Get your Wordpress site primed for sales…
So, in this next video, I show you how to structure your posts for maximum search engine exposure, how to put your Wordpress pinging on steroids, how to get your affiliate links in Wordpress, and how to track your results.
After this we are all set to promote and start making some sales!
And hey, if you like these videos and you get something out of them, maybe tell a friend! I’d love to have them hang out with us here!
Resources Used:
Pinging Services:
http://rpc.pingomatic.com
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://ping.myblog.jp
http://ping.bitacoras.com
http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
http://bblog.com/ping.php
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
Domains Google LOVES (pick them right)…
This is Part 5 in the sample campaign I am setting up where I show you how to pick the best domain and how to set-up your site. Picking the domain is becoming one of the easiest things you can do to get quick rankings if you do it right. And there is one platform to set your site up on that Google absolutely LOVES…
(EXPAND THE VIDEO TO FULL SCREEN, I MADE IT BIGGER THIS TIME SO IT CAN BE SEEN EASIER)
Resources:
Don’t Always Trust A Guru (and my newest site revealed)…
Recently an IM guru (who I consider a friend) came out with a series of videos on running a profitable campaign. Now, I am not saying who, and above all, I still respect and admire this person greatly, so I don’t want this to come across too negative because their intentions are in the right place.
Anyway, the first video was about keyword research. I was a bit dissapointed to find that the primary way they said to find good keywords to rank for was to do the quote search and the “intitle” search.
If you get under 50,000 results in quotes and under 10,000 results for intitle, it could be a good keyword is what was said.
And that was it.
So, as I was in the middle of creating my new site, I thought I would ditch my usual method of keyword research (found in this post and emphasizing looking at average page rank of the first 10 results) and give it a whirl.
These are the results I got…but first let me tell you about the new site I was building.
I got to thinking about how I could really add value. And I mean REALLY add value to peoples lives.
Well, I thought about it for a while and realized how silly it is for me to try and market all the things I market – double chin exercises, guitar courses, anxiety treatments, registry repair software, boil treatments, emetophobia and on and on.
First, I don’t know squat about most of this stuff, so first I have to spend time learning. And second, they don’t really get me all jazzed up to write about, so they get boring after a while. And finally, am I REALLY trying to add value or make a buck selling e-books and miracle potions?
So, as amazingly stupid and simple as this sounds, I came up with the idea of doing something in the profession my offline business is in – accounting. Not the most exciting, but I do it every day, I know it inside and out, and I truly get to help people solve problems. And most important of all – I KNOW exactly what their problems are (this is crucial).
So I came up with www.learnquickbooksforfree.com. I won’t go into the details of why this is a problem for business owners, but basically I recorded 14 videos on how to use Quickbooks. It’s about 7-8 hours of video training, all completely free. And I encourage people to email me with their questions.
I could not find free training like this anywhere online. So, it really, truly adds value to people.
And its a simple opt-in list where I can build a relationship with my subscribers. Check out this email I got from one subscriber about the site and the help I gave her:
Mat,
You are amazing. I have gone to many sites and forums seeking an answer for this reimbursement issue, and I always seem to get confused and not really get my question answered. You have explained my options below and I see it so clearly and it seems so simple.
I will be using option 1 which is easiest for me to do. You have saved me a lot of time and frustration. The greatest thing about this is that I feel confident and I am now very excited to continue to populate quickbooks with my information and see my final reports. I wish you could understand what it means to users like us to find someone like you who is so knowledgeable, but more than that, is the fact that you are willing to share this information and devote your time for no cost, in today’s world. You are truly amazing and different.
Happy 4th and I know that I will have another question soon.
Thanks again!
Is that awesome or what!! That makes you feel good and is truly adding value to peoples lives.
So, thats my new site, and it is a simple Wordpress template I found free. I paid $10 for the domain and spent time on the videos. I plan on getting subscribers, building the relationship, and presenting offers on any one of the 1,000’s of business affiliate products out there (for example, a Stamps.com CPA offer pays $50 if they sign up for a 4 week trial!).
Now back to my keyword research fiasco.
My first keyphrase I chose was “free quickbooks training online” and here are some stats:
1. Between 1,300-1,600 searches per month
2. 369,000 search results
3. 39,000 quote results
4. 157 intitle results with quotes
Should be a slam dunk, right?
Final data:
5. Average page rank – 3.6 (yikes!)
So, I did 1 video, submitted to about 15 video sites, like Youtube and Metacafe. I wrote one article and submitted to about 25 social sites and I have built maybe 40-50 backlinks to the site.
See if you can find me ANYWHERE in the regular search results. Good luck, I can’t be found on at least the 1st 5 pages. Do it in quotes and I’m number 1, but people don’t search in quotes.
But I have 22 subscribers so far – and they literally have ALL come from Youtube.
I know, I know, one keyword can’t determine whether or not looking just at quotes and intitle is the best or not. BUT, I’m telling you, you can’t always blindly trust a so called guru, and you have to know what works.
In the case of keyword research, look at average page rank – that will be the best indicator of if you will rank quickly and high or not (remember www.bamboopatioshades.com? It’s still ranked number 1 and I have done NOTHING to it!).
And there is something to TRULY adding value. For one, it makes you feel good, and two, you build trust MUCH, MUCH faster. Think about it in your campaigns – are you really adding value or just trying to make a quick buck?
Random Thoughts On Effective Headlines…
This morning as I was getting breakfast for my kids, I noticed an interesting saying on the side of the box of Apple Jacks cereal. It said “Life is better when your kids are healthy.”
That grabbed my attention because of course its true. You don’t want your kids to be sick, and life is much easier when they are healthy. And God forbid you feed them something unhealthy so they get sick or malnourished!
This got me thinking about an old slogan for Jiff Peanut Butter. This is showing my age I guess, but the slogan on the commercials and all the print used to say “Choosy moms choose Jiff.” Have you heard this before?
I remember as a kid this being plastered everywhere to where it was virtually branded on your brain.
And if you were a mom, it made you think, “Well, I’m choosy about what I feed my kids. I don’t want to just give them any old food. I probably should give them Jiff!” Maybe not just like that, but you get the point.
You see, I have NEVER liked the headlines people use in Internet Marketing.
Things like, “Discover How I Made $50,376.48 In My Sleep In 2 Hours!” or crap like that. It’s too spammy and I hate when people advocate using headlines like that because in my opinion it’s almost like you are preying on peoples emotions.
But if you break down the above examples I gave for Apple Jacks and Jiff, what are they really doing? Are they also preying on peoples emotions, but in a more subtle way?
Here is the way I think about them – 1) they are attention grabbing because they touch a nerve with something most people already think about themselves (keeping their kids healthy, not just putting any ‘ol junky food into their kids), and 2) people reading the headlines have to agree with the statements otherwise they would be “bad parents.”
I am no psychologist (but I love psychology), but my guess is that if the headline states something they CAN’T disagree with and implies what just about every parent wants (to be a good parent), then the copy below it ties in the product and BINGO, they now associate the food with being a good parent. Make sense?
It’s brilliant in its simplicity.
So, how can we use this type of knowledge to become better Internet marketers?
I think first you have to know and understand your prospects deepest and darkest fear, belief and/or desire about a given ailment or problem they have. Then you have to state the obvious in your headline, something they cannot disagree with.
Finally, in your copy, you have to tie in your product as the perfect solution to reinforce their beliefs.
I am doing this off the top of my head, but let’s say we take anxiety as an example. I know for a fact that people who suffer from anxiety believe that life would be better if they did not have anxiety and they look for “cures” to their disorder. So, maybe the headline could somewhat copy the Apple Jacks example:
“Life Is Better When You Are Cured of Anxiety And Panic Attacks…”
Or…
“Life Is Fuller When You Are Cured Of Anxiety And Panic Attacks…”
Or…
“Life Is Full Of Opportunity When You Are Cured Of Anxiety And Panic Attacks.”
Like I said, these are just off the top of my head and I plan on testing some of them in my campaigns.
But I like it better than the same old “See How I Cured My Anxiety In 5 Minutes!!!” kind of garbage.
Do you think it would be more effective, less effective? Is it as attention grabbing as the spammy headlines? What would make it more attention grabbing? Is it also “preying” on peoples emotions?
I’d love to hear your feedback.
How to connect with your website visitors?
OK, this idea is so simple it is stupid, but it uncovers a goldmine of information that you can use to establish a connection with your website visitors. Hope you enjoy it, and feel free to leave a comment below the post (or even Tweet it!)…
Having trouble making sales? This may make it easier…
OK, if you are having trouble selling digital e-books, whether you can’t connect with the customer or there is just way too much competition, watch this video on a whole other world in affiliate marketing that most affiliates don’t even bother with – BUT, and keep this a secret — it’s profitable!
Why do you buy stuff?
Why do you go online and buy things? Why do you buy things in stores? If you break it down, what information do you really want and need to hit that final “Buy Now” button.
Does it depend on what you are buying? The cost? Do you like really detailed specs or is just a summary fine?
What is it that tips you over the edge to say in your head “OK, I have enough information, I’m ready to buy?”
If you go through this process in your mind when you buy things, don’t you think most other people do too?
You see, this is the essence of marketing online (and marketing in general). Giving people the information they need to make a decision to buy.
Screaming “BUY, BUY, BUY” on your site simply DOES NOT WORK. It’s like a used car salesman and totally turns people off.
I have been guilty of it and so are about 99% of online marketers out there. Why is this?
Well, I think it’s because when you first get into marketing online, that’s most of what you are exposed to, you don’t know any better. All of the slick sales letters, and being exposed to all of the other crap that other new marketers are putting online influences you to do the same thing.
But you have to STOP. People DO NOT want to be sold to, they want to find answers to their questions and solutions to their problems. Your ONLY job is to answer those questions and offer those solutions, simple as that.
It’s hard to do, believe me.
One way I have trained myself to take this approach is to NOT think about selling anything on my site. I put myself into the shoes of my visitors and ask myself some questions:
- If I were looking for this information, what would I want to know?
- What questions would I ask?
- What questions should I ask?
- How would I want this information shown to me?
- How much is it?
- How much is it compared to other alternatives?
- How do the different ones compare in reliability and price?
- What would make me hit the “Buy” button?
Brainstorm a little bit and put yourself in the shoes of your visitors.
So, if you are having problems converting visitors into buyers, step back and examine your copy.
Are you screaming “BUY, BUY, BUY” or are you truly trying to help people find a solution to their problem.
It happened sooner than I thought…
I got my first sale yesterday with the guitar niche. Quite frankly this happened sooner than I thought it would. I have only gotten about 40 clicks to the sales pages, so that is pretty quick to me.
Also, the sale was not even the main product I am promoting! Hmmm.
So, from here I will keep promoting just like I have been except add in some new keywords to target, just as I was planning on doing anyway.
One sale means nothing really, but I still get a thrill when I get them, especially in a niche I have never gone into. And I am not concerned that I didn’t get a sale of the main product I was promoting – if this happens some more I may change the main product to the one that is selling.
Not that I want to invite competition, but the website I made is http://www.learnelectricguitaronline.net.
It’s a simple “review” style site made with Affiliate Genie (which makes the whole process extremely easy by the way). I started off targeting a few keywords, like “learn electric guitar online,” “learn to play the electric guitar,” and “learn to play electric guitar.”
But I stopped targeting these and targeted product names ONLY, like Jamplay, Guitartricks, Elmore and Jamorama. I also added extensions to these keywords like “review,” “reviews,” “lessons,” “scam.” You get the idea.
Then I did exactly what I have been explaining on this blog in THIS POST by getting my content out there and building links. I use SENUKE to save time and automate the process, but all of this can be done by hand.
Otherwise, that’s it. It’s not rocket science. To me it’s a numbers game – you find a hungry crowd, find an affiliate product, build a blog or a site, drive traffic, and you will make sales.
Does it happen overnight? Sometimes yes, but it’s rare. It takes time, patience and work, but you can make it happen.
I will keep you updated on how this site grows and progresses, but I plan on continuing to spread content and links so that it becomes a nice little passive income generator for me.
And I am also working on some cool stuff I will be posting here in the coming weeks on new ways of building links as well as how you can make a ton of money in little goldmine niches that literally no one goes after.
2 Secrets To Ensure Your Spot On The 1st Page of Google
There are 2 things I do every time to ensure my spot on the 1st page of Google. I don’t see many marketers doing this, which makes me understand why so many fail.
Related Blogs
How To Get Massive Free (and very close to free) Traffic – Part 2
If you are just coming here to this post, I am showing you a sample campaign, blow by blow. To start at the beginning, go HERE.
I’m excited about this post because I have been getting some FANTASTIC results with this process recently. The goal here is to absolutely splatter our content all over the place, creating tons and tons of backlinks to our site AND our content.
When it comes down to it, there are really only 2 things that matter in getting free traffic from organic listings – content and backlinks. Think about it like a huge spiderweb on content and links all coming back to the center of the web, which is our site.
And my approach is to pick my 1st keyword and do everything to dominate the 1st page of Google with that keyword. Then after I conquer that one, move on to the 2nd keyword, and so on. You can do it however you want, but I have found that if I focus my content on more than one keyword at a time, I end up not ranking for anything. Call me stupid, but I get too confused as to which
keyword I am creating content on or building links to if I try to focus on more than one at a time.
SO, choose whatever works for you, but I start off by picking one keyword and focusing on that one until I dominate, then move on to the next.
Here, in order, is what I do to dominate:
1. Now, to get things started I blast my site to about 400-600 Web directories. This puts a link in these directories back to my site. And they all don’t happen at once, they come in over time due to the nature of the approval process for most of these directories.
I use a new service to do this called Deep Linker Pro, by Josh Spaulding. If you don’t know Josh, he is an honest, stand-up IMer who stands behind everything he does 100%. Deep Linker Pro is a one time fee software program with free lifetime updates to the directory list and to the software. I HIGHLY recommend it if you can spare a few dollars.
Is it 100% necessary to buy this software? No, it’s not. Will it save you time getting backlinks? Yes, it will save you a ton of time.
***IMPORTANT – the only time, in my opinion, that you should pay for ANYTHING in internet marketing, is if 1) it fits into your goals and 2) it saves you time. By sticking to these 2 criteria, you will save yourself a ton of time and money by not buying every new guru “magic formula” that comes on the market. I will ONLY recommed products and services that fit these 2 criteria. If I don’t think it will help you in some fashion, or I don’t use it in my own business, I WILL NOT tell you to buy it just so I can make a few bucks.
2. I submit my article to www.Ezinearticles.com. We spoke about this in THIS POST so I won’t go over it again, but plain and simple, I submit it to Ezinearticles.
3. I take that article and submit it to Unique Article Wizard. Again, Unique Article Wizard is one of those services that saves me a TON of time distributing content and creating backlinks. Basically what it does is takes one of your articles, changes is it around into 100’s, if not 1,000’s of combinations and distributes it to 1,000’s of article directories, all on autopilot. It takes me about an hour of work and everything else is automated. It’s not cheap, but it is a fantastic service that has helped me rank on quite a few keywords.
4. I then come up with 3 alternate titles for my article so I have 3 of the same exact articles, but with 3 different titles.
5. I take these 3 articles with different titles and I submit one each to 3 different document sharing websites. The major document sharing websites I submit to are:
www.docstoc.com
www.scribd.com
www.calameo.com
If you are not familiar with these sites, you need to be. The things I like about them are 1) you can include anchor links anywhere in the document, 2) there is no approval process, 3) they get indexed VERY quickly, 4) they usually out rank EZA articles, Goarticles, articlesbase, Squidoo and Youtube and 5) you can add pictures to your article.
Here is an example of one I have up for this guitar campaign:
Looks way better than an Ezinearticle, huh?
There are other document sharing sites, like www.slideshare.com, www.authorstream.com, and www.yudu.com, and I am trying some of these out, but for now I simply use the 3 above. By the way, you’ll notice again that my name on the article above is not my name – I do this for anonymity.
6. Once these documents are published, I then take the URL’s of the documents and ping them at www.pingomatic.com. This let’s the search engines know that this information is out there.
7. I will then social bookmark these same URL’s. You can use a social bookmarking service like www.socialmarker.com, or you can even buy a service that will automatically submit to a bunch of social bookmark sites, but I have found that Digg works the best. I will typically submit my documents to the following:
www.digg.com
www.propeller.com
www.reddit.com
8. Next, I head over to www.html2rss.com and create an RSS feed out of my document URL’s. This is a pretty cool free service because it allows you to take a number of URL’s and create on RSS feed out of all of them. Then I take that RSS feed and submit it to the following RSS aggregators:
www.badrss.com
www.friendfeed.com
www.feedage.com
www.postrank.com
www.blogdigger.com
www.blogpulse.com
www.plazoo.com
http://publisher.yahoo.com/rss_guide/submit.php
There are tons of others, but I have gotten good results with these.
9. I then create high authority backlinks to 1) my site and 2) the document URL’s (at scribd, docstoc, etc.). I do this manually through a service that costs me $5 per month. With this service I get 30 very high PR sites that I can put my links on. It’s a very cheap price for the kind of link juice you get out of these. It’s called Easy Backlink Builder.
I will typically create 5 links to each of my documents and 5 to my niche site for my 1st keyword I am targeting.
10. As I build these links, I keep track of the URL’s for the profile pages where the links are by pasting them in a text document.
11. Next, I ping these URL’s one at a time at Pingomatic.com
12. Then I create another RSS feed at www.html2rss.com of these profile page URL’s and submit this RSS feed to the RSS aggregator sites listed above.
13. At this point my Ezinearticle submission should have been approved. Once it is, I social bookmark it at Digg.com, reddit.com and propeller.com. Then I create an RSS feed out of its URL and submit the feed to the RSS aggregators.
14. Finally, I let it simmer a few days. Google will naturally shuffle around. You may be on the 1st page one day, then nowhere to be found the next. I let this whole pot of stew simmer and then I check over the next few days to see where I am ranking for my keyword.
If I am nowhere close to ranking, then I will either 1) build more high PR links from Easy Backlink Builder to my site and my documents and/or 2) start the cycle over with a new article but the same keyword.
I will continue to pound Google with my content and links until most of my content shows up on Page 1 for my keyword. Eventually, if your competition is not too tough, you will dominate the 1st page.
***IMPORTANT – this is how I currently do it. I usually try out different things in addition to these steps, but these are the core things. For example, I may create a blogger blog pointed at my site, ot I may create a Squidoo lens (although I hate these!) pointing to my documents and my site. You have to flexible and try out new things because you generally can’t go wrong.
So, get to work on that first keyword and get ranked. We want to start getting some natural traffic in there and start getting some sales!
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Tools I Personally Use & Recommend
