It can be difficult nowadays to access The web with no totally free on-line game titles.
February 4th, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsSome by far the most well-known on the internet game titles nowadays are determined by incredibly straightforward rules, they’ll allow you to run virtual farms, plant and expand your personal crops that you can flip approximately and advertise to make money that you can use to increase. I’ve got no clue as to why these video games are as popular as these are, but they are. I guess if I was to bring a shot at explaining I’d need to say that they may allow individuals to enjoy a game. View full post on Live News from PR-USA.net
February 4th, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsThe most interesting piece from this past week was Quit Your Job and Die Alone by Financial Samurai at Untemplater.
What was so epic about this article?
This reminded me of my harsh reality check on full-time blogging. There are too many of us falling for the dream and wanting to be “our own boss.” Do you really want to be your own boss or do you just hate your job? I find that it’s usually the latter. We hate our jobs so much that we want to quit and work for ourselves.
Do you realize how tough it is to be your own boss? When you’re the boss you can’t pass the buck, leave early, take it easy, or be stress-free. Everything is now on you. You can’t blame Steve in Accounting for the money problems. Everything is on you.
What’s the best part of this piece?
“Someone can sell you a product to give you that motivation, but guess what happens after you’ve failed at going at it alone for 2 years? You have one big gaping hole in your resume and a lot less money. Meanwhile, the person who sold you the dream of quitting your job has your money and is relaxing on the beach, thank you very much!”
This is so true. I also must admit that I’m guilty of this. I’ve consumed far too many products on how to work for yourself and be your own boss. I’m just enamored with the idea of making money on my own. I love making my own money. I love helping others. I love being compensated for my passions. I do however realize that there’s a lot of delusional people out there that want to be full-time bloggers because they hate their jobs.
I must argue with one point. Sam goes off at the end about how starting your own business and quitting your job could lead to disaster. I do agree with some of his points, but I don’t think that it’s that bad. The worst case scenario is that you have a few empty years on your resume. I think that beats the feeling of regret that would come with not even trying.
Before we part ways for the weekend, I also wanted to remind you of another piece from here about calling it quits. There’s nothing wrong with giving up on something that’s obviously not working out.
View full post on The Financial Blogger
ChristianSingles.com Makes Christian Dating Easier
February 3rd, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsWhen
it comes to dating, internet can help singles connect with likeminded
individuals to eventually find a life partner. ChristianSingles.com
is the best online destination that brings together Christian singles
from different parts of the world to have a fun experience in finding
a suitable better half.
View full post on Live News from PR-USA.net
How-to Overcome The Fear of Getting Rich Slowly
February 3rd, 2012 | Posted by Global Investors“I’m thinking of faking a shoulder injury at work to get some money or time off.” This is what a friend said to me the other day. I didn’t know how to react because I hate to shoot ideas down and judge friends. I just didn’t react at all. This friend is all about chasing the next buck. He’s always looking for that quick dollar. He’s going to get rich one day. He’s holding out for the day that he can make big money and retire. He’s not really a fan of the whole build your wealth through making more money and cutting back on expenses approach. I guess it’s not for everyone.
Are you always chasing the next buck? Are you after that huge money? Are you waiting to get rich quick?
“If you enter a niche because you’re following the dollars, you wont keep it up. It’s too much work, and you will get tired and frustrated and you will eventually fold.” — Gary Vaynerchuk
There’s nothing wrong with hustle and working your butt off. There’s a problem with always trying to chase the next trend or big money opportunity. Trying to get rich quick is a pretty serious problem. There’s a cure though.
How you can avoid chasing the next buck and actually focus on what really matters (aka crush the fear of getting rich slowly):
This isn’t just some corny line that you hear on the first day of grade 7. The average person (not including Jersey Shore characters) won’t have the ability to become successful if they don’t put the work in first. That’s just how it works. You can argue all that you want but you don’t want to risk missing out on life by trying to get rich quick.
When your mind is all over the place you dilute your focus and don’t give the right amount of energy to important tasks. I’ve seen too many friends get lost in the idea of starting the next Facebook that they lose complete focus on what matters (their studies) and they end up failing where it hurts the most (dropping out of school). This is why I truly believe in focusing on one major goal. This could be a dream job, a solid business idea, a trade, a job where you can move up the ranks, or profitable hobby. When you keep on trying to chase the big dollars you can lose yourself easily.
You’re not going to accomplish anything by complaining and blaming the world for your problems. Henry Hartman said it best with, “success always comes when preparation meets opportunity.” If you’re prepare and working hard, great things can come to YOU. When you’re looking for a shortcut you’re not going to find the response that you want.
Our generation is pretty concerned about slow progress. This is likely why workout supplements are a 24 BILLION dollar industry on an annual basis. We all want quick results. We all want a shortcut. We just rarely take the time to look at the negatives of trying to go fast. What are some of setbacks of searching for a shortcut:
Are you sure you want immediate results? Can you wait?
I’m not opposed to chasing the big bucks and going after the big wins. I just think the problem is that you can waste valuable skills by not focusing on consistent and daily goals. You’ll be surprised by what you can accomplish over an extended period of time with just a few hours a day.
View full post on The Financial Blogger
February 2nd, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsPaxil sold by the generic name paroxetine is a prescription drug manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline since 1992. Classified in the SSRI antidepressant class, the drug since its introduction has been linked with the incidence of many severe complications among patients. Those injured by this product have filed lawsuits to get justice for them and their loved ones. Many such law cases have been tried under the court of law. While some have received justice still others are being tried till today. View full post on Live News from PR-USA.net
Blog Monthly Income Report A Kung Fu Panda Month!
February 2nd, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsI really feel like Kung Fu Panda while writing this post.
I feel like him because I LOVE eating and I made some delicious dishes over the past 2 weeks…
Oh wait… this is not where we should be going with the post.
There is another reason why I feel like Kung Fu Panda….
It’s because I’ve kicked ass in January!!!
It’s really about the income (I’m pretty stable on that side) but it’s more about how quickly the business evolved in a single month:
- I’ve made major advances in my book.
- I successfully monetized my mailing list for the first time.
- We closed some great deals through our advertising management service.
- We found a professional designer to do both our book layout and a mini site to sell it.
This is why I’m so excited!!! But the stats for January are cool too! Let’s look at them:
Ahhh, it feels good to be back to normal! This shows similar stats to the ones published back in November. However, we had a few server difficulties with some of our sites during the month of January. Therefore, I expect next month to be even bigger. I’m actually preparing a few great posts about servers and hosting services. If you have any questions, now’s the time to send them 
.
February’s stats should be a lot bigger due to the inclusion of our latest purchase too. I’m not going to disclose the site name since the transfer is currently in progress (so it’s not quite ours yet lol!).
The Adsense December payment was obviously smaller than the previous month but stats have come back for January. There is one thing I find particularly interesting: my niche websites are starting to contribute more significantly of late. In January (for which the payment will land in February), What is Dividend and Canadian Dividend Stock generated over $150 in Adsense! If I can continue to increase their traffic, these 2 sites will become cash cows as well 
. I’m now waiting to see their PR increase to include a few private adverting deals on them!
While I didn’t receive many cheques in January, the bulk of my income for this segment came from my broker activities. I’ve closed a total of $10,775 in advertising for my clients which generated a profit of $1,426. My profit is still higher than my 8.33% commission rate since I get paid for full commission on a 6 month deal (and the client gets the full 6 month renewal if I renew the ad). With this month, I’m getting closer to my $2,000/month objective for 2012. What will help me is that I’ll have a VA take care of managing the deals starting in February .This is why I expect to be able to rack up a steady $10,000/month worth of advertising for my clients (hopefully!). I must admit that since the beginning of this “official” program, I never thought of making this much with it!
I don’t want to go crazy on private advertising. I’ve written it many times but my goal is to keep an average of $5K-$6K. I see a trend from advertiser to aim for 6 month and 12 month deals. I can’t complaint about this trend since you get more money upfront and advertisers usually renew 6 month deals. They get a rebate by paying upfront while I get assured that my ad spot is taken for the year. If you want to know how I manage my ads, I suggest you start by reading my “build a media kit” series.
Here’s good news and bad news at the same time: the good news is that I was able to generate for $267 in adsense for the month. The bad news is that I wasn’t able to generate any big private advertising deals. So the “stable” income is increasing but it doesn’t put more money in my pocket either! I definitely have a long way to go before I meet my $2K/month objective. I’ve made some great progress but I still need to tweak all my sites to make it happen.
About a year ago, I wrote about my cost structure. Many of you were skeptical on why I was spending so much on my company. I was forecasting a total cost of 66,7K which never happened (my main VA went in maternity leaves and was not replaced). This is how I got down to spending roughly $4K on my online company since then.
I can understand your skepticism since 4K/month seems a lot of money for a sideline. However, I want to outline that my cost structure has not grown for the past year while my income has. In fact, my last 6 months show an average of $10,833 while the last 12 months show an average income of $9,770. So the extra $1,000 of income is just pure profit in our pockets . In 2012, I expect to have an average expense of $5K per month (4K as a stable budget + random peaks according to our needs). For example, we will soon pay for another design for our ebook and mini site. This will cost about 2K in total.
I’m very proud of what we earned in January even though it’s not an astronomical number. Why? Because it’s the fifth month in a row we show an income exceeding 10K. This is also an increase of 43% compared to January 2011 (when we made $7,626). I’m posting our blog income progression with a comparison to the 2011 numbers (I hope that all the red columns will be bigger than the blue columns ).
In the upcoming weeks, I’ll be home (as we’re expecting our 3rd child to arrive anytime now!).
View full post on The Financial Blogger
Easy Discounts and Economical Rebates Now Accessible through New Voucher UK Discount Coupons.
February 1st, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsNew Voucher UK brings the best and latest online
discounts through coupon codes and promotional codes on the site.
View full post on Live News from PR-USA.net
February 1st, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsYesterday, I teased a few of you by claiming that I made $463 in 15 minutes from my newsletter.
If you are patient enough and read through this post (and follow me through my newsletter), you will learn how I did it.
Most people agree that we all as bloggers, need a newsletter. I wasn’t part of the majority at first, but now I am a believer). However, most of you keep asking:
How the hell are you making money with your mailing list?
The answer will come, just bear with me for a few more minutes. But just to make sure you are with me, here’s proof of what I’m saying:
You can see that my affiliate sales show $471 for “Today’s 50 Top Trending Stocks for the period of Jan 1st to Jan 24th. So I already lied to you with the title of my email, it’s not $463, I made $471! The best part is that I will keep making money throughout the year with the same affiliate program. This is obviously the very definition of passive income!
But once again, how the hell can you make money with your mailing list????
I told you to be patient because I know this post is long. Because the truth is that you can’t just start running around like a chicken with his head cut off and make money with your mailing list. To be honest, this was my first attempt to monetize the DGB newsletter with an affiliate link in one of my mailings. I wasn’t too sure how to set it up and didn’t want to burn my audience. My Aweber dashboard is showing me an opening rate of 74.21%, a click through rate of 62.08% and a 0.465% unsubscribe rate (10 out of 2152) and 0% complaint rate (because Aweber doesn’t allow you to use their software for spammy reasons). So I guess that I did my job right and made money in a good way.
But before you can do that… there are a lot of things to accomplish first!
The first step has nothing to do with your readers but everything to do with yourself. Personally, this was the hardest step of them all. I’ve been wondering a lot about what kind of content I should include in my newsletter that would not be redundant for RSS & Blog readers. I also wanted to find a way to provide exclusive content that would be complimentary to my blog.
In fact, the newsletter is like a second blog within your blog! So you need to clearly establish what you want to write in your newsletter and what you want to write on your blog. Make sure to create an incentive for people to a) read your blog and b) subscribe to your newsletter. This is why I haven’t change my way of writing or choice of topics on The Dividend Guy Blog and decided to provide more technical stuff and stock lists in my newsletter. This is how I was able to successfully separate my blog from my newsletter.
I use my newsletter for the following purposes:
- Give eBooks to my readers
- Offer stock lists and website resources (free)
- Announce new projects (such as What is Dividend or Canadian Dividend Stock)
- Ask my readers for feedback (through surveys or quick questions)
- Provide more technical concepts (such as the different ways of calculating Payout Ratio)
On my blog, I write about the following topics:
- Dividend stock analysis
- Sector analysis
- Stock market commentary
- Investing strategy (leveraging, moving average, etc)
As you can see, I’m able to make a clear distinction between my blog and newsletter. It makes it easier for my readers too!
Once you know where you are going with your blog and newsletter (this is also called having a direction), you can start building your readership. You can attack 2 sides of the same problem:
a) Growing your Blog readership and then sending them to your newsletter
b) Growing your mailing list directly through incentive posts on your blog (such as my Best 2012 Dividend Stocks article)
I guess you already know the basics of growing your blog readership (playing the SEO game, doing guest posts, commenting on other blogs, being active on social media, connecting with other bloggers, submitting your stuff to carnivals, etc.). But I guess that it’s a bit tougher if you want to grow your newsletter readership (it has been for me anyway!).
I’ve used several techniques to grow my mailing list but the most successful was to offer a free eBook to get it (read the full post about it here). Here are other great techniques you can use:
- Host a contest (you get tons of new subscribers but they might very well cancel after 2 emails!)
- Make your mailing list box visible (just look at the DGB printscreen):
- Plug your newsletter whenever you have a chance (mention it at the end of each article, and link to it whenever you have something relevant such as “this question came from George, a newsletter subscriber).
- Write about what is coming up on your newsletter (I’ve used this to tease my audience, especially for TFB, and it works pretty well too!).
What can you expect from these techniques? How many subscribers is a good number? Here’s what I have experienced so far with the DGB newsletter. This is another screen you can get from Aweber that help you see the progression of your newsletter:
As of January 2011, I had only 203 subscribers. As of January 25th, 2012, I have 2,456 subscribers. The major change was definitely due to the fact that I now require people sign-up before downloading my eBook (October 2011 and January 2012). Since then, I’m getting an average of 20 new subscribers per day. Can you imagine how fast this will grow in 2012?
Yeah… okay… I didn’t invent this one, I know! It is obvious that if you want to do business with someone, you first have to earn his trust. This is true for any kind of business. But how can you gain trust from someone who you are not directly talking to? Unless you have a few email conversations with your reader, you don’t really know who he is and if he really trusts you to any extent. Since you can’t discuss with everybody by email, engaging the conversation via this media is not the best way to earn the trust of 2000+ individuals!
Some people use their newsletter to plug in roundups or previous articles they have written. I don’t think it’s a bad idea per se, but this is not how to build trust with your audience!
The way I’ve built trust with mine was by sending a series of great articles including great content and absolutely no promotions. I actually do the same thing with my newsletter that I send to clients at my day job. I never mention any of my products or services. I just write good articles with a lot of “what’s in it for me” points for the readers. The point here is to add value each time someone opens your newsletter. You want to create that hype from your readers where they will be looking forward to receive your new stuff.
I also put my subscribers at the top of my list when I want to offer something. For example, when I produced my 2012 Best dividend stocks eBook, I sent them the download link before I even mentioned that the book is available on my site.
All right, press fast forward on your time machine and teleport yourself 6 months later (or simply bookmark this artcle ). You have a solid mailing list of 500 subscribers (at least!) that follow you and are eager to read your newest articles. We are still down to the very same question:
How the hell are you making money with your mailing list?
The answer is quite simple. By using affiliate links . However, it’s useless to simply “plug and play” any product in your newsletter. Believe it or not, your readers are far from being stupid and they became BS detector pros after being bombarded by advertisements every single day of their life.
This is why you need to talk about products that YOU use and YOU like. If you don’t do that, forget about this whole strategy; you will end-up hitting to the brick wall. I personally like INO products as they help me make technical analysis before I buy a stock. Therefore, it’s not a problem for me to offer for free, a list of 50 top trending stocks. So INO pays me for each lead and my readers have the opportunity to take a look at the best trending stocks on the market. WIN-WIN situation and everybody is happy .
The most interesting part of this strategy is that you can make money forever with the very same email. Say what? While the bulk of my income has been done when I first sent this email, I will continue to make money out of it because… the very same email will be sent to all my new subscribers in the future.
How crazy is that? That’s another AWESOME option offered with Aweber! You can either send a “broadcast” (which is a one time email sent to your current subscribers) or send a “follow-up” message (which will be sent to all your subscribers that will eventually join your newsletter).
The “broadcast” mode is perfect when you want to write a timely email such as announcing a contest or forwarding important news. But if your article is timeless, you can use the “follow-up” mode. The follow-up mode will automatically send your article to subscribers after a specific time determined by you. Therefore, you can create your series of articles and send them to your subscribers every 15 days. Take a look at what I have as “follow-up” with The Financial Blogger at the moment:
So if you subscribe today, in 2 days, you will get my “Do You Know How Dividend Investing Works?” email. 7 days later, you will receive the “No BS” email, and so on.
This technique allows you to:
#1 create a funnel of trust
#2 make sure everybody gets your previous exclusive content
#3 make sure that you have a shot at making money with everybody (KATCHING!)
All right, if your eyes are not burning yet, it’s because you are not human . I’m leaving you with enough work to book your entire month, lol!
However, I’m not done on the topic just yet. I’ll actually continue this series in my newsletter in the upcoming week (don’t forget to subscribe ). I want to create a “step by step” series on building your newsletter and how to do it. And of course, I’ll add this series to my “follow-up” messages ;-D
Send me your questions if there is anything that’s not clear so far!
Cheers,
Mike
View full post on The Financial Blogger
Technical Foam Services Marks Twenty One Years of Business
January 31st, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsTechnical Foam Services, a leading independent engineering-based manufacturer and foam producer, comment on their continuous growth over the last twenty one years.
View full post on Live News from PR-USA.net
I Don’t Care What You Do, You Need a Newsletter
January 31st, 2012 | Posted by Global InvestorsDo you want to know how to close a $1,9M deal at work?
Do you want to know how to make $463 with 15 minutes of work?
Do you want to know how to connect with more than 6,000 individuals in a single minute?
Only 7 months ago, I couldn’t see this as a really good idea… all right: I’ll be truly honest; I thought it was just more work added to my routine. And I also thought that it was on the edge of being a stupid idea. Yup, I’m talking about my partner’s idea to have a mailing list.
Why in the hell would you want to run mailing list when you are already posting on a daily basis and offer RRS feeds?
Why would you write more content that you can’t put on your blog if you put it out via the mailing list? Why don’t you just post it on your blog if you are willing to hustle more?
Why would you PAY a monthly fee to have a professional email marketing service to manage your mailing list on top of that? (I use Aweber by the waywink wink wink
Well, believe it or not, it does because having a newsletter attached to our blog completely changed our way of doing business.
I realized it for the first time when I was at work. Since I can’t send clients to my blogs (this is obviously unethical!), I decided to start a newsletter. For about a year and a half, I sent a newsletter about the stock market, interest rates and other financial news to my clients every 6 months or so. I provided them with great content as I don’t advertise any products but instead I give them useful info to manage their finances. After a while, I noticed that every time I sent my newsletter, it generated meetings with my clients. The newsletter was actually their trigger to take action and schedule to meet with me regarding their finances. This was going well until the day that I landed a $1.9M meeting generated from my newsletter. On that day, I understood something about having a newsletter: this is a direct and privileged contact with someone who gives you full trust. You don’t give out your email to someone you don’t want to hear from. You give it to someone from whom you expect to get insightful information.
Since my partner was pushing me to take care of my newsletter seriously for a whole year, I started to invest more time in it. Those who are subscribed to my TFB newsletter (the big box on the right column on the top of the site ) already know that I provide awesome and exclusive content on it. It’s not just a lame excuse to do a round-up and self-promote my other sites. I brought this to a whole new level with The Dividend Guy Blog Newsletter. I guess I have more ease in making it interesting as I’m used to writing financial and investment related newsletters.
This mailing list alone has over 2,413 subscribers (and we started from almost 0 back in June 2011). The opening rate is over 63% and the click through rate (when I include a link inside my article) is over 42%. These rates go through the roof (near 100% for both opening and click through rate) when I look at my free eBook offers (Dividend Investing and Best 2012 Dividend Stocks).
The funniest part is that I only have 753 RSS readers on this blog. So I have 3 times more readers for my newsletter than on my blog (I might stop blogging right away then… lol!). I hooked them up with some freebies (read how I did it here) and they stay connected (I only have 271 unsubscribes so far) since I provide them with great stuff. I’m now able to connect directly with them, ask them questions and send them to my new sites such as What is Dividend and Canadian Dividend Stock.
The following posts (and next newsletter article!) will be about how I manage (and make money!) my mailing lists. But you can do the same in just about any field. I just gave you my example where I have a mailing list for my clients. In fact, if you are in sales, regardless of which kind of product or service, you need a mailing list! This will enable you to get direct feedback from your clients, connect with them, be the top name in your field when they think of it and ultimately generate more sales!
But if you want to be able to do that, you’ll have to follow the upcoming series carefully. A mailing list can be the most awesome tool for growth in your business but it can also have the effect of a weapon of mass destruction on your clientele if you bully your clients with a bunch of ads and promotions. This is exactly what the big brands haven’t realized yet. But what do you want? Their marketing departments hire kids who only think about pushing sales (I was once like that so I know what I’m talking about ).
So are you in? what are you waiting for? Subscribe to my newsletter
View full post on The Financial Blogger
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