The Thirty Day Challenge 2008 is almost upon us!

Excited? I sure am!!

Well guess what? I’m gonna see this one all the way through and I’d love for you be part of it!

So, this is what we’ve got to do to get started.

Firstly lets head on over the the 30DC website,

Official Website

Ed has put together a great video that explains the challenge perfectly, there’s a registration form under that too. Once you’ve signed up you’ll get an activation email and you’ll be good to go!

On the other side, there are various areas of interest

For one, Intro vid! sign up here to see it

Sign Up!

Inspiring stuff, we’ll be looking at what these new technologies are and all the new gadgets once the pre season kicks off.

Stay Tuned

Alex

Niche Marketing Basics

Hey all, Happy new year and hope everyone is well!

This is a quick post regarding niche marketing, which is in the eyes of most is an art form these days and can be very prosperous..

The word ‘niche’ is defined as: “A special area of demand for a product or service”. ‘Marketing’ is defined as: “The opportunity to buy or sell”. If you put the two works together, niche marketing means buying or selling a product or service in a special area of demand. All that really means is that a product or service is being sold to the people who are most interested in that particular product or service and not to the world in general.

Oftentimes big businesses use niche marketing. For example, a company that makes computers and computer accessories might advertise all-in-one copy/printer/scanners to the home computer user while at the same time advertising single function machines to large businesses.

One of the things that make niche marketing so attractive to sellers is that their advertising budgets go further. It costs less to advertise to a specialized market than it does to advertise to a broader market.

Niche marketing must be designed to meet the unique needs of the targeted audience. Niche marketers must tailor their product to meet those unique needs. If, for example, you have designed a product to make poodle grooming easy enough for the untrained professional to do it, those who own poodles will be most interested in your product. Those who own Blood Hounds or cats couldn’t care less. If you have written an e-book that will explain how to start and succeed at an online business, those who are looking for that information are your niche market. Those who are happy doing what they are doing are not interested at all.

Niche marketing is a very effective and cost efficient way to advertise and sell specific products or services to a specific audience or, hopefully, buyers of that product or service.

Alex

Internet Marketing Basic Summary

Ok so what is internet marketing?

Most of you who are reading this are more than likely in this area of marketing, but do you understand exactly what you’re part of?

Internet marketing is, in very basic terms the act of selling online, both to individuals (B2C) and to other businesses (B2B). Exploring the idea thoroughly and seeing how it takes place however is something we’ll cover in posts to come. The main reason for this is that the internet is still young and is constantly growing. Internet expert Vinton Cerf once said that “a year in the Internet business is like a dog year… Equivalent to seven years in a regular person’s life. In other words, it’s evolving faster and faster.”

Internet technology is always giving new chances for businesses to add to their sales strategy and content. Also, more and more people are buying computers off the high street due to the drop in recent prices; resulting in usage of the internet rising dramatically. As more people go online, the demographic is changing, and focusing sales efforts on the rich (who have disposable income at their finger tips) isn’t the only goal of internet marketing. Today internet businesses must plan to sell to all economic levels.

The Use of the big search engines such as Google and Yahoo can provide sellers with an idea of what products people look for. This offers a big chance to know what is needed on the market. To emulate the advertisements shown on television or radio, markets use pop-up windows and advertising placed directly on a website. E-mail has proven to be a wonderful means of selling, but this usually only proves successful after a business has established a good relationship with the customer.

People are spending more time on the internet daily, and their numbers are growing. This is easy to figure out why: the easy access to the internet, added to the increasing ability of the internet to aid completion of tasks, has allowed for all manner of business to be completed with the click of a mouse. Many chores no longer need to be done by hopping in a vehicle and taking a drive. This means relationships are increasing through the internet, and as they grow, the internet sales have risen into the billions of pounds. Better technologies, and more traffic, are pointing to a future for internet marketing that is out of this world.

Thanks for reading
Alex

My Motivation

Hey all, well I just thought I’d post the following by Rudyard Kipling. It’s called “IF” and is a poem most of you will already know but just thought I’d share it with those who don’t..

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream–and not make dreams your master,
If you can think–and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings–nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And–which is more–you’ll be a Man, my son!

Something I wouldn’t usually do but believe it deserves a post of its own

All the best

Alex

bit cheesy but hey

Welcome!

Hey there, thanks for visiting my Blog. Well I guess I should begin with a little about myself.

If you hadn’t guessed it already my name is Alex, 17 year old guy from the UK… Well Norfolk to be precise which is a bit rubbish but its home ey? I’ve been online for roughly two and a bit years now and for at least 2 of those years I’ve attempted to set up some form of business in one way or another. My first experience with making money online was, if I remember correctly Affiliate Marketing, where I made one whole sale! great huh? not really… but it was enough for me. Knowing that it was possible really fueled the fire and I’ve been hooked on Internet Marketing ever since. I don’t know what it is, the internet is such a great source of information and I feel it gives truly everyone an opportunity to set up a successful business regardless of age or background…and thats the beauty of it, the truth of it is everyone has something to offer.

My first business selling a digital product was a bit of a shambles sadly, I purchased the website at £70 or around that price and the usual domain etc. The website was called the health kit, the plan was to sell an ebook on natural diets. I had the guy from the Kodak adverts put together a voice over for me which cost around £30 (bargain! honestly it sounded great) and uploaded the website. Within the first week traffic was poor, I’d only just turned 16 at the time and really didn’t know how to market effectively… popular free methods of today such as article marketing and viral were unknown to me. Google Adwords were my main source of bringing in customers, but with a tiny budget going up against the big dogs just wasn’t worth thinking about. So, my beloved website even though full of my blood, sweat and tears took a trip to eBay. The 7 day listing had ended and I was shocked! It actually made a profit…selling for £210!! I couldn’t stop smiling for the rest of that day, at last I’d actually made a bit of money worth talking about…!

What would I do with this new capital? much needed at that, I took a gamble and decided to reinvest in some much needed knowledge….The first ebook I ever purchased was the Rich Jerk and I grew to find out what a Jerk he was! however a great read from a marketing point of view. It pretty much covered all I needed to know at the time, mainly Google Adwords for me.

After waking up one morning in the summer of ‘06 I received an email from the customer who had purchased the website from me, being my first big’ish sale online I was a little hesitant to open the email. I was thinking the worst (like usual), is something up? I REALLY hope she doesn’t want a refund? but I decided just to open it up and find out… It was completely the opposite in fact! she was very happy with the website, thank God! but needed help. Help which I was more than happy to give, I worked with her for about half a month, trying to share as much knowledge I had picked up from eBooks and online so that she could attempt to run the business successfully but it turned out she just didn’t have a clue. At the time I took on my first summer job, a Hog Roasting Caterer, to get ready for my annual trip to Spain. Time was of short supply and I really couldn’t dedicate any more time to helping, so she offered to pay me… It was great! my main job was to take care of all the advertising, from Adwords to Email copy and I was getting paid to do it!! I would do Keyword research each day and report back to her once the Ad’s were in place and that was the way things were for some time.

All in all it lasted around 2 and a half months , I’d returned from my holiday at this point and had just received my results from school (we’ll talk about them another time). She felt it just wasn’t making her enough money, and she also ran another business on the side that couldn’t be put in jeopardy. For some time due to my income being slashed I was a bit short on cash, until I went for the Interview…

I decided for now school just wasn’t for me, I don’t know why, I had great friends and the option of going on to A Levels was open but the life just wasn’t what was wanted at the time. So.. the dreaded Interview and how it came about, as luck would have it after going to meet with one of my careers advisor’s in my local town, ITV in Norwich needed a position filled. So I got on my suit after organizing the meeting and hopped on the train to possibly the best city in the UK (my sad opinion), Norwich. I was well and truly overwhelmed, but the guys were great and very welcoming! and I walked out an employee…

I’d never in a million years pictured myself working for Anglia News, I grew up watching it on TV with Kevin Piper and Clare Weller being my local hero’s (if you’re not from East Anglia you probably won’t know what the hell I’m on about) but didn’t think I’d be working in News… especially not at 16. Well as you can Imagine the Job involved doing things that weren’t the most glamorous BUT who cares? My official title was Broadcast Assistant, I had my own desk, computer and get this about 4 TV’s within watching distance (not a good idea especially if its got sky sports one, Oz Aerobics ;D the guys reading this will know what I’m on about). Life was great, traveling to work everyday and commuting, one of my early childhood dreams which I grew to despise. I still work there to this day in fact on and off but Its taught me a lot about myself, others and the working environment which I thank the guys there for giving me the opportunity.

So, I had my Job. This was bringing in more than enough money (especially when my great mum didn’t charge too much for rent) to start investing in my next venture. I took my time searching different websites and forums for opportunities to go into a business 50/50, my thoughts were that it might be worth my while buying into something already making money and the expertise of an individual a bit more experienced than myself. I think it was around Christmas time when I found that individual. It was going to cost me £500 to buy a 50% stake in a successful dating website with over 800 members. I mean this was a lot of money to me but after looking over the sales sheets of the past 2 years of it being established it seemed like a worthwhile investment. I went ahead, I wouldn’t say I’m rubbish with money but this was quite a calculated risk. The website proved to be successful, everyday it would be a case of advertising, checking members profiles and customer support. I made my money back eventually but it really wasn’t that worth while in the end, I’m not afraid of hard work but it was very time consuming and pretty boring in fact. January 07′ I decided to get rid, again making a bit of profit but I really just wanted to refocus my attention on my Job.

For about 2 months I just had a rest from Internet Marketing and joined possibly one of the best groups on the planet… the Warrior Forum

        <<<<<<<<<<<

I’ve been a member for around a year now, if you’re serious about Internet Marketing I suggest you join. I mean only recently have I begun posting but theres seriously a lot of information to learn.

I found myself so engrossed In what was going on here that I chose to just focus on learning the ins and outs of IM and the art of making money online. I had also stopped working at ITV full time in August and after arriving back of my 4 week surfing holiday such an amazing sport, started a new Marketing course.

Me attempting to surf>>>

As far as my story goes I want to stop there, one reason being I actually believe it or not don’t enjoy talking about myself non stop and the other I’d like to share what I’ve learned in posts to come. The reason I set up this blog is really to help anyone, literally anyone who’s starting up online or in business in general through articles and what little advice I can give! The other reason was to help me, Its time I reminded myself of all the key things I’ve been learning and structuring that process through articles I’m guessing is the best way. I hope to provide some Interesting pieces over the coming months, varying from SEO and Video Marketing to articles on motivation. With the new world online that is Web 2.0 things are changing rapidly, my other aim is to keep you guys in the know about the latest trends and news on the Internet. These changes are huge, I mean if I knew what I do now back when I had a business such as the Health kit, I would be driving traffic to it left, right and centre. So… please any of you with questions please ask! I love speaking with like minded people and helping in any way I can.

All the best and thanks again for reading this incredibly long post

Cheers

Alex