If you’ve been engaging in IM over the years, you are probably used to the hype and constant bombardment of internet marketing products from all the people whose list you signed up for.  It gets mind numbing sometimes.

Listen, I’m here to help inject some sanity.  You can say I’m a hardened IM– I’ve reached a point where I can ignore the hype of some re-hashed worthless launch, but can also recognized something with true utility.

Anyways, I am going to be posting a series of my IM Journal entries.  Yes, I use my Outlook Journal to write down my thoughts before I forget them, and to add clarity and direction to my efforts.  Hope you can learn from these.  You can think of them as the filtered, concentrated knowledge from pages and pages of IM info.  Here’s the first one.

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Date:  4/29/2008

The path to internet marketing success has two basic pillars:

• Keyword research
• Affiliate program research:  Amazon, eBay, etc.
• CPA research
• Website construction
• Blog construction
• AdSense set up
• E-Book creation
• Video Product creation
• Audio/ podcast Product creation
• Webinar creation

Major B Functions:

E-Book publishing for Amazon Kindle store
- Internet Riches for the Little Guy?
-Blogging

Ok, that’s the first entry in my IM journal.  I recommend you start one, too, because you will come across some “a-ha” moments that you’ll need to write down (don’t trust yourself to remember it, because you will be distracted by the next big IM launch and all those promo emails.  So…. get to work!

People, stop the insanity!  Stop buying ebook after ebook; course after course; jumping from one to another and GETTING NOWHERE.  NO, that new, over-hyped, gotta-have-it-at-all-cost product is NOT the system that is finally going to make you rich.  You are chasing yet another quick little fish while the other fish you had an opportunity to eat are getting away, and as a result you are still STARVING (not making any money).

People who tend to be more analytical, more impulsive, or lazy (want to get rich quick with little effort) are the ones who suffer from this affliction the most.   If you find yourself frustrated after months or even years of tinkering in internet marketing because you only made enough money to buy a nice shirt, time to rehabilitate yourself.

Here’s the GOLDEN RULE to internet marketing success:

You are much more likely to have success working on just one internet marketing campaign at a time, and engaging in no more than three (3) different internet marketing vehicles.

What I mean here is  once you start on a particular campaign, FINISH it before you start on the next one.  In this context, “finish” means to the point where you are making steady income from the campaign.

Limit yourself to no more than three (3)  internet marketing vehicles.  This is huge.  A vehicle, or ”specialty” takes a lot of time to master, especially with the constantly changing nature of the internet.  Examples of internet marketing strategies:

• PPC-ClickBank
• PPC-CPA Offers
• Blogging
• Social Media Marketing
• List Building and Marketing
• Membership Sites
• Website Flipping

Now, if your thing is affiliate marketing using Wordpress blogs, pick one niche (like Persian rugs) and focus on that.  That one niche is enough to keep you busy all day:  setting up your blog(s), adding content, adding to directories, tweeting about it, FaceBooking about it, forum posting, finding good affiliate programs for it, contacting other sites to link to you, setting up your PPC campaigns and tweaking them… and so on.

If you get tempted to start ANOTHER campaign at the same time, well, your chances of generating revenue just dropped 50%.   What winds up happening is both of these campaigns are done half-assed because you spread yourself too thin.  Your site’s content will suck because you won”t have time to write frequent, good content, and as a result your sites won’t make it to the first page of Google, and/or they won’t convert.

The only way around this is to leverage your time by OUTSOURCING the SEO.  There are content writers in India and the Philippines who can crank out content for you at reasonable prices, but you need to get over the urge of doing everything yourself.

Example 1. If your main strategy is selling ClickBank products, do ONE PRODUCT AT A TIME.  What I mean by this is, do everything you need to do to get your campaign producing a steady stream of income before you even think about starting a second one.  If you are driving traffic through PPC and direct linking, well, make sure your campaign is tweaked and making you money before you abandon it and jump to another product.  Otherwise you’ll be like a dog chasing its tail.

Example 2.  If you plan to create a comparison site for several Clickbank products and don’t plan to use PPC, then put all your energy in making the best site you can in terms of keyword targeting and search engine optimization.  Then, hit the off-site SEO hard.  Stay focused until you see the dollars rolling in.

A third guideline can be to limit yourself to no more than 2 or 3 niches; two preferably.  Remember, as you take on more niches, you are diluting yourself.  It’s like biting off more than you can chew, and you will LOSE.

Ok, here’s a simple task you can do as part of you rehabilitation.  When you are in the mood to take a stab making money online, write down your niche, campaign, and vehicle.  Turn off all other distractions (email, forums, blogs, web surfing) and implement the Golden Rule.  Examples below:

Niche:  Persian Rugs

Campaign: Persian Rug CPA Offers in CJ and PepperJam

Vehicle:  WordPress SEO optimized blog

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Niche:  Weight Loss

Campaign:  ClickBank product FatLoss4 Idiots

Vehicle:  PPC

Remember, DO NOT change or start a new niche, campaign or vehicle until you FINISH what you started by seeing the MONEY rolling in.  Be disciplined!  Do whatever it takes to keep you focused.

Now, go for it.

Internet marketers are fully aware of the constantly evolving nature of the business and are therefore compelled to learn  (or at least check out) everything new that comes out, or risk missing out on a key discovery/technique that competitors will use to their advantage.  Before you have a chance to test out a new technique, another one comes along, and the cycle repeats.  So it’s very easy to find yourself spending 80% of your time studying internet marketing and 20% of your time actually DOING the actual internet marketing activities that MAKE YOU MONEY.  Most people justify this by telling themselves that the studying is an investment that will pay off later… but later may never come if you keep getting bombarded with an endless supply of material.

I am subscribed to several lists (which was pared down from a much bigger list) and therefore get notified of upcoming product launches; usually a course of some type or a software application.  And when one is about to get released, I receive a torrent of emails from the product creator’s JVs (joint venture partners; super affiliates) .  You see, if you buy the product through their link, they get a commission; usually 50% or more.  And these JVers know that they share a lot of the same people on their lists, but have no shame sending out the emails, offering something free if you access the product through their link.  It’s like a bunch of fishermen angling for a big prize.

Check this one out from StomperNet regarding Brad Callen’s Keyword Minute report (great stuff, by the way):

From:  StomperNet

Subject:  3 Money-Making Strategies in Under a Minute (free report)

Many of you reading this will already know Brad Callen – if not, chances are you thought we were the same guy.   (That happens a lot.)

Brad CALLEN is well-known as the maker of one of the BEST (and one of my favorite) SEO toolsets out there.  Particularly, SEO Elite and Keyword Elite have been incredibly useful in my businesses.

So he knows a thing or two when it comes to making money online, and that’s why I want you to check out this free report called “The Keyword Minute” [I removed their affiliate link].

In it, he takes 3 strategies that beginners and veterans alike often find confusing:

- Integration Marketing
- AdWords
- Article Marketing

…And boils them all down to strategies that you can use to immediately start making money today.  I’m telling you, at 36 pages, this is massive for a free report, but it’s amazing how thoroughly these THREE powerful tactics are explained.

And best of all, it’s step-by-step, so you can begin using what you learn before you even finish reading the report if you do them as you follow along.

This is definitely worth your time, so don’t miss it while you can get it for free.

Talk again soon,
Brad Fallon
CEO
StomperNet

The solution to this conundrum is to read fast; take the good stuff, and put it to use.  Set metered goals each week, and don’t jump to a new strategy until you complete each goal (build a website, create a product, set up a PPC campaign, etc.).  Otherwise, you’ll be the most knowledgeable yet poorest internet marketer on the planet!

P.S.  I’ll talk about Brad Callen’s three techniques in the next post; they are quite good.