Startup Basics – Alphadog Success

The Practical Guide to Understanding PLR and MRR Licenses

Hey there, brilliant minds! Today, we’re diving into the practical world of PLR (Private Label Rights) and MRR (Master Resale Rights) content. Whether you’re a savvy marketer, a content creator, or just stepping into the vast digital landscape, understanding PLR licenses can be a total game-changer for your business. If you’ve ever found yourself stuck staring at a blank screen, PLR might just be the “shortcut” you’ve been looking for. Maybe you want to start your own business and have seen a lot of the Master Resell Rights (MRR) courses and products that promise a simple starting point. But before you dive into the PLR pool, it’s crucial to understand the different licenses involved and how each one can serve your unique needs. So, let’s break it down and make sense of these options, shall we? What Exactly is PLR? First off, PLR content is pre-created material that you can buy the rights to use, change, and, often, claim as your own. It’s like having a ghostwriter or a silent contributor who’s cool with you taking all the credit. Pretty sweet, right? The Types of PLR Licenses You must understand the different between all the PLR licenses. Pay attention to what is allowed at each level. This is key to using content effectively without stepping on any legal toes. Here’s the scoop on the most common types of licenses: Private Label Rights (PLR) What You Get: The freedom to alter, add to, and rebrand the content. You can even put your name on it as if you whipped it up yourself. What’s Not Allowed: The restrictions depend on the seller, but typically, you cannot resell the rights to someone else. Ideal For: Creating branded ebooks, courses, or articles for your blog that feel tailor made. Resell Rights (RR) What You Get: You can sell the product to others and keep 100% of the profits. You may not change the product. You cannot alter or edit the content. It’s a take-it-as-it-is option. Ideal For: Anyone looking to add new products to their digital shop without the hassle of creating something from scratch. Master Resell Rights (MRR) What You Get: Not only can you sell the product, but you can also pass along the resell rights to your customers. What’s Not Allowed: Typically, like RR, you cannot change the original content. Ideal For those who want to provide more value to their customers, allowing them to resell the product too. Benefits of Using PLR Why everyone should use PLR content? Here’s why it’s a potential savior for many entrepreneurs and content creators: Improved efficiency. Save a tremendous amount of time and energy. PLR content is ready to go–you just need to tweak it to fit your brand’s voice and style. Save yourself a little money and time. Hiring writers or content creators can be expensive. Creating everything yourself, from scratch, can take up a lot of your time. PLR offers a budget-friendly alternative that keeps your content pipeline flowing. With a little creativity, you can unlock infinite potential with unrestricted products. When you’re free to edit or transform the content, the possibilities are endless. Adapt it to create newsletters, social media posts, courses, or even marketing materials. Choosing the Right PLR License When shopping for PLR content, consider how you plan to use it. If customization and branding are important, go for full PLR. If you simply need products to resell, RR or MRR might be right up your alley. Always read the license terms—trust me, it’s crucial to know what you can and can’t do! Wrap-Up In the vast ocean of digital content, PLR is like having a speedboat. It gets you where you need to go faster, allowing you to focus on steering your business towards greater success. Whether you’re looking to save time, cut costs, or streamline content creation, PLR can propel you forward. Make sure you pay attention to what the license permits. So, go ahead, give PLR a shot and watch how it can transform your content strategy while freeing up your precious time. Let’s make magic happen with less stress and more creativity. Cheers to smart solutions and even smarter implementations!

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How Your Ideal Client Saves Your Time And Money

Why is an Ideal Client important? One of the most fundamental aspects of your marketing, product development and business plan is knowing who your ideal client is. Without this knowledge, you won’t know how to write your content in a way that’s attractive to your clients, and you won’t be able to tailor your products or services to their unique needs. When I talk about content I mean everything that you develop for your clients or potential clients to draw them to you and help you solve the problems that they face in their everyday lives, so everything hinges on this. When you know who your ideal clients are, your client attraction efforts will become vastly more effective, because you’ll be able to pinpoint what they want, what challenges they have, where they’re looking for information about your industry, and what trends and mindsets influence the way they search for products and choose who to buy from. In this blog post, I’ll bust some myths about having ideal clients that cost businesses thousands of dollars each year, and I’ll tell you the nine things you need to know about your ideal client, as well as how to choose your ideal client if you aren’t sure who they are. Why some businesses avoid having ideal clients: One of the costliest myths that businesses fall for is the idea that they don’t need an ideal client. Some of their reasons seem sound, but they’re based on misconceptions about what clients want and how client attraction works. Here are two of the reasons why people fall into that trap: Reason 1: They’re afraid of driving clients away. If you could potentially target a wide range of different demographics, why would you want to alienate some of them by narrowing your niche? That’s a fear that many business owners have when they first start to consider identifying an ideal client. They believe that the wider the net they cast, the more clients they’ll draw in. Reason 2: Their product could be used by anyone. Some businesses could, in theory, serve almost any client under the sun. Life coaches who teach universal success principles that apply to anyone, chiropractors who could work on anyone who has a spine, and businesses that sell food are all examples of people with a very broad potential audience. If you’re in such an industry, why would you want to narrow your client base? Why not having an ideal client WILL cost you: If you share these concerns about having an ideal client, here are four truths about client attraction that should put your mind at ease: What’s attractive to one client won’t be attractive to others. People are the most inclined to make a purchase when your marketing speaks to their exact challenges and needs. When someone looks at your offer, they should think “Yes – that’s EXACTLY what I need! It’s like that product was made for me!” If you try to create and sell offerings that are meant to apply to everyone, there’s a good chance that they’ll be partly applicable to everyone, but ideal for no one. Your clients will look at your offer and think, “Some of that looks good, but a lot of it just doesn’t apply to me”. If someone is motivated enough that they’re actively looking to buy, the chances are good that they’re looking for something in specific. An offer that’s only a partial match, or that seems to be designed with a different demographic in mind, will be rejected. One excellent example I’ve heard a few times is that of a pharmacy. If you try to sell an “everything pill”, will anybody trust it enough to buy it? Probably not – and even if they did, there’s a good chance that they wouldn’t think to look for it. If you have a headache, the chances are good that you’re looking for a pill designed to treat headaches. Unless you were already aware of the “everything pill” before your search began, it probably won’t even occur to you to look for it. You could walk right past it and not even register it. When you know exactly who your clients are, what they need, and what they struggle with, you’ll be able to create products and marketing materials that are exactly what they’re looking for, and you can learn their language and phrase your marketing in ways that appeal strongly to them. You don’t want to waste your time and budget on people who are less inclined to buy. Your ideal clients aren’t the ONLY people who will buy from you, but they are the people who are the most likely to make a purchase. If you were fishing, would you cast your line or drop your net repeatedly in random parts of the lake, or would you specifically target the areas where you knew you’d catch the most fish? Would you use bait or a lure that’s good for all kinds of fish, or the ones that will attract the specific type of fish you’re looking to catch? The same principle applies to marketing. You’ll never have the time and budget to reach ALL the possible demographics at once, so you should spend that time and money on the demographic that needs and wants your product the most, and that’s the most likely to make a purchase. You don’t WANT to attract every type of client. Not every client is a good one, especially if you’re selling services as opposed to products. If you’re going to have to spend any amount of time working with a client, you don’t want to attract the kind of people who are lukewarm about your services, and who will drag their feet, complain, nitpick, make unreasonable demands, hamper your efforts, and prove impossible to please. You also don’t want to attract people who aren’t able to get the full benefit from your offering. If something outside of your control will prevent you from getting

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8 Important Tasks for One Person Marketing Teams

You could easily succeed if you had a dedicated team, a million-dollar marketing budget, and 48 hours in a day. But that’s not how real life works. Especially for a new entrepreneur or one-person marketing team. It’s easy to get into the “if only” mindset when you’re the only employee/marketer at your company. But if you want to grow your business, it’s important to get solution-oriented. Try to focus on getting the biggest ROI from every marketing activity you have the time and resources to execute. To help you out – I’ve compiled eight incredibly important marketing activities that a one-man or one-woman team can execute that will start moving key metrics. No more dilly dallying around with things that don’t move the needle. 1) Set strategic and measurable marketing goals. Before you start posting, sending emails or scheduling tweets, be sure you’ve properly set goals for your marketing. Think of your marketing like a road trip. You wouldn’t start driving until you’ve found your destination, and mapped out the most effective route to get there. In the same way, you should always make sure your activities and goals help you drive your business forward. You wouldn’t want a goal of converting more leads into customers if you aren’t converting visitors into leads already. You can’t pull people through the funnel until you’ve gotten them there in the first place. And of course, ensure the goals you set are measurable. For instance, if your goal is to increase visitor-to-lead conversion rate, think about whether you have the tools in place to measure whether you’re doing that. If you need help determining which goals are right for your business, check out my guide to setting SMART goals. 2) Establish exactly who your target audience is. With only so much time in the day to devote to marketing, you want to make sure that every piece of content you produce (ebook, landing page, blog post, or email) is on-target and effective. Wouldn’t it be frustrating to spend a ton of time creating content that falls on deaf ears? The best way to guard against wasting your time creating content is to create and use buyer personas/ideal client/customer avatar/etc. If you’re not familiar with buyer personas, they’re models for what your ideal customers are like. A persona includes information such as what sort of person they are (education, income level, or job, for example) as well as what’s important to them (saving time or money, for example). If you haven’t developed them yet, or you think you could put a little more elbow grease into ones you already have, here’s a free checklist to help you nail down your market research and target audience. If you put together buyer personas now, and then create every piece of content with a persona in mind, your content will work harder for you — in fact, you may find persona-driven content results in your audience marketing your content for you! 3) Focus on the right social media platforms. Now that we have some important baselines established that will make your subsequent marketing efforts pack a more powerful punch, let’s figure out the right places to spend your time (so it’s not wasted in the wrong ones). And if there’s one area rife with opportunities for misspent time, it’s on social media. It’s tempting to try to be on all of the social media platforms because everyone else is doing it, and it feels like that’s what good marketers do. Fortunately for you, they are most definitely wrong. Instead of wasting your time engaging on social networks that won’t help you achieve your SMART goals, strategically choose one or two platforms to be on and knock them out of the park. To find out which social networks you should spend your time on, check out your analytics. In your sources report Identify which social networks are already sending you the most traffic, and then capitalize on them. If you have closed-loop analytics, I also recommend drilling down further to see which networks are sending you the most leads and customers. Have access to all of this information will help you make better decisions on which social networks you spend your marketing time. You may find that a top social network for you isn’t Facebook or Twitter, but rather a niche social network specific to your industry. Instead of wasting time on a big social network because it’s something you’re just “supposed” to do, switch your efforts to social networks that will pay off big time for your business. 4) Schedule out social media posts/updates. Now that you know where to spend your time on social media, let’s make your time spent on it both efficient, and effective. First, let’s talk about scheduling your content in advance. Instead of freaking out every day trying to find something amazing to post to social media, sit down once a week to think of all of the subsequent week’s social media content. While you may have a couple things come up that warrant posting – like breaking industry news, for example – bucketing your time like this will make you more efficient. (platform itself, buffer, later, hootsuite, etc.) Alright, now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s make your time on social media more effective by thinking about the best times of day to publish your content. I encourage you to look for timing trends for your own social media presences. 5) Create evergreen content to reap short and long term benefits. Since content creation can get pretty time consuming, focus on creating evergreen content – content that stays relevant over a long period of time — to pack the biggest punch. This type of content pays for itself over and over again. Because it’s not time-sensitive, search engines will continue to drive traffic to evergreen posts, helping to drive leads long after you hit publish. If you’re having trouble finding an evergreen topic to write about on your company’s

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Does Anyone Know Who The REAL YOU Is Online?

There’s thousands of individuals and companies marketing themselves out there – and you are one of them… So, here is my question for the day: Who are you? Because as you can see, when you search through products, people, and services online – mediocrity and conformity is already 99% of everyone else’s day. Not to sound harsh, but most people just follow what is trending or what is hot, and while that may be an awesome way to make some quick money – regarding a long-term and life purpose – it is not exactly fulfilling, is it? It is just a means to an end if we think about it that way, and not sustainable. But you probably started online to make money – that is a given. You also probably wanted to have the flexibility and freedom it brings. Internet marketing has great potential to earn a large amount of money in a short amount of time. It’s a great way to learn. Most times, it is easier than your best friend’s 9-5 job, isn’t it? However, when we skip from one affiliate product to another or try to promote several things aimlessly with no real long-term vision or lifestyle design goals, we are not really building a future for ourselves overall… And as human beings, our long-term goal always stretches beyond money. In fact, as we get older, it is much more about – How can you serve and add value? How can you discover your life’s purpose? What really makes you happy? Who are you? The most difficult part in life is to really discover who you are (you: not the kid of your parents, not the wife of your husband, not the student in school, not what society thinks about you or expects from you, etc.). Once we go away and discover the answer to that – to what we really want from life, we can then apply our knowledge of who we really are to what we really enjoy doing – and in marketing terms – that can also bring money to the table. That’s where the start is. Trust me: Do what you love and what adds value in your personal opinion –and the money will follow. Picking a job or service or product is not the first thing you need to do – not yet anyway. Discovering yourself is the starting point. There is nothing before that point. The only other thing is what others are and what your position is in THEIR circles – not what your position is in YOUR life. Take a break and make a list. List all of the things you loved as a child that you have forgotten about, but still like doing. Then name five strengths you have in business and by nature. Also list five weaknesses. After a while, you will start to see a pattern – things you are good at and that you can offer. There is a reason you have the specific skills that you do; you are unique in these delivery skills and traits. Focus on what you LOVE to do and what you are good at and live from that end first before you decide what path to take. You are here for a reason. What is it? Who are you really? “You did not come into this world; you came out of it. Like a wave from the ocean. You are not a stranger here.” – Alan Watts

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Grow Your Biz Faster With Focused Efforts

How To Grow Your Business While Doing Less By Working Smarter And Focusing Your Efforts

I get it…you’ve been working hard to grow your business…but for some reason you aren’t seeing the results you were expecting. But don’t worry, it happens to the best of us, it’s all part of the learning and growth process. After talking to numerous business owners over the last few years I realized most of them were facing a handful of very similar issues. Below is a quick outline of exactly what I tell clients. How to grow your business without adding hours of additional work to your already busy schedule! Review all the products or services that have brought in profits and will grow your business. Make a list of everything your offer or would like to offer. (If you’re brand new, then this will be something you can revisit when you have more numbers to work with.) Find the one or two core services (If you are in e-comm then you can get away with 5-10 products). Separate the ones that produced the best profits and focus all of your effort on selling more of those. SAY NO to anything that does not fall under those core products and services. This allows you to control your time and scale your business with more predictability and profitability. STOP following fake idols and countless guru’s. Find a real mentor, join a mastermind group, and pay the money to get into a REAL course. Outsource the time-consuming work so that you can focus on income-producing activities and being the best at what you do. If you think you’re getting all you need from YouTube videos and other free trainings, you are sadly mistaken. People come to you for your expertise or for the products you sell. It’s NOT because you were the person doing the marketing. Find someone that can help with your marketing and enlist them for training or services. Stop listening to all the noise. Stop chasing shiny objects. Focus your ad dollars on things that actually provide a return. If you’re unable to track a client’s engagement with your business from click to customer, then that’s your first priority. You should think twice before making any additional investments until that’s managed. Start with Google Ads then follow up with a social media campaign. According to the National Sales Executive Association, Very few people (≅ 2%) will actually purchase a product the first time they see an offer. The vast majority of them, ≅ 80%, will purchase between the 5th and 11th touch. This makes follow up and retargeting crucial aspects of your marketing campaign. Visitors that come from Google PPC campaigns are typically more responsive to social retargeting campaigns. They are more likely to become customers after viewing additional relevant ads/content on another platform. Data and Tracking are THE most important parts to grow your business effectively. If you do not understand what you are looking at and how to read the reports that are given to you, it’s a sure way to lose money. Make sure you understand which numbers are important to pay attention to, and how to find them. If you are using an omnichannel marketing strategy, then you will need to know exactly who came from where. This was you’ll understand which campaigns are successful and which you can do without. This may mean creating a custom tracking URL for each platform or campaign. Each type of business will have different performance indicators (KPI). Understanding what is essential to your business will help dictate how and where you choose to grow your business. Treat your social platforms like a job. Unless your business requires you to be on social media, 24/7 (it almost always doesn’t) use it only when you need to and then get off. Don’t worry about all the NOISE happening on social because it is just that…NOISE. You don’t need to field every reaction or comment as it comes in. If you want to use social media for your business, come up with a plan and stick to it. In general, I tell companies to start posting three times a week and gradually work their way up to everyday. Make sure the content is of high quality and features your core products or services. Most small businesses see success by posting original, authentic content and using up to 30 relevant hashtags (where applicable). YOU DON’T NEED A MILLION FOLLOWERS to be successful, do not buy into the cheap follower programs or software. Social platforms are getting smarter, and they WILL suspend your account for utilizing shady tactics. Plus, it’s much better to have fewer, more engaging followers than a bunch of empty numbers. Do you believe that YOU are why you can’t grow your business? Throughout the day the average person thinks over 50,000 thoughts, including good and bad, empowering and limiting. It is natural to doubt yourself, especially if you own or operate your own business. Sometimes you don’t see the progress because you are in the thick of it, or you lose track of your goals because life happens, and that’s normal! Creating confidence and finding your ability to overcome self-doubt happens gradually over time; there is no magic pill. What does help is controlling your mindset, managing your mental state, working with a coach, having a proven process, and keeping track of your goals. Having a proven process will keep you on task regardless of how you feel about yourself and your abilities. Writing down your goals and creating check-in’s is how you begin that accountability process. As you see yourself accomplishing and checking off goals, the fear of not being good enough goes away and the motivation to continue increases. So now I guess you are thinking, “Drew, this is great… but, what are my next steps?” First, as I mentioned above, you need to focus your efforts, so start by finding the most profitable products or services you offer. Having more offers will not grow your business. Second, choose no more than 2 subject matter

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An Entirely New Way to Look at Criticism

Almost any marketing coach can tell you stories of students who came to them for help in launching their product. The student has the product ready to go. Maybe it needs a few tweaks, but they are small things that could be done in a few days or maybe even in a few hours. We’re talking about products that in many cases are better quality than 90% of products out there. But they won’t launch the product. They keep telling themselves their product/service isn’t ready, that it needs improving, the time isn’t right, etc… They’re deceiving themselves. The real reason they’re not launching? FEAR. Stark terror that someone, somewhere, will dislike them or say something BAD about their product. Or worse yet – people will hate their product AND the product won’t sell. But here’s the fact to focus on instead: A product that is never launched makes no money. Period. Yes, someone might not like your product. So what? In fact, there could be HUNDREDS of people who don’t like your product. So what? If the product is selling, does it matter that some people don’t like it? Look at radio talk show hosts and commentators. They have thousands or in some cases hundreds of thousands of people who don’t like them. Yet they also have LOTS and LOTS of loyal followers willing to pay to hear them or jump on their recommended products. So how do you get over the fear of launching? Here’s one way: Agree with yourself that your product isn’t finished. That’s right – it isn’t done yet. But you’re going to launch ANYWAY. As you improve your product, you will send your customers updated versions. What’s that? You forgot to add a section about managing gophers to your gardening product? Add the section and send it out to buyers. Then add it to the product itself so all new buyers get it automatically. And then add a couple of bullets to your sales letter that let prospects know you cover gophers, too. Easy, right? In fact, this gives you an entirely new way to look at criticism. Instead of cringing and wishing you had done the product differently, you can objectively look at the criticism and decide if you want to make a change based on that feedback or not. This is a much more empowering point of view than hiding in the corner, fearful of any negative comment that might come your way. Now then, let’s look at a worst case scenario: You launch your product and the very first feedback you get is, “This product sucks, I want a refund!” If this happens, there is one of two things going on, and the next few days will tell you which one it is. If more people write back with similar comments, then maybe you do have a poor product. In that case, pull it, fix it and relaunch it. Or pull it and create something else. But if sales are good and refunds are low, then what you encountered on that first feedback was likely a chronic ‘refunder’ – one of those people who buy products with the intention of finding a miracle/instant fix…who immediately quit and ask for a refund. Don’t waste your time trying to help those people. Just know that the overwhelming majority of buyers don’t do this. Most buyers are good, honest, decent people. The few who do chronically refund are just a minor annoyance that ALL product sellers have to put up with, including the big names in your niche and elsewhere. So don’t sweat it! Give them their refund and if you have the capability, block them from buying from you again, just to avoid aggravation down the line when you launch your next product. Fear of launching your product is a fear of leaving your comfort zone. Comfort zones are… well… comfy. Cozy. Warm. Secure. Safe. But sometimes you have to take a deep breath, hit the button and launch your new product to the world. Don’t worry – it gets less scary each time you do it. And you’re never alone. Even product creators who have made millions still get plenty nervous when it’s time to launch their new creation. It’s a natural reaction. The point is, you can’t let a case of nerves, no matter how bad they are, get in the way of moving forward and launching your product. Find out what you need to use to get yourself to launch. Is it a reward? Blackmail? A psychological trick? A reminder of WHY you are doing this? I know one marketer who imagines hurling himself into battle each time he launches. Another one keeps photos of his family at his desk to remind him of why he needs to overcome his fear. And a third bribes herself with a 4 day vacation for each product she launches. Whatever it takes to get you to launch – just do it. Of course, it always helps to have a coach or mentor on your side – so if you don’t have one of those yet – get one! ~Wishing you success!Drew

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Embrace Your Unique Self And Build A Business Around YOU

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson And here’s another one…(not quite with the Emerson flair, but still quite eloquent): “You can’t fit a round peg into a square hole.” In the digital world, we’re more exposed to this than ever before! People online will tell you what to do. How to do it. When to do it. And are always happy to point out everything you’re “doing wrong”. They’ll tell you to get up two hours early and work on your business before work. Or set a timer for 30 minutes and work without distraction. Or enter a niche just because there is money there. They’ll tell you all sorts of things. And they’ll even get righteously indignant when you don’t do what they tell you to do. So now I’m going to tell you what to do. Seriously. Know yourself first. Yes, you can get round pegs into square holes, but it does a tremendous amount of damage to the round peg. If you like to sleep in until 10:00 am, then maybe that’s what you should do. You probably do your best work in the afternoon and evening anyway. If you have a flair for an odd niche, maybe you should find a way to monetize that, instead of going into a more popular and overcrowded field that everyone is telling you to enter. If you don’t like speaking to people in person, why are you buying that course on how to do marketing for local businesses? Figure out who you are and what you’re good at. Then build your business around YOU. For example, if you’re great at seeing the big picture and hate details, then focus on what needs to be done and have other people do the actual work through outsourcing. If you love to write but hate to deal with websites, have someone else set up and run your blog. If you hate writing but love talking, make a vlog instead of a blog. Or do a podcast. Or both. Just don’t do the thing you hate to do, because guess what? You cannot force yourself to do the things you don’t like for any real length of time. It just isn’t going to work. To be successful, figure out who you are and what you like. THEN figure out how to build a business around you, instead of trying to mold yourself to a business you simply aren’t suited to. “You have to remember the value of your individuality – that you have something special and different to offer that nobody else can.“ ~Wishing you success!Drew

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How To Start Over & Build A Business From Scratch In 3-Months

Someone asked me what I would do if I had to start a business from scratch in 3 months (90-days). And that got me thinking, if I could take the experience I have and use it to start over from scratch… How would I do it? When I say starting over, I mean it. In this hypothetical I wouldn’t have my mailing list. I wouldn’t have organic traffic, a following, name recognition – none of that. Just my experience as to what works and what doesn’t and the drive to make it happen. Now let’s say that my life depends on me having a full-time income at the end of those 3 months. No pressure there, right?It sounds unrealistic, but a lot of people find themselves in a remarkably similar situation – make more money or else… Or else they’re in trouble, or else the bills go unpaid, or else they’re facing losing their home, or… worse. So, with that in mind, here’s what I would do: I would stop looking for magic ‘make money online’ products, strategies and ideas. There is no secret combo of tricks and buttons to make money. It’s not a printing press – It’s a free market. It may sound counter-intuitive, but in that free market the way to make money is to stop focusing on the money. Simply make yourself indispensable to people who need your solution to their problem. That’s the best way to start a business. Do that and the money will follow. When you’re focused on providing solutions, you no longer be distracted by ‘Shiny Object Syndrome’ that steals your time and your money. Now, I’m not saying all programs are bad. In fact, many of the “how-to” and “step-by-step” trainings are useful as building blocks to the larger puzzle. But that’s usually all they are – they’re puzzle pieces – not full-blown businesses. So, I would start with the outcome first. What is my market? Will I offer a product or a service? What solution can I provide that people will gladly pay for? What’s THE ONE BIG BENEFIT I can provide to my customers? What is my goal (How will I know when I’ve “made it?”) Clarity is key here. You must know where you are going and how you plan on getting there. I don’t mean that you need to have all the specific tactics worked out. I’m talking about the big picture. Think of your business as a GPS. You must know exactly where you are and exactly where you want to end up; plus your chosen method of transportation, in order for it to work properly. This is the starting point of everything that will come next. Next, I would build my website. Odds are it’s going to be a blog. Now, I’m not going to spend a ton of time on setting this up because I only have 3 months to start a business and generate an income. I’ll spend an hour maximum choosing the URL, I’ll get the hosting, I’ll choose a simple, streamlined theme, I’ll get the autoresponder and I’ll be ready to get started. Yes, it takes money to get started. Not a lot, but some. You’re making an investment into your future. And if you think spending a couple of hundred dollars to set up your internet business is somehow a lot of money, consider the alternative: Spending at least that much each month just to drive to and from a job, or spending tens or hundreds of thousands for a brick and mortar business. Time to create content for that blog. But this isn’t about running a blog, it’s about running a business. The blog is just a tool to get the business done. So, here’s what I would do: Look at the big benefit I deliver, and then write down all the stumbling blocks people encounter trying to get that big benefit. Then pick out 3 of these and write detailed posts on how to overcome those barriers. Then repurpose those posts into videos (for YouTube or Facebook) and podcasts, or some type of lead magnet/incentive to get people to join my list. Notice I’m only creating 3 pieces of great content initially, not 300. And I’m repurposing those in multiple ways. Some folks spend years trying to get everything exactly right, but in this hypothetical, I’ve only got 3 months, so forget perfection and just get it done. Don’t get carried away with content creation either. Keep it simple to start, there will be plenty of time to expand later on. The blog posts should be highly focused on getting my prospects to take the next step, which is likely going to be a free consultation. Think about the format of a successful sales funnel that drive people to take a specific action. It’s not very easy to sell a $300 a month coaching program or a $1,000 website optimization package online. Especially if you are under a time constraint. But its typically much easier and faster if you can talk on the phone or in a meeting first. Next, I would offer a service or coaching. Do you know why? Because it’s the quickest way to make real money. Offering products is great, but it takes time to create the products and more time to build the lists to promote that product to. When your list is small, it’s best to focus on services or coaching because it’s the fastest way to start a business that generates a profit. Most people are already experts at something. And to be an expert you just have to have lived through and overcome a specific problem. Get people on a free call, help them solve a problem, and invite them to participate in your coaching program where you will share what is actually holding them back and how to overcome that based on your personal experience. In its simplest form, we are simply sharing our personal knowledge. Now, I’d focus on getting as many people on the phone as I can, because I know two

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How Successful Affiliates Are Making More Commissions Than Their Competitors

Affiliate marketing is the easiest way to make money online, without having to create your own products, build a formal website, or design a sales page with integrated payment processing. So, why is it that most affiliate marketers never make nearly what they could make? Anyone has the potential to make HUGE money in affiliate marketing, yet > 90% or more of affiliates make a pittance. Think about this: If you earn an average of $50 on each sale in a sales funnel you promote, and you make 6 sales, you’ve made $300. Sounds good, right? But guaranteed, there is something else who made 600 sales and walked away with $30,000. Why did they make 600 sales when you made just 6? There are reasons why a handful of affiliate marketers do amazingly well, and everyone else barely makes a profit. And marketers who understand this will always have a tremendous advantage over marketers who don’t. 1. Build a Relationship I know you’ve heard it before, but are you doing it? People buy people, not products. If you want them to open your email and click your link, or visit your Facebook Group and click a link, you’ve got to have a RELATIONSHIP with your people. This is so simple to do, yet few marketers take the time. Start with a blog post that is all about you, and then send new opt-ins to the post so they can get to know you better. Make the post silly, funny and most of all REAL. Talk about the stupid stuff you’ve done, the mistakes you’ve made, where you live and what your goals are. Don’t even think about affiliate marketing yet. Do you have a strange hobby or unusual taste in food? Include that. Do you have 17 pets? Talk about them. Do you work until 3 in the morning and sleep until noon? Mentions that too. Reveal the real you. Not the details people don’t want, but the ones that amuse and interest. You’re looking to make a real connection, not apply for a job, nobody wants your resume. And above all else, don’t make your life seem like a series of magnificent accomplishments. No one is going to relate to someone who turns everything they touch into gold. But they are going to relate to the time you bought Bitcoin when it was worthless and sold it just before it took off, or the time you thought you could fly and jumped off your parent’s back deck into the pool. And don’t stop with your ‘about me’ page, either. Use this relationship building in your lead magnets, your emails, your other blog posts, etc. Always inject a little bit about yourself in everything you do. Not so much that you bore people, or make everything seem about you, but just enough to keep it real. Think about relating an event to a friend. Aren’t you going to give your own perceptions of what happened, as well as tell about how you got out of your car and stepped into the mud puddle just before your big presentation? Use this same method of personal, one-on-one friend communication with your readers and followers. Post on your blog as often as possible, at least once a week, but as much as every day. Encourage your list to follow you on social media or subscribe to your list so they know when you add a new post. Your readers will realize you’re a real person who isn’t out to pitch them a new product every 5-minutes. So, they’ll gladly read your sales emails much more readily when they know there is a real live human being who is sending them these messages. 2. Use Your Own Voice Just because you’re doing affiliate marketing, doesn’t mean you need to act like someone else. How many emails do you receive that say something along the lines of, “Buy this product – this product is the greatest product ever – you will be sorry if you miss this – this is the one thing that will help you create success – but it now.” Yeah. Same old stuff, over and over again. There is a marketer (or maybe several, but I’m thinking of one in particular) who sells MASSIVE quantities of this exact type of emails as a swipe file to new marketers. Like a brand-new marketer couldn’t write their own 25-word email that basically says, “buy this magic product now.” People don’t like getting sold to and are TIRED of seeing this crap. You’re tired of getting these emails. I’m tired of getting these emails. Same phrases, same message, same B.S. If you’re not going to stand apart from the crowd, then you’re going to have to share the same crumbs they’re getting. Here’s what to say: Instead, take 30-minutes and write your own promotional email with your own voice. You can even do this by dictating and having a free software like Google Docs to type the email for you! Forget about all the hype. Be sincere, be honest. “Hey, this product isn’t for everyone. I don’t even know if it’s for you. But, if you have this problem, then maybe this is your solution. Check it out and decide if it’s right for you, because I know it’s worked like crazy for some people, including me.” I’ve written emails where I basically tell people not to buy something unless they really really want it or need it. “Don’t buy this if you already know how to do XYZ.” “Don’t buy this if you’re not going to be doing this type of marketing.” This is only for people who want _______. It’s like I’m trying to talk them out of it, which paradoxically often results in more sales, not fewer. But the point isn’t tricking people into buying, it’s to be honest. You know this, but the latest, greatest product you’re promoting isn’t for everyone on your list. Some of them sure, but

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Does Success Have A Finish Line?

Is your measure of success clear or are you striving for an undefined finish line? When you go on a vacation you know where you are starting from, where you are going and how you are going to get there. Even if you aren’t travelling to a new location, you are aiming for a new destination. If you want to bring success into your life, then those same elements are key. To create success, you must be clear on where you are right now, as well as what achieving success looks like to you. Success looks different for everyone so each of us must complete their own quest. As such, there are certain lessons that you must learn on your own in order to level-up in your life. To discover what success means to you, just follow this system. In the steps below you can create a plan to achieve the success you desire in whatever area of your personal or professional life you choose. You will discover the success habits you need to include in your life to achieve your goals. First, you need to decide exactly what you want to achieve (your goal) before you can expect to achieve it. Write it down. Be very descriptive and use the present tense as if it’s happening NOW. Write down WHY achieving this goal is so important to you. What does it mean to you? How motivated are you to achieve this goal? Then, write down how you will FEEL when you finally achieve your goal. How will your life look? How will your thoughts, feelings, or emotions change? Again, be very specific and detailed, and write using the present tense. Next, write down your current situation and how that makes you feel. Although that is how you feel right now, try writing it in the past tense. This will help you in changing the way you think about your situation and moving towards creating the success you want. Your mind will begin to distance itself from your current situation and further support you in moving towards your goal. You now have your starting and ending points on your journey to success. Now you need to find out HOW you are going to get there… What needs to change within you to shift your perception of your current situation and to get you from where you are to where you want to be? Write down each step. You will find that you will need to look at your mind-set, behavior and habits…your reticular activating system will actually prevent you from seeing possible scenarios that are contrary to your controlling beliefs. Identify potential blocks to achieving your goal. Write them down and add how you will overcome them if they pop up. If you cannot imagine possible obstacles or how to overcome them, then leave space to add to this section later. Clarity in this step will make this journey much less intimidating. By completing the tasks above you are conquering one of the key success habits; goal setting. You are also learning to understand yourself better, which is crucial for success because self-knowledge and a positive mindset will allow you be more resourceful in the moment using your natural skills. To achieve success you need to understand what success is, what it means to you and how you will achieve it. Then you need to take deliberate action. If you enjoyed this exercise and would like to try my newest Alphadog Awareness mini-course you can still get it for FREE here. ~Wishing you success!

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What Are SMART Goals & How To Use Them

What Does SMART Goals Mean? SMART is an acronym that you can use to guide your goal setting. To make sure your goals are clear and reachable, each one should be: How to Use SMART Goals 1. Specific Your goal should be clear and specific, otherwise you won’t be able to focus your efforts or feel truly motivated to achieve it. When drafting your goal, try to answer the five “W” questions: Example Imagine that you are currently a marketing executive, and you’d like to become head of marketing. A specific goal could be, “I want to gain the skills and experience necessary to become head of marketing within my organization, so that I can build my career and lead a successful team.” 2. Measurable It’s important to have measurable goals, so that you can track your progress and stay motivated. Assessing progress helps you to stay focused, meet your deadlines, and feel the excitement of getting closer to achieving your goal. A measurable goal should address questions such as: Example You might measure your goal of acquiring the skills to become head of marketing by determining that you will have completed the necessary training courses and gained the relevant experience within five years’ time. 3. Achievable Your goal also needs to be realistic and attainable to be successful. In other words, it should stretch your abilities but still remain possible. When you set an achievable goal, you may be able to identify previously overlooked opportunities or resources that can bring you closer to it. An achievable goal will usually answer questions such as: Example You might need to ask yourself whether developing the skills required to become head of marketing is realistic, based on your existing experience and qualifications. For example, do you have the time to complete the required training effectively? Are the necessary resources available to you? Can you afford to do it? Tip: Beware setting goals that someone else has power over. For example, “Get that promotion!” depends on who else applies, and on the recruiter’s decision. But “Get the experience and training that I need to be considered for that promotion” is entirely down to you. 4. Relevant This step is about ensuring that your goal matters to you, and that it also aligns with other relevant goals. We all need support and assistance in achieving our goals, but it’s important to retain control over them. So, make sure that your plans drive everyone forward, but that you’re still responsible for achieving your own goal. A relevant goal can answer “yes” to these questions: Example You might want to gain the skills to become head of marketing within your organization, but is it the right time to undertake the required training, or work toward additional qualifications? Are you sure that you’re the right person for the head of marketing role? Have you considered your spouse’s goals? For example, if you want to start a family, would completing training in your free time make this more difficult? 5. Time-bound Every goal needs a target date, so that you have a deadline to focus on and something to work toward. This part of the SMART goal criteria helps to prevent everyday tasks from taking priority over your longer-term goals. A time-bound goal will usually answer these questions: Example Gaining the skills to become head of marketing may require additional training or experience, as we mentioned earlier. How long will it take you to acquire these skills? Do you need further training, so that you’re eligible for certain exams or qualifications? It’s important to give yourself a realistic time frame for accomplishing the smaller goals that are necessary to achieving your final objective. So, if you aren’t using SMART goals in your planning process, now is the time to start! For a little extra guidance on better goal setting, check out this email course, or consider talking with a coach.

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3 Reasons Your First Step Is Essential for Success

”A real decision is measured by the fact that you’ve taken a new action. If there’s no action, you haven’t truly decided.” – Tony Robbins. For some reason, many people believe they can simply coast through life and still end up successful. They envision success, maybe even meditate on it, but never take the necessary action to reach the next level. It’s probably the reason why many people fall for get-rich-quick scams. Imagine doing minimal work and raking in bags of cash in return! If you really want to succeed, you’re going to have to put in a lot of time and effort to make it work. You will need to take action, consistent and focused action. Here are 3 reasons why taking action is important if you want to succeed: 1. It’s your first step towards success If you don’t take any action, you’re never going to take that first step towards achieving your goals. You’re never going to go anywhere. As they say, it’s always the first step that’s the hardest…but it’s also the most important. It’s relatively easy to choose the right goal and to make a grand plan on how you’re going to achieve that goal. But actually going out there and taking that first step, is when that plan actually begins. Many people have fun at the planning stage, but the moment they actually need to do something, then the reality will sink in. “That’s a lot of work,” they’ll say. They’ll start procrastinating, or they’ll start thinking it’s a bad idea. Maybe the limiting beliefs set in and you think that you will do it wrong, or that nobody will respond to you, or that you could even end up in a worse position than you’re in now…And they’ll just stop there. That’s all they do – just plan things, but never really take action out of fear or discomfort. 2. No amount of prep or knowledge compares with first-hand experience. When you take action, you will find out that whatever you’ve planned isn’t always going to happen the way you imagined. It isn’t always going to be feasible even. Sometimes, what you think something is may be different from what it actually is in reality; but you’ll never know until you get started. This is why being flexible and knowing when to adjust is so important. Your plan, no matter how long you spent on it, is still just a general guide – you don’t have to take it at face value – and probably shouldn’t. When you take action and go out into the real world, you find out what’s working and what’s not. You will improve your ability to go with the flow. You will learn there’s almost always another option out there that will help you achieve your goals faster, more efficiently, or with less stress than what you initially anticipated! But, with consistent and dedicated action, you are guaranteed to put yourself in a better place than you are in now, even if you fail first. 3. You will grow as a person Taking action is important if you also want to grow as a person. On the way to success, you’ll encounter so many obstacles, glitches, and challenges. Those are the opportune times to grow as a person. When you learn how to overcome all these obstacles: you gain new skills, you develop resilience, you become more patient, you develop a new level of self-awareness, and you grow as a person. If you don’t take action, you’ll remain as you always have been, doing the same things you’ve always been doing, thinking the same thoughts, and feeling the same feelings. So, what are you waiting for? Take the first step!

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