This is the last of the four videos of Derek Gehl building a business website. He’s met the original challenge and built a complete site in the four days.

In video 4 Derek notes that he’s been doing this for awhile. He also mentions that he’s challenging us to do the same, except that we get four weeks, not four days. In fact, when you watch the video you’ll see a link to the 28 day chellenge. The challenge is limited to 250 people, so I assume the link will disappear then he gets the 250 takers. If you want to take him up on it now’s the time.

Todays topic is SEO and Pay Per Click.

SEO (Search enging Optimization) is the art and science (some say black art) of setting up your pages and site to do well in the search engines, such as Google. It involves putting the right keywords in the right places on your site, so that the engines know how to categorize your page, and it involves getting links into your page.

Pay Per Click refers to buying traffic through mediums such as Google’s Adwords program. You can read more here about how Adwords and Adsense work.

Derek notes that people who come to your site via the search engines tend to buy more. A lot more. He makes some really good points about keywords here. Where to put them, how to use them, and how to get traffic with them.

Next he mentions how you can get Google to notice your site. And it isn’t by submitting your site to Google. For example he talks about using dmoz.org to get quality links.

He covers article marketing and adds some good tips.

Now he’s going to talk about getting the Pay Per Click set up.

Having done some adwords marketing I have an idea how it works. BeBiz looks like it streamlines the process. Keep in mind that you can lose a lot of money fast with adwords. You’re buying advertising, after all.  That said, there are people who make a lot of money with adwords. Guess which group Derek Gehl is in?

He gives some good tips to avoid losing money. He makes some good points about grouping your ads and how adwords works. If you’re not familiar with Adwords you might not get some of what he’s talking about, but most of it is pretty clear.

If you know what you’re doing with Pay Per Click you can be driving traffic to your site within an hour.

I like how he wraps things up: Success doesn’t (usually) happen instantly. It’s going to take time and work. But compare it to setting up a “brick and morter” business in the real world.

He’ll send an email in a few days and let us know how things are working.

So go sign up for the videos. There’s lots of good info there.

The Challenge to Derek Gehl
Video 1 overview
video 2 overview
video 3 overview
Sign up to watch the free videos

Ok, this post is covering video three, day three, step three, of Derek Gehl’s BeBiz Challenge.

His site is now live and he does invite you to take a look: http://www.mountainbikerepairtips.com/

First Derek runs through an overviwew of what he covered before and where he’s going. Here are the links to my previous posts and where to go to watch the videos yourself.

The BeBiz Challenge
Video #1 overview
Video #2 overview
Access the BeBiz Videos yourself

So today he’s going to put up his website. BeBiz comes with a lot of templates to make the web design easy. He’s going to put together his header, footer, body, opt-in form, naviagtion, etc. Took a bit over and hour and it’s up and running. He’s hooked up to PayPal.com for payment processing, has his order form and everything and the site is ready to go.

He cheated a bit in the he did use a separate program to play with the header graphic. I think he said he used Fireworks. So if you have art skills, which I don’t, you can use other programs to create prettier graphics to put into your site. The graphics that are included are good enough for most of us, I think.

He hits the publishing button and everything is live. Obviously there is webhosting and ftp going on here which is one big step that you don’t need to think about. So I’ll call someone and confirm that.

Ok, I called their help line and talked to a real person. BeBiz is an online system and does provide it’s own webhosting and FTP functionality. This means that you do not not need to buy webhosting elsewhere for your site or any other related tools. BeBiz takes care of it all. You do have to buy your domain name and point it to BeBiz, but the system will walk you through all that, so it’s not a big thing.

Cool. One less thing to think about.

Since I’ve had hosting services shut down two of my sites for too much traffic I also asked the question, “What if I get too much traffic.” She said that IMC gets a lot of traffic, which I believe since they make several million bux a year, hosts several online systems, and has never had a problem.

So I think we may be good here.

His site is now live and he’s inviting people to check it out.

Next he reviews what he’s done so far and points out that once he started on the site it only took about 6 hours to get the whole thing written, hooked up, and published. The actual research took longer.

His next project is to get traffic. He also points out that he’s not leveraging his list or other tools to get traffic. He’s starting from scratch.

But he doesn’t have a product??? No, he doesn’t and he covers that. At this point he’s doing market research to prove that there is a business here and he’s going to refund all sales!!! He’ll also add a note to the buyer explaining what’s going on here.

So the next video will be on getting traffic and then a fifth video, a few days later, will cover the results.

So it’s been three days, maybe 18 hours, and he has done all his research and put up a solid, completely functional (no product yet) site. Not bad.

Finally there is another overview and he talks more about BeBiz and what goodies you get with the package. Including a chance to win an $8,000 mentoring package.

Here are those links again:

The BeBiz Challenge
Video #1 overview
Video #2 overview
Access the BeBiz Videos yourself

This post covers video #2 of the Build a Business Challenge being put on by Derek Gehl of IMC. The challenge is to build a money making website in four days.

Here’s the challenge announcement
Here’s an overview of video #1
BeBiz Challenge Video #3
Here’s where to go to watch the videos for yourself.

Video #2 discusses what type of product you’ll make and How to Write Your salesletter.

DG talks about products to sell through his website. He considers a membership site and discusses using videos as part of the content. He also mentions affiliate products being available.

So he’s going to go with a membership site and gives a lot of good reasons for it. Of course, other options are ebooks, physical products, affiliate products, and virtual stores.

He’s using the BeBiz program to walk through all the steps of putting this all together, but this is also something you can probably do with a notepad. People has been doing just this for years. BeBiz simply makes it much easier.

Note: He talks about a “call to action.” This is simply the point where you ask the potential customer to do something. Fill out an opt-in form, hit the buy button, whatever. Be clear on what you most want that potential customer to do, it won’t necessarily be to hit that buy button.

images, paypal, bonuses, etc. Walks through the whole setup.

He makes the point that the sales copy is the most important part of the process, not the site design. He covers the points that the sales copy needs to have. From headlines to bullets to the meat to testimonials to the PS. Bebiz looks like it offers plenty of writing tips, but you could probably google copywriting and get some tips.

Since SG uses these same tips on all the IMC sales letters he probably knows what he’s talking about.

He defines the problem, tells a story, provides the solution with his product and shows you how to do it. Including the “ask for the order” part and guarantee.

BeBiz includes graphics, which is cool, since my photoshop skills are nill.

So where’s my product? Here it is: The MMO Cookbook. BeBiz wasn’t out at the time that we put it together, but it would have made things much easier.

So after a few hours he has a sales letter. It’s a rough draft, which he makes clear, but I’ll bet that his rough product is better than most people’s final product. I think BeBiz will help close that gap, a lot.

Note: This whole project isn’t a make money in 5 minutes plan. He spent around 12 hours to do the niche research for video #1. If you only have an hour a day you’ll spend at least 12 days doing the same. Maybe less if you hit a good niche right off, maybe more if you get some misses, like DG did.

He’s going to spend several hours on that sales letter, too. Heh. He measures time by the number of Starbucks coffees consumed. Total time DG spent doing parts 1 and 2? Looks like four cups and about 16 hours.

The point, of course, is that he’s sitting down and doing the work. No excuses, no distractions, no checking of the email, none of the things that hold me back (and maybe you?)

Lastly he mentions the 28 day challenge for us to do the same.

Here’s the challenge announcement
Here’s an overview of video #1
BeBiz Challenge Video #3
Here’s where to go to watch the videos for yourself.

Are you one of those few people who are having trouble in getting their cars repaired in an affordable manner? If you are, then here are some easy tips to save on your car repairs and keep money in your piggy banks.

Defective cars are tough to sell without getting at least minimal repairs. You can’t even exchange it with another car without getting it repaired, unless the other guy really loves to work on cars. So you’re left with the choice to get it fixed or live with it. The only problem is that it’s easy to wind up spending more than you can comfortably afford.

With the high prices going on in the market today, few can really afford to have their cars repaired for every little thing or to give a blank check to the mechanic.  Here’s how you can save your hard earned cash on car repairs:

1. Do your homework

One of the greatest problems most motorists encounter is that they spend more on car repairs simply because they didn’t choose the best mechanic or repair service for their cars. Through research, you can identify the right mechanic and the right shop.

Ask around, get references, get prices, do your homework.

2. Take note of the things that need to be repaired

Before you go to your mechanic make sure you have all the necessary repairs listed on a piece of paper.

In this way, you can tell your mechanic right way the things that need to be repaired and you won’t forget any. This will prevent unnecessary repairs or misunderstandings on the type of repairs that your car needs. Unnecessary repairs will only add up to your repair expenses.

3. Shop and compare

To get the best quotes on car repairs, try to shop around and compare prices. In this way, you can evaluate and contrast prices enabling you to find the best quotes possible. Never grab the first repair shop you find. By looking around, you can still find better shops than what you have right now.

4. Try to make every transaction in black and white

This means that before you commit yourself in a particular repair job, it is best to have the estimate written on a piece of paper. Make sure you get a copy of your own. This will prevent unnecessary accumulation of extra charges, which weren’t included on the first estimate.

Keep in mind that not all job repairs were created equal and not all mechanics are honest. Some people who have been bitten too many times might even argue that most mechanics are questionable. I’ve had very good experiences with car repairs and mechanics, but it is best to protect yourself as you would with anything else.

5. Before you let the mechanic start the repair process…

There are certain car parts that can still be rebuilt, even in this day of electronic engine controls and monitors. If you know what the defective part is you might be able to pull it out and get it repaired at a machine shop and cut back your expenses on the next repair.

6. Know your way around

If you don’t know your way around car repairs, it is best to ask someone (even other mechanics) for some second opinions. In this way, you can decide which things need greater considerations. One experience that we had was with a Corvette radiator repair. The Corvette shop wanted $1000 to pull it and fix it. The Chevy dealer found the pinhole leak and fixed it for $50.

Most cars have detailed repair manuals that can be purchased for at any parts store. They’re not expensive and some are even readable by someone who isn’t an expert. At the very least you’ll learn the names of the parts and some of the other terminology. Who know? ou may decide that you can do certain repairs yourself.

Besides, if you will just let your mechanic decide on your car’s repair process, you might pay more than what you can imagine.

7. Ask for the warranty

Some repair shops offer warranties on the services that they make. Take note of this so that you can be sure not to spend another hundred dollars for the same repair in just a few days.

Finding a good repair shop isn’t that hard. Just remember these pointers and you will spend less with car repairs.

In the last post Derek Gehl, of the Internet Marketing Center, was challenged to build a profitable website in a week. So he’s going to do so and let us all watch the process, free of charge. Read the last post for all the details. Here’s how to access the videos.

Here’s an overview of the first video.

After an intro Derek walks us through how to generate ideas for a niche and how to decide what aspect of that niche we’ll build our site around. Of course, he’s using the new BeBiz software, but BeBiz looks to me like a tool which will make your job much easier. I think that’s worth quite a bit just for the time it’ll save and the way it’ll keep us organized.

Derek talks a lot about keyword research. Just in case you don’t know a “keyword” is simply any word or phrase that you might type into a search engine, such as Google. For example: “Golf” is a keyword, as is “how to improve my golf swing” as is “callaway big bertha irons golf clubs.”

What he’s looking for are terms (keywords) that people search on with some frequency that also indicate they’re interested in solving a problem or buying something. He also wants to find areas that don’t have too much competition.

So someone typing “golf” into Google might be hunting for anything golf related, from prety pictures to travel to clubs to tips, etc. Someone searching for “how to…” is looking for very specific info and someone typing in “callaway big bertha irons golf clubs” is looking for a very specific product, probably to buy.

By the way, those last couple of keywords are referred to as long tail keywords. They’re the type of keywords someone enters after going through all the less specific words in their research. Long tail keywords are the terms used when someone is looking for detailed info or to buy something.

All of his keyword research is done within his BeBiz tool, which is cool, but there are other sources for such info.

Now he’s checking on Google’s Adwords for competition info. If there aren’t any adwords then there’s probably no market for that keyword. What are Adwords? If you search on google, for nearly anything, you’ll see ads along the right side of the page, maybe on the top as well. These are adwords. You set up an account with Google, design your ad, tell G how much you want to pay every time your ad is clicked and you’re good to go. You can set up your own adwords to drive traffic to your sites.

Later on Derek will mention “PPC.” PPC = Pay Per Click. You pay for every click someone makes on your ads. Google, MSN, Yahoo, and several other search engines have those programs.

Since he’s looking at bid prices he’s probably looking at buying traffic to his new site, via adwords, as well as seeing if there’s a market for a product.

Competition research. You do want to know who you’re competing against. So you can do it better or cover what they don’t. If there’s too much good competition your job will be tougher. If there’s too little then that might mean that there’s no market. Which isn’t necessarily bad, but you might have to build that market.

This is cool. He failed at finding a good niche on the first try. And his 2nd and third, If he was doing it as a company effort he could probably pull it off, since they have some resources to put into marketing and development, but this is a project for the rest of us.

One of the criticisms that people like Derek G get goes along the lines of this: “Well of course you can do it. You have 400 million fanatical followers who will bite at anything you put in front of them… Normal people don’t have (list of all DG’s advantages…”

So he deliberately chose a niches to research where no one knows him from a hole in the ground and he’s doing it himself, not with his team. And he failed on the first three tries to find a niche.

He does find a niche which fits all the criteria of a good niche with enough traffic and little enough competition. Mountain Bike Repair. Cool.

Next he needs a domain name. He uses www.GoDaddy.com to register the name and after a few false starts grabs one. By the way, here’s a walkthrough of using GoDaddy.

Here’s the link to grab the videos for yourself.

The challenge
Video #2 overview
Video #3 overview

Here’s something you should check out now. The price is certainly right!

Some people have done similar things before this, but Derek’s been around a long time and his IMC group has mastered the subject.

Derek Gehl just got challenged by some angry blog reader to PROVE it’s possible to start a money-making online business in ONE WEEK OR LESS.

… And Derek accepted the guy’s challenge! I don’t think he’s nuts. How about you?

How’s he going to prove you can build a profitable business in such a short time?

Simple: He’s going to do it himself — on camera!

Yep, that’s right…

… Derek is going to start a brand-new business 100% from scratch in less than ONE WEEK — and he’s going to film the entire process and turn it into a FREE video course, so you can see how easily it can be done!

Derek will release the complete “X-Treme Challenge” video course over a four-day period: April 21-24th.

These videos will be absolutely FREE, but will only be made available to people who sign up for Derek’s notification list.

So if you want to learn how to build a money-making online business in ONE WEEK OR LESS, then I urge you to go to his site now and sign up.
All the best,

Greg

P.S. Make sure you set aside at least one hour each day on April 21-24th, so you can watch Derek’s FREE trainingvideos and implement the lessons you learn right away.

… Who knows? You could be making good money online by the 1st week in May!

Click here to learn more

Overview of the first video of the four
Video #2
Video #3

If you only had $300 a month to spend on groceries for a family of four, could you do it? What sort of food would make the list and what would stay tauntingly on the store’s shelves?

Whatever your reason for having a tight budget, the truth is that going to the grocery store without a plan is a BIG budget breaker. And sadly all that cash ends up vanishing into our stomachs and then…let’s stop there.

Could you save $25 a month on groceries? How about $50 or $100? Possibly you could cut your bill by almost 50% if you consider some of the following suggestions:

First you must divide the budget you have into three categories; weekly, bi-weekly and monthly. Once you have the totals fixed, try to find a way to make it work. If you budgeted too tight, only then consider how much more you really need to spend.

Second, identify your WEEKLY needs; milk, bread, fruits. These will be your saving graces when the troops are hungry. You can load up every week and always have a healthy snack available. Think about $15/week.

Third, identify your BI-WEEKLY needs; eggs, cheese, vegetables, meat and cheese for sandwiches etc. These items have a slightly longer shelf life but you will watch how much you use when you know there’s still four days until your next purchase. Try $20 every two weeks.

Fourth, get the remainder of your groceries in one place. Use cash to pay (to avoid temptation of over spending) and work out your shopping list ahead of time. You only need to do this once as many of the items (Cereal, meat etc.) will need to be repurchased each time. Other items (sugar, flour etc.) may be substituted every other month. In this example you have $200 left.

Fifth, have a schedule of meals that you can rotate. Cheap, healthy meals like stir fry can be inexpensive as they use less meat than full pieces of chicken or beef for dinner. Plan to have a meat meal offset by a simpler dish like pasta every other night. This way your family will not go through ‘feast-and-famine’ when they eat like kings the first week and are eating canned chili every night for the last week.

Always determine your meals based on what you really plan to cook. If you have easy weeknight staples, try to find the cheapest method of preparing them, or make do with less pre- packaged affair on other nights when you have more time. Using items like frozen vegetables can make eating cheap also healthy and convenient.

Clearly the $300 suggestion will depend on your family, the age of your children and how much your budget really allows. Whatever your budget, taking the time to draw up a plan and think about your choices will guarantee that you keep more cash in your wallet for other important things.

No matter where you stand on the healthcare issue I think we can all agree, at least those of us who have to pay for it, that it’s a bit on the expensive side.

So here are 50 tips to save on your healtch care expenses.

According to the article, the average American devotes 15-20% of take-home pay (approximately $8,000 per year) on car payments, with additional money spent for gas, maintenance, parking, and insurance.

Surely, we all have seen examples of people buying automobiles above their income level, e.g., purchasing a full-size truck or SUV instead of a compact or mid-size car, or a luxury or sports car instead of a generic model. To afford more expensive cars, the article explains, more and more Americans are using long-term financing (more than 4 years), which means they are spending more on interest and building equity more slowly. Furthermore, 25 percent of car loans include debt rolled over from a previous vehicle. As Ms. Weston states: “Rolling debt from one car to another is . . . a terrible idea.”

Here’s the rest of the article.

4 Free Website Traffic Myths & Scams

      - by Jim Edwards

© Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
http://www.thenetreporter.com
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The question rates almost as old as the Internet itself: “How do I get free traffic to my website?”

In fact, entire online industries spawn and die trying to fulfill this wish by website owners desperate to get eyeballs to their sites without any time, money, energy or effort whatsoever.

Much like the “medicine wagons” of the old Wild West sold potions and snake oil to “cure what ails you,” any unsuspecting website owner can spend thousands of dollars on software, schemes, services and scams that promise to deliver tens-of-thousands of visitors for “free.”

In fact, one of the biggest scams online that I know of personally involved the promise of riches through “free ads.”

Unfortunately, most people don’t learn the truth about these myths and scams until after they get separated from their hard-earned cash.

Myth #1 -Traffic Exchanges

Traffic exchanges promise piles of cash by delivering thousands of visitors who get shuffled around between members’ sites through ads.

Originally set up mostly as “exit traffic exchanges,” this scheme lost popularity once pop-up blockers started coming as standard issue with most browser toolbars and Internet Explorer 6.0+.

The main problem with this scheme centers on the fact that they shuffle NON-targeted traffic to your site.

If someone is looking for bicycle information, the chances of them clicking on a link or loitering on your “home beer kit” site are slim to none.

Myth #2 - FFA Pages

FFA (Free For All) Links Pages surfaced when people realized that search engines included “back links” in their calculations of a site’s relevance to various keyword phrases.

If you got 100 links to your site with “purple gargoyle” in the text, various search engines would list you prominently for most purple gargoyle searches.

Once the search engines got wise to these “link farms” as worthless link lists, they quickly started penalizing anyone who listed their site on them.

Moral of the story: unless you want your search engine rankings to plunge, avoid FFA pages or “link farms” like the plague.

Myth #3 - Safe Lists

How’s this for an idiotic traffic idea. Let’s all join a list and mail each other our offers, regardless of our actual tastes, preferences, businesses, or any other coherent factor.

Then, let’s promise that we can all get rich as a result of mailing each other.

Safe lists must rate as the most pathetic scam when it comes to website traffic, yet people still sell them and people still join them.

In fact, I know someone (several people actually) who got sued because emails sent to a safe list.

What makes the situation even more horrendous is that they didn’t send the emails, their affiliates did!

The only people who make money with safe lists are the people who set them up and persuade others to join.

Myth #4 - Surf-for-Traffic

If you visit my website, I’ll visit yours, then we’ll each get a visitor to our sites.

“Surf-for-traffic” schemes basically promise to deliver visitors in proportion to the number of sites you visit while displaying their browser toolbar.

Two main problems arise from this type of scheme. First, a real human being can only visit so many sites before they all look alike (rendering any marketing power of the sites useless due to viewer fatigue).

Second, some idiot will always figure out how to get hits using a software robot that simulates surfing (you can get them free online) to rack up credits.

Bottom line: there are only three legitimate ways to deliver targeted traffic to your website.

You “buy” traffic through pay-per-click ads, banner ads, niche site ads and similar methods.

You “borrow” traffic through your affiliate program or other pay-per-action method by paying people who promote your site only when a sale is made.

You “create” traffic by publishing and posting content to your website, blog, article announcement sites, and other proven places, along with other legitimate methods that drive organic search engine traffic.

–
Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the
co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how
to use fr^e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
visitors to your website, affiliate links, or blogs…

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Need MORE TRAFFIC to your website or affiliate links?
“Turn Words Into Traffic” reveals the secrets for driving
Thousands of NEW visitors to your website or affiliate
links… without spending a dime on advertising!
Click Here> http://www.turnwordsintotraffic.com
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