One of the most important things you can do if your running an online business or you are just about to begin an online business is “Target Marketing”.  And I don’t say this lightly. Target Marketing is what keeps my business going with a continuous flow of new orders and new clients

So with the aid of this article I am going to explain exactly why you should be target marketing and how to do market research.

Why Target Market?

Well first off if you spend a bit of time working out who it is your looking to attract to your business and you build up a picture of what they want and where they are then several things will happen.

1) You will leap frog over 95% of all the people looking to make money online.

2) You will save a huge amount of time and money running your business

3) Your business will not be based on luck but rather on sound judgement.

In a nutshell you will know who you are looking to attract to your business, you will know what they want, you will know what to give them, you will know where to advertise and you will know how to word your adverts.

Can you now see how important it is to do your target marketing. Can you now see how you will save so much time and money and can you now see that your business will not be based on luck or random acts but on cold hard facts.

So lets now look at the steps required for target marketing

1) Who are You Looking to Attract?

Who exactly will be interested in your business. Now I know at first this might seem obvious. If you take my business for example. I help people make a living online and anyone interested in that is part of my target market.

But within that I have identified certain niche markets such as working parents, people moving abroad. And because I have done this I now have a clearer picture of who it is I am looking to attract.

So make sure you now get a clear idea of who you want to attract.

2) What are there Problems

Once you have an idea of your target market and exactly who they are you want to then start finding out what issues or problems these people have. Remember we are building up a complete picture here so that you can use this information to your benefit later.

One of the best ways to discover your target markets problems is to search online forums. Taking me as an example again, I know that one of my targets is working parents so in that case I would Google “working parents forums”.

Now I would see whats being said on these forums, remembering to take notes and slowly you will begin to see a common thread. You will discover what their issues and problems are which is all critical info we can use later.

3) Where do they Hang out

You now want to be asking yourself where do your target markets hang out either online or in the real world. One obvious answer here is they hang out on online forums, we know this because we have just been there.

But where else do they go. For me working parents might go to job sites or parenting websites. Just have a good think about where your target market likes to go.

Now What

OK so you know who your target market is, you know what their problems are and you know where they hang out. But what do you do with all this information.

Well if you now know there problems then you now know what products to offer them as a solution to their problems. You also now know what content they want to read that you can add to your website or blog.

If you also now know where they hang out then you know exactly where to place your adverts promoting your products or content. And when it comes to your adverts because you know lots of information about your target market then you will know exactly how to word your adverts.

You will be able to write a headline that really speaks to your audience and you will be able to fill the body of the ad with compelling words that 100% resonate with your target market.

Its a no Brainer

Can you now see how by spending a bit of time target marketing you can really take your business from just random sales or sign ups and on to calculated regular sales and sign ups.

And remember this article, “Target Marketing-How to do market research” and all its details can be applied to any market/business model you wish, its just a case of getting into action and doing your homework.

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If your someone like me who uses blog commenting for your advertising and back-linking then you will want to maximise your return on this by having a universal Avatar or Gravatar.

Blog Commenting can be a powerful way to advertise your business if done consistently and correctly.

In layman’s terms this means having a picture of yourself automaticly appear every time you leave a comment on a Gravatar enabled blog.

This has 2 benefits. 

1. Quite often you will see most people do not have a picture of themselves alongside there comments they leave on other blogs. Which means that if you do then when anyone is reading the comments (which a lot of people like to read) they are more likely to see yours along with any of your website links you have placed with it.
2. Having an Avatar gives you a another way of promoting yourself because when anyone clicks on your photo they are taken to a profile page that can give more details about you, your services, your products, your websites and your contact details.

To make sure your picture appears alongside your comment just type in the email address associated with your Gravatar. There will always be an email section when you leave a comment.

But before all that though you need to set certain things up such as your profile details and picture which can all be done for free by using the services of www.gravatar.com

Using Avatars for free advertising like this that can have huge benifits for you in the long run especially if your focusing some of your advertising time on posting comments on other blogs.

If after reading this you would like to learn more about this advertising system then why not leave some details on my Contact Me page. I will then get back to you with some help.

Until then, Nick Squires-The English Entrepreneur

What I am going to talk about here in the next few paragraphs is really a win, win situation for all involved. And I mean by this that not only can you be in business very quickly and make make money online from home but at the same time give the people paying you, excellent value to go with it. So with that in mind this short article “how to make money online from home by giving value” will explain exactly how you can do this.

The Basic Idea

Whether you are just considering making money online or you are already down this path one thing you must remember is to always give as much value to your target market as possible. Your target market is the people you have identified as people interested in what services or products you offer.

When you give them value be with quality free information like content on a website or recommending excellent products or services that will solve their problems then you create a relationship/trust that will serve you well again and again when you repeat this process. And this process can be applied to any type of market out there.

Where do you begin

Well the first thing you need to know in the process of how to make money online by giving value, is to work out exactly what your target market problems are. You need to understand what they are concerned about, what fears they have and what questions do they keep asking. And when you know this, you will then know what value to give them.

How do I find out there problems?

Let’s say your chosen market is Golf and let’s say that within this market you have identified a niche market of left handed lady golfers. Sometimes a market such as golf can be too big a subject to cover so then it’s important narrow it down a bit which in this case is left handed lady golfers.

Now to find out there concerns one of the things you can do is visit online forums. These are great places to find out what your chosen market is talking about. Just search in Google for your particular niche forum and see what is being said.

Find out there concerns and there questions which in this case will be on ladies golfer forums. There may even be a left handed ladies golfer forum but the main thing is that you do your research via several of these forums so that you can build up a picture of what they want to know or do.

You can also visit relevant websites to again build up your information about your target market.

How do I monetize this information?

Once you have a good picture of what your target market is talking about and you know what their wants and needs are then it’s time to look for the solutions, which in this case could be content, products, services or a mixture of all three.

If you are just starting online then you may not have a website that you can place content on so in your case you will just need to find some quality products to promote.

If you do have your own website or blog then armed with your research you can add content that really speaks to your markets concerns.

With regards to promoting products then you will do this as an affiliate, which means you can promote other peoples products without having to stock them, take payments for them or deal with any enquiries. Its a great way to be quickly up and running and making money online from home.

Basicly you join for free a companies affiliate program who then give you a unique affiliate link that you can use in your advertising or on your website. When someone clicks on this link they are taken to the main companies sales page and if a sale is made you are paid a commission.

My article “make money online with affiliate marketing” will give you all the details you need around this such as how to and where to find excellent products for free to promote to your target market.

As an example lets say you have discovered that your target market, in this case left handed ladies golfers, have a real problem in finding quality golf clubs. It may be that the bulk of golfing companies cater mainly to the right handed market and its a real problem finding left handed golf clubs.

So with that in mind you would go looking for companies providing such golf clubs and then join their affiliate program so that you can then start promoting their products or services. Bearing in mind you are looking for excellent companies who offer great value and service to all their customers.

How to advertise your products and services

This is the easy part. With your newly acquired affiliate links you go back to the same forums and websites that you originally checked out to find out their problems and then start advertising there.

Or if you have a website then you can either use your affiliate links or your website address for advertising.

In the case of forums you will need to join them first and then you can start interacting with these people and answering their questions/problems with little messages about what you can offer. And at the bottom of your message you will normally be allowed to type in your personal affiliate link/web address to the product/website your promoting.

Not all forums allow you to do this but most will, but make sure you don’t just go on them pasting your affiliate links. Give some genuine value/information regarding the topic/question your posting on.

This is again where the value comes in. Using the knowledge you have built up through your research enlighten these people to what you have found out. It could be tips an tricks or a genuine review of a product you are promoting.

If you did your research on websites then with these you will look to place a comment at the end of any articles on their site relevant to what you are offering with again your affiliate link/website address in. Remembering to give value as always

Will it Work

In a nutshell, YES. But you have to be consistent, you have to be going on these forums and websites consistently to build up some trust so that people see you as someone to look out for and then are inclined to click your links.

And the more value you give with your information and quality products the more inclined they are to click your links and the more likely you are to make a commission.

Turbo charge your results

If you really want to increase your earnings then consider having a website/blog specific to your target market. Just like I have with this website that caters for people looking to make money online from home and the internet, you can have one that is full of great content (value) centred around your target markets needs with links and adverts to your affiliate promotions.

You can, as before, promote your website to the forums and a whole host of other places where you know your target market hangs out. They can then come to your site and see lots of great free content that builds up your trust with them as well as anything your promoting.

Value, Value, Value,

At the risk of banging on too much about it, to ensure the highest success with all this, your #1 priority is to give all concerned massive value, hence the title of this article “how to make money online from home by giving value”. If you do this then success is yours but if you go into to this just looking to make money then you will struggle all the way. And hey, it feels a lot nicer when you do get your commission payments knowing you have provided a great service to get it.

Over to you

All of the information above plus the link to my affiliate article will be what you need to get going but if you feel its a bit daunting or your not quite sure how to do it then why not consider using my Home Business Guru download course that offers step by step instructions on such things as,

• Finding a great market to be in
• Finding great products to promote
• Setting up a website to promote your products
• Where and how to advertise your website and affiliate links
• And everything else you need to make money online

The course its self is just a one time fee of £39.95 and comes with a 30 day money back guarantee. Plus you also get my personal phone number to call me on if you need any assistance as you work through the course.

To find out more go to Home Business Guru download course

To your Success, Nick Squires-The English Entrepreneur

Affiliate marketing is an excellent way to have an online business and make a very good living without all the expense and hassles normally associated with starting your own business, particularly having to develop your own products to sell or to purhcase a stock of products ready to sell .

Affiliate marketing gives you all of the flexibility of being in business for yourself such as choosing your working hours ,choosing an income but none of the constraints of going it alone.

Affiliate marketing gives you the chance to sell products online but without having to stock them, own them, take payments for them, ship them out to customers or handle any queries.

In my mind its a no brainer for anyone looking to start an online business and wants to be up an running as quick as possible. Its also perfect for anyone looking to make money online but is also working a job as well. It allows you to start in your spare time and then if you so wish go full time later on.

What Exactly Is Affiliate Marketing.

In a nut shell there are all sorts of different companies out there who have what’s known as affiliate programs and who will pay you a commission on any sales that are generated from your efforts.

These companies range from some of the biggest and most famous on the planet such as Amazon, Nike, Microsoft, all the way down to a guy operating on his own who has Ebooks for sale. And 99% of these companies affiliate programs are free to join.

What Do You Do?

Your job in all this is to attract people/customers to the companies website with the idea that they will purchase something. When this happens you get paid. That’s it, that is your job and if you do it well you can be paid very handsomely indeed.

The sort of commissions you can expect really depends on the company itself but overall you will find affiliate programs that payout anything from 3% to 70% of the total sale price. Normally the higher commission payouts come from products or services that only have to be made once such as download courses and the lower payouts will be for actual physical products like clothing or electrical goods.

My advice here is to find products to promote that not only pay you this commission for the intial sale but also have a residual payment built in to it, such as a monthly subscription program, which will mean you get paid every month on a product you sold only once.

Much better to concentrate your efforts on products with repeat sales as it takes no more effort to do this than it does for a product with a one time only sale.

How Do You Get Paid.

When you join a companies affiliate program, which will nearly always be free, you are given, along with lots of other tools, a tracking code (link). This tracking code is unique to you and no one else so that when someone clicks on a link of yours and they are taken to that companies web/sales page then any sale that’s made will be credited to your account.The company knows the customer came from you because they clicked on your unique link.

Then once your account reaches a certain level, perhaps $100, the money is then released to you by way of a cheque or bank transfer or Pay Pal. Although this really depends on the individual company as to exactly how you get paid.

Be aware that companies will have set dates for sending out commissions so don’t expect a cheque as soon as you reach $100, you may have to wait until the end of the month and some companies will hold your money until any return dates on the product you sold has expired, normally 30-60 days. But if you imagine it is only the same as starting a salaried job where you don’t get paid until the end of the month.

How Do I Get Started.

First thing you need to do is find some products to promote. It might be best to find ones that interest you first rather than ones that pay the most, perhaps you will find both. Or you could do a search online to see what is popular at the moment and then find products that match this.

Some of the best place to find these products are through affiliate networks. These are places that quite literally have thousands of companies on their books who have products they want to sell via the efforts of you.

Affiliate networks are great because you will get paid by them for any of the programs you join within there network rather than having to wait for all the individual companies to pay you. A few of the best ones are,

• www.clickbank.com
• www.tradedoubler.com
• www.paydotcom.com

Just visit one of these sites above and join. Its free to do and as soon as you do you can start looking for and then promoting products. I would recommend you read any help pages they have so that you can become familiar with how they work.

You can also search for affiliate programms individualy through Google. Just type in what your looking for such as “Home Business Affiliate Program” and then join an appropriate program.

What Next

Ok so now you have your products, you just need to sell them and of course you do this by attracting customers.

Now you can just go out there and start posting your affiliate links wherever you feel is appropriate. My guide to marketing will show where and how.

But one of the best ways to make affiliate sales is to have your own blog/website filled with great content that will appeal to the type of persons your looking to sell to and have your links to the products your promoting on there as well. Normaly a good affiliate program will not only give you links to use but attractive adverts to use as well that can be linked to you.

The idea here is, you create a blog/website , you fill it with great content that matches the type of products your promoting, you then have your links/adverts on there, you do some advertising promoting your website, readers arrive at your own site to read the content which will be content matching your products and they then click on these links and ads. The company your promoting then takes over from there.

If you create a good website and you have quality content and products that match then you have a very good way of making an income by way of a business that is working for your 24/7 365.

What Can I Earn And What Are My Chances.

There are many many people all over the world who make money from Affiliate Marketing including myself. Some make a few dollars/Pounds a month part time while some make millions of dollars a year and everything in between. Its not hard to do but there is work to be done and on a consistent basis but when you consider that an affiliate marketing business can allow you to work when and where you like then this effort seems small by comparison.

You can if you so desire make a very good living with affiliate marketing. One that can replace your current income or one that can suppliment it. Its up to you and the effort you put in that dictates your level of success.

Finally

If this article has given you food for thought and you do like the idea of making money from affiliate marketing then I would be happy to show you how.

I can show you how to find good markets to be in and good products to promote. I can also create you a website that will promote all this for you and teach you how to advertise .

All you need do for now is show me your interest by leaving your details on my “Contact Me” page with a short message. I will then be in touch to explain all.

To your success, Nick Squires-The English Entrepreneur

We are going to focus today on how to arrange specific WordPress widgets in a sidebar such as adverts so that they appear only on a specific page or post.

At the moment whenever you add something to a sidebar this feature will always appear on every page or post on your WordPress website. But this is no good if say you have written a page solely about a certain product and you only want to show that product/advert that goes with that article on that page.

With this in mind I would like to explain to you how to use the WordPress plugin “TS Custom Widgets” so that you can have full control over what and where things appear in your sidebars on your WordPress site..

This article is really intended for people who are fairly familiar with the basics of WordPress such as adding posts or pages and know how to use widgets and plugins. If you are not then read some other my other WordPress Articles  first.

Using TS Custom Widgets Plugin

First thing you need to do is install the plugin and activate it. Just type in the plugin search bar  “Custom Widgets“. You should then see it at the top of the search results. The plugin is by ThaSlayer. Once found just install it.

Once installed look to the very bottom of your WordPress dashboard at the bottom left under settings. You will see the link/tab for TS Custom Widgets. Click on this.

You will now see a page that list all the sidebars/widgets areas you have and what is in them.

Just click on the one you want to customise. If you are not sure what a particular widget is in your sidebar then look at your live website and see what is in what sidebar and what position. You will then know what each one is within the custom widget plugin.

So click the widget you want to customize. You will now be on a page where you can decide on what pages or posts + other sections of your site that you want the widget to only display on.

Click the “Edit link” that you see next to Posts or Pages depending on whether you want the widget to appear on either a specific post or page or both.

On this new page you will decide where exactly the widget will appear. Simply tick the box of the page/post you want it to appear on. This could be all of them or just one. When you have decided, look below and see the link for “Add selected Pages/Posts” and click this. Your widget will now be showing only on those specific pages/posts.Go to your site and now check this has happened.

If you decide that a widget is displaying somewhere you do not like then simply go through the previous steps again. This time the widget you have altered will be in red. But when you get to the page where you choose where the widget will be seen, this time look to the left underneath “show in pages/posts” you will see a list of pages/posts that this widget is on. Just click on the page/post you do not want the widget on and it is done.

As far as this plugin goes it seems to work very well. The only problem I have encountered was placing a widget on the Home page and the Blog page at the same time. It would only show on the Home page. Not sure why this happens. But apart from that this is the best plugin I have come across for placing specific features in a sidebar on specific pages or posts.

Don’t forget if you have a specific question about WordPress then why not leave a message on the Contact Me page. I would also be happy to show you how to make money from your WordPress site as well.

]]> http://nick-squires.com/2012/03/12/wordpress-sidebar-customization/feed/ 0 http://nick-squires.com/2012/03/05/adding-youtube-videos-wordpress/ http://nick-squires.com/2012/03/05/adding-youtube-videos-wordpress/#comments Mon, 05 Mar 2012 10:25:43 +0000 Nick Squires http://nick-squires.com/?p=1034

A great way of quickly adding extra content to your WordPress site or to liven up some content is to add Youtube videos into your WordPress website.

How to Add YouTube

First go to www.youtube.com and then search for a video that would be appropriate for your website/blog using the Youtube search bar at the top of the page.

When you have found a video make sure you watch it to see if its any good. Remember that when placing any type of content on your website make sure its of great value to your readers.

If your happy with the video then you now need to get the code that we can use to put into your wordpress site.

To get the code look just underneath the video where you will be able to click the tab “Share“. You then will need to click the tab “Embed”

What you are now looking at is a section that allows you to customise the video and then get the code.

What I suggest you do first is uncheck the box which says “Show suggested videos when the video finishes” This way you won’t have your readers caught up in watching other videos rather than your WordPress website.

Now you can decide the size of the video screen. This will largely depend on where your putting the video. My tip here is to just go with the size they have suggested because you can adjust the exact size you need when you have the video on your site.

Get the Code

When you happy with your customization then all you need do now is copy the embed code in the main box. Now with that code go and login to your wordpress Admin panel/dashboard.

Whether your adding the Youtube video into a post or page makes no difference as its the same procedure but whatever way you are doing it make sure before you add the code that you are in HTML mode. To do that look just above where you add your content and to the right where you will see either Visual or HTML.

Ok now your in HTML mode paste the Youtube video Embed code into the content area. Now you can click on Visual to see how it looks in relation to the page.

At this point you won’t actually see the video its self, that only is available on your website when published. But you can change the size of the video from here. Either just click on the video and use your cursor on the border of it to increase or decrease its size or go back to HTML mode and adjust the size within the actual code its self.

When your happy with it all then just publish and then see what it looks like live on your site, of course editing anything that needs doing.

Once you get the hang of it you will see that adding Youtube videos into WordPress is a very quick way of getting content onto your site plus you can always add a few words of your own on top or underneath the video before you publish it.

One Final Thing

If you want to add a Youtube video into a side bar then just paste the code into a Text Widget using the widget section of your WordPress Dashboard.

Want to Make Money with WordPress

I can teach you how to make money with WordPress as I do myself. Just leave your contact details and a message on this page “Contact Me” and I will get back to you to explain all.

Below you will find a selection of paid advertising ideas that can be used for an offline or online business. Its not an exhaustive list but there is certainly enough good quality ideas for you to promote your business with.

PAID ADVERTISING

1) Pay Per Click (PPC) One of the most effective paid marketing options out there. These type of adverts are the ones you see on the right hand side of the page whenever you do a search through Google or Yahoo etc. You may even see some at the top of the search results page. There the small advert with a title, a couple of lines of content and a website address.

The idea is you set up an account with a PPC company and you create some adverts that are linked to certain words (keywords) these will be words people use when doing a search. If they type in a word you have linked with your advert then your advert will appear on their screen on the right hand side. They then click on your ad and are taken to your website. You only ever pay when someone clicks on an advert of yours and the great thing is your advert only appears when someone is actually looking for what you have.

How much you pay is set by you. It can be anything you want but to be on the first page of say Google you need to be paying more than your competitors. Your price can start from £0.05/ $0.05 a click .

There is a bit more to it than this and it can get a bit complicated but it can also get you on the first page of Google/Yahoo in minutes.

If you have the patience and you have at least £300/$450 a month to get going then definately use this system.

The most famous PPC system to use is Googles Adwords but Facebook also have there own version which works very well. Another great one is Yahoo Search.

If you do decide to use PPC then do your home work first.

2) Newspapers/Magazines. Remember well folks even in this day and age people will still want to read newspapers/magazines rather than looking at a computer screen for their
news or gossip. And the classified section is the most read part. Yes their readership
levels are in decline but that’s great news for you because deals can be had. A tip here is
to always ask for a discount and to run your ad for at least 4 weeks. Some people need to
see it a few times before they will take action.

3) Drop Cards. These are business sized cards that will have a tempting message on there about your business with either a phone number or a web address. There not your
normal type business cards. These will be brightly coloured (yellow background with
black writing is proven best) and the message will intrigue people enough to pick it up
and respond. The cards want to be in your face, not nicey nicey but bold enough for
people to take note. Tell them exactly what you want on the card and no more.

The example below is for someone promoting a home business.

Don’t tell them everything but leave them wondering enough to keep the card and visit your site. I find that the people who do bother to keep my cards and do bother to visit my site are very good prospects and ones I normaly make a sale from. I leave these cards every where I go during my normal day. At cash dispensers, in shops, restraunts, wherever people will see them and pick them up.

www.Vistaprint.com is the place to buy them. Get the cheapest you can (£/$20 for 500).

4) AdlandPro.com. This is a great site for finding lots of advertising avenues under one
roof. Lots of it free, lots of it paid.

5) Online Classifieds. There are some great paid classified sites online as well as the free ones. Try some out against the free ones and see what works best for your market. Just Google “Paid Online Classifieds” to find lots of places to advertise.

6) Flyers. Get your local printers to do you a batch of flyers and start posting them. A great place is outside seminars that are all about what your business is. Put them on cars or in peoples hands but get out there. As I am in the business of teaching people how to make money from home I would hand out flyers to people leaving a train station after a day at work. Think about where your customers would be and go post flyers there.

7) Shop Windows. Get your adverts in the windows of your local shops. The ads I am
talking about are just a bit bigger than business cards. This might be free but if not its
not going to cost a lot. Just go in and ask.

8 ) Banner Ads. You will have seen these on websites, there the adverts that flash at you in the corner of your eye. Normally a bright picture with little writing that are 1 or 2 cm in
width and height. They have fallen out of favour of late but they can still be very
effective for promoting your business. You will have a direct message on it that also tells people to click it. When they do there taken to your website or a product your promoting.

Just Google “banner ads” to make some yourself and either place them on
your own website or pay to advertise them on someone else’s who is in your
market or a similar market.

9) Ezine Ads. These are adverts you place on online magazines. There are literally thousands of these online mags in all different markets that you can place ads on. They all have readers who have aggreed to recieve newsletters that will contain these adverts. These are people who are already interested in what you have to promote and these magazines/Ezines can have many thousands of subscribers. Expect to pay around £20/$30 an ad

To find out exactly how to use this method have a read of my article all about Ezine advertising.

If you would like to implement some more advertising ideas then take a look at my article about Free Advertising

I am also available for any help when it comes to setting up or running an online business. Just leave your details either on my Contact Me Page or my Coaching Course Page. I will then get back to you for a talk.

You will find below a selection of free online and offline advertising ideas. These are ideas I have either used myself succesfuly or seen others have success with them. They are not the only ways to advertise your business but they are some of the best free advertising ideas.

FREE ADVERTISING

1) Facebook. www.facebook.com Whatever you think about Facebook it is one of the
most powerful advertising tools out there and for the most part its free. At present there are 700 million users and when they join and as they use Facebook they all give you hints as to what there into which means we know exactly what to sell them.

The idea with free Facebook advertising is to find relervant groups on FB that are into what you do/sell etc and then start interacting by leaving messages on the groups wall and making friends with the members of the groups. This means not only will people see your messages with links to your website on but the friends you have made through these groups will also see any messages you post on your own FB wall.

2) Twitter. www.twitter.com Another social site that you can use for free and again as above you can target people who will be interested in what you do. The idea here is to set up an account and then start following people who you believe would be interested in what your business is about. What will then happen is they will start following you. Its a bit of an unwritten law with Twitter, everyone follows who is following them. When you do get followers you then start posting tweets (messages) about your business or about related things with the intention of generating interest in what you do.

Don’t over do it by only trying to sell them something but genuinely give out great information with links back to your site or even other credible sites. If you do this well then you will gain credibility so that when you do post a product or a link to your site your followers will be interested.

3) Online Classifieds (free) There are many of these free online sites that you can place an ad on and get instant viewings for your business. Yes there are paid ones out there but stick to the free ones if your budget is tight.

The biggest one out there is www.craigslist.org which allows you to place ads in cities all over the world but its not perfect for every type of business.

Another great classified site is www.Gumtree.com

Just Google “Free online classifieds” for more free clssified sites and see what comes up.

4) Shop Notice Boards. A lot of large supermarkets/stores will let you place a small ads on there notice boards for free. Go round your local area and find as many as you can. Be aware that your ad does not stay up forever so you will need to place new ones every few weeks. The type of ads I mean will be postcard sized.

5) Email Signature. This is simply where you put a little message at the bottom of every email you send out. It will have a quick message about what you do and your website address. Just think of all the emails you send out, everyone of them could be promoting for you. You can set this up so its done automaticly for you within your email system such as Hotmail, Gmail etc so that every email you send has this signature at the bottom. Don’t make the signiture too long, just a quick message and then your website.

6) Article Writing. Not for everyone but if your happy to sit down a write some good articles of between 250 and 1000 words then you have a great opportunity to market your business for free.

There are article directories out there that will upload your articles on to the internet plus allow you to put a business link at the bottom, known as a resource box. This resource box is like a mini advert for you with your website address in. A good article can be picked up by lots of people who either read it and then click on your website address or place the article on their blog or website and it will include your resource box with your business link in it.

This is a very effective way of marketing and whats great is your articles are around forever with your business link in it. One of the best sites is www.ezinearticles.com but if you Google “article directories” you will find many more you can post articles to for free.

7) Forums. Forums are great places for interacting with people who will be interested in your type of business. What you can do is find forums (just type into Google what your looking for) that are specificly about the type of market you are in and then join them. Then you can start answering or posting questions as well as interacting with other forum members and at the end of your messages you will have your website address. Now if your interacting genuinely and not just spamming your products then people will be inclined to click on your website link.

Q & A sites. Similar to forums but with the sole intention of answering or posting questions with a link to your website. Again remember to be genuine here and not just spamming your products. Two good places to join are

www.aolanswers.com

www.answers.yahoo.com

9) Video Marketing. Why not make a quick video and upload it to the internet using sites such as www.YouTube or www.Vidler.com

Make an informative video about an issue people may have within your particular market with obviously a link to your website that has more content about this issue and a product that helps. You don’t have to be Spielberg here, you don’t even have to be in it, just your voice with some pictures. A simple clean video will do.

10) Contact Marketing. A good old fashioned conversation or better known as contact marketing. If your comfortable doing this then when your out and about strike up some conversations with strangers, don’t go out deliberately looking for people but the ones you casually encounter during the day. Invariably the talk will come around to what you do and then you can do some self promotion or hand them a business card.

11) Commenting. Adding comments to websites/blogs that are in your market and similar to your website content is a very quick and free way to market. Find websites/blogs that are in your market and leave a comment at the bottom of any articles you see on the site. Read the article so that you can leave a genuine comment. When you do this you can leave your business website address for people to click. People like to read comments. Plus leaving your website address particularly on high ranking websites gives you a better ranking as well (back linking) because the search engines take note of website addresses that can be found on other websites.

12) A4 Tearoffs. Now this idea may seem very basic but its one I have used and many others as well to generate income with. Simply create an advert on your computer in Microsoft Word or some similar program, nothing fancy, just some exciting words about your business or the products or service you offer. Then at the bottom create some vertical sections that have your website address in it. Ths part is the tearoff bit.

Now print your advert off. You can then post these ads all over your local area or wherever you like. I put them in bus stops, at cash dispensers, any where there is a high volume of traffic. What will happen is anyone who is interested in your advert can simply tearoff your website address and check your site out later. Very effective and very cheap.

If you would now like to see some more advertising ideas then take a look at my Paid advetising Ideas article.

Do you want some help?

If your looking for some help with your marketing then why not leave me a message on the Contact Me Page and I will get back to you or if your looking to start an online business and are not sure of the best way to go about this then why not leave your details on my Coaching Course Page. I will then be in touch to explain all.

Nick Squires-The English Entrepreneur

How to construct and advert

I just want to explain some basics to you about the way you should be constructing an advert. That is the way you format it so you can get the maximum response from the people reading it.

Now the way you construct you advert will depend on the types of advertising your doing and the amount of space you have available to do this in but by and large the following formula will be relevant to most types of advertising.

Headline

First thing of course is the advert will need a headline. This headline needs to be eye catching and curious. A good headline will more often than not either ask a question or create a problem.

You want the reader to start thinking as soon as they see your advert and a headline that gets them to either to answer that question or agree with that problem is a great start.

Body

The body of the advert will really want to address the issues created in the headline. You can offer a solution to the question asked or the problem created. The solution will be found when they visit your website or when they view a particular product and you can tell them this within the body of the advert.

How much information you tell in the body or the way you tell it is really dependant on how much space you have to write. Most often you will only have a few lines to get your solution across so make it straight to the point.

Call to Action

The final part of your advert is where you explain to the reader what to do next. More than likely you will be getting them to visit a website address to view your website or a product your promoting. You give them a call to action such as “Visit Today” or “Click Here Now”

Advert Example

The example below is an advert that is targeting the weightloss market and is set out how I have just explained.

Are You Still Struggling To Lose Weight

Follow my 6 easy weightloss steps and
lose weight permanently and easily.

Find out HOW

Visit
www.YourWebSiteHere.com
TODAY

The advert above has the headline posing a question. It then offers a solution and finally it explains what they need to do next with the call to action.

In the example above I have highlighted certain words and made the website address stand out as well as made the letters all capitals at the start of each word in the title. You may not always be able to do this but if you can then use these strategies too.

Final Thoughts

You only have a split second to attract the reader so make your advert as attention grabbing as possible. Try to be different from other adverts out there but don’t stray too far from the above formula as it is well proven. And remember that what you state in the body of the ad really must be the solution that they will find once they visit your website or product.

Online Income Coaching

Don’t forget if you are looking to make an income online and you would like a mentor and advisor to help you attain this then fill out your details here on My Coaching Page I will then get back to you to explain in detail what I can do for you.

I just want to introduce you to an area of making money online that you may not have heard of before and that is list building.

List building is basicly collecting peoples information, normally their name and email with the sole intention of creating a relationship with them. When I say relationship I mean an interaction where you build up some trust so that you are in a postion to be able to promote products or sevices to them. And you do this with your emails that you send out on a regular basis.

The collection of emails via a contact form and then the automatic sending of the follow up emails can all be done with the use of an auto-responder. Once you have set up your auto-responder your emails will go out in the order you set at the time you want to everyone who leaves their details.

This means that you can be creating relationships and promoting products without you ever personally contacting these people.

Here is How it Works

You decide on a market to be involved in.

You then create a 1 page website known as a squeeze page. This squeeze page will have an enticing headline regarding this particular market and a contact form for people to leave there details with. The way you get them to leave their details is to offer a free gift in return.

You then advertise this squeeze page to the people who will be interested in what you offer.

Now you set up your auto-responder to have a series or follow up emails with the first one being the free gift and the rest will be quality information about the topic these people are interested in. Plus you will also have products related to the market these people are interested about in the emails for people to view and purchace. These will be Affiliate Products that you promote for free. You get paid a commision when a sale is made but you don’t have to stock them, ship them or take payments for them.

And that’s it. You are now list building and making money on auto pilot. You put the effort in at the start and you reap the rewards over and over again. So long as you have new people joining your lists you will have new people going through your system seeing your information and products.

And you can literally set up your list building to be in any market you like.

If you would like to find out more about list building and exactly how you can get everything set up correctly then why not now leave your details on the Contact Me Page. I will then be in touch to explain all about list building and answer any of your questions.

Nick Squires-The English Entrepreneur

With todays article, “5 online business misconceptions” I would like to point out a few of the more popular mistakes I see people make or think when working from home or building an online business.

These are certainly not the only ones I have come across people making but certainly understanding the following 5 misconceptions will help you to grow your business a lot quicker and a lot more profitably whether you are just starting out or already on this path.

5 Online Business Misconceptions

 1) Low cost = Higher sales. You would think this to be true every time and certainly in some cases it is but generally you will find that a customer will perceive something of low cost as something that is of low quality. But here is an interesting note. If you stick a higher ticket price on the same product that was lower priced the customer will now see it as one of higher quality.

So in fact putting the price up on your merchandise or services is a great way to increase your sales. But always bear in mind that you must always be giving value to you customer no matter what price you are charging. Giving value is your number 1 priority and believe me when I say ” Your bank account is always reflective of the amount of value you give out”

2) Gurus offer the best sales advice. While there are many professionals out there who offer a very good service indeed and can really help you increase your sales, the best people by far for helping you improve your income are your customers.

Asking your current customers what they think will give you way more insight into how best you might serve them in the future. After all these are the people who will be spending money with you so knowing exactly what they want is vital. Asking questions such as, “how can we serve you better” or “what product or service is difficult for you to find” will really help you target your customers with exactly what they want.

3) A product has to have the most gadgets to sell. Of course the product they are going to buy has to meet certain requirements, it needs to do a certain level of tasks but at the end of the day a person will buy something based on their emotions.

They will ultimately decide to buy something based on how it will make them feel. So with this in mind your advertising should focus more heavily on what pay off they will get emotionally from the purchase rather than focusing on the features.

4) New blood is your lifeline. While every business needs to keep finding new customers it is a lot easier to sell to your existing customer base than to a brand new enquirer. It normally takes half a dozen times for you to convert a prospect into a customer.

That is they may need to see your ad or website etc 5 or 6 times before they make a decision but your existing customer base has already gone through this process and assuming you gave them value the first time round then they will be willing to buy more.

5) Marketing is not Sales. When you are marketing you are creating an awareness, you are branding yourself or your business or both. You are making people aware that you are about and that they should consider you when the time is right for them purchase or use whatever products or services you are offering. The sales part is the next bit where you turn this person into a customer.

So there you have it, 5 online business misconceptions that I often come across particularly when people are just starting out building an online income and business. Incorporating these ideas will certainly help you understand your business and market better but it should also give you and your customers a better experience too which will make everyone happier.

Don’t forget if you want any help in making a living online either setting up a new online business or help with your exisiting one then let me know, either by clicking this coaching course link or the contact me link .

If you found this article any good then would you mind sharing it by simply hitting one of the share options just below Many thanks, Nick Squires.

A great way of reaching a large audience that is already interested in what you do and will not cost you very much is Ezine advertising or Newsletter advertising.

Ezine advertising is fast, effective, targeted and cheap and they are great for promoting your website, landing pages or products.

There are some tips and tricks to this type of advertising but once you understand the principles and you do some home work then online advertising with Ezine ads can be very effective indeed.

What exactly Are They

Ezines or Newsletters are simply online magazines. They will be web pages that focus on a particular topic and they are updated on a regular basis.

And these Ezines will have readership that has signed up to their newsletter that is sent out on a regular basis.

It is these newsletters that you can advertise on. You can place different types of ads with the intention of them being seen by the subscribers. And what is great is that the Ezine magazine will have built up a good relationship with its subscribers which means they will be already warm to what you have to offer.

I find Ezine advertising particularly good for list building with Aweber.

So How Do You Advertise With Ezines

Well first of all to find ezines to advertise on you simply type in to Google whatever market your business is involved in with ezine at the end.

So if your in the golf market just type in “Golf Ezine.” I would you suggest you be a bit more specific than this, perhaps type in “golf course ezine” or “European golf ezine”

Now have a look at all the different ones and see which appeals to you. If you find ones that are informative on the subject and are not just full of ads and have a professional look about them then you can do several things.

1) Look to see where you can sign up for their newsletter. Leave your details and then when you receive it see if it is a newsletter you would like to pay to have an ad in. One thing to look out for here is if the newsletter goes in your spam box. If it does more times than not then I would suggest to not advertise with them. Look for ones that end up in your email inbox.

2) Have a look on the Ezine and now find the link for advertising. This link should give you all the details of what ads you can place and how much. If there is no link for advertising then look for a contact us link and ask them directly about placing ads.

3) Try to find out what sort of readership numbers the Ezine has. This can often be found in the “About” tab. Now a tip here. Don’t always think that an Ezine with the biggest readership is always the best. Sometimes a much smaller subscriber list that has not been abused with constant advertising will be much better. I have known subscriber lists of around 25k to be much more effective than ones of 500k

But to be honest Ezine advertising can be a bit of trial and error. Fortunately they are not too expensive (£20-30 for classified ads) so you won’t spend too much in finding the good ones.

Ezine Example

The Ezine below is a good example of what I have just been talking about. Have a click and see   www.golftoday.co.uk

You will see on the Ezine that there is a link at the bottom of the page to the Newsletter that you can subscribe to plus links for the Advertising and an About link. There is also a Contact Us link.

Now all of these are found at the bottom but for other Ezines this may be different so hunt around for the info your after.

Types of Ads

There are quite a few advertising options when it comes to Ezines. It does depend on the actual Ezine but often you will find options such as, Classified ads, Sponsor ads, Banners ads, Advertorial ads or the most powerful but most expensive, Solo ads.

Really when your beginning to advertise with Ezines you will probably want to stick with Classifieds to start with.

See what sort of response you get with the classifieds and if your happy with the way your ads and the ezine performs then go for a solo ad.

A solo ad is simply an ad that is sent out to the subscribers with no other ads around it to distract the reader. There more expensive but this is for a reason, they work.

Your Ads

When writing your ads really be congruent with the actual Ezine its self. You know what the ezine is about so you know what the subscribers will be looking for. Speak to them on this level.

Make your headline attention grabbing. Perhaps create a problem and then in body of the ad offer a solution and finally at the bottom give a call to action.

Here is an example for a golf advert

Headline  Do You Still Slice Your Drives?

Body         Then follow these 6 proven steps from a former pro golfer that will stop you slicing your drives.

Call to action     Click the link below today

www.yourgolfwebsite.com

The advert above has an attention grabbing headline creating a problem. The body of the ad is giving a solution and finally the call to action is telling people what to do now.

What To Do Next

Start looking for ezines, sign up to there newsletters, see what type of quality they are, check for advertising rates and start advertising.

Online advertising with Ezine ads can be a very effective way to market your business but you need to do a little bit of homework and taking action to find the ones that work for you.

Interlinking is something very easy to do but at the same time very important to do. Regardless of what type of websites you have, interlinking is a vital part of the structure of any type of website. Having said that this article is focused towards WordPress sites.

What is Interlinking

Interlinking is where you link one piece of content on your website to another. This could be from a post to a page or vicer versa. And you do this linking with keywords or keyword phrases known as anchor text.

Why Do We Interlink

We interlink for several very good reasons. Firstly we want to reduce something known as your bounce rate. This is where someone will visit your site and then very quickly leave.

If we use some interlinking then we increase your chances of this person staying on your site longer. EG: if they are reading your home page and towards the bottom of the content you have linked a keyword to another page on your site it increases the chances of them staying longer, assuming they click that link.

Secondly, interlinking is good because it keeps the search engines happy like Google. If they see that people are visiting more of your pages/posts/content etc then they view this as a good thing and this helps with your search ranking. Meaning you get seen by more people for free.

So How Do We Interlink

This is very easy to do in WordPress either when you are adding new content or going back over old content.

You will need to be logged into your WordPress dashboard to do this.

What you want to do first is decide where you are going to link your content to. That is, find a page or post on your site that has similar or corresponding content to the one you are about to make the link in.

Now within the content you are working on find a keyword or keyword phrase that matches to the content your linking to.

Lets say your linking to a page about weight loss then if you can find a word or words(keywords or keyword phrases) that match up with this then this will be your link (anchor text)

Next simply highlight the anchor text, you will then see above in the text editor box a link symbol that is now highlighted as well, it actually looks like a piece of chain link and is on the line below the upload insert options.

Now click this link so that a new box appears and in here you can then add the website address (URL) of the page you are linking to. Obviously remembering that it links to another place on your website. If you want to link to another website of yours or even someone elses then you can do that too but that will not be interlinking.

You can also give it a title which is good for telling the search engines what the link is about.

Also in the box you will see “link to existing content”. If you click this it will show all the pages or posts already on your website. You can click on any of these and it will automaticly add the URL and title for you.

Once all this is done click add link to the bottom right. All that now needs doing is either publishing it or updating it depending on whether its new content or existing.

You can see a live example of interlinking in this very content. I have used a keyword phrase and linked it to another post on my site. Try it out and see where it goes.

Some Tips

Always make it a habit of interlinking whenever you add new content. If you have  old content that needs linking then go back and do this.

If I created your website for you then any content I added will already have been linked.

If you find you have a lot of content that needs doing then one of the great WordPress plugins you can add to WordPress is called “SEO Smart Links” This plugin will automate all your interlinking for old content without having to go back and manually do it.

Another tip is to make sure you add the link towards  the bottom of your content. There is no point getting people to click away before they have even read the content their on.

Also make sure the keywords you use for linking are as highly relevant as possible. This will help people know what there clicking to and also help the search engines know what’s going on.

Well I hope this article was helpful and you now know how to interlink content on your WordPress website.

Over the last few days I took a good long look at where my life has been, where it is now and where it is going. I took stock of all the things that are in my life right now and I got clear on all the things I would like to see appear in my life some time soon.

Doing all this, getting clear on me, led me once again to this conclusion and that is, “Life Is What You Make It.” and nobody else’s responsibility.

Look Around You

When you really set some time aside and I suggest everyone should do this, then you will see that your life is a direct result of what you have chosen to think and do in the past. Just take a look around you and see what surrounds you. What’s your house like, the car you drive, the job you have, your clothes you wear, the schools your kids attend, the way your kids behave, the amount of money in your account, the amount of debt you have, how many friends do you have, the state of your health.

This list could go on and on but like it or not everything that is on that list is there because you decided it to be. You made the relevant thoughts and took the relevant actions that correlated to those things and situations turning up in your life.

Now I hope some of those things will be good experiences and if so then congratulations but I bet a lot of them are not. I bet a lot of them you would like to see different and make go away.

You can plead innocence at this point and say it was someone else’s doing but if you really look back and think hard you will see that it was ultimately you who decided , allowed or took action for it all to happen.

I cant remember who first said this but it always makes me chuckle when I recite it because it is so true,

“ Whenever there is a situation or a problem going on in your life, no matter how big or small, you will find that there is only ever one person who always keeps reappearing at the scene of the crime, YOU”

The Good News Is

Look at the title of this article again, “Life Is What You Make It.” Are you starting to see the correlation especially after reading the previous paragraphs. Life is what you decide it to be, not what the guy down the road decides or your boss decides or the bank manager decides or the town hall decides, nope its you who decides.

Yes all those people can inflict certain situations on you, like closing your bank account or not collecting your rubbish or being fired but none of these people can have the ultimate say. They can’t dictate your actions and they certainly can’t dictate your thoughts.

Regardless of what life throws at you, you never have to take it lying down.

Just look at the good things that are in your life. I am sure you will take credit for those and quite rightly so, it was you who created all that. So if this is the case for all the good stuff then it shows you that you have full control over the not so good stuff. You have the choice on what your life looks like and that includes changing anything you are not happy with.

Take Action

Don’t just read this article and think “Hey nice words, must do that some day” and then go back to whatever it is you were doing. I promise you nothing will change and that treadmill your on will just get bigger. Instead take action make a few moments spare for yourself and get clear on what in your life needs improving or what in your life you would like to see appear.

Just get a piece of paper and put in bold letters at the top, Life Is What You Make It and then underneath list what’s going on in your life right now. Just keep writing, let the emotions pour out and then sit back and take stock. Its at this point you will have an understanding of what needs changing.

You now just have to figure out how your going to change it. Remember, its you who decided what your life will look like and also remember this. If there are things on that list that need changing but scare you at the thought of doing it then this is a sign that you must do it. You must take the action that will lead to a better scenario and believe me once you do take the action you will realise its not so scary after all.

Keep Designing

If you make this a regular habit of taking stock of your life and then plotting a course of action to improve it you will surely have a wonderful life indeed. It cannot be any other way. Once you see that life is what you make it and not , life is what someone else decides, then amazing things start to happen. As you begin to see more evidence of your personal power to change things you will start to think on more grander scales and you will start to expect that your life should be the way that you want it and not somebody else’s decision.

If you enjoyed this article and feel others would do so too then please Facebook or Tweet it by clicking the relevant links at the top and bottom of this page, you could also leave a comment just below, thank you, Nick Squires

Is it starting to frustrate you, is it starting to get you down, can you see no obvious answer. Why is it, what’s blocking your business success. Your doing all the right actions, your doing them consistently. In fact your putting in way more hours than anyone else but still it just will not come good, you just can’t seem to make that break through that you know is possible.

What Is It

What can be causing this lack of business success. Well I am sorry to have to tell you this but its YOU! You are the one who is causing the problem. It is you that is stopping that deal going through or that advert to not work or the leads to be bad.

Yes you are doing all the physical actions correctly like placing the adverts, talking to the prospects, building the websites, promoting affiliate programs etc but after all that, your attitude lets you down. You have successful actions but you don’t have a successful mindset.

What Do You Mean

I mean you can be placing a brilliant advert the one minute but the next be thinking it will not work or you can have a list of prospects to call but your mental chatter is “I bet there all like yesterdays, just a bunch of losers who don’t have a penny.

You see what you expect you invariably receive. Your mental chatter is what you are expecting to receive regardless of the good actions you may have done.

Here is the Science or Voodoo bit

Depending again on your attitude this next bit is either going to be a science lesson or some sort of bizarre cult teaching.

“You Become What You Are” “You must first BE before you see” You will never ever obtain the results your looking for in business unless you become the person who has already obtained those results. You must be the person first who has great leads, who has successful adverts, who has the income there looking for.

When you do this, and assuming you are doing the actions that correspond with these thoughts, you will see the result.

Like it or not we are in a vibrational universe here. (stay with me on this one) A universe that gives you exactly what you ask for, every time. It does not know whether you want more money or less or great leads or bad ones or a website that works or one that Google just laughs at. It only knows what thoughts you are thinking and vibrating and if your thinking lack thoughts then that’s exactly what you will receive.

Lets make this sound a bit less voodoo for you. Everything in this universe is energy. When you break everything down from the biggest star, a human being to the tiniest insect, you will find that they are all made up with energy. And this is a scientific fact. Another scientific fact is, that like energy attracts like energy.

Ok still with me, now the really important part of all this is, is that our thoughts our energy too which means that that what ever types of thoughts we are thinking, be it positive or negative will be what we attract to ourselves. So going back to our earlier problems of not having business success we need to look closely at the thoughts we are having when we are doing the actions and the ones we are having after.

How To Apply This

The simplest way to apply all this is to, as mentioned earlier, become now the person you wish to be. Is it that your looking to make more money each month with your business, well then be that person now who already is making the money. And in being this person it must correspond that you are being the person who has successful adverts or websites or prospects otherwise you would not be making the money.

Some Final Words

You need to apply these principals and mindsets on a consistent basis. We tend to negate the good work we do by letting our minds slip back to one of fear and lack. At first this will be the case of being positive then negative but in time you will quickly be aware of this back and forth going on and be able to concentrate of the good results you want.

If after reading about what’s blocking you business success, you are still not convinced, then I urge you to do some more research into the power of positive thoughts. You may want to look up the “Law of Attraction” just Google it and take your pick. Believe me once you understand and apply this universal law your life will never be the same again.

For more help with your mindset you can find some interesting articles here Correct Mindset

If you enjoyed this article and feel others would do so too then please Tweet it or Facebook it by hitting the relevant links at the top and bottom of this page, you could also leave a comment just below, thank you, Nick Squires

This is not going to be a long article today simply for the fact that learning how to improve your prospecting in not a lengthy process. You have all the tools you require right now to be a great prospector and to have fun while you are doing it.

Me And My Prospecting

For a long time prospecting for me was a tedious and laborious thing to do. It was never something I would enjoy and I would normally come away with a headache having battled my way through a list of leads that all were hard work to talk to.

But these days its fun, these days I speak to people I enjoy talking to who are happy to receive my call. I don’t have a headache at the end and I look forward to prospecting the next day. And guess what, my income reflects this. My income goes up the more fun I am having and the more fun and income I have the more I enjoy prospecting, what a lovely circle to be in.

So How Do You Get To That Point

To be in a place where prospecting is fun and its making you more money, well the answer is easy, “Just Be Yourself” Be who you really are.

For a while I tried to be someone else. I would act all serious on the phone and have everything dead quiet locked away in my office. I would sit there with this list of names that I had to call and if they did not answer I would become a bit stressed because I needed them to be in. If they were in then I had a rigid script to stick to that they also had to follow and of course they did not which got me more stressed.

I Had built up such an image of what a professional prospector must look and behave like that was so far removed from who I really am that of course I did not feel good when prospecting.

Again, just be yourself and for me that meant ditching the script. I already knew what I wanted to say. It also meant getting out of the office and talking to prospects in different environments. This could be in the kitchen, in the garden, in the car. Sometimes I would prospect while the partner was clothes shopping (Now this was definitely more fun). I did not care if it was noisy or someone interrupted me, this was all part of a real conversation that happened in real life..

I decided to drop this all serious and professional side to prospecting and just be me who was just having a conversation with someone who wanted more information about working from home. Two human beings have an authentic and genuine conversation as if we were down the pub.

Authenticity is Missing

The problem with this day and age is technology. Now don’t get me wrong technology is great. Technology allows me to live all over the world and make amazing money but its made all are lives so automated. Everything is done without the human touch because we want it faster than light.

We text or email rather than talk, we leave voice mail when a machine prompts us. We watch tv or dvd’s rather socialising. We do lots of shopping and banking online and book are flights and holidays this way too and we sound like a prospecting robot when we do actually talk to a human being.

People are starved of a genuine conversation these days. If they do get to talk with someone then this person will be all superficial and just treating it as a stepping stone to whatever is happening next in their life. But if you allow yourself to be who you are and talk to your prospect as though you do care, you do want to help them and you are interested in what they have to say well wonderful things start happening.

You start to attain relaxed confidence, you start to enjoy yourself, the prospect starts to open up more and you begin to really find out what they are truly looking for and believe me, its more than the generic answer of, “to make more money.”

So at the risk of labouring the point in how to improve your prospecting, just be yourself and allow the prospect to be themselves, you will have more fun and so will they which will increase your chances of making more money.

So go out there have fun and make money.

Do you think this was another outstanding article that the whole world should know about, great then just hit the links for Twitter and Facebook on this page and also leave a comment just below, you can put a link to your website or blog with it as well. Thanks, Nick Squires

I am going to describe to you in the next few paragraphs a technique or a mind set if you like that will completely transform the way you look at your life and particularly the way you look at making money working for yourself.

This idea I am going to divulge to you has helped countless others achieve a level of happiness and a level of results in life and business that they had always been searching for.

This concept is not something I have come up with but it is something I now use to great effect in my life and the lives of others.

Obviously there is some clue to what it is within the title of this article “Life is a game and making money is a game” in fact the whole basis of this concept could be explained in the first four words, “Life Is A Game”.

So lets get into the meat of this article and hopefully demonstrate a way that will have you feeling 100% more in control of your life and business.

Way To Serious

In every aspect of our lives we are way too serious. We put too much pressure on ourselves to get the perfect result and if we do not get that result then we beat ourselves up a bit more. In are attainment of the perfect life (whatever that may be) we have forgotten the fundamentals of how we should behave to ourselves and to others and that is to be good.

We do not have to be completely stressed out and forcing a result and at the same time trampling other others in order that we reach a certain goal in a certain time. No, we can be good, we can enjoy the process, we can make the whole motion of getting what we desire a pleasant experience for everyone concerned and at the same time improve the result we were searching for.

So How Do We Do This

We make life a game and everything within in it a game too. We decide what the games are and how the games are played. Now at this point you may be saying “but Nick making moneyis a serious thing, I have a roof to maintain and kids to feed” and I agree with you, these and many other situations are very important but it does not mean we have to take the goodness out of life for ourselves and everyone else in order for us to maintain or achieve these important situations.

When you decide that life is a game and making money is a game too then you open up to the possibilities of designing your life the way you want it to be.

The Nuts And Bolts

Lets assume you have opened up to the idea that making money is a game. So now you can decide what games you want to play or just as importantly what games you do not want to play (the stress games)

You may be at this moment in time building a business working online and going through what seem like lots of obstacles in your way. Well if so change it. If the game your playing now is perhaps one of “Google stopped my ads running, I gotta figure out what they don’t like and fix it or I am screwed” If this is what your playing (stress games) and a lot of people are then change the game to another one such as “lets sit down for 20 mins and figure out two even better ways than Google to generate leads with that are free” or “ lets take a moment here and change my perceptions of what the amount of leads I really need each week to make money with are”.

Do you see whats happening, you are taking yourself out of a game that is hurting you and putting yourself in a game thats making you feel good and when you feel good, results are easier to come by because your not forcing it.

Another scenario could be, your playing the game of “ if I do not make £1000 this week then I am really in a tight spot, I got bills to pay” this is a game you have set up that has stress all over it from beginning to end. How about changing it to a game of “what is the best way for me to make £1000 this week”. This game has negated any stress but it has also opened you up to thinking more about a positive end result rather than an unwanted negative end result. It has set you up to seeing what is possible, what can you achieve.

Things To Remember

Always remember that it is you who creates the game, it is you who decides what the result is your looking for. So always set up a game that is empowering rather than dis-empowering. If the game your playing gives you stress or makes you feel anything but happy then change it, eg, your in a business that you hate, well play the game of how to make this business better or lets find something new.

Remember, in this life is a game and making money is a game you are not the pawn, you are not the game piece but you are the maker of the game. I cant repeat this enough but if your playing a game that is stressing you out then change the game. You decide how it should be.

These games too will all have resistance no matter how good a one it is. A game without resistance is no game at all otherwise it would be too easy, it would be no fun, no challenge and completely boring. In fact if there were no resistance you would not even know you were in the game to begin with. If your whole life consisted of games like this then to be honest you would merely be on the sidelines watching others play the game of life.

Take football as an example. Anybody can kick a ball and score a goal, thats easy and after a while of doing this it would become totally mind numbing as its too easy but if you add in a bunch of other players some of which are trying to stop you scoring a goal ( the resistance) then it becomes challenging because your not guaranteed to score every time. It becomes more fun and more exciting when you do score.

But remember the resistance you do have in your games does not need to be a struggle or debilitating in anyway. Create money making games that, again, empower you rather than dis-empower you.

Rules Of The Game

As with any game you play be it monopoly, cards or making a multiple six figure income this year there will be rules. If there are no rules then there is no game, it just would not work if nobody had a set of rules to go by. But the rules you play by in the games that you set up are simply the beliefs you have around it, the way you think about it and the way you act within it.

Essentially your making the rules to fit with your game. You decide your belief, you decide the way you think and you decide how you act. Get these three elements working the way you desire and you have set the rules in your favour.

Your now playing some powerful games that are heavily stacked in your favour but still with a challenge. You have chosen what you want to play, you have figured out the resistance you want involved and you have designed the rules you play by.

Once you do decide all this then truly life is a game and making money is a game within it that becomes an enjoyable experience for all involved, especially you, now go play.

Did you enjoy this article, would you like your friends to read it then hit the Twitter and Facebook links at the top and bottom of the page. A comment just below would be great too, thanks, Nick Squires

With this article we are going to go through all the stages required in order for you to have a Clickbank product with an advert for that product on to your WordPress site. The advert will be linked to your Clickbank account so that when you make a sale from someone clicking an advert on your site, Clickbank then will pay you the commission.

NB: I am assuming that because you are at this stage of your business/website then you are comfortable with the way that your WordPress system works. Such as adding post/pages and you understand what and where widgets are on your dashboard. If you are not to this level then I suggest you go and read some of my other WordPress Instruction Articles first. I am also assuming you have a Clickbank account. If not just click the link below and sign up for free.

Lets Get Started

First you need to go to www.clickbank.com  

Next you want to go to “Marketplace” which is found at the top of the page.

On the market  page look to the left  for “categories”. Choose and click the category you want. After you have done this just check the catergory again as you will probably see a drop down menu with more options within this catergory.

You now want to look through all the different products you can promote and find one that looks good and feels right for your site. Along with the product you will see lots of information that tells you such things as, your commision, how many others are selling it, if its a recurring commision (always best) etc.

Finding An Image

Now I am now assuming you have chosen the correct category and you have decided on a product.

What we do next is to first get an image that we can put on your WordPress site. We do this by clicking on the red writing that is at the top of the product you want to promote, just above the description of the product. You will know if your in the right place because the product description will have a big green Promote button to the right.

Once you have clicked on the red writing you will be taken to the products main sales page. This will be the page that people see when they click your ad on your site.

Its a good Idea if you have already checked out the sales page when deciding if this is a product you want to promote. You want to be happy/comfortable with the look and feel of the sales page, in other words would it make you want to buy.

From here we are looking to extract an image. Now we can do this by finding a suitable image we like on the sales page that represents the product your promoting and then right clicking on it and then left click on “save image as” or it might say “save picture”. You will then be saving the image to a file on your computer. Remember where this file is as we will need it in a moment.

One tip here. If you find no suitable images on the sales page then scroll to the very bottom of the page and see if there is a link that says “Affiliate”, usually in small writing. Click this and you will be on a page detailing the affiliate program. All your looking for is the section with adverts that you can download and use on your site.

Into Your WordPress Dashboard

Ok for now we are going to leave Clickbank and go to your WordPress dashboard but remember to keep open the clickbank page that has the info about the product with the green promote button.

So “log into WordPress” and then go to the pages tab to the left of your dashboard then “Add New” .

On this page we are going to add an Image.

Don’t worry about giving the page a title or anything we just want to upload the image you saved earlier.

You will find where to add an image/media just below where you put the title for the page next to “upload/insert”.

From here a box will have appeard from which we can now upload the image you saved a few moments ago in a file. So click “Select Files” and find that file. When you do see the file, locate the image within the file and double click on it .

Your WordPress page will now start “crunching” and upload the image which will eventually appear on your screen.

Pay Attention here My friends

Now these next few steps are the most important ones as we are going to link the image to your Clickbank account.

If you look at the image you just uploaded you will see underneath  “Edit Image” then underneath this,  Alternative Text, Caption, Description and finaly the important part “Link URL” What we need to do here is delete everything that is in the box to the right of the “Link URL” We do this because we are going to replace it with your unique Clickbank code (Hop Link)

When you have deleted all that you now go back to Clickbank and to the product you want to promote. You will then see the very large Green “Promote” button to the right. Click this and a new box appears, from here you will be given the opportunity to enter your Clickbank “Account Nickname”. You created this nick name when you opend your account with Clickbank. Fill in this. You don’t need to add in the Tracking Id as well. Now click the Green “create” button.

You will now see your “Hop links”. There will be two of them. The one we need is the top one in black that starts with “HTTP”. This is your unique code to the product you want to promote. Nobody else has this which means Clickbank will always know it was you who refered the customer through this link.

Copy this black link and then return to WordPress and paste it into the now empty “link URL” box.

NB: There are at this stage lots of options for editing the image such as size and alignment that you can do but for now we are just concerend with putting an image that is linked to you on your site and not too fussed about making it look pretty, you can come back and do this later.

When you have pasted the link in just go to the bottom of the box and click “Insert into Post”

Hey presto you now have the image within the main box of the add new page.

Creating the HTML Code

Next we want to get the HTML code for this image, stay with me hear its not as bad as it sounds. Simply look to where upload/insert is that you used a few moments ago and over to the right and next to “Visual” you will see “HTML”.

Click on HTML and you will then see the image has disappeared and the code (HTML) has appeared.

Widgets Section

Ok copy the code you see and then click on “widgets” on the left of the page in the “Appearence” tab.

Once on the Widgets page look towards the bottom of “available widgets” in the center for a widget called “Text” and click “Add” to the right of this particular widget. If you dont see the add link then you need to click “screen Options” at the top right of the page your on and then click in the drop down menu to the left “enable Accesibility mode”

So click add on the text widget and from here you simple have to paste the HTML code you copied earlier in to the main box of the “Text Widget”. Then decide just below where you want this Image to appear. Depending on the theme you have will depend on where you can put your image. You may have a theme with many sidebars to choose from or perhaps just one. When you have decided the sidebar you want now to choose the position that the image will appear. This all depends on if you have used this sidebar before. If you have not then your only choice will be position 1. If you have then obviously your position choice will be based on the amount of features already within this sidebar.

When you have decided on the image/widget positon click “Save Widget”.

Congratulations

You can now go to your WordPress site online and see what the image looks like. If you like the look of it then great no more work is required. If you don’t then you will need to go back and edit it. Perhaps it looks to big or it does not fit in correctly in the sidebar. Simply start again from the part where you upload the image from the file you saved it to and from there you can make any adjustments such as image size. But always remembering to add your Clickbank Hop link (product link) into the Link URL box.

Will You Get Paid

One last thing to do here is check that the image is connected to your Clickbank account and the way we always do this is to click on the image that is now live on your site and make sure it goes to the product page you first saw and where you got the image originaly.

You now want to pretend you are going to buy this product so click what ever it says on this page to purchace the product, possibly “Add to Cart”.

You will eventually be taken to the Clickbank order form where you pay for the product.

Just scroll to the bottom of the page and the very last thing you will see is [Affiliate=Your ClickBank nick name here]. You should see your nickname within the brackets. If you don’t see your nickmane then its not linked to you and you won’t get paid. You need to make sure then that you entered all the correct details such as your nickname. This will ensure that your Clickbank hop link is linked to you.

So there you go folks you now know how to take a Clickbank product, grab an image, link this image to your Clickbank account and then place the image on your website so that people can click on it and you can make money. Congratulations you are on your way to making money online.

If your looking to add a bit more functionality or you would like to clean up your wordpress dashboard then a great little feature that often gets over looked is the “Screen Options” tab.

This can be found always to the top right of whatever page you are on within your wordpress dashboard.

Simply click on the tab and see what options become available to you for that particular page. It may be that you can add or delete (not permanantly) particular features that can enhance your experience of WordPress.

A handy feature of the “Screen Options ” tab is the ability to clean up a wordpress page by removing features that you rarely or perhaps never use. This make life a bit easier when you only have the features on screen that you only ever want to use.

You can also decide on a different page layout by choosing the amount of columns your dashboard uses and displays.

One particular feature I always recommend is to go to the widgets page of your dashboard and click the screen options tab. From here you can then click on the blue link to the top left of the page that says “Enable Accesibility Mode”. This will make life easier when you want to add or edite/delete any widgets. If you are already an online income client of mine then I would have set this for you as standard.

Doing this activates an add link on all your widgets so that you do not have to drag and drop your widget to the exact position on the exact side bar. Yes I know its not the cure for cancer but it does make things easier.

What I recommend is to use your WordPress dashboard for a while and then see what options you would like to add or delete on the various pages you use within your dashboard, remembering that you can reverse any decissions you make whenever you like.

If you are reading this and you have not already installed or downloaded WordPress .org but would like to then just follow my Easy Install WordPress.org Instructions. This article offers a very quick and painless way of installing wordpress plus setting up your hosting account and your website address. All of it is written in plain English and takes about 15 minutes.

I am assuming that as your reading this article you are looking to make money with your WordPress site or at least be promoting something or someone.

So obviously you will be wanting the world and his wife to be able to see your site otherwise your not going to ever make a single penny.

So with this in mind I would quickly like to show you something that you must do whenever you start a new WordPress.org site and that is to have it enabled so that all the search engines such as Google, Yahoo etc can see you.

Its not hard to do and will take only a few seconds but unless you know that you have to do it then you will never be seen by anyone in large numbers.

How To Make Google And The World See You

First log into your WordPress dashboard. Now go to the “Settings Tab” which you will see to the left of the screen towards the bottom of the page.

Within the settings tab you are looking for the link that says “Privacy”. Click on this.

Now on this page you simply have to make sure that the “Privacy Settings” (Site Visibility) are set to allowing the search engines to see your site.

This may have already been activated by default but it is not uncommon for the site to be set for the opposite

Once you have checked the one that you need just click “Save Changes” and you are done.

As you can see its very simple to do but it has a major impact on your success if its not set correctly.

Don’t forget to read all my other WordPress Instructions so you get the most out of this experience.