Breath -- five minutes can change your life | Stacey Schuerman | TEDxCha...

Being a Grandad

I think I've finally graduated as a Grandad! During my regular chores I found myself humming 'Baa Baa Blacksheep'. The thing is I can remember the words !!!not sure whether it is a worrying development or just how it is. I am happy with the latter justification and am off to practice Incy Wincy Spider' 

How books can open your mind | Lisa Bu

Best Ted Talks 2015 - Draw your future - Take control of your life

Banned TEDTalk about Psychic Abilities | Russell Targ

As a keen follower of 'TED Talks' I came across this video recently. I have always been fascinated by this subject since I was at university and spent many an evening (in the pub) discussing strange events with my friend and colleague, Bob Rickard. Bob was quite an expert in paranormal activities and unexplained events and as the founder and early editor of 'The Fortean Times' he has written a great number of articles and books about this subject, (primarily based on the works of Charles Fort), containing articles about, for extreme example, 'Falls of Frogs' from the sky, (100's of them!)

The interesting thing about this talk is that the speaker is a hard-nosed physicist and his talk is based on personal as well as recorded experiences, with surprising results. Plenty of food for thought. Judge for yourselves, as always any comments below add to the debate. Happy viewing.

House Rules!

Just an amusing item seen whilst whiling away the time in a DIY store. The thing which took my eye (and the reason for buying it) was the reference to 'running in the house'. As the grandfather of a two year old with boundless energy I thought it wise to introduce him to some health and safety issues. 

10 mile walk

10.00am Off along the banks of the Wansbeck, to the coast and up to Newbiggin thence through the Queen Elizabeth Country Park and back home. 10 miles, 2 1/2 hrs good stretch, beautiful country/seaside, minus calories, plus diminishing size 😇

8 Things to Remember When Starting Any Blog

1  Start your blog on the right platform.  There are many companies out there where you can start a free blog but no matter who they are and what services they offer it would still best to choose the number one writing platform which is WordPress.com.

A blog can be started either by signing up for free or by getting your domain which will make your blog unique. This will insure that you can now start building your house.

2  Choose the template which will fit your personality and business.  You can choose many different templates and view these templates before you install them on your WordPress.com website. This can save you a lot of time later and you won't have to change your whole site around if you are happy with the correct template and sometimes the keyword here is simple is best.

3  Choose a template which is not complicated and will work for your business as well. I have to admit that this is indeed the easiest way for anybody to start a blog.

4  Get the main elements together on your blog.  A few pages must be created and then added to your menu in your back office. This includes about us page, home, contact us, privacy policy, income disclaimer if needed. The privacy policy can be created for free online.

These pages important and it will tell your audience more about your business and what type of services you are offering. Not only is it fun to create your blog, but it is all about your personality as well.

WordPress.com is not a difficult site to work with and in time you will do it with eyes close.

5  Add content that is relevant to your site.

Adding content is the best way to add more value for your subscribers. The most important thing is to give them more than what they are asking for. We are not all writers but if you don't have the time to add content it can always be outsourced.

6  Spend time on a regular basis to update your content.  There is nothing worse than going to a site and the author just seemed to have abandoned his site. It isn't always true that the biggest sites are the most popular. The one thing that they do that we can really learn from them is that they make sure that they are consistent.

7  Learn more about SEO methods.  Unfortunately, we were not born with all the knowledge in the world. Spending time on doing research that can help your site is a definite investment and one that you can always use to improve your site.

It is only the beginning that is the hardest, but learning how to optimize your site will not only bring your site more traffic, more sign ups but most definitely build your community or your list.

8  Focus on what you do know and not what you don't know.  There will be technical things that you don't understand at first, but this is not a problem. This will only be an indication of how many things you will still need to learn.

The internet is filled with free source offering information on any topic or subject that you might acquire or need. Spend your time wisely and focus on what you still need to learn before things will change around for you.

Finally, no matter what you do never give up!  Build a blog or website can be overwhelming at first and the wonderful thing about the mind is that we remember by practice on a regular basis. These are simple things to remember, but very important if your blog is going to be successful.

I had to redo my template in the beginning and this took me three months. Now I do understand that if I had this knowledge in the beginning, it would have changed my world around.

Learning one thing every single day will improve your life and your blog. In the beginning you might not see results and it is only temporary. The main thing to remember is to do what 90% of marketers will never do and that is sticking it out until you are happy with the end results.

SOURCE

Power Foods for the Brain | Neal Barnard | TEDxBismarck

What you can do to prevent Alzheimer's | Lisa Genova

Your Most Important Launch Tool: Building Your List

Growing your business from scratch each day isn't easy.

Maybe you aren't completely starting over, but if you're working to grow your business online, it sure can feel that way. Every day is a new struggle to build your email list. Each morning you start at zero for the day and work to see how many new subscribers you can get.

It can be frustrating, adding new email subscribers. It's hard work convincing people that you really want to help them, to provide them with terrific content they are going to love. You work hard to write terrific emails and engaging blog posts and yet your subscriber list builds slowly. You feel like the tortoise.

You know this is work you have to do, but boy, isn't it easier to just hop on to your social media account and engage with your fans there? Images, video, fast moving comments - these are the things that pump you up and get your juices flowing. Be careful, this is where you become dangerously close to becoming the hare.

Sure, it's nice to have a massive following on social media. It feels good to know that people respect you, that they enjoy interacting with you, but have you ever considered that these leads, these social media fans you have are not your own?

It's All About Your List: Your Email List

In the world of online marketing, where everything is virtual, all you really have... is your list.

The list of people who love what you're doing, will follow your every word and are likely to buy whatever you sell. If that valuable list of people who love you is only on social media, you are operating at the whim of a company you can't control.

What if you woke up tomorrow and Facebook was gone? How would that affect your business, your client interaction? What if it were Pinterest, or Instagram or Twitter?

Over the past few years we've seen how platforms modify their policies, change their algorithms, and decide to start charging us if we want followers to see our content. This is no way to build your business: at the mercy of someone else's business success.

Whether you have hundreds or thousands of followers on Facebook, Pinterest or Twitter, you eventually need to move them to your email list if you want to be able to market to them. This can be much more difficult than it sounds. It is easy for people to decide to engage with you on social media, there's very little commitment on their part. All they have to do is click a button. They can log in or out at will, they can block you, or they can unfollow you and you'll never even know. Don't let a huge social media following to give you a false feeling of your popularity.

Just yesterday I responded to someone who is launching her product and despite the fact she has thousands of followers on FB who love what she's doing and like her posts, she's unable to get them to buy. That's because social media is for interaction, not sales.

Building Your List is Personal 

Getting into someone's email inbox is much more personal than getting them to "like" or share something you've posted on social media. Instead of your message being one of thousands they scroll through quickly and "like" without reading, now your message is among those of the people they care most about: their family and friends.

Once someone trusts you with their email address, once you begin offering them amazing content as your beloved subscriber, they will tell you they appreciate what you have to say by engaging with you, by buying from you. They are allowing you into their inner circle. Make sure you deserve to be there.

Yes, building an email list is hard. Yes it can be slow, but it is also the very best way to give your business a firm and solid foundation. You may feel like a tortoise, but at least your home moves along with you, it isn't left behind in the interest of the next flashy new thing.

If you want to build an amazing online business, if you want to be able to launch incredible products to the people who most respect and admire you, trust me. Your most important launch tool is your email list.

SOURCE

Its not about you!

There's nothing more irritating than to be lectured by a zealot who thinks his/her way of doing things is the only way. I can assure you that that is not the main premise of this blog. I am doing this for my own purposes and the exercise of putting my experience in the form of a newsletter is a challenge, something different to occupy my mind. Should it be of any assistance to anyone else then that pleases me but I do not propose myself as campaigner or a 'disciple' of any kind, the very thought bugs me. I am embarking on a new venture simply because I needed something to stretch me. Following a relatively successful career in education and a short period of time playing golf (badly) I realised I was vegetating and needed something to stimulate the grey matter. Thus I did some research and found something I thought had the potential to do what I was looking for. The ability to work from home was a big attraction, indeed, as I began to discover, the 'business' can be done from anywhere (e.g. you often see marketing material showing bronzed young men/women with their laptops on their beach towel.) Though possible, I am content to be writing this whilst on a short break 'house minding' for my in-laws, anywhere, as it happens, there is an internet connection is a workable environment. That appeals to me. The subject of the 'business' is 'Social Media', something I confess I knew little about (I should explain that although my main criteria in terms of involvement in a new venture was cerebral there is a good opportunity of making some money as well). Indeed I suspect, like most people of my generation, I was of the opinion that elements such as Twitter and Facebook were simple teenage fads. winging trivia across the atmosphere without much substance. How wrong I was, using either/both of them for business purposes is a totally different proposition and I am learning to do so in the belief that I will soon be able to generate a reasonable level of income from a home based business which is giving me plenty of food for thought. It is not easy. There is much to learn and key to it all is persistence. There have been times when I questioned my involvement but I am encouraged by the level of support I receive and my confidence and level of expertise is growing exponentially. The Internet is a vast arena of opportunity and there are a myriad of ways one can benefit from participating. It can be a frightening thing and the consequences of making a mistake can be daunting, however it is like most things in life, how did you learn to drive a car? by going to someone who has done it before; listening to their advice; accepting their support/encouragement; practising their proposals; passing the test of your capability and then continuing to learn as different situations present themselves. I am following a similar path in terms of the business of Social Media Marketing. It is fascinating, challenging and potentially lucrative. All it needs is positivity and the desire to make the most of your capabilities. I now have a blog of my own, I am regularly posting on  Facebook and Twitter with a long list of 'followers' and just three months ago I didn't have a clue. I have targets and I am attempting to shake off 50 years of bad habits which affect the way I look at the 'new order' of things. I want my independence back! 

It is possible. Let me know what you think, always interested.

You are never too old!! 

for your first 'driving lesson' try

http://tiny.cc/2y17ky

Ashington, Northumberland

Its funny how, even after 50 years of displacement, a visit to the 'homeland' twangs the heart strings. Here for a number of reasons, my wife to see old friends and me to catch up on work in a peaceful and tranquil setting, we are currently house sitting for our brother and sister in law who have beautiful riverside walks just minutes from their door. 

I have taken advantage of this, early morning, to burn off some calories before breakfast, all part of the 'new me' routine aimed at losing a few pounds (three pairs of trousers hanging redundantly in the wardrobe). Fast walking, I hasten to add, before anyone gets a mistaken image of me jogging or some other extreme activity. 2.4 miles were completed in 38 mins. avg. pace (15.49 mins/mile) with 314 calories burned off. Add in a low calorie diet, (mainly fruit and veg.) and things are looking good. 

Feeling great, fit and healthy with 5 more days up here to complete the job. Looking to get under 13 stones in weight for the first time for 12 months (13.8 at the start of the journey) Watch this space.    

PM - Cragside, Rothbury, Northumberland - The Worlds first electrically powered house. (hydro electricity)


This is the most amazing place, my favourite National Trust property with astounding interiors which contain a vast variety of artefacts from all over the world. A particularly impressive feature is the magnificent marble fireplace . (shown right)


Unfortunately we missed the magnificent display of Rhododendrons which had reached full bloom some two weeks earlier and cover the extensive beautiful gardens with a rich variety of colours and textures. I would strongly recommend a visit not just to anyone interested in engineering technology (Lord Armstrong built an extensive business based around his work in shipbuilding and armaments) but also to those who enjoy horticulture. In typical National Trust style the history and beauty of the items on display within augment the extravagant interiors. Best allow a whole day to witness the full extent of this property, you won't be disappointed.

How to speak so that people want to listen | Julian Treasure

'Sound' advice

Isolation is the dream-killer, not your attitude | Barbara Sher | TEDxPr...

Positivity rules OK

Publish Powerful Articles On LinkedIn That Get Noticed

It's Well Worth The Trouble To Publish Articles On LinkedIn.

According to LinkedIn: the average Influencer post can tally up more than 31,000 views and receives more than 250 likes and 80 comments".

Granted not everyone is an influencer on LinkedIn with thousands of followers, however, if you are connected with people of similar interests and nurture the positive growth of your network you too can also see amazing results with a short period of time on LinkedIn.

To grow your Power on LinkedIn it's first important to remember the basics;

Maybe the most important thing is to have a profile picture with a clear headshot you and update your profile frequently.

On LinkedIn' you're creating a sort of online resume with your background and business acumen.

For self-employed individuals and small business owners, LinkedIn is an amazing opportunity for you to reflect upon your personal background and achievements allowing you to connect on a more personal level with your connections and share information or even create articles catered to or focused on your business.

What Does Publishing an Article on LinkedIn Accomplish?

"Publishing an article on LinkedIn is worth the effort and I have built an amazing network of positive connections from all around the world that love to read and comment on my articles. LinkedIn provides a network for businesses, article writers, and entrepreneurs."

If you have something to say to a large audience of business leaders and successful individuals LinkedIn is without a doubt the best social platform for you. With LinkedIn, you have the opportunity to reach other professionals from around the globe. You can connect with senior leaders, potential clients, employers, partners, mentors, or whatever connection suits your interest. If you have something to say to a large audience of business leaders and successful individuals LinkedIn is without a doubt the best social platform for you.

• It provides you the opportunity to connect with people that can even impact your business or career.

The audience on LinkedIn is looking for the content leaders;

Many posts or articles on LinkedIn can appear outside your connection network and can help you connect with related people long into the future. Don't be shy to make the first request to the connection it's a fabulous way to be introduced.

6 LinkedIn Stats That Stand Out: June 1st, 2017

1. LinkedIn sends nearly four times more people to your homepage than Twitter and Facebook.
2. LinkedIn helps big time in direct traffic to your site. In other words, the benefits of publishing are very much worth your while.
3. LinkedIn Users Are Way More Likely to Visit your Homepage
4. LinkedIn Is Growing Fastest Among New Graduates
5. Forty Percentage of users use LinkedIn Daily
6. 13% of Millennials (15-34 Years old) use LinkedIn.

LinkedIn has 466,000,000+ registered members according to its official counter. Some of the impressive country-by-country breakdowns include:

Although LinkedIn has proven such a powerful platform many business owners are barely using LinkedIn for the great possibilities;

• 128 million Americans use LinkedIn (40.1% of the entire population)
• 12 million Canadians use LinkedIn (34.1% of the entire population)
• The UK has 20 million LinkedIn users, Australia has 7 million, and India has 35 million

How do I write an article people will read and interact with?

It's easy and anyone can do it if. Begin with what's familiar and of interest to you. Then you need to select your topic;

• I like to start with my topic and subject header (six or seven words long). This helps set the tone for the entire article and the subject header can also change in tandem with your writing to cater to the core overall message.
• Fulfill a need or interest for your audience but also remembering your core audience and interests of your LinkedIn connections you're trying to influence.
• Research your topic and provide valuable information that will educate the reader. Think of Including details like images profiling your message, industry statistics or market research.
• Update your articles. After publishing your articles it's a good idea to keep your LinkedIn article publishings up to date and relevant to current information. Many writers think quickly and can make simple mistakes (It's allowed), so correcting your research or article information when presented with new information. It will always benefit the reader.Publishing an Article on LinkedIn

All you need is a LinkedIn account your article and a header image (recommended for best clarity 1200 x 628 and Image result for minimum size 1536 x 768 pixels.

SOURCE

Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person - Alain de Botton

Having been happily married for 49 years we must have been doing something right.(or wrong)

Social Engagement Tips You Can Count On

Social media has become one of the most used marketing tools on the internet today. Social media can be good or bad for your business and this is something to remember and live by. Remember while you can generate positive interest, it is just as easy to generate negative results, so you want to focus on your social engagement and ensure that you retain a good online reputation at all ties.

An affordable SEO packages company, has advised that there are five essential tips when it comes to social engagement that companies can rely on to boost their brand visibility, reach a wider audience and ensure that their clients notice them online daily, so that they are the first name they think of when it comes to buying a product or service that their clients provide.

It is essential that you take the time to listen to your customers, both online and offline. Is there certain questions a large percentage of your customers ask about your products? Do your customers look for more information on certain products before making a purchase? What can you add to your clients experience to help them with their choices? Maybe writing an interesting post on social media answering some of the questions is the first step to reaching your audience and new clients on a daily basis.

It is very important that you take note of all the comments that you receive to your social media page, good and bad. Facebook, for example, enables you to have a review button where clients can review your company, you can remove this option, but it will also remove the map of your location. If you choose to keep it on, then ensure that you respond to each and every comment and review, providing a positive answer and assisting the client. Clients will see you are trying to resolve any issues and will feel more confident dealing with your company moving forward.

Ensure you add high quality pictures and make use of informative and how to videos to attract more clients to your social media page. Every affordable SEO package will encourage you to attract more clients to your website and you can do this through social media. People on social media enjoy browsing pictures, reading interesting articles and watching videos. Always ensure the videos and pictures you upload are relevant to your industry and is something your customers will find interesting and hopefully want to share with their contact group.

Make use of promotions, competitions and offers. The more competitions or promotions that you run, the more interest you can create. Getting people to like your page, share the picture and have a chance to win is a great way to generate more interest and have more customers joining your page moving forward.

One of the most interesting things that companies will find helps them increase their social engagement is to ask questions. Ask questions relevant to your industry and give your clients chances to reply. Get a good conversation going and remain in the conversation wherever possible to ensure that your clients always feel that you are there to assist them and are on hand when they need you.

The final thing to be very careful of is to ensure that you respond to each private message that you receive via social media so that your clients can always feel connected. Don't automatically assume interested clients are going to email you directly, many will make use of the social media tools to get in contact, so keep an eye out for this.

Cartoozo is a multiple award-winning internet marketing agency with over ten years' experience in the online marketing environment. This company has an active customer base of over three hundred with their customers being based around the world. This company helps their customers achieve online success with a host of packages designed to meet their customers' needs and budgets. Cartoozo offer a host of expert services ranging from web design to search engine optimization and copy writing to pay per click advertising, just to name a few. They have a team of experienced and dedicated technicians and the entire team focus on customer satisfaction at all times. To find out more, visit http://www.cartoozo.com

SOURCE

Gathering More Top-Quality Twitter Followers

Twitter can be an extremely beneficial and valuable social media tool for your business. It has a variety of strong selling points, including its real-time aspect and the vast number of people who actually engage on Twitter on a regular basis.

You may not be aware of all that you can do with Twitter 

In spite of the 140-character (with spaces) limitation per tweet, you can still accomplish a great deal with each tweet that you send. When it comes to your content marketing efforts, the fact is that if you haven't done it already, you should make Twitter a permanent part of your content marketing strategy. As a social media tool, it has proven itself as a permanent member of the social media repository (or, at least, as permanent as anything can possibly be).

With that said, if you have a small (or relatively small) number of followers, it is time that you think about taking measures to increase that number. It can only benefit your business. Of course, it goes without saying that your number of followers (whatever that number happens to be) will not be very useful if those followers don't engage with you and your brand.

You don't merely want to increase your number of followers, you want to increase the number of followers with whom you can share a mutually beneficial relationship. Your constant desire should be to engage the right people for your brand and for your business.

Persevere and be patient 

Persistence and consistency are two extremely important qualities when it comes to engaging people through Twitter (as well as the other social media channels). If you want something to happen, you need to really stick with it and be committed to sharing great content with people a consistent number of days per week and on specific days of the week.

That is very important because, as you are building relationships with members of your target audience, those members will expect to see your content at regular intervals and it is your responsibility to make sure that they get what they want and need.

There are a few different ways that you can gain more Twitter followers but only you will be able to determine which of the following tips work for your particular business.

• Make your Twitter profile more visible: The first concept that you want to ensure is that your Twitter profile is as easy for other people to find as possible. There are a few basic ways that you can accomplish that, such as making sure that your profile is as complete as possible. That means that you have your name, biography, geographic location, website URL, and photo (a headshot is preferable).


• Promote your Twitter profile on other social media channels, website, etc.: Basically, the more opportunity you give people to connect with you on Twitter, the better your chances will be of increasing your number of Twitter followers. You want to make it as easy as possible for your target audience members to connect and interact with you. Not only will you find that existing online contacts will start to interact with you but there will also be other people who will reach out to you. Those people will be people who have not built relationships with you yet. It is a wonderful opportunity to increase your list of followers.


• Connect Twitter with live events with which you are involved: This is one of the easiest things to do. Use the hashtag of the event and start engaging people while you are at the live event. You may be surprised at how interested other people are to know about what is happening at your live event. Communicating in that way will make it very easy for other people to stay involved with the event and it will boost your visibility and reputation at the same time.


• Create a buzz about your brand and your offerings: If you have exciting products and/or services that you think may really entice other people, you should use a call-to-action (CTA) right in your tweet. Many people will be more than willing to check out what you have to offer. The CTA will allow the other people to reach out to you and start interacting.

Conclusion 

Twitter followers are very important for your business. Twitter is a powerful social media tool and many people like to interact that way. You will want to leverage Twitter as much as you need and you will start to see positive results before too long. Your Twitter followers will increase and your online presence will become stronger and gain a greater momentum before you know it.

Of course, your ability to successfully acquire new Twitter followers will be closely connected to the quality of your content. If your content does what it is supposed to do, your followers will want to retweet what you have shared. That is one of your main objectives. Finally, it is important to keep in mind that not only do you want to increase the number of Twitter followers but you also want those followers to be top-quality and appropriate for your particular business.

Michael Cohn is the founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of CompuKol Communications. He has over 25 years of experience in IT and web technologies. Mr. Cohn spent a significant amount of time at a major telecommunications company, where his main focus was on initiating and leading synergy efforts across all business units by dramatically improving efficiency, online collaboration, and the company's Intranet capabilities, which accelerated gains in business productivity. He also reduced company travel and travel costs by introducing and implementing various collaboration technologies.

His expertise includes business analysis; project management; management of global cross-matrix teams; systems engineering and analysis, architecture, prototyping and integration; technology evaluation and assessment; systems development; performance evaluation; and management of off-shore development.

Mr. Cohn earned a Master's degree in project management from George Washington University in Washington, DC; and a Master's degree in computer science and a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, NJ.

Mr. Cohn is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

SOURCE

The future

Following the disastrous result of the UK  election it remains to be seen whether promises made can be kept. Unholy alliances with Minority parties are likely to dictate compromise just when we need positivity. I was a last minute decider and IMO the outcome is the worst possible option. The uncertainty in terms of business and the Brexit negotiations is likely to have profound effects on employment and the economy as a whole. Assuming that the 'Brexiteers' are right it will take years to build up flourishing relationships with new business partners and who knows what the effect will be on existing partnerships within Europe. As these uncertainties take hold it could not be be a better time to become completely independent of the system and go it alone. Those who dipped their toes in the Online Marketing business in recent years have seen tremendous growth and with the tendency for more and more people to purchase goods and services through the internet it is only going to get bigger.

With this in mind I have invested in a programme fronted by a top level online marketer and the course  I will be following is aimed at building a solid business which I can take on and provide for my family into the future. I am developing a set of skills to enable me to take advantage of the current (and future) situation and in the process I aim to pass on experiences from my perspective to help others who might be thinking along the same lines, There is no magic bullet in this respect, it is taking a lot of hard and persistent work and I don't expect to see the benefits of my efforts for a few months yet, However, in twelve months I should have all of the tools to enable me to go it alone and sustain a growing business which can be handed on to my children to further develop. As I have said earlier in this blog the main aim is to generate a sustainable level of income for my children but also it has given me a new lease of life in terms of exercising the 'grey matter'. I felt that all of the skills I had developed over the years were being wasted and I felt I had so much more to offer. I am afterall ONLY 70 and needed a challenge to stimulate me and keep on growing. I plan to develop the blog to cover a range of associated elements linked to a perceived 'senior lifestyle', primarily associated with online marketing and my personal experiences I hope it will also provide some amusing asides. It is still early days and there's a lot to do but I am comfortable with the targets set and confident in the potential outcome. Watch this space. (and learn from my mistakes ;-) http://tiny.cc/2y17ky

You can grow new brain cells. Here's how | Sandrine Thuret

Theres still hope, if I can just remember 

How To Make Money On Your List

This month we're going to start a four month series on how to build your own business using a lead magnet, a squeeze page and Facebook. First we'll start with creating the perfect leads that targets your audience and makes them sign onto your list.

Then we're going to cover exactly how to build a squeeze page or landing page that gets those visitors to say, "YES! Add me to your list NOW!"  In our third installment we're going to cover how to get as much traffic as you want from Facebook.

Once you have learned all three of these skills, you can literally go into any market and create a list building machine in just days.

Better still, you can take it one step further and build a complete product funnel behind your lead magnet, offering a tripwire (low ticket) offer, followed by your main offer, followed by a big ticket item. In fact we are going to cover all of that in month 4 of this series.

First, we better reveal what a lead magnet is. You know those freebies you get for subscribing to a list? Those are lead magnets.  They're something offered as a free gift or enticement in exchange for an email address. And they're the easiest, fastest way to build a list of target subscribers.

Remember this: The goal of any lead magnet is to convert traffic into leads.

While it's true you can throw just about anything together and call it a lead magnet, it's also true that the better (and more targeted) the lead magnet is, the easier it will be to build a profitable list.  A lead magnet doesn't make money by itself. Yet working as your front line ambassador, they can be extremely lucrative.

As you know, there are three ways to grow a business:

· Increase the number of customers

· Increase the average transaction value per customer

· Increase the number of transactions per customer

With the right lead magnet, you can increase the number of prospects and customers you have joining your list.  And with a well-targeted niche, you can also increase the average transaction value and even the number of transactions per customer, by attracting the very best customers for your particular business.  As you go through the following sections, always think of your leads as an irresistible bribe that will offer real value to your prospects.

Your leads has to be so good, your prospects will 'buy' it with their email address.

It should be relevant to your niche and your offers.

It should be ultra-specific in what it gives to the user.

It should be priceless, in that the prospect can't easily Google the information and find it for themselves, or even buy it someplace else.

And it should be easily consumed, because you want the prospect to consume it immediately after they download it.

We'll go through each of these in turn in a moment.

The point to remember right now is this: Your lead magnet is perhaps the single most important piece of your entire marketing system.

The right leads will bring you a never ending stream of new prospects and soon-to-be customers. The wrong leads will bring either the wrong prospects for your offers, or no prospects at all.

Discover how to engage and excite new customers into taking action and spending money with you by using these simple free marketing tips from Nick James, The Internet Business Coach http://www.Nick-James.com

What Happens If You Eat 4 Almonds Every Day

I find food and its effects on the body fascinating. More than just an 
antidote to hunger, food articles such as this open our eyes to many 
more of the benefits (and potential dangers) of eating everyday items. 
Small changes can have a massive effect if done consistently, and the
mantra 'healthy mind healthy body' is possible without having to be a fanatic,
just be committed and a more comfortable lifestyle can be achieved.

Attract Search Engines To Your WordPress Blog

WordPress and SEO go hand in hand because the search engines favor the WordPress blogging platform to a high extent. If you have a WordPress blog, then you probably will receive a higher ranking than other websites. Reasonably, your chances will be improved if you get some things right initially. You can choose any topic out there and there will be loads of WordPress blogs covering that topic. But, for many different causes, they do not all have excellent search engine rankings. You have to learn how to optimize your WordPress blog for the search engines. Ensure that you place specific things in motion so that you will be ranked highly for your keyword.

Paid themes are a safer way to go and do not use advertisements. If you can meet the expense, you should initially select a high class theme that is not shared and this will allow you less hassles.

Have Trackbacks in Your Comments:

One of the main things that helps your WordPress blog get excellent ranking is the trackbacks. This makes it simple to have links made in the comments section to anyone who is linking to your content. When you allow trackbacks on your WordPress blog, this gives other people an avenue for linking to your articles and making a backlink for you. If you do your homework, you will learn that most of well populated WordPress blogs have trackbacks turned on. This is a method for allowing others to link to your article if they found it fascinating.

Sprinkle Keywords in Your Content:

Even if you run your site on the WordPress platform that doesn't mean that you can waive off the basic principles of SEO. You should always maintain a decent keyword density in your articles so that you're not completely ignoring this aspect. Don't stuff too many keywords into your content but weave them in at targeted locations that seem vital; beef up your synonym use to keep from repeating your keywords too many times within your article.

WordPress blogs do seem to have a distinct advantage when it comes to optimizing for search engines. It's the small stuff that will make or break you no matter how huge or small your blog may be at the second. Why aren't you getting started yet? Now your blog can be a huge player in a really huge pond. These three things can help make that happen.

Corey Preiss has been involved in SEO for 6 years. Go to Mandatory Blog SEO for more articles.

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A Japanese Method to Raise Creative Kids

Quality!!, character building and respect. Wake up western world. Old fashioned habits? Reminds me of my early primary education and homelife, emphasis on play and experimentation.

Blog For Fun And Profit

Blogging has become very, very popular in recent times and that popularity continues to grow by the day. Many blogs are run purely as a social outlet to share views, interests, information, etc. with friends and anyone else who wants to read. The vast majority of bloggers are not especially interested in using their blogs as a means of generating income but some people have seized on what is a great profitable opportunity.

If you are considering this latter option, however, simply sitting down at your computer and typing away is not going to bring in the money you are looking for. So how can you turn your blogging into a viable business? There are a number of ways that this can be achieved. Here are a few tips that will get you started and, hopefully, help you turn your hobby into a profitable career.

First of all, rather obviously, if you don't already have a blog you need to create one. Two of the most popular platforms these days seem to be 'WordPress' and Google's 'Blogger'. One big advantage of blogging sites is that they are usually free to set up and free to use. These are very easy to setup and there are many instructional videos on You Tube to help you with this.

Secondly, you need to decide how you are going to create income streams from your blog. There are a number of ways to do just that. The most popular way is to place adverts on your blog site. There are various internet based companies who will place adverts on your site for you. You will then receive a financial reward every time someone clicks on one of these ads. Google AdSense is one of the most widely used. An alternative is to sell a product or service from your website and use your blog to bring in customers. A sort of combination of these two strategies would be to advertise someone else's product on your site and then get some sort of commission from that person. Whatever method you decide on to monetize your blogging you need a plan, a strategy to follow consistently to maximise your profits. Once you have your blog and your strategy in place you are your way to a blogging career.

The third and most important step is to drive traffic to your site. Once your blog is set up it will only be effective as a money-making source if people visit it. Internet marketing, to a large degree, is a numbers game. The more traffic you can bring to your website the more people will read your blogs and other content. By the law of averages more visitors equals more sales and/or ad-clicks. So, how are you going to draw that traffic to your blog site? In this the use of keywords is important. There was a time when keywords were almost the only criteria. That is no longer the case. Search engines now respond to activity, (ie - regular new posts, backlinks, etc.) You need high quality content on your site to bring traffic from search engines to your blog.

Blogging is an enjoyable pastime to many but the potential is also there to develop a profitable business if you are prepared to put in the time and effort to learn how.

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UK election: what you need to know | World

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, decisions, decisions. 

At least we have a choice #democracy

If you have already heard about attraction marketing and know what it is, you already know so much more than many out there using the internet to grow their business. You have a feeling that it's exactly THE strategy for you and the perfect way for you prefer to come across out there, but are not entirely sure as how to get started.

Today we'll give you some tips here on how to get on with it right here, right now. Being an attraction marketer doesn't mean that you should not offer people what you have. On the contrary. It's the WAY you offer your product service or opportunity that is different.

The difference between attraction marketing and ordinary marketing is that you do not "spam" people, stuffing your service or product down their throat. This unfortunately happens all the time on social media and the truth is that NOBODY likes it.

And no one never really has built a long-term successful business that way. No top earner that I know of has built their empire using that method. They ALL used attraction marketing - and so should you.


Your focus is firstly on making relations with your prospects and THEN you start considering whether or not what you have is a good fit for that person. So distinguish between being an advisor or a seller. And distinguish between being intruding and being valuable.

So, let's get started shall we!

STEP 1   First of all you need to take a look at ALL your online profiles. Are they attractive?

Are YOU attractive? Take a look at your different timelines and see if you would be attracted to you. Is it positive, inspiring, fun, motivating, informing? 

Because that's what it should be. And when I say informing I'm not talking about product or company links scattered all over your personal profile. That is you being a seller. People don't like that, especially not new friends you make.

Imagine you add someone as a friend. The first thing they do is to go check out your personal profile. If they find advertising all over the place, they will know why you added them and they'll get out of there as quickly as possible. So first thing first. Your profile must be attractive, inspiring, informative and inviting.

STEP 2  Invest in yourself!  Buy a course on attraction marketing or a course with the strategy you'd like to start implementing. 

It could be a Facebook or an Instagram course. Education is essential!  To get better and being able to advice others you need to study.  Choose only ONE social media platform and become an expert on that. And make sure to keep your focus on that one platform. Also make sure to be active, engaging and interactive with other people on your platform.

STEP 3  Now start sharing some of the valuable content that you have just learned. Some of the tips from the course you are doing. Share, share, share. You can easily make a small cheat-sheet on 5 of the best tips you've just learned, save it as an PDF and share it with people in exchange of their email. Start building your list this way and send out emails to your list with the latest tips and tricks you learn from your course.

Invest, Learn & Teach say's Ray Higdon and you'll find that people will start reaching out TO you instead of YOU running after them.

And when THAT happens it will feel just amazing, believe me!

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Are You Ignoring Social Media Marketing To The Detriment Of Your Company?

In today's market, businesses cannot dismiss social media as a way to get good exposure to potential customers, as well as being able to enhance their company brand. In fact, social media has become a well-known and popular way for businesses to extend their reach in a very cost-effective and efficient manner. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have millions of registered users, with these numbers expanding immeasurably on a daily basis. In fact, if it were a country, Facebook would now be the largest country on Earth* - with an estimated 1.39 billion people logging into Facebook from month-to-month, that makes it bigger than the entire population of China that has 1.36 billion people. Therefore it would be a huge mistake for any business, small or large, to ignore the economic value that these websites could be to them.

Social media for business has many advantages and the prime one is that it allows you to reach out to a large set of online audience base who are telling you what their interests they have. There are entire groups of people who are telling the world that they have an interest in photography. They even tell you what level they are at when it comes to this space. Does your business cater to amateur photographers who are just starting to learn how to take better photographs? Search Facebook and you'll find groups of people who fit that category perfectly! Do you sell small dog outfits for breeds like Shih Tzus or Chihuahuas? Guess what! There are so many groups for these breeds of dogs full of doting owners who want to spoil their four-legged friends. And it is so easy for you to get involved in these communities and reach out to the group members.

In the past advertising online was so expensive. Search engine pay-per-click advertising tended to have the monopoly for these types of opportunities, but the problem was that it was so expensive, and you were often paying Google or Yahoo a few dollars for every click that people carried out on your ads, even if the click was made by mistake, or by a competitor who was trying to run up your advertising bill. The other problem was that you very limited when it came to controlling who saw your ad and would therefore, have the opportunity to click on it. In fact, the only control you had was to say which keywords should be searched before your ad would be seen.

With Facebook ads, online advertising has become way more affordable, and you have so much more control over who sees your ads. You can limit visibility by age, sex, religion, stated interests, location and even by purchasing history. And best of all, your ad costs will be measured in cents and not dollars.

The other benefit with social media is that potential buyers will often be influenced by the reviews and comments of previous customers of a business that they read online. If your customer satisfaction stinks, then perhaps this is not such good news. But for the more reliable and conscientious suppliers who take customer satisfaction seriously then this can be used to their advantage.

So what are you waiting for? If you haven't already it's time for you to take the social media's bull by the horns and to show it who's the master. If you don't know where to start, there are so many social media experts out there who are waiting to show you how they can help you and your business. Or, if you're more of a do-it-yourselfer, then there are numerous books and videos on YouTube or Vimeo that can help you get started. Make the decision to start building your own online marketing strategy today, and it is only a matter of time before your business will be enjoying the benefits of brand and product recognition on the major social media sites.

* http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/28/facebook-biggest-country_n_6565428.html

Earl Gardner is the founder and owner of Alchemy Digital Media, a website development and online marketing company in Fort Myers, FL. Earl has worked directly with many small to medium-sized businesses to help them develop and implement their own online marketing strategies and shown them how to measure success and re-organize their online marketing plans to help them get a better return on their marketing investments while maximizing their financial and personnel resources.

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