The importance of the “List”

Posted on November 26, 2011 by TaiZejan

What is internet marketing, if you don’t know how to build a list, or you don’t have a list?  After all you need an audience, right?  It has come to my attention that most internet marketers fail severely when it comes to list building.  List building should come naturally, and everything you do should be focused around the list.

What is a list? It’s simple a list of followers or buyers.  It’s important to remain in communication with these people, as they will be the driving force behind your internet marketing business.  There is a rule of thumb, for each person on your list you should be able to make $1/month.  So if you have 500 people that are quality folks you should be able to make at least 500 per month.   So on and So forth.

At first I didn’t feel comfortable with my list when I first started IM’ing a few years ago.  My thing was this: I didn’t want to “bother” my list.  I know how it is getting slammed with random product offerings and promotions, I didn’t want ot be that guy.  However, there are ways to promote items that don’t turn you into “that guy.”  Simply offering products that you know trust and use it the best philosphy, products that you totally believe in.  Think of your mailing list like your personal phone book.  When you buy that new shiny product, what’s the first thing you do? You tell your friends and family! Then what do they do? SOMEONE will go out and buy it, it’s a sure thing.  However, if you buy something random that nobody will appreciate, and you know it.. will you still tell them? Probably not.  And worse yet, if you don’t even buy the item to try it out yourself, you just offer it.. do you still tell them all about it and why they should buy it? No, of course not!

So you can’t treat your mailing list like that, respect your list and they will love you for it, offer good products, communicate with them, offer tips and tricks and you will build a loyal following.

So how do you build a mailing list?

  1. You need to have an autoresponder first and foremost,  I use auto aweber.
  2. You need to create a “squeeze page”
  3. You need to have a compelling offer, or a give away.
  4. You need Traffic.
Okay, so let’s break this down.

Auto Responder:

This is the heart of your list I would date say. It’s nearly impossible to build a sizable list without one.  It’s what you need to manage your subscribers, and does all of the back end.  When I first started, I was going to try o go the free route, but trust me, to install your own custom list, and all that can be much more headache then what it is worth, aweber has a great deal, the first month is $1

Squeeze Page

You’ve seen a squeeze page whether you know it, or not.  It’s simply a quick little page that offers something and encourages the visitor to enter their name/email and exchange for something like a free report, free access, instant download etc.  Visitors are not just going ot up and give you their contact information for nothing, and as time progresses the offer has to get much more compelling.. a simply 1 page report is not going to cut it, unless it’s a VERY SOLID and interesting one page report.

Compelling offer:

I sort of talked about this above.. essentially, you must give something away.  If you don’t give anything away you won’t get them on your list, that’s a promise. Don’t let thins scare you though,  there are a lot of sources out there for you to get PLR (Prive label rights) products for little or no money, and you can simply just give that sort of information away, or you can create your own for free.  This post is not about product creation, but i will go into that later.

TRAFFIC

Auto Responder + Compelling offer + No TRaffic = No list.

YOU NEED TRAFFIC.  Just like I said the autoresponder is the heart of the mailing list, TRAFFIC is the absolute heart of internet marketing.. you need an audience.  There are a ton of ways to get traffic.  A few posts ago I mentioned youtube traffic.  So what you’ll want to do is enter the link to your squeeze page in the description of your youtube channel, that will drive people to your funnel.

Another good way to get traffic is by visiting the warrior forum, being active in the community, provide helpful tips and hints.  In your Signature file, you should put a link to your squeeze page, if you position yourself as an expert in something people will want what you have.

Another good way to get traffic is to buy it using paid traffic sources such as adwords, mediatraffic or lead impact. I don’t suggest you pay for your traffic until you hammer down good campaigns that are working using free methods first.

Well, this post has went on a lot longer then it should have, but I think it’s an important post.

Please post any comment and struggles you have building a list below, I’ll be sure to respond!

Stay Inspired,
Tai Zejan

 

Posted in Internet Marketing | 6 Comments

Generating Traffic – A must for business success.

Posted on November 20, 2011 by TaiZejan

How many successful retail stores do you know with no business? I’m not a magician, by any means but I can guess the answer is a big fat zero! Why is this? Simple, traffic drives business. Without traffic, you won’t make any money. Simple concept, I know plenty of people are thinking “Tai, we already know this.” If this is the case, my question in return is, so why are you barely achieving success?

It’s simple, most people know the importance of traffic, but they don’t know how to get it. So lets go back. There are a number of types of traffic too, some quality, some not so much.. if you are generating low quality traffic you’ll have to generate more of that traffic to see the same level as activity as you would with high quality traffic sources.

There are a lot of ways to generate traffic, in this blog posting, I’m going to talk about one free source that has the potential to generate a TON of traffic if you know what you’re doing.

In fact, alot of people who know about me are as a result of this one method.

Yes, that’s right.  www.YouTube.com.  The fact of the matter is, youtube is becoming one of the first places to go to search on popular topics!  Are you in the weight loss niche?  Great, you should be making (or outsourcing) youtube video’s on a regular basis, and in the description you need to link back to your site.  This will do 2 things, 1) build solid quality backlinks and 2) generate traffic.

The video’s don’t even have to be fancy, you don’t have to be gimicky or anything, just a quick informational video made in windows movie maker works just fine!  You can easily generate 50-100 visitors per day using youtube a lone.

A lot of people shy away from youtube for various reasons, one of the main ones is they assume that they have to be some professional video master with high end equipment. FALSE.  One of my close friends uploades no less then 10 video’s per week per niche and generates a very healthy income.

They other REALLY nice thing about youtube video’s is they tend to rank a lot higer a lot quicker in the search engine’s then a typical website.  It’s no uncomming to upload a video, and it get indexed within hours.  If you’re in a niche that has medium competition you can be on the first page of Google within no time.

Youtube, Get it done!

Be Inspired,

Tai Zejan

Posted in Internet Marketing | 6 Comments

The Top Reasons why People Fail

Posted on November 13, 2011 by TaiZejan

Hey Everyone,

So I have come into contact with hundreds of individuals who all had a similar goal:  Make Money Online. And for a vast, overwhelmingly majority of them, their dreams of massive paydays never came.

We have all seen hype and many of us fell for it, whether it’s a late night infomercial telling us we can get rich form one tiny little classified add, or online by someone saying we can get rich overnight while we sleep practically doing nothing.

The following are the top reasons why I believe people fail:

1) The fail to take action.
2) The Make to Many Excuses
3) They don’t have a mentor.
4) They claim failure.

Lets start with the first one.  We’ve all heard the cliche phrase, “Take Action!” It’s a very powerful phrase that really separates those who are successful and those who are not.  Look at any person who has achieved wealth, notoriety, fame, power, etc.. all measures of “success.” What do they have in common? They all took action.  If you’re not willing to get in the game, how do you expect to win?  People tell me all the time how they want to be rich, but they are not willing to do what it takes.  One thing I’m not shy about is hard work.  I’m going to bust my ass in school, in business and in my professional life so I can become successful.  You need to adopt this attitude. And remember, if you don’t take action.. someone else, who is more eager will and you will lose out on the reward promised to you.

We all know what excuses are, and people tend to have too many.  One thing I can’t stand is excuses, my close friends know this.  I really can’t stand it when people always shift the blame to someone or something else.  You can’t always make up excuses, at some point you need to take ownership.  One of my favorite quotes is, “Excuses are tools of the incompetent, they build bridges leading to nowhere, those who specialize in excuses are seldom successful in anything”

Now let us move on to number three.  Everyone needs a mentor, or several!  You can’t get to where you want to go alone.  In my studies, I see this all the time.  There are generally two types of students.  Those students who welcome the idea of a mentor, and team up with people who are industry experts and ask for guidance, as well as those students who think they can go solo and will just cruise through without a professional bond.  Guess who usually ends up getting the jobs come graduation day? You got it, the people with mentors.  Guess whose careers excel much quicker? That’s right, the people who have mentors.. I think you get the point.  The purpose of a mentor is to teach, train and guide you.  You will learn form their mistakes, and you won’t have to worry about making the same ones, hopefully to get you upto speed much quicker.  All successful people have mentors, this is important for success.

Lets move to the last of my main reasons why I believe people fail, and one of the main ones.  THEY CLAIM FAILURE!  I am a faithful guy, and I believe that words have power.  When you speak something, you’re claiming that.  It’s the same philosophy that you can find in the move movie, “The Secret”.  If you have not watched that movie, I highly Suggest it.

I can’t tell you how many emails I get from people, and they all open up like, “Tai, I’m too poor, ” or “Tai, I can’t do this because ….” , “Tai, this isn’t working because…”  There are so many complaints!  What you speak is what you will receive.  Complaining is very dangerous, what you have to do is to look for the treasure in every trial.

Secondly, if you are complaining all of the time, I am going to go as far and say you have an ungrateful heart.  In stead of complaining about what you don’t have, be grateful for what you do have.  Without this shift in mindset, you’ll forever be trapped in a cycle that is hard to get out.  Top leaders never complain. Top Business professional don’t understand the word complain, any challenge they face is simply motivation to excel.

Do you want the secret for true freedom??

Real freedom is not getting your way all of the time.  Real freedom is when you don’t get your way and you’re just as happy as when you did get your way.

With that, I want to leave you with a short clip from The Secret.

Be Inspired,

Tai Zejan

Posted in Motivational | 2 Comments

Don’t forget about eBay

Posted on November 5, 2011 by TaiZejan

A lot of people, for whatever reason tend to forget about eBay. eBay is actually what got me started in making an income for myself. I think one of the reasons why people tend to pass ebay off is they think it is a much more labor intensive business. Which, in part they may be right, however if you run your business like a business and not like a job it can be totally automated and you can enjoy passive income much the same you can from Internet Marketing.

What do I like about business? To me, my ebay business is much more predictable. I can look at the market, see what current trends are and predict what people will buy. You don’t have to play these mind games with people, you simply offer a product for sale, if they want it, great, if not they won’t buy. Based on the traffic, you buy what is popular. If the item is a hot item, it’s for sure going to sell. Or on the flip side, if you buy a stock lot of something at below bargain prices, you can sell it for half of the current ebay value and still make a great process.

In this economy, even more people are looking for deals on items. By the nature of the beast, ebay is filled up with buyers who want to buy for cheap. This actually turns off a lot of sellers who prefer to sell for a premium. And you know what, I don’t really blame them, you can still run a very good business catering to these people who want $1000 items for $100.

Those things along is why I will never ever give up my ebay business, it’s way to lucrative, and frankly it’s too easy to make a massive amount of income.

I do have to wonder though, why people don’t pay closer attention to ebay.

Have you ever dealt with ebay? What were some of the challenges that you faced, what were things that you did not “get” to take you to the next level?

Stay Inspired,
Tai

Posted in ebay | 15 Comments

Essential Tools of an Internet Marketer

Posted on November 1, 2011 by TaiZejan

Professionals in every industry have specific tools needed for success.  Just as carpenters needs hammers, screw drivers and drills Internet Marketers need to have basic tools to be able to run, grow and stay in business.  You likely won’t find a policeman without a gun, right? So why should you, the internet marketer think it’s okay to run your internet marketing business with out a variety of tools?

Often times, some beginner internet marketers look at a tool as a direct investment, something in which they will get a direct return on.  I had a discussion with a fellow not to long ago, and he asked me what the ROI (Return on investment) was for having one of the tools suggested.

A medical doctor that purchases a stethoscope does not do so because he’s going to get $100 in return for having it, no.  He purchases it because he knows it is a vital tool he needs to run his practice.

If you are serious about Internet Marketing you NEED at bare minimum three tools for success.

  1. Domain Name (www.Godaddy.com $11.99/yr)
  2. Hosting (www.Hostgator.com , plans start at $4.99/month)
  3. Auto-res ponder. (www.Aweber.com, $1 for first 30 days $29.99/month after)

We all know what the domain name is.  Hosting is where you are able to store your files, website, etc.  It’s like your online hard drive, it is required to have a hosting service to have your domain name.  The auto responder is a way to comminicate with people who are on your mailing list.  It is a very effective way at building relationship with individuals and sending promotional offers.

I would ague, that if you are reluctant to purchase any of the aforementioned then you are not serious about building your online business.  I don’t want to sound blunt, but that is the way it is.  You don’t have to get the ones I listed above, there are other domain services, hosting services and auto respondors out there, those are just the three that I know, trust and recommend.

As I teach you methods on building, running and growing your online business, I’m going to partially assume that you have atleast these three tools.

Be Inspired,

Tai Zejan

P.S. Please post your thoughts, comments, questions and incites! I love to hear from you.

Posted in Internet Marketing | 14 Comments

Re-Inventing myself. A post from the heart.

Posted on October 29, 2011 by TaiZejan

Hello Everyone,

A some of you may already know me, or be students of mine.  A few years ago I started this journey to start an Internet Marketing businesses.  It’s hard to believe that was three years ago this December.  You can see my first blog HERE since then, a lot has changed.  I have met a lot of cool people, I have released a number of different products and I have made a good income from home.

After a while in this game I started to realize what it took to make money.  With eBay, the key is to buy low sell high.  My ebay course, really laid out a game plan to help people see the inside scoop and what it takes to become a player in the game.  My internet marketing career was focused primarily on clickbank, where I had great success. Some of you may have seen the video I created of my opening checks for thousands of dollars.

So now, you may be asking yourself, why are you reinventing yourself? The reason is simple.  For a long time I was focused on the transaction.  My goal was simply to engage in a transfer of funds from you to me.  Selfish, right? I think so too, but that was the road the Gurus I once followed led me down.

Now, if you know me, and you have purchased any of my products, you will know that is not totally the path I followed. I always strived to over deliver and provide value to the customer andto help answer questions that may have come up.  In fact, I answered thousands of questions and have received hundreds of messages from people saying how much I have inspired them, and I have am motivating them and their online business.

Yes – I did show people how to make money. However, I did not focus on helping people build and grow their business.

I struggled with this for a while.  I do not want to be known as the hype man, I want to be known as the guy who is truly making a difference in the way people conduct business online.  In fact, this year if you have not noticed I basically went underground for a while.  I essentially laid low.  I was undergoing a deep transformation.  I am still growing, and undergoing this transformation and soon, when I emerge I will be a totally new Tai Zejan.

My goal is to truly help people get back to the basics, run their business like a business, motivate and inspire them.  I would also like to see my business grow, but for the right reasons.  Of course,  that is the name of the game right? I have recently sought out a mentor who is going to help transform my business from a transaction based business to a people building business. My aim is to grow by helping others, simple as that.

I pledge not to be that Hype Man we have all come to love.  I am not going to make flashy video’s of me counting cash and opening checks anymore.  All that is inspirational to some but I have come to realize that the hype only does me good, rarely does it do you good.

I would love to hear from my friends and students.  Please post a comment below and let me know I have your support as I undergo this transformation.  It will mean a lot to and help me re-emerge a better me.

Be Inspired,

Tai Zejan

Posted in General | 33 Comments