The Google Alert You Never Got
On March 11th, I received an email alert from my buddy, Marc Harty who posts his PR Traffic tips on this blog.
His email was disturbing because it was in response to an an email he received from my about my Virtual Book Tour with another buddy of mine, Harvey Mackay.
Here’s what Marc wrote me:
Alex, I wanted to let you know this right away … Gmail doesn’t show URLs with initial caps as link. This changed happened recently. For a URL to be a link in Gmail it needs to contain: 1. the “www” and 2. all lowercase . Thought you should know.
Gee, thanks Marc … both my emails for Harvey Mackay were in the queue and sent, so I couldn’t anything about it and I did get over 500 people on that VBT to listen in … but I wonder how many more people could have listened if I was aware of the recent change.
If you’re scratching you head right now say “Huh?” to yourself, then do yourself a favor and watch a 2 min. 5 sec video posted by Frank Bauer. It’s the best explanation I’ve seen and he posted it back on Feb. 10th!
Click here for the video tutorial and please put a ton of comments on Frank’s blog and show him some love :-) Tell him I sent you. His “fluff-free” style of explaining the predicament that Google failed to announce is worth passing on.
What To Do Now: 1) Watch the VIDEO … 2) Comment and share … and as Frank says, 3) Have “an awesome day!”
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The “Social Gathering Power” of Reunions
One of the most fundamental ways to stay united with your colleagues and friends is through the power of Reunions.
Unlike seminars or workshops, Reunion events are not episodic and thus create a greater sense of community and unity among the participants who attend.
(The picture on the upper left of this post is the SFO Marriott where I’m hosting my annual Teleseminarian Reunion this year – March 5th and 6th)
Click here if you’re in a big hurry and watch the video now.
If you’ve ever thought of hosting a conference, workshop or seminar, think instead of tapping into the continuity power of what a Reunion can bring to you and your tribe.
Reunions can be held weekly with professional networking groups like what BNI members do throughout the world, or monthly with private mastermind groups. They can even occur every 60 days such as CEO Space gatherings or annually such as my Teleseminarian Reunion … even every decade like high school reunions.
The time of year or frequency isn’t as important as the gathering power that Reunions create. When I say gathering power, I mean building the sense of belonging or feeling of unity espoused by the members of your community.
And whether those communities are twenty or two-thousand members strong, there are 3 key advantages that Reunions participants have over attending episodic workshops or seminars. These are the 3 unifying elements that espouse more social gathering power:
- Unique language or vocabulary
- Unique community or culture
- Unique facilitation or leadership
If you’re an entrepreneur, small business owner or (more…)
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I Can’t Stop My Article Marketing Traffic!
Article Marketing consistently provides the 5 success factors you need to be successful on the internet in any niche: Content Creation, Traffic Generation, List Building, Marketing Messages and Product Creation. In this article we are going to take a closer look at Traffic Generation.
Creating Unstoppable Traffic – In the introduction that gets read before I speak at a seminar or on a Teleseminar interview, it is stated that “I could not stop the traffic coming into my web sites even if I wanted to, and I certainly do not want to.”
And it’s so true.
Because of Article Marketing I get a hourly and daily flow of traffic into my web sites that is virtually unstoppable. And you can too when you follow these three simple and powerful steps. (more…)
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Do You Measure Your “Critical Drivers” Daily?
“Drivers” are key metrics that can expand (grow) or collapse (kill) your business or any business. Critical drivers are those key metrics, tested and tracked daily, that assist you to anticipate the future.
As I once heard Tony Robbins say, “Anticipation is power.” And I agree. When you look into the past – each day – you can predict the future of your business.
I’ve read many business management books over the years and one of my favorite quotes comes from Tom Peters says, “Test fast, fail fast, adjust fast.“
The age-old management adage, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure,” was probably first uttered (and discovered) by some bazaar merchant thousands of years ago in Babylon.
Yet it’s still positively accurate today!
In my experience, the easiest step to improve any business to begin measuring the critical drivers in the business and then celebrate and amplify what you want to see more of. Case closed.
For retailers like Sam’s Club, a core critical driver may be the “dollars-per-square-foot” generated in each store.
For a real estate management organization like Remax, it may be the “number of new agency offices” opened each month. For an insurance agency, it may mean the “dollars-per-policy” generated, or the “revenue-per-agent.”
The species or types of critical drivers you want to measure is (more…)
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Email “FROM” Lines vs. “SUBJECT” Lines
I’ve surveyed thousands of my students about my findings in this post, so please read it carefully.
Here’s the heart of the matter: Whenever you send an email message to your list, to your friends or colleagues, they privately ask themselves these 2 critical questions before taking further action:
1) WHO is this email from?
2) WHAT is this email about?
Test this premise with yourself. The next time you’re about to open-up and read email messages from your Inbox, what question(s) do you privately ask yourself before grabbing your mouse, clicking and reading them?
If you’re like most people I’ve surveyed, the answers are: WHO? and WHAT?
The WHO Question: Answering the WHO? question is easy because it involves the FROM LINE of your email messages. I recommend that your FROM LINE never changes. Here’s what mine looks like:
~ Alex Mandossian ~
Specifically, I put a tilda (“~”), then a space, then my first name, then a another space then my last name, then another space, then a second tilda.
That’s it.
I never change my (more…)
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Got “Affiliate Signup” Access On Your Blog?
Do you see Affiliate Signup button (the one I’m pointing at) on the upper left side of this blog?
I published that button a week ago (as an experiment) to test if I’d get a “passive” spike in attracting new Affiliate Partners and so far, I’ve doubled my daily Affiliate sign-up rate.
Even if this “doubling” effect doesn’t continue, “shame on me” for not adding that button to my blog sooner!
How about you? Do you have an affiliate program? Do you have a blog?
If you answered “YES” to both questions, then I encourage you to ask yourself this question before you put your Affiliate sign-up button on your blog:
“Do I want my Affiliate Program to be ‘closed’ or ‘open’?”
A “closed” program is typically only available to Affiliates who have also purchased one of your offers. An “open” program is available to anyone who is in good standing with you and wants to promote your offers.
For the first 8 years of my online marketing experience, I had a “closed” affiliate program. But it is now “open” as a result of wanting to build-out the AskAlexToday “outer circle” calls held on the first Thursday of each month.
Turning Pro: The difference between an “amateur” and a “professional” is $1. The moment you make your first dollar, you’ve turned “pro” from my point of view.
Since my goal to get you to “turn Pro” as fast as possible, I’ll (more…)
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How Your “Actionizer” Can Change Behavior
If you’ve heard me speak on stage or on a Teleseminar, then you’re already familiar with my favorite “monetization” mantra: “Marketing changes minds. Promotion changes behavior.”
Read those six words again and again because they’re indelibly etched in your mind, you’ll dramatically improve the results of your presentations.
The key element to “monetizing” your marketing an “Actionizer.” A high value, dramatic action device that inspires, motivates and influences your audience to take physical action.
The $100 poker chip (above) was the “Actionizer” I tested at my Teleseminar Secrets Reunion on March 7th, 2009.
It changed behavior to get people to say “Yes” to the DoublingIncomeSecrets 5-Module Bookinar Series in less than 59 seconds. If you were there see if you can spot yourself. Click the video to see it now.:
Key Point: Before you design any presentation curriculum, it’s important that you write down these 3 verbs:
Think (“mind”) <—— Feel (“heart”) <—— Do (“body”)
Then ask yourself these 3 critical questions: (more…)
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“Outer Circle Marketing” Target Exposed
Picture yourself with a bow and quiver full of arrows. You aim at one of the five circles or rings on your target that graduate inward from WHITE to BLACK to BLUE to RED and finally, YELLOW.
The biggest outer circle is WHITE and directly surrounds the smaller BLACK ring closer to the middle. (Please refer to the picture to the left to see the five colored rings).
The BLACK circle surrounds a smaller BLUE circle, which in turn, surrounds an even smaller RED circle. That RED circle surrounds the fifth circle which is YELLOW and in the center of the target known as the “bull’s-eye.”
Why am I telling you this?
I’m telling you this because it is a useful analogy of how your prospects take aim at your marketing offers, whether they want to become first-time customers or multi-buyers.
The way I see it, the WHITE outermost ring represents your “get-to-know-you” offer such as a free Teleseminar, eBook, audio eCourse or video.
This is your opt-in email offer. To continue the analogy, it is that defining moment when a new prospect has successfully hit your target by aiming and shooting their imaginary arrow at your outermost WHITE circle.
“Outer Circle Marketing” is Time-Tested: Please realize that what I’m talking about here is not just another clever marketing analogy that’s untested. It is tested and it is time-proven.
OCM = “Outer Circle Marketing” and that’s also the formal name I’ve given to this new breakthrough strategy. If you want to experience it first hand, join my AskAlexToday Teleseminars scheduled on the first Thursday of each month.
I’ve utilized OCM for the past 2 years with (more…)
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A Great Way To Start Your Day
Almost every entrepreneur I know begins doing business with a daily ritual.
Many of my colleagues read of the local newspaper. Others watch the morning news on CNN. And many others simply close their eyes and meditate for about 20 minutes.
I have no idea what you do or if you even have a daily ritual, but today I want to “part the curtain” on what I believe is the single most important activity I do to start my day.
It’s a simple 20-minute business ritual that inspires and motivates me to face any business challenge head-on and helps me to generate new ideas and innovations with little effort.
My Morning Ritual: At about 7:30am (Pacific Time) , I grab my PC mouse, fire-up my browser and punch-in (more…)
VIDEO: Quickly Create Your First 10 Articles
Click the garnet arrow to watch this short video about how to quickly & easily create your first 10 articles!
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