The Good, the Bad … and the Ugly (Not necessarily in that order LOL)

Posted on 28 May 2010 by Suzanne

Ever had “one of those days”? Well, that was yesterday for me LOL

I live in a very small town that’s located about 15-20 minutes north of San Antonio and when I started working with local businesses I put some serious thought into where to focus my energy … here in my local area or further into San Antonio.

I’ve done some cold calling here locally and I’ve had some decent results so far but I’ve also decided to do some marketing in San Antonio. There’s a business association in the north side of town that meets about once a month for a lunch meeting with guest speakers but they also do an event called “Speed Networking” a couple of times a year … and last night was one of them. There are about 150 people, you have a number, a chart, you move every so often and introduce your business to all other attendees throughout the night – pretty cool huh?

I decided about a week ago that I was going to go to this event and see if I could make some good contacts and gain some new clients.

A while back I had Chrissy design me some business cards and although I’d been printing them out on my computer I decided it was time to order them from a printer so they’d look more professional (and so I wouldn’t burn through my toner cartridge). I also got the idea to have a shirt made up that says, “My Business is #1 on Google … Is Yours?” I put some thought into an “offer” for potential clients and I decided to print up some coupons on cardstock offering a free one hour consultation to discuss online marketing, SEO, social media … whatever they’d like to discuss about their business during that hour (I limited this to the first 25 people who took me up on it and booked an appointment).

The “Bad”

So … it’s the day of the event … I finish my workout … I call to let the lady know I’m on my way to pick up my shirt – not ready yet. *sigh* OK … I’ll go home and eat first. I leave and go print and cut the coupons – no issues there. I go pick up my shirt but I happen to be on the phone so I quickly look at the shirt and pay her and leave. I stop in to see an existing client and we visit for a while. OK … time to go home and get ready. I very proudly pull out my new shirt to show Ken and the kids when my daughter looks up and says, “Mommy, I don’t think something is spelled right?!” Huh? What? Very funny! Yea right! I put the shirt down … Oh sh#%! What the???!

Well … as you can see she ran the words “business” and “is” together so it looked like some kind of misspelling. Hardly the attention I wanted to get or be remembered for right? LOL. OK … I’m upset but not the end of the world.

Hmmm … More “Bad”

Come to think of it … Did UPS deliver my business cards yet? What no cards either?!” *sigh*

Have you had one of these moments? You know … the kind where you feel like everything that can go wrong is going wrong? OK Suzanne … pull yourself together!

Ken’s reassuring me that I’ll do great despite these hurdles *sigh* (very sweet of him – love that guy).

I get showered and ready, find something else to wear and gather my coupons. Ken says he has kids and dinner handled so I run out the door a bit frazzled but back on track for a great evening.

Here Comes the Ugly! LOL

Well, as I’m flying down the highway telling myself how great tonight is going to be … meeting a lot of wonderful business people in town and reminding myself how much I miss interacting with real live people LOL … my radar detector starts screaming at me! Oh sh#%! You’ve got to be kidding me! There he is … on the other side of the highway going the other direction … oh please … just this once … give me a break … Well crap! There in my rear view comes the unmistakable colorful reminder that I’m driving through the “gauntlet” (the nickname for the town I was passing through because it’s well known for a high number of speeding tickets and, yes, I know better than to speed there LOL). I get my driver’s license out and as he approaches I’m sarcastically saying to myself, “Miss … is there an emergency I need to be aware of?” (They’re required to ask you that here in Texas). Hmmm … I’m reciting in my head, “No, dude … I’m late for an important business networking meeting and absolutely nothing has gone right today! Could you please give me a break?!” Uhhh … feeling fairly certain that wouldn’t go over too well … I hand over my driver’s license and smile, “No sir … no emergency.”

Now I have a decision to make … I’ll be a few minutes late … I’ve never been to an event with these people before (remember they’re expecting 150 attendees). Will I make a fool of myself? A bad first impression? I’ve teared up a bit … have I run my makeup everywhere? Screw it … I should just go home … nothing has gone right today. Clearly this wasn’t meant to be. But … how would I face my kids? I don’t let them “quit”!!! What will my husband think? Say? Is that really the soft, weak, self-defeating person I strive to be? No … Suzanne … pull it together and get back on the road (drive the speed limit) and walk in with a smile on your face and have the great night you deserve (Yes, lots of self talk yesterday LOL).

Finally … The “Good”

Well, guess what? I got there in plenty of time … met a ton of really neat people. Had a wonderful dinner (I even made very healthy choices – despite my mood LOL) and I expect to get some new clients from the event. In fact, I couldn’t even sleep last night. I stayed up late running keywords through my tools, checking rank for some of the potential new clients … I was happy and totally glad I followed through (despite feeling the world was just totally against me LOL).

Thanks for letting me vent … and if you’ve read this far … you must be a true friend (or bored LOL).

And, yes, I’ll keep you posted on how I make out with gaining new clients. *SmiLes* Suzanne

So … you know I’m going to ask … ever had “one of those days”? Did it work out fine in the end? Do you find that you let hurdles keep you from being successful in your business? What does your self-talk sound like? If you hear it getting negative … are you able to turn it around before you end up defeated? What do you think of the marketing materials I used (or even the ones I wasn’t able to use LOL)?

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Blogging Idol Secrets Revealed eBookGlad you're here! I wrote my first eBook, "Blogging Idol Secrets Revealed," and it's my FREE gift for those who supported me in the Blogging Idol competition (and for my new online friends too LOL).

Go download it and learn how I drove new visitors and grew my RSS subscribers by over 800% ... in 30 days flat! Let me know what you think of the book ok?

Blogging Idol Secrets Revealed

RSS Subscribe Box: Does Yours Get Attention? (Video)

Posted on 19 May 2010 by Suzanne

Do you have an eye-catching subscribe button on your blog? Here’s what you need to look at …

When you start any new site and you start to invite others to visit your site you will want to decide what you want them to do when they get there. You probably want them to do several things while they’re there so you’ll need to write those out and number them.

If you have a product for sale then you probably want to invite them to a sales page where you have sales copy for your product and their options are either buy or leave.

If you want them to read your posts and find your content valuable then you want to make reading your posts your main focus.

If you are trying to grow a mailing list or RSS subscriber base … then you want those to be the dominant feature.

For my Bikini After 40 site I want my main focus to be on gaining RSS subscribers. Eventually I will offer some nice freebies to grow my mailing list but that will come down the road.

So if my main focus is gaining RSS subscribers I want to (a) put my opt in box in a “prime real estate” area of my blog, (b) draw some attention to it, and (c) ask readers to subscribe.

I put the opt in box in the area that’s called “above the fold.” That means the part of your page that you can see when the page loads without having to scroll down the page. Then depending on where your side bar is located you would want to put it at either the top left or the top right side. Research shows that our eye scans a page in a “z” pattern … starting at the top left side … moving straight across to the top right side … then down and left … and then back across to the right so you’ll want to keep that in mind when choosing the opt in location.

To draw some attention I like to use something animated in the opt in area. I hired Chrissy Jensen to design the opt in area for the site and I think she did a great job. I told her to use the one here on suzannefranco.com as a guide and to make it match the look and feel of the bikini site.

In the box I ask readers to subscribe. Seems obvious but sometimes I just see icons and a field to fill in … and I like to make it a little more apparent that I want them to subscribe. I’m still coming up ideas for something to dangle and a call to action but I’ll get it there eventually.

Here’s the screen capture video I made for you:

So what do you think of my opt in on the bikini site? Do you have some ideas for me? I’d like to entice visitors to subscribe … do I need a good freebie? What info do you think my readership would most appreciate?

Do you know what your number one priority is for your site? Have you focused your efforts and energy there? Is it obvious to your visitors/readers? Do you have any questions I can answer? Let us hear from you! *SmiLes* Suzanne

P.S. If  you’ve enjoyed the post and video would you please take a quick second and share it with your friends on Twitter or Facebook (or your favorite social site) … I’d really appreciate it! ;)

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Earnings / Profits for My BANS eBay EPN Niche Stores – March and April 2010

Posted on 11 May 2010 by Suzanne

Well … it’s that time … time to post my earnings for my eBay EPN (BANS – “Build a Niche Store”) niche stores for March and April 2010.

Not amazing … not horrible. LOL. Again, I still haven’t taken the time to try to figure out what they (eBay) is looking for in this affiliate program. I haven’t done anything at all to my stores. I did however do a small amount of advertising on some free classified sites in April and I can see it probably helped a little bit.

Here are the numbers:

March 2010 = 533.86

April 2010 = 672.78

Looks like I’m going to have to do some work on these sites here soon. My buddy, Mark, over at Niche Store Builder posted: ePN Users Pay Attention – Significant Update for You! Yep … EPN making changes for us again. *sigh*

I’ve been very busy working on my SEO/Google Positioning business for offline local businesses and that’s going pretty well. I’ve also started my new site about Fitness at 40 and that’s been a really fun distraction. LOL I’m working out and eating healthy and I’m fully committed to losing all of my extra fat and to being healthy and strong.

Hope you are all doing well with your online businesses. Let me know if you need some help and I’ll do what I can. Also, do let me know if there’s something specific you’d like me to blog about and I’ll do my best to get it up here on the blog. *SmiLes* Suzanne

So … you still a niche store person? Are you still using BANS? How about EPN? Amazon? Let us know what you’re up to and how your stores are performing ok?

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How I Got My BikiniAfter40.com Site Started

Posted on 10 May 2010 by Suzanne

I mentioned here on the blog that I had started a brand new blog where I share my fitness, health, and weight loss progress and that I was going to start sharing how I set up the new blog and how I drive traffic, get readers and subscribers, and how I monetize that blog.

So this is the first post of many where I will share what I’m doing with that blog. Obviously I’m sharing here from the blogging standpoint but if you’re also interested in fitness, health, and weight loss please join us over there on the blog Bikini After 40 so we can all encourage and support each other.

My buddy, Dennis, asked me if men were welcome … Yes, men are definitely welcome (despite the reference to “bikini”) to join us gals and participate there. Some of the topics are geared towards women but much of it is fitness, health and weight loss in general so no worries there.

OK … let’s get started …

Choosing My Domain and Setting Up the Blog

I’ve mentioned here on the blog that I use HostGator hosting and I use GoDaddy for all of my domains. Yes, they are affiliate links LOL but I really do believe I have a system down pat for setting up a new blog very quickly and without any hassle.

Domain Name. First, I choose my domain name. For my niche sites I choose domains that are very … hmmm … full of keywords, but for this site I wanted it to be something fun and catchy. I did however do the keyword research and luckily some of the keyword phrases I set out to tackle (“fitness at 40” and “fitness for over 40”) worked well for the domain I wanted. No, not an exact phrase like I usually try to get but at least it’s got a couple of my keywords in there. LOL.

I log into my GoDaddy account and I purchase the domain name. DURING the purchase there is an option to “Set nameserver.” (see image). Since I already have an account with HostGator I can enter the nameservers while purchasing and then everything is set up almost instantly (instead of waiting the 72 hours they quote). You can get the nameservers from your host or if you have other domains with GoDaddy that are hosted elsewhere you can get the nameservers from inside your GoDaddy account (find them attached to the other domains in your account).

Hosting. Then I go to HostGator via my cpanel and I add the new domain to my account. By the time I’m done doing this the domain is usually up and ready and online. I then go to the Fantastico section within my HostGator account and I add WordPress to the new domain.

I Select a Theme

For this particular blog I decided to go with Squeeze Theme. I am also using it here on suzannefranco.com and I’m starting to really like it (didn’t “not” like it before … I’m just technophobic and resistant to change LOL). Some of the reasons I chose Squeeze Theme for the BA40 site (that “BA40” looks kinda funny huh?! LOL) is that it’s (a) very easy to work with within the admin panel and doesn’t require a lot (if any) coding for what I need to do, and (b) I can add some “squeeze” pages for some optin pages (an example would be here on the sf.com blog http://www.suzannefranco.com/blogging-idol-secrets-revealed-ebook/). A “squeeze” page is typically a page that promotes something specific and visitors/readers no place to go but to buy/optin or leave. The one I used is a modified version where they can still see the main navigation buttons at the top but there is no sidebar to distract them.

On BA40 I will offer some free eBooks and possibly email mini-series so that I can grow my email list.

I Dressed It Up

OK … well I didn’t personally dress it up! LOL. I hired the very talented Chrissy Jensen (<– love her!) to do that for me. Initially she did the header and the color scheme (header, background colors, heading colors, link colors, etc.). This can all be changed within the Squeeze Theme admin area but I’m not creative at all so for me it’s best left to a professional. I also hired her for the optin box and some other graphics but we’ll get to those in an upcoming post.

I Defined My “Purpose” for the Blog

We often have ideas swimming around in our heads about a business and we never really map it out from start to finish.

When I first had the idea to do a blog about my journey to lose weight and get healthy it was more of an online journal to keep myself accountable. As I thought more and more about it and visited other blogs with a similar “niche” or “theme” I realized that I would eventually reach my goals and I would love to help others get there too. If you’ve known me for any amount of time you’ll know that’s what I enjoy most about being online … meeting new people and helping them as much as possible.

I have tried a lot of ways to lose weight … some have worked and some have failed. I would love to share what they are and the reasons I believe they worked or didn’t work.

I also have access to a great fitness trainer who is also a personal friend. I explained the blog to her and told her that I’m very lucky to have her helping me. I know that readers who don’t have access to a personal trainer will assume that it’s the reason I will succeed and the reason they can’t. So … I will be getting help from her to show my readers how they too can get in an incredible workout. She will show us effective home workouts we can do without any fancy club or equipment. Pretty cool huh?

So the purpose is to keep myself accountable and to help as many people as possible. When I find ways to actually monetize the blog I am open to that too. This is in stark contrast to the niche sites I set up that are simply there to drive traffic and/or sales to make me money! This one is very personal and I’m very passionate about it! The money will come when it’s time.

I Wrote Out Some Post Ideas and Outlined the Categories

I got a Word Doc started with my topic and post ideas … and after reviewing those I was able to define some of my categories. These will change as time goes by and I find my “groove” on the blog but it’s important to have some type of an outline to get started … or you WON’T EVER START!

(Side Note): Speaking of STARTING … I’ve said time and time again the biggest reason I believe people fail online is they simply never get STARTED!!! This isn’t brain surgery guys! It isn’t rocket science! Just take an idea … any of the hundreds you have swimming around in your head … and take that leap ok? What’s the worst thing that could happen? I can tell you … the worst thing that could happen is that you change your mind and you’ve spent $7.50 on a domain and you don’t keep it up and move on to something else. You will still have your hosting and you just start again and see if something else sticks. Come on … give it a go!

Get the eBook So You Can Follow Along

OK … that is a brief overview of how I actually got the blog idea off of my chest and onto the net. Next I’ll start using the very techniques I’ve outlined in my “Blogging Idol Secrets Revealed” eBook to drive visitors and subscribers to the blog. If you haven’t downloaded it yet you really should check it out so you can follow along.

Do you have any questions so far? Do you have the eBook yet? Have you implemented any of the ideas so far? What would you most like to see step-by-step (in more detail) while I build and promote my new blog? I’m here to help so just tell me what to do ok? *SmiLes* Suzanne

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Happy Mother’s Day (Watch My Most Favorite YouTube Video)

Posted on 09 May 2010 by Suzanne

I want to wish all moms a Happy Mother’s Day! I hope you’re doing something wonderful today … whether it’s exciting or relaxing … I hope you get to see or talk to your favorite people today.

I want to share my most favorite YouTube video with you … it’s my dedication to my own mom (love you mom!) and to all mom’s in the world today. *huGs* Suzanne

P.S. She sings very fast so I chose the version with the lyrics included … Hope you get a great laugh … and it puts a smile on your face ;)

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Come Check Out My Newest Site! (Video)

Posted on 06 May 2010 by Suzanne

Well … we’ve planned our next trip to Mexico and I’m soooo stoked! In early June we’ll be taking kids down to the resort where we took our honeymoon, Dreams Puerto Aventuras, in the Riviera Maya area about 45 minutes from Cancun. It’s an all-inclusive resort and we’ll be totally spoiled. LOL We’ll also be in our bathing suits much of the time … so that means the race is on for me to lose some weight and tone up.

Since I was journaling my food and exercise and taking before and after pictures I decided to put up a blog and share my tips and ideas with others who would also like to look great in their swimsuit http://www.bikiniafter40.com. Why am I sharing that with you? Well, I am building this blog from the ground up so I thought some of you might want want to follow along and see what I do to set it up, to drive traffic, build backlinks, do the SEO, monetize, etc.

If you’d be interested in watching me I’ll be posting every so often here on the blog at suzannefranco.com and I’d love to hear any questions you have about what I’m doing with the site. I’d also love to have your feedback on the blog itself. What do you think of the concept? Of the look and feel? Of the content? All thoughts are welcome of course!

Here’s a video message:

Please leave me your comments and let me know what you’d like to learn about my new site and I’ll address it here on the blog. *SmiLes* Suzanne

P.S. If you’re looking to lose weight and/or tone up … or interested in health and fitness in general I hope you’ll join me over on the new site so we can support and encourage each other ;)

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Wanna Attend an Online Seminar With Me?

Posted on 03 May 2010 by Suzanne

I got an email this morning that piqued my curiosity … it was from Dori Friend and it was an invitation to a free online seminar. Turns out it’s a pretty darn clever set up and I’m going to attend.

The seminar itself is about driving traffic (and I think you’d agree we could all use more traffic) and you won’t believe the line-up:

Ryan Deiss, Mike Hill, Ryan Ringold, Amit Mehta, Jeff Walker, Mike Filsaime, Brad Fallon, Jeff Johnson, Jonathan Mizel, Yanik Silver, Kevin Wilke, Leslie Rohde, Dan Thies, Dr. Mike, Howie Schwartz, Donna Fox, Charlie Page, Tom Antion, Jon Benson, Dustin Struckman, and more!

You sign up for free but I guess from what I read they will also offered some paid spots (backstage passes). You can check it out here: http://www.suzannefranco.com/uses/rock-star.php (<—- cleverly disguised affiliate link LOL) and it would be fun to “see” you there. When you log in and attend the event you can also chat with other attendees via chat and/or audio and video. Super cool huh?

Well, check it out and let me know what you think. Will you attend? Have you ever seen a set up like this before? Let me know if you’ll be there so we can chat and learn together k? *SmiLes* Suzanne

http://www.suzannefranco.com/uses/rock-star.php

P.S. Don’t forget … Sharing is Sexy!

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