One of my favourite bloggers at the moment is James Chartrand. Here is one of his wonderful tips for when we’re suffering from blogger’s block.
“Great quotations are the richest goldmine of blog post ideas you’ll ever have.”

So I popped over to Wikiquote and found this great quotation by Sarah Bernhardt -  “Life engenders life. Energy creates energy. It is by spending oneself that one becomes rich.”

This is what I have been prattling on about for months. Give, give, give and eventually you will receive. Take a look at my blog, “Selling to the taxi driver” and you’ll see what I mean.

Here’s another:

“Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.” Helen Keller

I love this one, how many of you have the courage to really take a chance – to give up that job you hate or walk away from an employer who infuriates you? How may of you would love to be your own boss but have no idea how to do it?

I did it, I gave up a full time job to become an internet entrepreneur and I have never looked back. My choice of businesses fitted my values and beliefs, I chose to build a Blog site, this one, and to join a company called LifePathUnlimited.
It is important that you choose the right one for you and also the right mentor to help you on your way. If you want help with your life decisions please do contact me.

If you see yourself as an author and are interested in a monetised blog site then don’t forget to check out the fabulous Darren Rowse’s Blogger’s Workbook, it is what set me off on the right track.

“Just remember that even a long life is not long enough and an opportunity missed is not something lost but something never achieved.”
And that’s one of mine!

Pat Sutton – Blog Author at http://www.patsutton.com

A good way to beat writer’s block!

It doesn’t matter what kind of business you have and how benevolent you are, you can give things away for free, you can raise money for great causes, you can hold people’s hands but everyone at sometime needs to make a living.
The baker puts bread on your table, not to feed your family but to feed his own!

I am sure, if you own a bakery or a grocers then online marketing is not so important but if you have a product or service that has a website at it’s heart then you need to know how to drive traffic, create a contact list and to make sales.

Ok, so you have a great website that showcases your products or services or you have signed up for an online, work at home business that has provided you with their propriatory website to promote – what next?

It doesn’t matter what kind of online or offline business you have, if you sell from a website then you need to get it out there to the right target audience.

Not many of us are really clever enough to know, for sure, who will buy from us, I promise you, I have had many surprises! But somehow we need to work out how to get our business in front of buying customers. So a scatter gun approach is not really the way to do it, you need to target the right people.

So how do you recruit people to an online business. How do you get people to come to your website?
Online? Offline? Cold calling? Friends and family?

Let’s look at Friends and Family first.
If you want to lose friends then pitch to them, the same with family members. I don’t know about you but I would hate it if my loved ones avoided me because they felt guilty for not buying into my business! So that is a definite “no no”.

Cold calling? Hey! I’m into this online gig because I want to enjoy it, I want a better quality of life and cold calling just does not do it for me! So, for me, that’s out too.

Offline – now here’s a thing – yes it can work, even for an online business. You could:

1. Get out there to your local business networking events.

2. Build relationships with local business owners to encourage referrals.

3. Take stands at exhibitions.

4. Advertise in the newspapers.

5. Give out flyer’s in shopping malls and markets.

6. Carry business cards for those chance encounters!

Then there’s ONLINE.
Now this is where your marketing can really rock!

Here are my 5 very best online marketing tips.

1. Any good at writing?
You don’t have to be Jeffrey Archer but a good clear blog with all the right keywords can be a fantastic marketing tool.
The article should not be about your business but about something helpful for the reader. Of-course it should be linked to your business, for instance if you are a garden landscaper then an article or blog about growing roses would be good but a blog about baking a chocolate cake may not be.
You need to engage with the reader, they need to see you as a leader and expert.
Once you have constructed your blog or article you then need to add a clear succinct signature at the bottom, this is very important for obvious reasons.

I know what you’re asking….what do I do with my blog once it is finished?

Well if you have a blog section on your website then that is ideal as readers can click to your website to read the blog.

You would open your blog on your website, copy the URL or address and add that link along with a catchy intro like:
An easy way to bake a chocolate cake – if you love chocolate you’ll love this – http://www……
You would add it to places like Facebook, Twitter, Ecademy, LinkedIn etc that’s assuming that you are a member of all these social sites, if not why not???

If you have written your blog on someone else’s website, like Blogger, Ezines or another blogging platform like my site for business women, TheBusinessWoman then you need to make sure that all your website details are in your signature.

2. Twitter!
I know a lot of people think that Twitter is a waste of time well, I promise you that it is not, if you do it right.
A daily tweet containing great advice to followers who are your target audience can really boost your profile. If you have a good profile then people will see you in a good light and are more likely to buy from you. If you read my blog, How to market on Twitter, you will see how you can make Twitter really work for your business.

3. Facebook Fan Pages.
Create a fan page with the same name as your business then set to work making friends and then inviting them to become fans of your page. Once you have a reasonable amount of members you can create a badge to upload onto your website. This creates a sense of community and will give confidence to your website visitors. Of-course you also have your fans to market to as well.

4. Relationships.
Join groups and forums to get to know people, (not to pitch to them), once they get to know you they will eventually ask you what you do and then you can get away with a subtle pitch.

5. LinkedIn groups.
Join the groups on LinkedIn, you are allowed upto 50 group memberships. Of-course you need to find groups of people who would be interested in your sector and will be beneficial to you as well. Then once in a group you can upload your articles or blogs to their discussion pages. These are then sent out by the system to the group members in update e-mails. Some of the groups have memberships of thousands of people each so your one article alone can get you enormous exposure.

Pat Sutton – Internet Marketing Specialist – Official Blog Site http://www.PatSutton.com
Business Mentor with LifePath Unlimited – http://www.ThisBusinessRocks.com

How to market your website so that people buy from you!

I am so excited to be on the Forbes List as Thirty Women Entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter.
I am honoured to be in the company all those inspirational women.

Forbes’ Natalie MacNeil said:

“These business-savvy tweeters are all excited about helping you grow your company, create buzz for your brand and stay inspired.

Twitter has been an incredible tool for connecting with like-minded people from around the world. I am always on the lookout for women entrepreneurs and women in business to follow, connect with and learn from. The following 30 women entrepreneurs have excellent Twitter feeds to follow….. ”

So what does this mean to me and how can I, as a marketer, profit from this?

We women are not very good at blowing our own trumpet but we have to learn, not only to get a sound out but to play a good tune!

Here are my 10 tips on what to do when you have public recognition to shout about.

1. Turn your good news into a helpful article or blog, as I have done here.
2. Once you have created your blog, grab the URL and get it out across the web to social networks like Twitter, Facebook, MySpace etc.
3. Post your blog on all your group’s news pages on LinkedIn. If you are not a member and have not joined any groups then why not? (My blog about marketing on LinkedIn coming soon).
4. Add your news to your e-mail signature.
5. Use your news to prove your credibility, for instance when trying to get articles or books published.
6. Add to all your marketing brochures and publications.
7. Include the news in any advertising campaigns.
8. Create a banner that you can pop onto your website.
9. Send your news, together with a story about how you gained recognition, to your local or national newspaper editors.
10. And probably the most important thing to do is to say thank you to the journalist…if you can’t get to her or he directly, write to the editor or better still both!

Think on this…it’s great to feel you are important. The feeling is infectious and once you get the bug it will drive you to strive for even more success. But my tip here is, “What goes around, comes around”.
I believe that if you help others as much as you can then good things will happen to you!
Thank you so much Natalie, I’m truly honoured!

If anyone has any other ideas – love to hear them!

Pat Sutton – Official Blog http://www.patsutton.com

Wow! I’ve been listed!

A Retweet allows Twitter users to share their favourite tweets with their own followers.
So if someone has 10,000 followers and they like one of your tweets and they retweet it, then it will go out to all of their followers, good eh!

It is done by copying and pasting the original tweet and sending it out. It’s usual to put “RT” plus the originator’s username at the beginning of the tweet. Here’s an example:

RT@thebizwoman: How to monetize your blog!

Obviously, if you regularly tweet great content then people will pick up on it and retweet you. They will also retweet you if your tweets are relevant to them or even, dare I say it, complementary.

A good way to get people to retweet you is to ask to be retweeted.
This works really well if your tweets are for a good cause or are likely to be helpful to your follower’s audience.

Here’s an example:

Entrepreneurs – learn how to monetize your blog PLEASE RETWEET ME!

This is only about 66 character; very important if you don’t want retweets with clipped off ends as you are only allowed a total of 140 characters in your tweets.

It is always better to simplify the procedure for your retweeter.
There is a great little application called PleaseRT.me – http://pleasert.me/
You add your tweet and it makes you keep it short then it adds a plea for a retweet at the end of your message, (I’m saying “message” because I’m fed up of saying “tweet”), which your follower can then click on to easily retweet without all the copy and pasting.
You can try it out now by retweeting this post.

Let’s face it if you don’t ask you don’t get!

Pat Sutton – Official Blog, http://www.patsutton.com

Retweet – What does it mean and how important is it!

In my previous blog “6 steps closer to monetising your blog” I said that you need:
1. Patience
2. Resilience.
3. A great imagination.
4. Knowledge.
5. The discipline to learn.
6. Multiple Income streams?

Today I am going to tell you about the next 6 items you need:

1. Products that sell well.
2. A great mailing list.
3. An easy to use e-mail marketing system.
4. To be seen on the first page of Google.
5. A membership site with real value.
6. Private advertisers.

It is very difficult to find a product that sells - the Internet has spawned an enormous amount of “get rich quick” schemes. Some are great but some are…quite honestly, a mis-representation.
My rule of thumb is…if it sounds too good to be true then it is too good to be true!

I am sure that some people actually do make a lot of money from these businesses but they usually have a large infrastructure behind them.

When they say stuff like, “make money while you sleep” it does ring alarm bells for me!
In saying that, a busy blog site with the right money making products can actually make money for you while you sleep but you need to work very hard when you’re awake to get it!

I have made a pact with myself, I will only sell products that I firmly believe in, like my Bloggers Workbook. This course actually helped me to change my hobby blog into a great
business.
So my advice to you is to only sell the stuff that you would use yourself, that way you have more conviction in your sales pitch.

The mailing list is your life’s blood. Always have a sign up box on your website. If you can give something away as a sweetener then that is even better. Make sure that it is something worth having.
I would like to E-SHOUT an important point at you….do not abuse your mailing list. If they have signed up to receive a newsletter then that is what you should send them. Your marketing can be inside your newsletter.
If thay have signed up to a general mailing list then you have a little more freedom but the content of anything you send to them should be, value, value, value, a subtle sales pitch, then more value.

There are many marketing systems out there, the one I use is Aweber, I find them the easiest to use and one of the cheapest. There are many more like IContact, Constant Contact, Getresponse.
The marketing sytem works by allowing you to set up e-mail campaigns. So when your visitor registers to be added to your mailing list it automatically generates an e-mail from your
marketing system to ask them to confirm their subscription, (they call, this opting in). Once they have confirmed then the massages that you will have previously set up will arrive into
their inbox either daily, weekly monthly or what ever days you have chosen.
It’s as simple as that!
The beauty of this system is that any new subscriber, no matter when they join, will receive the first message and then the second and so on.
You can actually configure your sign up box within the system too!

We would all love to be seen on the first pages of the search engines and if you are selling something unique then you will probably be there after a couple of days. But there are many
thousands of blogging sites out there, all trying to get to the top spots so the competition is fearce for us.
My answer for you is to do what you do best…blogs, blogs, blogs and more blogs.
When you write your blog on your website you need to also upload it to the best networking sites as well, sites like EZines, Ecademy, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.
There is an easy way to do this. Make sure that you have social bookmarking share buttons at the bottom of your blog. Once in situe on your website it can be sent out across the web in no time at all.
Here is a screanshot of Google today, notice how my last blog, “6 steps closer to monetising your blog”, has actually got three….not just one spot, on the front page of Google and that’s not paying a penny in advertising. If you’re having trouble seeing this then try searching, “How to monetise your blog”.
Clever eh!

A membership site
You can provide products, a course or service…these are good if you want members to pay on a monthly basis thus generating a residual income for you. See ours here!
You have a choice how you sell it.
You can have a free membership that will help you to generate a mailing list of a captive audience.
Or you can have a “Join now for $1 or first month FREE offer”.

What ever the offering there is one thing that is paramount….give them a risk free call to action!

Think of all the things that would be going through your head at that moment before you joined.

Will this instigate spam?
Is there a catch?
If I don’t like it, can I have my money back?
Can I hear from someone who has used this?
Do I trust this person?
Will my hair fall out?
Will my………

At this point you need to think of everything they are likely to say to themselves and address that problem…such as money back guarantees, full contact details of the vendor, testimonials
of satisfied customers, no spam etc.etc.
If you get it right, a membership can build and build to make you some serious money that you can actually earn while you sleep.

Private Advertisers are those elusive companies who may be prepared to pay you a nice tidy sum to have their banners all over your blog.
Be-careful, what you gain in money you could lose in loyal readers.
Although it always amazes me how people think that us bloggers are doing this out of the goodness of our hearts, we stay up all hours researching and writing all for no financial remuneration…get real guys… as they say, “The baker puts bread on your table, not to feed your family but to feed his own“.

Pat Sutton – Official Blog http://www.PatSutton.com

How to really monetise your blog

At last my official blog website is actually finished. My intention of blogging for a living has become a reality.
Ok, what next?

The first thing I need to do is to go back over the archives and delete all my earlier muses.
In the early days, as is usual for blog virgins, my impression of a blog was something that no sane person would ever read or be interested in. So my first blogs were indulgent, grammatically terrible and some were even downright silly.
But as my hand hovers over the delete button I hesitate….wait a minute…this is like throwing out an old photograph album.
There’s the one about my dog Sadie, now gone, who was miraculously cured of cancer by a Spirit healer. And the time a had my cat trimmed and she looked like one of those nodding animals you put in the back window of your car.
Then there are the feelings I had when starting a new job or moving house.
I recorded my first days on Facebook and how cheeky people were, asking to be “my friend” when they didn’t even know me!
Of-course, I would hate for all you guys with discerning tastes to read these old blogs but I am definately not going to dispose of them. I’m going to print them up and stick them into a scrap book for posterity.
Maybe one day one of my grand daughters will find them and will read them to their children…how strange it will be to them…how old fashioned it will seem!
This time of Ipods, webcams and Twitter will be an archaic, bygone age to them!

I wish I had written more!

Read Pat’s Official Blog at http://www.patsutton.com

Confessions of a Blogger.