Copyblogger Weekly Wrap

Sales and marketing is all about reframing, so after getting nailed with snow last week, I decided to make the most of the next round: the huge “snowpocalypse” due to arrive early this week. I would bend it to my will. I would use it for nefarious business purposes.

So I thought: What if I did one of my promotions where I set up WordPress blogs for free while buried in my living snow tomb? That sounded compelling. I talk a lot about story, and this was a fun one: “Man trapped under seven feet of snow keeps warm by doing marketing stunt, eats own foot to survive.” Man, it sold itself.

So I filled the wood bins to overflowing. Made sure both the tractor and generator worked, and filled both with gas. Bought extra gas. Bought supplies. Rented Jingle All the Way.

We got like 2 inches of snow. Next up: my “Overreaction is Underrated” sale.

Here’s what happened this week on Copyblogger:

Monday:

How to Find the Gold in Your Business

If you’re myopically focused on how much traffic, tweets, or comments you get, I’d argue you’re looking in the wrong place if sales aren’t going up accordingly. This post is all about how to take the large amount of “raw material” that passes your online home every day and sift through it to find your “pure gold” customers. (NOTE: “pure gold customers” are not the same as “Solid Gold dancers” in at least 9 out of 10 cases.)

Read the full post here.

Tuesday:

How to Make People Give a Damn About Your Business

So you’ve accepted that you’re telling a story with your marketing, but still your readers are saying, “Frankly Scarlett, I don’t give a damn about your business,” and then you realize the war is over and you still have your beloved plantation and tomorrow is another day, right? Well, cool, but you still want people to give a damn because we don’t all live in the old South. So, you should really read this post to learn how “putting something at stake” can keep people riveted to that story of yours.

Read the full post here.

Wednesday:

Tim Ferriss on How to Reinvent Yourself with Blog Marketing: IMfSP Radio # 6

Man, I’m jealous as hell of Brian for getting this chance to talk to Tim Ferriss, who is one of my personal heroes. But you can be there vicariously by listening to this episode of IMfSP Radio, where these two dudes talk about how Tim used blogging and “blogger outreach” to propel himself to bestsellerdom and interwebs phenomenon.

Read the full post here.

Wednesday, part 2:

Get a Copyblogger T-Shirt, Help a Child Learn to Read

If you get a Copyblogger T-shirt, the fine and goodhearted folks at Copyblogger will donate 100% of the profits to the childhood literacy program Reading is Fundamental, also known as RIF. I recommend doing this because not only are the shirts spiffy, but you’ll also be supporting an organization with a good acronym. (For contrast, here are some real-life examples of bad acronyms I have seen: WTF, LOL, and FUD.)

Read the full post here.

Thursday:

Donald Trump’s Top Three Tips for Dominating Your Niche

There’s a lot we can learn from Donald Trump, be it his business acumen, his hair styling regimen, or his ability to consistently hook up with hot Eastern European women. This post has three hot tips for the first item on that list, which will naturally augment the last item on the list. (Side note: I once saw Donald Trump speak. He was barely coherent in his message. It’s like he said, “Screw you, I’m Donald Trump! I’m not going to prepare or have a point.” And I had to respect that.)

Read the full post here.

Friday:

Three Keys to Creating an Online Experience Worth Paying For

How to you create an irresistible reason for people to join you in a membership program? Why, you create an awesome experience for them. It’s not about the stuff… it’s about the experience of getting the stuff. Although I have to admit that I still don’t understand why anyone would pay for an American Express card. Is it the cool look? Because you know, I’ve seen cooler, like ones with monkeys on them and stuff.

Read the full post here.

This week’s cool links:

• Why Investing in Your Customer is the Best Bet You Can Make: We’re all in this big social media thing (and the business that comes with it) together. It’s time to lean into it, to go all the way, and to reinvest in the people around you.
• Lady Gaga and me: I was tempted to use this one solely because of the awesome title (which could only have been better if “and” were changed to “is”), but there’s a really important point here. Are you focused on the one person who doesn’t like you or isn’t paying attention? If so, knock it off.
• The 5 Critical Errors Most People Make When they Start Using Social Media for Business: This one is really good, and the title says it all. Want to alienate and annoy people while getting nothing out of social media? Then do these things.
• Do Your Readers Have Fan Stories?: Well? Do they? Because they should. Give this post a read, because if you aren’t generating retell-worthy fan stories, you’re leaving a lot on the table.

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Facebook Traffic Buying Tips

I've been advertising affiliate offers, and now some of my own, on Facebook for over 3 years. People know this, and new affiliates love to come to me for tips. Rather than answer the same questions I get 50 times a day, I thought I'd write up a guest post for Jonathan's blog so you could all gain a little insight into affiliate marketing on Facebook Ads.

Justin! What niche or affiliate offers should I run?

Here's a question I get a bit more than I want. There are a few ways for affiliates to figure this out on their own. One of the most simple ways to go about this yourself is by checking out ads on your own profiles. You can create multiple profile accounts with different likes, interests, ages and sex to view different ads. When you see the same ad multiple times over the course of a week or so, you should be able to come to the conclusion that this ad is doing pretty well.

Lots of advanced advertisers use this technique coupled with spy scripts that will gather thousands of ads from tens to hundreds of profiles at a time. If you've got the programming know how, this can be an amazing tool to have.

If you want to know directly, what kind of niches have worked well for me lately, gaming, dating, and education have been extremely hot.

How much money should I have to start putting ads on Facebook?

When I started advertising, I had $50 saved up from freelance writing. I also had a student loan that I was dipping in to, but wanted to avoid. Things went really well for me, and I was profiting from Day 2. I can't say everyone will be this lucky. These days, it costs me much more to test offers than it did 3 years ago.

So what would I say the bare minimum is you should have? I'd say around $1,000 saved up, all that you are ready to lose, and plenty of research time put in before you go head long into dropping ads.

The suggested bid costs are way too high! How can I lower them?

With the influx of new marketers noticing the power of Facebook ads, the costs included have been raised considerably the last year. If you need to know anything about Facebook ads, it is that Facebook bid prices have a direct relationship with ad click-through rate (CTR). That being said, the most effective way to decrease click costs is to increase ad CTR. The best way to do this is go back and think about your targeting and how you can better relate your ad's image, headline, and ad body copy to your targeting.

Another way to lower bids? Sure! Try going international. There are tons of offers for just about any niche that can be run in other countries other than the main English speaking ones. Bid costs here are considerably lower, but you'll have to be careful about translating your ads. Use a prefessional translation service like OneHourTranslation.co

Justin Dupre is an affiliate marketer and blogger at JustinDupre.com. He also helps other affiliate marketers make more money through his 1-on-1 consulting services and his private affiliate marketing forums.

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The Top 6 Pitfalls of Affiliate Marketing for Advertisers

Affiliate marketing can be a very rewarding endeavor for the ambitious online marketer; however, there are several things you should be aware of before you take the plunge. To help you on your journey, I’ve compiled a list of some of the top 6 pitfalls you may face as you deploy your own affiliate marketing advertising campaigns.

While this list is by no means comprehensive of all the challenges you’ll face in your campaigns, it’s a good place to start and might help you avoid some headaches along the way.

1. Double Commissions

When you run your campaign you might decide to promote your offer on multiple affiliate platforms (networks, home grown, etc.), but be warned! Affiliates can register for your offer on multiple platforms and with a little cookie stuffing, earn commissions from both platforms for the same order. Yikes!

Use order number tracking in your conversion code so you can cross reference each of your platforms for duplicate orders.

Check with your platform’s support group for their policy on cancelling double commission orders, but keep in mind you can always kick the offending affiliate off one of your platforms for a temporary fix. There are more complex methods for tracking and cancelling double commissions that are a bit too involved for this post, but just check with your platform’s support for guidance.

2. Cookie Stuffing

Cookie Stuffing refers to the practice of forcing an affiliate cookie into a visitor’s browser even if they have not clicked on an affiliate link. Imagine you have a site with a ton of traffic and you force your Amazon affiliate cookie on every visitor to your site. Now, any time your visitors buy something from Amazon you’ll get a commission. Pretty nifty huh?

Well, as an advertiser this can be a total nightmare. You’re not paying affiliates commissions for sales from people who happened to have visited the affiliate’s website. You’re paying affiliates to promote your website and refer customers.

Keep an eye out for higher than usual conversion rates and visit your affiliate’s website to check to see what cookies are set when you visit. If you see your affiliate cookie and you haven’t clicked on the website’s affiliate link, it’s time to kick this guy out.

3. Branded Search Campaigns

You spent a lot of money on that Super Bowl ad where no one could tell what you do and now tons of people are flocking to Google and searching for your company name. Low and behold there’s a paid ad that says “Your Company Name” linking to your website through an affiliate link. Uh….. what?

That’s right, if you don’t restrict branded terms from your affiliates’ search campaigns, you can end up paying someone a commission for traffic generated for your brand via another advertising medium. Make sure to consider restricting branded search terms in your Affiliate Terms and Conditions. Check periodically for violators and make sure to enforce your policy.

Also, you may consider restricting specific keywords if you’re worried about your affiliates driving up your own PPC costs.

4. Pay Per Lead (PPL)

From time to time, you may want to pay commissions on leads (insurance quotes, free trials, etc.); however, if you don’t monetize those leads until another event happens (purchase) then you need to be extra diligent.

First, make sure you have an excellent handle on your lead to purchase conversion rate for every affiliate. Certain affiliates may fake leads or just naturally have a lower than normal lead to purchase conversion rate. If so, this affiliate is less profitable and may need to have their commissions adjusted. Additionally, if the affiliate offers an incentive to visitors for generating a lead (virtual currency, real currency, etc.) you could have even bigger problems on your hands. Keep an eye on your profitability per affiliate and adjust your PPL rates accordingly.

5. Lazy Affiliate Managers

The key to any good affiliate campaign is relationships, relationships, relationships. Your affiliate managers should be a friend and a resource to your top affiliates. Affiliate managers should frequently visit your affiliates’ websites and make sure they’re running the right banners in the right location with the most visibility.

Use Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software to keep track of your affiliates. Set reminders to check in on performance and to review the affiliate’s website for out of date banners, old pricing and opportunities for improvements. Run activity reports through your CRM to make sure your affiliate managers are staying on top of things.

If an affiliate has to choose between offers, he might just choose the offer from the guy who helps him with his campaign and is a resource he can rely on.

6. Focusing too much on graphic banners

Did you know that many advertisers derive a significant portion of their conversions through text ads, product feeds and coupons? That’s right, there’s more to affiliate marketing than graphic banners. As you design your ad inventory, make sure to include a wide variety of graphic ads, text ads, product feeds and coupons. A little spaghetti marketing (throw it up and see what sticks) might surprise you.

Also, don’t forget to update your ads as your product changes or seasonally if appropriate. There’s nothing like a well timed ad to help drive sales.

****************

So what about you? What pitfalls have you encountered with your affiliate marketing campaigns?

Be sure to check back on Monday for my follow-up post: The Top 7 Pitfalls of Affiliate Marketing for Publishers.

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Interview: Eric Itzkowitz

Eric Itzkowitz is a successful, well-rounded Internet Marketer with over 10 years of hands-on experience. Although his dominant skill is SEO and SEO strategy, he has also managed (as an in-house guy) retail affiliate programs, PPC campaigns, email programs and all other aspects of Internet Marketing.

Eric was introduced to affiliate marketing when he created and managed an affiliate program on bCentral in 1999. Sadly, however, he did not pick up on the true potential of affiliate marketing--from the affiliate side—until several years later.

Eric works several hours a week, still holding a fantastic “day-job” and doing his best to push forward on a few personal projects. One worth noting is a WordPress plug-in for affiliate marketers named the PPC Keyword Tracker.

Tell us a little background info about yourself. Where are you from? How old are you? How long have you been making money online?
My name is Eric Itzkowitz. Yes, I caught a whole lot of crap as a child for having such a complex last name.

I am from San Diego having lived here for well over 99% of my life. I was born in Riverside, CA which means I’ll be turning 38 this year. Whatever, I still feel like I’m 24.

I have been making money from various online-related positions and projects since 1999 when I became an intern for a San Diego company who sold corporate due diligence website packages.

Do you have any experience with affiliate marketing? If so, to what extent?
The vast majority of my experience in the affiliate marketing world is from the advertiser side of things. I’ve been managing affiliate programs for mostly small companies since 1999, which was running on what was then named Microsoft’s bCentral.

What accomplishments so far are you the most proud of?
The accomplishment I am most proud of, to date, was coming back from a nearly 2-year bout of unemployment after having been laid-off during the Internet Bubble burst in 2000 and re-finding success online. This experience has definitely made me a much stronger Internet Marketer and teacher, as well.

Next in line would have to be having helped a $300k/mo e-commerce company double their revenue to $600k in less than 6 months then jump to $1MM/mo in less than 2.5 years. Most of the growth was due to a greater presence on the search engines--SEO.

How did you become successful? Why did you choose this career? When did you first realize the full potential in the Internet? When did you first “hit the big time?”
I was able to become successful by not being lazy and thinking outside of the box. I was not afraid to do this thing called Internet Marketing while many close to me thought I was crazy for not securing a “real job.” It’s pretty clear, in my case, choosing the path less traveled was a wise decision.

I actually chose Business/Marketing for a career in the 7th grade. A few years ago my mom showed to me some of my school work and projects from elementary school through middle school. One project, in particular, I had to write about what I wanted to do when I grew up. It was clear I was interested in business from a very young age.

With regard to when I first realized the potential of the Internet, I am sad to say it took a few years since first “getting online” about 1995. If only I would have realized people would be able to sell and buy products…ugggh. It actually makes me a bit sick thinking about it. (:

At any rate, I would say I first realized the true potential of the Internet in 1998 when I enrolled in the first ever offered Internet Marketing class at San Diego State University. Funny enough, this realization still wasn’t enough for me to realize I should be buying domain names. Oh well!

I really don’t think I’ve hit the big time yet, but that might mean something different to each person reading this interview, right? I believe I am destined for something great within the online world, but not yet sure what this will entail. I believe my largest success to date was helping the aforementioned company grow from $300k/mo to over $1MM/mo in about 2.5 years.

What do you think it takes to be successful?
To be successful online or otherwise, takes your blood, tears, sweat equity and networking. More and more, however, I am learning that focus and passion will also give you a much better chance to succeed. Get out there and run with people who can help you succeed.

What have been your biggest failures and frustrations?
My biggest failure has been having not recognizing the value of direct type-in (exact) domain names back in 1995. I literally feel my stomach turn every time I admit to this. I have also accidentally pissed away a few thousand dollars in less than a day by forgetting to uncheck certain check boxes in a Google AdWords campaign.

Oh man… I know I am going to catch a ton of flack for this next comment. Nonetheless, my biggest frustrations almost always lie within programming resources. It is sooooooo incredibly hard to find and retain good programmers who actually write good code and within a specified time-frame.

I also have to mention my frustration with poor executive management teams. Ever worked for a company whose business model changed every day? What about a company who had a freaking killer product you watched die due to miscommunication and utter cluelessness. Yeehaw!

What is the single toughest problem you've had to face, and how did you get through it?
The single toughest problem I have had to face was being unemployed for nearly two years during and after the Internet crash. How could an Internet Marketer find a job? It was very scary times for me. Family and pure optimism got me through this shitty time. Plus, I REALLY hate to fail.

Is there anything that you don’t like to do, that you just hate working on?
I HATE link building! Yeah, I said it! I’ve become a big fan of outsourcing this aspect of SEO. I enjoy creating the strategy and measuring the success, however.

What is the future of marketing?
Mobile is the future… and basically any portable mobile/wireless device. And, with the recent announcement of Google TV, I’d have to say TV-based applications and related advertising models. Facebook and Twitter are not going away anytime soon. And, if I may throw out one for the affiliate marketing community, I’d say Information Products are going to be hot for a long time.

What have you been up to recently? What projects are you working on?
My most recent project is a WordPress plug-in named the PPC Keyword Tracker. I promote this on my personal blog and at the plug-in’s official website.

What problems have you had with those new projects?
Finding time to create and market personal projects is always an issue. I always seem to have a lack of time. I bet that is what most people say. LOL!

Do you think anything particular in your past prepared you for this industry? Your education? Jobs you’ve held before?
Honestly, I would say getting a degree in business and marketing, taking Internet marketing classes at SDSU and getting into the industry early-on helped to prepare me for this industry. Experience plays such a huge part in wall we do.

What are your greatest strengths?
Self-motivation is probably my largest strength. Sure, I have other necessary strengths, but they are worthless if I am not able to get motivated… especially when others are not so motivated.

What are your greatest weaknesses?
For as long as I have been around computers you’d think I’d know everything there is to know about how they work. Not the case. Similarly, I know I could definitely work on my technical SEO knowledge. I know what to look for and how to resolve pretty much any SEO-related issue, but I don’t always know the very best way to handle it from a technical nature. To combat this, I align myself with programmers who do know. (:

What motivates you?
I’d be full of crap if I didn’t mention money as a motivator. It’s how I keep score. Creating jobs, however, is also incredibly motivating. I thoroughly enjoy providing those I know with jobs in and around my world.

What is the best advice you’ve been given and try to apply to your life?
Don’t wait! I used to be a very big procrastinator. I realized that the speed of the Internet is such that if you blink you’re competitors will pass right by and never look back.

Who has impacted you most in your career, and how?
Since the vast majority of my career and success has been around SEO, I would say the big dogs in my industry have helped the most. People like Eric Enge, Eric Ward, Danny Sullivan, Jill Whalen, Aaron Wall, Todd Malioat and yes…even Matt Cutts and others like them have helped; they share a lot and you can learn a lot if you pay attention. I didn’t have anybody in my circle of friends to learn SEO and Internet Marketing from, so following these people through the years has definitely helped in all aspects of what I do as an Internet Marketer.

What kinds of people do you have difficulties working with? Any good stories?
I do not enjoy being around pessimists and snobs. It’s annoying and embarrassing so just stop it! I have stories, but I can’t really discuss them at this time. (:

What are some of your long-term goals? How much is enough? If money was no object, what would you be doing?
My long-term goal is to build my own business and create an awesome work environment for awesome people who just want to kick ass and dominate whatever industry we are in.

To me enough money means being able to work when and how I want… wanting to work and not having to work, per say.

If money was no object, I would definitely do something HUGE for our oceans. I LOVE the Surfrider Foundation and would love to see what I could do to help further their cause.

Where do you want to be ten years from now?
In ten years I would like to be an even more successful Internet Marketer. I want to be married to my gorgeous wife and help my two young kids charge through high school with straight A’s. I’d really like to be living closer to the beach so I could surf every day, and perhaps spend more time practicing jiu-jitsu.

How do you like to spend your free time? What does work-life balance mean to you?
Free time? LOL! I have a three year old and a one month old. I work over 50 hours a week. Actually, I practice jiu-jitsu, go to the gym, surf and hang with family. I know it’s important to have a nice balance of both, but my goals are quite lofty at this point. I want to “dig with the biggest shovel” while I can and hopefully I will be in a place where I can really enjoy the finer things life has to offer—down the road.

If you could go back to being 18, what different career choices would you make?
Honestly, I would not make a different career choice. Once, however, I had wanted to become a Veterinarian.

What is your greatest achievement outside of work? What are some of your unfulfilled dreams?
My greatest achievement outside of work has marrying my wife and starting a family.

Mu unfulfilled dreams are pretty much covered in the “if money was no object” and “where do I want to be in ten years” questions. Aside from these, I just want to be a better person and hopefully be able to provide a better life for those closest to me.

Do you have a Twitter account or Facebook “Like” page?
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ericitzkowitz

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My Interview on ABC News

Once again, the power and exposure of having a blog pays off big time! Last week I was in New York City doing an interview with ABC Studios on how to make money blogging and how to help others get started. The interview went live on ABC NEWS Now and ABC VIDEO yesterday. You can watch the full interview below.

The main points discussed in the interview were how to start a blog, when to start monetizing and how to build an audience then start making real money with a blog. It doesn’t matter if you know anything about making money online or even how to make a web site, a blog can be thrown together within a few minutes and can easily be self taught with all of the resources available online. You wont make money right away by throwing a simple blog up on the web, but it will potentially get you started and on the path for a secondary income source. Taking your blog to the next level is where you will have to put in the major dedication and efforts.

Special thanks to Tory Johnson for the interview, everyone at ABC Studios and of course, all of my blog readers! It wouldn’t be possible without you. Thanks!

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Do the Big Brands Have an Advantage When it Comes to Social Media?

Social media is the great equalizer; Lady Gaga (VEGAS tonight, gambling and inappropriate attire to ensue ) Tweeting alongside Taylyr, the junior high school student with a band (:/ im in QUIET the awful state. im pretty sure i dont want to go to school in the morning). Facebook, where you can have updates from TV vampires right next to reminders from your mom. Age, race, socio-economic status, celeb or regular Joe — there are no barriers in social media.

So why is it that the big brands are dominating when it comes to social media marketing? That’s the question Brian Sheehan is asking over at AdAge.

“The dominance of big marketers is in many ways a straightforward matter of resources. For example, Pepsico’s Gatorade has a group of full-time staff who man their “Mission Control” room, monitoring and participating in social media 24 hours a day. Smaller brands may not be able to afford that.”

Resources are good. Money, creative teams, access to software and tools others don’t have. But how important are all of those things when it comes to writing a daily Tweet. Does Nabisco really have an advantage over the Incredibly Edible Cookie Company? I say it’s not about the resources, so much as it’s about brand recognition. If I were to ask 100 people to follow only one of these two companies, most people would pick Nabisco simply because they know the name.

How do you get around big dog? By being creative. Look at Old Spice. They made a terrific video that went viral, but there are thousands of no-cost, homemade videos on YouTube that go viral, too.

You don’t need an expensive ad agency to create a social media campaign.  Just look around. Check with your staff, your family and your friends. I’ll bet someone in that group has a good idea. That’s what social media marketing is really about, a good idea. An idea that hooks the people in and makes them want to share it with their friends.

Social media marketing is the one area where money and resources shouldn’t matter. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube are all free to use and let me tell you something, brand loyalty only goes so far. If you become known as the DVD seller who has the funniest movie reviews, consumers will be hitting your Facebook page every week before they head over to Netflix.

What do you think? Do big brands have the social media advantage or can the little guy hit it big on Facebook and Twitter?

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How to Make People Give a Damn About Your Business

There’s been a lot of talk about “story” here at Copyblogger lately. Actually, they’ve been talking about story for about four years, but you might not have realized it.

As a content marketer, or even just a blogger who’s trying to figure out the basics, you’re writing a story.

Every day. With every word you put in front of your readers.

So far, Robert Bruce has given us a lesson in dramatic tension; Sonia, protagonists; and Brian, crafting remarkable marketing stories.

But there’s something that wasn’t touched on. Something, to me, that’s the most important aspect of any marketing story.

It’s the “what at stake” — both for the character in your story and the person reading it. It’s the thing that unifies the protagonist, the tension, and the story to make it worth sticking around for.

The story of two star-crossed lovers …



In high school you read the story of Romeo and Juliet. It was the play that introduced us to two households, both alike in dignity, and the star-crossed lovers fighting for their chance to be together.

Shakespeare let us know immediately what was at stake for the characters — forever love. The drama and the swords make it sexy, but what the reader wants to know is if love can defy death. If love is as powerful as the stories have always told us.

Because if Romeo and Juliet can attain forever love, then there’s hope for the rest of us. We’re hooked because we need to know. Our own love is at stake.

Of course, not every story is about love.

With the holiday season in full swing, we’re currently bombarded with stories of all kinds. We’ll see stories about family, joy, loneliness, hope, second chances. And marketers will attempt to tie the tension to why it matters to you, the audience. If they go after the wrong message, audiences will ignore it.

And if they get it right? Audiences will cling for dear life.

An organization that does this remarkably well is the ASPCA. They know how to craft stories that compel people to not only pay attention, but to act. They bring us to our knees showing us abandoned puppy faces set to the tune of heart-wrenching Sarah McLachlan melodies.

The result of this marketing story will be droves of people heading out to their local animal shelter to adopt a new family member. The commercials work because we immediately know what’s at stake: Adopt a puppy or the puppy dies. If the puppy dies, so does a piece of our humanity.

We choose the puppy.

What’s at stake for your customers?

As marketers we use stories as a way of relating a specific need to our customers.

We set ourselves (or our customers) as the protagonist, reveal the tension, and then set the product as what moves the mountain. It’s a good story, but it’s not going to hook anyone yet. Not until you can show what’s on the line.

If you’re telling your customers what your product does, you’re telling the wrong story. What you need to tell them is how it will help them achieve that inner need.

In Brian’s post, he spoke about how knowing your audience is what will cause you to win or lose the battle. He couldn’t be more right. You need to know the inner battle your prospects and customers are facing so that you can set your product or service up as the answer. The story has never been about the purchase itself, it’s about the benefit achieved via the purchase.

• If you’re selling laser printers, it’s not about how fast the new printer shoots out copy, it’s how that allows the busy mom to spend more time with her children.
• It’s not how many blades that fancy new razor has, it’s how much closer that shave allows you to get to the person you love. It’s the image of the embrace.
• It’s not the size of the television screen, it’s how buying it will strengthen your friendships when you can crowd more people around it. It’s the Christmas morning shot where everyone you love is within an arm’s reach.

Whether you’re writing a novel, content for your Web site, or a blog post you want people to not just read it, but act on, you need to show them what they’re fighting for, and the benefits of winning.

Setting up what’s at stake

Sounds good. How do you do it?

Define it: Apple doesn’t sell a product; they sell a lifestyle others want to attain. (Usually one of self-righteousness.)

(Kidding.)

(Not really.)

What are you selling? To truly know, you need to do what Brian said: get to know your audience. Effective writers move people by tying the theme of the story back to whatever crisis their customers are facing.

Show It Early: Show what’s at stake for your characters (and your readers) from the beginning. Give them the protagonist, what they’re fighting for, and then pan out to show the seemingly-unmovable mountain directly in their path.

Then realize no one cares about the mountain. We care about what that person loses if he can’t get over it. We care about what’s on the other side and what he’s racing toward. The earlier we see it, the more invested we become.

If we cared about mountains, we’d actually be outside.

Mirror Character and Customer: Your audience and character don’t have to be entwined in the same battle for the story to work.

Just because I’m not a prostitute doesn’t mean I don’t understand what’s at stake when Richard Gere offers to put up Julia Roberts in the movie Pretty Woman and she’s forced to tell him no.

What’s at stake is self-empowerment. It’s universal and that’s why it works. If Richard Gere can climb that fire escape for her, someone can do it for us, but only if we empower ourselves first.

Tie it All Back: In order for a story to work, we have to see the theme moving from beginning to end. To appreciate the resolution, we need to understand the fight that it took to get there. The clearer you are about setting up what’s a stake in your story, the better your audience understands why characters are acting in a certain way and the more invested they become.

As a content writer, being able to relate the struggles being face by a protagonist to the struggles of your customers? Well, it’s pretty much the holy grail of marketing.

It’s the “Why the hell should I give a damn?” that all stories need. Without it, you haven’t hooked anyone.

It doesn’t matter if your story continues to move that character up their mountain if you’re not moving your audience in the process. You need to show people what’s on the other side and what it is they’re fighting for. It’s what’s at stake.

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How to Find the Gold in Your Business

I was talking to a concerned client recently.

After taking my advice, his traffic and blog comments had started to decrease. We’d had three or four sessions, and he’d diligently done all I suggested, and he was implementing and enjoying himself and excited about his business.

But that graph kept trending downward. And it was starting to get to him.

Honestly, I could see where he was coming from. You hire a coach, and he tells you what to do, and your numbers go down?

Awesome.

But here’s the flip side:

During that same time that he was sweating readership and some zeros above his comments sections, he got his first big sale. Then his second big sale.

His number of customer inquiries went up, too — a growing pool of people who hadn’t hired him yet, but were on the right track to do so.

I told him to stop worrying about traffic. His goal wasn’t to attract as many eyeballs to his site as possible. What he really wanted was to find the action-takers and the customers — people who loved him and would prove it via their wallets.

No matter what your business, the goal isn’t to amass as much raw material as possible. (For a business centered around a blog, that “raw material” is typically traffic.)

The goal is to sift through that raw material, discard the junk, and find the small amount of true gold inside.

Small and engaged is better than big and vaguely interested

When the Third Tribe opened its doors earlier this year, Sonia and I talked in the very first seminar about the smallness of our lists. Sonia said that the big gurus would laugh at the size of her list, and I told Sonia that she’d laugh at mine.

Since that time, not much has changed. Relatively speaking, I still don’t have a large email list. I don’t have huge traffic to my blog.

But I don’t care in the least, because what I do have is a connection to a relatively small group of people who are pure gold.

They’re like me. They like me. I like them. I can talk to them like old friends. I can tell a borderline joke and nobody leaves, because we all have the same sense of humor.

I can make them an offer that I think is great and be pretty darn sure that they’ll think it’s great, too.

My people and I feel more like a club than a crowd. We’re not a huge group, but I’ll take close bonds with a few over a larger but more disconnected group of people who “read stuff from some guy online somewhere” any day. We’re small, but we’re a unit. Team Johnny, if you will.

That didn’t happen by accident. I had to sift and sort to find these people, and doing that is a lot harder than “increasing traffic.”

I don’t care about traffic if it’s unfiltered and nonspecific. Hell, I could increase traffic tomorrow if I wanted, but if it isn’t traffic that converts into sales, what’s the point?

Asking for more traffic is like asking for more vaguely interested people to shout at over a megaphone. I don’t care about that. I want new members to Team Johnny, so I only care about that big crowd for as long as it takes to sift through it to find the gold.

A simple, 2-step plan for finding for your own gold

Regardless of whether your traffic increases or decreases — or whether your number of comments goes up or goes down — the question you should always be asking is, “Am I getting more gold in my pan, or am I just collecting meaningless rocks and dirt?”

Commenters are more interesting to me than raw traffic, but even commenters are the wrong people if they’re just hanging out.

So if you’re out to find the gold in them thar hills, here’s how to go about it:

1. Get a guide

You don’t just need to know where to go to find gold. You also have to know what specifically you’re looking for (i.e. gold is usually in small flakes, not giant nuggets — and correspondingly, your ideal people may not be who you think they are) and how to tell the real stuff from fool’s gold.

Your guide in the quest to find more of those best people is intimate knowledge of your ideal reader.

Writing content is the blogger’s way of hiking through the trails and kneeling in the rivers to look for that glint of gold. That sketch of your perfect person is your map, so stick to it and don’t wander around trying to write for everyone. Think narrow and precise.

If a prospector’s map showed a hundred-mile circle bearing the legend, “Gold is in here somewhere,” it’d be pretty useless as a treasure map.

2. Sift and discard the junk

People look at traffic and blog comments because they’re incredibly easy stats to see and to measure. But people also forget that they’re largely irrelevant.

You don’t care how many people come to your site; you care how many people LOVE your site — and go on to take the action you want them to take.

You don’t care how many people comment; you care how many of them come back again and again, and use your comment section as a way to know, like, and trust you.

You don’t care how many people look at your products and services, or how many eyes see your offers.

Don’t turn down traffic that comes by chance, because more eyes means more potential customers. We all need traffic. But what you ultimately care about is how many people buy your stuff, not just the raw number of visitors.

Put all of that riverbed dirt through your sieve, and let go of everything that isn’t gold.

Don’t be afraid if people leave your site or unsubscribe from your email list, because those people aren’t the ones you’re looking for.

The question you want to ask is, is your connection to your ideal people increasing? Are you seeing more sales or more inquiries about possible sales? Those are the metrics that matter.

One quick warning

Do you know another reason for decreased traffic and decreased comments?

Those things also happen when your content sucks. So it doesn’t always mean you’re doing things right if your stats go down. Far from it, actually.

The lesson here isn’t to ignore or scorn traffic, but instead to pay more attention to the numbers that really matter.

• Are you generating more true fans?
• Do people buy your stuff, or buy on your recommendation?
• Do they tell their friends about you?
• Do they ask questions about your products and services?
• Do they tell you that they really love your incredibly awesome free content?

If they’re doing more of that, you’re finding your gold, and traffic becomes a bonus.

Now get prospecting!

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Use Photos to Stand Out in the Facebook News Feed

This guest post is by Tommy Walker, Online Marketing Strategist and owner of Tommy.ismy.name.

A picture is worth a thousand words, right? This old cliché has become especially true in blogging. It’s statistically proven that by inserting compelling photographs into your blog posts, you’re able to better retain your reader’s attention.

So what if photos are also exactly what you need to stand out on the world’s most popular social network?

On Facebook, Photos are the most used features of the site (after status updates of course). You may have already known that, but did you also know that Facebook is one of the most used photo sharing platforms on the entire Internet?

So how can we tap into the power of Facebook Photos to separate your Page from the rest of the noise on Facebook?

If you’ve been using Facebook ads to perform inception on your blog, you’ll have a good idea of the psychographic profile of your readers. We can use this information to create (or find) compelling images that will resonate with your audience.

Let’s imagine I run a blog about creating Hollywood movie props on an indie movie budget. Normally I build simple props that are pretty general, like ray guns, or jet packs. But lately I’ve been running Facebook ads and I’ve learned from the Responder Profile report that the majority of the people who clicked on my ad have listed “Iron Man” as a favorite movie in their profile.

Knowing this, I create a tutorial for my blog that gives instructions on how to make an Iron Man mask.

To really draw attention to this step-by-step tutorial and stand out in my fans’ news feeds only requires a little extra thought and attention to detail. Just a little more work, and I get a result that looks something like this:

Now let’s break down what I did here, so you can create results like this, too.

Step 1: Breaking up the image

Take the main image that you would like to show up in the News Feed and break it up into two or three parts using a photo editor. For the Iron Man album, I broke one photo up into two separate images, with each image highlighting a different element of the build.

The original image looks like this:

To break it up, I simply opened the image in Gimp (although you could use Photoshop or even Paint!) and selected the Battery and Arc Reactor. Then I copied and pasted it into its own image file, and did the same for the mask.

I then very quickly created the album cover by typing “Become” over the Iron Man logo, and saved that as its own image file> I then saved everything to its own folder on my desktop.

Here are two quick notes about album covers. Firstly, selecting the right image is important for two reasons:

1. The album cover is the first thing people see when someone clicks on the Photos tab on your page. By default, Facebook also displays the two most recent photo albums on the left-hand sidebar underneath the list of people who like your page. When they visit a page, it’s only natural for people to check out the number of people who like that page — for social proof. Take advantage of this curiosity by creating an eye-catching album cover. Even with a small number of likes, you’ll appear to be ahead of the game, as this is valuable real estate that most pages simply aren’t taking advantage of.
   
2. The album cover will always appear in the furthest left-hand corner when you publish an album to the news feed. Selecting the wrong image for the album cover can make the entire update completely pointless. take a look at the images below. By default, the photo titled “Step 5″ would be the album cover here, but it’s not a great image. To have the most impact on the News Feed, you’d want to make sure that the album cover shows the image titled “Step 10.” We’ll talk about this more in the next section.

Step 2: Selecting the album cover and organizing your photos

Go to the Photos tab on your Business Page and click on Create a Photo Album.

A dialog box will appear, giving you instructions on uploading your photos.

Click Select Photos and choose the photos you would like to be included in the album.

Click Open once you’ve selected all of the photos for your album. The photos will begin to be uploaded to the album. By default, the album is named with the date and time that you’re uploading the photos. Change the name to reflect the contents of the album. Also, check the High Resolution button (just because you can!).

Once the photos have finished uploading, click Create Album.

From here, select the image you want to use for the cover of your album. Also feel free to add descriptions to your pictures. If it makes sense, insert links to relevant pages within your blog (this will depend on the content of your album).

Once you’re satisfied with your Photo descriptions, click Save Changes. A dialog box will appear prompting you to Publish or Skip.

Do not click publish!

Click Skip. You will be brought to the album and all of the images will appear in the order in which they were uploaded. This isn’t always ideal if you’re really looking to stand out in the news feed.

It is vital to note the arrangement of the photos in the album, as it will determine their order in the news feed.

As I said earlier, Facebook automatically puts the album cover as the far left image of the three in the album preview in the news feed—regardless of how the images are arranged in the album. Facebook then takes the two images after the photo that’s designated as the cover, and assigns them as the middle and far-right images in the news feed.

So if the photos are arranged like this in the album:

They will look like this in the news feed:

To achieve this landscape effect in the news feed, simply drag the two images that are meant to follow the album cover in the order in which you’d like them to appear in the news feed.

Then, your album will look like this:

And the feed will look like this:

Once you have your photos arranged the way you’d like them to appear in the news feed, all you have left to do is create an album description and publish the album.

Step 3: Entering your album’s description

Underneath your photos, you’ll see an Add a Caption link. Click it to open the popup where you can describe your album and include any external links.

Facebook will allow a total of 320 characters (including spaces) in your album description before it hides the content and adds a See More link to the end of your description.

Keep your descriptions around one to two lines, and always put a line break between your description and link so that the content appears cleanly in the news feed.

After you’ve clicked Save, click Edit Album Info to see the Album Description page. Click the Edit Photos tab on the top right of the gray box. Then, click Publish Now.

And there you have it! Your album will have a good chance of standing out in the otherwise really crowded news feed!

What’s that you say? You don’t make props? There are all sorts of other creative ways to use Facebook Photos to promote your business. What are some ways you’ve used this tool? Are there other Facebook Photo ideas you can share?

Tommy is an Online Marketing Strategist and owner of Tommy.ismy.name. He is about to release Hack The Social Network, the ultimate guide to Facebook Marketing, and is currently developing a “mind hacking” course.

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