Author Archive | AJ Steve

How do you get your readers to RACE to open your emails the moment they arrive in their inbox? Here’s one way to do it. It’s kind of sneaky but if you condition your readers properly, it can work really, really well.

First, you already know that paying customers are worth far, far more than freebie seekers. So why not make an offer to your freebie seekers that even they cannot refuse?

And in the process, why not get them to open (and read) your emails?

Here’s how it works: Every few days or every few emails, you have one of your links go to a wonderful $1 or $5 deal, but only for the first x number of people.

This might be a product that normally sells for a great deal more, a resale product, something you no longer sell, etc. So long as it still has real value, you can use it.

Your link can be obvious or disguised. For example, you might send an email promoting xyz product, but your link goes to your special offer until it’s sold out, and then it directs back to the xyz offer. And on your special offer page, be sure to have a prominent link to the offer mentioned in the email.

The following day, you can congratulate those who got the special deal, and remind the other readers that they, too, can grab these deals if they pay attention and if they’re fast.

You’ll want to condition your readers ahead of time to always be looking for these deals by opening your emails and clicking your links.

You can even get tricky. You can have the link go where you say it will, but then embed an Easter egg on the page that leads to the special offer. If they read your email, they’ll know where to find it.

There is a trade-off here. While you are conditioning your readers to open your emails and click your links, you’re also training them to look for special deals. So while your opens and clicks should rise dramatically, the money you make per open and per click could drop off slightly. You’ll want to test this.

Odds are you’ll still make more money because so many more people are opening and reading your emails and clicking your links. This means more sales of the products you promote, not just the special deals.

Would you like to add a new income stream to an existing business? Or are you looking for a brand new business? Then check this out.

First, you need knowledge. If you don’t have it, then obviously you can get it. It’s got to be specialized knowledge. Maybe you’re an expert at a certain software program, or a WordPress expert, or you know everything there is to know about how to drop to 5% body fat. Whatever it is, it’s got to be knowledge that other people want NOW.

Next, you need a way to get your consulting in front of the people who need it. Let’s say you’re an affiliate for a software or program that you personally know inside and out. You keep a mailing list of everyone who’s visited your site or bought the product from you.

These people sometimes email you with questions about the product. “How do I… ?” “Where is the… ?” “When so and so happens, what do I do?” And so forth. Being the good affiliate you are, you probably answer these questions. And you’re good at it, too.

But what if you could get paid to do it? Set up a page on your site offering your consulting service by email. Charge a reasonable fee, like $27 or $47 for the day or for the week, whatever is appropriate for the information you have to offer.

Remember, a certain percentage of people would much rather have someone show them how to do something than to have to figure it out for themselves. And they will gladly pay you for making their life easier.

That’s really all there is to it. Answer their questions by email, and remember – you are a consultant, not a technical advisor (unless you are.) This way you can focus on the types of questions you’re good at.

Bonus tip: Spend some time in forums finding out what the most common questions are about the topic, and then SEO your site to get high rankings for several of the well searched keywords. Then on every page of your site, point them in the direction of your consulting.

Your consulting can even help you to sell more affiliate products, because you will be building trust with your readers that you are in fact an expert. Thus when you recommend something, it’s really and truly worth buying.

I know I preach about picking something and staying focused on that something until you make it a success, but there are exceptions, and this is a big one. There are certain products you should probably grab whenever you see them. These are “how to” products on marketing techniques that contain three little words that can be a goldmine for you – “Step by step.”

The reason I love these is because for a very cheap price – usually less than $40 and sometimes only $10 – you get a complete step by step system on how to do something.

You might buy 2 or 3 of these a week. Then when you’ve got time, go through each one. Read the PDF’s and watch the videos.

Decide if you think the technique is something you can apply to your business. If it is, try it out. You might set aside one afternoon each week to try a new step by step technique.

Then wait and see what happens. Sometimes you see results right away and other times it takes a while, depending on what the technique might be.

You’re watching to see if it works. For example, if it’s a technique on how to get traffic then you’re watching to see if: You get traffic and if that traffic converts.

Once you know it works, you apply the fourth magic word – Outsourcing.

That’s right – you give your “how to” product to your outsourcer, along with any notes you’ve made when you implemented it yourself, and have them do it for you.

The first day they might send you a few emails with questions, but it won’t take you much time to answer them.

Then you just let them run with it and watch your numbers. Make sure you’re making more from results of the system than you’re paying the outsourcer and you’re good to go.

One of the best things about “step by step” products is they’re written for the average person, not a rocket scientist marketer. They have to be, or else the product creator would get a million questions. This makes it super easy to hand it off to another person to do the actual work for you. As long as the technique results in more income than outlay, it’s a winner.

And all you invested was the initial price of the ‘how to’ program, along with an afternoon to try it out for yourself.

To give an example: Let’s say you pick up 5 new ‘how to get traffic’ systems. 4 of them work well, so you outsource those and forget about the fifth one.

The new traffic results in X amount of new subscribers and X amount of new sales. Maybe it’s 1,000 new subscribers a month, and $1,500 in sales the first month, $500 the second month on those 1,000 subscribers.

So as long as you’re paying your outsourcer less than $2,000 a month (which is easy to do) you’re in profit.

This is a great way to add extra income to your existing business without a lot of time and effort on your part.

So remember to use these 4 magic words – “Step by step” and “Outsourcing.”

And one more thing: If you have a fistful of resell products sitting on your hard drive, take a look at those. You never know what step by step technique you’re going to find that you can use to help build your business through outsourcing.

Print and keep this checklist handy for the next time you send a promotional email to your list or to a prospect if you want more email opens, product sales and online profits…

__ Do you get to the point right away? Do not tell them about the last four hours you spent watching television or mowing the lawn unless it’s pertinent to the story.

__ Are you telling a story? Ideally you should tell an interesting story in every email you send to increase your open rates.

__ WIIFT… What’s in it for them? Don’t just tell them how great your product is. Tell them what they get for taking the action you’re promoting.

__ “So what?” Read the email as if you were the recipient, and see if they would ask, “So what?” You want to fascinate and excite them to click that link.

__ Is your writing boring? Uh-oh. Not talking about what’s in it for them, or writing “so what” emails are leading causes of massive email boredom.

__ Are you using action verbs? Contrast these two sentences to see the importance of using action verbs: 1. The cat seems healthy. 2. The cat raced across the yard and dove into the bushes chasing the terrified ground squirrel. Which one keeps the reader awake and reading?

__ Is your email just long enough to get them to click the link, and no longer? You’d be surprised how many marketers talk themselves out of getting that link clicked by rambling too much.

__ Is the formatting super easy to read? Or is it all one long indistinguishable paragraph?

__ Have you read it through and cut out all the fat? Seriously. Get to the point. Now.

__ Have you established credibility? Give them a good, honest, believable and credible reason why this is THE product they should buy.

__ Are you using bullet points? If not, are you crazy? Bullet points are your best sales tool in an email or a sales letter.

__ Have you given them a reason to respond right now? Preferably one that doesn’t sound cheesy?

__ Have you included your call to action? Don’t assume they know what to do next.

Use this checklist on your next 5 emails, and compare the results with your last 5 emails. You should see a significant bump in conversions.

Let me ask you a question: Are you on a certain marketer’s email list? You know the one – he sends out an email every day or two telling you to go check out “X” product because it’s new, revolutionary, exciting and the most amazing thing ever? Yeah, that guy. I’m on his list, too.

In fact, I’m on the list of a couple of dozen marketers who fit that description. And the fact is, I seldom open their emails anymore, much less buy their recommendations. And I bet you’re the same way.

So who do you buy from? The marketers you trust, right? Me too.

And here’s who I trust the most: The marketer who actually USES the product they promote to me, and then records a video of them using it, or writes an HONEST review of it.

It’s so simple. It’s so easy. And yet 99% of marketers never do these things.

You want to promote a product to your list. You get the product – maybe you buy it, maybe the product owner gives it to you. You open the product up and consume it. You read the pdf, you watch the videos and you take some notes. Then you implement the strategy and you see what kind of results you get.

Then you write a review telling me about the product. What you like, what you think sucks, what is missing and so forth. You tell me who should buy this (ie: newbies, website owners, etc.) and who shouldn’t. Maybe you record a little video showing either what’s in the product or how you used it or both.

You send me an email with this info. Wow! Talk about doing me a service. Maybe I buy, maybe I don’t, but you have now earned my trust. I open your next email and your next email and the one after that. I read your REAL reviews (notice the word ‘real’) and the more I read, the more I trust you. Pretty soon I’m not buying anything unless YOU recommend it.

Congratulations – you have just risen above 99% of email marketers out there. You have earned my trust and my business and as long as you keep it up, I will continue to buy from your links.

But you know what? 99% of list owners who read this will never do it. They won’t actually USE the products they recommend. They won’t write HONEST reviews. They won’t record videos of the results they’ve achieved through using the product.

And in the long run, they won’t build the audience or make nearly the sales of the few marketers who take the time to do these things.

Here’s a sneaky little underused tactic for making money before you even create your product: Decide what your product is going to be and write an outline for it. From this, create a list of bullet points that presell the product.

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Now using these bullet points, offer your upcoming product to your list as a Beta test.

Tell your list:

• The product is being created right now
• They will get the product the moment it’s finished – expected delivery date is ___
• They are getting a killer deal because you want and need their feedback
• They are your beta testers. If it’s software, they will look for bugs. If it is written material, they will let you know about typos, what they think should be added, etc.
• Once you get their feedback, you will fix any bugs, add what’s missing, fix typos, etc. and send them the finalized, polished version.
• You will then offer the product to the public for a significantly higher price than they paid.

Not only does this give you some money up front to work with – it also provides you with valuable feedback you can use to make your product even better than you originally planned. Guaranteed a handful of your beta testers will give you suggestions you never would have thought of by yourself – suggestions that can greatly increase your sales later.

In fact, the feedback aspect alone makes this technique well worth doing. One caution: Do not be tempted to give away your Beta product – 9 out of 10 people you give it away to will never get back to you with feedback because they have nothing invested. When you charge something, even if it’s only a paltry sum, the number of users who give you feedback will greatly increase.

The one exception to the previous rule is people you personally know, like friends and JV partners. Because you already have a relationship with them, they don’t need to financially invest in order to feel vested in your success.

Special bonus for using this technique: Ask your Beta testers for testimonials you can use in your sales material.

You know webinars are a great way to sell products. Hop on a webinar, talk for 30 to 60 minutes and sell some products right there on the spot. Then rinse and repeat as many times as you like, buddying up with a different list owner each time. It’s simple, it’s fairly easy, and the more you do the better you’ll get.

But for many marketers, it’s scary to get on the Internet and talk to tens, hundreds and maybe even a thousand people at one time. “Me? Talk for an HOUR? To PEOPLE?”

Here’s something to consider: You don’t need your own list to run webinars. If you have a great product or service, you can go to list owners and split the money with them. What an outstanding way to get access to other people’s lists and make money doing it!

And most list owners love doing webinars because it’s almost hands off cash in the bank for them. All they do is send out one or more emails to their list, and you do the rest of the work. This means that webinars are an excellent way to get your foot in the door with people who have big, active lists.

Another thing to consider is that webinars mean almost instant and highly targeted traffic for you. Your partner promotes your webinar to their list and their people flock to your site to sign up.

Webinars create instant products in themselves. You can SELL your webinar if it’s packed full of good info. Think about that – what better way to create an instant product than by talking to an audience for an hour?

Or you can give your webinar recording away as a list building incentive of your own.

Plus, webinars can be REPLAYED to make even MORE sales. Again, you record it once and you can set it up on your own website to make more sales. You can also let your list-owner partner put it on their site as well, or send more traffic to your site to listen to the webinar.

And here’s the kicker you probably never even considered: Webinars are one of the best ways to build your own list. You partner with someone, they send traffic from their list, you get (for example) 500 sign-ups and 150 of those attend the webinar. 15-30 of the attendees buy your product, and now you have sales AND a new list of 500 people!

Webinars provide quality traffic, high conversion, partnerships and quick product creation for both free and paid products.

Webinars are truly great for selling products because nothing gets people more excited to buy your product than hearing from you – the expert – on how they can achieve their goal.

And they’re also one of the best ways to build your list.

Imagine if you do just one webinar a week or even once per month – how much more you could accomplish in your business… Believe in yourself and go for it!

There are thousands of courses you can buy that will tell you how to make money online. But there is only one method – sell something to someone.

That’s it – that’s the ‘secret’ to making money online.

And once you know the ‘secret,’ it’s just a matter of deciding what you’re going to sell and who you’re going to sell it to.

The easiest way to do that? If you already know the basics of marketing, then probably the easiest method is to turn off your Internet connection and just get busy.

Because building your online business while buying every IM program that comes along is a lot like trying to get across town when you’ve got a hundred people telling you different ways to get there.

“You gotta have the right shoes or you’re not gonna make it – buy these.”

“You better buy our raincoat, it could rain and then you’d be in trouble”

“Dude, use my method and you can avoid the ugly side of town.”

“Take my shuttle bus and it will get you there faster.”

“Go talk to my friend Joe and he’ll fix you right up, only $9.99.”

“You better buy my car because otherwise it will take you forever to get there and besides, it will pay for itself.”

“Forget the car, take my limo and we’ll do the driving for you.”

“Limos are too slow and cumbersome, buy our jet plane. You’re guaranteed to get there fast.”

“That is way too complicated, just ride our camel, he already knows the way.”

“Look, that destination is over-saturated and it’s too late to go there. Here’s where you should go instead, and don’t worry – this way works for everyone.”

And so forth.

Pretty soon you’re so confused you don’t know what to do. Meanwhile, the gal who chose her path and ignored the rest has already arrived at her destination. She’s sipping pina coladas and wondering why everyone says it’s so hard to get to where she is. And she’s looking for you… only you’re not there yet.

Get the point? Choose a method, get busy and stay focused until you get there. The rest will take care of itself.

Long story short – people buy based on the benefits, and then they justify their decision based on the features. That’s why you need both to sell.

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No one buys a lawn mower because it has a big engine – he buys it because he can cut his lawn in half the time and spend twice as much time golfing. He buys it because he can cut even the tallest grass without stalling out and making himself look like an idiot for not cutting his grass sooner. And he buys it because something this big and powerful can only make him look bigger and more powerful to his neighbors and his wife (or so he hopes).

But when he’s bragging about his new mower to their next door neighbor, he’s talking about how much horsepower that baby has, how it’s made out of the same metal as the space shuttle, and how a team of 4 inspectors go over the entire mower three times before it leaves the factory.

These features are his justification, and they’re nearly as important as the original benefits that made him buy in the first place. They’re the reason he can justify the thousand dollar purchase to himself and to his wife, and justify why he doesn’t return it for something smaller and cheaper they can actually afford.

Now let’s put this whole features and benefits thing on steroids…

Features are useful, but by themselves they won’t sell a thing. Benefits are terrific, and by themselves they will sell stuff. But without the features, you’ll get a lot of buyer’s remorse and refunds.

BUT… if you add EMOTION to the equation, you put your entire selling process on steroids. That’s because while people think in terms of logic (or to be more accurate, they believe they are thinking in terms of logic) it’s their emotions that weigh in most when it’s time to make a decision.

Emotion SELLS.

Thus, the more you can tap into your prospects’ emotional wants, the more they will respond to your offers.

And the best way to get at their emotions is to go all the way. Don’t stop with just the obvious stuff, dig deeper.

Let’s use an example: You’re selling a weight loss product. You could say, “Take this pill, lose weight.” Losing the weight is the direct benefit of taking the pills. But that’s what everyone in the marketplace is saying. Plus, you’re not tapping into your prospect’s emotions, are you?

Instead, dig deeper and find the indirect benefits. What happens when they lose weight?

• They have more energy
• Stamina increases
• Higher self esteem
• More confidence
• Better dates with sexier people
• More outgoing and social
• Looks better
• Feels better
• Stronger
• Better able to take on life’s challenges
• Less jealous of others (now they’re jealous of YOU)
• Happier
• Healthier
• Live longer
• And so forth.

NOW you’re tapping into the REAL emotions behind losing weight.

Take it one step further, and put them directly into the picture. Don’t tell them they’ll have more confidence. Instead, ask him to imagine what it will be like when his confidence is so high, he can walk into a room of beautiful women and ask the most gorgeous one on a date, and she’ll say YES.

Or ask her what it will feel like when every eye in the room turns towards her – knowing all the men want her, and all the women wish they were her.

Now THAT’s tapping into emotion.

And that will get you the sale every time.

You may have noticed that Internet marketing goes through phases where everyone seems to be jumping on the same bandwagon. That wagon might be the latest, greatest social network. It might be paid newsletters or membership sites or video marketing or…

You get the point. There are times when it seems everyone is coming out with a new product that does basically the same thing as the previous dozen products, and they’re all competing against each other for customers.

This is when you can be a copycat or smart cookie. Let’s say the newest, greatest thing is $10 a month paid newsletters. (Yes, I know that was a number of years ago, but this is just an example.)

The copy cats observe that courses on how to write and sell little newsletters for small prices to lots of people are selling like hotcakes. And because they’re copycats, they create their own courses and jump into the selling fray. The competition gets stiffer and stiffer and soon underhanded techniques are being used, prices are being slashed, and everything is downhill from there.

Just like the copycats, the smart cookies watch to see what’s happening in the market. But instead of jumping in like everyone else, they sit back and ask, “What do these people need that I can provide?”

In the case of the paid mini-newsletters, there are now tons of customers who bought or are about to buy the newsletter courses who are going to need:

• Membership software
• A list of profitable topics
• A list of places to find their prospects
• Content for their newsletters
• Sales copy for their sales letters and sales videos
• Etc.

And this is what the smart cookie does. She doesn’t try to compete with the dozens of people selling the “how to” courses on mini-newsletters. Instead, she looks to see how she can complement what everyone else is doing.

In this manner every customer of ANY product teaching how to run these newsletters becomes her target prospect. She’s not competing with the course sellers. In fact, she’s often working hand in hand to provide their customers with exactly what they want and need to make their new businesses work.

The customers are happy. The people selling the courses are happy. And she’s rolling in the dough because she took a step back from the fray and asked, “What can I do to complement this trend, rather than compete in it?”

Next time you notice a trend, don’t compete. Instead, find ways to help both the sellers and the customers of this trend, and watch your bank account grow as you fulfill customer’s needs and desires.