John Melanson

Failing To Plan Equals Planning To Fail

The best laid plans of mice and men…

My guess is that most of you spent yesterday or at least a few moments before the “ball dropped” reflecting on 2008 and resolving to make 2009 different.

The question is, how exactly do you plan to make it different this year?

If you look at each day with the same resolve and retrospect that you looked at the past year last night you’ll find yourself making the changes necessary to ensure that this day, this week, this month and therefore this year will all be better than the one before it.

So what’s the best way to make a plan for the year?

In my opinion (and please comment if you hold a different stance, I welcome discussion), if you consider finances for example; we all want to make more money this year than we did last year or ever for that matter.

If you know that you want to add $25 K to your bottom line this year, that breaks down to adding roughly $480 per week to your income. Now as an Internet Marketer, that is a totally achievable goal. That further breaks down to less than $69 per day. That doesn’t seem so daunting or impossible now, does it?

Even if you’re at $0 per day right now, you CAN get to a place this year that will get you on track to make that goal and surpass it. The irony is that once you get into the habits that will make the $50 or $75 a day income possible, your entire thought process goes through a change and the light bulb over your head shines blindingly….you suddenly “get it” and your income then begins to grow almost exponentially.

Now when you look at that goal of an increased income you believe it to be attainable. The next step is to, well….set up the steps to get there.

You need to look at your existing business/es and website/s and ALL of your projects and ideas and decide for yourself what you need to do in order to “get there”.

For me that meant breaking up my year something like what follows, tho I won’t bore you with the minutiae, you’ll get the idea and be able to do it for yourself.

MY GOALS FOR THE NEW YEAR

1. 100 Subscribers per month consistently on at least ONE of my domains.
2. At least 1 site profiting at least $1000/month in sales, membership fees, etc…
3. 3 Product releases to occur in April, July and December.

So, for me to talk about how I’ll achieve those goals, I will break them down something like this:

1. 100 subscribers per month is only an average of 3.44 per day. Any blog that is properly SEO’d and then socially linked through article directories, Facebook, MySPace, etc, and also socially bookmarked through the network of Tweets and Diggs and so forth should be able to draw enough “interested” traffic to secure at least 3-5 opt ins per day. That’s the plan anyway.
2. $1000 Profit per month is an average of $33.34 per day in sales minus your operating expenses for that site. In that case let’s just round it up to $40 per day, and that’s being very liberal with the operating cost estimate. Whether you’re selling your own products or as an affiliate marketer for someone else, if you can get to where you’re averaging a minimum of $40 in sales per day, that goal looks not only attainable but one easily surpassed.
3. In staying consistent with the above goals, and using each one to build upon the next the product releases will also be a natural progression. Having my “BIG” product release next Christmas, I’ll be setting myself up to step into 2010 in a position to set and achieve even bigger goals. The releases in April and July will both be directing people toward the third and final product of the year and IT will be a natural progression of my product line.

What is YOUR plan?

Remember…

If you fail to plan, plan on failing.

New Forum For Internet Marketers

I’ve just finished laying the groundwork and completed the intital phase of creating a forum for new to intermediate Internet Marketers to learn and/or expand their knowledge of the essential subjects necessary to succeed in successfully marketing yourself and your products.

The forum is FREE but you will have to register in order to read and post. The content is growing as fast as I can get it in there and I welcome your contributions as well. Please feel free to sign in and add your two cents, leave feedback and suggestions. The forum exists to serve YOU, so tell me what you need.

Here’s a taste of what you’ll find inside:

• Branding Yourself
• What is Branding? – What is branding and how does it apply to my business?
• Why is Branding Important? – Why is branding myself important to my business?
• How Do I Brand Myself? – How do I remain first in people’s minds when they think of my type of business?
• Plus Much More To Come…

• Getting Started
• Domains – The ins and outs of purchasing your first domain. What you need and what you don’t.
• Hosting – These are things that you should know before choosing your webhost.
• What To Sell? – Until you’re creating your own products you should focus on selling other people’s products.
• Can I Start Without A Website? – It’s possible to get started in Internet Marketing without having your own website or products.
• Plus Much More To Come…

• Marketing Methods
• Affiliate Marketing – Affiliate Marketing is one of the easiest ways to get started with your business.
• Article Marketing – You can earn money by simply submitting articles to different article directories.
• Video Marketing – Using video as an Affiliate Marketer.
• Blogging – Blogs are a must in order to quickly be recognized by the search engines.
• Plus Much More To Come…

• Traffic
• Traffic Generation – How Do You Get Traffic To Your Sites?
• Traffic Conversion – How Do You Convert Visitors Into Buyers?
• Social Bookmarking – How Does Social Bookmarking Help Me Increase Traffic?
• Plus Much More To Come

• Advanced Marketing Methods
• Adwords – Marketing with Google AdWords.
• PPC – Marketing With Other PPC Resources
• PPL – Marketing With Pay Per Lead
• Social Networking – How To Use Social Networking To Your Best Advantage

YOU CAN REACH THE FORUM BY CLICKING HERE

It is an outlet for you to test the waters with your first products, get feedback on your sites, blogs, articles and offerings and to generally have a place to hang out with other like minded people that share the same goal that you and I do, namely to grow and sustain a successful home business in order to achieve the freedom that great abundance and prosperity bring.

For me that means being able to spend more time with my family enjoying the things that we love to do together. It means not missing meals together for the sake of work.

Having a successful home business also means that I have the freedom to vacation more often. Being able to attend Internet Marketing Seminars in warm and exotic places becomes an enjoyable time instead of feeling like I have to sacrifice somewhere else in order to attend.

It’s about being able to raise my children  so that they know that they’re able to achieve whatever they set their minds to. We may have been told that same thing ourselves growing up, but until you walk it out, and can show your own kids the fruit of that persistence, they won’t get the message. Enable your kids to create their own futures by showing them that you’ve done it yourself.

You can take the first steps today. Make the choices today that will affect your tomorrows in a positive way.

YOU CAN REACH THE FORUM BY CLICKING HERE