There aren’t too many things online that really impress me. There’s too much hype and not enough real ‘how to’ information readily available for people who are new to internet or affiliate marketing. Not so with NAMS, which stands for Niche Affiliate Marketing System. The NAMS Workshop I had the opportunity to attend August 14-17 was an outstanding example of an event that catered to newbies, as well as those who are not.

I still haven’t had a chance to process all the valuable information that was shared during this three day Workshop, but I am certain I will be implementing a lot of what I learned. And that’s saying something since I’ve been to four other Internet Marketing workshops in the past two years and NAMS was the first one where I can honestly say I learned something new and useful.

One of the more exciting parts of the NAMS Workshop was watching an audio product being created that we could actually market during the workshop! Here’s one attendee’s take on that:

Not only were we able to promote and sell that 90 minute audio product within minutes after it was done, but one of the attendees happily reported that she made her first online sale ever by tweeting her affiliate link during the workshop. Now THAT is hands on quality training at its best!

Another highlight for me was the networking with interesting people from across the United States, Canada and Australia, as well actually having the opportunity to talk with these outstanding speakers:

David Perdew – I was surprised to learn that during one of the prize giveaways, I won the Diamond membership in NicheWidget.

Kathleen Gage – She introduced herself first and greeted me as I entered the Workshop to find a seat; and gave an outstanding opening presentation to over 100 people;

Mark Hendricks – Said I gave him an idea as he called me and four other attendees to the front of the room to illustrate a point about traffic.

Jeff Herring – As many times as I’ve heard that article writing is the way to go, it wasn’t until his presentation that I finally wrote my first article;

Willie Crawford (and his lovely wife, Nancy) – Gracious and humble during dinner with Judy Kelly and I;

Lynn Terry – Judy and I had lunch with her the first day of NAMS, and whose every word I hung onto as I furiously typed during her presentations to make sure I didn’t miss any of her “secrets”;

Nicole Dean – Lynn referred to Nicole several times, but I didn’t actually meet Nicole until after the Workshop’s end as people were leaving NAMS; and

Alieen Bennett – One of the most charming and quick witted people I have ever met! Her presentation “BE YOU” was a crowd pleaser and well worth remembering.

So, I highly recommend that YOU take advantage of the next NAMS Workshop . . . especially before the Early Bird price disappears.

Oh, and if you’d like to get a taste of the type of training available from David Perdew, grab his 10-part video series at no-cost for a VERY limited time.

In my last post, I recommended Renegade Professional to anyone who wants to learn how to promote themselves better online.

Because I believe in that program so strongly, I recently did my first teleseminar . . . a “training wheels” experience, if you will. The “training wheels” teleseminar was meant to be a product view of Renegade Professional, although a good bit of it tells ‘my story’. The teleseminar was done during Bob “The Teacher” Jenkins’ Teleseminar Formula Training Camp 3.0.

Although the live workshop is over, Bob offers a self-study program that is very indepth, with both audio and video replays of the live workshop. And there’s a mastermind community available of people who have already gone through the live workshop and completed at least one teleseminar; so they can be helpful as well, if you choose to learn how to do your own teleseminars.

To get an idea of Bob’s training, why not join for free to see what he offers inside the membership area?

By the way, if you’d like to hear the replay of my “training wheels” teleseminar go ahead and fill in the opt-in form on the right.

Because I provide customer support for one of Mike Filsaime’s stellar Butterfly Marketers, Bob “The Teacher” Jenkins, I wanted to offer some insight and assistance to the people who ordered a copy of Butterfly Marketing 2.0 that Mike gave away at the end of March, 2009.

Bob has created a training course at DiscoverButterflyMarketing.com, and I highly encourage any of the new owners of the Butterfly Marketing 2.0 software to take advantage of what Bob has to offer.

Personally, I had no intentions of getting the software, or even blogging about it here, because I KNOW it’s way too technical for beginners (“newbies”). My goal with this site is to provide information that can benefit the new person online, however, I’m making an exception for these reasons:

• I already know what’s involved in installing the software and setting up the Admin Dashboard inside the software because I’ve done it for the last 10 of Bob’s sites; and
• New owners of Butterfly Marketing are going to NEED step-by-step, easy to follow instructions. Especially since it was understood when ordering the software, that there is no technical support for Butterfly Marketing, unless you pay for it.

Bob’s Discover Butterfly Marketing course encompasses a virtual webinar Workshop that just started this past Tuesday with an Orientation session of what will be covered in the virtual Workshop. Today, April 9th, we’re going to be starting the first session. And each of these webinars is being recorded, not only for the benefit of people taking the virtual Workshop now, but for any one who later decides to take advantage of the Workshop.

You can start by becoming a Free Preview member of Discover Butterfly Marketing in order to get a taste of what Bob offers. This membership level will give you access to:

• An exclusive Teleseminar with Mike Filsaime;
• Bob Jenkins’ Own History with Butterfly Marketing; and
• Short videos that will show you exactly how to install the Butterfly Marketing software

And of course, if you have any questions regarding Discover Butterfly Marketing, just open a support ticket at The Teachers Help Desk and I’ll get back to you within 24 hours or less.

Well, I’m taking the plunge . . . I’ve decided to start using YouTube.  Created an account a few years ago, but never really saw a reason to put my face out there.  The first video I uploaded in October, 2008 was for a contest I entered, called the 6o-Second Elevator Pitch.  Although I didn’t win, it was an interesting experience trying to record my message in 60 seconds or less.

However, now that I’m finally beginning to understand what video can do for someone who is looking to attract a certain type of audience, I’m going to be adding more to the channel I just created. Feel free to subscribe so you can stay updated on what I’m doing over there.

More importantly, though, you are encouraged to find out for yourself how several Web 2.0 sites can help YOU!

And take some time to really listen to what Mike Klingler has to say about getting yourself found online.

If you’ve been online any length of time, I’m sure you’ve been hearing about Twitter. If you’re not already using it, chances are you’re either not real sure what it is, or why you’d even want to be bothered with it. That’s what I thought when I first opened an account last year. And I just wasn’t getting it at the time.

If I were to use the system’s invitation email, you’d know that:

“Twitter is a unique approach to communication and networking based on the simple concept of status. What are you doing? What are your friends doing—right now? With Twitter, you may answer this question over SMS or the Web and the responses are shared between contacts.”

It’s kinda like texting on a cell phone (which takes me longer to do than simply typing on my keyboard). In fact, I only added text messaging to my cell so I could communicate anytime with my son in AZ. He uses that shorthand that all the young people know, but I can’t make myself text anything on my cell other than complete words in plain English. But I digress . . .

So while I have a Twitter account, even now, I’m not tweeting (sending 140 characters or less into the twitterverse) like it seems a lot of people are. You know . . . like every few minutes, hours, or even on a daily basis. BUT . . . I recognize the potential and want to be in the loop.

Now, if you’d like to learn more about Twitter and how it may help you in whatever online ventures you are involved with, take a look at this video tutorial training that won’t cost you a cent!

Oh, and once you’ve set up your Twitter account, you’re welcome to Follow Me, if you’d like.

If you are a network marketer, or direct seller, or even an affiliate promoting someone else’s product or program, are you guilty of:

• using replicated websites;
• buying leads;
• blasting ads across the internet;
• emailing everyone you know to entice them to join your deal; or
• any number of other tactics that you believe will get the word out about what you have to offer, are selling, or doing to make money?

Do you think that this type of marketing is effective, efficient or even attractive?  If so, let me ask you . . . how’s that working for you?

I ask these questions only because most people who are online trying to make money, sell a product or service, or even build a team (downline), simply are not being taught a better way.

I know because I used to be one of those people.  When I got started, I had no clue what I was doing, so I did what I saw everyone else doing.  And I wasn’t taught marketing in school or on my job(s).  Before coming to the Internet in search of income, I simply did not see a need to learn what marketing was, why it was important to know, or even how to do it.

Too many people find themselves spending money they don’t really have trying to learn how to promote their deal, product or service, and sadly, they are just spinning their wheels, not fully realizing that it simply doesn’t work that way any more.  At least not as well as “attraction marketing” does.

If you haven’t heard the term “Attraction Marketing” before, you will.  Starting today, you can find out what this concept is and how you can benefit from it.

You are encouraged to get this newly released, FREE report called “The Attraction Marketer’s Manifesto.”   While it speaks specifically to the Network Marketer, the information will work for anyone who wants to finally learn a better, more efficient and effective way to get the word out about whatever you have to offer. And if you want to find out how well this is working, you can contact me through No Job, No Worry.

BREAKING NEWS (UPDATE as of 3/8/09): Watch this interesting interview between the Author and the man who is teaching “attraction marketing“.

The number one issue faced by any business person with a website today is getting traffic.

Without visitors to your website, how will you ever be paid for your products and services (or through your affiliate recommendations)?

One solution to this problem is holding a teleseminar.

A teleseminar is simply a phone call where somebody (i.e., you) talks to somebody else (i.e., a guest expert or just the audience) about a specific topic of interest.

You don’t have to have any specific educational background or be some kind of certified expert to hold a teleseminar – just the courage to hold an intelligent conversation for about an hour about something you enjoy.

Marketing with teleseminars gives you over a dozen ways to get traffic to your products and services. Let me highlight 3 of them for you right now.

Teleseminars can…

• Provide a live event for people to get immediate answers to their questions
• Turn into articles and blog posts which are magnets for search engine-traffic
• Connect you with new affiliates who share your teleseminar with others in exchange for a commission

Let me describe how each of these 3 could work for you.

Attract Traffic With A Live Teleseminar

When you host a teleseminar, you provide a specific time and date for a group of people to gather together. At heart, most people are still social animals. Because of that fact, if people know they can get together with other people like them at the same time and date and learn or discuss their favorite topic, they’ll show up.

And if you provide a way for your listeners to ask you a question that you answer during the teleseminar then they’ll definitely want to connect with you after the call is over.

Create Traffic Magnet Articles And Blog Posts

A second way teleseminars can generate traffic for your website, products, and services is by turning into text.

Most people talk at about 200 words per minute, and within an hour, you can create a 50 page transcript. Simply by breaking apart that text, you can create a dozen articles and many more blog posts with just a single teleseminar.

You then submit those articles to article directories and ezine publishers to spread your message. Each article becomes a traffic magnet by connecting readers back to your website through a link at the end of the text.

You can “write” weeks worth of search-engine friendly content by taking the same articles and breaking them up into blog posts you publish on your own blog or on someone else’s.

Get Affiliates To Send You Traffic

My favorite method of getting traffic with teleseminars is by creating an affiliate program for the sale of your teleseminars, their transcripts, or additional calls you do in the future.

Even before you hold a call, people are willing to pay in advance for the transcripts and/or the recording of your teleseminar. And once you start selling something online, you can invite affiliate marketers to promote your teleseminar product for you.

In exchange for sending you traffic, you agree to pay a certain percentage of the profits – a simple arrangement that’s made very easy with software available today (ranging from free to quite expensive).

Affiliates then spend their time and energy sending you traffic and you can spend your time concentrating on holding an excellent teleseminar.

Start Getting More Traffic With Teleseminars

These are just 3 methods of getting traffic with teleseminars that you can put into action immediately. And once you get started, you’ll quickly realize that your traffic problems are suddenly not so large anymore!

Bob Jenkins is the creator of TeleseminarFormula.com, an in-depth training program teaching business owners how to use teleseminars to magnetically attract better customers, get more sales, and accelerate their growth using their phone. For your free copy of  “The 7 Secrets To Success With Teleseminars”, visit TeleseminarFormula.com today.

Are you using social networks to build your reputation online? Whether you already are or you are just getting started with sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Ning, building your online reputation is your biggest responsibility.Here are five ways to make sure you do it right.

#1: Be Proud Of Being You

The first thing is, you have to be yourself. You have to be who you are. Because although you can get away with being fake for a little while, as soon as one person realizes that you’re not who you say you are, your reputation is destroyed almost instantly because of the power of social networking.

So be yourself. And don’t be afraid of being yourself. Realize that you have some gifts and some knowledge that people need to know about, and those that want to learn from you are going to gravitate towards you. Those that don’t think you’re worth listening to are basically going to ignore you. And it’s at their peril, so don’t worry about them.

#2: Transparency – Never Hide From Your Audience

The second thing about your reputation is you should try to be transparent at all times. This means you keep everything real with your audience.

For example, over the last year, I used social media to show you my move from Maryland to North Carolina, including drama with the movers, picking the house, and getting it set up. I also pulled back the curtain to show what it takes to run a product launch.

When I did my last product launch, I was Twittering every day what I was doing to get ready for this site. Most of the gurus out there would keep everything under lock and key, and I was being very clear, saying, “This is what I’m doing to get ready for this launch.” It actually helped me have a better launch, even though I told everybody exactly what I was going to be doing.

They didn’t think that they had some surprise or whatever like most people teach; they just were excited to be part of it and part of the story. So be transparent. Let people know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it, and they’re going to learn how to trust you.

#3: Be Positive For Positive Results

The third way to build your reputation is to be positive.

There are folks out there who generally can do a good job of being negative. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find that to be a very long-term profitable strategy.

It may get you some attention at first and spark some controversy, but that’s not the way to go. Be looking forward to the optimistic of your industry, of your business and what the results are going to be.

It would be easy for you to go onto Twitter or onto Facebook and talk about how you’re having a bad day or this product sucks or this week sucks or this relationship sucks. But you’re not really there for a support network, per se.

You’ll find some of that. If you have something bad happen in your life, sharing it with your followers will be very therapeutic for you and you will get a lot of support back. But when you’re just blasting negative things out, you’re going to get negative things in return, usually.

So try to be positive as much as possible and look for the opportunities that are out there and look at them from that positive perspective.

#4: Build Your Reputation And They Will Come

The fourth thing you must do is to be patient. This is because, initially, your reputation is going to be built only by yourself and the first initial people who get to know you. But as time goes on and you get more followers and you build a larger network of friends and peers, your reputation will solidify to allow your business to grow.

Once it hits a tipping point, your reputation and business accelerates at a very quick pace.

So be patient and let it happen. Don’t try this stuff out for a week and then come back to me next week and say, “Well, it didn’t really work. I didn’t really get any results yet.” You’ve got to let social networking play out over a few weeks and then a couple months and so on. A year from now your business is going to be tremendously different compared to where it is right now.

#5: Contribute To The Conversation Every Day!

The fifth thing about your reputation is you need to be someone that people look to as a contributor, not as a leech, not as a mooch, as a contributor.

You have to be willing to be involved in the conversation, and you have to be willing to give as much or even more than what you’re going to get in return. The people who do that are growing so fast it makes my head spin.

I feel that I’m a pretty giving person but I see some other folks out there that just keep on giving, giving, giving and they just build up a huge following and that social capital is a real asset to your business. So you need to make sure that you’re contributing as much as possible to the conversation.

I don’t mean that as just go around randomly and try to help people. Within your specific task, your specific industry, the things you know well, you need to be at the forefront of letting people know how to do what you know how to do without charging them money at first.

They’ll come and find your site and your products and they’ll pay you for that as time goes on and their needs grow. With social networking you need to be building your reputation up first.

If somebody has a question, you should be one of the first people who answers and you need to answer without reservation not just, “Oh, I answered that in my eBook; go buy it”. They’re going to find your eBook if you just talk to them and give them solutions to the problem they are struggling with at that moment.

Give people your input, your encouragement for them to get better at what they are trying to do.

Any little quick free advice you can give, give it.

Actively Build Your Reputation With Social Networking And Reap The Rewards

You’ve got to be in this for the reason of having fun and really building that relationship. Dollars will come, there’s no doubt about that. But first, connect with people and really help them out. Understand that they’ll become loyal followers of what you do and see you for who you are.

Follow these 5 steps to building your reputation online and you’ll not only beat your competition, you’ll have more fun doing it!

Bob Jenkins teaches business owners how to use internet marketing strategies effectively to attract more customers and get more sales without spending a fortune on advertising. Get more free social networking lessons at www.DiscoverSocialNetworking.com.

I had the pleasure of attending an OUTSTANDING online workshop the last few days of 2007. The 2008 Success Workshop was conducted by “Bob The Teacher” and attended by over 60 people from around the world.

If you’ve been online any length of time and feel as if you don’t know exactly what to do, or all the pieces just aren’t falling into place, then I highly recommend the 2008 Success Workshop to get you on the the right path for the New Year. The next session may be held around the end of January, so if I were you, I’d definitely get on the list for it.  You can get all the details of what you’ll learn when you scroll down past the registration form.  And be sure read the entire page to find out what others have experienced.

While I normally don’t invest my dollars in most of the online programs that make claims about what they can do for your business (and therefore, don’t make those recommendations here), the 2008 Success Workshop is an exception.

Yes, it was definitely a lot of information to digest, but overall, well worth the time, energy and dollars spent. Furthermore, you’ll come away with a new mastermind group of like-minded people who are willing to help you go forward. So, if you are really SERIOUS about getting your business off the ground and/or making it more profitable for you in 2008, don’t delay in getting on the list, otherwise you will miss out on the next 2008 Success Workshop.

Here’s to our SUCCESSES and making 2008 GREAT!

A friend of mine told me about something I needed to check out immediately. Well, I’ve done what I was instructed to do.

I’m evaluating a multi-media course on blogging from the folks at Simpleology. For a while, they’re letting you snag it for free if you post about it on your blog. It covers: the best blogging techniques; how to get traffic to your blog; and how to turn your blog into money.

I’ll let you know what I think once I’ve had a chance to check it out. Meanwhile, go grab yours while it’s still free. Then post a comment letting me know what you thought about it, and I’ll do the same.

After that, I’ve got something else I want to share with you that involves an interactive workshop that I highly recommend you take advantage of when it opens up again. I’ll tell you more about my own experience in an upcoming post. Stay tuned . . .