Once I find something that interests me, I’ll do
a quick keyword research on my competition.

But, instead of using Google, I go straight to
Yahoo listing.  Why?  You’ll find out soon.

2. Using Yahoo, I type in the author’s or
product’s names.  Now you’re going to see
organic search results for these terms.

3. After finding organic listings, I go straight to
this link > http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/

Using “Explore URL feature,” I cut and paste the URL
I found through Yahoo organic search results.

When you hit “Links” you’ll see the list of external
web pages linking back to these sites.

Are there a lot of sites linking?  If so, move on
to another URL you found from organic search result.

Pretty soon, you’ll find an URL with a very few
external sources linking to it.

4. Now you found a goldmine.

If there is a very few sources linking to that URL,
there is a chance you can beat that listing if you just
duplicate the effort by linking from the same sources,
or link it from more authority sites.

If the first page of Yahoo is filled with URLs all linked
from multiple sources, then move onto another product
because you face too much competition.

But, if you find listings closer to the top result with
very few backlinks, you’re going to beat these ranking.

5. I go grab a brand new domain that sounds like the
original product’s name. This converts well.

Using this domain, start approaching the external sites
linking back to these URLs you found during your Yahoo
search.

I sometimes offer to even pay $20 if someone links from
their blogroll link, knowing that will help rank my domain.

Most people are flattered that you’re contacting them
because they’ve never been offered money for simply
linking. To many people, this is their first “ad” revenue
on their blogs.

– and you’re right, this works better with non-IM niche site
owners because people have less knowledge about affiliate
marketing I am going to get into more of it in a minute –

Seek as many link partners as possible to your new domain.

You’ll see your domain surge in Yahoo listing.  Make sure to
link with good anchor text targeting product names or
author’s names.

6. Now I am going to explain why I went straight to Yahoo
instead of Google.

There is one very “annoying” habit that Google likes repeating.
That is… they dislike brand new domains.  They always
weigh more value on domains that have been around a while.

well, that’s completely fine.

With Google, don’t try competing against organic listings using
your brand new domain.

They won’t move easily so you’re going to feed Google
with sites they like and you’re going to let Google play
their game.

This is when you’re going to use, “authority sites.”

Do you remember I told you how Google prefers domains that have
been around for a while?

So for this reason, you’re going to use authority sites
like EZA, social Networking/Web 2.0 sites.  I even use
classified sites that people don’t believe it works, they rank
better than my unknown brand new domain with Google.

7. When you perform organic search results using Google,
you might see one or two EZA articles listing.

Now if you go back to Yahoo Explorer and check on backlinks,
pointing to these articles.

If they only have a very few external backlinks coming in, that
listing is in danger — You can probably outrank or get close
to that listing by simply submitting your article to EZA.

8. You linkback from other Web2.0 sites to your domain. Some will
rank well with Google, while some do nothing. This is completely fine.

Because in the meantime, this activity is helping your Yahoo organic
result. Yes, you should see your domain on Yahoo slowly going up
in ranks.

9.  The point of all this is let Google play their game by feeding
it with sites they like.  In the meantime, you bank more commissions
from Yahoo while everyone is crazy about ranking in Google.

With high Google ranking, you’re always in danger of competition’s
spy activity.  All these sophisticated SEO spy tools all focus on
spying on Google activity because that’s what their clients want.

10.  Now we know everyone is after Google listing for “IM products”,
you’re going to play safe by going after non-IM products in clickbank
(or whatever you choose to promote) and start approaching other
site owners and building relationships.

Try gardening, woodworking, crocheting…. either link to clickbank
products related to these what I call “safe” niches or if you’re like me
buy “ready made” PLR books on these niches and upload them on your
RAP (Rapid Action Profit) script sites.

Then approach non-IM niche site owners.

Many of these Non-IM site owners have no idea what affiliate marketing
is and they just do “hobby blogging” and just know their sites rank
well with Google.

Well, that’s great, now you can tell them to link back to your product
URL with just one-time fee approach I told you about (so that way,
they never know what you’re doing) or you can structure a special
deal with them so they’ll link you from more sites they know.

Some of these site owners don’t need $20 for fee, they’ll just
accept crosslink from your site, too.

As you know, you get far more search inquiries every month when you
happen to promote outside Non-IM niche.

11. I haven’t seen this effect, yet, but if you set up a good deal
with these site owners and they begin telling their other blog/site
buddies in their niches, you might get more backlinks.  Now you’re
teaching them the first taste of ad revenue on their sites.

The key is to find mainstream hobby niches far from engaging any type
of affiliate marketing so they don’t become your competition.

If you don’t know any products for these niches, just go make one
using Elance and charge $17 a pop for each product you sell.
I find people don’t think long about paying anything less than $17.

–

I hope you enjoyed it and let me know what you think!

Branding – It’s one of the most spoken, yet least understood elements of marketing.  If someone who has never studied marketing asks you what branding means, what would you say?

It is the perception?  The gut feeling?  The impression about you?  All of the answers are correct and they’re all intuitive.   A subjective feeling of how others observe you becomes your brand.

Mashable’s Dan Schwabel takes this subject a step further.  He challenges you to establish a brand online and maintain it, particularly with the use of Social Networking tools.

Here is the summary of what Dan has to say.

“To know if you’ve discovered your brand, you need to make this equation equal.  Your self-impression = How people perceive you”.

Then gives what he calls ”Personal Branding Toolkit” with list of things you can use to highlight brand.

Speaking of online presence, Schwabel reminds us

“Don’t be fooled by the myth that if you build it, they will come. Unless you’re the luckiest person on earth,  you’ll have to actually communicate everything you’ve created to others”.

Then in the following article, he goes on to talk about how to maintain a brand once you establish it.

Schwabel mentions,

“…what others say about your brand (especially if they are respected and well-known) is more impactful than what you say about yourself”.

There are two main parts to brand maintenance that matter: online “spring cleaning” and careful listening.

“Online ’spring cleaning’: As your brand grows, you must ensure that all the online assets that you have control of grow in the same respect”.

“Careful listening: People are going to be talking about you in various places, such as Twitter, blogs, social networks and more. You need to keep track of what they are saying, so that you can respond accordingly”.

In summary, Schwabel says

“It all starts with you. You can make anything happen and now, with these social tools, it’s easier to accomplish more in less time. People that can help you accomplish your dreams are at your fingertips.  It’s up to you to figure out what you want to do and surround yourself with the people that can help in your personal branding conquest”.

If there is one secret you wish you knew, what would it be?  How about a secret to persuade and influence your blog/newsletter readers?

Persuasion… can be studied, measured, practiced and orchestrated.  It’s not anything you just let it happen.  But something you can make it happen.

I am going to share that secret with you today and if you don’t know any other way to persuade people, this will help you promote tremendously.

You can persuade your readers by providing the type of content that challenges their intelligence and make them want to re-evaluate what they’re currently doing.

Make people say “Wow, I’ve never thought about it from that perspective” or “I’ve never been asked that question before”.

The moment people start saying this, their minds are shifting — you just gave them a different reality, perspective, idea that allow them to think in fresh ways.

When this occurs, they will appreciate you and be more open to you.  If you want to do this effectively, start thinking like a composer.  It takes a composer to create a piece of music that consists of music notes.  However, you and I both know that music notes have been around before Mozart came into the world.

To spread your ideas, you do NOT have to invent anything new.  All you have to do is to liberate people from their conventional thinking and allow them to challenge their own existing beliefs.

People don’t need to agree with everything you say — as long as they’ll have something to ponder after reading/listening to your message, you’ve accomplish your job as a persuader.

Too often, business owners feel they’re not progressing and are stuck at certain stages of their business.  More than likely, all these people are doing is seeing their business from the perspective that they only know about — so question them, challenge them, and make them think that it’s okay to “step outside” of the box.

If you’re successful at giving people new vision, reality and possibility that they’ve never thought possible to realize, you’ve just shifted someone else’s mind forever no matter how small that movement may be.

Every morning, I listen to the radio like all other drivers on the road.

Then I noticed something what I’ve always known.  It doesn’t matter what city I live, all car dealers blast the same radio ads.

It can’t be truer.  They all sound the same and want to be number dealership in ____ state.  But what does “being a No. 1 car dealership” mean to a consumer?

Nothing.

It doesn’t mean when I visit that dealership, I know I am going to get the fairest deal.  It doesn’t mean I am going to be treated fairly.  It doesn’t mean that I am going to experience anything different than when I visit other dealerships (with the exception of dealership like CarMax).

In fact, all I am getting is the name of that dealership and by so doing, hopefully I will make a visit there instead of the one next to it.

Car dealerships do this for a few reasons.  Mainly, this is why — they look at what others do in their industry.  When you have been in the same line of business so long, it’s hard to change the way things you do in one industry.

But, there is a problem — if all you’re doing is the same as what everybody else is doing in the same industry, it’s going to be difficult to always achieve the “No. 1″ market share.

Pretty soon, the market will sort out the irrelevant ads from the superior brands.

What’s the solution there?

You can borrow ideas from outside your industry.  In fact, you can bring different, unique, superior concepts from other industries and innovate to suit your industry.

This way, you can be the first one to introduce that concept to your industry and become the authority figure when it comes to that particular concept — how refreshing would it be?

Then if that concept is truly consumer centric, if it clearly articulates “What’s in it for me”?  It will outperform “We are number one dealership in ____ state” ads by 100 times.

Now whenever Seth has anything to say on his blog, Google rewards him with immediate search engine result — that’s powerful.

How did Seth do this?

One post at a time – No secret.

I write personal journal entry every night.  I began doing this 11 years ago and now I have a volume of 5 “big and thick” journal books sitting in my house.  It contains more than 3000 entries inside (hey I outdid Seth Godin) and if it was a blog, I can’t imagine how powerful it would be.

I initially began keeping  journal so that my children and their children would know what kind of person I was.  But it has been taking me 11 years to reach that much of volume.  But I did it one at a time.

You can too.

Seth is remarkable because he offers different perspective of marketing.  The kind of post that makes you think after reading.

Just like a movie director films a movie, Seth is NOT asking you to agree on all of his perspectives, but he gives you something to contemplate on.  He challenges your intelligent by giving different marketing perspectives.

If you don’t bookmark anyone else’s blog, you should at least read Seth Godin’s blog.

[Image Source]

I sent this article out to my newsletter subscribers on Friday, preparatory to the launch of Mass Control 2.0.

I take Frank Kern’s marketing strategy as an example of why giving outstanding content brands you best online.

ACTION TAKERS NEWSLETTER BROADCAST FEB 13, 2009

Hello it’s Tak Hikichi here. I appreciate you taking busy time
reading this newsletter this week.  Hope you’re having a good
Valentine Day weekend with your family and loved ones.

=======================
MY TAKE ON FRANK’S STUFF
=======================

Tomorrow, you’ll start receiving tons of emails regarding Mass
Control 2.0.

I am not participating in this launch promotion and would like to
give you my take on it today.

I’ve been watching Frank launch products over the last few years and
his style has been nothing but short of exemplary.

================================
WHAT MAKES FRANK KERN SO UNIQUE?
================================

One way Frank Kern does so well to brand himself is offering not just
“different” content, but OUTSTANDING content.

In the crowded marketplace such as “Internet Marketing niche”, it
won’t take long for anyone to become “forgotten” if you don’t produce
great stuff.

Business Owners, whether online or offline, do things very similar
to their competitors within the same industry.  This happens because
businesses look to their most profitable competitor and wants to
craft their marketing campaigns — similar or just better.

However, what would happen if you decide to “step outside the box”,
and as business school professors would tell you to “move outside your
paradigm”?

–

You’re going to stand out.  When everyone zigs, you zag. If you
succeed in promoting it, you may even produce an outstanding result.

But this takes “the guts” to do because you’re going to be looked at
differently.  Your idea may NOT be accepted and it’ll test your “guts”.

For these reasons, many marketers or business owners choose to stay
within the comfort zone.

After all, it’s easier that way.

===============
FRANK IS BOLD
===============

Yet, Frank Kern is bold.  He sets the standard for this industry and
dominates in popularity.

He is likable because he leads by example — this also takes the
guts to do.

==========
THE SECRET
==========

What he coined as “Mass Control” is really nothing but the Education-Based
Marketing.  First he gives a cool name (Mass Control) to this method
and creates a private brand of his own.

He uses it within the Internet Marketing community and positions
himself as the “authority figure” of such method.

Notice this method of marketing isn’t anything new, yet he crafted
his promotion around this concept so well that others THINK that he
is the “go to guy” when it comes to this type of stuff.

Result? Brilliant.

==========
THE GUTS
==========

This happens when you bring a concept or idea from outside your industry
and apply it.

In fact, a “profitable idea” doesn’t need to be something that you
invent yourself.

Think of the Japanese business world for a moment.  The Japanese
is known NOT for its reputation to INVENT, but IMPROVE on an idea.

In fact, many of their existing products and services were born in
America.  But they do it very differently, producing different results.

===========================================
CROWDED MARKETPLACE IS YOUR NEW OPPORTUNITY
===========================================

In order to really standout in the crowded marketplace, it won’t be
easy unless you’re generating ideas.  But you don’t have to necessarily
become the one to “invent” it.

Look for ideas that have helped you in the past from your profession
or own expertise and see if you can somehow IMPROVE it by applying
to your niche.

To do this effectively, you must know your “strengths”.  If you don’t
you WILL FOLLOW the herd by doing what everyone else is doing in
your industry and end up even staying “mediocre”.

Let’s not be that way.

========================
DEVELOPING “YOUR STYLE”
========================

If you feel you don’t have anything “different” about yourself,
it means you’re not qualified, yet.  You have lots to learn and
study before perhaps offering your service.

If you don’t have nothing to say, then your list isn’t worth
joining and others won’t sign up. It’s the fastest way to perish
in the crowded marketplace.

If you think you have to be earning lots of dollars before
publishing your ideas, then think of something that you KNOW you’re
better at it than anyone else you know – this doesn’t have to be
a “marketing method”.

Capitalize on your knowledge and try offering your opinion or method
that might lead to a new idea or concept if you can explain it
from “refreshing” point of view.

–

It’s easy to do this in the Internet Marketing niche.  Why?  Because
so many marketers look at their competitors and only attempt to do
bit better.  As a result, many marketers end up giving up, thinking
this is a battleground only reserved for the gurus.

It is, if you keep on playing a game on “their” turf.

But it won’t be, if you can generate a unique idea, concept or
philosophy that others value – then you will gain a home court
advantage because you’re now playing the game on your turf.

It’s contagious and others will follow you.  Instead of you following,
you’re going to lead. That’s scary, it takes “the guts”.

Your Newsletter and your list will stand out because so many marketers
today are using their lists exactly the same way.

It’s okay because that’s other people’s style.

Not yours — you’re going to be unique, you’re going to be outstanding.

============================
IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN THIS
============================

I do have a Master Resale Rights for “Mass Control Revealed” interview
if you’re interested. It’s not the actual Mass Control product, but
a 60 minute interview Frank gave about a year ago.

I am an authorized reseller for this product and you can buy the same
rights at $7.

It’ll come with the product, reseller package and you can put your
own name to where it says “From the Desktop of: My Name” and sell it
just like I do.

I just use simple Paypal secret script and sell it whenever Frank
promotes something. You can promote it to your list and
people always grab a copy.

Here is the link >> http://asktak.com/mass/

========================
COULD YOU DO ME A FAVOR?
========================

If you’re a subscriber to my Action Taker’s and if anything has
helped you.  Would you please send me a testimonial?

I am in the middle of having serious makeover to my existing sites
and products.

It’ll be nice if you could join me on my home page.

It doesn’t have to be long or it doesn’t have to be supplied with
picture.

But if you like to include URL, name or first name and last name
initial, whatever style you prefer, you’ll be on my home page once
it’s done.

Just reply me to this email and I will thank you by displaying your
business profile once my new site is up.

But please send it only when it warrants.

Hello it’s Tak Hikichi here. I appreciate you taking busy time
reading this newsletter this week.  I normally don’t send
broadcasts on weekdays but I wanted to write something that I think
it’s important.

===================
HOW TO ADD CONTENT
===================

Today I am going to write something useful.  Many people struggle
with the idea of writing and I want to tell you what I do to
continue writing longer and meatier articles.

Here is what I do.

First I decide on a thesis.

for example, I might write an article on

1. “Generating Traffic Using PPC”.

then what I do is I’ll expand more from there. So it goes,

1a – How to bid effectively while lowering the cost per click
1b – You can lose your shirt overnight if you don’t know how
1c – Perry Marshall, the PPC guru

Now if you can write 100 words per item, you’re going to generate
an article that contains 300 words, long enough to submit to
EzineArticles.com

You may also add numbers and bullet points when writing an article.
My test shows when you add numbers and summarize points, click
through rate goes up, perhaps you can replicate this effort when
writing yours.  Test it and let me know how it goes.

=====================================================
WHAT SHOULD YOU WRITE TO YOUR NEWSLETTER SUBSCRIBERS?
=====================================================

I believe this is an entirely different matter from writing articles
used for so called Article Marketing.

To me, “helpful” articles are nice, but that alone won’t keep me
subscribed to someone’s list.

If I want to read helpful or even “useful” contents, I’d go online
and search it myself — I don’t need anyone sending me newsletter
to my inbox in order for me to get that information.

I like reading newsletters with personality, sense of humor, style
and class.  I have nothing against “promo only” emails, but I believe
to rise above the noise and come out of the crowded marketplace,
a marketer needs to be innovative and generating new ideas.

I don’t need to read contents that “I agree with”, instead, I look
for contents that are interesting enough to ponder and make me want
to think about something differently.  To me, that’s inspiring and
motivating.

–

OK, that’s enough for today.

==============================
WHAT HAVE I BEEN DOING LATELY?
==============================

I have been playing with this site Herbal Profits.  It’s owned by
my friend James Brown who became a millionaire promoting herbs.

He decided to market this knowledge and I decided to take up on that.

I’ve always been interested in learning about herbs and I thought
it’s an interesting concept to market it online.

I do have an affiliate link if you’re interested in.

>> Sign up.

It’s a membership site, but you really just pay the fee for the whole
year, no monthly charges or anything.

I’ll tell you more about it next week.

Hello it’s Tak Hikichi here. I appreciate you taking busy time
reading this newsletter this week.  It’s been two weeks since
I last sent Sunday broadcast and I thank everyone who has
recently signed up for Action Taker’s.

I’ll be doing some product reviews here today… none contain
my affiliate links.

================
REAL OTO SCRIPT
================

First item on the list today is an interesting OTO script, which
doesn’t cost a dime.

When I say “OTO”, I trust you know what it stands for.. it’s the
One time only offer, which typically is shown as soon as you order
something or you sign up for something.  It then asks you to read
every word carefully because you’re only going to see the discounted
price once and you must act now — you know how that goes.

For the most part, internet marketers don’t have scripts sophisticated
enough to make this a true event.  In fact, if you bookmark and later
return to the page, you’re more likely see the same page shown with
the same discount offered once.

So it really is not a true OTO.

But this is about to change.

I forgot where I signed up… but David Thomas gave me a script
that pretty much disables anyone to return to the page from the
same computer.  In other words, if your customer sees your OTO page
and attempts to returns to the page, they lose the ability to do
this.  The script reads IP address and bans anyone from attempting
to access that page – so you must really act on it right then, right
there.

Now you can get this at $0.  However, there was an OTO when I signed
up for the free script, but I didn’t buy it.  The OTO was limited-time
offer script (this is how David profits by first giving you the
free script as a bait) and I wasn’t interested in it. It may work
for you though.

For this reason, even though this comes with affiliate program, I’m
only sending you the original link from the product owner.

>> David’s OTO script.

Enjoy.  I think it’s a good script to own.

============
PPC Web Spy
============

If what I am about to explain to you confuses you, you have to
see the video demonstration offered through the link below.

Brad Callen released a new product that enables you to spy how much
people are spending on Adwords campaigns.

When I first heard about it, I wasn’t happy. I have several Adwords
campaigns making me nice income on autopilot right now.  What if
others find out exactly how much and what keyword I am bidding?

All they have to do is to replicate what I do and steal my method.

PPC Web Spy supposesly does this.

It installs script on your FireFox browser (so you must use this
with FireFox, not Internet Explore) and as soon as you Google
and all the keywords and bidding terms are revealed.

Well, that WAS the pitch demonstrated during the video part.

But it didn’t.  It generated other key phrases that I am not bidding
on. (So kind of glad that it worked imperfectly)

Now, it has an upgraded version, which reveals all key phrases that I
was bidding on.  But since the free version revealed more
key phrases that were RELATED to my campaigns but I wasn’t actually
bidding, I wasn’t all that convinced.

So I didn’t buy the upgraded (Yes, OTO) version of the software, but
I have it installed on my FireFox just to occasionally spy on what
others may be bidding on certain keywords.  So in my opinion, it’s
a nice tool to have for free, but not sure if I would pay for the
upgraded version since it didn’t work perfectly during the free
phase.

You might like it though… See it for yourself and decide if it’s for you.

>> http://www.ppcwebspy.com (not my affiliate link)

=============
WARRIOR PDF
=============

Recently, I was creating a PDF report, explaining how to convert
hyperlinks within PDF.  My traffic report shows people come to
my site, inquiring about it.  So I thought I’d write more
complete step by step style report.

Well, like 90% of everyone out there, I would use Open Office to
convert Word from PDF.  But as you might know, this is a two step
process.

Then I forgot that I had bookmarked something and for the first time,
I had it installed on my computer.  It’s called Warrior PDF and
it’s awesome.

With this software, you can now directly convert Word to PDF from
within the MS Word.  No, you don’t have to first import to Open Office
before converting.

So in case you didn’t know… I thought I’d share this with you.

>>  Warrior PDF

==============
$4 FOR ECOVERS
==============

From time to time, I let my newsletter readers know what’s taking
place in Warrior Forum.  Particularly, I think this one would
be helpful.

Dennis Grubbs (aka jjpmarketing) is running a special right now
and will create eCovers for your ebooks for $4 a pop.

I quickly bought 7 of those.  So far, he is working on my first
project and I like working with him.

Take a look at this WSO and see if it’s a fit for you.

>> $4 for eCovers.

====================================
DUNTE, I HAVEN’T FORGOTTEN ABOUT YOU
====================================

I also have a subscriber you might benefit from. His site is
http://www.ecoversalive.com

Dunte is an African designer who brings different touch to the
eCover and site designing.

His rate should run about $30 an eCover but if you tell him I sent
you, he’ll probably cut you a special deal.

Take a look at his portfolio and add him as one of your designer dudes.

==============================
NEED TO HIRE ARTICLES WRITERS?
==============================

Ok, my newsletter is not classified and none of these guys actually
paid me to tell you about their services, but I am feeling this might
also help you, so here it is another one.  This is for ghostwriting.

A friend of mine from Malaysia is managing a team of writers from
Malaysia and if you’re in a market for inexpensive ghostwriters,
you might benefit from this service.

It’s running at $3 an article.  Can you get a nice article for $3?

Well, it’s all in the eyes of the beholder and it depends on how you
use it.  Personally, I don’t think price matters when it comes to
ghostwriters.  I look into more of their work ethics than anyting
else.

So these guys might be able to help you with your article needs. Let
them know that I sent you.

>>  Ghostwriters

=================
SEE YOU NEXT WEEK
=================

I spent a week in Vegas last week.  I don’t gamble so all of my money
was spent on eating out and taking my wife and kids out.

Now I am back in Arizona and am already using AC this week… in the
middle of winter.  I love the whether here and I wear Aloha shirts
all through the year – that’s my style.