Contributors Needed for Newbie Training Giveaway

I just signed up to be a contributor in the Newbie Training Giveaway put together by Bill McRea. Bill put this event together to help new internet marketers get started in 2009.

The event will run from January 7 to January 31, 2009 and Bill still needs contributors.

These giveaway events are a fantastic way to build your subscriber list. Many marketers mistakenly assume that the people who download information from a free giveaway are just freebie seekers and will never buy anything. This is the wrong assumption to make. It’s true, many will be freebie seekers who never buy but so are those that sign-up at your website. Once you have a subscriber on your list, they will start to hear from you and eventually start thinking of you as an authority. Soon it will come that they are in the market to buy because it gets to be too time consuming for them to sift through the internet (or their hard drive) for the information they seek.

Basically, it’s a numbers game and the bigger the numbers on your list, the more buyers you will have.

So, consider joining this giveaway if you have a product that suits a newbie marketer. Additionally, there is an upgrade option where you can compete to win prizes and offer one-time-offers to those who download your giveaway item. It’s worth looking at, here’s the link:

Newbie Training Giveaway

I have a product entered in the giveaway and, if I do say so myself, it’s a good one (that’s the cover in the pic above). It’s called “Get Started Growing Your Website Traffic” and it’s going on sale after the giveaway. Anyone who is a newbie marketer will truly benefit from the information included in this report. So, if you want the info and you want it for free, keep your eyes open for the start of the “Newbie Training Giveaway” that will start on January 7th. Sign-up for my mailing list and I’ll send you a reminder.

Bill is looking for only quality information products that can help newbies break the learning curve. If you are interested in participating now is the time to get involved.

Newbie Training Giveaway

This is a good way to get your internet business started.

Cheers!

Reba

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I Thought I Did That…

I was reading a blog today called “Fifty is the New” and there was a post by Prudence Baird where she posted a YouTube video that made me laugh. It’s a song sung by Tom Rush ~ I just had to share.

When was you’re last memory lapse?

How do you keep track of everything that needs to be done?

Is today’s “information age” maxing out your memory?

Have you noticed it getting harder to rely on your memory and you need a better way to remember little things?

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Can anyone relate? I’m not that bad yet but sometimes I wonder!

Let’s discuss ~

Cheers,

Reba

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Tips on Finding Great Content for Your Blog

Making sure you have a constant flow of traffic to your blog is the only way to be successful at making money with it. And the only way to keep a constant flow of traffic is to provide the best and most interesting content you can for your readers.

It’s not an easy task to keep a constant flow on content going, even the most successful bloggers start to run out of their own original content. Some resort to scraping the bottom of the barrel to find things to discuss, but that will ultimately cause you to lose your readers, which means less money streaming in.

So, where do you find great ideas to post about?  Actually, there are many things to use to get your creative juices flowing. These techniques may seem simple, but they can be effective. Next time you feel like you have writer’s block, try some of these techniques to get unblocked:

Scour news sites – Search the news sites like CNN, MSNBC, and FOXNEWS to see if you can find a top story that you can blog about. Instead of just linking to the story, add your own commentary and opinions.

You can write about your own personal feelings toward the story or ask your readers what their thoughts are and ask them to comment on the post. Just make sure the story somehow relates to your blog’s topic and the niche you’re targeting.

Check other blogger’s sites and see what they’re blogging about – This is not an unethical practice as long as you’re not stealing content. It’s perfectly acceptable to see what your niche or community is talking about.

If you see a post that would be of interest to your readers, write about it adding your own ideas or give it a whole new spin. Other media, like TV news stations, magazines and newspapers always have an eye on the competition – and you should, too!

Internet research – Do a search on the Internet for your blog’s topic to see what information you can come up with. You may be inspired by something or it may make you think of something new to post about.

Google’s experimental search lets you search in different ways, including timeline, information lists, and mapping details.  This can give you more ideas than the traditional search route: http://www.google.com/experimental/index.html.

Check the video sites – YouTube.com has millions of videos that you can add to your blog.  See if you can find one that relates to your blog’s topic. Post the video to your blog and have your readers share their thoughts on it. I did this in my post, Goal Setting – Zig Zigler is a Legend, using one of Zig’s YouTube videos.

Consider doing reviews - Reviews can be a good filler to use while you try to get inspired again. Choose an article, website, a book or whatever you like that’s related to your niche and post a review. Add your affiliate link and make some money from your opinions. You’ll see me do this a lot on this blog for good internet marketing programs that I recommend.

Your daily activities – Think about what happened in your day that you might be able to write about.  If your blog is about flowers and you went for a walk and saw some flowers, use that as the basis for your post. Let your readers know what kinds of flowers are seen in your neighborhood and if possible, take some pictures to add to the post becasue visual stimulation enhances the reader’s experience.

I received an email from Yaro Starak once that talked about WordPress and I made a post out it, Don’t Be A Blogger Victim – Use WordPress. If you use someone else’s words in your post, be sure to link to their site and it’s always a good idea to give credit to your inspiration.

Blog Energizer – For those of you who were smart enough to read all the way to the end, I have a special treat. My friend, Lynn Chandler, has just launched a new website to help bloggers find things to write about. It’s called Blog Energizer. You can consider it your own personal blogging muse. Best of all, it’s free. Just go there and sign-up for access, once inside you’ll find some great stuff:

• Find out who’s looking to promote your blog or product, for free.
• Connect with people who want to blog for you for free.
• Meet bloggers who would love to feature your posts on their blog.
• Find interesting activity ideas you can do on your blog to bring in new readers, and bring back previous readers.
• Free goodies like reports, coupons, and audios that you can freely distribute to your readers at no cost to you.

Blog Energizer is going strong with over 1100 members. I will add, I noticed a lot of the postings requesting guests or offering guest blogging were bloggers from the Work At Home Mom community. Lynette markets to that niche, so of course the first to join her new site will be those followers. But if you’re not part of that community, don’t let that stop you from joining Blog Energizer. There’s a bunch of great info in the downloads Lynn offers and if you join and post a need for a guest blogger, I’m sure you will find some very capable bloggers who can write about just about any subject.  Just join and you’ll see. It’s free, so let this great community help you keep your blog interesting. Here’s the link:

Blog Energizer

These techniques will not only keep you and your readers up-to-date on what’s happening in your niche, but they will help you keep your blog interesting while you get back your inspiration. In fact, these techniques might just be THE way to keep your blog interesting just as long as you’re not regurgitating what other people are talking about but adding your own personal inspiration to the mix as well.

My next post will be about generating traffic for your money-making blog.

Cheers ~

Reba

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Blog Posting Tips For Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

It’s been a while since I posted in my series about blogging for money, the holidays kind of got me sidetracked. But I’m back and want to finish up the series, there are just a few more posts after this one.

I have to be honest here, I don’t always follow the tips I’m going to provide in this post. I tend to write for my readers rather than for the search engines. That decision will be yours to make but my take is that if you write for your readers, the search engines will soon find you. That being said, if you want to blog for money, search engine optimization and following these tips will get you indexed and ranked much quicker.

When you researched your niche, if you were following the advice I gave in my post, Finding A Good Niche For Making Money Blogging, you probably did some keyword research. This research will now come into play. You will want to start by posting for your long tail (multiple word) phrases first.

Make each post include a single phrase only and use that keyword in the title of your post.

Example:

Let’s say your keyword is “red silk duvet cover”. In your post use that keyword phase along with “silk duvet cover” and “duvet cover”. This post will be about all three but specifically about the “red silk duvet cover”. Make the title of your post start with your longtail keyword phrase, so in this example, it will start with “red silk duvet cover”.

The next item you’ll need to pay attention to will be the title tag. If you followed my instructions in the Setting Up Your Blog Properly Series, it is set to use the title of the post in both your URL and as the title tag. That is the default when using the All-In-One-SEO plug-in.

The problem is that you have two parties you are trying to satisfy; your reader and the search engines. All-In-One-SEO will allow you to give each what they want.

Now if we go back to our example, let’s say your post title “Red Silk Duvet Cover For A Sensual Bed.” Both the reader and the search engines are satisfied as your keyword is the first thing in your title.

But…

If you had a title of “Five Things You Must Look For In A Red Silk Duvet Cover” you have a problem with the search engines. The keyword you want to rank for starts at word eight of the title and the search engines won’t put much weight on it in that position of the title.

However, if you want to get your post read, you must make it as compelling as possible and “Five Things You Must Look For In A Red Silk Duvet Cover” is as compelling as you can get.

The solution is to use the All in One SEO Pack. After you type your post, scroll down to the All-In-One-SEO on your posting page and add a new title -

Here you can change your title to “Red Silk Duvet Cover – 5 Things You Must Look For”.

Now the search engine has the keyword you want to rank for in the beginning and your reader will still have a compelling title that will lead them to read the article.

In testing on other blogs, I have moved a post from page 3 or 4 of Google to page 1 for a specific keyword just by changing the title tag, so this is an important component for search engine optimization. When blogging for money, traffic is essential and you will get more traffic the higher your post ranks in the search engines.

Finally, the order that you post will definitely make a difference in how fast your blog ranks.  It is much easier to rank for very long-tail keywords phrases such as those with four or more words than those that are only two word phrases.  Once you are ranking for those four words phrases, you will eventually start to rank for the primary keyword phrases that bring in even more traffic.

The next post in the ‘Blogging For Money’ series will be tips for finding and writing great content.

Ciao!

Reba

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WordPress 2.7 Upgrade – It Was SCARY But It Worked

I finally decided to upgrade to WordPress 2.7. I knew I was going to have to do it someday, but I was so scared that something would go awry with my Revolution Theme.

Yeah, if you were following me on Twitter two weeks ago, that was all I was talking about. “Has anyone upgraded to WP 2.7 with a Revolution Theme?” I never got an answer.

So I was scared it would be a huge mess and I’d have to spend days and dollars fixing it.

Well, as usual, the mind imagines things much bigger than they really are and even though it was scary (especially the part in the instructions where it says to delete all your files-ahhhhh), the upgrade went smoothly and it appears everything is working properly.

The new dashboard is FABULOUS!!! So much more intuitive than the old one. I still need to spend a little time getting used to it but that’s no big deal.

So, if you still haven’t upgraded, don’t be scared. If I can do it, you can too. Just be extra careful to follow ALL the instructions step-by-step.

Here’s the link to the instructions, remember, step-by-step, each and EVERY step:

http://codex.wordpress.org/Upgrading_WordPress_Extended#Step_3:_Verify_the_backups

I should talk, when I got to Step 13: Add security key definitions to the wp-config.php file, it said all versions from 2.6 up had a security key. Well, I had version 2.6 and I never added the security key! Shame on me! I added it this time, I’m now secure.

Good Luck with your upgrade! You’re going to LOVE it!

Cheers,

Reba

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Goal Setting – Zig Zigler Is A Legend

I was having a Twitter conversation today with Asher Aw (@asheraw at http://twitter.com/asheraw) about getting passed the struggles and roadblocks of growing your business and he led me to one of his blog posts about goal setting. It had some fabulous videos of Zig Zigler and I wanted to share some of that with you here on my site.

In the first video, Zig talks about the formula he uses for setting and accomplishing goals. Do all the following in writing (writing it down is ESSENTIAL):

1. Identify your objective – what it is you want to accomplish
2. Set the date you expect to complete your goal – put a date on it
3. Identify your obstacles – things you need to overcome
4. Identify the people, groups, and organizations you need to work with – who will help you
5. Devise a plan of action – include time limits
6. Identify what it is you need know – do you need to learn anything
7. Identify all the benefits to you if accomplished – “what’s in it for me”

Check out Zig ~ I love him, he’s such a motivator:

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In listening to Zig speak, I’m not only motivated but a bit overwhelmed. Just the thought of doing all the steps can be more than we think we can handle alone, not to mention following through on everything. Having help is really okay. Getting someone to push you a little or having a system to follow can really be the difference in reaching your goals or just saying “I wish I had followed through” later.

If you’re looking for a system to help you reach your goals next year, check out Gary Ryan Blair’s (The Goals Guy) new program called “Got Resolutions?”. If focus, discipline, and accountability were the things that prevented you from achieving your resolutions in the past, then you must get the “Got Resolutions?” program!

Earlier this year you probably set some goals and resolutions, made promises to yourself, and ended up with unmet goals and unmet resolutions. Don’t let that happen in 2009. As Zig said, you need to devise a plan. Let part of your plan be to get some help and accountability to reach your goals next year.

Got Resolutions?

Cheers!

Reba

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Learn A New Skill In 2009

This is Day 10  of 10 of my tips to help you increase your online business profits in 2009. Yes, this is the LAST tip.

By making just a few changes in the ways you handle a few little things each day, you can grow your business and increase your profits substantially.

Stay tuned over the next ten days and I will share ten important ideas that can help you increase your business and grow your profits in 2009.

Day 10 -

LEARN A NEW SKILL IN 2009

By learning a new ‘in demand’ skill it will most certainly help you grow your business and increase your profits in the coming months and years. Personally, I think copywriting is the best skill you could possibly learn and it’s worth the monetary investment to take a class or course. The ability to write effective sales copy, not only helps you write your own sales letters to promote your own products and affiliate promotions, but you can also charge a high price for your sales copywriting services.

If copywriting just isn’t for you or is too time consuming to pursue, there are many other skills you can learn. Watch internet marketing forums or sites like e-Lance to see what skills you can learn to enhance your business in 2009. Here’s a short list:

• Web design
• Article writing
• Graphic design
• SEO Techniques
• LSI Techniques
• Time Management skills
• .PHP, MySQL, HTML, Java, Flash, Ruby on Rails, or any of these related skills are highly sought after and pay very well
• How to create your own product
• How to land a joint venture (JV)
• Basically, anything creative that you can come up with!

Whether you learn the new skill to use solely for your own business or so you can sell your services — you will profit highly from acquiring one of these skills. If you learn the skill to use for yourself, you will save money on outsourcing adding straight to your bottom line. If you learn the skill in order to sell your services you will also (obviously) profit greatly from that route as well.

Take article writing for example. If you learn how to do this simple skill, you can profit in at least 3 ways:

1. Writing articles for yourself to promote your products/services, etc.
2. Saving money by not having to outsource
3. Selling your article writing services for even more profit

You will leave money on the table if you don’t learn a new skill this year. Think about it. There are so many little nooks and crannies that can be squeezed to add profits and long term income streams to your business. Your efforts can really add up and make a significant difference in the success of your business.

CONCLUSION

It is clear that there are a lot of things we can do to grow our business and increase our profits, no matter how successful or unsuccessful we have been in the past. The past is done and gone. What matters is the present, which is what shapes the future. The future is important because it determines where we will be in a year, two years, five and ten years.

Will you be happy? Healthy? Wealthy? It’s really all up to you.

Implementing even ONE of the tips I’ve outlined over the last ten days will help you grow your business and increase your profits during 2009 and beyond. Taking action is always the most important factor in the end, no matter how great of an idea or plan you have in mind.

I wish you all the best of success!

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year!

P.S. Be sure to check out Gary Ryan Blair’s (you know, The Goals Guy) new program called “Got Resolutions?“. “Got Resolutions?” is a personal leadership program that provides a step-by-step system for setting and achieving your New Year’s resolutions. If you want to implement one of the strategies in my tips but know you have trouble staying focused and on target with your goals, this program might be just the thing you need to make your goals a reality in 2009. Just click the link to see what I mean.

Got Resolutions?

Ciao!

Reba

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Get With The Times And Grow Your Online Business in 2009

This is Day 9 of 10 of my tips to help you increase your online business profits in 2009.

By making just a few changes in the ways you handle a few little things each day, you can grow your business and increase your profits substantially.

Stay tuned over the next ten days and I will share ten important ideas that can help you increase your business and grow your profits in 2009.

Day 9 -

GET WITH THE TIMES

It’s 2008 and drawing ever closer to 2009. We were supposed to have flying cars by now but instead we have iPods and eBooks. Still, it’s pretty advanced compared to even 15-20 years ago, heck, even 10 years ago! A lot of internet marketers stick to what has made them money ‘in the past’ or they follow a business model that worked for somebody else, ‘in the past.’

But, what’s important is right now.

If a new product comes out tomorrow that sweeps the nation and everybody MUST have one — your job as a marketer is to go out and market it! Why would you stay back and market beepers or pagers, when iPhones and BlackBerries are the latest and greatest?

Most of the time, Amazon.com and eBay.com will be selling the latest and hottest products on the market and therefore you can get a piece of the action by promoting these items as an affiliate. Even the greats have to ‘get with the times’ every now and then. Great music artists like Paul McCartney write songs that fit the style of the current time. In the 60’s he was writing “She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!” and in the 80’s he was writing “Silly Love Songs” and “Ebony and Ivory” which was very much 80’s style music.

Getting with the times is an essential part of your business — online or off — and it will most certainly result in your business growing and your profits increasing.

Here are some things you can do to ‘Get With the Times’ as far as your internet business is concerned:

• Get into video marketing
• Use Web 2.0 techniques
• Make your site look modern
• Be involved in social networks (twitter, etc.)
• Have video on your site, as well as new looking Web 2.0 graphics
• Sell Products that are popular NOW, in the current time (day, week, month)
• Follow the latest rule changes so you can keep up with effective SEO techniques (A lot of people use very outdated SEO tactics that don’t work anymore).
• Use LSI Techniques when doing SEO for your site or when writing optimized articles, etc.
• Build a list of opt-in subscribers using a squeeze page or a give away
• And anything else that is new, groundbreaking, effective, creative and profitable!

Tomorrow – Day 10

LEARN A NEW SKILL IN 2009

Cheers!

Reba

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‘Doubling Up’ To Grow Your Business

This is Day 8 of 10 of my tips to help you increase your online business profits in 2009.

By making just a few changes in the ways you handle a few little things each day, you can grow your business and increase your profits substantially.

Stay tuned over the next ten days and I will share ten important ideas that can help you increase your business and grow your profits in 2009.

Day 8 -

‘DOUBLING UP’ TO GROW YOUR BUSINESS

This is technique I like to call ‘Doubling Up’ and it’s a strategy you can  use to grow your business and increase profits every couple years.

‘Doubling Up’ can be applied to many different areas of your business. For instance, if you write articles to promote your website and it’s working well for you, what could you do to double that success? Simple. Outsource the exact number of articles you write, so if you write five articles, outsource five articles and then you’ll have ten articles. This means your efforts, as well as your traffic, as well as your PROFITS, have the potential to double.

Even if you can’t double your output, what if you increased by 50%? That would still increase your profits. If you can’t afford to outsource just yet, you can still apply the technique and write all ten articles yourself. You can even have a friend, family member or significant other help write for you as well, provided you give them a little bit of training.

What else could you do in your online business that could DOUBLE your profits?

• Create two videos instead of just one.
• Market to two niches instead of one.
• Charge double for one of your products or service (do split testing to prove which price sells better).
• Do two launches instead of one this year (with the help of outsourcing or JV partnering).
• Put up a website AND a blog instead of just one or the other.
• Double your PPC advertising budget or raise it by a percentage.

Any of the above tactics will increase your profits significantly, so there is no reason to ignore the magical potential of ‘Doubling Up.’

This isn’t rocket science but it works and it’s a tactic that’s easy to try.

What if you took it even further and did ‘TRIPLING UP’? Of course, that would take a bit more outsourcing or tripling the amount of hours you work on that segment of your business, but triple the income doesn’t sound bad at all.

Tomorrow – Day 9

GET WITH THE TIMES

Cheers!

Reba

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Stay Focused on Your New Year’s Resolutions in 2009

Setting New Year’s resolutions is effortless. It’s not hard to think up resolutions and even put them in writing. Achieving them, on the other hand, can be a bit of a challenge. What would THIS year have looked like if you’d really made major progress with all the resolutions you set last year?

In order to reach your goals, you must maintain your focus, discipline, and accountability, especially when things get rough. Here are a few tips to aid you in staying focused on your goals, but at the end of this post I’m going to tell you about a program that Gary Ryan Blair, the Goals Guy, has developed that will give you the tools you need in maintaining that focus, discipline and accountability so you can reach your goals this year. So keep reading.

1. Create a visual reminder. A wish book contains pictures, personal reflections and other notes related to the finished goal. Visual reminders are meant to encourage and keep your eye on the prize when you hit a rough spot in your plans.
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2. Reassess the game plan. A goal is only as good as the plan behind it. Looking at that plan every three to six months lets you see what can be tweaked or omitted all together. As things change, so do the steps in that plan.
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3. Reward yourself. For every step along the way that brings you closer to your goal, celebrate. It can be a night on the town with friends, a new outfit, or a quiet weekend alone.
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4. Learn how to deal with setbacks. One reason people lose focus on their goals is a temporary delay or two. They call them failures, when in all honesty, they are anything but. Setbacks can signal that the goal needs a new direction or you need to rededicate yourself to the task at hand. Put it into perspective, deal with the hindrance and move on.
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5. Ask for help. This point can’t be stated enough. No man or woman is an island. Without help, everyone would fail at something. Support such as weekly phone calls with a friend or mentor for encouragement, focusing sessions, or even just a sounding board for you when things get a bit off course.

Now, going back to the question I started with, “What would THIS year have looked like if you’d really made major progress with all your resolutions?

What if you achieved one? How about two? Which ones? How about ALL of them? What will this year look like if you do it NOW?

Well, you can’t sit on the sofa and manifest a new home, car or a million dollar income producing website. If anyone tells you differently, run the other way.

The tips I supplied above will help you move in the right direction in achieving your goals, but what if you had help and guidance?

Have you ever noticed when you KNOW you’re going in the right direction that everything just seems to fall into place? It’s called “FLOW.” That’s what I’m talking about, yet most people don’t know how to get it or what process it takes to find it. It’s elusive. But not when you have guidance because then you KNOW you’re going in the right direction.

Does such a process exist? Is there a proven system to help you achieve every goal you desire, one that will help you to make 2009 the best year of your life?

Yes there is. It’s called “Got Resolutions?” and it can be yours!

Got Resolutions?

“Got Resolutions?” is a personal leadership program by Gary Ryan Blair that provides a step-by-step system for setting and achieving your New Year’s resolutions.

If focus, discipline, and accountability were the things that prevented you from achieving your resolutions in the past, then you must get the “Got Resolutions?” program!

In fact, here’s what Best-Selling Author Brian Tracy has to say:

“Got Resolutions? is a serious program for serious people who want to make serious and immediate change in their lives. There is no better way to start the New Year, and Gary Ryan Blair will show you how to finally turn your resolution into reality!”

Earlier this year you probably set some goals and resolutions, made promises to yourself, and ended up with unmet goals and unmet resolutions. Don’t let that happen in 2009. Right now you have the opportunity to create history rather than repeat it.

It’s easy to get started right away. Visit the link below and MAKE your resolutions reality!

Got Resolutions?

I’m wishing you a New Year of health, wealth, and happiness.

You just need to get out there and pursue your resolutions with open arms and believe deeply in your ability to enjoy the rewards of resolutions and dreams achieved.

Now THAT would be an amazing New Year’s gift to yourself, wouldn’t it?

Happy New Year!

Reba

P.S. Be sure to check out the video that explains the entire process. You’ll be glad you did!

Got Resolutions?

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