Students Of Success

118 118 is a UK supplier of directory enquiry services, facilitating users to get hold of phone numbers as well as more useful data.

118 118 have The Number UK Ltd’ to provide directory enquiry data - the company is a subsidiary of US Business InfoNXX - the very largest independent directory enquiries supplier worldwide.

Directory enquiries was formerly invoked through calling 192 (UK), but, the marketplace was relaxed in ‘02 and in August ‘03 192 closed down.

In addition to offering up a directory enquiry facility, 118 118 also offer a service by which you can ask their team anything, like’ Where is the highest building in Iceland’ and 118 can then provide the answer to your problem, over a mobile phone, or using a text (extremely useful for the pub quiz!)

118 118 have introduced various striking ad campaigns in the past few years, making two guys sporting droopy moustaches, well known for promoting 118’s system. The cheeky chappies have appeared in lots of eccentric circumstances, including a caricature of ‘The A-team’. 118 are, now, a very relevant element of the 118 118 brand throughout the United Kingdom, and are instantly recognizable.

So you’ve been thinking of doing some internet marketing or you’ve done some and you’re not making money yet. What does it really take? Even more importantly, how long does it take and how much does it cost? Isn’t that what you really want to know?

The problem with this question is that there isn’t a black and white answer. It’s not like you can spend $500 and you will definitely get a specific result. For some reason though that’s how people think it works.

A lot of folks buy this or that “how to” product and think it’s going to magically make them money. The key ingredient to making money from these products you buy is to take action and do what they tell you to do.

Just like buying a piece of excercise equipment won’t make you lose weight, buying the greatest “how to make money on the internet” product won’t make you money if you don’t use it.

But if you buy proven products and do what they tell you, then it’s simple to build a great business. It can happen for you though it probably won’t happen overnight.

We all know the internet is full of hype and also has a lot of genuine success stories. The biggest truth or lie, depending on how you see it, is that you can make good money fast. Whether this is true or false depends on what you’re willing to do and what you think “fast” is.

Internet marketing is not a get rich quick scheme. It’s a business which means there is time, money and work involved. If you think becoming rich in 3 to 5 years is quick then I guess this can be a get rich vehicle for you. If you don’t think 5 or even 10 years is quick for getting rich, then think about how many people you know who have done it in 5 years. Or in 20? Or in their lifetimes?

The only people I know who have done this have done it through internet marketing, direct marketing, network marketing or through owning their own company. None of them are just employees. The cheapest and fastest way to get there is through internet marketing.

FACT: 74% of the wealthiest people in America own their own business. If there’s one thing they have that maybe you don’t, it’s their own business.

Even the internet marketing gurus will tell you that it’s never been easier to make good money online. If you listen to the folks who are the biggest successes today most of them started at least 3 years ago. Some of them started back before the internet was called the internet. It was a lot rougher then. Even 3 years ago they didn’t have the advantages we have today.

You can buy subscribers to build your ezine lists. You can use pay-per-click search engines. You can read hundreds of e-zines for great free tips. You can make money through free affiliate programs. You can swap for free ads that reach over 10,000 people at a time. You can make a lot of money from e-bay and online auctions. You have a lot more potential partners for joint ventures than they ever had.

Most importantly, you can buy “how to” products from the people who are internet marketing millionaires. You can follow their directions to get where they are. They had to make it up from scratch when times were harder and now you can do it faster with fewer mistakes.

So if you really want to make good money online what do you do? Research the big dogs. Do what’s been proven to work. And treat your business like a business or you’ll end up with an expensive hobby. If you’re just kicking the tires to see what’ll happen, nothing will. This is true with anything you do in life, not just internet marketing.

Internet marketing is a tremendous vehicle for making great money. Like any vehicle, it won’t go down the road if you don’t gas it up, turn the key and push on the accelerator.

How long it takes to get to the top of the hill at the end of the road depends on how much gas you put in, how hard you press the accelerator, how well you steer and how good your map is.

The first year you drove a car did you drive as well as you do now? No. You’ve gotten better with experience. So don’t expect money to fall out of the sky the first year you do internet marketing. Can you make good money the first year? Sure. But it depends on how much work you do to pay your dues and get some experience.

Like driving a car, the longer you do it the better you get (which means the more money you make).

If you’re a tire kicker I suggest you put your money in your pocket, walk away now and spend your time on something you love to do. If you’re driven to build your own business I suggest you invest your time, energy and money into internet marketing. The payoff can be priceless. See you at the top of the hill at the end of the road.

About The Author

Sopan Greene, M.A. is a marketing & life coach & editor of the Net Profits newsletter. Get 2 FREE eBooks & a FREE report: “Million Dollar Emails”,”How To Start Your Own Traffic Virus” & “The 13 Deadly Internet Marketing Mistakes Almost Every Business Is Making…”

mailto:webmaster87-5956@autocontactor.com

www.NetMarketingMastery.com

Reading is the most efficient and economical way to help anyone
to acquire information, knowledge, skills and improve on one
self. And it is most wonderful to help your child to be a
great reader as young as possible.

The best way to help a child or any one to learn a skill and be
good at it is to create a Supportive and Conducive Environment
to make it easy for her to learn. Here are some suggestions
that you may find helpful:

1. Have lots of good books in the home at all times. You can
either buy them or borrow them from the library. The National
Library has tons of excellent books suitable for children of
all ages - story books and information books (you can find
books on all kinds of topic, e.g. books on animals, seasons,
famous artists and people, human body, interesting places,
occupations). For our family, we make it a routine to visit the
library every week if not every fortnight. It is a great family outing
for all of us.

2. At your home, have the reading materials and books easily
accessible to your child so that she can get hold of them at
her convenience. The best way is to have an open book shelf
that is of the right height for your child. Providing her a
proper place to keep her books and stuffs is also a good way to
teach your child about responsibility - teach her to care for
her things by getting her to put them back in the right place
after use.

3. Adults at home (especially parents) must set good examples
by reading books regularly. Children learn by observing what
their parents do. Be a good reader yourself. I’d recommend
non-fiction books - e.g. books on parenting, self-enrichment
and improvement etc. (By the way, newspapers are not considered
because there is simply too much negative news and sensational
but non-useful information in each publication - they are not
good to our brain and personal growth.)

4. Read to your child daily. Make it a routine, like before
bed time. The best persons to read to the child is her parents
and that is you. Reading together with your child is also one
of the best ways for bonding with your child.

5. Carry books with you when you bring your child out so that
you can read to her when an opportunity arises, e.g. while
waiting for someone, at the petrol station, on the MRT/ subway.

6. Give lots of encouragement and praise when the child make
the effort to read by herself. Encouragement helps to boost
your child’s self-esteem and help her want to do even better.

7. Make learning fun and enjoyable. Discuss with your child
about the things she has read and has fun with her by acting
out some of the scenes in the books. This will help to fill
your home with lots of laughter and love.

Article by Alvin Poh, founder of The Parenting Network For The Achievement of Human Potential. To learn how you help your children to develop and excel in their natural potential, go to: http://www.alvinkh.per.sg/parentingnetwork

Content

One of the best ways to encourage website owners to link to your website is to provide good quality, relevant content on your website. As the content contained within your website grows, more and more website owners will consider your website a good source of information. As they add content to their own sites they may refer to related information on your site and therefore create an Outbound Link (OBL) to your website.
But what content should you add? It is important to keep the content relevant to the overall concept of the website. Most websites however have a core subject matter about which the website owner should have a certain level of expertise.

• Writing short articles explaining the basics of the core subject is often a good starting place.
• How To? Articles are often easy to write and useful.
• You could write ‘review’ articles.

And the list goes on. Once you have some good quality content, you then need to encourage other website owners to link to you. The first thing you could do, although it sounds counter-productive, is to allow other websites to publish your article.

Publishing Articles on other Websites

Writing good quality articles and getting them published on other websites can be a good way of generating inbound links and increased traffic. There are many websites dedicated to publishing articles on all manner of topics. Almost all of them allow you to include a brief biography about the author or the authors’ business which also allows for a link to your website.

Publishing articles in this way is good for your website for many reasons:

• Good quality articles will establish you or your business
• The article pages usually have few other links on them so the IBL to your website is better for your Page Rank than a link from ‘links’ page.
• Websites publishing articles often have high levels of traffic so publishing articles on them is a good advertising method.

Provide a Service

Providing a useful service on your website is not only a good way of encouraging repeat visits to your website but is also a way of encouraging other website owners to link to that service.

Getting Reciprocal Links.

If you have followed the advice above and provide quality, relevant content and services then encouraging website owners to link to your website should be relatively easy. You will find that many website owners link to your website without any encouragement, but a little pro-activity will go a long way.
E-mail webmasters of websites which compliment your website and ask to exchange links with them. Most webmasters will agree to exchange links as it will be mutually beneficial. It is often useful to add a link to their site before e-mailing them and then in the e-mail you can direct them to the page that contains their link. You should also mention the connections between the two sites and the mutual benefits of reciprocal linking.
Generating, adding and checking reciprocal links can be time-consuming. It is however possible to add automatic reciprocal link pages to your website. These programs allow other webmasters to automatically add their link to your website. A good reciprocal link manager will allow you to verify the links before adding them to your site, will check that the website has included a link back to your site and will also periodically check the links to ensure that they remain active.

Submit your Website to Web Directories.

There are literally thousands of web directories out there, some like Yahoo and DMOZ are very generic in their coverage, others may be small and very specific. You will be able to find directories related to your websites particular subject as well as regional directories. Most allow you to submit your website free of charge, although some will require you to add a reciprocal link to their directory from your site.

Post in relevant forums.

One really good way of generating traffic and inbound links is to become a member of and contribute to web based forums. Once again there are forums on almost every subject imaginable. Some forums are very specific in their subject matter others more generic. Find some that are relevant to your website and post in them. You may even find you enjoy the online ‘banter’. Most forums will allow you to enter a ‘signature’ that will be shown at the bottom of every post you make. Make sure that you include your website address in this signature to create an inbound link on every post you make to the forums.

Post in relevant Newsgroups.

As with forums, there are newsgroups on every subject imaginable. Many newsgroups are also published on the web and can therefore be used to generate IBL if you include your web address in your signature file.

Use your e-mail Signature File.

Use your e-mail program to set up a signature file that includes a link to your website. Whenever you send an e-mail the recipient will then be able to click on the link to access your website. This won’t increase your Page Rank, but is a useful way of encouraging real visitors to your website.

Webrings.

The importance of IBLs means that there are now many websites dedicated to nothing other than the sharing of links between websites. Webrings work by connecting relevant websites. Each member of a webring displays a small banner on their site which includes a link to another relevant site. In return for displaying this banner a banner directed to your website will be displayed on the websites of the other webring members. If you can’t find a webring relevant to your particular subject, it is possible to start your own.

Alan Cole runs http://www.pixelwave.co.uk, a one-person web design studio. His aim is to provide cost effective website design production and maintenance by offering professional web solutions that stand out from the crowd.