Net Profit News

There are some sad facts about this article you’ve just started to read, sad for me as the author and sad because it reflects something unfortunate about our current society.

Today we just don’t have enough time to learn new things. Worse still, most people don’t have the motivation to improve themselves and their lives, and instead choose to use what spare time they have to seek instant gratification, short-lived pleasures from entertainment, food and other leisure activities.

It’s a universal law that what comes quickly and easily is not satisfying for a long period of time and often can have a lasting negative impact. Junk food is tasty while you eat it, but it’s not doing much good for your body. Eating raw veggies is not always the tasty option, but doing it for long enough and you start to feel good.

In the Internet marketing space the same rule holds true. The techniques that are easy to do, for example using automation software to scrape RSS content for use on “spam” blogs, is never going to make you money long term. Yet if you focus on producing quality original content on your blog, and do it long enough, you can establish an asset that delivers income for years.

There’s nothing wrong with having fun, enjoying your spare time and occasionally indulging in instant gratification behaviors, but if you want to experience long term satisfaction in your life, you need to invest in yourself and become a better person. You need to become more than most people ever aspire to in their lives.

Most People Will Not Read The Next Paragraph

I said this article is sad for me as the author because the majority of people who were exposed to this text never read this far. Even if the title was compelling enough to convince them to read the first paragraph, they likely only made it as far as one or two paragraphs, began scanning the document from there, or browsed away.

As a blogger you learn to live with short attention spans and as an Internet marketer you learn that you can do very well if you have the attention of a small group of people who love your work. This is a powerful awareness, once you accept it and learn how best to leverage the situation.

Sadly, the knowledge I just shared with you, which I gained through experience and study, and teach to others through this blog each and every week, is insight most people will never become aware of, let alone go on to benefit from by starting their own blog or Internet business.

Pay Attention And Learn A Fundamental Truth

(more…)

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Internet Marketing, Internet Marketing Fundamentals, Mindset, Opinion & Self Improvement, Personal Development, andrew lock, business success, john reese, motivational advice, productivity tips

Usually you think you should look to the big successful stores and businesses for ideas on how to be successful. Not always. In fact, not usually. Here's an example from Sears that you should NEVER follow. We have a 3 ¾ year old son (the youngest of four children). My mother saved an advertisement from Sears and asked me if I thought she should get this for him. It's an advertisement for "The Laptop Computer Just For Kids", you can see the front of the small, folder ad flyer below. The photo makes it look like a small laptop computer running Microsoft Windows. My first impression was sure, looks like something he would like. He already uses our computers to play games for kids his age. Then I opened the flyer and saw the price of $29.99 and said to myself "What? How can they do that?". So I started reading the ad copy and the small print. You can see the inside of the flyer below The ad copy refers to the product as a "toy laptop computer", and says it's preloaded with over 20 easy-to-learn activities. But then it says "Interactive LCD screen is located in the middle of the list-top with bold computer graphics on either side". What??? The small print at the bottom (in photo below) says the LCD screen is 1 15/16" x 1 5/8". So basically the flip-top part of the laptop, where it looks like a normal color laptop screen is just printed graphics with a non-color, small, LCD screen in the middle: they even printed in the green Windows "Start" button. In other words, it's a rip-off. Well, maybe not a rip-off for $29.99, but definitely misleading. Very misleading. Most people would not catch the fact that the display is not a full color, normal laptop display and would expect that they've ordered a normal laptop computer type device. It's not. Now maybe it's just fine for learning, but the ad does not give a suggested age range that it's applicable for either. It's also only available "by Mail Only". Wonder why? Because if you saw it in the store you'd laugh in disgust and not buy it. Companies doing business like this is why there's an issue establishing credibility and trust in mail-order and Internet based businesses. This entire ad is designed in tricking someone like my mother, a grandmother, into order something thinking they're buying their child or grandchild a useful laptop computer for a child. You would think Sears would know better. They built their original mail-order business on trust. I guess that's been lost in the modernization. We've had some products around the house that had similar functions and a similar small display. They were used for a little while and then tossed aside. Were they worth $29.99? Probably. But they were not disguised as a laptop computer and advertised as such. Always remember ads like this and never create one.

• You can destroy the trust you've built in your customer base, or guarantee a new customer will never order another product from you, by taking advantage of them off like this.
• Always deliver what you promise, allude to, or infer. In fact, deliver more.
• Don't try to "trick" people into buying; no good can or will ever come from it.
• Your customer base is the most valuable thing you have, treat them with respect and honesty and you can successfully build a profitable business.

Until next time, Fred

Internet Business, Internet Marketing

Most of the financial news regarding the economy has been pretty dismal over the past few months. Plummeting stocks, failing banks, hundreds of billions of dollars being passed around in the hopes of fixing it all. People are understandably worried about the economy, their jobs, their homes and their credit.

Meanwhile, in the past 3 months my net income has risen 20% even though I've only been working an hour or two per day since my son was born. How is that possible? It's simple: Internet Marketing is very resistant to the economic woes facing other industries. Let's talk about why.

Advertising

Television and radio are kept alive by the ROI (return on investment) of their sponsors, and the commercial web is no different. The advantage of advertising online is that it's far more efficient. When a sponsor puts an ad on a television show or radio program, they can only be vaguely certain of who is watching or listening. Sure the networks provide their own research in demographics and how large their audience is, but much of it is guesswork and impossible to know for sure.

Also, results from TV and radio are very difficult to track. How do you know if the person who just bought your widget was motivated to do so by seeing or hearing your commercial? Again, it's guesswork.

The internet is different. When you place an ad online, you can track exactly how many people saw it, precisely how many people responded (clicked-through) and exactly how much money you earned from it. You can work to refine and improve your ads to improve your ROI as well. It's vastly superior to TV and radio in that regard.

So when it comes time for companies to tighten their belts, it only makes sense that they will focus on the ad medium that has the best ROI.

What does this mean for you, the Internet Marketer? It means that your advertising-driven web sites that use AdSense or other programs will likely remain relatively healthy during hard times. My own AdSense income has not changed much despite the economic troubles, which is no surprise to me. It's also good news for anyone in the search engine optimization business (or related businesses such as pay-per-click), since they, too offer great ROI opportunities.

Selling Information

Another reason that Internet Marketing does well when other sectors are having problems is that people who lose their jobs in those other sectors often turn to the Internet to try and earn a living. When an industry starts having problems, people who lose their jobs in that industry often have a very hard time finding work in the same industry. If they can't find a job, what can they do? Again, many turn to the Internet — the "new economy."

Unfortunately, there are a lot of sharks out there ready to take advantage of these individuals. But for those of us who are honestly offering real opportunities and solutions, we find even more customers during such hard times.

Leveling the Risk

A third reason why Internet Marketing tends to do well even when things look gloomy everywhere else is because the Internet makes it much easier to level your risk. I have customers in 60+ countries. When one country's economy isn't doing so well, another's is flying high, and so I'm less affected. A unique advantage of doing business on the web.

So stay focused on your online business, and remember that you're in a better position to weather the storm than most.

Please leave your thoughts and questions in a comment below.

AdSense, Blog, Internet Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

Not excited by the prospect of making $99 in a month? You should be. Why do I say that, and what did I do to make my brand new, 2 page web site earn about a hundred bucks in one month? Let me tell you.

Why You Should Be Interested

First of all, to build your enthusiasm for the results of this case study, let me lay out a few figures that can be derived from 66 visitors, 13 downloads, 3 sales and $99.

$99 from 66 visitors is $1.50 per visitor.

Think about that. On a great day you'll earn $1.50 per click from AdSense ads on a page, but even with a good click-through rate of 10%, you need 10 visitors to earn that $1.50. That means you're really only earning 15 cents per visitor on average. The methods I used for this case study earned 10 times that per-visitor value.

3 sales from 66 visitors is a 4.5% conversion rate.

A 4.5% conversion rate is great for an affiliate product (which is what was used in this case study). It's far better when you consider that the product was a free software download that the user had to choose to register for a fee — which is when I got paid. Conversion rates for software registration are typically far lower than conversion rates for pay-first products. But in this case, of the 13 people who downloaded the software in the last month, 3 people bought. That's 23%! Very nice indeed.

It only took 6 weeks to get a #3 ranking in Google for the keywords that earned the $99.

Yup, a mere six weeks after putting the brand-new, 2 page case study site into the 3WayLinks Network, I had a #3 ranking in Google for my chosen keywords.

How I Did It

Now to get to heart of the matter: how did I do it? It's actually very simple.

1. I created a simple 2 page site that pitched the product and provided a link to download the software.
2. I put the site in the 3WayLinks network, using the name of the product as my primary keywords.
3. I gave the site a title that looks like this: [PRODUCT NAME] - GET IT FREE! — Do you see why a title like that will draw clicks from the searchers who might otherwise have clicked on the #1 result instead?

Why It Works

Ranking for the name of a product is a great way to earn easy affiliate commissions. The reasons for this are threefold.

1. Conversion rates are higher.

   If somebody is searching for the specific name of a product in Google, they are obviously much more interested in the product, and therefore are a lot easier to sell the product to.

2. Competition is lower.

   If you look for software products (or other digital products) that aren't immensely popular, you'll find that there's not much competition for the product name in Google. That means it's really easy to rank for the name of the product — and fast.

3. It's easy to "rinse and repeat."

   Since the web site is incredibly simple to build (2 pages, no fancy graphics or expensive templates), it's also very easy to duplicate. Just find another product to create a site around and repeat the process over and over again.

   3WayLinks lets you put 50 web sites in your account. Think about that: if you can build 50 sites that, on average, earn a target goal of $3 a day, that's $4,500 a month, or $54,000 a year — on autopilot.

Where can you find such digital products whose product name you can rank for? They're all over the place: ClickBank, PayDotCom, and RegSoft are all loaded with software and digital products that you can be an affiliate for. Create the sites, drop them into 3WayLinks (or 1WayLinks.net, which is also proving incredibly successful) and wait for the commissions to arrive.

To find out how competitive the keywords are for the product names, just go to Google's keyword tool and do an "Exact" match search for the product name. Look for product names that get some searches, but not a lot.

My case study site targets a product name that only gets 210 searches a month, according to Google's keyword tool. The products that only get a few searches don't have anywhere near the competition, which means it's a lot easier to rank for the product names.

Please post your thoughts and questions in a comment below.

Blog, Internet Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

IMPORTANT UPDATE: I have written a follow-up post to this entire drama and it’s important that you read it. Thank you.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. This post is something I’ve wanted to express for a long time. So grab some popcorn and your beverage of choice. You’re in for a long one.

I was recently called out and attacked by Mark Hopkins over at the blog Mashable with his latest post, Is Twitter Vulnerable To Marketer Attack?

Mark apparently got his motivation to make such a post after reading blogger Duncan Riley’s recent post (also directed at me and showing a recent email I sent to my list) Pending Sign Of The Twitter Apocalypse: It’s Being Talked About By Internet Marketers.

I think it’s about time that someone actually set the record straight and addressed attacks like these against Internet marketers. On the Web, there has always been this massive divide between entrepreneurs using the Net for marketing purposes and those that aren’t.

If You’re Going To Call Someone Out And Attack Them At Least Get Your Facts Straight

Both Mark and Duncan referred to me as an “ebook salesman.”

That’s pretty interesting considering I’ve never sold an ebook since I’ve been marketing online for over 15 years.

So come on, guys, you’re supposed to be “journalists” so try doing your research first — especially if you’re going to publish something that more or less is a personal attack and tries to put someone down.

But even, though, they have this fact wrong about me their implication with this statement is something I’m going to come back to in a moment because it’s important.

Both Mark and Duncan attempt to imply that somehow I was encouraging marketers to abuse or spam Twitter in some way.

Here’s a tip: Why don’t you actually READ whatever email you’re trying to use as ‘evidence’ to make your case? You may want to reread that email and pay close attention to this sentence:

“Observe how others post and you’ll quickly learn the culture, etiquette, and uses for Twitter.”

I clearly state that there’s an ETIQUETTE to be used on Twitter. I am not in anyway encouraging people to abuse Twitter. It’s clearly stated directly in that email.

Even if that sentence wasn’t included, the implication is still that I am notorious for teaching people to be abusive with their marketing or something. Well, if you would have actually done your research on me (before attacking me) you’d know that I don’t support or teach any Internet abuse of any kind.

If you’re not going to take the time to actually do some research about me the very least you could have done is OBSERVE MY POSTS ON TWITTER.

As anyone can clearly see, what I’m encouraging people to do is actually the OPPOSITE of what Mark and Duncan are trying to imply.

But they’d know that if they had done their research.

Anyone can see the public history of my Twitter account at: http://twitter.com/johnreese

So why on earth did these ‘journalists’ not investigate it?

Ironically, Mashable has used their Twitter account for 100 TIMES MORE promotional effort than I have with mine. Hey pot, meet kettle.

Last Time I Checked Twitter Used A ‘Voluntary’ Messaging System

And completely aside from the points I just made, Twitter works by having users opt to follow other users — and they only see their tweets after they have voluntarily chosen to follow that person.

This makes it nearly impossible for someone to abuse the system for evil marketing purposes. Certainly some idiot will probably come up with a way to mass-send ‘direct’ messages to people (and Twitter will squash them) but Twitter’s design does not allow people to just blast anyone.

But what do I know. I’m not trying to make a living as an ‘expert’ blogger about Web 2.0 services.

Mark also took the ‘attack’ efforts against me quite a bit further than Duncan. Mark makes a statement that I’m a “Web 2.0 flopster.” The word “flopster” implying FAILURE.

Back to the lack of research factor…

If Mark had done his proper research on me he’d know that I’ve been one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the history of the Internet when it comes to creating online projects that CREATE PROFITS.

I was a pioneer of opt-in email marketing when I created one of the first auto-reply email services for businesses in 1994.

I am one of the few people in the world that can say they’ve created a web site from scratch and using a tiny marketing budget put that site into the Top 500 most trafficked web sites in the world.

And, oh yeah, I’ve done it with THREE different sites and I’m currently working on my 4th.

I’ve made millions of dollars in a variety of markets - from golf to hobby markets to B2B. I’ve been one of the top super affiliates in the world for companies like eBay, Chase, and other Fortune 500 companies. I’ve even generated over $1,000,000 in AdSense earnings without paying a penny for advertising or playing the “arbitrage” game — and I did it as a ’side’ project.

And as most online marketers know, in 2004 I released a training course and generated $1,000,000 in sales in the first 18 hours from the marketing campaign I put together — which ended up creating $1M in net profit within the first 7 days.

And I did it without risking a single penny on traditional advertising.

So Does That Make Me A ‘Flopster’?

Again, it’s all about the research.

HOWEVER… maybe Mark was simply referring to me as a failure in the “Web 2.0″ sense? Referring only to projects that are Web 2.0 services.

Fair enough. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt.

Mark has consistently ‘hated’ on my BlogRush project. He has bashed it in the past and for whatever reason continues to seem all fired up about it.

He implies that the service was a dumb idea (without so many words) and that it failed, was overhyped, yadda yadda yadda.

Was BlogRush A Total Failure?

Even if it was… WHO CARES? I mean, if an entrepreneur comes up with a crazy idea at 4AM and has the guts to ‘go for it’ and it fails, does that make that person a FAILURE? After all, BlogRush is not even the core focus of the company I’m trying to build. But should someone that has a failed project like this just call it quits?

If I had taken that attitude about being an entrepreneur I would have been homeless a long time ago. It’s better to have the courage to try something and fail to not try at all. It’s amazing how many people bashed BlogRush yet most of them had never taken a major risk in their entire life.

No risk, no reward.

At least I had the guts to invest $400,000+ of my own money to give the idea a shot. Yes, my money. Not money some VC gave me.

The Internet would not be what it is today without the courage of entrepreneurs trying all kinds of crazy ideas.

As far as BlogRush is concerned, I’ll be the first to admit that it did not work out the way I had hoped it would. I hoped it would be a great service that would provide tremendous VALUE to a lot of people.

There were many factors that I didn’t expect when I created the service — such as the amount of abuse, that many people would hide the widget so low on their pages it wouldn’t get much click activity, etc. Then there’s also the issue that most bloggers don’t know how to write compelling titles — which has everything to do with the click-rate.

BlogRush also encountered some technical issues and other growing pains. Hey, it happens. But even with all of those problems and unforeseen issues, was BlogRush truly a failure?

Well, let’s look at some traffic analytics from Compete.com. In this chart let’s compare BlogRush’s traffic with that of Mashable the super popular blog where Mark is one of their writers:

Huh? That’s weird. For someone calling me a failure when it comes to my little “Web 2.0″ side project it can’t be that bad of a failure considering it gets more traffic than one of the most popular blogs in the world — that Mark happens to works for.

And here’s what’s really amazing… this chart is primarily showing unique visitor numbers based on the BlogRush site and NOT on the reach of the widget itself; because the widget is served on other sites.

Here’s A NEWSFLASH For Mark: The BlogRush widget has already been served over 540 MILLION TIMES.

I think most other entrepreneurs would LOVE to ‘fail’ that badly.

Mark also attacks some of the marketing copy that I used for BlogRush. He says it’s nothing but “hyperbole” and overhype, etc.

Hehe. I love the irony in the fact that Mark created his post based on a blog title that contains “Pending Sign Of The Twitter Apocalypse.” Great use of hyperbole, Duncan. I actually think that title rules!

Bloggers are notorious for their strong usage of hyperbole. Hey pot, meet kettle. Oh, you guys already met. Well, maybe you should get married.

I will be the first to admit that we overpromised and underdelivered (so far) with the promises of the copy for BlogRush. Anyone that knows me as a marketer knows that my entire career has been the OPPOSITE. I thrive on overdelivering value to my customers. And again, I admit that BlogRush didn’t work out like I thought it would - no one is more disappointed about that than I am.

Many BlogRush users ARE getting the free traffic benefits that were promoted. But most of these marketers have a solid grasp on writing really click-worthy titles; which makes all the difference.

But Mark is very passionate about dogging BlogRush, and that’s his right just like anyone else. So, Mark, I’m sorry that it didn’t live up to your expectations. We’ll gladly issue you a full and prompt refund.

Oh wait. Somehow I forgot BlogRush was a totally FREE service.

But There’s A Much More ‘Poisonous’ Message About Internet Marketers That Needs To Be Addressed

I’m so sick and tired of the anti-marketing attitudes of writers, pundits, and others on the Internet. It’s been going on since the Web started to take off in 1994/1995.

So many of these people make it out like all Internet-based marketers are only selling scammy, rip-off garbage. And while the Internet is certainly filled with all kinds of jackasses that spam and abuse every known online service and tool there is, not enough ‘credit’ is given to marketers (like me and most of my customers) that have great marketing and success online and do things the RIGHT way.

And not enough credit and attention is given to the fact that if it wasn’t for Internet marketers there would be no Internet or Web 2.0 as it is today.

MONETIZATION IS THE LIFEBLOOD OF THE INTERNET.

Without all of the affiliate marketers, affiliate merchants, small bloggers, advertising networks, marketers buying PPC traffic, and everything else that is a part of the “Internet Economy” 99% of what’s on the Web today would not exist.

So for Mark, and any others that seem to take this anti-marketing attitude, the next time you cash your paycheck you should take a moment to realize it wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for the very marketers that create and sustain the economy of the Web.

Heck, just take a look at many of the ways that the Mashable blog is able to generate revenue — many of those programs and networks only exist because of marketer activity.

So if you kill all the Internet marketers, YOU KILL THE INTERNET.

As far as the spammy and abusive marketers go, it’s unfortunate and it pollutes the Web. Thankfully, the Internet has this great darwinism effect where those that don’t provide value end up getting destroyed. Junk and scammy crap will always end up in FAILURE. The ‘problem’ is that so many new junk peddlers take the place of the old ones.

One more point I want to make… Mark and Duncan’s efforts to call me an “ebook salesman” is being done in a negative light relating towards selling information to teach people how to make money in some way.

This is another common anti-marketing attitude that has existed online for ages. So many people are put off by marketing or promotion for anything to do with “making money.” Even, though, there are hundreds if not thousands of fantastic products on the subject that are truly helping people.

To realize this, I only have to take a look at the success stories created by my own teachings and what they’ve done for thousands of individuals and their families.

Are there tons of people peddling utter garbage and worthless “I’ll show you how to press a big red button and get rich” crap online? Unfortunately, YES.

But to stereotype anyone and everyone that publishes or provides marketing or business advice is PATHETIC. And that is primarily what happens when it comes to the anti-marketing attitude.

A Quiet Revolution Is Forming

These anti-marketing folks need to realize something…

The world is changing quickly. Economies are evolving. More and more people around the globe are realizing the benefits of having their own business online. The ‘marketing’ uses of the Internet are only going to GROW. And it’s actually going to make the Internet even STRONGER and more developed. As the needs to increase monetization are created it will spawn more innovation online.

The survival of Ideas, Sites, Services, and Companies on the Web are ALL dependent upon the activity from Internet marketers. I just wish more people would start to realize it.

* I would like to encourage my fellow Internet marketers to spread the word about this post. Thank you.

Internet Marketing