Why You Should Blog

I've been blogging for a little over two months now. Many of my mentoring students have asked me for blogging advice. Up until now, I've been hesitant to teach much about blogging because it's not something I feel I ?know? yet. I feel much more comfortable learning about things I know. Well? I checked Alexa today and noticed that this blog has almost made it into the top 10,000 most visited sites on the internet today. I have seen success with many methods that are unique to blog promotion. I felt it was time to write a blog promotion post? BUT? WAIT! I haven't even explained why I have this blog. I can't really jump into getting traffic to your blog without explaining why I have a blog and why you should too; can i now Let's go back to my history. I did it? online without many of the tools offered to me today. I didn't have any products. I had no copywriting skills. My search engine ranking data was my key to my initial success on the internet. I would simply build a high ranking website for some market and sell the traffic from that site directly to those who had copywriting skills and products. Of course, I don't recommend that anymore. Having your own product and copywriting skills are multipliers to knowing how to get traffic. I now focus on all three aspects of your internet business and encourage you to do the same. With that said? don't underestimate the transportation business. Consider this. Who is the richest man in the world? Right. Bill Gates. It sells software. Software is good business! However, consider this. Who are the top 3 sites on the internet? Go check Alexa if you don't know. OK; do not check. I'll just tell you: 1. Yahoo 2. Google 3. MSN (Microsoft) Now look at the third one. This is the company that Bill Gates (the richest man in the world, remember?) founded. It is now playing on the internet in third place. Now; let's jump in here. What do these three sites sell? OK; take a moment. There will be a test. That is right. They sell traffic (or mostly sell traffic? Yahoo and MSN are a bit more diverse). Now isn't that interesting? The richest man in the world? who are going this way by selling software? now he wants to sell traffic. OK; that was a diversion. We'll come back to that later. What I wanted to tell you about was my experience selling traffic (which is still the biggest part of my business). I made a mistake. I sold traffic anonymously under company names. None of my traffic customers know who I am. They simply buy traffic from XYZ Corporation because it translates into revenue for them. XYZ Corporation has no personality. It's actually fully automated and most of my customers seem to like it that way. A few years ago I tried to change that. I started sending them emails teaching them how they can get the most out of my transportation service. I came late. They didn't know me and didn't want to hear from me. Then I tried one last shot (I'm glad I did) by offering them a special run that month. I think I did a two for one deal or something. Over 25% of my customers bought a new campaign that day. I made over $60,000 in one day with this one email. I thought it was cool! I still do. I can write a single email and make thousands of dollars in a single day. I think a lot of traders like it. The power of your customer list is incredible! If you can convert 2% of strangers to customers with a sales page, you can convert 25% of your existing customers to customers of another product with the same sales page. That's powerful! I tried with another product. It was a good product. It was mine. It was the search engine research itself that led to the traffic these customers were buying. In fact, I offered to teach them how to generate the same traffic I was selling them. It went down badly. Nobody bought. I have tried several other products. Nothing. Why? Some answers told me right away. Even though I wrote under the company name, they didn't know me. I will repeat it. They didn't know me. They knew my company. They knew my company provided great converting traffic, but they just didn't know me. Support from one company to another is not very strong. It's not nearly as powerful as supporting an individual. So I went on to organize Freedom Events. You know how they turned out. Based on the support of several well-known Internet marketers, they sold out. Lesson learned. To get that 25% number, you need one of the following: 1. As a company, you want to promote your customers and sell a special offer on your company's product that your customers already know about. 2. Do you want to be marketing to your customers as a person and sell a special offer on any product that you personally endorse? and you have never given your customers bad product support before. Did I want to do the latter with my own customers? not from another internet merchant. What is the best way to do this? The way I see it, a blog is the perfect vehicle for that. Since I sell products (and cross-promote them on the owner's site), I also promote this blog. I do this very early in the process. It's mentioned on the owner's page and it's also mentioned in the very first email most people receive after purchasing one of my products. They buy a product from a stranger, but very soon I introduce myself as the creator of that product by directing them (you) to this blog. Then I won't hide the blog behind some corporate image. You buy my products from a corporation, but do you even know the name of that corporation? Who cares what it's called? I want you to know me. That is the purpose of this blog. Now some people find this blog before they buy any of my products. That's okay too. Some people buy a product based on the sales page. Some buy because they know the author never produces junk. Some have a combination of these reasons. OK; so? Yes? you should have a blog. I suggest you build your blog between the 3rd and 4th product in your primary market. That's when I created this blog. This is also when you want to start cross-promoting your 3 or 4 products on their owner's site. Here are some other things I think are important: 1. Register your name for your blog domain. 2. Put your name at the top, not some cute blog name. 3. Share yourself. Don't post on your blog like you're a customer service rep answering the phone for a big company? do you never reveal anything about yourself? corporate script only. Chat with your customers as if they were dear friends. Don't include your home address or phone number, but in the context of the blog? what are you afraid of? Let your blog readers get to know you. 4. Fast often. People very easily get into the habit of doing something daily or hourly. It is much more difficult to get into a weekly or monthly habit. Post at least daily.