4) Leverage Your Efforts

Leverage is such a simple way to build your business fast, but most people don’t use it. The way I see leverage, it is all about maximizing your efforts. Let’s use traffic exchanges as an example.

Let’s say you earn 100 credits to show your affiliate link 100 times and you make 1 sale. Great job! But… if you want to make another sale, you have to keep surfing to find another customer. What happened to the first buyer? Did you just let them go after they buy? If you stopped surfing today, you also stop making money.

Now let’s pretend that instead, you use your 100 credits and build your subscriber list. You get 1 subscriber, and sell that person a product. But guess what, now you still have that customer! You can contact them again later whether they bought your product or not! You can build a relationship and sell to the same person several times instead of just once. Now every time you surf, you are increasing your customer base and adding more value to your business every day!

This is an example of what leveraging your efforts means to me. One effort should be helping you create multiple chances to make money. Rather than looking for the quick buck, plan ahead (does that planning thing sound familiar? ) and think about how you can maximize your efforts and increase your long term profits!

The top things that come to mind for me are building your list, upselling more products, branding, and creating things that go viral. However building your list should be number 1, because it can help you do all of those other things any time you want. If you want to build your list, I highly recommend aweber , which is widely considered the best autoresponder for Internet Marketers.

If you want to see your business succeed, start thinking about how your efforts can give you more opportunities to make money!

Well I hope you’ve enjoyed this short series. I didn’t just make these things up from thin air. These are literally some of the cornerstones I have used to help turn my business around overnight!

3) Create Value

A huge mistake I see is that people try to sell their product, but never create enough value to make people want to buy. I don’t know where it comes from, but I love the concept of "Underpromise and overdeliver." Create value for your customers. They should feel like they are getting a great deal, because that is what will make them buy. Offer superior products, customer service, or whatever it is you think you can offer. But go out of your way to create value and make people say wow.

As an example, just recently I was looking at a PLR product for sale from a very reputable writer. I looked at the description and it sounded like a solid product I can sell. Then the guy says on top of that, he’ll thrown in 2 more PLR E-books he’s written before. I thought well that was nice. But then he tells me he’s also including 4 ready-made squeeze pages to help capture leads. I really liked that. AND then also a rebrandable video where I can add my name and website. And a salespage. And a complete autoresponder series!

So what I started with was a basic PLR product, and what I ended up leaving with was a complete mini-business in a box. By the time I was finished reading, I couldn’t have opened my wallet faster. Why? It’s because he created value.

You don’t necessarily have to go this far, but find a way to create a real value to your customers, and they will be happy to spend their money with you. You see it all the time from every prominent website. You’ll join for their free membership which sounds fantastic. Then you’ll get a one time offer that completely blows your mind! Even if you can’t afford it, it sounds so good that you buy it anyway! Why? They created so much value for your money, you are almost forced to buy it because it would be dumb not to!

When was the last time you made your customers say wow?

2) Network

When I say network, I mean making an effort to meet and befriend new people. Do you think business would be easier if you could ask experienced people for help and advice? It sure is a lot better than buying several E-books trying to find the answer. What if you launched a new website and had 5 friends with a total of 25,000 subscribers promoting your website to their list? Do you think that would help your business? Building a network is probably one of the simplest things you can do to ensure your success. I highly recommend going out there and meeting new people at the hot spots for Internet Marketers. These are my favorite forums to visit:

• NetMarketingForum
• Warrior Forum
• Conquer Your Niche

Here are some tips to keep in mind when networking at forums:

• Don’t argue about things you don’t know anything about, it kills your credibility
• See someone successful there? Listen to what they say!
• Don’t believe to everything you read. Make sure you realize who you’re getting your advice from. (Hint: Read the above bullet point again. )
• Be honest. You don’t necessarily have to be nice, but be honest in your advice and tips to others. If you’re knowledgeable, it will shine through.
• Look for the topics you have strong knowledge about and and contribute to those threads.

One huge mistake I made was not networking. To this day I can’t believe just how helpful it is knowing great people that are willing to take the time to help. People like me would be nowhere without the guidance I’ve received by meeting great people. Again, take a look at the "gurus". Doesn’t it seem like they seem to know everybody? That’s because they understand the value of a network!

But you don’t have to make the same mistakes. So many experts have already done the hard work for you and laid out a path, all you really need to do is listen to them and follow what they do. It is guaranteed that you will make mistakes, but I’m hoping you can take what I plan to share with you and make less errors than I have. I’ve learned so many things and there is so much information out there that this could be a 7,000 part series and not truly be complete.

I say it all the time and I will continue to say it – 6 months ago no one knew who Solomon Huey was. Anyone can become a trusted a name in this business. Today you could a "nobody" and in a few months time find yourself being recognized by thousands of people!

The concepts of success are simple, but the fact is that most people don’t do them. I know I didn’t! However you’ll find all the people that make money do all of these. What I’m going to do is share with you four simple things that truly helped me change my business overnight. I hope you enjoy it…

1) Have a plan

You want to make more money? There’s nothing wrong with that, but how do you plan to do it? What’s your strategy? Who are you targeting? How much time do you have to invest each day? How much money do you expect to make? How long will it make you money? Do I have the skills to offer this product/service? If you don’t have the skills, do you know someone who does? How much will it cost you to develop?

I finally went to the SWAT Traffic seminar for the first time. Soren Jordensan touched on something that I strongly believe in, and that is to have a plan. If you want to make money, you need to map out a plan for success! Even better, write out a detailed business plan. I know it sounds like a lot of work, but I’d rather spend the next 3 months writing out a plan that I know will succeed than spending the next 6 years with little to no success (which is exactly what I did in the past ).

Does this sound familiar? I would buy some product or come up with a "great" idea. Then I’d say, ok I’m going to sell this! I’d put the website together and realized that I had no way to get traffic. So now I need to figure out where to sell it. Now how do I get these people to buy it? Then after awhile, I realize these people don’t even want my product to begin with, I just thought they wanted it!

I heard this quote a long time ago somewhere and sadly I lived by it for many years, "Failing to prepare is preparing to fail."

By planning ahead, you are creating a plan for success. Or maybe as you plan everything, you realize it won’t work. That’s ok, because you have just saved yourself a lot of wasted time, money, and effort. You don’t need to take my word for it, just look at the successful people and watch how every launch seems to be perfect down to the finest detail. That’s not an accident, they planned it that way.

So what’s your plan for success?

Visit again or join my mailing list so you can read the next thing that helped me change my business overnight!

Just the other day I ranted about a lack of value and creativity and used Traffic Dynamite as my example. Now I’m taking their launch as an example again, but this time for something good. It doesn’t mean I like or dislike Traffic Dynamite , I’m simply using them as an example.

The other day I talked about the need to innovate when launching a new traffic exchange. It’s necessary because as a new TE, competition is tough when you’re trying to get people to sign up. When I say innovate, I don’t mean it has to be some revolutionary new concept that changes the TE world. I just want to see something different that makes me want to surf! If I’m interested in surfing, maybe others will be too.

I read the 24 hour update that Traffic Dynamite sent, and out of everything I read, the one thing that caught my eye was a comic that will display every 20 pages. It’s nothing crazy, but it’s a simple idea that made me curious enough to surf their traffic exchange today. It is something that can set itself apart, and makes me think that perhaps it will encourage others to surf as well.

This is a small example of what I’d like to see the traffic exchange industry evolve into. The idea that new and better ideas get introduced into the mix. I think it is especially necessary for the new traffic exchange that is trying to establish itself in the marketplace. It could be Savvy Clicks’ Memory game, I Love Hits’ new member page feature, Blue-Surf’s option for number of page views per nember, or a simple comic. These establish more value to their respective exchanges and make for a potentially better user experience.

The idea of giving away cash for the Gladiator Hits Launch was a nice touch in my opinion. However once one person has a successful launch using a particular method, everyone jumps on the bandwagon. Dragon Surf did its relaunch awhile back and it had amazing results because they were giving cash for all referrals. Once everyone saw what Dragon Surf did, I’ve seen several websites launch with the same concept and mild success.

The reason these ideas were successful in the first place is because either no one did them before or no one did it as well. Once someone comes along and copies the same idea, it doesn’t have the same effect. Launches should be big and it’s ok to use another idea, but please add your own twist to make it special. Being unique is what helps a launch become successful in the first place.

The other problem I’m seeing is a lack of value. I’m going to use Traffic Dynamite as an example, but again this is not anything against them. They are giving away $7 to the first 700 people who join, but I’m not interested in joining for cash … I’m there for quality traffic! The $7 is meaningless in the big picture, because I’m using the traffic they provide to help me make money. This $7, while a great incentive, doesn’t assure me in any way that I’m getting good traffic. You know what really gets me excited about a TE launch? It’s knowing that you’ve done something that will make your traffic convert better than others. If you’ve done that, I’ll make a lot more than $7.

Yes, these old giant Traffic exchanges don’t have much that makes them unique, but they deserve their place for being first to the market. We’ve established the industry standards, and now I want to see innovation and value, so that I know you’re willing to invest as much time and effort into your business as I’m willing to put into surfing at your exchange.

I don’t know if anyone else feels the same way, but I think it is something that all Traffic exchange users should be paying attention to before joining a new TE.

If you’ve seen some of the information being covered at Tim Linden’s Blog or Jon Olson’s Hit Exchange News , this is the type of information that I’d like to share with you as well. I’m not as experienced as them, but I think I bring a fresh perspective and unique ideas to traffic exchanges.

Of course I’ll always deliver the latest scoop and great bonuses being given out because I still get excited every time I see something big happening! However it will be less summarizing and a lot more tips, information, and analyzing of the traffic exchange industry.

I hope you’ll enjoy the change of direction here at TEscoop!

To Your Success,
Solomon Huey

P.S. In case you are going to miss those daily updates, I found out someone does a great job of that too! Check out Gina’s TE Corner .

In the meantime, TEsoop will pause it’s usual updates. I apologize for the inconvenience.

Update: Looks like we survived and TEscoop came out in tact! Luckily most of the information that I thought was lost was still in the database too.

I’ll be sure try and repair this as soon as possible, though I will need to look through some of my saved files and see what I still have lying around. I apologize for the inconvenience, I’ve had a string of bad luck lately but I promise to keep things running as smoothly as possible.

As posted on my wall at home, “Challenges are what makes life interesting, overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” – Author unknown.

Want to know the truth about TEscoop? I may lay my referral links all over the place here, but I hardly get any referrals from TEscoop at all! The truth is that most of you that visit here are already fairly avid traffic exchange users, which means you are likely a member of most major TE’s. That makes my referral links pretty much useless. So why bother?

I started TEscoop with one major goal in mind, and that was to brand myself. I spent hours and hours surfing to promote TEscoop, which earned me nothing financially(and continues to earn nothing)! It may seem like a waste of time because I’m not earning any money from this website, but we have to look at the bigger picture. It helped brand my name in the industry!

In less than 2 months, several owners from big traffic exchanges recognized me and the work that I was doing! That is amazing if you think about it. How powerful is branding? When several big traffic exchange owners recognize your name and the work that you do, that is worth more than a few sales.

Since then, I’ve made some valuable connections and at least brought attention to who I am and what I do. Am I big player yet? No. But branding has brought me one step closer and made the process much easier. It’s helped me make my own  mark with TEscoop and EliteSafelist. The big boys like Jon Olson keep telling you that branding is key, but I don’t think I’ve ever understood it as well as I do today.

Folks, if anything is to be learned from this, listen to the experts! If you want to achieve their success, you should pay attention to what they do and say. You can disagree, but at least acknowledge and recognize their message. They have achieved their success for a reason!

So here is one more guy telling you to brand yourself. It doesn’t take much work to just put a picture up on your splash pages and let people know who is the person behind the business. You may or may not recognize me as a big name or an expert. But remember, it was only about 6 months ago that almost no one knew the name Solomon Huey!