Do you have barriers that holding YOU back from creating your own product?

Do you have barriers that holding YOU back from creating your own product?

* You aren't an expert on anything?
* You aren't a good writer?
* You don't know where to start?

Let's talk about how you can break through your barriers and get started immediately. Because as soon as you have your own product, you can start trading products for dollars instead of time for dollars.

Obstacle one: You aren't an expert on anything

The solution to this is to find people who ARE experts and interview them.

It's beyond the scope of this article but in Product Dashboard
(productdashboard.com) I give you a specific resource for finding experts to interview and the email to send to them that has been proven to work.

The reason I mention this is one of the questions that came up on the call above is, "Will experts do this?" And the answer is that not all experts will.

But if you know WHERE to find them and HOW to approach them and you put a WIFM in it (what's in it for me) they will.

As a quick tip, I recommend you hunt down people who have something to promote. This gives them a reason to do an interview with you -- because they need to get exposure for whatever they're promoting.

For example, look for people who are ALREADY doing interviews.
You can search blogs for interviews using technorati.com. That's a good way to start.

Obstacle two: You can't write

The solution here is to do telephone interviews and record them.
You can also sell your products via teleseminars instead of sales letters.

Don't let the lack of writing skills hold you back.

TIP: Use freeconferencecall.com to conduct and record your call.

Now, obviously, I recommend taking some writing classes to improve your writing skills in the meantime. But to get started, use what you HAVE.

If you can talk over the phone, you too can create your own product!

One of the issues that comes up is what questions to ask.

TIP: Ask the questions you personally are curious about.

Obstacle three: You don't know where to start

The obvious place to start is with your passions, hobbies and interests.

But if you're really stuck, then go to Facebook or Myspace and look at all the groups you can join.

Typically, if there are groups formed on a topic, there are people selling products to that group. But you can always find out if that's the case by joining 5 or 10 groups and see who is selling what and for how much.

By reading the blogs of the product sellers, you'll get an idea of whether or not they're making money.

Here is the magic formula:

Step 1: Find a group of people with money to spend who are in the habit of spending it.

Step 2: Find out what they're spending their money on and why.

Step 3: Give them a reason to spend their money with you

You must have a clear benefit, strong differentiation and potent proof. Those are the 3 keys to selling.

If you don't have a crystal clear benefit that is somewhat unique vs. the competition and if you don't have strong proof you can deliver that benefit, you'll have problems making sales.

But if you can present a clear benefit that other products don't offer and you prove you can deliver the benefit, then you're on the road to sales.

Here's the thing:

In life you either trade time for dollars or products for dollars.
As long as you're trading time for dollars you have a limit on your income because you only have so many hours in a day.

But there is almost no limit to how many products you can sell in a day, especially if you're selling ebooks or digitally delivered products on the Internet.

Marlon Sanders

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For step-by-step help in creating your own products, check out:
Info Products Wizard

50 Years and still Thankful. Happy Thanksgiving everyone. The video is of my Mum & Dad dancing as they celebrate their 50th anniversary. This year I am so thankful that they are still around, still healthy & still married. I have parents that rate with the best. Thanks Mum & Dad. I love you

Marlon's In-Depth 16-Point Guide To Hiring Your First Part Time Virtual Assistant Based On How I Hired My Own Virtual Assisants.

Save this for reference and use it as a checklist

By Marlon Sanders

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Let's talk about hiring your first part time virtual assistant:

-- Can you afford it?
-- Where do you find them?
-- How do you work with them?
-- How do you save 50% on their pay?
-- What country should you hire them from?
-- What if their work isn't up to par?
-- What skills do they need?

One of the big steps in your online career will be when you make that move to hire your first online assistant.

There are many ways to outsource your work. You can, of course, hire freelancers off of elance or other sites.

That's good for one-off projects.

But very soon in your career, you're going to want to hire a part time virtual assistant and later a full-time one. That way, they can learn over time how you think and what you want.

You get a higher quality result with less work.

As you know, Lisa worked for me for 7 years. I've had other virtual assistants. And now I have some employees. But I worked my way up to this point over time.

Here are my tips for finding and using your first part time virtual assistant:

1. Hire someone in Canada. They have high speed Internet and are Internet savvy. If you're in the U.S., they're on US time.

Lisa was in Canada. Rick Hanson did my technical stuff for many years. He's in Canada.

2. Hire someone in your relative time zone.

It's hard for me to work with virtual assistants in UK or Australia because of the time zone difference.

Whatever country you're in, I think you need to look for someone in the same time zone. That way, you can collaborate on projects during work hours.

The cool thing is that if you're a night owl, you can find a time zone where that's someone else's work day.

3. Grab a 50% discount on pay

The great thing about Canada when I started there with Lisa was I got a 50% discount due to the exchange rate. Over time, this wilted.

But when you're getting started, look for that exchange rate discount.

4. Use your resources to find people

a. Craigs List -- That should be obvious. I love using Craigs List.

b. Newspapers. I ran classified ads in several newspapers in Canada.

c. Post in forums. Post what you're looking for in forums like Warriorsforum, Digital Point forums, the Rich Jerk forum, abestweb forum, Anthony Blake's forum (ablake.com).
There are many other forums you can use, depending on the talent.

5. Do NOT be scared to hire someone if you have revenue.

As long as you have a profitable sales process, don't be scared to hire someone part time. You'll NEVER feel like you can afford it.

But as long as you have a product that's selling, a target market and a lead generation process, you will very likely find it pays off.

You WILL be scared to death to hire that first person. But if you have a sales process that's working, I really believe it'll free up your time and let you concentrate on higher return activities.

Face it, answering customer service emails doesn't make you any dough.

6. Hire talent over pay

I'd rather pay more and get someone really talented than pay less and get mediocre talent.

You want someone you don't have to train. Trust me on this one.

7. Find someone with exposure to Photoshop and good writing skills. When you're hiring that first virtual assistant, you need a jack of all trades.

Someone whose very computer savvy, has had a little customer service experience, good writing skills, and a little art background or Photoshop is great. It's ideal if they can do the basics in Dreamweaver.

When I hired Lisa, she was already doing customer service for Internet Marketing Challenge but they let her go when Corey bought the company. She could do a drop shadow in Photoshop and had taken a correspondence course on html.

8. Call them first thing every day and plan the day's work.
Even if they're part time, you need to review their work plan daily. Just call and go over the work for the day.

This is why I say you need someone in your time zone. In my opinion, Skype doesn't cut it. You need to be able to talk over the phone.

And you need to be able to EASILY reach the person. If you have to email them and get a response overnight, this isn't going to work out long term.

Yes, you can do that for repetitious outsourced projects.
But the virtual assistant person is your RIGHT HAND. You need them on demand at least during set hours.

9. Here are some tasks you can have them do:

a. Fix html problems
b. Customer service problem solving
c. Compile pdf's
d. Create reseller pages and contests
e. Respond to the needs of affiliates or jv partners f. Create products g. Design banner ads for affiliates h. Write emails i. Write postcards to resellers j. Do things you don't want to

10. Dictate your promo emails to your VA.

This is why you want someone you work with every day. You can dictate your promo emails to them.

Over time, they'll learn how to type these up and you get promos out to your list just by dictating an email in your morning call.

11. Set rules upfront about days off, time off, emergencies and advancing pay.

a. Set a rule upfront that you don't advance pay.
b. Set a rule on time off from work hours for personal errands.

Virtual assistants sometimes don't see it as a job. And you have crucial tasks for the day when they up and announce they have a dentist appointment or need to take a family member to the Pharmacy. Whatever. Set the rules upfront.

c. Decide if there will be vacation time.
d. Have some form of non-disclosure agreement even if it isn't legally valid. At least you can have a clear, unambiguous agreement.

12. Be quick to pull the plug.

If junk goes on such as their Internet goes down all the time, tasks don't get done and you get excuses, critical mistakes are made, pull the plug.

13. You'll know within one to two weeks if the person is good.
A bad hire will want to take a month to get up to speed and research the tasks. A good person will hop right in and start doing work.

14. Let the person in your plans. Brainstorm with them. Let them experience fun and exciting tasks also. Don't always just give them boring stuff. Find out what they love to do and see if you can work some of those things into their responsibilities.

15. Let them grow in the position.

If you see potential, talent or abilities they aren't using, pay for them to get a little training and see if that talent will blossom.

I bought Lisa a Photoshop book and in 30 days she had gone through all the tutorials and was amazing. But she had an art background and tons of talent.

16. The hardest person you'll EVER hire is your first.

I remember Corey (Rudl) telling me that once over the phone. And it was so true. And it's true.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Marlon Sanders is the author of "The Amazing Formula That Sells Products Like Crazy."

Check out all my products here:

Marlon's Products

YOU MAY BE A TALIBAN IF....

Our troops in Afghanistan prove they've retained their sense of humor
with the following 'YOU MAY BE A TALIBAN IF...'

1. You refine heroin for a living, but you have a moral objection to beer.

2. You own a $3,000 machine gun and $5,000 rocket launcher, but you
can't afford shoes.
3. You have more wives than teeth.
4. You wipe your butt with your bare left hand, but consider bacon
'unclean.'
5. You think vests come in two styles: bullet-proof and suicide.
6. You can't think of anyone you HAVEN'T declared Jihad against.
7. You consider television dangerous, but routinely carry explosives
in your clothing.
8. You were amazed to discover that cell phones have uses other than
setting off roadside bombs.
9. You've often uttered the phrase, 'I love what you've done with
your cave.'
10. You have nothing against women and think every man should own at
least one.
11. You bathe at least monthly whether necessary or not.
12. You have a crush on your neighbor's goat.

My Beautiful America

Here are some wonderful pictures of this great country of ours.

Enjoy!

http://oldbluewebdesigns.com/mybeautifulamerica.htm

Trap

Change

There's an old sea story in the Marine Corps about a lieutenant who
inspected his Marines in the field and afterward told the "Gunny" that
the men smelled bad. The lieutenant suggested the solution is that they
should change underwear.

The Gunny responded, " Aye, aye, sir! I'll see to it immediately!"

The Gunny went straight to the squad tent and announced, "The
lieutenant thinks you guys smell bad and wants you to change underwear.
Smith, you change with Witkowsky ~ and Brown, you change with Schultz.
Now get to it !"

MORAL: A candidate may promise "change" in Washington.
Don't count on things smelling any better.

Happy Birthday Marines!

Greetings Ya'll,


Today, I would like to wish my beloved United States Marine Corps
a Happy Birthday! The Corps is 233 years old today, founded in
Tun Tavern in Philadelphia.

If you see a Marine today, past or present, please take a moment
and wish this "Warrior from the Sea" a Happy Birthday.

We sometimes take our freedom and personal safety & security
for granted, but our Marines never do.

Morning, noon and night, they are there for us, usually in harm's
way keeping us safe.

To all the Marines, past and present that have served and are
serving our glorious Corps, a heartfelt THANK YOU &
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Sgt Thomas "Trapper" Sherwood
Sherwood Locksmithing

Tailgating at MTSU

Greetings, today my wanderings have found me tailgating on the campus of MTSU, Mufreesboro TN. My buddy Rob; from Napa Auto Care in Mufreesboro invited me. As u can see from the picture, the entree of the day was a 85lb roasted pig. To say this tasted good is an understatement. What a meal, & waht a way to spend a day, hanging with a good friend, making new friends, and enjoying some real good food.

Key Internet marketing terms & vocabulary

Hello,

Marlon here.

A lot of times Internet marketers throw terms around and assume everyone knows what they mean.

To help you out, I'm providing a list here written in layman's terms. Some of these aren't the "precise" technical definition.
But they're what I call working definitions that are easy to understand.

KEY TERMS AND VOCABULARY

Continuity: The means something that people are charged for regularly, typically monthly or quarterly. In the biz, we call this "continuity income" or recurring billing.
Newsletters are usually paid for monthly as are membership sites. The reason you see a lot of emphasis on continuity offers is it provides steady income and gives you a way to pay your bills. The classic example is the book club of the month programs.

Forced Continuity: Forced means you don't have a choice.
The way this works is when you buy one product, you're given a free trial of a newsletter, membership site or CD of the month club. The trial is usually 14 to 30 days.
Sometimes as long as two months. At the end of that time period, if you don't cancel, you're charged monthly for whatever it is.

Some marketers get people in continuity billing then NEVER send emails or communications hoping people will FORGET about the purchase and let the billing continue forever. I find this to be legally risky. If you do forced continuity, make sure people know they're being charged and can cancel without jumping through hoops.

Back End: The back end of the business is everything AFTER the initial sale. In other words, it's the follow up business. In the ideal world, you break even or make a small profit on the initial sale (or what we call the "front end." And you make your profits on the upsells, downsells and subsequent sales.

Upsells: Additional products or services offered at the point of the sale. As crazy as it sounds, the EASIEST time to make another sale to the customer is when they already have their credit card out! Any additional product offered is an upsell.

Downsell: If the upsell is declined, another offer for a lower price than the upsell is made. This is called a downsell.

Target market: A market is a group of people who are in the MARKET for a product or service. A target market is the market you're targeting. For example, males online between the ages of 35 and 65 who want to start a home-based business would be a target market. Stated differently, it's the people who are the potential buyers of what you sell.

Sales letters: In this business, we often use very long sales letters similar to the direct mail letters you receive in the mail. We call these sales letters because they're me-to-you letters that SELL something. These are different from a brochure, which is an impersonal communication. Sales letters are written as though you're talking to the person directly. They're more personal and persuasive.

Membership site: These are password protected sites that have content delivered regularly and often have a forum or other way to interact with members.

Forum: These are places you go to talk to others who share a common interest.

Opt ins: When someone joins your email list, they "opt in"
to receive emails from you.

Double opt in: When someone joins your email list, they receive an email asking them to click a confirmation link to PROVE they subscribed to the email list. This is an anti-spam feature and is now standard practice.

Autoresponder: This is a software program that lets you send email broadcasts to everyone on your list. It will also send a sequence of emails any number of days apart that you specify.m

Shopping cart: The ordering mechanism you use to get people's name, address and credit card or check info and process their order.

Affiliate program: A program where you promote a vendor's product or service and receive a commission when there's a sale. The classic example is Amazon.com. You can link to books on Amazon. And if a visitor to your web site buys one of them, you get a small commission.

Associate program: Same as affiliate program

Banner ads: Those square or horizontal ads on web sites.

Ebook: Basically the same as a printed book but delivered online, quite often as a PDF.

PDF: Portable Delivery Format. This is a uniform format for delivering digital information. A standard of method of delivering documents on the web.

White paper: A research paper or report delivered as a PDF.

Name Squeeze: A term trademarked by Jonathan Mizel. See Squeeze page.

Squeeze page: A page with only one purpose to obtain or "squeeze" a name and email address, or email address alone, from the web visitor.

Lead capture page: Same as a squeeze page.

Power Squeeze page: See squeeze page

Hits: Some stats programs measure web site traffic by hits. This is not a particularly accurate way to measure visitors.

Unique visitors: Stat programs attempt to identify actual visitors and eliminate duplicate visitors in a 24-hour period.

Cookies: The way things get tracked on the Internet. These are little text files put on your computer. They contain tidbits of information that allow stuff to be tracked. In the case of affiliate programs, the way we track sales and credit the correct reseller with the commissions is through the use of cookies. The cookie simply contains that affiliate's ID number.

PPC: Pay-per-click advertising. Google made PPC a dominant advertising method. As a ppc advertiser, you run ads on Google and ONLY pay when someone clicks on your ad.

Monetize: When you find a way to make money with something, you monetize it. So you'll hear people talk about monetizing their traffic. All their talking about is finding a way to make money off of their web site visitors.

Traffic: Visitors to your web site or web page are traffic.

Product launch: When a number of affiliates promote one product o one day or one week. Typically last for one or two weeks and often involve heavy promotions by affiliates who are trying to win cash and prizes.

Aweber: One of the main autoresponder services.

One Shopping Cart: Another autoresponder service that also contains a shopping cart, ad tracker, affiliate software and other bells and whistles.

Ad tracker: A program that lets you create links that track when people click on them and then also count actions or sales that follow the click.

Affiliate software: Software that allows you to run your own affiliate program and pay affiliates commissions when they sell your product or service.

Clickbank: A marketplace for ebooks sold by affiliates.

This list by Marlon Sanders from MarlonSanders.com. You have permission to re-publish this list as long as you leave this part in tact.

Visit Marlon's blog at: http://www.marlonsnews.com


Higher Response Marketing, Inc.
11844 Bandera Rd. #469
Helotes, TX 78023

Hair of the Dog also prevents Hangovers

Greetings and Good Morning,

Did we all have a good weekend?

Or did we maybe have "one" too many cocktails over the weekend?

If so, did you "pay" for it the next morning?

Hi, It's Trapper from www.HOTDenergy.com.

I just wanted to pass on a tidbit of info on hangovers.

Hangovers as we all know are no fun!

But, Hangovers Beware!

You have probably heard all sorts of of "Crazy"
solutions to cure or prevent hangovers, but I am going to share one with you that really does work.

Here it is, "Hair of the Dog"!

How can I make such a bold claim?

Here's why, I have personally put "Hair of the Dog" to the test!

I have stayed up way to late, I have drank "one" to many, and as you know, when that happens, the next morning can be a bear!

With Hair of the Dog's patented formula it literally clarify and restore your body.

Not only does each can of Hair of the Dog contain over 1,000mg of Vitamin C, but here's the kicker, each can also delivers 3,200mg of Phase 1 and Phase 2 detoxifiers which specifically targets the liver.

As you know the liver works as a filter, protecting you from thousands of toxic substances you ingest each day such as medicines, alcohol, pesticides and chemicals.

So why not detoxify your body while you drink the Healthiest energy drink on the Planet!

Get yourself prepared for those long weekends, where you might tip just one or two to many.

Trust me, you'll regret not getting some Hair of the Dog the next morning!

Face it, Hangovers, when they do occur are no fun, but now you can do something about them.

Take a bite out of Hangovers with Hair of the Dog.

Visit Hair of the Dog now to get your cure.

http://trapper.hairofdog.com

Sincerely,

Thomas "Trapper" Sherwood


PS...Delivery time to your door is usually a quick two-three days after you place your order.
http://trapper.hairofdog.com

Discover how to limit your loss of sleep

Greetings,

Loss of sleep, even for a few short hours during the night, can prompt one's
immune system to turn against healthy tissue and organs.

Loss of sleep insidiously affects sustained attention, cognitive speed and
accuracy, working memory, reaction time, and overall behavioral capability,
often without the sleep-deprived person being aware of the deficits.

Loss of sleep also reduces levels of leptin, a hormone that suppresses
appetite, and increases ghrelin (GRELL-in), an appetite-stimulating hormone
a combination that can encourage eating.

Loss of sleep can even be dangerous.

Insomnia was defined as having any one of the following symptoms:
difficulty falling asleep, waking often during the night, waking up to early in
the morning and being unable to go back to sleep, or even waking up in the
morning feeling unrested.

Over half (58percent) of the poll respondents reported at least one symptom
of insomnia on two or more nights of the week.

Sleep deprivation also results in the loss of sleep benefits for cognitive
processes such as memory and insight formation: the building blocks of
learning, creativity, and scientific discovery.

"It's the worry that gets you, not the loss of sleep"- Dale Carnegie.

Current research shows that loss of sleep is related to weight gain.
Multiple studies show that chronic loss of sleep may increase the risk of
obesity.

"An estimated 40percent of Americans promise to lose weight in the New Year;
however,almost 90 percent of those who responded to a nationwide survey
reported either occasional or no success losing weight.

According to recent studies published in the Journal of the American Medical
Association and the Lancet, sleep loss tends to increase hunger and affects
the body's metabolism making it difficult to maintain weight loss or lose
weight.

Restful sleep could be the missing ingredient in your weight loss program and
the answer to losing the weight you want.

A good night’s sleep, each and every night, can help you lose weight.

Health officials say that people should get around eight hours sleep per night
for maximum effect.

In other words, sleep is vitally important to maintaining a healthy body.

America's sleep habits are simply not healthy.

After all, if you're experiencing sleepless nights, you can't afford to spend
hours crawling the Web and searching the health sections of bookshops for
information on sleep treatments.

If you would like to sleep better, sleep without the aid of pills or drugs and
wake up feeling refreshed and rejuvenated, then please visit:
http://is.gd/4BbY for your FREE copy of "The Sleep Secret"
by Dr. David Tracy

To your health & a better night's sleep,

Thomas Sherwood