Internet Marketing Badger

When it comes to making money online, a while back I realized that it all boiled down to three things:

a) Tech skills
b) Writing skills
c) Marketing skills

You're going to need to be somewhat well-versed in each thing to make money as an Internet marketer. And you'll also want to continually expand your education in these subjects because the Internet is always changing, Google is always burping with some new algorhythm, and your website profits can disappear in a cloud if you're not careful.

I don't say this to scare you - just to remind you!

Tech skills are all about the "hard" stuff - thinking more like a computer and learning some html to update your sites, learning enough about code to recognize if something bizarro is happening on your site so you can call your hosting provider, that type of thing. It also involves putting websites together. But this can get a lot easier through the use of premade templates or Wordpress themes.

Writing skills I'm afraid are something you will have either developed or not developed through your school years. But don't confuse being an entertaining writer (which is what you have to be in the Net environment) with being a great English class writer. Your talent writing a 30 page essay about Jane Austen isn't going to do much good when you launch your first website or blog. Quite frankly, no one wants to read your long-winded stuff.

Instead, writing should come from the gut, remain simple, and you need to use user-friendly words which will connect with your audience. It gets a lot easier with practice.

And marketing skills can be difficult if you've never promoted yourself as a consultant or never had your own business. It can seem very odd at first to realize that you need to constantly be SELLING. I know it took me a long time to get comfortable with that one.

Badgers don't like to sell. They like to lurk in their burrow.

Marketing is about watching broader buying trends, seeing what people are buying online, and doing a good job at matching a product with that demand. And it involves things like copywriting and creating interesting headlines and articles which will get people to click through to buy the product your promoting.

The nice thing is that you don't have to be at expert or be perfect at ANY of these three things. But everything you are doing to make money online will boil down to those three categories of effort - tech skills, writing skills, and marketing skills.

So the more you can keep plugging away and getting better in each area, the quicker you'll see wonderful results and make real money online.

Have you ever struggled with writer's block? When you publish a website, it can be challenging coming up with creative ideas all the time.

Many people promote their websites through article marketing or a variation on article marketing called bum marketing. This is basically submitting your articles to directories, third party sites like the fabulous Squidoo, Blogger, and hubpages, along with some free classifieds sites. The idea is to have as many backlinks as possible pointing back to your site.

The problem is that it's not a good idea to have all your articles be the same. So you need to alter them slightly or even rewrite them completely each time you submit them places.

This can be extremely time-consuming! Not to mention tiring.

I found some fabulous writing hooks recently which will help you jumpstart your article writing.

I'd love for you to take a look at them:

Overcome Writers Block

Sometimes it can be hard keeping your blogs and static websites looking fresh with new content. I'm not a big fan of the article spinners currently on the market, but my friend Gerry who has about 100 Wordpress niche blogs has been having very good results with a program called Wordpress Spinner.

This program dynamically changes elements of your page, from presenting articles you've prewritten in a new way to changing ads dynamically to presenting different versions of your header or sidebar. It can even change your css stylesheets. This allows you to do real A/B split testing on your WordPress blog to see which version of your blog converts best. Gerry saw his sales go up by about three percent after he started using Wordpress Spinner.

Also there is a separate software that does the same things for static html websites or php websites. It's called Php Spinner. I'm tempted to try that on some of my sites because I'd really like to split test elements of my sites like color variations, headers, and header images. Especially after seeing the results Gerry has been getting.

You can check out WordPress Spinner here:

Wordpress Spinner.

And Php Spinner is here:

Php Spinner

Did you know you can sell everything from soy milk to DVD's to rhinos on Amazon these days as an Amazon Associate?

Okay, so I lied about the rhino part. But I hear Jeff Bezos is working on it.

Read about how I've been making nice chunks of change after finally getting to speed on how to make real money as an Amazon Associate:

Amazon Affiliate Program Weirdness

I'm excited to share a new review I've posted at my main badger blog. It's a review of Confessions of a Lazy Super Affiliate by Chris Rempel.

This controversial review is unlike any others out there about this eBook - you have to check it out!

Confessions of a Lazy Super Affiliate Review.

It's okay to cheat a little when you're trying to set up a new website or blog. Coming up with your own layout and graphical design can be complicated, especially if you don't know much about HTML or CSS.

Read my article about one fabulous free template resource here:

Free Templates

I've blogged before about hosting provider and domain registrar GoDaddy. They used to have a lot going for them, but these days many users are reporting major problems.

Common GoDaddy problems including having a site shut down with no notice (and no recource) if someone even lodges a frivolous complaint about the domain; emails being lost/mislaid; a clunky control panel setup making work on your site difficult; and lack of Wordpress support.

I write more about recent Godaddy problems in my new post at my blog - learn why Godaddy's problems are in the news this week:

Godaddy Problems - The Saga Continues

Okay, you've launched your bouncing baby new website or blog. Now what? Well, nobody will know you're out there in Internet land unless you start getting back links.

Building back links is time consuming and sometimes you might want to outsource this work. But there are a bunch of easy ways to start building your back links today.

I write about them today in my main blog:

Some Easy Ways to Build Backlinks

Ignore that $99 eBook or that $3000 web guru course.

You can easily pick up skills to start making your first money online. It doesn't have to give you hemorrhoids. It can be easy!

I have a free Internet Marketing Quick Start report available courtesy of web goddess Sara Brown of Laycock Publishing. If you're feeling droopy about making money online and need some motivation - whether you're a beginner or advanced Internet marketer - I know you'll enjoy this free report.

Grab your copy here:
Internet Marketing Quick Start - Free Report

In my new blog entry, You Don't Have to Organize Orgies, But It Helps I talk about a unique business card that Matt Cutts of Google found in an old book and how it teaches us all to be more original with our marketing and promotion. Check this out, it's very funny!

Read about AOL's many woes and why the whole company might well be cursed!

AOL is Cursed

Alexis Dawes of Desperate Buyers Only fame (the best guide ever written on how to write a highly marketable ebook)also maintains a really interesting Internet marketing blog at AlexisDawes.com

Recently she's been posting some super stuff, including a recent entry listing 50 superb free or inexpensive resources for eBook writers.

Find out more here:

Alex Dawes of Desperate Buyers Only Does it Again

From time to time I'll be posting blog entries about "a day in the life" of an Internet marketer. I'll be talking about some of the activities and task that go into my work as an Internet marketer.

Last week it seemed like all I did was "plumbing" - rooting around and digging up problems (some of them stinky) at my various websites.

I created a free audio about it and in it I talk about affiliate marketing, choosing affiliate vendors, and maintaining your websites.

Check it out at my main badger blog:

Why Internet Marketing is Like Plumbing - Free Audio

You know how, if something gets repeated often enough, you sort of just assume that it's true?

It's a sad fact about human nature that we do this all the time. How many times have you heard somebody repeat a piece of "wisdom" and just automatically assumed it was true?

To be a successful Internet marketer, you need to learn discernment. And you need to think objectively and rationally. Just because somebody says something doesn't mean they're right.

"The money is in the list."

We hear this repeated, over and over again, ad nauseum.

Find out why this "truism" ain't so true:

The Money Is In the List - Not!

Did you know that this is a great time to be making money online? Recession or no recession, profits can be huge. It does help to do a few things to recession proof your business, though.

I outline a bunch of steps I'm taking to recession proof my businesses here:

How to Recession Proof Your Online Business

Pinging is a great way to get your blog noticed by the search engines and bring in traffic, fast. Usually if you have a WordPress blog or a Blogger blog you can ping your feed at sites like Pingomatic or Pingoat and get your latest content indexed right away - which brings traffic immediately.

But if you have a regular html website without a blog, did you know that you can add a simple one page feed in just a few minutes and harness all the amazing benefits of blog and ping?

I teach you how in a special new package I've created called:

Feedify Your Site: How to Create a Simple, Homemade Feed for Your Static Html Website and Get Fast Indexing and Pinging Power.

You'll want to check it out at my site:

Add a Feed To Your Regular Html Website

Right now the world of Internet marketers (especially full-time Internet marketers like me) is filled with men, but not so many women are in this insular little world yet. That needs to change!

Read my article about it here:

Internet Marketing Doesn't Have to Be a Boy's Club

Golly gee, I'm so proud. I've just launched a new site called FeedifyYourSite.com

On this site I sell my new report, Feedify Your Site.

You can read all about it in my latest blog entry:

Feedify Your Site Launches

Learn why Google is making you stupid. Have you developed the attention span of a flea? Maybe it's because you're overwhelming your poor brain with too many technologies.

Is Google Making You Stupid? Probably.

One of my favorite books for design inspiration is A Book of Colors by Shigenobu Kobayashi. Kobayashi is a Japanese color expert who shares simple color combinations that evoke certain emotions. Use his color combos to give you inspiration as you design your next website or blog.

A Book of Colors.

If you'd like to find a minimalist, user-friendly approach to creating successful affiliate sites, I think you might like Niche Marketing on Crack by Andrew Hansen. It's a little different from other books about affiliate marketing because it teaches you a very streamlined approach to setting up small sites that target buyers instead of freebie seekers.

I make nice money each month with my Niche Marketing on Crack sites. You can do them with WordPress blogs or set them up with a regular html site. (I advise creating a feed and following the techniques I teach in my Feedify Your Site report though if you're going to use a regular html site.

I've posted more info about how I use Niche Marketing on Crack to make nice money each month plus a sort of review of the ebook by Andrew Hansen here:

Niche Marketing on Crack is Da Bomb

Enjoy!