Failing, My Way to Success

Ralph PriceUncategorized


I realised that I didn’t like authority when I was at school. My school was quite traditional and appointed other students to be prefects, which was not for me. I would react badly to being told what to do. It was probably a bad side to my character back then, but if anyone exercised authority my way, I made it a point to resist. My parents were quite strict when I was younger, but good people, so once I was fourteen or so, they left me to it. I had actually become a good student by then, but nothing that I studied over the following seven years contributed in any way to my bank balance.

Some years later, I spent four years as an employee in an airline IT department, but there were way too many judgements and assessments being passed down for me to feel comfortable. So, I went freelancing instead for seven years working in financial marketing until one day I realised I had worked 43 days without a break and hadn’t seen real daylight, or a green space in over a week. I quit and dropped out for a while, to go and live in Europe.

Eight years, two kids and a divorce later I returned home. Finding myself rescued by Tony Robbins and his Personal Power audio course, I decided to start helping people and launched start-up after start-up from being a therapist to a life coach (which were not great business models by the way as I was getting paid by the hour). This morphed into video producer, then to running a solar panel installation company until I finally ended up online because I wanted to ‘earn money while I was sleeping’. So, I launched an online food ordering business but that came with lots of online fraud and customer service problems. So, I moved into DVD sales, web design, and a whole stack of small business opportunities, but never reached the really big time that I was searching for. All of these failed the ‘success test’ as they ended up taking bigger and bigger chunks of my time, once again.

Then, one day, something strange happened. I woke up and realised that by accident I had all of the pieces of a puzzle. I knew how to write, how to advertise, how to make videos, how to create web pages, how to produce or source products, and I certainly knew how to collect money. The problem was putting all of the pieces together, in the right way, in the right order and … most importantly, doing it quickly enough so that I could test, fail and start again, often enough to succeed. That last thought is VERY important, because the most valuable lesson I have learned is persistence; that success comes after a lot of failure. If you want a job, you fill out a whole bunch of applications, not just one. If you want your book published then you send it to every publisher, because we all know stories about great books that were turned down many times. That all involves a lot of failure. The trick is to fail as fast as possible.  So, I looked for the people that had failed most and found Russell Brunson. Paradoxically, ‘failed most’ sounds like a reason to avoid someone, but, by then I knew that lots of failure meant that statistically, you just had to succeed at some point. As it turned out for Russell Brunson that amounted to over $100,000,000 of success.

My final problem was solved, Russell had that holy grail of fast failure I was looking for. So here I am. Happily failing my way to success with ClickFunnels. If any of this sounds vaguely familiar and you haven’t heard of ClickFunnels then this might well be your lucky day.

Find out about ClickFunnels here …

Internet Marketing Master Plan

Ralph PriceAdvertising, Business, Email Marketing, Internet Marketing, Product Creation, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media, Traffic Generation, Video Marketing, Viral Marketing

Internet Marketing Master Plan

If you are hoping to make money from an internet business then I have a plan for you. It’s completely free with my compliments.

If this seems a lot to take in then, if you do nothing else, go to step 3 and download the free software. It is an amazing, completely free, video creation package. No strings, no catches.

Here’s the Master Plan.

Check out who I say I am

My best advice is never do business with anyone that you cannot background check in some way.  This is from personal experience from my last thirty years dealing with local and online businesses. Feel free to connect with me – my personal email address on LinkedIn is r_h_price@yahoo.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ralphprice/

Check out the business website

We have been in business since 2006, mainly creating corporate videos and websites for small and medium sized businesses. Talking about videos, the next step in the plan is to get hold of some software that is a game changer in the video marketing world. We used ity on the home page of our business website that you might have just looked at.

Download Easy Sketch Pro 3.0 software for free

[eafl id=”1031″ name=”Easy Sketch Pro 3.0″ text=”Easy-Sketch-Pro-3.0″]

Watch the video to understand the power of the videos that you can produce in minutes.

You will need to supply your name and email address, then you will receive an email from me with login details to the website so you can download the software and the activation code.

It is the full product with image libraries and backing tracks, so there is never any purchase to make. You will have unlimited full use and it really is completely free so, no subscriptions or anything like that.

This is run by MyDotComBusiness which is probably the best startup site on the internet for online marketing. They give this product away for free but they also sell it. They use a Fremium marketing strategy similar to companies like Adobe and Malwarebytes.

Download YouTube Marketing 3.0 video training for free

This is a really useful overview but not hands on training like the next two steps.

[eafl id=”1033″ name=”YouTube Marketing 3.0″ text=”YouTube Marketing 3.0″]

Again you will need to supply your name and email address. Your download password is emailed to you.

Sign up for the free ‘One Penny Per Visitor’ video training (MyDotComBusiness again).

[eafl id=”1034″ name=”One Penny Per Visitor” text=”One Penny Per Visitor”]

Watch the video. This is the same website as for the software so use the same email address.

Sign up for the free Instagram Tsunami training (MyDotComBusiness).

[eafl id=”1035″ name=”Instagram Tsunami” text=”Instagram Tsunami”]

 

Take Action

You now have all the tools and the knowledge you need. So time to TAKE ACTION. It is down to you to put in some hours work and get it done. This is where 99%+ of people fail.

If you need more tools, or more training or a bunch of products that you can sell (including the Easy Sketch Pro software that normally sells for $29 – $47) then you can go the MyDotComBusiness.com and do their Pro Upgrade – follow my link below – this will cost you $77, but, please watch the presentation video and understand exactly what you get for your money, I think you will be surprised.

[eafl id=”1036″ name=”MyDotComBusiness Pro Upgrade” text=”MyDotComBusiness Pro Upgrade”]

Thanks for taking time to look at this.  It really can be a game changer.

To your online success,

Ralph Price

On behalf of Paul Lynch at My Dot Com Business and Global Web Products Ltd

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Art of Conversation – How To Talk & How To Listen

Ralph PriceBusiness

Celeste Headlee

  • Don’t multi-task. Focus on the conversation.
  • Don’t pontificate – you are not there to preach – do not enter a conversation unless you think you have something to learn
  • Use open ended questions – who, what, where, when, why and how.
  • Go with the flow – let thoughts come and go – don’t hang on to something that seemed like a good idea.
  • If you don’t know, say that you don’t know.
  • Never equate your experience with theirs – it is never the same.
  • Try not to repeat yourself – it is condescending and boring.
  • Stay out of the weeds – people don’t care about the details – names, dates etc. They care about you and your commonality.
  • Listen – active listening – LISTEN – If your mouth is open then you are not learning (Buddha) – nobody ever listened themselves out of a job (Calvin Coolidge) – 225 words per minute talking – 500 words per minute listening. Most people don’t listen with the intent to understand, we listen with the intent to reply (Steven Cubby).
  • Be interested in other people. A good conversation is like a miniskirt; short enough to retain interest, but long enough to cover the subject.

Viral Marketing – YouTube Optimization Strategy

Ralph PriceInternet Marketing, Video Marketing Leave a Comment

This is a straightforward 5 step process to upload videos to your YouTube channel and rank them highly on Google in the shortest time.

  1. Do your keyword research
  2. Set up your video platform accounts
  3. Create your videos
  4. Upload the video
  5. Generate Traffic

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1. Accurate Keyword Research

Main keyword with LOW COMPETITION and DECENT global monthly searches

  1. Use the Google Keyword Tool to select a phrase on match types.  Use the settings for All Countries, English language and run the search.
  2. Select an appropriate keyword idea and browse the results for keywords with low competition and at least 1,000 monthly searches
  3. Find 3 – 10 other keyword ideas with the same criteria – low competition and decent searches
  4. Save these keywords to a list in a spread sheet
  5. Go to Google Search and type the keyword without the last letter so Google shows all of the current recommended searches that start with this phrase.
  6. Write down all of these keywords and add to spreadsheet
  7. Back to Google and scroll to the bottom of the first page of search results and save the keywords in the Searches Related section to your list
  8. You should now have a list of core keywords that will give you specific topics to talk about in your videos.
  9. Create a video for each of these keyword phrases and incorporating at least 5 of the other keywords in each video.
  10. Like writing an article you surround the main keyword with all of the supporting keywords.
  11. Using the core keyword and the five or more related keywords write a short description of each video

2. Set up your video platform accounts

 

Name URL Rank
YouTube www.youtube.com

3
DailyMotion http://www.dailymotion.com

83
Flickr http://www.flickr.com

89
Vimeo www.vimeo.com

143
MySpace https://myspace.com

458
Metacafe http://www.metacafe.com

830
Ustream http://www.ustream.tv

1161
Veoh http://www.veoh.com

2020
BlipTV www.blip.tv

4887
Blinkx http://www.blinkx.com

13577
Viddler http://www.viddler.com

13762
MeFeedia http://www.mefeedia.com

14642

 

  1. Use at LEAST 10 different platforms
  2. You want to reach as many people as possible
  3. Some of these platforms will rank your videos very fast
  4. Optimise each account for keywords
  5. Create a new account WITHOUT Facebook. Use your main keyword as your channel name.
  6. Sometimes the name is taken so you need to juggle the name a little to find a useful phrase.
  7. There is also a description where he places main keyword twice and one to three related keywords
  8. Add your website URL – your website should also be named in this way
  9. Apply to all channels

3. Know what you are talking about

 

  1. Create great videos with great information
  2. Choose keywords from your list and make a video about that
  3. Write a script – the exact words
  4. Memorise script and present on camera OR Make a power point presentation and do a voice over reading the script
  5. Repeat the process for each keyword
  6. This way you are creating an arsenal of topics that will make you an authority

4. Upload the video

 

  1. Pay ATTENTION to the video name.  You need to name the video BEFORE you upload it.
  2. The name should include the keyword
  3. Place your main keyword at the start and a secondary keyword at the end
  4. Make sure the name makes sense
  5. Click Upload
  6. Select File
  7. YouTube will use your name of the video for the title
  8. You may want to modify the title – especially the modified keyword if there is a better one
  9. Enter your full description. The first two lines will be displayed in Google and YouTube so make these count.  Start the description with the main keyword you are using.
  10. Don’t put the Website URL at the start if it does not contain the keyword
  11. If the Website URL is the main keyword then put that at the start
  12. Mention as many benefits as possible
  13. Add as many calls to action as possible
  14. IF you want to see how (benefit) then click here … (article link)
  15.  Mention any gift you are giving away and link to the opt in page on your website, your Facebook account or YouTube channel.
  16. You can use up to 1,000 words although YouTube are reducing this.  It used to be 2,000.
  17. Use as many keywords and URLs as possible
  18. Use a tracker to monitor the clicks
  19. This is where you support the main keyword with the supporting keywords
  20. Add as many tags as you can, after about 20 or so the tag line will become too long so save and add a few more and save again.
  21. As soon as video is ready go to video and copy and paste the URL to the end of your description
  22. There are people looking for fresh content to embed and they use robots to locate the video and go to the video to capture the information – you get back links and more exposure for free.  DO This RIGHT AWAY before the bots do their first scan of the content.

5. Building Traffic

  1. Post something on your Facebook fan page and post the video URL
  2. Do the same on all your other social media accounts like Pinterest and Twitter
  3. Go to your autoresponder list and send a broadcast email with the URL of the video
  4. Create some back links from other video platforms – do it from oneload.com for free.  It asks for a URL you want to promote – put your YouTube video URL – NOT your website URL- If your video ranks well you will get the traffic. Remember not to upload
  5. Embed the video in a post on your blog – DONT copy the link EMBED the link
  6. Go to Pingler.com and create an entry with the same title as on YouTube. IN the URL place the website blog and ping that then replace with the video URL and ping again
  7. Go to FaceBook and create a $5 advertisement and allow it to run for 1 day only so you get some traffic to your video – select optimise for Impressions
  8. Go to virool.com – they play all of their ads on YouTube so you can set up a campaign about 12 hours after you upload the video on YouTube, It is IMPORTANT TO OBSERVE TIME GAP.
  9. You can leverage other people’s videos to boost traffic using YouTube Playlists

 

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Social Networking

Ralph PriceSearch Engine Optimization Leave a Comment

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is all about knowing where to focus your efforts for the biggest payback.  The best strategies are constantly changing as the Search Engine algorithms change. This article describes the current (November 2013) most influential areas for marketing activity and should remain relevant for some time, bar any major changes in Search Engine strategy.

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There are four main categories that most influence the ranking of websites on search engines.

  • social networking
  • Backlinking
  • Content SEO
  • Technical SEO

2/3rds of SEO influence is off-site through the social networks and backlinks from other websites.

Social Networking (42.1%)

Search Engines are continuously trying to identify quality websites and their best guess at the moment relies on the activity a website stirs up in the social networks. These networks should be your primary focus for advertising and promotion, aside a quality website of course.

There are 4 main social network platforms that dominate SEO rankings.

Facebook Shares, Totals, Comments & Likes
Google +1
Pinterest
Twitter

Facebook is still the social networking platform of choice but the Google plus platform is becoming more important, if nothing else because it is Google. That said, Google Plus is very impressive once you look into it in detail. It has not grown up in public like Facebook and a lot has been added in a short time so it is still not properly understood by many people and is not as intuitive to use. However, if you have not yet started to grow Google circles then you are seriously missing out.

Pinterest and Twitter are useful in certain market places but not in others though neither can be ignored. Pinterest is fairly versatile but Twitter is hampered by continuously changing rules and regulations aimed to control its users, rather than going with the flow, so innovative marketing strategies can be risky.

Backlinking (23.5%)

The influence of backlinks has reduced in recent years and rightly so as it is has proven the easiest method to manipulate and distort good quality search results.

Marketing activity here focuses on guest blog posts, writing articles, creating video channels, forum posts, website comments and building relationships with other websites in your community.

I have heard ‘building backlinks’ described as grunt work but it is really your Public Relations. Backlinks are important and you should be generating these by default. Participating in forums, issuing press releases, writing articles for blogs, journals and article sites are all part of your PR activity.

Content (20.8%)

If an article, post or page is well written then it should contain everything that you need to rank well.  In practice this is often not the case as it is quality content that search engines seem to get most wrong.  The focus has been to weed out fake and misleading websites and this has worked very well. However, identifying true quality has mostly eluded the major search engines and the result has been a dearth of mediocre repetitive content.

For general knowledge and education Wikipedia is still the best place to go, but its scope is limited. Like a public library, Wikipedia is not the best place to research anything topical or ground breaking.  Innovation and information with a premium attached, falls to the online marketers.

Technical (13.6%)

Knowing what you need to include on a web page is essential and fortunately there are a lot of free and paid for tools out there to help you to analayze and fix any omissions or errors.

  • Google Webmaster Tools to find technical errors
  • Browseo to find more technical errors
  • Xenu to find any broken links

You must deal with the following basics:

  • Know the difference between:302 and a 301 redirects – and their importance in transferring link authority
  • Understand the importance of adding an XML sitemap to your site
  • Remove the infamous disallow: / from your robots.txt file
  • Know how best to handle pagination issues for SEO

This subject will be dealt with in detail in a later post.

The following table breaks down these four areas into its most important parts.  From the top down this should be the basis of your SEO strategy.

SEO-Spearman-Correlation-of-Google-Results

Google +1

Not surprisingly Google moved into the Social Networking sphere a short while ago and has been quietly building an impressive platform.

If you haven’t already created a Google Plus presence then the following 4 or 5 steps are essential. NOT optional.

  • Create a new Google Account and Email address for your website
  • Create a dedicated Google Plus page for your website and other subsidiary pages that tackle related subjects that are not part of the main subject
  • Install Google Analytics
  • Install Google Webmaster Tools
  • If you are using WordPress as your website platform (which you should be) then install the plugins Google Analytics for WordPress and SEO for WordPress on your website.

The number of times that a Google Plus profile shows up in a circle is an indicator of how engaged a profile is with the Google Plus network. Quantity is not better than quality but profiles with thousands of followers will draw more visitors than those with only a handful of followers.

Google Plus users will only see posts after they have added you to one of their circles. The more times that your profile shows up in circles, the greater the chance of your website posts being noticed. If your profile is in a large number of circles on Google Plus will give your profile a higher PageRank with Google. Google Plus profiles that have achieved high PageRank through continuous engagement pass SEO benefits to all of their managed pages.

Interact with people who are already on Google Plus. Enough activity will help grow your circle count organically.

  1. Mention them using a + sign on your posts
  2. Give their posts a +1
  3. Add comments to their posts

Create shared circles that list people who have a common interest with your profile and promote the shared circle to your peers. We all like to be part of a club that directly involves us in a joint project or interest. If this is done well then the circle grows as people share it and draw in new members.  Think Facebook or Linkedin Groups.

Mention Google Plus in your posts and articles. This seems to work very well as people can see the benefit as Google, like any organisation, likes to be talked about.

Post regularly to your Google pages. You can link your WordPress feed directly to a Google page with HootSuite which is free if you have a couple of feeds going out to 5 or fewer social networks.

Use Google Plus Ripples to learn who has been influential in promoting your post.  Studies into consumer behaviour shows that certain individuals are key networkers who love to share.  Get to know these people and thank them for their participation, they are important members of the community.

Facebook Shares

Any Facebook post can be shared and any image tagged. Both of these activities will post to your timeline. This is the Search Engine’s highest rated action on Facebook. It is seen as an truly authentic vote by the search engines as it is very hard to manipulate..

Targeted Facebook advertising is about the best way generate new Facebook shares. You need a post that people would be proud to share for all the usual psychological reasons. No-one will recommend anything that will put them in a bad light, especially in front of their friends.  The priority is to learn how to write and submit ads properly. Facebook advertising should only cost a few cents for a click through to your Facebook page.  I would highly recommend Armand Morin’s training on this subject. Click here for an educational video (also a sales pitch but interesting content anyway).

Facebook shares are good for SEO but Facebook is not a direct selling platform. Posts linked to sales pages do not do well as people are not primarily on Facebook to buy.   [Aside: You can now (since April 2013) place direct eBay listings on a Facebook page and effectively create a mini eBay search page. This is probably a move by Facebook to introduce the idea of sales pages in their mainstream website away from the Facebook MarketPlace].

Advertising effectiveness has to be tracked carefully as Facebook page shares (and likes) are still one step away from your website sales activity and may not contribute to any sales.  Measuring the cost-benefit of a Facebook share is tricky; if anyone has tested and measured this in any way then please feel free to contribute in the comments section.

Facebook Comments

Exactly like Shares these are harder to come by. The best way to improve comment scores is to actively reply to all messages and comments to get a conversation going on your Facebook page. This applies equally to your blog comments.  The fastest way to lose people is to ignore them, so reply to everyone.

Facebook Likes

Easier to get than Shares and easier to manipulate, so worth less in SEO terms. Similar to shares the best way to get Likes is through brute advertising.

Never be tempted to buy Facebook Likes through some outsource service.  This will hugely decrease the effectiveness of your advertising as ads will be served to people with no real interest in your product or service. You can opt to serve ads to people not connected to your pages but it is not as effective as targeting those people already engaged in your page.

Pinterest

A recent study from Semiocast shows that Pinterest currently has more than 70 million users on the site and 30% were active in the month that users were polled. Pinterest now the third most popular social network in the United States according to Mashable. Back in February, comScore reported that Pinterest had 48.7 million users globally so there has been a large growth spurt this year.  There are still only 500,000 business accounts mainly in the USA (no surprise) and China (surprise).

Pinterest went nofollow in March 2012 so links from images no longer count towards SEO ‘link juice’.

Look at the most popular Pinterest walls and they are almost works of art.  The visual impact can be tremendous and is a great brand building tool. Active participation is key, like Google Plus or any Blog being part of the community is what works. For the first time you can see Pinterest Specialist showing up in job descriptions so the big brands appear to be employing dedicated people.

Pinterest is all about images and there is no better place to source them than Dreamstime as it has a big resource of free high resolution images as well as some great deals for monthly bulk downloads that give you high resolution images for less than $0.20 each.

Twitter Tweets

Twitter users that retweet others, participate in tweeted discussions and engage with followers are vastly more successful than the Twitter users who only tweet their own links or randomly follow hundreds of users every day in the hope of gaining followbacks.

One of the most interesting studies found that Google has threshold levels of tweet activity that count towards Page Ranking. The first threshold is 50 tweets and the second is around 5,000 tweets. So, getting to 50 tweets is essential but after that it takes a lot more work to improve the SEO effect.

Note that tweets from different users count a lot more than the same user tweeting the same website link.

Coming Soon:  Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Backlinking

Please subscribe (top right) and we will keep you posted

 

Outsourcing Your Online Business

Ralph PriceBusiness Leave a Comment

hOne of the most common obstacles in the growth of owner operated small business is the inability to delegate and let go of some of the control.  The do it all yourself ’control freak’ personality profile is the most common to fail in business.

Habits are hard to break but they are easy to form, so delegate from the start.

 

In a world where an office full of highly paid workers is a big liability, delegation means outsourcing.

There are 4 basic types of outsourcing

1.    Piece Work

You can outsource an enormous number off tasks very cheaply but the problem with this is that you are micro managing and spending a lot of time placing these orders and monitoring them.  The big upside is that it is also incredibly cheap as you outsource individual tasks for $5 – $15 which could be tasks like a 2 minutes audio overdub, a short video review or blog article writing.

This is often how online marketers start out and it is certainly useful to get those tasks done that you cannot do yourself or lack the equipment to do.

There are a number of online services offering these low rates:

2.    Larger Projects

If you are looking to build software, create a website, have an ebook written or even create entire products then there are various online sources to find these skills. Sources.  You negotiate rates based on a guide price or you can put a project out to tender and see what prices you are quoted.  These projects do need managing and payments and delivery should be staged so you can monitor the quality and progress. Also, you need to get a feel for the marketplace to see what you should be paying for a particular job and this can be time consuming.

When you are posting your project on a jobsite, do take some time to check out similar projects that are posted by other people. This will give you a good idea of what you should pay. Equally importantly, you must keep your own budget in focus when posting the project.

These are the main outsourcing websites currently available:

Paid Tweets

Paid Review Blog Brokering Sites

3.    Full Time Employee Employed Directly

When you think you can afford $300 – $400 / month to get yourself a full time employee then DO IT. In the current economic conditions this is simply a gift and the best thing you can possibly do for your business.

However, you will be employing a real person full time with their family and commitments and so you must take your responsibility seriously. You will be responsible for somebody’s livelihood so this is a long term commitment.

What is equally important is that you will be getting a graduate educated, loyal, fluent English speaker that will make a huge contribution to your business.

Wages run from $200 – $800 / month depending upon the calibre of employee you need. The average wage in places like the Philippines is just over $300 /month and would be the entry level; graduate salary.  An experienced mobile app developer or designer would come in at the top end of that range

If you are going to employ someone then one of the best recruitment platforms is www.onlinejobs.com, but before you visit that site I must recommend that you watch an excellent introductory video here.  ReplaceMyself is a complete management package geared at finding outsourcers on the openjobs.com network. It costs $99 /month and gives you access to openjobs.com and provides a full library of training videos and support materials to help you as an employer and to take away the burden of having to do any training yourself.  Click here to watch the webinar video and find out why this is such an indispensable service.

4.    Full Time Employee Employed Through An Agency

If you do not want to build your own team with the associated responsibility then you can buy into someone else’s team.  This is the idea behind 123Employee.  They recruit and train from the same pool as ReplaceMyself, but they take on all of the management and training responsibilities and you buy a slice of their time every month.

It works out more expensive as a full time employee works out at $900+ /month but you can buy just a set number of hours per week and you have the option to cancel if it does not work out for you.

Royalty Free Images – Free High-Res Downloads – Great Resource Website

Ralph PriceProduct Creation Leave a Comment

dreamstimefree_1116661

This image was free to download in high resolution ( 2532px x 1868px ) from DreamTime

There are a lot of photo libraries on the internet like iStock but when you are posting regularly you need a lot of images and the costs can mount up.  However, DreamTime have a ‘fremium’ business model that really works. You can download a lot of free images and sometimes pay for the ones that you really like but carry a cost.  You can also bulk download at THE cheapest rate anywhere on the internet.

2 reasons why the DreamTime photo library is recommended

1. You can get some fairly decent free images in case your budget is tight
2. Later, if you find you need a lot of high resolution images then there is a $140 option that allows you to download 25 high resolution images every day for 30 days so you get 750 images as long as you remember each day.  This works out at $0.19 each (12p) which for high res images, some of which sell for $10, is the best value on the internet.  Lots of professionally shot images to be had. You do have to download every day so if you forget one day then you do not get that chance again. Even if you forgot half the time this is still a great deal.

Spend some time gathering some images.  Buy credits if you need them.  For websites, you only need the low res images (approx. 480 pixels wide) which is the cheapest option.
Gather images that reflect what you are offering, not where your potential customers are now. For example, if you were selling a product to help with depression you do NOT want images of depressed people, you want good lifestyle shots showing happy or at least contented people.  Remember you are selling a dream or a solution.

Every article you post to your blog will need an accompanying photo so try and plan ahead for what you need.

Remember if you use the free images to post an acknowledgement to the photo library. In fact, turn it into an affiliate link, there is commission to be earned from every link away from your website.  You can sign up for the Dreamtime affiliate program once you are a signed up member, just go to the About Us page look for the Referral link.

 

The Rules of Social Media

Ralph PriceSocial Media Leave a Comment

rules-of-social-media

Pause for a moment and think about something for a minute. Is there anything you can really be successful at without following some “rules”? I know what you are thinking, entrepreneurs are meant to “break rules” instead of follow rules right? Wrong! In my opinion there are just some times when you have to follow rules and Social Media is one of those times. When it comes to Social Media, you simply have to follow in the footsteps of people who have gone ahead of you and been successful. These footsteps are what I refer to as “rules” in this article and they will certainly lead you to a degree of success. As with anything in life, we might be following the same recipe but results will differ depending on more personal characteristics.

Rule #1 it’s not about YOU

The only radio station everybody tunes in to is WIIFM FM (What’s in It for Me). If you have a Social Media account for your business then it is not about you, but what your connections will benefit from association with you. This could either be Facebook fans, Twitter followers or LinkedIn connections. Talking all about yourself and your business is a sure way of losing everyone’s attention and they just stop listening. To have a successful Social Media presence make sure you talk none stop about the benefits your visitors will get from association with you. It’s all about THEM.

Rule #2 Content is KING

Break this rule at your own peril. A Social Media page lacking in content is like going to a party and you are the only guest there, who wants to go to such a party. This is where the 80:20 rule comes in. Spend 20% of your time creating great content and the rest delivering it to your audience, engaging with them, listening to them and talking about THEM. At no point are you ever expected to reverse this ratio, this amount to shooting yourself in the Social Media foot.

Rule #3 Do not be a One-Hit-Wonder

Social Media success is 24/7 business. Just because you have thousands of fans or followers does not mean you can sit on your haunches. It is a fulltime occupation to make sure those fans are being fed and you have to work at keeping their attention. Just because you made one killer post that got them in does not mean you can sit back and relax. Your fans are hungry monsters, keep feeding them and they will keep bringing their friends in.

Rule #4 Reply to EVERYONE

This is one rule you must never break. If someone posts a comment or engages with you, you MUST respond and reply to them. There is no faster way to lose fans or followers by ignoring their message or comment, and then replying to the one after theirs. It is therefore imperative that you look after your audience; it generally costs more to get a new customer than to retain an existing one.

Rule #5 Remember Social Media is about PEOPLE

This has got to be one of the most important of the 5 rules. Sometimes when we are exploring the Social Media jungle we see “people” as prospects and forget that it is all about creating lasting relationships. As the adage goes, no one wants to be sold to, and if you treat people in real life as we see some being treated in Social Media, then you wouldn’t have any friends. Also remember people are more likely to react more to something that stirs their emotions. Appeal to people’s hearts and they will love you forever (well considering that a tweet has a half-life of 6-7 minutes and good Facebook post only lasts a couple of hours.)

Well there you go 5 very powerful Social Media rules which will make you or break you. Now go and check if you have been applying these rules in your interactions, if not then it’s not too late to ring in the changes. Good luck.

Emails That Make Sales

Ralph PriceEmail Marketing Leave a Comment

email-addresses

Emails must contains good content!

Sending content that is interesting and sharable will make you more sales.

The following 5 email styles are usually the most effective.

1. Emails With Video Links.

Videos are without doubt the best sales medium out there right now and people love to share good stuff.

A study by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) of mobile users, reported that 92% share mobile video content with others. 92% share videos!

As about half of email reading occurs on mobile devices you have an audience of video sharers who will actively forward your video email message on to their friends, family and colleagues.

33% share video content by email. While 56% post the video to Facebook or similar social sites to share it.

What videos do people like to share?

* 66% share short and funny video clips

* 52% share music videos

* 35% movie trailers

* 31% share content created by themselves or someone they know

* 22% share how-to videos

Start making your own videos or search on YouTube for interesting videos to share.

Not only will video emails get you more shares, but links to videos in emails receive 2 or 3 times as many clicks as text links.

2. Emails Reviewing Competing Products

Look for products you can compare. Write comparison articles. Good cop, bad cop always works.  People like to buy knowing that they have a better product. It is human psychology and that internal reassurance that says – well it was better than the alternative, even if the alternative is just one other product.

Highlight the good points but never over sell, be balanced, never biased. Modern buyers can spot fake praise a mile off.

Comparison guides are rated highly by prospective buyers
as useful resource that encourages them to buy.

Include in your comparison guide:

* Price
* Benefits
* Other Reviews
* Negatives
* Questions & Answers

3. Email With Interesting Infographics

These appeal to the info-junkies out there

Studies show Internet users prefer visual content and that it works to drive sales.

People appreciate and share Infographics. They provide good information and they’re easy to understand.

An Infographic can explain concepts and situation at a glance where as a text explanation could take pages.

4. Emails With Promotional Offers

People like bargains and they like to shop online!

Don’t swamp them but every now and then dig out something of good value and let them know about it.  When you find a great offer or bargain online you should be running to your PC to spread the word. Hopefully it will be your products and services but don’t limit yourself, especially if there is a commission involved.

Prospects say that sales letters help them learn more about what your company does. The promotional email provides needed details about the products and services you offer.

Just email your complete sales letter or at least an interesting introduction with a read more button at the bottom (and the top)

5. Emails With Links To Current News

Let people know what is happening in your industry or market.

New = Interesting.

Pay attention to the news and studies related to your business when a brand new story breaks be the first to email out a link to your list with the update.

Sharing relevant industry news links with prospects in your email messages will increase the likelihood of a sale!

Send out short quick notes with a links to quality stories and you’ll keep in touch with prospects while building rapport. Before you know it you’ll be making more sales!