As you know, the Privacy Pirates are out there stealing your personal data, but this is one step beyond that – this is potentially LIVE and ADAPTIVE in both the physical and virtual world.

You don’t need to be a conspiracy theorist to get worried. I’m far from being paranoid, but there are tell tale signs that the abuses are increasing at an alarming rate.

Since I am NOT into propagating conspiracy theories, I have put together a report that summarises several issues that you should be aware of.

If you’d like a copy, you’ll need to contact us to get it. It’s not a free giveaway download. The 24 page report took 37 hours of research assembling 67 articles with 126 reference links for you to get quick access to what you need to protect yourself. Contact us – prevention is the only cure for this disease!

The video below, by the Book Box Company is the perfect explanation of what they do, how they do it and why it’s important to the final (finished) product.

There is no doubt that once you’ve seen the short video (less than 4 minutes), you know everything you need to know.

There is also no doubt that sales will increase as a result of the video – because we can appreciate the time, care, effort and thought that has gone into the process – especially all the recycling!

I’m sure they’ll refer to this blog post from their blogs since it’s one of the many Internet Marketing Strategies I covered at the recent Blogging for Business Sales Lead Generation and How To Converts Your Online Browsers To Buyers Workshops – now both available as convenient Webinars.

When Angela Muzyczka sent me this joke, I just had to share it with you, not for SEO reasons, but because it’s funny.

The Difference Between Dogs And Computers

Favorite Food
Dogs: Kibbles
Computers: Bits

Method used to end undesirable behavior
Dogs: Hit with rolled up newspaper
Computers: Hit control-alt-delete

After destruction of personal property
DOGS: Dog not found
COMPUTERS: File not found

Favorite trick
DOGS: Roll over
COMPUTERS: Play dead

Comic page hero
DOGS: Dogbert
COMPUTERS: Dilbert

Fun way to mess with their heads
DOGS: Peanut butter on roof of mouth
COMPUTERS: Peanut butter in CD-ROM drive

Consequence of virus
DOGS: Replace valuable carpeting
COMPUTERS: Replace valuable data

Widely ignored government mandate
DOGS: Leash law at the park or beach
COMPUTERS: Communications Decency Act

Waste disposal tool
DOGS: Pooper-scooper
COMPUTERS: uninstaller (necessary only on Win-tel machines!)

Method of marking territory
DOGS: Lifting leg
COMPUTERS: “Designed for Windows XP”

Unique behavior
DOGS: Lick and drag
COMPUTERS: click-and-drag

Inexplicable physical feature
DOGS: Dewclaw
COMPUTERS: Scroll lock key

Estimated lifespan
DOGS: 12 years
COMPUTERS: 12 months

At end of useful life
DOGS: Euthanasia
COMPUTERS: Tax deduction

I guess you could say the difference between computers and dogs is bits and bites…!

Put differently, years ago, when you bought a Yellow Pages ad, you’d SPEND thousands of dollars with NO appreciation in the capital asset value of the phone book. With the Internet, every dollar spent on your website should increase its capital value. Think about it this way – if you were assess two identical businesses, one with a website and the other without one, which one would YOU buy?  Enough said.

Most small businesses don’t proactively deal with their website and/or web online presence for a long list of reasons including:

• “I don’t get all this Interweb stuff”
• “I don’t like Facebook and don’t understand why people waste so much time ‘talking’ to complete strangers”
• “My son-in-law, nephew or neighbour seems to understand it and is not charging me much to handle my website…”
• “Technology is changing too quickly, I can’t keep up.”
• “I don’t get any web inquiries so it’s not worth worrying about.”
• “My staff’s taking care of it, in fact, we all kinda pitch in to get stuff done.”*

Whatever your excuses, as a small business person, in this day and age you simply cannot hand over your online presence to just anyone anymore than you would give them the pin code to your bank card. I am totally serious.

Lack of attention to and understanding of the Internet’s role in business is one of the fastest rising causes of small business failures today. Sticking your head in the sand is no longer an option. The Interweb is here to stay and the Yellow Pages era is over. (Pstt! The phone book era was over more than 10 years ago!)

If you’re a small business owner operator, ask yourself the following questions:

• Can you make reasonable demands of your web supplier with commercial results or are you walking on eggshells every time something needs to get fixed or done?
• Are you proactively engaged making things happen to achieve YOUR online outcomes or are you a victim of your supplier’s whims and preferences because “it’s what they do and how they do it?”
• Are you tracking metrics at least every month so you know what every dollar spent is producing for you in sales and/or profits?
• Do you know if you actually own your domains and if you do, do you know how to access them?
• Do you know who is hosting your site and what the access and security protocols are to protect you from hackers and other risks?
• Does it take more than 24 hours to make minor updates and/or correct something on your website and/or blog?

If you don’t have positive answers to most of these questions – are you at least a little worried about the risk to your business?

I see it every single day. A hard working business operator who is so busy working IN his/her business that the Internet gets pushed aside and the Web / IT supplier knows it and exploits it.

How do unscrupulous web / IT people exploit business owners?

• They make everything they do sound complicated when in reality it’s so easy, even a fifth grader can do it now with the latest new online tools
• They make it seem intimidating when it’s never been easier to understand BECAUSE online success is no longer about technology, it’s about STRATEGY which is what business people are good at (and what IT people are NOT good at… Hmmm…)
• They tell them it’s expensive and labour intensive when many/most solutions are FREE, quick and easy to implement in minutes.

Why do they do this? Because they either don’t know any better or because they know that if YOU knew what I teach my clients, you won’t need them.

Let’s look at another industry – optometry. Did you know you can get rid of your glasses without expensive eye surgery? You can.

If the strategies have been around for more than 100 years,
why do more and more people need glasses?

Simple – the optometry business model is not to cure you of  near or farsightedness, it’s to sell you glasses and contacts on an on-going, recurring basis for the rest of your life.

The solution to wearing glasses existed in the late 19^th century. Back in the 1880’s it was UNFASHIONABLE to wear ‘spectacles’ so opticians gave you a treatment plan to return your eyesight back to normal – without medication or surgery.

But there was a problem – there was no on-going recurring business.

That’s when the ‘industry’ changed and today, more than 100 years later, more people wear glasses than ever before.

You have to question people’s motivations – if their model is based on making money FROM you rather than FOR you, you’ve got a problem.

I’ve been wearing glasses (or contacts) for more than 30 years. Within the last 2 weeks, I reduced my prescription strength from -2.25 to -1.00. I expect to be free of glasses and contacts within the next 30 days.

I don’t want to rid you of your glasses, I want to rid you of your
frustrating and aggravating Web / IT supplier
who is working against your best interests

The day has arrived when you don’t have to have a specialised web/IT company fleecing you, trying to convincing you that you can’t do it on your own when you absolutely can.

There are thousands of small business people getting rid of expensive, arrogant and troublesome Web / IT companies and are reaping the benefits.

When you get control of your website and online presence, you can:

• Save money – a LOT of money. Most of the tips, tools and techniques are free or cost very little.
• Reduce your level of aggravation and frustration that distracts from you doing what you enjoy. Without the constant confrontation with a 3^rd party, you can focus on what’s most important to you when it’s convenient.
• Act and react faster. With full and total control over your website and blog, you can instantly make changes to react to competitors, a newsworthy event or special promotional idea – without delay and ‘negotiation’ to put it at the top of the queue’.
• Work on your website when it suits you, rather than try to fit into someone else’s rigid ‘production schedule’. That means you can do it while travelling, in your hotel room on a rainy night or in-between meetings at a local coffee shop when you’re inspired and have a few spare minutes.
• Be much consistent, congruent and authentic. Let’s face it, by the time you delegate something to a 3^rd party, everyone wants his/her 2 cents to count. That means your original idea gets watered down, sometimes altered beyond recognition all for the cause of “improvement” when deep down, you know your clients and prospects better than ‘they do’.
• Get more involved in your branding and positioning. With the Internet’s audio and visual capabilities, you can get much closer to your clients than ever before. You might uncover a new source of leads by becoming more engaged and involved.
• Have more fun! Yes, that’s right. The Internet doesn’t have to be a chore. It can and should be fun. I am NOT advocating wasting countless hours with strangers on Facebook, I’m simply suggesting that as you explore new strategies, you’ll probably get reinvigorated by the new ways you can relate to your clients.
• Increase your asset value much more quickly. A 3^rd party supplier doesn’t understand your industry as you do. A well developed online presence can become a priceless asset – when you follow your intuition and do what works. When you’re in charge, without the constant hassles of dealing with an outsider, you can grow (the asset) much more quickly.
• Expand your sphere of influence. Without becoming an industry advocate, with an improved online presence, you will attract more attention and as such gain pre-eminence in stature that otherwise would elude you. That doesn’t mean you’ll become the next celebrity, it does mean that your peers, clients and prospects will admire and respect you for who you’ve become.

Imagine controlling your website and blog WITHOUT the intervention,
constant frustration and aggravation of your Web / IT company?

Stop Imagining. It’s here right now.

But you have to have the courage to make it happen.

I want to teach you to become fully “web independent” so you can navigate the web on your own WITHOUT ANY dependency on any 3^rd party whatsoever.

Imagine what that will be worth to you in the next year… And every year after that!

Click on the hyperlink to find out more about the Exponential Internet Marketing Bootcamp. It’s a 3-day investment that will pay off for a lifetime.

Still sitting on the fence?

You can sit on the fence until the next time you want something done to your website and your web developer says:

• “I’ll get to it as soon as I can, certainly within the next WEEK OR SO.”
• “No probs, that’ll be $100+ GST to fix that typo.”
• “We don’t think that will work (free option), we suggest X at a cost of $Y.”
• “We don’t work on weekends.”
• “Sorry, our tech guy’s on vacation in Bali…”
• “If you want it urgently, we have a 50% surcharge.”

When you’ve had enough – join the thousands of other Australian businesses who have given their arrogant web guys the flick!

* Here’s a quick question for you if you have your staff kind of handling your Internet tasks… “Do you also let your car mechanic cut your hair?” If not, why not, after all you’re paying him, so he could just do it at the same time… Getting your UNTRAINED staff to take care of your Internet Strategies is just as ridiculous as a car mechanic cutting your hair and you’d NEVER consider that as an option. Yet one of your most important business activities is being treated with the same disrespect… Seriously, think about it. If it’s any consolation, most SMALL businesses do it this way – THAT’S WHY THEY ARE SMALL AND ALWAYS WILL BE.

If you want your staff to competent take care of your Internet Marketing Strategies, you need to train them properly – simple as that. You know what to do… Bring them along to the Exponential Internet Marketing Bootcamp.

I know too many people who post a profile picture that is 5 to 10 years old…

What do they think the impression is when someone meets them in person and they LOOK that much older?!?!?

“You never get a second chance to make a first impression”

If the first impression is deceitful, how do you move on from there?!?!

NEWS UPDATE:

CLICK THE HYPERLINK to download the Blogging For Small Business
Interview With Ludwina Dautovic on Red Tent Radio!

If you missed our exceptionally popular workshop “Business Blogging For Sales Lead Generation“, you’re in luck – it’s now available as a 4-hour webinar you can stream to your computer. A webinar is great because you can stop, pause and rewind to make sure you don’t miss any important details.

Ludwina and I discussed WHY small business people need to blog,
what NOT to do and HOW to get started quickly and easily

As you’d expect, I have a very different take on most marketing strategies – one of them is I am not a fan of Social Media… I don’t adhere to the common propaganda that’s proliferating “out there” that you need to be on Facebook and Twitter. If you want to hear an honest viewpoint that will benefit your bottom line and save you from wasting countless hours, make sure you keep an eye out for the interview – I will blog about it when it comes out and you’ll be able to download it for free.

But, by that time, you’ll realise you should have attended my 4-hour Masterclass called “How to convert your online browsers to buyers” in Sydney and Melbourne on April 11th and 18th respectively.

So you know what to do – take the time now to have a look at the event page and keep in mind it comes with a 100% no-questions-asked money back guarantee. If at the end of the 4 hours, you haven’t received at least 2 or 3 times the cost of admission, we’ll refund you and remove you from our mailing list. That’s how confident we are of the immense value we’ll be revealing.

Here’s one of the concepts Ludwina and I touched on during the interview – it’s called the Miser Mentality. With a Miser Mentality, the focus is on the cost of something rather than the value or potential. A prime example is someone who drives 15 to 20 minutes to save a few cents on petrol. They have no appreciation for their TIME VALUE. A Miser can only see the COST (petrol saving) – not the BENEFIT (paying a little more, but saving time).

The strategies I will reveal at the next DIY Internet Marketing Masterclass can increase your website traffic anywhere from 15% to as much as 200%, depending on what you’ve done and how well you’ve done it. But here’s the thing – anyone who has a product or service that is worth at least $300 would get a benefit of $3,000 to $5,000 from the strategies I will reveal as a MINIMUM STARTING POINT.

So if the question was:

Would you pay $300 to get $3,000 in sales
in the next 12 months?

The answer should be YES! but the problem is that with a Miser Mentality there is a filter, a bias, a distortion that comes into play – that PREVENTS the POSSIBILITY from being even considered.

It might be thought, in a fleeting moment, but not seriously assessed or considered at its full (potential) value. Therein lies one of the key differences between the abundantly wealthy people who seek and focus on potential opportunities whereas misers miss those opportunities NOT because they aren’t there, but because they can’t see them.

In the psychological literature it’s called a Scotoma. The best example is looking for the salt when the salt shaker is right there in front of you…

I will address some of these inhibitors to success at the upcoming Exponential Extravaganza in May and June, but before that event takes place, the Internet DIY 4 hour Masterclass takes place.

Can you see the dilemma EVERYONE FACES – you know you want the benefits, results and rewards… But you have to consider and BELIEVE it’s possible. Quite the tug of war isn’t it?

I know. I struggled with it more than 30 years ago. I don’t remember what the trigger or catalyst was, but at some point I decided that the Miser Mentality can’t work – so I gave Boundless Opportunity Thinking a try. Once adopted, I transformed it into my own Exponential Mindset Thinking and the rest as they say is history…

So what “history” will you create for yourself in 2012, 2013, 2014 and beyond…?

It’s hard to get the message across
without being heavy-handed or sensationalistic

Brendan Rigby of Inspire Fitness and Wellbeing in Melbourne tells me that someone who’s overweight, drinks too much alcohol, smokes and doesn’t exercise is a prime target for Type II Diabetes, but even if all the red flags are there, everyone but the ‘patient’ sees them.

I feel it’s the same thing with the Internet. I see or hear about small business owners  getting fleeced, taken advantage of and otherwise ‘robbed’ by Internet Marketing Spruikers who pitch miracle solutions from stage with manipulative tactics at the get-rich-quick opportunists that many would argue “get what they deserve”.

But isn’t that the same for the smokers or obese, soon-to-be diabetics?

The challenge we all have is how do we get the message across without being fear mongerers and using heavy-handed tactics like the video below?

I can remember meeting a smoker amputee who lost BOTH her legs (above the knee) due to smoking. She was still smoking with the impeding threat of double-arm amputation, which is when she claimed she would “try to quit”. I was in my early twenties at the time, she was in her 40′s. I doubt she made it to her 50th birthday. I am still shocked almost 30 years later recalling that conversation.

There are some people that can’t and don’t want to be helped or saved

But there are those who, given a fair chance,
want to be forewarned – especially if the alternative is better

Leveraging the Internet does not have to be scary, intimidating or costly. In fact, the world has changed to make technology and access ubiquitous via increasingly easier and cheaper tools.

But the bottom line is – there is no point in discussing any of them – UNLESS YOU’RE OPEN to the possibilities.

If you are open to consider alternatives to expensive web designers and social media consultants, we’re staging an eye-opening workshop in Sydney and Melbourne in April.

It comes with a 100% Money-Back Guarantee that simply states that if after the 4-hour DIY Masterclass you didn’t get enough ideas, tips and tools to make or save you at least a multiple of the workshop fee, we’ll refund you the full registration fee – NO QUESTIONS ASKED.

Why? Because we don’t offer Internet web design and Social Media Consulting services – we and our clients don’t like them any more than you do.

AND BELIEVE IT OR NOT, you can grow your business leveraging the Internet doing it yourself AT A FRACTION OF THE COST OF THE SO-CALLED EXPERTS… AND GET BETTER RESULTS !!!

Come find out how at our next workshop called “How To Convert Online Browsers Into Buyers“.

Simply put, if you want to get more clients walking in your door or visitors to buy from your website, you have to do things differently.

The short YouTube video below captures one of the key concepts that prevents many businesses from selling more online (and of course offline).

Can you afford NOT to learn this stuff?

This blog is all about giving you the tools you need to be effective in your online lead generation strategies and web marketing.

Make sure you bookmark this page or even better – subscribe to the blog so you don’t miss out on any important information, tips or tools!

“Thinking that you can only get paid while working is like thinking

you can only listen to music while someone is playing an instrument.”

_________________________________

This is the fundamental principle of Exponential Internet Marketing that we teach our clients in our Online Lead Generation Programs.

Our Internet strategies are legitimate, proven systems avoiding trying to ‘cheat the system’ with ‘black hat strategies’. They work in all industries for companies of all shapes and sizes that have real products and services to offer.

The best part of the strategies is that they can be setup with a passive income aspect so that traffic is generated ‘automatically’ and systematically to feed the sales funnel. Most of the strategies and tools we use are FREE and require no internal IT resources.

If you’re interested in making money 24/7/365, contact us for a quick chat and we’ll explain how we’ve helped hundreds of small business owners become market dominant leaders within their market niches within 12 to 24 months.

The same can be said about “what’s the point of having a business blog?”

You might not be a farmer and might not care why the rear wheels of an old tractor need to be that big, but in business, you can’t afford not to know why blogging has become so important for lead generation.

That’s why we’re staging a 1/day workshop called Business Blogging For Sales Lead Generation on the Gold Coast, Sydney and Melbourne.

But then again you could go back to the paddock and give plowing a go…

This is 2012. We are in the 21^st century with email at the nucleus of our communication paradigm. Business people who struggle with technology and especially emails are ‘dinosaurs’.

Now that’s a bold statement to make, but it really is THAT important.

Allow me to contrast the top 10% versus the bottom 90%.

The top 10% respond within a reasonable time frame. It can be within the hour, the day, but rarely ever more than 48 hours (unless they are on leave or otherwise occupied with a project/event). One thing is for sure – you’re never wondering if they got or lost the email.

The bottom 90%…

• Claim to ‘lose’ or not receive emails
• Ask for emails to be re-sent because they accidentally deleted them
• Actually do have problems receiving emails because of their spam folder settings that are too strict
• Are challenged with their spam and junk mail folders – reviewing them only ‘every once in a while’ even though many important emails end up there
• Have hundreds or thousands of emails in their inbox
• Respond to emails erratically sometimes immediately and then are ‘offline’ for days with no communication
• Don’t use meaningful subject lines
• Don’t maintain message threads that are important – creating new emails with each new response
• Use TXT acronyms trying to be “hip or groovy” instead of clear in their explanations – creating the need for additional threads to find out what they meant to say
• Subscribe to every free email list available fearful that they will miss something.
• Don’t read their emails – instead skimming and overlooking the most important and time sensitive information
• Have multiple emails that they don’t monitor appropriately
• Share emails with others so everyone gets the email and multiple people responding with conflicting suggestions
• Don’t have folders for their emails – so can’t quickly locate what they need when they need it. Even though emails are now indexed, not having folders is like not having a filing cabinet for your physical documents.

Poor email management is one of my strongest pet peeves, but the reason I mention it here is because it’s also symptomatic of poor business management.

Without needing to become a Productivity Powerhouse – lack of effective email management skills (and tools) can be an important obstacle to your overall business success.

Anecdotally, over the past 10 to 15 years, I have noticed that the top business people don’t just manage their emails – the MASTER and CONTROL them with an adeptness that is remarkable.

If you’re struggling to grow your business – just look at your inbox and the list above. It’s a quick and easy problem to solve.

If it isn’t – you now have the SOURCE of the real problem!

Even though as a small business, Internet advertising is not something you’re probably engaged in, a recent report by CONTEXTWEB reveals something that I have known all along, albeit anecdotally -

Average click-through rates (CTRs) for ads placed
on long-tail websites are 24% higher than
those placed on short-tail sites.

Long tail versus short tail marketing refers to specialised niches versus broad mass markets respectively. What’s of particular interest is that the MORE specialised and targeted you are with your web strategies, the greater the returns you’ll produce.

Our clients have known this for years – often out-performing their much larger, national competitors with very deep pockets.

Long tail websites—the millions of smaller websites with niche audiences—offer significant ad performance advantages across a wide number of verticals.

Among all 20 categories studied, long tail ads registered increased CTRs over short-tail ads, led by alcohol beverages (50%), B2B (48%) and charities (48%). The lowest long-tail lift observed was for auto advertisers, but still had (12%) better CTRs.

The trade off remains between quantity and quality of the communication. This is something we cover in depth in our Killer Kopywriting Konversations™ workshops as we help our clients design Killer Kampaigns That Konvert Klients™.

As shown below, among 21 publisher categories, 16 categories registered increased CTRs on long tail sites whereas in five content categories, ads on short tail sites underperformed long tail ads.

Data Source: CONTEXTWEB‘s Intelligence Report: Using Long Tail Sites to Optimize Media Spend was published in March 2011. It analysed digital media performance from roughly 18,000 publisher sites across 1,000 campaigns in the second half of 2010.

As a business person, you need you to read the emails that are important – you are losing a lot more than you know by not reading them.

The problem or challenge is that you have too much junk or spam in your inbox. This is 2011 – DEAL WITH IT.

But let’s face it, it’s not really spam is it?

You’re on everyone’s opt-in list and you don’t want to miss anything that’s FREE…

Well guess what?

It’s not FREE – it’s costing you, dearly.

Each time you or someone who needs to reach you has to re-send an email, it DOUBLES the communication effort. It’s not trivial – with many people sending/receiving more than 100 emails/day, that’s a lot of wasted time and effort ON BOTH SIDES.

In some cases, I stopped dealing with people who can’t respond fast enough. In one supplier’s case it was worth more than $1,000. Gone. Not to mention additional on-going sales or referrals…

You need to find the SOURCE of the problem and get rid of it (excess emails).

For the emails you do need to receive -

Are you skimming them?

Are you distracted when you read them?

In this day and age, I can tell you (anecdotally) that I can gauge someone’s success (or lack thereof) by the efficiency of their email communication.

Simple as that – I know what a ‘reasonable amount of time is to respond’ and when that extends beyond the ‘acceptable’ I know it’s symptomatic.

Symptomatic of a lack of discipline.

A lack of organisation.

A lack of responsiveness.

Lack, lack, lack.

As a business coach, mentor and Exponential Growth Strategist, I figure if you can’t deal with emails you’re not anywhere close to being ready to grow your business.