Author Archive | Lawrence

Tony Robbins is fond of saying that “Success leaves clues,” and he’s right. Let’s look at how to use this to your advantage so that you can reverse engineer your way to success.

Say your goal is to make $10,000 a month with your online business, since that’s a very popular goal among Internet marketers.

How do you want to make that income? Perhaps you want to create and sell products in a particular niche, or list build, or do CPA, or build a membership site. Your first step is to decide what it is that you want to do and what niche you want to do it in.

I suggest running some numbers as well. For example, if you’re creating products then you need to sell 100+ $97 products a month to reach $10,000 a month. Or sell twice that many if you’re using affiliates and paying 50% commissions.

If you’ve got your niche selected but you don’t know what to do next, then your first step is to find every big marketer in that niche and get on their lists. See what they’re doing, what they’re saying, and especially what they’re selling. This should give you some terrific ideas in less than a week’s time. Write down all of your ideas, even the ones you think are silly or beyond your reach.

Now then, narrow your choices. Maybe you’ve decided to create a blog, build a list and sell affiliate products and your own membership site. Now you have a plan. You can get basic info from the Internet on starting your blog and list building to get you started.

Next, you’re going to analyze what your competitors are doing that’s working in terms of blogging, list building, selling affiliate products and running a membership site in your niche. This is information you won’t get out of any course. It’s been said that if you want to know the real secrets of what the best marketers do, then you should watch what they do rather than listen to what they say. That’s why you joined your competitors’ lists, to see how they’re doing what they’re doing.

Questions to research:

How are they getting traffic?
Where do they get their links?
Who are their affiliates?
What is their content strategy?
What is their unique selling point?
How do they structure their websites?
Who is their audience?
What is their website or product missing?
And so forth.

There are multiple tools online to help you do this which you can research on Google. This isn’t a tutorial I’m offering you here so much as a mindset:

Success is simple, because no matter what you want to accomplish, in most cases someone has already done it or something very close to it. You don’t need to reinvent anything, you just need to find out what they did and go do it yourself.

Mind you, I’m not suggesting you infringe upon any copyrights. Rather, I’m suggesting that there are no wheels that need reinventing. Furthermore, if someone else can do it, then you certainly can as well. You can outsource anything you cannot do and fill in the rest yourself.

And you don’t want to “copy” when it comes to content. Let’s say your entire strategy for earning $10,000 a month is to build a $97 membership site and keep it filled with 100+ members. Let’s also say that someone else in your niche is already doing that. Should you copy them? Not exactly. By all means use their methods for traffic and lead generation, since those are obviously working. But create your own brand, your own unique selling proposition and your own unique content. Furthermore, whatever it is they’re doing, you want to do it better in some way. This means delivering more results, or delivering those results in an easier way, or something that sets you apart and above the other membership site. This will make it easier to get and retain members.

Focus your efforts on taking care of your customers and you’ll find the money tends to take care of itself. As Zig Ziglar used to say, “When you help enough people get what they want, you’ll get what you want.”

Now then, don’t restrict your reverse engineering to your own niche. Many times you can gain valuable insights from other niches that translate nicely to yours. For example, you might be in the fashion niche and you see a financial membership that sends out a CD every month, or has a hotline, or somehow personalizes content for each member. Is this something you could do in your fashion membership? Perhaps you send out a CD of the latest styles and patterns. Or you have a fashion ‘hotline’ on your site that offers the latest fashion industry insider’s news. Or you have a feature that shows members how each new clothing line would look on their particular body build.

Mind you, I know nothing about fashion, in case you couldn’t guess. My fashion style is simple: If it’s comfortable and doesn’t make me look silly, I wear it. Perhaps there’s a need for a fashion website for people like me.

My whole point is this: Stop thinking you’ve got to start from scratch, or that every answer is hidden inside the latest marketing info product. The truth is you already have the capability to discover exactly what is working – because success leaves clues. All you have to do is play detective, follow the clues and get busy reverse engineering your own success story.

If you’re in the IM niche, you probably get the same emails I do asking: “I need to make money YESTERDAY, what do you recommend?”

Or maybe you need some extra money for a project you’re working on right now, or you’ve got an unexpected bill.

Here’s a method I sometimes suggest for earning a quick $500 or $1,000, and what people seem to like about it is how simple and straightforward it is.

Ask yourself what skills and knowledge you possess right now. Maybe you can write really well, or you’re good at building WordPress sites. Maybe you’re a graphic artist, or a photographer or videographer. Maybe you’ve got great people skills and you can act as an affiliate manager or set up joint ventures. Perhaps you can coach people on how to do something specific, or teach them how to find the perfect virtual assistant. I guarantee you have at least one skill or piece of knowledge that others are willing to pay for.

“But I don’t have a skill!” Really? Then you need to find dynamite outsourcers who do have skills you can market. You must find something that others are willing to pay for, and that’s usually a skill and sometimes simply a piece of very valuable knowledge.

Once you’ve identified your skill, set up a web page offering that skill for hire. A simple blog site will do, preferably on your own domain. Check out other similar websites to get ideas on how to set yours up.

Find blogs that are relevant to your skill and allow guest bloggers. For example, if you’re really good at writing engaging blog posts, find blogs about blogging. If you can troubleshoot antique engines over the phone, then find blogs about old cars. These blogs should have a bare minimum of 5,000 readers a month, and be sure they already allow guest posting.

Now write articles that provide awesome content for these blogs. Study each blog and write an article just for them that solves a problem or tells how to do something that is totally relevant to your particular skill. For example, if your skill is article writing, you’re going to tell them how to write the perfect article. If your skill is photographing products, then that’s what you’ll teach. Don’t worry about giving away all your secrets – some people would much rather hire a professional than do the work themselves. Link back to your website in the author’s box.

Don’t know if you spotted it, but there is a flaw in the steps above and here it is…

It can sometimes take WEEKS to get your guest blog post published. How do you speed up the process? One way is to link whatever you are writing about with something that is current in the news, preferably in the last 12 to 48 hours. You might need to get a little creative here but if you can pull it off then blog owners will be racing to publish your post. For example, if you’re a sales letter copywriter and the FTC just handed down new rules for what you can and cannot say in your sales copy, you’re golden.

Another trick for getting published quickly is to provide dynamite graphics, pictures or even infographics to go with your article. In fact, your infographic could even BE your article. And don’t forget to politely make a good case to the blog owners on why they should consider publishing your article as quickly as possible.

Continue writing articles and getting them published until the orders start coming in or your phone starts ringing.

The entire process could take as little as 48 hours or as long as 10 days, depending on how fast you get those first blog posts published.

Added benefit – you’ll make more business connections which can continue to benefit you in the future.

If you’re not outsourcing some of your work yet, you might be wondering what the benefits are. Obviously you’ll save time, but you’re trading money for the time saved.

So is it really worth it? Here are 7 benefits of outsourcing you may not have realized:

1. Not only are you saving time, but the time you save can be put to a higher use. For example, instead of spending time writing your next article, you could outsource the article creation to a professional and spend that time making contact with potential JV partners who will promote your products.

2. You don’t have to learn a new skill. If it’s a skill you’re going to rarely use anyway, or if it’s something that you simply have no interest in learning, you are much better off outsourcing it to a professional.

3. Even if you know how to perform the skill you’re thinking of outsourcing, there is a good chance someone else can do it better than you. Maybe a lot better. Do you really want to spend the next ‘x’ amount of your own hours to achieve mediocre results? Or do you want an amazing payoff that can only come from someone who skillfully performs that task every day of the week?

4. You can grow your business faster when you outsource. If you’re trying to do every task yourself, you can only grow as fast as you can work. But if you harness the skills of others, you can grow exponentially.

5. You can react to the market faster. Let’s say a new social media site hits the scene and you want to create a product that teaches people how to use it. If you do all the work yourself, it could take weeks. But if you outsource some of the work, you can have it done in days. Money loves speed.

6. Once you have a system that works, you can ramp it up on a large scale with outsourcing. For example, you’ve discovered the exact type of video to make to promote affiliate products and how to get it ranked high in Google. Now outsource the work to others and instead of creating and ranking two new videos a week, you can do 2 a day. Or even 10 a day.

7. You’ll be happier. By outsourcing all the tasks you either don’t enjoy or aren’t very good at, you can focus on the areas of your business that you truly enjoy. And when you enjoy your work, you will naturally tend to get more done and be more successful.

We are all familiar with social proof – placing positive testimonials on your sales pages and websites to show what others think of our products. However, there is a form of social proof used by many marketers that actually backfires and causes sales to drop dramatically, and it’s what they call “negative” social proof.

It works like this: You want to create a sense of urgency, so you say something like, “A lot of people have missed out on this, and you do NOT want to be one of them.” Or “Only a handful of people who read this letter will be smart enough to grab this offer before it’s too late.”

The problem is, you’re indicating that a lot of people are not buying the product. And since people tend to look to others for indications of what to do, this kind of social proof will actually encourage prospects to follow the lead of the majority and not make the purchase.

If you read the book Yes!, you’ll see Robert Cialdini’s experiment where he measured the effects of signs posted in the Arizona Petrified Forest to prevent theft of petrified wood. They tested 3 different signs, and the one that included negative social proof actually INCREASED theft.

The sign read, “Many past visitors have removed the petrified wood from the park, destroying the natural state of the Petrified Forest.” This sign actually TRIPLED the amount of theft because it demonstrated to readers that other people were already stealing, thereby making it seem alright for them to steal as well.

Here are more examples of negative social proof:

“This year Americans will produce more litter and pollution than ever before.” Potential result in thinking: It’s okay to litter, everybody’s doing it.

“35% of sexually active teens do not always use condoms.” Potential result in thinking: I don’t have to use a condom if I don’t feel like it.

“4 years ago, over 22 million single women did not vote.” Potential result in thinking: They didn’t bother to vote, why should I?

“50% of women report being harassed in the workplace.” Potential result in thinking: Lots of other men are doing it, I’ll do it too.

However well intentioned those messages may be, as you can see they are likely to have the exact opposite effect than what was intended.

So for example, if you’re marketing something to enhance the security of a WordPress blog, do not say “80% of WordPress owners unintentionally leave their websites wide open to hacking.” If you’re selling an SEO product, do not say “90% of website owners do no SEO whatsoever.”

If you’re selling a diet product, do not say “90% of overweight people will never lose the excess weight.” And if you’re selling a dating product for people over 40, do not say “Most single people over 40 have given up looking for their ideal mate.”

How can you avoid negative social proof? Don’t focus on how common the undesirable behavior is. Instead, show that it is rare and practiced only by social outcasts. Emphasize (where appropriate) that the behavior is:

– Illegal
– Subject to penalties
– Immoral
– Reprehensible
– Irresponsible
– Stupid
– Outdated and no longer acceptable
– (And best of all) Universally scorned.

By doing this, you can make negative social proof work for you rather than against you.

You might want to look over any sales material you have, and make sure you haven’t inadvertently used negative social proof. Just because 80% of marketers have unintentionally used it at least once doesn’t mean you should. 😉

And if you didn’t catch that last bit of negative social proof, you might want to reread this article again.

The New Year is upon us – time to talk about your goals, right? Goals are important, yes… But I’d like to focus for a moment on one of the real drivers that will allow you to achieve all of your 2019 ambitions, whatever they might be: Keeping Your Brain Happy so it can help you to accomplish your tasks and see your intentions through to success.

We all know what it’s like to try to try to work when our brain is in a fog or just doesn’t want to cooperate with us. We feel like we can’t get it in gear, like everything takes too long and the end result is sadly lacking.

Just like any other part of the body, brains can get tired. Suffering from cerebral fatigue results in a lack of new ideas, poor thinking, lousy problem solving and can even be a cause of depression.

Here then are 12 tips to keep your brain refreshed, energized and happy:

1. Mix it up. It’s just common sense that if you spend hour after hour on the same task, you’re going to get burned out. So instead of writing articles for 8 hours straight, try writing articles for 2 hours, researching your next product for an hour, returning emails for an hour, etc.

2. Don’t multitask important stuff. Sure, you can listen to the radio while you’re doing the dishes, but that’s because neither one requires your full attention. When doing something important like learning a new skill from a webinar or working on your next product, don’t be checking email or the score of the game. By not multitasking you’ll accomplish more in less time, and your quality of work will be better, too.

3. Stand up and move around. If you can, get one of those standing work desks and use it at least half the time. If you alternate between standing and sitting you’ll find that you’re more alert and your brain works better.

4. Take a quick break every 20 minutes or so. 20 minute “bursts” of work followed by 2-3 minutes of non-work can make you productive and keep you and your brain energized. BEST: Do something physical on these short breaks like push-ups, sit-ups or deep knee bends.

5. Engage your senses. Use some peppermint or orange oil to wake you up. Make your work space interesting to look at with thought-provoking art. Use colored paper and pens. Get a worry stone or some kind of object you like to hold and pick this up for tactile stimulation when you’re thinking through a problem.

6. Relax for 10 minutes every 90 – 120 minutes. Take 10 minutes off to meditate, walk around the block or work on a puzzle. Your brain will love this.

7. Work when your brain wants to work. Everyone has their own circadian rhythm. Some people are morning people, others are night owls, and many fall in between. Find out what time of day is your most productive and then schedule that time for your most intense and important work.

8. Prioritize. Work on your most important task first, when your brain is at its freshest. Getting this task done first will also give you a much needed feeling of accomplishment and free you up to focus on smaller goals and tasks.

9. Work less, play more. Seriously, if you’re working 100 hours a week then I suspect you’re only doing 50 hours worth of work. Think about it – how much of your time is truly devoted to working, and how much is devoted to “getting ready to work?” Don’t allow yourself to get distracted by emails, games, news, weather, etc.

Instead focus yourself on getting your tasks done as quickly as possible, and then leave your computer, leave your office and go do something totally unrelated to work. While you are out “playing” your brain will be rejuvenating. One unexpected benefit to this is you’ll find your brain becomes more creative and a much better problem solver when it gets periods of rest, relaxation and diversion from work.

10. Take a weekly vacation. No, I’m not kidding. Getting away once a week does wonders for every part of you, especially your brain. And you don’t have to leave your area to take a vacation. Go someplace locally you’ve never been to, take a class, go to events, spend the day walking downtown or in the woods, etc.

Is the weather terrible and you don’t want to leave home? Then grab that book you’ve got of nature photographs or travel shots and sit in a comfortable chair and transport yourself to the exotic places you see in the photos. In terms of benefits to the brain, it’s almost as good as being there.

11. Exercise. I’m not going to tell you all the reasons why you should exercise here – you probably already know them. And one of the biggest reasons is because when you exercise, your brain works better. You think better and more clearly. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if people who regularly exercise improve their IQ scores – it’s already been proven to increase memory and comprehension.

12. Feed your brain. Good nutrition is vital to your brain’s well being. If you’re eating processed foods or junk foods, you’re starving your brain. If you’re eating things like fresh fruits and vegetables and fish, then you’re feeding your brain. Don’t believe me? Cut out all junk food and processed food for one week. Add in fish oils or fish, along with plenty of veggies and some fruits. See if you don’t notice a massive difference in both the way you feel and how well your brain functions.

Be good to your brain and it will help you reach your goals this year, and beyond!

Yes, people come for the content, but first you’ve got to attract them with the image. After all, images are the first thing people notice about your page or post.

The right image can grab attention and create intrigue, mystery, curiosity and a host of other emotions that wrap their tendrils around your visitor and glue them to your writing. As an added benefit, the better your image is at capturing attention, the less important your headline becomes. A great image with a mediocre headline will almost always lure the visitor into reading your content, while a sub par headline on its own seldom will.

What can you do to maximize the effect images have on your visitor? Here are 10 keys:

1. Use at least one image per post. Every post should have an image of its own above the fold. And if your post is long, consider adding images into the middle as well to break up your post. These will provide welcome breaks to your readers, as well as enticing scanners to stop and read your content.

2. Look for images that work on a gut level. If your post is about how to prevent a house fire, you might be tempted to post an image of a building on fire. But how much more captivating would it be to have an image of someone experiencing loss – even without a single charred remain in the background? Look for images that play on the emotions, rather than ones that simply illustrate your story.

3. Use faces. Studies show that readers pause longer on an image that shows at least one face. If you don’t use faces, then look for something provocative or downright spectacular – something that makes the viewer stop in her tracks and want to know more.

4. Use images in your RSS feed. Just like blog posts, an image can make the difference between your writing being read or ignored. Think of the image combined with the headline as your book cover, and your post as the contents. People do judge books by their covers, and they do the same when looking through their feeds.

5. Take the time to get it right. Grabbing the first interesting image you see is seldom a recipe for stopping Internet traffic. If you need to spend as much time sourcing an image as you do writing the post, then do it. It’s worth the extra effort.

Consider purchasing your images. You can almost always find far better images when you’re willing to pay a little bit to use them, and the selection is far more vast and interesting as well. Keep in mind – a bland as toast image could actually HURT your chance to get your post read. Spend a buck or two and get something that leaps off the page and into your reader’s imagination.

If money is tight, there is a third option, and that’s using creative commons photos. They’re free to use but you MUST give the proper attribution to the photographer. For example, you can start a search for creative commons images here: https://search.creativecommons.org

6. Just do it. Adding images might sound too simple, but the fact is that it will almost certainly increase the time visitors spend on your site.

7. Consider taking and using your own photos. If you’re a shutterbug, by all means get busy. Using your own photos will personalize your website that much more, as well as building a deeper connection with your audience.

8. Build an entire post around pictures. With the advent of social media, you can now get traffic simply for having great images. So why not try a post that’s image dense, such as the most romantic places in your country, or the funniest photos ever, etc.

9. Don’t forget to add alt tags to your images. This can help you to rank higher in the search engines, bringing you more traffic.

10. Have fun. Not only is reading an article that contains images more interesting for the reader – it’s also more fun for the author to put together.

Can you really get 50,000 visitors to your blog in 30 days or less… and do it without lists, without JV partners, without name recognition and without advertising?

Jane Smarts was a brand new blogger who knew she would have to do something different to get visitors to his brand new blog.

And to put this in perspective in case you’re not a blogger yet, getting 50,000 visitors in your very first month is akin to winning the lottery – it rarely happens and when it does it can pay off big.

So what did she do? We broke his methods into these steps:

1. Choose a niche you’re passionate about. Jane chose corporate consulting because it’s closest to her heart, and it’s also what her company does.

2. Make some quick posts so it appears as though your blog has been around for awhile. Jane already had 10 or 15 posts from previous work that she could immediately publish. Hopefully you already have some content written, whether it’s articles, an ebook, etc.

Break whatever you have down into blog posts and post them. If you don’t have content already written, it’s up to you whether or not you take this step. By having content already on your blog it appears as though you’ve been doing it for a while, but posting inferior content that you rushed to write is never helpful if someone should actually want to read it.

3. Do your research. Jane researched what kind of blog posts take off in her niche, and which get the most shares on social media. Her research showed that she needed to write really long posts – between 2200 and 3000 words, and she needed to use mixed media that included bullet points, video, images, sub headlines, etc. Her research also showed that “how to” posts or posts that people can apply to get results were the most popular.

4. Apply what you learn. Once she did her research, Jane knew just what to do and she did it.

5. Think about distribution. You can write your posts according to what your research finds works best, but that still won’t initially get your article in front of people. Even the most shared blog posts in the world have to first be seen before they are shared, and if you have no traffic to begin with, you’ve got to find it.

What Jane did was tailor her first post specifically to the audience of a social news website that she read everyday. By tailoring it to that specific audience, there was an excellent chance they would appreciate it and share it.

6. Write amazing content. Jane spent 3-4 days writing her initial post. That’s right… 3-4 DAYS, not hours. Make your content great.

7. Use what contacts you have. Don’t have any? Get some. Jane started the ball rolling by having a handful of friends give her post a bump so that people would begin checking it out. The post was good, it took off, the rest was history.

8. Capture email addresses and ask for social shares. Be sure to place your opt-in box on every page, both in the right hand column and again at the end of the article. And ask your readers – if they found your post helpful – to share it via social media.

9. Rinse and repeat. Jane found a formula that worked, so she did it again and again, each time focusing and targeting her newest blog post to a very specific distribution channel.

You might not hit the 50,000 mark your first month, but if you follow these steps you could very well hit it within 2 to 3 months, even in a smaller niche. Imagine if you capture just 10% of that traffic – that’s an email list of 5,000 who you can now invite directly to every new blog post you make. Not a bad way to get your blog rolling…

You’ve got a new product or website, but you’re stuck for a tagline.

Should you spend a lot of time thinking up the best possibility? Surprisingly, no. There is a simple shortcut to writing the perfect tagline that will grab people’s attention and let them know immediately that your product is right for them.

So what’s the shortcut? Believe it or not, it’s letting your customer write your tagline FOR YOU.

First, a few things you should know about the perfect tagline:

1. It needs to accurately articulate what it is that you are offering, and it needs to position you positively with your target market.

2. It’s got to be original. Whatever it is that you’re selling, odds are there are plenty of others selling something similar. By being original, you can stand apart from the crowd to get noticed and remembered.

3. It’s got to be concise and precise. Memories are exceedingly short and the competition to be heard is getting tougher every day.

Now then, keeping those three points in mind, what do your clients tell you about your product or service? Better still, what do they tell you about the problem your product or service fixes? For example, career coach Julie Jansen helps people to find their ideal work. What do her clients frequently tell her when they’re in her office? “I don’t know what I want, but I know it’s not this.” That became the title of her book.

Another career coach kept hearing, “I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up!” She resisted using the phrase at first because her clients WERE grown up and she thought it might offend them. However, once she added it to the top of her website, she immediately experienced a dramatic increase in inquiries.

Two young software designers were showing a venture capitalist how their software worked. The investor suddenly exclaimed, “That’s so simple, my mother could do it!” Bingo! Their tagline was born.

An author wanted to write and speak about male-female communications. With the room full of people, she laid out a scenario in which they were all trying to communicate with the opposite sex but having difficulties. One gentleman yelled out, “Can’t she see I’m watching the game?” And her tagline was born.

If your tagline captures exactly how your ideal customer feels, you’ve got it right. As you can see, you don’t need to place pressure on yourself to find the perfect tagline – instead, simply listen to your customers.

To learn more, read the book: “POP! Create the Perfect Pitch, Title and Tagline” by Sam Horn. Then go improve the tagline for your product so you can sell more and serve more.

There may be no faster way to create a great product than by interviewing an expert in your niche. You set a time for the interview, prepare a few questions, record it, and possibly get it transcribed. Total time? Maybe 2 hours, tops.

But exactly what is it that you, as the interviewer, need to do to make the interview great?

To put it another way, how do you ensure that your listeners are going to stay riveted by the interview and be thrilled that they took the time to listen to it?

Here’s 17 indispensable tips for conducting a memorable podcast interview:

1. Have fun with it. If you’re all stressed out about doing this interview, odds are it’s not going to turn out well. You’ve got to relax and have a good time. Laugh. Joke a little. Smile. Did you know people can HEAR if you’re smiling? It’s true. And the more at ease you are, the more comfortable your guest will be, too.

2. Do some research. Know the person you’re interviewing, and by all means know something about the topic.

3. Confirm the details with the person you’re interviewing. This includes time and date, length of the interview and how they will be communicating (phone, skype, etc.)

4. Forget the umms, errs and ahhs. Please. If it takes you a second to think of the word you’re looking for, so be it. Don’t fill that time with incoherent sounds.

5. Do use the highest quality equipment possible. You can have the greatest interview ever, but if the sound quality is terrible then no one is going to listen.

6. Don’t ask yes or no questions. “Do you like to play tennis?” “Yes.” Have you been playing for long? “Yes.” Do you win every tournament?” “No.” How dull can you get? Always ask open ended questions that cannot be answered with simple yes’s and no’s.

7. Listen. I mean really LISTEN to the answers your expert is giving you. Your audience can tell if you’re just playing along rather than being fully engaged. So engage. Be prepared to ask spontaneous questions based on what you’re hearing. The best interviewers aren’t afraid to pursue new avenues and unearth new discoveries.

8. Don’t just ask “what,” also ask “why” and “how.” Learn everything you can from the person you’re interviewing. Go in depth and find out the reasons behind the reasons.

9. Remember that you are the interviewer. Don’t try to steal the show and don’t talk over your guest. You are there to elicit information, they are there to share their expertise. Don’t try to fill both roles yourself. If you do, you’ll annoy your guest and irritate your audience.

10. Don’t ask more than one question at a time. “How do you propose to do project A, and while you’re doing it do you also run the xyz program, and how do the two integrate into your discombobulator?” Sheesh. Think of your poor interview subject and just ask one question at a time.

11. Don’t say anything like, “I wanted to ask you…” or “My next question is…” Or even, “How are you?” Get to the topic at hand and keep the interview moving. Please.

12. Prepare your questions ahead of time. This will ensure you don’t get stuck for something to ask. Prepare follow up questions for each question. Or if the purpose of the interview is to teach a task, you and your guest might prepare an outline of the steps you’ll cover. In either case, this is a guide to help you along, not something written in stone. Be flexible.

13. Don’t keep your guest in the dark. Let them know beforehand what to expect and any pertinent details they should know. Offer to send them the questions you plan on asking. Thank them for participating. You should thank them when they agree to the interview and again in any conversations or correspondence you have both prior to the interview and after the interview.

14. Show your enthusiasm for both your topic and your expert guest. Enthusiasm is contagious, so share yours liberally. Your guest will appreciate your enthusiasm, and your audience will be more engaged.

15. Remember who your real VIP is – it’s not your guest and it’s not you, it’s your audience. You are doing this interview for them, so your first priority is to get your audience great content they want or need.

16. Relax. It’s not Mars-landing science, it’s just an interview. Don’t get stressed – think of it as an adventure.

17. Make mistakes. Look, you’re going to make them regardless, so why not put it on this list? You’re going to trip over your tongue, forget what you were about to say, or mispronounce a word you use all the time. It’s okay. Fix your mistake, smile, laugh, and move on. Your audience will love you MORE for the mistakes you make.

I got out my trusty calculator and did a little math. Assuming you make your own information products, what would it take to earn $100,000 in a year if you work with affiliates and pay them 50% commission?

$47 Ebooks: You’d need to sell 355 of these a month, or 12 per day.

$97 Teleseminars and Webinars: You’ll be selling 172 seats a month, or 5.7 per day. Think no one would pay that kind of money for a teleseminar? If your information is timely and valuable, they’ll line up for it. For example, stock market and forex trading advice would fit this category.

$197 Audio Courses: You only need to sell 85 of these a month, or 2.9 per day. Now who’s going to pay $197 for an audio course? Actually, a lot of people. The trick is to make a big promise, record on a library of CD’s, and make sure you fulfill that promise. Example titles might be; 7 Days To Speaking Confidence or perhaps Improve Your SAT Scores by 33% In Two Weeks or even How To Become A Master Pick Up Artist Practically Overnight.

$497 Video Courses: I know what you’re thinking – who’s going to pay $497 for a video course? The truth is, many people have paid TWICE that amount. Sample title? How about… How to Generate a Six Figure Income in 90 Days. Oh yes, and to earn $100,000 a year using affiliates at 50% commission, you’d only need to sell 33.5 a month. That’s practically one per day.

Now then – would you rather make 12 sales a day, or 1 sale a day? Are you ready to step up and start selling big ticket products?

And by the way, other products you can sell for $497 and MORE are…

– Home Study Courses (video, audio and written material)
– Online Study Courses (video, audio and written material, plus it’s more interactive and more likely to actually be used by the buyers.)
– Seminars and Workshops
– Group Coaching

So let me ask you a question: What if you put on a killer online study course and you charged $997 – how many sales would you need to reach that $100,000 mark (assuming all sales were made through affiliates?) Just 16.7 per month.

Or what if you charge $2,000 for your seminar – you’d only need 100 attendees to make a $100,000 payday.

Or if you charge $300 a month for group coaching – you’d need just 55 members.

And in any of the above scenarios, what if you didn’t use affiliates? What if you made all the sales yourself? Then of course you’d only need half as many sales to make just as much money. So in the $997 product example, you’d only need 8 or 9 sales a month to generate a $100,000 income.

If you’ve been paying attention here, you might have noticed I left out one major possibility. Do you know what it is?

Recurring subscriptions or membership sites. 355 members paying $47 a month yields $200,000 – half for you and half for your affiliates. Can you retain 355 for the full 12 months? You’ll have to offer killer content and incentives to come close.

One more thought – what if you do a combination of the above? Perhaps you choose two things, or three or four. Then instead of earning $100,000, you’re earning $200,000 or more.

I’ll let you in on a secret: We tend to get so bogged down in day to day thinking that we forget to step back and look at the big picture. And so is it any wonder that we think small, instead of thinking in numbers like these? You can indeed attain these marks and more, but the first step is to think the thoughts and the second is to believe you can do it.

And you already know the third step – take action on a massive scale and don’t stop until you reach your goal.