One of the things that marketers always want more of, is traffic.  The idea is, the more traffic you have, the more sales you'll do.  Hmm, yeah, okay, not always true, but a good general principle to adopt.  (What you actually need is well targetted traffic, but even so, any traffic is good.)

I've always said you can get traffic just by writing, and that you also don't need to go out and get loads of backlinks either.  The concept is, if you write about anything and everything, you'll start to get search engine traffic because some of what you write will end up on the first couple of pages of Google.  (The power of WordPress and the pings it sends to the highly spidered global update servers.)

So I took out a new domain a couple of weeks ago using "Frank Haywood" with a .me extension.  (Work it out, okay?)

I don't want to link to it just yet as I want to see how much search traffic it will get just by me doing nothing but writing about stuff that occurs to me, and that I want to write about there and then.  (It's good practice for writing other stuff.)

This is proof of concept that just using a self-hosted WordPress blog and then writing every couple of days or so will start to pull search traffic.  No backlinks, article marketing or ANY kind of marketing, just writing about stuff that happens to me or pops into my mind, with no thought for good taste or any of the marketing stuff.

As a result, I'll begin to see the kind of things that people are searching for, and I'll learn this almost randomly – it's based purely on what I decide to write on for pleasure.

There's absolutely no monetisation on the site whatsoever yet, and there are only links out to stuff that I find interesting, and NOT marketing related.

Okay?

So three weeks ago I took out the domain, and a week ago I got my first two visitors via Google search for a write up of a cheap camera I bought from Tesco on an impulse buy because of the price.  (It's a good camera too – I'm pleased with it.)  The camera itself is small enough to fit in my coat pocket, so it's great for taking with me wherever I go, and I can pretty much forget about it until I need it.  It took me about an hour to do the write up.

Since then I've had another 7 visitors to the site, all from Google search, and all for that camera.

Now while I didn't write about the camera to make money from the review of it, I did write about it for pleasure and lo and behold, I started to get traffic.  I could monetise it by sending people off to the Tesco site using my aff link, but I'm not going to bother as that's not what that site's about.

For now. 

But you tell me.  How hard is it to get traffic?

Isn't this proof enough that if you pick a product that looks like it could be popular, and do a little research and a write up about it, that you will inevitably get visitors?

Now here's the thing.  People agonise over how to get traffic and then more traffic.  It's the one thing I get asked about more often than anything else.

I've proven to myself again that it isn't that hard to get traffic, and yet people still seem to have a difficult time getting the right traffic to their sites to match their topic.  That's what I get told.

But maybe, and this is a message to everybody who's interested in earning a living online, you should be looking at it the other way round.  Maybe you should instead be looking at what people are searching for, making sure there isn't too much competition, and then supply them useful content based on their interest, and then use your affiliate links to monetise it.

See the subtle difference?

Many people choose a topic that's either too broad or too competitive.

The learning point here is if you want to make money from blogging, then choose a more tightly focussed topic and make sure there's some interest, but also not much in the way of competition.

You'll then find if you write about the subject and because you're filling an empty content gap, Google etc will be interested and take notice of your site.

Okay?

I'll continue to write for pleasure (and to blow off steam every now and then) on that site, and maybe sooner or later I'll come across some niche or another that gets a lot of interest, purely by accident.  Who knows what it might be, and when that might happen?

I won't lose any sleep over it because that's not what that site is for, but it's certainly an interesting experiment to do, don't you think?

-Frank Haywood

I just received an email from a well known marketer (I'm on a LOT of mailing lists) that referred to me as an "overseas person".

It struck me as disconnected and dumb.  We all do daft things every now and then, often when we don't have our brains engaged, but this was just dumb, dumb, dumb.  One of the dumbest things I've ever seen any marketer do, and an extreme case of being parochial without realising it.

Because of course…

He's overseas, not me.  I'm at the centre of civilisation here in the UK, while he lives in what used to be one of our colonies in a country that didn't even exist as such a couple of hundred years ago.  So of course he's the the one that's overseas, not me.  Ahem. 

Hmm…  Do you see how a simple but ill thought out comment can be misconstrued and instant defensive barriers put up?  I've now unsubscribed from his mailing list.

Here's a simple tip as to how not to alienate or upset people.  Unless your mailing list is specifically about one of the following topics and people are actively interested in receiving information about them, you should never mention any of these.  I've unsubscribed from more than one mailing list because of it.

#1 – Sex.

#2 – Politics.

#3 – Religion.

I guarantee if you start talking about any of these taboo subjects, you will upset people.

For instance, you might criticise your government for their style, and instantly you've alienated about half your readers.  Or you may say that Jedi is the only true religion, and you thereby manage to upset a HUGE chunk of people.

Nobody wants to hear what you have to say on these subjects unless they've joined your mailing list just so they can find out.

And almost equally, I didn't join that marketers mailing list just to hear myself pigeonholed as "overseas".

-Frank Haywood

We'd first tried to do it with a plugin that was supposed to remove dates, but it was an old plugin and didn't work with the themes we were using, so I'd sort of resigned myself to editing the theme to remove them, but I only wanted to do that as a last resort because if the theme got updated, any customisation is usually lost.

So last night my wife sat quietly fiddling with one of her blogs and found the answer.  Well, at least for the theme she was using – SemioLogic Pro – the same theme I use on this site.  I've tried it with a couple of other themes and it didn't work, but that doesn't mean to say it won't work for you either now or in the future if the WordPress developers decide to change things a little.

What she did was perfectly logical and easily overlooked.  Go to Settings-General and scroll down to Date Format.  Select the Custom radio button and delete the contents of the box next to it – you may also have to do it with the time too – and click Save Changes.

Ta-daa!

No more dates on posts.

Not ideal if you want some posts to show dates and others not, and as I said it doesn't work with every theme, but I know that at least some people will find this useful.  Hopefully someone will eventually write a plugin that does this properly with post level control, but until then we have to use workarounds like this.

-Frank Haywood

What's that all about?  What's going on there?

I DO know that we all walk around with filters (prejudices) over our eyes and we see the world as we expect to see it based on those filters.  But why would anybody read something, forget or distort vital parts of it, make a decision based on that distortion, and then whine it isn't what they thought it was?

Well no, of course it isn't.

It's quite often actually what it is, not what it was wanted to be.

Just the facts, just the truth.

If you already know what I'm talking about and see that behaviour in the people around you, you'll now be smiling quietly to yourself (or shouting "YES!" at your monitor).  If you don't, then watch the world closely and one day you WILL see exactly what I'm talking about.

-Frank Haywood

It's always an eye opener for people when I say that the size of your business is a direct reflection of the size of your mailing list.  Okay that's not 100% true as there are other variables which I'll talk about shortly, but it is a good indicator.

There are many ways to list build, and a favourite of many people is to offer a freebie in return for a name and email address.

The problem with only using this method is you get what are called "tyre kickers" on your lists.  Now that's not a bad thing as over time you can educate your tyre kickers into becoming buyers, but generally speaking if you're building a list, you want to build a list of buyers rather than tyre kickers.

I've found that if you have say 10,000 people on your mailing list that there's a small core of a few hundred people who tend to take notice of what you say.

(If you're reading this then you're probably one of those people, and to you I say Thank You!)

If you think about it, this is one of the variables I mentioned above.  It's entirely possible to run a successful business online with just those few hundred people.  It's not always size that counts!  It's the responsiveness of the people on your mailing list that really makes the difference, and that's obvious when you stop to think about it.

So ideally you want to build lists of a mix of freebie seekers that you can educate over the long term, and more importantly buyers.

I've already mentioned the most common way of building a freebie seekers list – you just give stuff away in return for a name and email address.  You might now be thinking to yourself, "Okay so I have to sell stuff in order to build a list of buyers, and that's harder than it sounds."

True.

And one of the reasons it's so hard to build a buyers list is you don't get enough proven buyers visiting the site where you're selling your products.  Just increasing your search engine traffic isn't enough, as you could just end up with a pile of freebie seekers at your site who have no intention of buying anything.

So how do you increase the number of proven buyers to your site?

Here it comes.  The answer is in four parts.

#1 – You create a low cost product, usually under $17, under $12 is better, and $7 is the magic number.

#2 – You run an affiliate scheme, and let affiliates and joint venture partners send you traffic that consists of people who listen to them.  These people are already warm and there's a better than average chance they'll buy.

#3 – You pay 100% commission directly to the affiliate and straight into their PayPal account.  Affiliates love this and are always eager to promote.

#4 – On your download page you get them to join your mailing list.  There's a simple technique you can use that will turn almost 95% of buyers into subscribers.  I'll tell you about that next time.

What happens is as you pick up buyers they immediately turn into affiliates who are all willing to promote your product.  Think – they were impressed enough to buy it and so why wouldn't they be impressed enough to also promote it and make back the money they spent buying it?

So you end up with a constant stream of buyers and affiliates, all busy buying and then promoting your product, and ultimately building you a list of buyers which is exactly what you want.

You don't make any money from this product, but you can later sell something else to your list of buyers, or even promote someone elses product, maybe another 100% commission item.

There's also another option where you even upsell directly during the sales process, and take a cut of that sale rather than the front end one.

There are even more variants on this entire process.

You could put a squeeze page on the front of your site, and get a name and email address in return for a freebie, and then offer the full price item as an upsell, and maybe even do another upsell to something else.  The full price item could be 100% commission and the second upsell 50%.

Or you could use a DHTML popover on your regular sales page to capture the name and email address instead.

Using either of those you build a list of freebie seekers and a list of buyers at the same time.

It's up to you really how you do it, but I'm sure you can see the benefit?  Doesn't all this make perfect sense?

The question you might have now is how you can do it.  You need a script that will handle the sales process.

Well first up, both the free and paid for versions of SmartDD will allow you to run a 100% affiliate scheme and also run one time offers at a different percentage commission.  Or the Nickel Script will also allow you to run fixed price sales at 100% commission too, but no upsells.

However, probably the simplest method is to use a script that's specially designed to handle the exact scenarios I've mentioned above.

Now the thing is, I thought everyone knew about this script, but I just shouldn't take things like that for granted as I've had several people tell me recently that they'd never heard of it.

What you actually buy is an ebook that describes in detail the advantages of using the above method and exactly how to do it.  And what comes with it is the script that will allow you to use this method and pay your affiliates instantly and automatically directly into their PayPal account.

Better still is that there are no databases to set up – the whole thing runs off flat text files just like the Nickel Script does.

But the icing on the cake is the price.

Just $7.

You can get it from here:-

http://www.frankhaywood.com/go/7ds/

-Frank Haywood

I'm still looking.

A weakness I've noticed in many of the membership scripts is you're either IN the membership, or you're OUT of it.  It doesn't seem like there's been enough thought given over to all the different methods of actually handling members.

Even the the one I've found that has considered that you might not actually want members to be just in or out is flawed.  The assumption is that it's a drip fed membership concerned with supplying content as learning rather than as products.

Here's the specific scenario I'm thinking about where the content is product, as with PLR Code Mine.

Someone joins a membership today.  They're a member for three months and then for whatever reason they drop out.  Two months later, they rejoin.  What would you expect to have happened in this scenario?

What I expect from a really good membership script is that if someone has been a paid member for 3 months, then they should ALWAYS have access to that content, even during the times they're not a paid member.  So if the content they've purchased is updated, they get the benefit of it.

If they then drop out for two months, then as administrator I should be able to specify that they shouldn't get access to that two months worth of content.  They've missed the boat.

I may also wish to sell it to them at a much higher price than if they'd been a regular member, to allow them to catch up.

So when they rejoin at month 6, they now have access to months 1-3 and 6, but not to month 4 and 5.  They can purchase month 4 and 5 at say three times the regular membership price if they wish to, at which point they then have perpetual access to it, even if they drop out of the membership again.

To me, that would be a perfect membership solution.  But I'm damned if I can find anyone that does such a script.

I have found one where a lot of thought has gone into membership as learning, but not where membership involves a product.  What happens there is that when the member rejoins at month 6, then they get access to month 4, not month 6.  And the workaround suggested by the very helpful developer / owner involved just doesn't cut it.  Grrr…

There's nothing for it, I'll have to get my own done.  I can see from other sites that I'm a member of that there's a real need for such a script, as they all have the same issues.  I'm either in or out, and once a month has gone by, the back products get removed.

I just find it difficult to believe that no-one has ever sat down and thought about this.  Fortunately for me, it's such a glaring omission it leaves the door wide open for a BETTER membership script than the rest of the stuff on the market, doesn't it?

Watch this space.

-Frank Haywood

Membership numbers are restricted and for just 100 people, as my thank you for being a subscriber, the price is a rock bottom…

Well, you can see for yourself here:-

http://www.plrcodemine.com/

-Frank Haywood

.

[EDIT] Now closed at this price.  Sorry folks.  Watch out for when we re-open at $27 for a short time.

If you've had a problem registering, check your email as I think I've caught everybody now and emailed a personal registration link.  The cause of the problem itself is now fixed.  If you haven't had a personal email from me and you've been to PayPal, don't panic, you're in!

If you're getting redirected back to the sales page after logging in, it seems to be a bug in the membership software we're using.  You ARE logged in.  Just go back to the previous page and choose one of the protected pages.

.

Last year I decided I wanted to help you get rid of your job and start working for yourself.  There are many paths you can take to get there, and I always advise people to work towards multiple streams of income.  That way if one fails for whatever reason, you have others you can fall back on.

Over the years I've been on this planet, I've done all sorts of things to earn a living, and I've held down all sorts of jobs from fish-fryer to Data Manager for the projects that introduced the last two Range Rovers to the world.  But the VERY BEST thing I ever did was to strike out on my own.

Don't get me wrong.  There have been ups and downs.  There have been some months I've started where I've wondered where the money to pay the mortgage was going to come from.  But somehow we always made it through.

And I KNOW that some people reading this are in that position right now through no fault of their own.

The problem is from the moment we're born it's always been about the job.

Our entire society literally forces people out of school and into a job, and any square peg that doesn't want to fit that round hole is frowned upon.

The problem with a job is that when you take one, you're at the mercy of someone else.  You're putting all your eggs in one basket.  Your entire livelihood can be taken from you at any moment, and you don't have ANY income security.

There's the difference.  Income security as opposed to job security.  I don't believe there's any such thing as the latter, it's really all just smoke and mirrors when you think long and hard about it.

If you want income security, then you have to do as I've suggested above.  You have to ensure you have multiple income streams.

If one breaks, it's a hiccup, not a disaster.

That's why I decided to launch this new PLR software membership.  It's so you can add an additional income stream and protect your livelihood.

This is the first prong of my multi-pronged effort to help you make it this year.

I always say your target should be to replace your current income from your job by this time next year, whenever you start.  It's not easy.  It takes effort.  But the rewards are well worth it…

-You no longer have to do what your boss tells you to, simply because you don't have one.

-You don't have to get up at 7.00am just to go to work for 8 hours.

-When you do work, then it's all for you.  You're not making someone else rich.

-If you feel like some time off for a walk in the park, then you can take it.

-You're not working for / with people that are clearly stupid in a way that it seems only you can see.  Yes, I think we've all felt like that at some point haven't we?  Whether it's true or not.

The list goes on…

Where was I?

Oh yes, multiple income streams.  That's very important.

Here's your first of 2010.

In three hours time at 6.00pm GMT (1.00pm EST), my new monthly software membership goes live.  Membership is available for the first 100 people to make it there in time at less than half the final price, locked in for as long as you remain a member.

The aim of the site is to give you a new, completely white label piece of software that you can rename and call your own, and also show you how and what to do with it to start to replace your current income.

The price is ridulously low for two reasons.

#1 – As a thank you for being a subscriber.
#2 – The site is still being built and you should regard it as a BETA.

On that last one, the site is very definitely a Work In Progress, as there's plenty of content in the form of tools, articles and videos I want to add to the members area as well as providing you with the software itself.

And…  One or two things might not work exactly as they're supposed to.  We'll resolve those issues as we go.

Your reward for your patience is a much lower price than will be available to other people when the site goes officially live.

As I've said previously, the price you join up with will be locked in for as long as you remain a member.

And as the site grows and new groups are introduced with new software products in those groups, you'll get the opportunity to join those new groups at the same price you lock in today.

Okay that's it for now.

Watch out for the email with the link for when the site goes live at 6.00pm today.

-Frank Haywood

That's because the perceived value of software compared to say an ebook is far higher.

Well, after a few false starts, it looks like the new software PLR membership I've created for you is just about ready to rock and roll.

The new site has been created to give you a chance to fast track your business in 2010.

The idea is simple.  In order to build a business you need products, and a good way of getting those together is to use private label rights material you can put your name on and call your own.

It cuts down on your creation time and makes it easy to get yourself up and running.  You may even already be doing this with PLR ebooks, and that's okay…  But there's a bit of a downside to ebooks.

You've probably seen that everybody and his dog are now selling the same ebooks with their own name on.  They're not even bothering to change the title, which is a basic mistake in itself.

Wrong, wrong, wrong!

I know that having your own source of software you can sell is MUCH better.

Software has a far higher perceived value than an ebook, but of course getting hold if it is the problem.  And even when you can get hold of it, you always end up buying it "as-is" with no warranty or support.  I've found that in nearly every case I've bought PLR software, I've had to scrap it simply because the software was never designed to be released as PLR in the first place.

What that's meant to me is it's been extremely difficult to take PLR software and call it my own.  It can cost a lot of money to take most PLR software and change even the title of it.  I know that because I've been there, and I'm sure lots of other people have too.

So in the end most people go with PLR ebooks simply because there isn't a decent regular source of PLR software that they can easily adapt and call their own.

Until now.

Opening tomorrow at 6.00pm GMT (1.00pm EST) is my new PLR software membership site.

This is a joint venture between myself and a group of developers.

Each product we create is specially put together with its final use as PLR kept firmly in mind.  This means it's written from the start with the idea of keeping it easy to edit either by the use of a language file, or if its a WordPress plugin, by editing a bit of text in the plugin.

It's dead simple, and we show you how in the members area.

The product you get each month comes usually as either an untitled WordPress plugin or PHP script, plus a sales page design and sales copy, plus some basic documentation.  All you have to do is think up a product name and edit the bundle to reflect that new name.

Hey presto!  One brand new never-before-seen product, and it's all yours to pretty much do with as you please.

We've even decided to make it effectively unrestricted PLR.  In fact there are just two very reasonable restrictions as to what you can do with the software you get from us.

#1 – You can't sell or offer PLR to any of them.
#2 – You can't offer them as part of a mass product membership, paid or otherwise.

The reason is simple – that's what WE do.

Okay, I think that's enough for now.  I'll send you another email tomorrow about the membership site, plus some ideas as to what you can do with your new PLR software, so look out for that.

Then at 6.00pm GMT (1.00pm EST) tomorrow, I'll send you the link where you can join.

Which reminds me…

As one of my subscribers you're going to get the lowest price available locked in for life, but only if you're one of the lucky 100 to get in.

What's more, as I open up new groups within the membership, you'll have the chance to join those new groups at the locked in price you get tomorrow.

NO-ONE else will get that, and they'll end up paying double what you will.

It's just for you IF you get inside in time.  I fully expect the site to be oversubscribed.

Okay?

More tomorrow, or you can leave a comment if you want to squeeze a little bit more out of me.

-Frank Haywood

In response to a survey I did in the middle of last year, it seems there are three things that concern most people, so I've set myself a challenge to provide all three, and get you into "the game".

This is what I've been told by people over and over again.

#1 – You WANT your own product to sell, and preferably not another ebook found in some enormous PLR library that's already being touted by thousands of people.

#2 – You WANT to be given a plan for online success, and you want it to be step by step and clearly achievable.

#3 – You WANT to know how to generate traffic as you realise it's the life blood of any web site.

Based on those three desires that YOU'VE told me, that's what I'm going to give you.  Taking my own advice about 30 day projects, I've broken the plan down into achievable chunks, and the first part is coming sooner than you think.

If all goes well in the next couple of days, then 100 (and ONLY 100) fast movers will get access to the first part of my plan in a deal that I think will blow your socks off.  If I'd had exactly this a few years ago, then things would have moved a lot faster for me, so pay close attention.

This is a reward for you for being a subscriber, no-one else will get this, and like I said this deal will only be for the first 100 people to claim it, so make sure to keep an eye on your email over the next few days.

As I said above, the money is (without a doubt in my mind) driven by having your own products you can sell.  At some point in the path that got me to where I am today, I realised that software has a much higher perceived value then ebooks.

Think about it.

Software is much sexier because it generally saves you time and lets you automate and do cool things that would normally have to be done manually or not at all.  Usually not at all.

I've found that people are more likely to part with money for software than they are for ebooks or videos – with very few exceptions.

So what I've done for you is I've arranged for a group of developers to provide you with a high quality software package each and every month.

Each month you will have at least one new really cool product that with a little tweaking you can call your own.  By tweaking, I mean renaming.  And I've made sure it's easy to do too.  The software will usually be a PHP script or a WordPress plugin, but not always.

Let me explain what you can do with a product like this.  I'll give you an idea.

When I release a new product, I usually run a cut price nickel sale to engender some interest, get the market seeded with the product, and attract affiliates.  Word gets around and I typically make $2,000 – $3,000 in a couple of days and then see a steady trickle of sales after that once the official site goes live and affiliates start promoting.

It's really cool, and there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to do this too.  I'm not a developer, I pay other people to do the coding for me, and that's exactly what I'm offering you too.

I come up with the ideas, I pay developers to come up with the product, and you get to do almost anything you like with it.

All for a fraction of the price it would have cost you if you'd done it on your own.

More importantly you haven't had all the heartache and pain that comes with dealing with developers.  Please believe me when I say that it can be a nightmare to find someone who will do what they say when they say they will, and the fact is most developers just don't get sales and marketing and will tell you so.

That can make it very hard to get a finished product that meets the bill, and I've certainly had more than my share of frustrations over the last few years.

You can easily avoid all that heartache simply by allowing me to take all the hassle out of it and letting you take all the profits.

The deal I'm setting up for you is to offer you membership to a new site that will give you at least one brand new software product each and every month with almost completely unrestricted Private Label Rights.

In fact there's only TWO very reasonable restrictions for the products you'll get from me.

#1 – You can't sell or offer PLR to any of them.
#2 – You can't offer them as part of a mass product membership, paid or otherwise.

The reason is simple – that's what I do.

In most cases, one sale a month of just ONE product will pay for your entire membership – you'll be getting a new one EVERY month.

Even if you decide to give the product away in return for a name and email address, or as a loyalty bonus to your existing subscribers, you'll still make money on the deal when you promote other products.

And because I've made sure it's EASY to rename the product, you can call it anything your imagination can come up with to differentiate your version.

To me this is a no-brainer, especially at the special deal price I'm offering to just 100 people.  I just wish I'd had something like this when I got started a few years ago, it would have made life a lot simpler.

There's one other point I want to make before closing.

Some people say that having the same product as 100 other people is no good because you'll all be competing with each other.  I used to think the same thing – let me put you straight on that.

First of all, I'm supplying all the products without a name.  The product name is the BIGGEST differentiator to any product, so by not supplying you with any idea of a name, you'll have to use your imagination to come up with something that works for you.

Secondly, the marketplace for software is HUGE!  The chances of anyone spotting that you're selling the same product is unlikely.  The closest you'll get is someone might notice and compare features, but a bit of creative thinking will give you the edge.

Finally, and this is an eye-opener if you've never seen anyone say this before.  The product isn't as important as the marketing.  You may be sceptical about that, but I know 100% for a fact that it's true, and that most marketers won't tell you that.

You pitch the product right, you generate traffic to your site, and you'll make sales.

And as I said, just ONE sale of ONE of the products per month will pay for your membership.  And each month you'll have another product you can market which will give you nice steady growth.

Okay, that covers all I want to say for now for part 1 of my 2010 Challenge to get you into "the game" -  all based on what you've told me you want and what I know you need.

Parts 2 and 3 – training and traffic – will come over the next few weeks.  I hope you understand that I had to get part 1 running first to generate the initial income needed to fund the other parts.  (Frank Haywood Projects Rule #1 – All projects must fund themselves ASAP.)

There's no doubt in my mind that the total three part package will put money in your pocket.

Okay?

Watch for another blog post and another email tomorrow.  The product membership will be open in the next couple of days – in fact as soon as I can get the last few wrinkles sorted out.

And of course as well as the very low price, there's also a bonus for the 100 people who take up this special membership offer.

More on that tomorrow.

-Frank Haywood