If you are to use social media to find potential customers online or increase traffic to your blog or site, you would need to start by getting involved in the right sites. There are really a handful of sites that you can choose to use for your online marketing but knowing how you can use these to your advantage is the key.This depends mostly on the kind of business you have. If you are after getting people’s opinions to help you make good decisions, then Facebook and Twitter are your obvious choices. Here are some sites that can aren’t very popular but will be a great help:

Insidefacebook.com

Though this isn’t an official Facebook resource it can help you interpret what’s happening on your Facebook page. The site offers informative stats about your Facebook page and can help you understand it better.

Formulists.com

This is a site that goes with Twitter. It’s a list creation and management tool that can allow you to create and update customized Twitter lists that update constantly. You can easily expand and manage your network with this site.

KnowEm.com

This site is a great tool that can check your brand or product name in over 550 popular and merging social network sites. Why would you want to do that? Well, you will be making sure that nobody uses your name aside from yourself. It’s in a way ‘reserving’ your name on all these sites.

Addictomatic.com

Instead of searching all your favorite social networking sites for the latest news and updates on your business, this site allows you to do this search on a single site. Simply create your own ‘hot topic’ and you’ll be able to get results on all those sites! Bet you didn’t know such a site existed.

Brandtags.net

This is something you would be especially interested in if you are a brand. The site allows you to enter a brand and search for what’s being said about it. It’s a great way to see how your reputation is doing online.

Keeping up to date with all the social networking sites that you are connected to can be a hassle. These sites do all the hard work for you.

For a complete list, check this article.

I’m a fitness fanatic these days. I live an existence of protein shakes and insane workouts. In fact, I just did the Spartacus Workout 2.0 that nearly wiped the floor with my carcass.

Another equally gut-busting workout is the phenomenon known as P90X.

I personally don’t use P90X but my wife does and so does some of my other freaks.

For those who don’t know, P90X is a killer fitness product that’s taken the world by storm, mainly because the founder Tony Horton is an insane info-marketer (that’s for another post!) and they crush it with their info-mercials.

Anyway… In a recent interview with Men’s Health, Tony revealed four P90X fitness principles. I found the 3rd one relevant to not just health but life and business as well…

Find (and Flirt) with the Line

The Line is your discomfort threshold. It’s the one pushup beyond what you think you can do. It’s that extra agonizing rep after you’ve finished a set. But it’s not just the effort that’s important; it’s the desire to want to go there again and again. That’s the secret to becoming fit.

And it’s the reason Horton scoffs at walking, riding an exercise bike while reading, or doing any mild form of cardio as a sole means of fitness. “Walking is just a waste of time for most people,” he says. “We’re primates and we walk—that’s what we do. And even though it’s better than doing nothing, it’s not enough. You have to find that Line in whatever you’re doing and continually push it out.”

P90X at your place Use Horton’s discomfort scale to gauge where you are during your workout.

10 = so brutal, so awful, you’re miserable.
9 = just short of the above.
7 or 8 = really hard, but you’re maintaining form and hanging in there.
6 = it’s not a 7 or 8, but you’re working as hard as you can today.
5 = you can do more…but you’re not.
1 to 4 = unless it’s a recovery day, you’re wasting your time.
The Line is at 6, 7, or 8 on the scale.

The main reason why our business isn’t experiencing quantum growth is because we neither find nor flirt with the line. We are comfortable with what works and stick with that, ignoring the dynamic nature of the changing rules of the marketplace.

I remembered when I just refused to outsource. Even though me and my wife were stretched to the brim from doing all the work ourselves, we were making 5 figures so why allow some random hire to screw up a good thing.

It’s only out of the threat of burn out we started outsourcing. Was it uncomfortable? You bet. Were we endlessly frustrated from our rookie mistakes? Hell yeah. Did we feel like running away from the line and doing what feels good? Yup.

Yet its when we push through that true breakthrough happens. We now have 10 people working under us and our business has grown geometrically. We deal with some of the biggest portals in our region. All because we flirted with the line and build our team.

The line can look different to you. It can be paid traffic. It can be SEO. It can be creating your very first product. Heck, it could be just getting off your bum and doing something, anything.

Find your line, and flirt with it over and over again. In the physical realm, your muscles will grow. In the self-development realm, your character will grow. In the business realm, your wallet will grow.

What is your line? And how do you plan to flirt with it?

I’ll explain why my wife’s hurtful words made me thankful… Before that, there’s another reason to be thankful this Thanksgiving…

…And that’s a heartfelt thank you for sticking around for my now infrequent emails.

I just want to say I’m sorry.

It’s just that life has been pretty crazy. The business has just grown like crazy, and we’ve been trying to keep up.

Over the course of the last year… We added 6 people to the team… Became the SEO superstars to the biggest property portal in Asia… Spoke around the world… Made a killing from Adsense…

I’m not saying that to boast. Nor is it an excuse for my lack of communication.

But all I’m saying is that the internet marketing dream is possible – where you make money while you sleep, earn more in one week than you do the whole year, work from anywhere in the world.

However… the internet marketing dream is not easy. If it was–then there wouldn’t only be a dozen or so peers who are making a full time living online in my country with a population of 27,467,837.

In fact…

Here’s the no.1 reason why most people fail to make money on the Internet…

They don’t treat it like a business.

Here’s the harsh truth…

5 years ago, hobby efforts got you hobby income. You wrote a few EzineArticles, slapped on your affiliate link, and voila… You got some grocery money for the month.

Today, 5 years down the line, hobby efforts get you ZERO income. The prior hobbyist who had a little more success than average has developed million dollar businesses with an army of outsourcers and a near unlimited advertising budget.

And unless you rise above the ranks of hobbyist to become a business person, you’re never going to succeed in this space.

Sorry if I sound a little brutal.

But you know the only reason why I can say that?

I was one of these hobbyists just a few months ago.

And the only reason I’m not one anymore is because of the verbal lashing my usually demure wife gave me.

Even though it stings to admit it, for this whole year I treated Puppet String Marketing like a hobby, when I was supposed to treat it like business.

Don’t get me wrong, we make a decent living from Puppet String Marketing. The thing is… We could have been a lot bigger than we already are.

In the space of 2 years of doing business… I have passed up countless opportunities (even strategic alliances with the biggest guns on the planet), left money on the table due to a lack of implementation, and left my wife holding the bag.

And then… Came the obvious question…

Why was I acting in such a baffling way?

The answer is twofold.

1. I don’t have a “do whatever it takes” mindset
2. Action requires overcoming inertia

You see… I have always mistaken my superior marketing and copywriting skills for the actual running of the business. I ignored the “boring” aspects of cash flow in favor of cool ideas and persuasion. Even though marketing is really important, a biz owner’s role expands far more than that.

The bulk of online marketers are just technicians. Good at the theory of marketing, but unable to create a business out of it.

Now… you start to find an explanation for the local marketing boom of 2010. This industry has bred a ton of marketers with just an inkling of direct response knowledge –but no actual business acumen.

No wonder they’re doomed to failure.

And I was going down that forlorn route until my wife saved me.

And that’s my first point, that the hallmark of a successful entrepreneur is in the willingness to suffer until the business venture reaches breakthrough.

I guess I was seduced by the promise of instant riches.

Well… I did make a ton of money with my launches. But I wasn’t willing to do more of them, since it takes work.

And I wasn’t certainly investing in systems and outsourcing processes. Too much tedium. Thank you very much.

No business is going to sustain with that kind of chronic laziness.

Here’s the surprising thing…

Most of the internet millionaires you know work really, really hard.

They work when they’re on holiday. They work even crazier hours than those who are employed.

This brings me to my second point. You may not be achieving your fullest potential because its darn hard to get out of a state of stagnation.

After all… A body at rest tends to stay the rest…

That is…

Until external force is used.

In my case, it was my wife being uncharacteristically sharp. Reminding me we’re not in the business just for our own survival… But so that we can positively impact the nations with our ideas and our finances.

What’s your external force?

God? Not becoming homeless? Paying off debts?

Until you get one… Nothing is going to change. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Well… This is my thanksgiving lesson to you. To succeed in the internet marketing realm. You need these 2 things – a “whatever it takes” mindset, and a willingness to overcome inertia and take action.

And yes… Me and the wife are still very much in love.

Hope this helps you. Would love to know your thoughts in the comments section. So write away!

Imagine a magic machine.

And imagine that when you pour in all your marketing efforts into this machine, you’ll start seeing double, triple even quadruple your results without expending any more effort than you should.

Take all your online marketing activities…

• Blog posts…
• EzineArticles…
• Youtube…

Take all your content and plonk it into this mysterious contraption…

Suddenly…  You start seeing exponential results.

Where you were once making $997 per ad campaign. You’re now making $1997. Maybe even $4997…

We call it the Great Amplifier.

And no, this isn’t some overhyped guru product. Nor is it some newfangled SEO loophole. It isn’t even a software service or product.

This “magic machine” exists in the realm of the mind.

Yes, it’s almost like that hot movie out right now – Inception. It’s all about the power of a sticky idea…

What is the most resilient parasite? Bacteria? A virus? An intestinal worm? An idea. Resilient… highly contagious. Once an idea has taken hold of the brain it’s almost impossible to eradicate. An idea that is fully formed – fully understood – that sticks; right in there somewhere. ~ Cobb

Like the Christopher Nolan-helmed movie, the Great Amplifier takes your idea and wedging it deep into your prospect’s consciousness. And that idea could be a marketing message… A suggestion to buy your product… An idea to inspire them to change the world… Whatever the case… An idea deep rooted enough nearly always lead to action… And for your customers, that idea could be a buying one…

The end result? Profit for you.

Wait… It gets better… Imagine replicating that effect over and over and over again. A mass conversion from cold prospect to warm leads to red hot buyers. Automated forever. This is true niche domination, my friend… Once you can wrap your head around the forbidden truth that is going to be revealed by the Puppet Master tomorrow…

The seed that we plant in YOUR mind could change everything. ~ Cobb (paraphrased)

Prepare for it… You’re about to discover a breakthrough way of marketing that will fatten your coffers in a way like you never seen before. Watch out for an email tomorrow revealing the secret location of the never-before-seen video.

Get ready for an inception.