For some this may not be a big deal, but sadly, I have a horrible habit of skimming. It’s something I really need to break and this lesson started it off. Short, to the point, and a bulleted list of homework to get started on right away. It worked, I did.

I’ll be running an affiliate contest in May. Oh, you didn’t know I had products let alone an affiliate program? Yeah, I know, hence Nicole’s lesson is getting me up and rolling. I’ve kept the affiliate program low key because I just had so much I wanted to set up before I recruited strongly. It’s time to get over that and just get it to working.

I’ll have more details coming up, but you can get a jump start and become an affiliate HERE. I immediately emailed my top affiliate Lauren to brainstorm prizes she’d like to earn in this upcoming contest.

So there’s just a few hours of pushing my education up a notch. What are your plans for learning in business this year?

There are thousands of mom bloggers already online. Many of them are making money, and most of them are trying to make money. Do you have what it takes to be a profitable mom blogger? I believe that any mom blogger can start to generate a profit from her blog with the right approach and learned skills. That means you too.

It does take some study and some work. You will not become a millionaire overnight. Now that we have that cleared up let me reiterate that you can make money blogging. It might not be the same type of blogging that you are thinking of right now. How serious are you about making money blogging? You might have to adjust your thinking, your habits, and your schedule, but you can make a profit.

Here’s some ways to start a blog that won’t work very well.
**the willy-nilly-slap-something-up approach,
**the kiss-up-to companies approach,
**the controversial approach to get attention,
**the fake-it-till-you-make-it approach, and
**the guilt-my-family-and-friends-into-reading approach.
Go ahead if you want to try them. You might see a flare-up of popularity before everything goes down the drain. If you do try them you will learn some good lessons, but you will also waste some valuable time.

While you are working on building traffic to your blog you can add affiliate links and become an affiliate marketer. You don’t have to have your own product to sell; you can sell an already finished product for a commission. You can also use your sidebar as a place for an ad network. They find the advertisers; you wait for the profit.

Just because anyone can start a blog for free does not mean that there isn’t a necessary skill set. The good news is that the necessary skills can be learned and developed by anyone with the will to learn. There are profitable bloggers of all age levels from middle school to senior citizens; and of all skill sets from drop-outs to college grads. Blogging is a good thing to know. Most websites have them and the skill of blogging is a marketable asset in and of itself.

Just doing what you can and hoping for the best will only get you so far. If you want your blog to make a profit then you need to study and learn the best way to do just that.

If you want to learn more about blogging, gaining more exposure in the blogosphere, building great relationships and incorporating new profit points into your content be sure to sign up for the Smart Blogging Skills 10 week course.

The first thing you should do after setting up your blog is to set up your social media accounts. You might already have some accounts set up; now you need to make sure you are using them the best possible way.

Social media is an amazing tool for anyone online, and especially for moms. One of the top reasons moms spend time online is to be social. They are looking to make friends, find information, share what they know, sympathize with others, and maybe even make some money.

Social media sites are set-up so moms, or anyone, can pop in and out and easily share. They are always busy with a ton of traffic and you need to direct some of that traffic to your blog. However, you need to make them want to come interact with you because your sign is so compelling; not be forced to drive past because someone has a whistle and white gloves.

If you want to make friends on social media sites here are 5 things you should avoid:

1. Boring conversation about the details of your life
2. Links in every update
3. Constant bragging
4. Only retweets
5. Constant quotes

None of those things are terribly wrong. In fact, each of those things will appeal to someone, but not if that’s all that they hear from you. It’s the mixture that’s important.

If you think, “I’m blogging to make money, not friends” you won’t get anywhere online. Readers visit people they like and shoppers buy from people they know. The key to using social media sites the right way is honest interaction. Here are five tips that might help:

1. Be yourself. Don’t set up a persona.
2. Use your best level of conversation. Don’t talk like you are at a sleepover with your friends; talk like you are at a networking conference.
3. Search for a topic that you like and talk to people about that topic.
4. For every tweet you post about yourself reply to someone else.
5. Strive to build people up and never tear people down publicly.

Don’t be intimidated by the unwritten rules of social media. Instead watch, read, and learn how to go about things the best way so that you are accepted easily and hopefully, spread around. You want people to associate good things with your name and brand.

Building relationships, gaining trust, becoming friends, honest interaction – those take time; but remember that anything worth doing is worth doing well.

If you want to learn more about blogging, gaining more exposure in the blogosphere, building great relationships and incorporating new profit points into your content be sure to sign up for the Smart Blogging Skills 10 week course. If you sign up for the next course starting on March 30th you will have group coaching added to the already incredible coaching ecourse.

photo © 2010 Channelship Web Agency | more info (via: Wylio)

Four years ago (November 6, 2006), Facebook launched their advertising program. It’s essentially a PPC, Pay Per Click, program. However, it offers a number of features and benefits that other PPC programs don’t. Want some good reasons why Facebook advertisement works?

1. Facebook is in millions of homes around the world. In fact, it has more than 500 million active users. When you create a Facebook ad, you have direct access to those 500 million users.

2. Facebook allows you to narrow your ads to be seen by more specific demographic. For example, you can specify your prospects’ age, sex, location and interest.

3. Facebook ads are delivered directly to your target audience. The advertisements show up on their profile pages. This is a much more focused method of advertising. Other ad programs don’t guarantee this degree of attention from prospects. The more targeted the program, the more likely it is to convert.

4.There’s less competition on Facebook than other PPC services. This means you pay less per click than you might with another program – Google AdSense for example.

5. You can advertise your website, blog or your Facebook fan page with a Facebook ad. More options is nice.

6. People can “Like” your advertisements. This helps you generate attention for your advertisement. The more people who like your ad, the more attention – and clicks – it receives.

7. Facebook provides a wealth of data. Like many other PPC programs, Facebook provides you with the ability to test and track your ad’s success. This gives you the power to get the most return on investment from your advertisements and change things up as needed.

Facebook advertisements offer the most targeted options found anywhere. Business owners can create user-specific campaigns to drive traffic to their landing page, sales page, opt-in form, blog or even their Facebook fan page.

For example, with Facebook you can create one separate ad for single women, married women, and divorced women. You can then further segment them by age. For example, single women aged 30-40. Each advertisement you create can be designed to speak to this person specifically. Your choice of keywords, your headline and your call to action can all be written to target that exact audience.

Facebook advertising offers one of the lowest cost PPC options on the market. Combined with the ability to target a specific demographic, you can really maximize your ad’s effectiveness. If you use PPC in your marketing strategy, consider trying Facebook’s advertising program.

Have you had success with your facebook advertising?

photo © 2009 Joe King | more info (via: Wylio)

Here are seven free advertising ideas for small businesses.

#1 Register your website on free listing directories like DMOZ which would help increase the online traffic.

#2 Utilize classified ad sites. Create ads to advertise a specific product or service. Make sure to create your ad like you would any other paid ad. Solve a problem. Create a compelling headline. Offer a call to action.

#3 Add your business to local search engines like Google Places, Local Yahoo, Local MSN and so on. Add reviews to your profile. Make sure the address and contact information is consistent with what you have published on your site. Also add a few local keywords to your website SEO strategy. For example, if you’re located in Austin Texas and your website is about fitness training, then you might choose “Fitness training Austin Texas.”

#4 Publish ads on social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace. Don’t go crazy with the advertising. Simply publish them on your profile page or include them occasionally in your posts.

#5 Swap advertisements with relevant websites. For example, if you’re a fitness trainer and you know a nutritionist, you can each publish an ad for the other on your website. It’s a simple advertising partnership. You can also publish ads in each other’s newsletters.

#6 Participate in industry forums that allow you to promote your business. You can create advertisements specifically for your forum audience. Also come up with interesting signature lines for your profile.

#7 Use free listing sites like Craigslist to advertise for your business. Create the advertisements like you would for any other medium. Have a captivating headline, copy that provides a solution to a problem and then a call to action.

You can also print flyers and brochures and leave them around town. And while it’s not free, you can also print your website on stickers or magnets and place them on your car. These types of ads generally don’t cost much and they can have a good return on investment – particularly for local businesses.

Free advertising opportunities are all around you. It just takes a bit of creativity to recognize and capitalize on them.

While it’s understandable that it’s difficult to put the time in to market your business when you’re already so busy, it’s important to keep in mind that it is exactly this marketing that will help you stay in business.

Here are a few tips to help you easily and effectively market your skills online:

* Join a related forum or discussion board – If you offer a service of use to online business professionals, a good first step is to join a marketing discussion forum. You can start slowly and make contributions to the group where you feel appropriate. This will help you get your name out there, and other business owners will see your website link and potentially click over to learn more about your services.

Joining a marketing forum as an online service provider puts your business directly in front of many potential customers. Always remember to follow the forum guidelines and basic rules of etiquette when joining any discussion. First impressions do count, so keep in mind that while on the forum you are always representing your business – make it work for you.

* Join a networking group – Networking with others in your field is important. Not only does it allow you the opportunity to bounce ideas back and forth between people in your industry, but it can also be a great source of friendship and support.

Networking groups also help you in other ways. If a fellow service provider is too busy to take on extra work, she or he may pass the referral on to you. Likewise, you may be able to return the favor in the future. A good networking group is a fantastic way to get support, advice and even more business.

* Become an expert – People trust and like experts. And as a service provider you can become the “go to” expert in your industry. An easy way to do this is to write related articles for business owners to read. List them on your website and also submit them to the article directories online.

You can create an educational area on your service business website. This area can provide tips and articles related to your services. By conducting yourself as an expert in your industry, you let others know that you are knowledgeable in your field. If a potential client then visits your website and reads through your content, they are more likely to contact you for support.

Marketing your skills online is important. It is potentially the lifeblood of your business. And although your schedule may be busy, try to pencil in a little time each day for this important task. This simple step can make all the difference to the success of your business.

But that aside, it’s always driven me nuts that I don’t know about any local big online events until the weekend of or after. WTF? I am not bragging when I say that I am a social media nut and I also include local media in hopes of finding out about stuff early. Hasn’t happened, so guess what, I’m deleting all of those biggies in my area because in 2 years I haven’t learned jack shit from them that I didn’t already know and I didn’t get early notice of any events. Usefullness? #fail as we like to post in twitter.

However, my being active on my account and posting to smaller local accounts? #twitterawesome I have now gotten an introduction to a social media event next week. I will clear the deck and head downtown Seattle. I’m excited and this stems on my missing a major event I wanted to hit in Portland. It’s the last one I will miss as I’ve made quite a few friends from the Power of MOB and I’d honestly like to put a package together and speak at next years event. Besides the fact I want to just hang and have a real drink instead of a virtual drink with friends.

Then another site has been going out and out and out. It’s a passion of mine. Firefighter Wife is not a money making site of mine. Yes, I do hope to make some here and there, but it’s truly a resource. To be contacted by others with resources I can push and especially resources that are charitable is awesome. Once such site I’ve fallen in love with, Firefighters Wives.net is built around helping those with career ending disease or injury. This is an organization I would love to get involved with and I couldn’t believe they are local. Sure, it’s a 2 hour drive, but hey it’s not every day. lol They have their site launch in 2 weeks and I want to be there to meet the women behind the site. I already have emails to them about some joint work.

Local meetups will increase your passion. Social media has been the answer to my local meetup. I’m making connections and then meeting up. Previously the groups had a link that they met up and not much info. I can’t tell you how excited I am about these local events and how out of character it is that I’ve already told my family I MUST GO!

Getting Crissy’s email about plr rights to her incredible workshop, was exactly what I wanted to hear and what could help bring an extra spark back into one of my sites. She’s sold this previously as a how to get your craft biz online workshop, but has reworked it so it will fit all businesses. It is a highly marketable workbook package now called Teach Your Readers How To Market Their Business Online. At an affordable $34.99 you can make more than the sale amount in just 3 sales. This isn’t something to market for less than $19.95 and if you add some email coaching to the mix, you can charge much more.

Grab this Free Marketing PLR Bundle and see just how great the writing is at All Marketing Content.

Not into the WAHM or marketing scene? Here are some awesome free plr bundles to try as well. Yes, I’ve used them all.

Free Health PLR Article Bundle
Free Finance Article Bundle
Free Craft Bundle
Free Mom Bundle
Free Travel PLR Bundle
Free Green Bundle

There’s always the Retiring Bundle Sale that you must check out and jump on if it’s in your niche. Right now there are a few VERY useful bundles at 50% off.

Lynette Chandler and TechBasedTraining has an awesome deal that I can pass on to my readers. 15% off the latest amember training package that explains how to add a forum to amember. If you need to learn how to do this for yourself or you want another way to market your VA skills, this is for you. Amember is one of the best ways to manage a membership site. Jump to the amember power series and use coupon code ASSOCIATE910. This coupon is only good until Sept. 15th so don’t wait to add more marketable skills to your business!

Even though I will get a commission on any sales from these links, I don’t put up links that I don’t believe in. These are deals from businesses I use, have used or know the owners personally and all the above.

But lately every blog has just been hit by so many commenters loading their name field with keywords. I appreciate that many of them are actual comments, but I am getting really ticked off at the blatant lack of etiquette by keyword loading.

It’s fine, cause what you may not have been told is I CAN CHANGE IT! So many have names in their email, I’m sure they are fake, but I still go and put that name instead. If I like the comment enough I’ll create a name from the website and email combo. It’s still a legit comment, I’m just not giving you the keywords for a one time posting.

One of my sites has been hit for so many months that I’m actually going through and deleting the url for the commenter along with adding their name. I figure that site ended up on a list as it’s one website in particular that keeps returning. I’ll slowly make my way through all the back comments I wasn’t paying attention to and get them all deleted as well.

Keyword loading isn’t friendly at all. It isn’t networking. I understand that it’s getting you some backlinks for the search engines, but not on my blogs. In fact if I have to correct it more than twice, your url will be deleted from all comments. So you’ll be posting out of the kindness of your networking heart

So who is right? Are forums a timewaster or a great place to network?

The answer is yes.

An online forum is what you make of it. If you visit your favorite marketing forum and end up getting drawn into discussion after discussion without having much to show for it – then you’re wasting your valuable time. It’s not that the time isn’t beneficial, but you are taking time away from other aspects of your business if you are on the forum all day.

On the other hand, if you visit a forum for a specific period of time each day and spend that time wisely – sharing tips and discussing interesting topics for example – then it’s safe to say that forum is a great contribution to your business. As I’ve talked about before, building yourself up as an expert really drives up traffic and sales.

Many valuable friendships and joint ventures have been made through online networking forums. I have met many top woman in internet marketing through paid membership and free forums. The key, like with most things, is to use moderation and common sense.

Here are a few of the most common pitfalls of online forums and how to avoid them:

1# – They can be negative places. Sometimes you can visit a forum, get dragged in for two hours and leave feeling uninspired and even depressed. The truth is, when you visit an online forum you don’t always know who you’re dealing with – this is the anonymity our online world offers us. Unfortunately many forum regulars can be quite negative and even downright nasty.

To avoid this trap, visit forums that inspire you and make you feel productive. If you leave the forum feeling you have gained something and feel ready to get back to work on your business, then it’s likely a good place to spend time in each week.

#2 – You can get sucked in to meaningless discussions. While it’s okay to make friendships as well as network, you really don’t want to spend half of your day talking about non-business related topics (not while you’re meant to be working). It may be fine to contribute an answer or two, but keep your end goal in mind at all times – are you there to simply socialize or are you there to network as well?

To avoid this trap, use your time wisely. Be friendly and contribute to the informal chitchat from time to time, but don’t make it the emphasis of your time at the forum. If you apply this rule from the start, it’s easier to avoid this trap. It’s a lot harder to switch back to being more business-like after you’ve been very socially chatty and informal for a while.

#3 – You give more than you get. It’s good to give back; there is no denying that. But, if you spend a lot of time on forums helping others and not achieving much in return yourself, then you may want to ask why you’re doing it in the first place?

There is nothing wrong with helping someone from time to time. But not to the extent that it takes away from your own work or makes you feel used.

To avoid this trap, give out a few helpful nuggets of information here and there and include a link back to your website for further information. For example, if someone is asking a lot of questions about search engine optimization and you’re an expert, give them a few tips then direct them to the search engine optimization section on your website for further help. If you don’t have a post with more information, then create one!

Most forums will allow you to do this as long as you have been helpful and provided information in your original post. At the very least you can include a link back to your website in your signature line.

Forums can be a great addition to your business success or a complete time-wasting exercise. It’s ultimately up to you how you use your time and if in doubt keep the old saying in mind – “time is money.” Are you using yours valuably?

Some good, positive forums I network in:

Mom Masterminds
Mommy’s Helper Community
Work at Home Space
Classy Chic’s
Self Starters Weekly Tips