IM Dosh – Internet Marketing Cash

Archive for the ‘IM Myths and Partial Truths’ Category

Since your keyword forms the foundation of your niche, a profitable niche is literally built on keyword research.

Everything you do to establish your online presence begins with your keyword. You’ll use your keyword to select your domain name. (It will give you a slight edge in ranking.) You’ll add keyword focused content to your website. And you’ll promote those keyword rich pages, building your back links, working to get top rankings for your pages.

If your initial keyword research is faulty and you’ve chosen a bad keyword, you might find yourself up against a huge wall of competition where it could take forever to get your pages ranked.

Worse yet, after promoting your site to a page one ranking, you find there is no market, no traffic, for your keyword. All of your efforts were a total waste of your time.

So, what makes a niche keyword profitable?

A good keyword is one that people are searching for, one that puts you right in front of your traffic, and one in which your competitors are either light weights or you can see that, in time with back link building, you can overtake your ranking competition.

Obviously, your best bet is to go up against light weights from the beginning. Or find a keyword where there is little or no competition. This way your promotion will be easy and you can rank quickly. On the other hand, if you are up against some heavy competition, but you are passionate about your keyword,  have patience, and are willing to put in some work, odds are that, in time, you will rank.

So how do you begin to find a profitable niche keyword?

You can scour Amazon’s Best Sellers in each of their categories. You can go to the Dummies Books site and look over their listings. Google Trends will tell you what’s hot. Check Google News and the Wonder Wheel for ideas. Do an online search for “10 Top Selling Products.”

Profitable keywords offer a solution to a nagging problem. Keywords sought after by avid hobbyists can put you in front of some serious traffic. Or you could sneak up on a keyword by using trigger words, like “problem,” “solution,” “calculator,” “guide,” “how to,” “lessons”…and see what they turn up.  Finding keywords can be great fun.

Once you have your prospective keyword, you’ll want reliable data to be sure people are indeed searching for your keyword and you also want to check out your competition.

Where can you find reliable data?

The free Google Keyword Tool can give you a good idea if your keyword is being searched for, and a Google Search will lead you to your competition.

In the Keyword Tool, type in your keyword, let’s say it’s golf swing. Click search.

You’ll see what is called a broad match listed in the Global and Local Monthly Searches. Don’t stop there. These numbers can be very misleading since they will be inflated.

To illustrate what I mean, go to the far left hand column. Under Match Types add [Exact] and “Phrase” and click Search again. Now you’ll see three different numbers for golf swing..

Golf swing, broad match, has 450,000 Global Monthly Searches

“Golf swing,” phrase match (seen in quotes), has 368,000.

And exact match [golf swing] (in square brackets) gets 18,100.

Big difference.

When someone searches Google for golf swing and hits Enter, the exact match is golf swing. Phrase match results will contain any phrase that has the words golf (and) swing next to each other (in the exact order) in a phrase, like…a famous athlete’s golf swing can… While broad match will contain golf and swing in any order, as in, now is the perfect season to swing into golf.

So to get the best data possible when researching your prospective keyword, always search for an exact match. Depending on what how targeted your keyword is (a precise make and model number is very targeted) and the cost of what you are promoting (say $200 – $300), an exact match of 500 in Local Monthly Searches just might pay off (although 1000 to 1500 would be better).

Many gurus will tell you to search Google with your prospective keywords in quotes to check out your total competition. Some say under 50,000 total results makes it a good keyword. But let’s think about this…

Are you actually competing with 50,000 results? Or are you really competing only with the sites ranking on Google’s first page.

So logically, your competition has nothing to do the total number of search results. Your competition is the site sitting in the spot you want.

So evaluate your competition by first checking their off page SEO to see if your site is able to rank and therefore worth building.

Find out the amount and quality of back links going to your competition. See how long they have have been on line… Are you up against an authority site? (I mean, you really can’t go up against sites like Wikipedia)…or a huge, heavily backlinked manufacturing site?

There are many free tools to help check your competition’s off line SEO: Rank Checker, FireFox’s SEO Quake (an add on), Traffic Travis can help with both on and off page SEO. For more tools, search Google and YouTube for “free SEO tools” and be sure to check out seomoz.org/tools.

If it’s a go, start building.

Next post: On Page SEO

A major problem navigating the IM ocean are the many partial truths and directions that present themselves. You will have to do your best (not easy) to avoid “the kid in the candy store syndrome.” Lured from one shiny object – a beguiling course, piece of expensive software, or silver-tongued “guru” – to another can blur your focus. Ask yourself: What will this piece of  software do for me? Do I really need it now? What do I expect from this course? Will it bring me to the next step? Evaluate the “fit” into your overall marketing strategy. However simple or complex your plan, keep your direction and focus on your goal!

So what are these partial truths?

Partial Truth #1. You don’t need a website to make money. The question is: how much money do you want to make? Making money with or without a site is going to take work. It’s probably easiest to make money with a site. It’s a valuable anchor for your sales funnel. Having your own real estate, your own digs,  one with your own photo, allows you to become known, gives you credentials, brands you and identifies what you‘re all about. Think of your site as a place to welcome your “special” guests, have them sign your guest book, give them a gift of value, and invite them to the offers they are looking for.

Partial Truth #2. You don’t need to spend money to make money online. Relative to setting up a brick and mortar business, this is true. But you do have to be able, at the very least, to invest in a domain name and a web host. Don’t opt for freebies – your entire business can be wiped out at someone’s whim. To get things really going, it’s very important to have a sequential autoresponder for your list building.

Partial Truth #3. An exciting website is the key! One man’s excitement is another person’s clutter. Simple (even ugly) two-page, “to the point” sites can market very well. The real key is having a crystal clear objective and a site that reflects what your business is about. More important than design, is clarity of content. It will define who your customer is by clearly listing the benefits you offer to your prospect.  Talk directly to him or her.  Know what your prospect is looking for.  Testimonials add credentials. And a clear call to action ranks over dazzling design (which may even distract your prospect from your offer).

Partial Truth #4. You need your own product(s) to make money. Not really. You can become an affiliate marketer and do very well. Not everyone wants to bother with customer issues. As an affiliate, you connect your prospect to the seller and you are done.

Partial Truth #5. More traffic means more sales! True, if that traffic is targeted… if you have a sales page that converts and… if you offer what your prospects are already looking for.

Partial Truth #6. The money is in the list! Yes, it is. But your list must be targeted, fresh, and the people on it must want to buy from YOU. It is vital to cultivate your list and build a rapport with your live (as in living, breathing human beings) prospects and clients. Keep your list interested. Make sure they are excited to recieve your posts. Cultivate good will – give a gift, establish your credibility before you ask for a purchase. Generally, response tends to fall off after someone has been on a list for awhile. Five thousand prospects on an old list may not be as responsive as a fresh, highly targeted list of 1,000 prospects. Keep it fresh!

Partial Truth #7. Killer copy is the most important. Important, yes, but a one- or two-sentence opt-in page and audio/video are edging out killer copy on some sites.

Partial Truth #8. Video is the best thing since sliced bread. According to many marketers, it’s darned close. But if you’re not comfortable with video, you may be better off with good sales copy. Other options might include having someone else record for you.

Partial Truth #9. Offer great products/services/information and people will come. Yes they will come…if…they know where to find you. You can build a great home on top of a mountain, but if people can’t get to it or don’t know it’s there…get the point? Besides a great offer, you need build roads, avenues, expressways to bring targeted traffic to your website.  You can begin building with SEO optimization, article marketing, JV giveaways, posting in forums, PPC/PPV/AdSense advertising, social marketing, list swaps…. When traffic comes to your door, offer a free gift in exchange for an email address and have a sales page that can close the deal.

Partial Truth #10. You need a coach to take you by the hand and teach you. If you know someone who has done it, truly has the credentials, you can afford it,  and want to go the private coaching route, life can be a whole lot easier. But on the other hand, gurus can cost a small fortune, be a big disappointment… and there are usually no refunds. Valuable content is available online for the research it costs. With time being your price tag, you can still make IM “dosh.”

Internet myths abound. They exist on every level and come in waves.
The first wave holds the Big Three:

Myth #1. Making money online is easy! This is the wildest “fish story” of all. Truth is 90% of all people who try to make money on the internet, fail! The exact figure for those who really make it may be closer to 2% – 3%.

Why? Because it takes work, because there is a steep, ever-changing learning curve, and because information overload abounds. There is no one solution, no set-it-and-forget formula any more than there is one in any other part of living.

Another why? Because naïve, hopeful, hungry “ready to buy” prospects are drawn in by well laid out psychological sales pitches made by online “PT Barnums” – many of whom haven’t made a dime on the net, except for the one you’re ready to shell out.

Don’t get me wrong. There are very ethical people online who want to help, who offer quality information, step-by-step courses…but it is human nature to want to hear that it’s easy, that someone else will do all the work while we rake in the cash, drive the flashy car, live in a mansion and take trips to paradise whenever we get the itch. Hello…A little reality check is needed here.

And the story is a little more complex… The internet is changing so quickly that it’s difficult for even established marketers to keep pace. But on the other hand, if you’re willing to get with the program and move out of your comfort zone, it may be one of the most fertile times to get into marketing on the internet.

Myth #2. You can make a fortune overnight! Yup, you can! Just like overnight Superstars, who after years of struggling, paying their dues, refining their craft, and working their butts off, became overnight successes. When you know what you are doing, have the desire, the drive and motivation, and are willing to put in the work, odds are, the time may come when “overnight” fortune will too.

Myth #3. Anyone can make money on line!  Anyone can live the internet “dream!” Believe it or not, this has some merit just as long as you add in the above qualifiers.