The Five Deadly Mistakes of Internet Marketers

Five deadly mistakes to not make in Internet Marketing

Originally written in December 28, 2008 and Revised February 27, 2011, Revised again on 26 of June 2014

Here's my update of June 26 of 2014:

Boy, it's been a while since I visited my own blog! 3 years? Wow! I'm still making a little bit of money with Adsense on this blog. I'm not sure what ad was clicked to generate the revenue.

A lot has changed since I wrote this post (I'll leave the original below untouched).  Well, I now create and manage websites. The object, of course, is to be able to make money online. And I've been making a pretty good living at it. If I had to emphasize anything about what I've been doing is that: in order to make money online, you have to be willing to invest some money, learn what the hell you're doing and work hard.

The old adage still applies: "knowledge is power". But knowledge alone will not make you money. You must more than wish to make money. You have to learn how to do it and take ACTION (work for it).

So what I have I've been doing exactly?  I learned so HTML,  put Paypal on some of my sites and use Adwords to promote. All of these activities require learning how to do them, practice and then doing them. 

Check out some of my sites: bettershutters.com,  bettershutters.net and my new website that I'm working on: goodfoodandfitness.com. Plus I've written many, many posts on making money on a blog I continuously post on: howtogetinspired.com. 

If you want to know how I've done this and are a regular visitor comment and I'll drop you a line.

Here's the original Five Deadly Mistakes:

This is a long post and you will need some time to read "The Five Deadly Mistakes of Internet marketers".  make yourself comfortable and enjoy! You will get a lot out of it.  I wrote it so that I could save you tons of grief and disappointment as a beginning Internet Marketer.


I decided to leave this post as the main page of this blog.  That is why you will see the date above into the future. As far as I know, that is the only way that Blogger lets you do it.  Posts are archived in order of most recently posted hierarchy.  The latest will show up first. 

I originally wrote this back in April of 2008 I believe. Close to three years later I can tell you that I have learned what makes money and what doesn't.  More importantly, I have discovered the hard way that there is no easy method of making money on line. 

There are as many legitimate methods to doing this as there are successful businesses out there.  The bad news is that in order to find a legitimate method, your research can take quite a long time.  Many eventually give up and become valets or waiters rather than give Internet Marketing any more thought.  There are way too many false lures out there, way too many "experts" that hire firms or smart writers and take your money and run!

I'll add some more to this revision.  There have been many changes in the Internet Marketing field such as who's come and gone; what worked then doesn't work now; what Google's been up to, etc.

For now (you'll still get a lot out of what follows), here's the original post:

The Five Deadly Mistakes of Internet marketers

This blog is dedicated to all Internet Marketers (I.M's) who have been frustrated and are looking for a better way to make money online.

I'll first explore what maybe killing you as a wannabe marketer. I promise I won't be cruel.

Then I'll get into I'm sure will work for you. I assure you I know what I'm talking about. This is a brand new blog and yet I've received hundreds of hits without doing any advertising.




After having quite a bit of fun in the Internet and almost going broke in the process learning all manner of new methods, tricks, come-ons, etc. I’ve been able to isolate: How not to make money in the Internet!

At first sight this statement may not shock you or give you a desire to read on. I know: my natural instinct is to get interested in: How to make money in the Internet. After all who cares about what doesn’t work? "I want to know what works!". I will show you what works. But you need to first break of the habit of clicking on every ad that promised to make you rich, but doesn't deliver.

My mission is to help you in recognizing all of the misinformation out there that, in the end, leaves you broke and hopeless. There is no need for that. Such can easily be avoided. Read on and I'm sure some fireworks will go off in your head.

Please bookmark this page. You may get lost in hyper-space with what you're about to read and not remember how you landed here.

Definition of insanity (By Mr. Brainiac Einstein): "Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results"(actually I think that is is more like "stubbornness": a lesser form of insanity).You need to first break away from what is NOT working so that you can concentrate on what works. It’s that simple.

I finally realized..
I had to do something different...

I promise you that as you read on I will reveal to you How to make money in the Internet, but you must bear with me reading these few words, as they’re designed to save you tons of grief, aggravation and going broke. After all, I don't want you broke and desperate. I want you as my precious client who I can continue to help along as you begin to get results.

Before you’re even done reading all of this, you may just realize how to do it. If so, I definitely want you on my team—move to the head of the class! Either way you should read on.

I’m pretty sure I can only help you, if only in releasing some pent up frustrations you might have built up and best of all: get refreshed! It's time to have a new outlook, without you won't get far.

Here's an example of a very crappy, time consuming, worthless method that you may have heard of. It's called The Spider Web Marketing System. I tried it, pumped over $3,000 dollars into it, worked it like mad and got no results. Right, So much for a "free system". Check it out if you wish at your own risk: I repeat: This is a very crappy system. You will learn some stuff "for free", but it's still crappy:


The Spider Web Marketing system




Here's an interesting article I read regarding a super crappy website that lures "innocent prospectors" into believing that they can do rebates from home.

"I've tried that"

Here's a review of Rachael Ryan (or a spin off) with her "Stay at home system". I personally checked out Rachael Ryan. I wasn't impressed. The following link might have changed.
 
The Work At Home Authority

The author leads you to believe that all you have to do is buy her system and you will be automatically connected to tons of companies that pay you to process rebates. Supposedly you get paid up to $15 per rebate you process. This sounds lovely and very enticing. So I clicked on it and had this nagging thought: "If it's that simple, how come the author doesn't hire grandma and her kids do this all day long for a buck per rebate and keep $14?".

In actual fact, after you pay $97 for this, you then realize that you won't make money processing rebates. You have to now promote the system to make your $97 back! Come on. How far from the truth can you get?


There's actually a site out there called: "The Site Review Authority" that recommends it. It does well for the author, as it comes up under a lot of keywords and search terms on Pay Per Click. It's been on the internet for over a year now, as far as I know. So they must be making money to keep paying Google for Adwords.


This is one that I haven't truly checked out. It shows some promise for those who don't have a fat wallet:Two minute Profits. I'm not recommending it, just pointing it out.

O.K., fair enough, but have you noticed that what grabs your attention is not necessarily best for you? How many car commercials have you seen with the pretty girl (which has nothing to do with the car), get your attention and make you want the new car? Even though you know better and your old Buick is running fine and paid for? Did the car above grab your attention?. Here it is again:


I'm sorry. I really love this car!

Or, for girls: How many times have you seen the Jenny Craig commercials, felt guilty about being over-weight, if you are, and buy into the system, even though you knew there was nothing wrong with your weight loss system, except for will power and some more discipline? Here's a pretty girl- attention getter:



So the first thing that won’t let you make money is:

1. Dispersal: That means going off in too many directions at once, killing your focus and efficiency. Look it up if you wish for a more Collegiate definition, but that is basically what it is. So what makes you dispersed? Well, all of these beautiful websites, landing pages, capture pages, etc. that clamor for your attention, capture you and make it irresistible for you to buy and finally you give in and “BUY”. They very ingeniously use "buttons", or better yet "marketing buttons".

These are very stimulus-response. Before you even know what happened, you've just reacted to the stimulus you were exposed to and responded. Did you feel a little dispersed by clicking the links I gave you above? You have to understand that every one, without exception, in this business of Internet marketing is out to make a buck, and he who clamors the most gets the most attention. Attention= Money. Lots of attention= Lots of money.

Did you ever hear the expression: "The squeaky wheel gets the grease?"That doesn’t mean that they are necessarily unethical, but they NEED to make a buck, and they will go to almost any length to make that happen.

Therefore: the pretty girl, the slim girl, the flashing pages, the pop ups, etc. Almost all Internet Marketers realize this, and in their desperate bids to get attention create horribly dispersing pages with all kinds of links, pop ups, banner ads, widgets, etc. I guess they feel that if they don’t get you in one way, they’ll get you another. But there's a downside.
These sites are called “Flea market sites” by many experts. And this is horrible Man! When I’ve been unfortunate enough to land on these sites, I’ve felt completely giddy (my head spinning) and confused-- like my power was sapped-- then when I’m ready to click out, this stupid chat box pops up and won’t leave me alone (a hover ad) until I’ve realized all I have to do is press the “X” to leave.

Lots of people finally give in and buy more junk, only to realize they just gave somebody a license to be your firing squad with an endless assault of up sales. Man...that's insane!

Then there’s:
2. Misplaced trust: Let’s say you’ve recycled through a soup of websites as above and been lured to BUY in compulsion, frustration or whatever, the realization comes that “the money is on the other side of the fence”= Not in your pocket, theirs.

So even if you don’t know whether the course will work or not, you know that you have to make it work. After all you paid for it, even though you can get a refund, but you’ve already put time and money into this and genuinely desire to make it work.

Now, that’s not so terrible. Many of us have done that and been there. Who knows, this thing might just work, just like the testimonials say. But wouldn’t it be terrible to find out many months later, that the company or person you were dealing with and willing to coach you gave up himself? Or that the company is now out of business and all you managed to get out of it was information overload with nothing to show for it?

That leads right into our next one:

3. Too long a runway (taking too long): When someone didn’t really read the fine print that reads “results not typical”, he deluded himself into believing that all those beautiful success stories:
“I made $500 my first 24 hours!” or: “I only spent $19 and made $700!” and many more like it. Yes it is possible to do this. But you need to use your judgment and fine tune it like a radar.

The truth is this: if we could all make $700 in 24 hours, don’t you think we all would be doing it? People, including myself, tend to take the path of least resistance. Why would I, or anyone else for that matter, want to work 8 hours a day for peanuts? So we delude ourselves and persist on a course that we know deep down inside will frustrate us why? TRUST: a fine quality that bonds us, but it is too easily exploited and betrayed.

Too long a runway is taking too long BEFORE we see any viable results. It's an airplane running out of runway and yet the pilot refuses to take off. Result: PLOW! right into the rice field, at least.


The keyword here is “viable”. Sure the course or system will work for some. That is why we persist. But it’s not working for us. So there comes a crossroads in our quest: “will it get worse if we keep at it or do I persist just a little longer?” We're not quitters, you know.

Toni Robbins, the motivational speaker, once gave a great analogy: "what good is having all of this energy not properly channeled, like a fly trying to get out through a closed window?. He'll never get out and finally get frustrated and die." I don't like man being compared to a fly, but I couldn't think of another analogy to give you.

To add insult to injury, you get a further dose of “dispersal” above”. Just when you “thought it was safe to go back in the water”, here comes another auto-responder urging you to buy more stuff from the same guy or company!

You say: “But wait! I haven’t made a dime yet! You realize that there is now crossroads (a point of decision) staring you in the face and you say: “Oh no. Not another wasted attempt. Not another wasted year!” But the crossroads is still there. You must now decide: “Do I keep going, or do I stop doing this?” “Do I quit?”


You know. Most Internet Marketers quit. I did. But came back armed with new true knowledge of what to do. Actually the attrition rate is about 97%, per what I read on the guru sites. Yes. I keep myself well informed and resist buying into the latest craze.

So finally we get to:

4. Going broke with no results: The bright hopes of this Internet Marketer wannabe have now dimmed. He really wants to make this work. But man! His legs just don’t respond as well in the morning. He doesn’t really look forward to answering e-mails. His Google Adwords campaigns stopped running. No more money for ad placement, etc. His bills pile up.

He sees his caller I.D. and knows it’s a creditor. “Why answer? He knows the bill collector won’t let up and he doesn’t have the money”. He “knows” he isn’t making it. So why bother? “Maybe if I try another method and then another and then another, things will work out”, he says.

5. Desperation: In sheer panic he gropes for the “only thing” that “just might work”. Then something else and then something else. None work! This finishes him and he quits. He becomes another statistic added on to the 97% of “failures” out there. He is forced to go out and get a JOB! This is the last thing he wanted! Now he has to go back to the daily grind, with less time, no money and lots of bills!

Alright, as I said earlier, this blog is dedicated to all internet marketers out there who have had little or no results. My hat's off to them. I feel for them. I've been there.

Some of the copy writing that I'm doing here probably violates every principle in the book. I'm concentrating on the negative part of this business in too much detail. But I said: "what the hell. Perhaps many will benefit from reading this, experience relief, avoid getting scammed again and start making money for real. That is the positive side of it and that's why I'm doing it.

Another positive to this is the incredible magnitude and resilience of the human spirit. Whoever said "Man is the only 'animal' that will trip twice over the same stone", was short sighted. There is some slight truth to that. But such "maxim" should have gone as follows: "Man is the only species who can trip over the same stone twice, and three times and a hundred, but finally he figures out how to get it out of the way, and paves a road to success". Besides, man is not an "animal". True he has an animal body. But there's a lot more to him than just his body. He is a sentient being being full of abilities and unlimited capabilities.

Just because you may be feeling down toady or for a while, is no reason to agree that it will be so all the time. Look at this as a temporary set-back or test to your abilities. Such tests usually result in opened never before seen opportunities. Do you know how many times Thomas Edison had to re-develop the light bulb over and over and almost went broke until he hit pay dirt! you may not be a Thomas Edison but you'll be surprised: your capabilities are a lot greater than anyone ever led you to believe.

“AHA! Here it comes. I bet he’s going to pitch his method now, the one that got him out of the rut. He just got done dragging me through the mud.” you might be saying: “Alright. How much?”

Wait! We’re not there yet.First I want to know. And I want to know honestly. Have you at least experienced some relief? If you read this far, I’m sure you may have at least similar experiences. Yes? Well good. Thank you for your honesty.

Two things should have happened at this point:

1. You have felt some relief and have figured out what works and....

2. You have felt some relief, figured out what works, but want to learn more. If you’re amongst 1 and 2 above, I have a wonderful surprise for you my friend! You CAN make money online! But you don’t need a long and grueling course on how to do it that will take you a year or so plus $10,000 to implement.
Here's a simple solution: Avoid doing all of the things above. Just, I REPEAT, don’t do them! They're a sure path to suicide!

Remember:

I finally realized..
I had to do something different...


“O.K. That’s great”, you say, “But what the hell do I do that will work?” The answer is:

Copy Success:

Why re-invent the wheel when you don't have to. There are some very successful internet marketers out there that you may have never heard of before. Searching for these seemed to be an endless job. The internet is endless, for all intent and purposes. It was an intimidating and, at times, frustrating task. I invested thousands of hours and dollars looking for reputable companies and well meaning Joes, so that you don't have to. I must admit, there were very few out there.

But the good news is they are out there.

Copy the successful internet marketer. Why waste your time buying failed and unsuccessful methods that don't make money and worse of all: make you waste your precious time? What you need is a successful or successful systems, not more hype.

There IS a simple formula connected with making money online and I will give it to you for free:

1. Create lead generation
2. Create personal branding (Create a successful personal identity)
3. Earn money immediately upfront, whether the client buys from you or not.

This last one has to do with something called "the reverse funnel system". You can look it up at Jonathanbudd.com. He's young, enthusiastic and has an incredible positive energy that will just brighten up your day. Many people are now following his system.

Successful systems= multiple sources of income. I have chosen only these systems mainly because they have:

1. Lead generation
2. Personal branding
3. Earn money immediately upfront, whether the client buys from you or not.



I guarantee you will be a pro in a very short time. You will avoid the five deadly mistakes. I will ask you to, once again, extend me your trust. I know you have been let down too many times before. But nothing happens without ACTION and such you must take.




There you have it have it my friends. I sincerely hope that this blog has been helpful and that I can be your friend for life.

You can write to me at: thefighter@bellsouth.net
                  No SPAM please!
Yes, I've branded myself as "The Fighter"

I like networking with other Internet Marketers.

I open my e mails everyday and answer almost immediately. Any comment is welcome.

To your success,

Carlos Manrique

free html web counter

****************************************************************************
Update January 19, 2009

Hello my friends and subscribers,

I have been doing a bit of writing and creating or improving other blogs. My quest has been to provide unique quality content that will add value to the reader in order to generate traffic and make a good living online.

I can't honestly say that I'm there yet (the making a good living at it part), but I have been getting a lot of free traffic by being industrious at finding and using various traffic building generating tools. that's why I suggest you follow this blog so that you can track my no B.S. progress annd more importantly, so that I can share these tools with you.

One tool that is getting me results is the Feedjit Map, which you can download for free. I'm not exactly sure how it works, but suffice it to say that it generates traffic. I suggest you add it to your blog. It works.

I'm learning how to use another tool called "viral marketing", which is quite interesting. I won't give you a link yet, as I need to learn it myself well and apply it and see results before I share it.
From my understanding, Viral Marketing has to do with getting your users to spread your message and building traffic to your sites by their efforts, not yours. It's pretty neat and has nothing to do with computer viruses. so don't worry.

In keeping with the theme of this blog, I stumbled on a website that describes some mistakes made by Internet Marketers, which I agree with and thought you should be aware of them.

"Some of the mistakes people make when marketing online are as follows:

• They try to advertise and offer the same products to the same people that everyone else is marketing to. What separates you from the rest?
• They buy an e mail list to market to. The problem is that the people on that list didn’t subscribe to your blog or website and don’t know you from Adam. That’s kind of like spam isn’t it? You should build your list from your own sign up forms on your blog or website.
• Some people try to make mega-bucks quickly and aren’t as careful as they should be with how they market or what they sell.
• Trying to do everything yourself is a big mistake. No one person has all the skills necessary to build a website, write a sales letter, develop promotional material, develop products, etc. Don’t be afraid to joint venture with others to move you along faster."

I hope this was helpful,

Carlos

Winning Ads

Winning Ads are ads that attract attention. An "ad" by definition means "Advertising". It is a short form of it. We are used to saying "ad", because it's shorter.

I call it "Winning Ads" because they win for me and they win for the reader. I get revenue from Adsense and other affiliate programs, which is fair and you win by getting content that you can use as either an internet marketer or writer. Further an ad that doesn't grab the attention of the reader in one or two seconds is a bad ad.

In this fast paced world of ours where we get our food through the drive-through, our dinners from the micro-wave and our news from our favorite 11 O'clock news or whatever, we usually only get one shot at our reader to pay attention.

A good ad is short and to the point. It doesn't have a long message or confusing logos or text. Below I'll give you examples of what I mean. Why? so that you don't make mistakes in writing your ads as an internet marketer:

                                                         The Coke Nemesis Pepsi



Here's an old McDonald's ad:

Oh yes. the "old pretty girl in lingerie" ad:

The above were or are successful winning ads. How do I know? I searched Google and key worded "Successful ad images" and this is what I came up with. They're all short and sweet. Pardon the pun.

But how does this relate to your ads? When you write, you should write likewise, short and to the point. Don't use confusing or Doctor-like language. Who cares? You are writing for your audience. The average internet surfer has little time. He won't look at the online dictionary for definitions ( I might be one of the few who does it). You only have seconds. That is why I write, as much as possible, in short concise paragraphs. They are much easier on the reader.

Your ads: If you're not a graphic designer, copy and paste your graphics (make sure you don't violate copyrights) and keep them related to your text. Put a short caption underneath that communicates your product. If you want to add Adsense to your blog, place such under your posts, not on the right as they could be distracting. Some gurus might disagree with me.  Sometimes Adsense  works best on the top left of your blog, that is if you use the Blogger template "Minima left"  I personally like the "Sample blog"  template and put Adsense at the bottom.  You cab configure this by going to your "Edit template" tab and clicking and dragging page elements. If you are a Power Point pro, import your own template.

On your paragraphs use something called "anchors". This is simply "anchoring" or fixing the attention of your reader like this:

How would you like to win a million dollars?  No...I don't know how you'll win a million dollars, but made you look, right? That's called anchoring. But you don't have to pull a dirty trick like I did here to get your reader to look. I just couldn't think of anything else. Wherever you want your reader to be "anchored" to, use bold letters at the beginning of your paragraph---occasionally elsewhere, but don't over do it.

The above formula and layouts should make for a good looking blog with Winning ads: ads that win for you and your reader.

I hope this has been helpful.






Carlos

How to Make Money Online for Beginners: Presenting: Talent

   I must confess I had a bit of writer's block and couldn't think of much to say on the subject of Internet marketing mistakes or Making money online.  So I just posted the link above and below on the two subjects. Why? I was embarrassed and didn't want you to leave empty handed if you came back to my page for some more reading. I had nothing.

   The link and post below is not by me. It was written by "Griz", one of my favorite internet marketers. I've learned a lot from him for free. Go ahead, click on the link below. You don't have to pull your wallet out like most sites.  There will be no annoying hover ads or pop ups. Just some good ol' readin'. Grab a cup of coffee. Get comfortable and enjoy.

   Why the waterfall? I don't know, it's just "subliminal" so that you can relax before you learn new and innovative ways of making money online.

Carlos

How to Make Money Online for Beginners: Presenting: Talent

Three Steps to Financial Freedom

Hello my friends and welcome again!

For those of you who are returning to The Five Deadly Mistakes of Internet Marketers, I wanted to bring you some great new tools that I've researched over the past month and have found to be highly workable. This update is especially geared for those Internet Marketers who are fed up with spending tons of money on "systems" without getting any results and getting auto responded to death to buy more crap.

All of these tools I'm giving away here. That's right FREE. You don't have to buy anything.
What's the catch? You will have to put up with some pop ups as you go through the process, especially with the first one. But all you do is skip a few offers and you're all set. For FREE.

Another reason I'm doing this is the following: "The fewer the resources, the greater the genius you must have." LRH said. I've read many of his books.
We're now under a recession. But this doesn't mean you won't make money. Last week I had a great week! About $7,800. All applying these steps.

Let's face it, auto-responders cost money, web hosting, domain names, your internet connection. Yes I took in $7,800, but if I can get stuff for free and maximize my profits without jeopardizing the flow of money, I'll do it!

As you may well remember there is a formula you need to follow in order to establish financial freedom. To some "financial freedom" may be: "I have enough to get by... and that's enough!", or "I'll have enough money to last for a year.", etc., etc.

I define "financial freedom" as follows: "To never have to worry about money again to survive well, because one has the wherewithal". How do you get this wherewithal? By following a formula and doggedly applying it.

Remember we talked about "copying success"? Well, when something IS successful, THAT is your formula to follow.

I'm sorry. There are no gimmicks, no fads, no "new trend", no "new system' to follow. This formula has worked in Babylonia, ancient Greece and as sure as I am that the sun will rise on the East tomorrow, so shall this formula work today and tomorrow for you.

The formula is made up of only three simple steps. Yes, there are other "sub actions" within the three steps, but there are only three steps to financial freedom. It's like having your own perpetual cash printing machine, although it's all legal.

I'll go over the steps again, but this time I'll give you the exact proper links without sending you all over the internet so that you have, RIGHT NOW, the proper tools with which to apply them.

Let's break them down:

1. Create lead generation:

You don't have the money to invest in an auto-responder? Don't worry. this auto-responder won't drive you crazy with annoying pop ups. Some will show up, but they are minimal. just skip the offers and go on to set it up.
This is how it works: You will begin to get tons of e mails from other members. If you mind this like I do, don't give out your primary address. Use Gmail or any other free service if you don't want your personal e mail box filled quickly.

You'll get tons of offers and ideas on how to create your lists. Most of the e mails, if not all, are from marketers just like yourself, who are trying to make a buck on line. In this blog I have cautioned against "dispersal", one of the five deadly mistakes. So don't go "click crazy". Use your judgment and weed out the crap.

Some of these e mails are from successful marketers---very few. As you go to their sites or get redirected though affiliate links, if you like something they have to say, post a comment and leave your e mail address or URL.

Now you have a potential of successful marketers coming to your site and even linking to you if they like what you have. Translation: more leads.



Get your own affiliate banner from the site and copy and paste on your site. As readers go there by clicking the banner, you'll pick up their e mail address and will go into your auto responder.
Read their tutorials and practice, practice and practice until you know what you're doing and begin your opt in campaigns.


2. Create personal branding (Create a successful personal identity):

If you have already succeeded with anything online and have a following, you may want to skip this step. Just make sure you don't skip step 1. You'll need your auto-responder to massively send out your offer/s and generate thousands of leads.
If you are looking for more products to promote, or even if you've never promoted anything and want to know what products are hot, and are selling, go here:

Click 2 Sell is pretty new and competing with Clickbank. These two sites are free to promote affiliate products. You will get paid. I've already tested them and gotten paid.
If you have any issues with them, click their "customer support" button and you will hear from them in less than 24 hours! If you have any questions, they will answer them quickly. They are fairly new and want your business and help you to succeed.

Let's say you know exactly what you want to promote, are very impatient, like most of us, and just want to get going. I suggest the following:

Farm out web design, keyword analysis, search engine optimization, Page ranking and all that to a pro. Nowadays you can get all that done for under $500. this used to cost around $3,000. But now it seems that everywhere you look as you drive, you see the signs "websites for under $299".
Obviously, if you know somebody that you can trust, then just do that.

But YOU give HIM the content. Remember. You are unique in that is only one YOU and YOU know better about your business than anybody. Your techie is there for technical support only.

Alright, let's say that you don't have the money to hire a webmaster, open an account with blogger.com. It's free and fairly easy. Write content as you wish, following my tips. add Adsense and your affiliate links as well as a FeedJit map, as you see in this blog.

You can later submit your blog to various search engines for free. You get a confirmation e mail and you're on your way. Here's the link:




After you get some confidence, you'll later want to at least get your blog or blogs in Word Press format and get a domain name. Then you repeat the process all over again.

Yes. It is hard work no matter which way you look at it. I haven't covered everything by far in these three points, but these are the basics. I will be updating this blog and giving you links to Word Press, Cheap domain names and hosting.

For now, you should be well on your way.


3. Earn money immediately upfront, whether the client buys from you or not:

This requires a bit more know how, and it can be done cleverly without being a cheat or misdirecting the reader.

There are various methods that are tricky and downright disgusting such as hover ads (Yeah, those annoying pop ups that follow you around the page). The idea is that click out and get re directed! and on and on and on, until you finally fall for it. Some of these sites use Trojans, Adware, Spyware, "free" Banner Ads, etc. This last one is designed to re-direct your lead to somebody else's site and your lead is gone!. I'm not totally sure how that works, mainly because I've had no interest to find out.

The way you earn money up front is by selling a product-- especially one that they feel they must have in order to get what they want. Again, go to:

and get lots of ideas on how to do this.

Here, you'll use some of these pitch pages that you can just copy and paste with the author's permission and either copy and paste on your site or blog with your own affiliate link, or copy and paste in your auto responder as material to interest your reader.

One word of caution: Stay focused. If you are selling Adwords advice or promotional advice, stay on that subject. If you are selling anti-virus software and related items, stay on that. Don't confuse your list with "mixed messages".

Make money on your readers whether they buy from you or not:

Here's the not so cool way to do it:

If you don't intend to do internet marketing very long, say a few months "make a killing and cash out", make "copy cat sites". these sites are very crappy but can be very lucrative for the "I don't give a crap operator". You basically copy and paste good content and put up hundreds if not thousands of websites, capture pages leading to them and other crap on the internet. Interestingly enough there are many programs that will do just this and mostly proprietary. The big boys won't tell you, but they do just that. They then load their sites with Adsense.

Visitors when they land on these crappy sites go "What the...?" and proceed to click out of there through Adsense. They click on something else with the hopes of finding what they are looking for elsewhere. when they land in that "elsewhere", maybe they buy what they are looking for. the crappy site just made money for impressions and a referral. I don't recommend this as it's unethical, no matter how it's justified. But a lot of the big boys do it. Sucks, doesn't it?

Here's the downside: You won't last long. Google is very smart actually. the algorithms it uses were and keep getting created by very bright people. this is how they give sites merit or not. when the bot crawls those sites, they get "sand- boxed" (thrown at the very bottom of the heap). They may initially get "good" ranking. The programs may fool the bots, but only so long. After a short while, Google decides that they are no longer worth seeing and get so far down in the rankings that they might as well be dead sites. Who knows how many sites are there. I suspect billions!

I also wonder how many have copied my content and tried to pass of as their own? You know what? That's not so bad. many times you wind up with a back link to your site and they help you rank better! talk about poetic justice.

This is what I suggest (so that you can live with yourself):

Give them lots of reading material and useful information throughout your page. remember to keep it related. Show a video here and there to back up your points. They may abandon your site, but they've landed on a page that you're affiliated with, such as a Click 2 Sell partner publisher, or one whose product you promote.

You can also give them freebies, such as I'm doing here. Make sure you put in your affiliate links on your banners and links, or you won't be credited for any of your efforts.

A good one is to give away free e books that are not junk, but valuable. I learned quite a bit about Internet Marketing through these books. I will be bringing you books that you can give away as your own. Nice huh?

To your success,

Carlos, The fighter. Write to me: thefighter@bellsouth.net

P.S. I work hard to bring you freebies. Leave me a comment to let me know how I'm doing so that I can improve this blog.


Update March 17, 2010

I've been pretty busy and haven't been able to post much or update. On Inspiration for your day I've been inspired to post quite a bit. I've realized that money, although very nice to have, is not what truly inspires me. I love helping others and hopefully this blog I wrote on inspiration can help you in many ways. So if you're looking for a quick buck that I can teach you to make, "I ain't it".  I stay pretty busy by providing good old fashioned service and products. Sorry. I'm not a capitalist and I'm actually lousy at investments. I pay Google too much in my opinion for Adwords. I buy high and sell low and I'm not very good at watching trends or bird dogging stocks.

But even without tons of money to flaunt I've been able to find my special kind of freedom, thanks to Google Blogger by self expression. L Ron Hubbard, an American philosopher stated: "A being is as alive as he's able to communicate." I therefore, by corollary, feel as alive as I communicate.

To you feeling alive,

Carlos

Does money truly make the world go round?

I had an inspiration today and wanted to share my thoughts with you regarding this subject: "Does money truly make the world go 'round"?

Many will say it does. after all, we've been using the money system ever since the Phoenicians, perhaps long before that. We can't seem to get a loaf of bread without it at the local supermarket, much less pay the rent or mortgage.

Those with money seem to enjoy the rewards associated with work to the fullest. Those fortunate enough to have inherited it or gotten break may say that money, in effect, is "what makes the world go 'round". Anyone who has struggled long and hard to get it, invest it wisely and amassed great wealth may also hold this view.

But, think about it: "Does money really make the world go 'round?".
If it does, why is the idle (unproductive) rich so miserable? Why do the rich and famous seem to struggle with constant addictions--"luxuries" the pauper cannot afford-- legal issues and depression? If money truly makes the world go 'round', shouldn't these evils merely go away by paying the right clinic, the right attorney or shrink?

Yes, money does help a lot. Our modern world's economy is based on it. It's what made most barter systems impractical, cancers more tolerable and modern day comforts more attainable. It's what most people desperately need and few of us seem to have. "If I could just have a few more thousands dollars...boy...would I be really happy!", is what most of us in financial need or desperation seem to wish.

Money is a very needed commodity. It has made life as we know it possible. But money is not what makes the world go 'round. It's trust. Think about it. We find ourselves in a recession. There is actually lots of money out there to go around. But it doesn't go around: No! not really. only drips and drabs it seem, just enough to "get by". Why?: lack of trust, lack of confidence.

The banks don't seem to want to lend you money, even if you have excellent credit. The "big three" auto makers, can't even "give" their cars away, despite all the incentives and are filing for bankruptcy.

So if there's all this money "out there to go around", why doesn't it go around? It's lack of trust.

You see, trust is the steam behind money. It's the "catalyst". A great American philosopher called L. Ron Hubbard said: "Money is an idea backed by confidence". This idea became a note with a symbolism attached to it. Money symbolizes wealth, a legal note which is exchangeable for goods and services, a unit of exchange. Such is practical and is a commodity. it can be traded, sold, borrowed, used for payment, etc.

But without trust behind it, it loses all of this significance or symbolism. It is merely a nice looking peace of paper, that without any value can be used for wall papering. witness what happened to Italy and Germany after World War 2. Nobody wanted franks or lires. It was absolutely worthless. One wheelbarrow's contents of this stuff couldn't even buy a loaf of bread!

What happened really. These 2 governments were desperate to buy goods and services as their own were non existent. This was a great war of attrition for these 2 countries as well as Japan. When you really think about it, we beat them economically more so than with weapons. After that the whole world learned a big lesson: "He who has the most finances wins the war".

Do you know why The Soviet Union was dissolved? It wasn't just Reagan shouting: Mr. Gorbachev please bring down that wall!" The Star Wars arms race made them go bankrupt! They simply wised up and said: "Go ahead U.S. you keep on making them weapons. we'll just use our money to survive!" Hard to believe but true.

The world no longer trusted the frank or the lire. Good old american dollars reigned back then and during Star Wars. The Russian rubel wasn't trusted by Soviet allies. They would rather trade with the U.S. Dollars were trusted. American allies and even Soviet supporters welcomed the "almighty dollar". Just as the German and the Italian trading partners were afraid that these countries would just keep on printing more bills as the answer to their economic woes,
so were they afraid of the Soviets pulling the same stunt. They had actually started to inflate their currency by printing. the rest of the world said: "No more rubels!"

The almighty dollar is accepted because it is trusted. it is actually the prefered method of payment internationally despite claims that the Euro is. Don't believe it? Have you heard of the expression "When the U.S. sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold"? Well, what happened to the rest of the world when Bush announced that were were actually in a recession? Catastrophe in all the world markets. That's what happened!

The dollar, for the first time in a long time was on shaky grounds. Speculators and profiteers now
went through all kinds of motions to discredit the faith on the dollar and make a buck with euros. Then make a buch again when the dollar stabilized.

I took a good hard look at this pattern of money, not just in recent times, but throughout our history, and it holds true: trust is the foundation of the value of money. Trust is what sells a product: the buyer trusts that he will get at least his money's worth and the seller trusts that the checkj is good or that the bills are not counterfit. Trust, trust, trust.

And, that is all that money is. It's a man made invention---convenient as it is-- but still man-made, and the push behind it is trust (confidence). That is what stalls money. It's there, but it isn't "encouraged" by trust. There is not enough confidence out there in present time to make it go around enough for all our sakes.

So what do you do? Create confidence! Do whatever ligitimately possible to get your buyer trust you:

Are you selling an old re-hashed sytem sold by all the gurus out there that just doesn't work despite all the hype? Well, develop something that actually works, if your affiliate products don't deliver, or research, research and research until you know for sure people will get results! Remember, it's a give and take when it comes to trust (buyer and seller).

Am I just talking hype?

Google "roll up shutters Miami". Go ahead, just copy and paste it. I won't give you the link as it's not proof enough. You'll find " Exacta Tech Inc." as your first organic search. I'm not paying a dime and was able to rank it as number one!

Go ahead: google "aluminum roofs Miami" in google or yahoo, I'll be in the top.

How did I do it you ask? How did I build enough trust to go from a few measly hundred bucks a week to thousands a week in sales in a rotten economy?

Bookmark this post or subscribe to it and I tune in next week. I will tell you how!

I hope this was helpful. let me know.

Carlos,

The fighter

How to get traffic to your website or blog

For the Super frugal:

I understand that some of you may be strapped for cash and don't like to spend money before you start seeing results. But here's my take on it. The most valuable thing that you have is TIME. Sure you can get free traffic by getting the Feedjit map and corresponding gadget. You can publish in Blog catalog, like I do, you can do article submissions till you're blue in the face and get traffic. You can post comments on popular sites and get a back link to your site. You can do the social networks like Twitter and Facebook.  That's all fine and good and you WILL get FREE  traffic, like I have.

But Google favors custom domain names for your blogs. It costs  a measly ten bucks a year. Custom domains will rank you higher with the Google bot. That is just a fact. I've been too cheap to have wanted to do it. After I did it with one of my blogs Inspiration for your day ,  Google ranked me on second page with the keyword "Inspiration for your day". I've only had the custom domain for about 1 week. Not bad.

So if you're feeling like a "big spender", I suggest you buy a $10 custom domain name for your blog in order to rank higher and get more traffic to your blog or website via organic placement. I don't think you'll regret it.
If you want traffic, the fastest way to do it is to start spending a little. You don't have to, but time is your most valuable possession. Why wait 2,3 or 4 years to rank high by only doing it the free way, when you can get near instant results for so little.

Here's how you do "Custom domain name" from your blog at blogger.com settings:

1. Go to the "Settings" tab. 2. Press "publishing" tab. You'll see a new window which will give you an option to get a "Custom Domain". It will say "Switch to custom domain". 3. Click on that. You will be re directed to another page where you can search for your new domain name. Go daddy is the new host.

Your "Custom domain" window should look like this:

I picked my Make money blogging settings as an example:

You're publishing on blogspot.com

Switch to: •  Custom Domain (Point your own registered domain name to your blog)   

Blog*Spot Address	http:// .blogspot.com Subject to availability.
Word Verification	Type the characters you see in the picture.

Note: If you have a blog that is already ranking well, disregard this. Why mess with something that's already working. Do this only if your blog is getting almost no traffic. You want to get about 100 clicks a week at the beginning. If that is the case, you will get many more, the more you optimize you page. Remember to refer to the tips by Griz below.

Let's get lots and lots and lots of traffic! Did I already say "lots"? But getting lots of traffic requires being a "big spender" like me.

Carlos

On Today.com

I subscribed to Today.com just today and stumbled upon this great article by Griz and it goes as follows:

"In general there are two free sources of traffic online. These sources are broadly defined as Social traffic and Search Engine traffic. 99% of all newcomers online set up a blog or website and proceed to try and obtain social traffic. They do this simply because everyone else does it.
Social traffic consists of using social networks like Stumbleupon, Digg, Reddit, Entrecard, Forums and hundreds of other services that allow you to sign up and promote your site on them. These services are the backbone of what is known as Web 2.0 and has evolved into a newer version centered around Facebook, MySpace and the current craze - Twitter.

The general idea is to get out there and make friends online using these networks, draw them in to your site, wow them with your content and wait for the links to come pouring in from your adoring fans. As the links increase your traffic increases as more and more people find your site and in turn tell more people through the use of more links and one day you will become famous just like Darren Rowse of Problogger or failing personal fame you may still develop a hugely popular site like Engadget or the Huffington Post.

There is a certain appeal to all this - becoming popular has many advantages aside from the most obvious monetary considerations. Many people blog because they have something to say and just want an outlet for their views. Others dream of being a writer and use the net to publish their stories. Get your work out there and get discovered. Musicians and filmmakers use the net in the same way. Whatever your reason for starting a blog or website there will come a day when you say to yourself, “what is the point if no one is reading or watching or listening to my creative output?”

It is at that point that you will begin your quest to find traffic and invariably you will turn to the social networks. You will discover quite quickly that you can get social traffic fairly easily using Stumbleupon or even easier using Entrecard. Twitter might be the easiest of all. You will join forums and work at becoming an “authority” in your niche. You will make friends. They will send links. All will be wonderful… for a while.

Six months to a year down the road two things will happen - it always happens and it happens whether you have achieved a large readership or not. You wake up one day and realize that you are working like a dog and there is little to no benefit from all that work. Driving social traffic is a constant grind. If you stop posting, twittering, digging, stumbling, dropping entrecards, leaving comments on other blogs or any of the other daily chores needed to keep your name out there the traffic dries up. Moreover your health deteriorates and your friends and family are neglected as you spend hours and hours sitting in front of your computer single mindedly developing your brand. Even if you have managed to develope a few thousand RSS subscribers - something most beginners think of as a successful blogger - you will still ask yourself “is all this work worth it?”

Why? Because at some point everyone wants to be compensated for all that work. You may say now that you are just doing it because you like to “write” or you just need an outlet to release your opinions and I believe you. The problem is that you will not be satisfied just writing or opinionating if no one is reading your output. You will get sucked into the social traffic cycle and find out that it is work. And when you work that hard you will eventually want a monetary reward for it - in one form or another. Having 10,000 readers coming and reading just wont cut it if a book deal doesn’t materialize. Or you can’t make money from advertisers. Or JV (joint venture) offers don’t show up. No matter what your reason for blogging at some point you are going to want a reward for it and the more work you put into it the more return on time invested will be expected.

And that is the problem - you wont get a return from social traffic. They don’t spend money - they don’t click ads and the advertisers are no longer supplying inventory to social sites as that fact has become known. Today.com claims 10 million page views a month. That is fairly significant traffic. So why don’t we see the big advertisers on this site? Where are the finance/credit/bank advertisements? The auto company ads? The big brand names? What we see are ads for dating sites. And Adsense.

The advertisers are not coming to this domain in spite of the traffic. Today.com has had to find a means to monetize this site using affiliate marketing platforms which they are currently rolling out. Adsense does not perform well as the sub-domains are not targeted for premium CPC (cost per click) and are smart priced. They get pennies per click from adsense and the CTR is dismal at best. Today.com is a successful domain based on traffic but like many others online they have found out that all traffic is not equal. The majority of this domains traffic comes from social networks and social traffic does not convert well - meaning they can’t make much profit from it.

If you are reading this then chances are you have a site yourself and you spend a fair amount of time reading blogs and surfing the net. You are social traffic. When was the last time you bought something on a friends site? Or clicked on an Ad? You don’t do it often if at all and neither do all the other social bloggers and social network users. You are here to read. You are online looking for information and not looking to buy something.

Search engine traffic is quite different. Most people use the search engines - Google by far - when they need to find something. You don’t go to Today.com when you want tickets to a Broadway musical or are looking for a hotel in New York. You use Google. You have a purpose in mind and that usually entails buying something or at the least you need specific information about a specific thing. Search traffic is targeted and whether you are trying to make money online or just want readers, search traffic is the traffic you want because it consists of people looking specifically for what you are offering.

If you have a humor blog for no other reason than just to entertain then why not target people looking for humor blogs? The easiest way to do that is to rank number 1 in Google for the term “humor blog”. On average 2400 people a month will find your site. If you rank for more related keywords like “humorous photos”, “Humor writer”, “humor”, “funny pics”, “funny stories” etc then you will eventually have thousands of daily visitors to your site. And this is the best part - you can post when you want or not at all and the same traffic will show up every day. Moreover you will never have to spend 1 minute commenting on other blogs or stumbling or dropping entrecards or doing any of the other chores involved in social marketing. And the icing on the cake - your search traffic will click your ads. They will read your humorous post and because they found you while searching for humor they are likely going to click on those ads that point them to other humorous sites. They don’t care if they make you money or not - they are not bloggers. They are civilians looking for something and will click anything that leads them to their goal.

The process for obtaining search traffic is actually very simple but it does take work and most of all patience. It can also be done in conjunction with social traffic. The problem is 99% of bloggers only chase social traffic and completely shut the door on search traffic right from the get go. This doesn’t have to be and I will show you how to optimize for the search engines using some basic SEO techniques that will pay off hugely by the time you wane on social traffic. You can use social networks for immediate traffic while building your site for long term search traffic. If you don’t achieve search traffic then you will eventually burn out and all the social traffic in the world will not change that fact.

SEO Basics that must be used in order to drive search traffic to your blog are as follows;

You must use your keyword in your URL.

You must use your keyword in your Blog Title.

You must use your keywords in your Post Titles.

You must use your keywords and related terms in your post content.

You will get the best search results by only posting one post per page unless all your posts are related to the same keywords.

If using Adsense then always stick to one post per page.

If using photos then your keywords should be used in the alt tags.

You must use html for the bulk of your pages content. (plain old text)

These simple little steps are all you need to do to optimize your site for the search engines. You will get indexed for your keywords and ranked well. How high you get ranked depends on the competition. If there is little competition you could achieve top ranking doing little else. (Many of you experience some Google traffic for long tail keywords. This is because you used a term in your content that has little competition and Google found your site when someone searched for that term - unfortunately these terms don’t often provide much traffic) If there is a lot of competition then you will need backlinks pointing to your site using your keyword in the anchored text of the link pointing to you.

That is all that is required to dominate any keyword online. Simple yes. In practice the hard part will be obtaining all the anchored backlinks needed to dominate a competitive keyword but following my on-site advice will make this task much easier - especially if you use social networks.

Now let me demonstrate what I am talking about.
I mentioned “humor” a few paragraphs ago as a lead in for my example site. But first a pre-amble to fill you in.

It seems I ruffled a few feathers in a post on my main site a few weeks ago. I mentioned that the bloggers on Today.com were beginners and the reason was to point out that most of the bloggers on here are following a failed strategy. They are almost without exception chasing social traffic and will eventually quit blogging for all the reasons I mentioned above. They will work their butts off making a few dollars a day and burn out. Most will not even do the social chasing and will quit long before they make a few dollars a day.

This isn’t any different here or with beginners who start a self hosted blog or use free domains like Blogger that can be fully monetized. The fact is most of the people blogging today will not be blogging in six months. They give it a go, fail to attract readers, fail to attract money or both and quit. I have seen this cycle for years and anyone that has lasted as long as a year knows this is true. We see it time and again. Very few people actually do the work - the majority of my readers have been reading my blogs for a year or two and still haven’t built a site. It is what it is.

I highlighted one blogger in particular in my post - not to bash her - but because she is one of the few on Today that has the work ethic to succeed. She has a “humorous Photo ” blog and drives the most traffic to her site of all the Today bloggers. She does it using social traffic and works her tail off to do it. She is the type of person who could succeed online with a little SEO knowledge. It is unfortunate that her reaction was quite negative.

Note: The screenshot of Melissa’s post on the forum has been removed as it was inappropriate of me to show it - the forum is private and hence the comments made are as well. - Griz
Tact is not my strong suit and those who know me have seen this kind of reaction before. The thing is you also know I am going to show Melissa how she can improve her traffic stats whether she wants to listen or not. Her site is the perfect example of what not to do in regards to search traffic and by illustrating the mistakes it will become clear to both her and others how some simple tweaks could make a huge difference in her long term success. If it’s any consolation to Melissa she should know I only “pick on” bloggers who have the talent to succeed - there is no point in highlighting those that don’t.

This post is long enough so I will demonstrate on-site SEO next post and illustrate exactly why you should follow my advice regarding keywords using both Melissa’s site and mine. The results will not leave you in doubt about how effective it is at building links and traffic.
For those who are members of Today.com you can follow Melissa’s forum thread here - Grizzly is a Douche Bag - I think they were about to tar and feather me last I checked.
Cheers
Griz
Share and Enjoy:"

Brought to you by:

Carlos, The fighter

Update March 22, 2010  

This is a pretty good blog about getting traffic to it. It's simple and to the point. The author recommends Word press to create your blog.  If you are a bit cheap like me and want to stick top blogger.com, go ahead, but you can still follow this guy. The rules still apply about properly anchoring text, Search Engine Optimization and all that good stuff.  Oh yeah, he's got some pretty good hints on "inbound links" I think his content is pretty good and on the nose. I like the layout and the transparency of the author.  Here's the link:

How To Get Blog Traffic – Inbound Links And Anchor Text

Keep blogging,

Carlos