Dan Kennedy Info Riches - Must Read Review
April 10, 2009 by Erich Mosier
Filed under All About Domains, Top Product Reviews
If you have been in online marketing for any length of time you doubtless know the name Dan Kennedy. If you don’t know who Dan Kennedy is, research his name on Amazon and see what everyone has to say about his best-selling books! He is the “guru’s guru”, the Godfather of online marketers. All of the top “Guru’s” today will often attribute their success to Dan Kennedy. So when Dan comes out with a product you should take time to listen.
You know that being in the IM business, we are constantly being bombarded with products almost daily. The new latest and greatest products that are always coming out may or may not be worth the investment. For my readers I try to let you know which you should spend your money on and which you should avoid. But when Dan Kennedy releases a Info Marketing product it should be taken into strong consideration if you are serious about being an online marketer.
Over the years, the information I have received from Dan has been invaluable in helping me grow my business. Even though I have been in it a while, he still comes out with ideas that I use to dramatically increase my earnings.
There is a major difference between all of the marketing products that you see everyday and what you get from Dan Kennedy. The information that you get today, relies on the newest tricks of the trade. What you get from Dan is tried and true business advice that should form the basis for your marketing business. Don’t get me wrong, the new tips and tricks that the new products show you can definitely show you how to make a bunch of money. But they are generally short term solutions and may not be applicable after a couple of years.
The information that Dan Kennedy gives you will last for years and years. They are the basic business practices that you can build an empire on, and many of today’s top marketers have. Without having a solid foundation, you will have the tendency to be blown by the wind. Chasing new product after new product, in the hopes that one of them will help you achieve your goal of financial independence. (By the way, that will never work)
I could really go on and on for pages about how much I have learned from Dan, but here is the bottom line… if you are truly serious about making it in internet marketing, I highly recommend that you get this product. If you are just going to be doing online marketing as a hobby to make a little bit of money one the side, then this may not be as important for your business, but you still may want to consider it.
Click here if you are ready to get serious about your internet marketing business.
You need to decide what it is you want to accomplish with your business, because honestly it is a lot of money to spend when you are first starting out (almost $1000). But for the quality and quantity of information you get, compared to most of the $2-3K products that have been coming out, it is an absolute bargain. When I was first starting out, I was terrified of spending big money on products that promised the moon. I didn’t want to waste my money on something that wasn’t going to work. And at that time, there wasn’t anyone out there to tell me what was good and what was bad.
Thankfully I was smart (or lucky) enough to buy one of Dan’s products, for much more than this one, and it was well worth it. I was able to, and still do, use the information I got from him to make an extremely solid income online. Had I not, I have no idea how long it would have taken me, if ever, to reach my goals.
If you want some more information first, here is a short video about Dan Kennedy’s Info Riches program. Then you can click the link below to read more about it. Take a look…
Click here to learn about Dan Kennedy’s Info Riches.
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Amazons New Policy Means Big Change For Direct Linking Strategies
April 7, 2009 by Erich Mosier
Filed under Adwords & PPC, All About Domains, Email Marketing, Internet Marketing, SEO You Should Know, Website Flipping
I recieved an email from the Amazon Associates program last night (April 6, 2009) stating their changes to their program. Here is an excerpt containing the two main points of this change:
“After careful review of how we are investing our advertising resources, we have made the decision to no longer pay referral fees to Associates who send users to www.amazon.com, www.amazon.ca, or www.endless.com through keyword bidding and other paid search on Google, Yahoo, MSN, and other search engines, and their extended search networks.”
“As of May 1, 2009, Associates will not be paid referral fees for paid search traffic. Also, in connection with this change, as of May 1, 2009, Amazon will no longer make data feeds available to Associates for the purpose of sending users to the Amazon websites in the US or Canada via paid search. “
The first section basically says that they will no longer pay affilates that direct link to them from Paid Search like Google Adwords or Yahoo Marketing. This will no doubt take some of the wind out of the sails of products like Google Cash and PPC Ninja, although neither of them rely strictly on Amazon for sales, they both make mention of them as good ways to make quick money. I am sure that there will be a lot of people very unhappy about this and will see a dent in their earnings until they restructure.
The second section will probably affect less people, but I am sure there are a number of people making good money with Amazon datafeeds.
Obviously it must make good business sense to Amazon to do this. If those things weren’t helping their bottom line, then obviously these changes were necessary. At least they are giving their affilates a little bit of time to readjust. These changes don’t go into effect until May 1, 2009.
So if you didn’t get the email, and you happen to be reading this (before May 1), then it is time to start making some new plans on how to work your PPC campaigns.
This is why you need to diversify. Do not rely solely on one form of income. I have know many people that have been virtually wiped out when the have all of their eggs in one basket and a major change like this comes. If you are just starting out in internet marketing, be sure to keep this in mind. Create multiple streams of income from different sources. It is the only way to be truely financially independent. Mail this post
Best Web Site Hosting- How To Choose The Best Web Host For You
April 1, 2009 by Erich Mosier
Filed under Website Flipping
Finding the best web site hosting plan for your business can be confusing, but if your business is going to be involved on the internet in any serious capacity, one of the most important decisions you will need to make is choosing a hosting provider. Choosing the best one is not as important as NOT choosing the wrong one. Speaking from years of experience, the wrong hosting provider can be a nightmare, especially if you have other clients that depend on you.
Choosing the right host is mostly a matter of doing a little research and asking the right questions. You may be looking for the best rated web hosting company to work with, but here’s a secret….there is no “best” host out there. That’s because everyone’s circumstances are different and change over time and therefore require different things at different times. But there are a lot of very good hosts out there to choose from. Which one is “best” will depend on your situation. I will give you my opinions of the best web site hosting companies based on my experience at the end of this article.
Note: Although I mainly focus my discussion on Internet marketing, the points I make will apply to basically any business that is going online.
1. Price - You get what you pay for
Although for most people starting in internet marketing price is a big consideration, price should not be the only determining factor. Your time, not to mention your sanity, has price. The good news is that many of the good hosts out there are all in the same range and offer most of the same basic features. As I write this I would say that you should expect to pay about $8-$10.00 per month for web hosting. There are some that charge in the $3-$5 per month range, but I would tend to stay away from those, as they are usually not as reliable and more restrictive in their options. The extra couple of dollars a month is well worth it.
And remember, that even though the costs are low, that doesn’t diminish the fact that this is a very important business decision. If you choose the wrong host and need to switch down the road, it can take days or weeks of time to move your site(s) over, depending on how many you have. So don’t think that just because it only $10.00 per month that this should be taken lightly. I have been doing this for over 9 years, and have made my share of bad hosting decisions over that time. So use my experience to avoid making the same mistakes.
2. Features - What’s in it for me?
Once you figure out what you want to pay, now it is time to start looking at the features each host offers. Most web hosting companies offer multiple plans. For instance, Hostgator offers 3 basic plans, Hatchling, Baby, and Business available in either Windows or Linux web site hosting (I’ll discuss those in another article). Each level offers many of the same features, but they each have their differences.
Hostgator Comparison Chart (example)
Below are comparisons of different basic Hostgator plans. These are only a partial list of features, to show where they differ. All other features are the same, so I didn’t think you needed to see that here. See the full list of features here.
The first thing you should notice is the prices. All pretty good. The Hatchling price looks great until you start looking at features. The big problem with this package is that it only allows you to host 1 domain. That is great if that is all you will ever do, but it is unlikely in most cases, especially if you are going to be in online marketing. You will be much better off with either of the other two packages that offer “unlimited” domains. In theory, that means you can host as many domains as you would like.
With most FTP features, like anonymous FTP, you won’t really need to worry about them unless you have a specific reason to. And if you have a specifc reason you, you should already know what you need.
Addon / parked domains are only important if you are planning on parking your domain pages.
Sub Domains come in handy sometimes but are not critical
FTP accounts really only get used if you will have other people accessing the web server files.
This last image shows a couple of interesting things. The first thing to look at is the $2.00 / monthly for the dedicated IP. This is not an option, this is automatically included, which makes the actual price of the package $9.95 per month. I think they could have done this a little differently, as it is kind of a cheesey way of being able to show a more competitive price, but it must work for them. Anyway, just be aware of that if you go with them.
The “Toll free number” and “private SSL” are only going to be useful if you have an online store where you will be selling products, or you will want people to be able to call you. This is not the case with most online marketers, so the extra $3.00 expense is typically not worth it.
I am not singling out Hostgator as the one you should go with, but they are one that you should seriously consider. They are one of the most popular hosts among internet marketers for a reason.
3. Reputation - What’s the word on the street?
As with any business decision you need to do your homework. The problem with trying to find reviews of web hosts on the web is that all of “review” sites out there are just affiliate sites, with no true information on them. They will list 10 sites, with a feature comparison chart, and whichever one pays the highest commissions is the one they list as best. You really have to dig to find any real information from real people. Plan on looking for about an hour.
Obviously you can’t trust the testimonial on the actual web hosts site. They could be just cherry picking the best ones and not showing the negative ones, or they could be fake (gasp!).
You could try someone like the Better Business Bureau (BBB), but personally I wouldn’t trust them either.
What you are really looking for are blogs where you have real people praising the good and complaining about the bad. Remember, every host will have bad reviews. I don’t care how good they are. Some people just like to bitch and moan, and typically they are the ones that like to vent.
I used to own a ColdStone Creamery, and one of the things I told my employees is that a customer that gets good service may tell 1 other person about it, but a customer that gets bad service will tell 20 people. It is just the way things are.
Without being able to hear both sides of the story, it is hard to know what the truth is. Granted, some people just have a bad experience. They have a perfect storm of circumstances and everything goes wrong. But some people make things worse than they need to be and no matter what you do you can’t make them happy. These are usually the people that complain the loudest.
My point is, if you are able to find a discussion about a particular webhost, you should weigh the good comments heavier than the bad in most cases. If there are nothing but bad comments, then the host is probably bad. If they are pretty equal, then the host is probably pretty good. If they are mostly good, they they are probably excellent.
4. Customer Support - Help! I need somebody…
This goes right along with the number 3 above. A hosts customer support are the front lines of their business. If their customer service sucks, you will want to leave, and tell everyone about it. If their customer service is good, you will probably rarely ever need to speak with them, and will probably never mention it to anyone.
Unfortunately this is only information you can get beforehand from comments and discussions. But good customer service is vitally important to your mental well being and your business (in that order). Not that it is critical, but having a customer service rep that speaks your language (natively) makes a huge difference. I don’t mean to sound xenophobic, but trying to solve a crisis is not the time to try and tackle a language barrier as well. It does nothing but make the CS rep frustrated with you and make you angry at the them.
5. Growing old together? - Scalability
If you are just starting out, then this isn’t going to be a major factor, but it should be in the back of your mind. Depending on how big you get (or are planning on getting) you will want a web host that will grow with you. This mainly has to do with the amount of traffic you have coming to your site. Most sites will be just fine with the “unlimited” amount of bandwidth most hosts offer. But once you get up to 10K or more visits per day , you will find out that “unlimited” is not as infinite as it may sound. You will start getting charged with “exceeding your bandwidth” charges. At that point it will be time to scale up, possibly to a dedicated server. But for the vast majority of internet and affiliate marketing people out there, this is not something you will need to worry about for a long time.
So who do I recommend?
I currently use several different hosts for my various network marketing ventures. If you are serious about internet marketing you are going to want to have several web hosting accounts for SEO purposes. Based on my experience, or the experiences of other internet marketers, here are the web hosts I recommend and the ones I don’t.
Highly Recommended
HostGator
Good Price, pretty good service, good variety of plans, very good control panel, great reputation
GoDaddy
Good price, pretty good service, good variety of plans, good reliability, great reputation
HostMonster
Good price, pretty good service, good reliability, good variety of plans available
Mosso
High price, excellent service, excellent reliability and scalability
(only recommended for larger clients)
Recommended
1&1 Web Hosting
very good prices, good plan options, good tools and extras, not great service
(if they ever fix their customer service, I would move 1&1 up to highly recommended)
SuperGreen Hosting
Very good prices, only 1 plan offered, good extra features, so-so service
Not Recommended
Network Solutions
high price, good reliability, mediocre service, bad control panel
Just Host
good price, questionable reliability, poor service
FatCow
good price, questionable reliability, poor service
Inmotion
good price, questionable reliability, poor service
Bluehost
good price, ok reliablity, poor service
If you have had any experiences with these hosts or any other, please leave a comment so others can gain some insight from your experience. Mail this post
How To Register A Domain Name: Domain Registration Explained Easy
March 23, 2009 by Erich Mosier
Filed under All About Domains
How to Register a Domain Name
So you finally decided on the domain name you wanted, so now what do you do? Well now you need to register it and make it yours. “But how do I do that”, you ask? I am glad you asked. It just so happens I would like nothing more at this moment than to describe to you how you register a domain. It really is a simple process, and after the first time, you will be a pro. Before we get started, here is a short video describing how to register a domain name. You don’t need to watch it, and men may find it more interesting than women, but it is funny and will give you at least a basic idea of what the process of domain registration is.
Step 1: Is the Domain Available
If you are not sure whether your desired domain name is available or not, your first step is to check. Just type it into the address bar of your browser and see what comes up. If a site comes up, someone owns it. You can either look in to trying to buy it from them, or choose another name. If a page comes up saying something like “This page does not exist”, then you are in luck and you can proceed to step two. If you want to see who owns it you need to do a “WHOIS” search. You can use the Verisign WHOIS search for this.
WARNING: If you need to look for new domains, be careful who you use. There are a lot of websites out there that will let you do searches to see if a domain is available, but as soon as you search for it, they will buy it if it is available, and then you will have to pay a higher price to buy it throught them. And it is not only small websites that do it. A few of the bigger ones did it as well. Network Solutions, and GoDaddy were doing it for a while. I think GoDaddy stopped after a cry of outrage from the masses, but I am not sure if Network Solutions still does it or not.
If you are going to start registering a lot of domains, for instance if you were going to start making money site flipping, then you may want to sign up with a service domaintools.com. They have a free registration that gives you access to a lot of great domain tools, like whois lookups, domain suggestions, domain searching, domain monitoring, etc. I use them almost everyday. Even if this is going to be the only domain you register, it would still be worthwhile to use them. For security and piece of mind, if nothing else.
Step 2: Where to Register
Okay, so you found your dream domain name, you know that it’s available, so now where do you go? My first recommendation is that you stay with the big players. By this I mean, the larger companies that do its as their primary business. So depending on what your goals are will also determine where you should go.
Something to consider -Will you need hosting?
Almost all companies that do domain registrations also do website hosting. The range of pricing for hosting varies as much as the quality. I have worked with multiple hosting companies, and I have found it is better to pay a little more for better quality, and fewer frustrations, than to pay a little less to deal with the headaches that come along with it. Now my situation is a little different, because I have many clients and hundreds of domains that I maintain. Because I have to answer to other people when things go wrong, I tend to be a little more picky about my providers.
Your situation may be different. You may only have one site to maintain, and you may be willing to sacrifice a little quality for cheaper price. I’m not here to judge, you know your situation better than I. I’m just telling you what I do. If you are going to need hosting. I would recommend registering your domain with whoever does your hosting. In general, it just makes your life easier to have everything in one place.
So try to find somewhere that will give you what you need for the price you want to pay. I have hosting accounts with several hosts. For internet marketing, it is absolutely necessary to have separate “C-Blocks” for your domains.
Here are a list of some hosts that you may want to consider and my opinions on them.
GoDaddy
GoDaddy is the top choice for registering domains and one of the best for hosting. I currently have an account with GoDaddy and have had no problems with them so far. Registering a domain with them is insanely fast and easy. Very competitive prices on hosting and domains. Especially if you buy a lot of domains like me. They have a “Discount Domain Club” that can save you a lot of money if you plan on registering a lot of domains in a year (more than 30). If you don’t do that many, I wouldn’t recommend it as it won’t save you any money.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP WITH GODADDY
HostGator I also have accounts with HostGator. The thing I like about HostGator is that their system is very easy to use. You can do everything from the control panel. They use CPanel, if you are familiar with that. I haven’t used them for domain registration, so I can’t give you a personal recommendation on that, although I haven’t heard any complaints from any of the people I know that have used them. This is a good recommendation if you are on a budget.
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP WITH HOSTGATOR
HostMonster 
I do not currently have a hostmonster account, but they are the next on my list when I get ready to get another host. I have heard a lot of good things about them from other Internet Marketers who have had a good experience with them. Their prices are competitive with HostGator and GoDaddy, with unlimited space, domains, and transfers.
CLICK HERE TO SIGNUP FOR HOSTMONSTER.COM NOW.
1and1 1and1 is a company that I also use for hosting and use for most of my domain registrations. Mainly because they have good prices, and that just happens to be where most of my domains are registered. Like I said before, much easier when you keep them all in one place, and when you’re dealing with hundreds of domains, it’s even more true. As far as hosting their prices are hard to beat, but their quality and their customer service leaves something to be desired.
Host unlimited domains + get up to 5 FREE domains with your 1&1 hosting account.
Must see monthly hosting specials!
Mosso Let me start by saying I LOVE Mosso. Since I started using them. I haven’t had any major hosting problems, and any of the problems I have had, their tech support team (which is based in Texas, not India or the Philippines) gets it done right away. I have also not had a noticeable downtime with any of my sites, or client sites, since I started using them. The bad thing about them is that they are much more expensive. As of this writing, I believe their basic plan starts at $100 a month. But again, for my business, it is well worth it.
Network Solutions I would tend to stay away from Network Solutions. Although their quality may be good. They are VERY overpriced, especially when it comes to domain name registration. I only deal with them becuase some of my clients use them, and therefore I have to. I do not recommend you use them.
In summary about hosting, if you are only planning on starting a couple of websites and price is a concern, I would probably go with GoDaddy, HostGator, or HostMonster . If you will be building sites for other people and stability is a concern I would highly recommend Mosso. In summary about domain registration, they are all within about a dollar of each other as far as price with basic domain registration. Most usually run some type of special, like $1.99 domain registration when you purchase hosting. As of this writing, you should expect to pay anywhere from $7.99-$10 for a domain. You certainly should not pay more than that. But keep in mind price increases do happen. In fact, one that just happened a couple months ago (as of this writing), and prices went up about a couple of dollars.
Step 3: Registering your domain
Once you’ve determined, what company you are going to go with. You simply need to register with them. Most of the companies will walk you through the process of registering the domain. The basic information you need to have on hand, is:
- the domain name.
- Your information (name, address etc.).
- Credit card information
When you register a domain, they will ask you for information on three people:
- the site owner.
- The site administrator.
- Technical contact.
In most cases these three people will be the same person. But in some cases, they may be different. If you are merely going to own the domain, but have someone else act as a webmaster, you will generally fill out their information for the administrator and technical contact. Again, it will all depend on your particular circumstance. I’m just telling you what information you need to have on hand.
They will probably also try to sell, or give, you other products like hosting, website building software, SSL certificates, privacy protection. Again, it will depend on your circumstances, as far as what you need. As far as keeping your domain name public or private, you will generally want to keep it public. This mayhelp you with Google ranking. You will only need SSL certificates, if you’re planning on doing online e-commerce.
Step 4: How long should I register my domain?
You also need to do add how long you want to register the domain for. Typically, the longer you register it for the cheaper the per year price, but you have to pay all upfront. It also reduces your concern with having to renew it. Most companies will auto renew the domain for you and you won’t have to do anything. But I would make sure and check with whichever company you go with that auto renewal is a service that they provide.
Again, it will depend on your circumstances. If your main business is just going to be site flipping (buying and selling websites for profit). Then you’ll probably only want to register the name for a year. If you’re starting a business and planning on being around for a while a longer-term may be more cost-effective.
Step 5: Pay for your domain name
The last step in buying your domain name will be to pay for it. It’s no different than buying anything else online. Once you’ve done that. It’s time to celebrate! You are now officially a domain owner. Welcome to the Internet.
Once your domain is created, it’s time to hurry up and wait. Your domain needs to “propagate” through the web. Basically, that just means it takes time for the servers around the world to be able to recognize your domain. This generally takes between 4and 24 hours, but can take as much a 72. There is nothing you, or anyone else, can do to speed up this process. So don’t waste time worrying about it. Take this time to sit back and think about all the stuff you will sell, or all the information you will give, or whatever it is you will do with your new website.
If you would like to find out more information on how you can make money flipping websites, see our other articles on this subject.
Please leave me a comment and let me know if this was useful.
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