I was chatting with James Grandstaff the other evening and he asked me if I was still using ListJoe and some of the other list builders, safelists or whatever we’re calling them these days…
My answer was “Yes, of course…”
We then talked about his new “3 Step Secrets” system that he’s setting up for his team (and those that want to be in his team) and he asked me if I’d like to try it out.. kind of test it and take it for a test drive… well, as you might expect, I said “Sure Jim! I’d love to!”
So James sent me to a web page and I went from there.. I followed the instructions he’d laid out and got to the bottom of the 3 step secret (step 3 really is brilliant!) … and I sent out 1 email to 3016 listjoe members
That was yesterday.. Here’s the shocking part: While I was sleeping, just after midnight lastnight, I got a new sign up! Obviously it works and works well…
So, here’s my dilemma.. should I carry on testing this system and keep growing the business it’s building without telling you what’s going on, or, should I tell you about it and see if you want to join the fun?
The system is obviously brand new, hardly anyone has seen these pages and they’re converting really well which means that you have an opportunity to jump on this before it gets real big (like James’ other systems)
So, should you try it out, test it or use it?
The answer is this: If you want a very simple system that works, costs you nothing to use, and you’re willing to follow the instructions and effectively “work a system” then the answer is a resounding Yes!
on the other hand, if you’re not really fussed or bothered about this stuff, then definately not… don’t even go there
I’ll leave it to you to decide, but here’s the link to the first page I saw that lead to the rest:
I have been stunned by the results of VWD’s recent launch of their ‘Viral’ site.
12,000 new members in under 30 days is not too shabby!
This one page includes a very short teaser video with some pretty ‘generic’ text discussing a huge market and encouraging visitors to opt in for more information.
I was watching some Frank Kern stuff the other day, about the ‘triangle of trust’ and the power of video on blogs and I think he made a real important point:
Video holds a relatively high ‘preceived value’ to website visitors, especially on a blog.
Frank talked about the blog being a fairly ‘non threatening’ environment. ie. it’s not perceived as something that will sell you something (like a sales page does)
So, maybe, it’s the video on this viral page that’s made all these people opt in…
Of course, once you have opted in, you get the info and all the ’social, tell a friend and bookmark tools’ to help get the word out about the site… I wonder though whether it’s those that’s driving the traffic to the viral page, numbers on the inside suggest the social tools are doing very well, especially for those just starting out on the net.
VWD have just launched their much anticipated ‘Viral Marketing System’ to the affiliates on their network, and it’s proving to be a hit with the 200,000 current members of the website.
VWD dropped the £9.99 joining fee allowing affiliates to join the program for Free. This is great news for both new and more experienced affiliates and sets VWD up for explosive growth over the coming months. New affiliates get a 100% free, zero risk, online presence with built in viral marketing system, more experienced affiliates can focus on assisting new affiliates with the growth of their networks.
VWD’s affiliate program is one of those rare cases where payments are made on 7 levels of affiliate activity, almost unique!
Building an Online Network Marketing Business is in many ways like building any online business. It takes certain skills, a level of motivation and probably most important of all, a willingness to learn and to be ‘coachable’.
In my time building mlm businesses here are the 7 secrets that have been shared with me by some of the most successful online network marketers out there:
1. Have a VERY Strong Reason.
You’ll hear this referred to as ‘the dream’, ‘your goal’ and so on. The whole point of this is that you are going to need something to drive you on, even when things don’t seem like they’re working. Having a nice car is one thing, but as we all know, we can easily settle for less and give up. Get emotionally attached to your goal, make it something you can see, believe and feel strongly about. Amongst the easiest ‘emotional goals’ you can focus on are those involving your children and your immediate family. Imagine being able to provide that dream for your family. Visualise it and see it in your minds eye as if you have already have it, feel it, believe it, get attached to it.
2. Use a ‘System’ to Generate Your Own Leads and Extra Cash
Don’t make the mistake of buying leads. There are lots of systems out there designed to allow you to generate your own leads for free. The systems known as ‘funded proposals’ are designed to do two things: Provide you with an endless stream of new leads and Put money in your pocket. I cannot endorse the funded proposal system enough. Network Marketers suffer two problems: not enough leads and running out of money. The funded proposal solves both of these problems.
3. Promote YOU First.
People join you in business, mostly they don’t really join you in business for the products. People love to follow leaders and will join you in business for your leadership and the relationship they can build with you. By promoting You Inc. it maybe that you can lead your team to opportunities when things may have gone wrong in your existing company. (This doesn’t sound too positive but it is a reality and it does happen)
4. Focus on Attracting Experienced Network Marketers.
This is what we might call a ‘no brainer!’ Experienced network marketers already understand the principles of mlm, they already understand the power of leverage and duplication and most importantly they are usually educated and positive and are a lot easier to work with. By focusing on attracting experienced mlmers you are not going to go through the whole pyramid, scam argument and all that other negative, time wasting blah blah stuff.
5. Take the Time to Build Relationships with Your Leads
Provide value, care about them, develop bonds, share your skills and experiences. Listen to their challenges and issues, empathise, understand and where appropriate provide solutions. Always remember: It’s the little things that make a BIG difference, one tiny act of kindness can go a VERY long way.
6. If You Can Help – HELP!
Support the network marketing industry, support your fellow network marketers. It really doesn’t matter which company they are with, whether they are cross line, upline, downline or whatever. Always help out where you can. Remember a rising tide will raise all ships. If you can suggest a solution to a problem, suggest it, If you know of a resource that will help someone, send them to it. What goes around comes around. What we give out is what we get back.
7. LEARN Stuff Fom People That Have Already Done It
You simply must be ‘Coachable’ Quite simply makes no sense to try and figure everything out on your own and effectively rewrite the book. there are thousands of successful online network marketers to learn from and they are giving giving giving! Find someone you can relate to and learn from them. Look for a mentor and become a student. ASK For Help!
Get FREE ACCESS to my “Squeeze Page Traffic Secrets” video by opting in to the small form at the top of this page. Your comments are always warmly welcomed!
It’s been a while since I posted here on my blog.. tut tut! The truth is that I have been pretty busy with a number of things both on and offline.
We had a pretty good training meeting up in Northampton on Sunday just gone, this was a training to support those people that have downloaded and have put to use the ebook authored by David Butler, Gordon Bunker and yours truly (The PIE System). It was really intended to help people out with the setting up of the various programs and systems once you dig in to IMSP and PIPS and then also how to get the best out of some of those programs. So, I spent a fair while preparing and getting materials together for that. It seemed like a good idea to put together video’s that could be shown at the training which show step by step how to perform various activities and actions.
It has become apparent that for the new net marketer things can be pretty darn daunting, not to mention highly confusing and overwhelming! As I cast my mind back to when I first set out on this amazing journey it was a mad time for me too, incredibly exciting, but downright crazy!
Like anything worthwhile, there’s quite a learning curve to deal with, and, to be honest, that learning curve doesn’t seem to stop, there’s always something new to learn about and lots of ways to fine tune and improve results. That’s really what I wanted to focus on in this post.
We’re in the business of building lists, opt in email lists… We hear it all the time “Build your list” and “The money is in the list”. What I have been taught, and what I teach others is rather than sending your traffic directly to your affiliate sign up page, where ever that may be, capture the name and email address of that person first with a ’squeeze’ or ‘data capture’ page so that they can be added to your auto responder list such as those provided by Aweber or Get Response. That’s all very well, but, the question has always been “How do I get someone to part with their name and email address on a capture page and end up on my opt in list?”. There’s lots of ways of doing this, but what’s worked really well for me is to use proven systems that are known to convert traffic into subscribers and subscribers into buyers. A great example of this is James Grandstaff’s Instant MLM Squeeze Pages, my favourite squeeze page of the lot is this one: http://www.theeasyprofitgenerator.com
I have spent many hours studying James’ system and techniques, and, through this I managed to put my own little squeeze page together which captures subscribers for my e-lottery business: http://stacktheodds.net
Having these great systems and capture pages is great, but it’s completely pointless if we don’t have traffic! So, I suppose that’s the next big question: “How do I get traffic to my squeeze pages?” This, for me, is where the fun really begins! So, what follows in this post is a few methods of creating traffic at low cost or for free and also what I’ve done to measure the ‘responsiveness’ of that traffic.
Talking to any good net marketer, they will always say ‘Track your results’. Simple web stats can tell you about where that traffic came from and what may have been searched for etc, but it won’t tell you what ‘actions’ occured on your page and it certainly won’t tell you what traffic turned into a ’sale’ or ’subscriber’.
Why Track?
If we’re going to spend time and money on developing a traffic stream to our squeeze page, we want to know which traffic sources are providing results. A really good service that was recommended to me is ProTrackerPlus. It’s a great service because it not only allows you to track all sorts of links and sources, it also teaches you how to track, or as the boys over there (Dam and Mark) put it… All you want in a tracker.. with the Training You Deserve!
Setting up a free account over at ProtrackerPlus allows you to set up 5 trackers. So, I deceided a while ago to track some of my pages to see what happened.. The results were surprising (at least to me!).
Heres my results from tracking my pages on 4 manual traffic exchanges over 5 days (in no particular order):
This test has been a real eye opener for me. Generating traffic for free in a Manual Traffic Exchange is not really my favourite pass time, and, to accrue the amount of traffic you see in the figures above for free takes a little while.
What have I learned?
In the last 5 days, Hit Safari out performed the other 3 exchanges with a conversion rate of 0.39% (for every 509 clicks I have got 2 subscribers to my list) It’s worth me spending a bit more time at Hit Safari or even worth buying some traffic
Traffic Goldrush has a bunch of traffic still left to deliver (something like 700 hits) but has not managed to deliver me that traffic over the last 5 days.
Dragon Surf is a steady 0.22% conversion and delivers the traffic at a good rate
Traffic Splash also steady 0.20% and delivers traffic at a good rate
The surprise here for me has been Hit Safari. While surfing I always pick up loads of free prize credits which always made me a little suspicious. Turns out my suspicions were unfounded and that this Traffic Exchange not only delivers traffic it also provides responsive traffic!
List Builders
Another good source of responsive traffic for me has been list builders. As part of the training we did on Sunday I produced a few videos, I’ll post two of them here.
The first one is based on List Joe. List Joe is a credit based list builder. This effectively means that if I read other List Joe members emails, I will earn credits, which in turn will enable me to email ListJoe members. The video is based on using a free account which allows you to deliver 2500 emails to ListJoe emails every 7 days.
My List Joe results have been to land 3 subscribers for every 2500 emails sent (which resulted in 120 visits) That’s a pretty good conversion rate of 2.5%
Finally, There’s Downline Builder Direct.
Downline Builder Direct is more of a ‘Safe List’. This means that I agree to receive other DBD emails in return for the ability to email DBD members in return. This is not credit based, so it means that we have to concentrate a little harder on writing a good email that encourages people to open it and read it. (There’s a great free course just come out by Michael Rasmussen called ‘Email Promo’s Exposed’ I would strongly recommend checking this out if you are interested in sending out promotional emails!)
So, With a Diamond Membership at Downline Builder Direct, you have the ability to email 20,000 members every 2 days. This safe list has been great for me. At my last mailing it produced 13 subscribers to my list.
I cannot tell you the number of hits it took to create these subscribers as I didn’t use a tracker. I chose to use a fully qualified domain name in the email that I sent rather than a tracking link. For some reason this seems to produce better results than a ‘tracker url’. I suppose that’s a price we pay…. The downline builder direct membership I took costs $77 and it has been worth every penny so far!
So here’s what I did in DBD the other day in video:
That’s it for this post, I hope this has been useful to you in some way. Do comment, even if it bored your socks off I really enjoy any feedback…
If you’re really not interested in becoming a PPC blackbelt, then this course is definately not for you!
Actually, if you’re in MLM or Network Marketing and you’re not using PPC advertising then I totally understand how you feel. I shy’d away from PPC for fear of loosing a stack of cash very quickly… As you’ll know there’s a bazillion horror stories out there about PPC and the big G. All the advice I got when I started on my Internet Network Marketing quest was to avoid PPC until ‘I knew what I was doing’.
BUT, we all know that there are people out there who are making, literally, fortunes using the PPC traffic methods.
I got to the point where I decided that I’d like to learn PPC in order to expand my various businesses and on good recommendation invested in Mike Dillard and Jim Yaghi’s PPC Domination course which is available through Magnetic Sponsoring. There’s a full 30 day money back guarantee and Mike Dillard’s reputation is excellent, so, I took the plunge.
To be honest, the first video in the series I didn’t really learn too much and considered actually going for a refund, but, having got through that and moved on to the next video’s I am really impressed. It just felt that it may turn into a pitch for something else… Turns out I was wrong
This post is not to say that the free and paid traffic methods I currently use are not working… on the contrary, they work very well, but, adding the PPC string to the traffic bow seemed a very sensible thing to do, especially when the people running this course are pitching at Internet Network Marketers… that is really special, I don’t know of any other PPC course out there, specifically tailored to the Network Marketing and MLM niche.
This is apparently due to pressure from the masses:
“Over the last 24 hours we have received a flood of emails asking, begging and pleading with us to extend the WebProsperity Pre-Launch and continue to accept free sign-ups.”
Webprosperity anticipate over 100,000 free prelaunch signups, come 13th January no more free signups will be taken and the launch will begin to move to the next stage.
If you’d like to find out more about this opportunity and the products, take a look at http://ian.webprosperity.com/ you can see there signups happening every few seconds on the live feed…
This will be my last blog post of 2008, the year has come to an end so shockingly quickly.
I spent a while this morning just going back through my calendar, notes and posts and I am pretty surprised at how much can change in a single year. 2008 started in a difficult and sad way with my dear wife losing her father and an uncle within a few days. Mick, my father in law, was a military man, an extremely proud husband, father, grandfather and leader who will always be sorely missed. His legacy is the way in which he lived his life, he set a fine example in taking responsibility, doing what’s right, speaking his mind, being brave and chasing down his dreams. An inspirational act to follow!
With all of this, and not wanting to dwell on the sadness, it put us in a position where we needed to evaluate our lives and set some goals for the future. So, that’s what we did!
My wife’s, Larina’s, side of the family are very small and it soon occurred to me that I would have to step up to the plate and be the man of the family, I promised Mick with my last words to him that I would take care of his girls and I continue to strive to do that today.
So, goals were set and decisions were made. We’d sell both of our houses and move into something a little bigger meaning that Coral, my mother in law, could come live with us annexed or otherwise… My idea of a shed at the bottom of the garden didn’t go down too well so maybe something a little more elaborate was in order
What transpired in the housing market here in the UK, and indeed around the world had a big impact on those plans! We did manage to find several suitable places that ticked all the right boxes but with the market going the way it was we knew it just wasn’t going to be plain sailing. To this day we have not moved or sold the houses and are still contemplating the markets.
This situation has irritated me somewhat! I mean market conditions have been able to limit our freedom and choices… Those of you that know me will know that I don’t take this kind of stuff laying down, I knew that if I wanted to change some stuff in our lives I would have to change some stuff in our lives…
Don’t get me wrong, I am extremely grateful for what we have, a lovely family, our own home, my own business, a property in North Cyprus, vehicles and so forth, but what I really crave for my family is the freedom to choice and security.
As you may have read in one or two of my ezine articles, I was into mlm up until 1999. This was ‘old school’ mlm, product based, home meetings, driving thousands of miles, books, tapes, the whole shabang.. come ‘99 I quit after 5 years. To this day I am not exactly sure why I did so.. but I did. The thing is that mlm or network marketing gets engrained. The rewards are exactly what I still craved, freedom. To be honest I had been keeping tabs on the leaders from that organisation and in May 2008 I found out that some pretty drastic stuff had happened. I don’t want to harp on about it but people like the Scrivens, Gregory’s and Butlers had some very serious issues to deal with. I watched with much interest what was happening to those people and that organisation.
In August 2008 we took 3 weeks out and went off to our place in Kyrenia, North Cyprus. I love the island, the people, the way of life and of course the climate is good too. The food is magnificent and the coffee is to die for My eldest son and I managed to get our Advanced Open Water PADI Scuba Diving tickets and we had what was simply a fantastic time. Now we have been over to Cyprus many many times, but this time something happened. I realised I wanted to be there a lot more of the time and I found out that my family did too. Larina was born there (Mick and Coral having been stationed there for many years) it is kind of like going home for her.
So, we get home and miss the place like crazy, and in true ‘be the man’ style, I sat down with Larina and set the goal, we would be there in time for the London Olympics. I wanted to watch the opening ceremony on the giant screen in Kyrenia Square. The thing is I realised that we were going to need the income to support ourselves and being a Scuba Instructor probably wouldn’t cut the mustard. My business, much as it is subscription based probably would end up shrinking and eventually dying. I needed something else.
It was September 2008 when I wrote to Jerry Scriven and inquired as to business opportunities. I was looking for a business that I could build online, that would provide residual income, that I could take with me wherever we went. Jerry very kindly passed my inquiry on to Dave Butler… the rest, as they say, is history.
So here we are, at the end of 2008 with a bunch of online mlm or network marketing businesses all of them growing… it’s so exciting!
I have learned so much over the past few months it’s astonishing and we haven’t even started yet! Things are a lot different 10 years on (that is in the way we build our businesses) what a huge learning curve that has been. The difference is that it is FUN FUN FUN! (kind of important!)
The dream is real, we are moving steadily towards our goal and we can see it happening.
I’ve a few people to thank:
Larina, my wife, Thank you my Love for your patience and belief
David and Tina, Thank you for helping me get started and being a great mentor
James Grandstaff, Thank you for developing a magnificent downline building system for us all to use
Gordon Bunker, For being a great crossline pal and Joint Venture partner
The Team, For being an inspirational bunch of entrepreneurs
Sean Supplee, For being a great online friend and running partner
Lastly, I’m really looking forwards to 2009, it’s going to be a great year. One of the last opportunities to come my way in 2008 is Web Prosperity. You can check it out here: http://ian.webprosperity.com
This opportunity is still in pre-launch and promises to be one of the great success stories of 2009. It actually launches Jan 6th.
If you are wondering what you can do to make 2009 even more successful for you and yours then I would strongly recommend you go take a look and grab yourself a free position before launch. Without too much of the detail this is a 2 x 15 matrix that will be filled not only by you but also your upline… Launches like this don’t come around too often, they are a truly special event that can make a MASSIVE difference.
I definately urge you to go look at the site, get a position and then wake up Jan 6th realising that you already have a downline… http://ian.webprosperity.com It costs nothing to find out!
That’s it for my last post this year.
Have a wonderful new year celebration and a super prosperous 2009 and beyond
Cheers!
Ian
This post is inspired through a question I have been asked by a new Twitter contact.
I was asked this question, and frankly, I think it’s the best question I have been asked in a while, so, thank you Robert, for giving me the opportunity to write out my thoughts.
Success University, for those of you who know the business, opportunity and product, you will already know the answer to this question! It’s a resounding YES!
I think an important thing to cover is that given the nature of Success University, it gives us students the opportunity to reach out around the world and share the opportunity. The opportunity to give people the opportunity to add value to their lives. The principles taught within Success University are universal, they apply to all areas of our lives and can enrich anybody’s life.
I had an interesting discussion with my mentor, Dave, today… It went a bit like this:
Success principles can be a bit like jokes, jokes are often recycled and told in a different way… Have you ever listened to someone begin to tell you a joke and you think… yep, heard that, heard that, heard that and then someone else begins to tell you a joke, and all of a sudden it’s funny, it’s also like you’ve never heard it before.. the fact is, that in more cases than not, it’s actually a recycled joke that has actually been told before.
Success principles are similar I guess, they are the same things told in different ways by different people, it’s just a matter of whether or not our hearts and minds are receptive to the information being delivered at the particular time. Sometimes we don’t hear something until it is put in a particular way.
Success University provides us with the ability to learn to take on and apply these principles, it teaches us to be leaders, leaders in life.
Leaders realise that change is the only thing in life that is guaranteed, leaders realise that the only way to influence change is to have a clearly defined goal, leaders realise that in order to achieve their goals they must act…
So here is an acton from me
Thanks again Robert for such an inspiring question!
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