infopreneur
Starting Internet Marketing? You Are Not Alone
Starting Internet Marketing? You Are Not Alone
Internet marketing is something a lot of people are interested in getting started in, but their eyes glaze over once they hear terms like FTP, domain names, hosting, script installation… all those terms that all internet marketers have to learn eventually, but seem so daunting to a beginner.
This post is going to cover some of the most important things you’ll need to know as a newbie to internet marketing.
We’re going to cover topics such as domain names, hosting, cPanel and FTP and in future posts we will cover much more. We’ll cover some of the technical basics that you need to get started in internet marketing as it is these technical things that stop so many people from even starting!
Domain Name Registration and Management
The first thing you’ll likely need to know is how to get a domain name. Your domain name is your website’s street address, basically. It tells web browsers how to find your website.
A domain name looks like this >> your-domain.com
And your web address would look like this >> http://www.your-domain.com
While you could get away with using a web address such as:
http://www.wordpress.com/your-business-name
The fact is there are some problems with this.
First of all, it doesn’t look as professional as using your own domain. If you’re hosting on a free platform like WordPress or Blogger, you may find people aren’t as likely to trust you, especially if you’re selling something.
Another potential problem is that free hosts have a variety of different rules you must follow. Some of them don’t allow you to use advertisements on your site. Others don’t allow you to use plugins. These rules and limitations can be extremely restrictive and hamper your marketing efforts greatly.
Finally, if you don’t have your own domain on your own hosting, you will be extremely limited with what you can accomplish with your website itself. Running WordPress on your own domain will allow you to use custom themes and plugins on your site, for example. While hosting on the WordPress servers limits you quite severely.
There are many different places to buy a domain, but not all are created equal. Some have higher fees than others, while some use tricky or deceptive means to entice buyers to use their services.
The most commonly used registrar by internet marketers is:
NameCheap has very fair prices, and they are known for being honest and having excellent customer service. Additionally, you can Google “NameCheap coupon and you will get a discount code that will take a fair amount of the purchase price of a new domain name.
WhoisGuard
NameCheap offers a service called WhoisGuard that comes free with a brand new domain. What is WhoisGuard? Well, it protects your private information from potentially prying eyes, spammers and stalkers. This service is absolutely invaluable when it comes to privacy.
There are a couple of minor potential drawbacks to using it.
Some people may not trust you if you use it, so it may slightly lessen sales. But the odds of someone checking your WHOIS information before they buy from you are relatively slim.
Additionally, some people say Google may penalize your site if you are using WhoisGuard, but there is no real evidence of this. It is purely anecdotal. This is nothing to worry about for most people, and unless you are in an extremely competitive niche SEO wise, it’s not worth considering.
If you don’t want to risk disgruntled customers or crazy stalkers showing up at your front door, this is a great way to protect yourself.
Choosing a Domain
First of all, don’t be suckered into buying anything but a domain that ends with the .com extension. It’s been proven that domains that end in other extensions have a tougher time ranking well in the search engines. Not only that, but if you want people to be able to remember your domain if they want to come back and have forgotten to bookmark it, you really need to have the .com version. It is what people instinctively visit.
Ideally, you want to choose one of two types of domains:
- Short, unique and brandable
- Keyword rich
A short, unique and brandable domain would be something that is one or two words, easy to spell and remember, unique enough to stand out in people’s minds so they remember it, and clever enough to be highly brandable.
Here are some examples:
- Twitter.com
- Pinterest.com
This type of domain is best for online stores, social media sites, and other types of sites that focus on products or services more than content.
Keyword rich domains generally contain one major keyword phrase that you’d want to rank well for in the search engines. These don’t work as well for SEO as they used to, but are still beneficial to some degree.
Examples would be:
- HowToBuildATreehouse.com
- FreeGroceryCoupons.com
- BestCasseroleRecipes.com
I have no idea if any of those are currently being used, but they are examples of the types of domains you might want to get if you were trying to rank for those phrases.
Hosting
If you buy a domain name, you must have somewhere to host it. If your domain is your street address, your hosting is basically the building in which your company resides at that address.
There are many reputable hosting companies to choose from, but perhaps the most popular among internet marketers are Bluehost and HostGator.
>>Bluehost: warr.us/bluehost
>>Hostgator: warr.us/hostgator
HostGator has a very affordable plan called Baby Croc that costs about $10 per month and gives you all the space and bandwidth the average person can use. If you happen to use more than your server can handle, you may need to get a dedicated server, but if that becomes the case, you should hopefully be making more than enough money to afford it.
HostGator also has the Fantastico system, which will allow you to install scripts such as WordPress with just a few mouse clicks and with ZERO knowledge of technical stuff like databases.
The minimum specs you will need from your hosting company will depend on what you want to accomplish with it and how much traffic you think you’ll be getting, but most companies are fairly flexible. You can move up or down in plan size pretty much anytime if you find you need more options or if you’re paying too much for stuff you don’t need.
At the very least you will probably want:
- FTP access
- Unlimited domains
- Unlimited or reasonable storage
- Unlimited or reasonable bandwidth
- Fantastico (for script installation)
There are other features that come in handy, such as regular automatic backups to protect your websites in case of crash or hacking, but nothing is really critical. Most hosting companies these days will offer such features, anyway.
cPanel
One thing you may need to become acquainted with is cPanel. Your hosting company will probably provide some basic tutorials to help you learn to use it. But if you want to add new domains to your account, setup redirects, install software, etc., you will need to learn to use it.
>> https://www.cpanel.net/products/cpanelwhm/cpanel11/tutorials.html
FTP
FTP, also known as File Transfer Protocol, is a method of transferring files to and from your hosting server. This is used for uploading images, HTML files, etc.
You will need to use a FTP program if you need to transfer files, and unless you’re using WordPress (installed with Fantastic) exclusively, you will likely need to upload files at some point.
There are some great free FTP programs available for most OS platforms. Very few people would need the features that come with paid FTP programs, anyway.
Here are a few to check out:
>> http://filezilla-project.org (Windows and Mac)
>> http://www.coffeecup.com/free-ftp/ (Windows)
>> https://www.smartftp.com (Windows)
>> http://www.coreftp.com (Windows)
Check the instructions that come with the individual programs to learn how to use them. Most are quite simple so get stuck in.
Hopefully this post helps you to look at some of the more technical aspects of Internet Marketing with a little less trepidation.
This post is actually part of a larger report that I have put together and if you want to get hold of a FREE copy you can do so HERE
How To Start Your Own Coaching Business
OK, so you are interested in becoming a coach and helping others to succeed; that’s great but how do you go about getting started in the first place?
Before you start, let’s take a quick look at the pro’s and cons of running your own coaching business so you can decide whether this is an avenue you really want to pursue.
The pro’s of coaching
This could be quite a lengthy list as coaching is a business that anyone can embark upon, but here are five of the top benefits to becoming a coach:
- Anyone with people skills and the ability to help can become a coach. As long as you are an expert at something you can coach someone to become an expert too. Although it’s recommended you take some courses and get certified, the coaching profession isn’t highly regulated yet, which means anyone can call themselves a coach (perhaps this could be called a con too)!
- You can start small so it is actually quite affordable to get your coaching business off the ground. Odds are you already have the equipment needed to start; a computer. You can download Skype for free and buy a quality set of headphones for under $50. You should also have a website, coaching contract and perhaps homework materials, but again, those can all be had for less than $100.
- You can feel good about helping people in the area you coach in. There is nothing better than helping someone who is stuck in an area of their life or business and seeing them progress forward.
- You can do individual and/or group coaching. Especially for people who can’t afford one-on-one time with you, group coaching allows them a way to work with you and you to be able to help more people in less time. And if you are a business coach, as they see the benefits and results in higher profits, they will probably be able to invest more into coaching and pay to access you on an individual basis.
- You can offer add-on products or services to further assist your clients. Many coaches have books and home study products and this offshoot can generate an extremely lucrative business in itself and you can reach far more people who, once again, may seek out more access to you as they progress and see results.
The cons of coaching
- As stated in the pro’s list above, although certification is not currently required, getting certified can certainly increase your credibility and marketability. But, of course, getting a coaching certification takes time and money and this needs to be taken into consideration.
- You do need to have great people skills and patience. Just because people come to you for help, doesn’t mean they’ll do what you suggest, even if it is in their own best interests. In fact, many people are fearful and resistant to change, so you need to be able to support, encourage and sometimes challenge your clients to make needed changes to have the breakthrough they desire.
- You’ll spend a lot of time on the phone or video conferencing. If you don’t mind having many appointments a day, that won’t be a problem (this is where having an information business on the side will alleviate this issue).
- You need to be in top form whenever you’re with clients. You might feel bad/sick, have a personal issue or other difficulties in your life, but when you’re with a client, you need to be “on” no matter what and laser focused on them 100%. Remember that as a coach you will ultimately be judged on the results you get for your clients.
- It can take a while to build a solid, stable business. Getting your first clients can be tricky, but you can offer discounted or even free sessions to get them in through the door to show them the value you offer and to hook them. But this does take time and perseverance, although this can be argued the same for any business!
Now, before you even think about starting up a coaching business you need a thorough understanding and acceptance of who you are. Don’t forget that the most valuable resource you have in your business is you. It’s the one thing your business cannot do without. Take time to really understand what makes you tick, how you ended up where you are and who you want to be for the rest of your life. Yes, your business will provide an income (hopefully), but it’s also an opportunity for fun and fulfilment.
All great creations start with a dream. You have permission to dream about what you want, where you want to go, who you want to work with. Make this dream as real as possible, use all your senses. Yes, create a vision board and mind map. Test drive that dream car. Record your dream in a way that you can revisit it as often as you need for inspiration. Then check how comfortably your business fits in to your dream. And this is important, if it does not fit, then you need adjust your business, not your dream.
Still here, good! Now let’s take a look at a few personal qualities that you will need to succeed as a coach:
You Are Happy To Invest In Yourself
To succeed as a coach, you must not be afraid to invest in yourself consistently. Take a look around and you will see that this is a trait shared by the best coaches. Think about it; if you aren’t willing to invest in yourself, why should a client invest in you? You can’t help others see their blind spots if you can’t see your own. The best coaches are constantly getting support from other coaches.
You Need To Have (Or Develop) A Business Mindset
Too many coaches only want to coach. That motivation and passion is critical, but as a coach, you’re also a solopreneur. For better or worse, the stamina you have for coaching has to transfer over into maintaining the bottom line, and no matter what, running a business is serious work. This means personal branding, social media strategy, writing articles, speaking to audiences – and that isn’t even delving into the financial management and bookkeeping elements of running a business. It’s not about whether you can do it, it’s about whether you can enjoy it enough to do it. The major reason that many coaches fail is not because they can’t coach enough clients, but rather because they lack a strategic business plan. Seeing clients is a small slice of it… a good coach gets and enjoys all aspects of the business, especially the marketing.
You Are A Good Listener
Studies show that listening skills can actually boost economic success, yet coaches often fail to apply this in their own practice. The worst coaches are focused only on feeding you information whereas a great coach has the skills to facilitate a shift in your mindset and perspective, which is only possible by really listening to you and understanding you at a deep level. Once that inner shift occurs, it is reflected back with massive powerful results which will ultimately benefit both coach and client.
Ok, so you have got this far and you are definitely invested into becoming a coach. Here are 7 quick steps you can use to get going.
Step 1: What Type Of Coach?
You are probably aware that life and business coaching are extremely popular, but they aren’t the only types of coaching you can do. If you are in the fitness niche you can become a weight loss, fitness or health coach. What about a sports coach? You can also become a parenting or relationship coach, organizational or productivity coach, technical coach, sales coach or a career coach. Where is your area of expertise and work from there?
Step 2: Set up Your Business/Company
Decide your business structure, create a business name and get a business license if required. Write a coaching contract that outlines your services and expectations.
Step 3: Invest In Your Coaching Equipment
If you’re going to be doing video conferencing, download the needed software and purchase a quality headset and webcam. Some coaches record calls and give them to their clients so they can review the session. If you want to do that, you’ll need to get a recorder that will record your video/audio calls. You can use Skype which is free to hold these types of calls. If you want to run group sessions, you could run weekly webinars etc. so you will need to invest in webinar software. Whatever you do, it is important that people can hear you clearly so invest in a quality microphone such as the Blue Yeti.
Step 4: Build Your Website
Potential clients need a place to learn about your coaching business and there’s no better place to sell your coaching and related materials than on a website.
You will need to purchase hosting and a domain name (preferably the name of your coaching company). Using WordPress, you can quickly get a website live online and customise the look and feel through various plugins and themes. If you aren’t very techy, you can outsource this to freelance sites such as Fiverr.com or Upwork.com and get someone to install and set this up for you (remember that this is an investment in your business and not a cost).
Write content that is client-focused on how you can help them improve their lives. Once you have testimonials, post them on your website as social proof is very powerful.
Step 5: Develop A Marketing Strategy
Do thorough market research to figure out your ideal client and where you can find them and then develop specific marketing strategies to lure them to your business. For example, if you’re a business oriented coach, you should develop a LinkedIn profile. If you’re a personal training coach, you might want to have videos on YouTube that offer fitness tips or teach specific exercises etc. Really delve into your market and understand what makes them tick, their hopes and fears, and determine how you can position yourself as the answer to those hopes and fears.
Step 6: Keep On Marketing!
In all honesty getting your first client will likely be the hardest. Use your personal and professional network to help. Like I have already stated in this article, consider offering a heavily discounted, or even better, a free 15 or 30-minute coaching session to entice people to try you out. Deliver as much value as you possibly can during these sessions as your business could depend on it. Just because they are free, doesn’t mean you should hold back. Help them as much as you can, and once they see the benefit and that you are genuinely interested in helping them, hopefully the decision to invest in you becomes a no-brainer.
Step 7: Be The Best Coach That You Can!
This may seem to be obvious but it needs to be stated. Coaching isn’t a business to take lightly. People are entrusting their emotional and possibility their physical well-being to you. You also owe it to them to stay on top of current trends in your industry, as well as best practices for coaches.
Remember that ultimately you will be judged on the results you achieve for your clients, so give them 100% and as they see the results, you will probably get referrals and your coaching business will soar. You could become the go-to coach in your niche with all the recognition and kudos that brings, and you know that you are affecting many people’s lives for the better and there is no greater feeling that that!
I hope this post has given you some insight into the benefits that starting your own coaching business can give to you. If you want to learn more about starting your own coaching business, I have also recorded some video training that you can see here: warr.us/atgmen1
The Benefits of Personal Coaching
As a successful entrepreneur or business person, you probably know exactly what you want and how to get it. You are driven, determined and a self-starter. So if you have all these great qualities, why would you need a coach?
10 Real World Benefits of Coaching
The personal benefits of coaching are as wide-ranging as the individuals involved. Many clients report that coaching has positively impacted their careers as well as their lives in many ways. Here are ten of the many ways that having a coach will benefit you.
1. Establish and take action towards achieving goals:
This is especially important for introverted entrepreneurs and solopreneurs who run online businesses as it’s easy to become enmeshed in your own business world. A business coach will push you to step outside your comfort zone, meet new people and try new things in your business. Even extroverted entrepreneurs can get caught in ruts and a business coach will push you out of them and force you to take action to strive towards your goals.
2. Regain clarity:
When you decide to become an entrepreneur, you start with great dreams and aspirations of growing a business, hoping to achieve great things. As the months and sometimes even the years go by, you start realizing that your business is yet to become what you had initially envisioned, and you have yet to implement all the ambitious action plans you once thought of. You may start seeing that you are so caught up in the day-to-day running of the business that you find little time to think and plan a strategy. Working with a coach will help you raise your head from the day-to-day business race and look at the bigger picture. Your coach will get you to start thinking about the future, where do you see yourself and your business, and get you to act on this vision by developing a winning strategy that you can execute with confidence.
3. Become more self-reliant:
The one aspect that a coach brings that group sessions or mentors do not, is a keen awareness of your entire business and way of being. There are few times when someone is going to focus just on you for an entire hour, probing you about something that happened last quarter, an employee issue you had three weeks ago or your style of leadership. By being totally focused on you, a good coach can show you the way and when you take the necessary action you will become far more self reliant when running your business, and your confidence will soar and you are on an upwards success spiral.
4. Increased Productivity:
Professional coaching maximizes potential and, therefore, unlocks latent sources of productivity. To be successful and to get to a point where you haven’t been before, you need to do something you haven’t done before. And this is really what separates real successful entrepreneurs from mediocre ones. A good coach will not only motivate and encourage you, he/she will point out the things you are good at but most importantly he/she will point out the things that you are not exceeding in and you need to improve. We all have blind spots and often the more successful we are, the harder it becomes to highlight and accept our shortcomings. Identifying blind spots means that you get to work on areas of yourself you haven’t addressed before, which will result in becoming more productive and more aware about you need to do to lead a more fulfilling life.
5. Positive attitude and increased self-confidence:
Building the self-confidence of employees to face challenges is critical in meeting organizational demands and you will get much more done if the people around you are positive and uplifting, rather than negative people who are always complaining and wear you down.
6. Greater responsibility and accountability for actions and commitments:
A coach will not only push you and challenge you to do and achieve your best, but will also hold you accountable for your actions. An experienced coach is able to detect when you are lying to yourself and when you are sugarcoating existing realities in order to avoid the pain of taking action.
When you are procrastinating your strategy, the coach will point out whether you are just being lazy, or if you are just uncomfortable with the direction things are moving toward, your coach will help identify what the right direction is for you. For many of us, this clear direction and vision is often being blurred by what we should be doing. Working with a coach, you will be able to push those should’s aside and work without guilt on what you want to achieve.
This leads to –
7. Return on Investment:
Coaching generates learning and clarity for forward action with a commitment to measurable outcomes.The vast majority of companies (86%) say they at least made their investment back.
8. Work more easily and productively with others:
Finding ways to do tasks more quickly and efficiently and understanding that is a process worth investing your time in is an important skill and this includes working well with others and, perhaps more importantly, being able to delegate tasks to others (especially when you may feel like it would be easier to do it yourself). You need to think about the bigger picture, the long-term results of investing the time to train and delegate tasks to others.
9. Communicate more effectively by voicing your frustrations:
Whether you are a solopreneur or you have a team around you, there will always be certain things that you may not be able to share with those around you for a number of reasons. In a coaching relationship, you can share your concerns with the coach, knowing that you are in a confidential setting; your coach is always your biggest advocate and wants you to succeed in whatever you set out to.
Releasing all your worries, frustrations and emotions will not only give you a sense of relief, but will help you understand the triggers of any negative emotions. Once you know what triggers your emotions and your reactions, you will be become better at managing your stress levels and you will be more proactive other than reactive to the world around you. This is in turn will filter down to the way you act and communicate with those around you, and is generally a positive change.
10. Coaching provides an invaluable space for personal development:
This is an important, but often overlooked benefit, especially in the corporate world but is just as important for a company as an individual. Take this for example; managers frequently have to deal with employees struggling with low confidence. The traditional approach would be to send them to an assertiveness course and hope this addresses the issue. In the short-term, the employee learns new strategies for communicating which may improve confidence. Unfortunately, in isolation these courses rarely produce a sustained increase in confidence. Although external behavior may change; it needs to be supported by changes in their internal thought processes. This is often where coaching is most effective and it can be tailored to the individuals needs.
Okay, there you have it. Ten top ways that coaching can benefit you.
Do you have the knowledge and expertise in your niche that would enable you to become a coach? There is no greater feeling than helping others to succeed. If you would like to learn more about how you can start your own coaching program/business, take a look at Mentoring Magic here: warr.us/atgmen1
What Is Your Online Marketing Strategy?
Every business today should have a strong online presence. This will allow you to potentially reach out to more customers than you would with regular marketing methods. A solid online strategy will allow you to increase your business image, send more traffic to your site and promote customer awareness.
There are various marketing strategies that you should implement to achieve this. Use the following tips to help you plan a strategy that will give you results.
Develop a Marketing Message
You should work on creating methods that clearly project your marketing message. This needs to be done in such a way that your audience clearly knows what message you are sending. Work on understanding what your message is first, then practice writing it out so that it becomes super clear.
Who is Your Target Market?
This aspect is vital and should not be overlooked. Take the time to research who it is your products or services are targeting. It is not always the group that you first had in mind. Learn how they operate, how they think, their wants and desires. By doing this you will discover ways that you can easily market to them. Without this knowledge your marketing strategy will not be as successful as it could be.
It really can’t be stressed enough how important market research is to the success of your business. Understanding your market will guarantee that you are providing the right products and services to your audience, ones that they will be interested in purchasing and at a price point that they are willing to pay.
Without researching your market, you’re just shooting in the dark. With the right type of market research, you’re shining a bright light on your target so you’ll be a lot more likely to be successful.
It Helps You Focus on What’s Most Important
When you conduct market research, it will help you focus on what’s most important to your audience and therefore to you. You cannot make assumptions about your market without confirming them by researching the situation. You might find out that your ideas are wrong or you might find out they’re correct.
It Helps You To Understand Your Audience
You might think that you can wing it, but if you don’t know everything about your audience that you can, you may make a mistake. For instance, one-time Coke thought it was a good idea to come out with “New Coke” without really learning about what their audience would think about that. It was a colossal failure.
It Helps You To Understand Which Path Is the Most Profitable
When you learn more about your market, you’ll be able to create even better products and services that your audience really wants. In fact, they will think that you’re able to read minds and will clamor to buy what you’re selling.
It Enables You To Become Adaptable
Even when you are marketing to the same general demographic, the morals, views, thoughts, and ideals of a demographic changes over time. That’s why companies that have been around for ages have to change their marketing plans and advertising periodically, because people change.
It Helps in Decision-Making
Having the right information in front of you will help you make a lot better choices for your business and your audience. After all, decisions made with no information, the wrong information, or assumptions will almost always be wrong. Having the right information is going to make your choices so much better.
It Helps Minimise Risk
When you know what your market is doing and what they want, you lower your risk of mistakes and failure when pushing out new products and services. Why waste time and money with shooting in the dark when you can shine the light on your work and hit your target every time?
It Helps You Develop New Strategies
The right marketing research will help you create new approaches for everything you do in your business. With market research done properly, the new things you do for your business will be more likely to work out.
Don’t just do market research once; consider it an ongoing need in order to stay competitive in your business. You’ll identify future problems faster, which will enable you to create products and services even faster too.
Discovering Your Options
Any good business will know what their options are and how to put them into play. No matter how great your marketing strategy is, it will eventually come to a standstill. By having options in place, you can simply move on to the next thing.
Be Consistent
A good marketing strategy will offer consistency. This includes ensuring that your branding and any promotional materials are all consistent. This way your potential customers will know who is sending the message. Use the same image and logo across all of your social sites. Keep the branding in place on your website or blog. Eventually customers will associate this look with your business name.
Always Follow Up
As well as following up with your customers you need to follow up with your online marketing strategies. This way you can identify which methods were successful or not. You will then know what areas of your business need tweaking or changing completely, and what methods to keep in place.
If you take the time to include all of these points into your marketing strategy, you will have a well thought out plan in place. You will know how to communicate with your audience and you will know who it is you are targeting with your messages.
By having a good marketing strategy in place your business will prosper and grow. So take the time to put yours into place today.