My good friend, Kelly McCausey, is running a very cool program over the summer, in which you are encourage and guided to Keep It Simple and create three simple reports. One to use as a free giveaway to grow your list, one to sell, and one to put on Kindle.

I did a quick walk-through video for you of the program so you can check it out and see if it's something you want to achieve over the summer.

If this is a definite YES for you, jump in here:
Yes, I want it, Nik!

If you're still not sure, let me ask you these questions…

1. When is the right time to start building your list? (Now.)

2. Why over-complicate things? (This is simple and it works.)

3. Do you have something for your people to buy from you? (If so, awesome but adding more is always good. If not, then when?)

Now is the time. This is the place. You get to keep the recordings, so even if you can't make it on the forum very often, you're still in.

Here's the link again:  Click here to Check it Out

I hope this has been helpful in helping you decide if it's right for you.

Warmly,
Nicole

PS.

This video is part of our Sticky List Profits training where we give you some ideas to use our Done-for-You content from CoachGlue.  I hope you enjoy it!

In this video, my business partner, Melissa Ingold, talks about how you can leverage the content we've created for you at CoachGlue.com in your own business, which makes putting together your free list building giveaway easy and super fast!

Resources Mentioned (or Additional Training): CoachGlue.com

• Book Cover Pro Software
• 50 Things Your Website Needs to Attract More Clients
• 100 Things Every Business Must Do to Succeed Online
• Easy Webinars: 30 Days to a Big List, Instant Stardom, and Huge Profits
• How to Write Your Book in 30 Days (Bonus! 10 Extra Worksheets)
• Using 1ShoppingCart to Boost Your Business
• Using InstantTeleseminar
• Step-by-Step Guide to Using GoToWebinar

If you would like more videos about List Building, including the following topics, sign up at Sticky List Profits.

You'll discover..

Module #1: Getting Started and Growing Your Targeted List

The Basics:

• Why your list is important, which tools to use, and definitions

Choosing what to offer your readers to sign up.  What to use as your List Bait to get people to sign up for your lists?

• Best Strategies for Coming Up with Your Winning Idea

Ways to make it simpler for you.

Module #2: What Your List is Begging You to Mail Them

What to Send?

Module #3: List Engagement & Selling for Increased Profits

Learning how to sell more while still building a relationship with your audience.

Module #4: Setting Yourself Up for Long-Term Growth & Maximizing Your Profits

How to Schedule/Plan your Mailings?

Setting up Squeeze Pages.

Growing your Lists to Grow your Business

Again, you can check that out here:  
Sticky List Profits

Have a beautiful day. YOU ARE AWESOME!!!

Warmly,
Nicole Dean

My business partner, Melissa Ingold, and I have been using a new tool called LeadPages for a few months. We've been playing with it to see if it's something we want to recommend.

We do!

What does it do?

LeadPages allows you to quickly and easily create beautiful:

• Squeeze Pages (Optin pages)
• Webinar signup pages
• Sales Pages
• Facebook Optin Pages
• and bunches more.

Melissa shares why she likes it in this video:

-> Click here to try LeadPages.

How Does LeadPages Work?

Here is her demo:

 Click here to learn more about LeadPages.

Want to See an Example of an Optin Page?

Click on the image above or this link to see it in action.

How About an Example of a Lead Page Posted on Facebook?

You can see a sample of one that I've done and posted on Facebook (which was SUPER easy):

Click here to see this page live.

LeadPages Tutorial: How to Create Facebook Optin Forms like the one above

Here's how easy it is to do what I did:

-> You can find more info about LeadPages here.

How about a Sales Page? Yep. It does that, too.

Example of a Sales Page Created with LeadPages:

You can view this page live here.

Interested in learning more and maybe trying it out?

You'll find more demos and you can try LeadPages here.

Warmly,
Nicole Dean

Before I took off “leavin' on a jet plane”, my friend, Alice Seba told me about a new course she's teaching about List Building.

I asked her if I could send her a few questions for a quick blog interview. Not surprisingly, she graciously and generously agreed.

So I'll hand it over to Alice Seba – who is a pretty smart cookie when it comes to building an email list and making money with it.

List Building Q&A

with Alice Seba

Nicole: Why does every WordPress site need a list? Isn’t RSS enough?

Alice: That’s a great question and I know it’s one that a lot of people need the answer to. It’s so easy to set up the little RSS button and then just forget about any other list building. But really, it’s a big mistake to do that. If you rely on RSS only, you’re missing out on some very powerful marketing opportunities. Email beats RSS for a variety of reasons and are here are just a few:

• Just about every online user has email. Not nearly as many people use RSS readers, so you’re likely shutting out a huge chunk of your audience by offering an RSS feed only.
• An RSS feed only updates your audience about your new blog posts. You can’t send them special offers, promotions and other unique marketing messages which are crucial to real business growth.
• It’s also important to realize that email is simply more commercial by nature. People expect offers and sales pitches, but on blogs, they mainly expect content. Sure, you can add promotions into your blog posts and they can be effective, but you’ll experience better conversions by sending the offer directly to their inbox.
• And speaking of sending email directly, email definitely is a much more direct way to communicate with your readers. It goes right into their email inbox and you can personalize the emails to create a deeper connection and get more results. An RSS reader is something people tend to check less often and is saved for when they have time. Email gets checked because it has to get checked.

An RSS feed is definitely important because it caters to certain preferences. If someone just wants your blog updates, they can get them. Then you can continue to wow them with your awesome posts and present them with compelling reasons to opt-in to your list. Make your ultimate goal to get them on your email list, even if they start with your RSS feed.

Nicole. What's a big mistake you see when you do look at people who have lists – where they're losing out?

Alice: I’ve got two, if that’s okay.

Nicole: Nope. Just one. Just teasin'. Let us have them.

Alice: #1. People are often so concerned about having a large list and not losing subscribers that they forget about crafting their IDEAL target list of subscribers. Many people I’ve worked with over the years tell me they hesitate to send out product promotions because when they do, people unsubscribe. So they just keep sending content and wonder why their list doesn’t make them any money.

At this point, I always have to remind them if someone unsubscribes because you tried to sell them something, they will NEVER become a customer anyway, so let them be on their way. Having people leave your list is fine because you want to attract and keep the people who are interested in your products and who want to hear about them. We’ve trained ourselves to believe we have to satisfy everyone, but it’s a losing battle. Satisfy the very specific group of people who love your content AND your products.

#2. One other thing people seem to forget is their CUSTOMER list and it’s the most valuable list of all. A satisfied who has purchased from you once is much more likely to purchase from you again. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve worked with people who tell me they don’t actually add their customers to a mailing list. When someone purchases a product from you, a commercial relationship has formed and you can (and should) start emailing them. But even those people who have customer lists, don’t use them to their fullest potential. Treat your customers like gold. Send them better offers than everyone else gets, give them advanced notice of products and secure discounts for other people’s products for them.

Nicole:  Why should everyone reading this sign up for your training?

Alice: Everyone comes from a different place when it comes to their email marketing.

• Some people are just starting out.
• Other people have lists, but don’t email them (GASP!).
• Still, others have a list and email them, but aren’t making any money.
• Then there are others, who just want to bring it to the next level.

Our “30 Days to a Bigger Email List, Better Relationships and More Results” includes something to PUSH you to do more, no matter where you are now. Each day includes 2 challenge tasks to help ensure you’re both GROWING your list and COMMUNICATING with them regularly and effectively.

But outside of that, we offer a unique opportunity to:

• Ask questions and get plenty of feedback along the way, ensuring you stay on task and keep growing your email marketing skills. And this opportunity doesn’t stop after 30 days. You can come in and get help anytime you want. For life.
• Get access to handy brainstorming sheets, templates and other tools to ensure your list keeps working for you long after the 30 days are over. We’re here to make it easy for you to command the power of email in your business.
• Receive valuable discounts and special offers to make it easier to create your winning content. Members get some pretty sweet perks!
• We even get together online live for a couple of training/brainstorming sessions to ensure you’re on track for a bigger list and more sales.

Well there you have it, my friends.

Take what you want from what Alice said above. I agree with it all.

And, if you are interested in her course, you can see more details here: 30 Day List Building with Alice Seba

Gotta get back to the fun.

Talk soon.

Warmly,

Nicole Dean

PS.. Just for fun, here's a picture of (from left to right) Dennis Becker,  Alice, me, Kelly McCausey, and Connie Ragen Green.

You may have seen Terry's amazingly thorough responses in my Expert Briefs posts including the following:

• How to Only Work One Hour Per Day
• How to Regain Focus

If you're newer to the scene, Terry is an established marketer who I respect and enjoy very much.

Here's his official bio so you can be suitably impressed.

Terry Dean started his online business from scratch in 1996. He went from delivering pizzas for a living to building a million dollar Internet business promoted primarily through the Internet. Within a few years he was also consulting with home based businesses, local companies, and million dollar corporations. His original company and websites were sold in 2004, and he founded MyMarketingCoach, LLC. which is dedicated to coaching entrepreneurs in the 10 key principles of success in business and life.

I am a paying member of his Mentoring Club – and I love the content.

Click here to Check out Terry's Mentoring Club

Be sure to check out the bonuses on that page. They. Are. RIDICULOUS!

Now that you know that we have a rock star in the house, read on for an awesome article.

The Problem We Are Discussing Today.

Terry's going to talk today about the new Gmail tabs. If you're not aware of this new feature this is what it looks like inside my own Gmail account. Gmail is automatically filtering emails for me that I may or may not want filtered.

As an email marketer – the concern is that less people on your list will be seeing your emails and that your open rate will decline.

Here's how you can still get your emails read.

5 Ways to Profit from Gmail Tabs

by Terry Dean

You've probably heard the news if you do any type of email marketing.

Google has been rolling out primary, social, and promotional tabs inside of Gmail since May 29th.

This was greeted by a chorus of marketers screaming, “The sky is falling again!”

Sometimes I wonder if people are hoping for a disaster just so they can finally be right to be so upset.

Of course smart marketers have been testing to see if there is a way to land in the primary tab instead of the promotional tab.  And so far, there is no consistent way to do so.  Google is smart.  I wouldn't be surprised if they're tracking the unsubscribe link we legally need attached to email newsletters.

You have a choice.  You can use this as an opportunity to give up.

Or you can take advantage of this change while competitors hide their heads in the sand.

Here are 5 quick ways to take advantage of the new email tabs.

1. Tell subscribers to look in promotions box.

A lot of people don't even realize all their newsletters are landing in “promotions.”

Let them know to look for your email there on your thank you page.

You can even tell your subscribers how to move your emails from the promotional tab into their primary tab.  Wouldn't that be a masterpiece of marketing…if you're the ONLY newsletter in the primary tab?

Simply grab an email with your left mouse button and slide it over to the primary tab.  You can also right click it and choose “move to tab” to move it to the primary tab.

A little note will pop-up to ask you if you want to make this change permanent.

Say, “Yes.”

You won't have to worry about missing your favorite emails again.

2. Get subscribers excited about what you'll be sharing.

Tease your subscribers with the information you have coming up.  End your story on a cliffhanger.

They will be LOOKING for your email when it comes.  If they miss it, they'll contact you.  It's the perfect opportunity to have your support suggest they move you to the primary box so it doesn't happen again.

3. Write series (part 1, 2, 3)

Create emails in a series with part 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on.  If you got message #2 and #4…you'd want to know where in the world #3 went!

This is all about making your emails useful to your audience.  Make them something they look forward to receiving…not like all those sales emails being sent by everyone else.

4. Scarcity in Offers

The one negative is that subscribers may put off opening emails in their promotional tab until later.  And we all know what happens when it gets put off.  It likely gets forgotten or deleted in mass.

Consider adding more offers that are scarce in time frame.  If they don't open the email in time, they miss out on the offer.  Your best sales days will almost always be the last day before a deadline.  Use deadlines more often.

5. More Frequent Emails

Mailchimp recently reported they reviewed the open rates of emails on their system.  The average open rate before the change for Gmail users was just above 13% for weekdays.  After the change, there was a noticeable drop in open rates to just about 12%.

That's a pretty small drop, and some of it could easily be attributed to the system being new and subscribers not being able to find their emails.

The easiest fix is to simply add one more email a month.  That will make up for the drop.  And you'll see an increase in your open rates with more frequent emails…as subscribers start expecting them more often from you.

Even if Google does relegate you to the “promotional” category, you can brand your emails as something they look forward to receiving instead of just another promotion.

Find out how here in my new course Autoresponder Alchemy

Your Marketing Coach,
Terry Dean
“The Internet Lifestyle Mentor”
Earn More. Work Less. Enjoy Life!

Can you see why I love this guy?

Let me remind you about Terry's Marketing Mentor Program, so you can see if it's right for you.

In my opinion, this is for people who have already gotten past the initial hurdles and are ready for some serious butt-kicking.

Should you buy it?

NO. I would not recommend it for you if you're brand new and don't even have a blog or list yet.

YES! – If you're already building a list and you have a product under your belt and want to learn more about running a profitable business – then this can DEFINITELY help you to grow your income.

Here's the link to check it out again, if you think this is something that can help you.

Click here to Check out Terry's Mentoring Club

I love how Terry doesn't just call this article “How to survive in the day of Gmail tabs” but instead “How to Profit with Gmail tabs”. Clever.

One of the things I'm going to experiment with is an idea that I learned from my friend, Deb Drum, which I'll have her share over here in the next week or so – or possibly make this topic another Expert Briefs discussion – if you're interested.

Let's talk.

• What do you think about the new gmail tabs?
• Got any questions for me or Terry?
• Want more on this topic?

Let me know in the comments below.

Warmly,
Nicole

PS. If you are not ready for the Mentoring Program, check out Terry's free reports here -> Terry Dean's Internet Lifestyle Manifesto

PS again. Terry and I are not related nor married, by the way, in case you were wondering. (People ask all the time.)

I'm running a promotion over at my new site CoachGlue.com to get it rocking and rolling – and we're doing a big (kind of nuts) affiliate contest over there right now.

Several of my friends have promoted successfully using great email marketing strategies and I wanted to show them off while sharing examples for you to learn from, as well.

So here's the scoop.

To get an idea of what the affiliate contest is about, go to Coach Glue June Affiliate Contest (opens in a new window so you won't lose your spot).

Then, take a look through this report where I pulled promos from the top four sellers so far this month so that you can SEE what's working and learn from it.

Affiliate Marketing: Email Promotions that Work.

I hope you like it! (And yes, there will be an updated version coming when the contest wraps up. Watch for that.)

Warmly,
Nicole

PS. Here are the resources mentioned in the report:

Learn More about my Friends:

• David ->  Free Weekly Training
• Dennis -> Dennis' Awesome Community
• Kelly ->  Kelly's Super Podcast
• Rachel ->  Get to Know Rachel on My Podcast

Win Affiliate Contests!

I haven’t mentioned this yet, but my friend, Connie Green, has won several of my affiliate contests in the past and she has a cool product similar to this one showcasing HOW she did it.

You can grab that cheap here-> How to Win Affiliate Prizes (If you like my report, you'll enjoy that one, too.)

Meet us in Person:

• Vegas ->  Vegas Conference
• Atlanta -> Atlanta Conference

This week I asked our panel of experts…

“In the past weeks, we've talked about which web hosting providers
and webinar services you use in your own businesses.

So, today, let's all share which autoresponders we use to mail our lists.”

I think you'll enjoy this look under the hoods.

Tiffany Dow of The Guide to Shiny Object Syndrome says:

When I was first starting out in Internet Marketing, I wanted to do things right. All of my guru ghostwriting clients told me they used Aweber, so I went with them and have never once regretted that decision.

Now, they have a $1 trial for your first month, but I don’t remember getting that when I first signed up. You pay $19 a month for the first 500 subscribers and then it increases as your numbers go up.

Aweber has so many features – I don’t even begin to use them all, because I’m a simple girl. But what I love about the service is that the people behind it are helpful and truly want you to see success with it.

They could have just set up the service and charged for it, period. But they go above and beyond. They actually teach you email marketing if you’re unclear on how something works.

They have a really good knowledge base, live webinars, and video tutorials. Even when you start a new list, the system walks you through the set-up with step-by-step prompts. They have specific email marketing guides for different business types – photographers, restaurants, real estate agents, etc.

Customer service is excellent. They’re friendly, personable, and fast with their responses. They, along with Host Gator and Sam at Download Guard are in my top three when it comes to taking care of customers.

I feel comfortable with them and in this business, when you can wake up one morning and panic because something technical has gone haywire, that peace of mind is very crucial to my success.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Felicia Slattery of Signature Speech Secrets says:

The best auto-responder I've used is Aweber. Hands down they still have the best deliverability of all the big names.

I love Aweber because they give you the ability to split test quickly and easily, and they listen to their customers. A while back they did a major “improvement” to their online interface and the way they allow users to create and customize emails to subscribers. The problem was that many of us “legacy” users – that is folks who have used the service for 5+ years were used to our old ways. When we en masse complained that we liked things the way they were, just like the Coca-Cola company did when they introduced new Coke in the 1980s, Aweber did a quick fix and allowed for the Classic Coca-Cola version of their site to be used by those of us who liked it that way.

Aweber customer service is second to none. Even with all the options today, I still recommend Aweber.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Connie Ragen Green of Affiliate Marketing Case Studies says:

I use both 1 Shopping Cart and Aweber to stay in touch with my list.

Aweber is primarily comprised of people who have purchased from me, but I also have people there who wish to be notified about my upcoming live event and are still prospects until they sign up.

Because I started out with 1 Shopping Cart, I have 90% of my prospects and customers on lists there, segmented according to where they signed up originally or what they purchased for me.

This may sound confusing, but I feel better knowing that I have two different companies housing my database. Both of these companies can have ‘down time' on a regular basis, which can be very scary for a new entrepreneur. Our list is our most valuable asset and I like the peace of mind I have knowing I can reach the people who wish to hear from me whenever the need arises.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Kevin Riley of  Maximum E-Mail Marketing Profits In 2013 says:

I've been using Aweber since 2006. Mainly, I've been happy with the service. It was easy to use (until they created their new editing sequence, which I avoid by copying older e-mails already in my system, and editing them via the old editor).

It was very reasonable in price back in 2006; however, they changed their pricing structure a few years later and that made it less of a good deal (fortunately, those of us who got it early were grandfathered in at the old pricing structure) but I still think it's one of the most affordable autoresponder services (I think it and Get Response are close in pricing).

Still, even at a slightly higher cost, there is no better investment for your online business than a good autoresponder service. Of the somewhat-budget services, I would recommend Aweber, Get Response, or Imnica – all three provide good service and have a good team behind them to ensure e-mail deliverability.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Now, for a more robust system (but quite a bit costlier) I'm about to start using Office Autopilot for my new business (opening in October). After months of research and a long talk with an OAP rep (who becomes my rep when I join OAP, and is always there to provide support) I decided that OAP is perfect for running a truly effective online business. Not only an autoresponder, it is a full customer management system – and tracks customers from when they first come to your website. Definitely more expensive than the aforementioned autoresponders, and a little more complex to use (although the learning curve doesn't look too bad, even for a technodolt like me), but well worth it for building a great online business. It handles autoresponder service, tracking, memberships, etc.

Lain Ehmann of Crafting Your Business, Step-by-Step says:

Aweber!

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Rachel Rofe of How To Get Every Book You Write Onto The First Page Of Kindle says:

I use Office Autopilot right now to mail to my lists. I'd say I'm a 6 on excitement with them.

I've just signed up for an account with SendReach.com, and I'm looking forward to seeing how that goes too.

Despite trying a TON of them, I haven't found a “golden mecca” auto responder system yet.

Jeanette S. Cates, PhD of Plan Your Online Business says:

I've actually used just about every autoresponder on the market, but none are perfect. I'm currently beta-testing a new one that I think I will move everything to within the next month. But my history with autoresponders is long and varied. In fact, I did a full webinar on which autoresponders I've used and why I've made the switch several times.

• 1 Shopping Cart offers my favorite interface. It's easy to add someone to a subset and target messages to that smaller group. But it is so-so at best. However, this is currently my main autoresponder.
• AWeber has the best deliverability. But their naming scheme for their autoresponders is network wide so if someone already has the name that makes sense to you, you're out of luck. They are also very restrictive on their rules, so there is no way to manually add someone to a subset list for better targeting. And their pricing gets expensive when you start building a big list. Currently, I use Aweber as a supplementary list for some optin pages and special projects, particularly partner projects.
• ARP is an autoresponder you host yourself, but it is definitely not for new marketers! Plus you need to pay for monitoring services, which run $300 to $500 per month. I used ARP3 for several years and really liked it, in spite of a very out-dated interface. But when they “upgraded” their software to ARP Reach, I went back to 1ShoppingCart. (ARP Reach has some flaws!)

So all in all, there is no single solution for everyone. If this new service works out, I'll be telling everyone about it!

Lynette Chandler of Tech Based Marketing says:

I've been a long time customer of Aweber and at this point, I have no intention nor truly compelling reason to switch. However, sometimes I do get a little irked over the fact we pay for duplicate subscribers.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Recently, Armand Morin launched a new system called Sender.info. While it can do pretty much everything major auto responders can do, what captivates me are the analytics and connectivity with 3rd party systems. So, this is something on my “stuff to test” list.

Besides regular autoresponder, I've also been using Amazon SES which is insanely cheap. The problem with this is, it isn't easy to get up and running and you have to be approved by Amazon in order to obtain sending privileges. Still, it has been really handy when I needed to import and email a bunch of people from a shopping cart.

Shannon Cherry of Learn How I Get *Paid* to Attend Events says:

I've been using Aweber for years now (since 2006) and although there are others with many more bells and whistles, I doubt I'll ever leave. Why? Because I'm grandfathered in on an annual rate that if I switched I would be investing tons more.

Plus, it's deliverability and analytics are awesome…and it can do many of the things the ‘big guys' do.

It's just the industry standard. And I love it.

Try AWeber's Email Marketing Tool Risk-Free

Nicole Dean of . here! . says:

Like Connie, I have a few systems running.

1. I use Aweber to collect leads – like the list here on my blog. I love the ease of use and deliverability it offers.
2. I also use 1 Shopping Cart on one of my sites www.EasyPLR.com – which means that customers get put into that system, as do affiliates.  So I mail them through that cart.
3. I also use Amember (which is a membership site software) for a few other projects like www.CoachGlue.com – so our customers and affiliates also get mailed through that system.

The good news is that we have a bit of diversity of risk. The bad news is that there is no way that I've found to ensure that my readers only get one email from me at a time. (I'm open to suggestions.)

Recommendation?

If you do any affiliate marketing at all or are in a “Make Money in any way” niche, go with Aweber or 1ShoppingCart. Many other services aren't friendly with affiliate  marketers.

However, don't hold off on making a decision because you don't want to make the wrong decision. You really can't go wrong with either option.

If you have questions about which service is right for your specific situation, please ask in the comments.

Warmly,
Nicole

PS. If you want to build your list, this challenge is a great resource to have on hand. -> David Perdew is Nuts! <-

Today, David wants to share a message about failure and, even moreso, about taking BIG risks.

He is currently doing a list-building challenge where he is trying to increase his mailing list by 1000% (Yes, that's one THOUSAND PERCENT!) in the next 30 days. You can watch along if you join his challenge and work alongside him. I encourage you to check it out.

-> Check out David's List Building Challenge  (The link will open in a new window so you won't lose this post.

All rightie. Without further delay, I hand over the stage to David.

Congratulations! You Are a Wonderful Failure?

by David Perdew

I love a good baseball analogy.

Ty Cobb is the best hitter in baseball history – all of baseball history. He stopped playing in 1928.

His failure rate was 63.4 percent.

He got a base hit just 1 out 3 times he stepped up to bat in 11,434 at attempts in his professional career. Ty Cobb was a super star with a success record that has held for 85 years.

Ty Cobb never thought he would go to the plate a failure, for sure. Failure was not on his mind. But I bet he was all about learning the pitcher’s style, his good pitches and his weak pitches. I bet he knew what the pitcher was going to throw before the pitcher knew.

He learned through his failures.

So, why is it that most of us are allergic to failure and attach shame and guilt when something doesn’t work?

Thomas J. Watson, the founder of IBM, had the answer to that question when he was interviewed in the 50’s. At that time, IBM was the biggest company in the world.

He was asked what the secret to his success was.

“It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure.

You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it.

So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember that’s where you will find success.”

That’s where you will find success…

If you want success, fail more.

Man, that goes against everything we’re taught most of our life. Failure is bad. Failure is frightening. Failure means you’re not a good person. And you certainly aren’t perfect if you fail.

Watson alluded to two kinds of failure:

• Discouraging
• Educational

We don’t need to talk much about discouraging failure. Most of us know it too well.

It’s a failure that devastates us because we’re personally attached to the outcome.

We were absolutely sure that this task, this product, this relationship, this job – THIS was the one that was going to give me everything I want in life. This was the one that was going to solve all my problems. It would make me whole.

And when you get as old as I am, you finally realize that’s it’s never just one thing, but everything that adds up to who you are. You are today the sum of all your thoughts, behaviors and activities.

Failures are stepping stones to the success you’ve achieved if you finally learn from them.

Many years ago, I was on the fast track to stardom in the journalism world. I was young and dumb. I thought I was all that as my daughter says… So, I took the first job that offered more money and a little more sweet talk.

And man, was that a mistake.

I’d traded my values and my commitment to another company that had none.

Within 5 years, I was out of the journalism business because I couldn’t live with the choice I’d made.

That “failure” set me back for a long time. It broke my confidence and embarrassed me when I talked to my friends who were still living the journalism dream.

My concept of failure changed as I realized that it’s only a failure if we hide from it, stuff it in a drawer and don’t examine it.

Which brings me to failure of the educational variety

I teach something called The 6 Steps to Implementing Big Ideas.

It’s not complicated. In fact, it’s so simple that many people miss its importance. The steps are:

1) Dream
2) Prototype
3) Test
4) Execute
5) Feedback
6) Improve

Steps 2 and 3 embrace failure. In fact, you’re looking for as much failure there as you can muster. If you’re going to fail, you want to do it here.

If you haven’t executed your idea yet, but you’re testing it thoroughly with a low-cost or free prototype , then you’re not losing much money.

When we tell people to do research to find a profitable market before building a niche product, we’re telling them to find the prototypical customer. Test that customer. When customers tell you that there’s a problem, listen. Now’s the time to make the changes before you execute it.

(Prototype is a fancy word for a book outline, a drawing, a PowerPoint presentation, a mindmap or any number of communication tools.)

An educational failure is a blessing because it leads to greater success much faster.

Want to know how to create a disastrous failure? It’s really easy and guaranteed to work every time.

Skip the prototyping and testing steps and jump from Dream to Execute. Your chances of success are slim to none then.

One of my friends spent $18,000 producing a $97 product. She sold 2 of those. That’s a failure.

But, it’s only a failure if she doesn’t learn from it.

Remember what Watson said: “You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it.”

I’m scaring a lot of people right now…

I’ve challenged people to think big and do things differently. I’m a big thinker. Always have been.

When I challenge people, I roll up my sleeves and get dirty too. We’re doing that now with my MyNAMS 30-Day List Building Challenge.

List building is an essential part of business. It’s about filling the prospect funnel. That’s why I’m challenging people to improve or finally create their lists. Without a list, they have no business.

I’m pushing people to take action and do things differently – and to test before spending a ton of money.

Everyone is setting goals. If they don’t have a goal, I’ll set one for them. If their goal isn’t to add at least 1,000 new subscribers in the 30 day challenge, then they aren’t pushing hard enough.

And that means they're afraid of failing!

My goal is ridiculous – insane some have said. I plan to increase my list size by 1000 percent – that’s adding about 50,000 new subscribers to one of the small lists I have.

If I get 10,000 new subscribers, is that a failure? I don’t think so. What’s really lying behind that goal is finding the 20 percent that works massively and discarding the other 80 percent that consumes my day.

I guarantee we’re going to fail a lot in this challenge. Some tactics won’t work at all. When one tactic turns out to be a waste of time, we’ll jump up and down and celebrate as we toss that tactic in the trash.

But when something works really well, let’s do as much of that as possible.

So stop thinking of failure as – well, failure. Think of it as the next step to success.

And remember, if you don’t try, you can’t fail. If you don’t fail, you don’t grow. If you don’t grow…what’s the point!

The MyNAMS 30-Day List Building Challenge is an ongoing challenge.

It’s happening live right now, but anyone can join at any time to start their own challenge. You’re invited to come in and succeed today.

David Perdew is the founder and CEO of the Novice to Advanced Marketing System and MyNAMS.com and produces two intense workshops each year in Atlanta, including NAMS10 coming up Aug. 9-11.

As part of the challenge, David is touring the blogosphere and posting marketing and list building insights on different blogs. You can find the complete schedule of all the blog posts – past and future – here.

Hey guys. It's me (Nicole) again.

I'd like to share a few other famous “failures” with you.

I've also shared this video before, but I love it so much I wanted to share it again.

Warmly,
Nicole Dean

PS. Be sure to check out the links from David. I'll put them here again for your reference.

• MyNAMS 30-Day List Building Challenge – Watch David grow his list and you can grow yours, too.
• NAMS10 in Atlanta coming up Aug. 9-11 – I'll be there!
• The 6 Steps to Implementing Big Ideas – Free Training

PS again – Here's that quote in pinnable format if you'd like to share it.

If you've missed past Expert Briefs, you can click on the undies to see them all –>

Everyone always wants to know how to grow a list, what works and what doesn't, especially when they're new to email marketing. This week I asked our experts what advice they would give in this situation.

Let's say I'm a blogger with no products of my own.
What's the fastest way you would recommend that I build my list?

Here are their replies.

Jeanette S. Cates, PhD of Organize Your Online Business says:

You certainly don't need a product in order to build a list. But you do need several optin gifts, such as reports, audios, or videos. I find it best (and most effective) when I rotate these optin boxes, so that they are not always the same. That also helps me segment my list as it grows.

I use Robert Plank's Action Optin for my optin box, since they can join the list and never leave the page they're on. It just gives them the thank you message in the same space.

I change the offer every couple of weeks to keep it fresh.

It's also a good idea to notify the list that you DO have, as well as your social media contacts when you publish a new blog post. You can do this via email, Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn. This gives them the chance to see and comment on your blog post, as well as opt into your current offer.

I've also used the Covert Messenger Pro plugin that Nicole uses on her blog now and then. It's a great way to draw attention to a new offer or event. And it's easy to use and change!

Dr. Jeanette Cates works with online business owners who are ready to expand their Online Success. She provides training for new and intermediate marketers in her well-respected Online Success Incubator  course.

Lain Ehmann of Business Love Potion says:

Create a product! No, seriously – people need a reason to sign up for your list. Discounts, special exclusives, a free download — these are all great “bait” to lure them into your list – where you'll give them MORE goodies.

Even if you're primarily an affiliate marketer, you should establish yourself as an authority, and one of the best ways of doing so is through creating your own product. Here are some ideas:

• Checklist (“10 things you need to know before you write your next poem”)
• Special report (“The five biggest mistakes in ferret ownership and how to avoid them”)
• Audio interviews
• eBooks
• Free five-part email class (“Five Days to Silkier Skin”)

Then offer this product as a gift when someone signs up for your email list. Voila, instant subscribers!

Lain knows how to enchant her readers. Check out her podcast here: Business Love Potion

Connie Ragen Green of Affiliate Marketing Secrets Explained says:

Bloggers are in the enviable position of writing regularly on their topic. In order to build a list quickly I would recommend writing reviews of products, courses, and services in your niche, and to add a relevant short report as a bonus to anyone who buys through your link. Continue to blog about the benefits of being on your list, and ask people to share your posts on social media. This will bring you some income, build your list, and massively increase your visibility in a short period of time as the buzz grows about what you have to offer your audience.

How Has Connie won so Many Affiliate Contests? Find out here -> Affiliate Marketing Secrets Explained

Susanne Myers of  Daily Affiliate Tasks says:

There are a million and one ways to grow your list and a lot of them you can do from your blog. That being said, I get the best results from a very basic strategy … but you have to do it well and constantly test and tweak for best results. Here it is…

Have The Basics In Place and Then Tweak Them

The best way to grow your list from your blog is to have some sort of optin form on every page of your site, to offer a goodie or ethical bribe in exchange for your readers’ email addresses, to overcome any objections they may have for signing up and to ask your own readers to help you grow your list further.

Yes, this is pretty basic stuff, but are you doing all of it? Let’s look at each of these in a little more detail.

1. Optin Form on Every Page

Go check on your blog and see if you have some sort of optin form on every single page. It’s pretty easy to do with WordPress. You can add it to the sidebar or tweak your blog template so it’s automatically added to the bottom of every post.

Next it’s time to tweak and test. Try a different placement for your optin form. Test different copy, color, layout … you name it. If you can think of something to change, it’s worth testing. If you are using Aweber it’s very easy to set up split tests directly in your Aweber account settings. No need to change your Blog files every time you test something new.

Keep testing and keep improving your optin rate to grow your list faster and faster.

2. Offer An Ethical Bribe

Again… it’s a pretty obvious one. Make sure you offer something to new subscribers. This could be a short report, an audio or video recording, a coupon code etc. If you have an offer in place now, take a look at it. Does it still work? (You can use PLR content to create this.)

Either way it’s time to do some testing. Come up with a few different goodies to give away and see which one works best. This doesn’t have to be complicated. Just mention a different one in each test version and then add links to all of them in your welcome email that goes out automatically. You can mention in there that you’re throwing in a few extra bonuses that you thought they might enjoy.

3. Overcome Objections

Another good idea is to overcome any objections your blog readers may have. A great way to do that is to write up a page with 10 good reasons why someone should sign up for your list. Link to that page from right below your autoresponder signup box.

Here’s an example of my page for my Affiliate Treasure Chest blog.

4. Ask For Referrals

Last but not least, let’s talk about my favorite strategy. It’s getting my existing subscribers to help me grow my list faster. Every few weeks I ask them (usually in a P.S.) to help me grow the list by referring others to it. I invite them to share my emails with colleagues and friends that may also be interested in the topic.

I LOVE my Susanne friend! Check out her Daily Affiliate Tasks here.

David Perdew of NAMS says:

Because MyNAMS.com is a membership site, we’ve focused on growing that members’ list organically and without undercutting any of our affiliates. That’s a tall order. It means slow growth until we have a system in place that protects our affiliates first.

For example, I won’t send traffic to an aWeber opt-in page first. If we do that, we’re just raiding the affiliates list.

So, we built a list opt-in box that adds prospects to a free membership first, THEN to the autoresponder list.

Now, we’re customizing our opt-in process to recognize whether visitors are logged in (if so, don’t show them the sign up box), and whether they’ve signed up for the product on that page already (if so, don’t show them the sign up box).

I’ve been really slow creating opt-in funnels because I wanted to respect the traffic source. But now that we’re set up with target specific, non-invasive opt-in technology that rewards our affiliates, every page of MyNAMS will have a popup box to harvest the maximize number of visitors.

That kind of list building is really good for our affiliates since they are tagged with lifetime database referrals. In other words, more passive commissions through better list building

Be sure to sign up for David's free weekly webinars here: NAMS Training

Rachel Rofe of How To Get Every Book You Write Onto The First Page Of Kindle says:

To build your list, there a few things you could do.

First, you could do some kind of 30 day challenge based around whatever your niche is. So let's say you're in scrapbooking… maybe you can post a new scrapbook every day for 30 days.

If you're in “learn to play piano”, you can have videos showing you learning to play the piano.

If you're in internet marketing, post about what you are doing to earn money.

All of these should be done with affiliate links included. As you post more and more, people will get more enrolled in your journey and sign up just not to miss the updates.

When you're done with your challenge, offer an opt-in with your main learnings from the past 30 days. People can sign up to get the report that explains your main takeaways, what you would've done differently, etc.

This would be highly valuable to people.

Another idea to build your list would be to blog with excellent content, like Steve Pavlina, and just offer a newsletter for people to get your updates. Steve didn't have any of his own products for a LONG time and was still highly successful and one of the most trafficked blogs on the web.

Another idea would be to hold contests for your blog readers. If you can make your readership engaging (contests, particularly viral ones), people will keep coming back just for the inevitable community you build.

Rachel's customers are getting results with her latest product: How To Get Every Book You Write Onto The First Page Of Kindle

Kelly McCausey of Solo Smarts Podcast says:

This is a tip for podcasters. During a podcasting webinar earlier this year, we were brainstorming ways to get the most out of your podcast content and we came up with the idea of building a list from your podcast listeners by transcribing the best interviews and making them available to list members for free.

I don't transcribe the entire episode, just the guest interview alone. I don't transcribe every interview, just those that strike me as being really meaty.

When I publish the podcast I add a note like this one: “Prefer to read rather than listen? Subscribe to my list and get a free interview transcript!”

I manage this by storing the transcripts in a protected folder and provide new subscribers with the password.

Since I started doing this I see little bursts of new optins (as few as ten, as much as twenty-five) on the weeks that I offer a new transcript.

Be sure to check out Kelly’s podcasting course. You can check that out here: Smart Podcasting Skills

Nicole Dean of .. here! .. says:

Lists, lists, lists.  So much to say. So little time.

I have many thoughts on this topic. But first, let me share one thing that I've done.

The last few weeks, I decided to give some attention to my lists. And, it's paying off very nicely.

If you've been around recently, you may have noticed some things changing. Well, most of that was to make it irresistible to sign up for my list. While I don't think I'm at irresistible yet, I think it's much more appealing.

Here's what I've been up to.

Step One: Sexy-up the Bait.

First of all, you'll notice that I made the “bait” sexier to sign up for my blog updates. When they sign up, they get not just updates, but THREE awesome reports. (Soon to be more.)

1. Where to Find Images for your Blog Posts.

2. 104 Blog Title Ideas (printable list)

3. List of the Tools that Power my Business

You could easily use PLR content to create these or just take your most popular blog posts and turn them into pdfs. Either way works.

Step Two: Sexy-up the Signup Forms.

Next, I made the signup boxes a bit more updated and current as you can see.

The new Side nav opt-in looks like this:

I added a new top opt-in box which looks like this:

And, we updated the opt-in at the bottom of the posts, too. (Although that little pokey out black thing still needs to be removed.)

 I *wish* I had a tool to recommend to make these pretty boxes. I've tried several and they've all been buggy and disappointing, so I shall just keep them to myself. BUT – I just bought ANOTHER program, so I'm testing it and am hopeful that we have a winner. Keep your fingers crossed. If it works as well as they say it will, you'll be hearing about it very soon.

Step Three: Sexy-up Your Testing.

Make sure you're using different signup forms on your blog so that you can easily track your results in Aweber.

Even better would be if you used Aweber's split testing feature that is built into their program to see which sign-up forms are getting the best results. I have used that in the past and it provides great feedback. But we haven't done it yet with these. We will though.

Step Four: Sexy-up Your Traffic.

The fourth thing to do is to boost your traffic so you get lots of people on your blog. That will give you a true test to see if your new forms are getting more signups than your old ones.

There are several ways to get more traffic to your blog, fast. These are two of my favorites.

The first one may not be the most interesting way you've ever heard, but it flat out works.

Here's a free report you can have to read more about it.

• The Easiest Way to Get More Blog Traffic (pdf)

Note: The Workshop that's mentioned in that document “Get to Know Your Blog Stats” – use coupon code “peeps25” to save 25% on it if you decide to sign up.

The second method that I like to use is Guest Blogging.

If you're new to my blog or are just getting to know me, I'll let you in on a cool thing about me, I did 75 guest blog posts during a 15 week spell a few summers ago. It was AWESOME for my exposure.

I have a course that explains the methods to my madness and you can check that out here if you'd like: Guest Blogging on Steroids.

So Talk to Me.

What are your biggest questions about building your list on your blog?

What has worked well for you in the past?

Well, I'm going to get off this computer and enjoy the beautiful day outside.

Talk soon.

Warmly,
Nicole Dean

That would include you if you have created your own ebook, telecourse, membership site, software, plugin, checklist package, calendar or video series that you sell.

Well, one of my friends is someone who I brainstorm with regularly and who I feel is doing a LOT of things right, as evidenced by her multiple six figure income.

Melissa Ingold.

Well, Melissa is teaching a new course for infoproduct sellers that is being covered in five parts:

1. Simple Planning that Helps You Get the Right Things Done, Faster
2. How to Work Less and Less, While You Make More and More Money Consistently
3. How to Easily Use Email to Market and Sell to Hundreds or Even Thousands of People at a Time
4. How To Get Others to Sell For You with Affiliate Marketing
5. How to Create Easy Information Products in as Little as 3 Hours & Launch Them for the Greatest Impact and Maximum Profit

I thought it would be fun to ask Melissa a tough question about each of those areas. And, despite a nasty stomach bug, she got it done for us. She's cool like that.

Before we dig in, though, be sure to click here
-> Melissa's Info Publishing Success System

Melissa has a cool video on the page.

Here is our interview. I hope you find it helpful.

Simple Planning.

Nicole: Melissa, we both know the many quotes that essentially say “Failing to plan is planning to fail.” (Alan Lakein) However, I also believe that over-planning can be detrimental, too, because it limits you in your flexibility.

What is your view on planning, specifically for an infoproduct seller, and what mistakes do you see them making that cost them money in this area?

Melissa: I agree that there is such a thing as over-planning, because what happens is that you get so caught up in creating this wonderful plan for your business that you’re not actually doing anything. So over-planning by itself will cost you money.

On the flip side, you do have to plan to some extent because if you don’t, you’ll get sucked into the cycle of looking busy without actually working – if you know what I mean. I personally hate to-do lists because they’re so overwhelming, and looking at one gives me an icky feeling so I don’t use them. Instead, I use Basecamp to manage all my projects which has a built in calendar. And then for my actual planning, I use pen and paper and a blank monthly calendar.

As an infoproduct seller, it’s especially important that you plan your month out, because if you don’t, you’ll find that the month will come and go and you still won’t have your product ready. There are a lot of little pieces that go into creating and launching an information product.

For instance, will you need to record audio? And if so, who is going to transcribe that? What about writing your promotional blog content and emails? You can’t expect to have those things done overnight. So planning out what needs to be done and will help you move your project along quickly.

Nicole: I agree. I work with a loose plan. It allows me to make sure things are moving on schedule, while still having the flexibility to pop in a quick blog post like this to help my readers, too.

Working Less while Earning More.

Nicole: We both outsource in our businesses and have for years. In this area, what would you say is the myth that people buy into that holds them back?

Melissa: I’ve found the number one thing that holds people back from outsourcing is money. They believe that it’s expensive and that they shouldn’t be hiring help when they’re not making any or enough money.

And it makes sense, right? I mean why pay for someone to do something that you can do yourself for free? But what they don’t realize; is that it’s costing them money whether they do it themselves or outsource.

Scheduling content to a blog isn’t free just because you do it yourself. In fact, it will cost you more money to do it yourself than it would to outsource it, but most business owners don’t see it that way. They don’t understand that their time is money.

Knowing what an hour of your time is worth is so important, because when you see the numbers, it all makes sense.

Let’s say you want to make $50,000 per year. Here’s how we would figure out what your hourly rate is worth:

Income Goal: $50,000
Divide by 50 weeks: $1000 (2 weeks off for vacation)
Divide by 5 Day Week: $200
Divide by 5 Hours: $40/hr. (based on 5 hours of focused work time per day)

So your time is worth $40 an hour. If you spend 3 hours scheduling blog content, it costs you $120. Does it not make sense to hire a VA to do it for you for $15/hr. (a skilled VA can probably do the same amount of work in half the time, which will cost you even less money)? Then you can spend those 3 hours on money making tasks like product creation and marketing your business.

I’m going to end this question with a quote from Loral Langemeier about outsourcing, “Time can be bought through team.”

Email Marketing.

Nicole: You and I both earn a sizable income from our relationship with our lists. (Love you all!) The biggest struggle that I see that people need to overcome before anything is getting people to sign up in the first place. As an infoproduct seller, what has really worked well for you to grow your list overnight?

Melissa: Squeeze pages have and continue to work really well for me. I have a whole process that I use to set up a winning squeeze page, but I won’t go into that here. I almost wonder if people think squeeze pages are too ‘old school’, so they’re not using them anymore.

Anyway, if you’re not setting up squeeze pages to funnel traffic to your list on autopilot, you need start doing that right away. This is where PLR content comes in really handy because you can get packages that come with a squeeze page already written and a freebie report that you can use to entice people to sign up. And some even come with emails already written for you. So make use of that type of PLR to make fast work of setting up your squeeze pages. Set them up and then forget them…they’ll work for you while you’re off living your life.

Nicole: Hey guys. Melissa has some PLR sets that include squeeze pages on her site.  PLR for Internet Marketers

Having a Rocking Affiliate Program.

Nicole: Considering that I have been pretty much your top affiliate for years, I know you know how to run an affiliate program that is enticing to promote.

To that person who is totally overwhelmed by having their own affiliate program (or whose affiliate program is pretty stagnant), can you tell me what benefits you've gotten from investing time and energy into yours?

Melissa: Growth. My business continues to grow and grow because my affiliates are out there spreading the word and promoting my products for me. I have this great sales force that I only have to pay when they make sales. So it’s not like it’s going to cost you money on an ongoing basis to run an affiliate program, no, it’s going to make you more money than you can make on your own.

It’s impossible for you to market your business all on your own. You just can’t reach everyone, everywhere, which is why having an affiliate program is so beneficial to your business – it allows you to expand your reach beyond your existing market, which means you can help more people.

Expanding your Product Line.

Nicole: I always ask my Coaching Clients “What's next?” One infoproduct does not make a solid business. Having a line of products does.

That said, adding a second and third product typically confuses people as to what to create next – and then how to promote it. So, in a nutshell, how do you decide what product to create next in your line?

Melissa: I think it makes sense to build on what you’re already doing. For instance, let’s say you have an ebook that is an overview of marketing on facebook and you’re trying to figure out what product to create next. Why not do a quick survey asking your people what they struggle with most when it comes to marketing on facebook. Then based on their answers, you can create multiple products that solve their problems. It could be a webinar where you walk them through setting up their facebook timeline, or a series of videos about building their list with facebook, or whatever it is that your market wants to learn.

Your one product doesn’t have to be it…you can expand on it and create a whole bunch of different products around that one topic. So you lead from a $17 ebook, to a $27 webinar, to a $47 video series, etc. And then expand on that again with a membership site, coaching program, live workshop, etc. You can do the same with all the topics you decide to create products on. Don’t just plan for that one product. Look at the bigger picture and then break it down into multiple products.

What's Next?

Be sure to check out Melissa's program here
-> Info Publishing Success System <-
to see if it's right for you.

Talk to Me.

What are your biggest struggles as an infoproduct seller?
or
Got tips? Share your answers to any of the questions above.

Warmly,
Nicole Dean