One of the things I’ve learned lately is that in order to get a free marketing education, one simple thing you can do is simply to listen and observe the marketing that is going on around you all the time. What do you respond to? What pulls your strings?
And then use that knowledge in your own marketing. So the next time you get a free sample of Dove in the mail, read the copy a little bit more closely and become a student. 
I sent this out earlier to subscribers but in case your spam blocker ate it, here it is again:
Today is the very last day you can take advantage of two offers:
First, a prelaunch price of $7 for the new ebook”Full Time Money”. You can get a preview at: http://www.fulltimewahm.com/
To pick up the book, just send paypal payment to carrie at carrielauth.com and I’ll send it right over.
OR- you can get the ebook at no charge! As I mentioned in my last newsletter, I’m offering one on one coaching for a limited time. You can read more about it here: http://www.carriefaq.com/coaching.html
Invest in a half hour or more of coaching and get the ebook at no cost
One last thing – if you’re an affiliate of mine, be sure to check out the special contest and awesome prizes you can win. Not only will the top sellers cash in, but everyone who promotes can also win.
Check it out at: http://www.affiliatesfun.com/
I’ve had a stomachache for two days and woke up too tired to think of a good blog post today, so I’m going to do a hash/rehash of some oldie but goodie posts.
hash:
1. a dish of diced or chopped meat and often vegetables, as of leftover corned beef or veal and potatoes, sautéed in a frying pan or of meat, potatoes, and carrots cooked together in gravy.
2. a mess, jumble, or muddle: a hash of unorganized facts and figures.
3. a reworking of old and familiar material
rehash:
1. To bring forth again in another form without significant alteration;
2. To discuss again.
Here goes!
Free hard drive backups – So necessary if you want to sleep well as an online marketer.
Which wahm are you like? – Distracted Darla or Focused Franny?
Freebies – Is it ok to expect something in return?
I have lots of freebies to give away for this Friday Freebie, but there is a catch. You have to do something.
We’re having the first affiliate contest over at Affiliates Fun. You can win stuff by being one of the top two selling affiliates, but you also win just for trying (we love effort!).
I can’t wait to send you FAT affiliate commissions AND free gifts.
This is a quick and easy tip that can earn you increased affiliate commissions effortlessly once you set it up.
Do you have custom error pages for your sites? If yes, are you promoting an affiliate link on them?
Log in to your website stats and you may be surprised at how many requests your server gets for “bad” pages… if you have a custom error page, this won’t be a total waste of traffic and can turn into money in your pocket.
If you have a website that uses Cpanel (like MomWebs, my favorite web host), creating your error page is super easy. Just log into Cpanel and click “error pages”. A box will come onto the screen and you can enter your html there. If you don’t speak html, design the page first in Frontpage or whatever html editor you use , then paste the source code into the box.
Promote an appropriate affiliate product on that page and turn mistakes into cash. As an example, you can see how I’m promoting a menu planning product as an affiliate on one of my error pages HERE.
You can get more affiliate marketing tips and even a free audio I conducted with a mom who earns full time money with affiliate marketing.
After Spring Cleaning coaching with Alice, and Flipping Websites with Kelly, and the Content Site Challenge going on at Mom Masterminds, I’ve been thinking lots lately about giving some of my neglected websites some love.
I already sold one site, am giving one away, and have a couple more to sell, but I have one or two that DO fit into my target market and that just need a little love.
One of these sites had a bad domain name so I bought a newer one that fits into my plan for the site as well as my target market. It didn’t have much traffic or ranking so it didn’t matter much, and it’s already getting some love from search engines despite the change.
What I love about improving an existing site is how FAST you can see results. It’s awesome to add a few new pages to a site that’s aged a bit in the search engines and immediately see some increased traffic and income from those pages.
I’ve already done a couple of things, like design a custom 404 error page. You can see an example here.
Then I linked to the site from one of my other sites, giving it another one way link. I also added a 5 day ecourse to one site, and added a second free report to subscribers. I sent a broadcast email to the existing list.
So here’s what else I plan to do to boost a couple of sites:
There you go. Care to join me in my “Give a Site Some Love” challenge? I’ll link to you in this post. Leave a comment below with the website you plan on improving too, and it will get some immediate link love from me!
Tonight is the last of the Hot Summer Seminar learning series, and the featured guest is Lynne Klippel from My Book School. She’s going to be talking about how to use what you know to create income from information products. Very cool topic.
If you haven’t yet listened to any of the programs, they’ve been informative and fun, and Kelly is even cutting the price of the Season Pass to $57.97!
It starts at 9:00pm Eastern. Just register on the site to get free access to tonight’s program.
The Season Pass gives you access to all recordings and transcripts from the entire summer – including awesome topics from Lorrie Morgan-Ferrero, Lynn Terry, Alice Seba and more.
Kelly is also having a prize giveaway after the session tonight, tossing out full price products and coaching – so possibly everyone will leave with a little something.
One of the big things that many of the women featured in the Full Time Money ebook said was instrumental to the growh of their businesses was coaching.
I firmly believe in coaching too. I’ve hired business coaches before and always got renewed enthusiasm as well as a clear plan of action after speaking with a coach.
It’s interesting how others can often see things more clearly than you can! It’s a case of not being able to see the forest for the trees sometimes.
I’ve been toying with the idea for some time now, but have officially and for a VERY limited time, decided to offer some one on one coaching myself. You can see the special deal I’m offering for the month of August here:
I would love to work with you!
Here is an email I got from a subscriber to the Natural Mom Business Guide free ecourse. She said I could post a response here.
Hi Carrie,
I am interested in starting a makeover site with my expertise as an artist, professor of graphic design and licensed cosmetologist. I worked as a hair dresser, make up artist for 22 yrs and I currently teach all aspects of graphic design at local colleges. I have an MFA in Art and computer graphics.
I am tired of the grind and low pay. I have a physical disability which leaves me unable to do the running around I did in my youth. I turn 50 this year and I feel the need for a new life.
I want to create an on line business to help woman achieve a higher level of self esteem, health and beauty. I have a life coach I met with once so far, I am sending her a copy of this letter.
Contacting you is my first step in researching how to get involved with other woman who are working toward the same goals. Helping Moms and women in general to feel better and look better is what I want to do.
I know I can be passionate about this, but I need guidance for starting business, networking, marketing and growing while I connect with more wonderful smart women like yourself.
I am in the stage of researching. I want to look at many possibilities and read up on this beast in the library and on line etc. I will look over your e mails as I have several others to see if they can lead me to some decisions about how to get going.
So far I have seen many scams and marketing ploys to get people to spend money for information that I can get at my local library. I like your concept, so I will look forward to hearing what you have to say that is different from the hundreds of other self start business sights I have seen so far.
Thanks for your time.
Laura
Thanks Laura for your lengthy email! You’re obviously a smart lady and your education and expertise will certainly serve you well, as will your passion on the subject.
Here is what I would advise:
1) Get clear on who you want to market to first
It sounds like you’re a good researcher, and that’s a great skill for an online business owner. The first step is to really figure out WHO you want to market to. After that, everything else will fall into place. The WHAT and the HOW are much, much simpler.
2) Research – but set a limit
It’s so easy to get caught in the reading and researching phase and never hang the “open” sign on your virtual business.
So certainly do research your options, especially do market research around your target market, but set a limit for yourself, and once you’ve reached it, take action to get your website up and running.
3) Get help sooner rather than later
You’ve already met with a life coach, and that’s a wonderful step. Also, I can’t say enough about having a session with a business coach or hooking up with a networking/mentoring group like Mom Masterminds. If you wait until you’re already established to do so, you’ll have to undo some of your mistakes.
I hope that gives you some direction. Of course, if you need help learning how to market your new website, I recommend the Natural Mom Business Guide
Yes you read that right.
Today on WahmTalkRadio, Kelly and I talked about her new “Flip That Mom’s Website” project. Her first “flipping” project is a website of mine that has been neglected for months now but that has great potential in the right person’s hands.
You see, I launched this site but badly neglected it due to the fact that it is not a topic that I’m passionate about, nor does it fit into my business plan target market (bad wahm! bad wahm!).
Even though I preach the Focus message, I have been guilty a time or two of straying. This year I sold one site already that didn’t fit in and I have a couple more that need to go. You can have a chance to win this site, because after Kelly fixes it all up, I’m giving it away for FREE.
Go tune in to WahmTalkRadio and see how you can win it