Hello, Marlon here. I’ve been in this business of marketing online since before the world wide web existed. How? Because I was marketing on AOL and Compuserve. I’ve been full-time so many years I don’t remember NOT doing this for a living. So you might say I know a few things about how to build a business that will be here tomorrow and next month and next year and five years from now.

Let’s talk about how you can build one step at a time from  scratch.

1. Learn to acquire new customers

This is the heart and soul of your business. It’s your engine. If you learn to do this, you have a business that runs. If you don’t, you fail. Getting new customers requires several things:

a. Figuring how WHERE to find ‘em. If you can’t target them, you can’t get ‘em on your list.

b. Figuring out WHAT they’ll respond to If you’ve “tried” squeeze pages but they didn’t work for you, it’s because you never figured out what they’ll respond to.

c. Making irresistible offers. This involves figuring out their hot buttons and pushing them hard!

So the other day I visited the blog of a customer just out of curiosity. This person is still in the process of “getting it.” She’s getting closer but isn’t there yet. I looked at her blog and honest-to-goodness, I had NO IDEA of who she was targeting with her blog. You don’t write a blog or any communication just to blab. You target.

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“How To Have An Amazing “rest of” 2009 By Trading Products For Dollars, Even If You’re Filled With Doubt, Fear, Or certainty and Creating Your Own Product Feels Like Pulling Teeth.”

“How to Get It Done Even Though You Don’t Know If You’re Doing It Right. Even Though You Might Be Making Mistakes. Even Though You Are Following a Less Than Optimal Process.”

This article will get you in the right mindset for the rest of 2009. I highly recommend you read it now AND pass it along to at least one other person who NEEDS to hear this message.

I’ll never forget writing my first newsletter. It took forever. I never dreamed I’d be able to do one monthly.The first time you do anything, it’s like pulling teeth.  Sometimes you sweat bullets. You feel like you’ll never get it done. You make lots of mistakes. You feel uncertain about every little detail.

This is what STOPS most people from HAVING their own info products. They let doubt, fear, indecision, and uncertainty stop them from getting it done. Yet, this IS the path to having a great 2009. Finding a way to get it done anyway. Because it DOES get easier. It really does.

By the end of 2008, you will either be trading your own personal time for dollars. Or you will have a product of your own that you can trade for dollars.

Once you learn the process, you can bang out new products in a week or two. Maybe even less. But to get to that point, you have do it 3, 4 or 5 times. And the first few times will be tough. Hard. Almost like pulling teeth.

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The wisest man I ever met told me something I’ll never forget. Joe Karbo wrote this question in a famous ad many years ago. Are you too busy earning a living to make any money? See, Joe was one of the originals to discover the real secret of the direct response marketing business.

If you’re working hard, it means you’re trading your time for dollars. Since there’s a limit on your time, there’s a limit on your dollars. It’s the problem I have with the way a LOT of people teach what they call “Internet marketing.” Really, all they do is trade time for MORE dollars.

Why?

Because they don’t really do Internet marketing. They do sales pitches on webinars, teleseminars and from the stage. Which is all fine and dandy — if you know how to automate it.

But if you’re just slaving away trading time for dollars, even if it’s more dollars, you’re STILL in the TRAP.

Have you ever wondered why so many gurus and Internet marketers spring up one day as an overnight success then just as quickly fade away into oblivion?

That’s because they work within the TRAP and have never discovered how to get OUT of the fundamental time for dollars  trap.

I’m going to be the first to admit there ARE Internet marketers who put more in the bank month in and out than I do. Why? Because almost without fail, they’re working really hard for that money.

They’re still IN the TRAP.

And here they are pretending to get others out of the trap when they’re still IN it. Others say that the only way to get out of the TRAP is to get a big office, lots of overhead and lots of employees.

Since 1996, I ran this business from home. I have a small, relatively modest office now, and it’s 2X or 3X the size I really need.

It’s true that you can work your tail end off and make a zillion dollars on a launch. But it took 3-6 months of hard labor before the launch and another 3-6 months AFTER the launch.

That’s nothing but a glorified job.

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You don’t like competition? I don’t either.What if you could have your own BLUE ocean to sell to? What I’m going to explain to you is one of my secrets. It’s simple but very profound.

As you know, obviously, my name is Marlon. But you may not have connected my name to the The Blue Marlin fish. In days gone by people called me Blue, after the fish.

Now, to me the fish is a symbol of blue ocean. That is, ocean unfettered by the morass of boats, people, and others competing for your space.

To use another analogy, some call it “low hanging fruit.” In other words, money you make without competing hard.

Back in the 1980’s Jay Abraham revived a slogan from the 50’s called “unique selling proposition.” The modern term for it is “differentiation.” What makes you and your product or service DIFFERENT?

Unique = different

Selling = it sells

Proposition = it’s a proposition to the customer

Jay is such a great sales person he can take a term from the 1950’s, and get people to pay $5,000 to learn about it! Now that’s a guy I admire. I prefer the modern term differentiation. What differentiates your products and services.

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Do you want to know a secret to selling your affiliate products successfully online? It’s finding the right WORDS for the job.

And when it comes to your words, your headline needs to be rock solid!

That’s because most visitors take 10 seconds or less to decide whether to explore your site for awhile — or move on to the next site.

So it doesn’t matter how well-designed your site is… how high your search engine ranking is… or how amazing your product is. If your words don’t grab your visitors and keep them glued to your site, they’re going to leave — and probably never return.

Your headline is the first thing your visitors see. It needs to capture their attention, spark their curiosity, and compel them to read further. And it has to do it fast.

To guarantee YOUR headlines jump off the page and pull potential buyers deeper into your site, always follow our Top 5 “Unbreakable” Headline Rules…

Rule #1: Relate a Problem Most of your site visitors will be looking for specific information related to a problem they’re trying to solve.

Maybe they’re curious about local flight schools in their area. Maybe they’re searching for molded chrome fenders to put on a 1953 Chevy Bel-Air. Or maybe they’re trying to figure out how to “unshrink” wool clothes that accidentally ended up in the dryer.

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