There are some software which I just can’t do business without. I would like to mention one here which has saved me a considerable amount of time in my online business.

The software I’m about to mention is not something new. If you’ve been visiting internet marketing forums, then I’m sure you’ve heard of it.

What this software does is saves your username and password, and also autofills forms for you.

Doesn’t sound very exciting does it? Well let me explain more in detail on how I use it in my business.

I have many websites which I host on my dedicated server. When I access cpanel for each of the websites, I only need to type in the login once (username and password).

Afterwards, if I access which ever domain’s cpanel, I can click on a button on my toolbar and it will autofill the login details and help me login to the website.

Another situation where I use this software daily is for my affiliate programs. I’m an affiliate for many products and services. Again, using this software, I just bring up the website with Google Bookmark and click on this button in my browser’s toolbar to auto login. I have around 50 affiliate programs which I need to login and check the stats for. Imagining checking these different login details in an excel file (which I did previously).

There are so many things which you can use this simple, but time saving tool for. Such as web mail acount logins, membership sites and administering blogs.

Another feature of this handy tool is an autofill form. Where you can fill out the standard fields once, and then it can memorize the fields per profile for you.

For example, if you fill out the credit card information for a certain website, you can use that same information for other websites that require your credit card details when purchasing.

For me, I use my personal credit card, my business credit card and my wife’s personal credit card. So the software will prompt me to choose one of three profiles when filling out the form. An absolute time saver! No more getting my credit card out of the wallet and filling in the address details etc…

That’s another thing I love about this software. It lets you choose different logins when using the same form. For example, for my paypal login, it will prompt me for 3 different email addresses that I have saved for Paypal.

Apart from saving login details and autofilling forms, the software also allow me to autogenrate passwords. By that I mean complex passwords. Hey, I don’t even have to remember passwords anymore.

Some people may be concerned with the security of this software. Well the software has that sorted out as well.

The software uses strong encryption and algorithms which means it is very, very difficult to hack into the program and retrieve all your password even if the software files are physically copied by hackers.

All you need for the software to work is remember a Master Password. You need to enter this password once every time you boot up your machine to start using the software.

Now what happens if your machine crashes? There is a backup feature in the software where you can backup the files into a secure place. If you do have a disaster, then you can easily restore the backup and nothing is lost.

By not needing to check your affiliate program passwords, sometimes it will save you around 10 minutes. This includes opening the excel spreadsheet and checking old emails or resetting passwords using the web forms.

Also when you fill out long registration forms which require checkout information, this in itself will save you another 5 minutes including getting the credit card out of your wallet.

If you are submitting your articles to ezine directories, then the time saved will really add up when you try to login 10 or more directories when submitting your articles.

This software on average has saved me 20 minutes of my time per day. This comes to around 140 minutes (2 hrs 20 mins) per week or 600 minutes (10 hrs) per month.

Just imagine, saving 10 hours of your time per month. Not to mention the tasks for checking your credit card number, looking for your username and passwords in your spreadsheet will take the focus off the work you are currently doing. It takes another 5 minutes to re-focus yourself on the work you were doing.

Do you understand now why I highly recommend this software?

The software is called Roboform and you can download a free working version here –> Download Roboform

However, this free version is only good for saving 10 passwords. After that it will start bugging you to upgrade. If the free version is enough for you to use, then good for you. For many marketers like myself, we need a lot more.

If you made your mind up already with this software your can click here to purchase Roboform.

I would go for the USB key version which is a bit more expensive at $39.90 But it’s really useful for me because I can use it for my laptop and for the PC at my office.

This is one of the software which I advise all my friends and peers to buy. It takes such a huge weight off your brain and saves you so much time in the long run. It’s worth every cent if you consider how much your time is worth.

Enjoy the free version by downloading Roboform here

Social bookmarking has become more and more the craze during the past year. Many marketers are talking about getting traffic from social bookmarking websites because those places have a lot of traffic. However some are now questioning if the traffic from social bookmarking is any use.

Why the doubt? Obviously some marketers are working hard in some social bookmarks websites and noticing the increase in traffic. However, the additional traffic is not converting.

For Traffic Beast I have not done much with social bookmarking yet as I’m concentrating on the final touches on my book Article Marketing Strategies. My view on the traffic gained from social bookmarks is that they help in increasing your backlinks which therefore helps your rankings in the search engines.

People from social bookmarking websites are there to be socialable. Not to purchase anything. The links from authority sites such as Digg, StumbeUpon, HubPages etc… will do wonders for one way backlinks to your website.

For me, after my ebook launches next week, I will spend time in driving traffic from the social sites. To build many one-way backlinks to my website, I will choose some anchor text after doing some keywrod research.

I don’t mind the extra traffic even’s if the majority are not interested in internet marketing. It’s the gaining of backlinks, increase in search engine ranking and clicks on Adsense which I’m after. Not all traffic from social websites are useless, there will be some interest which is why there’s no reason for me not to try it.

I’ll keep you updated on the progress.

Video salesletters are one of the hottest things which internet marketers are using now.

Instead of the normal salesletter with the headline, graphics, bullet points, testimonials, order link and PS statements – we now just lie back with a cup of tea and watch a video that does all the selling.

You need to catch up with technology. More and more marketers are using videos to sell their products. No doubt the technique works.

The first time I saw a video salesletter being used was from John Reese. He had a $2.5K webinar program called Internet Marketing Advisor (IMA) which had nothing but video.

The next person I saw doing it was Mike Filsaime with HyperPlugins (http://projecthyperplugin.com/) and now Keith Wellman with VIP AutoPilot Profits System.

The reason video salesletter works is because of the entertainment value. Hey me and you love to be entertained right? We prefer watching videos rather than reading right? That’s why so many people are called couch potatoes.

Here is the VIP Autopilot Profits System video salesletter by Keith Wellman. http://www.privateorderlink.com

I’m not in anyway endorsing this product because:

1. I’m not an affiliate

2. I haven’t seen and used the product.

But I have seen the video which is why I’m telling you to watch it. You will learn from it.

When watching, notice how Keith uses the video to sell. There are no fancy music background, no special effects or any high production stuff. Just some slides with a voice selling you the product.

Take note of how simple and easy in making this video salesletter.

Through the video he is taking you through a selling process.

1. Tells your problem

2. Gives you the dream

3. Explain the benefits of the product

4. Keeps you in suspense by not telling you the price

5. Provides scarcity and explains the benefits of the product

6. Gives himself proof and authority by telling others how many testimonials he’s received

7. Tells you that this product is for you.

8. Gives you the order link at the end of the video.

Go and see the video and takes notes as you’re watching it. Then go and create a video for yourself.

Now go and study the video.

PS. Also go and study the video salesletter by Mike Filsaime. The product is off the market, but the video is there for everyone to study.

The word ‘Kaizen’ is derived from the Japanese meaning ‘continuous improvement’. Dare I say that this is the secret to success in your life and whatever business you are in.

When you see people who are a success – whether it’s fame, fortune or any major achievement, you tend to think that they must have some particular knowledge or secret that made them such as success. That secret is the ‘Kaizen  effect’.

Let me go into detail here on how this secret Japanese word can change our lives around…

If you want to be healthier you will tend to eat less, exercise more and read more on weight loss theories. But why do so many people fail? The answer lies in them not adopting the Kaizen strategy. Everything in life can be achieved using gradual improvement. If you want to lose weight you should do it continuously. Every little improvement per day counts.

If you go for a jog in the morning for 10 minutes, that counts. If you have a healthy breakfast and dinner, that counts. Too often we are looking for a quick fix, the magic forumla, which is why we don’t get the success.

Losing weight is easy. Just don’t expect to lose it quickly. Take the task as a daily project. Do something which improves on it every day. Don’t let the short-sightedness de-motivate you.

A very good way to explain this is using the extraordinary story of folding a piece of paper 50 times. If you were to imagine that you can do this act physically, do you know how high that piece of paper will be? For those of you who haven’t heard this, the answer is shocking…

If is about the distance from the Earth to the Sun.

Just imagine, looking at the first few folds of paper. It won’t be very attractive and you’ll give up if you’re trying to fold it until it reaches the Sun. The lesson is every bit counts. Just stick to it. Gradually improve whatever you are doing every day and the result of the improvement is exponential (in another words, mind blowing).

This blog is about web traffic, so let’s talk about how Kaizen affects the success in driving traffic to your business. There are so many website owners that struggle with getting traffic to their site. After diving deeper into their problem, you’ll normally see that they have’nt done much to attract traffic.

Some of them just build the websites and hope that traffic will come by itself. This is studipity on their part. They have’nt done anything to drive traffic to their websites. It’s just plain hope.

The other type of website owners are the saddest ones. They’ll try all sorts of ways to drive traffic to their websites but they don’t see the result with the effort they put in.

This is because they tried many tactics and strategies and not being good at any of them. I bet that if they had stuck to one strategy or one tactic, they would have succeeded.

One of the marketing tactics I discuss a lot on is Article Marketing which  I have also written a book on. (It’s to be released on April 18th by the way, so mark that on your calendar). With article marketing, many people will write the articles  after getting a few tips here and there. They’ll stick to it for about a month or 2 and then see that the traffic is not worth their time and try something else.

This goes completely against the Kaizen theory. What they should do is study on how to write articles effectively and how to submit them to directories and ezine publishers. Once you have the knowledge you should then work at it daily and let the Kaizen effect take its course. Article marketing works. Period!

With other techinques of driving traffic, the theory’s the same. Know how to do it and then work on it daily. Have success with it before you move on to the next thing.

So here are the steps:

1. Learn about what you want to achieve. (ie. have a six pack body, have thousands of visitors per day…)
2. Take Action on what you have learnt consistently. Do something every day to improve on your progress. If you want to drive visitors to your website, improve on you marketing every day. Learn from the mistakes you come across and continuously improve on what you are doing.
3. Once you’ve succeeded, move on to the next thing in your goals list you want to achieve. Rinse and Repeat.

I hope this helps you in improving your life and achieving what you want. On a final note, just understand that wanting instant results is what’s making people delay in achieving what they want.

When you’re starting out with a new website, the hardest part is to get that surge of traffic going - unless of course you’re already well established and just announce it to your list. Here’s what you need to do if you’re building a new website.

The first step in any search engine optimization that you may be doing on your website is actually to get the website listed in the search engines in the first place.

There are several different ways that you can do this but some of them are more effective than others.  There may also be some ways that you can acquire these listings in the search engines that may attract some attention to your website that may not be welcome.

Allow me to explain that this is especially the case if you’re uncomfortable with some of the content and how well it will be received by the search engines themselves.  Of course, the process of getting listed in the search engines is relatively simple at its most basic level.

All that is really needed is a link or two from another website in order for the search engine bots to follow that link into your site and begin spidering it. For the newbies out there, search engine bots are programs from the search engines which searches around your website and then update the content to their database. That’s how you see all these search results in Google, Yahoo, MSN etc…

The better the link that you receive, the faster you will be spidered and the more favor you will be shown by the search engines in general.  If you have a link from a website that is spidered daily then it’s very likely that your website will appear in the search engines within 24 hours. This is why many people pay for a text link on established websites so that they are spidererd and also hopefully get some diverted traffic.

One of the easiest ways to acquire these links is by writing an article and then posting a link back to your site in the biography. In article marketing terms, this is called a ‘Resource Box’.

You would then submit it to the article directories.  You may also want to do a little bit of social bookmarking or perhaps pinging your website through a ping service, such as Pingoat.com.

Another easy way for you to get listed in the Google search engine is to use a Google sitemap.  This is a free service that is available through Google itself and is there to help new websites to be spidered and for them to be re-spidered on a regular basis to check for new content.

Some people are uncomfortable with using this particular method but if your website is squeaky clean, you have nothing to lose by trying this.  If you’re uncomfortable with part of your website due to content or perhaps stepping outside of the Webmaster guidelines, avoid using a Google site map and try getting links instead as I mentioned above.

Getting your website listed in the major search engines is only the first part of the battle.  From that point forward, you will be acquiring new links and working on optimizing your website in order to rank well for your chosen keywords.  It’s a process that never really ends but the rewards can pay off in a very large way.

For me regarding SEO,  I only do what is needed. I optimise the title tags, link internally and get some external incoming links. After that I concentrate on content and building my list.

The reason being that search engine optimisation is important but their algorithms change so much. It’s a never ending battle trying to SEO your website. Therefore I just concentrate on writing good content and getting articles distributed, building my list, and networking with others.

I’m not saying SEO is not important. It is but you have to spend so much time on it consistently – this includes studying, implementing and testing.

To conclude, get your website listed on the search engines, do the minimal SEO on your website and start adding more content to it. The more content you have, the more chances you have of appearing on the search engines.

Sheryl Polomka, the Stay Home Mum, has just reviewed Traffic Beast on her website Black Spider Blog

Well I’m glad Sheryl liked the blog. One of the comments that really surprised me was how much she liked the header graphic of Traffic Beast. Take a look at the graphic header at Black Spider Blog and you’ll see what I mean.

 

Sheryl reviewed my blog because I signed up for her book Black Spider Blogging. A few weeks later, Sheryl followed up with an email asking if I wanted my blog reviewed. Naturally I replied and said yes etc… etc…

The point I want to make is you really need to go out there and build relationships with other bloggers. You cannot be shy. You’re not meeting them face to face – you’re behind a PC.  So go there and visit some blogs and forums and start building some relationships. This will drive traffic to your website.

Now regarding the book Black Spider Blogging, frankly speaking I did take some of the ideas and implemented it into my own blog. It was probably why Sheryl liked it. If you have a blog or if you’re just starting out, get a copy at the Black Spider Blog. It will give you some ideas on things which you may not have in your blog.
Here’s the link to the Traffic Beast review…http://black-spider.info/?p=26

One more thing before I wrap up today. I’ve just written an article on why people fail to make money online. You can read it here. I hope the things I mention don’t apply to you.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Internet-Marketing-Failure—The-Magic-Pill&id=1086441

About an hour of my day is spent visiting forums and blogs reading up on people’s problems and of course tips from other experienced marketers.

One of the things I noticed is that a lot of people don’t have a business model. They have lots of ideas of how to make money online such as clickbank, adwords, traffic exchange programs etc… but they use it as a money making technique.

They make some sales and that’s it. They move on to the next technique. What the successful online marketers do is they build a list and then market to this list continuously. Guess what? Everyone who reads forums or have bought any online course will have heard that.

Yup. Actually they get peed off whenever someone talks about the obvious “the money is in the list”. But I’ve noticed that these people have been complaining about their lack of success online and have still not started to build their list.

The majority have one time or another, built their list but have not stuck to it. They have sent out a few newsletters and have received no income from their recommendations and have given up on the whole thing.

These are the ones that have then started to branch off to other things such as driving adwords traffic to affiliate programs, bum marketing, social networking etc…

Here is a basic business model which every successful online entrpreneur uses to build their business and it works. If you still haven’t succeeded online yet, then I BEG you to start your business now using this business model I am about to tell you.

What I’m about to say is nothing new. But the successful gurus have the same model and they stick to it and have made a fortune from it. There is no way it won’t work for you if it works for everyone else.

Have some patience, give it some elbow grease and continuously work this business model. You cannot fail.

The Online Business Model All Successful Internet Marketers Have

1. Create free content.
You can create a video of yourself drawing something in photoshop, using social bookmarking to generate visitors to your website or writing a 20 page ebook on a certain topic.

This free content needs to be good. It needs to be something which will make your readers think, “Wow, why isn’t this guy selling this sort of stuff?”

Yes, blow their minds with the great content you have. You can create this content by studying forums, blogs and other ebooks on the same topic and then write them in your own words.

Your content is ready when you being to say to yourself “Shit! I should be selling this. Not giving it away free!”

2. Create an optin page.
Now that you’ve got your excellent content ready you need to create your optin page.

You optin page should ask people to subscribe to your newsletter and thus getting your free content as a bonus for signing up.

List out the benefits of your content and then create an subscription form using a good autoresponder service.

The autoresponder which I recommend in all my communications is Aweber. Excellent features and most important of all, has good rate of deliverability. You want those emails arriving at your subscribers’ inbox.

3. Create your autoresponder series.
Now you need to create a series of emails to be delivered to your prospect. About 30 days of content is good enough.

With your emails, you should continue to deliver good content to your subscribers. Occassionally reminding them to download your free ebook if they haven’t done so.

Your emails can be a 10 part lesson or something similiar. The point of this series is to build your relationship with your list.

The more good content you provide to the list, the more they will trust you and read your emails.

4. Promotion
You can now start to promote to your list of subscribers. Tell them a good product which you have used. Tell them how you have used it and then give them your affiliate link.

I would recommend you send a promotion every 2 weeks. During the gaps, send them interesting content which will help them in their online business.

5. Continously to drive traffic to your optin page.
Your business model is now set. All you need to do now is to coninuously drive traffic to your optin page to create more subscribers and build your list.

Once you have a good number of subscribers (eg. 1000) you can begin to have some money rolling in if you have treated your subscribers right.

That is the business model which all successful internet marketers use.
Why doesn’t it work for some people?

I can think of 3 reasons why this business model doesn’t work for a lot of people.

1. Not enough time to see the result
It can take over a month before you are able to see any affiliate income from your list. Once people send out promotions to the list and they don’t see the $$$, they immediatley stop emailing their list and do something else.

2. Relationship building is wrongly done
Before your list will buy the products you recommend, you need to build up the relationship with them. Continue to send them information that they can make use of and treat them well. Many people just send out promotion after promotion, expecting the sales to pour in without any relationship building. Ask yourself with every email, “Will my subscribers be happy to receive this email I send them?”

3. No contact with the subscribers for a long time
You probably don’t email to your list as often as you should be. Emailing your list once a month will kill the responsiveness of your list. You need to continuously stay in contact with your list. However this doesn’t mean emailing them daily. Once every 3 or 4 days or once a week is good enough.

4. Being boring
If your communication to your list is boring then not many people are going to read your emails the next time they see it in their inbox. You need to be interesting, sincere and helpful to your subscribers. Achieve all of those qualities then they’ll read your email for years.

5. Not adding new subscribers
Once your system is developed then you need to regularly drive traffic to your optin page. The more leads you have then the more money you will have. By this I don’t mean add more leads by buying co-reg lists. I mean add more leads by advertising your website and getting targeted leads such as pay per click, search engine traffic, writing articles, traffic exchanges, free viral reports etc… You need targeted leads.

The bigger your subscriber list is, then the more money you will make provided that you treat your list properly.

If you haven’t been able to make this business model work for you, then ask yourself if any of the 5 points above apply to you. This is the blueprint to online success. It has been proven to work. Why shouldn’t it work for you? Now go and start building your online business.

Before I dive into providing traffic generating information on my blog, I would like to share with you the topic on habits.

Now that I don’t have a regular job, I can spend more time to improve my online business, time management and my treasured Family Time.

Many of my friends mentioned to me that I will sleep in late every morning and won’t stick to my plans on improving my life. Exercise is one of them.

Well it’s been over a month now and I’ve proven them wrong. Most important of all I have proven to myself that I can achieve what I set out to do. This feeling is so great you have to experience it to know what I’m talking about.

All it comes down to is having good habits. Once you’ve made up your mind on what to do and actually do it, things will become a habit and your life will improve effortlessly.

I received an email from Norman Hallet of http://www.thinkandgrowrichblog.com/ on the subject of habits and on his blog was a mention of a video which I really liked.

Spend 15 minutes and Watch the video below. It was very inspriational for me and I hope it does for you too.

Today is the launch of Traffic Beast with my first post and I’ve been thinking hard on what to write. An introduction on my plans for this blog is a good way to start.

I’ve been marketing on the internet for 5 years now. Looking back it’s been a very educational 5 years.

Bought lots of ebooks and software learning internet marketing and trying to make a living online instead of the dreadful 9 – 7 job I have.

On Febrauary 18th 2008, the dream became a reality. I have my own personal office away from home which I can work full time doing what I enjoy.

Traffic Beast is what I will be working on full time and it will be the core of my business. The objective of Traffic Beast is to provide information on what works in driving traffic to websites.

Techniques which are free and paid will also be discussed. If you own a website selling your own products or an affiliate products then Traffic Beast will benefit you immensely.

I will be creating reports and writing articles on various topics in internet marketing. My first book, “Article Marketing Strategies” will be released soon. It’s my first ebook where I will distribute it free to help people who are having problems with article marketing. Saty tuned for the progress on that.

I will also be giving advice on other areas such as landing pages, improving conversions etc… which I hope to do sometime in the future. At the moment I’m still doing a lot of planning for the business.

Being my own boss now has brought many opportunities for me to improve on my own personal life. From the top of my head the benefits I love are:

1. Spending time with the family
2. Paying bills on time
3. Fixing things around the house
4. Exercise regularly
5. Meeting friends I haven’t contacted for a long time
6. Shopping in non-peak hours
7. Waking up later when I had a late night

At the end of the day, we all live for a reason. To be happy and take care of our family. I hope I can give this dream to as many people as I can and together we can make a difference to the people around us.

It never fails to amaze me why people don’t spend enough time to choose an autoresponder. Considering it is the most important tool of an online business, I called it stupidity.

The people I come across choose their autoresponders based on one criteria. The price.

If it’s cheap and gives them unlimited messages then it’s a done deal for them.

The question you’re thinking now is “So what autoresponder do you use, then?”.



I use Aweber's Autoresponder 
My choice is based upon the following criterias:

1. They are used by successful interent marketers. They have the occassional hiccups here and then but overall they are very reliable and the owner knows a lot internet marketing, so they understand how we think.

2. They have extremely high delivery rates. A lot of ISPs nowadays, ban certain domains from sending emails. Aweber has a good relationship with the main ISPs and so your emails will not be considered spam and actually get delivered.This is a BIG main reason for choosing Aweber. If most of your emails don’t get delivered, your business is screwed. You could be making a lot more if the emails were actually delivered.

3. Aweber has all the functions needed for an Autoresponder. It can generate web forms to capture your email subscriptions, split testing, open rates, allow the subscriber to change email address, automatically drop from an email list if the subscriber signs up to a certain list, etc…Not sure if you have any complex requirements that Aweber doesn’t meet, but so far they have all the things I need.

4. They have free training for the members via videos and free teleseminars. This includes writing your email, split testing etc…

5. They have great customer support. Yup, they answer the phone and get back to your emails quick!







The only thing which you may not like is that all your subscribers have to double optin. This means that less people will sign up to your list compared with a single optin. Although I personally prefer double optin due to the face that you have better subscribers who really want to be on your list.

However, to be fair you don’t need to purchase aweber if you are just starting out with using autoresponders. I would suggest you use a free service such as http://www.http://freeautobot.com/

Once you understand how to use an autoresponder, your business is growing and you see many people subscribing then switch to Aweber.

A word of warning – Aweber uses double optin even if you are importing genuine email leads to their system. Using this process, you may lose a lot of your original subscribers. Talk to Aweber’s customer service first if you are thinking of importing your leads.

A tip when using autoresponders – At the time of writing this post, I consider Aweber to be the best autoresponder service around. However, this doesn’t mean they’ll continue to be so in the next few years. So for all your communications do not mention your aweber address. Put your own domain address and forward it to Aweber. 

So if Aweber’s service goes downhill due to change of management for example, you can switch to another autoresponder easily by forwarding your domain address.

Click Here to purchase Aweber.