Each year continues to throw up new challenges for those trying to make money online. However, there are still several ways of ‘doing things right’ that can improve your chances of success (or of continued success) this year, whatever line of business you are in.

So, what follows are essential tips to help you do just that. So let’s begin with an obvious tip, shall we.

Tip 1: Plan

Plan what work you’re going to do, and stick to the plan.

A plan could consist of a set of daily activities - reply to your emails, visit a forum or two, create more content for your site - or it could consist of a set of activities you want to complete in a given month.

Whatever techniques or strategies you use, make sure you plan what you’re going to do first. Then do it.

Tip 2: Try Not To Rely On One Income Source

A source of income could be generated via pay per click search engines such as Google Adwords, or via article marketing. As an affiliate marketer, you might only make money from one website. As a vendor you might only sell one particular product. As a service seller you might be too reliant on one particular client.

Whatever your situation, it is never wise to rely on just one source of income, and this is especially true online.

Make sure you put some alternative strategies in place, some alternative pillars of income, if you like. This could be product diversification, or seeking out new clients or developing new ways to generating traffic to your website.

Tip 3: Commit To Learning

Commit to continuing to learn on a regular basis.

You can do this via an online forum, via a free ebook or website, or you can buy a suitable internet marketing product/service from a source that you trust and respect.

Equally as important as committing to learn is committing to not trying to learn everything. Be selective. Develop skills that will help grow your business. Ignore the rest.

Tip 4: Your Attitude Is Everything

Your attitude to success (and failure) is all important.

There are plenty of ways to succeed online, as you may well know; ultimately, however, what you do is not as important as how you do it.

I’m talking about your attitude. A positive attitude, combined with persistence, and a willingness to keep on learning, will seriously improve your chances of success.

I think Henry Ford said it best when he said: “Whether you think you can or can’t you’re right!”

Tip 5: Words Still Matter On The Web

Despite the rapid growth of YouTube, words still matter. Words that can persuade, cajole and build trust are more important than ever. Learn to write copy that is both clear and helpful to your site visitor, written with your voice and that the search engines like. And if you don’t want to learn this skill, pay someone to write copy for your website.

Tip 6: Spend Time On Activities That Make You Money

Are you working effectively? Are you making best use of your time? Form a habit of only spending time on activities that earn you money. And if you don’t know what those activities are, then find out.

Tip 7: Backup Your Work

Backup your work on a regular basis.

This is a very easy thing to state, but a very difficult thing to implement. We all know that we should backup our files, our mailing lists, our databases, our websites, but how many of us do it!

So this tip applies to everyone, including me.

Again, backup your work.

–

Okay, that’s enough.

It’s now over to you to integrate these successful tips and strategies into your business life.

Keep learning, keep using the right tools, and keep persevering, and you will succeed online.

Wishing you your most profitable year, yet.

Steve M Nash is owner of several sites including http://www.textmefree.com - a directory of free sms text messaging sites, and guide to bulk sms marketing. He promotes them all using the basic principles and tips detailed in his free website promotion guide, http://www.howipromotemywebsite.com

Okay we are on the eve of a new year. Make a resolution to learn something new. Here are some ideas:

RSS - learn more at RSS Specifications
Podcasting - learn more at Podcasting Tools
Social Bookmarking - tackle Digg

Digg is a popular user drive social network. ProNet Advertising wrote up a nice Beginners Guide to Digg.

If you have ever felt like you had to dig around the Internet for good content, you might want to look at something called Digg (digg.com). Digg is a site that will help you avoid the process of digging and instead, get exactly what others have dug up so you can see some of the great sites/stories/things out there on the Internet. Many people reading this might already know what Digg is all about so if you fall into this category, quit reading now and go elsewhere or you might feel this is a bit basic. If you haven’t heard of Digg, read further and you can not only understand one of the more successful sites on the web these days but also get an idea of how you can leverage it for your business. Digg epitomizes the value of collective intelligence and community on the Internet in a way that not only brings value to its users, but also to businesses that are savvy enough to take advantage.

Well Im back from my holidays to Egypt. I arrived in the UK at 3am on Tuesday all thanks to flight delays at Heathrow. Apparently there was loads of fog at Heathrow Airport whilst I was sunbathing in 26 degree weather! Anyway I had a really good time reading up about Ancient Egyptian history whilst visiting some tombs, old temples and an odd museum. In short I really feel fresh and ready to take on another year of business as a young entrepreneur.

A quick thankyou is in hand to Matt for helping to moderate the comments while I was away. Unfortunately the Forums gained spam traction but I will be debating whether to let it go in the next few weeks as there doesn’t seem to be much action taking place there.

I hope you and your families had a really good and joyful Christmas. Holidays like this are only one of a few opportunities you as a mogul can get the time off and really distract yourself from your busy lifestyles. I hope you grabbed the chance to do so and are feeling invigorated after the short break.

During my 7 day break I was pleased to see that I gained another Adbrite advertiser turns out they’ve just left me! But I do have another Text Link Ads advertiser AND a referral from TLA (thanks Rohail!). The 2 extra ads can be seen in my sidebar so by all means go check them out! This means that income from online activity is starting to build up really nicely so Im really excited about what the New Year will hold for me.

Check it out: You can accept credit cards on your website or blog!

New e-commerce trends have shaped this holiday season, including the increasing importance of social networks, blogs, and user content; booming sales of luxury items; an extended shopping period; and the emergence of niche sellers.

By all accounts, sales growth has been strong. Excluding travel and auctions, consumers spent $21.7 billion at U.S. online stores between November 1 and December 20, a 26 percent increase over the same period last year, according to comScore Networks.

Even more significant, the spending increase between December 18 and December 20 was 35 percent, reversing a trend from past years when sales slowed down as Christmas Day approached. The change this year is due to retailers’ improved ability to ship items on time later in the season and to consumers’ willingness to pay extra for this convenience.

complete article

Australian Courts recently ruled that providing web links to copyright-protected music is enough to make a site legally liable. This creates a huge legal uncertainty for search engines around the world, in particular YouTube could be viewed as liable for content that infringes on copyrights.

Today’s sales podcast was recorded in studio at Careers Today radio show on 1040 CFUN here in Vancouver. The Host Minto Roy interviewed me on the topic of sales performance systems, training, coaching, and of course closing bigger deals and landing larger clients.

You can dowload today’s sales podcast by clicking here

Subscribe in iTunes to this Sales Podcast

Get focused, think bigger, and close bigger!

Shane Gibson

This sales podcast is presented by Shane Gibson.

Shane Gibson is the author of Closing Bigger the Field Guide to Closing Bigger Deals and President of Knowledge Brokers International Systems Ltd. a leading sales performance and leadership development organization. Shane divides his time between his entrepreneurial projects, speaking at major conferences and mentoring salespeople and entrepreneurs.

Quick Links:

Sales Training Canada
Sales
Training South Africa
Sales Training Boot Camps Vancouver
Complete Sales Action System
Managing Complex Business
Relationships System

I just wanted to take a few minutes to say Merry Christmas from Blogtrepreneur for 2006. I hope you have a really great day!

Im flying back from Egypt today (this is an advanced Wordpress post), but will be online from tomorrow. Once again, I wish you a joyous 25th of December!

Check it out: You can accept credit cards on your website or blog!

For sale: A southeastern e-tailer of backyard playground and outdoor equipment that has $9 million in annual revenue.

Recently I discovered an awesome blog that I had stumbled on a few times in the past. Most of you may know the author for his brilliant design work with blogs or maybe for his talented video production and teaching skills. Either way, Chris Pearson from Pearsonified.com has gained me as a reader, and it his him who gave me the following tips on better indexation in Google.

Communication is the key to any relationship. There’s no “I” in “Team”, and so talking to your spouse, business partner or football goalkeeper is vital for success. In the same way, in order to nurture a website teeming with success its necessary that you network properly with the one being that can make or break your internet glory - the Googlemeister.

So how can I form this bond with the master?
It’s simple and there are 2 main ways to do so, each giving you that extra bit of love that should boost your rankings and drive more traffic to your site.

1. Add an XML Sitemap

With Wordpress, adding an XML map of your masses of pages couldn’t be easier. These days there are plugins for just about everything you could ever wish for. So of course, you won’t be surprised to hear that the Google Sitemap Generator is your key to solving the puzzle.

All the normal procedures apply - Download the plugin, Unzip it, Upload the contents to your Plugins directory then Activate the Plugin in your Admin section. The sitemap will then be on autopilot, pinging MSN, Yahoo and the G-Daddy periodically so they can stay up-to-date with your ever expanding online presence. For the best effects, I link to my XML Sitemap in my footer just for that extra peace of mind.

2. Add an XHTML Sitemap

This second phase of SEO is a tad harder to complete but none-the-less the results are great, especially for you webmasters who sites are cluttered with a mass of information and whose Archives are a disgrace. The XHTML map will serve up a page which will contain links to every single page you’ve ever created - neat huh!

To save me from repeating everything that Mr Pearson says, go and check out his post on Using XHTML Sitemaps for Better Indexing. In it he shows you how to download the plugin (yet another one!), and how to style the HTML page that results from using it to suit your sites look and feel.

Again, by linking to this sitemap it will help Google to journey through your whole site which then should get picked up by the bots and slapped onto the search engine for browsers to enjoy.

I hope this information helps your site to compete even more in the world of SEO - and if you’ve got any more tips or hints on better indexation - let me know through commenting!

Check it out: You can accept credit cards on your website or blog!