Starting your own web design business can be exciting and rewarding. In a stagnent economy, entrepreneurial activity tends to increase. There is nothing better to use your talents and passions in order to create a lasting source of revenue. But starting a business takes effort, and careful planning. So, once you have established the talent and the idea, what is the next step?

Create a business plan

A business plan or model defines the core activities of the business and some basic strategies for deploying them. Businesses that can maximize their online practices and business dealings have much less overheads than traditional retail locations. Less overheads equals higher profit margins. Web design services can begin with some home office space, software, and online promotion.

As you develop your business model, you will want to define your ideal customer and develop a company slogan to be used in conjunction with your marketing efforts. Think about how you can reach potential clients in the most effective manner. Part of developing your business model should include research on potential competitors.

An important mantra in business is not to reinvent the wheel!

Take the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of another business, and to alternatively, piggyback on successful strategies.

A word of advice here (that comes after years of making mistakes): try to compete in terms of quality of service; don’t try to compete in terms of price.

Develop an online presence

Once you have your business plan, you need to open up shop. If you are going to be developing websites, you should be able to refer customers to your own website. Remember that your website serves two functions – promoting your business and presenting your product. Your website will show potential customers what type of product they can expect.

The overall look of your website is important as it showcases your abilities as a web designer.

The actual content of the website is important in order to maximize web searches. It is highly recommended that you research SEO (search engine optimization) as well as social media promotion as you design and build your website.

You should be working on your website every single day! Not only should it be constantly improved in terms of design, speed and usability, you also should be constantly writing quality articles for your blog and promoting them as the best way to attract clients is with content marketing and SEO.

Establish referral relationships

Simply putting up the “open” sign on your shop does not guarantee business. It is also a good idea to partner with existing businesses who have established customer bases. This can be accomplished with some creative negotiating and leveraging. Think about strategic business relationships, and move forward from there.

There are a lot of designers hanging around on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+. Spend a bit of time engaging with other people in your field in social media. If you build enough trust you will win referrals this way.

Once you build a website for a client, they will need that website hosted. Partner with an established web hosting company, and use that partnership to generate referrals back and forth. If done properly, these types of relationships can become mutually beneficial, and they can help a new business establish a customer pipeline. Remember that as you establish a customer base; add a page to your website highlighting testimonials, and links to completed websites.

It’s a good idea to ask past clients to write glowing testimonials and to recommend you to their friends and associates.

Sell, sell, sell

Now, it’s go time. Often in a business, the first few sales will have a snowball effect on operations. Think about promotions for the first 50 customers. Offer reductions for up-front payments. The goal is to get a small base of satisfied customers as quickly as possible. Remember that both good and bad products and services generate word of mouth advertising. Solicit referrals by offering discounts, and refer customers to your business partners as often as you can.

What do you think?

Are you running a design business or thinking about starting one? Was this advice useful to you? What barriers are there in your life or the marketplace that are stopping your success in this field? I would love to hear what you think in the comments below

I had just received an email from an old friend Bradley. For as long as I’ve known him he’s been pulling a healthy 6 figures a year working in the international finance division of a major commercial bank. After nearly 15 years pushing a desk they cut him a month before Christmas 2011.

Bradley had been speaking with a mutual friend who had mentioned that I had been making a lot of money online for about the same length of time as Bradley did working at the bank. Let me paraphrase his message for you. (profanity changed to protect the sensitive).

“Hi David it’s Bradley. Those bast*()ds finally f(*ked me. I heard you’re making out like a gangsta on the world-wide web. I need to make at least $150K a year, got anything you can send my way? I needs to make it rain paper up in here yo! I got about 6 months to make it, otherwise I have to get another shi&^ty job. Let me know, peace homie!”

I always chuckle when middle-aged white guys channel their inner rapper. I can only imagine what kind of language investment bankers actually use. Loved it when he called it the world-wide web, so 1995. I was hoping for “information super highway”.

He needs to make $150K within 6 months. What should I tell him?

What would you have told Bradley if you were me?

I phoned him. How non-internet. I asked him to read a book by Harvey McKay called “Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty Dumbass“.

Things got a little heated. He’s my age, and has made over $2 million in salary in 18 years of gainful employment. He has a $800,000 mortgage, 2 car payments, a kid in private school, and a monthly nut nearly in the 5 figures. I told him to get a job, any job as soon as possible. Either that or embrace the minimalist lifestyle and make some drastic, humongous changes.

Of course he asked me about the web. He had heard people were making crazy money online. He had heard that you could outsource to India to ghost write a book for you, then outsource someone to write your ads and run your operations and send you a check once a month. He heard it only took a couple of hours a week.

I was tempted to run the scene from Vegas Vacation with Chevy Chase and the little guy from Princess Bride on him. “You give me ten grand, we’ll go out back, I’ll kick you in the nuts, and you’ll say thanks.” I’ve been to a few internet marketing conferences like that, how about you?

The entire discussion, while mildly entertaining was frankly, terrifying. How can there still be middle-aged guys running around as if it’s still the shiny happy days where the stock market and house prices went only up and jobs were plentiful?

I’ve been making money online since 1994. I’ve ridden out the dark days of the late nineties where everything was theoretical, the Dotcom Bust of 2000, the web 2.0 revolution of the past 5 or 6 years, and now the impending Second Internet Bust. I cobbled together for you 12 predictions for next year based on my observations and belief of what’s really going on out there.

1. The Facebook Fade

Find me 10 guys that are making ads on Facebook convert profitably. No, Shoemoney doesn’t count. He’s a genius. Find the solopreneur that’s cracked Facebook and I’ll show you a guy selling stuff that he won’t be selling a year from now. Ringtones? Acai skinny pills?  Seriously, that’s your long term viable business model?

I was in a conference room about 8 months ago with an angel investor that plays in the invite-only dark pools with other stock holders in Facebook. I asked him if he was worried about the MySpace phenomenon repeating with Facebook. He had never heard of Myspace. He had money in a game that he didn’t understand. I was gobsmacked. This guy was driving towards the edge of the Grand Canyon in a convertible Mustang with Van Halen cranking.

I predict by the end of 2012 Facebook will begin to twitch and smell a bit like Blockbuster Video did in 2006.

Do you make any money with Facebook, or is it just a schnozzle of crapola?

2. The Impending Google – Apple War

Apple loves to give clues if we just pay attention. As network television collapses, will the model slowly become private, paid subscription services?  Apple does something elegant, Google copies clumsily. Google Books, Google Music, Google Movies. Isn’t their core competency serving ads?

When I turn on my AppleTV, Vimeo appears. It’s better than YouTube. No ads. Better quality. Less videos of dogs farting. Apple is giving us a big clue to the future of online video. If you look closely you see subscriptions to watch baseball, football and hockey. The battle over TV will be waged with battle-axe and crossbow.

In 2012 I predict things get heated between the two behemoths, with small skirmishes as a prelude to all-out war.

3. Massive Deflationary Disruptions Accelerate

Music is pricing itself at near zero. An artist gets paid 75 cents from iTunes on a download, and yet has to endure 3500 streams on Pandora or Spotify for the same meagre pennies. My 24-year-old niece’s boyfriend stared in horror when I asked for an iTunes gift card for Christmas. He whispered to her, “does he need help learning how to use a torrent?”

Movies, music, TV, and publishing are all upside down. But so is accounting, payroll, book-keeping and graphic design. The popularity of micro-outsourcing sites like Fiverr.com continue to accelerate. The outsourcing of projects will continue to flow to the lowest possible price point that still gets the job done. Helicopter Ben can print greenbacks as fast as he wants, I still won’t pay more than $5 for a 9 hub link wheel for SEO.

4. Geo Arbitrage Accelerates

Tim Ferriss fan boys who sold all their stuff and grabbed a bag with 50 things and headed overseas a few years ago look like geniuses. While their domestic counterparts get sprayed in the face with orange food products and beaten with billy clubs, the smart ones are sitting on a beach with their Macbook Airs earning in dollars, pounds and euros and eating out in pesos and dinars and whatever the heck they spend doing Ashtanga in MySore India.

With most western democracies struggling with unemployment, corruption, fascism, bankruptcy and social chaos, small towns in emerging markets look like smart choices for extended working holidays in 2012.

If you are smart, and willing to travel, the world is your playground.

5.  People Will Buy Solutions to Problems

My in-laws live in Greece. My father-in-law has had a backyard garden for 52 years. Guess how many of the nephews that live in Athens have gardens? Zero. It’s not cool. The youth wanted to forget the hard days after fascism fell after the war. Getting dirty was part of that. Olives rot on the trees because no one will pick them.

Now that Greece is bankrupt and the nephews are paying tax for the first time since Socrates wore a toga, gardening is entering the discussion again. Except they don’t know how.

Enter an e-book based on relevant keyword analysis. How To Build A Raised Garden Bed. My wife is building raised garden beds in our backyard. So will tens of thousands of people in 2012. Gardening will be very popular in 2012.

People will buy solutions to real problems online this year. Videos showing how to fix things, do home repairs, car repairs, and tips on saving money will all be hot.

6. A 500 Year Old Career Model

When Leonardo Da Vinci was painting and sculpting and inventing, he didn’t cash royalty checks from a publisher or from his rich parents. He had a Benefactor. In the old days, rich people would personally sponsor artists. Apprentices would learn shipbuilding and barrel making and fishing net weaving from masters as well as painting and music. They would work for room and board learning a craft, then head out into the big bad world to make a living.

With the university student debt pyramid scam unraveling, smart young people will begin to seek out internet marketing masters to apprentice with. Paid coaching and tuition models will adapt accordingly. There are already informal campuses in Bali, Thailand and Philippines experimenting with this model.

I have three 20-somethings that I have adopted as apprentices for 10% of anything they make for 10 years. I trade my experience in leveraged blocks of time for future royalties. It’s a win-win for both parties.

7. Obesity Will Still Be A Hot Market

This is a no brainer. It’s a huge playground (no pun intended). The winners will be those that advertise locally and combine service businesses like menu planning and coaching with the latest hot workout. Over half of everyone that lives within 100 miles of you is overweight or obese. Over 90% have failed at a diet. They need hand-holding and encouragement.

8. Seniors Will Be A Hot Market

Seniors are either broke and want stuff done for them, or have money and want stuff done for them. Every 8 seconds someone turns 60 in North America. What do you think this means for driving on roads in the next decade? Think local, think service business. The silver-haired generation is more web savvy than you or I think.

9. Translating E-books in Amazon Will Be A Hot Market

If you or a partner have language and translation skills, then you have a recipe to print money. Amazon has operational stores in German, French, Italian and Spanish, with more to come. What about Asia? I personally am working on this in a big way in 2012. I’m constantly looking to joint venture with partners to get my books to a wider audience. My partners translate and sell for the lion’s share of the royalties. I’m not greedy.

10. Google Redefines Spam

Google’s tolerance for spam is approaching zero. Their patience for spammy niches is shrinking faster than Obama’s approval rating. Goodbye business opportunity marketers, pharma, “Pron”, gambling, and duplicate content. So long thin affiliates, and fluffy article sites. I have seen guys selling bizops with 6-figure monthly purchases of Adwords getting kicked out like a card counter in Vegas. Can your business survive without Google? It’s a great planning exercise and an excellent way to give yourself nightmares.

11. Big or Small. You Choose. The Middle Ground is a Killing Field.

Go big or go home when it comes to your start-up. Scale fast for a takeover play, or stay small. The supply of dumb investors with buckets of cash will vanish this year. When big names like Wikipedia and Twitter are whispered about nervously, you know that a high burn rate is not a good idea. I predict that a major house hold Web 2.0 name will sink by the end of 2012 beneath the waves, shocking many.

12. People With Good Credit Will Be Highly Desirable

Smart companies are building in-house lists of their best customers and are treating them well. Amazon Prime is an example. How many million customers does Amazon have a relationship with that can order with a single click? How about Apple? I bought an app yesterday with 2 clicks and never even thought about the $1.99. Over 100 million Americans have bad credit. But 50 million Americans have wonderful credit. Who do you think smart companies are searching for?

I’m still perplexed about my pal Bradley. He needs to make $150,000 a year within 6 months and has zero internet experience.

What would you tell him to do if he was YOUR friend?

David Ledoux is the author of half a dozen books including How I Went From Welfare To Millionaire Without Winning The Lottery. He coaches entrepreneurs, owns several businesses and writes a witty and irreverent blog at http://davidledoux.com. His newest book, 10 Quick & Easy Strategies For Successful Living is available for free at his website.

image © igor – Fotolia.com

In this article, I’m going to share with you some strategies I have used to create a strong, loyal following of people that love to send me comments, share my content and buy through me again and again and again.

It doesn’t matter if you have 10 followers or 10,000 followers – you can start to foster real relationships with them and grow your business at a RAPID speed by using a few simple concepts.

Word Of Mouth Has Become More Powerful Than Ever

In traditional offline business, word of mouth is the cream of the crop and for very good reason. If you can get lots of people voluntarily saying wonderful things about your business…you’re getting the highest quality of referrals and FREE, viral marketing.

In fact, this is why social media marketing has taken off so much. People trust things their friends recommend to them far more than they trust a blatant ad for a product and with all the different platforms out there, your message can be seen by thousands at the click of a button.

So, with that said, lets break this down a bit and get to the core – how do we take advantage of the power of social media and the trust factor between friends?

We get others recommending our content to their friends/fans/followers.

Seems pretty obvious, but I want to bring it up as there’s some important issues to cover.

There’s a difference between a ‘Share’ and a true Recommendation

First, there are lots of syndication groups and tribes out there that will help you get people sharing your content on social media sites. In fact I use one daily and get a great deal of traffic from it. This is a great way to get backlinks, but most of the time people will NOT share to their Facebook and Twitter accounts as that’s where their true fans are and they don’t want to send any-old-crap to their followers.

So while it’s a good traffic strategy, it’s only the first part of the puzzle. You still want to get people GENUINELY recommending you to their friends and followers. Not only that, but you want them feeling a real connection to you, coming back to your blog, following you on Facebook, Twitter etc and actively engaging with you.

You want them to fall in LOVE with you.

Remember when you were a teenager and developed your first big crush on someone? What did it feel like? What emotions did you go through? What ACTIONS did you take to show that person you liked them?

If you were anything like me, it started when you thought the person was cute… and then the more you were exposed to their cuteness the more you liked it. There was something different about them. No doubt they were thought to be attractive or ‘cool’ by others standards too. The more you allowed your mind to wander and imagine being close to them or… gosh… holding a hand or sneaking a kiss… the more you ‘fell’ for that person.

Then the excitement builds up and you start to get excited about bumping in to them at school, and when you do you make sure you laugh at all their jokes.

You spend your time in class writing I Heart So-and-So in side your jotters (or on the desk!)

Now you want them to like YOU too. So what do you do? You go out and buy that Blink182 album they were listening too and memorize all the words so that some day you can act all cool as you sing along to it and pretend to be their biggest fan.

Ah, young ‘love’ was so much hard work!

Online marketing isn’t much different. We want to develop the same excitement and commitment in your followers (except now they’ll be writing I <3 U on their Facebook walls, not their desks!)

How To Make Your Audience Develop A Massive Crush On You!

1. Be everywhere! The more people see you, the more they notice you and at some point they are going to start thinking you must be worth checking out.

My favourite places to simply ‘be’ are Facebook, Twitter, BetterNetworker.com, other people’s blogs and blogging communities like Blokcube, BlogEngage and FamousBloggers.net – Comment on people’s posts, share them on Twitter, Facebook, start conversations in forums, leave your thoughts on topics. Leave a little trail wherever you go and it will start to imprint on people’s minds.

2. Be different. Be yourself. There’s nothing more boring and uninspiring than to get up and pretend to be someone you are not all day just to try and please everyone (I used to work in a mobile phone shop and had to wear long sleeves to cover my tattoos and say silly phrases like a robot all day). Step outside the box and push people’s buttons. Speak up when you think something else, don’t be afraid to stand out!

3. Look good. Now I don’t mean you have to be super sexy to be a success, but what you do want to do is think about how you look wherever you go. Have a good clear avatar (I try to use the same one on every site) so that people get to know you, have your name clearly displayed, your website in your profile and above all don’t be spammy and petty. Develop a clear strong image that’s congruent across all your networking sites.

4. Flirt! Let people know you might be “in to them” a little bit too. Oh gosh- just a little smile from a boy I had a crush on in high school would have been enough to keep me daydreaming about him all WEEK! Let your audience know that you think they are cool too. Say thank you when you receive a comment, a share, tweet etc. I always take the time to check my networks and reply to any new messages, follows, shares and comments.

5. Give them value. You want your readers to feel like when they are around you they get so much from the experience that they come back again and again. To do that, always start writing your content with the thought – How can I help my audience solve their biggest problems and entertain them at the same time?

6. Invite them to your party – Let your audience know where they can get MORE of you, where the cool kids are hanging out and how they can be a part of it too. Show them how to get on your mailing list, how to hook up with you on different sites and where they can contact you if they have questions.

7. Interact on a DAILY basis. Your business is people – whatever you are doing. Forming connections and relationships with others in your industry is crucial for getting ahead. Always look out for ways that you can interact with your audience. Ask them for feedback, pull them out on webinars, get testimonials, leave comments, ALWAYS say thank you and reply to those that take the time to reach out to you.

8. ASK THEM TO SHARE. When you know you are providing wonderful value to the community you can ASK people to share. In fact I recently read in a great article by Ana Hoffman that the top phrases in the most retweeted posts include the phrase “Please Retweet” – Asking WORKS.

9. Act with integrity at ALL times. Only promote stuff you 100% stand behind and are proud to put your name on. Your buyers will thank you for it and you’ll develop a loyal group of repeat buyers.

10. Give BACK before you take. Contribute great content to the internet, share others posts, comment on others blogs, recommend people to your followers first and you’ll see a much greater return. It’s all about the WIN-WIN and you can’t win until you’ve helped others out.

Why Should You Follow These Steps!

If you follow these 10 steps to creating fantastic, long-lasting relationships I can GUARANTEE you will see your name start to spread like wildfire as people talk about you more and more.

There’s NOTHING like having people highly recommend you to their followings but you’ve got to DESERVE it first.

Today I would like to share my latest discoveries with you.

Here are 5 Startups that I consider to be worth yoru attention in 2012

1) Codeanywhere

Codeanywhere is a real godsend for those who are in love with web development and never want to lose an opportunity to code. Wherever you are, this multi-platform code editor with a FTP client lets you quickly and easily connect to your data on web servers and edit or create new files instantly.

Having faced the lack of cloud based coding tools, the developers from Croatia decided to make the platform that enables you to work on the move anytime, anywhere and on any platform.
The system is compatible with any browsers and mobile devices as a native app for iOS and Android. Moreover, the company promises that you will always be concentrated on work, not on the fact that you code via browser due to use of the latest technologies.

Codeanywhere has already been launched , so you can start using it right now – Codeanywhere

2) Teamlab

In my opinion, Teamlab is one of the most promising project management and collaboration software for small and mid-sized business. In just a year this startup turned into a huge system trusted by more than 100 000 companies all over the world.

The platform provides 4 fully-featured modules for project management, document management, online collaboration and CRM. In fact, Teamlab is a real social network for business where you can control project progress and communicate efficiently. With in-built online document editor, the system appears to be a real cloud-based web office with all the essential tools, so there is no need to resort to any other applications.

Brave Latvian team announces a desire to conquer the whole world and prove that Silicon Valley citizenship is not a must for being successful. Well, development in a high-competitive IT industry is a decisive step, but here it sounds reasonable. For the quality and number of integrated tools TeamLab is truly ahead of its analogues.

The service takes your office to the cloud in a few clicks which makes sense especially when it comes to remote teams and freelancers – TeamLab

3) Fast Dove

Fast Dove is another cloud computing system, aimed to make your life easier. This service lets you manage SMS communications freely and quickly.

The developers tell a beautiful story about the appearance of the project’s idea. Once in the forest they saw a flock of happy doves flying over their heads. This incredible view inspired them on the project FastDove.

Today FastDove is an application which helps companies and individuals communicate by sending sms via Internet. What makes it different from all other online sms-sending services is that the messages are delivered just as though they were sent via your own mobile phone. Moreover, recipients of your messages will be able to directly reply to your number.

The project is growing extremely fast. Launched in 2009, by developers from Barselona, currently they support 116 (!) countries and are not going to stop - FastDove

4) Relead

These years Latvia seems to be rich in ambitious IT projects.

Relead.me is SaaS software , which promises to increase the conversion rate of clicks to sales by up to 10 times. It is  a real-time web analytics tool for sales professionals and the project positioning ensures that the tool is really powerful.

With Relead you get detailed information about visitors: their company name, industry, company size, financial and credit information, positions and contacts like phones and email. Geo-information, so you can see your visitor on the map. Full visitor path, so you can see what products or services your visitor is looking at on your website.

Sales leads are generated from website visitors, who never signup or fill in any form.

In their own words : “With Relead, it is possible to identify each client that has demonstrated interest about each respective product. This will, in turn, generate increased sales opportunities”
As soon as the project is launched, it will definitely gain certain success. Waiting impatiently - Relead.me

5) Mediatoolkit

And the last but not the least startup, which I would like to review in this article is a very promising Croatian project – Mediatoolkit.

The developers state that they have vast experience in working with media companies, that’s why they know exactly what media professionals really need.

Let’s see, what they mean. Being a blogger, an editor, a journalist or just a freelancer, sharing your thoughts in the World Wide Web, you certainly need to know what kind of effect content produces on the Internet, right?

Everybody would like to predict the future and, being more exact  - to be sure what kind of content will be shared with friends in social networks, such as Twitter, Facebook or Digg. Mediatoolkit will help you to be a real foreteller in the sphere of Internet publications!

The developers explain: “This service helps to find the most popular and shared content in real time and on any website he is interested in as well as get a prediction of what will be popular in the future”
Still being sceptical? Get a 14-days trial here – MediaToolKit

I hope you find these applications useful for your business.

Once that happened, something changed. I quickly realized that there was a webmaster/blogger stirring inside me looking to claw its way out. I grew little horns and from that point forward, it was all over with. I was trapped. I realized that blogging and running an online business was a passion that I never knew I had.

That being said, like anything, once you do it long enough, you quickly become bored with the “status quo” and you find yourself looking to push the envelope more and more.

Lets Do This!

Generally, in terms of blogging, this means challenging yourself to drive more traffic, ranking higher in search results for not only more search terms, but more competitive search terms to boot. Additionally, if you’re like me, you’re always looking for ways to “juice” the bottom line too, if you “get my drift”.

Now, if you have a website or a blog and have been at it for a while, you may have experienced a meteoric rise in popularity at one point only to see it slowly taper down on the back-end. This is what many have complained about and I, for one, attribute this to a great degree to the latest string of search engine algorithm updates that have been released.

Three Out-Of-The-Box Ways To Take Your Blog To The Next Level

If you feel that this is happening in your case, then here are three simple ideas that I have implemented on my own site that I feel have benefited me and that have helped me take my site “beyond” SEO. So here they are in no particular order:

Offer A Free Service

Oops. Did I just use the “F” word? Yep. I sure did. I said “Free“. You will just have to trust me on this. In my opinion, this is a great idea because it is a great way to get your foot in the door in terms of marketing your products and services. Why do you think software and drug companies offer free trials? Its to “get ya hooked, man!”

If your website or blog is based around a  product or service, take a close look at it and see if there is a simplified or stripped down version of it you can offer for free. Then, paste a giant banner front and center on your site that advertises it. Now that’s what I call “link bait“.

Of course, this will cost you money on the front end, but if you play your cards correctly, it will be worth its weight in gold in terms of advertising expenditures.

Syndicate Your Blog Posts Or At Least Some Of Them

I have had a lot of success with this personally. Now this is a bit of a grey area in terms of SEO and marketing according to some, but in my experience, article marketing (even post-Panda) still pays off. Side note: And its a great way to dilute the effects of black-hat scrapers that steal your content.

With that in mind, all of your blog posts are prime candidates for syndication. You can syndicate to a variety of places such as other blogs, e-zines, article directories, document sharing sites or even your own private network if you have one.

Of course, you don’t have to syndicate all of your posts, but at least try a few that you feel may not be getting the love they deserve while just sitting there on your site. Just remember, follow Google’s guidelines on this matter for the greatest benefit and they are as follows:

“Syndicate carefully: If you syndicate your content on other sites, Google will always show the version we think is most appropriate for users in each given search, which may or may not be the version you’d prefer. However, it is helpful to ensure that each site on which your content is syndicated includes a link back to your original article. You can also ask those who use your syndicated material to use the noindex meta tag to prevent search engines from indexing their version of the content.

Source: Duplicate Content – Webmasters Help

Interestingly, some blogs and directories disallow linking back to the original because they feel that it detracts from the “use experience”. I say “nonsense”. They’re just trying to outrank you for your own article. Don’t fall for it.

Give Your Reading Public A Vested Interest

What in the world does that mean? Simple. It means “link out” WITHOUT slapping the “nofollow” attribute on everything. It never fails to amaze me when webmaster “nofollow” everything thinking that they will be conserving “link juice”. I say “Give And Ye Shall Receive”.

One of the best things I have ever done to my blog was remove the “nofollow” attribute from my comment names. Sure I get some SPAM, but I’n not afraid of it.

If you have trouble with comment spam, simply enable the “Bad Behavior” and “Growmap Antispam” plugins for WordPress and these problems will disappear. Sorry “Scrapebox”. Its nothing personal. Please understand. LOL!

Honestly, why would you NOT reward visitors that add highly valuable (SEO-valuable that is) User Generated Content (UGC) to your site or blog. Why would you NOT reward contributors that increase your “ping rate” keeping your site and posts fresh in search results? Why would you not reward your visitors who so kindly keep your site from looking like a “ghost town”?

So, Whats The Bottom Line?

The Bottom Line Is This: SEO by itself is simply not enough. You have to offer value and give your reading and visiting public a vested interest in your site. THAT is what will keep them coming back and THAT is what will take your site to the next level, which, in turn, will lead to higher traffic levels and (you guessed it) more revenue.

Everything is good. You have a great looking site, and ready to take you online business to the next level. You’ve got all your “marketing tools” up and ready to promote your business. You have selected a few elite affiliate networks to work with, and you are all systems go.

Now, what’s missing? The hard part, generating content. Without content, there is nothing for your audience to share or talk about. Without content there is nothing to SEO. Without content, there is nothing for anybody to link back to. Without content, your marketing efforts can be seriously hampered as you need to offer something of value to your potential visitors. Without content, you know the drill…

The problem with generating content nowadays is that it is very difficult to constantly have fresh ideas to write about. The more your site gets popular, the more the demand for good content. You can write awesome evergreen type articles, but doing it on a regular basis can be very demanding.

The web has gotten so big that content is created as we speak. So much so, that even Google is having problems to come up with solutions for finding high quality content from reputable sources. Human curation, as a result, is now a trending topic and its “making its way back” as people seek out trusted information from quality sources. This is where you can take advantage of that, by curating content.

What is Content Curation?

To be honest with you, there will probably be hundreds of articles out there that will give you definitions as to what content curation is. I will try to put this in a simple manner by asking you a question. Have you ever created a “roundup”, “mashup” or some sort, or a “resource list” in your website or blog?

Guess what, that is curating content. In essence, you choose a topic, research for the best articles out there, combine them into a post, publish, and share it to the world. That’s curating content! And remember, that curating is one thing, and scrapping is another. The later is frowned upon by just about everyone. including bots.

Now, if you have done any of that work before, you should know that doing so has many benefits, but is also very time consuming. I mean, you can always scour your friends blogs, do a search, visit news sites or other trusted sources available to you. But then, there is the matter of putting them all together, by copying and pasting, editing, among other things.

Well, that’s over now. With CurationSoft, creating curated content has taken a different level. Think of it as your content creation assistant. Just think of a topic you want to curate, and CurationSoft will do the heavy lifting for you.

Here’s a quick presentation of how CurationSoft works.

As you can see, that was relatively easy. Content curation can help a great deal with your online content marketing pains.

• Become recognized as an authority in your topic or niche
• Get easily found by people & related influencers online
• Keep your audience engaged with fresh content
• Improve your SEO.
• Make search bots happy . This is specially true with Google’s recent “Google Fresh” changes..
• and more…

Is Content Curation Worth The Trouble?

Just look at the vast amount of websites that help curate content for you. You have Paper.li, Scoop.it, Bundlr and more. The only difference is that you are curating content on their property and not on yours. The idea is to generate fresh content in you website that is relevant to your topic and are high authority and of great quality. After all, that is what content curation is all about.

CurationSoft publishes content directly on your property. It works on WordPress or other blog CMS without a middle man. It even works on Google+. Connecting what you curate to your site is obviously more advantageous than doing it on other sites. I publish a weekly “roundup” and it has been doing well.

How Much Does CurationSoft Cost?

OK, the part where the question normally pops up right a the beginning. Well, there are two options, don’t they all?

There is a free version and a paid version. The difference between the two is that the free version comes only with one “source” to search content for, and that is Google’s Blog Search.

The paid version comes with YouTube, Flickr, Google News, Twitter, and now Blekko.

If I where you, I would definitely download the free version and take it for a test drive.

This allows you to make a well informed decision as to whether, this tool will actually be of good use to you. If you don’t like it, delete it, and if you do like it, just hit the “upgrade” button and you are good to go.

CurationSoft will empower your marketing efforts as well as giving you equally the possibility of making money promoting and marketing the product.

They have an affiliate program, which they run via OneDirectNetwork, where they pay its affiliates 30% commission for every sale they generate. Sell 3 times and the software pays for itself.

How’s cool is that?

So what is Niche Profit Classroom all about?

NPC is an Internet Marketing online course that focuses on teaching how to build a passive income online business. The good thing is that, NPC evolves three times from its original 2.0 version to 4.0 version. And they will still be evolving in the future to fit their make money online strategies to that current technology.

Note: As you notice in the image above, it was marked as NPC 3.0. The fact is that, since the NPC 3.0 was updated, their website navigation has changed including the page of the videos. Though the course still has the same concept.

Try their 14-day trial for only a penny

What is NPC 2.0?

Niche Profit Classroom 2.0 focuses on teaching how to build an online business by creating and selling your own product. The course will guide you how to create your own product, give you the right sales tools, teach you how to construct a website, affiliate program, how to boost your profit and beyond.

Niche Profit Classroom 3.0

Meanwhile, the NPC 3.0 version focuses on teaching how to build an online business generating passive income as an affiliate. The course is more on teaching niche marketing techniques where it mostly focuses on finding a low niche market competition having an acceptable amount of demand.

This way, you will stand a chance of dominating Google SERPS and earn the most targeted free traffic that will lead you  onwards to other niche site projects because your first website is now generating an income.

 Niche Profit Classroom 4.0 – NPS.

NPC 4.0 is called the Niche Profit Shortcut that focuses on building a niche site that generates passive income through Google Adsense. In this version, you will learn how to find niches base on products having low competition and an acceptable amount of monthly search volume using Google Keyword Tool.

If you have been using Google Adsense as a way to monetize your blog or niche sites, and are wondering why you haven’t earned as much as you expected,  there are many factors and reasons behind your experience. I will explain it on this link.

To Sum it Up

You see, most of the courses are made up of videos so that you can follow the exact pattern that they are using. On the other hand, there are some video tutorials inside having a downloadable document for you to use in applying the technique they teach you.

Try their 14-day trial for only a penny

Not only that, they also have some FREE to use software that is really useful on your online business journey. Some of the tools inside are the following;

1. Market Profiler: Create A Profile For Your Million Dollar Market.
2. Keyword Advantage Tool: Find The Most Lucrative Keywords In Your Market.
3. Niche Profit Press Ultimate: Easily Install Everything You Need in Seconds.
4. Niche Profit Press Automator: Install a Pre-configured Website in Seconds.
5. Sales Letter Wizard: Create Converting Sales Letters In Minutes.
6. Mini-Course Creator: High-converting Hard-Sell and Soft-Sell Emails.
7. Download Page Generator: Create Your Download Page In Just 5 Minutes.

See the image list below.

On top of that, they also have a package of hosting the niche websites you’ve built inside NPC under your account. So you don’t need to purchase a hosting plan just for you to apply the techniques you have learned from them. But the domain name is yours.

They also have a Niche Profit Media center that contains all internet marketing related techniques that you can learn. Another thing is their Niche Packs – the done for you niches, Link Tracks -a  list of websites that can build backlinks, and Hot Market – a trended hot niche market where you can try to tap that certain market. This feature is under the Download tab which you can access immediately.

To learn more about this course, I suggest that you watch the video below!

 My Experience Inside NPC.

When I first learned about NPC, I didn’t hesitate to give it a try to promote the coaching product over my previous blog. Though I haven’t been inside before, I rely on the videos and banners that help me to promote the product. As a newbie blogger I was an unknown person in the saturated blogging niche. So what I did was just keep on updating my blog and promoting it through social media.

But after 6-8 months of blogging, I still had not earned a penny from my blog. That made me almost quit blogging. But suddenly a credit appeared in my paypal account. The credit was my first earnings as an affiliate marketer. Please see the image below.

And then in June 2010, I was able to get inside Niche Profit Classroom for the first time because I recommended the course to my employers ( I was hired as a full-time Virtual Assistant in that time for a period of almost 5 months).

The most important thing that I learned inside NPC is this qoute.

Success is the Repetition and Action of the Fundamentals.

Just recently, I was able to get inside NPC and learn their latest version – the Niche Profit Shortcut which I am going to apply in the near future.

My Words About Promoting Affiliate Products.

I’ve learned in my internet marketing journey that there are various techniques on how to promote affiliate products. The first one is promote it to your blog, the second one is taught inside NPC 3.0 which was building a niche site, the third one is by building review sites, and the fourth one is by promoting it through social media like twitter and facebook. There may be other techniques that were not mentioned above but those things works in my affiliate marketing journey.

In the end, I am hoping that by sharing my experience about affiliate marketing, you learn something from me, even if you say it’s a little bit. Lol! Anyway, the Niche Profit Classroom is really worth an investment.

Try their 14-day trial for only a penny

Cheers!

- Felix

It’s sad to say that most bloggers are struggling so hard in spite of the things they have done. Some end up thinking that  blogging is not meant for them or maybe their routines are not good enough. Being a professional blogger or a successful blogger, you need only this one thing in order to survive – and that is your Brand or Authority. Don’t argue with me! Lol… And that is really hard and takes a long time to accomplish.

On this post, I am going to tackle the technique that I used to make money online not just being a blogger on my own blog, but using the knowledge and skills of a blogger to other blogs.

What I mean by this is that, bloggers are what I call the professors of internet marketing. And that’s why we have a wide area of knowledge related to online marketing that we can use as our weapon in the new world that we will be entering in the future of our career.

Below are some of the effective options that you need to pursue once you discover that you are not making enough money from your blogging efforts.

1. Offering Services.

I’ve seen many bloggers are now offering services to other online business owners. Using their own blogs, they can offer their service packages. Perhaps, using their blog as a reference of what they have experience as an internet marketer.

You might think that offering services is also a way of monetizing your blog. Maybe, your blog helps you to gather clients but it is not a passive income. Most successful bloggers use their blog to make money online in a passive way. If you offer services, you do all the work but is it worth it for the money you generate?

2. Part-time Freelancing.

As a blogger, you know many techniques to drive more traffic to your blog or other peoples’  blogs. Using your experiences, you can do some part-time freelancing jobs like doing social media marketing, SEO or article writing while you are still managing your blog.

Perhaps, you can use the money that you earn from part-time online jobs for your blog’s benefit, for example applying a new concept of making money online,  purchasing a new domain name or extending your blog hosting subscription.

As a part-time freelancer, you need to join various marketplaces to find clients.  I suggest that joining the Micro Job Marketplace is the best way to gather your prospective clients. Below are some of the best micro job marketplaces that you should join.

• Fiverr.com – This is the place for people to share things they’re willing to do for $5.
• 3Quid.com -  This is the UK version of fiverr with a twist. Win CASH prizes from their monthly contest.
• Zeerk.com – This is another marketplace that you can join where you can offer different prices from your gigs.

Above are just some of the few and most recommended micro job marketplaces that I previously joined and make an income from.

3. Full – Time Freelancing.

Being a full-time freelancer is I think one of the best ways to generate money online. This is also the exact term for virtual assistants where you become a full time online employee for an online business company.

I suggest that before doing the full-time freelancing job, you should have some experience in the part-time. This way, you will know the characteristic adjustments that you need to undertake. What I mean by this is that, most of the time, bloggers tend to treat other people at their own level. That’s why you must think first how you call your employers because we bloggers mostly call other internet marketers by their names or in a personal approach. I guess there’s nothing wrong with that but this time, we are not solely a blogger but an employee for their online business.

To find companies that are looking for good Virtual Assistants, you should also join some marketplaces where you can create your own profile. Below are some of the best freelance marketplaces that I previously joined.

• Odesk.com – Remote staffing for long-term work
• Elance.com – Hire Online Workers. Get the Job Done.
• Freelancer.com – Hire online for a fraction of the cost!
• OnlineJobs.ph – Hire Filipino Virtual Assistants – Outsourcing to the Philippines. This is the marketplace where Filipino Virtual Assistants are gathered. This is owned and managed by John Jonas of ReplaceMySelf.com

The above marketplaces are some of the few examples of websites that I currently joined but I used to get more jobs from OnlineJobs.ph since I am also a Filipino Virtual Assistant.

Conclusion.

In the end, I am hoping that the information being shared above helps bloggers to start earning money online not just from their own blog but by also providing online services for other people’s businesses. I also suggest that if you don’t have an account with some marketplaces that I mentioned above, you should create an account right now.

For instance, if you need more information about Virtual Assisting, I would like to invite you to please visit our blog at www.blog.3quid.co.uk. I will be covering various tips and techniques on how to become a great virtual assistant or freelancer.

P.S. 3Quid.com is hosting a monthly contest for active users who create at least 3 Gigs.

Ahh, the voice mail. There are so many people in sales, yet there are so many that absolutely hate talking on the phone. I truly believe that the reason for this is lack of confidence within themselves, lack of confidence for their product or service, or a combination of both. However, that topic is for another time. Back to this topic; assuming you do have confidence and you do call prospects or leads – what do you say when you leave a voice mail? It matters – it actually matters a lot!

Calling A Lead

Suppose you had a lead come in through your website. They wanted to know more about an opportunity that you are offering. They left a phone number, which wasn’t required – but they did anyway. This automatically means that they want you to call them. So you should. Assuming you pick up the phone, it starts to ring, and then goes to voice mail – what do you say?

If you are an inexperienced salesman and aren’t quite sure how to close a deal, you may say something like “Hey ____, this is (your name). I just wanted to call you and tell you a bit about the opportunity. It has been around for ____ years. The pay plan is awesome – it is set up in this way ____. This opportunity is the best in the whole wide world and I want you to be a part of this team…blah blah blah.”

If you know what you are doing, your conversation will go something like this; “Hey ____, this is (your name). I just wanted to call and touch base with you. It’s important that you call me back when you get this message. I’ll talk to you then. Have a great day!”

So what’s the difference between the two scenarios?

To be honest, I could probably write a whole novel about the the differences. Seriously. For the sake of this article, I will keep it short and sweet.

Never forget; the goal is to get the lead to call you back. Period. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Too much talk and explaining results in confusion. Confusion leads to hesitation. Hesitation results in no sale or sign-up. Yep, it’s that simple. So call your leads and get them to call you back. Once they call you back, simply ask them questions.

• Why are they interested in what you have to offer?
• What type of situation are they currently in?
• Are they serious about building a profitable business?
• Are they willing to learn new material?

Once you know them a bit more, you are able to (and should) base the conversation on their wants and needs. See how that works?

You Are The Leader

In the eyes of your prospects, you are the leader, so lead the conversation. They are looking to you for answers. It is important not to bombard them with new and confusing material. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Nor will the business of your new prospect. These things take time. It also takes time to learn all of the new material. Be sure not to throw it all at them on the first day – especially over voice mail

I have been asked by my friends and blog readers to share my monthly income or make some sort of monthly reports to be published on the blog.

To be honest I didn’t digest the idea, and I say no, absolutely not. I didn’t want to share this kind of information to the public. My point was simple, I mean why I would share this kind of information on the blog?!

I didn’t find a reason to do it, and you can say I was actually against that idea of publishing monthly income report online.

But, then things changed, yes.. A few days ago, it happened that I changed my mind, I am sure that this happens to everyone, you stick with something for long time, and you tell yourself it’s impossible, and then you just change your mind about it.

To be honest, I realized that publishing this kind of earning reports will give my blog readers some insights about what works and what is not really working, and it will give inspiration and motivation for those who are still struggling with their online business and the whole making money online thing.

I got inspired by Pat of Smart Passive Income Blog, so go get some!

What you suppose to do with this information

I am going to put this information in your hands, you go and study it, think of it or use it the way you like, it’s free real information that is not easy to get, it’s a result of real hard work.

I am not publishing it to get ‘WOWs’, but as I told you, it will make me feel great if you actually can make use of this information, and by the way, I may change my mind any time and stop publishing income reports, so don’t think it’s a final decision :)

From the other side, to me -personally- I am trying to study my own performance through time and keep records, I failed in doing this in the last two years, so I think publishing it online will motivate me to keep it up.

Check the Income Reports Page and Graph

I am going to use some simple CSS3 Bar Graphs I bought from CodeCanyon.net today, this will help me to visualize the data and make more understandable by just looking to it.

This Graph will be updated mainly on monthly bases, but it could get some live updates when I have a chance. Anyways, I’ve created a simple WordPress short-code so I display the graph anywhere I want on the blog, but it’s a little wider than the content area’s width, so it won’t fit in posts, I hope once day I work out something to code it and automate it, so it will show more live information if I update it every day via an option panel of something.

I am going to dedicate a new category for my online Earnings Reports, and there will be a specific page for the Income Reports to display the Graph along with links to all reports to make it easier for you to find it, and study the case on one page.

To make things easy for me, I will start from last month income; I’ve collected the information from last August, and I will do my best to keep these reports updated on the blog in the coming months, but I am not sure if I can get the old data and complete the Graph, let’s see what will happen latter, maybe I will get a chance to update it.

Also, one thing that I would like you to know is I am sharing my expenses on this post; I will be doing this latter next month to show you the ugly face of online business. Let’s say that in this post I am warming up, and the report will get more complete with time.

Let’s get into business

I know… I know… I talk too much

Now, let’s get into business, here is a list of my income resources from August 2011:

My Thesis Skins Business

ThesisAwesome.com has been my main stream of income since the last 8 months with more than $17.000 of income so far, you can say that this website can draw a smile on my face every morning; it’s so sweet to wake up and find out that you’ve made a few sales while sleeping.

• ThesisAwesome.com
• Sales: $3,198.00 (before affiliate commissions)

I am planning to move the affiliate program to ShareASale.com soon because I want to organize the affiliate payouts to be on time without having to worry about it. I know it’s kinda expensive to join such network now, but still paying $650 to get a better service for you business and members is a good deal.

If you are up to affiliate marketing and you like to promote Thesis Theme, then we maybe can work together, why not join the awesome affiliate program, let’s start earning money.

Affiliate Earnings

• DIYthemes: $203.37
• Scribe SEO: $41.01
• Headway Themes: $70.52
• OptimizePress: $315.00
• Popup Domination: $79.23
• Keyword Winner: $88.72
• Backlink Profit Monster: $35.11
• TweetAdder: $235.60
• HootSuite : $11.98
• 31 Days to Build a Better Blog: $8.00
• Total: $1,088.54

 Paid Reviews

• Direct: $350
• Total: $350

Advertisements Earnings

• BuySellAds: $306.92
• Google AdSense: $240.77 (all my blogs)
• InLinks: $35.20
• AdvertiseSpace : $21.00
• Direct Ads: $115
• Total: $718.89

Gross Total in August: $5,355.43 

I remember I made almost $10,000 at 2010, that was my first year of blogging at FamousBloggers.net, not bad for a start, but I suffered a lot -being without a day job- dealing with life expenses, and while not having an income, I spend almost all my savings. However, things are getting better this year as you can see, the business grow very well and exceeded my expectations, but still not enough as there are many open doors that you have to make sure you close each of them every month, I bet you know that, well… This is life!

Success doesn’t mean relaxation, it means more responsibilities. Success requires more hard work to keep things running, especially in this stage, my stage, I call it .. The start!

It’s some sort of revolution, no… no… It’s a revolution

And, every revolution requires sacrifices. I’ve made sacrifices!

It’s almost 09:00 am here in Houston, and I am still working on this post since last night to deliver it to you Monday morning. So please, no hard feelings if you find a typo here or there

By the way, if you are wondering how many hours I work everyday…

I can tell it’s something between 15 – 18 hours 7 days a week with no days off. Many nights I sleep with -one eye open- my Galaxy under the bellow, or with the iPad on my chest. I dream of my business, my fellow bloggers and friends, those who I do respect a lot, even though I never meet them in my whole life, but I know they are real.

Appreciation!

I’ve got a lot of support from the community, and I would like to thank everyone who helped me, I really appreciate it and I wish one day I can return the favor.

I hope this information will benefit you, inspire you and motivate you in your journey.

Finally, I am making a full living from my online business.

What about you?