Sweetie on the Net This Week

If you’re looking fun and excitement on the Internet (hehehe), here’s where the Sweetie has been spotted this week:

The Future of Internet Marketing: Rob Toth, gave me 3 simple yet challenging questions about information marketing.

He asked me for my opinion on - the future of information marketing, an info marketing success tip and what mistake info marketers should avoid.

The audio has been posted to Dan Kennedy’s Info Riches blog right here.

WAHM 2.0 Profile: Kelly McCausey asked me 8 questions getting started as a “work at home mom” on WAHM 2.0 Sparkplugging blog.

Read it and find out how I chose my work at home business,
what I love about working from home, my hopes for the future
and more.

Mom PLR Ebooks Review

Mom PLR Ebooks is a membership that provides a monthly private label ebook and accompanying marketing materials. It allows users to easily set up and sell ebooks that appeal to the mom market. It is also useful for individuals who want to provide content and free reports to the same market.

Product Website: Mom PLR Ebooks

Membership Features:

• One monthly fully-editable and brandable ebook on a topic of interest to mothers.
• Pre-written sales copy to promote each monthly ebook.
• Graphic set with each ebook including: 3 different ecover sizes, flat cover for the written document, 2 promotional buttons.
• Includes a checklist of setting up the products and selling them.
• Each ebook includes a 5-day ecourse to promote the product.
• Also include: 26 newsletter topic ideas to keep content focused around the product.
• Suggestions for affiliate programs to earn extra income through recommendations.
• Printable ideas sheet that includes ideas for using the ebooks and marketing them.

Perks:

• Membership is limited to 300 members to reduce competition.
• 30-day money-back guarantee.
• Membership can be cancelled any time.

Thoughts:

The content in the membership really is top-notch and the marketing materials certainly do make it easy for members to break into the information product market. The nice thing is you can take what you want, edit what you want or even completely change certain things to suit your needs.

The membership is suitable for webmasters already working in the mom market or individuals interested in niche marketing and need more products to sell.

How to Find Out More:

You can get further details and sign up at Mom PLR Ebooks.

(Want to republish this review? Click here to sign up for the affiliate program)

I Gave Myself a Raise With a New Membership Site

Back in the spring I had a brainstorm for a new membership program. I grabbed my virtual notepad and quickly jotted thoughts out and saved the document on my desktop for later. I love those terrific ‘lightbulb’ moments, especially those bulbs that have great long term income potential.

I already own and partner on several membership programs. They provide reliable income month after month which as you can imagine is quite appreciated.

If I had to rely on hundreds of individual sales for the same income, I’d be working a lot harder and most likely spending more to support my efforts.

I launched my brainstorm (Blog Evangelists) this summer. Once again, I opted to partner with the techno-friendly Lynette Chandler. The launch went well and we continue to add new members to our program so for the last three months we have enjoyed a nice boost in income.

There are all kinds of membership/residual income programs that you can create to compliment your existing business. Coaching or consulting, premium newsletters or reports, access to services, access to software, product clubs and more. I blogged this summer about several work at home moms who are operating membership programs - here’s a partial reprint of the list I included there:

• Alice Seba & Mila Sidman launched All Private Label Content
• Alice Seba launched Outsourcing Sweetie and the Sweetie Saturday Report Club
• Michelle Waters launched Product Sellers Club
• Melody Spier and Kit Singleton launched Virtual Assistants Mavens
• Lynette Chandler & I launched Easy Internet Survey
• Crissy Heron Gipson launched Quick and Easy Newsletters
• Melissa Ingold turned Special Report Club into a paid membership site.
• Jenn Cangelosi owns Toy Auction Profits and Boutique Bargains
• Nicole Dean & Darina Loakman launched Shelancers
• Arika Liddiard launched Yummy PLR

Seeing how others are adding residual income to their businesses is very inspiring to me and I hope it is to you as well.

For Additional Learning: Lynette and I created Membership Site Intensive to teach others how to develop and profit from residual income programs.

Guess What $1.97 Can Get You? Answer In This Post…

Over the past couple of months, we’ve been lucky enough
to have Jarod Lam as a guest blogger at the Sweetie blog.
This guy knows his stuff and always shares GREAT tips.

That’s why I knew you’d want to know that Jarod’s new
guide:

“Information Empire Blueprint: Build a Successful Information Business without Any Marketing, Writing or Technical Skills”

What’s really cool about this blueprint is that it’s based
on the business of a stay-at-home mom who generates $330
million per year with her own information business. It’s a
definite must-read and you can learn more here.

But hey, if that’s not enough for you, when you grab Jarod’s
guide, you’re automatically signed up to a month of his “Startup Rebel Alliance” which brings you to info-packed interviews with…

1) A successful entrepreneur and
2) A noted expert in Internet marketing.

…each and every month. This month’s interviews happen to be with two resident Sweeties, Carrie Lauth and yours truly and it’s only $1.97 to access everything.

If you don’t know already, Carrie is the single mom of 4 and has built a successful online business all the while homeschooling all her kids. This girl’s got it together! Her interview includes tons of practical advice for all online entrepreneurs.

Find out more about my interview, the blueprint and this special offer go here.

Enjoy it and put some plans into action.

(By the way, if you want to promote report, you can sign up for Jarod’s affiliate program here.)

Marketing to Marketers? Here’s Some Quality PLR Stuff

If you’re in the business-to-business market on the Internet, you’ll know this market is littered with resell rights and private label rights garbage. It’s recycled everywhere and its value is reduced nil, nada, zilch.

But thank goodness, there are a few gems in the bunch and when you find them, you hold on tight to them.

One of those gems is definitely Melissa Ingold’s Special Report Club (not to be confused with the Sweetie Saturday Report Club - another gem, of course! ). It’s a membership that sets you up with marketing-related information products to sell month after month.

First and foremost, the content in the reports is top-notch. Without a good product, your long-term business fails. We all know this, but some unscrupulous people seem to keep peddling crap. You and I are different…thank goodness!

So not only do you get a quality marketing report each month, you get a ton of extras to go with it including:

• An mp3 recording of the report.
• A mini sales letter to sell the report.
• Digital promotional ecover.
• Affiliate program research.
• Suggested ad text (signature lines, pay-per-clicks)
• Keyword research
• Plenty of how-to info on making money from your reports.

My only complaint is that the cover of the actual report doesn’t match the promotional ecover. The ecover images are pretty sharp, but the covers placed on the reports are kind of lacklustre. Perhaps I can get Melissa to change that.

Other than that, the Special Report Club is pretty darned cool. You can use the content to sell, add it to your blog, give it as bonuses or even use it as learning materials for your affiliates. Plenty of uses for this great resource.

EDITED TO ADD: I’ve spoken to Melissa and she agrees! Although the October report doesn’t have the cover, she will be doing this in future months. Thanks Melissa.

Familiar Brand = More Sales

With the onslaught of advertising in today’s electronic age, we are exposed to thousands of advertising images every single day. And with our attachment to television it’s fairly easy to recognize those companies who have millions of dollars to spend on television advertising.

These millions of dollars of advertising help contribute to the brand awareness of the product. Think Coca Cola, McDonalds, Mercedes Benz. Even these highly successful and very recognizable brands still pay advertising dollars to keep their names foremost in the consumer minds. Familiar branding results in consumer awareness, trust, and increased purchases.

The same is true in the world of internet marketing. Branding plays a very critical role in an overall marketing strategy which is often the same as that of the billion dollar companies: make the consumer aware of your name and develop that trusted relationship. Sales will then follow.

The good news is, becoming a familiar brand doesn’t mean spending millions of dollars on a Super Bowl ad. Becoming a familiar brand simply requires patience and a strategy that encompasses a variety of marketing tools designed to increase brand recognition.

Think this is mumbo jumbo? Let’s think of it this way: if you were in a foreign city where you did not speak the language and you wanted something to eat, would you choose a foreign, unknown burger joint or the McDonald’s on the corner? Probably you would choose McDonalds, simply because you are familiar with the name. This familiarity has a direct result in purchasing behavior.

Do you remember the “Coke versus Pepsi” taste test? Subjects were blindfolded and asked to taste unmarked soda and identify which they preferred. What wasn’t generally shared was that when subjects were told that one of the drinks was Coca-Cola, they were more likely to show a preference for it even if it wasn’t Coke. Interestingly enough the people who were told it was Pepsi, even when it wasn’t, didn’t seem to show any biased behaviors. These results were attributed to Coca-Cola’s branding and the reason Coke generally sells more product than Pepsi.

Branding is an important part of any marketing campaign because of all the competition, both online and offline. Brand familiarity works on all business sizes, all industries, and all consumer types. Familiarity breeds comfort and confidence in a product even when we’ve never tried the product before.

It’s why building large databases and contacting them often is such an integral part of internet marketing. It’s why retail stores create loyalty programs and give consumers little cards to keep in their wallet and it’s why a long term branding strategy adds significant profits to a company’s bottom line.

What are YOU doing to improve your brand?

An Easy Strategy To Boost Your Viral Report’s Distribution By 400%

One of the most effective ways to generate free traffic is to distribute free viral reports. If you’re new to this strategy, here’s how it works:

Step One: You write a report in Microsoft Word. The report can be anywhere from 3 to 70 pages and will contain links to your website.

Step Two: You convert it into a PDF file using Adobe Acrobat software. A PDF file is a universal file that can be opened by PCs as well as Macs.

Step Three: You give it away to your website visitors and newsletter subscribers.

If your readers find the information valuable, they will pass it to their friends and colleagues. Then, their friends and colleagues will pass it to their own circle of friends and colleagues.

In short, your report becomes “viral.” In time, your report may be read by thousands of people and effectively driving free traffic to your site.

Now, what if you want to increase the distribution of your viral report? What would be a simple way to do that?

Well, here’s a simple strategy that could boost your report’s distribution by at least 400%:

I call it the Gang Up Strategy.

Here’s how it works:

Step One: Approach four experts in your market to contribute content to your report.

The key for this strategy to work is that each expert must have their own mailing list that is similar in size to yours. So, if you have 1000 subscribers, look for experts that have a mailing list with around 1000 subscribers.

You can try approaching experts with bigger mailing list but they may feel that it’s unfair to them. There’s no harm in trying, of course. Just don’t be disappointed if they decline your invitation.

Step Two: Compile the content and create the PDF report.

Once you have all the content from the four experts and yourself, compile them and create your viral report. You can host the report on your site or let each expert host it on theirs.

Step Three: Each expert gives the report away to their subscribers.

Once the report is ready for download, each expert will send an email to their respective list to announce the report. I suggest that you write the announcement email to save the experts’ time.

If each expert has an average of 1000 subscribers, your report will be read by an estimated 5000 people. That’s 400% more than having your report distributed to just your own list of 1000 subscribers.

This strategy works because everyone wins.

You and the four experts will gain more exposure from the wider distribution of the report. And your subscribers will get valuable content from five different experts instead of just one.

Easy enough, right? So, take action now!

Information Products: Adding An Income Stream to Any Online Business

If you’ve been online any amount of time (whether as a seller or a consumer), you’ll know that information is in demand.

Yes, a lot of information is free…but every day people shell out hard-earned cash to buy information. Whether it’s for the convenience, the reputation of the creator or the handy tools and guidance that come with the information - it’s absolutely no secret that information is BIG business.

Some online business owners base their businesses on information products only, some just dabble in it and others think that information products just wouldn’t work with their business. For those who think it won’t work, I challenge you to think out of the box. There is ALWAYS something your market needs to learn, to do better or wants help with…and when you educate your market, they are more likely to consume your products or the products you recommend.

Information Products don’t have to be for sale, but they should have value. Even if you don’t sell your information product, make it valuable to your readers. You can do this by offering information in different formats (PDF, audio, video, etc) and having your readers have to sign up to access your product. Even taking the time to have covers and graphics designed for your products can boost the perceived value for your readers. If they value your information, they are more likely to consume and take action on what you recommend.

Information products help you and your business establish expertise and trustworthiness. If you’re a seller of consumer goods, putting out quality and useful information can elevate your status in the market. It shows you know your stuff and go the extra mile to give your readers the guidance they need and not just a continuous sales pitch.

Information products help sell your other products. By teaching people how to do something or improve their skills, you naturally open the door to recommend the tools to complete the various tasks/steps. This is the perfect time to introduce your own products (or products through an affiliate link).

It really doesn’t matter what you sell, you can reach new prospects and deepen a connection to existing ones through well-presented, quality information. What does your target market want to learn?

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