Thursday, April 30, 2009

Discover the Ten Essentials for Healthy Living

By Michael Ellison

Ten days may not seem like a long time, but when you are making choices that have a powerful impact on the way you feel—instantly and throughout the day—you will begin to notice big changes in just a few days. Remember that when a day seems challenging, the Journey is only 10 days long, and you can get through it! Your health is worth the effort.


TriVita’s 10 Day Wellness Journey with Adaptogen Plus™ can help you…



  • Find energy you didn’t know you had
  • Improve your mood
  • Begin a routine for exercise
  • Devise a healthy nutrition plan that works for you
  • Reduce stress
  • Enhance mental clarity
  • Bring a sense of calmness to your busy day
  • Enrich personal relationships
  • Improve your overall health
  • Optimize your immune system to ward off viruses, illnesses and fatigue



Hello!  I’m Michael Ellison, the CEO and Co-Founder of TriVita. Are you ready to feel great in 10 days or less?

10 years ago, if anyone had asked me this question, I would have been more than a little cynical.  After 25 years of non-stop stress my body shut down – I went from running miles every day to barely being able to walk across the room.  Feel great? I would settle for surviving the morning!

My doctors had no answers – they shook their heads at my test results and finally told me I would have to live with it. Live with it?  How was I going to do the work I loved – be there for my family – teach my grandkids to fish?

On that day, I started my own Wellness Journey. I became a passionate Wellness Seeker. What I discovered are 10 Essentials for Wellness – 10 keys that unlock the door to restored physical, emotional and spiritual health. By making small but profound choices each day, I reclaimed my health, my strength and my life. I wrote my own Wellness Story.

When you sign on to take your own 10 Day Wellness Journey, you’ll have the confidence in knowing it’s a proven program backed by myself, TriVita’s health experts and TriVita Members who have all experienced this amazing journey, and are reaping the rewards. Together, we have developed quick, easy, proven activities to introduce you to one Essential a day. By spending just a few minutes each day, for 10 days, you can change your life.

Let’s get started!

Michael Ellison, Wellness Seeker since 1995

P.S.  The 10 Day Wellness Journey challenges you to take care of yourself – to provide the nutrients and nurturing you need to feel your best. Do it… you’re worth it!

The choices we make throughout the day determine the way we feel. However, life puts a variety of demands on us that can tax our bodies and our overall health—and we often wind up making unhealthy choices to deal with the stress. Your 10 Day Wellness Journey will rebalance your life and give you what you need to counterbalance stress and change the way you feel, starting today.

Discover what your body can do with wellness!

The Wellness Journey gives you simple, easy and powerful tips and ideas to help you develop new, healthy habits and replace negative ones. Small changes can make a big difference! We will help you to enhance the physical, emotional and spiritual aspects of your life one day at a time. From learning the proper methods to breathe deeply for health, to discovering how to develop gratitude and forgiveness, TriVita has a clear plan to help you do it.

Choose Wellness Today! Find out more about how you can make a healthy choice for yourself, and see how 10 days CAN make a big difference in how you feel.









Don’t wait—start your 10 Day Wellness Journey today!


Tuesday, April 28, 2009

10 Killer Ways To Multiply Your Sales

1. When you make your first sale, follow-up with the
customer. You could follow-up with a "thank you"
email and include an advertisement for other products
you sell. You could follow-up every few months.

2. You could upsell to your customers. When they're
at your order page, tell them about a few extra related
products you have for sale. They could just add it to
their original order.

3. Tell your customers if they refer four customers to
your web site, they will receive a full rebate of their
purchase price. This will turn one sale into three sales.

4. When you sell a product, give your customers the
option of joining an affiliate program so they can make
commissions selling your product. This will multiply
the sale you just made.

5. Sell the reprint/reproduction rights to your products.
You could include an ad on or with the product for
other products you sell. You could make sales for the
reproduction rights and sales on the back end product.

6. You could cross promote your product with other
businesses' products in a package deal. You can
include an ad or flyer for other products you sell and
have other businesses selling for you.

7. When you ship out or deliver your product, include
a coupon for other related products you sell in the
package. This will attract them to buy more products
from you.

8. Send your customers a catalog of add-on products
for the original product they purchased. This could be
upgrades, special services, attachments, etc. If they
enjoy your product they will buy the extra add-ons.

9. Sell gift certificates for your products. You'll make
sales from the purchase of the gift certificate, when
the recipient cashes it in. They could also buy other
items from your web site.

10. Send your customers free products with their
product package. The freebies should have your ad
printed on them. It could be bumper stickers, ball
caps, t-shirts etc. This will allow other people to see
your ad and order.


About the Author:
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Stone Evans helps ordinary people all over the world make
money online with affiliate programs. If you can follow 3
easy steps, you can get your own customized website,
autoresponder (email follow-up software) and pre-written
email marketing campaign professionally designed and
installed and ready to pull in profits for you in 24 hours
or less! See details at and sign up today at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com
---------------------------------------------------------------------

Monday, April 27, 2009

Multiple Income Streams - An Idea Whose Time Has Come in a Declining Economy: Featuring SFI

by Charles Aki, Ph.D.


Today's Multiple Income Streams Feature is SFI. For more information on this business model, click here.

Below is a reprint of my blog on the case for generating multiple streams of income.

In stocks and mutual funds investing, risk is minimized by owning a diversified portfolio of assets in different industries and family of funds. Just as diversification is essential to reducing losses in investing, so is generating multiple streams of income paramount to avoiding failure and losses in business.

No longer can the average household depend on only one source of income, especially now that our economy is in recession and more people are in danger of being laid off. No business or industry is exempted. Even giant companies in the automobile sector and financial industries are on the verge of declaring bankruptcy and laying off thousands of their employees. Is there any hope or solution for people who face layoffs, loss of income, and other related problems due to the nation's economic downturn?

I believe there is hope, and the solution is in building alternative sources of income. Helping people do this is the main mission of this blog site. It is my hope that whenever you visit this blog site, you will find an idea for making money online.

You may have already noticed the various business ideas and recommendations that have been posted on this blog site the past few days. I promise that more of these ideas will be shared on this blog site in the future. You will be hearing from experts and people who are already successful in implementing these multiple income strategies. I encourage you to read and act on the ideas presented here. If you need additional help, I am available to brainstorm some ideas with you to help you accomplish your goals much faster. Feel free to leave me a comment or request for further assistance; and, if you leave your contact details, I will respond to you as soon as possible.

Networking Your Home Business within Circles of Influence

When you need an auto mechanic or an air conditioning repairman, where do you turn for help? Sure, some people turn to the yellow pages. But most will turn to friends and family and ask if they know of anyone who can do the work.

The best place for your business to be positioned is to be the
business on the tips of the tongues of the people asked to make
the referral.

THE 300 RULE

Preachers, funeral directors and people in a few other
professions have learned "the 300 rule" through their own
personal experience.

"The 300 rule" states that the average person knows 300 people
on a friendly level. Wedding planners tend to make reservations
for 300 guests. Funeral directors tend to need to make room for
300 mourners. You get the idea.

DOODLING WITH CIRCLES OF INFLUENCE

Imagine your circle of friends, family and acquaintances, a.k.a.
your circle of influence. Now, draw your circle of influence as
a circle on a blank piece of paper.

Next, contemplate the people in your parents` circle of
influence. Some people who know your parents also know you.
Therefore, you will share some influence with the people your
folks know. Now draw your parents` circle of influence on your
piece of paper.

Your circle and your parents` circle will intersect in one area,
although the larger majority of the two circles will not
intersect. If you are like most people, the two circles on your
page at this point looks very similar to the MasterCard logo.

Now imagine drawing a page full of intersecting circles, each
circle representing the circle of influence of the people who
are within your own circle of influence. Imagine trying to
encapsulate an accurate rendering of where your circle and the
circle of your friends will actually intersect.

Some circles will share a large area of space, while others will
barely cover one another.

Actually, you can only imagine at this point what your piece of
paper will look like. The actual layout of the circles imagined
in this analogy is simply too overwhelming for the mind to
comprehend.

THE BIG PICTURE

300 multiplied by 300 equals 90,000. By using the analogy of
doodles in the previous section, the average person can actually
network with up to 90,000 people! Even factoring in the overlap,
one can still probably network with 50,000 people through their
own circle of influence!

Simply amazing, isn`t it?

HERE IS THE SECRET TO YOUR SUCCESS

There are 300 people on this planet whom you have a reasonable
amount of influence. Take advantage of this fact. Make darn sure
that every person within your own circle of influence KNOWS that
you are in business for yourself, and make sure they understand
what your business offers.

When your friend is asked to make a referral, they will
recommend you.

PASSIVE VERSUS ACTIVE REFERRAL NETWORKING

When people ask your friends for a referral and your friend
mentions your business, that is passive referral networking.

Active referral networking is when you can get your friends go
directly to their friends and say "Hey, I have a friend who just
started a business. If you are in need of what he offers or you
know someone who will need his services, would you please give
my friend a call or make the referral to his business?"

If you can get even a portion of the people in your own circle
of influence to actively refer your business, then you have
built the foundation to build an advertising campaign even more
effective than the average local television advertising campaign.

Think about that for a moment.

Most people only dream of reaching 50,000 potential customers
with their television advertising dollars. You now have the
knowledge to reach 50,000 people without spending a single penny.

About the Author:
------------------------------------------------------------
Stone Evans helps ordinary people all over the world make
money online with affiliate programs. If you can follow 3
easy steps, you can get your own customized website,
autoresponder (email follow-up software) and pre-written
email marketing campaign professionally designed and
installed and ready to pull in profits for you in 24 hours
or less! See details at and sign up today at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com
------------------------------------------------------------

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Fast-Track Your Journey to Home Business Success

No one has ever logged onto the Internet for the first time and started pocketing dollars in a really short period of time. As with all things in life, there is a learning curve.

SOME PERSONAL HISTORY

Just a few short years ago, I was a working stiff just like you.

One day, I bought and read a book called "Multiple Streams of Income" by bestselling author, Robert Allen. Immediately, I began my journey.

Every night after work and after my wife and children went to sleep, I would get online and explore different ways of using the Internet to make money.

In the two years that followed, I spent over $10,000 racking up credit card debt buying eBooks, membership sites, special reports, opt-in leads, and joining every "guru" recommended business opportunity that flew into my email inbox.

I stayed up learning, working, and drinking coffee until 5:00 in the morning, month after month filled with the hope of making money online.

In my third year of working part-time to build a home based income, I finally broke through and earned over $100,000 in just twelve months from the Internet.

BECOME THE MASTER OF YOUR LEARNING CURVE

Research the lives of all of the "gurus." The one thing that you will learn is that my own experience is not unique. Most of the high earners on the Internet experienced a learning curve very similar to my own.

Chances are that your curve will also be similar to mine, but it is my hope that you can get to the top faster than even I did. Three years was a long time to struggle, but every ounce of struggle was worth the reward I have finally received.

In order to shorten your own learning curve, you must do a few things differently than the rest of us did. You must become the master of your learning curve.

THE SHORTEST DISTANCE BETWEEN TWO POINTS IS A STRAIGHT LINE

There is only one way to shorten the curve on the Internet:

You must plan to succeed!

Here is the deal. Most people put up a freebie website and select a few affiliate programs to add to their website. Right out of the gate, most people are running for the finish line without any real plan in mind.

After a few short weeks, people begin to see the writing on the wall that says, "This is going to be a long hard road."

People check their hit counters daily for six weeks before they realize that getting traffic to their free site is going to be tough.

At this point, they begin developing their first batch of advertising. Then they spend countless months finding places to show their advertisements for free. Some make an even more drastic mistake by blowing thousands of hard earned dollars on
their new and untested ads. These are the people who will learn the facts of life the hard way. In time, they will learn how to make their advertising work for them, but most will earn very little money from their affiliate programs.

At this point in the learning curve, most people throw up their hands and walk away from their dreams in utter disgust. Instead of a walking away point, this should have convinced the struggling online entrepreneur that they were simply traveling
the wrong road.

YOU MUST PLAN TO SUCCEED

From day one, you must begin to learn about the nuances of web promotion. Read everything you can get your hands on. Don't just read the hype, back it up with the opinions of others who have reviewed the same programs before you came along. Learn from their mistakes and successes.

As you begin to learn, you must also look to make a decision. Do you want to step into a pre-built program that is designed to help you to succeed, OR do you want to create a completely new program of which you are the sole owner?

If you decide to step into a pre-designed and complete turn-key online money-making venture, then you must select the right venture to step into. If this is your decision, I encourage you to check out the Plug In Profit Site at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com


If you decide to go the journey on your own, then do all of the necessary research, planning and preparation that is needed for your success.

PREPARE TO SUCCEED

Decide what you think you would want to do, and then figure out how your planned site will generate a real income.

Internet old-timers know about hundreds of corporation domains that existed with IPO millions, but did not have an actual money plan that could sustain their business model. Most of these companies were among the hundreds of companies that bellied up in the 2000 dot bomb experience.

Don't blindly believe in your plan. Research others on the web who have undertaken similar business models and see if they have survived. Study your competitors in depth to learn what is working for them and what did not work for them. To better
understand what has or has not worked for competitor websites, check out their time lapsed progressions using the Wayback Machine: http://web.archive.org.

Once you have determined your money plan, then you should undertake the development of a business plan and a marketing plan. Utilize professional assistance if you need to do so. While creating your plans, make a determination as to which domain name you think would be best, then register it along with a hosting account. You can do this at Host4Profit in Step 2 on this page: http://www.pluginprofitsite.com

Once you have developed your business plan and marketing plan and have run them through several revisions, then it will be time to buy your domain name and to begin work with a site designer and developer. You may need to have your domain sitting on a web host for your site developer, but this is not always necessary. While they are doing their work, enlist a copywriter to help you with your site sales copy.

When your site designer and developer have your site working, you should then undertake significant testing to make sure everything works as planned. It is much harder to fix problems on a operational site than it is to fix problems on a site that has yet to be launched.

When testing is done, then you should fill in your sales copy and then shoot for launch. Of course, you already have a marketing plan in place, so your preparation here will be simply a matter of putting the pieces of the puzzle into place.

You are finally ready to open for business. Don't be afraid to spend the money to bring your dream alive. Time can replace money in the goal of starting a profitable online business, but money invested can shave years off of your company's growth.

About the Author:
------------------------------------------------------------
Stone Evans helps ordinary people all over the world make money online with affiliate programs. If you can follow 3 easy steps, you can get your own customized website, autoresponder (email follow-up software) and pre-written email marketing campaign professionally designed and installed and ready to pull in profits for you in 24 hours or less! See details at and sign up today at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com

------------------------------------------------------------

Saturday, April 25, 2009

FREE Report Reveals What Most Weight-Loss Companies Don't Want You to Know

Don’t try to lose another pound until you have
read this FREE report…

After trying 62 different diet programs, which ultimately led to
a maximum weight of 478 pounds, this guy discovered the ONE
thing that’s helped him lose over 190 pounds! His FREE
report reveals how he did it. It also reveals what most weight
loss companies don't want you to know.

Click here to get the FREE report

Friday, April 24, 2009

Multiple Income Streams - An Idea Whose Time Has Come in a Declining Economy

by Charles Aki, Ph.D.

In stocks and mutual funds investing, risk is minimized by owning a diversified portfolio of assets in different industries and family of funds. Just as diversification is essential to reducing losses in investing, so is generating multiple streams of income paramount to avoiding failure and losses in business.

No longer can the average household depend on only one source of income, especially now that our economy is in recession and more people are in danger of being laid off. No business or industry is exempted. Even giant companies in the automobile sector and financial industries are on the verge of declaring bankruptcy and laying off thousands of their employees. Is there any hope or solution for people who face layoffs, loss of income, and other related problems due to the nation's economic downturn?

I believe there is hope, and the solution is in building alternative sources of income. Helping people do this is the main mission of this blog site. It is my hope that whenever you visit this blog site, you will find an idea for making money online.

You may have already noticed the various business ideas and recommendations that have been posted on this blog site the past few days. I promise that more of these ideas will be shared on this blog site in the future. You will be hearing from experts and people who are already successful in implementing these multiple income strategies. I encourage you to read and act on the ideas presented here. If you need additional help, I am available to brainstorm some ideas with you to help you accomplish your goals much faster. Feel free to leave me a comment or request for further assistance; and, if you leave your contact details, I will respond to you as soon as possible.

Understanding the Difference between Marketing & Promotion

Are you an online marketer? Or do you simply promote affiliate
programs? Marketing is truly the most misunderstood word in use
today on the Internet. Let me see if I can clarify this issue
just a bit.

In Marketing 101 at your local university, marketing is actually
the process of Product, Place, Price and Promotion.

PRODUCT

No business can exist without a product or service to sell.

In a nutshell, entrepreneurs are the people who believe in a
product, service or idea, so much that they are willing to
invest their lives into the development of their dream.

Historically, every major corporation in the world was started
by an entrepreneur with a dream and the drive to make it a
reality.

However, there comes a time in the life of every corporation
when those who fear the gambling nature of their founder, squash
the entrepreneurial drive that made the company a viable concern
in the first place. The entrepreneur will either submit to the
careful nature of the stockholders, or he will be forced to
leave the company he created.

The only entrepreneurs who withstand the pressure to move more
carefully are those who have maintained majority control over
their companies.

PLACE

In the offline world, place is defined by location. On the
Internet, place is defined by domain name and the web hosting
service chosen.

Both online and offline, place can make or break a company
without respect to the quality and value of the product, service
or idea.

PRICE

Selecting a price is determined first on a basis of whether the
company wants to be seen as a discount or a value company.

Take for example Wal-Mart and Staples.

Wal-Mart is the lead discounter in the marketplace. Staples on
the other hand is the specialist in office supplies.

Both sell a significant number of office supplies despite the
fact that the lowest price can usually be found at Wal-Mart. As
a value dealer, Staples can afford to charge more for their
products than Wal-Mart.

So the question for you is whether you want to position your
company as a discount or value company.

Testing has shown that products and services can be sold at any
number of prices and still reach a significant number of people.

The challenge of selecting the best price for your product or
service will require a certain amount of testing.

UNDERSTANDING THE PRICING EQUATION

Let`s assume we are selling a product. Let us also assume that
we know that the product can be sold for $10 or $50. Let us also
assume that if the price dips below $10 or rises above $50, then
the product sales fall off significantly.

Our challenge is to determine the best rate at which to sell our
product.

Testing has shown us that we can sell 1000 items a week at $10.
Testing has also shown that we can sell 500 items per week at
$50. And testing has shown that we can sell 650 items per week
at $45.

At $10, our projected weekly earnings are $10,000. When we sell
the product at $50, we know that we can earn $25,000 per week.
Most importantly, we know that we can earn $29,250 when our
product is priced at $45.

With the imaginary testing we have done on our imaginary
product, we can easily see that selling our product at $45 per
item will earn us more money over the long haul.

Thus, when we make the decision for a national rollout of our
product, then we will price our product at $45.

Of course, this is a very simplistic analysis of the point I am
trying to make. Though simple, I believe this analogy will help
you understand the methods of developing a product`s prices.

PROMOTION

Promotion, on the other hand, is the process of notifying the
consumers for your product or service of your availability to
serve them.

Methods of promotion vary distinctly and should be arranged to
meet very specific goals.

As with product, place and price, promotion should not be left
to chance. You should test every ad, every media, and every
price point to determine the best bang for your promotional
dollars.

HEADS UP!

If you are an online promoter or marketer, please factor in the
most important element concerning the cost of your promotions.

What element is that? Your time!

Value your time at a certain dollar amount, and figure in your
time into the cost of your promotional accounting.

I say this because too many online promoters lose sight of this
concept and spend 20 hours to generate one sale while using free
advertising. Even if you rate your time at the federal minimum
wage, then you will have invested $105 of your time for one sale
that might only net you a gross sale of $45!

ARE YOU TRULY A MARKETER OR ARE YOU JUST A PROMOTER?

Most people who run a business on the Internet call themselves
marketers. Yet, most of these same people are really just
promoters wrapped in the label of a marketer.

True marketers do not promote without a lot of advance work.
They spend time planning, testing and measuring their actions
and results to get the most out of every dollar spent and earned.

Entrepreneurs finesse the art of marketing as they build their
company into a major enterprise.

If you are a promoter who does not keep an eye on the total
marketing equation, then you are bound to fail.

If you do call yourself a marketer, then do what a professional
marketer does. Make sure that every dollar spent is spent well.
Make sure that every dollar earned is put to good use. Market
well so that when the people of the next generation look at your
life, they will see a fine example of a successful entrepreneur
that they will strive to emulate.


About the Author:
------------------------------------------------------------
Stone Evans helps ordinary people all over the world make
money online with affiliate programs. If you can follow 3
easy steps, you can get your own customized website,
autoresponder (email follow-up software) and pre-written
email marketing campaign professionally designed and
installed and ready to pull in profits for you in 24 hours
or less! See details at and sign up today at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com
------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Internet Promotion Techniques 101

Did you realize there are only three types of online
promotion?... This statement may seem odd and even untrue in
your mind, but I am speaking in more general terms than you
might be thinking.

Let me explain.

The three types of promotion are Junk, Active and Passive
promotions.

JUNK PROMOTIONS ARE MONEY PITS

Junk promotions are those that seem to produce results, but by
their very nature are really only illusionary promotions.

For example, let me begin with FFA (Free For All) pages. You
might find yourself subscribing to a submission program that
tricks you into believing you are submitting your links to tens
of thousands search engines.

According to the Open Directory website, they have only approved 1705 search engines and directories for inclusion in their database (http://dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/Searching/).

I like using the DMOZ directory as an example because submitted
links are tested by human beings with integrity, for the honesty
used in site description. Search Engine Watch and other search
watchers tend to show fewer than these 1705 engines, primarily
because a lot of the engines provide very little value.

Yes, you can submit your URL to a FFA page, but FFA's usually
only permit 100 or 1000 links on their page at any one time. So,
if ten thousand people are submitting a link to an FFA page on a
daily basis, then the average life of your link is between seven
minutes and 144 minutes. I suspect the actual number of
submitters is much higher and the results are much worse. Given
that few people surf FFA pages, the chances of your submission
being of any real value is practically nill!

Most of the people telling you that you can submit your site to
tens of thousands of search engines are truly only submitting
your site to FFA pages! Beware of the false promises.

Another junk promotion method is Safe Lists. A safe list is a
mailing group that is signed up to be received by people who
want to submit their own ads. Now, most safe lists have
thousands of subscribers who are able to submit their ads daily
or weekly. The person signed up to receive the list will receive
anywhere from twenty to 140+ messages a day from the list. These
messages will be received by people only interested in promoting
their own thing who do not have the right motivation to open,
let alone read Your Advertising. As a result, thousands of
messages go out daily or weekly that will never be seen by
anyone but the sender of the ad. Where is the value in that?
There is none.

ACTIVE PROMOTIONS

Active promotions are the type that require you to go out on a
daily basis or a weekly basis and put out your advertisements.
With active promotions, you will either place your advertising
or you will not sell your products or services. Your choice is
simple --- work or starve.

Examples of active promotions include Pay Per Click Search
Engines (PPCSE's), Direct Email, Ezine Advertising, Solo Ezine
Ads, Newsletter Publishing, Ezine Ad Swaps, Classified Ads,
Auctions, Site Sponsorship and Banner Ads.

Some people are able to utilize these methods very productively,
while others are destined to drop their money into the
bottomless pit of failed Internet promotions.

PASSIVE PROMOTIONS

Passive promotions are those promotions that can continue to
provide results for you long after you have invested the work to
make them available to the Internet community.

Examples of passive promotions include: Link Exchanges,
Articles, Ebooks, Content Exchanges and Writing Testimonials for
others.

Let's look at articles as a solid example of my point.

You are reading an article that I have written to promote my own
business. This article is timeless and therefore could have been
written five years ago and still have been as valuable as it is
today.

Due to the fact that the article is timeless, it can and will be
placed in newsletters/ezines and their accompanying online
archives, on websites and in ebooks for many more years to come.

As a result, this article will continue to serve me well beyond
the time in which I wrote it and submitted it to publishers and
webmasters for public consumption and publication.

This is the best example I can give you of an excellent passive
promotional method.

AVOID THE MONEY PITS

Many try and even fewer succeed to conquer the Internet and to
produce their dreams of online wealth.

My hope is that you will be one of the people who conquer the
challenges before you and to make a nice living while working
online. It will take drive, determination, study plus trial and
error, but you can make it work for you.

Please continue to educate yourself so that you can avoid the
money pits - instead, strive to find the money barrels. It can
be done. I am living proof.

About the Author:
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stone Evans helps ordinary people all over the world make
money online with affiliate programs. If you can follow 3
easy steps, you can get your own customized website,
autoresponder (email follow-up software) and pre-written
email marketing campaign professionally designed and
installed and ready to pull in profits for you in 24 hours
or less! See details at and sign up today at:
http://www.pluginprofitsite.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

The Cooperative Marketing Approach - A New Model for Generating More Income

Create a successful business while working alongside an emerging industry leader to help bring a positive change. A TriVita Business can provide the opportunity for individuals to create a stable and ongoing income with a commitment of time, capital and effort. With the experience of proven business model supported by quality products, excellent customer service and a worthwhile cause, TriVita offers a viable opportunity for entrepreneurs to create an additional source of income.

If you’re like most entrepreneurs, you seek out opportunities that can increase or secure your lifestyle. It can be difficult to find good financial opportunities that offer a worthwhile return on one’s time, money and effort. Most business opportunities today require large up-front starting capital and rigorous hours that generally end up depleting your quality of life. Good financial opportunities are somewhat rare, but they do exist, and we believe a TriVita Business is one of them.

There are many benefits of a TriVita Business, including: Minimal start-up capital requirements. No operational headaches. The extensive support of TriVita’s professional corporate services staff. Ownership of a business that has equity and resale value.

TriVita has built a unique business model around the proven business of acquiring and servicing customers while growing your business. We invite you to learn more about a TriVita Business by contacting TriVita, listening to the audio link below, or clicking here for more information: www.trivita.net.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

How Smart Info-Marketers Sell Consulting Packages and Advisory Programs

By Janet Switzer

Consultants, experts and entrepreneurs can earn thousands of dollars per hour by conducting programs that help business owners or individuals apply proven principles of success.

A successful program packages your consulting and advisory services in a way that's designed to achieve a specific result. People buy results, not products. And as a consultant, you know that it takes time to achieve results for clients. So not only will you earn a lot more revenue if you sell a long-term package, you'll probably have a happier client in the long-run because you'll have the time to help them achieve the result they're looking for.

Who determines exactly what the "package" is and when the "result" is achieved? You do, of course. Remember, you are the expert. YOU tell the client which package they need to achieve the result they are looking for. If they knew everything it took to achieve the result, they wouldn't need you, would they? You dictate the services to be delivered. Of course, it helps greatly to have lots of testimonials that say "I bought Package XYZ and got this specific result."

What kind of packages can you offer?

Mentorship and Apprenticeship Programs -- Typically sold with an advertised goal or specific result in mind, these programs are marketed based upon the benefits the protege can expect to receive. They usually include both private and group coaching sessions -- such as a fixed number of private sessions with once-a-week group sessions for 6 months or a year. But most importantly, they are "hands-on" programs with participants applying what they learn during their time in the program.

Long-Term Consulting Contracts and Monthly Retainers -- If you can package consulting for a major corporation where you provide ongoing training for their staff or ongoing consulting services where there is a specific outcome expected, these contracts can be very lucrative. Monthly retainers can run into the thousands of dollars a month for each company you're working with, just to accomplish a certain amount of work each month -- or sometimes just to make yourself available.

Subscription Consulting -- If you successfully operate a specific type of business, fellow business owners will pay you a fixed amount every month for ongoing advice, materials, conference calls, email access or phone access -- assuming your program is marketed with a clearly stated result. Included services might include: (1) A private one-on-one call every month with a junior consultant or even the senior consultant, (2) A group call every month or every two weeks, (3) A monthly mailing of reference materials or business how-to information, or (4) A quarterly advertising and promotional sampler pack, and (5) A live event if required to effectively deliver your operating system. Pricing for these programs varies from $195 a month to $2,000 a month.

Business-Building and Practice-Building Systems -- When you sell to businesses who are desperate for the result you're offering, it not only makes your marketing job easier, it makes for a much more rewarding program for both of you. And whether you have a fixed system for getting results or you are offering business turnaround services, these programs can sell for thousands of dollars per person. One CPA developed an entire program specifically to help businesses bring more of their revenue to the bottom line. He didn't claim to grow revenues or grow the business in any way, he just claimed to help bring more of it to the bottom line through cost-saving procedures and other methods.

Coaching Programs -- Several years ago, some of the biggest names in the seminar business added an ongoing advisory option to their seminar programs and called it coaching -- making executive coaching, personal coaching and business coaching accepted and popular. Today, coaching has taken on more elaborate forms and typically includes:

• Live sessions over the phone or web sessions conducted live at a specific time
• Preparatory materials giving participants basic information they'll need to be coached effectively.
• Ongoing homework assignments -- which is what makes it a system, rather than just "small talk" over the phone.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Earning Top Dollar As an “Expert Who Speaks”

By Janet Switzer

How would you like to travel to the world's most exciting places, help others with business advice and personal development, earn thousands per day selling your info-products, and hear the applause of a crowd sitting on the edge of their seats?

If your answer is "Yes!" you should consider adding professional speaking to your info-product business.

How to Market Yourself as an International Expert Who Speaks

On any given day, thousands of conferences, workshops, meetings and other training events take place -- most of which need experts to deliver information the group can use. There are a number of different types of individuals and groups which hire speakers:

• Independent Meeting Planners are hired by companies to organize events including conventions, trade shows, workshops and conferences. They are also responsible for hiring the speakers for those events. Corporate meeting planners, on the other hand, are employees of a company who've been given the job of putting together the annual sales meeting, executive retreat or other event.

• Trade associations also hire speakers. They hold annual conferences and training events and want to bring good, solid information to their members in order to provide value for the association dues members pay every year. Trade associations look not only for high-profile motivational speakers, but also for experts who speak on their subject matter.

• Non-profit organizations, educator's organizations and charities also conduct a lot of training, hold conferences and have a need for speakers.

• One of the biggest buyers of speaker's services are network marketing and direct sales organizations -- not only the parent companies, but also individual "leaders" with large downlines of distributors or direct sellers.

• Other trainers, training companies and seminar promoters can also be customers for your speaking and training services, especially if you can deliver expertise they’re not able to provide.

Two Ways to Get Paid Speaking…

There are two ways to get paid when you speak -- either by being paid a fee to deliver a speech or by speaking for free in order to sell products at the back of the room. Typically, fee-based engagements require a lot of outbound telemarketing -- either by you or by your commissioned salesperson, which may include any speaker's bureaus that represent you. Speaking for free, on the other hand, makes "getting hired" much easier because you simply need to offer your services by phone -- or perhaps via a short written proposal letter -- to the person or organization holding the event.

If you're willing to speak for free or for low fees, a resource called www.SpeakerMatch.com can help connect you with hundreds of companies and organizations who are holding meetings and looking for speakers. You get to communicate directly with the person doing the hiring, so it's a lot easier to provide the organization exactly what it wants or needs.

There's no dishonor in speaking for free, by the way. This is particularly true if you can speak at a trade association meeting where everyone sitting in the audience represents a company who could buy your information product or pay for your advice.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

Sunday, April 19, 2009

My Prospecting Secrets Revealed

Let me start off by explaining the biggest benefit of providing your downline members with a viral prospecting system.

It boils down to this...

When you have a viral prospecting system in place for your team members, your downline has the potential to take on a life of its own and continue to grow effortlessly while you're focusing on more important things such as family and friends.

A gentleman I recently discovered managed to accomplish the difficult task of duplication while maintaining his full time job and family life.

He mentioned that ever since the beginning of his online ventures he was searching for a system that brought interested prospects in automatically.

He didn't have time to do the traditional recruiting methods because they required a lot of time and commitment.

What he wanted instead, was a huge downline that duplicated on auto-pilot from his part time efforts.

"But did such a solution exist?"

If it did, he said he couldn't find it...

So after many years of struggling to build a solid residual income through network marketing he decided it was time to take the bull by the horns (so to speak) and he created a 3 step marketing system that literally exploded his downline within a few months.

The part that amazed me the most was the fact that he didn't spend a dime on advertising. And his downline is now over 11,460 strong and growing monthly on auto-pilot.

Ultimately I learned that being a successful sponsor involves providing some type of system that helps people build their business, not sitting around wondering why your downline isn't doing anything.

I guess the quote from Zig Ziglar holds true:

"You can have everything in life you want, if you just help enough other people get what they want."


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If you'd like to learn more about a brand new prospecting system that builds YOUR primary business and generates multiple income streams, click here.
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Marketing Live Events for Info-Marketers

By Janet Switzer

Conducting live training events is an important part of many information product businesses. Yet filling seminars is often a daunting process. Here's how smart info-marketers sell hundreds of attendees into their live events.

EMAIL MARKETING -- The fastest and cheapest method for marketing live events is via email. You can acquire email addresses to mail either by: (1) collecting them at your website when visitors sign up for a free e-zine, special report or newsletter you offer, or (2) through convincing other list owners to endorse you to their customers. Emails should direct readers to a webpage that compels them to register for the event.

YOUR EVENT’S WEBSITE -- If you have secure registration and credit card processing at your website, prospects can read about your event any time of day or night – then register without needing to call you during business hours. Create a "landing page" sales letter just for your event, then include all kinds of descriptive copy about the benefits of the event, why the prospect should respect you as an expert, testimonials of other people who have worked with you, bullet points of what the prospect will learn, a listing of the materials they'll receive, how to register, what the price is, details that show the price is a great value, and so on.

PRINTED BROCHURES -- These are expensive to print and mail, but if you do speaking engagements, trade shows or other events, you can distribute them on-site. These can also be mailed as part of a direct-mail package. One type of brochure that is worth printing is an elaborate high-end looking business "portfolio" describing your program or live event -- particularly if you are marketing a very expensive program to business owners.

FREE SPECIAL REPORT OR OTHER INFO-SALES DEVICE -- An info-sales device can be anything from a special report to an article to a short ebook written in third-party style -- as if a journalist had written it. You can distribute it at your website or in other people's e-zines -- particularly if you are going to be offering the same event two or three times a year. On the Internet, these special reports tend to circulate for a long time, so be sure you have something to offer prospects months from now (such as the recordings of your live event).

JOINT VENTURES -- Whenever marketing live events, you should never rely on marketing solely to your own list. Other business owners will promote your event to their list is: (1) you pay a commission whenever a sale is made to one of their customers, and (2) if your event is a free workshop they can promote as a service to their customers and subscribers.

DIRECT MAIL -- One of the best methods for marketing expensive live trainings and long-term programs is direct mail. The ideal direct-mail package includes a personalized letter to your customer plus a separate 8- or 12-page program announcement. Alternatively, an endorser can send their own customers a letter that talks about you, explains how they've personally benefited from your expertise, why they are recommending your live event and why they are recommending that people read the enclosed announcement.

SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS -- If you speak from the platform, you can sell your live event as a product at the back of the room. One caveat is that you need to speak enough to fill your event if you plan to use speaking as your sole marketing method.

CORPORATE PREVIEWS -- A number of seminar promoters regularly contact large corporations with thousands of employees and offer to hold a free one-hour preview -- signing up employees afterward for a local seminar. These might be "lunch-and-learn" programs held in the company cafeteria or perhaps a two-hour evening program held in a large conference room.

MARKETING-ORIENTED TELESEMINARS -- Use email to promote a free teleseminar where you preview what will take place at your live seminar. Include guests on your teleseminar -- either other experts who will be speaking at your event or people who've attended the same event in the past and can be interviewed about how their life has changed as a result. Provide quality information of value so the entire tele-seminar isn't just one big commercial for your event. If you have a small group of listeners -- such as 75 people or less -- you can open the lines for questions at the end of the conference call. At the very end of the call, make sure listeners know that you have staff members standing by at your office to help folks register for the live event.

DISPLAY ADVERTISING -- Display advertising is expensive, but useful for promoting local public seminars. Similarly, if you are targeting a specific industry or business subject, you should certainly advertise in that industry's trade magazines. Try to buy advertising space on "remnant," which is advertising space left over at the end of the month when all of the other advertising has already been placed and paid for. You should get pricing that's up to 75% off the rates quoted on the magazine's rate card.

OUTBOUND TELEMARKETING -- If you have a relationship with a particular list of names, such as your own customers, you can get sales people to call these customers about your program or live event.

PRESS RELATIONS -- By far the most cost effective method, press releases and radio-TV appearances are a great way to promote events -- either within a specific industry or geographic territory. You should send a press release to all trade journals, trade association newsletters and other industry periodicals, particularly if you are selling in a specific business category. Websites such as PRWeb and PRNewswire will broadcast your press release to thousands of journalists, webmasters and others. Tying the subject of your seminar to a current event or trend is the key to successfully getting into print.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Developing and Selling Coaching Programs

By Janet Switzer

A decade ago, the term “coach” was reserved for sports, and coaching was something that happened on the ball field. Today, coaching, telecoaching, coaching programs and coaches training has become a multi-million dollar industry.
How does coaching differ from the rest of the “training” industry?
Coaches motivate people to action. They help them prioritize their projects and goals. They help them plan their work and work their plan — but they don’t necessarily give them the actual strategies to execute, steps to take, business or marketing plans to follow, nor do they give them financial or legal advice.
In fact, it may surprise you to know that many coaches have no industry expertise whatsoever in the field in which their clients conduct business. Sometimes coaches are personal coaches, helping individuals determine and take action on what would make them most happy in their life.

How to Benefit By Offering Coaching

Not only can you add coaching — either one-on-one or in groups — to your consulting work or to any information product you publish, you can also develop an entire product where coaching is the primary feature.
If you sell a home-study course, you can sell coaching as way to help your buyers and clients learn from the product, determine their own goals and move through their obstacles and roadblocks to take action.

What’s Typically Included in a Coaching Program?

Coaching “programs” are easier to sell and typically generate more revenue than coaching on an hourly basis. During individual coaching hours, you must always convince the client to buy the next hour and the next. Coaching programs, on the other hand, eliminate the continual question in the client’s mind about whether they’ve received value or not.
A coaching program typically consists of:
• A fixed number of coaching sessions or a fixed number of months of unlimited coaching services — conducted either privately or in group format and usually held weekly, twice a month, or when specifically requested by the client.
• Written material provided either at the beginning of the program or in weekly emails.
• Preparatory materials (in the form of exercises downloaded via the Internet, audio CDs, a questionnaire, survey or personal audit, a review of the client’s materials and so on).
A coaching program may also include a live training weekend or retreat, but this would be more appropriate to other kinds of programs.

Pricing Your Coaching Program

Pricing a personal-development coaching program can be as simple as bundling four coaching sessions with an audio program for $395. A business coaching program, on the other hand, should be priced at what the prospect is willing to pay to solve their pain or reach a specific goal. Typically, business coaching and “how to make money” coaching is priced much higher than personal coaching — occasionally in the thousands of dollars, depending on the price participants paid for your program prior to being sold the coaching program. Other factors that impact price include: how much access participants will get, how well you can describe the value of the coaching program, and more. Most business coaching programs are priced between $3,500 and $8,000.

How to Deliver a Coaching Program

Conduct all coaching sessions by telephone. Record them and send an MP3 file of the recording to the participant as an added value. During each session, use your motivational skills and any industry knowledge you have to get the client to commit to taking action by the time of your next call.

How to Market Your Coaching Program

The key to successfully marketing coaching programs is to deliver the message that your program will change the prospect’s life, give them a new career, jump-start their business, or in some other way give them highly valuable information they can use. There are dozens of strategies for launching and marketing a successful program. For instance:

• Create a powerful written announcement or compelling marketing copy you can distribute everywhere — in your ezine, at your website, in other people’s newsletters, as a flyer at your speaking engagements, in your subscription audio program, through dedicated mailings to your current customers, in press articles, everywhere.
• Speak at industry-specific events where the audience would be perfect prospects for coaching services and sell it as a package of sessions or one-on-one access over a specific time period.
• Offer your coaching package through your affiliate program.
• Do joint ventures with other people who have lists of customers and who can endorse your coaching service.
• Seek out endorsements and testimonials and media mentions from people — celebrities, past clients and customers, newspapers and magazines — that will appeal to specific segments of your market. Then approach these endorsers about selling your program to their customers.
• Position yourself as the leading expert for creating massive results in your area of expertise. Once you position yourself as this expert, you can not only conduct training programs and produce other information products, you can also generate press coverage and other media activity around your message.
• Call companies who distribute learning tools and especially audio programs, to see if they will give you a distribution contract for your home-study course or a product that causes a need for coaching. Include a special offer inside the home-study course that allows people to call for a free evaluation to decide if coaching is right for them.
• Do a “nationwide search” for individuals who would be interested in being test cases to work with you to achieve a specific result. Accept only three beta test students, and offer them the program for free. Then, when the final coaching program is launched (after beta testing), sell the program to the hundreds or thousands of prospects generated by the original “search.”


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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

Friday, April 17, 2009

Why Systems Sell and Info-Products Don’t

By Janet Switzer

Many info-marketers who create home-study courses – and authors who write beyond-the-book products -- could substantially improve revenues and protect the long-term marketability of their products by creating learning “systems” versus information “products.”

This principle of info-marketing has been proven repeatedly over decades of selling knowledge products: Customers will ALWAYS pay more money for “systems” than they will for “products.”

They’ll pay more money for a system that gets them to where they want be, than they will for a product they have to spend time understanding and applying to their situation. Buyers don’t want to figure out how to make your information work for them. They want you to do that for them.

What is a system?

(1) A system takes people through a process -- it describes a series of tasks that’s proven to accomplish a goal. A system isn’t just information randomly compiled together into a “course.”

(2) A system must discuss how to do each task -- it must fully explain how to execute each step.

(3) A system contains illustrative examples of how to perform the steps, whether you use anecdotal stories, actual sample documents or exercises the reader can complete in order to plan their activities. People learn through stories and through doing.

(4) A system must be packaged to look like it’s a system and be packaged to look like it’s worth the money you’re asking the prospect to spend. Remember that people will spend SOME amount of money to solve their problem. Your product has to look like it’s worth it.

Those are the four criteria for producing a system. But let’s take a look at some real-life examples of systems.

First of all, I recommend every expert start by developing a multi-media home study course. This combination of printed material, audio and video components does two things for you: (1) It lets you begin charging a high price for your expertise (from $^395 and up), plus (2) It can immediately be used as the reference materials for any training program you want to offer. This “system-in-a-box” can be shipped as soon as someone registers for your training program…while you deliver consulting, teleclasses, weekend workshops and other services later on. Your participants will have more confidence in your expensive training program if they receive high-quality reference materials at the beginning.

Other types of systems include:

* Video-Based Training Sets -- most typically a weekend workshop or other event video-recorded, then divided by topic into 4-6 DVDs.

* Tele-Seminar Series -- giving people a result over 90 days of group telephone training calls, perhaps delivering just one or two group calls a week.

* Train-the-Trainer Programs -- giving teachers, trainers, therapists and consultants a new topic to deliver to their students, patients and clients.

* Corporate Improvement Programs -- A facilitator’s manual plus a workbook for each company employee who participates. Some experts include a video of themselves delivering a portion of the training.

* Business-Building and Practice-Building Systems -- A complete system of how to improve revenues, bring in more customers, sell more products, and so on for a specific type of business or professional practice. Often called a “business in a box,” these systems often lead to further sales because you can easily upsell buyers into ongoing support programs and consulting packages.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

Thursday, April 16, 2009

The Ultimate Success Formula

What is the ultimate success formula? Here it is:

1. Write down what you want to accomplish (i.e., your goal).
2. State the reason you want it (i.e. your why).
3. Write down the date you intend to accomplish your goal (i.e., your when).
4. Specify what you have to do to accomplish your goal (i.e., your how).
5. List all the people you need to help you get what you want (i.e., your team).
6. Identify the approaches that are not working, then change them (i.e., your challenges).
7. Identify the approaches that are working, then reinforce them (i.e, your strengths).

My goal is to help 10,000 people become financially independent, each earning at least $100,000 a year, within the next five years. What is your goal?

How to Get Others to Sell Your Info-Products for You

By Janet Switzer

All authors and info-marketers would like to see more sales of their information products -- but too often, they lack the necessary marketing skills or the time to more effectively market their titles. Many emerging experts discover that it takes time to build up your own list of customers, prospects and subscribers.

But when you do a joint-venture with someone else who endorses your products to their customers -- you get to tap into and leverage the time, effort and money they’ve spent over the years building their list and maintaining customer loyalty.

When adding joint ventures to your marketing mix, there are four major questions to consider: (1) how to find joint venture partners, (2) how to approach the other party, (3) what kinds of deals to make, and most importantly (4) what kinds of marketing campaigns to conduct with the names once you negotiate a joint-venture arrangement.

To begin with, there are three categories of businesses where you’ll find ideal joint venture partners -- (1) synergistic companies, (2) your competitors and (3) companies that are completely unrelated to you.

Let’s look at synergistic businesses first.

(1) “Synergistic companies” or businesses are those that already sell complementary type of information. What they’re selling is similar or complementary to what you are offering.

Let’s say you’re selling a system for advertising accounting services and you do a joint-venture with a company that provides continuing education credits for CPAs. In the United States, accountants and other types of professional practitioners are required to maintain a certain level of competency and skills, so they take classes locally or at conferences and earn what are called CEUs or continuing education units.

If you have an information product to help these CPAs bring more clients in the door, perhaps you could locate a company that provides CEU classes but doesn’t offer advertising, marketing and practice-building information as you do.

This would be a perfect company to do a joint venture with -- not only because they are acquiring new students on a regular basis, but because these students know them, trust them, see them as a source of expertise and would probably listen to any recommendations they might give about you and your product.

(2) The next big category of potential joint-venture partners is “competitive companies.” Think about it: At the same time your competitor is prospecting and selling new customers, some prospects are not buying anything. Similarly, customers who have already purchased everything your competitor has to offer may be no longer buying or subscribing.

If you can convince your competitor to promote your products to their non-converted leads or past customer names, that’s a phenomenal joint-venture opportunity for the both of you. You could make money, but also turn those names into revenue for your competitor who has most likely given up ever selling them something else.

(3) The last big category of company to look for is “completely unrelated companies.” These are situations to look for where the company isn’t providing anything similar to what you provide, but COULD provide it if you proved there would be value for their customers and prospects in doing so.

For example, perhaps you find a company who sells a money-making program that is vastly different from the income-generation training program you sell. You can still approach these companies to become a recommended second-income idea or an alternative to the one their prospects originally investigated.

To help you execute joint ventures with these three kinds of companies, start investigating professional schools, magazines, newsletters, corporations, speakers, radio talk shows, infomercial companies and other information outlets for possibilities.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.

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Protecting Your Info-Products as Valuable Intellectual Properties

By Janet Switzer

The information products that you develop and sell are valuable properties that should be protected -- in the same way major corporations, big-name publishing brands and celebrity authors protect their intellectual property rights.

Intellectual properties are things like published works, recordings, website content, your brand and your trademark. And part of building an information empire is securing the legal control, ownership and defense of these properties -- from registering your trademark, to recording your copyrights to obtaining releases from other people whose expertise or comments you might include in your products. You may want someday to sell your business, assign the published assets, license your marketing system or simply prevent someone else from using your product name and creating confusion in the marketplace.

A few hours spent protecting these assets is critical.

TRADEMARKS

For info-marketers, authors, entrepreneurs and others who benefit from being published or publicized, the name of any product lines or publication series you might create should be officially registered as your trademark, assuming that the name is eligible to be trademarked. At the very least, you should add the trademark (TM) symbol to the name of your products, then put in fine print on your copyright page the words “[Title of Product] is a trademark of [your name or other owner of the trademark].”

Of course, you should always consult your own attorney before undertaking any legal matter. I can’t ethically or legally advise you on legal matters. But I do want to save you some time and money by directing you to information and resources you can use.

The first place to visit for information on trademarking your brand is the website of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (www.uspto.gov) where you can perform searches of pending and registered trademarks.

Anytime you register a trademark you have in mind, you and your attorney should conduct an extensive search of the mark in use before filing your trademark application and paying a lot of money. Those searches can run several hundreds dollars per name. But one of the easiest ways to save money in this process is to look up your proposed trademark first at the USPTO website, so you know whether you have a fighting chance of getting it.

When you log on to www.uspto.gov, look for the word “Trademarks” at the left-hand side of the home page, then click on the “Search” button just below it. You’ll jump over to the next page which is the main search page for the Trademark Electronic Search System (or TESS for short). There you can start your search.

Click on the very first search form option, which is New User Form Search (Basic). If you have an actual tradename in mind, you can simply type that word or phrase into the search window and see if any pre-existing marks exist in the TESS system. If you put your phrase in quotation marks, the system will search for that exact combination of words. If you think there may be trademarks that are similar to yours, you can type in just one of the words and see what comes up.

Here’s what you’ll be looking for: A results page that says, “Sorry, no results were returned for your query.” That’s a good sign because it means your proposed trademark has not been registered or applied for by someone else. But, to be safe, you should always do the search again without the quotation marks to see what IS registered that might be similar. In many cases, your proposed trademark might be so similar to an existing mark that your application will not be approved.

You’ll also need to apply in specific classes of commerce where you are using the trademark or plan to use the mark.

Most authors and info-marketers who are building an information empire or publishing brand will want to register their trademark in the following classes of commerce:

Class 9 -- Recorded material including audio, video, software, etc.
Class 16 -- Printed materials including books, newsletters and manuals
Class 35 -- Consulting, business management and professional services
Class 41 -- Education and training including live workshops, seminars and more

To obtain registration of a trademark (and the ability to use to R-circle symbol after your trademark, the mark must actually be in use in commerce at the time you apply for registration. If you’re just thinking about a new product line or name, you can file an “Intent to Use” application, then convert it to an “Actual Use” application once you can prove you are indeed using it in commerce.

A good intellectual property attorney can tell you more.

COPYRIGHTS

What if you simply want to protect your written material and spoken words from other people who might illegally copy it and include it their work? The United States Library of Congress will register your copyright on virtually any kind of written, recorded, visual or other work you produce.

Their website www.copyright.gov has so much good information, you should really take a look.

But one thing you should know is that any work you create actually carries a copyright the minute you write it and produce it in a tangible form – that means, printing it, distributing it, publishing it, recording it. However, even though the copyright is established when you produce it, you still need to register the work with the Library of Congress in order to enjoy expanded protection of the copyright.

It costs less than $50 to register copyright on each work, plus you have to submit two copies of the work. It’s always a good idea to add a copyright page to your written materials (or print on the label of any CD) a line that reads:

© 2005 Your Name

In other words, type out the C-circle symbol, followed by the year you produced the work, followed by the owner of the copyright (you, your company, two co-authors, etc.).

RELEASES FROM GUEST EXPERTS AND INTERVIEWEES
?Sometimes, you merely want to protect the information you’ve acquired from someone else to include in your product.

If you have a guest expert on your conference call series and you want to record that series and sell the recordings later, have the guest sign a release that allows you to use their name and voice for commercial purposes.

If you want to use a testimonial or endorsement from someone important in your advertising and marketing efforts, be sure to have them sign a release stating they said those words and are allowing you to use them for commercial purposes. Some people will sign this release, some won’t. But it’s always good to have this on file even years later -- especially if the testimonial is so powerful that you’re still using it.

Building an empire of super-lucrative information products, training programs and consulting services requires a little preparatory work in this area.

If your business is based outside the United States, check with your own national authorities or a local legal expert about securing trademarks, copyrights and releases.

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Janet Switzer is the marketing strategist behind some of the best known celebrity authors in the world: Jack Canfield of The Secret and Chicken Soup for the Soul, One Minute Millionaire author Mark Victor Hansen, personal finance guru David Bach, motivational speaker Les Brown and others. Subscribe to her FREE series of info-marketing special reports at http://www.charlesaki.com/ezines.


* DISCLAIMER: Janet Switzer is not an attorney and is not dispensing legal advice. No information contained herein should be construed as legal advice being given by a legal professional, nor should it be construed as particularly appropriate for your specific circumstances. Additionally, since the above material was written, changes to the law may have occurred. Please consult your own attorney before embarking on any activity that affects your legal rights and obligations.

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