I decided to take the weekend off from this site.  I normally post every day and lately I’ve been doing everything in real time as opposed to writing in advance (which is what I was doing before).  I’ve decided to post less frequently although I will post on here almost every day.  I have tons of pre-written notes for different topics but some of them go into so much detail it would take hours to formulate a decent post and frankly I don’t have that much free time to spare.  I use my free time to create new sites and stay on top of the latest trends and techniques.

Did you know that there’s a way to do all of your work and in record time?  Do you have some kind of daily task that’s repetitive and that you do every day or almost every day?  Since this is a blog to help your business I have a solution for you.

It’s called using macros.  A macro is basically a screen recording of some work you’ve done previously, except that instead of it just being a recording it actually does the work for you.  There are many programs available that create macros ranging from free to several thousand dollars.  I’ve compiled a list of several of them and most of them have free trials to see if you can use them in your business.

Here are several different macro creating programs:

Quick Macros

EZ Macros

iMacros for Firefox

iMacros

Smack Macro Recorder

Auto Macro Recorder

Journal Macro

WinAutomation

Automation Anywhere

Desktop Macros

You can save literally hours a day and run your business virtually on autopilot if you create the proper macros.

Some of these programs even create executable files that you can use on any computer without having to install any other programs.  Imagine you own a business and know other companies that have the same needs as you.  You can actually sell the macros to other businesses and help them automate everything.  It can be a side business to create extra income.

A swipe file is basically a sales letter you found that you thought was great.  To start using swipe files find several sales letters that you know were successful and that you think are well written.  Then save them to your computer.

Have a look at each sales letter and notice the way it was written; the headlines, the bolded print, the bullet points, the P.S., the images, etc…

Now that you have your swipe files you can take bits and pieces of each letter (not copying it word for word) and you can use that style within your sales letter.  You can even make the format look similar to your favorite letters.  This way you don’t have to brainstorm everything, all you’re really doing is re-writing sales letters and of course customizing it to your product.

Instead of spending days writing great copy, you will only spend minutes or hours.

You don’t need to do all the hard work someone else has already done the hard part for you.  You’ll find your sales letters are better and flow more fluidly if you model yours off of already successful sales letters.

A good resource to use when you’re copywriting is using a thesaurus.  There are tons of online thesauruses that are free to use.  If you see you’re using the same word too many time or even want ideas for what words to use these can be a very valuable resource in conjunction with your swipe files.  Synonyms help keep your written copy less redundant.

Right now people and companies don’t have the disposable cash they use to have.  Expanding your payment options and terms can help you get buyers that you thought you couldn’t reach.

I’m constantly evolving around my clients.  One client wants this, one client wants that.  No problem if there is a work around I’m always happy to do it.

Payment options could be accepting online payments like PayPal, EPassporte, Revolution Money Exchange, Google Checkout, etc…  It could be accepting cash, check, money order, bank transfers, different credit cards.  Extended or subscription payments, discounts for one time payments, discounts for cash.

You have to be flexible if you want the client.  If I think a client is serious I’ll bend over backwards to accomodate them and everyone should be thinking the same.  I’ll even barter for something I need, if the cash isn’t available.

You might also want to offer a “lite” or less complex version of your product at a lower cost if it’s possible.  If you offer a service you can only do part 1 and later on down the line the client can purchase part 2 when they can afford it.

If the client is willing to negotiate, I’m willing to negotiate.

Of course if no matter how much negotiating and flexible you try to be you can’t come to an agreement, just walk.  It’s not worth wasted energy if there is no hope in saving a deal.

Press releases aren’t as hard to write as you’ve been led to believe.  They all follow a simple formula.  Press releases can drive traffic to your site and free advertising for your business.

Press releases are short so you don’t have to write a whole book.  Generally they are between 250 words and 500 (usually closer to 250).

They are written in the third person.  So you shouldn’t put, “I created this site to be the best.”  It would have to read, “The site was created to be the best.”

Here’s the way a press release is setup:

Headline.  An eye catching headline.

City, State Date -

Introduction paragraph.  Introduce your company, explain what your company does, the reason for the press release.

2nd paragraph.  Include a quote from yourself, an employee or a customer.

3rd paragraph.  You can finish the press release on the third paragraph or include more information about your company.

4th paragraph.  Write a brief summary of everything you’ve mentioned above and include a link back to your site or some contact information.

Every press release need some kind of angle or hook.  If your press release is boring or looks like a straight out advertisement it won’t be picked up by a lot of sites and the legitimate press.

The press release sites all have a place to add your contact information also.  Usually they ask for name, company, title, phone, and email.

Most of the press release sites are similar so you can submit the same press release to several sources.  Every few weeks create a new press release and submit those.  That increases your odds of getting a popular press release out there.

Press releases are easy to create and should take less than an hour to create and submit.

Article writing is an easy way to get targeted traffic to your site.  The only bad thing is you actually have to write the articles or pay someone to do it for you.  There are several article sites with high page rank that will let you submit your article and add your link in the resource box.  With articles you are building authority and looked at as an expert in your topic and you are doing off page optimization (it’s even more powerful if you add anchor text to your hyperlinks).  Another good thing is you can sell your articles if you’re a prolific writer for quick cash.

Article marketing will get your website ranked quickly for a lot of keywords, for the price of an article.  You don’t only have to stick to article directories you can also use social networking sites and build web pages (on sites like blogger, squidoo, wordpress, etc…) based off of your articles and include anchor text links back to your site.  These are authority sites and give you that needed boost to get your sites ranking.

You can use the same article over and over again, but the best way to rank for many keywords is keeping each article unique.  It will maximize the amount of keywords you’ll rank for.

You can also use article marketing if you’re an affiliate for products and link them right to your cloaked affiliate link.  People actually do buy from reading a good article and a related affiliate product with a decent sales page.

A fast way of creating articles for those out there that aren’t good at typing or talk better than they write is using a speech to text converting program.  With a program that does this your article can be written as fast as you talk.  Arguably the best program out there for this is Dragon Naturally Speaking.  You train it to recognize your voice and words and the results get more accurate the more you use it.   Usually a few edits and fixing punctuation and you’re done.

Article marketing is really a way of reiterating that content is king on the internet.  Good content will get you ranked for a lot of the terms you desire.

The title might be off a bit, but if you sell online leads to your clients.  There is a simple way of doing this without having to purchase expensive scripts and you can get the leads into your clients email account in minutes.

There are two ways of doing this.

The first way is with your contact form.  Most contact forms allow you to send the email to multiple senders or CC multiple senders.  Take advantage of that and send the email to yourself and to your client.  This way you have a copy of all of the leads and you know what to bill your client.

The other way is with Outlook or a similar email program.  Basically we’ll be creating a rule that will sort the emails out for us.  The sorting can also be used with the contact form.  You’ll understand as I explain it a little more.

Open up Outlook.  I blurred out a lot of stuff (especially stuff that’s not necessary).

Go to Tools then scroll down to Rules and Alerts.

Pick Rules and Alerts.  Then click New Rule.

Pick Start from a Blank Rule.  Make sure Check Messages When They Arrive is highlighted.  Click Next.

Check with Specific Words in the Subject.  Then click on Specific Words.  Add whatever words the subject line are in the subject line of your lead capture form.  For my example I picked, “Hot New Lead for XYZ Client.”  Click Ok.

Click Next.

I prefer to keep client leads in separate folders or apart from my normal emails.  We also need to send those leads out to the client.

Click on Move a Copy to the Specified Folder.  Click on Forward it to People or Distribution List.

Click on people or distribution list.  In the blank space next to where it says To – > write the email address of your client.  Then click Ok.

Click on specified folder.  Then click New (if you want to separate clients from your own email).

If you clicked New type in your client’s name in the blank line.  Then press Ok.

Click Ok out of that.  And once you’re back in the Rules Wizard.  Click Next twice.  Then if you have any leads already in your Inbox that you want to separate check Run this Rule Now on Messages Already in “Inbox”.  Turn on This Rule should already be checked.  Click Finish.  Click Ok.

I’ve created a lead capture page just for this.  It took 2 minutes so it’s not the prettiest.

I’ll fill out the form and submit it.

I check my email and there’s the email magically appearing in it’s own folder.  It was also sent out to my client.  At the end of the week I can bill him for all of the leads he received.

The Rules and Alerts system in Outlook is very powerful and easy to use.  It can help you sort years of emails into nice and easy to find locations.  You can setup these rules for any emails coming in or that are already in your Inbox.  You can even setup rules per client and have emails sent and received from a particular client in a separate folder.

Experiment and play around with it.  You’ll find the rules are very easy to create and it’s easy to customize to your needs.

Everyone in the world doesn’t speak English.  If you want to cater to other audiences you have to speak their language.  There are three options.  One is speaking the language and creating content for them, two is paying someone that speaks the language to create your content in the other language and third is using translation software to create content in other languages.  Software is not perfect, but it’s a cheap and easy way of getting your product out to a new audience.

Here’s a quick video tutorial on how to do it:

Download


I buy a lot of information products.  I mean I put in at least 10 hours per week buying (and reading what I bought) and several hours researching on my own about new techniques.  I’m one to talk right.  The difference is I ask questions before I buy.  Sometimes I read a salespage and email or call the owner and ask them is your item this, this or this?  if they say no, I buy.  Sometimes I’m dissapointed and it’s something I already know, but a lot of times I’m pleasantly surprised and I know most of the techniques, but there is one or two nuggets of wisdom in the whole product that makes it all worth it.

You can buy an education, whether it’s a degree or internet marketing.

You have to try the techniques and actually use them to be successful.  Don’t just buy a product and think, “This sounds like it will work.”  And you’re done.  Actually try the techniques and see if they’re true.  You’ll find a lot of stuff online that makes sense and is complete bullshit.  I have my tried and true techniques and then I have my experimental techniques.  I know when to use each one and at which times.

Don’t get to experimental on your main or money site if you think it might be breaking a lot of search engine rules aka black hat.  The worst thing that can happen is getting your main site banned from the search engines.  I’m not saying don’t use black hat techniques because I fully support a lot of them, but be careful what you’re doing with your main site.

Read reviews if there are any from other buyers.  Don’t read fake review sites with affiliate links.  An affiliate link unless it’s from a trusted source is not to be trusted.  I know it’s all a big shady deal and hard to figure out who’s telling the truth.  I’ll make it easy.  I’ll start posting all the affiliate links you want and of course they are all trustworthy because I’m the best and you can buy from me.

You can also contact me and I’ll send you an affiliate link to whatever you want, don’t worry it’s not a problem for me, I’m a member of every affiliate network out there and if not give me two days and I will be.  Seriously watch your ass.  If you want ask me and if I know about a product I’ll tell you.

I’ve been on every major “gurus” list for the last several years and lately I’ve been unsubscribing from so many lists you wouldn’t believe it.  I’ve done work for several top marketers over the last few years and I’ll tell you a lot of them have dropped the quality of their emails significantly.  They no longer care or they’re just to famous to think people will unsubscribe.

I always look for quality content and if possible good offers in their emails.  When people think a good offer is buying a $2000 product with rehash with their own $1000 product of rehash included and think it’s a good deal, I just laugh at them and unsubscribe.  Back in the day you’d get some quality content and at times an offer to buy a good deal.  Nowadays you get an offer to buy a big $$$$ deal every single time.  Please.  I stayed on some lists because I like to read others copy, but there is so many sales pitches  you can take before you hit that dreaded unsubscribe button.

Here’s a little secret for you guys.  You can buy those same $2000 products from less known marketers with different names for less than $100 most of the time.  The concepts the big name marketers teach aren’t new.  They usually just repackage old stuff and add their name to it.

I buy for value on the dollar and I spend big money on products.  If you can convince me it’s not a waste of money 99% of the time I buy it.  I always keep myself relevant and know all the latest techniques.  Whether I invent them or I buy them.

The saying is true though.  “People buy the brand name not the product.”

If you don’t have a way to capture a visitors information on your site you are potentially losing a lot of money.  Depending on your product or your services you might want to have an “in your face” approach to capturing client information.

You can have a popup come out and ask for their information, you can have a opt-in box on the sidebar or inside of your landing page, you can have a contact form, even a phone number works since some people prefer to call.

The easiest way to get someone to give you their information is enticing them to do it.  You could give away a free report, an exclusive discount or if you’re the only game in town just tell them to contact you for more info.

If you have no competition you don’t have to be “in your face” about it.  You can just have a link to your email address or your phone number.  The problem is there usually is competition and if you’re not ranking in the first few spots on the search engines for your keywords you need every bit of help you can get.

Once you capture a lead make sure you treat each lead right.  That means following up.  If you don’t follow up a big chunk of your leads will go bad.

I’ve gotten some requests for how to build a lead generating site and sell the leads to clients.  I use custom scripts to handle the backend for me.  But on Monday I will post a way to do this for free and with very little effort.  That way if you do build sites to generate leads for your clients, you’ll have a way of keeping track for billing and record keeping purposes.