Free Video: Stephen Pierce's 3 Ways To Make Money Online

This is a 7 minute and 28 second video training from Stephen Pierce on "3 Ways To Make Money Online". Stephen is kind enough to put the video up on YouTube so everyone can watch and learn from it.

==> 3 Ways To Make Money Online

It is a great video of Stephen speaking in Australia and what you will learn is very important for you to know if you really want to make money online. Do you know that there are really only 3 ways... and only 3 ways to get paid online?

Yup, it's true.

In Stephen Pierce's video training, he will share with you what those are and how you can use them to achieve your financial freedom. Making money from the Internet can be easy and fun for you and your family... if you use the right methods.

According to Stephen, when you operate a simple internet business the right way...

* You don't need many customers to make a ton of money.
* You can leverage, outsource and delegate 100% of everything.
* No expertise is needed.
* No overhead is required.
* No ceiling on your income.

... and ...

YOUR business is always working, even when you're not.

Stephen is the most sincere Internet Marketing Guru I've come across who is willing to share everything he knows with no reserved. He is well-known to over deliver his content and knowledge.

Watch Stephen Pierce's video for FREE on YouTube:

3 Ways To Make MOney Online

Getting a "Buzz" On

Viral marketing has matured a bit over the years. There seems to have been a shift to the web not just being seen by agencies and brands as another tick box for any ad campaign, which is significant enough, but now being the medium where a campaign is launched to create a buzz before it hits TV and print. Even before a movie is released which used to be seen as the pre-launch buzz-generation activity. Big business “gets it”.

Buzz works! It can work for small and start-up businesses, as well. The planning stage of a viral campaign will set out objectives and develop the viral theme for a buzz. There are three core components to any viral campaign and businesses of any size can use them. They are:

1. The creative material: the viral agent that embodies the message you want to spread in a digital format (image, video, text, etc). The trick is to put together material that people will be eager to share with their family and friends and people are much more eager to share “advertainment” and advertisement.

2. Seeding: distributing and placing the agent online in places that provide the greatest potential spread. Direct viral material downloads or links on specialist viral third-party web sites in order to create awareness and spread before users get to the campaign destination site.

3. Tracking: Measuring the spread of the campaign to provide accountability and prove success. It is absolutely vital that you know what is or is not working. The only way to get that information is to track the results of your seeding.

Lessons have been learned, trends have been developed and there is definitely some science involved in creating a buzz successfully. The buzz technique is here to stay and, if used strategically, it can make a difference to the success of your e-business.

Keyword Research That Works

On the internet, keywords are terms or words that relate to particular topics. Keyword research will involve various aspects, such as finding sales oriented keywords or driving maximum qualified users to increase their online sales.

Keyword research is the first step towards a successful search engine optimization campaign. You have to be very careful when selecting keywords, as it can be very tricky to select targeted keywords for a website.

The selection of keywords should always be based on various aspects such as product names, services, brands, or general terms. Often times, people forget about targeting geographical terms when they have global presence.

When doing keyword research, it's highly recommended to do a very thorough market research analysis to find the best keywords used by search engines to find products and services online - and find out what keywords are targeted by competitors who are doing well in marketing on the internet.

The first step in finding the best keywords is to make a list of the products, topics, and services that you offer. You can also make good use of your website logs to know which keywords have brought you the traffic in the past.

Be sure to select keywords that clearly define your business and products to drive traffic from the search engines. There are some websites which get high levels of traffic through general keywords although they might not end up being sales.

Today, users of search engines are aware of how they work, for searching products and services on the net. Users always look for the better products, locations, etc. Therefore, you should cover all terms for each - products, locatins, etc.

There are numerous tools available which will help you identify keywords that are suitable for search engines. The challenge here, is to determine which keyword is the best to generate traffic.

When Is the Right Time to Redesign Your Website?

If you run a website, chances are you often wonder whether it is the right time to do a total redesign of the layout of your website. Here are some points to consider:

Are you thinking of a redesign just for the sake of it? If you answered yes to that question, it is not yet the right time to do a redesign. Remember, a design serves a specific purpose. If you are not sure whether to do an overhaul of your site, keep in mind that your current design might have a specific purpose that you might not know about. You will lose that function if you do a redesign.

On the other hand, if your website has had the same website design since 1990, perhaps it is high time to do a redesign. The last thing you would ever want to happen to your site is when visitors leave your site without taking a look at your content just because the design is old fashioned. If this is your case, here are some points to ponder before doing a redesign.

Redesigning your website is like performing plastic surgery on it. Your website loses its current identity (for the better or worse) and your regular visitors might not recognise your new design at first glance. You risk losing them just because they thought they landed on the wrong page. Hence, it is very important that you retain a characteristic feature from your old layout. Perhaps it is the logo of your site; perhaps it is the same text style for the title for your site.

To play it safe, put a poll on your site to let your visitors do the talking. If they think it is necessary for the website to have a fresh look, give it to them!

How to Sell Expensive Items on eBay

Selling expensive items on eBay is really no different than selling low cost items. Essentially, no matter what you are selling, it all comes down to how you market the item. This doesn’t mean you have to surf around the Internet placing ads here and there – when it comes to eBay auctions, the marketing is all done at the eBay website. Basically, when you set up your auction, you are setting up an automated marketing campaign.

First, you must determine what the value of your item is, in three different ways. This will help you determine what your reserve price is. On eBay, the reserve price is the lowest price that you are willing to accept for your item. First, have your high priced item evaluated to determine what the actual market value is. Next, research similar items from past auctions at eBay to see what price those items sold for. Finally, determine what the value of the item is to you. With this information, you should be able to determine the lowest amount you are willing to sell the item for.

Set your reserve price, and then set your opening bid price lower than $50 – no matter how high your reserve price is. This is a marketing tactic. It will be hard to attract potential buyers to an auction for an item selling for hundreds or thousands of dollars – but getting them to an auction where the opening bid is only $50 is quite simple. Remember, you don’t have to sell the item to anyone who bids less than your reserve price – unless you choose to do so at the close of the auction. This method of price setting resembles marketing gimmicks used by offline businesses that are simply designed to ‘get customers in the door.’

Work hard on the description for your listing. Use words that really describe your item well. Provide as many details as possible, including details that prove the authenticity of collectible items. Include pictures of the item as well. Do not try to deceive potential buyers! If the item has marks or scratches, simply be honest about it, and make sure that the pictures convey this as well. State how the item will be packed and shipped. Also let potential buyers know that shipping insurance must be purchased as well – in case the item is damaged once it leaves your possession.

For higher priced items, most eBay buyers feel more comfortable using an escrow service. Offer this as an option in your auction, with the understanding that the buyer must pay for the service. This protects both parties from fraud, and it makes many buyers more open to spending the money to obtain the item. eBay has partnered with an escrow service that is commonly used for high ticket items.

Problems You May Encounter When Buying From eBay

Avoiding eBay Buying Pitfalls

As with a real market, trading on eBay is not without its hassles and snags.

First of all, it should be duly noted that eBay is an online market/transaction facilitator. It merely becomes a means for the buyer and the seller to meet.

Because of its online nature, eBay’s auction listing provides the buyers with a wide selection of goods. The buyers are also enabled to review the buyer through its feedback rating. This helps the buyer decide whether to pursue the trade or not.

The sellers on the other hand, benefit from a wider audience due to the popularity of eBay because eBay enables them to post easily, quickly, and extensively.

When eBay connects buyer and seller, the transactions truly begin…as well as the headaches.

Even with the automated nature of most of today’s transactions, eBay is still built on the basic foundation of trading: trust.

A good deal of trust is involved in eBay trading. The buyer has to trust that the seller is listing a legitimate item, and that he or she will deliver that item when paid. The seller has to trust the buyer to pay fully and without any catches.

Here are some of the problems one may encounter while buying on eBay.

Seller does not deliver product
This is the buyer’s biggest fear. However, it is also one of the most common snags buyers encounter. Usually, when closing a deal, the seller will email purchase instructions to the buyer. This will most usually include instructions for payment. The seller will then promise to have the item delivered upon receipt of payment.

If the buyer, after fulfilling his or her part, does not receive the item within the agreed upon date, he or she should immediately try contacting the seller. If this proves to be fruitless, he or she should file a complaint with eBay for assistance regarding the matter.

Seller delivers a different/defective product
Sometimes the trading is smooth. Everything goes according to schedule. However, upon receipt of the item, the buyer finds out that the item is significantly different from its description on eBay.

What should the buyer do about this?

Good communication between the buyer and seller usually brings about a speedy and satisfying end to any trading dispute. This should always be step one for disputes.

Seller cannot be contacted to close deal or for questioning
Most disputes come about due to miscommunication between seller and buyer.
But if the seller can not be contacted, that presents a bigger problem for the buyer – especially if that person has already fulfilled payment of the item. eBay may help in this regard by furnishing you with further information on the seller.

Back End Affiliate Marketing

Within affiliate marketing, everyone involved in the program will benefit. Each time the affiliate refers a visitor to the website of the merchant, he will earn income. On the other end, the merchant will produce sales without spending a lot of money for advertising and promotion.

With the goal being to earn more income, both the affiliate and the merchant should be considering the practice of back end selling in their business. Back selling is a great and well known support for affiliate marketing, as it can greatly comment the income that is produced from affiliate marketing.

Back end selling is the selling that's conducted after the initial sale. When a visitor becomes a paying customer for a product, another product can then be advertised and sold to the exact same customer, with the second product being called the back end product.

Now, the customer will already be acquainted with the merchant or affiliate, meaning that is already a level of trust between them. Therefore, selling the back end product may actually be easier than the initial sale.

For many years, back end selling has helped boost sales for both online businesses and land bound companies. If the customer is happy with the initial product that was purchased, he'll logically assume that the online company is offering quality products and will come back again.

The normal technique with back end selling is to make the customer aware of other products, as these products can cater to other needs that the customer may have. When the customer becomes aware of the second or back end products, he will look into it and may make a purchase.

The technique of back end selling has been both known and proven to be very powerful in augmenting the income of many companies. Therefore, back end selling has made hundreds of online companies flourish and expand. If you use it correctly, it can work very well with affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing will attract many new customers and lead to the initial sale, while back end selling will build loyalty among the buyers. To put it in other terms, back end selling is a major ingredient in creating a winning formula in affiliate marketing.

Each and every affiliate should look into the financial promise of back end selling when it's coupled with affiliate marketing. The two of these can make the affiliate earn an amazing amount of income.

eBay: How Important is Your Buyer's Reputation?

Your reputation as a buyer (or 'feedback rating') is the most important thing people see when they deal with you on eBay. It is on the basis of this little number that they will decide whether they can trust you or not.

Each time you buy or sell something on eBay, people can leave feedback for you, and you can leave feedback for them. This feedback can be positive, negative, or neutral, along with a comment. Your feedback rating, then, is worked out using a very simple sum: the number of positive feedback comments people have left for you, minus the number of negative ones. This means that someone with a feedback rating of 28, for example, might have 30 positive ratings and 2 negative ones.

If you are a considerate buyer, then you should find that positive feedback will just appear next to your username, without you needing to do anything. If you want to help it along, though, there are a few things you can do.

Always leave feedback for others: People will feel an obligation to leave feedback for you if you leave it for them (eBay will send you an email after each transaction to offer you the opportunity). Take the time to write a positive comment about sellers who do what they should and the chances are they'll do the same for you.

Pay promptly: Sellers love nothing more than to be paid promptly - paying as soon as the auction ends saves the seller all sorts of worry, especially if you pay by credit card or another electronic method. You will often find that your positive feedback appears within a few minutes of you paying if you pay as soon as the auction ends.

Don't be a difficult customer: Understand that your seller might take a day or so to respond to you, and perhaps a few days to send your item - harassing them is nasty and unnecessary, and won't get you good feedback.

Build relationships: If a seller sells a lot of a certain kind of thing you like, buy from them a few more times. They will be very happy to find a regular customer, and will go out of their way to leave positive feedback like 'a joy to deal with as ever'. Also, they might offer you a few special deals!

Sellers won't generally be reluctant to sell to buyers without much of a reputation, simply because it is the buyer who takes most of the risk in a transaction. It is worth remembering, however, that transactions where you are the seller and where you are the buyer are counted towards the same feedback total - so if you ever want to start selling, being a good buyer is especially worthwhile.

On eBay, people pay far more attention to sellers' ratings than they do to buyers' - most sellers can't be bothered to check their buyers' feedback, while bad feedback on a seller can (and should) be a deal-breaker. When you are buying, then, you need to worry more about the seller's reputation than you do about your own, and that's why the next email will be all about sellers' feedback ratings.

The eBay Item Listing Rules

Because eBay is such a huge marketplace, with members from all walks of life, in almost every single country around the world, it is no wonder that there are many scammers lurking about. In order to better protect the buyers, eBay has specific rules concerning the items that can be auctioned off on the site. These rules must be followed, or the person posting the item for auction can be banned from the site.

Even though there are numerous categories, items that are put up for auction really only fall into one of four categories at eBay: Prohibited, Questionable, Potentially Infringing, and Approved. Approved is the simplest category to define and understand. An approved item is any item that does not fall into one of the other three categories. That is fairly simple, right?

After the ‘approved’ category, however, it starts to get a little harder to understand – with the exception of prohibited items. A prohibited item may not be auctioned on eBay for any reason, under any circumstances. Prohibited items include alcohol, drugs, animals, tobacco, human remains or body parts of any type, lottery tickets, and governmental property. There is quite a bit more on the list, and that list can be viewed at the eBay website.

Questionable items are those that are not prohibited, but are not necessarily infringing. Adult material falls under the ‘questionable’ category. Tickets of any type may also be questionable. Law enforcement related equipment, as well as guns, knives, and other weapons are questionable items. Artifacts, food items, batteries, all hazardous chemicals and materials are also on the list of questionable items. You can auction questionable items at eBay, as long as those items meet certain conditions.

Potentially Infringing items are those that violate copyrights, trademarks, and other legal rights. These items are almost always some type of media, such as software, DVDs, and CDs, but the list contains other items as well, such as counterfeit items and illegal recordings. You can find out more about ‘potentially infringing’ items at the eBay website as well.

If you are unsure as to which category your item falls into, you should contact eBay with this question before setting up the auction. As a buyer, you should carefully consider the consequences of purchasing items that fall under one of the three categories above. In some cases, it may be very illegal to have some of those items in your possession – no matter how they were obtained. Before making such a purchase, or bidding on such an item, you should find out more details about the item in question, and then get some legal advice.

Making Money from Selling Advertising Space

If you would observe the company that delivers the daily paper to your doorstep for a business case study, you will come to learn that the newspaper publisher hires reporters, writers and other important staff to create the contents and deliver the papers to their readers.

In addition to the above mention, the publisher has to invest regularly in heavy duty machineries and tons of papers in printing tons of newspapers on a daily basis.

And in order to ensure that the newspapers are delivered on time, the publisher appoints agents at every part of the covered territory.

So, how does the newspaper company make money? It is obvious that selling a copy of the papers at less than a dollar would not even be able to even fund the operations.

The answer? Selling advertising spaces! You have definitely seen lots of advertisements in the newspaper. The publisher simply sells advertising space in the papers to advertisers who want to leverage their advertising efforts on the paper’s high readership.

On the same analogy, you can make money the exact way from your newsletter: simply by selling advertising space to prospective advertisers!

If your mailing list size exceeds 1,000 (5,000 is recommended) subscribers and beyond, you can start selling advertising space for say, $10.00 per sponsor ad.

In this manner, you turn every issue you send out to your subscribers into a profit-pulling device. And since there is virtually no end to the stream of advertisers as products, services and businesses are cropping every single day in every industry imaginable, so are your money making opportunities.

Which One is More Important – Product or Mailing List?

If you would ask this question, “Which one is more important – the mailing list or the product?” any savvy marketer would answer you, “The mailing list”.

Principally, any wise business person puts the importance of hungry demand (and not just any demand) in front of the product. In other words, there is no product if there is no demand! And a mailing list represents the demand or your business if you would like to call it.

If you frequent the Joint Venture forums and membership sites of any kind, you will find that product and service owners need mailing list owners more than the other way round. This is because the mailing list owners have the prospects that the other type of partner is looking for to sell to.

And if you are a mailing list owner, you do not have to necessarily make money from selling your own product. You can sell advertising space or craft a Joint Venture with product owners in return of commissions, recurring or not.

Most of the biggest success web businesses on the Internet today often establish the mailing list (or subscribers) first before the product. One fine example is Friendster.com.

Friendster.com, in the nutshell, is a website that connects friends and potential friends from around the world through a free membership access.

While Friendster.com does not make money from the number of members who join the site, the business makes money from selling advertising space and partnering with other big time merchants and businesses, owing to the established number of members Friendster.com has recruited.

This business is perfect example that demonstrates why every business should establish a need or demand before the product itself, and why you should do the same, whether you run a friends site or not.

The Benefits to Creating Your Own Website to Resell Private Label Products

In the United States, many individuals are making money through a process that is known as private label resell rights. Private label resell rights are a special type of business opportunity. It is an opportunity that has a lot of potential; however, to be successful, you must first know what you are doing.

Private label resell rights are available on a wide variety of different products. Despite the wide variety of different products, e-books and software programs are the most popular. With private label resell rights, the original product creator either does not have the time or the money needed to market and sell their product. Instead of selling their product to prospective customers, they sell the rights to someone who has knowledge and the time to sell their product. There is a good chance that you can be that person.

The first step in taking part in this opportunity is to find a product with available resell rights. As previously mentioned, this product is often an e-book or a software program. Before agreeing to purchase the resell rights to a private label product, you are advised to know what you are purchasing. Not only will you want to make sure that the product is a quality one, but you will also need to make sure that it is one that will sell. Since you will be purchasing the resell rights to this product, you will not want to waste your money on something that you cannot use or sell.

As soon as you purchase the resell rights to a product you may be able to begin selling it; however, additional steps may need to be taken. For instance, private label resell rights often require you to change the product, which you just purchased the resell rights to. This change is often minimal, but it is sometimes required. The last thing that you may want to do is alter a perfect product, but in a way it may be able to help you. After this alteration, you may be able to claim the product as your own. This means that you could officially be the author of an e-book or a software developer.

Once the additional steps, if any are required, are taken, you can then begin to sell your product. Unfortunately, this is where many individuals go wrong. The only way that you will make money is if the product sells; therefore, you need to find and use an effective selling method. There are a number of different methods that you can use; however, you may find your own website to be the most beneficial. This website can not only be used to provide information on your product, but it can also be used to purchase it.

When it comes to developing a website, there are many individuals who are unfamiliar with web design. If you are one of those individuals, you will have a number of alternatives. One of those alternatives includes the assistance of a professional website developer or designer. For a fee, you should be able to have a professional design your website for you. If you are looking for a low-cost way to develop your own website, you are urged to choose a web hosting plan that includes a free site builder.

When building your website, you will want to add information on the product in which you are selling. If you are selling an e-book, you may not only want to give a description of your book, but a few samples. These samples, also often referred to as inserts, will allow your potential customers to determine whether or not your product is worth the buy. In addition to adding product descriptions, samples, and pictures, you will also want to add a shopping cart. This feature, provided by most web hosting companies, will allow you sell your product right off of your website.

For a small amount of money, you will have a way to not only sell your product, but market it as well. After you have created your website, you will find that customers make their way to you, thanks to search engines. In time, you should be able to sell your product and make a substantial profit.

The Disadvantages of AdSense

As AdSense becomes the most popular publisher program for Price per Click advertising, flaws and disadvantages still exist. Since its inception advertisers have chosen to advertise in search because they felt that visitors would be less targeted. This is a genuine concern and one that makes perfect sense. If you are visiting a website, and notice an advert then the chances are you are not particularly concentrating on its content.

AdSense has also become so popular that people can distinguish them from other adverts. Therefore people may choose to ignore them without even paying them a thought. This has been a hot topic discussed by Bloggers and one that could contain a lot of truth. Many have blamed Google for this, and their decision to include text that says “ads by Google” beneath the advert.

Many publishers also fail to ever gain the revenues they anticipated when starting the program. Those only gaining 30 – 40 visitors a day to their website would be unlikely to earn even one dollar a day. Many advertisers talk of rates such as 1.5%- 5% for traffic to click conversion, whilst only gaining around $0.10 per click. The maths doesn’t work out great, but you can hardly blame advertisers or Google if you are not bringing enough traffic. The key is to bring targeted traffic to your website that are likely to click on adverts, however it is said that it may be easier on other programs which allow figures such as 75% share of advertising revenues for publishers.

Another disadvantage in AdSense is that it has almost become tacky. Its appearance on websites that generally appear to be designed in a DIY fashion has lead people to associate them inextricably. This can only be tackled through AdSense evolving to be more attractive to the bigger brands, whilst those who currently use AdSense are restricted.

Google AdSense also has to tackle the issue of click fraud which is anticipated to count for over 15% of click through rate in content. This has meant that advertiser’s who have been particularly affected, have moved away to other programs or have restricted their advertising to search.

This has meant that there is less competition in content and therefore smaller revenues for publishers. Publisher’s who previously had high yielding ads, are now having to alter their content to ensure they get any adverts at all. This has largely been the fault of the publishers themselves however the issue is one that; if not addressed could bring AdSense to its knees.

Google AdSense also has the disadvantage of not paying enough for their search program. Other similar programs pay higher rates, and if publishers decide to go elsewhere then problems will occur for advertisers and publishers alike. Although Google fail to pay enough for search another major problem with AdSense is that it does not have a powerful database of graphic adverts. Many advertisers prefer showing graphically drive advertisements, however this has yet to materialize. As several other programs exist for PPC graphic distribution problems could occur.

Whilst this may not be a problem for all publishers, many complain that the adverts within their site do not change, so their repeat visitors fail to see fresh adverts so therefore fail to visit them. This is a problem which could be addressed through making adverts rotate. However if adverts rotate then how will that be linked with advertisers paying a rate per click? These are all problems which Google has to address to ensure that AdSense remains the market leader.

Adwords on the other hand also has major advantages, and remains the best in the market. It’s CPC rates can be chosen by the advertisers so that even when they feel that they are not getting the results they expect they can lower their prices whilst still using the service.

Whilst many issues remain with AdSense the program still remains the most popular amongst publishers, whilst Google Adwords remains the most popular amongst advertisers; with a database of over 140,000 Adwords will remain on top for the time to come.

Viral Marketing with Forum

In order to be successful using forums to do viral marketing there are some things that are required.

Do Your Homework: Prior to joining any forum, you must do some research.

1. Join relevant forums that are in some way related to the promotion’s primary sales market. For example, someone involved with a health related product, many types of forums could apply….everything from holistic medicine to stay-at-home moms.

2. Choose popular forums. There is no point in wasting your time and energy on forums with few members and few posts. Page ranking and the amount of active members are two good ways to check for this.

3. Choose forums that allow signature tags. If it’s possible read the rules before joining and pay attention to them. Your time is important, too. It is better to find out that a forum doesn’t allow posts with signature tags before you go to the time and trouble of joining.

After You Have Joined: OK…you have chosen two or three forums that meet your requirements…now what?

1. Keep your signature tag short and update it regularly. The ideal thing is to limit yourself to one link, preferably to your main website.

2. Never create posts that are nothing more than an advertisement. This all but a universal rule and only displays the marketers lack of experience if he does so. At best this kind of post will be deleted by the moderators….at worst, it grounds for being banned.

3. Work the room. Be an active member on the forum. Plan to spend at least an hour each day there and take the time to get to know the users. Take the time to introduce yourself with intelligent questions depending upon the forum’s topic.

As a marketer becomes a regular member, they will hopefully develop a good reputation and without saying a word about their promotion, those who are interested in their product will approach them.