May 21, 2012

No Pain... No Gain

There's a joke about an old farmer sitting on his porch with a Bloodhound lying by his feet. A neighbor comes over to talk and notices that, about every five minutes the dog lets out a long howl. So the visitor asks the old farmer why the dog howls every five minutes. The farmer says, "He's layin' on a nail." The surprised neighbor replies, "Well why don't he move off that nail?" The wise old farmer thinks for a second and replies, "I guess it don't hurt him enough."

Pain cases action. A little pain cases a little action A lot of pain cases BIG action. Homeowners are hurting out there. Some more than others. Put them in touch with their pain and help them get rid of it.

May 10, 2012

Everyone Is In Sales...

"We all sell and we sell our ideas EVERYDAY to EVERYONE that we come into contact with. We sell our children on getting up and going to school with a positive attitude, we sell our bosses on paying us, we sell our co-workers on helping us with projects, we sell our spouses on attending that family event that they really don't want to go to and we even sell the person at the post-office on just "letting one more person" in the door, even though it just hit 5:00pm! Don't tell me that you don't like Salespeople. You sell all the time so get over yourself! Just keep doing what you've always been doing if you are a Professional Salesperson, Business Owner or Relationship-Marketer - sell!"

~MJ Durkin

...nough said.

May 3, 2012

Backlinking Strategy | Short Sale Marketing | Real Estate Marketing

Re-Printed Here with Permission from Lee Honish...

Backlinking Strategy | Short Sale Marketing | Real Estate Marketing

I wish this was a blog I had written, but I did not! This is however the strategy I used to get my Google placement, page ranking and ALL of my links! It all came from this very simple article...

There are several strategies one can use to rank higher in the search engines and the one I’m going to explain is just one of them.

Please note that links to software and tools within this blog post are affiliate links which I do receive financial gain from if purchases are made from them.

Furthermore, the principles of this strategy can be done for absolutely free without having to buy any software or tools. I use the software to help and speed things up.

Don’t spend money on anything you see online unless you can afford it and you feel it will pay you back in the future.

Overview

I’d like to start by sharing an overview of the process with you so you can see how it all works as a whole. Later in this post, I’ll get into detail about the individual parts.

(Click to watch Backlinking Strategy & Process Overview on YouTube)

To summarize what I talk about in the video, the backlinking strategy I’m using involves two layers of backlinks – the anchor layer, which are links that you create which link directly to your niche site, and the indirect layer, which are links that you create which link directly to your anchor layer.

The Anchor Layer

The anchor layer consists of a few parts, again, which link directly to your niche site.

These include:

Top Article Directory Submissions
New Blogs
Web 2.0 Properties

Later in this post when I talk about how this all happens, I’ll get into what exactly is involved with each of these 4 parts in the anchor layer – what directories I submit to, what “new blogs” is, etc.

The Indirect Layer

The indirect layer is a way to create massive amounts of backlinks which link directly to the anchor properties we setup in the anchor layer. These links do not point directly to your niche site.

The indirect layer consists of:

Mass Article Submissions using Unique Article Wizard
Mass Bookmarking Submissions

The reason that you don’t want to link directly to your niche site is because you’re creating hundreds of backlinks at a time and if you point all of them to your niche site, it will look totally unnatural and your young site won’t be able to handle all of it without raising a red flag. When you point these links to your anchors, because your anchor sites are on high ranking, totally populated websites, they’ll be able to handle the wave/influx of links but at the same time passor feed that SEO power generated from all of those links into your niche site. Your anchor properties act as a shield while at the same time allow you to get the SEO benefit from the indirect layer.

Yes, I know – it sounds kind of wacky. When I first heard this strategy it really didn’t make sense to me, but after implementing the strategies myself the results are very clear.

The Streamlined Process

Now that you have a general understanding of the what, I’m going to show you the how.

I think the best way to do this is to actually just walk you through the process from start to finish and show you how I can create all of these backlinks from a single unique article.

Step 1: Write an Original Article Related to Your Niche

Everything in this process begins with writing an original article. Personally, I like to have full control of what’s written and what’s published, so I like to write the articles myself, but there are many people who are comfortable with having a virtual assistant or ghostwriter write the article for them instead.

Either way, it should definitely unique content and should typically be around 350-600 words in length. Although the length isn’t extremely important, it’s smart to stay within this range because it will make your life easier in the later steps of this process.

Lastly, you can choose to post this original article onto your niche site before you move on to the next steps. You could kill two birds with one stone by adding content to your site and following the next steps to help build backlinks as well.

Step 2: Prepare The Article for Spinning

Like I mentioned in the overview video above, spinning an article gives you the ability to quickly create multiple variations of an original article so that you can submit them to various places without worrying about duplicate content penalties and so that you can save tons of time by not having to create brand new content from scratch over and over again to get the same message across.

Not everyone is comfortable with the idea of spinning an article – using multiple variations of an original article and then submitting those variations to several different locations on the web. Some people view it as spammy and others view it as dangerous too. I totally respect that side of the argument, but let me tell you why I think it’s okay.

(I don’t want this post to turn into some huge debate, but I feel I should tell you why I am okay with this method since this is what I’m showing you how to do.)

First, I don’t view it as spammy because I’m making sure that the content that I submit (even after spinning) is good. Since they are quality articles and I don’t submit different versions of an article to the same location, I feel comfortable knowing that I’m doing what I can to make sure my message gets read in the most places as possible, without using the same exact text over and over again.

Also, think about press releases for a second. Press releases are one single version of an article that gets syndicated to tens of thousands of places on the web. Companies like PRWeb make money doing this for other companies, brands and people. As described on PRWeb’s site:

“We send your news to 35,000 journalists and bloggers, 30,000 websites and hundreds of newspapers including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune as well as local news outlets across the USA. PRWeb gets your story where it needs to go.”

Several brand name companies and individuals use press releases (the exact same article, not variations) to help spread the word about something. This is exactly what I’m doing when I submit my spun content to various places on the web, although I’m taking it a step further and am not using the same exact content over and over again. I’m using different variations because that’s the only way I can make it happen, at least without penalty.

In my previous post, I think Mark Mason’s comment says it best:

“I hate this spinning discussion. Let’s say Pat has the cure for cancer and he posts it on his blog. Curing cancer is good. So Pat spins articles about curing cancer and posts them everywhere so he can help the most people while playing by the rules that GOOGLE has set.

So what about security guards? Pat’s site rocks. It will help people that are thinking about becoming a security guard. Security guards are a help to society. It’s all good.

So what if Pat “advertises” his site by placing similar content all over the web? It’s not like the web is “full” and Pat is harming someone by taking up too much space.

It seems acceptable for Toyota to place the same add on every TV network and run it over and over. It’s OK for AP to syndicate their content everywhere. Why not Pat.

Not to mention the fact that Pat is only doing this because Google’s algorithms are too poor to tell good content from bad content. I would argue that if Pat Does not do something to rank his site, he is being unfair to all those readers out therebat NEED him but cannot find him.

Failing to properly promote your site when there are people to help profitably is A lot bigger sin than syndicating 47 very similar but different copies of a good article.

If you want to take a stand against someone, get mad at Google. They have an inferior product that relies on backlinks — yet they make Billions of dollars each year from it. That’s the problem, not Pat.

Anyways, I think we’ve beat this to a pulp already – it’s time to show you how it’s done.

In the video below, you’ll see me using a piece of software called The Best Spinner, which is by far the best spinning software available with the biggest bank of user generated synonyms that make the spinning process much faster.

Although there is a “one-button” approach that you can use to spin your articles, I would advise against using that feature because although The Best Spinner is awesome, it’s automated functions aren’t entirely perfect. You’ll see that I take the time to go through each word one-by-one to plug in good synonyms that make sense. Even though this takes some extra time (and like I said preparing an article for spinning is what takes up most of my time in this backlinking strategy), it’s totally worth it when you can just copy and paste spun versions of your articles in all of the later steps.

(Click to watch The Best Spinner – Article Spinning on YouTube)

Is article spinning absolutely necessary in order to make this strategy work. No! But as you will see, it does help to speed things up a bit.

Step 3: Submit to Article Directories

In this step, you’ll be submitting spun versions of your original article to various article marketing directories.

The directories I usually submit to are listed below:

You probably know that many of these top article directories check to make sure that the article is unique before approving and posting it onto their site. EzineArticles, especially, is notorious for this, however I’ve never once had an article denied approval or removed. If you are worried, you can still continue through this process by submitting a version to just one of the article directories.

EzineArticles is the top-choice directory, however it usually takes a while to get your articles approved (several days if you have not yet written 10 articles for their site). If you want an immediate approval, you can submit to GoArticles, which helps because then you don’t have to wait days to utilize the article in this backlinking process.

Here is one version of my article that I spun from the spinning video in step #2, live on GoArticles.com. Don’t forget to add a link directly to your niche site in the author bio / resource section, making sure you have at least one link that is an anchor text that matches your target keyword or keyphrase.

And yes, Pete Chamberlain is my pen name for my niche site and all related articles.

Step 4: Create Your New Blogs and Web 2.0 Properties

At this point you can use spun versions of your original article to create new blogs and web 2.0 properties that all have backlinks pointing to your site. They will be a part of the anchor layerthat we talked about in the overview, which means they will contain links that point directly back to your niche site.

New Blogs and Web 2.0 Properties

These are new blogs and web 2.0 sites that you create for free, and the real benefit here is that they are a part of a larger, more powerful and higher ranking domain.

So for example, when you create a free blog at WordPress.com, even though the blog you create will start out as a Page Rank 0 (PR0) website, it’s still a part of the PR9wordpress.com domain. This same ideology goes for all of the articles you’ve written for article directories too.

Each of the new sites will only require one post, which you can grab from a spun version of your original article (although you could and probably should add a little more (spun) content later – just to give the site more meat.

In addition to the content, you should embed a related video from YouTube (and even a picture too) just to make your page a little more relevant to the topic, and so it looks like it’s lived in a little.

Here is where you can create your free blogs and Web 2.0 Sites (thanks to Joseph for the updated list! - updated 2012):

Again, these only require 1 post (2 or 3 is better) with a link back to your niche site, and after that the only thing you have to do with them is remember the URL so you can link to them in the next step (step #5). I don’t do any cross linking between these sites.

Anchor Text Update for 2012: Also, make sure you vary your anchor text a bit. Meaning, the link from these sites that point back to your main site shouldn’t ALWAYS be using your main keyword. Why? Because it’s unnatural and a good variety of related anchor texts is better. So for example, if your target keyword is “Fly Fishing”, then it’s probably smart to use “Fly Fishing” about half the time (roughly) and then a mix of other keywords like “Fly Fishing Rods”, “Fly Fishing Reels”, “Fly Fishing Techniques”, “Fly Fishing Tips”, etc. for the other half.

Notable Web 2.0 Properties

There are two unique Web 2.0 sites I’d like to mention real quick:

They are free to setup and treated in the exact same manner as the New Blogs, they are just setup a little differently. You can use a (HIGHLY UNIQUE) spun version of your original article for some content, you can add an rss feed from your niche site, some videos, some pictures – there are a lot of cool things you can do with Squidoo and Hubpages. Again, just make sure there’s a least one backlink (with your keyword as the anchor text), pointing back to your niche site for each.

Note about Squidoo and Hubpages (and the reason why they’re separated out): More recently, they’ve been getting more and more strict with the content that is posted on their sites. I would actually write the content on these sites manually if possible, but if you don’t have the time you can test a spun version of your original article, knowing that it may not be approved. This is a warning for you just in case, just remember to think about the end user and what’s actually useful for them. The more “modules” and content you can add on those sites – the better, and the link that can come from those sites can be extremely powerful, if you can land ‘em.

After you have all of the above mentioned sites setup, you don’t need to keep creating more. When you get to this point, you can skip step #4 entirely because they will already be in place and doing their job.

Step 5: Indirect Linking to Your Anchor Sites

In this step, you’ll be creating a load of backlinks that link back to your anchor sites that you’ve created from your article submissions, your new blogs and web 2.0 properties.

Unique Article Wizard

Unique Article Wizard is a tool that I got familiar with a month after starting my niche site and it’s proving to work quite well. Previously, I’ve used Automatic Article Submitter to do mass article submissions, but UAW definitely outperforms AAS in my opinion, simply because I can get a lot more backlinks from it.

That being said, UAW isn’t entirely automatic either, but you can get up to 800-1000 backlinks form a single article, with links to prove it, which is awesome. This is why we use these articles to link to our anchor sites, because 1000s of backlinks to your niche site would definitely be a little much.

Here’s a video explaining how UAW works:

(Click to watch Unique Article Wizard – Massive Backlinks on YouTube)

Social Bookmarking

This is another method you can use to link directly to your anchor sites which will ultimately help boost the authority of your niche site.

There are several different backlinking tools available to help you with this process. One of them,Bookmarking Demon, automates the entire process but I’ve found the software to be really hard to handle, and it’s extremely expensive at $147 a pop. After purchasing it myself (again, I purchased and played around with all of these tools to see what works and what doesn’t so I could report back to you), personally I found that it wasn’t worth that much money to me.

I’d rather use a free tool from Social Poster, which really isn’t automated at all (and the initial time you run through it it takes a while because you have to manually sign up for all of the different social bookmarking sites), but it does save a little bit of time.

During my journey with my security guard training niche, social bookmarking was the thing I did the least. If I didn’t have unique article wizard on hand, I probably would have done more of it.

Step 6: Rinse and Repeat

Go back to Step 1.

An Important Final Note

So that’s the bulk of the backlinking strategy, and as you can see there are a lot of parts to it.

The thing is, most of the software and tools I’ve been talking about come with a cost, but I don’t want you to think that you need to purchase any of these things in order to succeed.

You can complete this entire backlinking strategy from the article submissions to the creation of new blogs and web 2.0 properties and social bookmarking without spending a dime. So please, don’t feel like you need to empty your wallet after reading this, I just wanted to show you exactly what I was doing and the tools I’ve been using to help save some time and speed things up a bit.

The tools work, but they aren’t necessary.

I know how much influence I have now that the Smart Passive Income Blog has grown so popular, and with that I accept the responsibility to make sure to never cheat you or tell you that you NEED to spend money on this or that in order to find success. When I created my first online business, the only thing I spent money on was a domain name and hosting package.

In the beginning, I didn’t spend money on a fancy website design, search engine optimization, article spinning software, submitter tools or anything like that. Heck, I didn’t even know those things existing and the only thing I did was publish great content, and I eventually gained a following and things just took off from there.

lee.honish@yahoo.com
www.honish.com
Lee Honish
858-663-2537

11 Mindsets That Can Make or Break You

MINDSET... What's yours?

Guess there's nothing else to say... Make it a great day!

Apr 27, 2012

The END of the REO cycle | The END of LISTINGS

By Lee Honish - Reprinted here with permission... Read Lee's BIO

It has become apparent to everyone that in MANY markets there seems to be a lack of listings. This isn't by accident and it's mostly based on separate occurrences.

The END of the REO cycle | The END of LISTINGS

Well sort of…

Properties will be once again liquidated by Freddie and Fannie AFTER we have a new president. It was made clear every quarter by Freddie and Fannie Representatives that this day would arrive. That if agents wanted any kind of success that needed to start working on short sales and to diversify their portfolios for new streams of listings.

With the economy "sort of” showing signs of improvement, Freddie and Fannie have almost completely halted all REO liquidations. Further the numbers that Freddie and Fannie have submitted for numbers do not even remotely match the core logic figures.

To say it's all a political charade would be an understatement…

Let's face reality, by halting the liquidations of REO sales it FREEZES the decline in valuation of properties and makes it into a "seller's” market and in theory should increase the value of property or at the very least plateau the value.

Once the new president is elected REO liquidations will once again occur…

OR WORSE, our government will go into the business of being permanent landlords?

In any case do not expect NEW REO's to hit the market till after the current election, the strategy is obvious since Freddie and Fannie reps have warned of this day for close to two years.

The END of the REO cycle | The END of LISTINGS

This is strictly based on 3 things:

You are a fool if you sell an equity based property in this market
Banks are handing our loan modifications to homeowners like it's crack cocaine, thus halting or slowing down the need for short sales
Banks are offering cash for deed in lieu of foreclosure and cutting out agents in the short sale listing cycle

The sad reality in both cases is that for an agent to be successful, the ONLY real solution is to approach a homeowner before they hit the NOTICE OF DEFAULT wall and are approached by banks, agents, and asset management companies.

Obtaining a TRUE pre-nod 61 day delinquency list and becoming a REAL advocate to a homeowner and advising them of all of their options is the current (and foreseeably the future) the ONLY way to get a new listing base and funnel of new clients until the market makes its next market turn.

If the focus by the agent is on GETTING A LISTING or GETTING PAID…

Ultimately the agent will not get what they are after!

Start with being an advocate and knowing the options for a homeowner and focus on outreach daily, first on a community level and expand to the city level, and if all goes well, move on the county level AND you will be the one with all the listings.

lee.honish@yahoo.com
www.honish.com
Lee Honish
858-663-2537

CLICK HERE for MONSTER information

If you cannot afford my program, please let me know how I can help you... there is always a way to make it work!
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The END of the REO cycle | The END of LISTINGS

Apr 26, 2012

The 4 Disciplines of a Seller-Based Business

Do you know how often homeowners move in their community?

According to the National Association of REALTORS, U.S. homeowners become sellers and move once about every 8 years. And a whopping 71 percent of all U.S. sellers remain in the same state in which they purchase their next home.

Early in your real estate career, you may have found that buyers buy more often than sellers sell. But there’s a fundamental difference between finding buyers and finding sellers.

Buyers come to you when you do things to put yourself in their path – most often at open houses, when they visit your Website to look at homes, because they visit your listings, or even because they called when you were handling floor calls at your office.

Sellers, on the hand, tend to be more elusive. You must proactively work to find them. It takes focus, market knowledge, script practice and proactive communication campaigns.

But it’s all worth it! Well-priced listings are a magnet for buyers, buyer agents, and potential sellers in the neighborhood as well. Here are the 4 disciplines of seller-based business:

PREPARE FOR SELLERS

Choose your area of real estate specialization. It might be a geographic area (part of town or certain subdivisions), a property type or a demographic group.

Do your market research. How much inventory is there, and is it rising or falling; how much is selling and how quickly; how are homes getting sold (price reductions, staging, investors, cash buyers.)

Talk like a seller-focused professional. Know your basic market data which might include the number of listings on the market (inventory) and average market time (days on market) that sellers are interested in knowing and practice your scripts for purposeful delivery when you’re in the moment.

Know where to find sellers. As you review MLS data, pay attention to segments of the market where the most sales are happening. Is it in a certain geographic area(s) or perhaps you look within a certain price range.

LEAD GENERATE FOR SELLERS

Accepting the proven premise that seller listings generate your biggest, most-leveraged business opportunity – the question is how best to find them. Focus on these four major sources:

Your database, especially your Mets.
Business-to-business leads
Open Houses
Farming
For Sale by Owners
Expired Listings

COMMUNICATE SYSTEMATICALLY

Essential to high-quality professional service is systematic communication. Here are some ways to make that happen with sellers from any group:

Use a Lead Sheet

A lead sheet is a very valuable simple tool. Make it a practice to have one and use it whenever you are having detailed conversation with a prospective seller – it’ll not only help you with you interviewing skills but it’s a HUGE time-saver.

Continue reading ‘The 4 Disciplines of a Seller-Based Business’

Apr 25, 2012

Accountability - Can You Dig It?? -or- Why You Need a Coach

Why do most independent business people struggle with inconsistent income and unreliable results? Simple, their bosses are incredibly bad. They lack the will to truly hold their employees accountable. So, you say that you don't have a boss or employees... that you're an independent contractor and you own your business? Great! I say, take a look in the mirror. Seriously. Do this with me here... Ready?

If you are looking in the mirror, you are looking at a boss who is terrible at holding people accountable AND you are looking at your single worst employee. Seriously. Would you hire yourself? That guy/girl never shows up for work on time. They are incredibly inconsistent in their lead generation tasks. Their follow-up is hit and miss. They are usually putting off tasks and projects that they should have accomplished by now and their time management sucks.

Does that sound brutal? Is any of this uncomfortable? If it is... GOOD! Discomfort causes change. Gene Rivers with Keller Williams Realty told me recently that accountability (true accountability) works because no one wants to feel loss of integrity. In other words, when you commit to something, when you promise someone that you will do something and then you don't follow through, you let that person down. Inside yourself you feel it! You are ashamed and you feel a great loss of integrity. Even if that person tries to tell you that they don't mind or that it's alright, it doesn't matter. You both know that you failed to deliver on a commitment.

The trouble with most of us is that the person we let down most often is ourselves. How many times have you said to yourself, "I'm going to start working out. Tomorrow I will get up early and get a run in before work." Or, "I'm going to lead generate every day from 8am to 11am." Then maybe it happens once or twice. But after a few times you will stop and revert back to your old habits. Most of us will readily let ourselves down when we would never drop the ball on a commitment that we made to someone else. I'm here to tell you that this is a major injustice on a cosmic scale. It is at least as bad and perhaps worse than letting someone else down. Gene Rivers was right! No one wants to feel loss of integrity. But the most invasive and destructive infection is the loss of integrity with ourselves. It results in negative thoughts, feelings, and self-talk. Things like;

"I just can't find the time."
"This business is so up and down that I never know what's coming next."
"Maybe I'm not cut out for this."
"I need to get a 'real job' so I can pay my bills"
"The market is no good."
"I'm not good enough."
I can't get in shape. I'm just "big boned".

You can probably think of more.

So use the fact that it's human nature to be ok with letting ourselves down but to be uncomfortable with letting others down. Get a coach or at the very least, an accountability partner. Sign a written accountability agreement with consequences for non-performance. Maybe you have to wash your coach's car in the parking lot if you don't deliver on a commitment.

What you'll find is that you probably will not ever have to wash your coach's car. Your natural built-in aversion to letting someone besides yourself down will help keep you on the straight and narrow path. And if you're implementing the right things, your business, your performance, your demeanor, your attitude, and your life with soar!

No limits babies!!