Avoiding Internet Marketing Burnout

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I hope you have enjoyed my blogs for 2009.  This will be my final blog for 2009.  I will be back in 2010.
Happy New Year.





Over the past 10 years, I've had dozens of friends, who had successful online businesses, tell me that they were going to quit the Internet marketing business and do something else.

Over the past 10 years, I've gone to hundreds of websites to discover that the owners of the sites had left the online world... simply packed up and quit. Some of them explained why they quit, others simply allowed their domains to expire and quietly faded away.

Many of the people, in both of the cases above, simply experienced "Internet marketing burnout." They no longer enjoyed Internet marketing and so they went on to do something that they enjoyed more.

Let's briefly examine some of the causes of Internet marketing burnout and perhaps address how you can avoid it!

One of the most prevalent causes of Internet marketing burnout, that I've noticed, resulted largely because people were selling thing that they really didn't believe in.  They simply tired of trying to "convince" people that they needed and wanted products that they didn't honestly believe were a good value. They were selling products that they made good money from, but that they weren't convinced improved peoples lives.

The solution to avoiding the type of burnout described above is very simple. Don't sell anything that you wouldn't buy yourself.  Don't sell anything that you feel somewhat guilty about offering to others.  It's that simple.  Get a sample of any product that you are thinking about selling, examine it end to end, and ONLY offer it to your market if you're convinced that it will add tremendous VALUE to your customers' lives.

A second thing that burns Internet marketers out ... especially consultants and coaches, is dealing with people who ask you for help but won't commit to helping themselves. You throw your heart and soul into giving someone the best advice that you have.  You spend a lot of time and effort helping someone to research a project and come up with a great plan - only to have them not follow through.  That burns a lot of people out over time.

The way to avoid encountering this type of burnout is to be very selective in agreeing to work with clients. Interview/screen them and confirm that they have the habit of completing tasks.  Confirm that they have a strong enough "reason why" that they will NEVER give up on a dream or a project. These are the people you want as clients. These are the ONLY people that I currently work with - because my time is very limited and I only want to work with people who are willing to help themselves. You should do the same!

Many Internet marketers burn out after growing tired of pushing product after product to a "jaded" market. They see new products "coming down the pike" every day, and they are asked to promote many of them.   Some can't resist this temptation. The problem arises when they realize that MOST of their customers, who buy product after product, NEVER actually use most of them. This becomes disheartening and can lead to burnout.

The solution is to be very selective and to only sell things that that you believe in.  Once you have a product that you really believe improves your customers' lives, don't just promote it for a week or two. Develop a long-term plan and promote it until it's no longer a timely and appropriate product.  Most of your customers will only buy that product after hearing you talk about it over and over again.  So, do repeat mailings for the same product rather than promoting 100 different products.  You'll find that more satisfying :-)

Many people burn out because what they're doing online doesn't fit in with what they see as their "purpose." When you do a job that has no real "meaning" to you, you soon get bored or tired of that job.

The solution is to do something that fits in with something in your life that has meaning... something bigger than just the act of making a few short-term sales.  As an example, I help with a project that, on the surface, sells cookbooks and is producing a television show. When you dig deeper, the project (at http://TheDevotionalChef.com) is helping to build and fund a homeless shelter... perhaps two homeless shelters, in Baton Rouge Louisiana.  That project has a LOT of meaning and purpose to me because I've known so many homeless people... some whom have died largely as a result of being homeless.  I enjoy that project because I can see the "good" that it's doing.

Not every project has to take on such significance, but when one does it's a lot easier to see it through to completion.   It's a lot easier to enjoy working on a project like that, even when the going gets tough!

Another way to avoid Internet marketing burnout is to take control of your time and lead a balanced life. One of the elements missing from many Internet marketers' (that I consult with) lives is that they have no real social life. They spend all of their time sitting in front of a computer and interact with other people face to face very little.  That can turn you into a very lonely place.

You can deal with the "lonely computer person" syndrome by making a conscious effort to get out and do things with neighbors, friends, and relatives. You can also make new friends who share your interest in Internet marketing by attending more Internet marketing seminars and conferences. You can form deep friendships at these events as well as meet new potential business, and joint venture,  partners.

A good place to locate Internet marketing events is: http://InternetMarketingSeminarSchedule.com There may even be inexpensive seminars and conferences within a convenient driving distance from where you live ;-)  Another cause of Internet marketing burnout is the feeling that you are not making any real progress. This is often due to the fact that, without a boss watching over your shoulders,  you have very little discipline and therefore VERY low productivity.

The solution to the low discipline, low productivity problem is simple...  guard against things that decrease your productivity such as instant messenger type programs, hanging out in forums too much, playing games online, etc. If you need to, eliminate... or at least schedule when these things will fit into your day!

Take a course or read a few books on time management. This will help you to see how others gain control over their time, and get much more done.  My favorite book on the topic is by Dan Kennedy, and is called: "No B.S. Time Management For Entrepreneurs - The Ultimate No Holds Barred Kick Butt Take No Prisoners Guide To Time Productivity & Sanity."  I bought a copy off Barnes and Nobles.  Get a copy, read it, and apply some of what Dan teaches... it will free up an amazing amount of time for you.

While you're learning from Dan, also grab a free 3-month subscription to his newsletter.  It will continue helping you to get a grip on your use of time, and also revolutionize your business. You can get a free 3-month subscription at: http://www.dk3monthspecial.com/best_offer  Grab it NOW ;-)  The final cause of low productivity that we will examine is lack of focus and trying to do too many different   projects at the same time. You begin to feel overwhelmed and that you are not getting ANY project finished.  The solution to this one is amazingly simple too.. Focus on one thing at a time and see it  through to completion. This gives you that much needed sense of accomplishment AND also gives you some cash flow.  Half-completed products can't be sold. After you've complete a given project, only then do you allow yourself to even NOTICE the next project.

I've just shared with you some common causes of Internet marketing burnout, and how I, and my clients, avoid them.  Apply the appropriate ones to your life today, and you can easily avoid this business killer!
Legitimate Business Opportunities Online

Avoiding 'Make Money Fast' Schemes

We live in a world where the internet is one of the most important tools for communication and business. The convenience the internet offers is vast.

About a decade ago, online businesses boomed and since then many people who wanted to make some extra buck turned to the internet. Some are legitimate businesses who sell products and skills and some are fraud sites that steal and harass people.

An example of these fraud schemes is the Make Money Fast or MMS schemes. This scheme is very much like chain letters forwarded to people. Make money fast will often claim that it is legal and promises vast sums of money in a short period. It will promise you with too good to be true investment opportunities.

People, especially those who are unlucky are easily deceived into joining this kind of frauds. So why do people believe such things? The only explanation is that they think these schemes are true and that they can afford it.

People tend to think “what do I have to lose?” and another thing is, almost everyone would love to make easy money.

Make money fast schemes usually come in the form of an email. The contents of the letter states that you should send money to some or all the names on the list then include your own name and send the email to other people.

Here are some basic contents in Make Money Fast emails:
• It will usually start with a greeting from the person who created the letter.

• This scheme will include some testimonials from “investors” that will say that it made them a millionaire or made their life easier.

• It will include a list of names and addresses.

• It will state that you have to send a specified amount of money (usually a small amount of money) to some or all the people on the list.

• It instructs you to forward the email to as many people as possible and modify the list of names by placing your own name and address at the bottom and removing one at the top.

• It will usually claim that it is legal and will promise you a return on your investment.

There are several variations of this scheme. One common type is that it will instruct you to send money to people as payment for reports.

It will always claim that it is legal and some will include section of the law to confirm the legality, when in fact the very same law will state that it is illegal.

There are also websites that offer these schemes, and often it will look very attractive and legitimate to lure people in investing. It will display pictures of people smiling and will include testimonials. Keep in mind that these are just photos which can be purchased for cents at various graphic sites and also be aware that anyone can make testimonials.

Although some of these websites are legitimate and offer true business opportunities, most are fraudulent. Before you invest, here are some tips on how to distinguish fraudulent sites from legitimate ones.

Fraudulent sites will often offer investment return and big profits that sound too good to be true. An example is that some will offer to convert your $20.00 investment into $50,000.00 in a matter of days and some even millions.

Find out if there is at least a reliable contact address on the website. If it is legitimate, it will include a legitimate phone number and address of the person. Call the phone number and wait for someone to answer to find out if it is in fact legitimate.

Research the website on internet forums to find out if it is a legitimate website or blacklisted. You can also find out if the forums you visited and the website are fraudulent by tracking the IP address. If the IP addresses are the same then it is fraud.

Keep in mind that not all offers on the internet are true. Save yourself from frustration and losing money, and always research before investing in any kind of businesses!

10 Questions You Should Answer Before Building An Internet Business

If you believe that the internet is still in its infancy, then you have to be aware that the infancy is almost over. The internet gains its maturity faster. Everybody wants to take advantage of the internet must treat it as if it a mature entity. You’ve got to be serious about using internet as your business vehicle.

If you still think that you can easily make fortune out of the internet, then you may miss the big picture of it unless you are aware of the things you should ask yourself and give your answer before you build your internet business.

You should understand that building an internet business is different from making money from the internet. You can make more money from the internet without building any business.

While building an internet business may 'cost' you big investment, making money from the internet may cost you nothing or less. But here's the interesting part. Making money from the internet needs you stick to the internet all the time. Simply put, the money stops coming in when you stop your internet activity. On the other hand, if you do it correctly, the internet business you're building will make money for you even while you're sleeping or away in vacation.

So, to do it correctly, you should ask yourself these questions before building any internet business:

1. Do you have a vision?
What is your business vision? You should have it clear in your mind what your business be in the next 5 years, 10 years, or 20 years.

2. Do you recognize your business strength?
What is your business strength? This will affect the whole concept and strategies of your business. If you think that you don't have that strength, then you must make an exercise to find that strength!

3. Do you set your business goals?
What missions you want to be accomplished to achieve your business vision? These missions will be your business goals. Make a list of clear and measurable goals with detail activities to reach it.

4. Do you have a business strategy?
What to do to win your business? Use a Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle to test your business strategy.

5. Do you have the technology?
What technology needed for your business? What will be involving? You need to decide which technology is appropriate to your business.

6. Do you have good quality products to offer?
What products you want to offer to your customer? You have to make sure that the product you want to offer to your customer is the one with good quality.

7. Do you have a good quality customer?
What kind of customer will you have? One part of your business activity should be about finding good quality customer. Good quality customer is the one who's willing to observe, evaluate and buy your products again, again, and again.

8. Do you have a good quality information to offer?
Your customer needs information. Unless you can provide it, you won't win the business game.

9. Do you have a business coach?
Who will mentor and watch your business growth from the outside? Sometimes you need more than just advice and consultation to grow your business. You may decide to get a business coach to help you grow your business.

10. Do you have the guts, the passion, the patient and the endurance toward the business?
The last things you should have: guts, passion, patient and endurance to build your business.

If you can't answer just one of the 10 questions above, then you may cancel or think over again about building an internet business.

Legitimate Business Opportunities Online

Best Internet Marketing Solutions

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The Internet has made this world an open enterprise. It has become important for companies to further expand their market and their consumer targets. Engaging to Internet Marketing maybe a risk for people who wish to be involved with this type of business.

Ensure that most of your target consumers will surely acquire your product. Consider the best products which will definitely capture their interests and needs. This means that you need to identify specifically who these people are, their location and financial level in the society. Have a marketing knowledge and skill to achieve your goal in the field of Internet marketing.

At the present, you can use varied Internet Marketing Solutions that is being offered by companies which can be your tool for support to your consumers. This solution maybe email marketing, search engine optimization or creating web pages or sites. Since you need to maximize your return profit, you need to choose Internet Marketing Solutions that will help you achieve this. These marketing techniques will not cost much since they are very self-explanatory, thus, learned easily.

Email marketing is a common Internet marketing Solution. This is a cost effective way of communicating and interacting to your consumers, driving them to visit your website and check out your products. It may be in a way of marketing articles, leading them to forums or newsletters. A newsletter has an advantage of expanding your consumers as more and more sign up on it until you can have a bulk list of emails.

Another great Internet marketing solution is through websites. This is a good promotion strategy to employ since you can display all the necessary information for your target consumers. The website should capture their interest and be complete since every transaction, from inquiry to payments may take place. All correspondence that will be done online must be well-facilitated by the features of your website.

Another Internet marketing solution is search engine optimization. This is a type of service for your website that you can make use of in order to raise the number of visitors to your site. Once a consumer uses a search engine, your website will rank high in the list of searches which in return will increase your site's traffic.

Considering these Internet Marketing Solution, there are different companies offering software products containing one or all of these solutions. It would be a great opportunity to try one of these which will match your financial capability and expected return profit.
Bencivenga, Halbert And Lok: The 3 Greatest Copywriters In The World!


No other element of marketing will make your business succeed or fail faster than your copywriting. Good copywriting can earn you a fortune. Bad copywriting will sink your business faster than the Titanic!

However, rather than write an article on how to write great copy, we decided to let three of the greatest copywriters of all time show you how it's done.
Legitimate Business Opportunities Online
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Are You Ready To Become Self-Employed By Starting An Online Home Business?

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If you are interested in starting an online home business, or taking over one, you face a daunting task that carries a level of risk and excitement not possible in the 'employee' world.

If the financial independence of self-employment appeals to you - no boss, no income limits as to time and wage, and the ability to let your personal drive determine your compensation - then you will no doubt be eagerly going over the many options available to release you from your current job.

However, the rush of financial excitement must be tempered by the necessary cost of time, money and effort in properly setting yourself up independently.

Despite income claims made by business opportunity companies, or competing businesses, you must be ready to accept the reality of not seeing personal income for several months - or even years.

Starting a self-employed online home business on the side, while keeping regular employment as your financial security, is a wise smethod of ensuring your income.

Another option is to have substantial savings that permit you the freedom to pursue your dreams unencumbered with other employment. However, the savings must also be capable of carrying the costs of developing an online home business along with providing for your material needs.

Do you also recognize the time that is required in starting your own online home business? In some ways it is almost unnecessary to bring up the point since your passion will likely drive you to spend many hours in your pursuits. If you have other obligations; family, job, social etc. then you will have to consider if you CAN devote the time needed to get your online home business off the ground.

Having discussed both money and time, you must recognize that there is much more effort extended BEFORE a business is profitable than at any other time in your business. Yes, once you are getting work and are satisfied with the income level you may be very busy indeed but you will then be compensated for it. When you are still cultivating your business - marketing, doing free jobs, searching for clients and customers - you may not be seeing any income, or a very meager one, which makes your EFFORTS seem immense.

Do not falter! If you come to the point when you are working your hardest and doing everything your online home business requires but still not seeing monetary results, you may hit a psychological wall. This is where truly entrepreneurial individuals see an obstacle to overcome as opposed to a dead-end to their hard work. Passion for their work and the strong desire to work for themselves overcomes any perceived barriers and moves them to keep going and ultimately becoming very successful.

By persevering you will certainly see the fine fruits of your labors and prove to yourself and others that the benefits of self-employment far outweigh the mediocre status quo of the typical worker's daily grind.
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An Internet Business Income Opportunity

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What is an Internet business income opportunity? This is one question that many people ask about when they first learn about working at home through the Internet. The fact is that you can make a good residual income by working at home with an Internet business. The start up expenses associated with an Internet business income opportunity are nowhere near what it would cost you to start-up a regular bricks and mortar business. Selling on the Internet is called e business and millions of people have latched onto this new way of making money, a very good Internet business income opportunity.

Consider all the things you have to do to start-up your own regular business. Office space, staff, salaries, cost of equipment – these all add up to a great start-up expense. With an Internet business income opportunity, you get everything you need for your Internet business start-up for one low cost.

People from all walks of life are starting up their own home based business which lets them work from home on a full or part time basis. The Internet business start up expenses only include the cost of a computer, an Internet connection, the purchase of a domain name and web hosting services. If you already have your own computer and the Internet connection, then you are already on your way to taking advantage of an Internet business income opportunity.

An Internet business operates from your own home. Depending on what it is that you do, you don’t have to have a stock pile of inventory or deal with shipping products to customers. You can become a reseller, which means you simply take the orders from customers through your website. You do need to find a supplier for your Internet business start up, but this is only easy to do. With this type of Internet business income opportunity, you can sell products from your website by sending the orders to a company, which in turn sends them out to the customers. You retain the profit from each and every sale.

One thing you do need to know about an Internet business income opportunity is that it is not a get rich quick scheme. You do have to work at it and working from home requires discipline. It means that you do have devote a specific amount of time each day to growing your business, whether that is finding new affiliates for your website, adding new products to sell or spending time writing. Most of the Internet business income opportunities give you all the tools you need to succeed, but you do need to work at it. Just setting up a website and not doing anything with it will not get you anywhere.

If you are looking for an Internet business income opportunity there is no shortage of choices.

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6 Steps to an Effective Online Business

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Creating and running an effective online business is realistically comprised of several hundred, rather than 6, but this will serve as a guide for the direction of your efforts.  Contrary to what you may hear rampantly on the Internet, there is no cookie-cutter, get-rich quick scheme on the web.  Not only is every online business different, what works for one person or in one month may not work for another person or in the next month.

The Internet is constantly changing, and the online market is inherently different this year than it was last year.  New technological improvements occur monthly, and impact the online business environment.  What works for one individual when he is the first to sell a certain product a certain way may not work just six months later when he has sold his idea to 40,000 other marketers, and they all begin to promote it.  Traffic generation tactics are significantly different than they were just a year ago, and hardly resemble profitable strategies three years ago.

These 6 Steps are simply the bare-bones skeleton of what has to happen for your online business to be successful.  They are foundational, and although the implementation strategies are different today than several years ago, the basic steps remain the same.

1.    Develop or discover a product.  You must find a product that meets today’s needs.  A 5 year old product whose resell rights you can buy for a dollar or get for free probably won’t meet the needs of today’s consumers.  You must be willing to pay for the rights to sell a current , useful product, or become an affiliate marketer, where you promote a popular product, and in exchange are paid a percentage of the income from the sale.

2.    Determine how the potential customers can view your product and see a sales presentation.  If you develop your own product or purchase the rights to sell someone else’s, you will need a website.  A few tips here: Rather than accept free web hosting, purchase your own domain name and pay to have your domain name and web site hosted by a professional web hosting company with a reputable history.  If your free web hosting company goes bankrupt, they generally take your fledgling business with them.

3.    Once you have your web site up and running, unless you are using an affiliate program that supplies a sales page, you must develop a sales script and web copy.  Aside from your web hosting decision, this is probably the most important thing you can do.  You may be tempted at first to write a sales pitch on your own, but unless you already have a lot of experience in the offline market writing effective sales letters, you need to, absolutely must, invest in a few courses on web copywriting.  Be willing to spend some money upfront on learning this skill.  Too many marketers try to wing it in this area and after a few months of losing money online, finally break down and purchase the knowledge to write a good sales pitch.  Do it the other way around—buy the knowledge first, and start making sales from the beginning.  Customers will not buy just because you have a web site---they buy from the web site that does the best job of convincing them it has the best product for their need.

4.    You must develop a traffic source that works.  When you first begin, you may be on a shoestring, and that is OK.  Assuming you have been willing to spend some money on sales letter writing and a decent web host, you may be able to skimp in the traffic arena for awhile, if you have plenty of time.  If you do not have money to advertise, nor time to seek out low cost advertising, you probably shouldn’t be attempting an online business.  If you do choose to go the low-cost route—know two things up front—the returns are really low and you will spend vast amounts of time on traffic generation.  Once you begin to make sales, you must invest your income in paid forms of traffic generation.  If you do not, you will run out of enthusiasm for generating the free traffic, and without reinvesting the income from your first sales into advertising, you are sure to fail.  Good sources of low-cost, but time consuming traffic are: writing articles and posting them to article directories, low cost classified ads, and ezine ads.  You may see hyped-up ads for thousands or visitors for a low cost or millions of banner ads for another reasonable price—both of these methods may have worked 2 years ago, but they are a sure waste today.

5.    Once you begin to get traffic to your online business site, you must keep detailed records of where the traffic comes from, and what percentage of visitors from each source are purchasing your product.  If you have visitors that cost you $50 per hundred to come to your web site, but on average they only purchase $25 per hundred visitors, the income may feel good, but you are not profitable, and are losing money.  By tracking your expenses on each type of visitor and by tracking your revenue on the same sources of visitors, you can determine which campaigns need changes or need to be eliminated and which need to be increased in intensity.

6.    By following this pattern of steps, and by keeping diligent records (there is plenty of good web site tracking software on the market that can help you do that), you can develop a profitable online business.  Again, it will not happen overnight, and you will not get rich quick.  However, if you build a solid online business with a solid foundation, and are willing to spend some money learning how to do it right, you really can become successful in business online.

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