John Dilbeck Musings

Have you been thinking about trying Site Build It?

If you have, Ken is offering his annual holiday special. Until midnight, December 25, 2006, you can buy one and get one free.

That is a real bargain.

You have several options.

You can buy one for yourself and get a second one free. If you choose to do this, you can start building one and wait up to nine months to start the second site.

Or…

Buy one for yourself and give the second one to your husband, wife, son, daughter, mom, dad, friend, business associate, or anyone else to whom you want to offer the gift of learning how to build a part-time (or full-time) online business using the proven tools and techniques that Ken will teach you and your friend.

Or, team up with someone else and buy two sites. Split the cost and Sitesell Support will help you transfer the second site to whomever it should belong.

You don’t have to take advantage of the special pricing, but now is the time to do it if you want to save money. You could even buy now, and find someone next week or next month to sell the second site to.

Just don’t miss this special if you have been on the fence about getting Site Build It for yourself.

I can tell you that finding Ken Evoy a few years ago has made a big difference in my life.

I have been Mom’s full-time caretaker for about five and a half years now. When I decided to bring her back home instead of putting her in a nursing home, I knew I would have to find a way to work inside the house near her and still earn a living. I closed my metalsmithing business and concentrated on helping her.

After I’d quickly blown through my savings, I had to get serious about earning an income while still working at home.

Luckily, amongst all the Internet marketing hype that was calculated to relieve me of my hard-earned money, I found Ken Evoy.

I learned how to start earning money from affiliate marketing by reading his Affiliate Masters Course, and started making sales and earning commission checks when I put what I learned to work on some of my web sites.

Later, I purchased his Make Your Site Sell! ebook. That was the best $30 I ever spent and now I earn it back many times over every month.

I took what I learned and re-built all my sites (and this took about six months). In a matter of weeks, my sites were being found and people started buying what I recommended. It was the real turning point in my home business.

This fall, Ken decided to give away Make Your Site Sell! as a free download. Even though I still believe it is worth much more than the previous price, it is now free. If you have a website and you want to earn more from it, download this book and read it. Then put to work what you learn from it.

Ken explains on the site why he decided to give away Make Your Site Sell! and concentrate on making Site Build It even better.

Eventually, I was able to scrape up enough to purchase my own Site Build It subscription.

For just $300 a year, I got not only a website, but an ever-growing collection of integrated tools (meaning I never have to install and manage scripts), a members-only community of thousands of helpful SBI site owners, regular newsletters with information to help me improve my sites and earn more, and the benefit of Ken Evoy’s wisdom and experience.

In a sea of Internet marketing hype, Ken presents the voice of experience, calm, and making slow progress towards building our businesses.

Ken is not one of the “gurus” who cleverly craft a marketing business to drain us of the money that remains in our wallets and bank accounts. If you go to Ken’s Blog and read his article on “Mooch Marketing,” you’ll know what I’m talking about.

I have never lost money when I follow Ken’s advice. More often than not, I increase the size of my commission checks, and for that I remain grateful to Ken.

I don’t want to mislead you. I am not getting rich and I don’t think I will, but that’s not my goal.

Right now, my main goal is to do what I love doing, and earn enough from it so I can continue to care for Mom and let her live in the house she has lived in for over 30 years.

I have worked hard at this, but I have to share part of the credit with Ken Evoy for being able to make this work.

You will note, I hope, that I don’t mention anyone else when sharing the credit for building my home business. I have learned from others. I have lost hard-earned money to others. Ken helps me keep on course and continue to build my business.

I do maintain quite a few other sites that are not powered by Site Build It, but I’m re-evaluating that decision. I have had problems with hackers destroying several of my sites. I’ve had problems with updating and maintaining scripts on them.

I am seriously considering closing most of my non-SBI sites and putting my efforts into doing more with Site Build It rather than continually bashing my head against the wall with the other sites.

I have learned a lot, and if I had to drop all my sites but one, it would be powered by Site Build It.

I hope you enjoy your holiday season and have a happy, prosperous, and healthy new year!

John L. Dilbeck

AYearFromNow.com - Act On Your Dream!

My primary blog: John Dilbeck And Friends

I’ve seen lots of websites and blogs about home business, and I just have to say that most of them do not impress me.

(I’m sure others have said that about what I write, too.)

I met Bryant Sandburg on Ryze.com when he offered his brand new blog for review.

We’ve had an exchange of messages and I get a very good feeling about him and what he has to say.

The blog is new, but shows real promise.

His article on Do affiliate programs work? covers the basics and offers some good advice, too.

I’ve just subscribed to his blog and you may want to go take a look, too.

Welcome, Bryant!

All the best,

JD

You may have seen lots of websites cropping up that have a .ws extension instead of the more common .com, .net, and .org extensions.

.ws actually is the top level domain for Western Samoa, but it is being marketed to mean .website.

Global Domains International is the company that manages the .ws domain registry for the Western Samoan government and it has developed a very interesting way to market these domains.

Instead of registering for a year, you pay $10 per month for the domain and simple website hosting.

For example, I host my domain UltimateDownlines.ws there. This is a simple, one-page marketing site that was mostly built using the free webpage generator at the Home Income Team.

If you are interested in an online marketing home business, the Home Income Team can help you in several ways, and it’s free to join and free to remain a member. There is an optional one time offer when you first sign up, but you are not obligated to purchase it, and there isn’t even a way to upgrade your free membership to a professional membership. It really is free.

One of the businesses the Home Income Team markets is Global Domains International (GDI), and that is why it is promoted on my UltimateDownlines.ws site.

If you are not interested in online marketing, you can use any tools you want to build your website and host it with GDI, or you can use the sitebuilder they provide for developing your website.

Perhaps you missed registering the .com version of your name or business name. I managed to register DilbeckMarketing.com, JohnDilbeck.com, DilbeckCommunications.com and several others. If you missed registering a domain you really wanted, it may still be available as a .ws domain.

Additionally, when you become a GDI customer you can also be an affiliate and earn commissions from any customers you recommend who purchase their own .ws domain.

Some people are earning very nice incomes as a GDI affiliate, but it would even be nice if you earned an extra $50 or $100 per month, wouldn’t it? Your domain would be free and you’d have some money for a dinner out, trip to the theater, or whatever you prefer. While we make no guarantees that you will earn anything as an affiliate, the opportunity is there if you want to pursue it.

GDI has spent nearly $1 million to create a movie that you can use for free, online, right now, to help you create a tremendous, ongoing monthly income for yourself.

If you haven’t seen it already, I invite you to view the movie, and see for yourself why many people, around the world, are promoting GDI.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been redesigning my 21st Century Sales site. I’m busily expanding it to offer great resources for people who want to build profitable home businesses.

While there are many types of home businesses, this site is targeted towards online marketing and sales, with an emphasis on earning income by marketing affiliate programs. I’ve found this to be an excellent way to build extra streams of income without having to invest a lot of money.

Of course, as with any business, it takes time, effort and some money to build a business to the point where it starts returning a profit. Normally, I expect to put in three to five years and a lot of time and money before I start earning a profit. This has gone faster than any other business I’ve ever started or helped to start.

In the past, I’ve had to invest many thousands of dollars up-front and then put in the time and effort to make things work.

With this business — my home-based online marketing business — I’ve been able to invest as little as three or four dollars every day (around $100 per month) and I’m already earning a growing profit all without incurring any debt.

It’s not financed by loans or credit cards, and that’s a first for me. I love being out of debt.

Now that it has reached the breakeven point, I don’t even have to invest the small amount I was spending out of pocket each month. Overhead, advertising, and promotional expenses are now coming out of revenue, and as I reinvest a substantial portion of that revenue, I look forward to watching the business grow even faster.

You, my customer, have made this possible and I appreciate it. I’ll continue to offer the best products, services, and opportunities I can find along with tips and advice based on my continuing research.

I appreciate your business. Thank you!

21st Century Sales is one site in my growing network of Dilbeck Marketing websites. There are several more on the drawing board and I’ll be introducing them over the next several months.

The May 1, 2004 edition of my Home Business Tips newsletter has been posted.

Congratulations to my SFI sales team for growing their businesses in April!

Hi,

This week, I’ve been thinking about a couple of issues that are gaining in importance for reasons I’ll mention below.

I was a bit out of the loop last week because my mother was scheduled for surgery on Thursday. The surgery was a success and she’s back home and doing well.

(You may not know that I’m a full-time caretaker for her after her cancer surgery a couple of years ago. I help her during the days and do most of my marketing work from the next room during the nights and early mornings.)

So, now, my mind is back in the game and I’m looking for ways to help you grow your SFI Marketing Group business.

Some thoughts about marketing and selling

As I’ve said before, we are a sales organization. No sales, no business.

Most people hate selling, but that may be because they have a misconception about what selling is all about.

Look around you. Everything you see was sold by someone and bought by someone.

Selling is difficult when you are trying to convince someone to purchase something she doesn’t want.

Selling is easy when you talk to your customer and find out what he or she is most interested in. If she’s interested in what you have to offer, tell her about it.

Selling is easiest when you find what a group of people want or need and then you find a way to provide that product or service to them.

It is much easier to sell ice to a hot person in the summer than it is to sell it to a cold person in the winter. Few people can sell refrigerators to Eskimos, but practically anyone can sell a cold soda to a hot sweaty person in the summer.

You don’t have to do a hard sell. Just mention the benefits and how to get it.

Don’t know how to define the benefits? That’s pretty easy once you know the trick.

First, take out a sheet of paper and draw a vertical line down the center of the page. On the left side, list all the features you can come up with. On the right side list the benefits of each of the features.

How?

A benefit must answer the question “What’s in it for me?” or “How does that help me?”

Try to think as your customer would think and then list how each feature will be of benefit to him or her.

Once you know the benefits of your product or service, don’t list the features any more. Tell about the benefits, because that’s what we’re all interested in.

Now, you’re not trying to make someone buy what you have to sell, you’re offering a list of ways to help someone get what he or she already wants.

Are you selling when you tell someone that you saw a good movie they would probably like?

Are you selling when you recommend a good restaurant?

Are you selling when you tell someone about the SFI business opportunity?

Sure you are.

You may or may not be getting paid for your selling efforts, however.

That’s the beauty of affiliate selling. All you have to do is get someone to go to your gateway or a specific page in your Veriuni store and purchase from that link, or sign up as your sponsored affiliate. Then you get paid.

It’s not hard, it just takes some effort. When someone likes what they see, buying is easy. Remember how easy it was for you to become an SFI affiliate? That’s just how easy it will be for someone else to sign up as your affiliate and that’s how your sales team will grow.

The more you learn about selling, the more money you make in commissions.

Of course, it’s not just about learning. You must take action. Knowledge without action accomplishes nothing. Action without knowledge may or may not accomplish something. Sometimes it can work against you.

So, make sure you know what you’re going to do before you just start doing it. Set your goals and plan how you’re going to accomplish them.

Then, work your plan.

Does your upline answer your email?

It occured to me yesterday that there may be several reasons why you don’t get a reply when you email someone for help.

One of you — I won’t mention who — sent me an email last week that I almost never saw.

Because of all the virii (viruses) and worms, I no longer open an email with the subject of just “Hi”, “Heya”, or “Hello”. I have programmed my email program to drop those directly into the trash without seeing them.

I get over 1,000 email messages every day and several hundred are spam. Of the others, I have a couple of hundred filters defined that send the messages into over 50 inboxes. Some — such as my SFI inbox — are a high priority. Others are low priority.

When I check my email, I read the messages in the high priority inboxes first, and if I have time I eventually get to the others, but it may take days or even weeks, if I ever get to them at all.

Last week I got an email from an affiliate with a subject of “Hi” and a body that consisted only of “What do I do next?” No name. No company mentioned — and I represent several. No discussion of what had been done before to lead up to this point.

It was automatically filtered into the trash. I only read it because I had a few extra minutes that day — unusual — and recognized the email address.

It took a while to respond to the message, because I had to find the affiliate’s name, and what he/she may have done already. It would have been much easier and faster with some basic information in the email.

So, I’m going to ask you, whenever you write me, to please include the following:

1. Your full name.

2. Your SFI affiliate ID.

3. Your city, state, and country — whatever is appropriate.

4. Put “SFI Affiliate” at the start of the subject line.

5. In the body, ask questions that can be answered and provide information about what you have already done and what I can help you with.

6. If you reply to a message from me, please quote the previous conversation so I don’t have to go searching for it. These simple steps will make sure I see your message and will make it much easier to respond to you.

That’s assuming, of course, that some ISP between us doesn’t throw the message away or refuse to deliver it for whatever reason.

Because email is getting more and more unreliable, I’m opening up alternative forms of communications. I’ve created a Residual Income Forum and I invite you to register and participate there. We can discuss SFI in the SFI Marketing Group section.

How do international affiliates become MIQ?

I define “international affiliate” to mean anyone who lives in any country other than the United States.

As you may know, it’s sometimes difficult for international affiliates to purchase anything online. We’re getting more and more international affiliates in our sales team, and I welcome you! I want to find a way to help you transfer money back and forth between the US and your country.

There are two issues: how to buy something here and how to get paid there.

Be aware that you are never required to purchase anything from SFI. You can become MIQ by selling rather than buying and I highly recommend selling. However, you may have decided that you’d like to join the IAHBE, but don’t have a way to do it if you don’t have a credit card.

I have to admit that I was rather ignorant of this whole situation until recently and now I’m trying to find a way or ways to help you. I’ve sent some information to a couple of you. If you find it helpful, please tell me and I’ll pass it along to the entire team.

I’d also like to know if it wasn’t helpful.

I think SFI must find a way to make it easier for international affiliates to play a bigger part in the company and I think that’s under development. After all, Gery Carson — the founder of SFI — has announced that he’s changing the name of the organization from Six Figure Income Marketing Group to Strong Future International Marketing Group, and if he’s going to position it as an international organization, it’s necessary to make it easier and more profitable for anyone who lives outside the US to be a part of the effort — and to reap the rewards.

I’ve also learned that it is difficult for some people to receive their commissions from SFI. Some of you have to pay very high fees to cash a check from the US. Som you may want to accumulate your commissions until they reach a certain level before SFI sends you a check, so the fee will be a lower percentage of what you earn.

I’m still looking into this and I’ll be checking the SFI discussion board every few days to see if any news is forthcoming in this regard. If you learn something that works for you, please share it with us.

(Update: September, 2006 - SFI has made some dramatic improvements in working with international affiliates. I’ve written about some of them in my SFI Sales Team blog.)

That’s all for today.

As usual, if you have any questions, comments, feedback or want to talk to me about any of this, I look forward to hearing from you.

I’d like to recommend that you read the SFI discussion forum on a regular basis and post there if you have questions or comments. We’re a friendly bunch and there are some very helpful people there. Just remember that you can’t post contact information on their forum.

If there’s anything I can do to help you grow your SFI business, please let me know at your convenience. I always try to answer my email within two or three days or so.

All the best,

JD

PS. Want your own SFI business? If you’re willing to learn, set goals and work to achieve them, and have at least a couple of dollars per day to invest in growing your business, please click the link and join my sales team today.

Gery Carson, President of SFI Marketing Group announced some important changes in the International Association of Home Business Entrepreneurs.

Since its inception in January 2003, the International Association of Home Business Entrepreneurs (IAHBE) has dedicated itself to providing the timely advice, information, and resources home-business owners around the world need to launch, operate, and grow a successful business. This commitment to excellence continues in 2004 with some exciting enhancements to the Association–enhancements designed to bring even more value from an IAHBE membership.

On March 1, 2004, the IAHBE moved to an all-digital format. According to feedback IAHBE members provided in the recent Association survey, a vast majority prefer getting their business materials online.

This new emphasis on online access has already resulted in a brand new look, feel, and organization for the IAHBE website.

Updated with a cleaner, more user-friendly interface, the newly redesigned IAHBE site now makes navigating to the material you’re looking for easier than ever. Articles and reports are now organized by topic, for example, while audio seminars, book and tool reviews, interviews, and other resources are listed in their own easy-access directories.

Here’s another MAJOR new bonus: The doors to the IAHBE archives have been swung wide open to ALL members of the IAHBE. This means that, as a member, you now have access to the entire IAHBE library, containing over 150 exclusive articles and expert reports, hours and hours of expert audio seminars, dozens of SFI-related business-building resources, and much more.

That’s not all! The IAHBE site will now be updated WEEKLY with fresh, new content, giving you a never-ending supply of new exclusive articles, expert reports, audio seminars, SFI resources, special IAHBE-exclusive offers, and more!

If you haven’t stopped by the IAHBE website lately, you owe it to yourself to check it out now.

After you visit the site and look it over, I’d like to invite you to become a member today.