The Pearl – Are there such things as Internet Marketing secrets?

I hope you enjoyed last week’s Part 3 edition of the Oyster Marketing strategy on selling.  Today I am going to talk about the 4th an final stage of the Oyster marketing technique, the pearl.

This is probably the most exciting for me to write about because it is the most mysterious.  Is there that hidden pearl online…or in Internet marketing terms, is there a secret that only a few high stakes marketers even know about?

Are there secret niches? I wonder.

What about secret keywords. Hmm…keywords that make people millions of bucks. Keywords that only certain people know how to find.  I wonder…

I am going to look into this and discuss my personal thoughts on IF there are secrets online, and if so, where do you find these hidden gems.

Before I get started, I want to quote the very first Oyster Marketing Strategy post that made the initial reference to “the pearl”.

Pearls are very rare and in fact, in my 4 years working in the oyster business, I only came across one…and it wasn’t the ideal pearl shape (perfectly round).  I guess you could call this kinda lucky (that I found one that is).

A pearl is VERY rare in the wild and….

….pearl is equivalent to hunting for something that is not there or very hard to find…or an illusion in attempt to earn a MASSIVE PROFIT.

The pearl is what most people look for, yet the fewest people ever find.  I compare it to someone looking for the “secret to success”…when in fact, the secret is that there is NO SECRET (if that makes sense).

So really, what I was saying is that:

If you are looking for some sort of Internet Marketing Secret, you are either going to grow old and grey doing so, or you are going to find something that appears to be a secret, but in actuality it is an “illusion”.

Being in the Internet marketing world for 8 years now, I have a seen and performed a lot of strategies that have worked, and on the same token, many that didn’t work.  In no way were they secrets, rather “techniques”.

I mean, if there was a secret, nobody would tell you right (unless they are really bad at keeping secrets).  Secrets are something that are private…stuff that isn’t revealed.

Do We Know of Any Hidden Internet Marketing Secrets?

Carson and I have never sought out secrets and we refrain from using the term altogether because the truth of the matter is, we FOCUS ON TECHNIQUES.

Any successful investor, any successful restaurateur, any successful Internet marketer, or any successful business person will tell you that they achieved their success not because of secrets, but because of the hard work, testing, implementation, and techniques they applied to their business.

I can honestly tell you that I don’t know any secrets.  In fact, anything that I do know I have and will continue to reveal to you as a blog post and ultimately, to all the active members at WA.   That is why Carson and I created WA…

So, all this talk about no “Internet Marketing Secrets”, but how do you succeed online if there are no secrets?

What really is Internet marketing?

Think about this for a second…

Hope you didn’t have a mental jammer there.   Internet marketing is the act of marketing something online.

Duh.

But seriously, it is the “interaction” between a consumer and a product/offer.  If you, as the marketer, can connect these two distinguished dots, you can succeed.

A consumer starts with a keyword.   A product/offer ends with an affiliate program, some sort of actionable offer, or a product that you own.

To understand the online world, let’s first look at the offline world.

Say you want to sell a hot dog…lots of hot dogs.  Where would you go looking to sell this hot dog.  Would you go looking inside a mall?

Maybe.  But there is a lot of competition there.  Ideally you want to position your hot dog stand in a place where people want your product.

Where is that?  Some place that you would find hungry people that like hot dogs.
Example: A baseball field.  Hot dogs sell well there.
Example: Outside a night club when you get all the hungry drunk people craving food.
Example: At the park where hungry business people go for a walk at lunchtime.

Now, with offline business there is a lot more trial and error to find your magic formula…or your pearl.  Remember, a pearl is not a secret, it is a well-defined technique.  In the online world, things are MUCH, MUCH easier.

Yes, you heard me say that.  We as Internet marketers have things easy.  Does this mean IM is easy? No.  But selling a dog training program online is a hell of a lot easier than trying to find the best place to sell a hot dog in New York City.

Why is Making Money Online Easier than Offline?

And the reasons why…HYPER-TARGETING.   Keywords.  Analytics.  ONE BILLION PEOPLE (with buying power).

This is where it gets really cool.

Want to sell a dog training program?  Target the keyword dog training program in Google.  You can pay for this if you like, or you can work to get your website naturally listed using article marketing and SEO techniques.

In the offline world, you would be a happy camper if you could attract only people looking for your product and only pay for these people.   I am not happy with selling my dog training product to someone looking for a dog training program though.

They are not serious enough.  These are the “window shoppers” of the Internet.

Now, in the case of dog training, I would probably seek out people that are more serious.  People that are looking for even more specific dog training.

People searching terms like:

“how to get my dog to stop digging up the lawn”
“how to get my dog to heel”
“German shepherd training commands”
“help me get my poodle to behave”

Now these people are serious.  They are the people that are in the stores, asking the clerks questions, and a tip or a piece of info away form buying something (or performing an action).

That is where you come in as the Internet Marketer.  That is where the pearl lies.

Looking back, I have had keywords that have converted for me every day.  Single keywords.  Sometimes a SINGLE keyword would make me $100 per day profit.  This is because I did a little digging…a little research, and a little marketing.

A few of the most important techniques I have learned:

• Be relevant
• Choose a niche that is interesting to YOU
• Don’t sell chocolates to a dieter (research your audience)
• Take continual action (do stuff, don’t just read)
• FAIL why don’t ya

Yes, I did fail lots.  Carson and I fail all the time still to this day.  It is part of growing and part of the reason we can find those Pearls online.

Here are some of the biggest failures I have ever had as an Internet marketer:

• Lost $10,000 on a keyword that I accidentally bid $10 instead of $0.10 on.  Google wouldn’t give me a refund.
• Got lazy and didn’t update a site for 6 months.  When I did updated it, the profit explosion was insane.
• Didn’t get into email marketing early enough in my IM career.  Would have many lists (personally) that were likely to exceed several 100,000 people
• In my 2nd  year marketing, I had two months where I let my affiliate marketing business go and had 2 consecutive months that were not profitable. (Note that these were followed by some of my best months ever when I got my butt in gear.)
• I spent 10 months building a site on the side that I never ended up earning a penny from because of a shift on the Internet.

I guess you could say I found out some UN-secrets.  If there were secrets that nobody wanted to know about, I found them out quickly and regularly.  However, I took them all in stride and realized that for every 10 failed campaigns or every 10 mediocre keywords, I was going to find the pearl.

Once I attained the pearl of wisdom (a well defined technique) I was able to reproduce it.  For example, once I found out (back in the day) that people liked review pages, I built them over and over.  This made me heaps of money (although the way you review products/services in 2010 has drastically changed).

To me this is not an Internet marketing secret.  This is a technique.

You agree?

If your answer is yes, you are a good person.   You will find success online just knowing that you have what it takes.

What if you think there is still some crazy secret out there that will make you a business mogul?

If you fit into this category, don’t worry…we are still friends.  I know you have likely been misinformed because there is so much misinformation out there.

Businesses claiming they can make you millions over night.  Internet marketing firms claiming that you can run your business in autopilot without investing any initial work.  Guru’s preaching to you that you need to buy their hidden information (crap) in order to survive in this NEW Internet.

ALL BULL PEOPLE.

Again, remember, if someone has to sell you in the glitz and glam, the hype, the sizzle not the steak, chances are it will not work.  And if it does work, chances are it will only be temporary.

The pearl in the sense of a secret does not exist.

But the company that manufactures the pearl does.  That company can be you.   Hunting for something seems ridiculous.  Creating something that builds the exact same success (finding a pearl) seems like a sound idea…and one that I am going to full-hearted-ly suggest to you.

I know you will succeed online if you stop seeking out the Internet Marketing Secrets.  Instead, look for and build upon the pearls (well defined techniques) that you know lie out there.  We teach those and we know that there are endless ways you can get at them.

This concludes the Oyster Marketing Series.  I hope you all have enjoyed these blog posts and as always, your feedback, comments, questions, and contributions are welcome.  Post them below.

Take it easy.  From one oyster marketer to another.

Kyle
wealthy affiliate
www.WealthyAffiliate.com

Click Here To Join wealthy affiliate University

The Meat – Sell More Low or Sell Less High

I hope you all enjoyed Part 2 of my Oyster Marketing Strategy last week where I discussed the “Shell“, or how to nurture a customer along a path in which they become a POWER CUSTOMER (aka, repeat buyer).

Today, I want to discuss the “meat”.

“Oysters tend to vary in size and although the biggest oysters fetch the most money, the smaller oyster are in much higher demand.   There are many more markets for small oysters because of their popularity within the restaurant business and “smoked” oysters business (canned).”

So really you have a couple of options:

(1) Target a broad niche in which you know people are selling tons

(2) Target a unique niche in which you know there is always wanted demand

I guess it is working within a long tail (more niche) versus a short tail (more broad) here.   Many people tend to naturally go towards very broad markets when starting out.  They choose the “small’ oysters, ie…the obvious products that they know sell because there are droves of other people selling it.

Something that would qualify as a broad niche would be “get a 6 pack”.  Sure, this is not as broad as weight loss, but it still tips the scale in my opinion on being a first rate, easy-to-think-of niche.

One thing that people fail to realize is that the Internet has opened up an absolutely ridiculously massive amount of products, keywords, and tiny little niches.  Gone are the days of going to your local record shop and choosing between 10,000 artists on the shelves and here are the days of being able to sift through 1,000,000 artists through online digital stores.

This represents 990,000 new products, new brands, and new marketing opportunities within one niche alone.

Another example of this is MOVIES.  Think of all the movies.  Think of all the foreign movies, independent films, and movies that simply an offline movie store cannot afford to keep on their shelves.

That market is massive.  I am not saying this is the best starting point for someone online, what I am saying is that the Internet has created the longest tail of niches…in pretty much every aspect of marketing.

One last example before I move on here.  Look at dieting.  Back in the day you would have been limited to just a few options.  An ab roller infomercial product, a health club membership, some special pill out of a magazine, or a diet plan that was advertised on TV.

Now, there are 10,000’s of dieting products available online.  Anything from “lose weight for you wedding guides”, to “online dietitians that will create you your own diet plan (for a fee)”.

For those that think outside of the box and choose to sell to smaller niches (sell the large, less-wanted-but-less-competition oyster meat), there is great opportunity.

But people tend to go so dang broad when starting out?

Is this a good idea?

What are the positives and negatives of tackling broader markets?

On rare occasion I see new marketers “going niche”.  This is how I recommend everyone start out…but very rarely do new marketers choose something really “niche”.

These are typical starting point markets that newbies choose:

(1) Dog training
(2) Make Money
(3) Lose Weight
(4) Learn Guitar
(5) Learn a New Language

These are the niches they should be starting with:

(1) Puppy Potty Training
(2) Make Money With WordPress
(3) Lose Lower Back Fat
(4) Learn how to play Nickelback Songs
(5) Learn how to learn spanish before vacation

These are examples of a longer tail niche.  These are also much more specific “problems” that people have and if you target them with targeted help…you will be much more successful.

Think about the state of mind of someone typing in “learn how to play guitar” versus “learn how to play nickelback songs”.  The latter is a much more targeted visitor and one that is further along in the customer lifecycle (something we explain in depth within wealthy affiliate).

Some people ask how I come up with a niche.  What would constitute and really unique niche for me? That leads me into…

How can I find a niche on my desk?

Well, probably something like…

Oh god…

I am thinking…

[I just popped 2 ginkgo biloba and drank a cup of coffee]

Ah, there we go.  Got one.

Tie Accessories.

Where the hell did I pull that from?  Gingko baby….

No seriously, finding these smaller, more unique niches is a piece of cake.  I looked on my desktop for some inspiration here and low and behold, there sitting from a lunch-time snack today was a “twist tie”.

Sure twist ties are a niche, but you are either going to have to have an “in” at a grocery store, or you are going to have to sell a 100 gazillion of these things to pay your house off.  Instead, I grabbed a word out of it.

“tie”

I know there are clips on the front of ties.  What I learned though is that there are other accessories with a quick search in Google.  Tie bars, pins, tacks and chains.

This is a very small niche.

But it has…

Limited affiliate competition.

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How to Make Money With Your WordPress Blog

OK, as many of you may already be closely aware of, we have recently launched a new WordPress site creator called WordPress Express.

This system has quickly become the “tool to have” within the Internet marketing world.  You can literally create sites like this one….

http://craftycontent.com

In the snap of the fingers.  Less than 40 seconds for the actual creation, another hour for the content.  Anyways, enough about that…

Today I want to talk about how to make money with your WordPress blog.  Unless you are a pure hobbyist, creating content without a plan to generate revenue form it is senseless.  With your WordPress blogs, this should be no different.  Making money should always be one of the primary considerations.

In order to make money with your wordpress blog, you need to consider the main factors which lead to success:

(1) A blog people want to read
(2) Relevant and Unique Content
(3) A way to make money from your traffic

Below I am going to explain these items in more detail…and when you are done reading, you are going to know exactly how your WordPress sites can lead to a solid make money venture.

How to Make Money With WordPress: Don’t be boring!

There is nothing worse than reading lame content.  People tend to like reading things as though you are having a conversation with them.  This is what is known as “conversational speak”.  For example, the way I am talking to you right now is much more engaging than if I were to refer to you in technical terms.

Lame speak:

“People online make money with their WordPress blogs by an affiliate program that matches their content.”

Conversational speak:

“If you really want to make some money with your WordPress blogs, you need to consider who your customer is.  For example, say I am “Joe Blow” looking for a solution to get rid of a mole on my forehead.  What sort of program would I be looking for?  What sort of products will remove a mole and is there anything that is natural that can cover this up without me having to consider surgery?

Answer your potential customers’ questions or they will mozy along to a site that does.”

Write interesting content and people will actually read it.  If people want to read a technical definition of something they will go to Wikipedia.   Help people understand stuff and relate to things by talking to them as though you would your mom or your best friend.

How to Make Money With WordPress: Writing Should be FUN, relevant and unique!

People tend to have such a tough time “writing”.

Here is the common stuff I hear every day:

“I suck at writing Kyle”.

“I don’t speak English well enough to write something good that people will like”.

“Kyle, I don’t know what the heck to write about.”

None of these are good excuses…well I guess they are OK ones, but I have never been a fan of excuses with the pure purpose of procrastination.

Here are my answers:

I suck at writing. No you don’t.  If you can write on your friend’s FaceBook wall or you can text your boyfriend, you have enough skills to write something.  The key is choosing something that you are interested in and the rest will come naturally.  Choose something you are passionate about on your WordPress blog and the writing will become easy.

I don’t speak English well. Yes, you do.  Whenever I get people telling me this, they go on to explain in 5 well written paragraphs how they don’t know English!  It is almost comical.  If you can write to me telling me you don’t know English well enough, then you DO KNOW ENGLISH WELL ENOUGH.  You only get better at a language by practicing! You only get better at writing by practicing!

What the heck to I write about? What I recommend is that you create yourself a list of at least 25 topics that you can write about.  This will be the starting point of your blog and your first set of posts and articles.  It may sound like a lot of work, but if you create 1 or 2 blog posts per day, you could have 25 pages or posts up in a matter of ONE month!

Here is an example list of 17 topics if you were going to create a blog about….hmmm….Raw Food Diets.

Potential Posts/Pages:

• Raw food festival
• Raw food health expo
• best raw food diets
• is eating raw foods safe
• spring vegetable raw foods
• find raw food retreat
• raw food diet results
• raw food diet plan
• eating raw nuts & seeds
• the benefits of eating raw vegetables
• healing benefits of raw foods
• what color vegetables should i eat
• what is a raw food diet
• how to get fat from vegetables
• lose weight eating raw foods
• best vegetables for protein
• raw food diet recipes

How did I come up with these topics.  Simple.  I first got a small list of ideas by going into Google and typed in “raw food diets”.  I browsed the web, the news, and the blogs to come up with some ideas.

Web: http://www.google.com
News: http://news.google.com/
Blogs: http://blogsearch.google.com

And I used a Q & A site, Wikihow:

http://www.wikihow.com

Then I plugged in some of these “themes” into the keyword tool at WA.

https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/tools/kw_research_home (have to be a member to access)

If you are not a member of WA, you can use the Google keyword tool:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Expand upon these topics and get some more ideas.  Also, if you are interested in a topic or a niche, you should spend some time doing some “involved” reading.  It will enhance your writing, your connection with your audience, and also give you a ton of blog post/page ideas.

There are ways to turn your content into huge amounts of traffic through SEO practices, but I am not going to explain that here.  Reason being, I just created a 15 lesson tutorial at wealthy affiliate explaining all of this!

How to Make Money With WordPress: Making Money From Your Traffic

The most effective ways to earn a significant amount of money from your WordPress traffic are:

(1) Affiliate Programs

There are many types of commission structured affiliate programs, but amongst the top are are Cost Per Sale and Cost Per Acquisition.  The most common is CPS which is usually commission % based, which includes networks like:

• Clickbank.com
• Linkshare.com
• ShareaSale.com
• CJ.com

But there are also many networks know that pay per action.  For example an action could be someone filling out a form, taking advantage of a free offer, or filling out a survey.  Many affiliates are making a ton of money with both styles of affiliate programs, leveraging their WordPress blogs to do so.

I recommend that if you aren’t already part of them, you seek out these top networks for affiliate programs that are relevant to your “niche”.  Many pay very well and will be a nice inclusion on your WP blog posts.

(2) Google Adsense and Content Networks

Adding Google Adsense or adding ads from other ad networks to your blog can be a great way to earn money.  If someone clicks on the ads that are displayed on your page, you earn money.   We recommend using Adsense for this, but there are other ad networks that work well.  They include:

• Infolinks.com
• Chitika.com
• Kontera.com

(3) Selling your own STUFF

There are many ways that you can sell your own products and services (or info) online.  If you have tangible products or used goods, you can use the following to sell them:

http://ebay.com
http://paypal.com

There are built-in plugins in WordPress that allow you to easily incorporate your eBay listings into your blog or to add a Paypal Payment feature on your blog.

Say you have a bunch of info on something and you think others would find it valuable and pay for it.  Maybe you know a lot about golf, maybe you know how to get rid of acne naturally…people pay for this stuff.  Create a PDF, and then put it on the Clickbank network as a merchant.

http://www.clickbank.com/sell_products.html

You can then turn your blog into a sales page and store for your product!

————————————-

These are just a few ideas of ways you can make money from your WordPress blog.  It all starts by knowing how to write interesting content.  Then it comes down to being able to come up with more unique content to write.  Then you need to offer something on your site that earns you money.

Again, I have just created a 15 lesson tutorial on “how to make money with WordPress” within WA on this, so if you are a member already, get access to this by logging in.  There is a link right on the dashboard.

For those of you that aren’t members yet and want to earn money online, I invite you to join us at wealthy affiliate.  We would love to work with you and help you achieve your goals.

Hope you enjoyed this post!

Kyle
wealthy affiliate
www.wealthyaffiliate.com

Click Here To Join wealthy affiliate University

How to build a website for LONG term success!

Whew…

Sorry, I just got back from a journey through success using this “thingy”!

What kind of success you ask?

• One where I built a website in 32 seconds.
• One where I built a site that Google is already french kissing.
• One where I built a site where I don’t need to know a lick of programming.
• One where I got listed in Google in under 12 hours.
• One that will change the way I do online business.

What is this?

OK…before I get into what this “thingy” is, I want to explain how the Internet has changed, and how it has not here in 2010.  I also want to give you a vision into what is probably going to take place in 2011 and beyond for us marketers.

Lastly, I am going to explain how I think I can help you out, save you time, and earn you a lot more money.

We cool?  Alriggggghty.

How the Internet Has Changed!

Since late 2009, the Internet has made a major shift.  Google has shifted.  PPC has changed.  SEO has changed.  Affiliate marketing has changed.  The way you are allowed to represent your own “voice” has changed. Article directories has changed the way they allow people to do business.

With so many changes, how do you overcome this to create success online.

First and foremost, you need a website.  This is a scary word for MANY people, but it is the truth.  Google will not touch your “direct links” with a 10 foot pole, YSM and Bing don’t really like you if you don’t have a website.

This is a good thing for those of us that “did things right” to begin with and bad for the lazy cats out there that simply direct linked…not because it was the right way, but because it was the easy way to do things.

A website has always been the best medium to offer people information, help them, and ultimately pre-sell any affiliate product or your own product.   So I can honestly say that without a website now, your chances for success are shrinking by the day.

Moral of the story.  YOU NEED A WEBSITE!

OK, you have a website.  Things are peachy right?

Not entirely.

I don’t want to be the grinch that stole your early x-mas, but just having a site is no longer enough either.

How you create your website now matters!

To understand this, you need to understand people.  I think you will find this very easy to do because, well, you are a person.  You need to also understand how Google has built their business and exactly what they truly care about.

Google does not care about advertisers.  Sure,they bring them billions of dollars per year…but without “PEOPLE” using their search, they would not have a business.  And for every person that decides to use another search engine for their daily searches, Google loses money.

There will always be advertisers, but there will not always be users unless Google understands and creates a quality user experience.

In order to create that experience, they push us marketers around based on their findings.  If they want a relevant landing page because they feel that it is going to give their users a better search experience, guess what?…they are going to make you create relevant landers.

If they find multi-page sites attract the best experience, they are going to make you do that.

If they like current and regularly updated content, guess who has to abide…YOU, the advertiser.

So let’s be clear here.  Google does not give a rats about you.  They only care about you when you are a searcher.  Their business is search, not advertising.

So how do you master creating websites for success?

Become yourself.

Yeah, really.  If you are marketing to someone, look at your site your pages through their eyes.  What makes a good site and what do you enjoy about good sites.  If you typed in “make my dog breakfast”…what would you want?

You would want a site on how to make a dog breakfast…maybe some recipes, maybe links to some cool breakfast bowls, doggy blankets, and as a bonus, a guide on how to make your dog walk on it’s hind legs if you bought something.

If you visit your site through a “visitors” eyes and you like the experience you are receiving, then chances are Google will like it to.  Be honest with yourself…or better yet, get a friend or family member to review your site for you.

So there you have the big bad Google.  In a nutshell…do what they say.

What about article marketing directories?

As for the article directories and the other aspects…they just follow Google’s rules.  So if you see a top level change at Google, you are likely to see a ripple effect down the chains of command.

This goes for a lot of the other Internet entities out there.  When Google makes a swift change to their algorithm, it causes a broad knee-jerk reaction across the industry.

Everything is not so bad though

In spite of everything I have said, many principles have remained the same and will remain the same going forward.

For example, relevance is the “rock” that allows campaigns to run profitable for years.  I still have campaigns running from 2005 that I have not touched and team “make life difficult” at Google have not slapped.

There are also articles that still are ranked from years ago.  There are blogs that have been up under terms like “make money” since 2007.  There is some interesting things that we can take from the “longevity” aspects of my business and others that will lead to your long term success.

I guess what I am saying is build your site for PEOPLE from the get go.  Don’t be a trend follower and use the latest black hat technique.  If you rely on these techniques, your business is always in jeopardy and one little shake up at Google and your business has collapsed.

To build these “PEOPLE” sites, sites that will last, sites that will succeed, and sites that will have longevity I would recommend nothing else than WordPress.

WordPress sites are great because they follow the RULES that make a site good for SEO, PPC, Email marketing, Articles, and ultimately appeal to Google.

These are:

(1) Easy to add Content
(2) SEO friendly (tags, page titles, directory structure, sitemaps, etc)
(3) Multi-paged and relevant content

These are the core principles of a quality website and will equate to success.

A example of a site I just created

Here is the website that I built using our latest system at WA.  This is a WordPress driven application that allows you to create as many blogs as you like.

The Website: CraftyContent.com
Total time taken to set-up this blog: 32 seconds
Total time to write the content: 1 hour
Total natural search listings: 10+
Total plug-ins installed: 6 (comes with each install)

Within one hour I have a pretty nice looking site, with content, and already attracting the search engine spiders.  How cool is that?

An absolute newbie could set something like this up using WordPress Express, our latest and greatest system included in the wealthy affiliate membership.  Once you have that site in place that Google will adore, the sky is the limit…now I can focus on making money from this site.

Next blog post I am going to discuss some of the techniques you can leverage to earn money from your WordPress Express sites.

Have a great day!

Kyle
wealthy affiliate
www.wealthyaffiliate.com

PS.  I would love to hear your feedback.  Please leave your comments below.

If you would like to get Instant Access to WordPress Express, CLICK HERE!

Click Here To Join wealthy affiliate University

The Oyster Shell – Creating More Powerful Customers

Last week I showed you how the geography of your audience (the beach) has an impact on your earning potential as an Internet marketer.

An audience is a group of people though.  My goal today is to show you how to turn an audience into revenue, or what we like to call “power customers”.

So here we have the oyster shell.

“This is the home for the oyster.  The bigger the shell, the more the meat there is within the oyster.  The longer you leave an oyster on the beach (ie, the more time you invest in it), the bigger the oyster grows and the more money it is worth.”

This translates into customer value in the Internet marketing world.

The more patient and more care you give your oyster (customer), the better the opportunity you will have to earn not only the first sale from that customer, but multiple sales.

I can give you a quick example of this to explain exactly what I am talking about.

I have had an iPhone ever since the first generation of it came out.  I am not one of those people that stand in line and camp outside overnight to get the first one, however, I can guarantee that I buy every single new iPhone that comes out (my next purchase will be the iPhone 4).

This is a beautiful thing for Apple.  Although many argue that there are much superior phones to the iPhone, I continue to buy.  In fact, I know there are phones that have more bells and whistles, have been rated higher, have better battery life, faster processors, etc….but I continue to buy EVERY iPhone that hits the market.

Why?

No…I’m not a freak.  I am a POWER CUSTOMER of the Apple brand.

What if you could create your own power customers, nurture your subscribers and your website visitors from the point of being just a baby oyster shell, to becoming a massive oyster!

In order to do this, we need to look at the characteristics of a POWER CUSTOMER…or in this case, I can just look at myself in terms of buying into Apple.

(1) I love the products
(2) I trust that it will work how it says it works, and if it doesn’t I know they will be there
(3) I like to talk about the products
(4) I even defend the product
(5) I recommend the product to my friends, and sometimes people I don’t even know

OK, this is fine and dandy.  I have outlined what is the genetic makeup of a power customer, but what we really want to know is how do you create a POWER CUSTOMER?

Over the years of marketing online, I have learned that creating customers does not have to be as difficult as some people would like to make you think.

Really, what is a customer…

Someone that buys something.

Why does someone buy something?

They need it.  They want it.  Or they simply like to spend money.

Why would they buy it from you?

Because you have HELPED them.

Oh no, there’s the “H” word.  This is the most common thing people overlook when promoting products, services and trying to create relationships online.

The emphasis is put on “selling” versus “helping” which will lead to inferior success.

People hate blatant promotions without being helped.  If I am going to buy something online, I am going to want some help, some education, and I want to know who I am buying from.  I have thought long and hard about the aspects of “creating” power customers, and the 3 most important aspects you as an Internet Marketer can have are:

(1) Be real.

If you were at a car lot and the salesman came out with a black sheet over their heads, and introduced themselves as “yoursite.com”, would you buy from them.  Um…NO.  You would probably find it very creepy and jump in your car and lock the doors.

Why is this OK online then?  People seem to think it is OK to hide behind their website.  Think about how silly the car lot examples sounds.  Now take a look at your online promotions.  If you don’t have a name, a face, and a personal brand behind your recommendations, your product, or your promotions, you might as well start selling cars with a sheet over your head.

Leave a good first impression.  Give people your name, tell them a story about yourself (could be a funny one) and let them know that you are there if they need any help.  One thing that I have found to be effective over the years is to give out an email address in which people can contact you.  If you do, you will not only create instant trust, people will feel as though they have reached a safe haven…and are much more likely to buy from your recommendations.

(2) Give more than you take.

Selling 101 here.  What makes a good buying experience?  One where the customer feels they get the most bang for their buck.  This does not necessarily mean a “firesale” or a “garage sale”…however it means that the value of the product or service you are selling are worth more than the actual price indicates.

If I buy an iPhone for $699, it is worth more to me than that.  If it is worth less I would not buy it.  Worth would come from many different aspects.

An iPhone is sexy.

I pay to be cool I guess (as lame as that sounds).

An iPhone allows me to check my emails.

That saves me time (and money).

An iPhone gives me GPS when I am lost.

That saves me stopping at a gas station to ask for directions.  I do have GPS in my car, but for some reason I use my iPhone instead!

An iPhone gives me 100,000’s of apps. Many are free.  This gives me something to do when I am standing in line to get my Subway or sitting in the airport waiting to catch my flight.

An iPhone allows me to check the Internet from where I wanted.

The other day my friend told me that Tuna fish get up to 600lbs in weight.  I didn’t believe him so I looked it up…and sure enough, the biggest Tuna ever caught was 1496lbs!!  Anyways, without the iPhone I would not have been able to do this.

Oh ya, I can also make PHONE calls.  Weird…

Anyways, the point I am getting at is that an iPhone is a great deal for me at $699.  It provides me much more value and substance than the 7 $100 bills do.  So I make the trade with Apple and they hapilly make their $300 profit on the product.

In the online world, if you offer your customers free incentives, upgrades, powerful information, bonuses, or continue to make your product or service better….you will make more money.  If people view the value of what you offer them to be more than that of their own money, they will buy from you EVERY SINGLE TIME!

(3) Know your stuff

There is nothing worse than being misinformed or being told ONLY stuff that you know in the same way you know it.

If you are promoting products to help greyhounds train for dog racing, you better know your stuff about dog racing.  You better know the terminology, you better know the reason people love racing greyhounds,  you better know the history of greyhound racing and you better know the products you are promoting.

If you don’t, it is obvious.

What do you think is a more knowledgeable statement:

Want to build a model airplane?  (at this point I didn’t know “jack” about model airplanes).

OR

Want to geek out your FPV with the Thomas Scherrer UHF Long Range System?  (at this point I know something).

With a tiny bit of research, you can be informed in pretty much any industry you want.  Whether it be model airplanes or mini horses.

I don’t know whether it is because some marketers are just plain LAZY or they have never considered the consumer in the correct “light”, I see a lot of websites out there that show a complete lack of “niche” knowledge.  A real turn off.

There you have it.

The oyster shell strategy, creating more lucrative and POWER CUSTOMERS comes down to three items.  One, be real and authentic.  Give people the feeling they can reach out and touch you.  In the online world there are a lot of headless horsemen out there…and I don’t want you to become one.  Be a personality.

Next…give, give, and then give again.  If you want to create a repeat customers you have to become known as someone that is generous.

Lastly, know your crapola.  If you don’t know jack, you won’t sell jack.  Simple as that.

Hope you enjoyed Part 2 of my 4 part “Oyster Marketing Strategy” series.  If you have any feedback I would love to hear it…so please leave your comments below.

Cheers,

Kyle
wealthy affiliate
www.wealthyaffiliate.com

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The Geographic Marketing “Beach”

The other day I made post in the forum pertaining to my old job as a Oyster Picker.  Yeah, yeah…enough chuckles!

Anyways, within that post I mentioned that there were 4 aspects (the beach, the shell, the meat, the pearl) to a successful oyster business, and I tied them into their extremely close relation to Internet marketing. (You can read my original post here)

Today I am going to elaborate on the beach, or the geographic marketing epicenter of a successful campaign.   This is post 1 or a 4 post series…and in the following posts I make I am going to be discussing the other components of an oyster (in terms of marketing) and hopefully it will give you a very strong grasp of how to market online.

“When you look for a beach you need to really analyze all of components of that area.  You need to understand the true demographics of it.  Is is easy to deliver product from that area…are the winds so high they will blow away your oysters, is it an area known for “red tide” in which there are seasonal times you cannot sell your poisonous oysters.”

The same goes for geographic locations for your marketing campaigns.  Geography can make all the difference between a successful campaign and one that is really struggling.

In order to sell something online, you need to be in the right market.

Have you ever been at work and so darn hungry that you just went to the cafe next door?  You see, the food doesn’t even need to be the best for this company to succeed if the office staff next door is large enough.  A lot of people will have the same idea as you and because of the cafes geographic location, they are positioned to succeed.

Put this same cafe down a dark alley and watch it be out of business in a month.  Conversely, if you have the best food in town but are in a jurisdiction that is difficult to travel to or where people are worried about crime, you are not going to be successful.

The exact same thing happens within the online marketing world.  If you have a product you are promoting to a certain geographic area and these people can’t actually BUY that product from that area (due to credit card processing restrictions), you are wasting your damn time and money on getting traffic.

Think Clickbank (CB), one of the largest affiliate networks out there.  Many people don’t realize that when they are getting traffic to promote Clickbank products, that some of it is wasted traffic…by that I mean they can’t buy ANY CB products due to the country they are in.

Paypal only allows payments from certain countries as well.  If you are promoting a product that only accepts Paypal payment, then you may want to look into which countries are on the “safe list”.

https://www.paypal.com/worldwide/

And what about the “rich versus poor”.  If you try to promote a 1980 Ford Pinto online to people that are billionaires you are wasting your money.  Same goes for putting a Maserati ad in front of people who have a lower income.  You might get some “looky loo’ers”, but you would not be anywhere near a successful campaign.

My recent case study:

I recently ran a test for the “make money online” promotion of an pure “squeeze page” the other day and ran it within all Countries & Territories.  My goal was to simply get people to opt-in to a mailing list…at which time I could build a relationship with them, one that was ideally strong enough that they would purchase based on my recommendations.

The results:

80% of all my traffic came from India & Nigeria

The problem:

Most of these people were willing to join a list (that is free), but next to none of them could afford to buy anything.  Sure these geographic regions would be great if you had a “free system” that you wanted to attract new people to…and they were willing to work hard, however they did not have adequate funds to make this campaign profitable.

The solution:

Target only countries that fit the geographic profile that would allow them to buy your product based on the demographics.

I edited the campaigns settings so that it would only show within countries with the purchasing power that I felt necessary to sell the products that I had within my back-end sequence.   The results were as anticipated, much better.  The pay-per-click price actually went up slightly, but the quality of lead was much more qualified.  Conversions also increased drastically from the opt-in to sale ratio.

So in conclusion, the beach you choose is VERY important.  You want to seek out the following criteria through research before promoting to a certain jurisdiction:

(a) Do they have the money to buy your product?
(b) Do they need money to buy your product?
(c) Do they want your product?
(d) Do they need your product?
(e) Are they capable of making the transaction you require?
(f) Do you run the risk of fraud?

If you can accurately assess each of these items, you will be much more successful with your promotions.

That’s all for today.  I will complete part 2, 3, and 4 in the coming weeks.

Take care,

Kyle
wealthy affiliate

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Five Things They Don’t Teach You About Working from Home

Guest Post by: Steve W.

I’ve been working full-time as an Internet Marketer for a little over a year now. In that time, I have learned that it takes a little bit more than knowing the methods of Internet Marketing to be successful.

Here are just a few of my observations that most other people either don’t want to talk about, or they simply forget to tell you about.

1. You become your own boss.

When you start a career at home for yourself, you don’t really have anyone to answer to. You need to force yourself to work. Sure, you aren’t going to get fired if you don’t do your work, but you also won’t make the money required to pay your bills.

A lot of people think anything goes when you work from home, but you should treat it no different than working a full time office job. When I first started at home full time, I figured out the time of day I was the most productive and set a work schedule for myself. Most days, I work from 10AM to 4PM with a break for lunch. I try and stay as productive as possible during those hours and limit the work I do outside of that schedule.

To stay focused and on track, create a to-do list for each day. Outline tasks you’d like to have accomplished by the end of your work day. The feeling of accomplishment you get when you cross of an item will keep you motivated all day long

If you need inspiration for an idea or just need to take a break, get away from the computer. Nearly every good money making idea I’ve had, I didn’t think of while staring at a screen. I’ve never had success by trying to force an idea and believe me, I’ve tried that.

2. Your home is now your office.

Create a dedicated workspace for yourself. Slouching on your couch in front of the TV with your feet up on the coffee table while using a laptop does not count as a workspace. Get yourself a real desk and keep it organized. If you ever have to stop working to investigate a strange smell, your workspace has become a distraction. Keep it clean.

Eliminate distractions before you start working. Finish up whatever small chores you need to do for the day so you don’t have to take care of them when you’re on a roll. Only do work related tasks while on your work schedule.

You also have the ability to grab a laptop and go work outside on nice days. Do this as often as you can but don’t brag about it to people who work in offices. They will resent you.

3. You need to take care of yourself.

For starters, take sick days. You’re human and you need time off to rest, just like everybody else. If you don’t feel well, grab a blanket, make your favorite soup, and nap on the couch all day. You may be capable of sitting up, but that does not mean you need to be working. Take time to rest your mind and body.

Speaking of staying healthy, you need to exercise. It’s easy to let yourself go when your only commute is from your bed to your computer chair. Take care of yourself and get a gym membership or at the very least spend some time walking outside. I like to try to workout in the mornings before starting my work day. It keeps me in shape and allows me to stay focused and energized all day.

One of the hardest adjustments I had to make when starting to work full time at home was dealing with being alone for extended periods of time. You need to find ways to stay social. Working alone can get depressing and having a social outlet is a vital part of success.

Try and find someone local who is also working from home to meet with every now and then for lunch or to discuss ideas. At the very least, invest in a web cam and keep in touch with your friends and family through Skype. If all else fails, get an animal friend. They make the day less boring and yes, you will start to talk to your pets.

4. You do not have to work 24 hours a day.

You may have merged where you work with where you live, but you need to find a way to still keep these lives separate.

I’ve spoken to a lot of people who try to start careers from home. For some reason, most people think they can dedicate 12 to 14 hours per day, 7 days a week to working online since they now have nothing else to do. There’s no easier way to burn out than trying to work all waking hours. You simply can’t stay productive after these long hours.

You need to respect the weekends and take time off on holidays. It’s okay to let an email wait until the morning or a phone call to go to voicemail. It’s okay to have a personal life. You do not have to always be readily available.

5. You get to live an awesome life.

If you reach a point in your work at home career where you can work full time at home for yourself, that is amazing. It’s a very big accomplishment that very few people can achieve.

I can’t tell you how often people tell me they envy my lifestyle. I’m usually very modest when it comes to talking about my career path, but it is seriously awesome. I live with my girlfriend who works 10-hour days in an office building and she often comes home stressed about her job, boss, deadlines, salary, or any number of things that accompany an office job. She’s even limited to the amount of sick days she’s allowed to take! I’m forever grateful that I don’t have to deal with any of that.

If you have a chance to start a work at home career, definitely seize the opportunity. It will be challenging at first, but there’s nothing that can match the feeling of running a successful business from home.

So, these were just a few things I’ve learned over the past year. I’m sure you have things to add to my list and I’d love to hear them.

Leave me a comment below!

Steve W.

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What makes a keyword a GOOD keyword?

Guest Post by: Marcus

Back in 2005 when I first started online I couldn’t get this question out of my head. Every which way I turned I was told that learning how to do keyword research was an important part of the whole Internet marketing process, but even though I understood that point in theory…I really didn’t understand what a GOOD keyword was.

I’m not talking about any keyword in particular here…I just couldn’t grasp exactly what it was that made one keyword stand out more than any other – in any niche.

So I set off on a mission to find out if anyone could give me some answers, and along the way I learned plenty of stuff that made things a lot clearer. Things like…

Long tail, relevance, low competition, search volume etc…

They all struck a chord with me and definitely made the process of identifying keywords a lot easier.

I then began to question if that kind of knowledge was really necessary because let’s face it…the way keyword tools are designed nowadays, you only have to push a couple of buttons and within seconds they will spit out 100’s of potential keywords (And then some!)

But do they really help to find GOOD keywords?

Now at the risk of sounding a little cranky, I later discovered that no matter what I learned about the keyword research process…and regardless of how many whistles and bells my keyword tool had on it, I was only uncovering keywords that MAY have potential.

You see, things suddenly became clearer for me when I realized that…

A keyword only becomes a GOOD keyword when you learn how to do something good with it!

But really…just what the heck is a keyword?  Many people overlook the simplicity of it all,  and therefore fail to understand keyword research.

A keyword is simply something that people type into search engines when they are:

(a) looking for information
(b) looking to solve a problem
(c) looking to buy something
(d) bored…and again, they will be looking for info

So thanks to my collection of keyword tools I thought I had become something of an expert at spotting some amazing keyword opportunities, but in reality those weren’t good keywords that I was finding, they were just…well…keywords.

That was when I had my first ‘cart before the horse’ moment (one of many I might add), when I realized that keyword research means absolutely NOTHING if you don’t know what to do with what you find.

I’d already been busy with my hoard of keywords up until that point…ranking high in the search engines with articles on some pretty random keywords, and I regarded this as a pretty big success.

But was I able to MONETIZE them?

Well I won’t say ‘not at all’, but I will say…HARDLY.

All those hours of hard work that I’d put in – pretty much a total waste of time.

Then again, there was a major positive that came out of this whole experience, and for that reason I’m so glad that it happened. My brush with ground zero conversion rates had forced me to learn how to focus on the person behind the keyword and connect with them and their issue, rather than just hitting them with some loosely related content and hoping it would just do.

Let me tell ya…that was when EVERYTHING changed!

And it’s no coincidence that we talk a lot on here and at WA about building relationships with visitors to our websites/promotions (see Eddie and Jennifer’s posts), and it emphasizes the fact that how we use keywords is fundamental to our success online.

All successful marketers know and understand this point…but at the same time, most people struggling online DON’T.

Keywords allow us to open the door of opportunity in any market we choose, via any medium of online promotion. Understanding how to interpret and use them and understanding the person behind the initial keyword search is one of the most important skills that you could ever possess as an Internet marketer.

So if you ever found yourself wasting hour after hour scouring the Internet for those elusive keywords that you can dominate, think back to my early experiences and how I discovered that they didn’t really exist, without my own consideration for “people” behind the search. I promise that when you do, you’ll end up with more good keywords than you can possibly handle

Thanks for reading, and have a great day!

Marcus

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The “Oyster” Marketing Strategy

Hey everyone,

This is a story I can completely relate to for many reasons.

Believe it or not, I used to work for an aquaculture company during my mid to late teens, with my main duty being “picking oysters”.  Although this was a back breaking job it was one that taught me a lot about work ethics and how to work quickly and efficiently.

I guess in a way it also taught what I don’t want to do for the rest of my life.  You can probably relate to this, and you may even be in a job right now that you are hoping to quit one day.

Anyways, here we are 10 years…and a roller coaster ride of a decade later. I have been able to accomplish success within the Internet marketing world through the same hard work and work ethic…in what some would call in “extraordinary fashion”.

So today I thought it would be COOL if I could combine the two industries and show you the relation between an “oyster” and “how to make money online”.  Although they are VERY different in nature, I was able to find a correlation between the two.

This is what I call the Oyster Marketing Technique…

To find the relation between online marketing and the oyster business, you need to understand a few things.  First, there are 4 components to the oyster that correlate to a successful marketing campaign…the beach, the oyster shell, the meat, and the pearl.

The first thing I want to look at is the beach. Oysters grow at different rates, and flourish much better depending on the water temperatures, currents, and location of the beach.  We will call this the beach component, and this translates to the “geographic market” in the Internet marketing world.

When you look for a beach you need to really analyze all of components of that area.  You need to understand the true demographics of it.  Is is easy to deliver product from that area…are the winds so high they will blow away your oysters, is it an area known for “red tide” in which there are seasonal times you cannot sell your poisonous oysters.

The same goes for geographic locations.  Can people in that area buy the product you are selling?  Do they have enough money to purchase your product (if it is paid)?  Are the people in that area even interested in your product?  Do they speak that language?   It is important that when you choose geographic location within PPC campaigns that you understand the market.  You need to know that there are adequate and qualified people within that jurisdiction that can purchase your product.

You need to understand the beaches and understand the seasons in which the beaches produce the best harvest.

Second, we have the oyster shell.  This is the home for the oyster.  The bigger the shell, the more the meat there is within the oyster.  The longer you leave an oyster on the beach (ie, the more time you invest in it), the bigger the oyster grows and the more money it is worth.

This translates into customer value in the Internet marketing world.

The more patient and more care you give your oyster (customer), the better the opportunity you will have to earn the most money from it.  The same goes for the IM world…the more you help out a visitor, the better the customer they will be.  This definitely applies in particular to the email marketing realm.

The better you are at building the relationship and nurturing your “list”, the more success you will have and the greater the “value per customer” relationship grows.

Next, we have the meat.  Oysters tend to vary in size and although the biggest oysters fetch the most money, the smaller oyster are in much higher demand.   There are many more markets for small oysters because of their popularity within the restaurant business and “smoked” oysters business (canned).

Because of this, you can typically sell more volume, but the small oyster market has much more competition and is subject to price slashing and business lag…things that the extra large oyster marketer and the cocktail (mini) oyster market are not subject to as much.

If you are crafty as an oyster business owner however, you can find more niche marketers for the more popular size oysters.  For example, there are restaurants that don’t serve oysters that you could deal “direct” with and earn higher profit.  There are also tradeshows, different distributors worldwide, and also an online market.

In the Internet marketing world, this translates into market size, versus the niche markets.

The largest markets online reap the largest amount of sales, yet are volatile to ongoing influxes of competition.  However, within these large markets (like weight loss, like dating), you can find smaller niches.  Long distance relationships.  Dieting for women post menopause.  Etc.

Then there are the “small” markets that have very little competition, and on occasion take a little more work to get going.  But the market is always there and MOST people are not willing to do it, so you can take full advantage and corner that specific market.  These are the unique niches like “tractor canopies”, “little big man ladders”, “men’s anti-aging cream”, “yoga for basketball players”.

The meat is where the market is!

And then you have the pearl.  Pearls are very rare and in fact, in my 4 years in the oyster business, I only came across one…and it wasn’t the ideal pearl shape (perfectly round).  I guess you could call this kinda lucky (that I found one that is).

A pearl is VERY rare in the wild and is created when a spec of sand finds it’s way into the mantle folds of the oyster…at which time a calcium carbonate form builds up around it.

A pearl is equivalent to hunting for something that is not there or very hard to find…or an illusion in attempt to earn a MASSIVE PROFIT.

The pearl is what most people look for, yet the fewest people ever find.  I compare it to someone looking for the “secret to success”…when in fact, the secret is that there is NO SECRET (if that makes sense).

I mean, there really is not secret niche, no pearl that is waiting to be found on the Internet.

Sure I guess you could refer to unexplored niches and keywords as pearls, but there are so many of them out there that I could not state they are “rare”.

All you need is to research and find your ideal beach (it doesn’t even need to be the best one), find the right size oyster shell, find a market for your oyster meat…and you will be a successful farmer and in Internet marketing terms…a SUPER AFFILIATE or a MILLIONAIRE!!!

I guess I could end this within the old saying…

“The world is your oyster”!

Cheers,

Kyle
Wealthy Affiliate
www.wealthyaffiliate.com

PS.  Leave feedback!  Also, I am going to be elaborating in great detail on each section (the beach, the shell, the meat, and the pearl) in the future!

Now Available!

Part 1: The Geographic Marketing “Beach”
Part 2: The Oyster Shell – Creating More Powerful Customers
Part 3: The Meat – Sell More Low or Sell Less High

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Why does google love my junk websites?

I really suck at building websites!<img class="alignright size-full wp-image-101" title="Kyle" src="http://www.wealthyaffiliate.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/kyle_side.jpg" alt="Kyle @ wealthy affiliate” width=”200″ height=”249″ />

Honestly, I do.

Looking back over the years (wow, almost 8 years now…I am getting up there), I have built some of the funkiest, stinkiest looking websites around.

Graphics…bah.  A waste of time right?

A fancy template with lots of bells and whistles…I had no need for that.

An ugly (by conventional rules), bare looking “homemade” website with quality and relevant content. That is what I was interested in creating.

I didn’t enjoy creating graphics and good thing…I would have likely sabotaged my sites!

I know Carson spoke to you last week about the importance of a website in this day and age.  To be honest with you, I think it has always been important.  What is not as important is how it looks…sites that I created in 2003 are still effective.

In fact, sites without any “template at all” are still effective.  Flat white background with a small border around it with good sales copy, and relevant pages within still work.

So, if technology has produced so many killer ways to build websites with a lot of flare and a lot of graphics, why hasn’t the way people view websites changed?

Think about this for second…

If you were searching for a solution to “change your dodge caravans spark plugs” in Google and were taken to a revolving door to your solution, what would you HOPE for on the other side.

CONTENT on how to change your spark plugs.

If the content is of quality, you could care less about the picture of the caravan in the banner, the moving image on the right, the beautiful detail that went into the table layouts and graphics….YOU WANT CONTENT.

People search Google for content.

And marketers that deliver the “sought after” content are those that succeed.  And that leads me to the idea of…

The Backwards Website Model

What if you were to build a website in reverse, based on what works (meaning, what earns you money).

Where would you begin to start?  What lead to all your conversions?

For those of you that have been able to achieve success online, you are likely putting your hand up right now and shouting out the answer.

The answer is:  THE CONTENT, THE STORY, THE SALES COPY, OR THE OFFER

All of these relate to writing, and none of them relate to graphics.   If you reverse engineer any successful website out there, the graphics would be the last component to come.  The content would be the first as the content is what leads to success.

And so goes the QUALITY of the content…

Ethics are still important.  Content is only content if you are doing it simply for displacing money.  IE, earning money without offering adequate “stuff” in return.  That leads me to the fact that although websites are key, you need to think of the bigger picture when creating your content….who is reading it?

BUT…Aren’t Websites Important?

Yes, websites are key.  Google no longer has love for people that direct link  They don’t care for people that do redirects.  In fact, they don’t even care much for affiliate link.  The reason being is there is a huge gap they are seeing a need to fill between their paid advertisers and their top search engine optimized sites.

The content quality has always been much better for “natural listings”.  Just a few years back, Google implemented what we call the Quality Score algorithm to try to increase this quality.   I remember back in the day seeing things like an ad being listed under a a keyword like “weight loss” that was for “making money online”.

Now, this was not cool for someone doing a search within the search engine that was faced with getting an irrelevant result for their search.  In order for Google to sustain their search market share, they needed to improve this.

So Quality Score came.

People then learned to “game” Quality Score.  Creating relevant pages, with little or no content Quality.

What marketers would do is simply stuff in a couple of relevant keywords, and then drive their traffic to click affiliate links…in which they would earn a commission from.  It worked…and people made a ton of money.

But Google Caught On!…

They found this loophole within their own Quality Score calculation and have recently stuffed a massive hole in these marketers game.

Stuffed a hole to the tune of anywhere between 100,000 and 200,000 Google Adwords accounts being shut down without warning.  To the tune of advertisers losing all their Quality Score rank and having their sites red flagged.  To the tune of million dollar marketers completely losing their businesses overnight!

Google now wants, really, what it should want.

Quality content. Relevant content.  Enough content. AND no greasy salesmen.

Google basically wants their user experience (people searching for stuff) to be the best possible.  Google wants marketers to have their own website and to put some thought into the content they write…for it to be unique, and for it to be adequate enough for a decent experience.

So, the rules of the NEW AGE are:

(1) Having your own website (a must)
(2) Having adequate content
(3) Having relevant content
(4) Having unique content
(5) Not trying to trick Google by stuffing keywords in your site
(6) Not being a smoke and mirror salesperson

You follow these rules, you are cool with Google and your are cool with me.  What worked for me worked back in 2002 when I was starting out.  Not because I knew some secret strategy then, I always put myself in the “searchers” shoes and aimed to make the search experience as good as possible.

BTW, I have ad groups that I have not touched for the last 6 years and are still effective.  They follow the convention and if you work forward using the “user experience” model,  you will have a safety shield from any major Google slaps, dances and punches.

The Internet has changed, but the ideology of website success has not.

Let me say this again in another way…

The Internet has NEW RULES, but the SAME OLD WEBSITE STILL PREVAIL!

Take it easy,

Kyle
wealthy affiliate
www.wealthyaffiliate.com

PS.  I love to get feedback…so if you have any comments, please feel free to leave them below.

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