Tim Pim Blog

I’m sure you’ve come across a wide variety of article and courses on the Internet about how to make money online. One of the most profitable ways of doing this is by providing ‘informational products’ to people, about topics they want to know about. If you think ‘information’ doesn’t sell, then think again. You just need to look at the success of places like Amazon to see that information does indeed sell, and it sells very well. It always has done and always will. The whole purpose of the Internet is to share information and is why you’re reading this article right now! You want information and so do millions of others who are willing to pay for it!!!!

The way to make money in this game is to identify an area, a niche, that people are interested in and create a product (an e-book, e-course, e-video) that provides………and this is what sets you apart from others………..QUALITY INFORMATION regarding that area. I say it needs to be a quality product as I’m sure we’ve all bought e-books which a very low quality and badly put together. Would you ever buy a product from that person again? No, of course not, and neither will any customer you have.

The goal for you is to provide quality material and provide the customer with MORE value than he’s actually paid for. By doing this you do two things:

1. You gain credibility with the customer as a supplier of excellent information and get recommended to others 2. This customer will be more likely to buy future products from you as he knows you over deliver and surpass his expectation with regards to quality

This over delivery will initially take you extra time, but in the future you’re in a win-win situation, and this becomes your unique selling point.

If you’re thinking…hmm ok this sounds like an area I want to pursue, but how do I go about finding a profitable niche? After all, you don’t want to create the ideal product and find out there’s not market for it.

Heres how to go about finding a great niche to profit from. There are ideas everywhere, you just need to be trained to identify and profit from them. A number of places that you can look for ideas for a niche products are:

1. Off the shelf magazines 2. Website blogs related to your idea 3. Sites already selling similar types of products 4. http://www.amazon.com 5. http://www.nichebot.com 6. http://clickbank.com 7. http://cbmall.com 8. http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

Searching these will bring up a huge list of products or search phrases that people are using and products they are interested in, within a particular area. The key here is to find a hot niche market that you know something about, and is of interest to you so you can put the time and effort in creating a quality products that can be sold over and over and bring in that elusive passive income.

The key with these websites is to choose something you are interested in, or search for a keyword in your specific area. This will keep you enthusiastic about the products you’re creating and will show in the content of the final content.

An excellent tool for identifying the number of hits a site gets (and therefore the number of potentially interested people in that area) is by downloading a tool called the alexa toolbar available from http://www.alexa.com

Key steps in all of this is:

1. Research your target audience and where they ‘congregate’ on the Net 2. Find out who they are and what they are interested in 3. Look for problems they want solutions to and information they are interested in 4. Go about creating your quality product to fulfil this need and over deliver in what you provide. 5. Setup a website promoting your product and an affiliate scheme so others can promote it for you 6. Collect customer email addresses, especially those who buy your product 7. Use this list in the future to send out update letters and offers on new products you create

This is some basic information which will get you on track to making money out of niches!

Entrepreneurs often experience extreme highs and extreme lows. It is not uncommon for an entrepreneur to be sitting on top of the world one minute, but then feel like the sky is falling the next as market conditions rapidly change. For these entrepreneurs, it is always important to keep the big picture in mind. Likewise, it never hurts to have the experiences of other successful entrepreneurs in their minds to inspire them to persevere. This article discusses one such entrepreneur: Milton S. Hershey.

For four of his teenage years, from 1872 to 1876, Milton Hershey served as an apprentice to a Lancaster, PA candy maker. After his apprenticeship, Hershey decided to start his own candy business. Armed with an in-depth knowledge of the business, he worked on building his business for six years. Unfortunately, despite his hard work, the business failed.

Undeterred, Hershey moved to Denver, CO and found a job with a candy maker who taught him how to make caramels. A year later, he returned to the East Coast and launched a second candy business, focusing on caramels, in New York City. This business also failed.

Despite two failures in the candy business and on the brink of bankruptcy, Hershey was convinced he would eventually succeed. As such, he returned to Lancaster, PA and started another caramel business. This business was successful. But rather than continuing with caramels, Hershey become interested in chocolates and dedicated himself to learning about and inventing ways to manufacture chocolate. As a result, he sold his caramel company and launched Hershey Chocolate Company. Just over a century after launching the company, Hershey’s firm (now called The Hershey Company (NYSE: HSY)) generates annual revenues in excess of $4 billion.

Milton S. Hershey was raised in rural central Pennsylvania and lacked a formal education. Despite this, and despite failing twice at the same business, Hershey maintained entrepreneurial passion, drive and perseverance. As history has shown, these factors were enough to transform Hershey from a failure to one of the great entrepreneurs in history.

Since its inception, Growthink Professional Business Plans has developed over 200 business plans. Growthink clients have collectively raised over $750 million in financing, launched numerous new product and service lines and gained competitive advantage and market share. Growthink has become the firm of choice for venture capital firms, angel investors, corporations and entrepreneurs in the know. For more information please visit http://www.growthink.com or visit our venture capital placement site at Venture Capital Banking.

Are your considering a move into self-employment? Do you wish to add a small business of your own into your American Dream? Have you been looking around at various business opportunities and businesses that you might see yourself doing? Have you been slowing refining your options down and have now got the list down to a dozen or so possible businesses that you would enjoy doing?

You would be surprised how many people this time of year begin to think about their future in this way. You have probably also heard of the risks of owning your own business as it is not as easy as it looks. Often you will work longer hours with no guarantees of a paycheck. In fact you the failure rate in this nation for small businesses is quite high and the deck is tacked against you. The laws whereas they pretend to be pro-small business are actually there as barriers to entry.

Additionally once you quit your job you maybe interested to know that you that you may not have benefits, health care insurance or that very steady and helpful paycheck. I would like you to think about this a little. Owning your own business is hard work and there are many more failures than winners. If you do decide to go for it, then you need to go all the way and work your ass off. Be sure you understand that.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

This third article in the series on Coaching Your Business to The Next Level Series.

• Article #1 — Top 7 Tips to Avoid the Top 7 Mistakes Small Business Owners Make. (See link at bottom of article to previous article.)
• Article #2 — Coaching Your Business to the Next Level Series Part 2

Assess Your Business both Externally and Internally
Mistake: Don’t presume that you know what is going on in your business. Take the time to assess your business both externally and internally. Using an organizational assessment based upon proven criteria such as Baldrige may help you to focus on the directionally correct actions.

Many business owners resist assessments because they take time, cost money and potentially reveal what the business owner fears. And FEAR in many instances is just False Evidence Appearing Real.

If you as a business owner, entrepreneur or department manager were to survey your employees and ask them to list the top 3 goals for the company or department as they believe them to be, would you receive EXACTLY the same answer from each employee? As a small business coach who works with entrepreneurs to even large corporations, I have asked this question and have yet to receive exactly the same answers from all employees. The next question is the real shocker for the organization’s leadership. What are all of these missteps, misdirections, costing you?

To avoid these unintentional mistakes, using an organizational assessment is one logical solution. The assessment should be have the following characteristics:

• Based on nationally recognized criteria such as Baldrige
• Be easily and quickly delivered such as via the Internet
• Provide a paper based instrument if Internet is not available
• Have a history of proven use (Customized solutions in many cases are expensive and build the income of the vendor at the expense of the client.)
• Tailored to industry needs such as manufacturing, professional services, health care or education
• Be affordable (Estimated range of $20 to $50 per person depending upon number of employees for the instrument only. Analysis not included)
• Include one on one confidential interviews to confirm or validate individual collected data using a cross section of the employees
• Provide a comprehensive report broken down by individual criterion, reporting groups, total responses and linked to current strategic plan
• Be timely from collecting responses to delivering a final comprehensive analysis
• Provide a simple action plan for immediate action
• Include a detailed debriefing between the decision-maker and the consultant
• Can be replicated in one year as a check up

Assessments are indeed necessary to quickly turnaround current actions and to ensure alignment for all shareholders within any business or organization. By investing time to assess or survey where you truly are right now, will help you as the small business owner to executive avoid this second mistake of the 7 top mistakes that many make. After all, would you agree to major surgery without a series of tests to determine what the real need is, then why should your business be any different?

Leanne coaches small business and large organizations using a quick, affordable organizational assessment. Our D.I.AL.O.G. survey is based upon Baldrige national criteria, can be delivered either by the Internet or paper based and has been conducted within a variety of industries including education, healthcare and manufacuturing.

One quick question, if you could quickly and affordably determine what is keeping you from breakthroughing that one roadbloack, what would that mean to you? Then, take a risk and give a call at 219.759.5601 to experience incredible results.

Find an Internet home business opportunity and start making money almost immediately. Getting started will not take a lot of time or money. You won’t be sending out spam. Start making money as soon as you apply the techniques you learn. An Internet home business opportunity is a great way to earn extra money, or start a full-time business if you wish. This new field is wide open and expanding every day.

One thing to keep in mind when seeking new money-making opportunities is low start-up costs. An Internet home business opportunity does not require a huge investment of either time or money. Start with $10. and put in a couple of hours a week. Make big returns for very little start-up. In the recent past you would have had to spend at least six months getting into this niche but now you don’t even have to spend time building a web site. You don’t even need a web site. Internet home business opportunities are the low-hanging fruit of the Internet.

You won’t need to send out spam. If you have a computer and an Internet connection you can start working immediately. An Internet home business opportunity will help you redefine what work means. Work where you want, when you want. Are you a late night-owl? Like working at the local Internet cafe? You decide. Maybe you want to put in a concentrated amount of effort in the evenings and be free during the day. Schedule your own time. An Internet home business opportunity is brilliant for people who want to be in charge of their own income, set their own hours and define their own professional goals.

There’s no long down time before you start bringing in good money. You can be in operation and be making money within a very short frame of time. In the recent past it took six months to build a site and persistent work to get it noticed by the Search Engines. Making commissions didn’t happen right away. Now those lengthy processes are unnecessary. If you have a computer and the Internet and you apply these techniques to an Internet home business opportunity, you can start bringing in cash now.

New products and services are constantly being added to the Internet. The number of products and services available far exceeds the number of advertisers for them. More products are added every day. This is where the unlimited opportunities are in business today. If you are a resourceful and creative thinker, even better. Whereas those personality traits that mark you as independent may not have worked for you in someone else’s company, with an Internet home business opportunity they’ll benefit you. Be your own boss. The more you learn about how these techniques work, the more fun it will be for you. You’ll be able to expand your business as much as you want.

The Internet is the new frontier. Start an Internet home business opportunity and be a pioneer.

Suzanne Arthur is a freelance writer, educator and Internet entrepreneur. You can learn more about the Internet home business opportunity that Suzanne uses at http://www.myhome-based-internet-business.com

Being able to offer your customers as many payment options as possible can make your business grow in a huge way. By giving them the ability to pay for merchandise with their credit cards, especially if you are an online business owner, you give them an ease and flexibility of shopping that will have them returning time and again to make purchases from you. And with the popularity of online shopping higher than it has ever been, the demands to make your business better are just as great. The vast majority of shoppers prefer to pay for their orders with credit cards, so it makes good business sense that you would offer that option to them. By opening a merchant account with one of the many merchant services available to business owners, your customers will enjoy the simplicity and speed of paying by credit card, and you will see your profits soar.

Merchant service firms provide merchant accounts to business owners. A merchant account allows a business to accept credit cards as a form of payment from customers. A merchant account is not the same as a bank account. Rather, a merchant service works to make sure the credit card is verified and that the funds are transferred from the customer you’re your business bank account. It used to be that merchant services were only available through banks and providers to retail establishments that were located in a physical location, like a mall. But the demands of online shopping have caused many merchant account providers to begin to provide merchant services to online business owners. There are many online merchant account providers that offer reliable and secure services particularly to merchants that sell their products on the Internet. Because there are so many merchant service providers available, it is important to be familiar with all characteristics of merchant services, especially the potentially high costs, so that you don’t lose your profits. It is also important to find a merchant account provider that is dependable, trustworthy, and offers secure services for you and your customers.

If you open a merchant account for your online business, the type of payment processing usually offered by a merchant account service is real-time processing. Real-time processing is the best solution for online business owners since the charge from the customer’s credit card is promptly processed when an order is placed. The customer receives an email notification that the order has been processed and the fund transfer is approved by the credit card company, upon verification and approval of the credit card. You will see the profits from the sale in your bank account within a few days.

The potential fees put upon you for merchant services can be numerous. Since not all of the fees are necessary, and not all merchant service providers change them, check around with different providers until you find one with reasonable fees and monthly charges. Some of these fees include an application fee, a monthly statement fee, a discount rate and transaction fee (these are deducted with each and every sale you make), an annual fee, and a refund fee. There are also other miscellaneous fees that individual merchant service providers might charge you. There are many potential costs associated with opening an account with a merchant service provider. Try to compare services before you make a decision. It’s also a good idea to try to estimate the monthly costs by using your current sales figures to project expenses.

Your relationship with your merchant service provider should last the duration of your business, if possible. You should trust your provider implicitly. Your merchant service provider should offer quick and secure processing of your credit card sales, and they should offer additional services to offer your customers even more payment options. Not only should they accept several types of credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, Discover, American Express, among others), but they should also provide your customers with added payment alternatives, like PayPal. Your merchant service provider should have a good reputation for having excellent service and reliability, as well as having a name for excellent customer relations. They should be equipped to deal with any issues or problems discreetly and quickly. The merchant services provider you choose to make a relationship with can make or break your business between its fees and service. Make sure you know the facts about merchant services and the providers so that you don’t lose your dream of being a successful business owner.

Mark is a director of 3 Internet Companies, is a published author and has written many articles on a widespread number of topics. All his articles may be reproduced provided that an active link is included to www.merchants-account-services.com

The number of businesses using direct mail marketing now compared to how many used this medium 10 to 15 years ago is staggeringly higher. More and more marketers understand its effectiveness and are on the bandwagon - especially Mortgage Brokers.

Years back the novelty of receiving an advertisement in your mailbox was such that any direct mail pieces were not only looked at but mulled over. Not so anymore. The term ‘junk mail’ was coined sometime since then and I’m sure you’ve thrown out your fair share of unread pieces enough to understand why. So, what can you do about it as a marketer? How can you ensure you get the biggest bang for your direct mail dollar? Now more than ever, you have to understand how to put together a direct mail piece. More than ever you have to really target your mailing to go to a specific market. And more than ever you need to be patient and learn how to campaign - because that is the key to success. Don’t get me wrong… direct mail is not dead - and I don’t see it dying any time soon. It is still the quintessential part of the largest company’s campaigns. Because it works.

In this article I will teach you some of these three topics:
• Designing a direct mail piece
• Targeting your specific market
• Campaigning

A Great Design
Many people think that the quality of any graphic design is determined by how aesthetically pleasing it is: Although making the card look good is important, this couldn’t be further from the truth. The only true measure of any design, at least commercially, is “How well does it pull?”. By pull we mean what type of response does it elicit? Does it pull in calls, or pull people into the store? In essence, does the design accomplish what it set out to do?

From this fact it is not a reach to come to the conclusion that the merit of a graphic designer is based on the performance of his or her designs. You may be able to put together the most beautiful ad that the world has ever seen, but if it doesn’t make the phone ring it isn’t worth the paper that it is printed on.

You need to make designs that are not only attractive but, more importantly, that get the response needed to turn a profit. You want to ensure people see your ad and want your services. In short, if the ad doesn’t make you any money, it’s not a good ad.

To BE or Not To BE
Easy. Say there is a monkey loose in your office and you can’t seem to get any work done. The only solution is to catch the little distraction and FedEx him back to the jungle that he came from. Question: How do you catch a monkey? You have to get into his head, think like him. You have to “BE” the monkey to find out what is going to bring him close enough for you to catch him.

Every potential customer is like the monkey. They are going to do whatever they want unless you can persuade them to listen to you. You have to get into their head, think like them, “BE” them. A monkey is a simple animal so you can probably get his attention with the stereotypical banana.

Human beings on the other hand are extremely complex. Then you add in the fact that the mailing list is targeted and it can get quite challenging. To help you answer the question of what you should say in your ad, you should use three things:

• Reasoning

• Experience

• Research

Take an unrelated subject to your own industry - sometimes it’s better learn that way. Pick something. Say you have an upscale Italian women’s shoe boutique. You want to appeal to women that like that sort of thing. Get in her head. What would make her want to buy from you? Remember, she gets bombarded with advertisements every day. What can you say that really draws her in? How about “Tired of Wearing the Same Styles as Everyone Else?” Have a graphic that supports the message - show a fantastic pair of shoes or better yet a good looking woman with a great pair of shoes on.

Now pretend you are a family man or woman with a household income of the $75k with revolving debt of $15K and you’ve got two kids! Kids can be pretty expensive. So, why would you like to refinance?

Find a Specialized Mailing List
If there is one thing I can’t say enough it is that the most important part of your mailing campaign is your mailing list. It is vital that you put the right amount of energy into learning about lists - who to mail to - so that your mailing efforts aren’t wasted. There are a few different ways that you can get an adequately targeted list.

As always the first step is to determine who your target market will be. Say you want to market to homeowners. Good, now we have narrowed it down to only 291,324 people in your area. As a minimum, your mailing campaign should send to the same names three times. So all you have to do is send out 873,972 postcards at $0.185 per piece & you get the point. We need to narrow it down some more.

So how do you accomplish the narrowing of your list? Many factors can be considered, including age, gender, zip code, annual salary, profession and number of children are some of the more common qualifiers. It may take a while to figure out what combination works for your specific product. Don’t worry about political correctness when considering whom you should mail to. It is perfectly acceptable to test certain lists that may be considered “stereotypical”. Many times these lists will work well. But you never know until you test them.

No matter how great an idea you have about a certain market, ALWAYS DO A SMALLER TEST MAILING FIRST! Average test mailings run around 1000-1500 names. Once you see acceptable returns on the smaller mailing then you can jump in with the larger numbers. Test, test, test!

The purpose of special mailing lists is to target a specific type of customer for your specific type of business. The eventual end result is more customers and a better bottom line. And this is what we all want, right?

Repeating Your Message

cam•paign n.

1. A series of military operations undertaken to achieve a large-scale objective during a war: Grant’s Vicksburg campaign secured the entire Mississippi for the Union.

2. An operation or series of operations energetically pursued to accomplish a purpose: an advertising campaign for a new product; a candidate’s political campaign.

intr.v. cam•paigned, cam•paign•ing, cam•paigns

To engage in an operation planned to achieve a certain goal: campaigned through the jungles of Vietnam; campaigned for human rights.

[French campagne, from Italian campagna, field, military operation, from Late Latin camp nia, open country, battlefield, from Latin campus, field.]

Definition number 2 above is the one we’re using. But from studying the entire definition along with the derivation (the word origin) you can see how all the definitions tie together. Campaigns for marketing are, in a nutshell, a series of advertising steps including repeat mailings that are strategically planned so that there is maximum benefit (more new customers) for your business.

Nota bene (that means “take note” in Latin - and I do mean take note): If you are not doing repeat mailings then you are flushing money down toilet. Sorry, I know. The truth sometimes hurts.

Why is this true? One mailing of one postcard once is barely going to get anyone’s attention for more then the minute they see it. Think about it. How many times have you seen the same TV commercials over and over? A one shot in the dark postcard mailing is not going to change your business, your bottom line, your life or your anything.

So, if you are not up to confronting that you need to do a campaign then maybe you shouldn’t be in business. And that may sound harsh - it is harsh. It’s a harsh world. And I want you to succeed in it.

There is another reason. Credibility. In some cases people will hold onto your postcard for a while. They can hold onto your postcard for six months. They may even hold on to your card for three years. But in most cases they’ll think “Oh, I may need that some day” and then while tidying up they’ll throw it away. When you repeat your mailings to those same people and they see your image, logo, slogan, message over and over you become credible to them. Your chances of them responding just got greater. Repeat mailings cannot be repeated enough.

To give you an example, I call it the ‘Trickle Down Effect’:

Say you send out 5000 postcards.

Out of that 5000, 150 hang onto your postcard.

Out of that 5000, so many call the 1st week.

Out of that 5000, so many call the 2nd week.

Out of that 5000, so many call the next month.

Out of that 5000, so many call in 6 months.

Out of that 5000, so many never call…

There is a dwindling inflow from that first mailing and therefore can give a false impression of what occurs from one mailing. Someone sends out a postcard and says, “I only got four responses from my mailing!” But there is a whole dynamic that is going on that is continuing from that one mailing way after the person who sent the mailing expects things to happen. Think about it. Do you jump at every single advertisement that you get bombarded with that you think is a good idea? If you do, you are either a millionaire or broke. But most likely, you see some advertisement that catches your interest and say to yourself that you’d like to check that out some day. Then, you see it again and remember that you wanted to check that out one day. And then, you see it again and this time you decide to check it out.

You want continuous and consistent growth. So what do you do? Look at this scenario:

What if,
You send out 5000 postcards one week and you have all that going on that I mentioned above.

You send out 5000 the next week and you have all that going on that I mentioned above.

You send out 5000 the next week and that dwindling flow chart is going on, on each one of those outflows.

What is going to happen? Eventually it is going to snowball - it’s coming in from all different places!

You are really putting your communication out there consistently in a big way.

And yes, it costs a lot of money to do it. (Once you have your list which you’ll use over and over - only paying for it once - postage is more then 55% of your costs) So, FIND THE MONEY. If you are going to borrow money to do a business, spend that borrowed money on marketing!

Start with a list and mail to one list one week, another list the next week and another list the following week. Then you rotate those lists - again. And again. And again.

Now you ask - what if you only have one list? You can still rotate one list. And it is always good to put it on a spreadsheet or a flow chart to track what you are doing and what you have already done.

For instance: You get one list of 6000 identities. You can mail to 2000 one week, 2000 the next week and 2000 the third week. Then you rotate. There are your three different lists!

A campaign is mailing to the same people over and over and over again. The point is you want to hit your prospects with different communication about the same thing or hit them with different products with the same look and feel or both. The rest will come.

Because what you are building with a marketing campaign is credibility. You are building your business through communication. You are communicating consistently, so much that people will believe you (credibility) and they will respond; they will come, they will spend.

1744, Benjamin Franklin published and mailed the first direct marketing catalog which sold scientific and academic books. Direct Mail has come a long way since then, so DON’T let your piece get lost in the mail, so to speak, make it stand out by applying these three basics of successful marketing:

• Being

• Targeting and

• Repeating

Good luck!

Joy Gendusa founded PostcardMania in 1998, her only assets a computer and a phone. By 2005 the company did over $12 million in sales, employed over 100 people and made Inc. Magazine’s prestigious Inc 500 List as the one of the 500 fastest growing companies in the nation. She attributes her explosive growth to her ability to choose incredible staff and her innate marketing savvy. As an Expert Author, she is always willing to share her marketing advice through articles, interviews and speaking engagements. Visit her web site at http://www.postcardmania.com