Anyone who is serious about making a long term business on line will need to consider just where they are going to get their content since anyone and his Uncle knows that content is King or perhaps Queen!
Before we proceed any further with this exhortation let’s get the following out of the way. Despite what you may have been led to believe, buying a whole truck load of so called Private Label Articles and loading them into an article crunching machine that magically rewrites them and spits them out as though they were your own is not the way to go if you plan on creating a reputation! These attempts at passing yourself off as the number one Guru in your niche will be obvious to most web site visitors as the work of someone who is a baguette short of a picnic!
Article altering software may be an innovative idea but by the time this has run its course and probably long before then, the pathetic excuses for so called expert articles that they spew out will be circulating a zillion times over around the Internet as newbies and other marketers who are either too lazy or unable to write themselves, think that they are on to a Winner. A few altered lines in the header and footer of an article are not going to do anything for your reputation. So what to do? Especially if you didn’t go to College, failed English in High school and can’t spell worth a cent! That’s a tough cookie!
Even if all the above is an accurate description of you, there is still hope for you yet because if you recognise that you have shortcomings then you sure as hell can do plenty about it! In fact you are already half way to the finishing post!
Here is my” Ten Sure Fire Ways to Get Started on your Writing Career”. Notice the very obvious absence of the words” Make a Million from your Articles in only ten days while you are asleep and on a beach the other side of the Planet” Now I know that successful Internet entrepreneurs are frequently writing these sentiments in their sales copy and I am equally sure that for many of them it is true but it certainly didn’t happen for them overnight. No Sir. we don’t do Overnight! Six months to a year may be but definitely not overnight!
It’s as well to tell yourself this several times before you reach for the credit card and buy your 37th e-book this month that promises that you will hold the key to untold wealth once you hold it in your sticky hands. Actually it will be on your sticky hard drive which is probably filling up very rapidly at this stage.
1. Before you can get over Writers Block you gotta start by getting over Readers Block! Plenty of reading and then some! Everything that you can lay your hands on in your own special niche and everything on writing and copywriting.
2. Subscribe to a few (very few) newsletters from Top Copy writers and Successful Marketers. Writers just love to share their ideas and often give freebies such as E-Books or Mini- Courses on writing for the web and creating content.
3. Subscribe to Google Alerts but be careful here in your selection of keywords since you will be flooded with stuff to read very quickly. It is a wonderful resource which will keep you totally up to date with happenings and give you more ideas for your articles than you thought possible!
4. Keep a folder of your sent e mails especially if they are business related. You will have a treasure trove of ideas here to trawl through whenever you get stuck.
5. Attending Seminars is an excellent way of not only brushing up your skills in many disciplines but also a trove of possible article and book ideas that you can put to good use. (gotta have a blue notebook with you though…see next sentence that’s Jim’s trick)) Yes seminars are expensive but you don’t have to spend $5000 and travel half way round the World to attend one. Jim Edwards hosted his first U.K Workshop recently at a sumptuous Hotel and it was just $1000 dollars and a wonderful experience for a whole weekend.
6. Set up a blog or two or three (in different niches) and make it a must-do first thing in the morning to put up a post or two. Until you have done it, it seems daunting but set the alarm 20 minutes earlier and you will be amazed at what you can achieve in a few weeks.
7. Here is where it gets interesting…you must put your blog posts into a separate folder so that you can refer back to them on a regular basis. If you are rather verbose you will be surprised to find that with very little tweaking you can create an article out of a blog post or string several posts together to make a presentable article in double quick time.
8. If you are passionate about your subject or niche then you could end up easily spending ten or twelve hours at your keyboard over a weekend and while this is not to be recommended on a regular basis especially if you have family considerations(or pet tortoises that need exercising) you would be surprised at how much content you will have created. Getting into the flow and a regular writing routine is the trick here and after a few months it will seem as though you have been doing it all your life.
9. How will you keep your enthusiasm going? Well you have to take on the onerous task of submitting to Article Directories which will give you very quickly some surprising search engine placements. When you see that what you are writing is actually appearing in print on the Web and joy of joys, actually being republished by other web Site owners who are scrambling for fresh content, you won’t need any more encouragement!( believe me this is a hot one!)
10. Getting started is the key …whinging and whining about your inability to write won’t get you anywhere but if you will only start I promise you that the momentum will gather strength quite rapidly. It doesn’t matter that your first attempts are not Booker Prize winning standard. To fine tune and improve, you have got to actually have something to begin with. A blog is great since not that many people will see it to begin with so you don’t need to be embarrassed and it doesn’t have to cost you anything. Later on you can spend time learning the mechanics of blogging and further improving your web site. First things first.
Could you see yourself in 12 months with a published article per week under your belt?…You bet …you have just read the fiftieth article by this Author and today is the first Anniversary of Article number one! So to use a familiar cliche…if this author can do it anyone can.(well he did have electrocution lessons for two months !)
Sorry got to go and get back to the keyboard…happy hunting.
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Robin Piggott is a Driving Instructor in Ireland who brings four decades of experience to his Astral Driving School based in Limerick. He is also learning the delicate art of persuasion through his newly refurbed web site which will be found in a few days at http://www.astraldrivingschool.com Here you can find a treasure trove of everything for the Learner Driver and also pages for the visitor who is contemplating Touring Ireland by Car.In the meantime check out the free Mini-Course that will help you to pass the Driving Test First Time at http://www.astralmotoring.ie |
You have invested a lot of time and energy on writing a business plan just to get a loan or to attract an investor. What do you do when you get the money or, worse, should you be turned down?
Do you just file it away? That’s like investing in a boat that remains parked in your driveway after its inaugural voyage.
Instead of filing it away or leaving it on a shelf to gather dust, why not capture more return on your investment? To gain a clearer perspective, convert your investment of time and energy into a dollar amount. Then, you’ll think twice before filing your business plan away.
Ways to capitalize on your investment
- Expand the marketing section for an ongoing planning document, or for periodic reviews, or for revising marketing strategies. The historical data, projections, competition surveys and analyses are valuable bases for updating the data into a working framework. The material is a convenient reference for when you are asked to make an oral presentation, to write an article, to provide background data for ad copy or for other promotional activities.
- Save the various sections as templates for any number of purposes. Some of these can be used for decision-making, for analyzing proposals and new ventures, or for dispensing with those time-consuming ‘dream/someday’ projects.
- Use some excerpts for such Human Resource Management activities as: orienting and training a new associate, or as a preparation for a staff promotion.
- All your grueling work on the financial data can form the foundation for financial controls and reviews, budget-actual sheets and as background for trend projections. Your original documents serve as benchmarks and as reminders of your progress for your bankers.
- You will not have to start out from scratch should you have a similar need to re-apply for funds, tender an invitation to a partner, or supply data for the experts should you consider ‘going public.’ The evidence of before-and-after progress is helpful as a contribution to a ‘for sale’ proposal, or for a sudden and urgent offer to buy. Plans for expansion, mergers, spin-offs, or cooperative alliances can start with your collected data.
- Your business plan, with its appendices, is a convenient repository for company data and records, equipment details, floor plans, measurements, maps, contact details for legal and accounting consultants, general historical information, industry descriptions including your historical SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis of the past, current and future at the time of its writing.
- Create in-house displays of your mission statement, the organizational chart or the photographs and biographical sketches of your benefactors and supporters.
Don’t have a business plan in your files? Begin preparing portions today as an investment for that day when you will need one. It’s quite probable that when that need arises you will be too pre-occupied to devote the required time and energy on an appropriate plan.
Now, you have a greater incentive to do a more thorough business plan today, knowing it is going to serve several useful purposes in the future.
About The Author
Gerry McRae added practical wisdom to his college and univeristy courses by owning and operating small businesses. That wisdom is now online at http://www.UncleMaxSays.com.
