build your list

How Can Traffic Exchanges and Squeeze Pages Help Me?

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Last week I sent out a mailing to my list on behalf of Brett Phillips and John Guanzon about the relaunch of their program TEReports.

In addition to adding two new products and twice as may new squeeze pages for upgraded members TERports now offers a squeeze page for free members.  This is a great way for free members to start building their list using free traffic exchange programs.

One of my subscribers replied to my email with a questions about using traffic exchanges and squeeze pages.  I thought I would share my response here.

Hi Jerry. I have been receiving your emails for some time now. I like the info but I need some clarity. How do I get on the traffic exchanges, and how will anyone find my squeeze page? I have a network marketing business and I would like to reach lots and lots of people, but I am not sure how. How can traffic exchanges and squeeze pages help me?

Hey Paul.

That’s a pretty big question but i’ll do my best to reply here.

First, to get on the traffic exchanges just pick one and join it.

You can start with any of these:
http://affiliatefunnel.com/top5te.php?rid=6698

They are all free but if you upgrade to a paid membership you’ll get more traffic for less work.

There are lots of guides out there about using traffic exchange but most of it is pretty self-explanatory:

1. Visit other member sites to earn credits
2. Spend your credits to show your site to other members

Using a traffic exchange is a great way to expose your squeeze page to thousands of new people.

It is important to remember though that the traffic you get from traffic exchanges is inscentivized (I know, big word).  Basically, that means that most people are only coming to your site because they want to earn credits to show their own site.  Your squeeze page should directly target these people and hopefully be interesting enough to stand out in the crowd.

It helps to have your own product to give away as an incentive for surfers to subscribe to your list.  If you don’t have your own product then you can use any of the free ones provided by TERports.  They all work really well in traffic exchanges.

Once you start building your list you have the opportunity to build a relationship with the people on your list and to potentially sell to them over and over again.

That’s sorta the simplified version but hopefully you get the gist of it.

If you need more details… just ask!


Click Here to Join TEReports

My First 3 Years of List Building

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I started building my list on June 30, 2007.

I know this because I just checked my Aweber account and searched for the date that my first lead was added.

I felt compelled to look this information up because I received an unexpected email from one of my subscribers tonight.  She was replying to one of the emails I had set to send from my autoresponder 3 years ago!

No, I am not crazy enough to try and write 3 years worth of emails.  I don’t even remember why I did it but for some reason I set the last message in my email series to be sent after 999 days.  The email simply said:

Just checking in to say hello.

How’s it going?

I never expected I would still be doing this 999 days later or that anybody would still be reading my emails after 3 years but sure enough I got a response back tonight:

[]Hi!
thank you for the message.

Have a Blessed new Week.
~ Becky

Thank you Becky!

Over the last few years I have started to gain some perspective on this whole make money from home thing.  I’ve noticed that there is always a handful programs that everybody is trying to promote claiming it’s the next big thing.  It usually lasts for about 3 or 4 months until the focus shifts to a new batch of programs.

For every hot new program you can name now I can name a dead one from a year ago that was just as popular.

I started building my list because I got involved with one of those dead programs which thankfully provided it’s members with lead capture pages to promote.  They had an in-house autoresponder but I chose to pay a little extra to use a 3rd party one.  That’s how I found Aweber.

The company I was promoting is long gone…

But after 3 years, I still have my list!

I’m not saying it’s wrong to promote the latest and greatest opportunity… just do it on the back end!

The only thing you should be promoting are things that build your brand and build your list.  Once people are on your list and have gotten to know you THEN you can introduce them to whatever you want.  If they aren’t interested… well, you’ve got at least 3 years to find something that they are interested in.

So thank you Becky for continuing to read my emails.  I’m going to keep building my list and I look forward to hearing how everyone else is doing for the next 999 days.

Let’s Start Building Your Funnel

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Welcome back to the money making series.

I mentioned in my previous post that I was going to share with you one of my all-time favorite Internet marketing sites today.

But first, let’s talk about funnels.

A funnel is wide at the top and narrow at the bottom.  Well, in order for your list to be profitable it needs to be setup this way too.  This is called a sales  funnel.

At the top of your sales funnel you are offering something for free in exchange for new people joining your list.  It’s easy to get sign-ups this way if you are offering something of value.

As your subscribers continue down your funnel you can start sending them paid offers which earn you a commission.  The people who don’t like this will either unsubscribe or stop reading.  The others will keep reading and hopefully find their way into your primary business.

This is the way many of the top Internet marketing gurus build their businesses and it is the secret to making the real money with your list.

It’s safe to say I would not have known about any of this without the help of a
site called Affiliate Funnel.

Affiliate Funnel is all about promoting you first to get people onto your list. The site is a collection of list building tools, free traffic sources, and free affiliate programs that you can use to promote your list.

Inside Affiliate Funnel you will find ready made lead capture pages that you can use along with an email series that you can load into your autoresponder that is automatically sent to your subscribers when they join your list.

The best part is that the site is totally free unless you want to have the ability to add some of your own programs into their downline builder which I do recommend doing at some point.

When you join Affiliate Funnel make sure you visit the “Lessons” page to fully
understand how everything works.  It can get a little overwhelming but it is well worth your time to explore everything it has to offer.

Click the link below to get your free Affiliate Funnel membership.

Flip Your Downline, Fill Your Funnel!
Join the ultimate marketing hub on the net and learn how to turn free leads using the best resources around into highly qualified buyers, team members and loyal clients.
Claim Your FREE Membership!

6 Steps To Creating a Killer Squeeze Page

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Now that we have all the safelists and giveaway stuff out of the way let’s get back to the list building.

My last post showed you how to get a product to give away to get people to join your list.

Do you have a product, yet?

Good.

Ok, I know you probably don’t have one yet but i’m going to keep going so you can come back to that step when you are ready. Until then, I want to show you how to create your own squeeze page that you will use to promote your product and build your list.

Just to get it out of the way, a lead capture page and a squeeze page are the same thing.  They are webpages which contain a piece of code from your autoresponder that are designed for one purpose… to get people on your list.

There are 5 things that make up a good squeeze page:

1. A Killer Headline – The purpose of your headline is to get your visitor to read the rest of your page.  Getting the perfect headline takes a lot of practice. Check out: http://www.copyblogger.com for some great tips to improving your copy writing skills.

2. An Eye Catching Graphic – A picture is worth 1000 words.  Having some kind of graphics on your page can really help your page stand out.  You can get access to all sorts of stock photography that you can use from sites like: http://www.istockphoto.com

3. List of Benefits – Your squeeze page should include a list outlining 3 to 5 of
the benefits of your product.  Notice I said “benefits” and not “features”.  If
you don’t know the difference do a google search for “features vs. benefits”.

4. A Call To Action – Now that you have your reader’s attention you need to tell them what to do.  “Fill out the form to get your copy now”.  It sounds  obvious but it makes a big difference if you don’t do it.

5. Your Autoresponder Code – Of course.  Just copy and paste the code from your autoresponder into the page where you want it to appear.

6. The Privacy Disclaimer – Just another way to ensure people that you won’t abuse their email address if they fill out your form.  It’s been proven that if you don’t include this you will definitely get fewer sign-ups.

Here’s a sample:
http://www.safelisttactics.com/jv.htm

Now that you know all the components that go into a squeeze page you probably want to know how to build one…

Personally, I like to make my own from scratch.  I have my own website and I use a free html editor to make my own pages.  For less than $10/month there is so much you can do with webhosting.  If you don’t have your own webhosting I use Servage but there are plenty of good hosts to choose from.

But even if you have hosting you still might not feel comfortable enough to make your own web page.  For that I offer several solutions.

1. Instant Bonus Page – I already posted something about this.  You can make bonus pages for free but if you upgrade you will get access to one of the most simple squeeze page makers around. Highly recommended.

2. AdKreator – This site is great.  It let’s you make stunning graphic  advertisements without having learn complicated programs like Photoshop.   There’s upgraded membership option that gives you the ability to make your own squeeze pages which is well worth the price.

3. TE Toolbox – TE Toolbox has a variety of free Internet marketing tools including a basic squeeze page maker.  While not quite as powerful as the other two squeeze page makers it’s not a bad option.

That all for now.

Are we having fun yet?

Great!  Because next I am going to share with you my all time favorite website which will give you access to all sorts of free tools that you can use to make  money with your list.

See you soon!

Build Your List, Build Your Business

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Welcome to part 2 of my exclusive money making series.

Today I want to start talking about my favorite subject… List building!

There  is is actually a lot more to this subject than I can cram into one blog posting but i’ll try and go over the basics to start with as much as I can.

If you are reading this chances are you have already tried promoting some kind of online business or affiliate program.  I am guessing you probably figured out  how to get some traffic but for some reason you aren’t getting many sales… if any.

Not as easy as you expected, is it?

Well, you are not alone.  Even people who are promoting free affiliate sites can have a hard time getting sign-ups.  That’s because most people don’t know them or trust them enough to join.

Trust is very important!

Here’s one of my favorite quotes:

“All things being equal people would rather buy from someone they know and trust.  All things NOT being equal… people would STILL rather buy from someone they know and trust”.

So how do you build trust?  Well, it does take some time…  and it usually takes a lot longer than the time it takes for someone to read your site.

In fact, here’s what usually happens.  Someone visits your website, they read your offer and think “sounds interesting, but i’m not ready to commit to this right now”. So what happens?  They leave and probably never come back.  The time and energy you spent getting them to your site was wasted.

That’s where the autoresponder comes in.

Your autoresponder is the single most important weapon in any Internet
marketer’s arsenal because it let’s you follow-up with your prospect days
and even months after they leave your website site.

The way it works is that you offer something of value to the people coming to your website in exchange for their email address.  Your offer can be a free ebook, a newsletter, software, or almost any other “digital” product.

When your visitor fills out the form on your site their info is sent to your autoresponder which then begins sending out a series of pre-written emails to them.  These emails can be used to tell your subscribers more about yourself and your business while providing them with more free information that they can use which compliments the free product you first sent them.

Hopefully over time your readers will get to know you and even look forward to the emails they receive from you.  Once they begin to trust you it makes it much easier for you to recommend paid products and services that you can earn commissions from later on.

Another great thing about autoresponders is that once you have your emails series setup you can practically set it and forget it.  If you wanted to you could set it to send an email a week for the next 5 years and it would do it for you.

Compare that to sending someone directly to your website where you only have one chance to get a sale.

Unfortunately good autoresponders are not free.  That’s one of the few things that you are just going to have to bite the bullet on if you want to succeed in this business.  Expect to pay about $20/month for a good autoresponder.

I recommend using either Aweber or TrafficWave.  Aweber is considered to be one of the best and includes a lot of advanced features.  TrafficWave is a more affordable alternative that will definitely get the job done.

Both autoresponders offer 30-day trial memberships so there is no reason not to try them both and decide which one you like the most.

Ok, I think that’s enough one day.

I’ll be posting my JV giveaway events listing tomorrow and Ryan Hogan is about to launch a new product so look for my next post in this series early next week.

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