Resignation Plans

It's very clear that I hate my job - more so my company. And I'm making my plans to resign. Not so soon, but I have set the date as the last day of June 2009.

If I hate the job so much, why do I have to delay my resignation? Well.. I don't plan on looking for another job. I can jump over to another company right now, but that is not what I want. So you can say that my planned resignation next year is somewhat a semi-retirement for me.

I'm looking forward to leaving next year. And I'm putting aside any other commitments for now, and putting my focus on building my business. You can say that I'm slowly leading an anti-social life these days.

Right now, all I'm working towards are:

1) Working on my business from home;
2) Taking care of my dear parents;
3) Building my wealth and realizing my dream lifestyle.

I know if I pray and work hard enough, and prepare to receive the rewards, I will win.

I'll Walk In Sunshine Again

Is that the best that you can do?
Do you think that I won't make it through?
You don't know where I come from
You don't know what I'm made of

And you won't haunt me anymore
I stand proud and I stand tall
And there will come a day my friend
I'll walk in sunshine...again

So come on bring on all your rain
It's only water it won't stain
You turn to ashes on the ground
My sun burns through your black cloud

And you won't haunt me anymore
I stand proud and I stand tall
And there will come a day my friend
I'll walk in sunshine again

Look What He's Done Again

And so my boss played his funny game on me again. And it isn't a pleasant one. Here's the story:

My company is planning a restructuring which puts me into a 9-6 lifekilling job. I hate that. Not eversince I started working on shifts that gave me ample time and freedom during weekdays.

So the deal is this: move up to the 9-6 job, get more responsibilities and headaches with no additional pay. OR.. stick with my shift job and take a $150 cut from my pay. (link)

A few months back when I was still working on shift hours, the office persuaded me to work on office hours instead. I didn't want to. I wanted the extra off days so I could do whatever I want, including minding my business. But the boss came up with all sorts of reasons WHY I should be doing office hours instead.

He told me, if I remain in shift work, I will lose my $150 transport allowance. And I specifically asked him "does that mean if I work office hours I will get $150 for working on Saturdays AND still get my transport allowance?" He said YES. Fine, I did some thinking and decided I needed the $150 each month to survive.

To date he hasn't paid my Saturday allowance. So I voiced out, and guess what he said. He will backpay the Saturday allowance that he owes me, but I shouldn't be getting the $150 transport allowance since I do not use the car for work. What? Let me get this straight.

Does he mean I could have stayed doing shift work and my pay would remain the same? When I told him that he promised me otherwise, he denied it. How convenient.

It's illogical isn't it? Why would I have moved from working shift (which I loved) to office hours if the pay is the same? Someone should throw a shoe at him.. seriously.

What goes around comes around. We'll see what happens next year. I'm just as cunning and witty as he is.

Hit Below The Belt, But I'm Still Standing

It's been a while since I wrote, and here's why. My dad was admitted to hospital again for his heart. This time, he had to go under the knife, and has been in hospital for the past few weeks. He's currently recuperating from a heart bypass surgery, and he's doing great so far.

Thanks to all who wished well for me and my family. I wish the same to you.

It appears to me that life has a lot of challenges in store for me. While dealing with the trauma of seeing your loved dad suffering in hospital, my online business got hit too...presumably by some low-life no-future-in-mind cheap hacker.

See, my website got hacked by some mutant. And because I was busy dealing with my family situation, I didn't realize it until today. God knows how long it has been, and how many potential sales I lost. Good job, my mutant friend.

So what did I do? Simple. Just upload a copy of my website. No point brooding over the lost anyway. As for the irresponsible prick? He'll get his share of life's surprises :)

Anyway, I wanted to show you a few pics of my latest earnings. Bear in mind, this all happened before my dad got into hospital, and I was looking forward to repeat or even improve this achievement. Take a look..



That's US$549.52 for half a month of sales. Not bad huh? :) I got excited and decided to reward myself with these...



A 3-day ticket package for the local F1 race to be held later this year. That's the joy of working online.

This may sound like an endorsement or advertisement, but take a look at Wealthy Affiliate. That's where I learned to make all this happen. So if you're interested, come join the "school" :)

Remember to take care of your health guys. Talk to you soon.

Hold Your Head Up High, Herwin

I'm tired physically and mentally. I have been laughed at, scorned, insulted, rejected, disappointed, ignored, scratched, left behind, outcast. But you know what?

I don't care.

I still hold my head up high when I walk. I bear a smile every possible minute. And I won't let a small failure bring me crashing down.

You can call me boastful or full of hot air. But I live by one mantra: To be successful, you must first feel successful.

Envision success, imagine yourself successful. Look at the sky when you do so, and smile quietly. Enjoy that single moment when you feel successful. Then repeat it every minute you are awake.

It's no secret that being positive brings about a powerful aura that attracts all the good things in life. And that includes success.

So hold your head up high, just like me. And your moment in time will naturally come to you.

Have You Given Up?

What I am about to say here does not solely pertain to the Internet Marketing business. But it applies to whatever you are pursuing today. Have you given up in what you are chasing after?

In the past few weeks, my marketing success has seen its share of lull periods. I suffered days and weeks of no sales at all. And I nearly gave up there and then. The funny thing is, this period of no sales resulted from me giving up.

I made the single common mistake that newbie Internet Marketers make - I mixed in emotions with my business. I started to see a few refunds from my customers, and that affected my morale. My emotions swirled and I began to think this does not work. I stopped working on my business - stopped writing articles, stopped testing and tweaking my website, stopped learning how to build my business.

All the above resulted in weeks of no sales. And I grew even more despondent.

It took me a while to gather my courage and picked myself up. I can't say I did that without any help from a few friends, and listening to Brian McKnight's Win. I realised this business means a lot to me. There was too much at stake - my family's life depends on it. My destiny depends on it!

So I fought back my emotions, worked on my articles once more, tweaked and tested my website again and again. And today, I'm back to seeing profits.

And if the current sales pattern continues, I can't wait to share my happYness with you by showing my next pay cheque.

I hope it will be sweet then :)

So don't give up in what you love to do. I added the "love to" part, because if you are trying hard to succeed in what you don't love, you will not win. And even if you do, it won't be as sweet as succeeding in what, or who, you love.

Let's Put It In "D" Gear Once Again

It seems like ages since I updated you on my Affiliate Marketing progress. And I can justify my absence. That's what it was about - absence.

I took myself off Affiliate Marketing somehow, because I was bogged down by many interruptions in life. Work, national service, and other affairs really drained me off energy and determination to pursue my "career".

This is why it's very important to have a friend or a group of friends working together with you on this project. By reading about others progress and success and taking it positively, one can really start to motivate himself again. I did just that, thanks to my Wealthy Affiliate buddy Ronn.

See, even though Ronn and I are marketing in the same niche (that makes us competitors so to speak), we share our knowledge and tips with each other. But most importantly, we drive each other further and faster towards our goals.

As I said early this year, I aim to earn as much as or more than what I earn in my day job. And quit the latter. Probably not end of this year, but mid next year.

It's not a long-shot, now that I've realized the potential earnings from Affiliate Marketing. And learning what it takes to make it work, I just have to double or triple that effort. Plain copy and paste.

I hope to deter myself from being interrupted again. But at some points in our lives, we have to temporarily put matters of the heart to the forefront, as long as we don't let it linger.

Of course it would be a bonus if I succeed in my Pursuit Of HappYness with that someone beside me cheering me on. Sweet.

Beautiful While It Lasts

And just like that, the highlight of my day is over. Just 45 minutes or so.

Oh well, there's always tomorrow morning, I suppose.

How To Make Your Pages Findable On The Internet

Hey all, anything poppin' yet? :)

It's kinda late now, but I'm taking some time to write to you guys regarding a major, major element in our Affiliate Marketing business. This section will ultimately be the most important factor on how much traffic will go to your articles/sites.

Are you ready? Got your notepad and pen/cil ready?

It's your KEYWORD. Keywords are like what carrots are to make donkeys work. They are the ones that will get people around the world finding your articles/squidoo/websites through Google or Yahoo.

Now I know when I mention keywords, many of you will be sprouting out single-words that would describe the field you are focusing on. I know, because I did that too once before. Let me tell you, never ever use a single-word keyword in your business.

Let's classify keywords into 2 types: Broad, and Long-Tail. Broad keywords are like what I mentioned above - single words that vaguely describe what you are talking about in your articles/squidoo/websites. Want to know why they're not good? Try searching on Google for "health" and see how many results you get. Millions yea? So how would you expect your articles/squidoo/websites to be found by people??

In our business, we need to narrow down our market as deep as we can. We need to think and be like the searcher - what would you type in Google to find an answer to your particular problem?

Ok let's use the broad keyword Car in this instance. Can we narrow down Car further? By sure we can, maybe by the make. I'll put this process down in steps for better illustration:

Car *narrow further by make
Mazda Car *narrow further by model
Mazda RX-8 Car *narrow further by color
Red Mazda RX-8 Car *narrow further by more details
Red Mazda RX-8 Car Spoiler

You catch the drift?

That is what we want. We want our keyword to be as detailed as possible. We want to get the right searcher to come to our pages, find what they are looking for, and be in the right mindset to proceed with buying the product.

So how do you know what keywords to use? Be the searcher! Ask yourself why do people want the solution you are offering (ie the product you're promoting). Once you get the list of answers, just add in the common prefix-es of "how", "why", "when". Let me use an example:

Say you're offering a software to make websites. Be the searcher, and think why would they want the software? To create websites easily, perhaps. Now, be smart and add in the prefix. What do you get?

How To Create Websites Easily

Wasn't that fun? That's what we call a long-tail keyword. Of course you can go more into detail on that keyword, just remember to think like the searcher.

Now you may ask what is the long-tail keyword for, and how do you incorporate it into your Affiliate Marketing campaign. Long-tail keywords are used in your articles and Squidoo lenses because these are the pages that you want your searchers to find on Google and Yahoo.

For now, do your market and people research. Go search for forums and through Yahoo Answers to find the people whom your product is going to help. Find out what are the common problems they face, and the words/phrases they use to describe their problems.

If you can, come back to me with the product that you are trying to promote, and a decent list of long-tail keywords that you have come up with from your short research. I'll assess them and advise you accordingly.

I'm sorry I can't chat long with you. There is still so much that I want to pass on to you, but I can't do it in one go. You'll be drowning in info overload.

So let me know your progress so that I can adjust and tweak my (so-called) training program with you.

Take care, and hope to hear from you soon.

Herwin
http://mdherwin.blogspot.com

ps, I have this idea - once you have decided on a niche market that you are going into, I'll spare some time to write an article for you just so you will get a rough idea of how an optimized article looks like :)

Answering A Common Question: What Should I Promote?

I'm starting a series of emails to help some of you guys launch your Affiliate Marketing adventure together with me. These emails will be included in my blog from now on for you guys to easily refer to in the future :)

Hey all, how's your weekend been so far?

The weather is hot everytime I'm at home - I hate that. I always prefer a gloomy or windy afternoons so I can feel more comfortable working on my PC/laptop.

Ok, let's do a progress check here. Some of you have done good, signing up for accounts with Squidoo, EzineArticles, and Clickbank. Some have even gone a step further by exploring how to create their virgin Squidoo lens. Kudos!

I like it when you take action :)

For those who have not done so, I know it's a weekend and you'd want to spend your time in leisure. But take just a few minutes to sign up first.

Now, some of you posted some questions and the most common one being "What should I promote?"

Clickbank, as you may already know, only holds products that are digital in format. Software, eBooks, subscriptions. So what if you are looking to promote physical products?

One other popular affiliate marketplace would be Commission Junction at www.cj.com. You'll see the major players with affiliate programs ready for your use. If you can't find what you are looking for, do this on Google:

Search for the product you want to promote, and add this to the back of the search phrase: +affiliate program

Eg, if you're searching for affiliate programs for weight loss formula, search for weight loss formula +affiliate program.

Right, now on to the next part. Remember I told you to do something you are comfortable with? I need to add on something - find something that people are looking for too. Not everything will sell just like that. People have varying degrees of needs and wants, and this will affect the urgency of them buying the products through you.

Take some time to think about it. Read up the newspapers and look at the current issues facing Man. Off the top of my head, I can think of 3 groups of people:

People with a serious life problems:
These include people with life-threatening diseases, serious credit problems, divorce issues, etc. They will tend to look for more professional help than getting one through the net.

People facing some sort of discomfort/concern:
Examples include those who are vain about their skin beauty, keeping their health on check, taking care of their beloved family or pets, etc. Most from this group will do a search for solutions from the net. This is your most profitable group of people.

People with a need for luxury:
People who are looking for products that would enhance their lives, like buying a new LCD tv, or clothes. They are not ready to spend their cash.

Feel free to discuss with me what you have elected to work on as your Affiliate Marketing campaign. I'll be happy to advise however well I can :)