Baby here sitting in for Gizzard. Has been a strange last couple weeks here. The Turtle Dad bought us fish and so far I am the only one eating them.

This has made it difficult but Gizzard and Gizzie have just not wanted to expend the effort to chase the fish. Gizzard won’t even do a blog post because she has no desire for fish right now. So you get stuck with me and this typing thing is hard let me tell you.

This has definitely made it tougher for me. Long ago I discovered that when we are all on the prowl it is easier to catch them. When I am the only one chasing them they have a lot more area to run away in.

See when we are all active we all benefit. Often as I am chasing one they get right in Gizzard’s strike area. She gets an easy meal. The same thing happens to my benefit too. The key is when we are all working together it makes it easier for all of us.

That is one of the reasons that launches work so well. When more than one person is creating buzz you are much more likely to get a response. People need to see things more than once before they decide to really look closely at it.

That is why having an affiliate program is important and why The Turtle Dad likes The Marketers Hosting. Not only does he get hosting but an affiliate program, autoresponder and much more.

Now when he adds a new product he can get more than just himself to create noise in the market place and it makes his efforts even more effective.

So if you want to be more effective add an affiliate program and get others to help you make noise.

Now if I could get my lazy tank mates interested the rest of the fish would disappear. It is hard work chasing them by my self.

Technorati Tags: affiliate program, autoresponder, benefit, hosting, marketers

Got into the Turtle Dad’s email. (Please don’t tell him.) The Turtle Dad is always talking about adding opt in forms so I want to ask him to get me these to study. I am liking the video lessons and learning about them from Profitable Blog Steps so this will be a next step for me.

Here is the email I saw.

Dear Friend,

Opt-in boxes.

You need those email address sucking bad boys on your
blog sidebars, blog popups, Facebook Wall AND Fan Pages,
Mini-Sites, Viral Sites, Affiliate Sites, Fly Catcher Pages,
Squeeze Pages, Web Page sidebars, popups, fly ins, exit pages
– and the list goes on and on.

But have you EVER tried to figure out how to cram one of
those suckers into the sidebar of your page, or try to fit it
into the small pop up windows? Tisn’t easy to figure out.

And what about putting ‘em on the Facebook Wall when your
Facebook Ain’t got H-T-M-L. What about that?

And how about CUSTOMIZING your submit button so it’s
one lean, mean tricked out call to action that you’d be proud
of showin’ to your visitors?

Those old gray buttons are fine but SOMETIMES you wanna
trick it out with a bright, shiny button. How do you pull THAT
off without watching your hair fall out on your keyboard?

New Videos Reveal… How To Become a List Building Machine
Using Little Known Opt-In Form Tips ‘n Tricks… Guaranteed
to BOOST Your Conversions.

Get all the details here.         

Now if I can only find the Turtle Dad’s credit card I will grab mine or I guess once he sees this he will know. (Oops should not have mentioned getting into his email. Sorry Dad.) Then maybe he will let me have my own autoresponder and we can up the amount of fish we get each week. MMMMMMMMMMMMM!

Gizmo

Technorati Tags: autoresponder, Facebook, fan pages, gray buttons, pop up windows, sidebars, squeeze page, video lessons

Gizmo here and I admit that right now I am fat and happy as we had fish and clean water yesterday. So because I am feeling so lazy I convinced Dad to copy and paste a quick message below from Marlon. After all anyone that would let a mouse get access to his autoresponder is okay with us turtles. Animals of the world unite. Oops better hope the Dad misses that part. Glad he did his part first. Besides the Dad really likes and gets excited about Marlon’s stuff. He made lots of notes while watching this short video.

Marlon Sanders just released a brand new video.

It really opened my eyes.

It is called “The 7 New Rules of Selling In 2010“

On this video he covers these 7 new rules of marketing in 2010.

Rule Number One: The foundation of ALL marketing and selling in 2010 is the “Value Proposition”

Rule Number Two: There’s a proliferation of new products and services at hyperspeed

Rule Number Three: You don’t sell in a vacuum any longer.

Rule Number Four: You no longer sell a product or service. You sell a set of experiences.

Rule Number Five: The strategy is the same but the tactics have changed.

Rule Number Six: The new sales formula is based on creating and implementing a Value Proposition.

Rule Number Seven: Marketers who win in 2010 must sell a superior set of experiences AND do a superior job of COMMUNICATING that set of superior experiences to the TARGET customers.

By the way this changes everything about how you promote on Facebook, Twitter, create products, teleseminars, webinars, sales letters and many other aspects of your business.

I don’t know how long he’ll have this up so I recommend you watch it now:

The 7 New Rules of Selling In 2010.

That is all from the turtle tank this week so I am off to relax after this strenuous work out. Hope Dad gets more fish soon they are much better than the normal food and a lot more fun to chase.

Gizmo

Technorati Tags: autoresponder, marketers, sales letters, target customers, value proposition

Usually I don’t use a big picture but I wanted you to see the detail in this. Now that dock was bought a few months back to handle the growing turtles. They have gotten so big now that the dock keeps dipping into the water when all 4 get on it one time.

Add in that they are quickly out growing the 40 gallon tank and it is about time to have to invest some more in their habitat. Guess they better start posting more often to increase their income from here .

Your business will be the same way. One of the reasons I recommend certain vendors is to make that growth easier. For example when you are just starting to build your list you need an autoresponder. If you use one like Aweber you can continue to grow without worry. Yes it will cost you a bit more as your list grows but you won’t have to worry about changing vendors.

Wish I could do that with my tank and just let it expand to fit the growing turtles. Would gladly pay the extra for that.

Like wise when you pick a web host you want the same ability. Get someone that will handle your growth easily. One of the reasons I like Zoot Host is that as I need more space Jon takes care of it. He moves the sites to the new box when it is necessary.

So take the time to get vendors that will be able to make your growth easy. You will appreciate it in the long term.

Now I just wish I could find a vendor to upgrade my turtle tank without any effort on my part.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: autoresponder, aweber, business growth, vendors, web host, Zoot Host

The lovely little turtles are growing at an amazing rate and thus the 10 gallon tank they reside in has become a bit small and we need to get a bigger tank for them.

The boss was out at a new thrift shop and came across a 30 gallon tank with three filters for sale at less than $20. Now I have looked at getting a new home for the three of them and figure that the cost for something similar will be about $300.

Now I don’t know about you but but we love a bargain so I got a call to come with the Jeep to bring this home. Go down and bring it home and a few days later decide to check the filters on our existing set up to make sure that they are working properly.

They worked fine so I cleared a spot for the new tank (it filled a table) and set up the stones for the bottom, added in the various houses etc and set everything in place.

Then the fun started. Started adding in the water, 5 gallons, 10 gallons, 15 gallons and all was great. Was sure that the turtles would have a new home in a few minutes.

Well when I started adding the next 5 gallons the bottom seal let loose.

I now have about 17 gallons of water leaking into my office area (the new site of their home so I can watch them more) with all the computers near by and the fun started.

Needless to say it was scary for a bit but I finally got it all cleaned up. Now back to buying them a new home at retail.

How does this tale of woe apply to your business?

As you find the need to expand you will look at trying to do it on the cheap. Sometimes it will work and other times it will come back to bite you in the you know what.

This is one of the reasons that it can be very costly to your growth and make you have to go back to step one when you get bit.

Just a couple of the things where I have seen it happen that you can avoid is going cheap on your autoresponder and your hosting.

My first autoresponder was free and part of a membership. The problem was the delivery sucked. Less than half my mail got out and no reputable service is going to allow you to import a list without reverifying it. This will cost you most of the list so you are back to step one.

That is why I strongly recommend you use a good quality paid autoresponder service no matter how tight your budget. Aweber is my choice and the best in my humble opinion.

Now hosting can also bite you hard. There are lots of relatively cheap services but…

What happens if you are actually successful? Have you planned for it?

Nothing worse than running out of bandwidth or having your site down just as you have a ton of visitors coming to your site. All that work and you with egg on your face. One of the reasons I recommend Zoot Host is you can reach Jon and get the service you need to get up asap if you do run into problems.

Always check out the support of any host you decide to use and if you can’t get support when you need it pay more for better service. The difference will come back to you many times over.

That’s all for this post and your comments and questions are welcomed and appreciated.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: autoresponder, business building, hosting, save money