The value of a good reputation is worth at least $524.50 USD today! That is how much money I spent buying Mike Filsaime’s “7 Figure Code”* on the recommendation of John Reese.

The remarkable thing about this is that I have seen the “7 Figure Code“* website several time before and decided it was not in the budget right now. I had also heard reports from several people I trust discussing the quality of the content in this product - and still decided not to buy it. I have read Mike Filsaime’s Butterfly Marketing Manuscript and thought it was brilliant - worth every penny - and still wasn’t ready to fork over $500+ to get this product. But…

…one single email from John Reese and my Paypal account is $524.50 lighter!

That is the power of a good reputation. I’ve been following John Reese’s writings for a while now. I’m on his mailing list for Income.com and have purchased a copy of his first Traffic Secret’s course and have been inspired and impressed with what I’ve learned. One thing he states over and over is the importance of delivering top quality content to people - even when creating giveaways. Not long ago John mentioned in an email that he would no longer use affiliate links in his newsletters so that people would know that he has no profit motive for recommending products.

All of this information, and an ongoing stream of excellent content in his newsletters and blog, have given me a very favorable opinion of John Reese. So, when he sent an email today and said he thought that the “7 Figure Code“* product is excellent and highly recommended (and also that he arranged for a discounted price for his members - check out the site, it lists for $797 there), I jumped in and made the purchase.

That’s the power of a good reputation. Without John Reese’s recommendation I would never have purchased this course - at least not any time soon. Without the quality products and informative blogs and emails, his recommendation wouldn’t have meant as much. The discount didn’t hurt either (and just makes me like him even more!)

Now I’m waiting for this new source of Internet marketing training to arrive. When I get my copy of the “7 Figure Code“* and get a chance to read through it and watch the DVD’s, I’ll certainly be posting a review on the site. But, until this new package arrives, I’ll leave you with these two questions:

What is your recommendation worth?

What have you done today to build your reputation?

The Go-To Guy!

P.S. Don’t let me have the last word. Scroll down and leave a comment.

I don’t know if this qualifies as truly outside of the box, but I did one project where I used several ideas that I learned in slightly different ways than they were presented to me.

Back in January I created a tool called the Amazon Deal Finder and placed it on my blog. Look up, it’s right there under the header. I had read an article at Lifehacker.com about how to manually create links to the Amazon search engine that would filter results by a preset discount amount. The process was very simple, but not for people with no tech background - I couldn’t imagine my mother being able to do it.

Several people had created blog entries that explained the idea and/or gave you a form based interface to create your own links. The worst examples created long lists of links to every possible combination of store/discount range available. All of them were on techie blogs and none was attractive. The blog entries were focused on explaining the process to other techies.

I setup a simple form based version of the idea on my own site, but spent my time making it friendly and attractive rather than explaining the tech.

Pick a store, pick a discount, and click the deal button.

It took a few hours in total to get everything together. Then, I posted the form to my site and made a blog entry about it with lots of keywords. (I’m #1 out of 1.8 million returns on google for the phrase “hidden amazon discounts” with no quotes - you can test that!) I also sent a note to Lifehacker about my version of the tool and they invited me to become a contributor and post comments. I added a comment with a link to my site.

The big ‘out of box’ moment came when I read a report that Dennis Becker posted on the 5 Bucks a Day forum’s download page about creating software products to boost your search engine rankings. The author suggested using a tool called MultiMedia Builder to create software that is essentially a mini browser that is programmed to open up your website.

In about 10 minutes I put together a little software file that opened the discount tool. It took almost no time. Then, I posted on software sites, added a link to my original page, and also listed it on a couple forums and JV giveaway sites as a free giveaway resource.

Finally, after having a few good months making commissions, I created the toolbar version of the Deal Finder and integrated it into my blog’s header. Now it shows up on every page of my site.

At every step I used the ideas I had been given in slightly different ways. I focussed on a user friendly interface and unique ways of getting it in front of people.

I’ve made a little money directly from these efforts so far - enough to have made it worth my while. In all, I spent 4 or 5 hours playing with this. It’s not yet a huge return on my investment, but I get new Amazon clicks every single day and every now and then I get an order for 20 drill bit sets or 5 hard drives that nets me $8.40 or $34.00.

I’m not done with this either. That’s another beautiful part of creating something like this. Whenever I think of a new place to incorporate the tool, I can plug it in and generate more sales. I have several ideas in the works now!

The Go-To Guy!

In addition to powering this blog, I use Wordpress to run a number of niche websites I have created as well. These are mostly focused on attracting targeted readers with a collection of topical articles and then generating revenue with a combination of Adsense ads and affiliate promotional products. Over time, as the website matures and the domain starts to grow in traffic and page rank, I determine whether to sell it off or develop it further.

There are a lot of excellent reasons for using Wordpress as my publishing platform. It is easy to manage, open source (so I can transfer ownership of the site without licensing issues), there are a ton of very valuable plugins to optimize the sites, and I can crank out professional sites in no time.

Part of the reason I can develop a site so quickly is that I create a ‘customized’ installation package on my local computer. This package includes all of the plugins that I typically install along with my preferred template (the Semilogic template system is amazingly versatile) and any code tweaks I’m using. When the time comes to create a new site, I simply upload the contents of my installation folder, link it up to a new database, and then switch on all the plugins and start tweaking the site.

I could speed this process up a little further if I also built a full online installation from the package and then saved a copy of the database (which would preserve all of my standard settings for the live installation too!) I could just install this to the database when I created it. Then, I would only need to modify the database settings in the configuration file and update the blog’s domain name, etc. once everything was installed.

On Saturday of this past weekend, I installed and customized 3 new sites (www.AuthorityMembershipSites.com and www.e-BookMarketingSecrets.com - the 3rd doesn’t have any content yet and I don’t want to post a link to it and have Google spider it before it is ready!) I uploaded several weeks worth of content updates on each using the ‘post in the future’ option in Wordpress. It will be a week or so before most of the content goes live (this is to give the search engines a steady supply of new content so that they check in regularly for updates.)
Creating sites in this fashion is ideal. I can move from idea to finished site with amazing speed. Once the domain is registered, I copy the installation to the server and start working on content. By the time the domain registration is complete, I have the basics in place and can have a really nice site live for the world to see.

Do you have any tips or tricks for speeding up your Wordpress installations? If so, leave a comment.

If you want to hire my to install a site for you from my custom package, click on the contact form and send me a message. I charge $65 for the basic installation and $65/hr for any additional customization - but my availability is limited to a few installations per week (I’ve got to keep my own sites going too!)

The Go-To Guy!

Clickbank* has long been a favorite marketplace for selling digital products. Apart from managing the sale and delivery of e-books and software for publishers with very little upfront costs, they manage an army of affiliates who will promote a publisher’s products for a commission on the sale. Now, they have added recurring billing to their services!

With recurring billing, Clickbank* will process ongoing membership fees for publishers and allow affiliates from their network to profit from the residual fees. My guess is that affiliates (myself included) will be foaming at the mouth for a chance to promote products with this type of long term residual payout!

It’s time to start making some membership sites!

The Go-To Guy!

* Affiliate Link

If you have spent more than 10 minutes searching for information about Internet marketing, you have probably experienced the results of Mike Filsaime’s Butterfly Marketing System. He created a detailed and integrated marketing system and built software that allows anyone to put the system into use with minimal technical knowledge.

This software, bundled with The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript*, and other audio and video training materials, sells for thousands of dollars - and it is worth the price!

After the initial launch of the Butterfly Marketing System, Mike Filsaime decided to sell the The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript* e-book separately from the rest of the package. This e-book explains the entire system and is available for less than $100. It is also the focus of this review.

The name, Butterfly Marketing, refers to the chaos theory concept known as the butterfly effect. This concept states that small actions can create big changes in the final outcome of an event. The example usually given to illustrate the idea is that a butterfly flapping its wings today can create disturbances in the atmosphere that eventually lead to storms instead of sunshine in the future.

In The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript*, Mike Filsaime focuses his attention on identifying small changes that online marketers can make to the way they do business that will have a huge impact on their profits.
The butterfly marketing approach is more evolutionary than revolutionary in nature. It includes viral marketing strategies, free membership sites, joint ventures, affiliate programs, developing pre-launch buzz, testing and tracking, email marketing, contests, promotions, one time offers, and more. Each concept is explained in detail - what it is, how it works, and WHY it works! For novice marketers, this information alone will save hundreds of hours of research and trial and error. But, The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript* doesn’t stop with the basics.

Mike Filsaime takes all of this information and structures and sequences it to give readers a complete blueprint for their online marketing projects. Those that spend the extra money for his software also get a complete business system built to operate according to this blueprint.

To further explain and demonstrate the Butterfly Marketing System, the manual provides 10 case studies of Mike Filsaime’s websites and products. These are familiar sites, but readers are given an inside look at why and how they work.

I highly recommend this book with a couple small caveats. First, Mike Filsaime is a former car salesman and car sales can be a pretty high pressure sales environment. I don’t question his honesty, but his tone can be a bit blunt.

When he describes how some affiliate sites provide links to their affiliates he exclaims, “Oh My Gosh, this is just damn insane!” The bulk of the book is on target, well written, and packed with high quality information, but these types of comments are peppered through the text and they might put some people off.

My main reservation has more to do with the way some of the ideas he presents have been implemented in the marketplace. One topic that Mike Filsaime teaches centers on giving affiliates a wide range of easy to use promotional resources. These include things like affiliate links, banners and buttons and also complete pre-written email sequences for them to mail to their lists. On the surface, these are all a good ideas. But, lazy affiliates just cut and paste these letters into their mailing programs. The result is that I often get 15 or 20 copies of the exact same letter from various affiliates who all just had to write and tell me how their best friend so-and-so has just released the most amazing new product that I just have to check out.

Coupled with the emphasis on building buzz and expectation before a launch and then driving tons of traffic during the launch, this can get aggravating and turn off potential customers. I’ve seen it happen many times.

I spend a lot of time in the Internet Marketing worlds and it is a crowded marketplace. This annoyance may not be a problem if you are applying the Butterfly Marketing System in a different marketplace.

Novice and intermediate online marketers should read The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript*. It is like getting a degree in online marketing in 125 pages. Print it out and keep it next to your computer. You’ll be referring to it often.

The Go-To Guy!

* Indicates Affiliate Link

Podcasting and the steps needed to set up a podcast came up in a recent conversation.

I’ve been working with a friend/client on the promotion of a book he wrote. Recently I was advising him to start a weekly podcast that incorporates portions of his book and then directs people to his website (were he sells the book, of course!)

He has already posted MP3 audio excerpts from the book (www.AllenPaulWeaverIII.com) and wanted to know what the difference is between these recordings and a podcast. I thought the answer would be a good addition to this site.

So, What is The Difference Between an MP3 and a Podcast?

Short answer, not much!

The audio file in a podcast is just a plain old MP3 - nothing fancy. But, the content of the audio file will be different.

The content of the file will probably have an opening segment to the show, maybe some commercial breaks, and a closing segment - like a radio show.

The resulting MP3 file is loaded onto your server, like any other file.

What distinguishes a Podcast from other MP3 files is the way in which it is promoted and distributed.

Podcasts use the RSS technology built into blogging software to create a ‘feed’ for people to subscribe to. This feed gets promoted at places like Apple’s iTunes store, iPodder.com, Odeo.com, and other places dedicated to tracking and promoting podcasts.

When a subscriber adds the RSS link to your podcast into a program like iTunes, the software will automatically download your podcast MP3s when a new one is posted and synchronize it with the subscribers iPod or media player.

There is one special distinction between a regular RSS feed and the RSS feed required for a podcast. The podcast feed must include enclosure tags around the link to the MP3 file. These tags tell the feed reader that a link to media is present.

Some blog software adds enclosure tags automatically and some does not. Wordpress handles it automatically. For those blogs that don’t do this automatically, take the feed from the podcast category and use feedburner.com to ‘burn’ a new feed. Feedburner will add the enclosure tags and then you can submit their feed link to the podcast directories. (Bonus - Feedburner will also give you lots of great statistical traffic data about your feed subscribers, so you might want to go this route anyway!)

Here is a sample method for distributing a podcast using WordPress:

1. Record and Upload your audio files
2. Create a new Category on your blog for the podcast
3. Post a new entry into this category that has a link to the audio file
4. Submit the RSS feed from your category page to the podcast directories (run it through Feedburner.com if you want the added stats)
5. Brag to all your friends about your cool new podcast
6. Record and Upload More Episodes

To create a link to the RSS feed on a specific page on a Wordpress blog, you just need to copy the address of the page from your browser and add “/rss” to the end. Here is a non-podcast example of a feed from my website as an illustration:

http://www.andrewseltz.com/category/bookbinding/rss

The hardest part of the whole process is coming up with great content for your podcast. The tech isn’t as complex as it may appear at first glance.

Did I leave something out or give an answer as confusing as the question? Just add a comment to this thread and I’ll do my best to clarify.

I haven’t set Allen’s podcast up yet, so I may discover a few new issues along the way. If I do, I’ll update this post.

The Go-To Guy!

I’ve recently gotten a few questions about how/whether to include Adsense ads on a blog or website and how the whole process works. This is my response:

The Adsense system works in a pretty direct way. You first sign up for an Adsense account with Google (they won’t approve you unless you have an active website). Next, select and ad style from a variety of ad formats that they make available. Customize the ads by choosing colors for the text, background and borders. Finally, Google provides you with a block of Javascript code to paste into your web page where you want the advertising displayed.

Every time a website visitor views your page, Google scans the text looking for keywords. It then looks for advertisers bidding on those keywords and places one or more relevant ads into the ad space you created. If a visitors clicks on an ad, Google will share the revenue payed by the advertiser with you the site owner.

There are a lot of nuances to how all this works and which ad formats and placements work best, but those are the basics. Look around and click on a few articles to see how I chose to integrate the ads on this site.

The best resource for understanding the nuances of Adsense that I have found is a book by Joel Comm called “The Adsense Code.” I have a copy on my bookshelf. I don’t expend quite as much energy on my Adsense income as the book recommends, but have used much of the advice about ad placement and formatting to arrive at the implementation that I currently use.

One of the most important factors in determining your success with Adsense is writing content on subjects that advertisers are willing to pay big money for. If people are only willing to pay $.05/click to advertise on your content pages, it will take a long time to make any money.

If you already have a website, use this free Google tool to see how much people would be willing to pay for ads on your site:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Click on the ‘The Site-Related Keywords’ tab and enter the domain name for your website in the URL box. Check the box labeled ‘Include other pages on my site linked from this URL’. In the drop-down box labeled ‘Choose data to display’ select ‘Cost and Ad Position Estimates.’ This will give you one more option to select the currency and maximum cost per click (CPC). Enter 100 in the CPC box.

When you have done all that, click the ‘Get Keywords’ button. Google will search through your site and identify the keywords that advertisers are paying for and then estimate the value of each click. If your site doesn’t generate at least a few keyword phrases worth $2-$3 or more, you won’t make much money from ads.

You can also use this tool to do research on other topics. If you find a web page on a subject you would be interested in writing about, run it through the tool and see how valuable the topic is to advertisers.

For most casual web publishers, Adsense is not going to make you much money. But, there is potential to earn respectable income if your site is on a high value topic. You can also create sites and content specifically focussed on high value keywords, but be warned, there is a lot of competition out there and you will have to work to get traffic to your sites.

Adsense isn’t likely to make you rich overnight. But, as my experience demonstrates, it can add a respectable amount of income to your overall business plan.

The Go-To Guy!

P.S. Don’t let me have the last word, leave a comment and let us know what you think.

Associate Content approved my recent articles today and made me offers. That is the fastest turnaround I have had with them so far. Up until now it has always taken me at least a week to get offers for anything (but I was also submitting more articles. They might deal with them in batches and the ‘bulk’ submissions are slowing them down???)

The speed of approval was the good news. The actual offers weren’t that great. My article titled “Speed Write Your NonFiction Book Using Dictation” got a whopping $5.10 offer and my article titled “How to Fly Without Getting Sick” got a truly underwhelming $4.61 - and that one was an exclusive submission.  Since it ended up taking me about and hour to write and submit each, I’m way off my target goal of earning $20/hour.

On the slightly brighter side, I’m $9.71 closer to my new monitor. That is better than last week, but I’ve got a lot more writing to do!

Since I didn’t see much benefit to submitting an exclusive article, I think I will submit most as non-exclusives so I can use them again and squeeze some more money out of them (but that money will not be counted toward the new monitor purchase.) The writing article will be going up on this blog immediately - I might get some Adsense income from that one.

So here is the running tally:

2 Articles Sold - $9.71
Balance Required to Buy Monitor - $590.29 - $790.29
Remaining Number of Articles to be Written at Current Average Price ($4.85/each) - 122-163

Looks like I have a ways to go. I had better find some more profitable subjects if I want to get this done before my 14 week old daughter graduates college.

Back to the article mines,

The Go-To Guy! 

Do you want to start your own business publishing information products? There is a mountain of information products out there promising to show you how to start your business. The dirty little secret is - most of these products are either incomplete or just plain garbage.

So, where do you turn for help? Well, I’ve spent the past year and a half exploring this market and building my business (this blog is one component that actually makes me a little money!) I discovered a person named Fred Gleeck, known as ‘The Product Guru’ and recently attended his One-Day Info Product Seminar.

I liked the seminar so much that I bought the rights to distribute a recorded version of the One-Day Info Product Seminar (and I also have a copy to listen to over and over!) Fred goes step-by-step through the process of creating and growing an info product business. There is no hype, he just lays out the details. Unlike most ‘gurus’, Fred doesn’t brag about million dollar product launches or hype the idea of becoming instantly wealthy. He focuses on the elements needed to create and run a lasting business.
To kick off my sales of these seminar audio recordings, I am offering a GIGANTIC DISCOUNT! My One-Day Info Product Seminar sales page is currently offering the package for $67 - 30% off the retail price of $97.

But, that is not good enough. I am distributing 10 copies at the ridiculously low price of only $37. But, when they are gone, I will never sell it for that low price again.

These specially priced copies are being sold through eBay. View the One-Day Info Product Seminar’s Auction page for details (and to see how many copies are left.)

I spent a long time looking for a mentor I could trust, and Fred is one of my mentors now. The sales/auction pages have a little more info how I discovered Fred and why I value his teaching.

If you want to build your own info product empire, don’t wait! Order your copy of the One-Day Info Product Seminar today!

Have a profitable day,

The Go-To Guy!

P.S. If this is not for you, but you know someone who would appreciate the information, please forward this page to them.

There is nothing like having a specific goal to help focus your work. I want a Dell UltraSharp 2407FPW 24 inch LCD Widescreen Monitor! I also want to get it using money I earn online using nothing but my computer, freely available Internet resources, and my writing skills. Lastly, I don’t want to work for peanuts and wait forever to make this happen. I want the monitor now and I want to earn at least $20/hour for my efforts.

I posted a personal challenge on the 5 Bucks a Day members forum today. That, and this post, are my official proclamation to the world that his will happen - I will have a new Dell UltraSharp 2407FPW 24 inch LCD Widescreen Monitor!

Dennis Becker, the author of “5 Bucks a Day” and owner of the members’ forum for owners of the book, has recently been adding a number of free download resources for the forum members that are related to article writing and selling articles. (Membership to the forum is included with the purchase of the “5 Bucks a Day” e-book.) Two specific e-books added to the members download area are Content Speed Writing and Increase Your Associated Content Profits. I plan to apply what I learned from these books to getting the money for my new monitor.

As a member of the forum I have learned a number of ways to earn money online. One of them is writing content articles and selling them to sites that pay authors for original new content. Usually, forum members focus on building projects that will earn them $5/day continually. But, one of the discussion threads introduced a way to sell articles for a quick profit.

Since I want my new monitor now!!!! I decided to use this short term article writing/selling strategy to earn the cash for my new monitor. I outlined the details of the plan in the original forum post. Basically, I think that I can write 30-40 articles in 20 hours which will earn me between $600 and $800 (enough to buy the monitor on eBay.) My target hourly income rate is $40 per hour. I would also like to have the work completed and the money in my back account within 4-6 weeks.

Bookmark this thread, or sign up to the RSS feed, to keep an eye on my progress. I will be posting updates of my progress.

The Go-To Guy

P.S. Of course, I will have plenty of pictures and video of my new monitor when it arrives!!!