This concludes the end of the year. And as year-end traditions go, those irresistible “best-of” lists are everywhere.

For fun, I decided to do an internet marketing edition of one of those lists. I know it’s a little indulgent and more than a little incestuous due to the tiny size of our niche, but I bet you’re a sucker for this as much as I am.

So the Best in Internet Marketing 2009… Here’s an overview of the various categories:

• Top 10 Internet Marketers
• 3 Biggest Shockers
• Top 5 Products
• Top 5 Online Marketing Breakthroughs
• 5 Bold Predictions for 2010
• Puppet String Marketing Products of 2009

Without further ado…

1) Ryan Deiss and Perry Belcher

I know I’m cheating by including 2 marketers instead of one. But these two are inseparable and boast of some of the best “good cop, bad cop” chemistry since the Lethal Weapon series. Awesome marketing insights and sharp-as-nails business acumen make them the marketing role models I wish I had years ago. These guys are the real deal.

2) Mike Hill

Mike Hill has been the secret weapon of many, many multi-million dollar corporations. He has pioneered a lot of the CPA offers we promote today, and has paved the way for Acai Berry, Teeth Whitening and Colon Cleansing to become the million-dollar niches they are today. He’s also a really big-hearted person and has even given me an unforgettable wedding gift.

3) Amish Shah

Some people call him the top CPA affiliate marketer in the world. I’m inclined to think so. His manic testing, grasp of human psychology and business smarts have put him way above the level of many other established marketers in his hyper-competitive domain. Recent props from Frank Kern will propel his already shining star even further.

4) Mike & Vishen from MindValley

The MindValley boys are going to be speaking at Yanik’s Underground 6 event  next year. And now… the doors will be flung open to those whom I feel to are among the world’s top underground online marketers. The only reason I know about this is because I used to be copy chief for these guys. These guys are all about marrying Silicon Valley-level technology, world-class email marketing and  topgrading to create 6 figure DAYS on a regular basis.

5) Marty Rozmanith

He’s on this list because he’s the man behind 2 of my top 2009 products WordPress Direct and CPA Ninjas. I rarely follow other marketers so closely. I even more rarely buy something a marketer’s put out. Most people produce derivative info or badly-coded software but whatever this guy handles is top notch. Learned a ton and Wordpress Direct is my single best investment this year, and I make plenty.

6) Tim Schmidt

He’s not one of those guru types but he’s introduced a whole new way of doing continuity programs that’s going to revolutionize the way we do membership sites in the years to come. Called Association Marketing, his 80% stick rate and other staggering figures make mincemeat out of the far inferior forced continuity models introduced by Mike Filsaime and Russel Brunson of yore.

7) “The Barefoot Exec” Carrie Wilkerson

There’s an old internet marketing adage that says “all you need is one idea to put money in your pocket”, and you see this on countless IM sales letters. Well, the reason is that it IS true. Carrie gave me just one idea in the early days of the business to come out with my flagship product the Twitter Salvation System, and we have hundreds of buyers since. Plus, of course… She has an iron-clad grasp of personal branding and social media.

8.) Robert Plank and Jason Fladien

These guys are synonymous with the words “Speed of Implementation”. In the space of less than 12 months, I’ve seen them churn out no less than a whopping 22 products between them. With them, quantity doesn’t compromise quality though, and these guys are a boundless guide to smart resourceful strategies that you don’t need a lot of money to implement.

9) Andy Jenkins

In my opinion, the former Stompernet CEO has ascended to the pantheon of the email marketing Gods where deities like Frank Kern, Matt Furey and Dave Dee now reside. And that’s for starters; his SEO and e-commerce teachings have already become the stuff of legends. After all, making $25,000 off of a fake sword site really deserves recognition of some sort.

10) Peter Parks

Though not as well-known as Amish Shah, Aymen or the rest of the CPA Cartel, he has successfully cut a swath as a really smart superaffiliate to watch out for. His mastery of little-known licensing strategies and Web 2.0 marketing has brought some much needed innovation to the tired affiliate marketing space.

Perry Belcher retiring

I consider Perry a friend. I know his name has been synonymous with controversy over the past few years, but I still consider him one of the most brilliant marketers of his generation. The next Vincent James, I dare say. So imagine my shock when all his social media accounts got deleted and the revelation of his retirement from the IM scene was written on his blog. You’ll be sorely missed, Perry.

Google shutting down 100,000 accounts

Those in the scene know Google ain’t the biggest fans of us online marketers. But what they did next was just balls out insane. In the sweeping move that may change the face of the affiliate marketing landscape forever, they shut down a 100,000 AdWords accounts of online marketers — both spammer and legit. Overnight, entire income streams disappeared. “What next?” seems to be the question on everyone’s lips for 2010.

Andy Jenkins leaving StomperNet

There have been a lot of nasty rumors and wild speculation surrounding the circumstances, but let’s not go there. All I’m going to say is that he was the face behind one of online marketing’s biggest innovations in Stompernet… Thus, forever ends the era of those awesome StomperNet emails and pop culture references.

1) Wordpress Direct

The one thing I missed about working for one of my previous companies was their content management system. They could set up an entire website structure in under 10 minutes. Now… technology has caught up because we can now do the exact same thing with Wordpress Direct. Of course you need to upgrade to Platinum membership in order to enjoy an optimal CMS experience. But I believe every penny spent is worth it. You can get it here.

2) SENuke

People once paid underground marketers like Jeff Johnson $25,000 to learn SEO tactics that now SENuke can do on autopilot in a span of 15 minutes…At a fraction of the cost. The single most powerful linkbuilding and SEO tool on the market today, it can easily take the place of your local SEO company. Huge learning curve, but the search engine rankings are worth it. You can get it now.

3) CPA Tsunami

CPA marketing has been the rage this year. This says something: As much as CPA marketers make a ton of money, the product owners are making much much more as they tap into their army of insane super-affiliates. CPA Tsunami is brilliant underground marketer Mike Hill’s gift to the world… On how to set up your own CPA marketing program so that you don’t have to worry about traffic again. Thank you, Mike.

4) CPA Ninja

To continue the CPA marketing craze… There has been a slew of CPA affiliate marketing products released throughout the year with exorbitant price tags attached… Ranging from the painfully mediocre to the plain darn excellent. The best of the lot to me is CPA Ninja–Marty Rozmanith and Matt Trainer have excellent chemistry together, and Trainer’s Excel tricks have revolutionized the way I set up my AdWords campaigns forever.

5) 13 Sneaky Little Email Tricks

As a highly-paid email copywriter, I have seldom come across email marketing products that are any good. This $97 package by Ryan Deiss is a hidden gem among the slew of overpriced product launches. His ninja autoresponder tricks are really cool, and have directly impacted my income more than any other product out there. It’s still available, so get it while you still can.

1) CPA over Clickbank

Clickbank has long been the default starting place of the fledgeling affiliate marketer. In 2009 however, marketers have flocked over the CPA networks instead. Why? The simple reason that a simple Zip/Email submit converts far better than trying to squeeze a sale from jaded prospects. The maths is staggering. CPA is here to stay.

2) The Rise of the Cartel

As with any industry growing up, oligopolies and monopolies will form. Whereas the internet marketing scene was the Wild, Wild West a few years back, it’s now resembling more and more the dog-eat-dog offline world. The early adopters who are now the “top dogs” have banded together to form an invincible faction with mailing lists and money in the millions. Good business sense. Not so good for the lone rangers.

3) Bleep Bloop

For far too long the IM scene has had no checks and balances. Unscrupulous marketers have run roughshod over consumers with their forced continuity and upsell hell over the past decade or so. As a consumer, I have dealt with non-existent support, terrible coding and rehashed products so much that it has sadly become an industry norm. And in comes the Salty Droid, a blog detailing the various scams and scandals of the industry. He may be vulgar and a tad mean-spirited, but he’s a much-need breath of fresh air in a scene plagued with chicken-hearted sycophants. Read his rants here.

4) The FTC

And while the Salty Droid is the voice of the grassroots, the FTC is the governmental enforcer part of the equation. To be honest… I sometimes see the FTC as an inconvenience. No more high-converting testimonials with specific results… Disclosures everywhere, etc. Yet it’s one of those painful-but-good-for-you necessities because with no guidelines, there’s just going to be wanton abuse. So a grudging thanks FTC, for keeping us honest.

5) Social Media

Twitter and Facebook. Facebook and Twitter. 2009 is the year of social media. Every other day there seems to be a breaking news story on Twitter, Facebook and other social media services. Social media marketing is indeed revolutionizing the way we do business. Even for an obscure Malaysian marketer like myself, it has catapulted me into stratospheric heights that otherwise would not be possible.

1) Greater barriers to entry

5 years ago, the internet playing field was indeed a level one. Your average industrious work-at-home mom or the unemployed bum could succeed in online marketing, given enough determination and a Clickbank ebook. Unfortunately, times have changed. With newly-loaded online marketers employing an army of article writers, backlink builders and bloggers, the one man army does not really stand a chance anymore. You need sufficient cash and stringent tracking and testing in order to compete… Now, the online marketing scene is like any other industry–competitive and cut-throat, where only the strong survive.

2) Local Marketing

I was one of the first few who hopped on the local marketing wave long before Jeff Walker and Frank Kern exposed it to the world–and I’ve profited greatly from it. Most small biz owners don’t know the different between a squeeze page and SEO. So grab these low-hanging fruit by using your knowledge, experience and expertise to charge lucrative consultation fees and stop competing against the Mike Filsaime’s and Aymen’s of this world.

3) Going to the CPA networks

If you’re an existing product or business owner, there’s no better traffic tactic then turning to the CPA networks to lend you their army of SuperAffiliates. PPC… SEO… Article marketing… All these pale in comparison to the sheer awesomeness of “having a daily product launch” (as Mike Hill says). That’s how obscure niches like teeth whitening and acai berry are now multi-million dollar industries. Once you have an offer that converts, you don’t have to worry about buyers’ traffic ever again.

4) The shift from affiliate to product owner

By the same token, being an affiliate now is really not advisable. Did you know that if you’re using AdWords, there’s an option where you can make Google your affiliate? Offer them commissions, and they will auto-optimize your campaigns while spelunking profitable new keywords for you. The big problem? When Google perfects this formula, they’ll probably start cutting out the middlemen–i.e. affiliate marketers. All the more reason for you to launch a product-driven business and let other affiliates worry about Google’s next destructive move.

5) Building your business outside Google

Face it: Google is arrogant.  They’re probably have cause to be proud because the money-loaded corporations have jumped on board and they don’t really have to take care of the needs of the small business owner anymore. Plus, their shutting down of a 100,000 affiliate marketing AdWords accounts isn’t creating any more goodwill. Good news: Google only represents 15-20% of the web, so there still a big and lucrative playing field outside of them. CPV, CPA and contextual marketing… Explore them all.

Of course, what’s a Puppet Master post without a plug eh? Here’s some of the best-selling products we have released this year.

Twitter Salvation System

The grand-daddy of Twitter marketing. The Twitter Salvation System has been purchased by the gurus themselves, pleasantly surprising me in the process. Mark Joyner calls me a “Twitter genius”, click on the link to find out why.

Twitter Mind Control

What happens when you combine forbidden persuasion with Twitter’s real-time power? Twitter Mind Control, that’s what. Use these sneaky psychological triggers to boost sales, attract prospects or carve out your niche. Your call.

Twitter Affiliate Marketing

There’s a lot of BS out there on using Twitter for affiliate marketing. Follow-spamming your prospects while spamming them with endless Clickbank offers is far from best practice. Here’s my tested and proven method to shovelling in big fat affiliate commissions to your bank account–no black hat or illegal tricks.

Advanced Affiliate Marketing

If you want to take your affiliate marketing to the next level, you should take a look at this. Judging from the number of the most prominent affiliate marketers who bought this course, the Puppet Master’s take on Bum Marketing will turbo-charge your SEO and article marketing like no other.

Email Salvation System

This email marketing home study system is one year in the making. One of my buyers told me that they can see themselves making money utilizing even a fraction of the content. Most email courses are either crap or expensive, this may be the best bang for your buck if you want to enjoy profitable autoresponder marketing for the new year.

Well, what do you folks think? Agree? Disagree? What are your thoughts for the Best of 2009? Please leave your comments below!

There seems to be an amazing persuasive power when it comes to one-on-one mails.

Love letters that endured the test of time, moving lovers into the throes of unstoppable desire. A bulk of the New Testament were the letters of Paul to a struggling church, and that changed the course of humanity forever.

Then, you have the billion dollar industry built off the backs of sales “letters”.

Now, back to the topic at hand.

You see, e-mails are basically letters in digital form.

With the right training, your prospect’s decisions can be effortlessly influenced by just a few strokes of the keyboard.

Who knew such simple text messages can have such insane power? It’s an amazing ability to foster such frightening intimacy that you’re able to wield such total control, where your prospect does your bidding.

Whatever that bidding may be — to buy your product, to refer you to their friends, to change the world by carrying your message forth.

In this modern age, your autoresponder is the quickest, fastest and most effective way to unleash that kind of money-geting power and pulling your prospect’s heartstrings AND pursestrings.

Unfortunately, it does not seem to be the case these days, doesn’t it?

Plummeting open rates, strict spam controls and just sheer ineffectuality seem to be the order of the day.

You know something? Puppet String Marketing — Laura, my wife and I have constantly beat the odds when it comes to our email marketing.

I have written an email in 20 minutes that had generated six figures within 24 hours, and that’s without any product launch formula-type strategies.

Granted, that’s not a common occurrences. Yet, we’ve mastered a proven six-figure formula that has enabled us to double one of our client’s revenues from their list–and that was in the Wall Street bloodbath a few months back. Or generate $84,567 in a month off a $27 ebook.

And it may sounds unbelievable, yet all it takes is just some back-to-basics old school persuasion and a sprinkle of nakedness. Not the naughty kind, mind you, but the heart-on-sleeve kind. You see, the more you bare your soul, the more your products are sold.

Actually come to think of it, this bears repeating.

*The more you bare your soul, the more your products are sold.*

Write it down in your notepad, because this tip’s free.

The more you STRATEGICALLY let people into your world, the more inclined they would be towards you and the more predisposed they will be towards you and your marketing messages.

Trust is such a scarce commodity in the recession tightwad world. Your emails function to do just that. Display ample doses of trust and you’ll attract prospects like water in the desert.

Anyway, in case you haven’t heard, we’re opening our 6 Figure Email Salvation Tele-Training up for you. This is probably one of the rare opportunities where you get the behind-the-scenes look at email rock stars at work. We brought in hundreds-of-thousands of dollars for both our clients and ourselves, and now we want to give you access to these top secret strategies.

Why? Because we care. Unapologetically. The recession is a monster and we want to show you the quickest, easiest way to email riches.

Claim your remaining slot for the 6 Figure Email Tele-class now.

That’s why the pricing is deliberately set so low.

However, here’s the catch. We’re closing the teleclass on  Feb 18th 2009 (Wednesday). It’s because classes start the next day on 19th Feb. Furthermore, we’re limiting seats to the first 77, since there’s exclusive personal consultations from us.

Already, 15 of these slots are already taken at last count.

Needless to say, this is a steal, I urge you to hurry while you still can.

Claim your remaining slot for the 6 Figure Email Tele-class now.

So, now you’ve used Twitter, you have generated a prospect base of about 7,000 people in the last month, and you’re raring and ready to go the next level.

They’re hot leads, following your links, praising the good information you’re putting out. But when it comes down to the actual dollars and cents, you’re not getting as many sales as you’d like. What’s missing?

Everyday, when you click open your inbox, as a savvy online marketer you are very conscious of people invading your privacy to sell to you via email marketing. As with all things, there are approaches that work, and some others that just…well…flop miserably.

You’ve probably even learned to lend a blind eye to the ones that have nothing to offer, and every now and again, a really good subject line will grab your attention and get you to open the message and read on…

Now, we’ve tried to compile a by-no-means-exhaustive list of 7 Common But Deadly ‘Sins’ that you can commit, all in the name of profitable email writing.

Experience is a good but tough teacher, and in the process of refining our email copywriting skills and  creating an email system that works, we’ve actually discovered is that almost everyone is within the bounds of the 7 Deadly Sins of Email Marketing.

The hard part is escaping them, and being free, especially if you’ve never realized you’re guilty in the first place, and never having anyone to show you how it’s really done.

Although it’s written in a somewhat humorous manner, we really hope you’ll take these as seriously as possible because the health –and wealth –of your online business depends on it. Then again, some people keep dangerous pets that eventually eat their child (or their neighbor’s) so it must be (fallen) human nature to “sow the seeds of our own destruction.” 

Enjoy…

The 7 Deadly Sins of Email Marketing.

1. Oversell.

This could be described in its simplest form as an excessive belief in your own abilities or in the abilities of your product, that interferes with the your realization that your marketing message is not targeted at you or your product –it’s about the prospect.

What this sin looks like: Selling, and selling hard. Pushing your product, and praising it to high heaven. Forgetting to talk to (and about) your prospect in a way that addresses their needs and what they care about.

2. Safety First.

Dare to stand out and be different!

What this sin looks like: Bland, standard, blah, meh type of emails. No variation in style, nothing exciting, no changes of development, it’s stagnant. And don’t paste your sales letter and try to make it pass for an email – it’s not!

3. Try really REALLY hard.

The email sounds too smooth, too glossy and too perfect – in other words, you don’t sound like a real, honest, down-to-earth, trustworthy person that your prospect can relate to and trust.

What this sin looks like: You don’t write like your Grandma. This is leading on from what I mentioned — email is intimate, it’s personal, it relates. Yes, good sales letters are meant to do that, but you can’t disguise a sales letter when you paste it in.

4. Be Spammy.

Even if you’re doing everything else right, this one sin can (and will, ultimately), kill your email marketing.

What this sin looks like: Your email doesn’t even get to your prospect’s inbox to be marked as spam because it gets caught by the spam filters. This involves using the wrong language, not testing your email with a spam filter prior to clicking ’send’, etc. (A very good one is E-filtrate, for example.)

5. Swipe like a dummy.

We all know that it is possible to swipe your way to the top. Swiping is a way of transferring others’ genius traits, status, abilities, and especially way of writing emails to become your own.

What this sin looks like: Copying others’ emails, word for word, without matching the tone, style, manner and phraseology to what your own list best responds to. This can be a tough one, especially when you’re not sure what to test, which leads us to the next sin…

6. Never Test.

Sloth is the avoidance of work. When it comes to email, many people aren’t slothful by choice. Often, it’s because they don’t know:

1. That they’re supposed to test,

2. They don’t know what to test,

3. They don’t know how to test, and

4. They don’t know how to interpret the results. eg. What’s a ‘good open rate’? Does it vary from niche to niche? How do you maximise a good response to certain emails?

What this sin looks like: Ultimately sticking to sending out emails at a certain time, never testing when you get the best open rates and clickthrough rates, not testing what kind of emails get the best response from your list,

7. Be Unlikable.

Unlikeability is manifested in the marketer who spurns love and likeability, and opts instead for disconnect and facelessness.

What this sin looks like: No persona, no personality, no distinguishing features, no riveting subject lines… and your email gets lost in the clutter of the inbox.

Bonus Sin…

8. Take Everything As Gospel Truth.

What this sin looks like: You listen to what every Tom, Harry and John Marketer has said. You test and try different things, sometimes not sticking to one thing long enough to see results; other times sticking to something for way too long without seeing results.

For example, I know one top marketer who teaches ‘newbies’ to do this to save costs when they’re starting out, but I reckon there’s a reason why he hired the top email autoresponder guy to write his emails. So, be careful whose ‘good advice’ you’re listening to.

But, Here’s The Good News…

If you’ve committed any of these sins, your redemption is coming soon.

In a month-long series of weekly tele-classes beginning next week, Laura and I will reveal our closely-held secrets to a select few in order to transform the way you think about email.  I can guarantee you that there is no other email copywriting system like it.

Tomorrow, at 5pm, the doors will open briefly to give you a final opportunity to enroll in the 6 Figure Email Salvation Tele-training:.