Author Archive | Jason

Would you like to write a great blog post or email in half the time without losing quality – and perhaps even make your content better in the process?

Here’s how you can start writing better, faster and more:

1: Create an outline. Your outline is your plan, and it’s going to make your entire task easier for 3 reasons:

Having a plan diffuses procrastination. When we look at a project our mind tells us it’s big – too big. This causes stress, which makes us want to avoid the whole thing. By having a plan, we can break the writing down into manageable, stress free steps.

Having a plan keeps you from wandering off topic. If you have a simple outline to follow, it’s just a matter of filling out each section of the outline. But without a plan, you could waste a great deal of time writing about things that in the end don’t even pertain to your main topic.

It makes research super easy. Once you have an outline, researching can be as simple as Googling each item on your outline. Without a plan, your research can lead you into never-ending time-wasting circles.

2: Once you’ve got your outline, set it aside for an hour or a day and let it bake in your brain.

By setting it aside, you can let your mind focus on something else. Meanwhile, your subconscious is still working on that outline. You’ll be surprised by what your subconscious gives you. All of a sudden you’ll realize you left out the most important part, or you’ve found a much better way to illustrate your main point.

3: Write every day. Writing, just like anything else, is a skill. The more you do it, the better and faster you will get.

Write even when you don’t ‘feel’ like it. As Stephen King has said, “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration. The rest of us just get up and go to work.”

Or as another writer stated, “I wait for inspiration to strike. Fortunately for me, it strikes every day at 9 am.”

Even if you absolutely, positively do NOT want to write, tell yourself you’re going to write for just 15 minutes. Then start writing. You can write anything – anything at all – but you must write. Pretty soon you’ll be working on your project and wondering why you were feeling such resistance to something you actually enjoy.

4: Use deadlines in your favor. Without a deadline, there is no stress. With no stress, your brain puts off the task of writing for later. After all, writing takes brain power, effort, thinking and decision making – things your brain would rather put off until later. Or never.

But when you have a deadline, you have stress to get the job done. The closer the deadline, the more stress. To relieve the stress, you’ve got to get busy. Now your brain is telling you to, “Write now!”

If self-imposed deadlines work for you, then you know what to do. If not, you’ll have to find a way to get others to hold you accountable for your deadlines. For example, telling your blog readers that your next post goes live on Tuesday at 10 am PST should work nicely.

No blog readers yet? Have a friend hold you accountable. If you don’t make your deadline, you owe them dinner.

5: Focus on the “feel goods.” Back when I had a regular job, I loved my days off. I especially loved them when I knew well in advance that they were coming.

But if I found out that morning that I wasn’t working, then half the joy of having time off was gone. There was no anticipation. No looking forward to that day off. Frankly, I felt ripped off if I didn’t know I wasn’t working until that same morning.

You can use this knowledge to self-motivate yourself. Think about how great it will feel to hit publish or send. Think about closing the file and doing something you love as a reward. Think about the accolades you’ll receive for finishing the project, or the money you’ll earn, or whatever it is that motivates you to keep working until you’re done.

6: Turn off the internet. Some folks, me included, tend to get distracted by the internet. We think we’re going to ‘sneak off’ for 5 minutes to check Reddit, and an hour later we still haven’t gotten back to work.

So whenever possible, just disconnect your wifi. Turn off your cell phone. Remove anything else that tends to distract you. And then go to work.

7: Speed up your typing. If you’re not able to type at least 50 words per minute, maybe it’s time you improved your typing skills.

It’s difficult when your thoughts are coming faster than your fingers can tap them out. But you have options:

• Type faster. There are plenty of free and paid courses online that will teach you how to touch type faster.
• Use a voice to text program such as Dragon Naturally.
• Record yourself and have it transcribed.

Writing by itself isn’t hard. It’s all the baggage we attach to it that makes it difficult.

But if you can think of writing as simply assembling the pieces to a puzzle, you’ll do it much better and faster.

If you have the right mindset, then everything else will work itself out. But if you have the wrong mindset, nothing else will work.

Here’s how to get your head on straight:

1: Trust your own ideas and strengths.

Stop comparing yourself, stop second guessing yourself and stand behind your own ideas and decisions.

2: Know your worth. Charge accordingly.

Dan Kennedy suggests that every business owner immediately raise their rates or prices.

You’ll get better customers and clients who appreciate you, fewer headaches and more revenue. So go ahead and give yourself a raise.

3: Realize you can’t do it alone.

Whatever ‘it’ is, you need help. Focus on the ideas, make the decisions, do the parts you’re good at and outsource everything else. You’ll stay sane and your business will prosper. Remember, teamwork makes the dream work. Start building your team today.

In my never ending search for ways to better appeal to my audience, I sometimes venture into the dark recesses of the human psyche so that I might better understand my customers and even myself.

I’m not picking on psychopaths here. Nor am I villainizing them. As I understand it, psychopaths are born the way they are – it’s not a choice.

A psychopath is generally someone who feels little or no real emotion, and instead has to fake it. They might lie a great deal. They have an inflated sense of self-worth. They use superficial charm and glibness to manipulate and con others. They lack remorse, guilt or empathy. And they constantly are in need of new stimulation.

About 1 out of 100 people are psychopaths. Odds are you know at least one, yet you might not realize it. Remember, most of them are not killers as the media might portray them.

But they can be incredibly charming and persuasive. Some psychopaths can find a person’s weak spot in minutes, manipulate that person using that knowledge, and actually make their target very happy and thankful to have been manipulated.

I’ve seen psychopaths at work. They fake emotions and use the techniques I’m about to cover to make people like them almost instantly.

Have you ever met someone and almost instantly thought you had a lot in common with them? Maybe you did – or maybe they were a psychopath adept at making you feel that way.

Now then, for those with active imaginations, I’m not recommending you turn into a psychopath when it comes to your marketing endeavors. And I’m certainly not suggesting you manipulate your prospects into becoming customers, either.

What I am suggesting is two-fold:

First, we can learn about influence from those who are skilled at it – and psychopaths tend to be especially adept at influencing others.

Second, forewarned is forearmed, which is to say once you are aware of these manipulation techniques, you will be better able to recognize them when they are being used on you or even against you.

Flattery: This isn’t just compliments and buttering you up, although that’s a part of it. Psychopaths can hone in on your insecurities and then provide you with the reassurance you crave to make you feel better. This makes you like them, trust them, and follow their suggestions.

As Marketers we do a variation of this in sales letters, agitating the problem and making the prospect feel the pain of the problem before we offer the feel good solution.

Favors and Gifts: The psychopath will do you a favor or give you a gift you might not even want. But still, now you feel obligated when s/he asks you to do something for them.

We do this in marketing, don’t we? We give away things, and in turn folks feel obligated to take a good look at what we’re offering.

False Intimacy: They’ll pretend to be interested in everything about you – your hobbies and interests, the kinds of music you like, your job, your family and so forth. Then they’ll tell you fake secrets to create an even deeper intimacy, at which point you’ll reciprocate and tell secrets about yourself. This is how a psychopath can go from ‘stranger’ to ‘new best friend’ in one or two meetings.

Again, marketers use a variation of this in sales copy, by first showing how similar we are to the prospect. “I had the same problem you do, here’s my story with all my dark secrets, etc.”

False Expectations: Psychopaths pretend things are already happening the way they want them to happen, before others even have a chance to think. So instead of asking, “Do you want to go to dinner?” They’ll simply say, “Let’s have dinner tonight, I’ll meet you at Harvey’s Grill at 8pm.” You’re not thinking IF you want to go to dinner, but instead you’re already making plans to meet him there.

Marketers and sales people alike will often ‘assume the sale’ to get the prospect to simply go along, rather than feeling like they have to ‘decide.’

Silent Treatment: Psychopaths will give random and unexpected silent treatments to throw you off. You might wonder if you did something wrong, and even try to make up for it with gifts or overt kindness. If you do, then the psychopath knows s/he’s got you wrapped around their finger.

In marketing, going silent is seldom going to pay. Out of sight is very quickly out of mind.

Over Asking: This is crafty – the psychopath asks you for this BIG favor, knowing you’ll balk. But then you feel bad that you had to say no. So when they now ask you for a small favor, you readily agree. Of course, it was the second request that they really wanted all along.

If you’re not using this technique in marketing, you’re probably losing money. Let’s say you offer your live coaching class for $1,000. Obviously a lot of prospects won’t buy it, which is when you offer them a recorded version for a whole lot less money.

Or maybe you want a fairly big name marketer to do an interview with you. You’ve already started building a relationship with them, so you ask if they would like to co-author a product with you. When they say no, you then ask for what you really wanted – a 30 minute interview. (Sneaky, right? But done correctly it does work, but only if you’ve already got a relationship with them.)

False Equivalence: A psychopath uses a logical fallacy to imply that if you don’t do what they desire, then it means something else. For example, if you don’t do what they want, then you don’t love them, or you’re stupid, or you’re immature, etc.

I just want to note here that outside the realm of psychopaths, false equivalence generally means two things are given the same weight, even though they are radically unequal. For example, if you have a scientist backed with decades of research stating a fact, and a non-scientist sitting next to him denying the fact, it appears both have equal weight, when in fact the scientist is backed by 99% of his or her peers on the subject as well as thousands of scientific studies.

In marketing, we can certainly use tactics like these to manipulate our customers, but it’s shady at best. I do recommend you stay on the lookout for it.

You’ll see this tactic used continuously on television and the internet, with ads telling you that you’re not a man if you don’t drink a certain drink, smoke a certain cigarette, drive a certain car and so forth.

Or if you don’t own an iPhone, you’re not part of the ‘in’ crowd.

It would be like me telling you that if you don’t subscribe to my newsletter, then you’re a lousy marketer. That’s blatant manipulation and in my opinion it’s time marketers let this one go forever.

Fake Normal: They communicate that, “Everyone is doing this,” so that the person feels inclined to do it, too.

We use this one a lot in marketing. “Everyone is grabbing ABC product, you better get yours, too!”

Fill Emotional Needs: Psychopaths will find your insecurities and unhappiness, and then provide reassurance. They’re giving people what they want and saying what they want to hear.

If we’re honest, we have to admit that we do a version of this all the time in successful marketing campaigns.

It’s perhaps a little surprising how much marketing has in common with psychopathy. Then again, we’re all about persuading and to a certain degree, manipulating – hopefully towards the BENEFIT and not the detriment of our customers.

If you are manipulating your customer for their own good, that’s one thing. If you’re doing it just to make a sale, you probably won’t be in business for long.

But one thing I learned from studying psychopaths is this – there is still far more that we can learn about persuasion, and sometimes we’ll find the answers in the oddest of places.

Jim Rohn once said:

Whose content do you most consume on social media? If it’s whoever happens to come up in your news feed that day, you might want to rethink. After all, do you want to be somebody, or just anybody?

Choose 5 people to follow online based on what they have accomplished and what they can teach you.

Then read their posts, listen to their podcasts and consume everything they put online.

If you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with, and you’re spending your time with five highly successful people, what do you think will happen in your life? There is one secret you need to follow though… Be sure to ACT on the most important things you learn from these mentors.

Why the picture of dogs? Frankly, many of life’s greatest lessons can be learned from them… Wouldn’t you agree?

You don’t need major skills to be a drop shipper these days. You don’t need to stock inventory, ship anything, or even guess what might sell.

Heck, you don’t even have to use your own money to pay for the goods.

You can work a couple of hours a day or week, depending on how serious you are.

And frankly the drop shipping method I’m about to show you is so straightforward, a teenager can do it.

Hint: Get your kids started with this when they’re in 8 or 9th grade, and by the time they graduate high school they’ll have a very nice nest egg for college, along with more real world business skills than most college graduates.

Now then… how do you find products? Amazon can give you a wealth of information on what’s selling and what’s hot at the moment.

Go to Google (yes Google, not Amazon) and run some searches such as…

• Most popular kitchen gadgets on Amazon
• Most popular fitness items on Amazon
• Most popular electronic gadgets on Amazon
• Most popular pet products on Amazon
• Etc.

The first few results will be from the Amazon website itself, but don’t stop at those.

You’ll also find articles showing what’s new, what’s selling and what’s especially popular.

Be sure you’re only looking at results from the last 12-18 months – anything else might be out of date, especially if you’re looking at anything electronic in nature.

Make a list of possible products you’d like to sell. Once you’ve got some research done, you should have an idea of what niche you’d like to focus on.

Once you’ve chosen your niche, dig deeper into that niche to find products. You might even choose a sub-niche to make targeting your prospects easier. For example, instead of choosing ‘dogs’ as your niche, you might choose a single breed like ‘Great Danes.’

When you have your chosen niche and your products, go to Shopify and open your own store with their 14 day free trial.

Next, go to Oberlo and sign up to get their free plugin. This is going to make it super simple to add products to your store.

Now add the Oberlo plugin to your Shopify store.

Set up your payment processor. This is probably going to be Paypal or Stripe, or whatever service you are currently using.

Last, go to AliExpress and open a new account.

Once you’ve done that, import your products to your store by using the Oberlo plugin.

Did this sound like a lot of work?

Remember, you only have to set up these accounts once. After that, anytime you want to add a new product, it will only take you a few minutes to open things, grab the product and put it on your site.

Once you’ve done these things, you’re ready to start driving traffic and making money.

If you already have a list in this niche, then that’s your first go-to place to get traffic.

Same way if you already have social media accounts and followers in this niche, you’ll want to promote your store in those accounts.

When you’ve done those things, it’s time to invest a little money and start advertising.

Let’s use $100 as an example. And if you don’t have the $100 to spare, you can always sell something on a site like Craigslist or Gumtree to get it, or just borrow it someplace.

Your goal will be to set up a Facebook page for your store and test ads until you find your winner. Plan on initially spending $10 a day for 10 days to find the ad that gets the sales.

Don’t overthink this or get stressed. If you’ve chosen hot selling products, this really isn’t going to be that difficult.

As an alternative, or in addition to using Facebook, you can also find large Instagram pages in your niche that have at least 50,000 followers and decent engagement.

To figure out the engagement rate, add up the number of likes for their last 10 posts, and then divide that number by 10 to find the average likes. Once you have that number, divide it by the total number of followers to find the average engagement rate.

You’re looking for a bare minimum of 1% engagement. Once you find these pages, send them a direct message asking if they’re willing to promote your product.

Rates for promotion are typically $15 for 50,000, $20-25 for 100,000, and $30-$50 for 200,000. But these rates aren’t written in stone. The higher the engagement, the more you might want to consider paying. And a lower engagement means you shouldn’t be paying as much. Negotiation is key.

Look for the pages that most closely match what you’re selling. For example, if you’re selling something for rose enthusiasts, you ideally want to find a page that focuses on roses, not on gardening in general.

By investing $50 to $100 in Instagram, you should get 2-6 promotions and several sales or more. Use your profits to reinvest in your advertising.

Closely monitor what’s working best, and do more of that. Tweak and test your page for optimal results. Add products, rinse and repeat.

See how easy that is? Yet I know that 98% or more of people who read this won’t do it. Which is good news for you… much less competition that way. Ready… Set… Go!!! 😉

With so many tweets being delivered to every Twitter user, it can be difficult to get your tweets seen and clicked. Twitter has 400 million current active users and growing so it’s no wonder why the average Twitter user’s tweets aren’t seen (but you’re not average)…

Done correctly, Twitter can still be a great source of traffic.

And as you know, if your Tweets aren’t driving traffic, then they’re not doing you or your business much good.

That’s why I’ve compiled this list of 15 ways to get your Tweets seen and clicked on by your followers.

1: Add Images

Did you know that tweets with images receive 18% more click-throughs, 89% more favorites and 150% more retweets?

And you can create multiple images for each blog post, using attractive colors, centered headlines and interesting textures.

Don’t forget to add your brand or URL, too.

For a slew of free design tools, check out this infographic: http://feldmancreative.com/2016/08/free-online-design-tools-infographic/

2: Use Faces

Studies show that few things in print or online media captures people’s attention faster than faces, so why not use them?

3: Use Your Own Face

Don’t forget to tweet your own face now and then, especially if you’re using a logo as your profile picture.

You’ll increase the stopping power of your tweet as well as build more of a personal connection with your followers.

4: Use Brackets

This is a great subject line trick as well – include something such as an afterthought in brackets, like this:

“Love the shoes [too sexy!]”

5: Quote Someone

Twitter users love quotes. They can be funny, famous, timely and so forth. When you come across something inspiring or thoughtful, by all means share it.

And if the quote is over 140 characters, feature the quote in an image.

Here are 20 tools to do just that. http://louisem.com/2573/make-picture-quotes-easy

6: Hashtag Your Topic

Your tweets are usually seen only by your followers. But if you add a hashtag or two, your tweet can potentially be found by others as well.

7: Make Your Tweets Contagious

To get your tweets shared, Jonah Berger, the author of Contagious: Why Things Catch On, says to make them viral using any of the following:

• Social Currency – how smart a user looks to others when they share your tweet
• Triggers – top of mind content people are triggered to think about
• Emotion – focus on feelings rather than function
• Public – built to show, built to grow. Think of a brand that puts a red bottom on all of their shoes and you get the idea.
• Practical Value – news you can use
• Stories – tell stories people want to share

8: Add Emojis and Symbols

Non-text characters make your message stand out. If you’re using a smartphone, you’ll find the emojis right on your keyboard.

If you’re on a computer, you can download a Chrome extension or copy and paste Twitter symbols from a Twitter library such as this one. https://www.piliapp.com/twitter-symbols/

9: Ask Questions

Posing questions to your followers is an effective way to engage people.

Be sure to follow up with everyone who answers you so they know you’re listening.

And you can always highlight answers by retweeting them with your response, keeping them alive and inspiring even more interaction.

10: Use Polls

Twitter Polls are a great tool for attracting attention and engaging followers.

Click the “Add poll” icon beneath the tweet box, add up to four questions, and choose how long you want your poll to run.

11: Thank Profusely and Often

When your fellow tweeters have promoted your content or even contributed to it, thank them. This makes you look like a really nice person, plus it’s great for building relationships.

12: Use @ to Get Specific Attention

If you want someone specific to see your tweet, mention them by including their username preceded by the @ symbol.

13: Use an Image to Grab Group Attention

If you want to get the attention of a group of people, include an image in your tweet. Then when Twitter prompts you with “Who’s in this photo?” you can tag the image with up to 10 users without affecting your character count.

14: Use Twitter Cards

Twitter cards let you include additional media types – such as images, videos, audio and download links – in your tweets.

They’re not the easiest thing to use the first time, though, so you might want to follow along with Twitter’s CMS Integration Guide. https://dev.twitter.com/cards/cms-integration

15: Tweet Multiple Times

Tweets go by so fast, many of your tweets will never be seen.

That’s why you want to tweet about that new blog post of yours several times over the course of a few days.

This service lets you increase the reach of your content as you share free links. Here’s how it works:

First you add a branded badge with content within any link.

Let’s say you’re sharing content from Mashable – you simply add a branded badge to the link.

Next, you share your third party content to increase engagement. After all, a link from Mashable will often get more clicks than a link from your own website.

And by the way, this doesn’t just work with Twitter – it works with Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and several other social media networks.

Lastly, your re-shared links continue to carry your recommendations to new audiences, exposing them to your content.

And you can track, measure and get instant insights on the performance of your third party content, too!

Make the very most of your Twitter time by using these little tricks to get your tweets noticed and shared. If you’re going to be Tweeting, make sure that your song is heard!

Do you sell a monthly membership? If not, you might want to consider it.

Here’s 3 reasons to start a membership site:

1. Monthly memberships mean residual income. You sell a membership once and you get paid for it month after month until the customer cancels.

2. Selling a membership generally isn’t any harder than selling a one-time product, yet you can get paid a whole lot more for the same effort.

3. If you offer a trial membership, it’s even easier to get new subscribers. In fact, it can be easier than selling a regular one time product. Yet you can make a LOT more, as this case study will show.

Michael Hyatt has a membership site called Platform University. Twice a year he opens the site up for enrollment. Of course, you can take new enrollees into your membership site as often as you choose, but Michael likes to do it just twice a year – probably because it seems more exclusive that way.

Membership costs $37 a month.

But when his recent launch ended, he decided to offer a $1.99 trial membership to anyone who didn’t take the full $37 a month membership.

So after the one week trial period ended, he sent out an email to everyone who didn’t become a member.

In the email he offered a 7 day trial for $1.99, but the catch was they only had 24 hours to grab it.

That email went out to 40,000 people. 819 signed up for the trial offer.

(If you’re going to do the math to see how much 819 times $1.99 is, you’re going to miss the point. But it’s $1,629)

Of those 819 people, 292 cancelled the membership before it rolled into the $37 a month auto payment.

That sounds bad, doesn’t it?

It’s not. Because that means 527 new members paid their first $37 a month.

At $37 a month, that’s an additional $19,499 of monthly recurring income that Michael never would have had if not for the trial membership.

And things get even crazier, because the average member stays for 17.3 months, which is a lifetime value of $640.10 per member.

Which is to say, that $1.99 trial offer resulted in over $300,000 of possible future revenue.

Wow.

Really, it makes you wonder why he doesn’t just offer the trial membership.

But here’s the thing: By spending a week or even two weeks selling the membership at full price, he really builds the value.

So when he does offer the one week trial for just $1.99, it is such a no-brainer that people sign up in droves.

The campaign to get new $37 members is really a campaign to show people how valuable the membership is, and set it up so that the $1.99 is just too good to pass up.

If he had ONLY offered the $1.99 membership, he would not have properly established the value of the membership, and I don’t think his results would have been as good.

And all of this isn’t even counting the members he did sign up during that week long campaign at $37 a month each.

So how can you use this in your own membership?

First, you want to provide plenty of value inside your membership so that new members stay for a long time. Find out exactly what members want and give it to them. Have a place inside your membership where members can actually request new features to be added to your membership.

Next, really establish the value to prospects. Use lots of testimonials to show how your membership helps members to achieve their goals. You want to build the value so high that the cost of membership seems low by comparison.

Lastly, offer your trial membership for only a day or two before closing it. This gets people off the fence and grabbing the trial before it’s too late. You can always open the trial back up again in a month or two, as you see fit.

Finally, track your numbers. See how many people sign up at the regular rate, how many sign up for the trial, and how many convert from the trial to the regular paid membership

Of course, keep track of how long members stay. Find ways to get them to stick around longer and you will consistently increase your monthly income for even bigger paydays.

One more thing – imagine working your tail off to get your membership up and running. You might invest, say, two months into finding out exactly what people want, setting up the membership and filling it with content, software, etc.

Then imagine four months beyond that – you’ve got hundreds or even thousands of members with more joining. You’re making residual money on people who joined months ago. In fact, every month your income increases. You invest part of that money to continue to provide the content, software or services that members get, and the rest is yours. And life is sweet.

If you haven’t started a membership site of your own yet, what are you waiting for?

What’s the easiest way to make money online, without having to create a product or a sales page? Affiliate marketing, of course. 🙂

So, why is it that most affiliate marketers never make nearly what they could make? Anyone has the potential to make HUGE money in affiliate marketing, yet 90% or more of affiliates make a pittance (I’ll wager the number is closer to 98%, in fact.)

Think about this: If you earn an average of $50 on each sale in a sales funnel you promote, and you make 6 sales, you’ve made $300. Sounds good, right?

But guaranteed, there is someone else who made 600 sales and walked away with $30,000.

Why did they make 600 sales when you made just 6?

There are reasons why a handful of affiliate marketers do amazingly well, and everyone else barely makes a profit.

And marketers who understand this will always have a tremendous advantage over marketers who don’t.

1: Build a Relationship

I know you’ve heard it before, but are you doing it? People buy people, not products.

If you want them to open your email and click your link, or visit your Facebook Group and click a link, you’ve got to have a RELATIONSHIP with your people.

This is so simple to do, yet few marketers take the time.

Start with a blog post that is all about you, and then send new opt-ins to the post so they can get to know you. Make the post silly, funny and most of all REAL. Talk about the stupid stuff you’ve done, the mistakes you’ve made, where you live and so forth.

Do you have a strange hobby or unusual taste in food? Include that. Do you have 17 pets? Talk about them. Do you work until 3 in the morning and sleep until noon? Mention that.

Reveal the real you. Not the details people don’t want, but the ones that amuse and interest. You’re looking to make a real connection, not give a resume.

And above all else, don’t make your life seem like a series of magnificent accomplishments. No one is going to relate to someone who turns everything they touch into gold.

But they are going to relate to the time you bought Bitcoin when it was worthless and sold it just before it took off, or the time you thought you could fly and jumped off your uncle’s barn into the manure pile.

And don’t stop with your ‘about me’ page, either. Use this relationship building in your lead magnet, your emails, your other blog posts and so forth.

Always inject a little bit about yourself. Not so much that you bore people, of course, or make everything seem about you. But just enough to keep it real.

Think about relating an event to a friend. Aren’t you going to give your own perceptions of what happened, as well as tell about how you got out of your car and stepped in the mud puddle just before your big presentation?

Use this same method of personal, one-on-one friend communication with your readers as well.

Post on your blog as often as possible, and we’re talking every day or two. Encourage your list to subscribe to Feedburner or the equivalent so they know when you add a new post.

Your readers will realize you’re a real person who isn’t out to pitch them a new product every 5 minutes. And they’ll gladly read your sales emails much more readily when they know there is a real live human being who is sending them these messages.

2: Use Your Own Voice

How many emails do you receive that say something along the lines of, “Buy this product – this product is the greatest product ever – you will be sorry if you miss this – so rush right over and buy it now.”

Yeah. Same old stuff, over and over again.

There is a marketer (or maybe several, but I’m thinking of one in particular) who sells MASSIVE quantities of this exact type of emails as a swipe file to new marketers.

Like a brand-new marketer couldn’t write their own 25 word email that basically says, “GO BUY THIS NOW!”

People are TIRED of getting these emails. You’re tired of getting these emails. I’m tired of getting these emails.

Same phrases, same message, same B.S.

If you’re not going to stand apart from the crowd, then you’re going to have to share the same crumbs they’re getting.

Instead, take 30 minutes and write your own promotional email in your own voice.

Forget hype. Be sincere. Be honest. “Hey, this product isn’t for everyone. I don’t even know if it’s for you. But if you have this problem, then maybe this is your solution. Check it out and decide if it’s right for you, because I know it’s worked like crazy for some people. And it’s on sale right now, too.”

I’ve written emails where I basically tell people not to buy something unless they really really want it or need it. “Don’t buy this if you already know how to do xyz.” “Don’t buy this if you’re not going to be doing this type of marketing.” This is only for people who want (fill in the blank.) It’s like I’m trying to talk them out of it, which paradoxically often results in more sales, not fewer.

But the point isn’t tricking them into buying; it’s to be honest. Because you know what? That latest, greatest product you’re promoting ISN’T what everyone on your list needs. Some of them, sure. The rest of them, no.

Do you have any idea how refreshing it is to open an email that says, “Here’s a new product, thought you might want to know, but please don’t buy it if you’re not going to use it.”

The first time I got an email like that, I bought the product without even reading the sales letter. True story. I was just so happy that someone wasn’t ramming a sale down my throat, that I jumped at the chance to buy it.

Weird but true.

My point is, be you. Be honest. Talk to your readers as though they are your best friends and you don’t want to lose your best friends by acting like a carnival barker who is here today and pulled up stakes (vanished) tomorrow with their money.

3: Email a LOT

This is the one where people like to argue with me, and I understand that.

You’ve heard over and over again that you shouldn’t email too often, or you’ll upset your subscribers, right?

After all, every time you email, there is the potential that a subscriber will hit the unsubscribe button.

Do you know what the potential is when you DON’T email? Nothing. No opens, no clicks, no sales… not even any relationship building.

Do you want people to open and read your emails? Then send out those emails EVERY DAY.

Here’s why:

First, almost no one will see every email you send out. Let’s say you’ve got a sale on one of your products. Don’t you think your readers might like to know about it? But if they miss the one and only email you send that lets them know, then they’ve missed out on the discount and you LOST a sale.

Second, send emails at different times. I opened someone’s email just yesterday, decided I was VERY interested in the new membership he was selling, clicked the link and discovered it was no longer available.

What happened? This particular marketer only sends out emails at 1:00 a.m. my time, so I don’t even see most of his emails in the avalanche of mail I get before I wake up.

Third, if you’re sending email once a week or once a month, your readers are forgetting who the heck you are. And when you finally do send an email, they think it’s spam.

Fourth, if you mail more often, you will make more money. Don’t take my word on this, just do it for one month. Send out one email per day, every day, for 30 days. Put a promotion in each one. See if you haven’t made more – a LOT more – money during that time period than during the previous month.

And by the way, I’m not saying JUST send out a promotion in each email. Make sure you have some content in there as well, even if it’s just an amusing anecdote.

4: Think of affiliate marketing as a BUSINESS

This isn’t a hobby, nor is it an add-on for an additional income stream.

Even if you go on vacation, be prepared to send out an email every day. Schedule them in advance or write them on vacation. Either way, affiliate marketing to your list is a business that you can’t just jump into when you need cash and forget about the rest of the time.

You don’t have many support issues, since the product owners handle this. You don’t have to worry about creating products, sales pages and so forth. You don’t have to drive traffic, unless it’s to build your list bigger.

With so much you don’t have to do, there’s no reason not to focus your time and energy into building relationships with your list and promoting to them every single day.

Affiliate marketing can be some of the easiest money you’ve ever made, if you put in the time and effort to make it a real business.