Inside the Internet Marketing Mind

What is Bloopio? A Preliminary Review…

Matthew Bredel — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 00:56:40 +0000

Bloopio What?

(Yes, today’s post is promotional but Hollis always seems to create pretty darn good products and this offer is a good one! Check it out below…)

A few months ago, I introduced you to a friend of mine, Hollis Carter, and I know a bunch of you joined his SNEmpire and currently LOVE IT! (I rarely get this much positive feedback on any product that I have recommended!).

But before I even knew anything about SNEmpire, I was originally introduced to Hollis’s vision of a Quick & Easy Website Builder.

Let me explain…

I first met Hollis at JVAlert here in San Diego last year. We randomly were just chilling by a pool drinking beers and he was telling me about this website builder he wascurrently creating.

Now I meet many people in the industry and the products are usually all the same (or something I have already heard of before).

I was skeptical at first!

Is this just another Wordpress blog?

After about three minutes, I realized that this was BETTER, SIMPLIER and MORE POWERFUL than Wordpress…at least for the function it was trying to provide.

The product name is Bloopio.

And what I liked most about Bloopio is its function:

“Fast, Professional Websites; No Technical Experience Required”

I receive countless numbers of emails from people asking me:

- how to get started?
- which website builder should I use?
- how long will it take to create a website?
- how will I create a website myself?
- how much will it cost to create a website?

I usually point people initially to Wordpress. It is a blog, though. Sure, it can be used to sell products and to promote products, but it is not designed to do that. It is meant to be a blog.

What makes Bloopio so unique is that it caters to the online marketer. It is the quick and easy way of getting actual offers and promotions onto the internet without having to deal with all of the
crazy plug-ins, modifications and WORK!

(It even incorporates things like opt-in forms for you…one thing that I ALWAYS tell my clients to add whenever they create an website.)

Enough of my ranting about this.

The moral of this story is that I mentioned to Hollis way-back-when that when he WAS to release this product, I want to be one of the first
to tell my clients about it.

Now is that time and Bloopio is currently in pre-launch…BUT NOT FOR YOU!

Between NOW and Tuesday (2/9), you can get this for only $97 before it goes live to the general public.

This is the link:

Watch Bloopio Video

Here, they tell you more about Bloopio, provide you with a great tour of the product and more information on taking advantage of this awesome price.

And if you are not sure, SEND ME AN EMAIL WITH YOUR QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS (justaskmatt@matthewbredel.com)! Comments below are also welcome!

I’ll follow up with Hollis and give you an answer before the $97 promotion expires!

Deal?

But first, check out their video and then tell me what you think…

Watch Bloopio Video

cheers…matt

P.S. As long as I have known Hollis, he has been a man of his word. Here, he offers top support, and I don’t doubt it. Plus, they always do such a good job documenting all of their products. I expect nothing less here.

And at $97, you really can’t lose here…but the price goes up on Tuesday when it officially goes live, so get it today!

Watch Bloopio Video

Mal/ObfJS-H Wordpress Hacked

Matthew Bredel — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 21:15:07 +0000

This is screwed up!

OK, so I got a call from my cousin this morning telling me that visitors to his blog were receiving a trojan warning about Mal/ObfJS-H. Hmmm…that is totally weird. So I did a little bit of searching and found this article (dated today, by the way) talking about the fact that this has been happening to other people, particularly those with Wordpress blogs.

So I did a little bit of digging in his Wordpress blog and sure enough, there it was! A blatant hack into the header.php file of his Wordpress theme.

DAMN! I haven’t seen a hack this open in a long time. Now, I really don’t know much about it other than how to recognize it and how to removed it.

1) Mal/ObjJS-H Discovery

Assuming you have some kind of internet protection software, you should see a trojan error when you go to your blog. That is pretty obvious (but again, not all of us have that type of protection.)

2) Finding the Mal/ObjJS-H Trojan Code

It appears that the hacker puts this code just below the closing head tag in the header.php file of your template. It is a javascript encrypted routine that looks like a bunch of goobly-gook as follows:

This is a bit condensed. I didn’t really want to put the full code here. But realize that this does not appear in the standard view source code (at least it didn’t when I originally checked). I only discovered it when I looked at the header.php file in the Appearance Editor.

3) Finding and removing the hack

Within your Wordpress admin, choose “Editor” under the Appearance section on the left hand menu in Wordpress.

Then, in the right column, choose the header.php file…

Finally, in the main window, scroll down to the tag and see if that ugly javascript routine exists. If so DELETE IT! You want to delete from the first tag (as kind of shown above).

That should do it! You may need to clear the cache on your web browser to no longer see the Mal/ObfJS-M trojan error, but hopefully this solves your problem (it did for us).

4) Prevention!

Again, I am not exactly sure who or why this is being done (probably a tracking cookie or maybe a cookie stuff), but my best advice to you is to make sure that all of the write permissions to your theme files are closed to anyone but the owner. (This is usually called a 755 permission). Depending on your FTP product, cpanel, host management software, etc. this will be different, but it isn’t a bad thing to do right now. Again, that my be the problem, but who knows.

For now, just keep an eye on things and lock this down if you can. This is the second case I have heard of today.

Gosh, don’t you love internet hacking? NOT!

cheers…matt

Are Negative Options Back?

Matthew Bredel — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 16:23:28 +0000

While at Affiliate Summit West a couple of weeks ago, I posted an email about Visa attacking negative option payment plans and other brand damaging activities that I received from my preferred merchant company, e-onlinedata. Just a few days ago (as I kind of expected), I received a follow-up on how these new super-strict rules have been backed off a little bit.

Again, I want to post that email here (I did not write this). It shows there are certain conditions and rules that must be met in order to offer trials. Plus, there are a lot of other goodies concerning your landing pages, the new FTC Regulations on Endorsements and Testimonials, and some general guidelines to follow when creating offers. Trials are not dead, BUT…

DIRECT RESPONSE BEST PRACTICE GUIDELINES FOR MERCHANTS

TRIAL OFFERS

Marketing models that employ “Free-Trial”, “Deferred Billing” and/or “Shipping Only” are considered trial offers for purposes of this communication. Consumers must be receiving a tangible good or contracted service in exchange for charging of payment cards. Incentivized discount offers are acceptable when the cardholder is receiving goods or services in exchange for payment; however we will be unable to support accounts engaging in hidden or delayed charges and ‘free’ offers that are not truly free.

1. Avoid using terms in your marketing and offer presentation such as “Free”, “Risk Free” or any similar and potentially misleading phrases when consumers will be enrolled in a monthly continuity program at the end of a trial period, or will be paying a deferred charge for the trial period. The phrase “Free Trial” is prohibited unless there is truly no cost or obligation incurred by the consumer.

2. “Shipping & Handling Only” offers must be a fair and accurate shipping charge reasonable to be accrued by the merchant for providing the product.

3. Trial offers must be extended for a minimum of 10 days.

4. Trial periods should not begin until the product is shipped to the consumer.

MARKETING

1. Avoid creating a ‘false sense of urgency’ for the consumer. Unless the consumer’s ability to order is genuinely taken away after a specified timeframe or order count is reached, this practice is prohibited. Use of applications such as countdown clocks, tickers, or language such as “Offer Expires Today!” is also prohibited.

2. Product claims, by law, must be truthful. Claims regarding effectiveness must be substantiated by clinical research conducted to support the claims, and consistent with the formulas and ingredients in your product

3. Qualifications for trial periods of a product should follow pre-determined rules disqualifying consumers who do not meet parameters, including but not limited to: Age, Weight, Height, and Location.

4. Unreasonable claims or guarantees are prohibited. Examples of claims considered unreasonable are:

“Flushes Pounds”, “Flushes Toxins”, “Builds Muscles”

Stating that use of a product will result in permanent weight loss
Stating that a product will cause the consumer to lose a specified amount of weight in a specified timeframe
Stating that a product will cause substantial weight loss no matter what or how much the consumer eats.
Stating that use of a product can cause weight loss (or muscle growth) in specific body parts

“Free Money”, “Instant Money”

Stating that the product can substitute the income of a full time job
Stating that money can be earned with little to no effort or investment
Stating that use of a product will earn you hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars

Additional examples include:

Stating that the product has been successfully used by an unrealistic or unsubstantiated number of people
Stating that a product will secure the consumer a job, either at the product’s company or another company
Stating or implying that a product is endorsed or in any way associated with President Obama or a government entity

ENDORSEMENTS/TESTIMONIALS:

1. Endorsements and testimonials of user experiences must reflect the true and honest opinions of the endorsee(s).

2. Endorsements and testimonials provided must present a clear picture to consumers of realistic results of using the product. If advertisers do not have substantiation of a specific claim or endorsement, then generally expected results must be clearly disclosed and backed by substantiation of any claims.

3. Blogs used for promotional purposes must be in compliance with published FTC guidelines, representing an accurate and full representation of the endorsee, or clearly designated as a fictional story if developed internally for marketing purposes.

4. News Sites published in marketing materials must be in compliance with published FTC guidelines, and must be clearly presented to the consumer as an advertorial. Written consent should be obtained from a media outlet prior to using the logo.

5. Implied celebrity endorsement by use of an image in your marketing is prohibited without express legal written consent.

AFFILIATE MARKETING (CPA) NETWORKS

A significant contributing factor to Historical Excessive chargeback violations has been the utilization of CPA Networks. Transactions generated from internet traffic and all other lead sources must be managed and monitored for potential fraud using an approved system. Third Party service engagement may be a requirement for account approval.

1. CPA Networks should contractually be held accountable for monitoring traffic generated from participating marketers.

2. Merchants must have monitoring plans in place to detect suspect traffic and monitor Affiliate and Sub-Affiliate performance.

BILLING TERMS DISCLOSURE

The FTC has recently published guidelines regarding “Negative Option” enrollment programs and is taking a very aggressive position against merchants utilizing/employing this business practice. Recommendations taken in part from the FTC’s website may include but are not limited to the following:

1. Negative Option disclosures must be clear and conspicuous to the consumer and comply with published FTC principals.

2. The full price of products sold must be within reasonable “fair market value”

3. Under no circumstances should consumers be billed for a product or service not disclosed.

4. Consumers must be required to validate understanding of the terms of the offer twice during order submission. The first validation can take place with the initial offer presentation prior to submission of credit card information, and the second during the checkout process. The confirmation order page must also require consumers to acknowledge that they agree to the Terms & Conditions and authorize the merchant to charge the credit card for the disclosed dollar amount. Terms must be displayed adjacent to the “submit”, “confirm” or any other “call to action” button confirming the order. The price must be within 100 pixels of the “submit”, “confirm” or any other “call to action” button.

o Terms must be in a minimum 12-point “easy to read” font.

o Avoid visually distracting graphics from the display of terms.

o Pre-checked boxes must never be used.

o Consumers should be required to actively and individually select each offer or bonus during the checkout process when there are multiple offers or up sells presented. No offers or up sells should be pre–selected or pre-checked.

o Consumers should not be able to move forward in the offer or checkout until the box acknowledging the terms is checked.

o Verbiage must clearly disclose the enrollment into an ongoing membership with no distraction. An example of an acceptable disclosure is: “By clicking “Submit” you acknowledge that you understand you are being enrolled in a 10 day trial for $4.95, and after expiration of the 10 day trial period you will be charged $59 per month until you cancel your service”

o All products or services purchased when the call-to-action button is clicked should be billed as a single charge unless the order is fulfilled at different times requiring multiple charges.

o Shipping and Handling should not be billed separate from charges for the product or service.

BILLING TIMEFRAMES

1. A merchant may not bill a consumer the full price twice in a 30-day span. An acceptable billing cycle example would be:

o Day 1 – Consumer signs up for a 10 day trial offer with paid shipping of $4.95 charged at the time of order.

o Day 11 – The first monthly order is shipped and the consumer is billed the full price of $59.

o Day 41 – The second monthly order is shipped and the consumer is billed the full price of $59.

2. Consumers should not be billed prior to shipment of products.

REFUND POLICIES

Merchants must not make it difficult for consumers to exercise the disclosed cancellation procedures and all cancellation requests must be honored in accordance with the stated terms of the transaction.

1. Refund policies must be disclosed prior to the sale completion. Establish a clear, concise statement of your refund and credit policy. Your policy should be consistent with the objectives of your business and the products or services sold.

2. Merchants must not require return of any trial offer product samples in order for the consumer to receive a refund, or cancel their ongoing subscription.

3. “Full Money Back” or “Full Satisfaction” guarantees are considered false and prohibited unless the offer provides a full refund on all products, including but not limited to Shipping & Handling charges.

4. Refunds should be for the full amount charged including shipping and handling

5. All future billing to a customer should be canceled when a refund is issued.

6. All future billing to a customer should be canceled when a chargeback is received.

BACK END OFFERS, AKA UP SELLS OR CROSS SELLS:

All sales should be directly between the business entities (merchants) processing the transactions and the consumer, with consumer authorization for all purchases.

1. Under no circumstances can consumer data be shared with another company as this is a violation of Brand Regulations, including but not limited to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard.

2. Forced and hidden up sells are strictly prohibited

3. Up Sells with recurring charges are prohibited, regardless of consumer opt-in or acknowledgement of the offer.

4. A one-time bonus offer may be extended to the consumer for an additional product offered by the same company as the initial transaction. The price of the bonus offer must be clearly disclosed and the consumer must acknowledge the terms of the sale prior to providing credit card information for completion of the sale, and again at order confirmation/ submission.

DESCRIPTORS

1. ALL MERCHANTS DEFINED AS OFFERING A DIRECT MARKETING PRODUCT WILL BE ASSIGNED A DESCRIPTOR FORMATTED TO COMPLY WITH VISA REQUIREMENTS, TO INCLUDE AN *.

2. Billing descriptor should be consistent with the website name, marketing materials, purchase confirmation, and shipping notification (if any) sent to the consumer.

FULFILLMENT

1. Orders must be fulfilled in a timely manner. It is recommended that all products be shipped within 48 hours (2 business days) from the date of order.

2. A confirmation email should be provided for all online orderswith physical shipment, within the prior 5 days to shipment or 2 days following shipment, including the following information:

o Merchant contact information (at minimum a consumer service phone number)

o Order information including purchaser’s name, unique order or customer ID, summary of item(s) purchased

o Terms of the order, including initial amount billed and future billing schedule (this should be stressed)

o Cancellation and refund policy

o Delivery confirmation / tracking information

3. An invoice should be included with the product including the following information:

o Merchant contact information (at minimum a consumer service phone number)

o Terms of the order, including initial amount billed and future billing schedule

o Cancellation and refund policy

CUSTOMER SERVICE:

1. Multiple methods of cancellation must be provided for consumers to cancel or request refunds, including at least two options of contact. Example of acceptable service channels include: phone, email, mail, and online chat. Phone support is strongly recommended as one of the options.

2. “Contact Us” information including contact methods and hours of availability should be prominently displayed in all marketing, offer and payment pages, as well as included in purchase confirmations, invoices and any other communication with consumers.

3. Customer Service must be easily accessible and available during reasonable business hours

4. Refund and Cancellation Policies must be followed as disclosed to the consumer at the time of order

5. Hold times to reach Customer Service must be less than 2 minutes.

6. After hours voice mail should include a greeting that properly identifies the merchant to the consumer, provides hours of Customer Service availability and an expectation for call back.

RESOURCES:

The FTC has published the regulations along with many resources online for businesses and consumers. A few helpful links are included below:

Commercial Practices Part 425, Use of Prenotification Negative Option Plans

Prenotification Negative Option Plans

Advertising and Marketing on the Internet

Dot Com Disclosures

Direct Response industry publications have provided articles with some clarification regarding these guidelines:

http://www.responsemagazine.com/resources/legal-resources/legal-review-getting-strict-with-negative-option-marketing-1351

http://www.dmnews.com/get-comfortable-with-new-ftc-regs/article/136023/

I have been using e-onlinedata as my preferred merchant for many years now and have always appreciated the open and honest communication they have provided to me. If you don’t have a merchant account, you should check them out. They have pretty good rates, too.

Visit e-OnlineData

Affiliate Summit West 2010 - End of CPA?

Matthew Bredel — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 16:09:44 +0000

So let’s cut to the chase here. It is Day 2 at Affiliate Summit West and I could continue to share with you all of the festivities, the parties, the tweet-ups, and the other countless promotional events that are going on. (By the way, I went to this party at the Palms last night in the penthouse suite…OMG! Talk about a view…and a crazy party…enough said!)

But what is REALLY happening at Affiliate Summit and the world of affiliate marketing?

There is a definite undertone to the event revolving around the new FTC regulations on testimonials and endorsements, but even more so in the world of merchanting.

I first heard about this from my merchant a couple of weeks ago about how visa and mastercard are cracking down on negative option offers on the internet. For those who don’t know, negative option offers occur when people sign up for a free trial or a shipping only trial (called a “plus-shipping offer”) and then force the buyer into a continuity payment plan.

(Read the entire explanation at New Visa Mastercard Guidelines for Negative Options)

This is really nothing new to marketing. Music clubs have been doing it for years. “Girls Gone Wild” has been the king of this on TV. But what we have seen over the past year is that this negative option offers have become more aggressive, lower quality and (I hate to admit it) scams in some cases.

Offers are being generated to get buyers into a “trial” when they are unknowing of the further payments they are responsible for. Some offers spell this out in the fine print at the bottom of the page. Some offers hide this in 10 pages of terms and conditions which the buyer agrees to in a checkbox. Some offers don’t disclaim it, period. This is the scam and it has been causing havoc in the merchanting industry.

So a few weeks ago, Visa and Mastercard stepped in and said “We’ve had enough”.

I really didn’t know what this meant at the time. It made sense that it was going to happen, but were they really going to act upon it?

Affiliate Summit answered that question for me! Talking with insiders in the business, this is causing a bit of chaos with advertisers (those who create the offers and sell them), the publishers (or affiliates) and the networks (like the CPA companies!).

Whole industries have essentially been shut down. The diet offers (aka Acai Berry offers, as an example) have been almost wiped out. “Google” offers, which were already on the chopping block due to the FTC regulations, are virtually non-existent.

And also because of this, we are seeing affiliate payout levels dropping from the networks.

Is this the end of Affiliate Marketing & CPA Wealth?

Not in the slightest, but I guarantee you will see some big changes in the business. Personally, this helps me greatly in my business. Lead generation (which in 2009) was virtually dead due to these low quality, negative option buyers, should start to grow again. And with it, the affiliate payouts are going to return back to Earth.

This is going to make it tougher for affiliates, that is for sure, but nothing they couldn’t do just 2 years ago. This inflated, high converting (and borderline unethical) market should return back to normal.

Still, the negative option is still not dead. The free trial is still a very viable form of funnel marketing. Having a good, communicative relationship with your merchant is the first step. Explain what you are trying to do and review your offer with them. Also, make sure to spell out EXACTLY what your customer is buying. Manage your refund requests according and promptly and avoid chargebacks at all costs. This should still work.

“But won’t that hurt conversion?”

Well, yes, but if you weren’t doing these things in the first place, you were probably misleading your customers anyway.

At the end of the day, this should help clean up the industry a bit. The era of buyer leads will hopefully return and the strength of these uber-arbitrage affiliates should become a little less powerful…

…and that is an opportunity! The playing field is slowly leveling again and anyone looking to jump in should do it now!

cheers…matt

New Visa Mastercard Guidelines for Negative Options

Matthew Bredel — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:54:08 +0000

e-onlinedata is one of my merchants who recently sent me the following notice about new Visa and Mastercard guideline. This is not exclusive to e-onlinedata and it is across the board for all US merchant accounts. This is a copy of the email that was sent to me…

e-onlinedata wants to inform everyone of changes expected from the Payment Brands regarding practices that are considered “Brand Damaging”. As you may be aware, both Visa and MasterCard are taking action in response to increases in consumer disputes related to card-not-present and direct response products and services. e-onlinedata is endorsing the adoption of Best Practices to support our merchant base in conducting business in a manner that protects both businesses and consumers from fraud. To date no formal announcement has been received, however e-onlinedata is issuing this communication now in an effort to educate and assist our agents/merchants in complying with anticipated Payment Brand mandates and actions.

MasterCard has recently warned the Acquiring community that “Negative Option” enrollment will be considered a “Brand Damaging” business practice. “Brand Damaging” is a very broad term and is still being defined, but in light of recent fines to our counterparts, we must be proactive. Indications are that MasterCard will require immediate termination of merchants identified as using this business practice, along with any other practices considered “Brand Damaging”. This follows recent policy changes from Visa regarding descriptor formats and disclosure of corporate entities related to Direct Response offers, with the intent to enforce all chargeback and transaction monitoring programs as defined by the associations.

e-onlinedata cannot accept merchant applications for products and/or services employing “Negative Option” enrollment, in addition to the following practices:

Marketing models that employ “Free-Trial”, “Deferred Billing” and/or “Shipping Only”. Customers must be receiving a tangible good or contracted service in exchange for charging of payment cards. Incentivized discount offers are acceptable when the cardholder is receiving something in exchange for payment, however we will be unable to support accounts engaging in hidden or delayed charges and ‘free’ offers that are not truly free.
“Cross-Selling” and “Up-selling” business practices. All sales should be directly between the business entities (merchant) processing the transaction and the cardholder, with cardholder authorization for all purchases.
Per Payment Brand guidelines, the use of multiple merchant accounts, billing descriptors and merchant processors may be viewed as an attempt to avoid chargeback monitoring programs and is prohibited. Perceived non-compliance has led to termination of processing relationships. e-onlinedata will review the business consideration for opening multiple merchant accounts to ensure compliance with Payment Brand guidelines.
Transactions generated from internet traffic and all other lead sources must be managed and monitored for potential fraud using an approved system. Third Party service engagement may be a requirement for account approval.

The FTC has recently published guidelines regarding “Negative Option” enrollment programs and is taking a very aggressive position against merchants utilizing/employing this business practice. Recommendations take in part from the FTC’s website may include but are not limited to the following:

Material terms should be disclosed in a clear, concise manner. Unnecessarily long or inconsistent terms are viewed as an attempt to mislead the consumer.
Terms should be disclosed in a conspicuous manner, clearly placed and labeled on websites in a location that indicates the importance and relevance to the transaction. Fonts and colors must be easy to view.
Material terms must be disclosed prior to completion of the transaction and before a financial obligation is incurred by the consumer.
Customers must provide affirmative consent to any offer, examples include a mandatory “I Agree…” statement checkbox, where the customer is acknowledging the Terms and Conditions of the offer and consents to be entered into continuity program as a result of completing the transaction. Pre-checked boxes do not qualify as affirmative consent.
Merchants must not discourage or make difficult in any way the disclosed cancellation procedures and all cancellation requests must be honored in accordance with the stated terms of the transaction.

I have been using e-onlinedata as one of my merchants for many years now and have always appreciated the open and honest communication they have provided to me. If you don’t have a merchant account, you should check them out. They have pretty good rates, too.

Visit e-OnlineData

Affiliate Summit West 2010 - Day 2: Good, Bad…& Ugly

Matthew Bredel — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 03:41:33 +0000

Hmmm…Let’s first start out with:

The Ugly

Well that is simple! The Chargers lost…and to the Jets, too. It might have also bad that I missed most of the game, too, but maybe that was a blessing. (How could they have lost???) On a good note here, I was told the devastating news by a beautiful 20-something blond (an attendee to Affiliate Summit) who gave me a sympathy hug for my pain.

The Bad

I seemed to have lost my Flip camera. Total bummer, dude. I had some very quality videos of myself entering the Rio (again) and me pondering over the Meet Market sardine can, I mean meeting halls (how fascinating!). Actually, I had a couple of cool interviews on it which where pretty good. Hope to find “some” video solution by tomorrow (I need to earn that press badge, you know!).

The Good

Despite the lost camera (that sucked) and the Chargers loss (that really sucked), the event itself is going great. There is a HUGE turn-out this year and the Meet Market (which is Day 1’s version of the expo) was wall-to-wall people. Still, I found most of the vendors I was looking for (and have already set up 3 follow-ups with potential partners!).

The energy is ALIVE! It has been awhile since I have been to an event with so much going on. Tonight is the big Share-A-Sale party back at the Rio and everyone seems to be on-board. Late night is divided all over the place with tons of parties at the Palms (across the street). And midnight brings the big charity bowling tournament over at the Gold Coast.

It is only 7pm and I’m drained. Where is my Red Bull? (Actually, I totally tweeked out last time I drank one of those energy drinks, so I think I will stick with caffeine for now!).

Today, I didn’t get a chance to sit in on the sessions, but tomorrow’s agenda looks promising for me. Talking with a few new’bs (that is newbies, for short), they seemed rather happy with what they learned today. I hear tomorrow (for Gold and Platinum attendees) gets a bit deeper in the topics. We’ll see.

For now, I need a shower and recovery margarita for my Chargers loss. I guess I’m a Saints fan until the Super Bowl. Go Brees!

Until tomorrow…cheers…matt

Affiliate Summit West 2010 - Day 0 Report

Matthew Bredel — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 04:06:01 +0000

Well, it has been less than a week since I was swimming in the DeeWhy waters of Northern Sydney and now I find myself in a lonely Starbucks at the Rio Hotel Las Vegas for Affiliate Summit West 2010.

Actually, I enjoy the peace and quiet. Tomorrow starts the Affiliate Summit event, which is organized by Missy Ward and Shawn Collins. (By the way, I talked with Shawn Collins at PubCon in November, remember?).

Believe it or not, but this is my 4th year attending this event. And even better, I have been blessed with a press pass this year, so I suppose I need to earn it right now! This is going to be good for you since I plan to cover a lot about the Affiliate Summit event, starting with Day 0 (or as they call it here, pre-registration).

I actually need to wait until noon tomorrow before anything begins, but so far so good. I have meetings with friends, old partners and potential partners booked up for the next two days. Plus I hope to fit a session or two in here and there.

And don’t forget those Chargers tomorrow! Go Bolts…they have actually set up a big screen in the “Meet Market” to watch the games. I actually saw Shawn Collins with his Jets gear on…poor guy…

For now, it is an endless night in Las Vegas. Off for a few beers, some dinner and maybe a little bit of blackjack.

Affiliate Summit in Las Vegas always rocks! More tomorrow…

cheers…matt

Get Ahead! Automate Your Wordpress (Pt 3)

Matthew Bredel — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 17:18:42 +0000

As you read this new post, you may not be aware that I am probably 30,000 feet over the Pacific Ocean and this was written on 2 weeks ago in a little apartment overlooking the Spit Bridge in Northern Sydney (without an internet connection).

The newer versions of Wordpress now provide you with the ability to schedule your blog posts without the need of plug-ins, an edit of your htaccess file or creation of a new cron job.

I know, you are going huh??? Don’t worry! You don’t need to know what an htaccess file or a cron job is because this is done for you.

Remember one of the most important aspects of blogging and social networking is consistency! Writing 7 posts in the first week and none for the next 3 weeks will not create you a good following. Develop an online routine to your posts and stick with it!

Train your readers to your writing patterns, too.

But this can be tough to manage for some of us. It can be a distraction or like me right now, I may be away from the internet for long periods of time.

The solution is to pre-write your blogs, schedule them according to your writing pattern and AUTOMATE your blog postings.

The video (above) shows you how simple this is to do.

Sure, there is the argument that a blog post can go “stale” and the real-time interaction with your readers may be lacking. But it is still more important to maintain consistency than to NOT write or write in chunks.

And just because you pre-write and schedule your posts doesn’t mean you lose your interaction. It may be smart time management.

Try devoting an afternoon to just writing and scheduling a month’s worth of posts. First, I bet you will do it rather quickly. Second, you will find yourself getting MORE done throughout the week without your posting distractions. And finally, I bet your readers won’t even know it!

cheers…matt

Automating the Buying Process Online (Pt 2)

Matthew Bredel — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 16:28:55 +0000

One of the luxuries of owning an online business is that it does not require you to hire someone to bag their purchases, ring them up, slide their credit card and print out their receipt. This can all be automated.

Believe it or not, but I still know people online that only can accept purchases via the telephone. This is crazy!

The other great thing about the internet is that your website and shopping cart is ALWAYS open: 24 hours per day, 7 days per week. While you sleep, you can be making sales (even fulfilling that product to your customer without you even lifting a finger). How is this done?

Automation!

So where do you start? The first place I turn to is Clickbank.

I know, some of you are saying “huh?” Isn’t Clickbank an affiliate network. And you are correct! But remember they have to sell the stuff, too. If you are selling any type of digital product (information product like an eBook, online videos, membership site, software, etc.), you should at least look into your Clickbank options.

As your merchant, they will:

Do your credit card processing and management (i.e., no need to do your own merchanting!)
Place it in their affiliate network (great marketing exposure!)
They will manage the affiliates and affiliate payouts
They will manage the billing customer service including refunds and membership cancellations

Basically, they are your merchant-in-a-box solution to selling info products online. All you really need is the product and a sales letter/web page to start. To create a product is a minimal $50 one-time fee. Yes, you do pay higher merchanting fees, but the services more than make up for it.

The only problem is that they can be inflexible with your price points , the type of product you sell and is very limiting on the ways of creating upsells and one-time offers. Still, if it fits into your price point and niche, Clickbank is a great all-inclusive selling solution.

For those of you looking for more control in managing your sales, CRM (customer relations management) systems should be considered. (Don’t try to do it yourself…I have tried and it became a management nightmare!)

1AutomationWiz is your basic and cost effective CRM. This includes the autoresponder, the merchanting options and the affiliate program, but it is kind of limiting when it comes to more advanced marketing tactics.

Infusionsoft is like 1AutomationWiz on steroids. It does everything you could want (and includes the autoresponder and affiliate system) and is flexible to perform some rather complicated marketing functions (some built-in, others through their API). This can get technical or require 3rd party programming assistance.

One other one to check out is Nanacast. This is newer and is aimed more at information products. It has some quite advanced marketing features and it is relatively easy to use (plus is is affordable). It does NOT have its own autoresponder, but it CAN communicate with some autoresponders, like Aweber.

In summary, getting the right automation tool for selling and merchanting your products can be the difference between success and failure (plus keeping your own management sanity…without spending a lot of money!)

cheers…matt

Read the entire 1AutomationWiz Review
Read the entire InfusionSoft Review

What Should You Automate? (Part 1)

Matthew Bredel — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 16:00:32 +0000

In my last post, Automate Your Business, Make More Money!, I discussed the importance of automating your website online. Today, I want to giving you more specifics (and tools!) and the things you SHOULD automate to save yourself time and money!

The first automation tool that comes to mind is an autoresponder.

This is an absolute MUST when it comes to online internet marketing. It should be the FIRST thing you invest in (even probably before you get a website!). One of the most important aspects to building a business online is developing an opt-in list (I learned this late and it cost me a fair chunk of cash!).

The tool is simple: They will give you a form (the “HTML Code”) and you will copy and paste it into you website. If you don’t have your own website, you can even integrate this into a simple Blogger.com blog or even into your social network in some cases. From here, everything is done for you!

You can create a series of pre-written emails that trigger on an interval basis, based on when you want the recipient to receive the email (immediately? 2 days from now? one week from now? on their birthday? all of these days?). The tool will manage the emails and do the email sending for you. THIS IS PERHAPS THE EASIEST, MOST COST EFFECTIVE, AND LEAST TIME CONSUMING WAY TO EARN MONEY ONLINE! Plus, you are building a relationship with your visitors.

The two companies I recommend are Aweber or GetResponse. Aweber is a little more popular, but I used GetResponse for years and never had a problem. You can usually join for free to try it out, but it is usually limiting in the number of clients and emails you can send. To join as a full member usually costs less than $20. (The best investment online!)

cheers…matt

Read the full Aweber Review
Read the full GetResponse Review