Today I had the pleasure of interviewing SEO, Productivity Expert and Businessman, Stephen Smith. In this 30 minute interview Stephen tells us: How he grew his consulting and coaching business after being made redundant His system for being productive The simple and basic SEO tweaks that any non-technical website owner can do to get more Google traffic Download the MP3 Check out the Writing for the Web course from Stephen and Brad. … [Read more...]

Business Blogging is fast becoming a vital part of any online strategy. The old days of "blogging puritanism" where bloggers were not supposed to make money have given way to individuals, companies and non-profits all hoping to use blogs and social media to grow and engage their audience. I just got back from Social Media Congres in the Netherlands where I presented on this subject, and I think the subject is so valuable it needed to be shared with you, your friends and colleagues. So hit up … [Read more...]

There are often unexpected perks to being a blogger and this Sunday was one of the best I have experienced. On top of having a great day out, I realized something about internet marketing that can benefit you in your business. 6th Gear had invited a bunch of online geeks, Al Carlton, Dave Naylor, Kieron Donoghue, Patrick Altoft and me, for a day of thrashing supercars around a race circuit. This involved us driving £1million worth of posh motors at bowel-shaking speeds, all the time … [Read more...]

Bloggers are for the most part very protective of their reputations. When topics like affiliate marketing come up in conversation, some people get nervous. I have been challenged a few times by folks who were worried about my recent appearance at A4UExpo - had I been lost to the "dark side"? Controversially, I don't think the affiliate world is necessarily a hive of "scum and villainy". The problem is not so much with affiliate marketing as a whole, but with some of the people involved in … [Read more...]

Authority can be a difficult concept to grasp for some people, but I find the people who struggle most are those who are already successful using another strategy. Here is my expertly executed whiteboard diagram I whipped up for some successful affiliate friends over the weekend. Before I describe it, let me give you some background. Today I am traveling down to the big smoke and staying with my big bro while I spend a few days hanging out with affiliate folks at A4UExpo in London. On … [Read more...]

Authority Blogger Course members have been asking me about my statement that Authority Bloggers are best placed to ride out economic turbulence. Can I stand by this statement? OK, there are never any guarantees, but there are several factors that make me believe this. Authority means top of mind - When you become the go-to person you get the pick of opportunities, deals and customers. You know in any market there is a minority who gets the lion share, you want to be first pick rather than … [Read more...]

A few years ago a book changed my thinking about business in a way only one other author has managed to do. The first of these will be familiar to a lot of you, especially my clients, it is the E-Myth series. I'm not alone in having a light bulb moment with those books. The book I am talking about here though blew me away because it made me realize what was wrong with the systems I was fighting against every day. The book was, I think, "The Goal" by Dr. Eliyahu M. Goldratt, and the light bulb … [Read more...]

With any business you have two choices if you want to make a decent profit: Sell lots of lower margin stuff to lots of people Sell higher margin stuff to fewer people Of course if you can sell lots of high value stuff to lots of people then you will do even better. Value Versus Visitor Count Websites and blogs have a similar choice but rather than being about sales think of it with value instead. You can provide a small amount of value to a huge audience or a deep and lasting value to … [Read more...]

I just realized that even though I have made my living from customers buying my services for a while, I have never actually had to sell. This seems to me quite an achievement. What got me thinking about this was I was just interviewed for an article for WordTracker by Rachelle Money. She asked how I got into this blogging lark, and during me waffling on I told her about how customers would come to me with their problems. Back when I started out, the problems people would come to me with … [Read more...]

Writers get a lot of criticism so tend to have to grow a thick skin, especially when working online. The internet tends to bring the inner critic out of people. This week while I have been out of the loop due to a family emergency it seems from heads-up emails I have received that I have caught a lot of flack. Some criticism has been level-headed and reasoned, some bizarre, some offensive and some just idiotic. I wasn't around to respond even if I wanted to, which in some cases seems to have … [Read more...]