But I my hope is to not to just pay you once. I want you to be earning commissions consistently! That’s the difference between having some extra spending cash and experiencing a complete lifestyle change.

When I say lifestyle change, it can even be a few hundred dollars a month. How much would your life change if you knew you would start making just $300 extra each month?

The odds are most online marketers are losing out on a ton of cash by not building the foundation of your business first. Making some cash online is great, but knowing it will come in each and every month is just pure bliss.

Here is how to prevent the cash from leaking out of your pockets before you ever get a chance to see it:

1. Commit – You can’t swim with just your toes in the water. Make the commitment to succeed with internet marketing and dive into the pool. This doesn’t mean to make rash decisions like quitting your day job or spending your life savings. Mentally, you must commit. If you are not committed to success, the odds are you’ll never experience it.

2. Invest In Yourself – Are you willing to skip your favorite tv show to read about money making tactics, traffic generation, list building, or learning basic HTML? Can you dedicate some of your leisure time now to create a lifetime of freedom later? Are you willing to skip out on going out to a pricey dinner or the movies once in a while, so you can pay for that website hosting or autoresponder service that has the potential to pay you back 100x more? Stop throwing away your resources, invest it and make it grow.

3. Discover – Take action and discover what it’s like to be in the trenches. You’ve been educating yourself, now it’s time to test your skills and discover what you have learned. You’re going to see small successes and lots failures. Learn from your mistakes and the experience of others, and continue onward.

Follow those steps and stop losing out on the cash you could be making.

Helpful sites for steps 2 and 3:

• Plug-and-Play Money Getting System
• Free Autopilot Empire Report
• Free One Time Offer Script
• Effortless, Viral Traffic

Everyone is trying to grab your attention, tells you you need to do “this” to make money, and then they try to sell you the next great something.

I’ve struggled, bought products that are just awful, been literally ripped off, and made lots of mistakes. Sound familiar? Well I’ve been there too! What I discovered was there IS light at the end of the tunnel… but you have to be willing to take that journey.

Making some extra cash (or a lot of cash) is more realistic when you think about it. If you make just one sale a day at $20, that is about $600 a month. When you pull in just three sales a day at $20, that’s $1,800 a month. That’s a lot of extra pocket money for most people!

So here’s how to get on the fast track to real results.

When I say real results, I mean to start making money from home whether you’re at your computer or not. That means you having more time. And enjoying life a little bit more.

The trick lies in a quote by author, Agatha Christie:

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started”

That’s it! So what I dare you to do is to just start taking action. You will never see any results buying product after product without execution. So here’s some easy action steps:

1. Start doing something – anything – that you think might help you towards making money online.
2. Of course try to take intelligent actions. There’s lots of advice on this blog as well.
3. You might make some mistakes or do the wrong thing. It’s ok as long as you’re learning from it.
4. Take note of your successes, no matter how small it is. That could be a sign you’re moving in the right direction.
5. No idea where to start? What would I suggest? Earn some credits at top advertising sites, and start advertising something. I recommend building your list with squeeze pages for the best earning potential, but if you want to do affiliate links go for it… just get something started!

I would love to hear your thoughts or experiences!

In fact, I make an effort to brand my websites and myself.

But just why is it so effective at making you money?

Branding means that people know who you are when they see it. And that is 90% of advertising! You WANT people to stop and look when you have something to say.

Building a brand means the spotlight is always on you whenever you show up to the party. It doesn’t matter what you tell people if no one is paying attention! One of my first websites, Elite Safelist, is advertised all over the place. I even see it when I’m doing work on other websites sometimes. If you’re new to internet marketing, you may ignore those ads at first. But when people see it every day or every week without fail, they inevitably start to pay attention to it.

Once people begin to pay attention, your voice begins to be heard… and THAT is your opportunity to turn your brand into something special.

“How do I turn my voice into a powerful message?”

Easy! Offer people something unique and tell them what you can honestly provide them, if they subscribe to your mailing list and pay attention to you.

Some examples:

• “I’m an experienced marketer who has accomplished ______ using ________. Join my list and uncover my secrets!”
• “I’ve been joining and reviewing all the hottest new websites. Save yourself the time and money, and let me reveal the sites that are designed to make you money, versus the sites designed to TAKE your money!”
• “I’m an average ______ (ex. mom, dad, student, construction worker, office lackey, etc) who discovered how to make some extra cash online in my spare time …. from the comfort of my own home! If that sounds interesting to you, I invite you to claim my free profit-making newsletter.”

Take some time, get creative, and market yourself or your business as something special!

What can you offer that is unique? Have questions or need feedback? Got a cool or interesting success story? Leave a comment below and lets brainstorm!

BUT there is a dirty little secret that not many people share…

You must pay your dues to reach success!

Of course there are some exceptions if you’re extremely lucky, but for 99% of people it will take some effort if you want to live a new and improved lifestyle.

One thing I’ve never shared with you is the amount of effort I put in my first few months before launching my first site, Elite Safelist. At the time I was in college, working a part time job, and trying to build my online business. This is literally what my schedule was like:

Mon-Fri

5:30 AM – Wake up (or at least try to!)

6 AM – Leave for School

7 AM – 7 PM – At School, In Class, Working, Driving  Home, Working On Biz Between All That Other Stuff!

8 PM – 2 AM – Working on my business

Weekends

All Day – Working on my business as much as humanly possible, with exceptions made for family, holidays, events, etc.

Yes, I was only sleeping a few hours a day at best – no exaggeration. Of course there were the occasional days where I had other stuff to do, but this was literally what I was doing on a daily basis. And there were many times I stayed up until 3 – 5 in the morning.

Today, I can say I live in a way that most people would probably be envious of. Most of my day belongs to me, while my business works for me.

But please do not misunderstand me, I am not asking you to put this much effort daily into your own business. I understand you probably have your own responsibilities and you don’t need to be crazy like I was to succeed. In fact what I did was borderline insane and quite unhealthy too! However, I would like you to realize that if you are not yet achieving the success you had imagined, the odds are you may not have paid your dues yet.

How many hours have you actually worked on your business so far?

And I’m not talking about looking at the computer deciding what to do, where to go, or searching online for another product to buy. But actually working, such as doing research, learning from experts, discovering new strategies/skills, building squeeze pages, getting traffic, brainstorming, etc etc.?

I probably put more effort in 3 months than the average person would do in 1-2 years.

BUT…

That is perfectly fine!

If it took you 1 year to be able to make a full time income online, would that be ok for you? Would you be happy even if it took you 2 years? Or even 5 years to get out of your job and actually get to spend time doing things you enjoy on a daily basis? A college education is roughly the same amount of time, and all that gets you is a j-o-b!

Success is not a race. I don’t care if you see success in 3 months or 5 years from now, but I want to see you succeed.

So understand that while you do have to pay your dues, and it is all worth the effort in the end. That’s the dirty little secret, but actually it’s not that bad if it means you can wake up with a smile on your face everyday!

Source 1

Source 2

Speaking Of Subscribers, Here’s How To Get Them!

So anyway… here are the final results!

Didn't Like This One!

DEFINITELY didn't like this one...if you could tell

Same one as above, different angle. I swear it looks a lot worse in person!

... and this is what I have chosen as my official new hair style! I've sinced dyed it to brown, but I don't like taking pictures so this is all you get to see

So, what does MY hair have to do with you? Well it’s 2009, so it’s the time for big changes and lots of success right? The question is, what are you going to do differently in 2009 to make this your year? My hairstyle change represents the concept of trying new things, breaking your old patterns, and not being afraid of screwing up in order to achieve success.

Yes, I know it’s just hair. But the message I’m trying to share is if you want to have a better year than you did in 2008, you can’t be afraid to try something new. Whether it’s trying a new program, testing a headline, or experimenting with your mailing list, you need to break your patterns if you aren’t getting the results you want.

If you’re using traffic exchanges and safelists for months and not getting results, try breaking the routine! Read my ebook (you can get it by joining my mailing list at the top right) and discover some new ways to achieve more success.

Are you earning hundreds or thousands of credits a day and not getting sign ups? Try to creating a new splash or squeeze page! With Instant Banner Creator, you can make custom images fast.

Is your mailing list growing but you aren’t making money with it? Try taking some time to read something that will help you do that, like IM Success Formula.

Are you already reading lots of ebooks every day and still just can’t figure out how to make money? Try learning somewhere else! My free report, Zero to Internet Marketing Hero shows you all kinds of places to discover new secrets directly from real experts.

The point is don’t get stuck in the monotony of doing the same thing every day if it’s not moving you towards the results you desire. One of my friends, who is a devoted Multi-Level Marketer, used to tell me that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

If you look at all of the successful Internet marketers, they are always working on their latest project or experimenting with ways to improve their business. They don’t sit around, waiting for magic to happen and money to fall from the sky.

If you want to be successful, don’t be afraid or too lazy to experiment. And remember, I said try something new. I never said to quit.

So if you are struggling with traffic exchanges (for example), I’m not saying to give it up. Jumping around to different opportunities only forces you to start over with almost nothing.

Stick with it! If you like what you are doing now and believe you can succeed, stay focused on that topic. Change your routine by discovering new things about it, expanding your knowledge, and applying what you’ve learned. You could literally be just one secret away from reaching massive success. But it won’t happen unless you are willing to experiment, improve, and evolve your business to the next level.

In all, my words of advice to you for 2009:

Be versatile, be willing to explore, and stay focused.

Oh yeah, and happy new year!