Good Business Requires Humility

My business partner Jay Kubassek just posted an excellent article to his blog about the necessity of humility in business. Here are a few of the key paragraphs.

I’ve always believed that the fundamental principle of humility does not have to exist in conflict with supreme self-confidence. They are not exclusive of each other; rather they are like emotional and mental sisters. Supporting each other in the pursuit of what some would call PERSPECTIVE. I challenge, and believe every PRO family member is part of the crème de la crème. The top 3%, but this does not mean we are infallible and without room for constant improvement. Becoming individually stagnant is the mark of indifference and ignorance. I force myself to learn something new every single day, knowing that constant progress is the mark of the proactive. The mark of the successful.

Evaluating our neighbor’s situation, I see a telltale sign of extreme hubris. The arrogance to not believe in adaptation. Being negligible of the simple business principles and having a sense of humble foresight. I have a favorite quote I use often from Einstein that states: “the mark of insanity is doing something the same way over and over and expecting a different result.” Good business is about having enough humility to know your practices are not perfect and keeping your ego in check. Knowing that your current success is not promised, it’s earned. It’s earned with a commitment to consistent evaluation, with listening and learning. Lessons of extreme value are amongst us constantly. Only those with the humility to accept their own imperfection as not an indictment on their ability, but an opportunity for betterment, see these lessons.

I also saw the importance of community. Success is the result of a collective energy, focus and common goals. A commitment to the success of the other only positively augments your own pursuit of achievement. The way these employees were marginalized, rendered more than just replaceable, but expendable is sad. The mark of good business is a belief that everyone has value, a sense of value breeds a sense of responsibility, a sense of responsibility breeds an environment of effort, an environment of committed effort breeds success.

To read the entire article click here.

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Twitter Growth Is Phenomenal!

The last time we checked in on my Twitter follower count was the end of May. Since then my follower count has continued to grow as if by magic. Below are a couple of screen shots showing the count on my Twitter home page. Oh, and by the way, my Twitter account is now ranked in the top 1%! That’s right-top 1%!!!!
Here’s the techniques I’ve been using.

Twitter On Autopilot

Twitter Keeps On Growing

Twitter Followers More and More

Top 1%!!!

Tweeting Techniques to Drive Traffic

I ran across a really good article with accompanying video on techniques for using Twitter to successfully drive traffic. The article is targeted toward driving traffic to your blog. But the techniques would be valid for driving traffic to any website you choose.

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1. Communicate a benefit

Blogs have been associated for a long time now with opinion and personal experience. This is often times the way they are portrayed in the main stream media. This may be due, in part, to the desire on some level to frame blogs as a less authoratative resource.

2. Make claims and promises

A claim or promise is certainly attractive, but because you are working in social media you must always maintain your trust asset. This, along with your content, is a major component to your traffic engine. This means that whatever your claims are, they should be backed up by content or services that meet those statements. Not doing so eats into your trust asset while doing so contributes to it. Halfway meeting it may maintain your status on this level but it also provides opportunities for competitors to surpass you with superior quality. You are better off being comprehensive and in so doing providing a disincentive for other to try and emulate you. What is more likely in this case is for someone to link to you and add their own commentary or insight on top of yours. What this does is embed you in the community as a person that consistently contributes. From there, you can develop the authority to a) sucessfully recommend affiliate products and services or b) market your own.

3. Personalize

– Rather than speaking in the general sense as in ‘drive more traffic to a blog’, it is better to phrase it: ‘Drive more traffic to your blog’ This is because many people in smaller niches may be of the opinion that a generalized approach is suitable only for sites with a given minimum traffic requirement. By making things more personal, a reader will start to visualize the proposition as applying to him or her.

4. Use Keywords

– This aids in being found because each keyword can help your tweet be found via different seach criteria. Many of these words work well together and may be searched as a pair, which will push you further up in the search result. Twitter search is used by many to find information but at the same time it does not have the same volume as Google. What this means is that you are competing with fewer people for top ranking. While this might mean a smaller base of users, it also means a more enthusiastic person because they are using a wider variety of tools to find what they want.

5. Ask a question

– A question can be one that searches for an answer but what tends to be more effective are questions that pose a controversy or are rhetorical. That latter is particularly effective because it states both the content being delivered as well as the fact that you have a possible solution for them.

6. Use power words (With caution)

– Words like ‘easy’, ‘discover’, ’secret’ , ‘fast’, ‘powerful’ and ‘amazing’ raise eyebrows and get attention. Using these words too heavily can result is superlative fatigue so practice judgement in employing them. Use such words when they really apply. People are quite capable of remembering when the word ‘powerful’ means nothing on blog A but something truly powerful on blog B. Associate yourself with accuracy.

7. Use humor

– This works best when referencing a conversation about a particular happening in pop culture or in the various hash tags that are meant to solicit funny replies. Clumsily using humor to drive traffic to something that isn’t really funny is misleading.

8. Create controversy

People like an opposing view. A title that does so will at least generate some interest. You should be careful, however, not to overdo it. Being identified as little more than a contrarian will actually pigeonhole you.

9. Update, modify

– Parts of your content can many times be transferred to another area in your niche. Take the time to reuse some ideas and principles to view your area of expertise from a different angle. Doing so has real value and can be appreciated as much as the original article.

10. Keep it simple

– With all of these points to consider, this last point may seem ironic, but it is crucial. Don’t overload your tweets with every single technique. Combine and layer them with taste and keep your audience in mind. They don’t want a barrage of hyperbole but are quite interested in exciting stuff, provided it really is exciting.

Here’s the link to the original article with accompanying video.

8 Tips to Create Headlines that DEMAND Attention

If you’ve been involved in online marketing for anytime at all, you understand how important the headline is to your success. It is the gateway to your content. Whether it is a sales letter, a blog post, a news release, or an article, the headline is what pulls your reader into your content.

So, here are eight tips to creating attention demanding headlines.

1. Review the sites of 10 top marketers before you begin to write. They are top marketers for a reason. And they didn’t get to the top by having lousy headlines. Now, don’t copy their headlines. That’s just wrong. But you can gather inspiration from them.

2. Keep the headline short. In testing, 5-7 word headlines generally work the best. That doesn’t mean you can’t have a 2 word or a 13 word headline be successful. But you will be bucking the odds. People want to quickly get to the point. So keep it short.

3. Use a question as your headline. This is a great way to pull the reader into your content. There’s a reason for the saying “Curiosity killed the cat”. People are curious by nature. We don’t like unanswered questions. But there is a catch. The answer to the question in your headline needs to be your product. So use a question as your headline and your readers will be more likely to read your content as they look for the answer to that question, which is your product.

4. Use an exclamation point or a question mark in your headline. This will help your headline stand out and breaks up the readers eye from seeing just plain text.

5. Be Clear. Most of the time, simple is better.

6. Use a “number of steps” formula. Almost every product can be broken up into a number of steps. “Learn piano in 7 easy steps” or “3 quick steps to secure your childs safety” are examples of using number of steps in your headline. Telling someone the number of steps to obtain the desired result, especially if the number is low, is a great way to get your reader to continue reading.

7. Use a “number of ways” formula. In this case, the larger the number the better. “30 ways to increase your income” is better than “3 ways to increase your income”. You get the idea.

8. Use an “in under” formula. This relates to time. “Master guitar in under 7 days” or “Who else wants $10,000 in under 30 days?” are examples of using this formula.

So, there you are. Eight tips to help you create headlines that demand attention.

(By the way, “Who else wants” or “Who else desires” or “Who else needs” is an excellent way to begin a question headline. Those words have been proven over and over. So, there you go, an extra tip.)

More Twitter Followers

Here’s a screen shot of my Twitter follower totals. This is just a few weeks after implementing some new techniques on Twitter. This is the system I’m using. http://bit.ly/AfKQ5

More Twitter followers

1000 New Twitter Followers in 6 Days on Autopilot!

Well, it’s been several days since my last post. My Twitter follower count has continued to climb steadily. My total follower count now stands at just over 2000! That’s 1000 new Twitter followers in 6 days! And with almost no input from myself at all. At most I’ve spent maybe 20 or 30 minutes since my last post updating my Twitter account. Here’s a screen shot of my Twitter account now.

2000 Twitter Followers

Now, I know you’re wondering what I’ve been doing. What are these techniques and methods I’ve been using to grow my account. Well, here it is. http://bit.ly/AfKQ5

Check back again. I’ll be posting more about the amazing growth of my Twitter followers.

Over 250 More Twitter Followers On Autopilot

Well, it’s been 48 hours since my last post about my new techniques to get more Twitter followers. In that 48 hours I’ve gained over 250 more followers. And all on autopilot!

More than 250 more Twitter followers

So, the new techniques are working great! Want to know what they are? Well, check back in a couple of days and I’ll let you in on my secrets.

Twitter Growth on Autopilot

Well, 24 hours have passed since my last post on the results of my new Twitter techniques and the results are great!  I’ve gained another 200 followers!  All on autopilot.  I spent about an hour getting everything set up.  That was 48 hours ago.  Since then I haven’t touched my account.  And I’ve gained about 400 followers! I’ll let this run a few days then I’ll post my results again so be sure and check back.

More Twitter Followers On Autopilot

Last night I implemented some new techniques designed to help me get more followers on my Twitter account.  These techniques are fairly straightforward, simple to do, and not at all black hat or anything.  If fact, it helps me give more value to my followers without me having to be as directly involved.  It truly is almost on autopilot.

Before I put these techniques into play, I had just over 1,000 followers.  Tonight, 24 hours later, I have just over 1,300 followers.  That’s almost 300 new followers in just 24 hours!

I’m going to be posting my results from these new techniques over the next couple of weeks so be sure to drop back by and check out my latest follower count.