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28 Profitable Internet Marketing Lessons for My 28th Birthday

by Puppet Master

I cried during my birthday.

I mean, don’t get me wrong… My wife Laura planned a heck of a celebration, and it was a fun day.

Still, it was bittersweet. Maybe it was the realization that life isn’t as easy as we like it to be, or reflecting back on the ups and downs of the year that was. Maybe it was just the built-up toll of a year’s worth of hard lessons.

Maybe I’m just a drama queen. But these are 28 valuable lessons on marketing, entrepreneurship, social media and copy that I  learned over the past 1 year. Read it, take action and reap the financial rewards.

1) The More You Mail, the More Money You Make

Here’s something that may surprise you, the more blasts you send out, the more monetizable your list becomes. Keep making offers to your list with emails written in your own voice, and you’ll make money while filtering non-interested parties through their unsubscribing.

2) Twitter is Adwords-of-Mouth

If PPC is AdWords, Twitter is AdWords-of-mouth. PPC and Twitter’s similarity is that they’re really good lead generation tools, but really crap when it comes to sales pages. Like PPC, use it to build your list, not direct linking it to your affiliate link and hope to God for some sales. Twitter is pre-selling, not selling.

3) Work Ain’t Life

There were times during the past few months that I approached burn-out. Setting up a business from scratch is like giving birth to a baby… You invest your heart and soul for relatively little return. Remember that if you fizzle so does your business, so keep tabs on your mental health by taking constant breaks and vacations to stay refreshed.

4) BAD NEWS!

Through extensive testing, paparazzi headlines in the vein of National Enquirer or the Sun works wonders for your response rates. The press knows that well, negativity sells. Human nature is just inherently attracted to train wrecks. Inject a dose of doom and gloom into your sales letters and emails and enjoy positive returns.

5) The Answer is “Yes”

What’s the best traffic generation method? PPC… CPA… SEO… Banners… The answer is yes…. yes… yes… yes… All marketing techniques work, you just need to know the best practices. Master them one at a time with careful testing but master them all. The more mediums your customer encounters you, the more response they will be.

6) The E-Myth Revisited

Michael Gerber wrote what experts deem the “entrepreneur’s Bible” many years ago. The main thrust was most entrepreneurs work in their business, not on their business. This means most business owners get trapped in the day-to-day rather than doing things that actually bring profit like sales or maintaining JV relationships. Work towards outsourcing and begin to focus on the things that matter.

7) Your Online Marketing is Already Outdated

By the time you’re reading this, your closely-held SEO and PPC strategy has already halved in effectiveness. The internet marketing scene changes at the speed of light and you need to keep up. Keep track of the trends and what guru’s tout as the Next Big Thing because you know what? Cut through the hype you realize they’re right.

8.) Don’t Put Your Eggs in One Basket

Twitter is notorious for going down when you need them the most. I was in the prickly spot of having my rice bowl cut off simply because I could not do any money-getting efforts on my one-and-only marketing medium. Ouch. Diversify. Stop relying on ONE traffic method and you’ll be invulnerable to Google Slaps, Twitter Fail Whales and other system failures.

9) Above-the-Fold Placement, Above Average Results

When it comes to anything email marketing related, anything above the screen where the reader does not need to scroll down is the most optimal. So set up squeeze pages and landing pages that are strictly one-pages. Short emails tend to work better as well when you place all your copy above the fold. Test it and let me know.

10) The Microcosm Traffic Method

What’s a microcosm? A microcosm is a mini-ecosystem that’s a representation of the larger ecosystem as a whole. Google loves that–a huge network of sites that’s a hub of activity as a representative of that niche. When I implement this scientific principle into my traffic generation strategies, my results went through the roof. Watch this space when I unveil my master secret to the world.

11) Twitter is Better Than Conferences

Most experts say JVs you find at conferences can boost your profits through the roof. I say Twitter can have the same effect–minus the travel and accommodation expenses. I had not left my native country of Malaysia, but I’ll been securing speaking gigs and strategic alliances nearly effortlessly. Put your social skills to work and see the results.

12) Cling On to The Vision

The online marketing world works very much like the bricks-and-mortars one… There’s a lot of elbow grease involved and a lot of hard work. You can make money in your underwear, but that doesn’t reduce any of the blood, sweat and tears involved. In the times of maximum effort and minimum return, you need to hold on to Magnificent Obsession of why you’re doing what you’re doing.

13) The Magic Ratio

Getting responsive leads isn’t really a mystery–Give them things of value to soften up their credit crunch-harderned defenses, and then make an offer relevant to their needs. The ratio of value to offer differs from medium to medium For emails its 1:1. for Twitter is 5 value-laden tweets for every 1 self-promotional one. Your results may vary.

14) The Medium is the Message

You can’t take what works in one medium and apply it to another. What is acceptable as sales letter copy is downright intrusive as an email. That’s why you may be getting poor results with your social marketing. Each medium has its own tone, manner and language. Learn them and you’ll see stellar results coming from every front.

15) “You” Rock

Human beings are essentially self-serving creatures. That’s why the word “you” is the most alluring one in the English language. Good copy is about them, them, them. What your product or service can do for them. In fact, the easiest way to hypnotic copywriting is to use “you” as much as humanly possible in your copy. Try it.

16) Twitter = Traffic Domination

Once you mastered writing compelling tweets (something taught in the Twitter Salvation System), driving traffic to your website or blog is one of the easiest things on the planet. ReTweeting gives you viral traffic you otherwise can’t tap, and its all FREE traffic anyway. That’s how I own 60% of the entire Most Viewed Articles on EzineArticles for all my categories. Unfair advantage, I know.

17) Step Up Your Bum Marketing

Bum Marketing was one of the big buzzwords of the past few years… Write an article, direct them to your affiliate link, collect commissions. Unfortunately, this method has lost a lot of its effectiveness over the past year or so due to the massive increase in bum marketers. So ramp up your game, outsource your articles, spin them all and submit more unique articles to as many article directories and web 2.0 properties as possible. Which brings me to the next point…

18) Quantity, Not Quality

Quality content may be nice, but unfortunately, Google does not really distinguish quality content from mediocre ones. Google rewards consistency of unique content rather than the awesomeness of them. Do ensure that they’re somewhat passable in quality, but eschew Dan Brown quality writing for just loads and loads and loads of content in as may websites as possible.

19) Purpose Attracts

Humanity is repelled by purposelessness. Give a reason why to every aspect of your business–from the existence of your product to your offer to the tribe you created. Give your customers a purpose bigger than themselves, and you’ll raise yourself an army of word-of-mouth evangelists to spread your cause to the ends of the Earth.

20) Positioning Matters

One of the key reasons the Puppet Master has risen up the ranks in record speed is because of the unique personal brand I’ve created. If I were to become yet another Beach Bum or Everyman Marketer, I’ll probably will not experience the kind of results I’m getting, even with the same content. Ask yourself… What is the ONE THING you want to own in your prospect’s mindshare? And take the steps to own it.

21) Tweet in Blocks


This was one of the main breakthroughs in my Twitter marketing efforts. In the Twitter Salvation System I’ll reveal what blocks are the most effective and what content proves to convert the best. All I can say is that it has drastically simplified my Twitter lead generation and affiliate sales processes and increased overall profits by 34%.

22) The Other Side of Social Media

Most experts harp on the personal branding and customer connection side of social media. It’s all well and good, but you’re probably only experiencing a puny 17% of the upside if that’s all you’re using social media for. Google LOVES social media sites, and they’re amazing for backlinks. That’s one of the components of the Microcosm Traffic Method I’m working on, and you’ll start seeing social marketing in a new light real soon.

23) Twitter for SEO

On the subject of SEO, Twitter is often overlooked by Search Marketing experts because they don’t give any link juice. However, like Youtube and Facebook, their PageRank score is through the roof. Just do a few RSS submissions and social bookmarks and you’ll start seeing your tweets rank in the SERPs. My personal Twitter account is a Pagerank 5 site at the moment from this method.

24) Transcription Riches

Article writing can be tedious process. Unfortunately, it is also an essential one, because it is one of the key ways of getting traffic. Here’s a trick, record yourself talking, send your audio to Elance and get transcriptions done. Now you can cut-and-paste portions of the transcrips for instant articles!

25) The Fortnight of Fandom

Studies have shown your leads are hottest starting from the day they sign in and start tampering off after the 2 week mark. This apply for Twitter, Facebook and autoresponder marketing. That’s why the first 2 weeks should be the site of your most vigorous promotions. Strike when the iron is hot, that’s the most effective window of opportunity you got.

26) Facebook Followers are Different from Twitter Ones

Even in similar sites and the same niches, your followers respond differently to different topics for the different sites. That’s why I don’t really encourage the Twitter-to-Facebook app that’s so popular. You could be wasting your hot links on Twitter on a Facebook audience that’s disinterested. So find out what each of them want individually, and give it to them.

27) Even in Social Media, It’s About ROI

My pet peeve with the whole social media phenomenon is how much hype is thrown around but people have little results to show. When it comes to Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, Youtube,etc… you still need the numbers… A marketing channel is only one when it can be measured. By all means jump on to the bandwagon, but have your metrics in place.

28) People ReTweet Before They Read

This is killer. People tend to retweet stuff before they click on the link. It may sound insane but with the amount of noise on Twitter, they make snap judgements about what they pass on to their followers. Retweetable content includes lists, quotes, and weird/curiosity type tweets. Try constructing your blog post as a list and experience a surge of viral traffic.

Bonus Tip:

29) Never Compromise On Your Marriage

In the midst of busyness, it is possible to neglect your spouse. It was a wise pastor who once said with a strong marriage, you can conquer the world. But if you have a weak one, even minor obstacles seem like major ones. Keep your marriage strong and you’ll rise above the pressures of life.

That’s the condensed version from me, we can sit down over a cuppa if you’d like to hear more :) Do let me know your thoughts –for example, which of these tips do you find the most helpful? Would love your feedback in the Comments Section below.

Also… as a related aside, there’s only 24 hours left till we close out our Puppet String Marketing Birthday Promotion….

Get up to 41% off all Puppet String Marketing products.

Click here to get yours NOW!

P.S. If you already own one of either Twitter Mind Control or Twitter Salvation System, please email me at puppetstringmarketing [at] gmail [dot] com. We’ve had a few such requests and so we’ve prepared an extra special “ala carte” deal for you.

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4 Urgent Reasons Why Oprah Matters to Your Twitter Marketing

by Puppet Master

Stop the presses!

On Friday, Oprah sent out her first tweet, and in the space of 3 days, she had over 300,000 followers.

Twitter is now officially uncool. (Actually, I’m kidding there. :p)

But on a serious note, I personally believe that when Oprah Winfrey got on Twitter on Friday, that represents one of the most significant things to ever happen to your business and to your marketing if you are using Twitter as a marketing, branding and business channel.

I’d like to discuss with you 4 urgent reasons why Oprah matters to your marketing, and why you should take note and take action as quick as you can.

1. Twitter has just had the Oprah Effect

As you know, Oprah is one of the most influential people on earth. Love her or hate her, her endorsements have turned otherwise obscure books into New York Times best-sellers; she is the reason why The Secret is the world-wide phenomenon it is today as opposed to a niche viral video.

And now, Oprah endorses Twitter above Facebook and Myspace and all the other social media of before.

It doesn’t take a detective to know that whatever Oprah endorses becomes successful.

We can already see the spike she’s caused; over 1.5 million more users were added on Twitter because of her arrival.

Shaq, Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore have used Twitter and brought it into the mainstream market, but Oprah has just stepped in to open the door to a much wider demographic.

And here’s why it matters to you.

1. Now you have a fresh audience on Twitter. Twitter’s grown immensely over the last year (1000%) and it’s probably going to grow another 1000% in the next few months because of the Oprah endorsement.

Hence the tipping point.

2. The second point is the acceleration of a trend that’s already growing on Twitter, namely that the older demographics are the first to get on board the Twitter wagon.

The 25-35 year-olds and the 45-60 year olds are by far the biggest users of Twitter right now, as opposed to teenagers or kids.

The Oprah audience is largely of this demographic as well.

This demographic has money, is eager to do business, and have the disposable income that marketers and businesses covet.

It’s not a fact ignored by many corporations either, because tons of brands are getting on Twitter.

Although Twitter has one seventh or one-eighth of the audience of Facebook, there are more businesses on Twitter than there are on Facebook already.

In short,

(i) You have a new dimension of audience on Twitter

(ii) And for the first time in history, this early-adopter/cusp of mainstream audience is a group of people with money; people with a financial security and disposable income.

That’s really good for business when you have a marketing channel filled with people who have the money to spare.

2. The Pareto Principle is now in Full Force

You see, Oprah’s audiences have been dwindling due to some mistimed moves.

Her audience has been dropping but she’s still the most influential person on television (as far as I know). But what is happening is a very clever strategy especially in the recession period: the Pareto principle, which is, as you probably know, 20% of your customers contribute 80% of your sales.

This means that if you have an existing brand like Oprah or you’re a small business owner and you’re actually getting people to follow you or to subscribe to your Twitter channel without much promotion or pushing, or just by promoting it to your customers, they probably fall into the 20% of your customers because they’re willing to sign up to what they know if a marketing channel and they’re interested in what you have to say.

Twitter succeeds in being a filter of sorts between the 80% of your audience who don’t care so much about what you have to say vs. the 20% of your audience who really care and actually sign up to be hit from multiple marketing channels with more marketing angles by you.

This is really good because as you know, 2 out of the 3 ways to make money are (i) to sell to an existing audience and (ii) to increase the size of purchase for every transaction. Twitter does that really well; it creates a pre-sold audience that’s already interested in you and can create a 20% that’s already interested in you just like The Cult Of Mac.

And Oprah knows that — she knows who her 20% are, as opposed to the 80% nominal viewers; she knows who the consumers are who’ll buy from her over and over and over again.

As you know, the backend sales will normally surpass the front-end ones, and it’s this 20% of your buying population who’ll do that.

Twitter easily and effectively separates the nominal 80% from the 20% of raving followers.

And the beauty of Twitter is that through certain strategies, even that 80% who may be lukewarm to you on Twitter can be converted into your 20% raving followers ratio.

3. You — Like Oprah – Will Now Know What People Want

Oprah now has what is probably the most effective channel of knowing what people are thinking of or about at the moment. Remember that I’ve said before that Google is good for what people are searching for at the moment, while Twitter is good for what people are thinking of at the moment.

No market research is as immediate and as precise as what’s happening on Twitter at the moment.

Oprah now has all that information; she would know what her 300,000 fans have to say; she’d know their thoughts by simply using the ultimate, free research tool: Twitter.

If the celebrities are going in, in full force, to get this direct connection with their fans on Twitter, it’s best for you to go in and to know your customers in a more intimate way too because on Twitter you’ll probably have people tweeting you their hopes, dreams, fears — uncensored and in a very safe and personal setting.

As you may know when it comes to marketing research and focus groups, a lot of focus groups don’t really work simply because people in that kind of setting will give an answer they think you want to hear as opposed to what they really think.

On Twitter, it’s uncensored and spontaneous; you get a true feel for your market’s demographic and you can craft marketing angles one after the other to create really excellent response results.

4. You still have room to dominate this marketing channel

Stephen Pierce, the great internet wealth expert and motivation speaker said something really interesting recently. He said that it’s easier now to dominate channels that it is to dominate markets.

What does that mean? It means that it’s easier now to dominate a certain channel of marketing for a particular niche as opposed to dominating the niche itself (unless of course the niche is really small and is at its beginning stages).

We’ve reached a point where nearly any and every niche is crowded.

You go into the marketing niche and there’s a thousand pretenders; you go into the financial niche and there’s a thousand other people competing for your share.

What you can do is be an authority in a specific marketing niche. And because of the newness of Twitter and because of the pioneering aspect of Twitter you can go on Twitter now and be the expert in your field for that particular channel.

Because of Twitter’s mainstream acceptance, when you position yourself as a Twitter expert, you have a large inbuilt list of buyers and prospects that you can reach out to that will see you as an authority, as the channel expert in your field on Twitter.

There are many ways to dominate this channel, and many ways in which you can position yourself as an authority.

For me, the world of copywriting is somewhat saturated, but on Twitter I am my own man; I am ‘the king’ of copywriting and email marketing with close to ten times the followers of most copywriters on Twitter which gives me credibility in this niche on Twitter.

Twitter has given me the authority and the edge I otherwise wouldn’t have if I’d followed the traditional route.

That is why I urge you to sign up today so that you can dominate Twitter so that no one else can. This is first-mover knowledge, it’s first-mover intelligence whereby I teach you how to dominate Twitter, to be a Twitter expert and to claim your market share as much as possible.

It’s so easy to get really big on Twitter simply because it’s easy to get new followers fast.

Just tap into my secrets to find out how you can be wildly successful on Twitter.

The mantra of both my course, the Twitter Salvation System and my marketing is this, “psychology, not technology.” You may have the latest nifty Twitter tools that can enable you to spread your message spread far and wide, but if you can’t grasp the Twitter user’s mindset, you’ll never be able to sell a dime.

Instead of using tired “Buy or Die” tactics, I give you sound advice and demonstrate the full potential that my little labor of love can do for your business.

I used these principles to launch a 5 figure biz from scratch nearly exclusively using Twitter—and that was even before I discovered any of the Twitter tools. Purely by using the web interface we’d made $10k in 3 weeks—with no list, no name and very little money.

I will do today what others will not do, so tomorrow I can do what others will not do

And now by replicating these same techniques over and over again, I have got a sizable income rise, speaking engagements and more JV projects that I have to turn down.

Here’s a sneak peek of the 3 BRAND NEW MODULES that I included with the package:

  • How to get 1000 followers in a day, and transform them into evangelist—with just 1 Tweet? Yes, it’s possible. A sprinkle of persuasion magic is all it takes!
  • How to unleash the power of social influence marketing. Often, it’s not the what but the who that matters in marketing. If you’re respected, everything you say holds more weight. A simple way to accomplish mavenhood in as little as a month.
  • A step-by-step Twitter for newbie’s module. Look, I know some of you came in from the nudging of Ashton  and Oprah. It’s nothing to be ashamed about. Here’s a quick and easy blueprint to get you up to speed. You’ll be tapping into Twitter as a lucrative marketing channel in no time.

Here’s the thing. There are strictly limited copies available.  We’re limiting it to 500 copies because me and my wife Laura do all the customer support ourselves –we believe in personalized support for each and every client we handle.

There’s been quite a bit of buzz about the Salvation System so I want to make sure you get first dibs on one of the hottest Twitter products around.

Your Twitter Salvation Is Here

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The “Buck Naked” Secret to Email Marketing Success

by Puppet Master

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.

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