A Quick-Start Guide for the Internet Entrepreneur
Archives: Daily Issues
Issue #2305
- WEALTHY: Keep your panic in check! (Rick Pendergraft)
- HEALTHY: 4 drug-free ways to protect against heart disease (Shane Ellison)
- WISE: J. Paul Getty on entrepreneurship
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- 6 steps to finding the market for your Internet business (Michael Masterson)
- Why YouTube didn’t turn out the way its founders expected
- It’s Good to Know… about depositing checks from home
- Add "magniloquent" to your vocabulary
Your St. Patrick’s Day Gift From Early to Rise
Top o’ the morning, and here’s a special St. Patrick’s Day gift to YOU from Early to Rise!
We’re going to buy you a drink to toast the holiday.
Yes, you heard right. Like a pint of Guinness? It’s on us. Prefer a nice Jameson on the rocks? Our treat. Coffee or tea more your style? Be our guest.
Okay, there is just one catch…
You’ll need to “collect” your gift in person, exactly one month from today.
Just register for our Profits in Paradise conference today, where you’ll get dozens of powerful recession-busting, retirement-saving, and breakthrough income-boosting strategies.
Then, after you’ve signed up, (or if you are one of the nearly 200 Early to Risers already registered) print out this offer and bring a copy with you to Orlando.
That’s it! When you meet us at the conference in Orlando, one of our friendly ETR staffers will greet you, and we’ll have a toast to the holiday – AND a toast to the commitment you’ve made to help secure your financial future by coming to this breakthrough profit-taking event.
Oh, almost forgot one other “catch”. You must mention the top secret code “Green317” to get your gift. But keep it quiet, we don’t want everyone getting in on this deal.
So register for the conference today (the price is going up $100 in a few days) and we’ll see you in sunny and warm Orlando Florida in a month! And whether you’ll be able to join us, or not…
Erin Go Bragh!
The Best-Laid Plans
As an investor, you’ve done your research. You’ve laid out your plans. All your drivers line up perfectly. But then some outside force comes in and changes everything. What do you do?
You stick to your guns.
Case in point: a recent day where everything was going great for me. I had two open put positions and the market was down sharply on the day. Then at 3:30 p.m., just 30 minutes before the closing bell, CNBC came out with a report about a proposed bailout for a troubled bond insurer. The report, which wasn’t yet confirmed, sent the Dow soaring over 200 points in the last half-hour of trading. The two puts I was sitting on both dropped as their stocks jumped in value, even though neither of the companies stood to benefit from the bailout plan.
But I didn’t panic. You see, the drivers that got me into those trades were still in place. So I kept the positions open.
The next trading day, both stocks moved back down. One dropped sharply and the other moderately, despite the fact that the overall market was higher. Had I panicked and gotten out of my two puts, I would have taken losses of over 50 percent on both of them. As it turned out, I still took a loss of 50 percent on one, but the other one came back and I was able to close it at a 50 percent gain.
Keep your emotions in check. Base your buying and selling decisions on solid analysis. If you are in a trade and the drivers that got you into the trade are still in place, be disciplined and don’t react to the news. Your wallet will thank you.
[Ed. Note: Rick Pendergraft is a professional trader and market analyst. In Rick's new investment service, he reveals how you can make hundreds - even thousands - of dollars just for playing a simple game of "guess the pattern." Learn more here.]
"There is only one way to make a great deal of money; and that is in a business of your own."
J. Paul Getty
A Quick-Start Guide for the Internet Entrepreneur
I recently got an e-mail from a man I’ll call Jim, a longtime ETR reader. His question is probably the most common question I get. If you are interested in breaking into the Internet, pay attention. What I have to say to Jim might give you the information you need to get started.
Jim writes:
"I have been struggling with the idea of starting my own Internet-based business. The question is, how and with what product or service?
"I have been a loyal fan of ETR for many years now, and you guys throw so many sound ideas and businesses at me it gets a little confusing. I would like to start small with some proven methods and techniques and build from there. I do not have countless thousands of dollars to experiment with, nor do I have the luxury of being able so sit in front of my computer day in and day out. I need your help to get me started in the right direction with a system that will hopefully start generating some return fairly quickly.
"I believe in and trust your advice more so than anyone out there when it comes to building an Internet-based business – or any other type of business, for that matter. Please help me make this the year I finally took the plunge and started achieving success!"
Everybody knows what a great opportunity the Internet offers. It is the only medium where someone without a lot of money can start a multimillion-dollar company. There are lots of good programs available that teach the ins and outs of Internet marketing. But choosing the right product or service to market… there’s the rub!
I’m going to give Jim some general advice. And then MaryEllen Tribby (ETR’s publisher and CEO) and Patrick Coffey (ETR’s Director of Internet Marketing) will jump in with some specific suggestions.
Which product to choose is a big question. Not the kind that can be answered simply and quickly. It depends so much on you – who you are, who you want to be, what you know, what you don’t know, etc.
That said, a few general suggestions apply.
First, and most important, it is always best to start a business in or around an industry/area that you understand. So many of the most expensive mistakes first-time entrepreneurs make are "outsider" mistakes – errors that someone with experience in the field would not have made.
Lots of first-time health publishers, for example, spend too much time explaining the disease or health problem they hope to cure. They do so both in the publications they create and the promotions they use to sell those publications. What these novices don’t understand is that the most active health buyers don’t need to know more about their problems. They can find out all they want to know on the Internet – for free. What they need are solutions.
So the first thing you must do is make a list of all the things you know about. Start with the business you are in (or employed by). But don’t stop there. Include all your hobbies and interests too. You don’t have to have any professional experience to know enough about a subject to start a business based on it.
I have a friend who started a successful business providing advice about astrology. She’d never taken a course in it or received certification. But she’d read about it for 30 years, and her knowledge was deep and wide. Because of that, she began her enterprise with a good idea of what kind of astrology she would practice and what kind of products and pricing would work.
Another friend started a successful Internet business selling martial arts information. He was a world-class black belt who had been competing for 20 years. He knew the industry inside and out. So he had some good ideas about new and exciting instructional videos he could produce that really caught fire.
This brings us to my second-most-important suggestion: If you are not an expert at direct marketing, you should become one before you spend a nickel on your new business.
I cannot overstate the importance of understanding the techniques of direct-response marketing. Direct marketing is the primary method for generating profits on the Internet. Other forms of advertising – from public relations to event marketing to social media and branding – are usually not nearly as effective.
Luckily, there are plenty of good information products and educational programs available that teach direct marketing for the Internet. On top of the list, I’d put ETR’s own Internet Money Club, The Magic Button, and Instant Internet Income. But I’d also recommend Bob Bly’s Internet Marketing Retirement Plan.
My third and final suggestion is this: In addition to focusing on an industry you are already familiar with and becoming an expert at direct marketing, you must learn the fundamentals of entrepreneurship. Starting a business can be a daunting task for the beginner. Most of those who try fail. And with good reason: They make some very basic mistakes.
The biggest mistake first-time entrepreneurs make is spending too much of their time and money on all sorts of secondary business concerns (getting business cards, setting up a website, finding a business location). But when you’re starting any new business, your priority has to be on making sales. In fact, at this stage of the game, at least 80 percent of your time should be devoted to selling.
To bring yourself up to speed, I recommend that you read Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero to $100 Million in No Time Flat. The book is based on my own experiences with building small businesses. It’s all about how to get your business off the ground and continue to grow it.
Okay. Those are my general suggestions. Now, here’s some specific advice from MaryEllen and Patrick:
* To develop your marketing materials, hire a copywriter who has in-depth and up-to-date knowledge of your niche. They should be on the cutting-edge of their specialty and always learning, whether it’s the financial markets or alternative health. "I never hire a copywriter who says they can write about anything," says MaryEllen.
* Do some quick research, then TEST your idea. Says Patrick, "One of the biggest problems I see is that people will take too much time analyzing what market to get into. I’ll talk to people who have been studying one of our programs for months and they’ll say, ‘I’m still in the market research stage.’ In my opinion, market research for a new online business should take no more than a week."
A week is plenty of time to decide what to sell. In fact, it’s a generous amount of time. At ETR’s annual 5 Days In July Internet Marketing Conference, attendees have to make this decision in a day.
To figure out what market to enter, you need to look for two things:
- Are people looking for this information?
- Are people buying this information?
"And," says Patrick, "you can get the answers to these questions very quickly with a few key strokes.
"One of the best ways to find out who is looking for what is with a free tool like WordTracker. And to determine if people are buying, simply enter a few search phrases for your product in Google. Then check the Web pages of the advertisers that come up. The fact that they’re paying for advertising and selling stuff is a good indicator that the market they’re selling to is buying.
"Sign up for e-mail lists of potential competitors, study their marketing materials, and even purchase some of their products. After that, you immediately begin working on your own offer so you can start testing. That’s what students of our Internet marketing programs who become most successful do."
Will all the ideas you’ll come up with work? No. But the only way you’ll find out is by trying to sell to the market. If an idea does not work, simply try to re-work the offer or explore a new idea.
* Remember that starting an Internet business – just like beginning any worthwhile venture – will take work. In his e-mail, Jim talked about wanting to generate some return "fairly quickly," despite the fact that he does not "have the luxury of being able to sit in front of [his] computer day in and day out." You need to have realistic expectations when you begin a new business. And one thing you must be prepared for is that it takes time and energy.
One last piece of advice from Charlie Byrne, ETR’s Editorial and Creative Director: Get started. Now. By no means is this all you need to know about starting an Internet business. But the best way to get it going is to begin. Ready, Fire, Aim. You can take time to adjust your product or marketing later. What’s most important is taking that initial leap.
[Ed. Note: What are the biggest problems you've faced as an Internet entrepreneur? How have you resolved your most pressing challenges? Let us know at ReadeFeedback@gmail.com.
For more information on how to get your Internet business off the ground, take a look at our Internet marketing and business-building products.]
A “Dumb” Way To Make Money Online
Listen: If you want to impress your friends and family with how you made a killing online by using all sorts of high tech wizardry and Internet knowledge, that’s fine. But this chance won’t be interesting for you…
On the other hand, if you don’t mind using an almost too easy system for having a chance at large online profits, then this new program is right up your alley. You just follow 3 easy steps and then push a button. Then just picture it as your first profits almost automatically roll in!
And then repeat this process over and over. There’s no limit to how often you can keep pushing a button that can keep fattening your bank account. This is for real and 100% verifiable. To see for yourself, click here…
Worth Quoting: Chad Hurley (Co-Founder of YouTube) on Listening to the Market
"As you start building the product, don’t assume that you know all the answers. Listen to the community and adapt. We had a lot of our own ideas about how [YouTube] would evolve. Coming from PayPal and eBay, we saw YouTube as a powerful way to add video to auctions, but we didn’t see anyone using our product that way, so we didn’t add features to support it."
(Source: Business 2.0 )
One Damn Good Reason to Avoid Cholesterol-Lowering Drugs
By Shane "The People’s Chemist" Ellison, M.Sc.
I’ve been called a lot of things. Science Nerd… Professor… and Cholesterol-Lowering Drug Nazi are among those that can be mentioned here. The only one I’ll admit to is being a Cholesterol-Lowering Drug Nazi.
Cholesterol-lowering drugs (statins) amass billions of dollars each year pretending to be a safe and effective way to protect against heart disease. Yet science shows that these drugs represent a clear and present danger to your health. In addition to lowering cholesterol, they elicit some really nasty side effects. Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS) is just one of them.
ALS occurs when cells of the nervous system (brain and spinal chord) become inactive. This can be caused by many cellular dysfunctions. But it’s usually from a protein entanglement within the nerve cell. Once tangled, these cells can no longer pass electrical messages through the body, resulting in a loss of voluntary muscle control. As time passes, muscle wasting (a Science Nerd would call it "atrophy") develops. Victims of ALS usually die from the inability to breathe when muscle loss has reached an extreme.
The national average of those who suffer from ALS is a mere .0005 percent. But – sit down for this one – among those who reported suffering from "drug-induced ALS," nearly a third were using cholesterol-lowering drugs! Apparently, this class of drugs can "tangle" something known as "tau proteins."
But protecting yourself from premature heart disease does not mean you have to put yourself at risk of wiping out your nervous system. You can do it with four simple tactics: Minimize your sugar intake, take part in interval training, maintain healthy vitamin D levels by spending time in the sun, and supplement with fish oil to boost your omega-3 levels.
[Ed. Note: Shane Ellison (www.thepeopleschemist.com) is an author, organic chemist, and contributor to ETR's free natural health newsletter. He is a two-time recipient of the prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Institute Research Grant for his research in biochemistry and physiology. An internationally recognized authority on therapeutic nutrition, he is the founder of The AM-PM Fat Loss Discovery package. Click here to learn more.]
It’s Good to Know: Depositing Checks From Home
The ATM freed bank customers from having to wait in long lines to deposit checks. And soon, this simple transaction could be taken care of from the comfort of your home. Several banks are considering adopting technology that would allow customers to scan checks with their home computers, and then submit them to the bank over the Internet.
This system – Remote Deposit Capture – has been in widespread use for several years among business clients. A banking services company recently modified it for individuals and has been lobbying banks to adopt the innovation. Check with your bank to see if they offer it.
(Source: CNN)
The World Is Shrinking… and the Opportunities to Make Money With This “Global” Economy Are Nothing Short of Staggering! If You Know How…
Imagine how well your business would be doing if you could slash your costs by more than 49% while boosting your profits by more than 57%.
You can do it… if you know how.
Today, as a matter of fact, all the Fortune 500 companies are doing just that, and they’re posting record-breaking profits by taking advantage of the “Global Economy.”
Unfortunately until now, only big companies could even think of doing this. But not anymore. Now it’s your turn.
Click here to find out how you can put the “Global Economy” to work for you.
The global borders are shrinking… The world’s becoming a smaller place… Will you just stand there watching opportunity go by or will you seize the moment and put the “Global Economy” to work for you? Click here to read more…
Word to the Wise: Magniloquent
"Magniloquent" (mag-NIL-uh-kwent) refers to lofty or grandiose speech or expression. The word is from the Latin for "great" + "to speak."
Example (as used by Algis Valiunas in Commentary): "[Wallace] Stevens did for American poetic language what Saul Bellow was to do for prose, extending its boundaries, taking in the magniloquent, the arcane, the plainspoken, the gaudy, the low-rent."
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker ... build your self-confidence and intellect ... increase your attractiveness to others ... just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR's new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2008
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