Did you know that your ideal lifestyle doesn’t cost a million dollars?

You really REALLY don’t need a lottery win.

My ideal lifestyle – and tust me, I’m pretty sure that I’m living it – cost just $2600 some years back.

That was the amount of money I needed to earn a month from my online business to be able to quit my job (actually to be able to dump my other business but it’s pretty much the same thing).

And it blew my mind. Suddenly I didn’t have to win the lottery or build a complicated, time-consuming internet business. I just needed two and half grand a month.  Yeah I know it might seem like a case of ‘well it might as WELL be a million bucks the way my business is going’ but that’s absolutely not true.

Building an internet business is pretty damn impossible if you look at it as just ONE task. It’s like looking at a pile of sand that you’ve got to move from outside your house to Bill Gate’s front door (probably at the end of a VERY long driveway) with a pair of tweezers.

So don’t even try.

Seriously – just DO NOT try to build your online business like that.

There’s an old joke about an American asking directions in IRELAND. The old Irishman looks at him for a while and then says ‘Well I wouldn’t start from here…..’

And that’s about it. There are already enough people who are happy to make your life difficult so why be one of them?

I tried to build a complete online business – to go full time online in ONE attempt. Well after the tears, the drinking and the anger against all things internet had finished I sat down and tried to work out where I’d gone wrong.

The answer was obvious. Little steps.

I know you’ve heard this before but listen to my take on how it works.

You need your internet business to ‘handle certain things for you’ – ideally monthly payments.

I started with my electricity bill. Wasn’t much – around $80 a month if I remember correctly. My first and ONLY online goal was to pay my monthly gas bill from my online earnings. Took me a while but I did it.

Sure I had another business at the time and could easily afford to pay my eleccy bill while my online earnings paid for a meal out with my wife or kept me in beer but that wasn’t the point.

Once I’d paid my electricity bill for a couple of monthly solely from my online earnings it was the turn of my car insurance. This took less time. Once that was done it was time for a biggie – my mortgage.

You see where I’m going?

Small, easily acheivable goals.

We’ve all heard about writing your goals on a postcard that you keep in your wallet, and repeat to yourself while looking in the mirror 3 times a day – ‘by 12th November of whatever year I will have a brand new Jaguar S-type parked in my drive’

November 12th comes and goes and the only thing in your drive is bird crap and leaves.

It’s not realistic. I think your mind – your subconscious needs proof that you’re putting the work in too. If you can show whatever cauldron of seething anxieties and neuroses you call your subconscious that you’re able to do at least something towards your goals then it’s all too happy to help you out.

If I do a decent launch I expect to see 5 figures from it. Usually this happens. It’s very nice but it’s no big deal anymore because I’m used to it and, well that’s just what happens. But go back some years and the thought of a five figure launch on the internet would be pretty unbelieveable to me by any stretch of the imagination.

And it’s the same with starting out. If you can show yourself that your online business is capable of supporting you in just one TINY area of your life, then you’re going to make an awful lot of money. Because I absolutely, completely believe that it’s harder to make your first $100 online than it is to make your first $100,000

Please try this out. Please.

It works.

Just concentrate your thoughts on paying one tiny bill – monthly ones are best – then work at your business with this in mind. Don’t worry about who is making $1000 a month, or $100,000 a month – they’re not your concern – they’re not coming round for Christmas dinner – it’s YOU and your loved ones that this is about, nobody else – at least not at first.

And get that first little bill paid…..and once you’ve done it, stand back because the flood gates of what’s acheivable online will well and truly OPEN WIDE.

The alternative?

How many hours – no, minutes in the day do you spend worrying whether your boss is happy, comfortable, and OK financially?

None?

Good – because that’s EXACTLY the same amount of time he spends thinking about how YOU’RE doing.

You have to make a start guys because there are strange times ahead. The most financially vulnerable place you can possible be, in terms of work,  is when you’re in ‘steady’ full time employement. Because you pay for your home, your food and your clothing at the whim of someone else. If your boss decides to sell up and move to a hut on the beach he isn’t going to think for a millisecond about you.

But there’s a way out, and you’re looking at it – your computer. You’re not a newbie anymore – you know what I mean when I say ‘affiliate’ or ‘pop-up’ and the chances are you didn’t before you got into IM. Sure you might be JUST above newbie status, but above it you certainly are.

It may not seem like it but you’re actually in a better position than 95% of the people around you, and the fact that you could afford to buy a computer puts you RIGHT at the top of the tree in terms of being lucky, on a worldwide scale.

But don’t give yourself a guilt trip about any of this – you have the right to do what you want with your life and if this involves making obscene amounts of money on the net then get to it! If you feel guilty when you’re polishing your Ferrari give some to charity – Hell – give the CAR to charity if you want, but whatever your second thoughts about Internet Marketing please just give my methods a go.

If you fancy a look inside my online business – which now brings me five figures a month  CLICK HERE

’till next time

Tony

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

I got laughed at the other day by another Internet Marketer.

It’s not someone I’d call a friend (certainly not now I know the guy’s a prat) but someone I’d skpe-chatted with now and again. He asked me about a certain part of my business – it was article marketing actually – and asked me what I thought of the process.

I told him that I’m much more a fan of viral marketing – writing a small 5 page report, setting it loose on the internet and having it bring me an up front profit AND drive traffic to my sites for free. (The full process is documented in www.viralsneakiness.com)

But I also do some article marketing, despite not liking the process very much, because it works for some niches.

So he laughed at me, and REALLY took the michael because I still did the process myself – I don’t often outsource the article marketing process or use software.

He proudly told me how he’d just spent thousands on software and membership sites for a process that would almost totally automate the article writing AND submission process and told me in no uncertain terms what a fool I was for doing it myself. He didn’t actually word it much nicer either.

So I asked how much money he made from traffic driven from his articles before he’d automated the process. Turns out not very much at all. I then visited a couple of article submission sites and read some of his articles. They were awful. Really crappy.

So the next time we chat I’m going to ask him why on Earth he’s automating a process that DOESN’T WORK?

If the process was bringing in a good profit and driving vast amounts of traffic then sure – automate away and reap the rewards but if you have a dead cat, putting it on a skateboard isn’t going to make it a pet.

You know what I mean?

There are loads – hundreds maybe thousands of Internet Marketers who are obsessed with ‘automating the process’ and spend a fortune on software and outsourcing expecting it to reap rewards. But if the process doesn’t work in the first place, automating it won’t make the slightest bit of difference.

You’ll just end up with an AUTOMATED system that doesn’t work!

Better to tweak the way you do things and suss out why they’re not working in the first place, get ’em working then automate.

Crazy.

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

Ever noticed how people who work for themselves have bigger houses and more money?

Me too – cos I’m one of them.

But I’d never really noticed it before in terms of how obvious it was. Let me explain.

I was driving to the office a few days ago, and the route takes me down a wide, tree lined avenue with big houses either side. At least one has a helicopter pad in the garden at the back, so they range from nice, slightly bigger than average houses to whopping great mansions.

Now I don’t know who lives in most of these homes but I’ll bet you my half eaten sandwich that most if not ALL of the people who live on the avenue are self employed.

You meet someone at a party and (you get drunk and chat up their wife, but BEFORE the embarassing fight ensues in the garden) you indulge in polite chat which usually involves aking them what they do for a living. If they say they’re self employed, or own a business, or run a company or whatever you immediately get a picture of them in a nice house, couple of cars, bit more money than the norm etc.

I do. People would think the same of me if I didn’t look like I’d just been dug up.

BUT have you ever thought WHY people who work for themselves earn more money?

It seems obvious but it’s not. You think people who work for themselves earn more money because well, people who are their own bosses just…….earn more money!

Think about it – even self employed people who are what I call a ‘one man band’ such as a plumber or electrician all seem to earn more money than people who are average employees.

And it’s because of this – self employed people don’t earn huge sums of money – the earn what is normal for our society and the cost of living.

It’s the poor sods who work for other people whose earnings are kept at an artifically low level by their employers.

No wonder most people who work 9-5’s these days are fighting a losing battle against poverty, because the amount of money they’re paid is never EVER enough to cope with inflation, rising prices and the cost of having a home, family and decent standard of living.

And here’s the really bad news guys.

While you work for other people you will never ever get to the point that you always think is round the corner – you know what I mean?

‘Once I’ve paid my loan off I’ll get back on my feet’

‘Once my pay rise comes next year we’ll stop feeling the pinch’

I’m really really sorry – but as someone who’s been in both camps I’m telling you now that you will NEVER get back on your feet while working for someone else.

Maybe when you retire – pay off the mortgage things will get a little easier – maybe they won’t – but that’s at age 65 (could be 75 in a few years time if the politicians get their way) and that’s a major chunk of the best years of your life taken up in a bloody great struggle against poverty, worry and stress.

If you work for an employer make sure than you have some of your own income too – an online business is my obvious suggestion – because you will need a buffer zone against the result of his pained expression as he explains how your wage packet has gone up by 1.5% but the cost of living has gone up by 3.5% – ‘we’re having to tighten the belt’ he’ll say as he pulls away in his 7 series BMW.

I’m no socialist – I like money and free time. I don’t like work (which I consider to be anything that I don’t like doing) but I’ve also had the sleepless nights and been snappy with my family through financial worry. It’s not fun.

So (same old same old but GOD it’s important) pleeeeeease try to get your business off the ground. Your family, your health and your bank balance would all be grateful. None more so than you though – being your own person in a world of unfortunate robots is a heady feeling.

Going to finish my sandwich now……

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

I took the kids to Sainsburys last week to get some supplies. For Non-UK readers, Sainsbury’s is a supermarket – one of the big four or five chains in the UK.

So I had the kids stuffed in the trolley, sitting among the groceries and because it took me longer than it did Bletchley Park to crack the Enigma code to make out what my wife had written on the shopping list they were getting bored and hungry.

So I went to the bakery section where by chance they’d just baked a new batch of crusty French bread. It was still warm so I grabbed a couple of sticks and tore some up so we could munch as we shopped. I put one whole stick and a part-eaten stick into the trolley so I could pay for it along with the rest of the groceries as we left the store.

Within seconds a woman with ‘I’m Janet – How Can I Help?’ written on a badge on her Sainsbury’s uniform marched up to me with a face like a bag of spanners and an attitude to match.

She then proceeded to give me a lecture about how I shouldn’t eat bread that I hadn’t paid for yet. I initially thought this was funny until I glanced at my little girl slowly stopping chewing and looking guiltily at the piece of bread in her hand.

Which is when I lost it. I kept my voice steady despite being furiously angry and explained to this women exactly whereabouts in the food chain I thought she was, and if she had any sense of business she’d realise that every time we came to the store my kids yelled for fresh bread thus making more profit for her employers.

But no.

Resisting the urge to tear the bread up into tiny pieces and scatter it around the bakery section while doing a mad dance I walked away, having made my opinion of her clear.

Now I WAS in the wrong, but there are ways of explaining things, and anyone with common sense could see I wasn’t about to eat half a baguette than put the rest back in the rack (although maybe next time I visit….)

Transfer the whole scenario to Internet Marketing and we see a strange thing.

People complain about the pettiest little things – slight mis-spellings in bolgs and repots, or a web page that takes a little too long to load.

What we REALLY should be complaining about are the things that nobody seems to notice in Internet Marketing – it’s like the emperor’s new clothes – nobody else says anything so nothing gets said at all. The HUGEST things are therefore ignored.

I’m talking about the multi millionaire marketers who launch $1,000 software before it works properly, or the super afilliates who entice you to buy the latest thousand dollar products through them by promising huge bonuses which never arrive.

Following the carbohydrate analogy, let’s get to what’s wrong with the bread and butter of IM – forget the little things that just annoy and concentrate on shouting about the BIG rip-offs that cost thousands of dollars.

If you want to have a good moan and find out what’s being said about IM by real IM’ers rather than guru’s or their butt buddies then go to www.guruscamforum.com and log in – it’s free, you won’t get any sales emails so just introduce yourslef and say hello to some of the smartest marketers around. Quite a few are online friends (which is why I don’t delete the posts where they take the pee out of me)

You’re more than welcome to join us.

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

….and it possibly wasn’t a good idea for me to tell a (slightly) dirty joke in my first post. But red wine and Sunday evening boredom is a heady mix so we’re going to leave it on.

 www.laycockpublishing.com – our new blog is now live on the net.

Da da daaaaaaah! As my 3 year old daughter says when she’s produced an especially good poop.

Sara B, my partner in Laycock Publishing wasn’t best pleased but that’s women for you. I’m sure she’ll see the funny side when you lot rush to the site to read the joke (pleeeeeease!)

In terms of business, blogging is a very serious matter, even when it’s fun. I think that blogs are going to be THE method of selling over the next decade.

Email marketing is looking decidedly shaky with everyone and his dog doing what they can to make sure not a single spam email plops into their inbox, so that pretty soon even the best marketers just won’t be able to get through to their lists.

So the lists will have to come to the marketers.

And how will that happen?  – well Mr Guru Marketer will have to write a very witty, entertaining, content filled blog (much like my own 🙂 ) if he wants anyone to buy from him at all.

It’s a good thing in my opinion – top marketers will SERIOUSLY have to provide content, entertainment and VALUE in their blogs or nobody will visit them. I welcome the change.

The more dirty jokes the better.

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

I went to the Doctor’s for an all round check up the other day.

I got so engrossed in reading a book I’d taken with me that I didn’t hear my name called and looked up just in time to see some smug woman walking into the doctor’s office and therefore stealing – yes STEALING – my turn.

I considered hammering on the Doctor’s door demanding my rightful place but I didn’t. I sat there for 15 minutes absolutely SEETHING with anger. When I eventually got in to see the Doctor, I’d wound myself up into such a state my blood pressure was 190/130 and they had to put electrodes on my chest to monitor my condition.

I clamed down when a nurse rubbed my shoulders for a bit (you really must go private if you’re reading this in the UK) and I managed to convince them that bright red with steam coming out of my ears wasn’t my natural state.

But the fact remained that I needed the check up.  I’m not exactly at death’s door (touch wood) at 41 but I sometimes make a groaning noise when I stand up and the amount of beer I used to drink as I was getting ready to go out now puts me on my back for three days.

The harsh fact of life is that none of us are getting out alive.

Whcih is why you need to start making your Internet Marketing COUNT. Not your relationship with your family, God or the Swedish twins you’ve got pencilled in for next Saturday night – that can come later – but your INTERNET MARKETING. Because that’s what’s going to give you the time and quality of life that makes it worth living rather than stumbling through coughing, spluttering and wondering where your 30’s went.

Internet Marketing is much like life – the only way to really make a success of it is to play it on your own terms. If you do it to please someone else you’re not going to enjoy it much. And let’s face it, if something isn’t enjoyable why the bloody hell should you do it (unless it’s charitable or will stop something swelling up or dropping off).

Sara Brown wrote a great post on how she personally found a way to break into IM – a way that worked for her. Have a read and hopefully realise that life, and IM need personalising or they won’t work.

Here’s the post http://laycockpublishing.com/2008/04/12/internet-marketing-does-work/

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

We gave subscribers to my Newsletter and Sara Brown’s Newsletter a 24 start when we launched www.monthlyplr.com

81 out of the 100 places went to subscribers in this time.

After that we went live on the internet starting with a Warrior Forum announcement that sold out in NINE MINUTES.

It seems word of the high quality 100% unique Laycock Publishing PLR has gotten around.

However as with all subscriber sites, people do decide it’s not for them and cancel their subscription. This hasn’t happened yet but in case some subscribers do decide to drop out, we’ve set up a waiting list at http://www.monthlyplr.com

If you’re interested, get your name on their and should a place among one of the 100 available arise we’ll email you directly. It’s done on a first come first served basis so if we email you and you decide not to take up the place it’ll go to the next person on the list.

Get my blog posts delivered by Email

We’ve been bullied into it!

Not entirely true but we probably wouldn’t have got around to launching a monthly subscription PLR site if we hadn’t been nagged and cajoled by our subscribers.

We’ve been putting out PLR products on an ad hoc basis for quite a while, and they never ever – NOT ONCE – got chance to go past subscriber offer stage because all the licenses get snapped up before general release stage.

So, cutting a long and extremely boring story short, we’ve launched

http://www.monthlyplr.com

We’re putting together one 100% unique, internet marketing related EBOOK each and every month for just 100 people.

It launched to subscribers a little while ago so you’ll have to be quick.

We even got the HUGE pleasure of turning down no less than TWO gurus who wanted in (too much competition for our subscribers)

So that’s buggered up any JV’s we might have done with them 🙂

Get in fast if you still can – at time of writing 81 have sold out of the 100 available places.

Get my blog posts delivered by Email