The first step in the product launch is to create anticipation and intrigue. By now you should be sending out weekly content to your email list in order to build trust and value. If you are not then you will not generate as many sales from your email list as you could do. It really is that simple. So sending out weekly content is a must. You should also have sent a survey to your list and found out what problems and frustrations they have, or at the very least researched forums and amazon in the way we taught you. And you should have found a product, or created one, that solves the frustrations and problems of your list. You should have found a product that people on your list would be eager to buy because it solves the problems they have in your niche. Next what you need to do is….tell your list about it! In your weekly newsletter I want you to put in a little paragraph at the end that creates anticipation in your list about a new product, but doesn't reveal too much. The point of this part of the launch is to create intrigue in your subscribers. Here is an example… Let's say you owned an email list of people looking for online dating advice. And let's say that after surveying your list you found out that the problem most people had was that they weren't getting enough dates or views of their online dating profile. At the end of your weekly newsletter, to create anticipation, you could say something like this: "I want to thank everyone who filled in the feedback survey. You really helped me to see exactly what kind of things you want to learn more about in this newsletter. The most common problem people had with their online dating endeavours is they were struggling to get views of their dating profile and dates online. If this is you then you're in for an exciting few weeks! Since the survey I have been hunting high and low for information that will help you overcome that problem and I've found some cracking tips which I will share with you over the next few weeks, starting in next weeks newsletter" Or another route to go would be…. "I want to thank everyone who filled in the feedback survey. You really helped me to see exactly what kind of things you want to learn more about in this newsletter. The most common problem people had with their online dating endeavours is they were struggling to get views of their dating profile and dates online. If this is you then you're in for an exciting few weeks! Since the survey I have been hunting high and low for products that will help you overcome that problem. Some are good, some are bad. I will be sending you some product reviews over the next few weeks so you can see the options for yourself". The "review route" helps you to establish trust by telling people what products to avoid and then recommending a quality product that does help them solve their problem (this would be the product you have decided to promote). So in this weeks newsletter that you send out be sure to include a closing paragraph or two at the end that creates intrigue and excitement and has your subscribers desperate to learn more. Then next week we will ramp up the excitement even more! This is a proven launch process. Use it!

If you like this post why not visit http://prosperitygrowth.com

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Wonder is like the spark plug that starts up your car's engine. Without that little spark of curiosity, the entire engine of your brain will simply be sitting idle and watching sitcom reruns. However if you let that spark carry you away, you'll grow and better quicker than you ever dreamt.

Exuberance alone won't land big positive changes to your life? I used to become truly enthusiastic whenever I heard a fresh personal growth idea. After 2 weeks, once the initial fervor wore off, I quit.

Wonder is amazing. Exhilaration is grand. But your life will be nothing but little bursts of exhilaration, unless you can leverage them to produce long-run positive shifts in your life

We learn best by taking action. A few bright folks did a study on marketers, to work out what the top ones are doing differently from the rest. What separates the top 5% from the 95% is the speed of execution.

Of course, there are times when you can't jump in headlong and make corrections to your course as you go. But those occasions are usually obvious, and in the huge majority of  cases, fast action is the way to go!

Don't be afraid to take action. Make your conclusion fast; take action, and then only make essential fine-tunes along the way.
Simply make a decision. Because each time you make a decision, you learn something. You acquire feedback.   Arriving at a decision… Whatever decision… is much much better than making no decision at all!

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One of the easiest ways to grow a business is also one of the most overlooked. Many of us want the latest marketing strategies or traffic tricks to grow our business. But the truth is the easiest way to grow your business, without spending a penny, is hiding right under your nose. The answer is in the people who visit your web site…

Knowing your site visitors better than they know themselves is the easiest way to grow your business. The more you understand your site visitors the less marketing and strategies you need. Why? because every single thing your site says, does or offers will hit the sweet spot. You will say exactly what your site visitor wants to hear in order to turn them into a paying customer.

You see it is far easier to get prospects to buy from you and customers to keep buying if you focus on providing them with exactly what they want to hear and to have. Anything that you put on your web site that does not speak to your site visitors fears,frustrations and desires is needless noise that is harming your conversion process.

Let me give you an example of what I mean…

You own a stall selling water in the desert (sounds strange but stick with me). You have a small sign on your stall that says "Quench Your Thirst With My Beautiful, Fresh, Cold Water – Only £1". Along comes a passer by who is sweating buckets and clearly desperate for a glass of water. For a pound he can have a glass from you. If he has the money  -he'll buy. Period.

Now let's say the same guy comes along but instead of seeing the previous sign your sign says "Sit Through My One Hour Presentation On How I Built A Water Pump And Get A Glass Of Water At The End For Just 50 Pence – Half Off The Normal Price". What do you think will happen? He may sit and wait, he may not. But now you have put up an obstacle that is stopping him from buying what he desperately wanted. And this, unfortunately, is what most web sites do. They try to be clever by putting in too much information or putting in obstacles that stop their site visitors from buying.

The bottom line: If you give your site visitors EXACTLY what they want at the right price – they will buy. Why wouldn't they?

The good news is all the research has been done for you. Go to Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk and search for products similar to yours. Then read through the reviews of the products and start writing down the good and bad points in the reviews. Look for the commonalities. What are the majority of people saying they do and do not like about a product? Spend a little while doing this and very soon you'll realise what potential buyers in your niche really want. Your job is then to explain to them on your site the positives/benefits that they get from buying your products or service (make sure this is true. If it isn't – create or source a better product/service).

If your product or service is not on Amazon then search the internet for "(product/service) forum". A forum is like an online notice board where people can chat about the topic. So if you sell something like car insurance you would search for "car insurance forum". Read what people do and don't like and ensure your site hits all the positives!

Or, and it is beyond me why most companies don't do this, ask your previous customers! Send them an email linking to a survey (use a survey like https://www.surveymonkey.com/) where they can fill in a short questionnaire about their desires and frustrations in the niche in return for a free gift of some kind (a discount on your products/services for example).

In my seven years online the most common mistake I have seen in failing sites is the owner/s believing they know what the customer really wants – when clearly they don't. An example of this was a guy who was trying to sell luxury holidays as an affiliate. His site focused on nothing but the cheap price of the holidays in comparison to other luxury holiday web sites. The problem was if someone is looking to book a luxury holiday they're not that
bothered about price. They're more bothered about the golden sand, clear blue sea, five star hotel etc etc. See the difference? You can think  you know your customers wants and desires but until you have done some research you may just be guessing  -and guessing wrong. And this can have a  detrimental effect on your web site sales.

Stop thinking you know what your site visitors want and instead make sure you really know – then give it to them.

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1)Distance yourself from negative people or ‘energy vampires’. If you have to work or socialise
with negative people. Don’t allow their dark mood or thoughts to impact on you.

2) Nurture relationships with positive, encouraging, inspiring ‘can-do’ types of people. Those
who believe in abundance creation are fantastic people to be around and it will help motivate you.

3) Realise that everything you have learnt at school or in life so far isn’t necessarily conclusive or
even right. Open your mind to continued learning but establish your own interpretations.

4) If you grew up hearing negative statements such as ‘you’re useless’, now’s the time to
eliminate those thoughts which have held you back. People often say things either without
thinking or out of frustration or even as a result of their own shortfalls! Don’t live your life by
their mistakes. Forgive those negative voices and let them go. You have the potential to achieve
a lot in your life. Focus on the positive!

  5) Life is like a game of chance. You roll a dice and sometimes things go wrong.
Don’t dwell on negative situations you should treat all experiences as positive and helps you grow. Try to resolve
any challenging matters and move on.

  6) Eradicate negative internal or external dialogue. Listen to your voice and thoughts on a regular
basis, but keep it positive.

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Here are 10 thoughts to help you develop a plan for 2012

1. What worked last year? Did it bring you closer to your  goals? What didn't? What should you be focusing on?

2. What things do I NEED to focus on in 2012  to successfully meet my goals for 2012?

3. What things do I NEED to Learn in 2012 that will help be keep focused on my goals?

Following the first 3 points can really improve your efficiency.

4. What big projects do I have on the table? What can I put in the back burner?

5. What productivity changes do I need to make for 2012 to help me stay focused and reach my goals?

6. What reading, courses, videos should you focus on to reach your goals, and what should you disregard as they do not help you toward your goals?

7. What emails lists should I stay on? What should I unsubscribe from?

8. What products should I be buying? What products will take me away from my goals and waste my time and money?
  
 9. What things do I need to cut back on to find more time for the really important things  in my life?

10. How can I effectively spend my time to be the most productive throughout the course of the day?

I hope all my readers have a very merry Christmas & a prosperous New Year

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There are psychological factors at play in this area. People have a habit of blaming everybody else but themselves for failure, real or perceived. I know of people in the internet market area who have given up, when they are only "gnat's whisker" away from success.

How do I know that?

Well because I was one of them!!!

There are those that sign up for programs free & paid for, who then proceed to do nothing, yes, nada, zilch!! I see those on the "Totalfreetraffic Site". Yes they sign up, at best make a half hearted effort & then go on some forum or other to complain that the system does not work. Yes, they want to blame everybody else for their own failures or insecurities.

Don't be one of them. Set your goals with realistic  time frames. Make sure you have the time to do each project. So many fail because they try to have too many balls in the air at one time. My advice concentrate on one area & give it 100%.

I was on the verge of giving up when I enlisted on a training program for beginners – what I discovered there led me to make a breakthrough of sorts. I had been trying to run before I could walk, I needed the basics!

Of course I would like to bring  in more money but,that would mean devoting more time & I have a very nice work/life balance and I do not intend to give that up.

Don't forget your "freebie" at www.prosperitygrowth.com

yes you have to give an email address to get access but you can unsubscribe at any time – although I am confident you will not want to.

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As some of you will know I decided to have a break from the Internet. However after a great deal of thought I Have decided to continue. I am limiting myself to the amount of time I spend at the computer – for me it is not about money not am I professing to be altruistic. I have always been interested in computers (my first paid employment was as a trainee programmer with English Electric Leo Computers) later part of ICL & then I think IBM.

I am more interested now in what computers can do and how they can be used to make a living, with a particular bias to the over 50' s and how they can use them to supplement their income and pensions. All too quickly eroded by inflation. I will therefore be making weekly posts (Tuesday or Wednesday) of what I have found to be of use to me. In future these posts will not be used to sell. My first post is:……………..

KNOW YOUR CUSTOMER

It never ceases to amaze me but the majority trying to sell on the internet do not know the customer they are targeting. How they intend to set up a marketing campaign without this information I know not! So do your research – don't make assumptions. When you understand them almost better than they understand themselves then you can make money.

You will probably have heard it before, because it is true, people are motivated to buy, by either pain or pleasure! That is they buy results or services which will either give them pleasure or cure a pain. That is you must give them benefits & solutions. Ideally you should be selling to what a customer emotionally needs. Remember your customer has his real life and what I can only call a dream life and it is this latter to which you should be targeting your efforts. for example an individual may say they want to lose 10 lbs but their real aim will be to be healthier or look more attractive to the opposite sex!

You are not marketing to what people are now but to what they want to be.

Really analyse your customers & potential customers look for the emotional triggers and aim your marketing there.

I hope you found this interesting. I am running a " free online influence seminar" at www.prosperitygrowth.com just enter your email address to sign up – there is nothing being sold – just good content.

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One of the biggest mistakes businesses make when they get their web site online is that they think that having a web site is all they need to grow their business using the internet. I'm afraid it is a little more difficult than that. You see it's no good having hundreds of visitors every single month to your site if none of them turn into customers.

Below are seven 'conversion' rules you can check out and see if your site adheres to them. If not you might want to consider making sure your site makes use of as many of the tips below as possible.

Conversion Rule One – Layout

Is your web site easy to read and follow? Or when someone lands on it do they have to click around a few times before they find your price list or opening times? You want to make your site as easy to navigate as possible.

Do they have clear ways to be contacted above the fold. 'Above the fold' means when someone lands on your web site do they have to scroll down to find your contact information, prices or contact details. If they do have to scroll down you might want to put the important information like prices etc above the fold (ie towards the top of the web site).

Is the content mashed into one big chunk or broken up well into short paragraphs and therefore easy to read? If people land on a web site and it is blocked together in large chunks of text they are more likely to leave the web site as it looks like more 'work' to read through it than if it was short paragraphs.

Are there graphics that represent what the company does? For example a leaking tap for a plumber, scissors for a hairdresser etc. Graphics like these help conversion. Be careful on the images though. You only need one or two. Too many can make the site load slowly.

Conversion Rule Two – Headline

Do you have a powerful headline that speaks directly to what the customers problem is and how they can solve it? The headline needs to capture the visitors attention. You will do that by speaking to the visitors problem directly. You need to get inside the head of someone using the internet to find your service.

What would they want to see for them to decide your business is the one they should deal with?

Bad headline: Plumbers Based In (area). Established 1998.

Good headline: 24 Hour Plumber Based In (area). No Fix No Fee. Guaranteed To Arrive Within The Hour.

The second headline is great because it outlines the benefits for the customer who picks your service. 'No fix no fee' for example is a great benefit for someone who is looking for a trustworthy plumber.

Conversion Rule Three – Credibility

Do you establish credibility and show you are a real business? How long have you been in business in (area) for? Are there any pictures of your premises? Videos of staff or services? For example a hairdresser could add a picture of the front of their hairdressers as well as some pictures of the members of staff.

Conversion Rule Four – Bullet Points

People will land on your web site, read the headline and then scan through bullet points before reading the rest of the site. So are there benefit laden bullet points on your web site? A bullet point is a one or two sentence line of text on your web site that really stands out. Bullet points should be a benefit not a feature.

A seat belt is a feature of a car A seat belt has the benefit of stopping serious injuries in car accidents

Chiropractor feature: Set in a nice building Chiropractor benefit: Free from back pain

If you sell a service or products ask yourself what benefits will someone get from using them and you over your competition?

Conversion Rule Five – Special Offers?

What makes you the best option over your competition? Is it price? Is it special offers? 24 hour call out 50% off first haircut First lesson – Pay Nothing Half an hour without paying on your first massage Whatever it is you need to say it. Special offers are the best way to get a customer to come and try the service. So offer some kind of deal for the first time they use your business.

Conversion Rule Six – Testimonials

Are there testimonials from previous customers? Testimonials are comments from previous customers. They provide social proof to people searching for a local business by showing them that previous customers are happy with their experience of doing business with you. Video testimonials are the best. Then audio. Then written. If you haven't been doing so you should ask your customer what comments they have about your business that you can add to your web site.

Ideally testimonials will be about specific results. For example take a look at hypothetical testimonials for an imaginary chiropractors 

Good: 'I visited Gary's Chiropractor surgery and within 3 sessions my back pain was cured. It's been bugging for me ten years and Gary had me 'fixed' in 3 weeks!' Ok: 'I thoroughly recommend Gary's Chiropractors!'

Below average (but better than nothing): 'Lovely surgery'

Conversion Rule Seven – General Rule

Does your web site capture the attention of the visitor,let them know you understand their problem and have the solution,offer them proof you can help and explain why you are a unique service? If not you need to make sure it does. You need to provide costs, opening times and why you are the best choice over your competition.

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The following is a shortened version of my recent Webinar presentation.

"Discover How to Set Up Your Internet Marketing Business in 7 Steps"

I have edited out the "About Me" section because you can find that on this site.

Your comments as usual would be appreciated.

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I promised to make a posting every Thursday – a sort of mid year resolution. However the best laid plans have the ability to come unstuck so easily.

Why & How?

After some Windows updates as well as Microsoft Essentials (my virus software) updates my computer started to misbehave. I naturally assumed this was because of recent updates so I thought I would use the "restore point" to go back to a day when the computer was performing in a satisfactory manner.

All well and good, or so I thought.

Seconds after the warning not to turn off my computer what happened but a power cut.

A new day dawns power on I turn on my computer full of trepidation, Nothing appears to work properly, programs start the drop out I am sick of messages saying "Firefox" not responding, "Notepad" not responding, Windows looking for a solution to your problem.

The computer was performing so slowly everything was happening at a "snails pace".

After nearly two days work I think I am back to some form of normality – time will tell. The point I want to make is that through the whole shebang I did have the confidence that everything was backed up to an "External Drive". Please, please if you do nothing else make sure you have your important files and folders backed up. You don't need to get infected with a virus to have a problem, just a bit of bad  luck.

I did my first Webinar last Wednesday, some of you may even have been on it. I intend to put out an edited version on this site in the next 48 hours provided my computer behaves itself – fingers crossed

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