Over half the small businesses that open their doors today, will close their doors in less than a year. That’s a 50% failure rate and that’s scary. But if business owners set their mindset before opening their businesses, the failure rate could drop.

Every entrepreneur faces a plethora of mindset challenges. We’re going to look at three of the common challenges that plague small business owners in a series of three articles.

Article 1 – Business Pitfall #1: Money Paradigm
Article 2 – Business Pitfall #2: No Plan
Article 3 – Business Pitfall #3: Information Overload

Business Pitfall #3: Information Overload

Information overload has become part of our every day life. Each day, the average person is exposed to almost 4,000 marketing messages. That’s in addition to the regular information they need to complete their jobs. The only way to cut through the noise is to focus.

Ignore the “amazing offer” that ends at midnight and will never be repeated. Today’s hot product is replaced by tomorrow’s hot product. To focus, you need to choose a path and follow it.

Although it’s very easy to look at this information and say, “I know that,” or “I have seen that before,” do not fall into the trap of misreading the simplicity. Knowing how to do something and actually doing it are two different things.

The easiest way to cut out the information overload in your life is selective ignorance. Ignore whatever is not important to you at this moment. If you’re working on a project, put your full focus into the project and block out anything that is not relevant to that project.

Although it’s easier said than done, you can learn to do it. Start by saying a polite “No” to unrelated activities that don’t help you finish your current project. At first it will feel unusual, but when you finish projects in record time, the rewards outweigh the slight awkward feeling of saying “No.”

Learning to cut through information overload is like discovering a 36 hour day. It’s an adrenaline rush. Finishing projects in record time, leaves you more time for the more important things in life, like golf and beaches

Terry Telford

- - -
Terry Telford is a co-founder of iClick University, a step-by-step program for building your internet business. For a full course outline, visit http://www.iClickUniversity.com
- - -

Over half the small businesses that open their doors today, will close their doors in less than a year. That’s a 50% failure rate and that’s scary. But if business owners set their mindset before opening their businesses, the failure rate could drop.

Every entrepreneur faces a plethora of mindset challenges. We’re going to look at three of the common challenges that plague small business owners in a series of three articles.

Article 1 – Business Pitfall #1: Money Paradigm
Article 2 – Business Pitfall #2: No Plan
Article 3 – Business Pitfall #3: Information Overload

Business Pitfall #2: No Plan

Let’s start with a well-known saying “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”. Without a plan you have no idea where you are going or how to get there. You do not need a 50-page thesis outlining every detail of your business. All you need is a very simple action plan.

A plan will also help you set benchmarks and allows you to celebrate your successes as you progress.

Setting up a simple business plan can be as easy as defining your:

1. Objectives
2. Strategies
3. Tactics
4. Daily To Do List

Objectives
Starting at the top, your objectives are your broad overview. They define what you want to accomplish. For example, ABC Business will gross $100,000 in sales in 2009…

Strategies
Your strategies answer your objectives. They describe how you are going to accomplish the objective you’ve set. For example, …by selling affiliate products on the internet…

Tactics
Your tactics explain how you plan to accomplish your strategies. They explain what you’re going to do in more detail. For example, …by setting up 10 websites that promote 5-10 products each and then promoting them…

Daily To Do List
And the final piece of your business plan is your daily to do list. This is where the rubber hits the road and where you take a definite action or actions, every single day. For example, …by writing one article per week, contacting ten new joint venture partners each week, and placing pay per click advertising on Google and Yahoo.

When you piece them all together you have a specific objective that will be met daily by your To Do list actions. For each business objective, you’ll have a complete path to a daily To Do list.

Here’s what your plan for the first objective looks like:

ABC Business will gross $100,000 in sales in 2009… by selling affiliate products on the internet… by setting up 10 websites that promote 5-10 products each and then promoting them… by writing one article per week, contacting ten new joint venture partners each week, and placing pay per click advertising on Google and Yahoo.

Now you have a very specific business plan with a daily To Do list. It makes it very easy to measure your progress by measuring what you accomplish each day and the results from each action you take.

Your business plan doesn’t have to be a book, it simply has to be a plan that you can follow to achieve your goals. And the smaller, more easy to follow your plan is, the more likely you are to follow it to success.

Terry Telford

- - -
Terry Telford is a co-founder of iClick University, a step-by-step program for building your internet business. For a full course outline, visit http://www.iClickUniversity.com
- - -

Watch for a series of iClick University stories. This is Fred’s Story:

Talk again soon.

Enjoy your day!

Terry Telford

Trenton, Ontario – April 1, 2009 – iClick University just released it’s new business development program, the Dynamic Internet Business Program. The three-semester course can be completed in less than a month and turns the average person into an Internet business owner. The self-directed program offers a step-by-step approach to setting up an online business and is easy enough for even a beginning internet user to follow.

The co-founders of iClick University, Terry Telford and Richard Butler, have 17 years of combined e-commerce experience, and a total of 31 years business experience. Both have successful consulting businesses and started iClick University to help the average person pull themselves out of their current economic situation.

Telford said, “Recent statistics show the average person is spending 114% of their income. Thanks to credit card debt, most people are effectively bankrupt. Getting out of that kind of debt is extremely difficult without an additional income. The internet provides people with the additional income they need.”

But starting a small business on the internet is not as easy as it first appears. As Butler said, “Type “Make money” into Google and you’ll find 232,000,000 results. That’s a potential 232,000,000 different ways to start a business. The average person needs one. One simple, step-by-step training program that shows them exactly what to do to set up and market a business on the internet. That’s what the iClick University Dynamic Internet Business Program does.”

The average person with little or no business experience can follow the course and have a fully functional website that makes sales within 30 days. The entire course takes about 70 hours and is fully self-directed. If the student wants to work at it full time, they can complete it in a week or two. If they want to work at it part time, they can take two or three months if they want. It’s completely up to the student.

For a course outline and further details on the program, visit http://www.iClickUniversity.com

About Terry Telford Communications Inc. and Ebits.ie

iClick University is a co-operative program designed by Terry Telford Communications Inc., based in Trenton, Ontario, Canada, and Ebits.ie, based in Dublin, Ireland. Terry Telford Communications Inc. specializes in consulting for small and medium businesses. Ebits specializes in personal and business coaching. Together, the owners of both companies worked on the core of iClick University for three years, prior to its release on April 1, 2009.

Contact Info:

Terry Telford

Terry Telford
Terry Telford Communications Inc.
PO Box 22111, Trenton Centre RPO
Trenton, Ontario
K8V 6S3
Canada
Skype: terry_telford
Web: http://www.iClickUniversity.com

Over half the small businesses that open their doors today, will close their doors in less than a year. That’s a 50% failure rate and that’s scary. But if business owners set their mindset before opening their businesses, the failure rate could drop.

Every entrepreneur faces a plethora of mindset challenges. We’re going to look at three of the common challenges that plague small business owners in a series of three articles.

Article 1 – Business Pitfall #1: Money Paradigm
Article 2 – Business Pitfall #2: No Plan
Article 3 – Business Pitfall #3: Information Overload

Business Pitfall #1: Money Paradigm

A paradigm is a commonly held belief, or way of thinking. Sometimes it may be true, but quite often it is not. For example, in ancient times, a common paradigm was, “the world is flat.” Science proved that paradigm to be false.

Today, a common paradigm is, money is in limited supply. The truth is, there is no limit to the amount of money you can amass. The only real commodity in limited supply is time. However, you must remember that time is your friend, not your enemy! Every person has the same amount of time in a day. But people use their time differently. The activities of a multimillionaire are much different than those of a struggling factory worker.

Today, most people’s outlook on money is defined by their paycheck. If they make $3,000 a month, they try to squeeze their lifestyle into a $3,000 box. They live in a house they can almost afford, they drive a vehicle they don’t like and they travel only as much as their credit card allows. They think money is limited.

In the industrial age, that was somewhat true. People could get a second job to supplement their income, but they rarely got further ahead, because they were still limited by the amount of time they could work. Thank goodness we’re not in the industrial age. At the turn of the century we entered the information age.

Today, you can sit in front of your computer for an hour or two and make tens, even hundreds of times more money than you could make in the industrial age. Your income is no longer limited to the number of hours you can work. It’s only limited by your imagination, your knowledge and your action.

People all over the world are turning to the internet to start a small business venture. The advantages of a virtual business include, no commuting, very low start up costs, minimal maintenance fees, flexible work hours, no set location – work wherever there’s an internet connection, and no boss hanging over your shoulder.

The internet opens a whole new world of possibilities for ordinary people who are willing to push through the money paradigm.

Terry Telford

Terry Telford is a co-founder of iClick University, a step-by-step program for building your internet business. For a full course outline, visit http://www.iClickUniversity.com

Hi there

I’ll try to keep this brief, but I’m really, really
excited, so I may ramble a bit

I need 100 Beta Testers to stress test and critique a brand
new training system. And that’s fantastic news for both of
us.

I’ll start at the beginning, so you know where this came
from.

I get at least 10 emails or phone calls each week from
people who want to know how to start an online business. I
sympathize with everyone who is struggling to start an
online business, but I don’t have time to train each person
individually.

The flip side of the coin is to hire me as a consultant,
but my fees don’t fit most beginning internet entrepreneur’s
budgets.

So there is a gap between teaching people how to set up and
profit from an online business and the new business owner’s
ability to pay for the consulting they need.

This is a gap that’s frustrated me for a while, because I’d
love to help everyone enjoy the internet business owner’s
lifestyle. And now I can

Here’s how:
Three years ago, my business coach, Richard Butler, and I
started working on a training system that combines the best
of both worlds. Our goal was to create a self-directed
university style course, but have contact with the students
at the same time.

We wanted to answer your questions live, in an open
TeleClass environment. And help you build a profitable
internet business, based on systems. So you could plug into
the system and repeat it as many times as you want in as
many internet businesses as you want.

We wanted a training program that took you right from the
beginning and taught you how to clone the way successful
entrepreneurs think. How to start at the beginning and
register a domain name, set up hosting, design a simple
product and build a basic website. And finally, how to get
lots of visitors, so you make lots of sales.

That’s what we wanted. And that’s what we built.

And now it’s your turn to put it to the ultimate test.

We are allowing 100 people to Beta Test the system and give
us feedback. It means getting into the system and using
everything we’ve provided for you.

Then we’re going to get on group conference call and
discuss what you like about the course and what you’d like
improved.

If you’d like to become a Beta Tester and learn how to
start and run a profitable internet business at the same
time, I invite you to visit

http://www.iClickUniversity.com

I look forward to hearing your comments.

Talk again soon.

Enjoy your day!

Terry Telford

Terry

Hi there my marketing friend

I have a bit of an interesting story for you. I’ve just started using YouTube a bit more and I thought it would be handy to put this tutorial on it. I spent about 12 hours creating the video and then discovered that YouTube only allows 10 minute videos. The original video was 12 minutes. Oops.

So I redid the video and cut out about 3 minutes, but that also cut out a big chunk of content I really wanted to share, so I’ve included my original script here, so you can also benefit from the content you don’t get to see in the YouTube video.

I hope this helps if you’re thinking about using Private Label Rights products.

- - - Original Script Starts Here - - -

Welcome to How to profit with private label rights and a review of Private Label Secrets.

Private Label Rights (PLR) are used by some of the top internet entrepreneurs to quickly create products with very little investment of time or capital. Unfortunately, most internet entrepreneurs who have heard about PLR, make very little money with it. Instead of following a profitable plan, they run around in circles like a dog chasing its tail. Here’s why.

PLR products are completely customizable. Whether it’s an ebook, a piece of software, or a graphics package, you have complete control over the content. It’s the same as if I write an ebook for you and then give it to you and let you put your name on it and take all the credit for the content as if it’s yours. It’s fast, it’s simple and it’s completely legal.

So why doesn’t everyone do it? Because it takes some work, it’s a very minimal amount of work, but it is work. Most people are chasing get rich quick schemes so their impression of a successful PLR business is to buy lots of PLR products, stick them on a website and sell them to other people who do the same.

It doesn’t take very long until the market is saturated with the same PLR products on all the PLR websites. And then the average entrepreneur says, “PLR products don’t work.”

Meanwhile, the entrepreneurs who have actually opened the zip file that the PLR product came in are making money hand over fist, because they took the time to customize the product and introduce it to the market as their own.

Here’s how simple it is:

1. Edit the ebook and add some of your own content. Add your own personal style and charm to the product. Then add your name as the author
2. Personalize the graphics or have a graphic designer do it for you
3. Edit the sales letter and again add your own style and character to it

When you’ve got the product complete, you can

1. Publish your website and send traffic to it. So you sell it as a stand alone product
2. If you embed affiliate links into it, you can give it away as a freebie. When your reader’s click on your affiliate links, you get paid
3. You can use them as a tool for your affiliates and allow them to re-brand the product with their affiliate links to your products
4. You can turn the written ebook into an audio and sell it as an audio ebook which adds value to the package
5. You can strip the book down and turn it into articles
6. You can add a workbook to it and market it as a course

Now just for comparison, let’s look at what it would cost to have your own ebook written.

Costs $200 - $500 for a good 50 page ebook
Graphics for a website including affiliate marketing pieces $150 - $250
Sales letter - $750 - $1,200

In real costs, you’re looking at  $1,100 - $1,950. That’s still good because you save a huge amount of time and all the heavy lifting is done for you. You don’t have to take care of all the intricate details of writing and designing.

And coming from someone who’s been on both sides of the table, I’d much rather pay someone to do the hard work.

Now the flip side of the coin with PLR products is, you’re not the only one with the product. Even though you’ve customized the product and it has your own design and feel, the core of the product is still out there for anyone to duplicate.

So it’s really a judgement call. Is it worth spending a sizeable amount of capital to have a product created specifically for you, or is it better to invest a minimal amount of time and money and use a PLR product.

My vote is the PLR product.

But it goes one step further. There are lots and lots and lots of PLR products on the market, so there’s no shortage of supply. The big difference comes when you start looking at the quality of the products. Suddenly, you have a pretty short list of products that you’d actually want to attach your name to.

My choice for using PLR is to find a service that creates their own in-house products and limits the distribution to a select few in the market. That way, I feel confident knowing I can tweek the product, get it out on the market and have limited risk of it looking like a copy cat product.

I have a couple PLR suppliers that I use regularly and today I’m going to take you behind the scenes into the private member’s area of Private Label Secrets. www.PLRPassport.com

I like this supplier because they have their own professional in-house team that creates two new PLR products every month. They’re high quality products that target very active markets, so the products are extremely easy to sell. The other thing I really like about this supplier is the completeness of the packages. In addition to the core product, you also get all the supplementary elements that go with it, including some marketing material, so it makes your customization of the product very simple. And you’ll see that when we get into the private member’s area.

So let’s start off by taking a look at what you get when you become a member:

Video

And the icing on the cake is the price. The first month you become a member it costs $67, then each additional month that you stay it only costs $47 a month. So you pay a small premium up front to access all the content at once and then you’re only paying $47 a month for 2 fresh new PLR products. So each new product only costs $23.50. And you have the first mover’s advantage because only the members of  Private Label Secrets have access to these products each month.

So bottom line, if you’re looking for a fast, easy, inexpensive way to create high quality products, I recommend a membership to the site. But if you’re not willing to invest a bit of time and effort to customize the products and make them work for you to help build your own brand, market your products, and develop an additional income stream, I’d suggest passing on this opportunity.

So that wraps it up for this review, my name is Terry Telford, from TerryTelford.com and I wish you all the success you deserve.

Talk again soon.

Enjoy your day!
Terry

Terry Telford

A new book hits the bookshelves this month that claims to take on the ailing economy. Guerrilla Marketing Breakthrough Strategies, by Terry Telford and Jay Conrad Levinson, teaches entrepreneurs how to expand their businesses, despite the current economic conditions. The strategy? Use joint venture partnerships to leverage your business’s assets without increasing expenses.

“Guerrilla Marketing Breakthrough Strategies is like a breath of fresh air in a stale and floundering economic environment,” said Telford. “One of the reasons Jay and I decided to release this book now is, business owners are hurting. Even though the economy is hanging by a thread, entrepreneurs can expand their businesses now as quickly as they could last year or the year before.”

“The key to rapid business expansion is strategic joint ventures,” says Telford. “When business owners work together, it’s a win-win scenario. In Guerrilla Marketing Breakthrough Strategies, I give real life examples of some of my businesses and how I have grown them by using joint venture partnerships.”

Guerrilla Marketing Breakthrough Strategies readers also get a free set of downloadable CDs in MP3 format. The CDs contain a live interview with Telford and Levinson. In the interview, Levinson reveals that one of the most profitable parts of his business is joint ventures.

This book has been compared to a home study course for business expansion. It contains email templates to send to potential joint venture partners, phone scripts to call prospective partners, 54 Guerrilla Marketing joint venture strategies and a fast track system. Everything a business owner needs to start expanding their business using joint venture partnerships is in this little book.

If you can’t find this book in your local bookstore, it’s available online at http://www.theguerrillaguys.com/

Building a prospect, subscriber or client list – quickly -
is a rewarding experience. Since August, 2001, I’ve built
lists that range from a few hundred highly targeted
prospects to lists of over 280,000 subscribers. In this
article, you’ll discover the secrets I’ve used to quickly
build targeted, effective lists. At the end, you’ll get
a glimpse of an actual case study of a list I’m working
on right now.

The basic principles of list building are pretty straight
forward.

- You need something of value to offer your prospects and
give them a reason to sign up to your list.

- You need to set up a form to capture your prospects
contact details and connect it to your autoresponder

- You need visitors to come to your website (Develop
traffic)

> Basic Principle 1 <
Starting with the first basic principle, you need
something of value to offer your potential prospects.

You can offer

1. A newsletter
2. A product
3. A service
4. A special offer

> Basic Principle 2 <
The second basic principle is setting up your lead
capture form. This is the box (form) on your website
that your prospects fill in with their contact details.
As soon as they press the send button, your autoresponder
adds them to your database and sends them your message.
Presto, you’re starting to build your list.

Most autoresponders give you the HTML code for your form,
so you don’t have to worry about any special programming.
All you have to do is cut and paste.

The details you can comfortably collect from a prospect
depends on your offer. If you’re offering an online
newsletter, you only need your prospect’s first name and
email address. If you’re sending them a CD by snail mail,
you can collect their postal address even phone and fax
numbers.

Quick Note:
You’ll increase your response rate if you include the
sign up form at the top and bottom of your webpage as
well as use a popup / popunder or slide in box.

Once you’ve got the ground work done, you’re ready to
start driving traffic to your website.

> Basic Principle 3 <
Building your list is like building a city. You want to
get as many people into your city as possible, so you
need to build roads. You need an 8 lane highway and
multiple smaller roads to fill your city with people.

In list building terms, you need to focus on one main
technique to pull prospects into your list. You also want
to use secondary techniques to add to the momentum of
your traffic. The following list gives you the exact
methods I use to develop my lists. Choose one method as
your main focus and use the rest as your secondary
traffic sources.

1. Advertise in print
Place advertising where ever your market is. Ask yourself
what you read personally, where do you get information?
Your market most likely does the same as you, so get in
front of them by using classified or display advertising
in:

a. magazines
b. trade journals
c. newspapers
d. direct mail

2. Advertise online
This is the least costly method of advertising. You can
reach a targeted audience through advertising in ezines,
online newsletters or pay per click services like Google
AdWords ™.

You can find some of the best ezine advertising deals at
http://www.EzineAdAuction.com

You’ll find Google AdWords ™ at
http://www.adwords.google.com

3. Write articles
Writing articles gives you credibility. Write articles on
a regular basis and submit them to online and offline
sources. You should be submitting articles to the same
sources you’re advertising with as well as all other
publications you can find in your market. Do a search on
Google or your favourite search engine for the keywords
“ezine directories” and you’ll find lists of potential
places for your articles and advertising.

4. Affiliate Program
One of the fastest ways to build your list exponentially
is to set up an affiliate program. Your affiliates will
link to your website, which means plenty of targeted
traffic, which, in turn helps your search engine rankings,
which brings you more traffic, which increases the number
of affiliates you get and helps you build your list at
break neck speed. It’s a never ending cycle.

5. Forums
Get involved in forums. When you post or answer a
question in a forum, you’re generally allowed to have a
signature file attached to your post. It’s just like the
signature file in your email. Your signature file should
direct people to your website where they can sign up for
your list.

6. Email signature file
The same as in forums, every email you send out should
have a signature file directing people to your website.

7. Joint Ventures
If you’ve got a unique, original product, a joint venture
may be an option for you. Contact some entrepreneurs who
have large lists and see if they’re interested in working
with you.

8. Referrals
This is very powerful. Include a referral or “tell a
friend” form on your website. This little form can help
build your list exponentially. When someone recommends
your site to a friend, that friend is most likely going
to visit and possibly tell another friend. And the
snowball starts rolling. Add this technique with an
affiliate program and you’ll soon have a nice fat,
targeted list of prospects.

9. Buy opt-in subscriptions
If you want to build a big list really fast, you can buy
opt-in subscribers for as low as a penny each from
http://www.pennyperlead.com. These leads have raised
their hand and said yes I’m interested in receiving
business opportunity information. They’ve filled out a
form and you can contact them with your offers.

The upside of this process is you build a big list fast.

The downside is your list will be less responsive than
one you build on your own. It takes some time to
cultivate a relationship with these new subscribers, but
if you send them quality information, you can convert
the list into an asset for your business.

Case Study
Right now, I’m building a list from scratch for
http://www.thebusinessprofessional.com My business
partner, Edwin Ryan, and I started building the list 2
weeks ago and today we have 506 new subscribers. Here’s
how we did it.

1. Put together an incredible offer.
We’re offering a rare niche marketing interview with
Kacper Postawski. The interview is valued at $245 and
we’re giving it away free.

2. Simple Form
To access and listen to the interview, visitors simply
fill in their name and email address and the secret
interview page is emailed to them.

To build traffic for this page, we’ve posted in the top
internet marketing and business forums, as well as sent
an email to a couple of our smaller lists of about 2,000
people total. That’s it. Within the next 2 weeks, we’ll
start the main marketing and have projected this list to
reach upwards of 5,000 new subscribers within the next 4
months.

The list building process is really quite simple if you
look at the basics. Offer a quality product as an
incentive to sign up to your list. Plug your sign up
form into an autoresponder. Drive traffic to your
webpage where your sign up list is located - and watch
your list expand.

Terry

I hope you’re having a wonderful day and I hope I can add to it for you.

Are you a bit too busy to create a website from scratch? Would you like me to do it for you? Your wish is my command

I just finished building 6 hot new websites and 2 have already been sold.  If you act fast, you can scoop up a complete website that’s ready to start selling for you right now. They’re priced to move quickly, so you’ll have to be fast to get the best choice.

Check them out at

www.TerryTelford.com/ForSale.html

Talk again soon.

Enjoy your day!
Terry