Joel Comm is one of the first people I learned from. He has a great way of explaining things so you really get it. And Joel is one of the people you really want to watch!

He has been on the Internet FOREVER, since he created a video game as a young kid which he later sold to Yahoo for millions. He created the first Internet Reality Show, The Next Internet Millionaire – which I wrote about a while ago. See http://www.savvymarketingsecrets.com/JV_Alert_Live.html.

He also created several iPhone apps including one that went viral — iFart — and he literally wrote the book on Google Adsense.

So listen to how he explains Affiliate marketing.

I’d love to hear any questions you may have after hearing Joel explain affiliate marketing. I’d also like to know what part of affiliate marketing are you finding hardest to do? What do you love? And what do you want to know more about affiliate marketing? Please leave a comment below so that others can learn from your experience.

Typically, I don’t promote big-ticket items this close to Christmas, but I don’t want you to miss out on a special deal guaranteed to help you with your blog that MaxBlogPress says it will never repeat.

MaxBlogPress is offering five of its hottest products for less than it usually charges for one of these blog tools, but there’s a catch. This deal with savings of 70 percent off the regular price is only available until TOMORROW (Dec. 14) at midnight.

I almost missed this one myself. I took a look at MaxBlogPress’ Ninja Affiliate this summer and added it to my wish list. The company describes this tool as a lethal affiliate tracking tool for WordPress bloggers. More recently, they MaxBlogPress introduced its Subscribers Magnet, a product that increases your ability to build a list with several features that fill in the visitors name and email automatically, so all your visitors have to do is click the submit button.

Other tools include:

• The WordPress Wizard 2.0, a coaching program with input from some of the most successful bloggers around - ProBloggers like Darren Rouse and Chris Garrett.
• The $365K Blog Traffic Formula
• RSS Email 2.0

 Grab your copy of the  MaxBlogPress Christmas Deal.

I am planning a lot of great things for the readers of the Savvy Marketing Secrets Blog going forward. So join my list or my feed. Also, please leave a comment and tell me your greatest concern for your business for 2011.

If you are a beginning marketer on the Internet you may want to start with affiliate marketing. And if you really are a newbie, you may be wondering just what is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing is promoting or selling the products of others for a commission. Your business advertises and sells for other companies. It is one of the fastest growing businesses in the Net. It’s a low cost business to start and it’s the perfect business to run from your home.

To succeed in affiliate marketing, you need the following:

• A professional looking website with great information to attract and benefit your target audience or niche. In addition to useful articles, your website might include a blog, product reviews and videos or podcasts designed to help your audience do things.
• Products to promote to your niche that they are interested in buying. You can promote affiliate products exclusively or blend your own products. The products can range from digital ebooks and special reports to audios, videos, webcasts and full-blown courses. You can find good digital products to promote at Clickbank.
• You also might choose to promote a physical product – which essentially means you can sell anything. You will need to establish an account at one of the affiliate networks that list physical products, such as Commission Junction.
• A list of prospects within your niche. Building a list is a major topic all of its own and perhaps the most important part of succeeding as an affiliate marketer. You can learn more about list building at http://incomeonautopilotnow.com.
• An autoresponder system such as Aweber.com. This is important because not everyone who visits your website where you market affiliate programs will purchase right away. An auto responder helps you follow up with these people, and will keep on reminding them about your website and invite them to visit your site. You can use an e-course or an e-zine with interesting tips that will make your prospects want to visit your website again. By doing this you are increasing the chances of generating a sale from most people who visit your site
• An optin page, often called a “squeeze page” because it’s only purpose is to get people to join your list. Your squeeze page links to your list housed at your autoresponder, which lets you automate your follow-up process.
• Web traffic which you acquire through dozens of free methods such as article marketing, posting videos on YouTube and social marketing, or paid traffic using pay per click ads or ezine advertising. Increasingly people are generating traffic to their blogs or websites using social media such as Twitter, Facebook Fan pages or other promotional tools. All of these strategies generate backlinks to your site from high-ranking, high-traffic websites. We’ll talk more about ways to generate web traffic in future blog posts.

To succeed as an affiliate marketer, you need to become adept at advertising and promotion. It helps to have strong skills as a copywriter. You will also need to be good with math to be able to track your campaigns, so you know which strategies are making you money.

Many information marketers say it is easy to make a lot of money in affiliate marketing. But take it from me, it is as not as easy as they say it is. The more prepared you are the better.

To learn more about affiliate marketing,  grab a copy of Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook. Rosalind has made a lot of money as a super affiliate so her secrets are priceless.

Here’s the link to Ros Gardner’s site again: Super Affiliate Handbook.

When trying to pick a niche for affiliate marketing, experts encourage you to go with your passion. Why? You have to do a lot of research and develop a great deal of content on the topic. You don’t want to pick something that bores you to tears.

The heart is a symbol of passion which can make a difference in perseverence in internet marketing.

 Well, I’ve been struggling with the issue of passion. Back in the nineties, I worked with a nonprofit agency to bring a brand new program to Delaware where I lived at the time.

It was a microloan program called Working Capital that provided business training and very small loans to tiny companies. Based on the Nobel Prize Winning Grameen Bank model created by Muhammad Yunus, Working Capital was supposed to do for America’s inner cities and rural areas what the international loan program had done for India and some African nations.

I can’t remember a time when I felt more passion than those many evenings I spent meeting with groups of small business owners explaining the program and helping them form loan groups. Once groups were formed, members discussed their business plans and sought the group’s approval for loans.

I was a woman on a mission. I really believed in free enterprise and its potential to transform communities.

What made the whole experience so powerful was the atmosphere we created. We held networking events, brought in special speakers and formed a lot of business loan groups. The energy in our building was so powerful you could feel the excitement. During the five or six years the program ran, hundreds of entrepreneurs joined Working Capital.

Our Delaware program was so successful that we won a Presidential Award and were invited to help form loan groups for street vendors before the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.

Thinking back, I realized that I poured so much of my heart and soul into that program that something inside me died with the program. I had a vision of little businesses transforming Wilmington in a similar way as successful minority owned companies changed the landscape of Memphis’ historic Beale Street. My hope died hard.

I created Savvy Marketing Secrets hoping to rekindle some of the passion I felt with Working Capital. By helping very small businesses harness the power of the Internet, I hoped to relight that spark.

Of course it’s not as easy to feel passion sitting in front of a computer screen as it was when I was meeting with real business owners. But tapping into that experience helped me remember my passion.

Many of the smallest businesses are not even on the Internet. But the net holds tremendous promise for business growth for those who take advantage of the various marketing tools. So my passion now is to use this blog to connect the dots to help businesses similar to the ones I worked with in Delaware.

I would love to hear your stories about your passion and how you are shaping it into your small business. Please leave a comment below. 

How to Write a Product Review

Lynn Terry has written a great post on “How to Write a Product Review.” If you review products as an affiliate, you do not want to miss her post.

The Internet is full of people telling you what to do to make money online. Lynn is one of a few people who actually show you how. I like her ideas, tips and reviews so much, that I signed up to receiver her newsletter. And so far it’s been well worth it for me.

I do not currently have an affiliate relationship with Lynn, but I may sign up if she offers an affiliate program — her advice is that good! Go here now to read her blog post: How to Write a Product Review.

Making the Best Use of Twitter

Everyone is trying to understand how to maximize their return on Twitter, the fastest growing social media tool around. I just discovered a great new blog about Twitter — TwitterWatchdog.com created by Skeeter Hansen and Al Ferretti.

With one visit, I was able to download their “Twitter Success Guide 2.0″ and get a special secret link to to 47 videos on how to drive traffic to your website or blog. You don’t want to miss this. Don’t tell anyone, I am sharing this link: 

http://twitterwatchdog.com/promo/training_videos.html

Well, I’m still reading my email, so I’ll see you later. Let me know by posting a comment of what you think of these two great resources. Take care.

Marcia Ming

Michael Jackson, King of Pop - 1958 – 2009

Sometimes you have to put business aside and honor the icons of your youth. Michael Jackson, the King of Pop, was just such an icon for me.

I grew up with Michael Jackson . I remember his performances as a boy on TV. Like millions of other fans, I hummed the words of his hit songs and danced to his music as a teenager and young adult.  So I had to drop everything to find a way to honor his tremendous contribution to the music world.

Brief BIO:

Michael Jackson was born in Gary, Indiana on August 29, 1958. He began his stellar career as a child star and lead singer of the Jackson Five. Hits like “I Want You Back”, “I Love You” and “I’ll Be There,” took the group to the Ed Sullivan Show and national fame. But it was Michael’s electrifying solo performances that made his one of the biggest musical performers in the world.

No musical performer was bigger than Michael Jackson in the ’80′s. His Thriller CD remains the biggest all-time seller in music history. “Dangerous” remains No. 2.”

Even more significantly, he influenced an entire generation of performers white and black, and that  influence stretched around the world.

His Thriller album was so big that he broke through racial barriers, forcing MTV and over venues to open doors to future African American performers. Even after his star dimmed in the US because of his personal problems, he remained a superstar overseas. His celebrity was unprecedented. 

Here are photos from Michael Jackson’s life:

Here are websites, where you can view his videos and get more information about Michael.

http://www.michaeljackson.com
http://www.myspace.com/michaeljackson
http://apps.facebook.com/ilike/artist/Mi…
http://musicbox.sonybmg.com/artists/mich…
http://www.youtube.com/michaeljackson
http://www.imeem.com/michaeljackson
http://www.legacyrecordings.com/Michael-…
http://www.legacyrecordings.com
http://www.epicrecords.com

Thank you Michael for your unforgettable performances.

May you rest in Peace.