How News Spreads Virally: Twitter

I'm adding this video for two reasons.

1. This guy is hella funny, reminds me of a dude I know named Mike kinda.

2. He explains how twitter brings viral marketing to the next level in about 3 seconds.

Everything Secondary Affiliate Program

This post has been moved to http://businesscircleblog.blogspot.com/ because it is private to my business circle.

Nice

You might want to watch this or me and Dave might weird you out whenever something is "nice".

California Wildfires Report

Californians Gather To Celebrate Annual Wildfire Tradition

The Best Way to Talk to Me

Mostly writing this to iterate it to myself, but I think it's important, and if you'll be coming to me for advice, this is MUCH MORE significant than you'd probably assume.

If you have something you want to talk to me about that you'd consider valuable information or important, the best way to talk to me about these things is via EMAIL, or less-preferably, text messaging.

Why? Simply, you'll get much more valuable information.

I'm not the clearest person to talk to on the fly. Sometimes I get my point across well, but more often than not, I don't speak clearly. The power of words is phenomenal. The correct words can be quite literally a map to your goal, while the wrong words can sometimes set you farther from your goal.

Since our definitions of words vary slightly, it's important to have the time to choose the right words when talking. Typically, this only takes a 5-10 second pause, but can sometimes take a while and occasionally will lead to exploring dictionary.com.

As an extrovert, I'll never take time to choose the correct words this while talking (okay, I do plan on encorporating this into my personality in the future, but you get what I mean.) Instead, I'll fumble around until I get to my point. Email me, and you'll get more valuable information.

If you plan on completing the thirty day challenge...

...then please watch this. It's mainly for internet entrepreneurs:

Success and Failure

Not going to elaborate on this one. Geez... I need to have some fun. You work 14 hours and it's like you can't stop... totally obsessed with this stuff... mind movie only making it worse...

I left this as a comment on Karganilla's Day 61. He explains that even if you fail the challenge, that's an opportunity for... [he goes to list a bunch of things]

The Comment:

"It's not a failure, it's an opportunity for..."

Failures ARE opportunities. Failures ARE growth. I guess you got to say it that way to relate to the masses, but damn... if people only understood that they work completely BACKWARDS on success and failure the world would go round.

Success slows you down!
Failure drives you forward!

SO LONG AS YOU CHOOSE TO LEARN.

Animoto Mind Movie

The Law of Attraction is just as real as the law of gravity. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZL3J2SKKEA

I'll be watching this mind movie twice a day. It will help me achieve my goals. The how-to is below.

Here's my Animoto Mind Movie:


(I really wanted that music, so I paid the $3 for a "full" video)

Here's the "How to":

1. Find 10 pictures that most powerfully describe the things you want in your future (you want for your life). Save these pictures to a folder on your hard drive.

2. Goto animoto.com, upload the pictures, and CHOOSE MUSIC FAST ENOUGH TO ENCORPORATE ALL PHOTOS. Basically, just make sure they all get in there. animoto makes doing all that as easy as pie... if you mess up, they even let you edit it. fantastic. Max time is 30 seconds, unless you want to pay them. that's perfect for this.

3. Have animoto upload it to youtube, and if you want, send me the link. I plan on posting these to the blog at a later date, but you can opt out of this.

4. WATCH YOUR MIND MOVIE UPON AWAKENING AND BEFORE GOING TO SLEEP EVERY SINGLE DAY. if it's not powerful enough, or what you want for your life changes in any way, make a new mind movie.

On the fly copywriting; Day 5 of my challenge

Want to be able to just read over something real quick and have that greatly help you with your copy writing... whenever you need it?

Check it out: I've updated the "How to Sell" guide... and now it's a SYSTEM. I'm VERY confident with it. You can check it out by clicking the link over there on the top-left (how to sell).

It's funny; I'm watching Dennis' day 5 video and he talks about how you should state your intent clearly to everyone whenever you want to do something.

If you state your intent, he says, others will help you, root you on, support you, etc. It makes doing something a lot easier.

I thought this was great because that's exactly what I wanted when I made the inner circle.

Here's my day 3-5:

Mind Movies & 90 Day Challenge

Mind Movies - An Alternative to reading "Think and Grow Rich"... Discovered these yesterday.

Here's the concept, and this goes with something called "the law of attraction":

When you know where you're going to be in 90 days or years even, and you can see that person, and you keep that up every day - it's enormously powerful to your subconscious.

When you get FOCUSED on WHO you're going to be and HOW you're going to get there, on a cellular level, you process EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD DIFFERENTLY.

You begin looking to Anything and Everything that can propel you towards success. Your mind is set in a context for generating a PARTICULAR STRAIN of thoughts, and picks up subconcious bits and pieces FROM ALL DATA AROUND YOU to help formulate your ideas, plan, and focus.

Basically, the law of attraction states that you will trigger your MIND to have ACCESS to the information you need to get where you want to go. Even though I don't know the "how to" for becoming a millionaire, after doing this for about a year now, I pretty much know all the next steps and could write the book.

DO YOU SEE HOW SIGNIFICANT THAT IS? I CAN TEACH YOU HOW TO BECOME A MULTIMILLIONAIRE. And doubt it - that's fine - I won't rub it in your face 12 months from now.

Here's an epic mind movie:


Learn more about how these work - http://www.TheOhanaSecret.com/x.php/6793

New 90 Day Challenge

Dennis Karganilla, that multi-millionaire I met, started hosting a 90 day challenge on youtube - and in the spirit of being someone who makes $4000 a month, and to get really serious about getting there, I've started following it. He's at day 60, so I'll be running a bit behind. Today is the 11th and I'm on Day 2.

When you do a 90 day challenge, the key is to do the habitual parts every single day. If you can keep at something for 90 days, you'll be a machine!

It's also important to lay out the goals. I have a few. Outside of the challenge, I want to move out and live a financially independent, quality life.

Inside this challenge, I expect, based on predictable data, to be making $2000 - $4000 a month by the end of the 90 days. My goal is to hit within that range, and to at the very least send myself to Vail mountain this winter, one of the worlds finest ski resorts in Colorado. Can't afford it unless I earn some $$. Plus, I'd like to afford a trip up to Montreal to see a bunch of friends.

I'll be making videos as I go along to document the challenge. Here's the first:


Follow the rest of the videos here: http://www.youtube.com/user/DrinkElectrolytes

Success is in BEING, not DOING

READ THIS MESSAGE VERY CAREFULLY, IT IS THE CRADLE OF YOUR SUCCESS:

I think this is basically the whole, zoomed out, macro-message behind my #1 book (by far) Think & Grow Rich.

Whether you want to voice your political opinion, become an internet marketer, or start your own tee-shirt company, you've got to BE it - these aren't things you should DO, simply because they're too big to ever get done.

Think about the last time someone told you, "You can do it!" For me, that makes me feel like procrastinating almost immediately, and if I'm being told this by someone, as if I'm not able to do it or something.

Gary Vaynerchuk has 1 really powerful message that replays over and over in my mind: "We're building a BUSINESS." This is not some easy, fast, simple, or by any means, SMALL, of a project.

This is a HUGE project. This is worthy of your LIFE. Being a political voice that gets heard, building a business, making it for yourself - these are "do or die" kind of things.

It's for this reason I'm saying You CAN'T REALLY DO IT. When's the last time someone said, "You can't do it"?

Here's the truth in it. To do something that big, you cross the line from "doing something" to "being". When you DO something, you run the necessary task or tasks. "Doing" is a context - like, I'm doing the laundry. It sets the grounds for the tasks you're going to be doing.

When you're being something, you're doing things that live in the realm of that being. Read that sentence a few more times.

So, where do you cross over from "doing something" to "being something". I'd say it's whether you can really complete the thing or whether you have to continue it {in this context.}

{{To figure out what extent to which you need to BE something, find the middle ground between these two questions: "Is this something that sets the grounds for a bunch of tasks, which I will complete?" OR "Is this something that sets the grounds for a bunch of tasks, of which not all are completable?"}}

Big things - like getting your opinion voiced to a large crowd - are something you live with. It's something you have to BE.

This is a quote from an email I just sent to my friend Anthony:

"What I'm really seeing... I mean, REALLY noticing here... is that the people who think they're hitting a goldmine or the people who think they'll "get started quick", tend to fail. People who try to work through it fast tend to fail. People who don't care enough tend to fail. People who are "DOING Entrepreneur" fail... and people who "ARE Entrepreneur" succeed.

This is why I really like your position - you're very much planning this over time, and basically inching your way there as you do other stuff. You take it one thing at a time. You continually bring it up, in a very consistent if not prolonged manner. This is your dream, and you're just working at it like a hobby. THAT'S being someone who IS an Entrepreneur - not someone who is DOING Entrepreneur.

Because of that, I have high confidence that you will succeed. And because of that, it's in my best interests to dedicate some time to help your business whenever I can."

If I were you, I'd consider this to be a gem. "BEING" is freedom from doing. You BE something just by thinking about it.

Here's how to be:

1. If you are going to continue doing this, you need to stop now, and spend a long time thinking about a lot of the things you'd be doing if you WERE that person. (If you're trying to be a politician, what would you be doing if you LIVED as a popular voice, on a day to day basis? What would you do all day if you were a successful entrepreneur? What would your life involve doing all the time if you were the CEO of that business, and that business was at such-and-such level of development?)
   
   
2. Spend time to develop those pictures.
   
   
3. Review the pictures daily and tweak them whenever you want.

The more serious you are about it, the faster this will happen, but after you do all that, you will BE that person. Now the missing steps are to start doing the things that person would do in your current position, and to start thinking as you would if you were that person.

For example, I value my time at about $1000 / hour, because even though it's not worth that much (no one would ever pay it right now), I realize that to the person I'm being, IT IS worth more than that on a technical basis.

I'll continue to be that person until my time is worth that. And then I'll be that person so much, the only way to get out of it would be to be someone else.

Take Aways:

• On a DAILY basis, you can do as little as you want, as slowly as you want, with large gaps of time in between, as long as you spend at least some time thinking about who you want to be that day. Thinking about this will help cause it OVER TIME. Eventually, this will be what was important, as the work you did will be completely pointless.
  
  
• If you really want to succeed at this, there's only one thing you need to do. Do the above bullet every day. Do this, and I promise you success.
  
  
• Don't work. Seriously, don't do things like the thirty day challenge. Just do the visualization exercise - and you'll naturally want to be that person, which will make you naturally want to do things like the thirty day challenge. ONLY THEN should you do it - and THAT'S THE ONLY TIME you should be combating your own laziness.
  

People fall off when it's time to grind through the hard stuff. You will too. This is your protection - a strong purpose and working wisely. You will have to grind through the hard work, and this is what will make you choose that over choosing not to do that.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS:

Continue reading here

Bridging, Outsourcing, Paid SEO

This is a really exciting concept that's like the big push you need after you start rolling.

It looks like in a couple of weeks I'll be at over 100 visitors a day. Right now, I'm getting into some cheap but powerful advertising to propel myself forward - and as soon as it's making profit I'm going to start outsourcing this concept of bridging.

Bridging: How to find tons of related categories to link to your site from.

A bridge is a site that is in more than one category. There's large ones and small ones. First I'll give an example of a large bridge: Pregnancy and Insomnia:

• You can go into forums & social platforms and build quick links by giving bursts of feedback and advice. Very quick and easy if and only if you're able to get into it quick and easily. Hint: Don't talk about things you don't know anything about.
  
  
• You can comment on blogs and articles and use market samurai to build more links with these.
  
  
• You can find article sites that you can outsource to.

Small Bridge: Skateboarder suffering from insomnia.

First of all, based on the very nature of skateboarding, this would be an uncommon bridge. (Does it seem like I'm well placed in the insomnia category? Being this well in touch increases the speed I can build quick links by 5-10x)

The idea is that I could write an article, for say, about.com, about a skateboarder that suffers from insomnia, and if I had an insomnia site linking TO that article, the article would gain power, and then I could link from the article to a skateboarding site and google would see that that link was also very relevant, giving power from the insomnia site, to the about.com article (would take a little time), and then to the skateboarding site.

This would be a small bridge.

This can be very powerful if used in hubs. Note that I'm predicting here, but based on my knowledge of SEO, this would be very poweful. Imaging the scene just described as 3 squares with an arrow from the insomnia square to the bridge, and then from the bridge to the skateboarding site.

If the skateboarding site then linked to another skateboarding / insomnia article, and that article linked to the insomnia site, this would be very powerful. Hubs work very well because it sends the spider in a loop of 1-way links, and the larger the hub, the more powerful.

A powerful hub may look like this, adding bridges (I=insomnia, B=bridge, S=skateboarding)

I->B->B->B->S->B->B->B->(Beginning)

Outsourcing:

When you decide to spend money on search engine optimization, this is the way to do it. It's the paid advertising of the organic search.

Goal: You want to submit 20 articles to 20 sites that are trusted by Google, each with 2-3 links pointing back to the page you're promoting. (You want to be careful to make sure they get at least 50% of the links without the same anchor text.)

Then, resubmitting to the sites that turn back quality backlinks, have an outsource write a few versions of each article, maybe using different keywords, and definately using different titles.

If you want quality articles that gain authority over time, have them written by an American and drive links to them.

If you just want 100+ quick low-quality, Page Rank 0 backlinks, this could be a lot cheaper and will still go a long ways towards getting a page to rank and could easily get you listed as #1 for long tail keywords, as long as you're careful not to look like spam.

Personally, I'm into the Americans, but hey, it could be expensive so make sure you're going to get a lot of profit out of something before you do it. Hint: Build slower for high quality, less spammy-looking links.

With the concept of the Bridge, you get a lot of extra places to do this in. The idea is that about.com and squidoo.com don't like seeing tons of the same articles coming through their systems, so it's A LOT SMARTER to use bridge concepts to build links to your site coming from all kinds of related content - which is exactly what Google wants to see.

This plays into my strategy:

1. Basic, Anchor-Text, Link-Bait oriented SEO. (I am here)
   --Goal: To get over 100 visitors per day, see profitablity in position ($1).
   
2. Use cheap advertising with Google Adwords and then Stumbleupon (and maybe others.)
   --Goal: Increasing profitablity, profitting from advertising costs.
   
3. Strategy Oriented, Paid SEO (Outsourcing)
4. More expensive advertising.
   

Warning: Being Too Focused On One Keyword

I don't think the thirty day challenge lets it on enough, but it would be a bad idea just to stick to one keyword. If all the content you write is on the exact same keyword, all the links pointing at you say the exact same keyword, and so on, google will find out what's up really fast.

1. Links: This is the most important area to have some variation in. To be safe, I'd never have more than half the links pointing to any particular page have the same anchor text.
   
   Also, be careful not to point many links at your home page. Your home page probably shouldn't have ANY links pointing to it for a little while.
   
   
2. Content: Write NATURALLY, and just follow the challenge. Remember, Google's really smart, so don't ONLY write about a couple of keywords.
   
   
3. Links & Relationships: Try to stick to your GENERAL category - like sports - and don't get links from unrelated categories. To get a link from my insomnia site, to jared's skateboarding site, he'd have to talk about insomnia on his page.
   
   On the other hand, this opens a huge opportunity that I've just seen. I'll be posting about "Bridging" next, and how it can get you hundreds of extra links when you start outsourcing. (click to learn more)
   

Being Lazy Works!

I've talked a lot about giving love lately and I just posted a resource that I think might make people only working 30 minutes - 3 hours a day on average freak out.

Look, I work 8-12 hours a day, and it's working really well. But really, my approach IS NOT THE BEST for the search engines.

The search engines really, really like to see stuff happen over a looong period of time. If you're a procrastinator, Google is one of the only places in the world that will actually give you a REWARD for being lazy.

I see you guys as being huge potential. I don't want you to stop and I don't want you to burn out, but I'm also not expecting you guys to yeild extraordinary results any time soon.

So look - if you're starting to call it off... if you EVER change your mind about what you're doing, don't DELETE anything, and DON'T STOP.

Here's what I mean by don't stop:

Do something once a week, even if it's merely a new blog post or sending one link to your website.

If you spend 5 MINUTES PER WEEK on your blog, in 5 years Google will see you as a considerable authority site. You will have page rank, meaning, any link on your site will have x10 or x100 power.

You will rank for all kinds of long keywords you'd never have thought of, and with the combination of all these you'll actually get decent traffic.

You can put ads on that site and have steady income... FOREVER.

I made a post a while back titled "Plant the seed now and your blog will grow". That message is just as clear now as it was then.

The more work you do now, the faster it will grow. But even if you don't touch it for months - if you've pointed ANY LINKS or ANY NETWORKING at it, your site will grow more powerful with time.

And I'm just going to keep throwing all kinds of resources at you.

So DON'T EVER stop. 5 minutes a week could mean an extra $100 a week a couple years from now - extra money you'll be happy to spend, that you get from spending less time on your blog per week than it takes to eat a meal.

As funny as it is, THIS blog actually ranks for long tail keywords, and I bet it actually does get some outside traffic. I haven't done a single thing to promote this blog. NOTHING, except the fact that it's a blogger blog and so Google has found it.

The more blog posts I have, the more keywords I have, the more long tail keywords this blog will rank for. Next time google crawls this blog, I can probably type in something like "lazy works time SEO" into google, and this very post would be likely to rank as #1.

Spend a little time thinking about that, and what you could do if you ever stopped trying.

A look at what I do day-by-day

This currently takes me about 8 hours a day, but I want to have down to about 6 in one week and hopefully, eventually, at 4 hours per day - so I can double my workforce ;).

This an incredible resource for developing ideas. (and if you're making your own processes.)

A few terms you might need to know:

• Authority Sites: A domain URL that google likes and you can post content on. These serve as sites linking to your site that will grow stronger over time and rank well in the search engines on their own, especially if you promote them. I track these using a system of my own that makes their status easy to see (Squidoo.com, hubpages.com, and a ton of others.)
• Extended Guide Post: Terminology refers to my system, but this is more commonly known as "Link Bait", this is very high quality content I have on my site that is so good, people will want to link to it from their website. Link bait works best in many industries when titled with "How to" in the beginning.
  
• Ghost Post: Terminology refers to my system, but this is similar to extended guide post... same thing, except these posts target a keyword and attempt to rank in google for "tier 2" keywords, or keywords that are easy to rank for but have lower traffic.
  
• Tier 1 keywords: Harder to rank for, build up your site to target these over the course of months.
• Guru: A dedicated expert in my field, I want to be the ultimate resource and come-to guy in the field of insomnia.
• Feedagg/age: this is basically RSS, but ranks really well on its own.
• "Power Monger": My own terminology, this refers to ranking for a keyword phrase that is incredibly easy to rank for and also has very high volumes of traffic. The idea is that the site will rank #1 easily, taking a lot of traffic in and thusly becoming considered as an authority by Google. As google gives it authority, the links pointing to your site will become much, much stronger. These are easiest to find in Market Samurai and the keyword should be in a related industry, because links are only powerful if they're coming from a place that relates to you.
  

The Daily Grind

(8 Authority Sites per day in total)

OPTIONAL #1
Spend the first hour or two (more or less) making an Extended Guide Post.

-Target the obvious keywords, or just target tier 1 keywords. I should write the post using as many different variations of my keywords as I can.
-Only wire + Bookmark it.
-(Optional) Make it a feed and RSS submitter it + feedagg/age

OPTIONAL #2
Spend an hour or two (more or less) dedicated to higher conversions and lower bounce rates.

-Lowering Bounce (improving viewer experience) - Sidebar, linkbait, more interaction with the text, ...continue this list here.
-Converting - This is a whole list in and of itself, but on the site there's probably things other than copy that you can split-test, and you should probably be split testing these.

Be A Guru:

• Follow people on twitter
• -----(if necessary, make video for an upcoming ghost post. (DO NOT USE YOUTUBE UPLOAD FOR AUTHORITY SITES) WHILE UPLOADING, market samurai some links.
  Make 1 ghost post using stomper bullets, post to blog
  
• Onlywire it
  
• Rewrite 1 time in google notebook
  
• Make 1 new authority site, using the SECOND EDITION as rewritten in google notebook. (make sure it's hub'd)
  
• Onlywire it, RSS Submitter it, & Feedagg/age it.
• Link to same-key GP & How-to.
  
• Participate in any forum. Post once or twice, max, on 1 forum only. It's really important that you do 2 things:
1. Make sure the signature link is DO FOLLOW (60% forums = link to blog posts i want ranked, 40% forums = link to authority sites i want ranked)
   
2. Only post value. If I'm on tech forums, I better do the research and talk tech. Ask a Q or something. In sleep forums, DO NOT MENTION YOURSELF > That's your signature's job.
   A Final Note - Adding value will greatly increase my potential AND my LONG-TERM-ROI. Do not underestimate really helping people.
• Rewrite GP again in google notebook, make 1 new authority site (Use Third Edition).
  
• Onlywire it, RSS Submitter it, & Feedagg/age it.
• Link to different GP (determine which one using Blog Posts map) & How-to
  
• Make 2 new authority sites using TIER 1 KEYWORD MATERIAL. Each keyword can be duplicated on up to 20 sites.. get creative for these when you run passed the main 12.
  
• Onlywire, RSS Submitter it, & Feedagg/age it.
• Link to 2 different GPs (one can be the GP from today)
• Join Insomnia Groups & Social Platforms (are you keeping a list of the groups you in yet?)
  
• Invest time here, this is a good time to help others by doing research for them, learn, and expand.
• Sign up for at least 1 new msn, yahoo, or google group.
• Add value to every group I'm in.
• Pitchlessly build backlinks everytime I add value. (50% links go to posts, 50% to authority sites)
• (optional) Find other groups, social media platforms, etc, using geneic keywords in google (like insomnia social, insomnia youtube, that kind of thing)
  The goal here is to be really creative in ways of finding people.
  
• Use Yahoo Answers
  
• Make 2 new authority sites using TIER 2 KEYWORD MATERIAL. Basically, each keyword can be duplicated on up to 12 sites, and as you can see v^, the new keyword only got 4 sites made today.
  
• Onlywire, RSS Submitter it, & Feedagg/age it.
• Link to 2 different GPs (one can be the GP from today)
• @Twitter by using sleep insomnia, going through the people you added TODAY, and sending @messages to the most qualified & those I can help.
• Make a new authority site using RANDOMIZED version of today's materal
  
• Onlywire it, RSS Submitter it, & Feedagg/age it.
• Link to How-to & different GP
• Make final new authority site using RANDOMIZED version of today's materal
• Link to same-key GP (from 2nd bullet) & different GP.
• Establish a "Power Monger"
• Find a keyword in another Health Category with High SEOT, with VERY LOW SEOC.
• Wordpress Direct or, better, a non-leaky friend of Google (like Tumblr... not squidoo. Squidoo leaks PR all over their site. Tumblr just says "powered by")
• Drive links to this site.

Twitter | Using Analytics: What Bounce Rate to Have

It's important to your rankings to keep your bounce rate fairly low.

Avinash Kaushik, Google's Analytics Evangelist states, "it is really hard to get a bounce rate under 20%, anything over 35% is cause for concern, 50% (above) is worrying."

If your following people on twitter to get visits to your website, be careful to put alittle more quality time into choosing QUALIFIED visitors / prospects. So, if you search.twitter.com "McCain" and follow people while your twitter link goes to a post talking about "the debate between obama and mccain", you'll have a higher bounce rate than if you followed people with a search.twitter.com: "presidential debate" (using quotes).

You should also only follow people that just recently tweeted about the keyword. I'd say most people tend to start forgetting about the event from yesterday and stop caring a week later.

Here's some more tips:
-spend some time really getting whats on the other side of that link ..and..
-spend 2 seconds per person before opening another tab (i go down the list, right clicking on people's names and pressing "t" to open a new tab. once i get about 50-100, i use a combo of hovering my mouse over "follow" and using ctrl+w [close tab] to get about 100 people added in 5-10 minutes)

How to check the order people type in the keywords you're researching.

The first keyword I ranked for, Candle Brass, had an seo traffic of about 300 with only around 4300 competing pages.

So I made a blog named candle brass and ranked #1 for that phrase within about 3 hours.

But no one ever types in candle brass. They type in brass candle. So I never saw any traffic.

Here's a fast, accurate way to figure it out without using quotes:



(the keywords are hidden because i posted this on the thirty day challenge forums.)

I just.. try not to think about it.

The Power Source

These are some of the most effective strategies I use now. Of course, I'm in 12-hours-a-day-deep, so I can't talk about all the things I do or go into much detail here... but these resources are MORE THAN ENOUGH TO GET YOU STARTED down a very powerful path of social networking.

This is NOT about social networking.

This is about PROMOTING your blog. Social Networking is HUGE and I would really like to write a guide on it soon... but in general, it's not the fastest method in the world and isn't very scalable - the best you can do to speed things up is to hire someone else to do it for you.

These models (minus twitter) are far more scalable, and will become WAY MORE POWERFUL as you socially network yourself. These are the things you want running in the background!

This Guide Covers:

My Twitter Strategy (see the beginning for a lightning fast, extremely effective course on copy writing and turning visitors into readers)

Search Engine Optimization All-In-One

Blog Profits

Effectiveness through Love

--

My Twitter Strategy:

It's simple.

This includes 3 twitter accounts.

First of all, on all three you're going to want the same basic BIO and greeting message. With the bio, just make sure the first thing in there is a link to your site. It's a "follow" link, and will pass more authority the more popular you are on twitter.

Your welcoming message is what people see when they follow you on twitter. Make it an ENTICEMENT (aka, AD - something slippery that will make them click). Obviously, you need your link in this. These get EXTREMELY HIGH click through ratios.

Here's how you make people click on an enticement:



I wish I could get you to understand how HUGE this is.

Since I started back in January, copy writing and converting visitors into readers has been pretty much the biggest issue. It's in the top two.

I have over 100 pages of notes on this topic. And that image right there sums of 75% of all of them. It was put together by stompernet and should be used when you write anything for anyone, ever. Just brilliant.

So spend some time thinking about what those mean. Here's alittle help:

Articulating their goal: Get inside their head. Feel the emotions. When a word pops out at you "oh, it feels like [pain]" - use that word and explore what that feels like to find more words, then feel those words, going deeper and deeper.

If you can say someones problem better than they can, THEY AUTOMATICALLY UNCONCIOUSLY CREDIT YOU WITH KNOWING THE SOLUTION. Humanity at it's craziest.

Demonstrate the Ownership experience. This one is hard to grasp, so here's an example: If you were selling baby's gifts, you could end your ad with "...and put a smile on your child's face". THAT demonstrates the ownership experience of buying their toy. Politics isn't necessarily harder - just more abstract.

Okay, so back to twitter. Here's my 3-accounts-attack-plan:

Account 1: My main account. Only talks about important, relevant things, sometimes with stuff in my life and what I'm doing. THIS IS FOR MY FOLLOWERS AND WILL SHOW UP ON MY BLOG.

Account 2: My "message you" account. I use this account with http://search.twitter.com/ ... search for "sleep insomnia", and then when I see people with a serious problem, I send them an "@username hey i can help you". This is WAY easier to do with something like politics.

Account 3: My "follow you" account. I just spend a little bit of my time every day following as many people as possible as fast as possible. With all these accounts, I try to seem like a real person with a series of messages trailing off into the past, but the message people see when they check out who just followed them BETTER SAY some kind of enticement. The goal is click through ratio.

---

Everything you need to know about ranking in the search engines:

www.seofaststart.com

If you're not ready for SEO Fast Start... Here's some quick notes...

There's trying to rank for a specific KEYWORD COMBINATION, which is easy if your the only page using those words (never the case), and then there's building your website's authority - which is how much google trusts you for keywords.

The bridge: The more you use a keyword on your site, the more google trusts you (sees you as an Authority) for those keywords.

Now see if you can understand these pictures:

How you attempt to rank for a keyword:

(missing factors = how many pages you do this on (keyword authority.. next photo) for the keyword and if the keyword is in your site's URL, TITLE, and DESCRIPTION. Obviously, these have the biggest effect and are hardest to achieve... save from making multiple blogs)



---

Blog Profits

How to make profits out of your blog:

Well, it's easy. Advertise on your blog.

Here's WHERE to advertise:



And Here's WHAT to advertise:



To learn how to socially network yourself to get TRAFFIC to your blog that will click on these things, read the blog profits guide (it's AWESOME):

1. Go to www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/
2. On the right, fill in your email and he'll mail you the download link.

---

Effectiveness Through Love

What Do I Have To Do DAY-BY-DAY To Be SUCCESSFUL??

This is an attempt to answer that question.

I used to go about all this from an elite point of view. The problem is I'd burn out from whipping myself so much. Now I take on the concept of consuming myself with what I'm doing - and I believe there's a FUNDAMENTAL behind this idea that we can all use... LOVE.

I want to suggest that the TIME you put into this is ONLY A BY-PRODUCT AND NOTHING MORE.

HOW MUCH TIME YOU PUT IN IS NOT THE RELEVANT FACTOR IN YOUR SUCCESS.

So, DONT plan for 30 minutes a day, 1 hour a day, or even 8 hours a day.

It's almost irrelevant all together.

What matters is how much LOVE you show your project, how often you show it love, how much you love it when you do, and just how much you love it in general.

I'd like to use my friend Alex for this example. He loves politics. Both me and my friend Dave even see him as being a politician at heart.

So it's only natural that he's going to want to put his ideas up when he has them and show his blog some love. Then, it's natural for him to share this with people by going on social media news sites and sharing, which generates links and traffic back to his blog.

The more love he shows it, the faster it will succeed. And sometimes, when your in love, you've got to do stuff for your sweetheart you just don't want to do. So keep that in mind, too, because that love is very important here.

Get it?

Give love, not time. In fact, since we're all wired to work in units of time, make it a HABIT to slap yourself whenever you get caught thinking this way for this project.

Seriously. Make it a habit to stop the thought process in it's tracks and say to yourself, "No, I need to give love. Not think about time."

Obviously, we tend to love things more if we spend more time with them...

You show love when you:
-Put your effectiveness to work, even timing yourself to be faster and better.
-Compete for your project.
-Do more things for your project.
-Dedicate full attention when you're with your project, not giving in to distractions.
-Spend A LOT of time with what you love.

This list is endless. The only problem is what your imagination can bring forth... and the lack of this in people greatly scares me.

Good luck out there! This is the cornerstone of what I'm calling "The Power Source" when it comes to the social networking challenge.

Photos that are EASILY Worth 1000 Words

Where people look; thus, where to place ADs and IMPORTANT information:



ESSENTIALS for Ranking In The Search Engines:



Search Engine Optimization THEORY:



A Secret Powertool you'll have to ask me about if you really want to rank for some keywords... (note to self: GET ON THIS ALREADY [check google-notebook plan]):



& Especially for ALEX - Advertisements you can throw on your site (and networks to advertise with):



And another note for ANYONE USING WORD PRESS DIRECT:

* http://www.naturalcuresforinsomnia.org/ GAHHHHH DONT EVER USE THE WORD PRESS DIRECT EDITOR.. I just lost 2 hours of work (via Twitter) - Sep 29, 2008

Embed music on your blog

Yup - this what I'm listening to: (instead of pirating, I just use this now... I got hit with 3-5 virus in a couple of months s0o..)



seeqpod.com - the playable search (and you can save your playlists, too =D)

Social Networking Challenge Preview - Check your email

First, I've got to mention a ridiculously awesome guide to getting readers to your blog - completely without the help of the search engines. It's a 50 page "blueprint" guide, and it's just excellent, free material. Putting out your own guide like this would easily make you popular on the internet (concept of the free line - which is new and booming...)

Get yours here: http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/ (you've got to give him your email, over to the right. It's worth it and you can unsubscribe right after.)

For the #2 I mentioned in my email, I'm copy and pasting this preview in from another source. Try to read around all the internet marketing jumbo. It's basically the concept of what I'll mainly be teaching:

If you're looking for a way to get rich from home and you want to run or already run your own Internet business, one of the best tools you can make use of is social bookmarking. Social bookmarking is a method of social networking to increase your flow of targeted traffic to your website(s). It has been made possible by the Internet.

Social networking is nothing new. It is a method of finding more qualified prospects for your business. In the business world before and outside of the Internet, networking involves joining groups such as a local racquetball club or anything that revolves around something that interests you, and then making friends and making yourself and your services known within those groups over time. By interacting in a friendly way with people with mutually shared interests, you build trust and a reputation for expertise in your professional area. As people within the groups become convinced that they might need or want your services, they come to you willingly for help; these same people are also far more likely to give you referrals, which along with repeat sales are the lifeblood of all business owners.

With social bookmarking, you blog or you or write articles and get these articles published at online content sites; then you bookmark your blog entries, articles you write for your website(s), and articles you publish at content sites at bookmarking websites. There is quite an abundance of these and their number continues to grow as their value becomes better known and they come more and more into demand.

The bookmarking websites are places where you share content that you find useful, well-written, or informative. These sites facilitate linking back to the original content and most of them also facilitate commentary. These sites are designed to give people all over the Net access to quality information in a targeted, organized way; consequently they virtually all have categories under which you index your content. You can bookmark any content that you like, but in this case it goes without saying that the content you are bookmarking is your own.

The idea is to create social "buzz" about yourself through your content at these networking bookmark sites and get people to access the links to your content, blogs, and website(s). By indexing your content using placement under appropriate site categories and adding keyword tags, you begin to draw the attention of people who might be interested in your offerings. You can greatly enhance your visibility by taking part in the socializing aspects of these bookmarking sites, by which you make online friends and add and get subscribers to your bookmarks and content. These people don't buy a subscription, but they do become automatic regular followers of your posts, getting them "hooked" on you and greatly upping the chances that they will eventually become a customer.

Targeted traffic is vastly more valuable than traffic you get from the "shotgun approach". It is a great waste of time to offer your services to just anybody when you could instead find people who already probably have some degree of interest in what you offer. In business, time is money, and when you waste time you lose money. But by constantly writing on a topic such as "how to get rich working from home" and socially bookmarking and networking with your content online, you become known, trusted, and seen as relevant to a certain group of people.

One of the most effective social bookmarking and networking websites is StumbleUpon. This is both a networking site and a web browser plug-in where you download the StumbleUpon toolbar to your desktop and it becomes part of your web browser. You find different websites when you click the "Stumble!" button on the toolbar. The website chooses which new page to show based on your ratings of previous pages, ratings by your online site friends, and by the ratings of other Internet users who have similar interests using a "thumbs-up/thumbs-down" display system. It also has one-click blogging built into it. The ramifications for your business should be obvious.

Another great site is Yahoo! Answers. Here you create a profile and then answer people's questions on specific topics. (You can also ask them.) Eventually you can become a Trusted Reporter for frequently sharing valuable answers, which greatly increases your profile at the site. You can post links to your website(s) in your answers and your profile, and post parts from your articles as answers. Yahoo! Answers is more frequently used all the time because people feel they are getting "friendly" and "earthy" advice from people with real experiences, making it a perfect fit for a social networker.

For targeting youthful prospects (teens and adults under 25), the fast-rising BEBO is perfect. BEBO is modeled on and similar to Facebook and early in 2008 was named the top performing Website of its kind in a report published in 'Computing Which?'. The editor commented, "No matter what age you are or what interests you have, there is a social networking site out there for you."

Have You Seen Our Blog Lately?

It's getting exciting! You can use dig over to the left to find out whats hot (Alex, just press "News"), and you can search and watch videos on youtube (>.<)

I'm still dying for someone to tell me what to think of this:

Email me as soon as you watch it (>.<)

James
(posting as team member because I was working on the blog)

You can now post to this blog

If you're part of the challenge... you can now post to the blog... just shoot me an email and I'll invite you.

Plant the seed now & your blog will grow

I mentioned the ULTIMATE PLAN [Link] was the first post on here recently - it's the next one down guys. For the social networkers - this post is UBER Important.

There's two videos you guys really have to see. If you just get your blog started now, and you just start interacting with one person... you'll grow big time, over time. It's like growing a tree - plant the seed now. It's not like growing a tree only because you've got to keep watering it like a flower, but if you're doing something you love...

Watch:
http://garyvaynerchuk.com/2008/08/05/content-and-community-how-to-build-a-good-show-on-the-internet/

Then watch:
http://garyvaynerchuk.com/2008/06/05/when-do-you-know-you-have-a-community/

Now for the optional videos - there's one here, and one in the post below this one: My Ultimate Plan



If your name is alex, dave, or steven, I highly recommend you goto Gary's blog and watch every video he's posted - it will take about 2 hours, but it's very worth it and inspiring and goes perfectly with the thirty day challenge.

My Ultimate Plan

This is a while we're waiting kinda post - sometime in the fall I want to have the social networking challenge ready - but you never know when things will come to pass, so in the meantime, I'm posting up my ultimate plan.

I've had this plan for a while now, but I saw a video tonight that added a whole dimension to it I hadn't anticipated. After looking at the statistics of successful 30 day challengers (low), I'm beginning to think this plan could take a lot of time to come to completion.

The plan is fairly simple - have about 10 markets beginning PPC / 30DC testing at a time. Those that show promise get the majority of my time, and further testing and expansion is applied. A niche that does really well ends up going to different mediums of advertising and expands into a full thriving business, and is eventually outsourced so I can have the time to dedicate to the other markets.

The idea is that there is ALWAYS 10. And the total failures only make it about 10 days. I continually rotate markets in the search for ones that will show signs of a profitable niche. Eventually, I should end up with 2-4 major businesses that bring in all the money, and niches that turn into profitable businesses after that will mostly be given away (hence, my business inner circle.)

But, it could be a long and hard road. I expect a lot of big bumps in the road. And today was kind of a wake up call as I faced the statistics - and the fact that I have to get back to working for my dad again this week.

I got kind of the missing ingredient for my plan tonight... as obvious as it is, this guy said it with the right spirit. I'll be putting up one business a day for months, maybe years until I find some that I can expand. To keep doing something every day for a year, you need this spirit:



...and just to kill time, here's another video (test):

The Social Networking Challenge is CLOSED - But Just For Now

Can you "close" a team?

So here's the "What Happened":

I encouraged every body to do the challenge... and...
Only one person really participated with me.

Problems?
1. The thirty day challenge is very entrepreneur based and it's hard for you guys to figure out how you could use the information.
2. It takes too long to watch all that video.

But, here's the reality:
1. You guys can use the information to do things you wouldn't have thought possible for yourself.
2. I can redesign and simplify the process.

My plan is to make 1 video. I'll be testing the material out first, and this could take a while... so it'll be on my time. This will be coming out sometime in the fall.

Now... WHY! Would I do this?

Sure it helps me to learn how I can network online... I am interested in this stuff as well... but those alone wouldn't make it worth it.

The reason I'm doing this is because it's an opportunity that needs to be presented. The stuff they showed me this year has never been seen before, and the web 2.0 / internet is just booming right now. This won't be available forever.

Even if no one takes me up on it... it still needs to be presented. Just the way I see things.

I'm going to copy and paste now my plans for a real "social networking challenge" from the email I sent out to my business inner circle.

QUOTE:
" The thirty day challenge was AMAZING for entrepreneurs... I plan on going into 2 MARKETS A DAY now that I have these tools... but it wasn't quite what I was expecting for the rest of you that were working on social networking yourself.

That doesn't mean there wasn't great web 2.0 training – it was just very search engine oriented. If you want to rank in the search engines – definitely check out the challenge when you get the chance. It'll be around.

If you still want to get yourself out there – don't worry, I'm coming back for my social networking team some time in the Fall. And instead of a crap load of videos most of you weren't ready to sit down and watch... I'll do all this for you in one video...

Here's what I'll show you how to do:

1. How to actually network socially in web 2.0 - and how to have more information on a topic than 95% of the people out there, flowing to you automatically AS-IT-HAPPENS. It takes SECONDS - and you'll be across an industry, and you'll have all the newest news and the biggest "WOW-facts". This would give you stuff to talk about (a must for networking) and I'll be showing you how to find people throughout web 2.0.

2. How you can use search engine traffic to socially network yourself in web 2.0.

3. How to get a website up and completely prepared to rank high (on google) for a keyword... within an hour of work on your part.

4. How to promote that site so that it will rank high in the search engine right off the bat (it'll be on Google within a few hours of creation) and so that it will climb in ranking over time. Part of that promotion is having articles which rank themselves, getting your site more power (because the articles have power from their ranking) and getting your site more visitors... because they click on your site from within the article. So far, we're up to only two hours of total work.

5. How to make your site very cool by adding videos, music, games, and awesome content to it (stumble upon)... so that people really check you out. This is the part that might take an extra hour or two.

6. And I'll share with you where you can take it from there.

I don't know if you followed this... but part of the point was the amount of time it takes. I think a lot of you aren't doing the challenge because it takes a lot of time... but the reality is, once you've learned the stuff (they REALLY drag it out) and you've done it once, you can have an amazing promoted site up and competing within a couple of hours.

I am literally going to research markets and compete within them at least twice a day. If you're not quite sure what that means- I'm going to be starting 2 businesses a day.

So... the whole challenge so far takes 2 hours to complete... and yet, there is over 10 hours of training to be watched. To me, that spells out UNNESSESSARY.. at least for you non-entrepreneuring social networkers. So I'll be coming back around for you guys. Just wanted you to know that – and this challenge isn't going to be entrepreneur-like – in particular, I plan on setting it up for musicians (Alex, I have something special I want to try with you, just remind me by saying "it had to do with NEWS").

And I'll test run it before I show it to you guys. So, at the very least, I'll be delivering the news that it doesn't work... or how well it does.

Keep checking your email this Fall,

James "

How to Make Great Ads

NOTE: The best way to make an Ad is to copy one that is effective already!!

BUILDING THE AD: Make an Irresistible Offer

Here's the table of contents and order of construction:

1. Develop an obviously high ROI for the prospect.
   
2. Create a compelling touchstone.
3. Make it believable.

1 - High ROI (Return on investment)

Every purchase is an investment: Hence, if I invest [what you want me to] I expect to get a really good return! All marketing (and even business) sums right down to this... so make sure it's an obviously good choice for them!

Key word: Obvious. If it's a great offer but they can't see it, it won't sell.

2 - Touchstone: How to say the offer...

• Clear - Every line makes perfect sense, has a lot of meaning.
• Simple - EASY to understand.
• Immediacy - Cuts to the chase (benefit focused).
• Short (brevity) - Cut out all extra words and condense.

3 - Believability: Make it credible (prove it)

Use Proof:

• Social Proof: Testimonials from other people, the more you get in the better (picture, phone number, whatever else can add to it's realness.)
• Technical Proof: Tests that show it works, scientific stuff.
• Factual Proof...

Other ways of making it believable:

• Have it endorsed by someone trustworthy in the industry or by a famous celebrity.
• Put it through qualified tests that people recognize.
• Use logic to show why the ROI is possible / why it just makes sense.
  

MAKING THE AD BETTER:

From a bird's eye view, selling is very simple. This was laid out by the grand master of selling, John Carlton:

1. Here's what I got. (Offer)
2. Here's what it will do for you. (Get the offer across to their life)
3. Here's what I want you to do next (be strait forward and hard. Confidence sells better than deals.)

1: "Here's what I got"

Here's how to make a compelling offer. Include all the following points:

Does it ...

* Make a Compelling Promise?
* Solve the Reader's Most Immediate Problem?
* Protect the Reader - With a Warning?
* Help the Reader Articulate Their Real Goal?
* Ask for ACTION!?
* Demonstrate the Ownership Experience?

It should do all of these - or at least the ones that are possible. The better you do them, the better the copy.

2. Here's what it will do for you.

Here's how to get your point across (getting the offer across to their life, so that no matter what personality type they are, they get why they'd want this in their life. This is extremely important, and only comes second because #1 catches their attention and interest.)

Answer each question:

1. Sales personality types - the motivators - ask,

WHY? (give the benefits)

2. Scholastic personality types - objective doers - ask,

WHAT FOR? (tell them what it'll do [what problems/frustrations it'll solve] & tell them what the results are.)

3. Technical personality types - how it works - ask,

HOW? (explain the system, show how everything is connected)

4. Advocate - focused on opportunities, creative, asks,

WHAT IF (show them how can you use it in other ways)

....

Now, it's also very important to answer these universal questions everyone always has before buying anything (yes! get these in the Ad IF YOU CAN... if you can't, just focus on the above, and maybe the most important question here)

The 12 Pre-Conversion Questions
1. Will it do what it says it will do?
2. Will it be easy for me to use?
3. Will it take a lot of my time to work?
4. Is this the only solution to my problem, or will it require
others?
5. What if it doesn't work?
6. What if something goes wrong?
7. Can I afford it?
8. What will my friends, family, or peers say?
9. Do I really need it?
10. Am I sure that I know enough about it?
11. Am I sure I know enough about the company selling it to me?
12. What if this is not the right version?

And no matter who they are, or what product they are buying -
those questions occur during their decision making process.

Please notice the following about those questions:
There are virtually no questions about the "up side" of
ownership. They're all based on Failure or Risk Scenarios.

Now I'll ask you the Sixty Four Thousand Dollar Question:
Are you letting your prospects into your sales process without
answering all of those questions?

-----

The points to cover in giving any presentation are then:

• Why you should buy
• How it will benefit you
• What this product will do
• What it will accomplish
• How it does what it does
• Creative things you can do with it

Part 3 of the carlton method, asking for action, should be strait forward enough. People can tell if something is worth getting based on how confident you are in it, so, when you ask for action, make sure to be really firm and validate why you believe they should.

And that's it! When you've got something good, this is all you need.

This works amazingly better when the thing is free. Give people free stuff to show them your value, but very importantly, win over their trust and get them accustomed to being sold. I plan on "selling" everything - whether or not it has anything to do with being sold.

AND THEN you get to the deeper copy writing elements – like being hypnotic etc

More for: The Getting of Ideas

I noticed something different from the video today and last year's video on "The Getting of Ideas".

This year, he's only mentioning looking at magazines.

First of all, if the concept of getting ideas is confusing to you because your not an entrepreneur or whatever, read the previous 2 blog posts to this one.

Second of all, consider this before using any of these resources I'm about to post: There is a reason Ed only wants us looking at magazines for ideas. He may actually release these resources later... but I think he may not... because magazine's are the most effective way to find profitable ideas. They are plugged into their markets, they've done all the surveys you'd never have time to do in 100 markets, and they show real world interests. You can use them to spawn the most ideas, and the best ideas.

Now that that has been said... here's some more resources for you guys to use in getting ideas within your area of interest or otherwise. Keep in mind that if you're struggling with your social networking category like guitar-rock, you can play entrepreneur and do the challenge as it was intended - because you'll learn a lot towards what you do want to do if you learn the challenge, and the best way to do this challenge is as it was intended.

Addictomatic: Inhale the Web
ClickBank Marketplace | Find ClickBank Products
CNET's Buzz Report with Molly Wood - CNET.com
Popular pages on del.icio.us
Depth Reporting: The Most Useful Web Sites for Reporters
ODP - Open Directory Project
http://www.dummies.com/WileyCDA/Dumm...All/index.html
eBay - Women's Clothing, Inside the Home, Cell Phone PDA Accessories items on eBay.com
eBay - The World's Online Marketplace
eBay Pulse: trends, hot picks, cool stuff and popular searches on eBay.com
eHow | How To Do Just About Everything!
Possible Error Detected
Furl > Most Popular
Gizmodo, the Gadget Guide
Google Catalogs
Google Product Search
Google Trends: Jun 28, 2008
Most viewed - Google Video
http://www.hobbieslist.com
Intute - the best Web resources for education and research
iVillage.com: Health, Beauty, Pregnancy, Entertainment and More
Lycos 50 - Lycos 50: Anne Hathaway, J-Lo & Kate Hudson
Mailing Lists Search Tool
Compare Prices On Any Product and Find the Best Deals Online Before You Buy with PriceRunner US
Retail news discussions and analysis. RetailWire ...Plug in. Free!
Technorati: Front Page
ThisWorld - ThisNext
Viral Video Chart - Top 20 Viral Videos
Categories - wikiHow
Portal:Contents/Lists of topics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Yahoo Answers (Advanced)
Yahoo! Shopping - Find Great Products Online, Compare, Shop & Save

Knock yourselves out.

10 Ideas???

Ed Dale has mentioned that you should be getting ideas. But, since we're into social networking - not nessesarily being entrepreneurs, it's not our job to find markets so much as it is to find ideas within our specific area of interest.

Here's an example:

Steven: ok, now what i dont get is, we're supposed to have 10 ideas
Steven: about what? lol .. he said he wants us to think up 10 ideas for the challenge
Jame: oh... well, you're gonna have to think out of the box for that one, like
Jame: whats 10 getting-popular things that have to do with your kind of music that you could use to promote yourself with
Jame: for the rest of us its 10 niche-markets
Steven: ?
Jame: kinda different there, but the concept is the same - like, amps
Jame: people into your music might be into getting certain things done to their amps, or might want advice for what amp for x-kind guitar
and since you use x-type guitar your one of the only people actually putting advice out there for what amp to get with x-type guitar and how to use it
James: that's one idea

So, it's 10 different ways you can reach people. Ideas are for what "niches" are available to you - where a niche is any keyword that people are interested in. amps-x-type-guitar is an example of a niche keyword (music, guitar), but it might also be mccain's-obama-britney-paris-ad (politics, news) or trout-fishing-hooks (entrepreneurial market).

The idea is that niche is specific - you could never, EVER get any attention if you main focus was "guitars" - and you were trying to get people's attention by say, teaching people how to do different things on guitar and showing off your music. You've got to get specific.

Now keep scrolling down (if your on the blog) - and read the post prior to this one that I also posted today.

What To Do With All These Tools...

First things first - To get google talk working in google desktop, download gtalk and then run it - and then double click on the name at the top - it will dock in your google desktop.

Concern - "I have all these tools but I have no idea how I'm supposed to use them yet"

No worries - A lot of these tools you won't know how to use until days 10-20.

Here's what you should do right now:

1. Goto friendfeed, make sure you have an account, search room: socialnetworkingchallenge.
2. Once in the room, click on "share something" and share all the accounts you've set up so far.
3. Click on the feed button in your flock browser and add the feed to your google reader.
4. And for bonus points... while you're on this blog right now, click feed button and add the blog to your google reader.
   

News: It Starts Tonight!

The challenge begins at 5pm California time tonight (technically 12am, the first of august 5 hours behind us) and there's a tv show kick off at www.thirtydaychallenge.tv.

I will be here today and tomorrow to start the challenge with you guys, but on the 2nd I go to camp.

You will be able to reach me via text or twitter at 10-11pm every night. I don't get much service up there (and I'll be busy dealing with 8 5th graders from 6am-9pm daily), but when I turn on my phone at 10 I'll get all your twitters & text.

So since the challenge is starting, just make sure you've joined our friend feed room, the four of you are following everyone on twitter (SonicAssault {NOT "mephitboy"}, AlexShahparnia, daveysilent, Kernelboy, JCMO, and Ed_Dale), and that you have this blog and our friend feed room added to your google reader.

And try to grasp the concepts of this video if you havent seen it yet: http://is.gd/152t

I'll be on vent and gtalk.

James

P.S. If you've got anything newsworthy, or you see a common concern, post on this blog- and just sign your name at the end of your post. For anything else you want to share with the team, post it to the friend feed room.

P.P.S. - Group meet up tonight - at my place and on ventrilo - I'll send a tweet out about it in a couple of hours.

Introverse & Extroverse - Finally Complete.. read the first 2 sentences for team news

The challenge is starting soon! Get to the friend feed lesson in pre-season (tv show automatically comes up when you click the package, then there's 2 instructional videos on the right) so that you can start sharing your stuff on friend feed! I'm going to let you GUESS the name of our friend feed room.

...and about that friend feed package... you know how I said ^ that tv show automatically comes up? That's what the last blog post was about. It's very important to understand the concept in there.

The rest of this post is mostly for Dave & Alex (and Steven) - but if you'd like to discover alittle bit about your personality, you can read it too.

So without futher ado - I present the finished version of my theory. I will be locked in my own head NO MORE!

Completing the Distinctions: Introverse & Extroverse

Specific Problem to address: introversing and extroversing at the same time.

Introverse: Having Thoughts (sourced from you or others) that you control-by-interpretation (as in, you control your thoughts since all your thoughts have to be filtered through your brain - you interpret them, you have control over them... or at least most of them.)
example: thinking about work... or thinking about philosophy... etc.

Extroverse: Doing (or flowing); to what extent depends on what you have to work with.
example: listening to music... or eating a great meal... meditating... making love... etc.

Describing someone as introverse or extroverse: Which they prefer to do more
intverse [---------------------------] ext (continuum)
Describing someone as introvert or extrovert: Do they think before they talk (in general more quiet) or do they talk-TO-think (in general more expressive)
intvert [---------------------------] ext (continuum)

There are 4 types of people:
Introverts that prefer an introverse (Bernice) (Dave & Alex's friend... i think? this is her?)
Introverts that prefer an extroverse (Shawn) (Fuller)
Extroverts that prefer an introverse (James) (me)
Extroverts that prefer an extroverse (Jared) (not you Kernel..)

I think introverts and extroverts are more or less locked into that distinction: It's part of their personality. Like anything else though, everyone talks to think and thinks before they talk at times. It's behavioral.

I think introverse and extroverse generally varies more on the situation, but preference can be linked with personality as I described above.

Problem: Trying to get out of an introverse by thinking about it-
Think about this for a second. Based on the distinction introverse, is this a working strategy?
And if other's encourage you to get "out there" more, you would naturally think about how to do that if you were in an introverse (like your in "think mode"). So for people who perfer introversing, it's easy to get locked into it. Like being trapped in a bubble.

Answer: Extroverse

Solution: See all thoughts for what they are: thoughts. Don't expect them to stop - you're a machine that cranks out thoughts continuously (hence the "get locked into it".) Just don't pay attention to them - by paying attention to something else.

You can't ignore them without doing something extroverse. You can't "just try to stop thinking". What'd be left? You'd be sitting there with nothing and that nothingness would get filled with thoughts. Instead, one must start doing or flowing- with something that doesn't require the chatter. Something like listening to a good song passionately, meditating, etc - but you'd have to embrace it. The more you embrace doing, the faster you "un-embrace" thinking.

Hence the problem with extroversing and introversing at the same time.

The Most Powerful Thing Yet....

Okay, you guys have to watch this if you haven't already: http://is.gd/152t
It's the thirty day challenge TV show talking about friend feed. 21-22 minutes into it he starts to talk about how you can use friend feed to search for comments, and this is powerful because...

YOU CAN FIND OUT WHAT PEOPLE WANT!

What people are looking for - what they find interesting - what everyone likes ... etc.

So you can find out what people want, and then give it to them... so people will basically follow you because they know you only give good stuff because you know exactly what they're going to like and want. It's a win-win situation, and it's VERY powerful.

Watch this video: http://is.gd/152t

How To Join The Team

You *officially* are on the team if you're signed up for the thirty day challenge and your twitter shows up over there on the left.

Here's the How To:

1. Read the "TEAM INSTRUCTIONS" (you can search that term at the top left)
2. Sign up for the thirty day challenge with my link: http://tinyurl.com/5mxvvh
3. Sign up for a twitter account at twitter.com and ask a team member to add your twitter to the blog (I find it's hard to add yourself... cookies or something?)

Do those things and your part of the team! Make sure to get all the preseason training while your at the thirtydaychallenge... the challenge will take about 1hour a day to get the learning, starting August 1.

I've set this all up for you because I'll be gone basically July 25 to August 9. But, I'll be getting your twitter messages to my phone whenever you update twitter (Aug 2-9 my phone will mostly be turned off) so I'll be keeping up to date and in touch.

New way of tracking twitter news

Instead of having to log into twitter to update the news, you'll now just post to your own twitter whenever you want something to go on the blog.

Thanks to Dave for the idea - if you're on the team, your twitter feed will show up on the blog. This means you can see what all team members are up to by jumping on the blog.

Get Emailed whenever someone posts to the blog.

1. Log in to the blog with username "socialnetworkingchallenge".
2. Goto "Settings", then goto "Email"
3. Add your email address after the last one. Make sure you email is comma separated from the one before it.

That's it. You'll get emailed when new posts are made to this blog.

TEAM INSTRUCTIONS - You can also see this by logging into gmail with name "socialnetworkingchallenge" and the same password

I'm setting up our blog with blogger, which you can use to see the team's newest twitter messages (aka NEWS), our friendfeed (aka videos and new items), and latest blog posts by our team's members (...and more social media stuff, too).

Our blog is the central hub for our communication, news, new stuff, and shared information. It's the team's home, if you will. And as you're probably aware, this isn't a normal thirty day challenge team - we're all doing our own thing. So this is just a way of having your questions answered and getting help when you need it. The main reason your here, though, is to do the thirty day challenge - so the team is just extra stuff that you may choose to participate in... but no one's expecting you to (I'd argue that it's a good idea...)

You can post on the blog. Blogger works with google, so you can log into google and as long as you don't log out of google you can just type blogger into your search engine and, when you arrive, you should already be logged into the edit-it area. If not, you can log in at blogger.com with the same account information. Note that if you log into google you can check the team's email, google reader, and other google tools.

POSTING TO TWITTER: Twitter is "mini-blogging" or news for the team, and it'll be syndicated into our blog. It's like a news feed for what's up.

If you want to post short-news to the blog, just log into your twitter and type a tweet. Make sure your twitter has been added to the blog.

POSTING TO FRIEND FEED: Friendfeed is an all-in-one hub for all social media events going on.
We have a room in friend feed specifically for our team. You'll see in the pre-season training that Ed Dale highly encourages using this as a medium for all our social media stuff. You can even get our friend feed room on your facebook.

It's very easy to share stuff - and you can share your social media items (they automatically update - so if you share your youtube videos, the room will see it whenever you make a new video on youtube or favorite a video) OR you can type messages and post to the room that way. If the blog is our hub of information, this would be our hub of showing off and seeing what everyone's up to.

All you have to do is have a friend feed account, goto rooms and search for the "SocialNETWORKINGChallenge" room.

And our friend feed plugs right into the blog, so you don't have to goto friend feed to see what the room's up to - you can see it at socialnetworkingchallenge.blogspot.com

Other Stuff:

Instant Messaging: You can get gtalk on your main google page, on your gmail page, or download it to your computer - this is our instant messenger for the group (I think it's on friend feed too... meaning it's on our blog too...)
Voice Communication: We use ventrilo (download: ventrilo.com) because we pay for a vent server (it's been around from the gaming days): IP: vent6.gameservers.com, PORT: 4229, no password.

I probably missed stuff, but it'll all be on the blog.

James