Fall in Love With Twitter Again

On the heels of its first-quarter earnings report, Twitter seems to be struggling to keep its users active. The social-media service added 14 million active users, up about 6 percent from the previous quarter, but not as much as some analysts would have liked.


Twitter now counts 255 million active users; Facebook has over 1 billion active users. Keep in mind that an active user as someone who logs into their account once a month, not someone who’s necessarily tweeting regularly.


So what to do if you are one of many that set up a Twitter account and abandoned it? Dust off that handle, and give it another try.  Your business needs it!


1. Be patient. Unless you’re Katy Perry or Starbucks, your brand probably doesn’t have a built-in following. Your first tweet isn’t going to get a lot of traction because no one knows you’re there. So start favoriting, retweeting and replying to content that interests you.


2. Follow more accounts. Find more accounts that are more relevant to your interests, but be selective. There are accounts that may have 100,000 followers, but they also follow 80,000. How in the world will that person ever see anything useful to them? At the same time, don’t feel bad for unfollowing. Remember, when it comes to Twitter, it's basically a high school game.  Don't waste your time following someone if they aren't going to return the favor.  Twitter upkeep can get horrible at times, esp when your in the 100k range.  You almost need to have a 3rd party program to manage your follows/unfollows.


3. Be diligent. Make a point to spend even five to ten minutes a day reading, favoriting and replying to tweets. Don’t be discouraged if your replies and tweets go unnoticed. The more you tweet, the sooner you will learn what works and what doesn’t. As the days go on, increase your time but don't overdue it.


4. Say something. Try not to go days between tweets. Whether it’s a discount code, information on sales or something fun, be active. That said, don’t tweet for the sake of tweeting.  Set up a schedule and follow it.  Don't fade away from Twitter again! 

You Can Kick-Start Your Own SEO Campaign

Search engine optimization can be a confusing and frustrating topic for an entrepreneur. He or she probably knows that SEO contributes to online success but may not always understand what it entails or how to best approach it.


Consumers turn to search engines when they look for products and services online, so positioning your website so it can land higher in search results can prove beneficial. Search engine optimization involves improving elements on your website's pages as well as increasing the number of inbound links (from other sites) to raise its ranking in nonpaid search results.


A new business can be inundated by offers from SEO agencies from every corner of the world, all promising the same outcome: top rankings in search results. Some digital agencies will quote five-figure monthly retainers. Or overseas companies will promise the world for a monthly stipend of a few hundred dollars a month.


But overpaying for a service that doesn’t deliver on its promises can quickly deplete a marketing budget; selecting a poor service can result in a website's penalization by Google. The worst thing an entrepreneur can do is contract for a low-quality SEO service in an effort to save money. The cost of cleaning up the mess created can surpass the steep fee for hiring a more experienced agency at the outset.


If your business doesn't have the budget to hire a SEO agency, then take a deep breath, grab the SEO reins and follow these tips to handle your search engine optimization process internally for a while.


Optimize on the page level first. Many businesses forget one of the most important elements of search engine optimization: focusing on the text within a page of a business website.


This involves making sure that website elements are properly optimized to make a given page worthy of a high ranking on a search engine's results for a desired keyword.


Create blog posts. Not only should your business website have a blog that's updated regularly, you can assign posts to staffers that hit the keywords you're trying to target for SEO. Have one employee manage the blog and delegate writing assignments throughout the company.


Curate a social media presence. A website that has its content shared across social media will attract social signals (tweets, "likes" and shares) and also receive visits from various social media channels, which will contribute to its ranking by search engines. 

A business needs a social media footprint from its birth, and while you might not be able to afford a full-time social media manager or agency, that doesn’t mean the company's social presence should be neglected.


Look for guest blogging opportunities. Guest blogging on industry-related sites that receive a lot of traffic is great for brand exposure but can also result in other sites' taking notice of your company and linking back to your site. This is a type of natural link building that Google loves when ranking websites.


Seek out industry blogs with the potential to provide your business some exposure and traffic and then offer them guest posts. The tasks can be spread out throughout your company at first. Have a contest that rewards the employee who lands the most guest posts and reward the staffer who creates the guest post driving the most traffic to your site. This kind of competition can produce great results while building camaraderie, which is very important for a new business.


Later on, when your business becomes more successful, then you'll be able to bring on full-time content marketers or hire an agency to handle the creation and distribution of such content.

5 Tools to Grow Your Online Presence

Growing your online presence is no easy job -- especially for small and midsize business that are often lacking the brand awareness and resources of their much larger counterparts. Fortunately, now, more than ever there are a plethora of tools to help newly-minted entrepreneurs build their brand quickly and cheaply.


Here are five to help jumpstart your online-community presence.


1. Buffer to post content. Content sharing is one of the easiest way to grow and nurture your community. Yet, with more and more social platforms popping up online, content sharing can be time consuming, as each has its own style and messaging. Enter Buffer. This tool is a great way to streamline your posting and schedule on multiple platforms, making sure you’re talking to everyone where it counts. Plus, it’s a great way to keep your communications going on the weekend, a time when many users are interested in sharing online content.


2. LaunchCrew to launch campaigns. When launch day comes, startups need to get the word out to as many people to have the most impact and increase the probability of being heard in crowded industries. Often this entails getting your current followers to share with their friends, family and connections. LaunchCrew will help you do just that. It lets you cast a much wider net, practically doubling or tripling your impact. But how? By asking your audience for their credentials to be able to post on their behalf on the day of your launch. Or for any major campaign. You’ll get that initial boost you’ve always dreamed of -- the one you really need these days to break out of the pack from the very start.


3. Unbounce to create landing pages. Landing pages are now a must-have design choice to boost your online special operations. By customizing these towards a targeted audience, along with specific and relatable calls to action, it makes them way more efficient at achieving higher click-through rates. Unbounce allows you to create landing pages incredibly fast, with no technical skills required, making it easy not only to build but also to A/B test and implement the best results.


4. Click to Tweet to foster sharing. It’s ok to ask people to share. But the simpler it is, the more people you’ll get to do so. By giving out a simple, pre-composed click-to-tweet URL for your audience to tweet in seconds, you’ll find that your potential for virality is drastically increased.


5. Mention to monitor and react. Once people start talking about you, the best way to continue growing is to detect these mentions and to reply to every one of them. By doing so, it fosters a lot of motivation for them to talk and mention even more about you, creating a network of trusted brand advocates. By having alerts based on keywords -- like the name of your company, your products or your competitors -- mention allows you to stay in the know and react in seconds by connecting your social accounts directly to the app.


With these five tools, you’ll find yourself developing and maintaining a clear brand voice in no time. And it’s then that you’ll start to see your online presence heating up.

Stop Talking About Yourself So Much

Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, Oh my! Now entrepreneurs have so many ways to reach out and talk to the world. Entrepreneurship is all about building a platform of loyal advocates who are excited about listening to your message and hopefully buying from you.


That said, the five biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make on social media all come down to one important lesson: You talk too much (at least on social media). Stop talking and start listening and you will turn your use of social media into a lean, mean, money-making, advocate-building, client-relationship machine. Avoid these social media mistakes and build a wider following:


1. Avoid me, me, me; it’s all about me. Take out a sheet of paper and write down your last 10 social media posts. Whom have you written about? I bet most, and probably all, your posts are about you, your company and your greatness. Stop writing about you. Instead, use your platform as an opportunity to promote others. My personal method of doing this is through blogging about amazing people.


Every week I choose an interesting business person to reach out to and interview for my blog. By doing so I guarantee that every single week I’m offering awesome content about other people and so my friends, followers and connections get way more than they bargained for when they followed me because my posts are not just about me. A side benefit to doing this is that I also strengthen my bonds with some amazing people.


2. Pivot from always using your lips not your ears. Most entrepreneurs use social media as their lips, not their ears. Instead of spending 30 minutes a day posting, spend that time scrolling through posts by friends, followers and potential clients to see what’s going on in their lives. When something awesome is happening in the life or business of one of your followers, act on it! Send a card or pick up the phone to acknowledge it. I spend 30 minutes a day scrolling through my social-media feeds to see what’s happening in everyone else’s lives. When I see anything at all, like a celebration or a challenge in their life, I consider this to be a prompt that I must act upon.


3. Too good for social media? Forget that! Surprisingly there are still individuals and companies that are resisting social media. Wow, these individuals and firms are missing out on a free opportunity to build a following. I’ve had conversations with business owners like this and the big reason they have resisted social media is because they personally hate social media. My advice to them is to get over it!


I know lots of entrepreneurs who hate selling yet they realize that this activity is so fundamentally important to their business that they figure out a way to get good at it -- just as they should do with social media.


To build a tribe, you must be accessible in a way that people can easily learn about you and your business. The easiest way to do this is through social media. There’s a good chance that your competition is eating it up on social media, and so should you!


4. No sunshine when she’s gone? Stop whining. Do not post negative stuff via social media. Do not complain. Do not share negative articles about your competition. If you choose to post about your political preferences, do so only with the knowledge that you are probably eliminating 50 percent of your followers as potential clients. Presumably, you want to grow a following for your business. To do so, you must have posts that are inclusionary. Therefore, don’t give people a reason to walk away from your business.


5. Steer away from impersonal birthday greetings. A person’s birthday is the most special day of the year, for that person. Ten years ago, collecting a database of birthdays would have been time-consuming and cumbersome. Today, you have this information at your fingertips. Don’t miss out an amazing opportunity to honor your customers, employees and sphere of influence on their birthdays.


By the way, posting on their Facebook wall is almost equal to ignoring their birthday. Everyone is posting stuff on that person's Facebook wall. At a minimum, if you are going to post on someone's Facebook wall, put a photo or a video so at least it gets noticed among the flood of birthday wishes. Better yet, don’t post on their wall at all. Send a card or pick up the phone to offer a birthday wish.


Social media offers entrepreneurs a unique opportunity to build a tribe by listening, acknowledging and honoring others. Shut up, start listening and thrive!

Facebook Isn't the End All, Be All for Social Marketing

Question: Given the not-so-recent changes in Facebook visibility of posts among fans, how useful is to still concentrate the part of social media effort on Facebook? Also, with your findings, how profitable -- from the traffic generation point of view -- is to invest in FB paid advertising?


Answer: A few years ago, you could say, “I’m on Facebook, that’s my social strategy.” Not any more.  The majority of the online audience in the U.S. (52 percent to be exact, according to comScore) is using two or more social platforms -- about an eighth of the audience is using seven or more.


Should you be on Facebook?  Yes, absolutely -- if you have content that’s appropriate for Facebook. But don't focus on all of your resources on Facebook. Instead, be everywhere.  If you have photos, be on Instagram and Pinterest.  If you have wisdom, be on Twitter.  There are a lot of social platforms. (Have you heard of Secret or Whisper yet?) You should use them each if you’ve got something appropriate to offer.


But the buck doesn't stop at social, you should also use email (think newsletters), and you should also think about paid search and SEO.


I can’t speak to your specific company and your strategy, but I can give you this: Try everything and measure your returns so you can balance your mix.


If you are trying to sell product through an ad, you should measure everything in terms of ROI.  That’s easy math.  How much did you spend to get the returns you can track through those efforts?  Eliminate the costly and double down on the efficient.


If you are trying to establish awareness or interest in your brand, the calculation is a little harder.  What you care about here is how you can best deliver your message to the perfect audience. How much are you willing to pay to speak to the right audience, how can you be sure the audience you want is the one you buy and how do you measure the effect the message has on them? (Hint: Clicks don’t measure brand impact.) This also requires not just buying access to the audience but experimenting with what to say to them when you’re in front of them.  The placement doesn’t make the impact, the creative does -- the placement gives your creative the eyeballs it needs to succeed.


Big companies have access to advertising opportunities that small businesses may not. But even small businesses have powerful advertising tools available to them through self-serve features on Facebook, Twitter, Google and others. Take a look at the ads you get on each platform -- you can bet many of those are from small businesses.  Do they work?  Well, some of them are priced on a cost per click, so if you are willing to pay the bid price for each click you get then they are very efficient. But the onus is on you to give them a reason to buy both before and after they click.


In closing, you need to keep track of sales on what works and what doesn't.  If you test the market on a paid ad and it isn't working.  Try something different or a new approach.  Try all the platforms out there. 

Zero to 23,900+ Twitter Followers Without Spending a Dime

As social media is becoming more engrained in our everyday lives, it is becoming imperative for businesses to get on board. And Twitter is huge for companies, as it provides a place to share news, engage with loyal customers and attract new ones. But it isn't easy.


While some opt for quick fixes, like buying followers (something I have never done), I don't see the point in these sketchy tactics. It may offer short-term spike, but it doesn't provide the kind of engagement that organic followers do.


When I joined the social media movement I was just an observer for the first few months. But by remaining consistent and sticking with daily-following methods, my account began to grow. Now with more than 23,900 followers, people often ask me for advice on growing a following on Twitter.


Here are a few very simple ways to grow your following (along with the process of what I do on Twitter) that you could also implement on your other social channels.


Return favors. Follow people that retweet or favorite your tweets, especially when they take the time to read articles you've written and share a comment with you. Also take the opportunity to engage when possible. The more you reach out, the more folks will return and reciprocate -- by following or making comments.  You can apply this across all your social networks.


Remain active. Follow new people every day even if you can only afford a few minutes on each network.  I usually do this on my phone while I am waiting on someone.


Widen your net. People say quality over quantity?  True, however, I would rather have both to maximize your reach.  You must continue to build your community -- whether online or offline.   I've met many of my community contacts from my tweets or share.


Make retweeting a habit. Although I have many followers to focus and respond to, I make my rounds every day to retweet at least one new person a day.  This sometimes will give you a fan for life.  You can apply this same exact method to grow your following and community on any of your networks.  I love Instagram, I spent a month focusing on following, in no time my social media presence grew there very quickly. That said, you must be consistent in harvesting your following and engaging with others on a daily basis


Pay attention. Keep your eyes open for those who retweet you often or share your blog.  Favorite a tweet to let the individual know you see them.  At a later point in time, perhaps return the favor as time permits.  How does this help with your following?  The more people see that you appreciate their efforts, they will more likely retweet you whenever online. The more visible your brand or Twitter handle lands on other pages, the more likely you will generate more organic following.


Stay focused. Tweet relevant and high quality content.  People will regularly visit your page to share your tweets.  When people are excited to pass along your message, additional branding and visibility to your account.


Keep networking and engaging. Take it offline. These days, people share their love of food, nature and other passions. For instance, if you are passionate about photography, organize a photo walk. When you take social media offline, people will share photos of you along with your Twitter handle to their audience, in turn you will get more followers. This is a great way to start a conversation online and offline.


Showcase your skills. Twitter is a great place to show off your talents, especially writing and photography. If you are a writer with informative, pertinent content, put it on Twitter. Same goes for amazing photos.  People will share your articles or images and this will give you visibility to more admirers.


Find influencers. Reach out to other thought leaders and feature 10 people on your blog.  They will be happy to share your content to their readers and this will also grow your readers as well as followers.


Diversify. Do not put all your eggs in one basket. With this last point, apply these ten tips in other social channels where the methods may fit to grow your network.  Technology changes very rapidly, it's smart to keep a pulse on the current social world.


I hope that these points will help you grow your brand.  Remember the more seeds you plant, the larger the harvest.  An hour a day focusing on following will give you a robust community.

5 Tricks to Get Influencers to See and Share Your Content

On the Internet, messages are meant to be heard. From high-powered advertising agencies to in-house marketing departments to individuals with a few hundred Twitter followers, everyone yearns for their message to be conveyed and shared. Finding a high-powered industry influencer can help jump start a sharing craze and kick your message into viral overdrive. A single retweet, blog link or public compliment can do more than you think.




So what can you do to improve your chances of an influencer noticing and sharing your content online? Start by following the five simple rules below.




1. Don’t expect a social media miracle.
Let’s start with an unfortunate truth for those on the hunt for influencers’ attention. Trying to reach out via social media likely won’t cut it. With anywhere from a few hundred to a few hundred thousand Twitter mentions and/or Facebook comments per day, influencers simply won’t have the time or opportunity to see your message. You can go ahead and try, but the chance of an influencer hearing you might be slimmer than winning the lottery. As for an in-person encounter -- forget it.


2. Instead, get creative to get an influencer’s ear. 
Since simple social media outreach likely won’t do the trick, you’ll need to find ways to get creative. Getting in touch with an influencer’s official PR agency or management team is a decent step, as is mining closer connections for an introduction. But for most influencers, making contact in a unique or innovative way can be key to the introduction. Consider a self-promoting website with plenty of personality similar to Matthew Epstein‘s brilliant Google Please Hire Me.


3. Show some passion! 
Hand in hand with showing off your creativity is finding a way to show insane amounts of passion for your work. Craft a pitch with just the right amount of passion and moxie so that the influencer you want to reach can’t say no. Venture for America, a program that pairs talented college grads with startups in burgeoning cities, asks this of their new fellows, most of whom are just weeks removed from receiving their diplomas. VFA’s “make contact” challenge saw one success story in a fellow who met with Dan Gilbert, CEO of Quicken Loans, by citing their mutual desire to rebuild Detroit. Another got in touch with Joe Kennedy, CEO of Pandora, by conveying his passion for companies at the intersection of tech and music.


4. Keep your content short and to the point. 
Obviously, your content needs to be razor sharp and engaging. More importantly, it needs to be easily digestible. Getting the attention of a major influencer is a difficult task by itself but convincing them to wade through a lengthy introduction or setup to get to your main point is simply asking to be ignored. The elevator pitch is a decent solution to this dilemma, but even that may be too long. Consider using various forms of micro-content to get your concept across in seconds.


5. Flattery never hurt anyone. 
Who doesn’t like compliments or a personalized pitch? Be sure to make any potential influencer feel good about why they should help you. Saying some nice words and having a good attitude is an incredibly low risk, high reward way to strike up a conversation with an influencer.  Do your own research.  Learn what they like and want.  Then, make your move. 

Niche Market / Keyword Info

This post is based on an important truths about search engine traffic:

Truth: When you enter a market (begin to target a set of keywords) for the first time you don’t know really anything about it.
You don’t know what keywords have traffic.
Yeah, Adwords Keyword Tool gave you some numbers, but in case after case, those numbers prove to be nothing more than symbolic. When you actually get into the market and start your SEO, you inevitably find that some keywords that apparently had “28 global searches a month” or whatever, actually bring hundreds of visitors and keywords that have “20,000 searches a month” don’t bring near as many.
Furthermore, you don’t know what keywords convert. You can make educated guesses, and based on principles, you can make intelligent assumptions, but until you’ve got the data, you don’t properly know.
This of course, is the reason why affiliates used to start a campaign by testing a market with instant PPC traffic. That allowed them to know their conversion metrics from the first week, and know the “real” numbers that Adwords doesn’t tell you straight away. Of course – and sadly – that’s no longer possible, so we need to take a different approach.
Think of this…
The BEST situation you can have in any market, is one where you know what keywords can provide easy search traffic, and you know what keywords convert for the affiliate offer you want to promote. As soon as those keywords are in your head, no one can take them from you. Yeah, your site can lose rankings, or get penalized, but who gives a shit? You know those keywords are profitable. You want what you did to get traffic from those keywords. And you can do it again. And again.
That in mind, here’s how you get to that point, without PPC, in a new niche, as quickly as possible.

Is Content Really King? Maybe. But In The Beginning? Definitely!

Here’s a secret some – maybe a lot – of new affiliates don’t know:
Advanced affiliate marketers don’t do much “niche research”. They know their niches already. They’ve had profitable sites before, they know certain markets, they know the right keywords, they know what sells. They keep hitting the same markets over and over again and keep replicating the same results… Google slaps be damned.
If that’s not you, the first thing you need to to do in a new market, is bomb your site with content targeting as many keywords as you can, that you THINK might have traffic, and THINK might be profitable.
Then you start your SEO.
On a new site your SEO shouldn’t be too specific anyway. You should be working on building up the authority of your domain name, and building those root domain backlinks to set yourself up for the specific keyword domination that will come later.
Why do you do this? It’s like fishing.
You’re casting a bunch of lines into the water, in all different places, to see where you get bites.
At first, the new content you add will do nothing. It will sit there – anything from a week to a month – depending on your market. But as your domain authority grows (thanks to your link building), some of those posts will start showing up in the SERPS for some of those long tail keywords we always talk about. 

THAT’S when things get exciting…
As soon as one keyword pops up… one keyword where you got traffic without even trying… that’s a sign.
You go back to that post, you consider the monetization, you try to improve it, you drop some internal links to that post (with the right anchor text) from other posts, and you see if you can grow that traffic… and if you can sell with that traffic. If you can’t improve the traffic or make sales… no problem. You wait for the next keyword to pop up. If you can. BOOM. You’ve got a keyword that’s in your bank so that you can draw on it and it’s potential FOREVER.
And if months pass and NONE of these keywords pop up? You couldn’t even get a few visitors from long tail keywords with all that content? It might be a sign that this market is too competitive to begin with. You take the hit, and you move on, happy that you didn’t waste even MORE time in that space.
Do you see why this is infinitely smarter than the alternative approach?
I mean the approach where you have some affiliate offer and you pick a keyword, then spend months SEOing it, riding all your hopes on that, only to rank for it and find that it doesn’t have as much traffic as you thought, or it doesn’t convert like you thought?
The approach I’m talking about in this post is one where you’re minimizing the possibility that factors out of your control – unexpected occurrences like the Adwords data being wrong – could hurt your profitability.
You’re maximizing the number of decisions you’re making that are backed by experience and data. It’s a TOTALLY different ball game.

Start Now…

If you’ve recently entered a new niche, or you’re about to do so: Give this a shot.
Do some keyword research. 
Grab 20 keywords. (adjust as per your budget)
Have 20 good articles knocked up. It’s a $100-$150 investment. Small for what you’ll get out of it.
Publish them on your site
Continue with your SEO
And watch your traffic stats.
Do this in enough market and you’ll be operating like a super affiliate before you know it.

The Social Media Experiment

First of all, we hope everyone had a great Memorial Day Weekend!  Hope you guys were all safe and had some fun, but also had time to reflect and give peace to those that have served and payed the ultimate price.


Now on to this entry - 'The Social Media Experiment" -  I wanted some facts to prove that women have it easier in marketing than men.  Weather it be online, or in person.  A sale is a sale, but why is it that women have a slight edge over men?  Because they have certain features that lure men into buying almost anything?  Or is it that they do have skill in the field?  I've found that both are the correct answer.

I, myself have been in marketing now for over 4 years and have been fairy successful.  However, it took countless hours of training, numerous sleepless nights of SEO, and many months before I started to turn a profit.

Last Sunday, I created a fictitious Facebook profile, made it a "classless" female with numerous inappropriate pictures and a fake background story.  The point was to see how many friends I could gather and then launch a few campaigns to see if I could generate any profit.

The results were above and beyond what I had expected.  In a mere 7 days, I had accumulated 3,300 friends, 700+ messages, and a handful of comments on the pictures, statues updates, and on the wall.

I then launched a few simple campaigns to see if I could  gather intelligence on the traffic and if they led to any actual sales.  In the end, I got some good traffic and even a few sales with minimal work.

The point is, is that anyone can make countless profiles, rinse and repeat this process, and with time and dedication you could add this to your stream of income.

The process can then be duplicated to other streams of social media, such as Twitter and Google+

With all this research done, I can safely say, that even with my 4+ years of experience and all the training I've done, a simple fake profile could ultimately out-sale me in the end with the same amount of effort.

I will keep conducting this experiment and also expanding it to add to my many income streams.

Remember guys, don't be afraid to try new avenues.  Even if you fail at something, it could still prove to be useful in the learning curve.   

Welcome Back!!

After a "minor" break...which was actually a long break.  We have decided to re-launch the blog and assist people in changing their lives.  When the blog first went live way back when, we received numerous feedback's and questions. After helping every single one of you, we want to get back out there and help spread the word again!

Starting very soon, we will be doing our normal posting and also adding some more info to the blog.  We are going to do a little remodeling, but not much.

Stay tuned :)  Lot's of things are coming your way!!

 

Product Review 3 - Webstarts

There are a ton of sites out there that will assist you in building a website.  Just do a simple Google search for "Website Builder" and you will get a few thousand results.  If you want to build your site from scratch in HTML or Java, then buy a web host and host your own site, by all means do so.  Just realize that this is 2012 and very few business's actually do that anymore.  Times have changed, and the old ways just aren't there any more.  Why pay someone loads of money when you can do it yourself for ten times less.  Even if you don't know what you are doing as far as web design goes, the sites now a days are pretty easy to follow.  From basic to custom templates.  You as a business owner may not have the time to invest into actually building a website for yourself, due to the fact that you are running your own business.  Small business owners have to do this.  Affiliate Marketers should be doing this.  But as I mentioned, why spend loads of money for someone else to do it, when you can do it yourself, the way you want it.  Today, I want to review one of the best website builders out there.  Let's do a quick run down on the basics.

What can you use the app for?

WebStarts is a user friendly website design tool. The application utilizes a drag and drop interface that makes it as simple as possible. Users can drag and drop video clips, photos and other content directly on the page. The user sees the page as they build it so they never have to jump back and forth or refresh to view the most recent version. WebStarts offers hosting and a domain name. Users can also add a custom domain if they prefer. Custom email addresses are available with domain names. Users can add other content, such as a forum or web form and ecommerce tools. The application has also added member’s only pages that allow users to limit access to certain content.

What is the history and popularity of the app?

WebStarts was founded by Adam Barger in February of 2007. The concept behind the application was created when Barger noted the severe lack of user friendly “do it yourself” webpage builders. The application was intended to give users a convenient way to build a functional webpage without the cost of a professional designer. The application has received a positive response from users because of its simple design and limitless customization options.

What are the differences to other apps?

The main draw to WebStarts is the combination of a user friendly interface and unlimited customization for each page. The user can build pages to their specifications simply by dragging and dropping elements right where they want them. The user can see the page as it develops without messing with any coding. WebStarts manages to provide a user friendly website builder that doesn’t limit creativity by corralling the user into a template or minimal features.

How does the web app look and feel to use?

WebStarts offers a smooth, user friendly design that lets even the most inexperienced user stay in control. Each website looks unique, in fact browsing the gallery provides the user with many examples of just how original each design can be. The drag and drop interface is the corner stone of the site’s appeal because it gives the user total freedom when customizing a web page. The user can add a wide range of elements directly to their page before publishing it live.

How does the registration process work?

A new user can get started by clicking the yellow “Sign Up Now – It’s Free!” button in the lower, right hand corner of the WebStarts homepage. The next step asks the user to select a design. A note lets the user know that they can change designs later if they decide to do so. The user is taken to the registration form after selecting a design. The form asks for a first and last name, email address and password. Next, the user can choose their preferred subscription plan and must choose a subdomain name. The user is automatically logged in to their new account. Users can also click the blue button in the upper, right hand corner of the homepage to sign in with a Facebook account.

What does it cost to use the application?

WebStarts offers three subscription plans to its users. The first is a free plan which includes up to five pages, 10 MBs of storage space, 5 GBs of bandwidth per month, email support and the WebStarts footer on all pages. The Pro plan costs $4.89 per month and includes one free domain name, 15 pages, $125 in free advertising, five forms, five slideshows, 1,000 MBs of storage space, 25 GBs of monthly bandwidth and HTML access. The Pro Plus plan costs $7.16 per month and includes 10 email addresses, unlimited pages, $300 in free advertising, search engine submit, unlimited forms and slideshows, 5,000 MBs of storage, 100 GB of bandwidth per month, membership feature access, no WebStarts footers and phone and email support. Please note that WebStarts sometimes does offer deals and price cuts. So these numbers could change.

Who would you recommend the application to?

WebStarts is a valuable tool for anyone who wants to create a web page but has no experience or design knowledge. The application makes building attractive pages quick and hassle-free. Users can drop many elements onto pages, including functional items such as forms and slideshows. Three subscription plans offer access suitable for any purpose. Even the high end plan is economical for casual users and comes with many attractive features.

WebStarts Features

• New users can register with a Facebook account
• Member's only pages lets users control who can view content
• Drag and drop interface makes it easy to organize web pages
• Forms and slideshows can be added as well as images and videos
• One free and two economical paid plans are available
• Web pages can link to Twitter and Facebook profiles
• Ecommerce tools allow users to sell merchandise online 

To wrap it up.  Webstarts is an amazing builder that I have used for a few years now.  Even if you just want to make a few free sites to get yourself going, then upgrade later, its perfectly fine.  Please do note though, that you can only have one website per free account.  If you upgrade to the Pro or Pro Plus, you can have as many different WebSites under one Account name.  I highly recommend WebStarts as your builder for your online business or your affiliate product page.  Click the Banner Below to get started today!



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Product Review 1 - SFI

If you have spent any time on the Internet, and particularly if you have been trying to figure out how to make money online, you have run across the SFI affiliate program. Perhaps you have taken the opportunity to investigate it further, perhaps not. However, if you have investigated a little more deeply, you have seen a lot of claims of how great it is, and maybe a few comments about the SFI "scam".

Well what is the truth about SFI? Let's review the program shall we? While people obviously want to know if they can make money with the SFI affiliate program, lets deal with the "scam" issue first. After all, if SFI is a scam, then there's no sense of going forward, is there?

Since I do not know how much experience you have with Internet Marketing, or Network Marketing. Let me make a couple of points before I get to the question, "Is SFI a scam?"

I have been on Internet marketing for a long time and I have seen all kinds of scams, and I have seen all kinds of claims for and against many of the same programs. Here's what I have observed on my research.
While there definetely are quite a few rip-offs and scams out there, many people who make claims against network marketing and/or Internet marketing programs make the claims because they fell prey to hyped-up claims about what they would expect from joining the program. Some people join and sit back and wait for something to happen without putting the effort. Some take a few half-hearted swings at selling some products or signing up distributors and then give up.

Here's the common thread almost ALL of those who sign up for network marketing and/or internet marketing programs HAVE NO CLUE WHAT THEY ARE DOING! At the same time, almost all have been signed up by someone who raised their expectations to a fever pitch by making inflated claims about how much money they will make, or about how fast their business will grow.

The bottom line is, that the growth of any business, whether it's selling cosmetics (AVON) , motor oil (AMSOIL) , or a broad range of products and services (SFI) will depend on the time, effort, and talent of the business owner or operator.

The question of whether a business is or is not a scam does not depend on the number of people who have been successful with it, but whether or not it can and will deliver the goods, services, and potential profits it claims. I have been with SFI, and when I make the sale the customer gets the product, and I get the commission. I have purchased and used many of the products, and I have been satisfied with what I have recieved for my payment.

Apparently my customers have been satisfied as well, as they have often come back and purchased again and again. There have been dissatisfied customers, there always are in retail, and I am sure that many of them do not have a good opinion about SFI. Looking at it this way, if SFI is a scam because some that have done business with it are dissatisfied, then so are Sears, Walmart, and Best Buy.

There is the issue of misleading claims, however. Well, once someone signs up to be a distributor for any program, there is not much a company can do to prevent them from making inflated or misleading claims.
There are a lot of people trying to rip you off out there in Internet-land, and some people who just believe that "advertising" means making the biggest , loudest, most audacious claim you can.

All I know is, that if you go to one of my SFI websites and purchase something , you will get what you were promised at the price that was quoted, and I will get the commission. If that is a scam, then I am confused about the definition of the word. Sorry that took so long, but, when it comes to SFI , and other network marketing or internet marketing, that issue seems to be a big one. Don't fall short and think everything on the internet is a "scam"  Some sites put this in there title heading just SO YOU CLICK ON it to view, and inside you will find a short review and there link to buy.  Most people see the word "scam" and of course they want to click the link to see what is being said.  It is a marketing technique that has been used for years.
Anyway, you came here for an SFI affiliate program review. So, what is SFI? What does it do? What can YOU do with it?

SFI began about 11 years ago as "Six Figure Income". Over time, it acquired an image of getting rich-quick scheme due to the wild and high-flying claims by many SFI affiliates. Also, however, although starting with one product available for sale only in the United States, it progressed to being an International Organization offering a huge range of products, and the SFI business opportunity, to over 100 countries.
In fact, Gery Carson's dream was to create a business opportunity available to anyone with a computer and internet access anywhere around the world. The dream has been a reality for many years now, as thousands of SFI affiliates sells millions of dollars in products every year. As business will, over time, the original Six Figure Income affiliate program became the "Secure Future International Marketing Group" , retaining the SFI mark which had become known around the world.

Recently, Gery Carson launched a new and improved SFI affiliate program based on two sites in particular. TripleClicks and EyeEarn. Of course, you are reading this to find out what you get if you choose to sign up as an SFI affiliate. As it has been since the start of SFI, every new affiliate recieves not only one, but a range of FREE websites, a free online portal leading people to several online stores for name products, free training of how to market online, and an array of free marketing materials, including banners, text ads, flyers, and presentations. Very important stuff when choosing a company that you want to promote. 

There is no cost to any of this to the SFI affilate , but he or she is tasked with the responsibility of leading people to one of their websites. After that, the SFI infrastructure takes over. People arrive at a professionally designed, and regularly updated, website. Should they make a purchase , they are automatically assigned as a customer of the SFI affiliate whose website they purchased from. SFI will see to processing the payment, delivering the product, and even make a refund if required. The affiliate recieves a commission for the sale.

Many SFI products are either subscriptions to a service, such as web hosting, membership in the IAHBE (International Association of Home Business Entrepreneur), the IAB Health Benefits Plan: or an expandable products such as nutritional supplements which need to be re-ordered from time to time. Sales of some products will allow the SFI affiliate to recieve some points, and, with enough points, they can begin to create a downline of other SFI affiliates whose sales will generate additional income.

The SFI affiliate program is an excellent place for the beginning internet marketer to get started for the following reasons:

It is entirely FREE to join. It provides all marketing materials, including several professionally designed websites for free. It provides an extensive training program in internet marketing (free) and it offers a broad range of products and services for the SFI affiliate to choose to target. If you can not succeed with the SFI affiliate program, there is a good chance that you will not succeed with internet marketing at all, as your only task would be to lead potential, and interested , customers to the websites provided by the SFI affiliate program. I would highly recommend that you take advantage of all the free items they offer and the training they give you.  If you want to get into this sort of game, this is a must starter site to get into.  This will teach you how to drive targeted traffic and get you off the ground.  Once you have learned the basics, you can then move on to more advanced companies. 

Anyone interested in this online marketing affiliate program opportunity can sign up at:

Blog Update 1 - Introduction to Online Marketing

Today, I'm going to discuss affiliate marketing. All the information provided in this blog can be used if you have your own product or decide to sell for another merchant.  Let's just jump right in and get started.  I know you have a lot of questions, so we'll begin with defining affiliate marketing.

Affiliate Marketing Defined
You, the affiliate drive traffic to a merchant's site via your website or blog, using special affiliate links that are personalized for your use. The merchant may be selling a product like DVDs or ebooks, or they may be trying to sign on clients, such as a bank.
The merchant pays you a commission once the visitor has completed the desired action, such as purchasing a product or completed a registration form. (Money exchange is not always the final goal.)
When you send a consumer to a merchant's site the specialized link you were assigned by that merchant tracks the activity and purchases of the consumer. Obviously, other affiliates have similarly personalized links to the same products on the same merchant's site(s).

Affiliate Goals
As an affiliate your goals is to drive the highest possible targeted traffic to your merchant(s) through your unique affiliate link.
Once you have your website or blog up and running, and it promotes the free flow of traffic to the merchant(s) through your affiliate link (s), you can continue to earn money from it whether you are in bed, on holiday, or sleeping.  This is called passive income.
It's passive because after the initial effort of researching your chosen market, building a website and setting up your campaign, you can earn with minimal day-to-day input in your campaign.

Affiliate Marketing Example:
Take Grit City Publications, for example. That company produces emotobooks. They have a website and affiliate program. Of course, you can apply these principles to any affiliate capable merchant.
First, build a content rich website about some kind of related matter that applies to the company's affiliate program. In the case of GCP, topics about pop culture and fiction apply.
Next, sign up and receive an affiliate link. The link given to you is unique and contains your affiliate ID (a number or your affiliate name). The link allows the merchant to track sales generated from your visitors so that you receive commission for sales generated through that link. You then place this link on your site or blog, and in appropriate online sales venues to drive traffic. If a visitor buys an emotobook, you get a commission.

Cookies Explained:
It gets better! With some reputable affiliate programs, a visitor does not actually have to buy during that visit. Say Jim lands on your website, clicks your affiliate link to some product on your website. He gets taken to the product's merchant site, looks at the sales page and then leaves without purchasing. During that click, a “cookie” is placed on Jim's computer. Cookies are nothing more than a bit of code that says that Jim's computer viewed the product on a specific date and time. It also holds a record of who referred Jim to the product, (i.e. you).
A week later, Jim decides to make the purchase. If he remembers the URL of the product's merchant website (Amazon, for example), and then types it into his web browser, the cookie kicks in and uses the original affiliate link, your link. The webpage recognizes Jim as being refered by you.
What does this mean?  You still get your commission!
Cookies could be valid for as little as one day, but could maintain up to 60 days. Some are lifetime cookies. As long as the purchase is made from the computer where the cookie is stored, within the time limit of the cookie, and Jim hasn't encountered other marketers cookies since using yours, you get your commission.

Word of caution: Cookies vary in their duration so read the companies affiliate agreement carefully to find out the life span of their cookie. A 3 month cookie is obviously more desirable that a one week cookie.

Is Affiliate Marketing for You?
That's the question, isn't it? Working as an affiliate can be a lot of fun and highly profitable, but it has its perils, like any career. See the following list:
1) You do not need to develop your own product. You make money promoting other peoples products.
2) You have no responsibility for after sales service for the product. This is all handled by the merchant.
3) You do not deal with shipping, storage, packaging ,or inventories.
4) You can promote one product, several products, or drop a product if you are not satisfied. You are essentially your own boss.

What is in affiliate marketing for the merchant?
More Exposure = More people will buy.  Which is great for the merchant.  Affiliate programs for any product/company is an awesome way to get products spread throughout the web.  If you are the developer of a product or owner of a merchant site, you should look into starting your own affiliate program.

What affiliate Marketing is Not:
Affiliate marketing is not a get rich quick business. It requires a lot of energy and determination to meet your own goals. Even if you don't want to start a business, you still must treat it as though it was its own business.
You can't make six-figure salaries by sitting around thinking everything is on auto-pilot. If you just want extra cash on the side, it still requires devotion. As you get involved with affiliate marketing you will come across a lot of products that claim to teach you how to make hundreds of dollars in 15 minutes. Beware of the hype!!
The reality for most of marketers is that it takes months of hard work to start making a substantial income. Time + Energy + Devotion = Money.

Financial Freedom:
Ask yourself, if you continue in your current job (just over broke] for the next 10 years, will you earn enough to be financially free for the rest of your life? No, of course not.  I've done the research. The top surgeons in the world are making around $400,000 - $500,000 a year.  Can these people retire in ten years? Yes, they most likely can, but they went to school for years, devoted their life to a noble profession and have worked all their lives to accomplish this goal. 
Now if you find an opportunity that if your worked at for a few months or years, that anyone can learn, and has the potential to make you financially indpendent for the rest of your life, take advantage? Of course you would.

Passive Income:
Let's think of our friend Jim, who works a regular job. He goes in, does his work, goes home and gets paid at the end of the month. He gets paid ONCE for the job he does. He needs to go to work again and again to get paid again and again. In affiliate marketing, you sit down, set up the website, set up your trafic generation methods and then build upwards. As long as traffic keeps coming to your affiliate marketing website or blog, you stand to make money again and again.

Multiple Streams Of Income:
Jim can only do a finite amount of work a day. He is limited by hours, home life, and physical ability. He cannot do 6 full time jobs a day.
In affiliate marketing, you can build 1, 2, or 30 websites, all of them earning. Like I mentioned, however much time you put into this business, that's what you can expect to earn. It takes time, determination, some investing, and the will power not to give up.

There are many affiliate companies out there.  Amazon, Ebay, Clickbank, and SFI are just some of the big guns. I hope you've enjoyed this post and I now hope you have an idea of what affiliate marketing is and what it can do for you.

Follow this blog and I will supply you with the information needed for marketing success!  


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