#1 “Secret” To Making Money Online
I get a little tired of this stuff. I really do.
I’m almost hesitant to even use this as a headline because it just furthers my point. But, this is the very subject line I got in a recent email from an internet marketer.
My readers know that I am always a straight-shooter. So, let’s just deal with this.
THERE IS NO SECRET.
If there is anybody who hasn’t made any money yet, but yet keep surfing the net, reading blogs and buying products, well guess what? THAT’S the reason you’re not making any money.
The “secret” is taking action. The people who are out there searching for a secret are the people who are trying to make it without taking any action. It won’t work. You might as well believe in the Easter bunny because it is about as workable.
Every single tactic you could possibly think of when it comes to making money online comes down to this simple 2-step process:
- Build up traffic.
- Sell them something.
See, it is simple. However, it obviously entails strategy, tactics, and ACTION to bring it to fruition.
Those of us who do make money online already know this. But, some marketers continue to appeal to the bottom feeders who don’t want to do anything yet want to have money just show up at the door.
This marketing will always work, I guess. But, you, as an enlightened reader of my blog (yes, I’m kissing ass a little), you know better.
There is no secret. Only tactics. And none of those tactics will work if you don’t take action on them.
Know and apply this and you’re already a huge step ahead.
4 Tactics To Increase Your Blog Traffic THIS WEEK
Do you want more traffic to your blog?
Well, why wait? Don’t let grass grow under your feet. Here are some tips you can put to use THIS WEEK to bring more traffic to your blog.
Write a Guest Post.
Find at least one blog in your market, author a guest post and send it over.
You don’t have to ask first. Just do it. The worse that could happen is they say “no”, in which case you just send it to somebody else. Here are some tips on guest posting.
Increase Social Participation.
Go out and comment on other blogs.
If you do not already have a bunch of related blogs set up in your feed reader, do that right away. Then, start commenting when you have something to say. Do the same on Twitter and Facebook. You’ve got to be a part of the conversation to be noticed.
For this week, make a goal to post 20 meaningful comments or tweets per day. Or you could go crazy and apply Christian’s Power of 100. 
Create A Piece of Link Bait
Link bait is a post written specifically to be attractive and thus spread virally.
Now, here are the keys to link bait:
7 Ways To Blog Your Way To A Thousand Visitors
This is a guest post by my friend (and BlogMasters student), Mike Crimmins. He is the coffee blogger. He’ll share what worked for him to get a blog about coffee up to 1,000 visitors and beyond.
I stayed up late every night, drinking lots of coffee and reading blog post after blog post on how to generate traffic. I was willing to work 24 hours a day on Daily Shot Of Coffee, but I didn’t know what to do to make people to visit it.
I tested a thousand different methods, techniques and tricks.
I tried the social bookmarking sites like Stumbleupon, but never got past ten hits a day. I discovered the hard way, that unless I found a best friend that was a power user or owned a site with a lot of traffic, I was never going to see thousands of visitors.
The blogging experts kept talking about link bait articles, blog posts that are so great that other bloggers just have to link to them, but how was I going to get them to my site to even read those articles?
After a whole lot of trial and error, lots of late nights and more pots of coffee than I can count, I found seven ways that worked and helped me blog my way to a 1,000 visitors a day.
When Comments Begin To HURT Your Blogging Success [VIDEO]
Yesterday, I got a Backtype notification of my name being used in a comment on somebody else’s blog. What I found was a post and a comment thread which seemed to be a little resentful toward professional bloggers, specifically calling out Problogger (Darren Rowse) and John Chow.
The post is: Why I No Longer Link To The Likes Of ProBlogger And John Chow.
The gripe? They don’t reply to comments on their own blog.
Today, I thought I’d do something a bit different and just post a video. So, I tested out Youtube’s ability to record a video direct to the web. Here we go…
What Do You Think?
Do you expect replies from bloggers when you post a comment? Do you get offended when they don’t reply?
And, do you agree or disagree with me when I say that engaging in conversation has to be taken up to a point, but at a certain point it becomes a hindrance to your success?
Let me know!
What Tiger Woods Can Teach Bloggers
Trust.
It is everything in business. It can take a while to build it, but you can ruin it in minutes if you are a big enough idiot.
Tiger Woods is just such an idiot. He is a gifted athlete and a man (I thought) worthy of respect. He had it all, but most of all he had the respect of his fans. And he lost it all. Sure, there are those who say it is his personal business and nobody should talk about it. Whatever… it doesn’t alleviate the fact that he’s an idiot.
Tiger Woods had trust. Lots of trust. He had a beautiful family. He had sponsors and people lining up to do business with him. He has 2 children. And what does he do? Screw it all up because he can’t keep willy in his pants. At this juncture, it looks as if he was cheating on his wife with multiple women, and all while having kids. Cheating on your wife is disreputable enough, but when kids are in the picture, that’s REALLY bad. As a family man myself, I find that just lowest of the low.
But, this post isn’t about Tiger Woods. His business doesn’t concern me. However, there is a lesson in it – a lesson for all businesses. I am going to address blogging specifically, however.
Trust is an important currency. It takes a while to build, but you can lose it all quickly if you’re an idiot.
Make sure that everything you say on your blog or to your mailing list is truthful. Never lie. Never endorse something that you do not fully beleive is worthy of your endorsement. Because, you know what? Eventually, it will come back to haunt you.
Be authentic on your blog and out in social media. Be truthful. If you are a straight-shooter, then that trust becomes part of your brand. It is valuable. Once you have it, don’t ruin it.
As an opinion leader in your market (as is easy to become with skillful blogging), your word is your value. Don’t squander it.
How To Set Up A Poll With Wordpress [And Why]
As bloggers, we want our readers to be involved with our blog. Blogging is not a one-way interaction.
Typically, most bloggers view comments as the main sign of involvement. A comment is certainly a sign of high involvement because it takes time to write a comment (a decent one anyway).
The reality is, though, that most of your blog readers will be lurkers. They are lazy and they won’t post comments because (a) they are too lazy, and (b) they have nothing all that important to add to the conversation.
Don’t just accept this fact and move on. You need involvement devices on your blog.
Which brings me to the use of polls.
Why A Poll?
A poll is an involvement device for your blog with an insanely low barrier to entry. With two clicks, a reader can chime in. No typing necessary.
By increasing involvement via polls, you can baby-step people into comments as well. It builds up a habit of interaction with your blog and this is useful in everything you do.
Lastly, you can use a poll to gain useful feedback from your audience which you can then use to tailor future content. You could even use the information for planning products to sell on your blog.
$2,918 In 55 hours With A Blog – How It Was Done
Yes, this last Black Friday weekend, I ran a special (as pretty much everybody does) and I brought in almost 3-grand in a little over 48 hours. I thought I would give you the scoop on how it was done. It is so insanely easy, and the marketing behind it is just about as simple as it gets.
The special began on Friday at a little after 1PM EST when I sent out my first email to the mailing list. On Sunday at 3AM EST, I sent a “final notice” to let them know the deal was coming to a close. The deadline was 8PM EST on Sunday. Why 8PM? Because it would be easy to pop onto the computer after dinner and turn the special off. And why did I send the last notice at 3AM? So that the people on the west coast would be after midnight and I could tell them that the special was ending on the same day (more urgency).
So, in total, the entire promo consisted of 2 emails to the list, and about 15 minutes of work on the site itself. I think I had about 45 minutes of my time in this promotion – total.
Here’s how it was done… [MORE]
How To Leverage Your “Money Posts”
Every blog has some posts which are much more popular than others. They have good search rankings and they sit there as constant traffic sources for your blog.
These are your “money posts”.
To determine your “money posts”, you just need to look at your site analytics and see what your most popular pages are. For example, on PCMech, I have a tutorial on building a PC as well as a laptop review. Both of these posts each bring in more daily traffic than the homepage of PCMech. I have several other “money posts” on the site, however they don’t do as much traffic as the homepage.
Now, when you have a situation like this, you need to leverage that resource. These posts are bringing in lots of traffic. [MORE]
The Downside Of Self-Inflicted Ignorance
I had a small exchange over on Twitter this afternoon that moved me to write an impromptu blog post. This post is NOT an attack piece or anything personal AT ALL. It just brought to mind an idea I feel is important.
I have been working on tightening up the funnel over on PCMech.com. My goal is to drive more readers onto the email list. This is, of course, always good for business.
One of the many things I did was create a simple squeeze page to drive people onto the list. I sent out a tweet about the squeeze page. In response I get this on Twitter:
Hope you’re not trying to turn into a gimmicky internet marketer! Saw your tweet yesterday about Product Launch Formula!
Yes, the day prior, I sent out a single tweet about Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Formula. I did not use an affiliate link. I just really like PLF. I consider PLF to be a must-have for any serious online businessperson.
So, the fact that I talked about PLF and made a squeeze page puts me into the same category as a “gimmicky internet marketer”, apparently.
Then, I got this tweet from the same person:
Well, I respect you as an expert of sorts, but not for using "internet marketing products"!
Huh? So the fact that I learn from those who came before me is a bad thing? A gimmick? By using “internet marketing products”, I have managed to almost double my business in the last 2 years. I’m on track to break the $200,000 mark in revenue for 2009 – as a BLOGGER.
Put more accurately, as a BLOG MARKETER.
The knowledge to do that doesn’t come through telepathy. That knowledge doesn’t spontaneously combust into my head while I sleep. Of course I study other people’s teachings!
What motivated me to write this post, however, was my strong belief that this attitude of natural distrust is one of the most concrete barriers to one’s success that you could ever have.
I have no idea if this person has an aim to build a business or not. But, the attitude exhibited is one of an employee. A person who will always be an employee.
That kind of knee-jerk reaction is one which keeps you from learning new things in life. It effectively bars an entire field of knowledge from you, which you know nothing about, all because you’ve concluded that it is all a big bunch of BS.
The Important Message
Always be willing to learn new things.
The moment you write off entire subjects that you have never personally inspected, you are just sealing your fate exactly where you are right now.
The moment you take somebody else’s judgment of a subject (one which they probably never inspected either), you’re just allowing THEIR stupidity to rub off on you.
The opportunities lost because you jumped to a conclusion rather than personally inspected something could be mind-boggling.
And that is why I decided to write this post. Small things lead me to a larger idea. And, like a good little blogger, I thought I’d share with you.
Peace out.
7 Simple Tips For Blogging Faster [Without Caffeine]
We all know that content is important in blogging. Most bloggers are under pressure to produce more blog posts.
I’m not sure why, but I can generally produce a blog post pretty quickly. In most cases, I can write a typical post in 15-20 minutes. To me it is normal.
When I talk to other bloggers, I get varying levels of speed. Some bloggers are fast while others struggle to get even one post per week out the door. Couple into this the demands of normal life, and it is easy to conclude that time is the major bottleneck to your blogging success.
A Viewpoint on Time
The way I see it, time is completely arbitrary. It is in the eye of the beholder.
Have you ever seen a person who gets one task done in a day, then sit back, act tired and act like their day was full? I have. Grocery shopping seems to be the day’s goal. Time to relax after that.
On the flip side, you’ve got people who just get things done all day. They are fast. They are MACHINES. And others marvel at their productivity.
Same exact day. But, one person tackles the day in a completely different way.
Look at the hummingbird. The hummingbird flaps its wings 8-10 times per SECOND. Everywhere it goes, it goes fast. Another example: the common house fly. Wonder why you can’t ever catch the damn thing? Its concept of time is different than ours. We probably look like we’re moving like turtles comparatively.
So, the way I see it, it isn’t that we have a finite amount of time per day and it is a fixed quantity. It is our viewpoint of time which makes the difference.
It might be easier said than done, but I think its true to say this: Just change your viewpoint! You’re the one who makes time scarce for yourself!
Now, let’s put aside philosophy and talk about this more practically.
7 Tips For Faster Blogging
Here are some simple tips that I have found helped me over the years:
I'm David Risley. I've been making my living as a blogger for over a decade. Blogging is my business and how I support my family. With this blog, I'm just gettin' REAL and telling you how this business works. 
