As a new SFIMG affiliate in 2003, I sent a press release to a dozen Southside Virginia small town newspapers, thinking to focus on school fund raising ideas. (SFIMG products are nutritionals, home maintenance supplies, pet care products, and internet access products.)
I've found three WORKING affiliates so far.
Earlier, as a Realtor in Birmingham, Alabama, I placed my office telephone number on my car doors...got a serious sale...and several prospects.
Now, about online marketing...
1) BUY a quality product for starters. Check out the testimonials, use the product, study the affiliate marketing materials. Add new materials for your affiliates regularly.monthly. Attract SUPER AFFILIATES....reward them..an additional 10% will work.
Find one free viral and brandable product to give away for starters. Add others later.
Here are three super products. I checked www.google.com this morning....more than 20 million freebies!! Find others to use in your business..
Download a free copy of James Maddux' SECRETS MY MOM NEVER TOLD ME at google.
SECRETS is loaded! More than 200 pages of quality content on traffic building and marketing. Brand it....and pass it on.
Jimmy Brown's ouvre exhales quality! Jimmy seems to have begun his 'net business by creating viral tutorials in the mid '90's. One of his older goodies is THE SCIENTIFIC, MATHEMATIC, THIS-IS-WHAT-EINSTEIN-WOULD-HAVE-DONE APPROACH TO EARNING MONTHLY INCOME ON THE WEB. You can't help getting caught up in the simple explanation of a profitable 'Net strategy. Jim writes like this title all the time.....the common made uncommon. Share Jimmy.
Harvey Segal has built an internet empire creating TIPS ....101 Super Tips, Ad Tracking Supertips, Viral Marketing Super Tips, Forum Super Tips, Click Bank Vender Supertips. Brand Harvey's books with your information and give them away. Harvey's books are twenty-five, thirty pages long.
2) create a pop-up content tips library the EASY way. Take your first article, and turn it into tips.....put the tips in your autoresponder and offer them to e-zine publishers. These folk are eager for quality. End each tip with your signature information.
E-mail two tips a week for five/six months. Imagine what this will do for your 'net reputation...
3) I'm sure you know what I'm about to say... YOU MUST WRITE ARTICLES if you want to send tips. Make it your goal to write one article a week. You could be doing just that in two/three months.
Don't know what to write about?
Here are some ideas.....maybe a bit strange...but hear me out. Make a list of your questions about the 'net for starters. Read free articles about the 'net that interest you or pique your fancy...and carry on conversations with the writers USING YOUR TAPE RECORDER. Come up with a take or an odd angle on what you have read. Stir yourself up by reading articles from all over the net. What you are doing is freeing yourself to think in new ways, to put into words wisdom you have stored and intuitions you vaguely sense....I'd suggest thirty or so minutes a day....
Talk to Jimmy and Harvey and James. Speak as they would and record their answers.
A word of caution. Be sure the members of your family know what you are up to walking around the house, talking to yourself, and recording what you are saying. Just tell them you are stirring up those brain cells, opening up new paths for thought, writing for your website.
Tell them to start packing mentally for a two week vacation in France in three years!
(Maybe this works for me because I am an only child with imaginary brothers, sisters, and playmates....)
Hey, if I can write this article, you can write one too. NOTHING in this article is ROCKET SCIENCE HARD. And, believe me, I started out with half the content here....the other came to me as I wrote.....
So, you can do this. So, do it!
4) Announce your articles to e-zine publishers. Get linked! You're generating a market for your tips.
5) It's helpful to create swipe strategies....share them with your affiliates and teach them to create their own. (Swipe files are vigorous and activity provoking ways of expressing yourself in print.) Check out some of Joe Vitale's work.....he'll show you how to write powerfully...as will Jimmy Brown. To put it simply, imitate the style of able net marketers. Not the words......but the style and the energy.
So, today, copy a short paragraph by Jimmy or Joe V and put your content in the frame they created. O.K. start with one great sentence...and go on from there.
Another idea ....Why not create a five/six e-mail series called HOW TO CREATE A SWIPE FILE....with two to three illustrations of each step....ten to twelve pages tops! Put this piece aside. Do the same exercise in two weeks....put that product aside. Do the activity two months later......see the difference?! When you feel good about what you have written, publish it!!
6) find and use free article announcement services. The more folk know what you are doing, the more traffic and the larger the e-zines' list that receives your tips......and on, and on......O.K?
7) create a cutting edge newsletter. When you begin earning decently, hire somebody to get it going......take it over yourself in six months or so. Study several strong newsletter/e-zines just to get the feel. Bonus content will come from your readers. (see point 10). Plan on publishing every other month.
8) archive free content on your website ---newsletters, articles, ezines, instructional pieces -- your swipe paper, for example. Quality content helps with search engine optimization ---AND lures folk to regularly visit your site. Ask folk to bookmark your site.
An idea...you may want to rotate borrowed content on your website ....articles about marketing for two months, articles about software products for two months.... reviews for two months....articles about blogging and RSS for two months, etc. A rotating archives is something to write about, generating interest...... Be FRESH.
Good sources for free articles are articlecity.com, ideamarketers.com, UltimateArticleInventory.com and ezinearticles,com
9) check www.bravenet.com for free guest books, free classified ads, free message forums, free website templates, free url redirecting, free traffic exchange programs. There's more. Check www.bravenet.com...and use the products. Start small....and add services over time.
10) Ask visitors/clients what they think of your work. Ask for ideas and testimonials. Ask them what they want you to produce. Add a regular (not posed) pictures section of your idea folk to your website. Learn the technology and use real signatures. Folk will respond, remember you, and buy from you when you pay attention to them.
Remember: being on the 'Net is not about you....it is about THEM...
Gladys Margaret Williams continues work on her Gardening, Health and WellBeing Tips, created in memory of her mother, an Alzheimers' victim. Gladys follows her own advice....has purchased an e-book to market and is turning her five articles into a bucket full of marketing tips. With this article, there are SIX****!!!