Category Archives: Neil Asher

where are the ecommerce entrepreneurs yachts?

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I’m sat at my local starbucks just reading my emails, and guess what

Another day another fake gooroo emailing me their pitch about some peace of crap that just needs you to “push a button” to become an online gazillionaire

Yawn

You get that too?

Bet you’re sick of it too right?

Listen I know a lot of these guys (they’re mostly guys as gals are under represented online imo) and guess what… they’re broke!

They live promotion to promotion.

They have no idea how to build a real business

Something that is useful and will still be around 10 years from now

That’s why I love selling things on Amazon

You can buy them cheaply in the East

And make a healthy profit when you sell in the West

It’s a time tested strategy that’s been around since the East india Company

Heck Cook was looking for new products to sell when he bumped into Australia!

Best of all it works

In the most recent shareholders letter Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos said

“130,000 people make over $100K a year on Amazon”

Read that again….

This is a tried and tested business that works.

Amazon is slowly taking over the world and you’d be crazy not to jump on its coat tails.

That’s a trend you should ride harder than a kid with a new bike

Wanna learn how to do that?

I’ve got your back

Join 246 other Australians (and a few poms 😉 whilst we build our own Amazon businesses

http://roarlocal.com.au/aussie-online-entrepreneurs/

You’ll learn everything you need to know and meet a supportive encouraging group of new friends 🙂

You can learn more by clicking the link below

Nei

Born Before 1976?

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If you were I have good news for you

You’re the No 1 demographic that shops on Amazon

76% of us do 🙂

What does that mean?

Well most folks just think it’s hipster millennial’s and Gen Y that shop online in any number

But that’s just not true

Fact is if you’re over 40 you already know what people our age want to buy

Look at your own buying habits

What do you like to buy?

What are you interested in?

From taxidermy to crochet, ketogenic diets to longevity and pretty much anything else you can imagine!

You can start a business selling on Amazon in whatever it is you’re interested in!

Got an idea for a product you’d like to build a business around?

Perfect!

Need some help bringing it to market so you can make some extra cashola?

Then I’m you’re man

So far I’m helping 246 Australian’s just like you (we let a few foreigners in just to keep the numbers up 😉 to build an online business that will set them free

So far we sell everything from beard oil to Egyptian cotton blankets!

Why not join us 🙂

Learn more here
http://roarlocal.com.au/aussie-online-entrepreneurs/

Neil

Making Money Math For Dummies

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I am fortunate to currently be one of the top affiliates in the world online, but it wasn’t always this way… for years I struggled and lost a fortune.

Literally.

Then 1 day whilst reading a book on venture capital ( this one if you’re interested – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enterprise-and-Venture-Capital-ebook/dp/B0051SIUOE ) I saw something that changed everything.

Allow me to demonstrate with a simple guide.

Lets suppose I’m selling a bucket and spade.

The bucket and spade costs – £100

The gross profit margin is 50% so for every bucket and spade I sell I make £50 gross profit

Simple so far.

OK so now how much money can I spend to sell my bucket and spade?

If you answered £49.99 go to the head of the class!

nb if you are selling things on the back end and you know your numbers often times you can do things MUCH differently. simply substitute life time value for bucket and spade.

OK now lets go to our marketing startegy.

Lets suppose we have 3 different strategies:

1. Google Adwords

2. Facebook PPC

3. LinkedIn

(3 is a terrible number, better to have 10 but 3 is simple to follow right now)

Now remember that I can spend up to £49.99 to acquire a customer and still make a profit.

So, just to emphasise, my aim now is to acquire as many customers as possible within my target range <£49.99

On Google I can acquire customers using keywords, suppose I have 100 keywords I bid on;

– buy bucket and spades

– bucket and spade reviews

– things to take to the beach

Now each of those keywords has a different type of person doing the searching.

– buy bucket and spades (this person is ready to buy right now)

– bucket and spade reviews (this person is doing research)

– things to take to the beach (this person is looking for ideas)

So it makes sense that each keyword will convert differently, someone who wants to buy a bucket and spade is going to be much easier to sell a bucket and spade too than someone looking for ideas.

Making sense so far?

So each of those keywords will have a different customer acquisition cost associated to it.

– buy bucket and spades – costs me £5 to make a sale (the number of clicks I get on my advert x the cost per click x the conversion rate)

– bucket and spade reviews – costs me £25 to make a sale

– things to take to the beach – costs me £49 to make a sale

Based on how many people search for my keyword, then click on my ad then buy the product. So the cumulative total marketing spend (customer acquisition cost) increases or decreases based on the search intent of the keyword.

Read that again.

The cumulative total marketing spend (customer acquisition cost) increases or decreases based on the search intent of the keyword.

Now that’s Google, but, facebook and linkedIn are also the same, each ad network (google, bing, facebook, linkedIn etc) has a different customer acquisiation cost profile to it.

So Facebook’s range may be as cheap as £10 up to £50 for me to buy a customer.

So is it smart for me to focus on what it costs me to get someone to click on my ad?

No.

It’s smart for me to know my numbers, establish how much I can spend up to to buy a customer then do everything I can to buy as many customers as I can.

Some customers are cheap, some are expensive (relativly) BUT as long as they make money I don’t care.

Some keywords are cheap some are expensive. It’s all irrelevant. What matters is does it make a profit.

This little insight has helped me become one of the highest earning affiliates in the world, it’s helped me launch numerous businesses and is now helping my clients who engage me to do their digital marketing for them.

Try it in your business, you’ll be streaks ahead of your competition when you do.

Neil

Why the wrong banner ad will kill your business

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I buy a LOT of display advertising and so I’m always fascinated to know what gets clicked when it comes to images.
Well thanks to eye tracking software we now know.
It’s not what you think…..
eyetrack

How men look at an H&M ad

Men spend more time looking at the woman, while women read the rest of the ad.

Men spend more time looking at the woman, while women read the rest of the ad.

Notice how the men are not looking at the shoes at all.

Notice how the men are not looking at the shoes at all.

These Sunsilk ads show that just putting a pretty face on a copy isn’t enough. It matters where she’s looking.

These Sunsilk ads show that just putting a pretty face on a copy isn't enough. It matters where she's looking.

This is called “banner blindness,” and shows why publishers and advertisers hate banner ads. People barely even look at them.

This is called "banner blindness," and shows why publishers and advertisers hate banner ads. People barely even look at them.

 

On Google, the top five listings on the page get the majority of eyeballs. The red lines are the “fold” — the point at which you’d have to scroll down.

Yes how often do you here guru’s (AKA people who have never actually run ads online) say aim for position 4….

On Google, the top five listings on the page get the majority of eyeballs. The red lines are the "fold" — the point at which you'd have to scroll down.

 

As you’d probably guess, more eyes are reading the pictures and headlines on this Ad Age page than anything else.

As you'd probably guess, more eyes are reading the pictures and headlines on this Ad Age page than anything else.

Notice how nobody’s looking at Wolf Blitzer, but at rather the center of the frame.

Notice how nobody's looking at Wolf Blitzer, but at rather the center of the frame.

Could we have a heat map post without Facebook? Photos catch the most eyes

Think about what this means for ads on FB…. use a REAL person!

Could we have a heat map post without Facebook? Photos catch the most eyes

Men focus on baseball players’ torso more than women, who look only at the face

Men focus on baseball players' torso more than women, who look only at the face

Even though there’s a large picture of a man’s face on this billboard, more people were looking at the words on the left.

Even though there's a large picture of a man's face on this billboard, more people were looking at the words on the left.

 

Women tend to focus on the face and the torso…

Women tend to focus on the face and the torso...

 

While men (disconcertingly) focus more on the junk than women…

While men focus more on the junk than women...

 

So what did you think?
It sure does add a whole new dimension to running banner ads don’t you think? Now to find some pictures of guys with big willy’s to advertise those biz op offers too 😉
Neil

want to see my dads website?

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It’s not very often I build websites anymore,
time is much better utilised working on selling
than creating but when my dad asked me to
re do his website I wanted to look after it personally.

So naturally I’ve utilised all the best SEO, PPC marketing
and mobile strategies to make sure his site kills it.

It’s my dad after all 🙂

Anyway I video’d the whole process from start to finish
including the secret SEO stuff I never talk about (some
strategies are for me only 😉

BUT

If you look hard you’ll see them (hint social media likes)

Anyway

If you want to take a look you can see it below

Before you go look.

If you have a website and want to get some link juice
e-mail me and I’ll put your link on one of my sites
in return you’ll put a link on your site.

Fair enough?

OK here’s the site:

drains unblocked derby

See if you can spot the SEO and Mobile strategies

after all you can be sure I did EVERYTHING I can
for my dad 🙂

Neil

P.S If you want to link swap let me know 🙂

be warned

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Let me outline a situation for you quickly:

Hypothetically, you’re a public company that lives and dies on it’s share price.

For years you’ve been the only supplier of your product.

You’ve made billions!

The shareholders are happy :o)

Then along comes a new upstart company.

They grow twice as fast as you did.

They’re smarter than you and they know it.

They’re stealing your business, your share price falters and the investors want ACTION!

So you go looking for ways to grow your revenue, but there is only a finite universe of people who want your product, it’s not like you can manufacture customers.

So you’re options are to:

1. Sell more to your existing customers

2. Take more from your existing customers

What do you do?

If you’re smart you’ll do both.

This is the situation Google finds itself in today Google announced that it would be altering it’s keyword triggering algorithms

in effect Google says it will no longer serve exact match keywords as exact match it will now serve them as quasi phrase match keywords to help us (the poor poor advertisers) do better….

So to make this very clear for you, yesterday one of my keywords [teach my baby how to read] would ONLY serve my ad IF someone typed in that exact word combo in that exact word order.

And as you can see that’s a strong indicator of buying interest for my product.

However; this is what Google says:

“Starting in mid-May, phrase and exact match keywords will match close variants, including misspellings, singular/plural forms, stemmings, accents and abbreviations”

That all looks great until you realise that search intent varies greatly from word to word!

What this will do for Google is vastly increase the number of times my ads get shown and clicked on resulting in MUCH more money for them and less in my bank account.

So my advice is get to work NOW on negative keywords, because come May your traffic may spike but your conversions will drop.

Neil Asher

P.S Facebook‘s ad revenue took a hit recently so expect a similar strategy from them in the not to distant future….

P.P.S want to opt out of this?

  1. Click the Settings tab.
  2. Scroll to the “Advanced settings” section. Click the Keyword matching options link.
  3. In the “Exact and phrase match” section, select “Do not include close variants”.

life cycle of an entrepreneur

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Neil Asher Rocks!

Neil Asher - Lifecycle of an entrepreneur

If you are or ever have been a work from home entrepreneur, you can probably relate to this…

These are the 4 Stages of the work from home entrepreneur Life Cycle, according to ME.

At the risk of laying my emotional immaturity bare for all the world to see, read about the four stages below.

I figure I’m probably in good company, however, according to Jung in his book memories dreams and reflections (which is AWESOME by the way), our emotional development stops at about age 7. So that would make the following juuuust about right then :)

Stage One

I call this one the wide-eyed and bushy tailed stage. Cause it’s the phase in being a work from home entrepreneur where you are all star eyed and bedazzled by what kind of earning potential you’ve got out there waiting for you.

I went from earning £8.50 an hour as a chef, to £100+ an hour (that’s my conservative guess–definitely on the low end, figuring £5,000 a week which is what I was making back then in my first business.

Stage Two

Here’s where the problems begin. You somehow missed it before, but now it becomes clear that being a work from home entrepreneur is actually work. Heaven forbid.

By stage two, you’re getting used to making money with a whole lot less effort than 99% of the world. And that’s the problem.

Call it human nature, but that soon gets old. You start to realize that while generating £10,000 a week is great, BUT…. it’s still work.

Dissatisfaction starts to brew. :)

Stage Three

Here’s where things can go south quick if you don’t just stop and take a breath and understand that you are where you are because you need to be there at the moment.

Tough pill to swallow sometimes, but it’s the truth.

However…

It can be hard to remember that when you look up long enough to see that you’re generating X pounds while you read about other people telling you they make £50K a week.

You don’t really think about all the risks, hard work, sacrifices, or their string of failures that led them to their current success. All you can see is the difference in the bottom line.

Thoughts like, “Well if that guy can do it, anyone can do it.” start to creep into your head.

Stage Four

The pressure builds enough for you to consider busting out of this (now crap) business and doing the next big thing.

After all, everywhere you look, there are a ton of successful people (far less equipped than you :) that are doing it. If they can do it, why not you?

Here’s where you have a choice to make.

You can either shrink back and stick with what you know, and somehow just be OK with the nature of the business. That you work for money. And that when you don’t work, you generally make less.

OR… you can stretch yourself and make a move.

For me, Stage Four is the time to make the move. A BIG, BOLD move.

Cause you realize that the only perfect business you’re ever going to get is…

YOU.

So you start shifting your thought processes. Instead of being focused on how to keep your client “happy” and how to keep the projects coming through the door, you start focusing on step one in business: generating more revenue for yourself… selling more of your own stuff or other people’s stuff.

This is where you need to FOCUS.

My advice make your first business work BEFORE you start the new business.

What does “work” mean?

For me it means it runs without me, if I need anymore than an hour of work to make the business work then it’s not a business, it’s a job.

So stay focused and systemise the business and get people to run it for you.

Then you’re ready for the next one.

Neil Asher

Sexy P.R? Neil Asher

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Neil Asher LOVES PR

Morning

I've just started a new P.R firm to look after
the P.R for Kidz 5 A Day

I Learnt a long time ago that the worst number
in business is 1 so I diversify my marketing
as much as possible now.

Doing both online and offline multiple
strategies to attract new business is smart.

anyway

I interviewed a ton of firms and 1 of my questions
for the P.R teams was this:

Q. What's the difference between Direct Response,
advertising and P.R?

simple huh?

Anyway the winner gave me the following answer;

A. Once again, sex explains everything Neil...including
the differences between direct marketing, advertising and PR. 

You go to a party and you see a SEXY chickybabe across the room.
You go up to her and say "Hi, I'm great in bed, what about it?"

That's direct marketing. 

You go to a party and you see a SEXY chickybabe across the room.
You give your friend ten quid. He goes up and says "Hi, my friend
over there is great in bed, what about it?"... 

That's advertising. 

You go to a party, you see a SEXY chickybabe across the room.
She comes over and says, "Hi, I hear you're great in bed, what about it?"...

That is the power of PR

:o)

Needless to say they got the job!

I'll let you know how things go

Neil Asher

P.S I'm putting on a free affiliate marketing seminar in London
my plan is 1 day, free, and you have to agree to invest £500
on implementing what I teach you…. I suspect that last caveat
will get rid of all the looky loos and leave the people who actually
want to learn… if that's you e-mail me and I'll send you more info :-)