I’ve generated income from…

• adsense sites
• affiliate sites
• membership sites
• mini membership sites
• ebooks
• software

What do you think is the easiest way to monetize a website? Leave your answers in the comments below…

Naturally we like to teach by example (including successes and failures). In this 5 part series we’re going to create a digital asset and launch it to a selected market and document the entire process (a condensed version).

This series will only be available on this blog. It will include videos and articles (there will also be some extra behind the scenes content for our VIP members).

We’re going to cover 3 main sections:

1. Product idea generation

2. Product development

3. Launch and marketing of finished product

Why are we doing this?

Because we want to show you how it’s done in the real world – without hype, without trying to sell you something. Just a real-world “almost live”, community style case study. We want to keep it real.

You can be a fly on our office wall as we go through the process. You might even get to join in on one of our boardroom meetings with my personal team, via webinar to help make product and marketing decisions. Even if you just listen in, you’ll get to see first hand how we operate. I’ve been doing this full-time for over 9 years and we’ve got our systems down.

In fact, you can make your first executive decision right now!

Vote on which digital asset we should create and document.

If there’s one main thing that slows me down when it comes to building my list, it’s creating, modifying and tracking landing pages (including WordPress landing pages). And I don’t like to be slowed down, so I have the perfect solution…

Landing pages are a big part of list building. Getting it right can mean the difference between a very profitable campaign and an expensive campaign. Testing and tweaking is usually a requirement. Google slaps also don’t help.

If you’re like me, the testing can be fun. It’s the tech stuff and tracking that’s frustrating.

I mainly use HTML landing pages, which means I have to open up my HTML editor, find the landing page file, mess with code and then login to my hosting cpanel (or FTP account) and upload the new files. Time consuming and tiring. In a minute I’m going to tell you about a new and quick solution to this problem, but first let’s check out what I use landing pages for and some of the key elements I test, for high conversions.

How I Use Landing Pages

My landing pages (including WordPress pages) usually only have two specific reasons:

1. Provide some content and then ask for an opt-in (like in the example to the right).

2. Provide content and ask for a direct sale (I use this method for lower end products or for higher end products where the customer is looking for an immediate solution).

Really, there’s no other action I want.

I avoid creating landing pages that ask people to opt-in without first getting to know me or the product. I’ll always provide some content. I let my real content do my selling, and I don’t use hype.

There’s one exception: If it’s people who already know me and just want to get on an announcement list (for example, enrolling in a webinar or new software release), then I will exclude content on the page and go straight for the opt-in.

Key Elements I Like To Test On A Landing Page

When testing and tweaking my landing pages I focus on these main points:

• Headline
• The offer (the offer will vary depending on if it’s a request for a sale or simply to invite visitors to opt-in). The offer is usually for more content. If you want high conversions, your offer should have elements of curiosity and a promise of high quality content to come, after a visitor signs up.
• The design of the landing page (the template itself).

I usually don’t mess with the video or main content on the page.

The only time I change these elements is if the landing page isn’t converting very well, or conversions have slowed down.

Each component is tested separately. The best combination then becomes the “control” landing page. Best combination = highest percentage of conversions.

How I Used To Create My Landing Pages

As I mentioned above, my current landing pages are usually static HTML templates or PHP. Either way I have to mess with code. And when it comes to code, I have no idea what I’m doing. But I get by, by forcing things around with my HTML editor. Why do I use HTML? For flexibility.

The other problem is the menu. To satisfy Google and other Pay-Per-Click companies you need to have terms, privacy and maybe a few other pages. Gone are the days of one page landing pages. It needs to feel more like a full website. Managing menus when it’s a static HTML page means you have to update the menu on each page you create (unless you have some other code managing them).

Testing the different elements list above one by one can also present a huge problem. It can be hard to track the small changes and split test different landing pages. But not any more…

The Easiest Way I Now Use To Create, Track & Modify WordPress Landing Pages

For the past 6 months we’ve been developing and creating a new WordPress plugin that allows you to create, track and test your landing pages. All from within WordPress.

It’s called IMPRESSION.

This new landing page system for WordPress isn’t quite ready for release yet, but I’ll give you a quick run down on its features and why I’m excited about using it on all of my sites.

Key Features

IMPRESSION allows you to create WordPress landing pages that convert. Here’s why…

1. You can create unlimited WordPress landing pages. Including different designs, templates and themes.

2. IMPRESSION won’t affect your current WordPress template. It runs on its own template system, giving you full flexibility.

3. You can create clones of your current WordPress landing pages. Why would you want to clone a landing page? So you can change one element (like a headline) and keep all of the other elements and pages in place, without copying each page – then test it against the current landing page to see which one converts the best.

4. Full stat tracking. You don’t have to add any code to your landing pages. The plugin automatically tracks the landing pages for you. Here’s an example…

5. Add menus and unlimited pages, that won’t affect your current WordPress site. In other words it has its own menu, giving you full control over your landing page. It’s almost like a “mini-me” WordPress inside of WordPress.

6. This is one of my favorites - you can use it for launches! The plugin allows you to protect other content pages on your WordPress site ( it will protect any page or post), using your chosen landing page. For example, you can send out a video on your blog to launch a new product. When visitors go to the page, they will see the landing page asking them to enter their details. Once they enter their details it will unlock the page. If they then refer a friend to the page, the friend will also have to opt-in to view the content. Perfect for launches or premium content!

7. Templates! We all like professional templates. IMPRESSION will come with its own set of pro-landing page templates. But you’ll still have control on the layout and look.

8. SEO Optimized: IMPRESSION allows you to optimize each landing page based on your main keywords. You can enter your description and other tags directly into the dedicated SEO boxes.

Will you be a beta tester for the new IMPRESSION software?

If you’d like to become a beta tester and receive notice when IMPRESSION is released, just click the link below:

> Click here to become an IMPRESSION beta tester

IMPRESSION is a new and powerful WordPress Landing Page Plugin

Here’s what’s been great about my backlinking:

1. I receive direct traffic from other sites linking to my sites

2. The sites linking to my site or particular blog post push it higher in the search engines and Google.

3. The process is straight forward and can be systemized, outsourced and then rolled out large scale. It’s like firing up the jets on traffic generation.

One thing that I’ve been focusing on lately with my blog and membership sites is to build business systems and strategies that can grow my business even if I’m not there. The business gets bigger, despite me. I want to build an engine that anyone can run. That’s a powerful concept. It’s how you build a true passive income business.

My strategies have 2 strict criterias: It must be able to be systemized. It must be outsourceable.

This is the ONLY way my online businesses can grow, even if I’m not there.

And this brings me to my first step…

Backlinking Strategies or Linking Strategies

For years a number of my sites rank high on Google and even #1. They still do today. But I haven’t focused too much on backlinking strategies, I would just submit an article to article sites here and there. This kind of strategy won’t grow your business, when you want to go on vacation.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of setting up some Google adwords, writing a few blog posts and leaving it there and then wondering why your traffic is staying the same. I’ve decided I’m going to change all that by putting systems in place. Systems that run without me.

Fortunately, as mentioned above,  backlinking strategies can be easily systemized and outsouced, once you understand the linking strategies.

There’s one person that’s really simplified the backlinking process for me. His name is Duncan Carver.

Duncan is the author of ULTIMATE LINK BUILDING DOSSIER – And as he’s the expert in the field of SEO, ranking high in Google and backlinking strategies.  I’ll let him walk you through some points we will be using so you can also plug into your site to increase its traffic and increase your Google rankings.

Enter Duncan Carver…

If you want high organic search engine rankings, you need incoming links. It really is as simple as that.

You can have the crappiest website in the world and still achieve high search engine rankings with enough (and the right type of) incoming links. Honestly, that’s how important they are.

I always say that 95% of the key to winning the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) game relates to link building and your backlinking strategy because…

· The more links you obtain…
· The better the quality of those links…
· The better structured those links are…
· The more diverse those links are (coming from multiple sources)…
· The longer those links are in place (the more they mature)…
…the faster your search engine rankings will improve.

More importantly, the more stable they will become. It’s not much fun to see your website in the top 10 results for a specific keyword term only to see it gone tomorrow. Long term stable “free traffic” from the organic search engines comes from a well structured and executed link building campaign.

To understand why let’s take a very brief tour of the history of search engine optimization. Specifically we’ll look at the way in which search engines, Google in particular, have ranked websites in various ways over the years.

I also want to start here because this little story should help to highlight the fact that Google is really just a big dumb ass computer algorithm. It is not some mythical beast that can’t be tamed.

The truth is that there are probably around 200 individual factors that determine where a website ranks in Google. However, I would say around 95% of that relates to your incoming links. 4% of that relates to having good quality unique content on your well structured website. The other 1% makes up the rest of the equation (things like having “Heading” tags for titles in content, “Meta Tags”, etc).

What that means is that if you master that 95% factor – you don’t need to worry too much about the other 5% of the equation.

Seriously.

Although it certainly can’t hurt to have the correct “Heading” tags in your content, and good “Meta Tags”, and keyword rich “image descriptions” etc. in your websites pages (it’s just good SEO practice) – it’s actually not “essential” to your backlinking strategy.

You can sit there tweaking all those little things until the cows come home, but that’s not what’s going to drive your search engine rankings higher.

Not every incoming link, even with targeted anchor text, holds the same search engine optimization value. Certain links will have a greater positive impact on increased search engine rankings.

So, although the rest of section might be a bit “theoretical”,  you really do need to understand the varying degrees of value that different incoming links can have.

It will help you to prioritize your focus and understand how much time, effort & possibly money you should put into specific link
building techniques to ensure you’re getting a decent ROI.

Now having said that – in my opinion – a link is a link.

Why is a link a link?

Any link is better than no link and every link is going to have some impact on your search engine rankings. That impact will vary from little to none whatsoever in the case of really poor quality links. Right up to the biggest impact possible for the best quality links. And of course there are varying degrees of positive impact in between those two extremes.

Link Diversity – Is Key to Your Link building Strategy

In this section I want to talk about the importance of “link diversity”.

When I talk about “link diversity” I’m referring to generating incoming links from as many different and totally unique websites AND sources as possible.

That means if you’re going to use article marketing as a link building technique (and you should), then you shouldn’t just submit your articles to EzineArticles.com (a popular article directory).

You should also syndicate your articles out to the hundreds of other “less popular” articles directories. The reasoning here is pretty straight forward.

If all you do is submit your articles to ezinearticles.com then you’re only ever going to get “implied votes” in the form of incoming links from that one source.

Think of that as one website’s opinion of yours.

You can submit 100 articles to that directory which will increase that website’s opinion of yours,  however it’s still just one opinion in the eyes of Google. Granted it might hold more weight than only having one or two references on that website, but at the end of the day it’s the same opinion.

It’s going to have less positive impact than if there were “more opinions” involved.

If you go ahead and submit articles to 500 other article directories, then you’re getting 500+ “implied votes” (or many positive opinions) for your website from many different totally unique sources.

That is going to have a much bigger impact on positive improvements in search engine rankings.

The same thing applies to website directory submissions. Getting listed in one website directory is good. Getting listed in 1,000 directories is better.

Article Marketing as a Backlinking Strategy

Using Article Marketing as a method to promote your website and build your online presence has always been one of the most effective online marketing techniques available to us. Although the internet is already a primary “entertainment” source in its own right,  its initial “public” purpose was and always will be about finding and sharing useful information quickly and easily.

That means we need content to “get ourselves found” and the more content we have out there, on our own website and on others, the bigger the chances become that we are actually found by people interested in what we’re offering. And perhaps the greatest and most exciting thing about article marketing is that it’s one of those techniques available to all marketers, of all experience levels, even those of us that might have very
limited “advertising” budgets.

Most people can write basic articles and for those who feel they can’t or simply don’t want to spend the time,  we can always outsource the writing component.

Purely from a link building aspect – article marketing can prove to be extremely effective in building many incoming links to our website to help strengthen our SEO and improve our rankings. We can very easily work the “quality of” or/and “quantity of” distribution angle for maximum impact.

All we really need is the content to distribute and a means of distributing it. In addition to that,  it can prove to be a tremendous source of targeted low cost traffic in its own right.

Traffic that is not only steady but can prove to be ever increasing,  as your content becomes syndicated further around the internet. In fact, short of a continuous paid advertising campaign using Pay-Per-Click Advertising or Media Buys, article marketing would have to be right up there in terms of being one of the most reliable sources of traffic generation we can explore.

And sure, whilst one time joint ventures and email advertising can be excellent, they simply don’t have the “lifetime” staying power of any articles that you might have out there, published on hundreds of different websites, working to pull in targeted traffic 24/7 for the lifetime of those articles.

Article Marketing itself is certainly more than just a means of generating incoming links to our website. For example over the years…

• I’ve been offered speaking positions at conferences.
• I’ve been asked on many occasions to become a featured guest writer in related offline
  magazines and publications.
• I’ve been approached by venture capitalists.
  I’ve been asked to conduct interviews for radio shows.
• I’ve been approached for consultation work.
• I’ve been asked to co-author books.

The list goes on. Getting your name out there via article marketing can open up so many possibilities. In fact, if you take a look at the top 3 expert authors on EzineArticles.com (what many consider to be the most important “article directory” online from an SEO perspective),  you can see just how effective article marketing can be in terms of traffic generation alone. We’re talking millions of article views for each one.

Wherever possible you want to use keyword rich anchor text in your resource box and if you can include two links like this (using two different keyword terms),  it’s certainly better than one. If you can include two links, then you should also consider deep linking to the most appropriate place within your website in addition to your home page.

Those links should also match the keyword term your articles primary topic is centered around. Obviously here, we’re linking back to our website multiple times, and we’re using our strategic keyword terms as anchor text, at least once, to help develop better theme relevancy for our website.

Where To Distribute Your Articles
There are several leading article directories that you want to distribute your articles to. These are used by other webmasters and ezine publishers to find content for their websites and email newsletters. Here are what I would consider to be the top 5 leading article directories.
I’ve listed them in order of the average number of unique visitors each website receives, per month, from most to least popular (according to compete.com)…

· http://www.Ezinearticles.com – 12,756,939 monthly unique visitors.
· http://www.Buzzle.com – 6,698,877 monthly unique visitors (requires unique content).
· http://www.Articlesbase.com – 3,832,251 monthly unique visitors (requires unique content).
· http://www.Articlealley.com – 487,292 monthly unique visitors.
· http://www.Goarticles.com – 300,681 monthly unique visitors.
· http://www.Ideamarketers.com – 192,534 monthly unique visitors.
· http://www.Articledashboard.com – 150,138 monthly unique visitors.

…as you can see EzineArticles.com leads the pack with almost twice the average number of monthly visitors than the next most popular Buzzle.com (although this gets more popular by the month and in fact has doubled its popularity to this level in 2010 alone, not to mention what will happen in 2011).

I would suggest that you put the majority focus on where the visitors are. That means focusing primarily on submitting the majority of your articles to EzineArticles.com You might also like to consider Buzzle.com and /or Articlesbase.com as alternatives for your primary focus
(my second pick would be Buzzle.com) – however they do require unique articles to be submitted. That means you’re unable to submit an article that you’ve already published on another article directory.

So you’ll want to pick one of these top 3 directories and really focus on becoming established within it as an expert author on your given subject material. You need to set yourself a serious goal to determine how many articles you are going to have written and implement a plan to reach that goal.

Outsourcing Article Creation
If you start to get really serious about article marketing, and if you put some serious effort into it and see the inevitable results, there’s a point in time when you’re going to realize that outsourcing just makes sense.

There is only so much time in the day that any of us can spend cranking out articles without other aspects of our business becoming neglected or simply suffering from writers burn out. And if you want to scale up the article marketing component of your overall link building plan,  then it really is a necessity.

It took me a long time to realize this but once I began outsourcing content creation,  it freed up a huge chunk of my time and I was able to focus on other more productive things. So when you’re able to,  I would strongly suggest you consider exploring the outsourcing option.

How to Get Higher Quality Articles & Content

If you’re looking for higher quality content,  my recommendation would be to check out the freelance marketplace websites. These tend to have the biggest group of more professional & experienced technical writers. Such sites include…
· http://www.guru.com
· http://www.ifreelance.com/
· http://www.freelancer.com/

…look around in the content writing categories to get a feel for the projects other people are posting. Post a detailed description of your own project and be sure to check out the feedback given by others who have employed any writers that express interest.

My comments

Article marketing is just one method (highly effective method) for backlinking, but there are many other strategies that are also free and effective.

The question to ask yourself is – how many articles did you submit last week and the week before? If you answered zero, it’s time to get some links coming into your site!

For more advanced backlinking strategies you can visit Duncan’s site by clicking here (affiliate link)

Whether it’s a membership site, software or video course I’m creating there’s a simple rule I always follow, before I even start the creation process.

It’s called MPI – “Market Place Innovator”. This one rule is usually the difference between a product’s success or failure. In a minute I’ll give you the 3 questions I always ask myself to lock me into this rule of thinking.

Last week I was watching the news. The news story was covering a huge mobile computing and technology expo with people attending from around the world. The main focus was of course smart phones, tablets, etc. All of the big brands were there, Microsoft, LG, Sony, Samsung, Nokia, etc. – except for one, Apple.

The news reporter went on to say that Apple didn’t bother to come because their market share for iPads was so dominant. He declared, “They are the computer tablet innovators.”

Now I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that they decided not to attend, but Steve Jobs sure knows how to create and launch mega successful products and they have the market share when it comes to iPad type products.

Because I’m in the digital product development business, people frequently show me their new websites and products. Many are really good, but the biggest problem I see is that people are just repackaging similar or the same old content. There’s nothing exciting about it. To be honest sometimes it’s even kinda boring. After all, anyone can create or outsource a product, right? But there’s more to it than just getting a product developed and launched.

What makes a product exciting? What makes consumers want it at first glance?

One answer… product innovation! They want something new. It doesn’t have to be entirely new, but it has to shake things up a bit within the niche. If not, it’s just like old news. Ask any publisher – old news doesn’t sell.

Once you do shake things up a bit, you can ride that for a long time, years even.

Which are one are you – Product Developer or Product Innovator?

When you apply the MPI rule, there’s a mental shift. You are now a product innovator and not just a product developer! Small shift, huge difference.

How do I keep myself on track and follow this rule?

The MPI formula:

As soon as I come up with a product idea I ask myself these 3 questions before I begin the creation process. It forms the basis for all of my mind maps, brainstorming sessions, etc.

This is my thought process. This is how I think.

1. What concept is new or innovative about my product?

2. How will my product improve the market place?

3. In what way will it serve my clients better than other products in the market place?

As you focus on the answers to these questions you can’t help but to develop new and innovative ideas to better service your clients. Personally, I spend a lot of time thinking, before I actually create the product.

Does this mean your product will always be better?

Not at all. But that’s ok. I’m not always the most innovative, I don’t think that’s possible. You can’t be. But if your product still has a degree of innovation about it, it can still sell well.

Good news: You don’t have to be a genius!

Fortunately for people like me, you don’t have to be a genius to be a product innovator. Even small changes can make you innovative within your market. Below are some of the basic things I look for with my products….

1. Add additional features that other products don’t have

2. Repackage a product by adding another valuable product to it

3. Add some kind of twist to the product. For example: A new way of doing something.

Apply MPI rule to older products or products you’ve recently created.

This rule just doesn’t apply to seed product ideas, it can also be applied to existing products. You can go back to products you’re already selling and see how you can add a twist or change them to become more innovative.

I’ve done this many times, with great success. In fact, authors do it all the time when they release an “updated and revised” version of their book. These updated versions can match or even outsell the former book.

Try focusing on these questions for your next product (or revamp existing products) and become a product innovator instead of just a product developer.

The problem is, Google hates landing pages, at least a page that LOOKS like a landing page. I know because they recently suspended my entire account!

Everyone has talked about the “Google Slap.” Fortunately it had never happened to me, with any of my sites – up until now.

It all started a couple of months ago. I was gearing up for a pre-Christmas launch and created a new campaign on Google Adwords. As I’ve done many times before, I created my landing page and launched a bunch of ads and keywords. Within 24 hours Google suspended my ad for that site and then went on to suspend other ads. Then they sent me a “Merry Christmas message” and suspended my entire account.

Landing page violations, they say.

I’ve been using landing pages on Adwords for years and never had a problem.

They even slapped one of my sites that I no longer wanted to run on Google. I had deleted the ad, but they still wanted that site changed. I said to them “delete it,  I don’t want to run it on Adwords.”  They said,  “no change it, even if you don’t want to run it.”

All of my ads were down for almost 3 weeks while I tried everything to please the Internet god – “Godgle” (aka: Google). This down time cost me thousands of dollars in sales. It was more of a “Google Kick in the Jimmy” than a slap. But I learned something.

I learned what Google loves when it comes to a landing page.

I applied the 4 elements below to my landing page templates and Google approved them the same day and re-activated my account. This was back in January.

I wanted to share these 4 key page elements because in all seriousness, it was a stressful situation. It was very difficult to get a straight answer from Google. I would resubmit changes, they would say “your page has not been approved”. I would ask why, they would say “be more transparent”… or “be more clear.” That’s all I could get out of them.

First, let me show you the before and after landing page and then I’ll break down the main elements.

This is the “Slapped Landing Page“

This is the “Instantly Approved Landing Page Template“

Before and After Landing Page Template looks almost the same, huh? Except for 4 key points…

4 Key Elements to building a *Google Approved Landing Page Template

1. Menu: Make sure you have some kind of navigation on your landing page, even if that simply means your terms, privacy policy, contact us, etc
2. Transparency: Let people know what’s coming after they opt-in
3. Privacy Page: Make sure you have a page that says what you will do with people’s email address once you collect it
4. Product image: This is huge. I had made all of the above changes to my landing page template and Google still wouldn’t approve it. I added a product image and they instantly approved my page. I did the same thing to my next landing page and guess what? – Instant approval. Here’s a screen shot…

If you’ve stopped using landing pages on Google because of the “Google Slap” add these 4 elements to your landing page designs and templates and start building your list the fast way.

Landing pages should be a vital part of your online marketing.

I’ll see if I can work an actual template download for you within the next week or two. A template you will have the rights to use on your own website. I’ll post it on the blog.

* Legal stuff: This site is not associated, affiliated, endorsed, or sponsored by Google. These techniques have not been certified by Google.

It seems we humans can’t go a day without watching something. It’s like we can’t live without it. Top news stories, celebrity gossip, major product releases, etc. can glue you to the TV or computer. But that’s great news for business owners and marketers. Why? Because video can sell more of any product, regardless of the product.

It would be fair to say that video is the most powerful mass marketing medium you can use today. If you think about it, video (regardless of the format) is used to influence others, to win elections, to spread an idea or a cause and to sell more stuff!

I love video! It’s fast, it’s effective and it’s easy to do (if you know a few tricks). So when I was asked to help put together the marketing campaign for a new novel (Tree of Life), my first thought was of course – video! A novel, especially for a self published author, or small publishing companies, can be very challenging to sell and market. However, using video delivers a whole new medium to the mix. It’s something that can be passed around by social media networks.

I’ll get to the video for the book in a minute, but first…

The single MOST important technique for making videos sell product

If I could only tell you one thing about making videos, videos that will sell your product or service,  it wouldn’t be about how to improve your lighting, or what kind of camera you should use, etc. It would be this…

… tell a great story!

Side note: I do have to point out that lighting, sound, etc… in other words “Production Value”, when added to a great story, will have even greater influence and impact. For now we’ll just focus on telling a great story.

If you build a story, or even stories, around a product using video – the product will sell even more. People want the story, they want the behind the scenes, they want to be on the inside.

To give an example; A new company recently released a series of videos showing how they made covers for iPads. Doesn’t sound that exciting right? So what videos did the owners make that helped them generate over half a million dollars in sales, within 6 months of starting the company? They took the customer behind the scenes of their manufacturing process. They showed the guy who makes it, the equipment he uses, the time they put into building them. They shared stories on how they came up with the idea for the product and the uniqueness behind it. Stories sell. It’s as simple as that.

The end result – they sold over 10,000 of their covers at around $60 a pop. And not only that, they now have a large following on YouTube, with tens of thousands of people watching their videos and many people asking for more. Not bad for a tiny start-up company. Even if they didn’t make any more videos, the ones they’ve created will go a long way, for many years to come, in selling more of their product.

How do you tell a great story?

It’s not as hard as you think. Usually all that’s required is to give the back story behind something, or show how something works. This kind of story telling falls into the “special interest” area. Once again, if you let people in on your own story, or your products story – that’s all you need. Simply share experiences, good and bad and you’ll have a great story.

If you want the easiest formula it’s….

• Story + Demonstration = interesting video that sells more product.

Just shoot a video explaining how or why you created something or how the product came about and then demonstrate how the product works. Simple.

How do we tell a great story when it comes to a novel? We have 2 choices…

1. Build the story around the author

2. Use the story or character from the book itself.

Both options should and will be used for the marketing campaign. But for this article, we’ll focus on using the story/character from the book itself. Just like Hollywood does, we created a video trailer for the book.

The making of a book trailer

Thanks to today’s resources it doesn’t cost a lot to make a high quality video. It does require a little bit of “know how” to get that professional edge, but it’s not as hard as you think.

I worked with my brother Orvon Gough, who’s a film school graduate and also lectures at a film school, when he’s not helping me create videos and video courses. Orvon worked with me on creating the book trailer. Despite his experience, we used basic tools that anyone can easily access. Here’s the break down.

- Sony camcorder – just the standard consumer end, that most people have in their home (or can borrow).

- Sony Vegas software (for editing).

- iStockVideo.com for purchased video footage used in the trailer

- A voice actor, to play the voice of the character in the book

- Sound scores, for adding sound effects and music

All up it only cost a few hundred dollars (not including the cost of the software and camera) to produce a “near Hollywood” style trailer. And that’s why I love video!

Running the book trailer ad on National TV

In my last blog post I spoke about creating an ad that would be tested on Google’s new TV ad service. I had a number of requests from customers and readers that I show one of the video ads we created. This will be one of the ads we test on Google. Naturally the video will also be distributed online through various distribution and social media networks.

As always I’ll keep you updated on the results.

With a little bit of practice and some great story telling, you can create video products and messages that make you famous, sell more products, or launch a business.

Ok, so here’s the trailer we created. Also there are some secret marketing techniques we use to create emotion in the video. It’s kinda like NLP for video. These techniques can be applied to any video you make. There are 4 specific techniques to create this emotional effect (which generates more sales, excitement, etc.). Feel free to take a guess at them and post on the forum.

I’ll be discussing these NLP style techniques for video making in an upcoming blog post. It’s pretty cool stuff -  Hollywood movie makers have mastered it. It’s so good you probably won’t even be able to resist buying a copy of the book after you see the trailer. Don’t say I didn’t warn you

By the way, the vision of the moon, storm clouds and lightning on the trailer were shot by my brother just outside of his house – which is about 13 minutes up the road from my house. He of course messed with the colors a bit to make the moon/clouds look red. Check it out.

Here’s the trailer…

If you’d like to check out the book site click the link below

> CLICK HERE TO VISIT THE SITE
(a new window will open)

Have you heard the buzz? Google has launched a new ad service that lets anyone run ads on national TV stations. Imagine your little web business, whether it’s a membership site, home study course, video, etc. running ads on TV to millions of viewers.

To put it simply, this is a “do-it-yourself” TV media buying system. They allow you to purchase TV ad spots, online, for your product or business – with an incredibly low entry price of $100. This basically opens up TV advertising to anyone. I’m already seeing the possibilities and I’m going to share some of them with you in just a minute. But first, check out Google’s ad…

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Bloggers are already jumping all over it, (me included). In the video case study video below the bloggers testing out this new service were able to get new visitors to their site for around a $1 a click (maybe a little more).

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My own personal case studies

I’ve decided I’m going to put it to the test for myself, and I’m going to document it here on the blog for all of you to watch/read. Here’s a quick breakdown on what we’ll cover…

1. We’ll show the TV ad making process – we’ll keep it simple.
2. Include the tools and resources we use to get the TV ad made quickly.
3. Teach some simple techniques to make the video look good for TV.
4. Show you the actual video of the TV ads (maybe before we even run it, to get your valued feedback).
5. I’m going to test two different products.

The first product I’m going to test will be for my standard online businesses. The second product…. well, it’s kinda top secret. It’s an up coming novel (I’m not the author, but I’m doing the marketing for it). The cool thing is, we just finished creating the video trailer for it last week. And I have to say the video ad for it looks like a block buster movie, even though it only cost a few hundred dollars to make it (including stock footage). It was a lot of fun making it and it looks pretty cool.

So, let me know what you think of Google’s new service. And, would you like to see the TV ads on my blog before running them on TV?