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 The Ultimate ClickBank Marketing ToolkitTable of Content Introduction: Mindset: Prepare For SuccessWithout A Vision, People PerishCultivate A Winning MindsetTen Things Successful People Have In CommonHow To Think Big And Put Things In Perspective Part 1: Market Research 101Start Your Business On A Solid FoundationFind Profitable Niches Define Your Target AudienceFind Keywords With The Highest Buyer Intent Check Out Your CompetitionBuild Your Client AvatarYour Secret Weapon: Lateral ThinkingPart 2: Create Your Online ProductBuild An Irresistible Offer How To Make People Trust YouThe Perfect Client Path Assessing Backend PotentialThe Art Of UpsellingSweeten The Deal With Free Bonuses The 80/20 Rule To Optimize Your InputPart 3: Sell Your Product Via ClickbankClickBank Setup ProcessManaging Your AffiliatesPricing Your ProductsTen Steps To A Perfect Product LaunchPart 4: Diversify Your Traffic SourcesFree Vs. Paid TrafficAdWordsBanner ads WebinarsYouTube Podcasting E-booksAmazon AdsMobileRetargeting AdsFinal ThoughtsLeverage Systems To Automate Your Business Learn To DelegateWhat’s Next? IntroductionIf you're interested in building a long-term solid business online, this could be the most important message you'll ever read. First of all, congratulations on deciding to get into the world of internet marketing. This is an amazing industry that will change your life!Wouldn't it be great if someone sat down with you and told you how to build an online business from scratch? Remove all the guesswork and fill all the missing pieces? Of course it would!This is the ultimate guide to walk you by the hand and teach you the inner game of affiliate marketing. The following 100+ pages will reveal a solid system that will help you grow your online business in ways you never thought possible.Smart people know that time is money. You want to get it right and be successful in the months and years to come. The biggest benefit of following this program is that you can reduce the number of mistakes you'll make, saving you time and money. A lot of the material inside this course will be intermediate and advanced. It’s highly recommended that you first follow the steps laid out in the ClickBank University and learn the basics of building an online business.In the following pages, I will cover more in-depth strategies to maximize your knowledge and earnings potential. Each section builds upon the information in previous chapters, so make sure you take notes and follow-through. Remember: going the extra mile is never crowded! The work you’re willing to invest now will compound in the upcoming months and years and it could virtually be the best investment of your life. This course gives you the most direct path possible to success in online marketing. Ready? Let’s go.Without A Vision, People PerishIf you’ve watched the Karate Kid movie, then you may remember the Bonsai Tree scene where Mr. Miyagi taught Daniel how to trim a bonsai tree using Visualization:- I don't know how to do this stuff. - Sit down. - I may mess it up or something. - Close eye. Trust. Concentrate. Think only tree. Make a perfect picture down to last pine needle. Wipe your mind clean. Everything but the tree. Nothing exists in whole world... Only the tree. You got it? Open eyes. Remember picture? - Yeah. - Make like picture. Just trust the picture.- How do I know my picture's the right one? - If come from inside you, always the right one.The same principle can be applied to anything, whether you want to build a house or an online business. You need to have a vision, a blueprint that will keep you connected to your end-goal and help you get back on track when you feel lost or unmotivated. Image sourceA clear vision will keep you fired up to keep pushing until you reach your goal. Your subconscious mind will always try to align your inner vision with your external reality, so you need to make your vision as detailed as possible. The more clearly defined your vision for your business, the greater your chances of accomplishing your goals. There is one caveat on being too specific on your goals. Remain flexible. You don’t want to get so hung-up on the details that you miss the big picture. Also, while creating your vision, ignore your current reality and forget about bills pilling up, past failures, broken relationships, etc. Leave out everything you don’t want and focus on what you do want to accomplish with your online business: Working on something you love,Promoting products and services that you know others will love,Creating online assets for the future,Spending more time with your family,Securing your financial future,And more!If you spend your time sabotaging your vision with your current limitations, you'll end up having more of the same. Visualize what you want, not what you have. So stay in the moment, define your goals, use your vision like a GPS and be ready to recognize and respond to opportunities as they begin to unfold.Cultivate A Winning MindsetA mindset is a frame of mind that is responsible for how you respond or react to different situations in life. A mindset is what sets apart a winner from a loser, it's the filter through which you “see” everything around you.Our mindset is shaped by:our experiencesother people's beliefs about us our own interpretations of everything that goes around us Basically, your mindset is the subconscious blueprint that predetermines how you feel and react to different circumstances, including how you handle success or failure. Mindset is everything. Once you understand this, you’ll never go back to your old ways again.Many people assume that a mindset cannot be changed in any way. This isn’t true. Your mindset may hold strong but it can be improved, especially if that change provides a positive outcome. Think of your mindset as being like a pair of goggles. What’s your current attitude about internet marketing? What about affiliate marketers? How do you feel about sales and pitchers? If you believe that online marketers are ripping people off with “get rich quick” schemes, then you will never be able to achieve any level of success online, because of your limited understanding of what is going on. However, if you get a clear understanding of the industry and you're confident in your own skills and believe that your passion and your hard work could be turned into a long-term valuable business, then you have a healthy business mindset that will guarantee your success online. The key to effectively changing your mindset is to provide strong logic as to WHY it should be changed. There is a great book on how to uncover the hidden treasures of the subconscious mind, written by Joseph Murphy, called The Power of Your Subconscious Mind. This is a definite must-read that will allow you to tap into the hidden side of your brain and use it to your advantage to reach any success you can imagine. In order to be successful, you must develop a mindset of engagement, outreach and ultimately as a community builder. The most successful internet marketers have developed this mindset and it fuels their motivation, inspiration and commitment to their business.The #1 thing you need to do in order to change your mindset is to pay attention to your thoughts and feelings. Ask yourself:How do you feel about money? How do you feel about running your own business?How do you feel about being solely accountable for your results?How do you feel about teaching and inspiring other people?How do you feel about buying the car, the house you've always wanted?The more comfortable you become with your new role as a successful online entrepreneur, the more success and fulfillment will come your way. Here is a quick video with Tony Robbins, explaining the real difference between a winner and a loser. You wouldn't believe!Another key component of a healthy mindset is having a clear purpose as to why you're getting into the online marketing business. Is it just the money? Is it because you want to help people, teach them, educate them with your skills and expertise? Your higher purpose (other than making money) will fuel your motivation to get going even when the going gets tough. Check out this great TED talk given by Simon Sinek, leadership and team management expert. Sinek talked about how great leaders inspire others to take action. This is what he said: "People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it." His TED video has received over 20 million views from around the world and his book, Start With Why, became a New York Times bestseller. The core message is that most of us are focused on what we do or how we do it, while few people actually ask themselves WHY they do what they do. The more clarity you'll bring to the table, the easier it will be for you to get organized and follow through. 10 Things Successful People Have In CommonSuccess is predictable. These are what numerous studies have shown works when analyzing the lives of the most successful entrepreneurs.Remember, it all ties to having a clear Purpose, which brings: Perspective – Things in your life fall into their proper places relative to your purpose Context – Purpose helps determine and clarify the meaning of an event or circumstance Motivation – When you have a strong sense of purpose, taking action becomes naturalFlexibility – Fulfilling your purpose is your highest mission, so you are always ready to course-correct along the wayAttraction – Purpose and confidence are irresistible. It makes people gravitate around you that help to reach your goalsEngagement – Focus is an intrinsic collateral benefit of having a clear sense of purpose Creativity – Purpose brings back courage and fosters a playful spirit Commitment – You are loyal to your purpose and are no longer tempted to waiver Guidance – Together with vision, your purpose is your compass Clarity – Everything in your life is now prioritized relative to your purpose and decision-making is done fasterUntil you “see” your Purpose with your mind’s eyes and believe it’s possible, you will continue to struggle – and fail. But once you lock that Vision in place and infuse it with Action and Faith, you begin to shift your life, your results and the ripple effect you have on others.How To Think Big And Put Things In Perspective Small thinking prevents you from seeing solutions that lay a few steps outside your comfort zone. Thinking big is scary for most, but it becomes addictive when you begin to feel its true implications. To see how big a person thinks, just look at the size of the problems they are trying to solve. If your main concerns each day are about how little money you have left in your bank account or how annoying your boss is, then you are not thinking big. To think big, you need to go after bigger problems, such as what you can do now to get yourself closer to your goals or how you can grow your business exponentially. Thinking big is a habit that forces you to stretch your imagination and expand your comfort zone.Here are two strategies to empower yourself to step back and see the big picture:1) Set Time Aside For Thinking This might seem obvious, but it’s amazing how little time we actually set aside just for thinking. If you try to accomplish only what you’ve put on a to-do list, thinking time will never come and you’ll never be able to do any actual thinking. So, set aside time every day based on when you’re feeling most creative (morning, afternoon, evening) and start brainstorming. Do this for a 7-day period and you’ll be amazed how many new ideas you’ll have. 2) Ask Bigger QuestionsAnother strategy for becoming a big thinker is to ask bigger, global, questions about your problems. Thinking big requires that you see challenges from a wider perspective by asking yourself: How could my product change the world? How could this idea revolutionize my industry? How could the answer to this problem solve a global issue? How can I solve this problem better than anyone else? The more you think beyond your limitations, the more you can contribute, learn and stretch to new territory. Big thinkers, innovators and anyone that has ever accomplished anything great developed a habit of asking big questions consistently and persistently until the right answer would come up. Look at problems as being nothing more than puzzles that need to be pieced together with the proper resources, mindset and ideas. The great part about thinking big in business is that you still need to zoom in on certain details while executing your plan. You need that big picture, the “zoomed out” vision, but you also need to be able to see the intricate details of your strategy, the goals, the priorities and your very next steps. Being able to zoom in and out of your business with ease is a true sign of great entrepreneurship.The next chapter will show you how to take an idea and put it through the process of growing it into a viable business opportunity.Part 1: Create An Online ProductThe path from an idea to a full-fledged product line with real market value must go through several different phases: the learning curve, market analysis, USP (Unique Selling Proposition), packaging, marketing and more. I emphasized earlier that the best way to get the basics covered is to follow the footsteps inside ClickBank University. The reason is simple. You want to build your business on solid ground, just as you would build your own house. Start Your Business On A Solid Foundation If you have the building blocks in place, you can grow and expand your business both vertically and horizontally. This is precisely what you get inside Clickbank University. Created by Adam Horwitz and Justin Atlan, ClickBank University is a step-by-step course that teaches people how to build a business online by developing their own products and selling them on ClickBank. The training comes in video format and summary PDF sheets and is structured into Categories and Modules. The CBU promise is to help you create squeeze pages, attract affiliates, build email lists and create your own digital product.This course is more newbie-friendly and is an excellent foundation for future learning and experimentation. The reason I’m not recommending CBU for intermediate and advanced levels is because the information tends to remain basic and there are few real-life examples of profitable campaigns. You can access ClickBank University for $47 / month and you get free product activation with your CBU membership. This is worth at least $50, if not hundreds with multiple products. Just mention that you are a CBU student when activating your product.Now let me give you a summary of each place:HomeYou get a welcome message and are told where to go and what to do next.OrientationHelps you set up a profile as a member of Clickbank University. You also get some good starting tips.The BuilderIt is a basic funnel builder that helps you create your own mini-sites hosted on the CB platform. Normally priced at $297 / year, the Site Builder is now available as a bundle with the Clickbank University for a quarterly payment option of $247. That’s $82.3 / month for both CBU and the Builder. A pretty sweet deal! You can learn more about the CBU Builder here.BeginnersThe Beginners section has eight different modules, each with their own set of training videos:Module 1: Your First Product Module 2: Packaging Your Product Module 3: Sales Pages + UpsellsModule 4: Convert Visitors Into Buyers Module 5: Product Pricing + Funnels Module 6: Building A List Module 7: Getting Approved Module 8: Leveraging Joint Venture Partners Advanced?This section includes five modules and you will learn more advanced techniques on being a successful vendor:Module 1: Visitors Into Subscribers Module 2: Advanced Selling Strategies Module 3: Split Testing + Conversions Module 4: Joint Venture Traffic + Social Module 5: Paid Advertising + SEO Some of the “meat” inside contains tips on:optimizing your sales funnelsetting up an exit pop up pageusing webinars to sell productscustomizing order forms reducing refundsand moreAffiliatesThe Affiliates section also has five modules:Module 1: List Building 101 Module 2: Building A Squeeze Page Module 3: Capturing Emails Module 4: Managing Your List Module 5: Driving Targeted TrafficBasically, you learn how to become an affiliate marketer on ClickBank. University TalksHere you’ll find a collection of previously recorded webinars where successful ClickBank entrepreneurs share their experience and techniques. CommunityThis is the CB forum where you get to introduce yourself inside the community, share ideas, solutions and partner up with people, creating JV’s and more. This is pretty much summing up the main sections inside CBU. As I said earlier, this is the perfect program for anyone wanting to get their feet wet in affiliate marketing and to learn how to: Take their knowledge and turn it into an informational product.Create sales pages and upsales. Build your email list.Find Joint Ventures Partners.And more!However… some of the key ingredients missing from their training:1) Test your idea for demand and profitability 2) Create a buyer persona through in-depth market research 3) SEO and Keyword Research4) How to drive traffic from Amazon 5) Scaling the business 6) Spy on the competition 7) Retargeting All of these (and much more) are going to be covered in detail in the next sections. So, even if you are not ready to create your own product, you can still use this course to build mini-sites and promote affiliate offers. Find Profitable NichesBefore you start creating a product or promoting affiliate offers, you need to find profitable niches that people are interested in and willing to spend money in. This is very important because if there isn’t a sizable market for your topic of interest or passion, then it will make doing business tough. On the flip side, if the market is profitable, but you have no interest at all in the topic, that could also make things very hard.There are two criteria when choosing good niches:1) It should be something you are passionate about.There is a concept I learned from Jim Collins’ book "Good to Great". It's called the Hedgehog concept and it helps you find your sweet spot or your "zone". He describes it as three overlapping circles (your Passion, your Skills and Profit) and their point of intersection is your niche. Image sourceTo become truly successful, you must identify the specific problems in your area of expertise that no one else is addressing and provide a solution. Here are some questions to help you find your sweet spot:What is your biggest passion? What things do you search for online? What is the first thing you feel like doing every morning? What do people thank you for? What comes naturally to you, even though it may be hard for others?Who inspires you? Why? What can you do with your skills and talent that people would be willing to pay for? Once you determine your sweet spot, you'll be able to focus your attention on doing just that: meaningful work. This is the only way you will experience true joy and success in your online marketing business. Here are some valuable assessment tools from Jim Collins on finding your own sweet spot and leveraging it for the greater good.But the key here is consistency. You have to be focused, in spite of any setbacks. Every step you take towards your goal is good even if they’re baby steps. One of the reasons many people fail at internet marketing is that they quit when the going gets rough. Just because you hit a wall doesn’t mean you’ve failed. It just means that you may need to go up and try again. Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that “concentration is the secret of strengths in politics, in war, in trade, in short in all management of human affairs.”2) It must be profitable.The second prerequisite for building a successful business is the “profitability” factor. In order to easily assess the commercial viability of a niche, you need to make sure that there are enough people already buying products in that market. Instead of trying to reinvent the wheel and discover untapped markets, you can start developing your online business in an existing niche and approach it using your mix of skills and interests. Some competition is actually good because it proves that customers in that market are actually buying products online. One of the best ways to start testing the market is find out whether there are any products being sold that have affiliate programs. If there are plenty of affiliates in your niche, you can be assured that there is a hungry market open to buy products online. But if you can’t find any affiliate products that are relevant to your niche, this may be a sign that your niche is not really commercially viable.Here is how you can quickly assess whether there are any affiliate products available in your niche. The top 3 providers of affiliate products are , Commission Junction and Clickbank. Your goal is to drill down into each of these platforms to find products that are specifically related to the niche that you’re targeting. Let’s use ClickBank as an example. Go to and click on the “Marketplace” tab. Once you’re in the Marketplace, you’ll notice down on the left hand side that there are a lot of different categories, such as Business / Investing; Coking, Food & Wine, Health & Fitness and so forth.I’ll go into the Self-Help category --> Dating Guides, which is further down the page. Now you’ll notice that you have a bunch of filters down the left hand side. Within each category there are literally hundreds of products to promote, but how do you know which ones to choose and which ones not to?Check out some of these products and keep in mind the following indicators:1) Gravity. How much interest is there in the product? Anything above 100 is an awesome product, although, I still may promote it if it is above 30.2) Refund rate. Should be a low refund rate. Stay away from products with high refund rates.3) What type of billing is it (recurring vs one-time). Recurring commissions will allow you to earn consistent money on one sale. One-time billing is where you only earn money once on a sale and that’s it. Try to go for recurring income when possible.4) Commissions. I usually like aiming for 50% or higher if possible.5) What does the merchant’s sales page look like? Is it the kind of page that somebody would like to buy from? Does it have good information about the product? Does it have an attention grabbing headline, testimonials and a strong call-to-action?6) Are you earning at least $20 on this product? Are you earning enough from this product so it’s worth your effort? You’re going to have to write content and do research to help promote this product, so make sure you‘re getting your bang per buck.Another thing you can do to assess the niche viability is to search Google by typing in your niche and then “affiliate” after it. For example: “dating affiliate program”. This allows you to see if there are any products that may interest you that are worth being promoted. Whatever product you decide to promote, make sure that it’s coming from a good business and it has good reviews. Also, it’s always best to stay away from big mega niches, especially when you are just starting out. The reason is that huge mega niche, like Money Making, Health, Dating, are so vast and there is so much competition in it that it may become really tough to compete. You want to narrow it down a bit, to something more manageable and doable, such as “making money online with Kindle books”, or “losing weight with Juicing”, “dating for newly divorced”, “weight loss tips for busy moms”, etc. Think about a “niche” as a hole in the marketplace that needs to be filled. You can meet that market demand using a product with mass-market appeal, but you’ll need to promote it in a unique way or with a new twist.The more unique you are, the less competition you have. The less competition you have, the less replaceable you are. And the less replaceable you are, the less important price becomes. Define Your Target AudienceThere are a couple of great tools online that will help you easily conduct keyword research to see if your product idea has best-selling potential and how much advertisers are spending to bid on those keywords.Why is this important? If people are researching your topic and, more importantly, if advertisers are spending good money to promote in that niche, that means there’s a viable market.You can start your keyword research using Google Keyword Planner. People are constantly searching for different topics on Google and your goal is to explore just what kinds of keywords people are searching in your niche.So if you don’t already have a Google AdWords account, you can click here to sign up for one. Once you’ve created your account and logged in, you will see your main page. From there go to “Tools” at the top of the page and click on the “Search for new keyword and ad group ideas” tab:For example, let’s do a search for “make money online”: Once you’ve clicked the “Get ideas” button, you’ll be brought to your results. Make sure you are under the “Keyword ideas” tab. You are looking for keywords that have high monthly searches and low competition. You can set the filter as to what you want your minimum number of monthly searches to be, but I often go with at least 1,000 monthly searches with medium to low competition. The bid price I am generally going with is anything above $0.50. The bid price is the price other advertisers are willing to pay for that keyword. These people are most likely running their own PPC advertising campaigns and if there is a good bid price on these keywords, then it’s a clear indication that the niche is profitable.Find Keywords With The Highest Buyer IntentMany people assume that choosing keywords is as simple as picking the ones with the highest “search volume”. But it’s de?nitely not that simple. Here comes the “buyer intention” concept. Many internet marketers don’t consider buyer intention when selecting their keyword phrases. So understanding this concept will give you a competitive edge over your competition. Buyer intention is about whether someone who is looking for something on the internet is actually in the mood to buy something from you. So it’s not so much about the number of visitors you can get to your site, but about the mood they are in and if they’re willing to buy from you.How can you tell if someone is in the mood to buy your product? 1) Identifying Buyer IntentSpotting buyer intent is really quite simple, once you understand it. For example, the keyword phrase “free Photoshop tutorial” has no buyer intent because of the word “free”. People using this keyword are only interested in finding free training.On the other hand, if someone searches for “Photoshop training ebook”, there are higher chances that this person might be willing to buy. They don’t say that they want something for free, but they’re also not showing a really strong intent. They’re somewhat in the middle and you have to do some guess work on that.But what if somebody uses the keyword phrase “buy Photoshop training ebook”? This would be a much stronger indicator that they are looking to buy a high quality product and not settle for some free offers. The bad thing is that even people who are looking to buy something, don’t always use the word “buy” in front of the rest of their keyword phrase, so you need to do a bit more digging to uncover buyer intent. So, try to jump inside the customer’s head and think about…what reasons they would have to use a certain keyword what reasons they could have for using keywords like “Photoshop training” whether they would be ready to buy something why they would use the phrase “buy Photoshop training ebook” why they would be thinking about buying something Here are the main types of buyer intention keywords:“Author / Product specific” keywords (users want to learn more about the author or product before making the purchase)“product name review”“author name review”“buy product name”Product type keywords (e.g. “buy Photoshop training book”)Crisis keywords (e.g. “Cure”, “Save”, “Prevent”, etc. – “Cure yeast infection”, “save marriage from divorce”, etc.)“How to” keywords (e.g. “How to speak Chinese”)If you can master the skill of understanding your customer’s intentions and whether they’re looking to buy something, you can get well ahead of most of your competitors, since many of them don’t understand the concept of buyer intention. Ultimately, you want to make sure that your keywords relate to the rest of the content on your website. Try not to use unrelated keywords as it would only confuse people and lower the intention to buy from your site. Check Out Your CompetitionNow that you know your niche has real demand and can be monetized, it's time to see how hard it is going to be to beat the competition. One of the biggest mistakes people make when they start a business is that they’re afraid to enter a market with competition. Don’t be afraid of competition! You want to be in a market where others are already making money. It means that there are people out there with enough interest in that topic to spend money and buy products and services. Keyword research will give you a good idea of the strength of that niche. Try keyword tools like , or . These sites charge a small monthly fee, but it’s well worth it for the data:KeywordSpy – Gives you a quick overview of the niche you’re interested in. You can quickly see data on PPC ads, related keyword phrases, your paid and organic competitors and more.SpyFu – Provides search volume, number of clicks per day and their average daily cost, the actual number of advertisers currently bidding on the keyword and the actual AdWord ads that are running.SEMrush – Here you’ll find insights into search volume, average cost per click, number of competing pages, related keywords, rank results and even companies currently buying ad space.SEMRush (free plan) allows you to gain some basic trend information as well some additional keyword ideas. More importantly, it will allow you to view the top 10 websites ranked on Google for any particular keyword. This is your direct competition.When you enter SEMRush you can search your keyword term in the search box. When you do this, the most important thing to take note of is the organic search results. These websites are the ones you will analyze to see if they are tough to rank out. You want to select a few different pages that you will want to analyze. Once you’ve found your direct competitors, head over to OpenSiteExplorer. Once you’ve entered the URL in the dialog box, it will give you these results:Domain Authority is important, but what you really want to focus on is the Page Authority. This tells you how difficult it will be to outrank this page. In this particular case, when we checked out the SEMRush result from MoneySavingExperts for “make money online”, it gives us a page authority of 66/100. That means that this page is quite competitive and may be tough to outrank. You are going to put a few of your competitors’ URLs into OpenSiteExplorer to truly assess their position in the market. If many of them are showing high page authority, it means this keyword is actually very competitive and it may be very difficult to compete.Next, go to and browse the top 10 best-selling books in your niche. Take a quick peek inside at the Table of Contents for each:How is the content structured? Where are the overlaps between books? Where are the gaps (hint: the opportunities)? What are the 3-star comments (positive feedback with suggestions for improvement)? What could you do better? Next, do a Google search to check for ads on that particular keyword. Are there ads on the page, especially on the top and sides? If not, then that is a sign that this niche may not be profitable. It’s not always the case, but when doing research you want to see ads on the top and side of Google.After you have checked for ads, do another Google search by typing in quotes your “keyword” price. This query will tell you if there are products selling in that niche, because the more, the better. From these basic steps you can determine if a niche is worth getting into. So after you've collected all that data, how do you decide if the niche you've chosen is worth your while? Ultimately it comes down to this: ?If you can add even more value, then creating your own product shouldn't be a problem and you'll make a lot of money. If you want to speed up your niche research, dive into one of these niches – these are popular, evergreen niches that will always be around:Weight lossGet your ex backHow to attract womenAnything to do with making moneyHealth (e.g. weight loss, acne, diabetes, etc.)RelationshipsJust make sure to select a sub- niche that you’re interested in – this will make your work a lot easier and enjoyable. Build Your Client AvatarNow that you know there is considerable demand in your niche and people are ready to pay for your product, it’s time to define your target audience – your ideal customer. This is your buyer persona (avatar), a fictional character that embodies all the main characteristics found in your ideal customer. A buyer persona represents the total demographic and psychographic profile (e.g. personality, values, opinions, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles) of your ideal customer. A solid market research will help you find more about your prospects, like:where they spend time onlinewhat they dohow they livetheir needs and wantsfears and aspirations, etc.The more you understand your client avatar, the faster you can begin to implement your sales & marketing strategy. The best way to know your audience is to start seeing them as real people. This may sound like a given, but you wouldn’t believe how many people start a business without really diving deep to figure out who their prospects are, what their needs and pain points really are. How can you possibly sell to your customers if you have no idea who they are, in the first place? Creating a buyer persona provides you with a lot of interesting (and often overlooked) insights on your audience. Your goal is to find as many reasons your prospects would buy from you. Once you know all of this, you’re ready to approach them. You can do your market research pretty fast and collect valuable data from many different sources. Once you drill down to your ideal target customer, creating your product and marketing will become much easier. Let’s say you’re promoting a PC Backup service. Here is an example of a well-targeted buyer persona:This image is for demonstration purposes only.BACKGROUND:Kelly Robertson, 33, science school teacher and wifeMother of two, Kyle 7 and Melissa 5She loves to travel, take lots of photos, plans trips onlineShe is organized and loves step by step planning and schedulingDEMOGRAPHICS:Age Range: 28-34Dual Household Income: $95,000 Urbanicity: She lives in Chelsea, MassachusettsONLINE ACTIVITYActive on mom blogs and parenting websitesFacebook PinterestIDENTIFIERS:Calm and well-organizedHappy to take her students outdoors Appreciates (and pays for) safetyDoesn’t like to take uncalculated risksGOALS:To find a safe but simple solution to backup her photos.BIGGEST FEARS:Losing all photo albums along with priceless memories and emotions captured in thousands of files.HOW WE HELP:Make it super easy to backup unlimited dataSync multiple computersAccess the files anywhere in the world on PC, Mac, tablet or smartphoneSimple, secure, automated backup solution 24/7 customer supportREAL-LIFE QUOTES:“I don’t have time to burn hundreds of DVDs to backup all these albums”.“I’d be crushed to lose my photos.”“I don’t know how to backup my photos. I need a simple drag & drop program.”COMMON OBJECTIONS:“I’m worried that my photos will be hacked and made public.”“I don’t understand the cloud storage technology. I’m not sure it’s a safe solution.”“If your servers crash or you go out of business, I will lose all my files.”MARKETING MESSAGING:"Backup Your Computer, Backup Your Life." ELEVATOR PITCH:We give you a safe, easy and portable data backup solution to protect your photos and access them from any computer or mobile device. Our cloud backup technology encrypts your files on your PC before uploading them via a secure Internet connection and they remain encrypted until you access them again.By the time you finish profiling your avatar, you should know your avatar like it’s your best friend. The more you learn about your ideal customer, the better you can align your offer to their needs and wants, and the better you can serve them. Your Secret Weapon: Lateral Thinking Discovering new perspectives in selling your products and targeting your audience is priceless, that’s why I recommend reading Six Thinking Hats. Six Thinking Hats is a framework developed by Edward de Bono for thinking and discovering unique solutions and angles to any problem. ??Edward de Bono was a British physician and inventor who coined the term “lateral thinking” back in the 60s as a counterpoint to conventional (vertical) thinking. He divides the thinking process into two methods:Vertical thinking – using logical thinking to select the best ideasLateral thinking – taking the indirect approach to generate ideas and solve problemsIn vertical thinking, people often go forward in a predictable, direct manner, whereas lateral thinking involves studying the problem from new angles, from the side. This is the cliché term “thinking outside the box”.De Bono’s framework involves six different imaginary hats that you can put on or off. Each hat is a different color and represents a different type or mode of thinking.In his book, “Six Thinking Hats,” de Bono presents a unique way (“hat”) of approaching problems from different six different angles:White Hat – Focuses on collecting and sharing data. Red Hat – Sees the problem using the intuition. Black Hat – Gets pessimistic and sees everything that could go wrong.Yellow Hat – Looks at all the benefits and everything that could go right.Green Hat – Brainstorm creative solutions and interesting perspectives.Blue Hat – Sees the big picture.We usually wear the same hat (do the same type of thinking) all the time. When you change hats (perspectives), you change your thinking. By using the different hats sequentially, you can focus on just that thinking activity and brainstorm more creatively.Here is a mindmap that illustrates the six thinking hats:Image sourceA great start with lateral thinking is to deliberately challenge and question every assumption and idea to see what happens. Asking “what if” questions is a lateral thinking technique that helps explore the opportunities and stretches every aspect of an idea. For example:What if you had unlimited marketing budget? What if you had no marketing budget?What if no one buys your product? What if a million people buy your product overnight? Each question stimulates the mind by testing existing assumptions and boundaries that are assumed to be tied to the problem. Take one question and see where it goes. You will start with silly ideas but these often lead to radical insights and innovations.The brain can make remarkable lateral connections between the variety of stimuli that you encounter and the problem, thus giving you unique angles to target and promote your offers.Chapter SummaryIn this chapter you’ve learned how to…Set the foundation for your business by following the Clickbank University training modules.Discover your niche market and perform market research to assess your competition. Target your audience and create your client avatar.Use lateral thinking to brainstorm ideas, collect market research data and identify new angles for your copy.The next section will teach you how to take all this information and create your product and sales funnel for your business. Part 2: Create Your Online ProductOnce you've collected all the information about your niche and target audience, you need to fine-tune your unique value proposition. This means fleshing out all the reasons why anybody would want to buy from you over everybody else. This is your “zone” – the place from where you can lead the conversation. Until you find your “zone”, you’ll compete on price, which means you're still being a commodity.You are positioning yourself as the expert that creates high quality content in your niche that’s perfectly aligned with your business goals and target audience. Build An Irresistible Offer This is the moment when you take your idea for a product and turn it into an irresistible offer using the “Life Force 8” model, as described in Ca$hvertising, one of the must-read books in marketing.The Life-Force 8 is a set of basic principles that lay at the foundation of any top selling product. The Life-Force 8 is a product creation model that targets the eight most powerful, unshakeable human desires: Survival, enjoyment of life, life extension Enjoyment of food and beverages Freedom from fear, pain and danger Sexual companionship Comfortable living conditions To be superior, winning, keeping up with the joneses Care and protection of loved ones Social approval Every human being has these 8 things embedded inside themselves and all successful marketers create products and services around the Life 8. We cannot help ourselves from chasing these desires in life, so your goal as a marketer is to tap into these biologically programmed desires and the job of selling your products and services will become a lot easier. Always keep the question “What’s in it for me” in the back of your head and use it as a compass for every piece of marketing you create. Once you understand what your audience wants and needs, give it to them. Your number one goal is to continually grow the number of people you can serve and grow their engagement. Let’s say you’re promoting a weight loss supplement (they seem to be everywhere these days). In reality, no one cares what’s inside that pill (features) or what it does to boost your metabolism. What people really want out of that product is to:Look good for the opposite sexGet those looks on the beach when they take their clothes offIncrease their confidence Make others jealous ? So, what these people really want is to have their #4, #6 and #8 desires covered. If you start to think in terms of the Life Force 8, you’ll be able to market your offers in ways you never knew possible. Just by knowing what people are searching for online, whether it’s Google, Youtube or Amazon, you can begin to uncover their real wants and needs and start giving it to them in a way that’s hard to resist.People can lie to themselves all day long saying they’re buying this or that for their health, and yes this is one reason why, but if you dig deeper you will find out what their real desires are. And that’s what you want to tap into. Which headline do you think would strike someone harder:1) “Our unique program will help you lose weight, get into shape and be sexy just in time for summer.”2) “You will see results in just 14 days! So please only buy this product if you can handle all the attention and jealous looks you’ll get everywhere you turn.” Most marketers would settle for the first headline and won’t even bother digging deeper. They assume that losing weight is the real benefit of their product. But they’re wrong! The second headline taps into several biologically programmed desires that every person struggling with weight loss has. They can’t escape them – they’re inside their inner dialogue all day long.Being able to write content that creates powerful emotions that strike the readers’ innermost desires is a great competitive advantage you can use to maximize your results. Just sit back and imagine your most satisfied customer and see how your product or service has changed their life in a positive way. Now all you need to do is write your Unique Selling Proposition in a way that forces your ideal customer to live those scenes you visualized for them. You need to tap into the right emotions and people will buy from you over and over again.How To Make People Trust YouTapping into the Life Force 8 will draw people’s attention right away, but what’s really going to open their wallets is their ability to trust you. Credibility is what makes people trust you. It’s what makes people believe you when you say: “It works!” Without credibility, you might sell a few products here and there to people willing to take a risk, but you’ll never have a massive win. At the end of the day, credibility means conversions. Credibility is what will secure your relationship with your audience in the long run and convince people that it’s okay to open their wallets and buy from you.So, how do you build credibility? Some people believe that credibility comes exclusively from education or college degrees. While these factors contribute to being perceived as an authority, showing someone your BA degree is probably not going to close a sale (unless, of course, you’re selling a book on “How to get into college”). Past successes contribute significantly to your credibility. That’s why social proof in the form of testimonials is so effective. But credibility can also come from another place: your eagerness to share yourself, your ability to be authentic and your commitment to serving others. This clearly isn’t something that’s built overnight, but there are some simple techniques that you can use to demonstrate your credibility to your audience without having to spend years getting to know them. Here is a simple 3-step formula you can use to build a foundation of trust:Make a promise. “I am going to show you three simple techniques to backup your entire PC immediately.”Deliver on the promise by sharing what you promised. Confirm the delivery. “These are three simple techniques for backing up all your data. Try them out today and I know you’ll feel a lot more relieved after that.”Even before Kelly, your avatar, tries out your PC backup service, she’ll already feel like she can trust you. You promised her something and you delivered. This creates an immense amount of credibility for you in a very short period of time.The Perfect Client Path Regardless of how good your product is, you can’t build a sustainable business on a one-time offer. To avoid the “one-hit wonder” situation, you need to have a long-term plan for your business, beyond launching that first product. Think about your relationship with your ideal customers through time and create a corresponding sales funnel. What do they need at each step of the journey to continue their work / life progress? It’s about incremental growth, not a one-time hit. Identify the ideal sequence of products and services you can create to give your customers another step (higher value and higher priced offer), after each product or service. A good sales funnel will multiply your profits without doing much more work, because it makes it easy to turn a single customer’s purchase into a stream or repeat buys and referrals. But the secret is turning that customer into your sales person. Your sales funnel is the typical path a visitor takes through your web site – from initial contact all the way through to the sale and on to retention. It starts from acquiring a prospect, nurturing them and then making them a customer. If you do this successfully, you will never lack for quality prospects because they are being referred by the best salesmen in the world: people who have bought your product / service and love it. Here is a breakdown of the sales funnel into three stages: Top of the funnel – lead generationMiddle of the funnel – lead nurturing and buyer engagementBottom of the funnel – customer acquisition and expansion Each one of these stages requires a different strategy for optimization and should have a separate goal and plan of attack associated with it. Let’s take a closer look:Image source1) Top Of The Funnel (Front-End) – Introductory Products Your goal here is to determine a desired action you want visitors to take when they just land on your website. Let’s say you’re selling an e-book. Someone who comes to your site for the first time probably isn’t going to buy it right off the bat, unless they had a strong word-of-mouth recommendation. Instead, you have to move them down that sales funnel. You will treat them with a lot of care because you are not just interested in making a quick buck. You want to build a partnership that will go on for a long time. So, in exchange for your visitor’s contact information, offer some free products and give out as much value as you can.Typical Formats: Social media postsNewsletters Special Reports Ebooks Webinars / VideosWorksheets PodcastsCustomer Mindset:What can you do for me?Why should I care?Customer Actions: Discovery/awarenessInitial researchInformation gatheringIn-depth researchCost analysisCompetitor researchSuccess Metrics:Unique / return visitorsPages per visitTime on siteBounce rateSocial media shares2) Middle Of The Funnel – Primary ProductsOnce you have a database of lead information, it’s time to bring that engagement to the next level with your primary products. These items represent the core offering of your business. They are your main products that fulfill the primary promise of your business to your customers.Typical Formats: Higher value product (video / audio with workbook)Subscription / membership programs Coaching programs Seminars / Live eventsCustomer Mindset:How do I believe you?Customer Actions: Request for more detailsPhone call to sales rep Complete free trialSuccess Metrics:Ebook downloads Lead form completions Wishlist additions3) Bottom Of The Funnel – Advanced / Backend ProductsThese are follow-up products and programs that will extend the relationship with your customers and continue to bring in more revenue. These are often your higher-end programs created for your high-end customers.Typical Formats: Personal One-on-one coaching or training High-end Live Seminars / WorkshopsRetreats / Getaways Platinum or Diamond Mastermind “Train the Trainer” programs Customer Mindset:When can we start?Customer Actions:Purchase SignupSuccess Metrics:Average order value Number of transactionsYou need to continually create new front-end (low-ticket) offers to attract fresh leads into your funnel. Always be moving your customers down the path toward a higher-priced product and extending your relationship with them. Here’s an example of a fine-tuned sales funnel: A Facebook fan clicks on your link and reads a post on your coaching blog. They like what they read, so they subscribe and sign up for your free offer, a special report on how to start building an email list. They really enjoy your free report because it teaches them a new email marketing strategy they didn’t know before. Wanting to learn more, they buy your cheapest offer, an ebook that expands on how to start making money online with Kindle books. They love it, it makes a huge difference to their outlook on internet marketing, which entices them to book a consultation with you for 1:1 coaching. The coaching blows their mind because they get your undivided attention for half an hour and come away feeling inspired by your insight and methods. As a result, they enroll in your 5-day mastermind and get to meet with you and your other highest paying members.So basically, an ideal client path is taking someone from not even knowing they need you to relying on your coaching and products to take their life and business to the next level of performance. That’s why you need to stay in touch with your customers (even non-buyers), so you can anticipate their needs in advance and always have new offers that extend your relationship with them along this path.To summarize the client path process: Create introductory offers to help people get immediate results in their area of need. Then, develop higher-ticket products and systems, such as home study courses to take them step-by-step through a process. Finally, go up into even higher value programs such as live events, 1-1 coaching, masterminds, etc. Assessing Backend Potential Now that you have a clear idea of how to build a client path, you need to assess the backend potential. This is, in fact, one of the key factors that determine whether you should pursue a niche. That’s because the vast majority of growth potential for any business is in the backend, where you can sell to a receptive audience of existing customers – with no additional costs in acquiring those customers. Backend simply means selling additional products to the same customer. The first purchase is your front end, while the next purchases are the backend of your business. So backend profits mean additional revenue from a single customer.Here is why the real money is made on the backend:You can set higher price points because customers already know and trust you. You don’t need to convince your guys anymore that you're selling high quality products and that your information is excellent. You only need to convince your existing customers that your backend product is way better than your front-end offer and that they need it to solve their problem.The hardest time to make a sale is the first time, whereas the easiest time to make a sale is… the next time. Backend sales are the sales you typically make just after your customer gives you money. Usually, front end offers are teasers to encourage prospects to sample your products. The front and the back end of your business are just like the main course versus appetizers. So always think about another logical sale you can make to your customer, either at the same time or shortly afterwards. Here’s a typical example of backend potential. You go to a concert where you pay $150-$200 for the ticket. Then once you’re at the show, you also drop another $35 on a T-shirt, $10 on a keychain, $20 on a live DVD, and so on. Each of these related items sold at the concession stands are backend sales to the front-end ticket sale. Even the concert ticket itself, is a backend sale. The original sale was made when you bought the band’s latest album. Everything’s about the backend. The CD album is just a lead-up to the backend concert purchase and the ticket is a lead-up to the backend concession purchase. So everything should be tied up to the backend, which relates to two things: Market worth – you need room to grow your businessMarket enthusiasm – you need a tribe of faithful followers First, you need to have people capable of spending money in your niche and you need enthusiasm to help build relationships for a strong backend and high lifetime customer value. You don’t need to get into a market where people just want to solve a problem and forget about it (e.g. yeast infection), because there is little to no backend potential. On the flip side, acne has backend potential through recurring purchases of maintenance treatments to keep the skin clear. The Art Of Upselling“Do you want fries with that burger?” it’s the classic example of upselling, a sales strategy meant to encourage people to upgrade in order to make a sale even more profitable. Studies have shown that the best way to sell more is right after the first sale. This is because your customers are already into the “buying mode”, so you just create a low-ticket offer and add it to your game. This is the best way to create momentum in your business and continue your conversation with people who are already customers. Upsells and cross-promotions are definitely the easiest way to grow your business. Now you know that it’s easier (and cheaper) to sell to existing customers, than trying to acquire new ones. Your past and current customers are your best prospects. Image sourceHere’s an example of a typical upsell. You go into a retail store and when you go up to the counter, there’s always a skilled salesperson (who gets paid a commission) who tries to upsell you:Scarf with your blouse? Hand cream with your perfume? Tie with your shirt? Each of these items (the scarf, the hand cream, the tie) are all clever upsells to your original purchase. This is the kind of thinking that will help you find new avenues to upgrade your customers. You need to look at your business as a chain of smaller systems all put together into a well-oiled funnel. When one system (sale) ends, another one begins. Each of your systems will have different end-results, but the main goal is to upgrade your customers with more and more offers. Here’s another example of how you can upsell existing customers. Let’s say you’re selling a front-end offer for $7 in the form of a 30-page e-book called “How To Drive More Traffic To Your Blog in 7 Days”. This offer will qualify leads and separate tyre-kickers from people committed to solving their problems. Your real money-making opportunity is in your full video course called “The Ultimate Traffic Black Book”, which includes a 12-part video series, plus a workbook and a full 200-page e-book describing every strategy discussed in the video course. The cost is $497 and the offer is super targeted to people who have the money, the time and the commitment to learn all there is about traffic. But you don’t need to own your own product in order to make money with backend offers. Here is how you can promote backend offers as an affiliate:Every time a prospect joins your free newsletter, send them to a Thank-You page where they can purchase one of your low-ticket affiliate offers.Every time someone makes a purchase from your site, ask them if they want to receive emails about your future offers. Newsletters work great in pre-selling back-end products.Send your subscribers regular quizzes and ask them if they're satisfied with their previous purchases. If they’re happy, don’t hesitate to slightly pitch them on your back-end offers.You can start with a low-cost product at the front end of your sales funnel. It could be a $7 / month membership, a $19 video tutorial or a $47 e-book. Your goal is to attract more and more qualified leads into your funnel and position yourself as a trusted expert for these people. Then, you can begin to partner with other product creators and sell related items to your list and try to solve problems that are related to your core offer. Most business owners will be very happy to partner up with you for the increase in their business, especially in this shaking economy.But just make sure you don’t push it too hard. Not everyone is loaded with cash, so you need to be sensitive on how much you ask for your upsells. Remember, these people have only asked for your free offer, so you need to consider that when pricing your items. You goal here is to get them to trust you enough to pull out their credit card and purchase from you, even it’s a $7 item. If your customers can afford to pay more, then you can upsell them with more and more expensive offers. But if they aren’t, you can still upsell them by giving them multiple payment options. Like, instead of asking for a $47 or $97 upsell price, break it down into smaller increments and bill them weekly or monthly. Ultimately, you want to create incentives and upsells for people who have already invested in your business. Your loyalty to your best customers will pay off in the form of happy fans and customers who will refer their friends and family and continue to buy your products and services.Sweeten The Deal With Free BonusesThere are two reasons to include bonuses with your product or service. First, you will establish incredible good will with your customers if you always make sure you deliver more than promised. Second, it will help your customers remove the buyers’ remorse (doubt) and justify the price of your product or service. There are two types of bonuses you need to include: 1) Announced bonusesThese are elements you’re adding to your offer to increase the value and tip the scales for prospects to make the decision to buy. Typically, your bonuses should worth at least two times the value of your core product. 2) Surprise bonuses ?These are unexpected components you give your customers after they have bought your product. Your goal here is to continue to increase the value for your customers and get them to stick with your product or service. Social psychologist and researcher Jerry Burger has demonstrated the effectiveness of free bonuses. In the first experiment, a group of customers were offered a cupcake for 75 cents, plus two free cookies. In the second experiment, the customers were offered a cupcake and two cookies for the total of 75 cents. Though the offer was identical, 73% of the customers preferred to buy a cupcake that came with two free cookies, over a package that contained a cupcake and two cookies. Same offer – different packaging!A well-timed bonus can totally re-engage your customers and get them even more excited about your offer. You can give out anything of value as long as it’s complimenting your core product or service. By all means, repurpose existing content, but don’t just throw stuff in there just because you have it. Be thoughtful about what you include, so you provide read added value – and not overwhelm your customers. After all, a good bonus is all about how useful it is in the eyes of the people who purchased your core product.You want to give away something related to what you’re selling. If it’s not related to your main offer, it’s not going to boost your sales. So, packaging your bonuses along with your core offer is very important. There’s a specific framework called a “bonus sandwich” and it smoothly integrates your bonuses with your main offer. A bonus sandwich would look something like this: “Meat”. A home course on advanced traffic methods. “Bottom bread”. A bonus PDF report that reveals a “secret” strategy for finding low-competition & high demand long-tail keywords.“Top bread”. An in-depth strategy for reaching page 1 of Google in under 10 minutes using YouTube and Google Plus.The “bottom bread” is an offer that would address an issue that may be preventing your customer from using your core product. The “top bread” is an offer related to your main product that people can use right after they purchase it.You can give away bonuses in the form of e-books, video /audio files, software, plug-ins, access to special webinars, events or members area, and so forth. Remember, make your bonuses useful and relevant. Anything that will make your customers smile and want to continue their experience with you.The 80/20 Rule To Optimize Your InputSo how can you optimize and maximize your efforts to reap the most benefits from your sales, upsells and cross-sells? Use the 80/20 Rule in everything you do. Pareto Principle (80/20 Rule) states that 80% of your outcomes are given by 20% of your inputs. On the flip side, 80% of your effort is only contributing to about 20% of your success. Image sourceAccording to this rule, 80% of your revenue comes from 20% of your customers. So, take care of these 20% and cut out the other 80%. Find out the characteristics of the 20% of your customers and target your marketing towards them. Soon, you will increase the percentage of the customers who are generating more revenue for you.Pareto's Principle should keep you focused on investing 80% of your time and energy on the 20% of work that’s really important. It’s not just important to “work hard” and “work smart”, but also to work smart on the right things.Look at your business and focus on the 20% that produces the 80% of benefit. Spend 80% of your time doing the 20% that really gets you results. Why spend 100% of your budget on ads that simply do not produce viable results, when you could track, measure and reinvest your budget into those 20% that will bring you the highest return?The bottom line in any business is to know where you’re going and for whom you’re creating your products and services. Remember the Karate Kid example at the beginning of the book? You need to visualize the Bonsai Tree before starting to trim it. Similarly, you need to “see” your ideal customers before you start building a business. This will ensure you create a system and series of products and services that will better support your customers through time.If you try to be everything to everyone, you’ll end up a small fish in a large pond. Many people make the huge mistake of building their business and creating their products by trying to be all things to all people. When asked “Who is your product for?” they reply “My product is for anyone who wants to be happier, healthier and wealthier.” This is the wrong answer! When you widen your net too far, it’s so much harder to stand out from the noise. Instead, use the power of niche – go deeper, not wider! Your goal is to get your potential customers to stand in line for your products and services and most important, open up their wallets and buy. Chapter SummaryIn this chapter you’ve learned how to…Build your online business on a solid foundation (ClickBank University) and apply the fundamentals. Find a viable niche through in-depth research and leverage your sweet spot to create maximum impact.Leverage the Life Force 8 model to tap into your customers’ innate e up with unique angles (reasons to buy) that are simply hard to resist. Create your own product and customer path.Go deeper, not wider in order to differentiate and avoid competing on price. Remember Zig Ziglar’s famous words, which perfectly illustrate success in any business: “You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.” It really is that simple.Part 3: Sell Your Product Via ClickbankNow that you have your offer, what’s next? It’s time to learn how to put your product on Clickbank and attract affiliates like bees to a honey pot! If you’re just starting out in online marketing, you can promote other people’s products, but to make bigger money online, you will eventually need to create your own product.ClickBank Setup ProcessSo here are the steps to get started selling your products on ClickBank:1) Create your Sales / Thank-You pages.Your Sales page is your Pitch page used to describe your product to potential customers and convince them to buy. The Thank-You page is your download page. After your customer purchases your product through your sales page, they’re going to be redirected to your Download page where they can access your offer.You also need to create a payment button and add it to your Sales page. This will enable you to create an automated system that allows you to run your online business 24/7.2) Upload all the files to your website.Now that you’re done creating your pitch page, your Thank-You page, and your payment button, you’ll need to upload all the files to your website. You can do that by using a FTP program that will upload your files from your computer to your website.3) Write your marketplace listing.Your description should be targeted to affiliates and encourage them to see the value in promoting your offer. Here’s what you need to include: commission percentagerecurring incomeaffiliate tools pageyour conversion ratereturn rate any other unique benefits (e.g. affiliate contests)4) Create the vendor spotlight page.This section allows you to communicate with affiliates. Check out CB guidelines to create your Vendor Spotlight.5) Create the affiliate tools page.You need to see your affiliates as an extension of your sales & marketing team. They duplicate your success by following specific guidelines, while tapping into a new client database: their own network of customers and followers.That’s why you need to do your best to give them all the necessary information and know-how of your product (e.g. text links, email copy, sales letters, banners, articles, ready-to-use personalized affiliate links, etc.).If you want to bring reliable affiliates onboard, give them all the tools they need to help you sell your products. Make it simple and easy for them – provide the best support available and stay in touch. Setup a blog or newsletter to streamline your communication with your guys and collect their feedback through polls, webinars, comments and emails.There are many ways to create an affiliate resource page, but here’s a free solution recommended by ClickBank. It’s a free WordPress plug-in created by online marketer and programmer Jack Born. Watch this video to learn how to properly install the plug-in on your site.Check out the affiliate tools page from the Kindle Money Mastery program: 6) Test your systemNext, you’re going to learn how to test your system. You need to make sure that everything works, including your payment button and your download links. So before anything else, you must make sure that your website is working properly and can actually sell. 7) Announce your affiliate programNow it's time to spread the word and announce your affiliate program. Once you have a proven sales process on your website and you've double-checked every detail on your site, you can begin to announce your program.Here are two effective steps to getting started:Email your list – Start promoting your program to your current client base. Simply send out an email announcing your program and providing the link where people can join. Join affiliate program directories. Next, there are directories of affiliate programs where you can announce your program. Here is a good list to get you started.Remember, the more generous you are with your affiliate payouts, the more interest you’ll create for your program. Always see your affiliates as partners and keep them happy by giving them a fair slice of the pie.8) Recruit affiliatesNearly 90% of Clickbank affiliates make just about 10% of the affiliate-referred sales, whereas the other 10% of affiliates typically generate 90% of the sales. This is the group which you want to attract. The catch with Clickbank is getting your gravity rating up over 10 and after you reach the top of a category, you’ll get a lot more sales on autopilot just from referral traffic. We’re not going to get in too much depth here because ClickBank has a solid knowledge base on getting started as a Vendor.Managing Your AffiliatesAside from giving out higher commissions, free product samples and exclusive landing pages, you need to build a strong relationship with your affiliates so you can maximize their efforts. This is essential. We all feel motivated by interesting work, exciting challenges and increased responsibilities that stimulate our growth and achievement. Affiliates are no different. They too need the right triggers to do their best work and promote your offer effectively. Here are the best ways you can engage and motivate your affiliates:1) Make It Copy-And-Paste Easy.Successful affiliates are busy trying to generate traffic and they have limited time to search for new products and plan marketing strategies. So you want to make it copy-and-paste easy for them to promote you. For example, tell your affiliates to: Send these ads your list Add these banners to your site Post these articles on your blog Place these text ads on Google Brand this e-book and give it away Promote this video to your listProvide them with a copy-and-paste solution for sending promotions and then give them an action plan to implement. Make it as simple as writing an email and clicking “Send”.2) Fair Commission Rates.At the end of the day, we’re all driven by rewards and compensation. So if you want your affiliates to perform to their fullest, you need to provide substantial commissions, too. Typically, in the case of digital products you can offer up to 70%-90% commission, which means you give out most of the front-end profits. Also, providing free product samples (especially if they’re expensive) is a great incentive, too.Occasionally, you might also consider giving a 100% commission to your affiliates. The opportunity to make such a high profit will motivate them to work even harder. While this approach might not bring you any immediate profit, it will sure bring in a lot more good quality leads into your database. 3) Prizes And Rewards. Contests are another great way to inspire your affiliates to sell more. The big launches giveaway prizes work well as incentives and as a result, your affiliates will promote your offer more than once.Creative incentives – You can also try running contests that offer prizes other than cash alone. Anything that adds an extra emotional dimension, like trips to exotic locations, free passes to exciting events, cool gadgets (e.g. iPads, espresso machines, mini laptops, etc.), are all great opportunities for deepening affiliate ties.The opportunity to make a difference – Many online entrepreneurs assume that it's just the money that affiliates are driven by, but for most, there's a deeper psychological trigger. If you are operating in a niche that adds genuinely value to people's lives, then wanting to make a difference in the world could be their key motivator. Personal freedom and passion – Most people choose to become affiliate marketers because it’s relatively easy to build a stream of income that allows them to be their own boss and quit a 9-5 horrible job. Others feel excited by the number of hits they got the day before and by brainstorming new creative promotion techniques.Being really passionate about what they do drives people to get up in the morning and give their best. In affiliate marketing, you get to meet so many different people from many different backgrounds, so you are always learning something new every day. Leverage this angle when recruiting new affiliates.4) Offer Personalized Incentives.Another great way to motivate affiliates is to target them individually. This might be time-consuming at first, but will definitely pay off in the future. Also, use polls, surveys or webinars to get their feedback and find out what is working for them and what they'd like to see in the future. This is a wonderful way to nurture, brainstorm and motivate your affiliates.5) Payment Frequency.Be flexible with your payment policies. For example, providing weekly payments to your affiliates puts a more readily available cash flow in their hands, which can be reinvested into their campaigns on a consistent basis.Type of payments can range from:PayPalSending a check in the mailDirect deposit into their accountWired to a debit card6) Establish A Two-Tier Program.Two tier programs are highly appreciated by affiliates – they not only allow them to monetize the actual sale, but they also earn commissions when they bring in a new affiliate. This is a double incentive model that will certainly keep your affiliates motivated.7) A First Sale Bonus.A great way to get an affiliate initially engaged is to offer a first sale bonus, such as, "I’ll offer you a $X bonus to make a sale by the end of the month." This can be a very effective way to get them started. Ideally, you should offer them a bonus that's far more than your profit from a single sale, just to get them engaged. 8) Give Praise Openly.Award your top affiliates with public recognition and explain how and why they are being praised to motivate new and struggling team members. The classic cheering "If they can, so can you" always works wonders!Send them a Thank-You note after a certain amount of sales and if you notice a decrease in their conversions, just ask them if they need your help. People thrive on praise and they work even harder when they know that you care.These are just some of the ways you can motivate and praise your affiliates. The best approach is to clearly define your goals and then attract the right people and nurture the most profitable relationships to help you achieve your goals.Pricing Your Products One of the secrets to business success is pricing your products based on the costs of getting traffic. Price your products correctly and that can influence how much you sell, creating the foundation for a healthy business. Pricing your product involves considering certain key factors, such as:knowing your costs for lead generationtracking how much competitors are chargingunderstanding the relationship between quality and pricePricing is also a key factor in determining your customers’ expectations. A web designer who charges $20 / hour, will have a very hard time convincing potential clients that he or she does high quality work.This is why you need to know the difference between cost, price and value: The cost is the amount you spend to produce it The price is your financial reward for providing the product or serviceThe value is what your customer believes the product or service is worth to themHere’s a classical example. The cost for a plumber to fix a leaking pipe is $100 ($5 for the materials and $95 for knowing where to look and how to do it). Your pricing should be in line with the value of the benefits that your product or service provides for people, while also keeping in mind the prices your competitors charge.Here are some strategies to set your prices:1) Get clear about making money. The first step is to get real clear about what you want to achieve with your pricing strategy: you want to make money. That's why you’re building a business. Making money means generating enough revenue from selling your products so that you can not only cover your costs, but reinvest part of your profit into growing your business.There are two main pitfalls you can encounter with pricing: under pricing and over pricing. Under pricing Many businesses mistakenly under price their products trying to convince people that their product is the least expensive choice, hoping to drive up volume, but more often than not it is simply perceived as “cheap”. Consumers want to feel that they are getting their “money’s worth” and most won’t buy from a seller that they feel to offer less value. Over pricingOn the flip side, overpricing a product can be just as harmful since the customer is always going to be looking at your competitors’ pricing. Pricing beyond the customer's desire (or ability) to pay can also bring down your sales. Put yourself in the customer's shoes. What would be a fair price to you? 2) Decide what you want out of your business. Aside from maximizing profits, you may also maximize the market share. This means that the more people use your product, the more the value of your product increases. You may also want your product to be known for its quality, rather than just being the cheapest on the market. If so, you may want to price your product higher to reflect the quality. 3) Know your customers and competitors.The more you know about your customer, the better you'll be able to provide what they value and the more you'll be able to charge. Look at your competition, because your customers most likely will, too. Are their products comparable to yours? If so, you can use their pricing as a starting point. Then, see if you can add more value to your product. If so, you may be able to ask for a higher price.4) Know your costs.The cost of a product is more than the literal cost of the item. It also includes:Fixed costs like rent, salaries, delegation, etc.Variable costs like shipping and marketing spendWhen setting your price, always keep it higher than the variable cost, so each sale will help you cover your fixed costs and making a profit.So, put the dollar amount for each of your fixed and variable costs on a spreadsheet and the total should give you a good idea of the gross revenue you need to make to cover your costs. If you only have one product, this is a simple process. Estimate the number of sales you expect to make over the next 6-12 months. Then divide your revenue target by the number of units you expect to sell and you have the price at which you need to sell in order to achieve your revenue and profit goals. 5) Match prices with packaging.The higher the price of your product, the higher the perceived value of the packaging must be. There’s nothing worse than investing $997 on something only to get a box in the mail or log-in to a membership site that looks completely thrown together. The packaging you use to deliver your product has a big impact on its perceived value by your customers. Remember that pricing should be in line with the value of the benefits that your product provides, while also keeping in mind the prices your competitors charge. 6) Segment your market with different price points.If you target customers who would be willing to pay a premium for your product, you'll be making more money per sale but limit the size of your market. Alternatively, if you target customers who are not willing to spend a lot on your products, you'll be making less per transaction, but selling more units. Ideally, you should have a clear sales funnel and offer different levels of value for different price points.Also, you can charge different prices to customers who purchase repeatedly or buy add-ons or related products, as a Thank-you for their loyalty. Please make sure to watch this Clickbank video to get even more insights on pricing. Ten Steps To A Perfect Product LaunchNow that you have your offer in place, you need to start planning your launch campaign. A product launch is a strategic move that requires a well-thought battle plan, so you need to map your entire launch process before actually building it out. This approach will gives you a realistic bird’s eye perspective of your launch from start to finish and give you breathing room to fine-tune the process on the go.An ideal product launch should include the following steps: 1) Tell your story.The story of your product is the heart of a launch. Your story answers the questions: “Why this? And why now?” It positions your product as the ultimate solution to a very important problem. It explains why there’s never been a better time to act than now. It also tells your potential customers who you are: “Why you?” Your story unfolds your own personal journey, explaining how you got where you are today, to position you as an expert whose unique background recommends you as the best person to lead your clients toward success. Your product’s story also gives people all the emotions of what’s possible and gets them excited about the transformation. A story gives your product, and its launch, meaning and context and provides your customers with the emotional momentum they need to in order to buy your product now.2) Pick a date.Next, comes your launch date. Block a day in your calendar and set it in stone. Then work backward to set every step needed to meet your deadline. For a big launch with a lot of top affiliates, you will need to pick a date at least six months in advance, to make sure you get as many super affiliates on board as possible. You’ll need this buffer time for relationship building with your affiliates and prepare all the marketing materials.3) Recruit affiliates.Now, you have to recruit affiliates and commit to your deadline. You could have the greatest launch sequence in the world, but if you don’t have enough affiliates on board, you won’t be able to get traction and make a lot of sales. But with the right affiliate support, then even a smaller launch will give you far greater results. This is the key to any successful product launch.4) Pre-launch buzz with awesome content.Your pre-launch campaign is like a teaser for a movie, getting people excited about your offer. It’s recommended that you start your pre-launch buzz campaign about 4 weeks before launch. This gives you enough time to attract early adopters, keep them engaged and make them hungry for your product.The best way to get early adopters is to send them to a landing with an opt-in form. So in exchange for their email, you drip-feed them awesome content that tie into your product. Here’s an example:Image sourceOnce a prospect has opted-in to your pre-launch list, you’ll spend the next weeks giving them great content, showing them:how your product solves their biggest problemone message to the story of your solutionwhat makes your solution different social proof The final message will show your prospects everything that they are going to get when the product launches. Also, keep them engaged on social media. Start with 1-2 posts a day and increase from there based on engagement. Notice what type of content triggers the most interactions and post more of those. Listen to what’s being said, answer questions and more importantly, ask questions. Just make sure you stay relevant and that your content is in line with your core product. Your goal here is to make people hungry, so give them a taste of your product, whether it’s a demo, or mention a feature that’s really cool. You need to keep them excited until the big day. 5) Promoting launch day.This is the big day your product goes live. Your prospects are eager for your solution, your affiliates are happy to promote and all this buzz creates momentum and enthusiasm.The launch day is really a three day-event, where…Day 1 is your biggest sales day. Many launches add a bonus as an extra incentive for people who buy on the first day. On Day 2, you can give out an extra bonus to get even more sales. On Day 3, you push the urgency of the deadline. This will likely make Day 3 your second biggest sales day, even your biggest sales day of the entire launch. 6) Close the doors. This is the day the promotion ends. Almost all product launches have a discounted price for the product launch – almost always at 50% off or more. And when that deadline hits, the price doubles. So make sure you are fully prepared for the massive amounts of customer service that you’ll have to deal with during the launch. 7) Fulfill orders and customer service requests.This is another major step and will allow your business to build a fan base whose loyalty will last for a long time. Part of the success of any business is due to its impeccable customer service. So this is when you need to shine – again.Just expect some small disasters, like people who simply cannot figure out how to download the package or just want a refund for whatever reason. So make sure you have everything planned out and that you’ve tested your order system a dozen times. But again, no matter how much you test, chances are that something will go wrong. Just keep things in perspective and know that the launch is just a phase in your business and if something does go wrong, there will still be tomorrow. ?8) Increase affiliate commissions.Every time an affiliate sends you a customer, Clickbank will “tag” them for up to 60 days. That means that if you add an upsell to your initial offer, then your affiliates will make more money in commissions, without having to do any extra promotional work. This is a great way of encouraging your affiliates to happily promote your product launches in the future.9) Create scarcity Scarcity is the perception of limited quantities or number of people who can participate and it leverages the fear of missing out. By building in a limit to the number of products you have available, you’ll encourage people to buy now or else risk being excluded from the promotion. If you’re promoting a live webinar, you could set an enrollment limit. It takes discipline to use scarcity with integrity, but when used wisely it can be an incredibly powerful influencer.10) Create urgencyUrgency is the perception of limited time. Your initial product launch can’t and shouldn’t last forever. Setting an end to your initial product launch will not only guarantee your peace of mind, but it will also give people a reason to buy now, before your promotion ends. To use urgency effectively, you need to set a time limit on your offer. For example, your product may be $24.95 until midnight tomorrow, at which time it will go up to $49.95 or it may not be available at all (combining both urgency and scarcity). Again, the key here is discipline. It may be hard for you to pull the plug from the promotion and tell potential customers that your product is no longer available for $24.95, but it sends out a message of trust and credibility. At the end of the day, the real purpose of a product launch is to build a customer list and not just to make money. Another purpose of your launch is to do such a great job collaborating with your affiliates that they’ll be happy to help you with all of your future launches. As your launch calendar comes together, all your actions will create a kind of synergy and buzz in the marketplace that will give you great momentum to form even more partnerships with affiliates and other entrepreneurs and turn even more prospects into customers.Chapter SummaryIn this chapter you’ve learned how to…Create momentum and traction using affiliates. Give your affiliates the best tools and resources and a fair piece of the profits. Keep the backend profits to yourself and market to your leads over and over again at no additional marketing costs. Structure your launch campaign and create maximum impact for your launch.Ultimately, the real difference between being an affiliate and being a product owner is in being able to have mini-sales armies doing all the work for you and only paying for results. So even if you start out as an affiliate, hopefully you can see just how powerful – and profitable – launching your own product can be.Part 4: Diversify Your Traffic SourcesNow that you have an offer and a system in place, it's time to start attracting some customers.Free vs Paid TrafficYou've probably heard a lot about ways to get “free” traffic to your website. This is just hype, don’t buy into that. Free traffic cannot be leveraged and may take up considerable time before you see any significant results.Instead, paid traffic can be tracked, measured and optimized. Any successful business has invested in some form of paid advertising. Sometimes, things like blogging don’t cost you money, but they will definitely cost you a lot of time and commitment. The recent Google updates have stripped many people off their online income when they de-ranked their website for no apparent reason. Even if you rank higher in Google and get plenty of sales, you still can’t leverage free traffic.Here are some of the best ways to get quality traffic to your product or to other affiliate offers:1. Google AdWords As long as there will be people searching for stuff on the internet, AdWords will exist as an advertising platform. In fact, it continues to be a very powerful advertising method – for a very simple reason: you can identify the buyer intent by the words they use in their queries. You can create landing pages specifically designed for particular keywords and close the sale a lot easier. Think of a PPC campaign as your ticket for not having to wait in line for getting new leads to your website, as with article marketing, for example. Regardless of how well you think you’ve optimized your content for SEO, it doesn’t always guarantee a good ranking in the search engines and it often takes time to rank your website by relying just on organic (free) traffic. The following section is split into three parts (how to setup a campaign, how to optimize a campaign and how to run a campaign on Google’s Display Network) to help you better understand each of these steps:1. How To Setup A Proper AdWords CampaignAdWords and PPC ads allow you to reach your target customers a lot faster and at the exact time when they need a product or service. AdWords can be a very profitable advertising model, but you need to do things the right way and follow a proven strategy. But before you do anything else with AdWords, you need to have the following: Google Analytics is installed on your website Google Webmaster Tools is installed on your website Your Google Analytics and Google AdWords accounts are linkedNext, here are the four key elements of a successful AdWords campaign:1) Account structureNow you’re ready to start searching for keywords to advertise your offer. When looking for keywords for your campaigns, try to think like your target audience. What words would they search if they’d be looking for the type of products or services you offer? Your goal here is to attract visitors that are closest to a buying decision. We’re talking about people who’ve already done their research and are now more likely to use specific long-tail keywords when searching for the product they want. Once you’ve identified the keywords you want to use in your ads, you need to group them into different categories, called ad groups. Ad groups are collections of related keywords and work best when clustered around one particular theme, such as the type of the products or services you offer. Here is how an AdWords account is setup:Image sourceAccount structure is the fundamental basis of being able to write relevant ads, track, optimize your campaigns and keep your budget manageable. Understanding this structure will help you plan your AdWords campaigns more effectively. 2) Campaign settings Next, you need to establish your campaign settings. Here are the main elements you need to set up:Geographic targeting This is where you decide where your ads will appear in. You can pick locations as broad as a country or narrow things down within a certain radius of a zip code.Search vs. Display The search network only serves text ads, which are triggered when someone types in a search query that matches one of your keywords. The display network is a large selection of websites where you can serve text, image, video and rich media ads. Image searchDeviceYou can target users by device, such as only serving ads to desktops and laptops or smart phones and mobile devices. Bidding options There are several types of PPC bidding strategies: CPC, CPM and CPA. a) CPC – This is the right choice if you want people to visit your site. Using CPC bidding means you'll pay only when someone clicks on your ad and comes to your site.b) CPM – With this option, you will pay by the number of times your ad is shown. CPM means you’ll pay for every 1,000 times your ad is displayed. It’s the right choice if you're mostly interested in increasing brand awareness and getting your name in front of a lot of people.c) CPA – This is an advanced strategy that works by telling AdWords how much you’re willing to spend for a conversion / acquisition (e.g. a sale, an email opt-in). This is still a PPC model, but the system will automatically adjust your bid to give you as many conversions as possible at your desired cost per acquisition. Budget & biddingToo low bids could block your ads from being shown as often as they should or push your ads in lower positions in the search listings, which means fewer clicks and money left on the table. On the other hand, too high bids could give you a higher conversion cost and unprofitable clicks that would blow your budget too fast. Watch this explainer video from Google’s Chief Economist to understand the basics of AdWords bidding process. 3) Writing the adsOnce you’ve built your keyword list and setup your campaign, it’s time to write your ads. Here’s the structure of an AdWords text ad:Headline (25 characters) Description line 1 (35 characters) Description line 2 (35 characters) Display URL (35 characters)Image sourceThe better you adapt your ad copy to the specific ad group that you are writing it for, the higher the chances for someone to click on it. If possible, use keywords in your headlines. If your ad is triggered by a keyword, then users are more likely to click on it if they see the same keyword in the ad. It increases the relevance of your ad, which can significantly boost your click-through rate.You also need to have user-friendly Display URLs. Your users may be hesitant to click on strange looking URLs which could be mistaken as spam. The Display URL is simply the web address users see when they view your ad (it’s recommended to use your home page). The Destination URL is where users land when they click your ad (it’s not visible in the ad). Display URL and destination URL don’t have to be the same. However, a display URL must be an actual URL for your site.2. How To Optimize a PPC CampaignPPC is not a “set and forget” type of work – you need to review your account a few times each week and optimize your campaigns to reap the maximum benefits. PPC optimization entails managing, testing and fine-tuning your campaigns on a consistent basis.Here are the two main things to consider when optimizing an AdWords campaign:1) Increase ad relevancy Your focus should always be on increasing the CTR. The higher the CTR, the better the placements you get for your ads in Google searches. Also, if you have a high CTR, you don’t have to bid as much for your ads (please go back to the explainer video mentioned earlier). You can increase the ad relevancy by using various matching options to determine what types of searches are going to trigger your ads:Image sourceBroad match By default, every keyword is broad match and this match type will reach the widest audience. When using broad match, your ad is eligible to appear whenever a user’s search query includes any word in your key phrase, in any order. For example, if you use broad match on “luxury car”, then your ad might be displayed if a user types “luxury cars”, “fast cars” or even “luxury apartments”. Google may also match your ad to queries using synonyms (e.g. “expensive vehicles”). Because broad matched ads are set up to reach the widest possible audience, searchers might see and click your ad when searching for topics that are irrelevant with your offer and make you lose money on blind clicks. However, broad match keywords are a great way to drive lots of clicks and get lots of traffic really fast, but you need to keep an eye on your search query reports to ensure that you’re not paying for irrelevant traffic that doesn’t convert. Phrase match Phrase match type offers some of the versatility of broad match, but gives you a bit more control. Your ad will only appear when a user searches for your key phrase using your keywords in the exact order you enter them, but there might be other words either before or after that phrase. For example, if your key phrase was “pet supplies”, your ad could appear when a user searched for “pet supplies”, “discount pet supplies” or “pet supplies wholesale”, but not for searches like “pet food”, “pet bird supplies” or "painting supplies”. Since the query can contain text before or after your keywords, there is some flexibility, but you are leaving a lot of potential traffic on the table.Exact matchExact match type is the most specific and restrictive of the keyword match types. With this match type, users can only see your ad when they type your exact keyword phrase. For example, if your keyword phrase was “black cocktail dress”, your ad will only appear when a user searches for “black cocktail dress” (those words in that exact order) and not for “cocktail dress”, “black dress” or “expensive black cocktail dress”. On the plus side, users who click on your ad when searching for that exact phrase are more likely to be interested in your product or service, which means more qualified users clicking on your ads and the less money you waste on clicks from uninterested users. On the down side, you will have less traffic as a result of your restrictions, because these more specific search queries (also called long-tail keywords) have lower search volume, so you won’t get as much overall traffic.Negative matchYou can use negative match to prevent your ad from showing to people searching for certain terms. Negative keywords are an especially useful way to filter out irrelevant traffic and prevent unwanted clicks. You can use negative keywords in conjunction with other match types. For example, you could use an exact match negative keyword to prevent your ad from showing to people who searched for that exact keyword. This option is very powerful because it allows you to exclude many searches that are not of interest to you. For example, it is worth it to add the “-free” negative keyword to nearly every Ad Group or campaign, so that your ad is not displayed for people that are looking for something free.All in all, you can expect to get the highest CTR using exact match type, but this will restrict the number of searches on that keyword significantly. Sometimes it is wiser to use exact match, sometimes it’s wiser to use broad or phrase match with lots of negatives. You need to test to see which gets the highest CTR and lowest CPC and pause whichever ads are underperforming.2) Match the text ad to the landing page copy.Using landing pages for your PPC ads will significantly increase the conversion rates and lower your CPC. Your goal is to create a unified experience for the user by matching the ad with the content of your landing page. This will result in lower bounce rates and a higher Quality Score and Ad Rank.What you need to know about Google’s Quality Score. First, it’s a grading system used to determine…if your ad is eligible to be shown in the ads space of the search results,at what position to be shown,how much you'll pay for each click.One of the key factors that influence the Quality Score is the landing page quality and relevance. This means that your visitors must have a great experience when they reach your website and easily find what was promised in the ad.Ideally, you should have unique landing pages for each ad group (keyword theme). This will show Google a straight path from the keyword you’re targeting all the way down to the content on your landing page.Since the Quality Score is influenced by CTR, it’s also helpful to register domains that contain your targeted keywords (e.g. ). This will drive more clicks, which means higher CTR, which would lead to an increased Quality Score.Just keep in mind that when someone clicks on your ad, they will spend roughly 5 seconds on your landing page before deciding whether to read more or leave your site. By writing a super clear headline on your landing page that perfectly aligns with your ad copy, you reassure people that they arrived at the right place to solve their problem. Let’s say that someone is searching for “Yoga retreat in Bali” and your ad copy says “Bali Yoga Retreat 2015?”. In order to leverage that person’s buyer intent, you need to match your landing page with the ad copy:If you fail to align your ad copy with your landing page, people will click the “back” button in no time, because they feel they’ve been deceived. The higher the bounce rate the lower the results. It’s that simple.So, let’s say that:Person A has a big budget and uses broad keywords on their landing pagePerson B has a small budget but uses very targeted keywords (exact match or phrase match)Person A might be paying $2 per click, while Person B is paying 70 cents, so regardless of the huge ad spend, Person A will be outranked by Person A because Person A’s landing page is more targeted, thus more relevant, which gives them a higher Quality Score.So, after someone clicks on your ad, you want them to focus on your core offer and take immediate action. Keep your landing pages to the point – never add more than one clear call-to-action. Don’t bore the reader with a long text they won’t even read. When users get to your landing page, you want them to do one thing only. This is why you need to remove all the navigation and links from your landers to ensure people remain focused on your offer. Make your text easily scannable using bullet points, lists and short paragraphs. You don’t need to write a novel, just continue the promise you made in your PPC ad. Your landing page is the place to pre-sell your visitors by reinforcing the benefits of buying from you or using your product or service. The better targeted your buyer avatar, the greater your chances for conversion and establishing trust with your visitors. Trust is what makes people click to an ad and complete the transaction, whether it’s to signup to your email list, download a free report or make a purchase.How To Create A Campaign On GDNFor many businesses, Google advertising is Search only. But the Google Display Network is a less known opportunity to make even more money. The GDN is a massive network of sites, from to small websites that run Google ads. The basic steps to create a profitable campaign on GDN are:Make a plan, set goals Structure your campaigns and prepare your creatives Run campaigns Evaluate performance Make improvements Example: “With a budget of $500, we want to generate 100 new newsletter signups within 30 days” To get started, go to your AdWords account and click on the “Campaigns” tab. On this page, give a name to your campaign and choose the campaign type “All features”. Choose “Display Network only” and set Location and Languages. In the Billing section, let AdWords set your bids to maximize the amount of clicks you can receive within your budget. Next, enter your daily budget and click Save and continue.Next, on the “Create an ad group” section you will give a name to the ad group you’re creating and decide how you will target your ads. Ad group targeting is one of the biggest decisions that will determine how well you will reach your audience. Google gives you several targeting options to reach your audience in the GDN:Managed Placements – A placement is basically a location where the Display ads are shown. It can be a website, part of the website, a specific video or mobile app. With this option, you give Google a list of websites that you want to show ads on.Contextually (keyword) targeted – Instead of giving Google a list of sites, you provide a list of themes. If you sell watches, so you might choose cars as a theme. You can serve someone your watches ad to someone that’s on a site about cars and only pay if that person clicks on your ic Targeting – Reach users by the main topic of the placement or the audience that visits that placement. All placements on the GDN are categorized by topics which are then matched against your own topic selections. You can give Google a list of topics to find for you all the pages that match your criteria. (Topic: blogs; Show on placements which are blogs)If it's your first time advertising on the DN, it’s recommend that you start with the Contextual targeting. You can change this option in the future. Now click “Save and continue”. Now you'll be able to create your ads. You can choose to create text ads or image ads.Before you start creating ads, look over your current advertising materials and your website. Ideally your ads should contain design elements which can easily be associated with your brand. This will affect how your site and ads are seen and will improve long term brand recognition. Use Remarketing (Retargeting) This is a campaign optimization practice where you advertise specifically to users who visited your site but did not conclude the visit with your expected action (subscribe, buy, call, etc.). For example, you can create a Display campaign which shows ads to users who visited your site, checked out some products, but left without making a purchase. Display is a lot more trial and error than Search advertising and you’ll need to experiment and learn from both successes and mistakes.But all in all, running AdWords campaigns can be extremely effective, if you know what you’re doing. Don’t start with a huge budget, just test the waters at first with $200-$300. Testing is the best way to gain experience and find out the real ad winners for your campaigns. 2. Banner AdvertisingPPC text ads work best for targeting a very specific market with a specific product. But if you want to generate impressions, display ads are far more effective. Banner ads are so effective because of the huge amount of traffic available online. You could place your banner on just about any site in the world, some of which get hundreds of thousands to millions of visitors a day. If you have an offer that converts like crazy for single men in their 30’s and 40’s, then a banner ad on websites like AskMen will easily take your business to the next level. With a smart banner and a clever placement, a well-crafted banner will work much like a TV commercial in grabbing attention. Just take a look at this great banner from Apple. Banner advertising is very easy to get started making money online, so if you’re an affiliate, you can simply pick an offer to promote, select a banner from the vendor’s affiliate toolkit and search for websites where you can post the banner. Or, you can create your own banners and set yourself apart from the rest of the affiliates that run the same offer.So here are the three steps to get you started with banner advertising:1) Pick an offer to promote.Once you find a good offer, go ahead and check out the advertiser’s banners. If you’re just starting out, you might want to begin promoting the offer using their ads and do some testing. Next, you need to get your affiliate link, so when someone clicks on your banner, you’ll be credited for that sale. It’s always best to test a new offer using text ads rather than banner ads. The traffic is cheaper, more targeted and converts better. If you can’t get AdWords to convert, chances are you won’t get banner ads to convert.2) Choose a website for your banner.At first, buy banners in small portions. One easy way to do this is to use Image Ads through Google’s Content Network. Place your banners on sites using AdSense that support image ads and test out your CTR and conversion rate.Then, you can start to buy your first few banner ads. One of the best places to find great sites for your banners is BuySellAds. This is a high quality platform for both site owners and advertisers (like yourself) to manage their ad space and inventory. Basically, you need to place your banner on other sites that are relevant to your offer. You don’t pay per click, you pay per CPM (thousand of impressions) for quality traffic that converts. Let’s say you’re promoting a dog related offer. You can go ahead and search for a relevant site, like the one below:Here you can see the various types of banners accepted by this site, as well as the price for each placement. Before purchasing ad space, you want to make some additional research on the site to determine if it’s going to be a good fit for your offer. Two great sites to collect more data about the site are Quantcast and Alexa. Here you’ll find more info on demographics, keywords, bounce rate, audience location, etc. 3) Create your banner.OK, so by now you have your affiliate link and the site where you want to place your ad. Now it’s time to get your banner created – you can either use the vendor’s default banner or have a custom one made for you (recommended). If you want to create a new banner, you can either go to Fiverr, Elance or 99designs. Fiverr is a good place to start as you’ll find lots of talented designers who will gladly make you a banner for just $5:Now that you have the banner, you need to add the link to your affiliate offer. You can either add the direct link, or, if you’re using a squeeze page between the banner and the sales pages, you’ll need to use your web form link as the Destination URL (e.g. a sign-up form).4) Fine-tune your media buy strategy.Here are some quick tips:finding more targeted sites for your bannersoptimizing the banners for higher click-through-ratesfinding better paying affiliate offers building your own email list At the end of the day, internet marketing is a balance game where you need to keep your EPCs higher than your CPCs. If you do, you’re making a profit. A word of cautionBanner ads aren’t for testing out new offers, they’re for rolling out successful offers. If you have a new offer and you don’t know if it will convert, test it on AdWords. If you have an offer that’s converting like crazy, then scale it with banner ads.3. Webinars Think of a webinar as an online seminar. They provide attendees with virtually the same experience as an in-person seminar, but they aren’t forced to travel to get to your location. People love to learn and webinars are an excellent way to share your wisdom to your readily waiting audience. Combined with an effective social promotion campaign, webinars are a great way to increase traffic to your website. Webinars offer a uniquely personal way to provide information to current and potential clients. It’s a form of face-to-face communication, even if you and your attendees are separated by hundreds or even thousands of km. That personal connection cannot be found through email marketing, e-newsletters, social media or e-book creation. Social media comes close, although it requires a longer time to form a personal bond on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn. That’s the primary benefit – the immediacy of the bond. A second benefit to using webinars is that it’s a great way to add authority to your business, stand out from the crowd and build your own brand, whether you’re a product creator or an affiliate marketer.Webinars are an excellent way to bring current clients together for a question and answer session when it’s not possible to do so anywhere else.How To Conduct A WebinarYou will need: A high-speed Internet connectionA good computerA microphone, headset and a webcam A webinar software Don’t use the mic built into your laptop. You need to provide good audio quality throughout the webinar, otherwise it’s only going to annoy people. You can buy a decent headset/mic combo with less than $50.You can choose between several different webinar services: GoToWebinarClickWebinarEasyWebinarEvergreenBusinessSystemGoogle HangoutsOnce you’ve got all your equipment together, you need to get comfortable using it. That means practicing.It’s natural to be nervous about conducting a webinar, particularly if you’ve never been much for public speaking. Practicing before you start can put you at your ease. A little practice is all that’s needed to familiarize yourself with your equipment, your webinar software and public speaking. Perhaps the best way to practice for a webinar is to conduct several mock events. Get a few family members or friends to help you practice. Go through the entire process from sending out invitations to setting up a time for the webinar in your software.GoToWebinar lets you schedule your event via the online user interface just like you would if you were going to speak to real clients. Also, this tool allows you to set up private practice sessions. You can practice as many times as you like, and it’s recommended that you do, until you’re familiar with all the controls, equipment and options you’ll need to use during a real event. It’s also a good idea to practice both on your own and with an audience so you can get used to speaking to more than one person at a time. This is particularly important for answering questions. Webinars are not one-way streets – they’re interactive and allow your audience members to interact with you if they have a mic. Have your friends or family members ask questions and interrupt you while you’re speaking so you can become familiar with how a real webinar might work.Preparing for your webinar isn’t as difficult as you might fear. While there are several steps you’ll need to follow, they’re not particularly complex or difficult. Here are the steps to conduct a webinar: 1) Choose your webinar software. Again, GoToWebinar is an excellent choice because it offers powerful performance, the ability to try it for 30 days before you buy it, private practice sessions and more.Image source2) Choose a topic for your webinar. It’s important that you have an overall goal to achieve here, or you risk your event turning into a rambling monologue that offers little to no value for attendees. The topic shouldn’t be difficult to determine – it might be a presentation on a hot topic in your niche, a burning question from a reader, or simply a trend you want to share with your audience.3) Tailor every aspect of the event to your audience’s perspective. This might sound difficult, but if you put yourself in your client’s or prospective client’s shoes, it should become easier. If you were in their position, what would you want to know about the topic of discussion? What would be the most pressing areas of interest? Think of all the ways in which you could answer these questions and provide a sound education, as well as demonstrate your authority and knowledge.4) Get your materials together. A webinar is both an audio and visual experience, so use that to your advantage. You can use video, slides, graphs and charts, audio recordings and virtually anything else you need to provide your audience with the best learning experience.5) Test your equipment before the webinar. Equipment failure does happen – test your equipment a day before the event to prevent any unexpected surprises. You should also do a dry run through your material to ensure that you’re comfortable speaking on all the topics and that you have all the materials and information you’ll need.6) Go live!Every person has a different style, a unique way of conducting their presentation. The way you conduct your webinars might vary wildly from how another person would do it. This is one reason why practice and preparation are so very vital – this gives you a chance to not only get more comfortable with the platform, but to determine what style works best for you. However, despite all the myriad differences in how a webinar is conducted, there are many similarities as well. Here’s a list of the main components in conducting a webinar:Promote your event and invite attendees. Once your audience is online and ready, welcome everyone to the webinar.Ask for introductions and make sure to introduce yourself. Begin your presentation.Somewhere in the middle, pause for questions.Conclude your presentation.Take questions from the audience.Now, these steps will vary considerably depending on the size of your audience, the length of your webinar, whether you’re the only speaker or if you have a guest(s), but it should give you a rough idea of what’s ahead of you. As you become more experienced, you’ll create your own templates that best fit your content and business.Record The Webinar And Repurpose The ContentThis is where the real magic happens: content repurposing. Your webinar is not a once-and-done kind of thing. If you record it, you can reuse the content later for any number of different purposes. For example, if you record your webinar, you can edit it into relevant chunks to use as video blog posts (vlogs), or you might upload it as a mini-series to YouTube. You might create an education section on your website and add relevant webinar chunks as individual lessons or as a series of videos for your clients or prospective clients. Video is incredibly powerful and it works to both attract search engines and offer very real value to your audience. You can also get the audio transcribed and developed into a workbook and sold as a training pack, which can also include an up-sell offer. Or, you can take the transcription, tweak it and make it a LinkedIn or blog post.You can also strip the audio and turn the file into a podcast. There are so many things you can do with a webinar, once it’s recorded. Repurposing your content should be a fun and creative process that will not only diversify your content, but also save you lots of money in the long run. So webinars can help you to attract qualified leads to your site, tighten the connections with your audience and then repurpose the content into various formats and share them on multiple platforms.4. YouTubeThink of Youtube as a highway to share your content and a great way to funnel that traffic back to your site. Just remember that Youtube is owned by Google so it’s definitely possible that the YouTube search algorithm has something to do with search results ranking.So how are videos ranked on YouTube? Well, unlike what most people might assume, videos are not ranked primarily by view count, but by watch time. So the videos that lead to a longer watch time will rank higher than those that get more clicks. Basically, this means that when a user searches for a video on YouTube, the longer they watch that video, the higher it will rank in the search results for a similar search query next time. So, the more engaging and “shareable” your video is, the more people will watch it and will appear higher in the search listings. Based on these considerations, follow these next steps to fine-tune your YouTube channel:1) Entertain your audience.This may seem like a no-brainer, but you wouldn’t believe how many online marketers fail on this one. Youtube gives you the unique opportunity to state your case in a natural and straightforward manner, which is video, so make the most of it. Make your videos engaging, even if you’re creating instructional content. Funny and inspirational videos will help your brand stay on top of people’s mind and make them want to tell their friends about you. The more inspiring your videos are, the more views, shares and responses you get. Once Youtube detects action around your video, that video has greater potential of getting featured, which will throw your traffic through the roof. Plus, the more videos you share, the more love you get from Youtube and your subscribers. 2) Tag your videos.Tagging is the first step to properly ranking your video in YouTube search results. Here’s how to do it like a pro:Include your brand-specific tags (you want to rank for your own brand / business name in the search results using different variations like: “brand name”, “brandname” or “”)Use your competitor’s videos to draw tagging inspiration from their best ranking videos Search for more keywords. Check out this cool keyword tool or use YouTube’s auto-suggest to find more tag ideas. You can even add your keyword and then add various letters just to see what may come up.When adding tags to your videos, insert them in quotations – this trick will make them even more relevant for people who are using specific keywords in their search queries.Add tags that best describe your video to make sure it gets as many views as possible when people are searching for specific keywords. 3) Optimize your descriptions.Writing good headlines and optimizing your video descriptions can have a huge impact on the number of views you can get. Make it easy for people to find your videos, so add relevant keywords in your description. Youtube is the second largest search engine in the world, so you’ll have much greater chances to rank inside Youtube than in Google.Youtube uses the text and keywords in your description to determine what your video is about and whether it’s relevant for users when they type in certain keywords. Write your description just as you would normally write a blog post. Briefly describe what’s inside your video and why people should spend their time watching it. Also, don’t forget to add your URL at the top of the description area – make it clickable by using the format ) Create annotations.Annotations are bits of text you can add as overlays to your video to…link to other videos invite people to subscribe to your channellink a video to your playlists or channels encourage comments and feedbackturn your video into an interactive game (check out this cool example)Here’s another creative example of a video that highlights the features of the brand in a fun, engaging way.Here’s how to add your annotations:Upload your video on YouTube.Head over to view the video on its YouTube page. Click “Edit annotations” at the top of the page and you will get to the YouTube Annotations Editor.Start adding all types of annotations, such as speech bubbles, notes, spotlights and pause annotationsUsing annotations is a great way to increase views to related videos and get even more subscribers to your channel. Annotations tell people to check out similar videos if they enjoyed the one they've just watched, which can virtually keep them watching your videos for hours. Check out this fun tutorial on how to use annotations effectively to promote your business. For more information, check out YouTube's instructions for creating annotations.5) Prettify your YouTube channel.You can add more love to your Youtube channel by adding a nice-looking background. You can either get a professional one made at or get one for free at . How To Exponentially Grow Your Results Geometric growth is a very powerful concept and once you understand it, you’ll be able to dramatically increase your Youtube results. Unlike linear growth, where you just focus on bringing in new leads, geometric growth is about leveraging your existing audience by focusing on follow-up, repeat sales and increased price points. Now, let’s apply this concept to your Youtube marketing strategy and grow your results exponentially. Here are four metrics, that when used together can skyrocket your results:number of viewsnumber of videosconversion of traffic from YouTube to your website conversion from web traffic to email subscribersIf you can find ways to gradually increase each of these numbers, you will achieve massive results in the long-run. Let’s assume that, on average, you get 100 new views per video every month and you upload 10 videos per month. This means that each month you get 1,000 views on your videos. Now, if you convince 20% of your YouTube viewers to visit your website, then your traffic from YouTube will be around 200 visits each month. Next, if you can get 30% of those 200 visitors to subscribe to your newsletter, you will have accumulated 60 new subscribers during that month.If you can increase each of these numbers by just 20%, you’ll manage to get an amazing number of new subscribers for that month. So here are the steps to help you achieve this level of growth for your Youtube traffic:1) Increase the number of views.Here are some effective ideas to make both the search engines and Youtube users happy:Optimize your video title Optimize your video descriptionOptimize your tags Add comments to other people’s channels and videos to get backlinks back to your channel Find a joint venture partner and combine efforts 2) Increase the number of videos.The more videos you upload, the more views you will have, and the faster you can build your reputation. Ideally, you should submit new videos 2-3 times per week. By simply posting new content on a consistent basis, you will literally crush your competition. The more content you share, the higher your rankings will be both in YouTube and Google.3) Increase your conversion from Youtube views to website traffic.Now it’s time to convert your Youtube views into steady website visitors. This is the best way to actually get to own the traffic you get from YouTube and turn it into a solid pool of leads. You can do this in a number of ways:Make it easy for people to come to your site by simply placing your URL at the top of the description area. Create a “bribe” for people to visit your site (you can either offer a free report, or promise people to answer their questions on your blog, etc).Place your URL inside your videos (like a stamp), so when people embed your video on their site, your URL will still be there, visible and accessible. Here is a cool example:source4) Increase the conversion from visitors to email subscribers.Your main goal here is to turn those YouTube views into loyal email subscribers. Why? Because the real money to be made are in the follow-up and the backend of your sales funnel. Here are a few suggestions:Use a simple opt-in form and put it at the top of your site, on each of your pages.Test how people are using your site with a service like CrazyEgg and make your decision based on that.Use a pop-up form (SumoMe has a great free offer) to make it really for people to join your list.Use a list building bar (the same SumoMe cool and free tool) to keep your newsletter on top of peoples mind. Use persuasive copywriting in your titles, in your calls to action, buttons, etc.By making small changes in all these areas, you will be amazed by how fast your Youtube traffic will grow over time. 5. Podcasting Podcasting is not new, it’s been around for some time now, but it’s making its comeback very fast. Just last year alone, podcasting has exploded into a huge traffic source and paved the way for new branding and monetization opportunities. Last year, mobile traffic has surpassed desktop traffic, which opens up a whole range of opportunities for every online marketer looking to reach out to new territory and engage with their audience on a more personal level. This is where podcasting comes in. In fact, audio is the easiest way to create content, share it and have people download it and consume it at their own convenience. Someone might open their podcast feeder and pick a show to run in the background while they get out for a walk, while others might listen to a show while cooking, cleaning the house, commuting to work or just laying back and relaxing on a Sunday afternoon.Plus, there is a great difference between a podcast listener and a web content reader. A web content reader is looking for a specific topic, whereas a podcast listener simply loves podcasts. These are the people who will listen to your show during their commute because they find it inspiring and captivating. Here’s Why Podcasts Are On The Rise In Edison’s recent “Share of Ear” study, shows that almost 2% of the total time spent listening to audio content is devoted to podcast listening, which on a grand scale means about 30 million users on any given day. That’s pretty much 15% percent of Americans! Another interesting finding from the study is that podcast consumers listen to an average of six podcasts per week. Now this is a lot time devoted to podcasts! The future is bright and podcasts will continue to spread like wildfire, as driven by the rise of smartphones and the Internet-connected cars and soon there will be podcasts in everybody’s car, because they are free and easy to listen to. You’ve probably heard of some big names like John Lee Dumas, Joe Polish, Pat Flynn and Lewis Howes. And the reason they’re so wildly successful is because they’ve put podcasting at the heart of their business. For example, John Lee Dumas, founder of the popular daily podcast Entrepreneur On Fire, is reaping huge benefits from podcasting. His show was featured in Best of iTunes in 2013 with 7.4 million downloads and 829,000 unique listens in June and subscribers in 145 countries. With over 860 episodes, the show brings in successful entrepreneurs like Brian Tracy Tim Ferriss, Seth Godin and Pat Flynn and last year alone, his gross profit was $446,000, achieving his first month of $100K net revenue in December. What About Ranting Without A Cause?Yes, a typical blog post requires a structure and visual cues like bullet points, sub-headers that will break the text into smaller, scannable chunks. While you can’t have these in a podcast, you can still use a structure like a mindmap or just a simple outline that will carry your message through to your listeners. A well-written script assures your podcast to be sharper and important details won't be left out. However, due to the more personal feel of a podcast, you can make small digressions to incorporate stories or give more context to your message. The great benefit of podcasting is that you are quite literally inside your listener’s head – they can hear your voice and feel like they actually know you. This level of personalization is a huge advantage over a typical blog post, where the tone may be pretty neutral and formal, especially for a business blog. How To Get Started With Your PodcastOnce you’ve decided to give this a try, it’s time to get ready to record your first episode. Here are the basic steps of creating a podcast: Record audioExport the file as .MP3 Upload the podcast Create a Feed Publish the podcastLet’s examine each step in more detail:1) Planning First, you come up with an actual outline for your podcast. Why are you doing this? State your mission and then create a script for your first episode. It’s always easier to record your podcast by trying and speak off the top of your head without any script, but you might find yourself losing focus and sometimes missing key points. So you might want to try writing a detailed outline of what you want to say before you start recording. This way you know exactly what you want to cover and can ensure there’s nothing that you miss out. This will also help you keep some form of flow and structure to the recording, as well. One downside to this approach though is that it is slower and you do run the risk of sounding like the TV anchorman…. To prevent this from happening, don’t be afraid to speak freely at times and then get back to your next thing on the list. 2) Production Next, decide on the more technical aspects like picking the tools, software, intros, editing, etc. The key elements of producing a podcast are:Intro / OutroIf you’ve listened to any podcasts, you’ll know that most of them have some sort of intro / outro music. Having these makes your recording sound a little more professional and shows new listeners that you’ve actually put some care into the production of what you’re doing. You can easily hire someone on Fiverr to get these done for you – just search for “podcast intro music” and you’ll get lots of results. Record the episode All you need is a computer, headset and a microphone. There are many mics out there, but the Blue Yeti USB microphone is highly recommended by most podcasters. A more affordable option is the Samson Go Mic USB microphone. Also, if you’re recording content using your smartphone, then the Rode lavelier microphone will give you higher quality, whether it’s for audio-only or in-person & Skype calls. On the software front, you’ll want to have an audio editing and recording program. For Windows users, check out Audacity (Free). For OS X users, GarageBand comes pre-installed on all Mac computers. If you’re doing an interview and want to share that as a podcast, there’s a software called Pamela for Skype that you can use. Basically, you start the Skype call, hit the “Record” button and it records exactly what Skype is hearing you and the other person. The free version records up to 15 minutes and the paid version offers unlimited recording time (you get 30 day free trial for both Professional and Business plans).Save the MP3 and embed image Once you’ve finished recording, it’s time to save it as an MP3 file. This is easily done with Audacity, which is basically an audio editor and recorder (for both Mac and Windows).You can also use a program called ID3 Editor to edit the metadata of your MP3 file and embed an image into the MP3. This image is what will show in iTunes as the cover graphic of your MP3s when playing them. Automate the editing & publishing processIf you don’t want to handle any kind of editing and publishing, you can use a service like Auphonic. They will take your recording, balance the levels, add metadata and chapter marks and then distribute it to YouTube, Amazon S3, Spreaker, Libsyn and SoundCloud. If you want to upload the file to iTunes, you can just take the edited file and upload it yourself. 3) DistributionNow that you have a great MP3 and you are ready to share it with the world as a podcast, you need to create an RSS Feed for your podcast. RSS means “Really Simple Syndication” and an RSS feed is an xml-formatted document that allows you to deliver your latest podcast shows regularly to your audience. By subscribing to your RSS Feed, listeners are able to stay in touch with you and get notifications about your most recent episodes without having to check for updates every day. They can receive your updates via a special podcast app or a news reader like Feedly.So, in order to publish your podcast to iTunes, you must have a RSS feed URL and give that RSS feed to iTunes. The easiest way to get a RSS feed for your podcast is to use this PowerPress plugin for WordPress.Once you have the RSS URL, you need to verify that your feed is valid. Go to the FEED Validator and past your RSS URL into the input box. Upload your podcast to iTunesAfter verifying your feed, open your feed in iTunes. This is like the ultimate test for your feed. Go to the “File” menu in iTunes and select the “Subscribe to Podcast” option. Paste the URL of the link in the dialog box and click “OK”.Next, you’re going to submit your podcast to the iTunes Store. Open iTunes (if it isn't already open) and click the “iTunes Store” in the upper side of the screen. Next, click on the “View” tab and select the click on the “Podcasts” section (or click CTRL+4 for Windows). Now you’ll see a small link on the right sidebar giving you the option to “Submit Your Podcast”: You’ll then be asked to provide your RSS URL, which iTunes will rely on to make sure the information is correct. Next, you’ll go through a manual review process before being approved into the store. This shouldn’t take too long to see your podcast live, once you’ve submitted it. As far as making any changes to the podcast RSS feed go, your changes will usually reflect in iTunes within a few hours.4) Promotion Now that your podcast is up and live, you need to add a description. In iTunes, you can have up to 4000 characters to describe your show. Your copy should be engaging and descriptive, but also include several keywords that you’d like to target in iTunes as well. When first launching your podcast, it’s best to have a few episodes recorded, so you can release all of them at the same time. This will help with gaining new subscribers, grabbing the attention of the iTunes team and allowing your audience to listen to more than just one episode when you are first starting out. The first eight weeks of your podcast are the most important because this is when you get a shot at ranking in the “New & Noteworthy” section of iTunes, which can bring massive and free exposure to your podcast. How Podcasting Can Grow Your Email ListNow it’s time to move people from your podcast to your email list. This is how you really begin to monetize your podcast. Think of it as the front-end of your sales funnel, where you get people from just finding out about you, all the way down to buying from you. Another huge benefit of a podcast is that now you get your listeners’ permission to follow up with them and tell them something like, “Hey, we’ve got these shows that are coming out every week. If you’d like to listen to them, subscribe to our podcast. Here’s the link.” The email list is still where businesses make most of their money, that’s why you need to add a call-to-action into each episode. The way you can do that is to create an incentive and mention it at the beginning, in the middle and definitely at the end of each show. You can easily give your listeners a link to go to and sign up for that free incentive right away. If they accept, they’re qualified leads by the time they’re entering their email on that page and your landing page will get a very high conversion rate because of that.This is how you can use your podcast to pre-sell. Once you get your listeners on an email list, you can grow that relationship up to the point where you can send them higher and higher ticket offers. Here is a great WordPress plugin that will help you build your email list easily and elegantly.But remember, at the end of the day, podcasting is still just another avenue for sharing your content and by publishing your show on iTunes alone won’t make you rich or successful overnight. Focus on creating content that you yourself would want to listen to and find the right balance between story-telling and value-delivering. This will help you a solid following around your brand and make people come back for more. Also, check out this huge list from Mashable with over 70 tools and resources for podcasters. 6. E-books E-books have become a vital component of any sustainable marketing strategy, whether you’re selling your own product or promoting affiliate offers. In this section, you will learn two effective ways you can use e-books to drive traffic to your website and grow your business.Publishing Kindle Books Kindle publishing is one of the easiest ways to sell your content and pre-sell on higher ticket offers, even if you’ve never written anything before and are totally new to online publishing. Here are the five steps to start making money with Kindle books and funnel spoke of Amazon’s traffic back to your website: 1) Find a niche topic to write on. You want to pick something you’re interested in and that’s also in demand – with not too much competition. Check out Amazon’s diverse categories to get a feel of the market. Remember, your goal is not to compete against the giants in the bigger categories, but to focus on the smaller sub-categories inside Kindle Books. This way, you’ll have far greater chances of selling your books and dealing with far less competition. For example, you don’t just want to enter the “Health” niche, when you can drill down to “Health, Fitness & Dieting” -> “Nutrition”-> “Vitamins & Supplements”: 2) Pick the best keywords.Choose 5-7 keywords you want to rank on Amazon. You can either do a quick search on Amazon or use Google’s Keyword Planner to pick your keywords: By searching inside Amazon, you’ll find many different topics that people are looking for. And if you start adding the alphabet after the space, you’ll get even more interesting suggestions for popular searches.3) Write the book.You can either write the book yourself, or hire a freelancer to do it for you. There are plenty of freelance websites where you can find great help, including Elance, oDesk or iWriter. Regarding research, Google is your friend! You’ll find lots of interesting information on any imaginable topic. You can search on websites, blogs, article directories, online libraries, magazines, interview, TV shows, etc. When you’ve finished writing your book, you’ll need to give it a nice looking and attention-grabbing cover. Here are a few places to find help: Fiverr, 99designs or Amazon's CreateSpace. If you’re using freelancers, make sure to send them examples of high quality book covers and ask them to create something similar for you. 4) Publish your book.Now that you’ve written the book and created a nice cover, it’s time to join Amazon’s Kindle Publishing program and set up your profile. Next, you need to format your document for Kindle. Here is how to do it:PC users: users: submitting the book to Amazon, you can list it in two categories. So, you can choose the broad or parent directory (e.g. Health, Fitness and Dieting) and a smaller category (e.g. Vitamins & Supplements). 5) Promote the book.Now it’s time to create a branding and promotion system using as many tools as possible. First, set up a Facebook Page, a blog (using your pen name) and an autoresponder account, such as GetResponse, Aweber or MailChimp. Once your first book is published, all you need to do is repeat the process for your second book. Other platforms for publishing e-books include:Nook Press – There is a lower reach and the royalty rates are also lower compared to Kindle. The authors receive 65% royalty (for e-books priced $2.99 – 9.99) and 40% royalty (for e-books higher than 9.99.iBooks Authors – This platform is for book sales through Apple’s iBook store only, so the reach is a bit lower. But its very good for image-rich interactive books (photography, children’s books, recipes, etc.), which are difficult to upload using Amazon’s KDP. The royalty rate is 70% throughout.Smashwords – This is a great distribution channel and one the largest sellers of self-published e-books. Smashwords pays 85% royalty on e-books sold through its website and 70% for those sold through other bookstores.Kobo Writing Life (KWL) – Kobo has its own reading devices, global bookstores and they have a deal with the top indie bookstores in the US allowing self-publishing authors to sell their e-books from their stores. Kobo offers authors a 70% royalty rate ($2.99 and above) and 45% royalty (below $2.99).Build Your E-Mail List With Kindle BooksNow, let’s see how you can grow your email list using Kindle books. Ideally each book should address a specific issue or problem inside a micro-niche. Solve a specific problemPeople often see Kindle books as quick “knowledge pills” that they can buy in order to get access a very specific solution to their problem. So pack your book with clear, actionable content that adds real value to people’s lives.The more specific you get, the more irreplaceable your content becomes and the stronger the connection you can make with your audience. You want to gain their trust right from the first book, so you can market to them via email over and over again.Write a compelling product descriptionGive people a strong enough reason to care about your book and, more importantly, see it as the best solution to their problem. You can create an eye-catchy description for your book using HTML tags. These will allow you to turn a boring text description into a pretty, formatted description. All you need to do is simply write the description and click the “Generate” button in the KDP Amazon HTML Editor and Amazon KDP will generate a great looking description:Include a free bonus With every new book, offer a free bonus e.g. (video tutorial, email course, exclusive webinar, etc.) to encourage people to buy your book. You can mention the free bonus in the preview section of the book and tell people that the link to the bonus is at the end of the book. Remember, the bonus should complement your main offer and give people real value for their money. No matter which format you choose for the bonus (video, audio, worksheets, etc), the content should be compelling and relevant to your book.Now, not all those who’ll find your book on Amazon will buy it. But you can still “save” these leads from being lost by inviting them to join your email list right off the bat. Here’s a great example of an author inviting people to join his email list:Include the sign up link at the beginning of the book, so it’s visible in the preview. So even if they don’t buy the book right away, they are now on your email list and you can contact them later with a new reminder about your book and even offer them additional products and services.Keep your readers entertainedAs you are growing your email list through Kindle books, you need to focus on nurturing your subscribers with regular emails packed with valuable, entertaining content. If your readers are happy with your content, they are more likely to stick with you and buy your future Kindle books as well.Keep your readers engaged by launching a series of books that connect to one another and entice them to buy more. Here’s a great example of book series:For example, if you’re looking to grow an email list in the dating niche, you can focus each book on solving a very specific issue (e.g. how to be funny on the first date, how to spark curiosity in your date, how to avoid falling into the “friend zone”, etc.). Your goal is to create multiple books that tie in to one another and keep people coming back for more.7. Amazon Product AdsAnother way to funnel traffic from Amazon to your website is to use Amazon Product Ads. With APA, you can promote your offer by placing your ads on various product pages. This type of ads guarantee a very good targeting because if someone checks out a product similar to yours, your ad is going to appear on that particular page and catch their interest. Amazon Ads is a very good way to sell your affiliate offers, given the vast stream of niches, sub-niches and products hosted by Amazon. Similar to Google Product listing ads, you only pay when a user clicks on your add. The setup process is very simple – simply upload your product catalog and set your budget. Amazon creates ads automatically for your products using the information you provide and customers searching for similar products will see your ads.Image sourceAmazon Product Ads enable you (as an affiliate) to drive people directly to your site using a CPC bidding model. Unlike listing your offer directly on the marketplace, with Product Ads you can redirect potential buyers to the seller’s site, where the transaction takes place. You can also retarget users who’ve clicked on your ads through e-mail or retargeting campaigns in the Google Display Network with similar or upsell products.To create your Amazon Product Ads, you’ll need to provide the following information: Product categoryTitleA unique SKU for each productA URL for the associated product page on your website An imageA product price You’ll also need to write a description that provides customers with detailed information about the product, including key features. As a result, people are able to make better buying decisions, which qualifies the traffic clicking through to your offer. You can also add up to five keywords for each product you advertise. Put yourself in your customers’ shoes and use the same terms that are popular on your website or in your PPC campaigns. There’s a 50-character limit on a single keyword, so shorter single keywords rather than phrases are more suitable for this section. Here is a detailed template to help you create your product feed. After the upload, you can go see your listings in the manage inventory page and set your category bids. Make sure you utilize every possible field in the Feed template. The more fields you use, the better it is for you. Hopefully, you can see just how powerful Amazon can be in driving traffic to your site, email list or any other platform. The key is knowing your market, seeing what sells best and offering more of the same, while building your list of subscribers at the same time. 8. Mobile WebThere is a huge shift going on today from desktop to mobile and you too need to make your business mobile-friendly. Having a mobile-optimized web is no longer a luxury, it’s a must. Smartphones have become indispensable for most people and are used everyday for research, news, entertainment, shopping, sharing and networking. Think about it – mobile devices are always on and always connected. Most people leave their phones always on, which totally shifts buyer behavior and impulsive shopping. People love mobile sites and are more likely to remember you for your simple and responsive mobile design and a positive user experience means repeat business. The main difference between desktop and mobile is that:desktop searches are more focused on research and data gatheringmobile searches are done when people are ready to buyAlso, a mobile site helps you rank higher in Google, as well. Google has a separate index for mobile content and it hasn’t been filled up yet. Having a mobile site can help you to rank higher in the SERPs and outrank companies that don't have a mobile presence.Keep in mind the biggest difference between desktop and mobile: immediacy. Mobile is focused on the now, on quick results – so keep your mobile copy short and to the point. A landing page on mobile can be a simple question that takes the user to your offer.Here are two effective ways to promote your business on mobile: QR codes and mobile apps.Promote Your Business With QR CodesQR codes are everywhere, from the back of cereal boxes sold in big box stores to kiosk ads and even tabletop ads in restaurants. Basically, a QR code is a computer-generated image with an embedded code with your desired URL, like a bar code. They can be coloured, or feature unique designs to make them stand out, but their primary use is as a vehicle for computer code. Image sourcePeople can scan your QR code with a QR code reader app on their smartphone and they are sent to a specific landing page. That page can be anything you want – your homepage, an offer for a free report, your Facebook page, etc.Here are some free QR code generators that help you create your own customized codes:KAYWAQR Code You can print them on anything, including postcards, brochures, flyers, business cards, product packaging, book covers and much more, which makes them priceless for your mobile marketing strategy. Mobilize Your Business With AppsThe other way to funnel mobile traffic is to develop your own mobile app. You’re definitely familiar with them, from games to research, news, utility and social media apps. Your app should deliver value to your customers and something that’s relevant to your business. The features you include in the app should empower the user, but also state your position in your niche. WatchVille is a great example of a mobile app – it is both a utility app and a news aggregator that serves the latest news from the luxury watch industry.Developing your own mobile app is lot like the process of web design. You need to have a vision for your site, identify the core functionalities and then communicate your specs to your developer. After app testing, distribute it (or have the developer distribute it) to the various app stores available.They key to a successful app is to provide something that users will enjoy and find value in. The features you include in the app should empower the user and communicate your position in your niche. This keeps your brand in the user’s mind without any need for direct selling.8. Retargeting AdsA retargeting campaign allows you to show your ads to past visitors and customize those ads based on the pages and products they visited. For example, if a visitor abandoned the shopping cart right after calculating shipping costs, you can show them ads that offer free shipping if they complete their order within the first 24 hours. Image sourceStatistics show that most websites have very low conversion rates and over 97% of their visitors leave the site without converting (e.g. subscribing to an email list, downloading a free offer, buying something, etc.). This is OK, because many visitors, especially the new ones, are not ready to engage with your site or buy something from you right away. They are in the early buying stages and are checking you out and comparing you with your competition. By using retargeting you can get many of those visitors back and eventually convert them into customers. Let’s say you need a new lamp for your home office. You go to , but you can't quite find what you're looking for, so you keep browsing. During the next few days you start seeing LampsPlus ads all over the internet and you’re thinking, these guys must be spending loads of advertising dollars to show their ads wherever I go online. Well no. They are just running retargeting ads. Setting Up A Google Display Retargeting CampaignRetargeting works by placing a tracking pixel on your website, which drops a cookie on the visitor’s browser. Then, you can use retargeting networks like Retargeter, AdRoll or the Google Display Network to serve ads to these past visitors as they surf the web on a regular basis. Here is how you can create a retargeting campaign using AdWords: 1) Go to your AdWords account and create a new campaign. Click on the “+New Campaign” tab and choose “Display Network only” as the campaign type. 2) Select the “Remarketing” button on the right.3) Name your campaign “Retargeting”. Next, enter your bidding option and budget. Click “Save and continue”.4) Create an ad group, named “Homepage” and enter the bid for this ad group.5) On the Remarketing lists, add the “All Visitors” list to your ad group. Click “Save and continue”.5) Go to the "Audiences" tab. You can find it under the Shared library tab on the down left side of the page. 6) Click "Audiences" to start building your audience. When you’re done, click Save.7) Insert the new tag and create your image ads. Now, as people visit your website and get the cookies dropped in their browser, your Audiences list will start to grow and more and more users will start seeing your ads on the web. Setting A Retargeting Campaign On Facebook Another great way to “hook” your past visitors is through Facebook. Why? Because 1.4 billion people are already using it, plus it gives you huge targeting capabilities. The possibilities are endless! You can target:People who have visited certain pages on your site (usually a landing page).Users who visited certain sections of your site, but did not complete a desired action (e.g. newsletter signup, purchase, etc.)People who have converted in some way and send them a Thank-You or welcome message.Buyers with up-selling offers.Creating this level of targeting is easy, thanks to the Web Custom Audiences feature in Power Editor. The process is simple. First, you need to install a piece of code on your page and when someone visits that page, the cookie will be dropped on their browser. Later, when they log in to Facebook, these users will be added to your Custom Audience list:Image sourceOnce your Custom Audience is created, you can start running a Facebook campaign and simply select the desired Custom Audiences. You can add site visitors, email subscribers or even your existing Facebook fans. You can also exclude Custom Audiences (same idea as with negative keywords in AdWords). This is particularly useful if you want to laser target your audience. For example, you can show your ad to only those people who visited a product page and excluding those users who made a purchase and got to the Thank-You. A great way to use Facebook retargeting is to target a large group of people with precise Interests and then use Custom Audiences to exclude those who are already email subscribers or buyers, to help you reach a more responsive audience and use your budget more effectively. Facebook retargeting is a great way to reach those people who are on the fence and help them decide a lot faster. It may seem like a lot of work, but once your Custom Audience has been created (you can create up to 200 lists), you can use these lists over and over again. Not to mention the boost in conversion rates, which is huge!As you can see, mobile is the new black in internet marketing and now it’s the best time to adopt it and scale your business. You want to make it as easy as possible for your consumers to reach your content and engage with you on the go. Chapter SummaryIn this chapter you’ve learned how to…Setup an AdWords campaign and structure your account.Set up budgeting, write ad copy and optimize a PPC campaign.Create a campaign in Google Display Network.Promote offers using banner media ads.Tighten the connection with your customers through webinars.Setup and optimize your Youtube videos and grow your results exponentially.Use podcasting to build your email list and authority. Use Kindle books to grow your mail list with free bonuses.Use Amazon product ads.Funnel mobile traffic to your offers using QR codes and mobile aps.Set up a retargeting campaign using Google Display and Facebook.Final Thoughts In order to scale and automate your business you need to systematize your entire work process. Think about it: if you follow the footsteps of a millionaire, what will that make you? Every single time the answer is: a millionaire. Isn’t that amazing? A system creates predictability in your business and helps you focus on the key areas of your operations that you enjoy most. Your goal is to automate as much of your business as possible and leverage all the tools available to you, and most importantly, your time. Leverage Systems To Automate Your BusinessSystems will allow you to save time, money and invest your energy into those areas of the business that you enjoy most. When you run repetitive tasks on autopilot, you earn more time to focus on scaling your business and making even more money: Image source The three most important parts of any business are: traffic, conversions (sales) and relationships. Here are some tips to help you systematize them: 1) Automate traffic & lead generation. Most people go to Google and paste in their questions or keywords. This is where it all starts. If they are able to find you there, you might get a visitor and possibly a repeat business. Once you setup your website for search traffic, it will pretty much run smooth in the background as you focus your attention on product creation and marketing. 2) Automate the sales process. Whether you have your own product or service, or you promote affiliate offers, you need to have a system that will automate the sales process. This means creating sales pages for people who land on your website from various sources (email list, solo ad, an article, a Slideshare presentation, a Youtube video, etc.). Create the sales page with an up-sell offer (the back-end of your funnel) and set it up to process payments and product delivery. Once you set this up, it will work completely on autopilot and you could wake up richer than the night before! 3) Automate relationships with customers.Once you have people into your system, whether they have bought from you or not, you can automate your communications with them using an autoresponder. Sending them valuable content on an ongoing basis, could double your conversion rate and make you money without needing to pay for traffic or advertising.When your website / business becomes automated, you can afford to go away for a few days without worrying that money will stop pouring in. This is the real freedom all business owners aspire to: minim input and maximum profits. Learn To DelegateTo stay in love with your business, you need to be working on the aspects of your business that you love doing. Now that you have all of these freshly created processes, you need to look for areas that you can outsource. Start with those areas you like the least.For instance, if you’re not good at numbers, hire someone. Or, if you are dealing with customer service issues, and you hate doing it, then stop. Make a list of things you love to do and things you don't and then try to stop doing the things you don't love doing and delegate them to someone else. Running your own business is all about enjoying what you do while being able to enjoy your life with your friends and family. If you try to run all aspects of your business yourself, you will be burned out in no time because you’ll find yourself working all of the time.Think of how cool it would be if you could wake up every day at 9am, spend three hours on your business and be finished with work for the day by noon? Even if you'd rather spend the rest of the day working, you could be running more than one business at a time. The key to long-term success is to create multiple streams of income. It’s so much easier to do that if you outsource. Plus, there are going to be plenty of things that only you can do in your business that you won’t be able to do anything else, in spite of your vast knowledge and talent. Here are five key steps for effective delegation:1) Delegate the entire job. This makes your employee feel responsibility, which increases motivation. 2) Avoid upward delegation. Avoid having your employee asking for help every other step, while working on the tasks that you delegated to them. Do some initial training. 3) Have progress checkpoints. Delegating is not just giving the work to someone else and then forgetting about it. Setup progress checkpoints to make sure your project is headed in the right direction.4) Don’t delegate if you don’t know anything about the task. If you don’t know what it takes to get the job done, then you cannot get it done from others.5) Provide constructive feedback. Review the work done (not the method) and if you’re not happy with the results, don’t immediately take the project back. Continue to work with your staff member and ensure they see the task as their responsibility. As a business owner and entrepreneur, your role is to supervise the whole operation and keep the lines of communication open between you and your team and various team members. Here are three powerful platforms to find external help:Elance. The process is easy – all you need to do is create an account and post your job. Elance provides many tools and features, including a time tracking and through user profile searches. This is also a great way to stay on budget since you indicate your maximum amount and providers bid to work for you.oDesk. Similar to Elance, oDesk has a slightly larger database of freelancers and have the “Work Diary”, which tracks the amount of time contractors spend working on a project.Fivver. Fivver is a cool place where you can find people who share activities they're willing to do for $5: online marketing tasks, web design, advertising, app development, voice overs and much more.Twitter. Twitter is another great resource for finding professionals. All you need to do is tweet about your job and you will instantly get messages from people looking for a job or others who can recommend one.Craigslist. You can use Craigslist to find freelancers in your local area. Now, how do you know if you can afford to delegate? Write down how much you want to earn this year and spend around 20% of that on external support to get you there. The secret lies in planning and acting from where you’re going (your goals and vision), not where you’re coming from. Don’t try to do everything yourself. You already have a full plate, which is why you need to outsource in the first place. Don’t take on tasks just because you can. There are many people who’ve trained for years in specific areas (e.g. coding, web design, app development, etc.) and it would be a waste of time not to hire their services.What’s Next? Congratulations if you’ve made it this far and take action with what you’ve learned from this guide. Keep growing your business and build upon the skills and knowledge you have acquired until now. Well done on making it this far, use all this wealth of information, keep persisting with your plan and I wish you all the best on your journey to a very profitable online business! ................
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