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11 Cool Content Marketing Tactics That Will Push Your Blog Traffic To The Next Level

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Effective content marketing can determine whether your content is read by thousands of people or a handful of people, and your content marketing strategy can determine whether you’ll make a full-time income as a blogger or struggle to get by.

Many bloggers know this, which is why they continuously test different methods to expand their content’s reach. The blogger with 100 monthly visitors and the blogger with 100,000 monthly visitors both strive to get their content in front of more people.

But how can you consistently expand your blog’s reach? How can you attract more readers today than you did yesterday? Here are 11 cool content marketing tactics you can use to push your blog traffic to the next level:

 

#1: Accept Guest Posts 

My blog generated the most traffic when I published two posts per day. But as my blog posts became longer and more content rich, it became increasingly difficult to publish as frequently and consistently.

I’m slowly getting closer to achieving that same frequency, but not because I’m writing 14 blog posts each week. Rather, I started accepting guest posts from my community.

Now I get free content for my blog without having to write a single word. How cool is that?

Of course, I still love writing at least one blog post every week, but having to write (and publish…big difference) a blog post every day would prevent me from addressing other parts of my business.

Accepting guest posts results in more updates and fresh content, and that results in more SEO love.

 

#2: Hire A Contributor

If you want to take accepting guest posts to the next level, you can hire a contributor who will produce the content for you. I recommend finding a paid contributor on Upwork and making sure this person is passionate about your blog’s topics.

You don’t want to hire a contributor who will write a blog post without any passion behind the topic. That lack of passion will show in the final draft.

If you hire a contributor, I recommend monitoring his or her content for 1-2 weeks and engaging in frequent conversations. This way, you are both on the same page and you’re more likely to get the content you want and expect.

 

#3: Use Internal Links 

By linking to your content internally, you increase the amount of time readers engage with your blog. And the more time people spend on your blog, the more likely they are to come back for more.

Keeping people on your blog longer also helps build trust and will result in more subscribers and sales over time. Bring attention to some of your older posts and every new post you publish. On the flip side, you can edit your older posts to link to your newer content.

 

#4: Outsource More Tasks

Outsourcing opens up so much time to pursue other parts of your business. I’ve outsourced social media posts, blog post editing, podcast episode editing, video editing, and an array of other tasks.

After I started outsourcing these tasks, I was able to concentrate on creative ways to promote my content such as reaching out to influencers, promoting my content through various outlets, and growing my brand.

Outsourcing will open up more of your time, but be sure to use the extra time productively. Otherwise you’re completely missing the point of outsourcing.

 

#5: Create A Content Calendar

An editorial calendar is a guide that lays out which content gets published when. You can organize the publication of your content in such a way that includes weekly or monthly themes on your blog.

Monthly themes can help with product launches or affiliate promotions. For instance, let’s say you write a blog about the best toys around in July (and also know that new LEGO sets are coming out in August).

You can use mid-July and the entire month of August to focus your content creation efforts on LEGO sets. By the time you introduce your affiliate links, your audience will be more conditioned to buy the LEGO sets.

 

#6: Write Longer Blog Posts

Longer blog posts like these grab more attention and provide more overall value. When I published two blog posts each day, most were only 250-500 words. While I’ve lost that level of frequency, my current blog posts are more in-depth.

Writing longer blog posts is also great for more blog traffic. Not only do search engines love longer blog posts, but you’ll keep people on your blog for a longer period of time.

Think about it. If you’ve made it to this sentence, you’re virtually committed to reading this entire blog post. You’re committed to knowing all 11 tactics mentioned in the post, even if you skim.

Of course, no one is forcing you to read through the entire post, but once you make it to this point, full commitment tends to be the unwritten rule of reading content.

 

#7: Write 1 Blog Post Per Day

If you can muster it, writing one blog post per day will result in a blog that’s consistently updated with fresh content. While it may take a while for search engines to boost your traffic, writing blog posts at a frequent rate will also give you more content to promote on social networks.

My Twitter usage motivated me to write two blog posts per day. I mean, I was tweeting every 15 minutes and wanted to share fresh, original content. And by spacing it out over a long period of time, I was able to garner strong interest for my content.

I still knew I could tweet some content over and over because my new followers wouldn’t have seen it before, and my regular followers wouldn’t have seen everything. I try to write a lot of evergreen content so a tweet linking to a blog post from two years ago would still be relevant to both groups.

 

#8: Submit At Least 3 Guest Post Pitches Per Day

Writing guest posts for other blogs is a well-known tactic to expand your reach. In my experience, it’s easy to approach guest blogging inconsistently.

It’s easy to send multiple pitches in a single week, but then concentrate on creating content for one or two guest p0sts, and stop or simply forget to keep sending pitches.

That’s a mistake. Sending at least three pitches per day helps step up your commitment to producing more content because you may have to meet a deadline that is not self-imposed.

If you submit at least three guest post pitches per day, you’ll submit 1095 guest post pitches each year. Assuming a conservative 20 percent acceptance rate, you’ll write at least 219 guest posts in a given year.

Writing one guest post every other day may seem like a lot of work, but it will result in many more people seeing your content (perhaps millions of additional people will read your content depending on where it’s published).

A single guest post of mine, published on Jeff Bullas’ Blog, was shared over 6,000 times. Talk about more exposure (and that’s just one guest post)! Imagine if you got those results from more than one of your 219 guest posts.

In fact, if you averaged 1,000 shares for all 219 of your guest posts, you’d get 219,000 shares for all of your guest posts that year. It’s very easy to assume that, at this point, over 1 million people will have viewed your content.

 

#9: Link To Influencers In Your Posts

Influencer marketing will be a strong form of marketing for a very long time. The idea behind influencer marketing is that you mention several influencers within your blog post. You then email them to let them know.

Some will share your content with their audiences while others won’t. The key thing not to do in every email to an influencer is to ask them to share your content.

I’ve gotten many emails from people mentioning me in their content and saying something like, “Can you share this with your audience?”

Influencers know how influencer marketing works. Instead of asking them to share your content, just tell them you featured them in your blog post. Don’t try to influence the influencer with explicit requests because those emails are usually ignored.

The more influencers you mention in your content, the better, but make sure the content doesn’t drag on because you’re trying to mention every possible influencer in your niche. That’s why you write multiple blog posts.

 

#10: Create A Content Series

There’s nothing more frustrating than not knowing the ending. Imagine going to the theater, watching Rogue One, and then halfway through the movie the screen stops working. The staff comes out and says they can’t fix the problem. You get a full refund, but you are left with only half of Rogue One.

You don’t know the ending, and that will frustrate you until you see it at another movie theater.

While it’s very difficult to reproduce the same feeling as stopping halfway through Rogue One, you can still create a content series without an ending.

Imagine writing a blog post called “5 Ways To Get More Twitter Followers.” At the end of the blog post you can say something like, “I actually have a bonus tip to get more Twitter followers, but I’ll reveal it in the next blog post along with four additional tips.”

Now you build suspense while creating a content series. People who read and enjoy Part 10 will be more likely to read the other nine blog posts in the series.

 

#11: Ride The Trendy Waves Of The Internet

Google Trends allows you to see what is trending on the internet. If you can connect a trending topic to your niche, you’ll write a blog post that will get traffic from its value plus additional traffic from riding a trendy wave.

One writer from Mashable rode the wave of Taylor Swift’s 1989 World Tour at just the right time. She wrote a post in June 2015 on the Taylor Swift businesswoman guidebook.

No, Taylor Swift didn’t actually write a businesswoman guidebook and publish it on Amazon. Rather, the writer analyzed Swift and came up with tips that Swift seemed to exemplify. The final result was a blog post filled with business insights and Swifty euphoria that was shared across the internet.

 

In Conclusion

The great thing about content marketing is that no matter how much traffic you get, you can always get more. You can always challenge yourself to do more today than you did yesterday.

Getting more traffic involves writing valuable content and spreading it. Spread your content to more people via search engines, social media, blogs and influencers, and you’ll eventually build an unforgettable blog.

What are your thoughts on these content marketing tactics? Do you have tips to share? Sound off in the comments section below.

5 Tactics That Almost Guarantee Success

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Guaranteed success is a strong prediction; every time people come across the words “guarantee” and “success” together, there’s bound to be some skepticism.

But these five tactics are powerful. The super secret kind of powerful, and I’m about to expose them all. While you may have already heard of some of these tactics, others will be new.

But none of them matter if you don’t take action.

You’d think that something like taking action would be the first tactic. However, we are constantly taking action. Every day, we take a massive amount of action, but our results don’t always match up with our efforts.

Here’s how to make your actions translate into results:

#1: Get Into A Routine

A routine is something you follow without fail every single day (or at least on specific days of the week). Following a routine, or having no routine at all, can singlehandedly make the difference between success and failure.

I recently read The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy, and one of his stories about routine really struck home. Here’s how it went:

Golfer Jack Nicklaus was known for his famous pre-shot routine. During an important Majors tournament, Nicklaus was at the top of his game. A psychologist timed the golfer from the moment he pulled the club out of the bag until the moment he hit the ball.

For each shot from start to finish, the timing of his routine never varied by more than one second.

That same psychologist measured Greg Norman during his collapse in the 1996 Masters. As the game progressed, his pre-shot routine became faster and faster.

If you don’t know what you are doing when you wake up, and right before you go to bed, you’re in trouble. Establishing a routine during the bookends of your day will get you into a rhythm of success. What are you doing each morning and evening? And in what order?

I always read for an hour before I go to bed. Lately, I’ve been responding to emails for 15 minutes before I begin reading. I continue to build backwards to get more activities wrapped into my routine.

People don’t mess up because they give themselves many goals. They mess up because they give themselves many goals without designating which portions of the day they’ll start working on each individual goal.

Without a routine in place, you risk missing out on your biggest goals.

#2: Think About What You Can Do

I am having a great time in college. I’m making new friends, running, and doing new things. I recently started to play pool and found myself playing for several hours on any given day.

While doing homework and showing up to a practice aren’t a problem, I was losing significant time for my business.

One day, I had had enough. I decided that I wouldn’t play any pool for one day. With this mindset, I did get more done (but I still ended up playing some pool).

I was so focused on not playing pool that I didn’t think about what else I could do. So instead of thinking, “I can’t play pool,” I began to think, “I can go to the library for an hour each day.” Then I started going to the library and getting more of my work done.

The moment I shifted from “I can’t do X” to “I can do Y,” making the transition became easier. I still play pool at college, but now I spend at least an hour each day on campus working on my business.

It’s easier to fight off a bad habit if you focus on what you can do instead, rather than simply cutting off the bad habit.

Furthermore, if you think you can’t do something, you are right. Only devote your time and attention towards the goals that you can do. Every battle begins and ends within the mind.

#3: Increase Your Desire

The desire you have for your work is important. If you desire your work, you’ll have no problem putting in the hours. If you don’t desire your work, you’ll want to get through it as soon as possible.

Desire gets you across the finish line. A lack of desire encourages you to find any reason to stop short.

If you want to increase your desire, the simple act of writing your desire to achieve each goal will increase your likelihood of success. If you want to get 100 subscribers each day, write the following:

“I WILL GET 100 SUBSCRIBERS EACH DAY BY THE END OF X.”

The all caps is very important here. Not only that, but giving yourself a reasonable deadline will make you hone in your efforts to meet the deadline.

If you give yourself an unreasonable deadline, you’ll lose motivation when you don’t accomplish your goal. If you give yourself a reasonable, but more challenging, deadline, you’ll make daily progress until you accomplish your goal.

If you want to get back in touch with your niche, simply write, “I LOVE [NICHE NAME]” and you’ll come to believe it. If you write about your desire long enough, that desire will ignite in a powerful way.

#4: Read A Lot Of Books

Reading has had a big impact on my success. Reading the right books about your niche allows you to acquire new knowledge. Once you apply the right knowledge, you’ll get better results in any area you are pursuing.

Each month, I set a target for myself to read 10 books. That adds up to at least 120 books every year, which is far more than what most people read. I won’t go into detail about reading a lot of books because I discussed that in a previous post.

Regardless of what niche you’re in, reading personal development books will work wonders for you. Personal development books help you become the best you imaginable. Some focus on productivity while others focus on relationships, but they all focus on making you perform effectively and efficiently in anything that you do.

#5: Analyze Successful People

There’s always that one cool kid in school who everyone wants to emulate. Becoming cool meant hanging with that cool kid. In a similar way, to become successful, you have to hang out with people who are already successful.

This version of hanging out consists of you reading their content, watching their interviews, and consuming virtually every piece of content they were involved in.

By doing that, you’ll learn a lot about how these individuals became successful. You’ll learn from their habits and expertise. Remember, you’re only as good as the company you keep. If you want to become successful, start following the example of successful people now.

In Conclusion

It’s just as easy to fall short as it is to become successful. There are many people who work just as hard or harder than the world’s greatest innovators.

The difference between these two groups of people is how they devote their time and what goals they pursue and accomplish.

Success requires patience combined with a strong mindset. Once you have that mixture, and live by the five tactics, you’ve already won the battle. At that point, it’s just a matter of time before you inevitably walk into a goldmine.

Which of these tactics resonated with you the most? Have any tips on becoming successful? Sound off in the comments section below.

Episode 19: How To Make Six Figures On Udemy With Joe Parys

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I’ve known Joe Parys for a while, so I was delighted when I learned he agreed to be a guest on my podcast.

Joe and I created two Udemy courses together and have been interacting with each other ever since. I’ve viewed him as a mentor on Udemy and I’ve asked him questions throughout my journey on that platform.

For anyone curious (and eager to get a big discount), these are the two courses we created together

 

 

 

Now I have him on my podcast to discuss how he made a six figure income on Udemy in 2016. While this alone is impressive, the cool part is how he achieved this goal.

On January 1, 2016, Joe declared his goal to make six figures selling his courses by the end of the year. Before that, he barely made $10,000 from his courses and had no idea how he would make six figures.

We talk about how he made his big transformation in this episode just in time for the excitement of a New Year. People set New Year’s resolutions all of the time. Joe talks about how to accomplish them even if you don’t know what you’re doing quite yet.

But Joe has some other insights up his sleeve in this episode. We talk about some of the tactics he used to get more sales for his courses and expand his Udemy student base.

At the end of 2016, Joe was rapidly approaching 200,000 students throughout his courses. That’s not bad for someone who only had 22,000 students just 366 days ago (2016 was a Leap Year. Remember that? I didn’t).

 

Key Links From The Show:

joeparys.com – Joe’s official website.

udemy.com – The site Joe publishes his training courses on

udemy.com/user/josephparys – Joe’s Udemy profile

 

Learn

– How to optimize your descriptions to boost sales

– How to increase student engagement in your online courses

– The pros and cons of using a site like Udemy VS hosting your courses

– How to accomplish your New Year’s resolutions (for real)

 

Subscribe to the Breakthrough Success Podcast on iTunes and Stitcher. If you genuinely enjoyed this episode, I would love it if you could leave a quick review for Breakthrough Success on iTunes, Stitcher, or both.

5 Pitfalls To Avoid When Accepting Guest Blog Posts

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Featuring guest posts on your blog can provide you with fresh content, SEO growth, and blog traffic. The challenge is finding quality contributors whose content your audience will love, and understanding which submissions may not be right for your blog. These are the top five pitfalls to avoid:

 

#1: Accepting Every Guest Post

If you accept every guest submission that comes your way, you’ll compromise the quality of your blog. While it’s flattering to be pitched, and tempting to add fresh content, not every submission will work for your blog; accepting them all can dilute the value of your content and confuse your readers.

That means you’ll have to pass on some contributions. To feel less bad about turning someone down, I suggest submitting some of your own guest posts. Like me, you will likely be denied by at least some of the people you pitch. But if you submit valuable content often, some of the prominent blogs within your niche will accept your guest blog posts.

 

#2: Avoid Over Promotional Bloggers

Let’s be real about guest blogging: people often write guest posts with the intent of getting more traffic, building credibility, and including a backlink. And I don’t mind that as long as someone is providing my readers with valuable content.

But I do mind content that is overly self-promotional. There aren’t any specific warning signs, so you’ll have to make assessments on a case-by-case basis. It’s important that the post provides value, and that any attempts at promotion are subtle and relevant to the topic, seamlessly woven into the overall content.

 

#3: Not Owning The Content

Guest posts should be original and not seen anywhere else on the web. You may face a SEO penalty for publishing content that exists elsewhere on the internet, which will compromise your efforts.

Guest blogging benefit the blogger as well as the blog owner (but only when the owner is the exclusive provider of that content). No matter how great the content, always deny contributions that may have been published anywhere on the web. To be considered, all submissions must be fresh and original.

 

#4: Content Mismatch

I recently received a guest blog post submission that I was eager to approve (I was making Mistake #1 and approving everything I got). However, I felt a little uneasy about the submission and sent it to my editor. She told me the post was not the right fit because the content was outside of my specific niche.

Why would a Twitter-related blog accept a guest blog post about Facebook? While it’s true that both Twitter and Facebook are social networks, dedicated blogs focus solely on content related to one or the other, not both.

If you find yourself looking for ways to make certain content work so that you can publish it on your blog, it’s probably a content mismatch. Contacting relevant contributors is a much better use of your time than trying to rework a mismatch.

 

#5: A Weak Submission Form

A weak submission form will make it significantly more difficult to receive quality contributions. Don’t expect bloggers to guess which content is most appropriate for your blog. Smart bloggers will spend time reading your past content, but a bad form makes everyone’s job more difficult.

Be sure to provide guidelines, examples and ideas before encouraging submissions. Here are the requirements for guest blog posts on my own submission form:

  • Your guest post must be at least 1,500 words. The more words, the better, but don’t sacrifice value.
  • Link to three of my blog posts.
  • Include at least three images.
  • You have the option to promote one of your blog posts, but not landing pages. You CAN promote your landing page in your bio.
  • All content must be original and not published anywhere else.

Since I don’t always link to three of my blog posts or include three images, I can’t expect a guest blogger to do the same without asking.

I also mention something about the benefits of writing for my blog such as exposure and credibility. These benefits give guest bloggers more reasons to want to contribute to my blog.

 

What’s Left?

The only thing left for you to do is encourage guest bloggers to write content for your blog. As your blog gets more traffic, more guest bloggers will submit their content through your form. But in the beginning, you’ll have to do most of the legwork.

You’ll have to advocate for your blog and entice guest bloggers to contribute. But finding guest bloggers is actually easier than you think. All you have to do is find a prominent blog in your niche that accepts guest posts. Then start contacting past contributors one by one.

These guest bloggers prequalify themselves since they’ve already written for a prominent blog within your niche. If you can present the guest bloggers with benefits that justify the effort, they’ll write content for your blog.

I like to contact at least three potential bloggers per day. As I get more guest bloggers to contribute to my blog, I’ll hire a freelancer to conduct outreach. Some of the most successful blogs hire freelancers for contributor outreach.

When I wrote a guest post for Crazy Egg, Neil Patel didn’t reach out to me, and I didn’t submit my post through a form. An individual from Crazy Egg’s outreach team contacted me and invited me to write the guest post. A few weeks later, my guest post showed up on Crazy Egg.

This individual reached out to me through Twitter (which was a smart move since I’m more active on Twitter than any other social network). You can reach out to potential contributors through email or social media. While I personally prefer email, social media conversations have made some of my contributions — and podcast interviews for that matter — possible.

Never rule out a method that works.

 

In Conclusion

Accepting guest posts for your blog is exciting and adds value. You finally get to learn from your own blog, and your content will reach more people.

But you want to make sure your guest blog posts are valuable. If you say yes to every submission without thinking about your audience, you risk sacrificing your blog’s value or creating a content mismatch that confuses your readers.

What are your thoughts on accepting guest blog posts? Are you a guest blogger? Have any questions for me? Sound off in the comments section below. I’ll read them 🙂

100 Lessons I Learned In 2016

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You and I are heading towards 2017, and the best time to prepare for an awesome year is right now. I dove through dozens of books, hundreds of videos and thousands of blog posts in 2016, and this is what I’ve learned:

#1: Massive action is the most natural state of action.

#2: Structuring each day of the week gives you more control over what you do.

#3: Sometimes opportunities come to you when you stop obsessing over them.

#4: As you don’t give up on yourself, you’ll be fine even if the world gives up on you.

#5: Every minute you spend self-criticizing is another minute that you can’t get closer to your dreams. Life is too short for self-criticism.

#6: Your story plays a big impact in how people view you, how many products you sell, and the power of word of mouth marketing for your brand.

#7: Before you grow your email list, you need to create a system for generating revenue for that email list so your other efforts aren’t in vain.

#8: Do anything you can to move forward each day.

#9: The less resistance there is between you and your work, the more you will accomplish.

#10: All pleasures are temporary. The impact you have on others is permanent.

#11: If you aren’t using Instagram then you are really missing out.

#12: If you ever get written up on a website like The Huffington Post, and you want to be a contributor, ask the person who mentioned you in the article to introduce you to the editor.

#13: If you are remarkable, the opportunities will come knocking on your door instead of the other way around.

#14: You need an arsenal of products and an emailing plan that ties them all together to get more sales from your email list.

#15: Reading 10+ books every year is doable if you do a little reading each day. If you read 30 pages per day, you end up reading 900 pages each month. Combine that with audiobooks and you’ll read more than 10 books per month in no time.

#16: It doesn’t matter how many books you read. While more is usually better, what matters is implementing what you learned from those books.

#17: Having hundreds of millions of users doesn’t make you safe. I never expected Twitter to shut down Vine, and I never expected the people at Blab to shut down their service (although Blab is concentrating its efforts to come out with a better Blab 2.0).

#18: We make decisions about people before a word is said. Within most lengthy interviews, the decision is made within five minutes and the rest of the interview is verification of that decision.

#19: We don’t like being told we are wrong. Don’t tell people they are wrong. Craft a different story that resonates with the audience without telling them they are wrong.

#20: It’s better to share a message in one sentence than it is to share the same message in two sentences. Value your readers’ time.

#21: There are so many times during which you can acquire more knowledge such as during a drive, while doing your grocery store shopping, while waiting on the train, and a long ride to your vacation destination. Audiobooks and podcast episodes make learning much easier.

#22: When reading a book, rush through it and underline the important stuff. Most of the books can be condensed into 20 pages. You want to get the important insights out of each book you read, not the same stuff you’ve been reading in all of the other books. If you commit to reading 10+ books each month about your niche, some things will sound familiar within the future books you read.

#23: The moment you stop giving yourself goals for the day and week is the moment your motivation will start to wane. If you don’t give yourself goals for the day, you’ll feel lost for some of it.

#24: Launching a podcast is a great way to connect with other influencers in your niche.

#25: Don’t be afraid to ask anyone for a favor that benefits both of you. If you told me in January that I would have interviewed Seth Godin, Neil Patel, and many others by the end of the year, I would have thought you were crazy.

#26: Going back to the other lesson, I would have given you a stranger look for telling me that I would start a podcast in the first place.  I denied myself the chance for two years. Then, before I could think about what was happening, I sent emails to influencers as if I already had a podcast. Once some of these influencers wanted me to interview them, I was committed.

#27: The more freelancers you hire, the more motivated you will be to make more revenue.

#28: Get into other people’s networks because you never know what opportunities await you.

#29: Face-to-face is still the best way to communicate with people.

#30: To produce the same effect online, you need to communicate with that person for a few months. While it takes a few months to produce the same effect of a face-to-face conversation, it is possible to create that level of connection on the web.

#31: Never stop learning new things.

#32: Don’t repeat the same things if they aren’t helping you to move forward.

#33: Twitter automated DMs work for acquiring more leads. Some people will get annoyed, but others will click through and become subscribers.

#34: If you are the smartest person in the room, you need to be in a different room.

#35: Always overestimate the amount of effort you need to apply to accomplish any given goal.

#36: If you keep producing content without investing a heavy amount of time towards marketing that content, you will be the world’s greatest secret.

#37: The social media landscape is very different from when I first started. I wish Twitter could go back to its prime sooner, but if I were starting today, I’d still start with Twitter. It’s been easier for me to meet remarkable people on Twitter than any other social network.

#38: Instagram is a close second though.

#39: Do one new thing every day.

#40: For each minute you spend doing something, you lose 60 seconds that could have went to something else. Use your time wisely.

#41: Market conditions won’t improve until you change the way you think.

#42: Taking action is a natural response to having passion for your work.

#43: Do multiple podcasts once the first podcast performs well.

#44: Advertisers must never be your primary source of income.

#45: Blogging doesn’t make you stand out anymore. Blogger is the crowd. For every 2,000 bloggers there is one podcaster.

#46: Create content calendars so you know exactly what you will produce each day of any given month of the year.

#47: The last slide in a presentation is critical. That’s when you promote yourself.

#48: If you are looking for a new shirt, you can custom make a shirt on Zazzle that features your SnapChat QR Code. That way, people can take a picture of your shirt and then automatically follow you on SnapChat.

#49: Growth hacking is as simple as changing your mindset.

#50: In a world dominated by Siri, Cortana, and other built-in virtual assistants, having an FAQ page is more important than ever since people ask those virtual assistants QUESTIONS about their niche.

#51: Retention is more important than acquisition.

#52: If you want to be a blogger with 100K visitors per month, hang out with the bloggers who get 100K visitors per month.

#53: Analyze the entire lifecycle of your customers and optimize each phase of that lifecycle.

#54: It helps to know the event organizer if you want to land the speaking gig.

#55: Info overload costs 25% of our time.

#56: Your brain needs energy but energy is not infinite. While I always understood the brain’s impact on the body, hearing it described in that manner made me realize my need to acquire more energy.

#57: Like eager puppies, new emails beg for attention. I always knew that new emails grabbed our attention, but this was a metaphor that had to make the list. I came across the metaphor in Ned Hallowell’s book Driven To Distraction At Work.

#58: Most of us pay continuous partial attention. Focus is the hidden driver of excellence.

#59: Viewing problems as games (or for my generation, video games) makes it easier for you to solve those problems. Part of my success was when I drew the connection between building a business and playing video games.

#60: You get better by dwelling in your success, so stop focusing on what went wrong.

#61: Happiness is wanting what you have.

#62: Challenge your brain to do different things. For instance, I recently started writing with my left hand. Now I’m decent and getting a little better.

#63: Reading helps you sleep faster. Guess when I start reading.

#64: It is in giving that we receive. People feel better about themselves when they donate money than when they make money.

#65: Write down 10 ideas every day.

#66: When David Letterman was still hosting The Late Show, the room’s temperature was strategically lowered to 55 degrees Fahrenheit. At this temperature, Letterman’s voice sounded more crisp and the audience was more attentive. That’s knowing your environment!

#67: If we don’t create and control the environment, we are control by the environment we dwell in.

#68: It is important to adjust your leadership based on your followers’ readiness.

#69: If you want to say certain things at a meeting or behave at a certain way, carry an index card with you that tells you what to do during the situation.

#70: Ask yourself active questions (not passive questions) every day (i.e. Did I do my best). These questions need to reinforce your commitment.

#71: Ask yourself “Am I getting better” multiple times each day.

#72: We become more fatigued as we are forced to make more decisions.

#73: Marginal motivation produces marginal results.

#74: If you change your behavior, you change the behavior of the people around you.

#75: For SEO, you must do the greatest amount of work and initially anticipate the least return.

#76: The best way to create a successful blog or website is to focus on the user experience.

#77: Think about the buying process and use that knowledge to write blog posts adding value based on specific stages of the buying process.

#78: Write a guest post on an authority site that links back to one of your blog posts. Then, repeatedly link to that guest post in your other writing to increase the link juice of that guest post. It’s easier to rank guest posts on authority sites high, and by doing so, the blog post you linked within the guest post will get a lot of traffic.

#79: Bullet points are easy for us to read. Use them more often.

#80: If you want to like someone, play a mental trick on yourself and think of that person as a long lost friend from 20 years ago. It works…even for an 18-year-old.

#81: Your eyes are grenades that have the power to detonate people’s emotions. Profound eye contact signals trust. I wish I could take credit for the prior description of eyes, but that goes to Leil Lowndes who wrote How To Talk To Anyone.

#82: Posture is associated with success. Practice good posture each time you walk through a door to turn it into a habit.

#83: People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

#84: Work ethic isn’t just a duty. It’s also spiritual.

#85: If you write notes but forget to write how you will take action based on those notes, you are taking notes wrong.

#86: Launch stacking makes each launch better than the last.

#87: To get more revenue, you can increase the number of your customers, increase the amount of revenue per transaction, and increase the quality of transactions.

#88: Focus on increasing your opt-in rate instead of whether you’re slightly below or above average. Getting slightly above average only makes you slightly better than everyone else. With the slightly better mindset, it is IMPOSSIBLE to dominate your niche in any way, shape, or form. The only person you should ever compete with is you.

#89: The data you obtain from a survey to your audience will help you create a high demand lead magnet.

#90: Email swaps (cross promotion to respective email lists) are a great way to get hundreds of new subscribers in a single day. Just make sure you only conduct email swaps with people in your niche.

#91: If your emails don’t look good on an iPhone (or any smartphone), you are missing out on a big chunk of traffic from your email list.

#92: Create two different versions of the same autoresponder. Split test virtually every part of your business to see what converts better.

#93: Offering a bonus related to an affiliate product you are promoting will result in more affiliate sales.

#94: 64% of people will open your email based on the subject line.

#95: AIDA = Attention, Interest, Desire (emotion), and Action.

#96: Some companies give their employees the same type of email address. If you can detect which pattern is used, you can contact anyone on the list. For instance, several high schools use the model of the last name followed by the first initial of the first name. If Joe Schmo went to Schmoville High School, the email address would be schmoj@schmovillehighschool.com. With this pattern detected, you know someone’s email address just by knowing the person’s name. Well-known magazines like Inc, Huffington Post, and many other magazines and brands follow a rule of this nature when assigning email addresses to employees.

#97: Instagram’s API rules make schedule pictures annoying, but it’s worth the effort. I schedule my Instagram pictures for a certain time and date. HootSuite then notifies me on my iPhone letting me know that now is the time to manually post the picture. Then I do so.

#98: Life is always better with an optimistic worldview than with a pessimistic worldview.

#99: Some would say the way I got into The Huffington Post and Success Magazine was pure luck (people contacted me out of the blue about both opportunities). That “pure luck” was seven years of work (more than a third of my life) leading up to those respective moments.

#100: Reflecting on the lessons you learned is a great way to remember them in the first place.

Drops mic until 2017

This is my final blog post of 2016. I’ll come back to this blog post on occasion in 2017, so this has been for both of us. I appreciate you being a part of my journey in 2016, and I look forward to serving you in 2017 as well.

What have you learned in 2016? Did any of the lessons on this list strike a chord with you?

December 2016 Performance Report

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December is always an exciting month for me. It’s one where I feel the holiday spirit, plan out for 2017, and sprint to the finish line of 2016. I also got interviewed in December, and I think you’ll be interested in what I said about digital marketing. With that said, here are some of December’s highlights:

 

Udemy Power

I initially had a slow start on Udemy, but since my middle of the month promotions, I’ve exceeded 37,000 students.

I’ve also added two courses to my arsenal giving me a total of 23 courses.

Write 1 Book In Under 6 Hours–the retail price is $40 but I lowered the price to $10 for the purposes of this Performance Report.

How To Accomplish Any Stretch Goal–this course is free for everyone.

While it seems like the end of the year has struck, I can very easily publish two additional courses (both free) by the end of the year. One would be about getting more blog traffic while the other would be a free Twitter course. I’ve done all of the blog traffic videos and am just about done with the Twitter course videos.

One of my New Year’s resolutions is to surpass 150,000 Udemy students by the end of 2017. At this rate, I need to gain at least 300 students per day. I’ll reach this milestone by creating more free courses.

I’m aiming for 40 courses on my Udemy profile before April 1st.

 

TSMD

I am NEARLY done with the Total Social Media Domination membership site. I’ve created the Facebook Group, added dozens of videos, and am working on the final stages.

I don’t have much to say about it now. The suspense continues 🙂

 

90% Of My Christmas List Consisted Of Books

I got many books this Christmas, and it’s my intention to read them all before the next Christmas. I enjoy reading books because they keep my mind sharp on matters relating to my niche.

Learning new things every day also makes it easier for me to come up with blog post ideas and video ideas. Since one of my goals is to come out with one YouTube video EVERY DAY for the entire year, I need as many ideas as I can possibly get.

In total, I got 21 books and I’ve already read a few of them (more on that later).

 

New Year’s Resolutions

I have mentioned two of my New Year’s resolutions so far. The rest of those resolutions are all included in this video.

Getting more blog traffic has been a recurring goal. With that in mind, I committed to getting 100,000 monthly blog visitors by the end of 2017. I made this goal public in a video that I can’t take off the web now. It’s too late to back out.

 

My Commitment To My Readers

At the end of 2016, my blog surpassed 700,000 lifetime views. Based on my goal to surpass 100,000 monthly visitors, I realize that, in 2017, my blog will surpass 1 million lifetime views.

To think I started this blog about five years ago…

As I thought about the milestone, I remembered that YOU are one of the many people who will make this milestone possible. To share my thanks, I am committed to providing a new experience on my blog.

I got comfortable with only publishing 1 blog post every week. While those blog posts were valuable, I know as a fact that publish 1 blog post every week isn’t enough. I will gradually increase the number of new blog posts until AT LEAST 1 blog posts gets published on this blog every day!

Here are some ways I plan on publishing 1 new blog post on this blog every day:

 

Accepting more guest posts: I like to learn from my blog too. In 2016, I publish two guest posts on this blog. While that may not sound like many guest posts, I started offering this option late into the year.

 

Do a better job with the podcast integration: Right now, my podcast tab leads people to a very basic webpage. In the upcoming weeks, that same tab will lead people to podcast interviews that you can find on this blog. The podcast interviews and the blog posts will now have the same home on the web.

UPDATE: I just got the podcast integration working yesterday with the PowerPress plugin. Huge hat-tip to Tom Corson-Knowles who I mention again in this performance report.

 

Write an extra blog post myself. I’m getting much better at writing a large quantity of quality, lengthy blog posts. My greatest fear of writing 1 blog post per day was sacrificing value, but I don’t have to do that since I’ll have help.

I am very excited about providing you with more content in 2017…and that doesn’t even include me publishing 1 new YouTube video every day. You can rest assured that some of those videos will end up on my blog.

 

My New Productivity Format

My productivity workflow is never set in stone. For about two years, I engaged in the weekly scorecard. With this weekly scorecard, I tallied my way to accomplishing a goal and used a checkmark to indicate I accomplished the goal.

My new weekly scorecard is more advanced.

Instead of giving myself weekly goals, I give myself daily minimums. Here’s how a daily minimum and a weekly goal differ:

Weekly Goal: Create 35 videos

Daily Goal: Create AT LEAST 5 videos

The weekly goal results in 35 videos that I can do at any moment I desire. If I really wanted to, I could do all 35 videos in two days. It would be stressful, and missing one of those days would spell “Game Over” for that goal.

The daily minimum makes video creation a habit. This form of goal setting made me feel more comfortable with creating videos. On some days, I find myself doing over a dozen videos in one sitting.

At the end of the week, I’ve created AT LEAST 35 videos. On some weeks, I create exactly 35 videos. On other days, I create over 45 videos. If I feel up to the task, I have no problem with creating additional videos.

The weekly goal structure got me focused, but I limited myself to 35 videos. With the new daily minimums, I can create as many videos as I please as long as I create at least 35 videos.

 

Books I Read

This portion of my performance report should get broken down into two sections: books I read before Christmas and books I read after Christmas. This month was my first semester of college finals so I didn’t do much reading before the break.

I only managed to listen to Find Your Extraordinary by Jessica Dilullo Herrin. While I don’t like only reading one book in one month, I’m happy I digitally picked this book up.

And the books after Christmas? Oh, I’m glad you asked. These are the books that I read from Christmas Day to the time I published this performance report.

The Kindle Publishing Bible by Tom Corson-Knowles

Secrets Of The Six-Figure Author by Tom Corson-Knowles

Email Marketing Mastery by Tom Corson-Knowles

What To Do When It’s Your Turn by Seth Godin

Content Machine by Dan Norris

There was one day in which I read two books. That made me feel great considering I had been slacking for the entire month. It’s also worth noting that I am also in the middle of reading The Success System That Never Fails by W. Clement Stone.

 

Blog Posts I Wrote

5 Social Media Lessons Pool Taught Me

23 Lessons I Learned From My Podcast In 2016

How I Went From Zero Books To Reading 10 Books Every Month

I’m honestly not very impressed with the quantity of blog posts. I know that each of them are valuable, but I want to provide more content for readers like you. I address this issue later in my performance report.

 

Podcast Episodes I Published

A glitch from UpWork combined with an inefficient workflow only resulted in two episodes this month. This is the last month that I will forget to do a weekly episode.

Episode 17: How To Host A Successful Event With Ramon Ray

Episode 18: How To Get Customers To Eagerly Buy Your Books With Tom Corson-Knowles

Both of those interviews are jam-packed with value. In terms of my workflow, I would do the interview, send it to my audio editor, and do the outro a few days later. The problem is that this would cut too close to the episode publication date.

I literally saved my outros for the last minute, and that didn’t go well since my audio editor was given very little time.

Now I do the outros immediately after I finish every interview. It saves me from frustration and the inability to serve my audience with my podcast.

 

January Goals

For most of my performance reports, the goals for the next month were rarely connected. The great part about coming out with a New Year’s resolutions video is that I am now very clear with what I need to do from now until the end of 2017. With that said, these are my goals for January:

 

#1: Surpass 1,000 Blog Visitors In 1 Day

I have achieved this milestone before, but I honestly don’t remember the last time I achieved it. To enlighten my memory, I’ve decided that I will accomplish that goal in January 2017.

My email list will be a critical factor that allows me to surpass 1,000 blog visitors in 1 day.

 

#2: Get My 1st TSMD Sale

I’m virtually ready to launch TSMD, and I’m getting its first sale this month. I will promote TSMD through Facebook advertising. Since TSMD is a $47/mo membership site, I expect to have a strong ROI from the Facebook ad I run.

 

#3: Have Videos Scheduled Past March

I currently have videos scheduled through January, but I want to strengthen my buffer. Creating videos isn’t a problem for me anymore. With a minimum goal of five videos per day, I’ll create 150 videos this month. That gives me at least 90 videos that I can dedicate to training courses and TSMD.

To achieve my other video related goals, I envision myself doing well over 10 videos on some days.

 

#4: Get 20 Guest Posts In The Queue

Every day, for the rest of the month, I will contact at least four people and invite them to write content for my blog. Getting guest contributors will allow me to learn from my blog and provide you with a better experience.

By following this plan, I’ll contact at least 124 guest bloggers by the end of the month.

If 16.2% of the guest bloggers I contact submit a quality guest post, then I have achieved my goal. This small approval percentage is the fuel behind my goal.

If I only contacted 20 guest bloggers in January, I’d have to hope that all 20 of those guest bloggers submitted quality guest posts. The margin for success is very small. Contacting 124 guest bloggers in January greatly expands my margin for success. The bigger my margin for success is, the better.

The cool thing is that as I get more guest posts on my blog, more people will submit their guest posts. Eventually, at least four people will submit their guest posts each day. That will be very cool.

 

#5: Publish At Least 16 Blog Posts

This is a big step for me. I’m slowly getting back to publishing 1 blog post per day. In one month, I will go from publishing 4 blog posts per month to publishing 4 blog posts per week.

I’ve made bigger leaps before 🙂

But enough blabbering. Here’s how I’ll publish at least 16 blog posts this month:

 

1: I write and publish two blog posts every week. These are the blog posts that you are accustomed to reading on my blog.

 

2: I complete the podcast integration. I publish new episodes on my podcast every Wednesday. So far, all podcast episodes exist on a separate entity. I will bring them to this blog to provide a new method of consuming content — audio. Previously I’ve only offered written content and videos.

UPDATE: I literally just figured this out. I apologize for an update on the same topic, but now I can focus on the artwork for each episode and using pictures to highlight the guests better.

 

3: Publish one guest post each week. I currently have no guest posts in the queue. If you know someone or would like to contribute following these guidelines, I’d love to have your guest post. I do have several guest bloggers who are interested in writing content for my blog, so I need at least four of them to give me quality posts by the end of January. If I get more guest posts, then I simply publish more content.

And that doesn’t include the fact that I’ll be publishing 1 YouTube video every day of the year.

 

#6: Create My 32nd Udemy Course

As of writing, I currently have published 23 Udemy courses. By the time you read this, chances are I’ve published a few others. While the New Year is rapidly approaching, I’m squeezing out as many valuable courses on Udemy as possible before 2016 comes to a close.

My goal for the end of 2017 is to have at least 50 Udemy courses. Publishing my 32nd course at the end of January means I only have to complete 18 courses to reach my minimum goal. 18 Udemy courses in 11 months is very doable for me…especially when summer rolls along.

Also, I’m still in the middle of my winter break. I will capitalize on the extra time to make this goal a reality.

 

#7: Surpass 50,000 Udemy Students

Between now and the end of January, I will have added nine courses to my arsenal. Those nine courses will be pivotal for me to surpass 50,000 Udemy students in January 2017.

Accomplishing this goal is dependent on my creating the additional courses. I know how to promote them. It’s just a matter of having new training courses to promote.

 

#8: Read 10 Books

I got a lot of books during Christmas. Now I have to read through them. I am currently researching to discover which method of speed reading will allow me to achieve the best results without blurring my vision.

I am excited to go through them. I’ll set a time at night to read through books. That way, it’s easier for me to fall asleep afterwards.

 

#9: Reassess How I Use Twitter

I believe a few small tweaks to my Twitter strategy will double my traffic and save me money and/or time. Here’s are some of the things I’ll reassess in January:

Outsourcing Costs—I think I could find five minutes in my day to do the bulk file uploads. If adding an extra task on my plate makes me go crazy, I’ll outsource it. I can also take on more work for my Twitter strategy and outsource more tasks in exchange.

The Tweets—I need to share more of my new content more often. Expect more tweets about my podcast episodes too! I might even tweet once every five minutes. I’m back to experimenting with new tactics. I also need to get better at including pictures within my tweets.

 

In Conclusion

This performance report is my last performance report of 2016. I wrote this performance report with my New Year’s resolutions in mind. I don’t fully know how to accomplish about half of them, but I’ll figure them out as I go.

Each performance report in 2017 will focus on my resolutions. All of my goals excite me, but the most exciting thing will be revamping this blog with new content at a more frequent rate.

Now that I think of it, a weekly Q&A blog post doesn’t seem outside the realm of possibility. 2017 is going to be a great year in my journey, and I hope you’ll stick with me to see its completion.

What were your thoughts on this performance report? Have any tips on accomplishing New Year’s resolutions? What are your goals for 2017? Sound off in the comments section below.