Even though I have not been able to post anything here, I have been staying in touch with the marketing world by reading as many emails about what happening in our world.

I feel that I must comment on one of the least appealing types of email I have seen being receiving regularly over my type away is from the less scrupulous types of marketer who is offering the “make heaps of money on autopilot without having to lift a finger to do it”" type of product.  These “goodies” can be offered in a variety of forms such as those promise to drive traffic to your websites from magical sources or a ready made money spinning website offering a product in a competitive niche to mention two of the more prevalent sorts of product.

These products seemed tobe aimed at marketers who are new to the business and are ready to part with their money when they see the sales letters showing fantastic projections for the profits they can expect make.    Unfortunately, what these type marketers know is that many of the  readers of their emails are willing blinded to be by the “facts” presented to them.  They usually will buy the product  fired up by the content of the sales letter and their own desire to make money as quickly as possible without thinking things through properly.

Having been stung in the past by these products due to my own lack of experience, I can now look at these “opportunities” with a lot more caution.  For those  of you who have gained wisdom and experience with time will know how to treat such offers.  But to those of you who are still new, take care, like any offers you may see in the offline world, if it seems too good to be true it probably is!

Think of things in this way, if you were to find a way to attract lots of potential customers to buy your products would you tell everyone else how to do so for what would seem a silly price?

I don’t think so!

What these people are doing with these emails is  to appeal to deepest desires of the recipient with the sole intent of  themselves making a  quick profit from the hopes of others.  Now let me say before anyone comments that I  that  not all marketers are motivated in this manner and that there many who are willing to give good advice and teach sound methods.  But how many of us have be burned in the past by the the opportunist preying on our lack of knowledge as the new?

Like all businesses, Internet marketing is learned through experience, (good and bad), and those expecting to to find a quick route to riches may find more often that the “push button” approach will as often as not end up with them feeling disillusioned and poorer for their efforts.

Keep in mind your own hard work and experience will reward you much more than false promises of  quick and easy riches from someone else.

Thanks to the fact that we have been empowered with the ability to visit each others sites to see how others are progressing has been interesting and helpful.  This can only be a big step in helping us in  getting to where we want to be a whole lot quicker.  Seeing the quality work and the efforts of my fellow classmates has only inspired me to go on and want to try harder in reaching  my own goals.   Personally speaking,  in seeing the the different types of sites and reading where each member is at this moment in time has allowed me to see that what I am striving for is not a lonely task.  When I first started this program I had my doubts about if I really could achieve anything, but even at this this early stage I feel that a lot can be achieved if I persist with this.

As I have said in my opening paragraph,  I am grateful for the positive responses to my blog so far.  However,  I feel one cautionary piece of advice is warranted, and please do not read this the wrong way, I do think that we must not go around back slapping each other for the sake of doing so, that said credit given where credit is due.    Speaking for Myself for a moment, I for one would be prepared to listen to any constructive criticism as long as it is given as advice on my blog, even if at first glance it may appear to be negative.   Remember we do not have to publish all the comments left and we can deal with them as we wish to.  I am not trying to make a negative statement here so please do not read this as such, but even though I am writing an item I think is helpful or informative, I would really like to know what real relevance it has to my readers.  I one would like to know that I am writing material that can have the potential to attract readers from outside our group in the shortest possible time.  That is not to say I am impatient with proceedings, but what I would really like is to know is am I going in the right direction.  Please do not think that I am setting myself up to be knocked down, nor would I wish that to happen to anyone else.  But I do feel I could benefit from from the comments from anyone who would normally just pass my blog by because they did not like it for whatever reason.  I would  be interested in what they thought of my style of writing or the content as long as it is a fair comment.

Having said that, I feel that I should say that if anyone does read this post and feel that I am suggesting that they should go and look for reasons to nit-pick  other blogs , PLEASE DON’T.   I am not saying that for one moment.  Please remember that each of us are putting 100% effort into what we do.  We should take care in order not to let others feel that we have put down their pride and joy because of an unintentional  slight in a well meant comment.   We all would benefit from the advice of others, (good or otherwise),  but please keep in mind we all have feelings!   So before we leave that “helpful” comment just stop and think for a moment how you would feel about what you would see when you were at the same stage, and as a result we should choose our words carefully!

Again, I would like to say that we have all been given a powerful tool to help each other to the good.  So we all should be  using it no matter how irrelevant we feel any comment we make might be, a word of support can go a long way.  By doing so and as long as we do it with the right intentions it can hopefully only help others who may feel as I do.  We should be prepared to spend some time visiting each others blogs and share our thoughts.  As we have been told when we were given this tool, this can only be to our benefit so let’s make the most of it.

I look forward to meeting you all on the forum soon!

In this article I am going to talk about some of the ways that those of you who have a new website can try to get it noticed and hopefully have it regularly visited by other internet users.  So in order to do this I would first like to ask you to create a mental picture of where you currently are in order to help me explain things more more easily.

You have probably just bought your domain name and a hosting package with the idea that you can get your web-page publicized for everyone to see as soon as possible.  Think of this as your little piece of real estate  on the internet.   Here you can advertise who you are and what you can offer to your visitors in the form of information and products.  To be honest that is all what you have at the moment,  nobody really knows where you are here and the access to your site has not signed posted for anyone to find you yet.  At this stage all you have is a suitcase full of ideas and a table to place it on in your piece of land.   When you think of the size of the internet your property is in the wilderness at this moment  and it is your task to develop your site into place where people will want to come and visit again and again.

But as it stands at this moment that is not very likely to happen.  So what is your next course of action?

Well, hopefully your plan is to gradually build yourself a welcoming place and over time stock it with goodies in order to attract visitors to come and browse and of course buy from you.  Once they have come through the door you will want them to have a look round and hopefully like what they see and also buy something they might like.   At the very least you should want them to leave you their address in order that you can inform them in the future with news that may be of  interest them.  It also goes with saying that you should also like to notify them about any new products you have in order to encourage them to buy these too.

Now before you can get that far, your first thoughts should really be how can you go about go about starting to get visitors to stop and look at what you have to offer?

The first thing you can do is to get up some adverting boards up as soon as possible, so that you can attract the attention of any passerby to encourage them to browse your site.  You should do this by posting blogs on your site that have content that is interesting and informative.  Maybe it can just let your visitor know a little bit about yourself and that you are not faceless entity that only wants to try and grab some of their money before they decide move on.  You also should  try to post regularly to it, in order to attract newcomers and keep the interest of those you have attracted.  This can be achieved by showing them that you have new and relevant content that may be of interest to them.

Once you have done this, the next step to take is think about putting up signposts to let people know where you are and how to get there.

You can start to do this by posting your own articles on  the different article sites around the web.  Again like your blogs these posts should be interesting and informative in order to keep the readers attention.  Most of these sites will allow you can leave a link so the that any reader should be to follow it easily to your blog if they wish to visit it.

You can also visit forums and use the same tactics on them.   You do not have to contribute immediately but you could see what the other visitors are posting and then make your own contribution when you feel confident enough to do so.

Another way to get way to try and attract traffic is to join social networks such as Facebook or Twitter to name a couple places.  A word of caution here, some of these sites do not tolerate direct marketing to its members, so any direct selling could get you banned.  You have be warned!   A better approach would be to learn first by watching what others are doing and try to do likewise.

By trying these tactics you are bound to be noticed and will over time generate traffic, the trick is not to be disheartened and put any setbacks down to experience.

Since I am really enjoying what I am doing I thought no big deal about that and after finishing my evening meal I sat down in front of the computer started happily typing away.  I wrote the content for some of my posts and then reread them again and updated them again, and again, and again.  Finally I decided I was content with them and wanted to move on.  Friday afternoon, my wife takes a call from her Dad to say her Mum had took a tumble in their kitchen and he had called an ambulance because her ankle looked bad.  Fortunately they don’t live too far from us and we jumped in the car and drove over to them.  When we got to the house the ambulance had arrived and mum was being treated by  the paramedics.  They told us that she had broke her ankle and would have to go to hospital for further treatment because it looked pretty bad.  When she as seen by the doctors there  they decided that she needed an operation on her ankle to pin the bone, but this could not happen until next week when her ankle swelling should go down.

What this meant for me was my planned evenings for my website have now changed again into night shifts because of the hospital visits after work.   Now I am certainly not grumbling about things because this is my family and they matter to me.  What I am telling  you that even if your life gets turned on its head because of fate we all have to adjust because of our circumstances.  If you really want to do something that matters to you, (including work on your computer), you can still find the time no matter what fate has planned for you!

So what is this lesson I have learnt?

If you are really serious about joining in, then it is time to say to yourself “enough is enough”, it’s time to jump. We all go through that phase when we have doubted ourselves and our readiness to make a presence on the Internet.   Let me tell you, all the best courses and videos cannot replace the one thing you really have to do.  Get a website, post blogs, feel like you are making a fool of yourself,  don’t wait any longer, get involved, we all have been in that position.  Sure, it may seem that it isn’t always easy to provide content for blogs, but this will come with time.  What you will find is that you will think about what you have to do and not waste more time listening to what others are telling you what you should do.

Having your own website will actually make you start to contribute to the online community, and you can do that as often as you wish, that part is entirely up to you.  Of course,  I am not saying that the courses and videos won’t help, (we will all still need help at some point),  and a lot of them will provide that.  What I am saying is, that until you have your own website  and participate, your plans for a future involved with the internet may just remain another dream.

But stop and ask yourself how often does that really happen?

Even if you did  somehow manage such a feat, would you be able to achieve the same results with your next product?

I don’t think so, do you?

Now you’re probably thinking why I have started this article with such a negative point of view.  My answer back to you  is…… I haven’t tried to be negative.   What I hope to have done is given you a wake up call in order to start your ventures with the right frame of mind.  Even in the offine world we have dreams to achieveing fantasic goals, and in order to reach them, we must first have a plan of what we have to do to get there.  Let me give a simple example that can happen to you:

Suppose you’re fed up with the unsatisfactory waste collection service in your neighbourhood, the refuse collectors are missing your bins and when they are collected they are not being emptied properly.   What can do you do?  You can moan about it with your neighbours, but what would that achieve?  So you may decide that you feel strongly enough about it to take action.  When you talk to your neighbours about the problem, you listen to their views.   Then you decide to write an article or two about it and send them to your local newspaper or local free magazine.  You may even find a community web page and leave your views on it .  Over time you will probably see other comments appear in response  to what you have written.  Having seen the comments left by others in response to your articles you feel inspired and decide to attend a public meeting and actually speak about the matter in front of other people.  The next thing that can happen is  that those people attending the meeting will  start to talk to  you and ask for your advice on on other issues which you may not have considered before.   The next thing you will have to do is decide what should you do next.  You can look for more  information and pass it on to the people you spoke to.  Before you know it,  more people are approaching you and asking your advice about other issues that are concerning them.  Without realising it, you’ve become an authority in your community.  Over time and more people continue to come to you for more advice and information.  The reason for this you realise is they will  have heard about you from those who you have helped earlier, you’ve gone viral!

What has this got to do with Internet Marketing?

A great deal!

Not many people will not approach a stranger for advice readily, let alone buy something from them.  Unless they can identify who that person is and they can feel comfortable with them nor  they are not going to be very receptive to ideas.  Like in the example above, you would have to decide what will call you to take action.  After you have decided what will prompt you, you should visit forums such as Warrior, Facebook, My Space, etc. to see if other people are discussing the same topics as you have an interest in.  You should want to participate, read others comments and when you feel confident enough,  make your own contributions to the discussions.  Leave interesting or relevant blogs on your own website and  leave your links at the forums you participate in.  That way you will have visitors to your site who are willing to listen to what you have to say and may even start asking you for information and advice!   Before you know it people are approaching you and asking your advice about matters that are concerning them.  You will become an authority in your niche over time without realising it and visitors will come to you for advice  and information as they will have heard about you from others you may have helped, before you know it you have gone viral!

Applications used by Apple are also known as widgets, which are really programmes that allow a user to fulfil a certain desire or requirement.  The attraction of using these applications is the user can access these programmes with ease by just touching the screen of the device they happen to be using.   This can be anything from playing games, accessing records such as bank accounts or getting the latest  traffic or weather reports.  In fact, the possibilities are endless, all it takes is imagination or the insight to spot a requirement and create a widget to fill that niche.  More and more people are creating Apps and earning huge amounts by selling them, most of the tools required to do this can be found for free on the Internet or at a small cost.

If you have an idea that you know you can profit from or just need help brainstorming in order to create an App,  I have found a product on the market that can help you make it real.  My phone riches  is  a guide that will take you from helping you with an idea to creating a fully working App for it.  You do not need any technical skills to do this as this guide will  fully explain what you need to know.  What is really great about this product is not only that it will show you how to list your finished application in Apple’s App store, it also market you App effectively in order to get maximum publicity for it, ( including social marketing) .  What I also like is that it does not just help you in the creation of your Apps and it will also show you where to find the resources that you may need in making them successful!   This product will definitly be of use for marketers wanting to have a presence in a market the consists of a new type of internet user.  It will also  appeal  to those who are looking to make money in this new marketplace by creating their own Apps.  My phone riches is a product that will appeal to all types of people, (whatever their technical skills are), who want to start a new venture in an area that  is still expanding.  If you want to make some serious money in this exciting market it will not hurt to check this product out.  

My name is Will Keane and I would like to tell you a little bit about Myself and how I have got involved in internet marketing.  I am currently running a busy village post office in the south of England and have done so for the past 10 years.  I am happily married and have a ten year old daughter, who loves to keep me busy whenever she gets the opportunity.   Now running a post office today involves a lot more work than just selling stamps and paying pensions.  I have to deal with products such as travel insurance and foreign exchange, and services such as business and personal banking, issuing car tax and other services you might be surprised to see offered at a post office. Naturally my staff and I have to deal with all sorts of post related matters which can be anything from dealing with personal mail to posting all sorts of items for our local businesses.  But one thing about this business is although it is giving me a good living, I doubt I will allow me to expand into any large scale ventures.

Because of this fact I started to look for other possibilities, something I noticed through my work is one of the biggest things to have come to the post office is ebay.  So many people have become involved with it in one form or another.  We have people coming in to post items which they no longer want and have sold them to get some extra cash, and we have also some Power sellers who have started their own businesses and are regularly selling different items every day.  I met one such power seller, (who also became a good friend), who used my post office for his posting a few years ago.  He made an arrangement with me to leave his post at the post office each morning and would return in the afternoon and settle his bill.  Over time the amount of mail he would leave with me grew and grew, and I would regularly hear him comment that there were not enough hours in the day to do all the things he had to do.  This he told me could be anything from listing new items and packing and arranging despatch of goods that he sold, or dealing with customers emails  and arranging for suppliers to keep his stock levels up for him.  It eventually got to the point that he enlisted the help of his family to deal with the dispatch side of the business.  With all this success from ebay my curiosity was aroused and I started to dabble in it Myself.   At that time my daughter was a lot younger and most of my time was spent between running the business and family life, so ebay was more of a hobby than a serious pursuit and I eventually I stopped it for one reason or another.

I still liked to surf the net as the idea of running a business on the internet still appealed to me and I saw sites where marketers were selling products as downloads for customers for every type of product you could think of.  Aha! I thought no physical items to pack! the customer just downloads whatever product they want, what could be easier! even I could do this!   Wrong! when I started to research what involved in this enterprise I realised there was was a lot more work involved than just launching a website and waiting for the customers to line up and buy the product I had advertised.  As part of my research I even went to a two day bootcamp in October 2009, and although  came away  even more inspired to start a business, I was even more frustrated about how I should start in this venture.  Over those two days I learned about search engine optimisation, niche marketing, adwords and adsense, driving traffic, social marketing, and lots more.  What I also learned, wich was more imprtant to me at that time, was I needed help in order to get the right start  and idealy follow someone who had been there and “got the T-shirt”.  Again through trawling the internet  I came across an opportunity that I first I hesistated about, an internet markerter was advertising a course as a masterclass which would be run over a number of weeks and I would learn how to build a presence and a brand that would help me to succeed.  The name of this marketer is John Thornhill and although I have only had a few weeks of his course I am already starting to plan my business quicker than I could have hoped if I had tried to go it alone.  The mentoring I have received from this helpful marketer has been clear, extremely imformative and very easy to understand and even at this stage has greatly helped in my development.