.

Conclusion

It’s obvious that a lot of the old school marketing tactics are now defunct and have no place in this modern world of technology and instant accessibility.

Companies need to shift their focus of the center of their marketing campaign from company-centric to consumer-centric.

Companies need to refocus their efforts to make a uniquely personalized experience in a community setting in order to reach and keep consumers.

Some companies, whom have been around for many years, find this change in marketing unsettling.

However, slowly most are coming around. Companies are beginning to realize that without some sort of internet presence, things may go down for them rather quickly and they are chancing the future of their company and products by not being available on the web.

With the rate that technology is advancing, the ways of advertisement and marketing are going to continue to change rapidly.

Keeping the good parts of old school marketing such as, authentic, interesting, helpful content on your website is still very effective.

However, using different channels on the web such as Facebook and blogs to get your information out, is going to be how to draw customers to you.

by Sean Donahoe

5 Cool Twitter Marketing Tips For Your Brand

Twitter and other social media platforms are great ways to keep in touch.

What started as a purely personal platform for people to re-connect with friends and family has today become a marketing tool for business, small and large.

Businesses are literally hustling up to get attention on social media platforms and leave their mark on people.

There is no doubt that Twitter is a great marketing tool for businesses and taking the right steps is the only way to get noticed.

But what are these right steps? In this article we will be looking at a few great ways to use Twitter for marketing.

1# Focusing on How To Use Search Results

Search function on Twitter works in a slightly different manner. For example when we type keywords in a search engine, we get any/all results related to the words used.

You would expect the same for Twitter however this isn’t the case. Twitter lists results when ‘all’ the keywords are present in a single tweet. Now, that’s not very helpful, isn’t it?

To avoid this you can use ‘the/or’ in between keywords while searching on Twitter. 

The use of these words tells Twitter that you are searching for one or the other term from the keywords.

2# Creating a ‘Special’ List of Followers

The idea of using Twitter for marketing is to follow certain kind of people/organizations. Similarly you would want that section of people to follow you who would add to your business in some way or the other.

Twitter allows you to group people based on similar characteristics, functions or interests. You can set these groups to be private or public.

With the help of the group, you can monitor your competitors, ideally on a private list, and flaunt your brand advocates on a public list.

There are other advantages of using groups – you can attract more people to your profile as your group listing can/will attract others.

You can also aim to become an authority in your field when your community starts trusting the information you tweet.

The twitter account of Moz, Unbounce, ChameleonJohn, Brandingly etc are living proof of this.

3# Images and Videos Should Never Be Neglected

Images and videos boost the chances of re-tweets. We are not merely saying it but we are quoting from a research done by Twitter which reveals that adding an image to a tweet boosts re-tweets up to 35% and adding a video boosts results by 28%.

The reason for this is quite simple. People get a sense of engagement when they see their pictures/videos getting appreciation in the form of re-tweets.

Twitter is integrated with video-sharing sites such as YouTube and Vine (owned by Twitter) which makes it easier to upload videos as tweets.

4# Communicate With People

There is a very popular saying about marketing – ‘people don’t talk to brands, they talk to people’. Twitter should not be seen as a medium to only give out information, in a top-down method.

Twitter should be seen as a channel to strike a conversation. Ask a question, incite your followers to reply, put across your opinion once they reply and make things personal.

Customers should feel that their favorite brands are listening to them too and not hammering them with information.

The advantage of using social media for marketing is that it helps brands connect to their customers in real-time, something that other mediums haven’t offered.

Use it wisely and communicate with people.

5# Use Analytics to Measure Engagement

It is one thing to follow the above mentioned tricks for marketing your brand on Twitter but it would be equally foolish to think your job is done.

Unless you keep a track on how your tweets are affecting your target audience, you wouldn’t really be making any progress with your marketing.

You need to measure the reach of your tweet. You can use the analytics feature which gives insightful statistics about your account.

However, the catch is that you have to sign up to Twitter Ads for accessing analytics. However analytics is free.

Social media, especially Twitter has had a huge impact on business and the above are tried and tested methods. 

Of course, there are many more tricks to use Twitter for marketing and the web is filled with resources for you to check.

There are several Twitter automation tools available nowadays CLICK HERE to discover the one that worked best in our testing. 

How to Build Your Email List: Taking Your Business to the Next Level

What are you going to do to get more subscribers? Your income may depend on it!

Despite what some “experts” may tell you, email marketing is still alive and well. For most online marketers, the majority of your income will come directly from your list of subscribers.

Get Started Today For Only $1! - AWeber Communications

According to McKinsley & Company, Email is almost 40 times better at acquiring new customers than Facebook and Twitter.

Not only that, but it’s economical as well. MarketingSherpa found that companies sending over 100,000 emails per month see a 94% return on investment.They also found that companies sending under 100,000 emails per month see a 139% return.

That’s absolutely amazing, I know, but none of this could be possible without gaining subscribers and building your email list enough to profit from. That is why today I am going to show you a simple method that will allow you to gain more subscribers and inflate your email list like never before!

Creating the Incentive

In order to gain new subscribers to your list, you’ll need to provide a reason for your readers to entrust you with their email address. What are you going to do to convince your prospected consumer to hand over their precious email?

People believe they have to give away the kitchen sink in order to entice their readers to provide their email. This is FALSE.

Your incentive doesn’t need to be something mind blowing. Instead, it has to be something specific and most of all, extremely actionable. Meaning it is something where they can see immediate results.

Everyone perceives value differently. A report that I may be willing to give up my house and first born for, may not even entice someone else enough to give away their email.

This is why it’s SO important to understand your target audience. Who are the people that frequent your site the most and what would they be interested in?

So how do you find out what your audience is interested in? Easy. You just ask. Chances are, you have multiple social media accounts (if you don’t then you should). Once you’ve established a following, ask them.

• What is the biggest problem that they are facing?
• Pitch an idea “Hey guys, would you be more interested in receiving a guide on (ABC) or (XYZ)?”
• What media would they prefer? (i.e. pdf format, video, audio, etc)

Then all you have to do is create it as per their requests and ensure that it is actionable. What do I mean by actionable? The information that you provide must be able to be used immediately. People respond far better to offers that they can use right away as opposed to something that may take them a long time to see any results.

Priming Your Homepage for Opt-ins

Alright, I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I’ve been testing a specific op-in method on a few of my sites that seems to work extremely well.

We all know how valuable opt-in forms are right? I don’t think that there’s an internet marketing expert alive that would tell you NOT to use an opt-in form on your home page…except me.

Instead, I’ve been using a two step opt-in process and have begun to capture more emails than ever before.

So what exactly is a two step opt-in?

Well, instead of having a traditional opt-in form that contains an area to submit an email, it looks more like a small banner that contains some persuasive text / images and a call to action for the reader to click on the banner.

The majority of the two step opt-in boxes I’ve seen are square shaped, and are located in the same sidebar area as the traditional opt-in form would be.

Now, once the reader clicks onto the box, they are taken to an entirely different page. This page will look similar to a short sales page (or squeeze page) that promotes your free offers and contains an actual form for the reader to provide their email and finally subscribe.

Most people scoff at the idea of using a two step opt-in because it requires the reader to do more. I too am a firm believer that minimizing steps in any process will usually lead to better results…except in this one special case.

Here’s Why the Two Step Opt-In Works

The traditional opt-in forms are severely flawed. Yes, the reader only has one step (fill in the box with the correct email and hit subscribe), but because the traditional opt-in form is located on your homepage, the amount of space that you have to promote your free offer is extremely limited.

How do you convey how awesome your offer is in only a brief sentence or two? Especially when there are so many great things to say about it.

By using the two step opt-in method, the box on the homepage simply asks that you click on it. Ok, that’s easy enough. Most people would be willing to do that out of sheer curiosity.

The page it links to is where you can provide as much text and images as you want in order to promote your offer. Instead of only a sentence or two, you can list bullet points as to why your offer is awesome.

Trust me, this works extremely well.

Prepping Other Pages for Opt-ins

This will require you to do a bit of investigative work. By now, you should have a working knowledge of your website and its analytics.

I want you to find your top 10 most visited pages.

These pages can be anything; About Me, a contact form, certain blog posts, ANYTHING.

Once you’ve found these pages, you’ll want to place a horizontal opt-in form somewhere within the text and provide a short call to action.

Check out the one I have below…

The trick is to make the opt-in form extremely bare bones basic so that it doesn’t detract away from the page that it is on (especially if it’s a blog post). Instead, find a way to work it in with the text.

For instance, if I added it to a blog post about fat loss, and one of the paragraphs was about nutrition, then I could end that paragraph with a simple call to action like “If you want to learn more about how proper nutrition can help you lose weight faster than diet pills, then subscribe to my weekly newsletter to gain up to date information right to your inbox”.

Then add your horizontal opt-in form. BAM! More subscribers overnight.

Here’s Why Adding a Horizontal opt-In Form to Your Text Works

Humans are suffering from information overload every time they visit a website. It’s a condition known as banner blindness.

In the field of human-computer interaction, the idea of banner blindness is relatively new. Researchers are beginning to suspect that web users have become so saturated with “in your face” information that they fail to even register in the mind of the viewer, causing them to completely glance over it entirely.

The term “banner blindness” doesn’t just apply to flashy banner ads. It pertains to any aspect of a page that is meant to attract attention by standing out from the rest of the page.

This means that people may be completely overlooking the opt-in area that is located in the usual positions such as the sidebar and the bottom of the page.

By placing the form somewhere in the text, it makes it virtually impossible for readers to miss.

Again, in order for this to work, it has to not detract from the rest of the page or else it may chase off readers, which is the last thing you want to do. However, if done correctly, it can be one of your most effective tools for gaining new subscribers.

Conclusion

If you aren’t using email marketing as part of your business model, then you’re probably missing out on some big pay days.

If you follow the basic strategy I outlined above, you should be on your way to making more money online, and who couldn’t use a few extra bucks in their pocket? Honestly, what do you have to lose?

If you have your own unique strategies that you personally use to grow your email list, feel free to let me know in the comment section below!

"The Money Is In The List"

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How To Build Your List: Why The “Experts” Are Wrong

Want no BS advice? Find out what you can do to dramatically improve the success of your business.

How familiar does this sound?

“I’ve dedicated countless hours to creating content, but nothing is happening. It’s like I’m working for free!”

“I post on my blog several times a week, comment on other relevant blogs in my niche, and even started guest blogging. I’ve seen small increases in my list, but not enough to create a full time business around.”

“I’ve got the content, but the traffic isn’t coming.”

Well, I’ve got good news and bad news for you.

I’ll start with the bad news first. Chances are, you’ve been following the advice of the so called “experts”, which is either severely flawed or flat out wrong.

How many times have you heard another marketer tell you that you need to focus your efforts on creating more content?

Though this is integral to your overall success, it’s only a small piece of the puzzle. The good news is, that there’s still time to turn things around, begin marketing the RIGHT way, and start building your subscriber’s list to epic proportions.

Why the “Experts” are Wrong

So why is there so much phony information online? For the most part, this false information is perpetuated by marketers that fall into one of two categories….

Category #1 The “old school” marketers – These are the online entrepreneurs that have been around for a while don’t quite have a grasp of what it’s like to be a newbie in today’s online world. Their advice comes from a time when building up a readership was EASY.

The times have changed a bit and there are more people turning to internet marketing every single day, causing the market place to become more crowded than ever before.

Category #2 The Deceivers – Those that fake it until they make it.These are the marketers that sell courses on how to make money online, despite never having made money online. They share rehashed ideas that they’ve read online that they believe will work.

Following the advice of marketers in either category will lead you to waste an astronomical amount of time, money, effort, and sanity.

There’s a reason why the vast amount of new marketers fail. It isn’t because internet marketing is inherently difficult to succeed in, most people fail because they’ve listened to faulty advice and eventually give up once they’ve realized that all the work they’ve put in was for nothing. Now that we got that out of the way, I can show you how to actually succeed…

Why Do People Subscribe?

As an internet marketer, the majority of your income will come from email marketing. So it’s important to understand what factors contribute to building your list of subscribers. The amount of subscribers you have depends on…

• Your ability to drive high quality traffic to your site
• Your ability to convert incoming traffic into a loyal following
• Your ability to get your followers to promote and refer your brand to others

Nowhere in that list did I mention that you need to be the next Pulitzer Prize winning author. Content is important, but again, it should only make up a fraction of your business plan.

Shape How People View Your Brand

Have you ever heard of Frank Kern? He was a highly popular marketer a few years back. He’s still relevant to this day, except he focuses his efforts on coaching more than selling information products.

I want you to take a second and think of your prototypical businessman. An image of a finely groomed man wearing a button up shirt, tie, and dress pants likely comes to mind. Well, Frank isn’t your typical marketer.

He would show up these speaking engagements with his long, shaggy hair, wearing board shorts and flip flops, and joked around a lot. If you saw him walking down the street you’d assume that he was just another surfer from Southern California.

When people would speak about Frank, everyone would say “Oh yeah, that laid back surfer guy.” Do you think it was a coincidence? No, Frank expertly shaped his image so that it would resonate with the people that saw him.

He wasn’t just another internet marketer, he had created an entire persona that stuck with people that allowed him to stand out among the pack.

What does this have to do with building an email list? Before you can build your email list to epic proportions, you’ve got to create a brand; a position in the marketplace that people can remember. You need to shape how people view you and your business and it has to be as specific as humanly possible.

You have to be known for SOMETHING, and it has to be memorable and unique to you. Don’t just be the lady that blogs about dog training, but instead be “Kathy, the expert in dog psychology”, so when people have a specific problem, you will be their go-to solution.

That means that everything you do online should perpetuate this message until it is successfully burned into the minds of your potential consumers.

Why Does This Matter?

Remember when I said that the amount of subscribers you have is dependent on your ability to get your followers to promote and refer your brand to others?

If people remember EXACTLY what you’re about, then whenever they encounter someone comes to them with a problem, your name will become the default recommendation for that problem.

Referral traffic not only helps build your brand, increase the amount of subscribers you have, but also converts like crazy! Think about the bloggers that you currently follow.

Chances are, you found them because someone said “Hey, check this person out because they’re awesome at…” This will ONLY work if you’ve already finely crafted your brand image and drilled it into the head of everyone that is interested in your niche.

Start Getting More Traffic

No, I’m not going to tell you to start building links and spamming the comment section in blog posts. Instead, I’m going to give you REAL actionable advice that has worked for countless businesses.

Attracting people to your business is not something that you’re born with. It’s an acquired skill that takes a lot of practice. Though you may have seen marketers propelled into the spotlight virtually overnight, there was likely a lot of work behind the scenes that you aren’t aware of.

The absolute EASIEST way to build traffic without having to break the bank on paid ads is to get featured by the press or other media outlets. Right now, you may be thinking to yourself:

“How can I get the media to feature my website if I don’t have an established brand?” Well I’ll show you how to follow an easy 3 step process…

Step #1 – Create something worth promoting This can be anything from a piece of content to free software. For the most people out there that don’t have the means to create software, it will have to be a piece of content. Now, this can’t be any generic piece of content, it has to be extremely specific and truly worth being promoted.

Step #2 – Finding the press You’ll want to build a relationship with people that have a history of covering what you’d like promoted. This means approaching bloggers, reporters, people that have a podcast within your niche, etc. They’re far more likely to promote your work.

Find out where your competitors have promoted. If they’ve scored a write-up on a huge online publication, then open up a dialogue with the writer of that write-up.

OR

An even better approach would be to contact the competitor of that online publication and convince them to cover you. This works well because they will see that the original write-up worked well for their competitor, which may convince them to follow suit.

Another method that I’ve seen used successfully is to find press based on specific topics. Let’s say that you’ve created a piece of content called “Red Fishing Lures Are Better than Black Fishing Lures”. You could do a quick Google search for “Why bright colored fishing lures work”.

You can then approach the blog owners of the sites that appeared in the search results because the opinion in their content likely corresponds with the opinion in your content. Site owners are always looking for other content that confirms the opinions they state on their blog.

Most site owners will jump at the chance to promote content that compliments theirs because it helps establish themselves as an authority in the eyes of their audience.

Step #3 – Persuade them to cover you Remember, bloggers are just like you. Most of them are simply trying to manage their time in a way that allows them to make the most amount of money.

Anything that YOU can do to make THEIR life a little bit easier would be greatly appreciated. This provides INCENTIVE for them to help you out in turn.

If you want someone to do ANYTHING for you, you must provide them an incentive for doing so, and the more important / influential the person you’re contacting, the bigger the incentive will need to be. It’s up to you to find what it will take to get that blogger to do what you want and give it to them.

Conclusion

Ignore the shady advice that most so called “experts” give you. Internet marketing isn’t rocket science, but is a highly psychological game.

If you can influence how people view your brand, you can build referrals, awareness, and brand loyalty. If you can convince publications to cover your brand, you can build massive amount of traffic.

If you combine the two, you will be able to create a massive following that WILL build your list, and eventually convert to sales.

From Sean Donahoe