Archive | December, 2023

One of the most important decisions you’ll ever make in your life is what kind of career you are going to have. Many people out there plan their career from the time they are in high school and work diligently to make sure they have the education that they need to make their dreams come true. There are also people out there that haven’t had the opportunity, for whatever reason, to get the education they need to work in the field they have always dreamt of working in. These people will often take whatever jobs they can find in order to make ends meet and survive.

Once one starts in a job, even one that may not pay sufficiently or be very satisfying, many people end up staying there while. In order to make a change, one must make a decision to break the cycle and do something that is different from what they know or are comfortable doing. Some people will take on extra jobs in order to get the money they need to go back to school and find a better career while others will adjust their lifestyle to fit the amount of money they have coming in.

There are still others out there that decide to take things into their own hands and start a home based business. These people tend to believe in themselves and are motivated enough to make sure their dream of working from home can be turned into a reality. Frankly, these are the kind of people that will do whatever it takes to make sure they are successful in the line of work or home based business they choose.

You see, building a successful home business doesn’t really require more work than building a successful career in the workforce. The difference between those who work for themselves at home and people who work for a boss in the “real world” usually comes down to a self-motivated mindset and unwavering commitment to work until you are successful. An employee might be motivated to work until their shift is over, while an entrepreneur is compelled to work until they have achieved their goals.

Working from home can be highly rewarding if you are willing to put the effort into making it work for you. You are going to find times when you are pulling long hours and not getting many days off when you start out, but that is part of the appeal of working from home. You don’t have to worry about doing those long hours and then commuting home only to go back to the office in a few hours. You can also take breaks or days off when you want once you are successful because the only boss of you, will be yourself.

Working from home isn’t usually like what some people fantasize about where you walk around in your pajamas all day looking like you just got out of bed… In fact, if that’s how you are dressed while you are working, then you probably aren’t taking your home-based business career very seriously, and your results will be half asleep as well. Just because no one else is around you doesn’t mean that you have to let yourself go and become unprofessional in your dressing habits. Maintaining your professional attitude is the key to having your home based business become a success and is something that you should strive for on all levels whether you work a job, or your own business at home.

Making the decision to build a successful home business is really the primary key to success. Just remember that the word decision means to “cut off from” all other possibilities. When you truly decide that you are going to build a successful home business, you surely will. And if you fall short of the success you dreamed of, well, you didn’t really make a decision, did you? That’s just a hope and a dream, and that won’t take you very far down the road to home business success. Think about it, and go all in.

If you have been thinking of becoming a green marketer – that is, turning your existing business into a greener one in order to attract customers interested in green issues – it is important to understand whether or not your existing customers are green already. If they aren’t yet, they soon could be if you lead the charge and set a good example of how to become more eco-friendly.

What Is Green Marketing?

Green marketing is all about marketing products and services which can be considered greener than what is readily available on the market at present. For example, if you were going to open a green dry cleaning business, it would use less harsh chemicals, recyclable plastic, reusable hangers and shirt boxes, and so on.

You would also need to educate consumers about why green dry cleaning is as good as, if not better than, existing dry cleaning. By explaining what the difference is, you can justify any price difference related to your new green product line.

Studies have shown that customers have indicated they would be willing to spend 10 to 20% more on a green product versus a traditional product – provided that it gives the same level of performance, if not better, than what they usually use.

A Few Tips on Running a Green Business

Green marketing is also about being conscious of waste in the business and trying to have as small a carbon footprint as possible in the running of the business.

The easiest place to lead the charge here is to stop creating paper catalogs and other paper-based sales materials. Instead, create an online catalog with full details of all of your products, and keep it updated frequently. Drive people to the site with classified ads in your local paper or niche-related or industry-related magazines.

Make the most of your email marketing lists to remind people to come to the site and see what’s new. Have regular product launches and promote them on social media and online press release distribution services. You will be spreading the word about your new green products and services, but without having a significant impact on the environment.

Around the office there are likely many things you can do to make it leaner and greener. And in this way, you can show your target customers that you are not just trying to cash in on the green trend, but are genuinely concerned about the environment. For example, use recycled paper in your printer, along with soy-based inks. Use recycled toilet paper, tissues, and paper towels as needed.

In terms of paper towels, consider buying cotton hand towels and washing them regularly rather than using up a lot of paper towels. Use mugs instead of disposable cups. Use a regular coffee machine instead of those pod thingies to reduce your daily plastic waste.

Use a stainless steel reusable filter in your coffee machine basket so you don’t have to waste paper on coffee filters. Buy water filters and filtered water jugs to cut back on bottled water use. Use BPA-free plastic (or stainless steel) water bottles and travel mugs to cut down on trash and plastic in the environment.

There are many things you can do to educate your customers about green issues. But first you have to learn about them yourself. Once you do, you can take a 360-degree look at your products, services, office, and vendors. In this way, you will be able to clean and green your company, and impress customers who are interested in green issues.

Affiliate marketing is one of the quickest ways to start making money online. However, like all businesses, there are many potential pitfalls in an affiliate marketing business. The most common mistakes can cost an affiliate marketer time and money. Avoid these 3 common affiliate mistakes and you will be a lot more successful in a faster period of time.

1. Choosing the wrong affiliate program to promote.

Many people want to earn from affiliate marketing as fast as possible as soon as they hear there is money to be made. In their rush to be part of a lucrative affiliate program, they often choose a product that is not in strong demand, doesn’t have a high-paying compensation plan or even a product the affiliate is not really interested in.

To be successful, it’s important to do quality research first and ensure that the products you want to promote as an affiliate have a strong and growing demand in the marketplace, that the affiliate program has a generous compensation plan that will reward you well for your efforts, and that you truly have an interest in the products you will be promoting as an affiliate. When these criteria are met, you will have a much greater probability of success with your affiliate marketing endeavor.

2. Joining too many affiliate programs at the same time.

Since affiliate programs are very easy to join, you might be tempted to join too many affiliate programs at the same time in an effort to increase your earnings potential. You may think that there is nothing wrong and nothing to lose by being part of many affiliate programs at the same time.

It is true that developing multiple streams of income is an important key to financial success as an affiliate marketer, but the cost of joining too many programs at the same time will be a loss of focus and concentration on the primary program or programs that are providing your opportunity to earn additional income.

The result? The maximum potential of your affiliate program is not realized and the income generated will not exactly be as much as you were thinking it would. The best way to maximize your results is to join one core program, or a small handful of related programs within a specific niche market and focus your efforts primarily on learning how the programs work, and then implementing an effective marketing action plan to start promoting your affiliate products effectively.

The idea is to roll out your marketing strategy consistently, day-by-day until you are making the sales and income you aspire toward with the affiliate program or programs that you have joined. Once you have achieved your goals, you can always expand the portfolio of affiliate programs you belong to, and with your well-developed marketing skills, success in new affiliate ventures will always come easier. The key in the beginning of an affiliate marketer’s career is to become an effective online marketer.

3. Not buying the product or using the service you’re promoting as an affiliate.

As an affiliate, your primary purpose is to effectively promote a product or service to potential customers. For you to achieve this aim, you must be able to share the benefits of the product or service convincingly with the correct target market. This is a lot easier to do if you have purchased the product yourself, and have your own experiences with how it has benefited you. It also adds to your personal integrity and credibility as a marketer.

Some of the most effective affiliate promotions of all are personal reviews. Many successful affiliates setup review sites or videos online to promote products and services they believe in by sharing their personal experience (story) that they have had with the product. Most consumer’s buying decisions are either influenced or motivated completely by a personal recommendation they have received from a trusted source. If you can establish yourself as a trusted source by writing or recording honest and insightful reviews for products you are promoting as an affiliate, you will be far more effective than simply trying to advertise the product through other means.

Therefore, buy and try the product or service personally first before you sign up as an affiliate to see if it is really delivering on what it promises, and if it’s something you would be proud to promote as an affiliate. Your prospects will then sense the sincerity and truthfulness in your recommendations and this will lead to more product sales.

Many hopeful affiliate marketers fall prey to the 3 affiliate marketing pitfalls above, and don’t succeed in their affiliate marketing business as a result. Now that you are informed, you have the knowledge required to avoid these common mistakes and get your affiliate marketing business off to a profitable start and successful future.

To make more sales, you can send more people to your offers, you can send better qualified people to your offers, or you can convert more of the people you send. Today let’s talk about how to convert more of your traffic into sales by using little copywriting tips and tricks that massively improve your copy’s ability to make those sales for you.

1: Do more research. If you know how to hit your prospect’s hot buttons, your conversion rates will improve. And to know what you’re talking about, you’ve got to do your research.

What other products are on the market? How is yours better? What do your prospects want most? How can you tailor your benefits to what they want? What did the reviewers say?

Sometimes you’ll even discover the perfect headline buried deep inside your research, such as the comment someone made when they tried the product and got spectacular results.

2: Talk to your market. Who is it that you’re targeting with your product? These are the people to talk to. If you don’t fully understand the relationship between your product, your customers and how it improves their lives, then find out. Ask for their experiences and listen carefully for emotions and key phrases that convey both how they felt about the problem and how the product has changed things for them.

Are you just launching and don’t yet have customers? You can still ask about their problem and what it will be like for them when they have the solution. Even going to Amazon and reading the reviews that people leave for products similar to yours can be super helpful. Look for the experiences others can relate to, the ones where someone is talking about how tough it was to have the problem, and how frustrating it is that the product didn’t solve the problem or how their life has changed since it did solve it.

3: Test headlines. Always have several headlines to test, because the one you are certain will be the winner is probably going to be the loser. It’s just a fact that even the most seasoned copywriters often can’t predict which headline will hit it out of the ballpark.

Try not to get attached to a headline prior to testing, either. Give each one a fair test and let the numbers speak for themselves. I’ve seen marketers fall in love with a headline and lose a great deal of sales because they took too long to test others.

4: Use mini-headlines. Those little headlines that break up copy also work like Australian Cattle dogs to herd sheep. When your reader starts to stray, your mini-headline will bring them back into the fold because it’s going to create intrigue, give benefits or simply raise so much curiosity that they MUST read what comes next.

Imagine someone is skimming your sales copy and all they are reading are the mini-headlines. Do they tell a story on their own? Do they create curiosity while also conveying benefits? Would you be drawn into the copy and perhaps even want to buy the product just from reading the mini-headlines? If not, you might want to work on those.

5: Use lots of bullet points. I’ve seen a lot of marketers who seem to think you’re supposed to have one section of bullet points and that’s it. But I’ve also noticed that some of the highest converting sales letters have 2, 3, 4 and even 5 separate sections of bullet points.

Bullets make reading easy. In fact, some of your prospects will read the headline, the bullet points and then maybe the guarantee before making up their minds if they want to go further. To create a bullet point, first write a mini headline and then add a sentence that supports the headline and adds a benefit.

For example:

The #1 Stealth Method of Persuasion (This is the exact covert method the US government used to turn die-hard Russian spies into secret double agents – use this method to get what you want every time.)

6: Add sidebars and boxes. Break up your copy with sidebars and boxes that highlight benefits, showcase testimonials and quote experts. This breaks up your copy, makes the entire letter look interesting and keeps the reader reading.

7: Use an experienced graphic artist. Ideally your designer has experience formatting sales copy within your niche. Take a look at the work they’ve done and see if their style will work for what you have in mind. Jot down ideas and suggestions of your own and then listen to your designer’s ideas, too.

Remember that good copy with great design can sometimes out-convert great copy with lousy design. The look of your page can be just as important as what your page says. If you don’t believe it, think of the last time you arrived at a sales page and clicked away because of what you saw and not what you read. First impressions are made so fast that the reader has often formed an opinion before they’ve even read your headline.

You know those headlines that scream out you can earn XXX amount of dollars by simply “pushing a few buttons” or “sending a few emails” or some such? Well, this case study is actually about someone doing almost no work and yet banking close to $5,000 a month.

In fact, she might be up to that amount now. The $4,400 was how much she earned when we spoke, and she mentioned that her income is increasing every single month. Yet she does almost no work whatsoever.

And by the way, OPA stands for Other People’s Artwork.

Here’s how it works:

I’ll call her Sally because, well, when I talk to her she giggles a lot and sounds kind of silly. Sort of like a high school girl, and yet she’s in her mid-twenties.

Sally has several different identities on Etsy and Ebay. Each identity sells a certain type of artwork. One sells paintings of animals, one sells landscapes, one sells abstract art, one sells hearts (I’m not kidding!) and so forth.

She has a real life assistant (we’ll call him Gorgeous George because as Sally tells it, in addition to working for her George also does some modeling and fitness instruction.) George makes all the listings for the artwork, gets the prints made from the originals, fulfills the orders and handles any customer service requests.

What does Sally do? She outsources work to several artists who do all of her paintings for her. Just like hiring a ghostwriter to write a book which you then sell, Sally is hiring “ghost painters”. She has them sign a non-disclosure agreement that gives her all rights to the paintings. And she never tells her artists what she does with the paintings, either.

If I were doing this business model, I might consider giving the artists a percentage of sales, but Sally likes to simply pay one fee up front to keep things simple.

Sally chooses the styles for the paintings by finding examples and showing them to her artists. She then asks them to replicate the style and not the actual painting. She sells the original paintings for a good price ($300 to $1,000) and sells limited edition prints for a lower price.

Her listings never claim that she or her persona is the artist. She’ll use generic language such as, “This painting was created May of 2021 using pastels on canvas.” She has her artists use several mediums, including acrylic, watercolor, pastels, ink, charcoal and so forth.

She also has a virtual assistant who has one job: Promoting the artwork through various social media channels. This is why her business is growing so fast, because word is getting out via social media. And she’s very good at picking her subjects, too, some of which are extremely timely and most of which prove popular.

As you can see she has expenses: Her real life assistant George, her virtual assistant, the artists and selling fees. But even after all this, she pulled in $4,400 in profit the month she revealed her system to me, and like it said, it’s increasing every month.

The real key here is to choose subjects that will sell. That’s why she likes animals, hearts and landscapes because they always do well. And her paintings aren’t super elaborate, either. An experienced painter can likely create one in a short afternoon.

One of her best-selling stores sells paintings that are somewhat cartoonish, including caricatures of real people as well as animals doing silly things. As mentioned earlier, one sells hearts. I suspect this artist probably does 4 or 5 paintings in a day because they are that simple. But they sell like hotcakes because people love hearts and bright colors.

This business is easy to replicate and if you use assistants, it takes very little time at all.