John Dilbeck Musings

After a very long hiatus, while I was trying to decide on a new approach, I have published the latest issue of the Act On Your Dream! newsletter.

It is archived at Act On Your Dream! — Issue #6 — Getting back on track

If you would like, you can subscribe to Act On Your Dream to get the next issues when they are published.

I intend to publish the newsletter on a regular basis, probably twice a month, and I want to feature you and what you are doing to act on your dream.

What can we do to help each other find the success and freedom we all want?

Act on your dream!

JD

(This article is part of my Marketing Tools and Techniques: Traffic Exchanges series.)

Normally, I won’t be promoting the latest and (supposedly) greatest thing, so don’t be afraid that I’ll bombard you with untested programs that may be here today and gone tomorrow.

I prefaced this recommendation because Soaring For Traffic is a new traffic exchange, but I believe it will be around for a long time and I think it will rise to be one of the best.

I’ve known Ray for a few months and I have seen for myself that he knows quite a bit about Internet marketing and is always working to learn more and to share what he learns with others.

I first met him on the Affiliate Funnel forum, where he answered some of my questions about ad tracking on traffic exchanges. I did some searching and found that he is the owner of Private Success Team, where he is busily helping others learn how to market on the Internet more successfully.

I recently learned that he has been working for about a year to introduce Soaring For Traffic, his free traffic exchange and downline builder.

Lately, I’ve become more discerning when it comes to traffic exchanges and I’m reaching the point where I probably won’t join too many more.

Over the last year, I’ve joined and used about 75 traffic exchanges with varying amounts of success. Now, I’m a member in about 60 and actively use about 20 of them.

I am an upgraded member in about a dozen exchanges, and I just upgraded my account with Soaring For Traffic.

Although Soaring For Traffic is free, you will get more traffic with less time and effort by upgrading to one of the two upgrade levels. I chose the highest upgrade and I’m looking forward to using this exchange a lot in the coming months.

I added about 170 sites to this exchange in one fell swoop by using my Page Swirl rotator and spent another hour or two advertising it on some of my marketing pages, including my LinkScout marketing site.

After I’d finished setting everything up, it was time to surf the new exchange and see how I liked it.

I found a couple of small errors when setting up to use the exchange, but surfing the sites of other members was easy and the site responded quickly, even on my very slow dial-up connection.

The downline builder part of the site contains five money making affiliate programs and I’m a member of three of them. I didn’t count the number of traffic exchanges in the downline builder, but almost all of my favorites were there and I saw only a handful of sites I’d never tried before.

I know that Ray will be a helpful and responsive owner, and that is a big part of being an upgraded member of an exchange.

Even though Soaring For Traffic is new, it already has nearly 1,500 members and is growing quickly.

Regarding the problems I encountered, one was just an incorrect height and width attribute in the HTML code for a 100×300 sidebar button link. That was easily corrected, and I’ll let Ray know about it as soon as I publish this.

The other was a bit more of a problem, but probably has an easy solution. The site offers a way to personalize one of the splash pages that can be used on other traffic exchanges. It features your name, photo, a banner, and a testimonial.

I filled in the form and submitted it, only to be told that the banner URL was incorrect. No problem; the exchange is new. However, the real problem, for me, was that the error page did not preserve the entries on the form that were correct. As a result, a very complimentary testimonial was lost.

Ray, if you read this, I said some nice things about you that nobody will read because the form lost my heartfelt compliments.

With only a couple of minor negatives (which I’m sure Ray will fix quickly) and lots of positives, I heartily recommend Soaring For Traffic to you.

If you want to be a free member, this exchange is better than most.

If you plan to upgrade, the prices are right and the One-Time-Offer page offers good discount pricing for an annual or lifetime membership.

If that doesn’t fit your budget, the second One-Time-Offer (OTO) page offers a 33% discount on the highest upgrade level, making it a good buy. Normally, the highest level, Soaring Eagle, costs $14.95 per month, and I think that is over-priced for a 1:1 surf ratio and anything less than 1,000 credits per month. However, the second OTO page offers the Soaring Eagle level for $9.99, and I think that is the proper price for what is offered.

I don’t know if either of these discount pages will be available should you join, nor what they may offer at that time. These things are always subject to change.

If you don’t take advantage of either OTO page, you’ll pay more, perhaps a lot more, in the long run.

Soaring For Traffic will be one of the dozen or so traffic exchanges I’ll use on a regular basis.

You can join Soaring For Traffic for free and see for yourself how well it works for you.

Act on your dream!

JD

Now that Groups are active on Squidoo, I have been inspired to start some new lenses.

For the Country Music Fans group, I just created a new Dolly Parton lens. Pigeon Forge is only a couple of hours from here and I’ve been a Dolly Parton fan for decades, so it seemed like a good lens to build.

For the Addicted to Squidoo group, I started a Marketing With Squidoo lens. I have some ideas for more content on that lens, but I’ve run out of time today to work on it.

I plan to start a new group that I’ll announce in a few days. I created a couple of lenses for adding to the group when it is created. They include:
Success With Power Blog and Success With Blogging. They may fit into groups that also include Home Businesses and Marketing. I have an idea that we’re going to see a lot of overlap in groups since anyone can start whatever group they want.

In fact, I plan to create a few more groups to cross promote lenses I’ve already created.

With the groups I’ve created at MySpace and Squidoo, I’m starting to think that I don’t want to over-extend into another direction! It’s a lot easier to join a group and let someone else manage it than it is to find the time to visit all the groups and forums I’ve started here and there every day. Some days I have other priorities and just don’t have the time and energy to visit all those sites to make sure things are staying on track.

I just added another 17 lenses i want to create to the file where I keep all my information about my existing lenses. I found I wanted a comprehensive list of all the lenses, their URLs, RSS feeds they publish, and any notes for further development. Otherwise, I don’t think I’ll be able to keep up with all of them and what I want to do, even if the Squidoo Dashboard does keep a list of all our lenses.

By the way, I just discovered a neat tool for promoting your lenses. On the bottom right of your Squidoo lenses dashboard, there is a section called Lensmaster Tools. At the bottom of that column is a link to Spread The Word. On that page, there is a nice tool that helps you create image links to your lenses. An example is shown below:

So, who else has been creating new lenses?

Over the last few days, there have been some big changes at Squidoo.com with the release of the new groups feature.

Now, your Squidoo lens is not a stand-alone page. You can join appropriate groups for cross promotion of similarly-themed lenses.

Don’t find a group you like? Start one of your own. Help all the members of your group find more readers and more success with Squidoo.

New Squidoo lenses

I just created a new Success With Blogging lens and I invite your feedback for resources that can be added to that lens.

New Squidoo groups

I have several lenses, websites, and forums related to North Carolina, so I created a new North Carolina Group and I invite you to add your lenses to this group as long as they relate primarily to a place, event, person, organization, or business that is in North Carolina.

I’ve never paid much attention to MySpace until the last couple of weeks.

When I looked at it last year, the people and their interests that I found there were not at all what I was interested in.

However, recently, there is a lot more business networking going on and I’ve started to invest some time there.

Come visit my MySpace John Dilbeck profile page.

If you have a MySpace account, come visit my page and - if you are interested - invite me to be your friend. If you don’t have already have an account, you can join for free.

From my page, you can link to some of the best online marketers I’ve been able to find and can expand your network as you want.

Some of the reasons I decided to invest some effort there is the built-in audience that numbers in the millions, good blogging tools, bulletins to keep in touch with friends and associates, the forums, and groups that you can start and moderate.

I’ve started new groups at:

Site Build It Webmasters

Success With Power Blog

Success With Affiliate Marketing

At the moment, I’m feeling rather lonely in these new groups and I hope you will join me there. I’m open to suggestions on how to make the groups better for all participants.

If you are going to use affiliate links, post it to your blog or profile page and link to it from the group forum. Please, do not post affiliate links in the forums.

I hope to see you there. Come be my MySpace friend!

The Power Blog is a brand new, hands-off, affiliate marketing service which combines the simplicity of dynamic internet marketing with the power of a search engine optimized blog needed to create a real profit pulling internet marketing campaign.

Join free or see all the benefits of pro membership.

After I discussed the idea with Peter Dobler, creator of the Power Blog, I set up a Success With Power Blog group on MySpace.

I’m inviting you to come and participate.

The more we discuss the Power Blog, the more we can succeed with it.

As long as I was promoting the Power Blog, I also created a lens at Squidoo, Success With Power Blog on Squidoo, to present it to new potential members.

I have a MySpace page, John Dilbeck, and I invite you to come view my profile.

I invite you to get a MySpace account if you don’t already have one. They’re free.

Sign in to your MySpace account and visit my profile page. Invite me to be your MySpace friend, if you want.

Then, come join the Success With Power Blog group and let’s spread the word.

A week ago, I didn’t know who Kimberly Dawn Wells was, and now I’m running across her lenses and groups everywhere I look!

That’s a good thing.

About Kimberly Dawn Wells

Kimberly is very active on Squidoo, CafePress, MySpace, and probably other places, but I’ve been concentrating on those three for the last couple of days. She has an outstanding lens about herself on Squidoo and an equally impressive page about herself on MySpace.

Activities on Squidoo

Kimberly is a Citizen Squid at Squidoo and has been creating groups on Squidoo to make it easier for lensmasters to group a bunch of lenses together on a common topic. While this is a pre-release feature at the moment, it looks like it won’t be too much longer before it becomes at least a beta release.

I’ve added a couple of my lenses to the Country Music Fan and Totally Awesome Tees groups, and I’ll be participating in more groups as they become available. I think this is going to be a very important addition to Squidoo.

She offers helpful advice

Kimberly is very helpful and offers her advice on a number of topics.

For example, she offers some very helpful tips on her MySpace Made Easy lens to help us improve our experiences at MySpace.

Activities on MySpace

Kimberly has several groups at MySpace, including Success with Squidoo and Success with CafePress. Groups on MySpace include the ability to discuss topics of interest on forums associated with the group and the optional ability to post bulletins which seem to be used to post news or ads.

I’m new to MySpace, so my limited knowledge of the community may not allow me to fully appreciate the nuances of membership and participation there. I’m open to being educated on the subject.

I created two groups at MySpace for Murphy NC Business and Site Build It Webmasters, which was an outgrowth of my Site Build It lens at Squidoo.

Free to participate

You can participate free at Squidoo and MySpace and I think both are great places to create content and tell about your activities and interests.

On MySpace, this is done through conversations on the forums, posting of bulletins, blogging, and leaving comments on your friends’ pages.

On Squidoo, you participate by creating lenses (one page keyword focused pages with out-pointing links) and joining the groups as they become available.

Both of these sites work well with other communities where I participate, including Ryze.com, PowerfulIntentions.com, AdlandPro.com, MySpace.com, and others.

I look forward to meeting you on one or more of these communities.

Feel free to tell me what you think. Correct me where I’m wrong and educate me where I’m ignorant.

First of all, I hope you have a very happy holiday season and I wish for you and your family a happy, healthy, and prosperous 2005.

This will be the last time you hear from me before the end of the year unless you write me.

The last day of 2004 is only one week from right now. That means we only have one week left to achieve the goals we set for this year.

Perhaps you have more than achieved what you planned. Congratulations!

On the other hand, perhaps you haven’t been as successful this year as you’d hoped and dreamed. Maybe there isn’t enough time to do what you planned before the year ends.

You know what?

It’s okay.

Look at what you’ve done, what you’ve wanted to do, and what you couldn’t do. Try to put everything in perspective. Then, re-examine what brought you to SFI.

(Not an SFI affiliate? Learn about it here.)

Was it the opportunity to earn more money?

Was it the chance to gain the freedom to do what you want on your own schedule?

What was YOUR reason for becoming an affiliate?

How much progress have you made on getting there?

The end of 2004 is not the end of the world. Just as one season follows another, 2005 will follow 2004. You have a new opportunity to examine your goals, make new plans, and work to achieve what you want.

I was looking through some of the articles in IAHBE this morning and I read “My Biggest Mistake in Network Marketing” by Tom Wood. It is a very interesting article, and if you are an IAHBE member you can read it here:

http://www.iahbe.org/Resources/Reports/ExpertReports/WOODMyBiggestMistake.jsp

(If you’re not a member of the International Association of Home Business Entrepreneurs, you can learn more about it here.)

Like most of us, he saw the opportunity to earn more, be his own boss, gain the freedom to set his own schedule, and do the other things we dream of when we first learn about SFI.

He had some success in the first month, but he sure didn’t get rich — and neither did you or I.

He kept working, but even into the second and third month he could have earned more working for minimum wage than he was earning from his new home business.

But he listened to his upline and knew the big money was years down the road.

In his third month, some of his downline started quitting! How was he to ever build an empire of freedom if everyone quit?

So, his upline told him to go to his “chicken list.”

What’s a chicken list?

It’s the people you are too chicken to call.

“They’re the people that don’t quit. Find people who don’t quit in their life, and you will have a rock-solid business.”

So, he lined up his list and made his worst mistake in network marketing.

First, he chose someone who had no success in business.

Second, he didn’t do a great job of presenting the business to him.

Third, the prospect turned out to be a mean-spirited person who blew up and said he never wanted to hear from him, again.

Fourth, he cared too much about what the prospect said.

Fifth, he spiraled down into misery.

But, eventually, he realized, “I’m in charge of my life. I’m responsible for my destiny.”

If you want to read the rest of the story, it’s available to all IAHBE members.

When I signed up with SFI, I made a decision I was going to make it to the top and I was going to achieve my dreams — no matter how long it takes and no matter how much work I have to do. I feel as strong about that now as I did then.

(I even started a website at AYearFromNow.com with the theme of Act On Your Dream! I haven’t had time to work on it much this year, but it will become my top priority in January and February. I decided earlier this year what my big life’s dream is and I’ve been working hard to put things in place to achieve that dream in the next few years. I’ll be talking more about it on that site as I have time to work on it for the next couple of months.)

I know that I’ll never get to where I want to go without the help of many others from around the world.

I also decided that I’d never get to where I want to go without helping others along the way. I chose for my motto: I succeed by helping you succeed.

I’m not going to quit. Are you?

I believe in you. I believe in your dreams.

Now, if you decide that it’s best to quit SFI, that’s okay. Be true to yourself and do what’s best for you. But, don’t quit on yourself. You can achieve the success you want if you keep working at it every day.

I want you to succeed as much as I want to succeed.

But, I can’t do it for you. You are the master of your destiny and you have to find a path for yourself that will take you where you want to go.

Never give up on yourself. Never give up on your dream. Never let anyone else steal your dream from you.

If you still want to succeed with SFI (or any other business), you’ll find a way to make it happen.

I will help you get there any way I can.

One week from tomorrow, we start a new year. We have a new opportunity to act on our dream and achieve the success and freedom for which we yearn.

Nobody will do it for you. Nobody will do it for me.

As Gery Carson says, “If’s it’s to be, it’s up to me.”

When 2005 rolls around, a brand new compensation plan will be implemented.

I’m ready and I’m aching to work even harder in 2005 than I have in 2004.

I’m MIQ this month and I’ll be in the T-Net when it is formed one week from tomorrow. You may have done the same thing this month. I’m very happy that you did and I want to congratulate you on your foresight. This new comp plan looks like it’s going to work well for all of us.

You may feel that you can’t afford to become MIQ this month. I understand that.

Just a little over two years ago I had to close my metalsmithing business to care for my Mom. I depleted my savings and had no income. So, I turned to online marketing so Mom could continue living at home and I could earn the income I need to live here. I scrimped and saved just to afford the hosting fees for JohnDilbeck.com. I kept at it. I added hundreds and then thousands of pages to the site. It started earning a little money.

Then I added more websites and more weblogs. Now, I’m paying more per month for hosting services than I earned the first year and my profit is growing. Each year, I’m earning several times more than I earned the previous year. But, it’s not easy.

It’s like pushing a boulder off a cliff. At first, it takes all your effort and you barely get any results. It’s easy to despair and quit. But, you keep pushing and slowly, with great difficulty, it moves a fraction of an inch. If you stop now, it will settle back and all that effort will be wasted.

So, you keep pushing, and the more energy and time you put into it, the more the boulder starts to move. Slowly - but surely - you can see it move.

When you first started pushing the boulder, everyone around you thought you were crazy. They laughed at you and told you it would never move. Nobody would help.

But, you kept at it. When it started to move and the people around you could see it for themselves, the laughing subsided. How could someone tell you it was impossible if they could see with their own eyes that you were doing it.

Now, it’s time to keep pushing — even harder than before. As momentum builds, others around you will pay attention. Eventually, gravity will take over and be your friend instead of your tormentor. The boulder moves faster. Now, your friends want to help.

That’s the way it is with a business, too. When the boulder starts moving (income starts coming in), it’s easier to get people to help you. Even if they laughed at you and told you it wasn’t possible, they can still become valuable team members. Don’t hold their lack of foresight and imagination against them.

Welcome them to your team and help them start pushing their own boulders.

We’re in this together. You help me. I help you. We help each other.

As the Team Network comes into being, we’ll be helping each other in a whole new way. It will take some time to see how it all works together. There may be some glitches that will have to be fixed, but I have confidence in the staff at SFI and I know they’ll smooth things out within a few days.

Whether you want to earn an extra $100 per month or you’re willing and able to work full-time to earn thousands of dollars per month, it starts by believing in yourself and taking action.

No action - no income. No sales - no income. No sponsoring new affiliates - no team.

I challenge you.

Make your chicken list. Find people in your neighborhood who are successful in business and know how to sell. Then, tell them about SFI. Show them how they can earn income by promoting the services and products we offer. Show them how they can become a part of your team. If you can’t afford to become MIQ/EA because you just don’t have the money, don’t give up. Sponsor someone with the money, experience, and personality and work together to build your team. With work, it won’t be long before your income will pay for being EA and you’ll take your place in the new T-Net.

It’s not a game. It’s not a scam. You CAN build your home business and start earning that extra income you want.

Go to your chicken list. Tell them.

Even if you only talk to one person on that list, you’re taking a step forward. Soon, it will be two steps, and then you’ll be on your journey.

Promote the products SFI offers and earn the sales commission.

Build your team and work towards that residual income you want a few years from now.

Or, do nothing.

It’s your choice.

You came to SFI with a dream. Don’t let anyone steal that dream from you.

You are the master of your fate. You are the captain of your ship. You are the king of your castle.

You’re next. I want to be here when you make it to the top and earn whatever level of financial freedom you want. Even if you’re half-way around the world, I want to be a small part of helping you succeed.

Are you ready for the challenge?

Take some time and visit the training section at:

https://www.sfimg.com/Training/SpecialReports.sfi

Learn how to build your business and work on it every day. Don’t let that boulder stop moving!

Thank you for being a part of my team this year. Thank you for letting me be a part of your team.

I’m looking forward to working with you in 2005.

Let’s make it the best year, yet.

All the best,

JD

Your opportunities with ShopForT1 continue to increase on a regular basis, as more and more Cognigen agents are seeing that T1 (and larger circuit) sales have closed and they are seeing the commissions. You are encouraged to take the time to understand what you have to offer here, since ShopForT1 is one of the absolute best deals around today.

You find a need for bandwidth, the lead is entered into the system, and a technical professional closes the sale for you! It just doesn’t get any better than that!

With the advent and ever-increasing demand for VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol, or broadband phone) services for businesses, ShopForT1 is aligned with Packet8 to provide a bundled solution for customers. This can be a tremendous cost savings for businesses, since a data-only T1 is typically less expensive than an integrated T1 line (combining data and voice circuits). The ShopForT1 closers understand this and are explaining it to customers as a cost-effective option on a regular basis.

The carriers that are represented by ShopForT1 are also noticing the tremendous success, and are continually amazed at the number of orders that are closed. As a result of this, these carriers are regularly offering very generous spiffs, bonuses, and increased commissions to compensate ShopForT1 (and you, the agent) for this continued success.

Is there really an opportunity here? You bet!

Consider that within the United States there are well over a MILLION T1 lines being used. This is a substantial market for you to go after. Now, consider that if a T1 line has been in place for more than 2 years, it is very likely that the customer is paying much more than he should be for it. If that T1 line has been in place for more than 3 years, it is almost certain that the customer is paying more than he needs to for that service. Even “techno-savvy” customers sometimes find it difficult to understand how ShopForT1 can offer such low prices from top-tier carriers. One ShopForT1 closer tells the story that one customer didn’t believe the prices he was being quoted by the closer over the phone, so he asked the closer to print the quote and get it notarized, and then fax it to him!

How can ShopForT1 offer such prices from these top-tier carriers?

The name of the game is VOLUME. Based on the volume of business that ShopForT1 provides to all of our carriers every month, those carriers guarantee the best prices possible. That’s why the closers don’t hesitate to tell the customer which carriers are being quoted, because the guarantee is that the customer cannot go to that same carrier directly and get a better price on the same service.

For you, the agent, ShopForT1 can represent a gold mine. Consider that you don’t need to close the sale — the sale is closed for you by a professional technical consultant at no cost to you or the customer. Also consider that a T1 line or larger circuit is almost always sold on a 1, 2, or 3 year contract. This means that you have a guaranteed commission every month from that customer for the life of the contract, and may ALSO get a one-time bonus or spiff from it.

It just doesn’t get any better than this.

Well, we have said that before and it still continues to get better and better, with more tools being added regularly. Don’t miss the boat on this tremendous opportunity.

Learn how average people are doing incredibly well with their websites while millions more struggle just to get a few visitors and a few measly sales.

I’ve mentioned many times before that Site Build It! produces results like no other small business webhosting service does. No other company even comes close.

Now, Sitesell has released a new page of case studies that are detailed recountings of individuals and their experiences with SBI! They’ve chosen one case study for each of the major categories of small, small businesses, and each case study is told in the words of the actual person who built the site.

Ken Evoy, president of Sitesell, describes the site, “From the U.S.A. to Kazakhstan, from Australia to Israel, the case studies show exactly how successful businesses are built online, whether one is a ‘pure infopreneur’ or a vendor of hard goods, whether you’re an economist at a brokerage firm or a novice employee of the world’s most famous affiliate. It even shows you how one young man went from ‘dead-end asphalt man to cutting edge digital man.’”

I just visited the site and read all the case studies, and I find them to be inspirational. I love reading how real people succeed by finding their niche and then telling the world about what they love doing.

When you visit the case studies site, don’t just skim it. Take some time to really read what these folks have to say, and then read between the lines. Feel the emotion they have for their business, for their success, and for SBI!

When is the last time you felt that way about your webhosting service and the tools they provide you? Have you EVER felt it?

When you read the site, pay attention to the “BYOBAM!” factor.

What’s BYOBAM?

“Bring your own brains and motivation!”

Each of the people in the case studies began with a desire to do something different and they were motivated enough to research and learn how to accomplish it. Then, using their own brains and the tools SBI provides, they “took the bull by the horns” and started doing something. Motivation, brains, action, and persistence are the keys to success. SBI provides the technical help to make your dream come alive.

Each of these people followed the SBI process of:

CONTENT -> TRAFFIC -> PRESELL -> MONETIZE

This process, fully explained in the ebook that comes with SBI and described in several of the case studies, has been proven to produce outstanding results.

Find the specific case study that most closely matches you and what you want to do. See how someone similar has already succeeded. You can do it, too.

A year from now, it could be YOU who is featured on the case studies site.

Act on your dreams!