I’m constantly answering newbie questions at the ListBuilding Club, which is great fun. Helping people to learn how to create an online business is probably the most fun part of being in online business, for me. And as the Project Manager for the LBC, I do lots of training for our members. I can tell you… there are questions that come up over and over and over again.

The biggest one is, “Why do I need a blog, and why can’t I just use a free one?”

I get that. People don’t have a lot of money to spend, especially in this economy. And they want to go the “Free” route every time.  Can’t say I blame them. When you’re making no money yet, online expenses can mount. Yet, the old saw “You have to spend money to make money,” applies online just as it does off. You cannot possibly have a successful online business without breaking a few dollars. You just can’t!

Host Your Own

One expense that is really important is that of self-hosting your blog. I know there are lots of free blog sites like WordPress.com, Blogger, ClearBlogs.com, and Tumblr to name only a few, but guess what? You can’t be commercial at any of those places. Blogger allows you to use AdSense, but that’s about it. The other sites will just shut you down without warning for marketing on your blog–even just posting an affiliate link, and you’ll lose every bit of work you put into it. No recourse, and no, they won’t give it back.

The cheapest and fastest way to have a powerful website is by setting up a WordPress blog. This comes from WordPress.ORG, and it’s open source (=free), search engine friendly software that is also so user friendly, it’s amazing. I’ve used WordPress blogs for years and I haven’t found an equal to them. Oh sure, people swear by Drupal, TypePad, and other platforms, but they’re just not as customizable and marketer friendly, at least in my experience.

So, you have a free WordPress blog. The next step is buying a great domain for it. At GoDaddy, the cost of a domain is currently under $10 a year.  That’s like 3 cents per day for your own domain, 21 cents a week, or 90 cents a month. Cheap! So, decide what your blog will be about and get a domain that includes a keyword for that topic in it. Keep it short, make it a .com, and stay away from dashes or anything hard for people to type into the address bar or remember. If you want to get maximum SEO benefit, register the name for 2 years. This way, Google will look at you as a more serious blogger, and it will be easier for you to rank.

OK… we’re up to 90 cents a month… cool.

Now, you need a place to host the domain and your blog.

The best hosting company I have found online (and I’ve been doing this for almost 6 years, remember) is HostGator.  Don’t get the minimum account because you’ll outgrow that much too fast. Cough up the dough for the “Baby” Gator account, which is only $7.95 a month if you pay for the entire year up front. That would be $95.40. Sweet! But if you can’t afford that, you can go the monthly route, and pay $9.95 a month for your account.

Check this out: For around $11 a month, you now have your own domain, a powerful hosting account, and with Fantastico (which is available at HostGator), you can install a WordPress blog with the push of a button. It will take you all of about 5 minutes to do it.

Your in business, baby!

Where else can you spend $10.85 a month and have a business? Only online!

Other concerns

There are other considerations, like you have to change your nameservers and such, but there is a solution to that, if none of this is making sense. The ListBuilding Club will take you by the hand and walk you through all of this in easy-to-understand videos. Brian Edomondson, my good friend and Chief Video Instructor, is a natural teacher, and he makes it all very easy for you.

Right now, there’s a trial membership going, so jump on over and sign up! I only wish that I had had the option of joining the LBC when I was starting out. It would have cut my learning curve by more than half.

Anyway, blogging is a great way to start out! AND, when the blog is on your hosting account, you can do anything with it you like. Nobody can tell you what content you can have or that you aren’t allowed to advertise. Plus, nobody can shut you down for that. Blogging is really a great way to begin, so don’t wait… get your blogging engines started!

Something that comes up time and again in calls, in email, on the phone with clients is that they can’t get started because there’s so much stuff coming at them all the time from people whose lists they’ve joined. They’re overwhelmed and unhappy and why aren’t they making all the big bucks they’ve been promised?

OK… I get that. I’ve been in this game for almost 6 years now, and I felt the same way at the beginning when I was a newbie. But I wanted to learn. I wanted to be the smartest and best damned Internet marketer on the planet, and I wanted to make all that money and have that Ferrari – Beachside – Buy Anything You Want, Anytime lifestyle, too. It was all so much fun and I figured it would all just gel in my brain one day.

And it did.

But though I knew a LOT of stuff (and still do, BTW), want to know how much good it did me?

NONE!

I was trying this and that. I had four blogs going. I was driving traffic ineffectively, and though I knew a ton of stuff, I wasn’t making ANY money! It was frustrating and time consuming and I couldn’t look away for an instant because well… I was sure that I would get the big break any second, and I really needed the extra money, and well… it just never happened.

In my case, I was lucky. Tellman happened, and my IM life was transformed.

Want to know how?… Come back on Monday and I’ll tell ya.

But, only if I get at least 10 good comments. (No “nice post” comments will do. Tell me your thoughts or what you’re feeling about all this right now!) Make a comment and the secret will be revealed. Otherwise…  Hmm… I guess you’ll just have to keep being overwhelmed.

OK, so I’m the project manager for The ListBuilding Club and totally love, love, love it. And why wouldn’t I? I’ve helped create it, have maintained it, and work on it 100% of my time for Overcome Everything. I’m prejudiced. But we have hundreds of people, if not thousands who would agree with me.

The site starts at the beginning with picking a niche, getting a domain name, setting up a blog and so on. I mean, it’s step-by-step video training that anyone can follow. It just rocks and we’re constantly working on what we have to offer to make it better and better. We really care that people love it and are able to use what they learn and take it to the bank.

But that’s not why I’m writing here.

I’m writing to tell you about our affiliate program. It’s awesome! I mean, where else can you get $20 – $29 a month from every customer you refer and pays for his or her membership? That keeps on coming! It’s an awesome site to promote, and something you can be proud to represent.

Want to join us?

http://EasySEOTricks.com/AA

Sell 50 memberships to the LBC and then, you can apply to be an affiliate for our high-end coaching programs that bring in MUCH bigger commissions. Show us you know your stuff and you stand to make a great deal of cash!

But here’s a cool thing:

Even if you’re new to this whole affiliate marketing environment, we’re there to help you. Every Friday, we’re putting on training teleseminars that will teach you what you need to know to promote and make money with our system. You’ll love it!

So, sign up now and be part of the team. We’re waiting to help you make the cash you need to get by in these tough times.

Oh wait???? What’s that? I mean, really. If you’re a good affiliate marketer, there is no recession. It’s awesome!

Email marketing is the most powerful tool you have! So, you need to improve the chances of converting with the people that do want to buy your stuff.

Join the ListBuilding Club

When I talk to people that are relatively new to Internet marketing, I’m astounded that they don’t see the value of building a list. Your list is the most important asset of your entire business! Without a list, you don’t make money, it’s just that simple.

Oh sure, there are some folks that have cracked the AdWords code, who know how to make AdWords pay off, but I guarantee that they’re also building a list around that activity. If they’re smart enough to conquer AdWords, they’re smart enough to know that the list will help them to make even more money, and not only that, but it will cost them far less cash. Emails are free, whereas we all know that AdWords is definitely not.

There are all kinds of ways to build a list, too. Obviously, you can put up a squeeze page and drive traffic to that. You can have an opt-in box on your blog. You can start a free site of some kind and pick up a huge list that way, or you can even buy a list through co-registration. But there are plenty of other ways to build a list, and if you aren’t doing it… good luck.

I spent the first couple of years online thinking that a list didn’t matter. I wasn’t making any money, either. It wasn’t until I connected with Tellman that he smacked me upside the head (virtually, of course), and said… “Start NOW!” And so, I did. And I have to say that my list means more to me than all the tea in England. Really. And my life is very different from what it was three years ago, too. It’s all because of my list.

Your LIST is your bread & butter. If you’re not building it… Start TODAY!

And if you need help with that, if you’re not sure how to begin… there’s always the ListBuilding Club. I assure you, it’s worth every single penny. Yes, I”m prejudiced, but I also know that you can’t find better training anywhere. We have thousands of satisfied customers, and I know that because they send us wonderful testimonials every single day. It’s really great to be part of that.

And it’s great for members because every single one of us at Overcome Everything cares. That’s our edge. We’re not just in it for the money. We want every single person that comes to us for help to succeed in a BIG way, and many have.

If you’re drowning out there and feel like you’re overwhelmed and don’t know where to start… Click Here and STOP the frustration. We really can help. And when your list is growing and you start making regular, steady money from it every day… you’ll “get” it, and be totally glad you did.

So, I was on a call today for the ListBuilding Club Ferrari Contest with Shawn Casey and he gave some really fantastic information about joint ventures.

His main point was, don’t just contact people to ask them to do something for you… Do something for them first, which is great advice, of course. And he went on to tell listeners everything about joint venturing like how to approach people, how to know if they will be good partners, how to get information about partners, and how to make joint ventures work well. Killer stuff. But then, who didn’t know that, right?

But then, he asked if I had anything to add, and well… how can you possibly improve on Shawn’s advice, right?

But then, I remembered what Tellman told me a long time ago, and that was that all joint ventures don’t include people with bigger lists mailing out for you, though that’s usually what new marketers think that joint venturing is all about.

The other side of that coin is where you joint venture because you need help. Maybe you aren’t a technical person and need help setting things up. Or, maybe you suck at copywriting, while someone else might be killer. I mean, there are so many reasons why you can partner up with people.

As Shawn mentioned today, a joint venture is where two or more people partner in business to achieve a mutual goal.

Sure, ad exchanges are joint ventures, or holding teleseminars for each other is a joint venture, or finding a business where you can help them to improve sales because of something you do better is a joint venture, too. But bonding with other folks to get your launch done is another cool way to JV. Don’t overlook it.

We have a premium level of The ListBuilding Club called “ListBuilding 411,” where members can ask a question each day and one of the Overcome Everything team answers it on video within 24 hours. It’s an awesome service, and I wish it had been available when I was learning. It could have shaved years off my learning curve.

Anyway, today, one of our clients asked how he could get 4 spreadsheets with multiple pages online so that he could collaborate with others. I was amazed that he’d never heard of Google Docs! And then, I’m thinking… Wait.  People know how to search with Google, but most folks don’t really get the power of Google!

Google Docs is a great way to store information online. It not only gives you the ability to get to it anytime you need to as long as you have an Internet connection, it gives you the ability to share with other folks and to keep it all private. Google Docs is great!

Of course, it’s not without limitations and irritations. Like sometimes, it won’t let you paste stuff in where you want it to go, or you can’t export or well… it’s just NOT as adaptable as MS Office applications, but it’s still worth the effort to get in there and try it. Why not? It’s free.

Google has given us a whole bunch of stuff that’s free and very helpful.

Google Calendar can help you plan your schedule.

Google Maps is more accurate than MapQuest, in my opinion, and with Google Earth, we can see our own street or what’s going on in London at 2 a..m. Why not?

Whatever would we do without GMail, and Picasa? Email and photos are all that some people do online, right?

Lest we forget, there’s Google Video and Shopping and blogs at Blogger.  And now, they’re even putting books online for us! There’s Google Alerts, so we can see what people are saying about any topic, Google Translate, and Google for our mobile phones.

But did you know that you can also create 3-D images at Google Sketchup, create your own keyboard shortcuts, let you see You Tube videos or Picassa images right in your Gmail messages, and a whole lot more through Google Labs.

Google is getting to be a very powerful resource (as though it wasn’t powerful enough already). Try some of the “hidden” perks of Google, and you might find a whole new world of stuff to help you or waste your time and not have to pay a single dime. Amazing.

Have you ever held a teleseminar with a JV partner? No? What are you waiting for? I mean, the power of teleseminars is E-normous!

When you get on the phone with a group of people and show expertise in your niche, they’re ready to follow you. They get it that you know your stuff and want to learn from you. They want to join your membership site or just pick your brain, but even before the call begins, people opt into a list to be able to get on the call.

When you hold a teleseminar, you’re getting the benefit of the other person’s list when they send people to your squeeze page to register. When you present on a teleseminar, the other person should be having people register at their own squeeze page and be getting the benefit of your list. So, you’re exchanging list members. You’re both building your list!

I don’t get it why people just don’t think to do this. It’s totally powerful and really important! List Building is all of it. That’s it. There are no magic weapons. Everything you do should be about building your list and a teleseminar is a perfect way to get that to happen for both partners.

Plus, when you sell your JV partners’ stuff on a teleseminar you host, you make money. You get half; they get half, right? When you’re a guest, you get to sell your stuff and they get half of your profits. Everybody wins on these things!

So, what are you waiting for? Find someone whose list is about the same size as yours and just exchange teleseminars. You’ll be so happy with the results.

Get it now… EasyTraffic Steps.com

We’ve done it again. Well, Tellman has done it again actually, and I’m pretty excited by this new coaching program we have going — ListBuilding 411.

How’s it work?

Members are able to ask one question per day, either in writing or on video, and a member of the Overcome Everything staff responds to each question with a video answer. It’s actually an upgrade to The ListBuilding Club, so that’s also included in the price, which is really sweet.

So far, we’ve been getting rave reviews for 411. It’s really cool to be able to help all these people, too. I’m managing the program, so I see all the questions that come in and am able to assign answering to the people that make the most sense.  With 14 of us with varying levels of expertise on every topic from copywriting to tech, there’s nothing we can’t handle.

I’ve found a couple of drawbacks from a customer standpoint. Some aren’t able to get their question posed clearly enough to be understood on video or we don’t get what they’re trying to say. So, we have to go back to them and get additional information, which delays their answer, or we try to answer the question, but it’s not the answer they wanted. But everyone in the program is very nice and we love working with them. Everyone gets their issues aired and fixed in a very short time.

If you’re working in a vacuum and don’t have anyone to talk to about this Internet marketing stuff (which only we IMers understand, right?), it has to be cool to know that there are people ready and able to help. Wish I’d had that support when I was first starting out. If you’re like me, you struggle to find the right stuff to concentrate on and you spin your wheels a lot. Getting someone who knows what to do and how to help you get things going in the right direction fast has to be relieving.

Anyway, if you’re one of those folks, I’m not selling here, just writing about a cool service. Nobody else is doing this! You can check it out at http://ListBuildingClub.com/411

I just wish I’d had the LBC 5 years ago when I started this incredible journey.

Have you been to an offline conference yet? If you’re brand new to this Internet business, it’s understandable. You may think,

I can’t afford it. I can get what I need right from the comfort of my desk chair via computer. I see a lot of the stuff on UStream, anyway, why bother?

Because at conferences, you make important friends.

You make relationships that last a lifetime.

You really need to start saving right now.  Even if it’s only $10 a month, put it away and when you have enough money saved up, put your butt in a car or in a plane and get out there and let people know who you are!

Here are some people I met  or know and got to visit with this week at JVAlert:

Carrie Wilkerson, the charming and brilliant, Barefoot Executive

Erik Stafford and his wife Wendy. They’re made for each other. Both very cool people.

Ross Goldberg, who I’m getting to know just a bit better. He offered moral support for my fibromyalgia, which was severe this weekend. Thanks for that, Ross!

Willie Crawford, along with Mrs. Crawford, who is very nice

Warren Whitlock

Joel Comm

Dan Nickerson

Adam Urbanski

The ever friendly and fun, Jeff Wellman

Felicia Slattery

Alan Bechtold

Gina Gaudio – Graves and her really nice-guy husband, Bill, who’s just a sweetheart

Wendy Y Bailey (Don’t call her Wendy, she’s “Wendy Y” I happen to think that’s cool.)

Carl Galletti

Bob the Teacher (Jenkins)

Ray Edwards

Michael Angier

Bob Burg

Paul Counts. Watch him. He’s a very smart young man.

EricaBiz, who stunned me with her brilliance

Chris Moos

Should I go on? I mean, really. This is a pretty sweet list, eh? I mean, they’re all uber nice folks and it’s a pleasure just shake their hands or to hang with them a while. That was the best part. Really!

But, I also learned some very cool stuff. Adam Urbanski is just charming to listen to, and I imagine he’s a pretty swell coach. Joel Comm gave some really cutting edge info about SMS Marketing, which really interested me. Bob the Teacher did an excellent presentation on teleseminars, though I’m pretty much all set with setting those up, eh? But for people who haven’t done them, he’s a great teacher. Hence, Bob the Teacher, right? He’s very good at what he does. Bob Burg was hilarious and a real pleasure to listen to. I already told you about Carrie, and well…

then, there’s Ken McArthur. He’s just a sweetheart, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him. He’s a great person and what more can I say?

So, you see? I didn’t know most of these folks before last year when I went to JVAlert. I just met Carrie in June, and she’s incredible. I love her energy, her sense of humor and her “mad skills” as she likes to say, as a marketer. Sharp lady.

And I made new friends of people whose names you wouldn’t recognize, but you will and I bet it won’t be too long, either. But new or old friends, it was just awesome.

I even got to hang with a couple of my amazing peeps from Blogging4Boomers, Cathly LaDow and Laurie Tossy. That was sweet! Wish I’d had more time to spend with them. Met some folks in The ListBuilding Club, too, like Daniel Perry, who is an attorney and was a judge for three years. He knows his stuff, and I regret that I didn’t have time to chat with him more. I’ll be interested in his new product, for sure.

The moral of this long and very animated story (Can you tell?) is…

Go to live conferences. Don’t waste the opportunity to meet folks. Except, pick your conference wisely. JV Alert isn’t one of the big impersonal conferences where the speakers are untouchable. Everyone at JVAlert is on a level playing field, and you can just walk up and talk to anyone. It’s great and a ton of fun!

OK… I don’t get a commission. I’m jes’ saying…

Here’s a video I made for Overcome Everything About Getting Traffic to your blog:

OK… Time for a Pat smackdown, people.

You know, I’m sick and tired of people asking me obvious questions. I mean, sure, “getting” this whole Internet marketing biz is hard when you get started. Trying to figure it all out is daunting and overwhelming, especially if you go off chasing after every pretty new thing that comes down the block.

STOP!

Do you think that I buy every product out there? Hell no. I bought one yesterday, tried it, liked it, and wrote to you about it here. But I don’t buy anything unless I know it will help me to move my business forward. And you should be the same way. Otherwise, your credit cards will be maxed out and you’ll be crying because it will take you seventeen years to pay them off.

But here’s the thing…

If you do buy something, USE it! READ it! Don’t join a club and then ask obvious questions about what’s inside it. This happens all the time with The ListBuilding Club and with Blogging4Boomers. People have legitimate questions, of course, but the ANSWERS are right there in front of their noses. Yet, they have never taken the time to go through the material in the course.

Guess what, people?

You won’t make it.

Why?

Because you don’t know how to find the answers you need. Nobody is going to hold your hand through this and show you every little thing you need to know. They just aren’t going to do it for you.  If you want to be successful, you have to do some looking and learning on YOUR OWN.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love doing Q&A. I do it twice a month for Overcome Everything and twice a month for my own business, and I love the calls. But I also get lots of emails. I must have answered at least 1,000 questions already this year and it’s only January. That’s awesome! I love helping people and I love to see them make progress and money. It’s a thrill to be able to help when folks just need something extra, and they often do.

But please… If you already have the answer–right in front of your nose, take some initiative and go find it! Otherwise, you’ll be frustrated and angry and you’ll never make it.

Part of this business that’s really important is that you have to learn where to find the answers. If you can do that, you’ll never be daunted. You’ll always know where to turn, and you’ll find success.

Don’t expect success to be handed to you because it won’t happen. Sorry. That’s just the deal.

So, here we go…

Tellman & Shawn won a Ferrari from Eben Pagan’s Altitude JV Contest. But it lives with Shawn in Atlanta, and they’ve decided to give it away! I asked Tellman why, and he said, “Think about it, Pat. I live in Vermont!” Well, yeah. I guess there aren’t too many Ferrari’s in rural Vermont.

And Shawn, well… he’d rather get you excited about making it big online.

True.

Get into the contest and you can not just win a Ferrari, but you can be Overcome Everything’s spokesperson! How powerful is that?

And in the bargain, all you have to do is be the best at following the step-by-step instructions inside The ListBuilding Club.

Wow.

Anyone can win this, and you can get in for just $1. Yep. One, slim dollar.

http://easyseotricks.com/lbc2

Check it out. Get excited! This is going to be enormous! We’ve been working really hard to make this the coolest contest on the Web. I mean, come on. Russell gave away a Corvette. That was cool. But THIS is a Ferrari.

Even if you just sell it, you’re a huge winner.

At least check it out. Everyone will come away a winner in this one.

You know, it sucks when things go wrong in cyberspace. And they always do.

Last month, the autoresponder I use in connection with a List Builder Pro account had a DOS attack. We got no notice of this, and the only way to find out was to put in a ticket to their support desk, which of course, they never answered.

But here’s the dumbest thing of all: I didn’t have my list backed up! That was really, really stupid on my part. So, remember this story.

I was assured by the List Builder Pro people that all the leads had been saved and would be restored. So, I waited. And waited.

Two weeks later, I got just over 2,500 of my leads back. I figured it might take a while to get everything re-loaded, so I waited some more. But nada. So, I wrote to the help desk again, asking where the rest of my list was.  We’re talking about 6,500 people. Not a huge amount, but a lot to me. My list was just over 12,000, and I was making good affiliate commissions in everything I promoted.

No response.

No nothing from List Builder Pro — Erik James’s program, to be exact.

Finally, I get this message like, “These things happen.”

No apology.

No offer to assuage my anger and frustration with their lack of responsivness — NOTHING.

So, by this time, I’m hurting and really, really pissed off.

It was definitely MY own fault that I hadn’t backed up my list since July. My fault. My loss.

But then, I couldn’t use the autoresponder, which is integrated right in with List Builder Pro, for a month. They charged me!

OK… no offer to reimburse for time lost — STILL nothing from them.

So, now, I’m like really frickin’ fried. I told them to cancel my account AFTER they delivered the leads that I had paid for. None of them had gone into my autoresponder, but they said they delivered the leads, right? I mean, I basically paid for leads that went into the crapper.

I’ve been with them for 2 years. This was the second time that their system just crapped out and they are totally irresponsible in the way they handle customers! I mean, you wait for weeks to even get a response to their help desk.

So, what did they do? They immediately cancelled my accounts — THAT I’VE ALREADY PAID FOR!

Basically, they totally suck. I was an affiliate for them, and told my people that the fastest way to build a list was with co-registration. This was a great service, and yadda,  yadda.

Now, they’ve totally made me lose all confidence in their system. Had they been concilliatory — sympathetic even, kind… NO. They’re arrogant about everything that happened.

What’s my recommendation?

If you have List Builder Pro,  back up your leads every day. You never know when this could happen again. If you’re using their autoresponder, stop.  I’ve found another one that seems pretty powerful called “ByReply” at http://byreply.com. Check that one out.

I contacted Get Response, but they won’t allow you to import co-reg leads, though they have a co-reg service. Makes me laugh. You can only use their service, if you buy their co-reg leads, which are overpriced. Kiss it.

iContact is totally too expensive.

I wish AWeber would change their policy re: coregistration. They’re still the best autoresponder, hands down. But I have to say that ByReply is much more sophisticated. Many more options and easy to navigate. I’ll let you know how it goes.

But the re-confirm thing  just sucks.

Moral: Don’t be dumb like me. Back everything up. Grr.

I have to admit that before I met Tellman Knudson, I was headed for nowhere.

Really.

I’d been online for about 3 years, trying really hard to make some kind of money. I had a couple of websites. I had a couple of products, one being totally lame-o and the other was great. Except, I had no one to sell the great one to. The bottom line was that I just didn’t know how internet marketing worked. I figured it was put a bunch of buttons and banners on your site and stick it into a traffic exchange.

Oh, yeah. That was the road to oblivion.

I really didn’t have any idea of how things needed to go down to be successful. I kept hearing that old adage, “The money’s in the list,” but did I listen?

No. I never really saw the benefit.

Well…

When Tellman found out that I wasn’t building a list…

Let’s say that I started to get serious about it about ten minutes after he found out. I finally got it. Jeez. And now that things are cranking, I’m smacking myself upside the head.

That was two + years ago, and I’ve learned SO much since that time that I’m very grateful. I knew hiring Tellman as my mentor was a good idea, but I never dreamed that I’d be working for him with all of the other amazing people at Overcome Everything.

Now, I have a list of more than 10,000 people, which isn’t huge, but it’s growing. I keep in constant contact with them, I’m making extra money every single month, and woot! I’m even winning prizes. Today, I won a Mino Flip Video Camera in the Traffic Geyser JV Contest. Not bad. I mean, I already have one, but as my friend and coworker, Mike Purvis, said, “You can never have too many.”

LOL When I grow up and am really moving, I’m looking for those Mac Book Airs, trips to Costa Rica, and big honkin’ Ferraris!

But the best thing about having a big list is that I have some really cool friends that came along with it. I mean, it’s not just about the money. Helping other folks to figure out this ONE piece to the puzzle and showing them different ways to do it is really cool for me. In fact, I have a Q&A session with my cool people tonight, and I always look forward to that. I love helping them to move forward and learn what they need to make money online, too. It rocks!

So, what’s my point?

If you’re not building a HUGE, MONSTER list of people you can relate to because they’re interested in the same things as you are, you’re wasting your time. Don’t chase every new program, every new system, just get frickin’ SERIOUS about list building. That should be your #1 priority.

With a list, everything falls into place.

I love the first Tuesday of the month. That’s when Kyle Battis, Brian Edmondson, and I do the monthly “Marathon” calls. We call them that because they last for three hours! During them, we answer questions about the content for the month in the ListBuilding Club and Internet marketing questions in general.

Why do I love it?

I just love helping folks who are new to this business. If I’d had The ListBuilding Club 5 years ago when I started with Internet Marketing, I’d be so much further ahead than I am now. And the ability to ask experts questions about what I was doing would have been invaluable.

The people on the calls are generally stuck with something. Either they need to focus on a niche, they have a technical issue that is easily solved by someone who’s been around a while, or they need explanations of the who, what, when, where, and why. I totally love being able to part the clouds for them. Some of the simplest things can be so danged frustrating when you start!

That’s what makes the ListBuilding Club so awesome. You can have a business up and running in a very short period of time, if you just watch the videos and take action! That’s the thing most people leave out. They watch and go, “Yeah! I should do that,” but they never do.  What’s cool about the members of the ListBuilding Club is that most of them take the time to DO, and they’re finding varied levels of success.

It’s awesome!

And I have to say that Brian Edmondson is awesome with video. His instruction is simple, but not simplistic. He’s straght-forward and has a good camera presence so that people warm up to him instantly. He makes the learning painless.

I could go on and on, but it’s because I’m kind of high right now. No, not THAT kind of high… The kind that makes feel good about helping people.

Love it!

If you’ve been marketing very long, you know you need to be building a list. Why? Because when you have a list of people who enjoy you and your marketing message, it’s a sure bet that you’ll make more money.

So, if you’re not sure how to get an optin box into your blog… Here’s the deal:

I had an email today from someone on my list who wanted to know how to get 100 people into his site. So, naturally, I’m thinking onto his list.

In itself isn’t terribly hard to do, right? I mean, put up a squeeze page with an ethical bribe and send traffic to it. Getting 100 people doesn’t take that long if you join a giveaway, do an ad swap, or run an ezine ad or two. There are tons of ways to get subscribers.

I know this doesn’t seem at all simple to people just starting out, and I was ready to go into more detail and help this guy to do what he wanted to do, but he sent me the page he wanted to build his list from…

A “You’ll make $2,000 a week! All you have to do is refer people to this program!”

And then, I felt sad.

I remember when I started online. All that stuff looked pretty good to me, too. I figured, well… If it’s working for them, it has to work for me, too, right?

And I built a pretty huge downline in one of those programs. It wasn’t quite as bad, not a wild claim. The site was offering tools that marketers can use. Trouble was, the stuff wasn’t happening. I mean, the site was new, but three months later, none of the tools were ready to use. So, I started thinking… Bull puckey, right?

As with most people who get caught up in stuff like that, it did absolutely nothing for me. Nothing.

I didn’t get the benefit of the list.

I didn’t make ANY money.

I had just built a nice big list for someone else. Plus, I had wasted my time and my money making it happen. I felt really dumb and very discouraged. I remember how that felt.

Had I know then what I know now.

If you’re still new and involved with one of those, “no work and all cash” programs, run fast in the other direction. Seriously. Don’t think that you can make money online overnight. It can happen pretty fast, if you go about it the right way, but you will have to work at it. There’s no free lunch.

So, for my friend (whom I already wrote to and suggested that he start with a squeeze page) and anyone else who’s involved in hoping for miracles that just won’t happen…

• Here’s step one: Learn about Internet Marketing from a trusted source before jumping in with both feet.

• Step two: Pick a niche, and it shouldn’t be Internet marketing, unless you love a whole lot of competition that is far, far ahead of you in the game. (Wish I’d known that one early on.) It’s possible to still do okay, but it’s a much harder niche to crack.

• Step three: Build a list. Put up a squeeze page and offer something of value for people to join. It can be a special report, an ebook, a teleseminar or even a series of teleseminars, a video, or a whole bunch of other things that can solve a problem that people in the niche you’ve chosen are having.

• Step four: Drive traffic to your squeeze page. Write articles, start a blog, make some videos. All that stuff is free to do and can help you to get traffic.

• Step five: Set up an autoresponder series with articles about your niche. Start with four really good bits of instruction or advice, and then, offer an affiliate product that is in line with that article.

• Step six: Deposit your checks in the bank.

Is that a simple plan or what? Seriously, it really is that simple. I didn’t say easy. It will mean work. And you won’t make money overnight, but you will make money. And you’ll build a list over time and build a steady income that you can depend on.

Pie in the sky? Nope. Just good, solid advice.

If you’ve read my blog before, you know I work with the uncrowned King of List Building, Tellman Knudson.

I started working for him 2 years ago, and then, I had about 200 people on my list. I thought that was respectable. LOL What a dunce!

So, Tellman suggested I start list building by using co-registration. If you don’t know what that is, co-registration is a way for you to advertise your ezine, newsletter, special report, or whatever with a group of other ads. The co-registration service does all of the advertising for you, and you’re guaranteed a certain number of names and email addresses each month.

This is NOT the same as buying a list. Never do that because it’s illegal. You only want people on your list that ask to be there by opting in.

Even with co-registration, it’s a double opt-in process. Someone sees your newsletter ad, checks a box saying that they want to receive your information and he or she confirms the email address, as well. They want to be on your list. See the difference? Anyway, my favorite co-reg service is List Builder Pro. You should check it out, if your list is small.

What’s a respectable size? Well, you can’t do much with the big names, unless you’re talking 10,000 names or more. It takes awhile, unless you’re good at joint ventures, which are hard to set up, if you have no list, right?

Anyway, after two years of list building heavily (It should be your main focus.), I’m seeing the results.

I respect and honor the people on my list. I’ve been bringing speakers to them for my Blogging4Boomers teleseminar series, and directing them to some cool free stuff that will help them to move their businesses forward. I also do Q&A sessions twice a month. And I send them offers, but only for products I know are good.

Tellman was right.

Tellman is right.

If you’re not list building, you’re missing the boat. I just got a nice check in the mail today and that happens a regularly these days. Pretty sweet. Want yours?

Always be list building! Always.

So, you can tell I’m back to work, eh? Yep. Running like mad, as usual. But…

I just had to write and tell you about my friend Mike Purvis’s new website, called The List Auction.

Even if you’re new to the Internet marketing arena, you’ve probably heard this more than once: “The money is in the list.”

It’s the mantra.

Guess what else?

It’s the truth.

If you don’t have a list, you had better start building one TODAY. Without a list, no money.

Yet, if you’re just starting to build your list, no matter how long you’ve been online, you won’t have a sizable list overnight. So, what can you do?

You can try co-registration. I have been a List Builder Pro member for a couple of years and it’s grown my list tremendously.  It’s reasonable and it works.

But it’s a monthly expense that some folks starting out just can’t afford.

What’s the alternative? Safelists. These are groups of people who belong to one website and who mail to each other. Some are non-credit based and some are credit based, meaning that you have to have enough credits in your account to mail to the other folks in the program. You usually earn credits by reading other members’ mails.

Well, The List Auction twists that notion a little and makes it more fun. You should check it out.

But don’t be surprised if you get a bunch of emails. That’s what safelists are for. So, set up a separate folder in Outlook to catch them all or open a GMail or Yahoo account for the purpose of just getting safelist emails. Then, go in and read them when you can.

I rarely use safelists anymore, but The List Auction might be something worth upgrading in and using religiously. I know for a fact that Corey Lewis uses them all the time and says they work great for him. I’ve decided to take a second look. Maybe you should, too.

Did you know that the big-time marketers all have something in common?

The have HUGE, big-ass, whopping lists of subscribers.

I mean, think not in thousands… Think in HUNDREDS of thousands.

When you have a list that huge, making money is simple. It’s just a matter of numbers. How many people on your list will buy what you’re offering? If you have 10,000 people and 2% of them buy a product with a $100 commission to you, guess what, you just made $20,000.

If you have 100,000… You made $200,000.

So, what’s the secret? Build a huge, big-ass, whopping list in everything you do.

Notice the optin box at the top of my sidebar? Yep. Always be list building.

That’s one tip.

Another tip is to check out Russell Bruson’s secret. He’s GIVING it away. He says it’s a tiny secret that has made him an extra gazillion bucks, and well… You think that’s worth $10?

That’s 2 Venti Double-Blended Green Tea Frappacinos to you.

It’s just a couple of bucks more than a theater ticket.

It’s less than a breakfast out.

It’s CHEAP!

So, here’s the deal… If you want this incredible secret from Russell, you just have to run over, quick like a bunny to http://easyseotricks.com/AE and pick it up.

I’m pretty excited about it. I mean, Russell’s a pretty smart guy, and if he’s going to show me how to do what he does… I’m down with that, pretty much no matter what it costs.

So, are you in?