Psalm 91

As I am posting this, the Lord has said to me, we are in that last calm before a storm of Biblical proportions are gathering to rage across this country. In that revelation, I pray to my Father in Heaven to cover Markethive and all who abide within, in His blood and protection. A mighty fortress is my Lord.

OK: Carry on

Psalm 91

91 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.

Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.

He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.

Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day;

Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.

A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.

Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.

Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation;

10 There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.

11 For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.

12 They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.

13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.

14 Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.

15 He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.

16 With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him my salvation.

Al Zibluk

Are Sales Funnels Really that Critical to Online Success?

update

What is this thing called a sales funnel, and why is everyone going crazy over it? There is always talk on the Internet about sales funnels, but who really understands what a sales funnel is and how to correctly implement one?

Well, perhaps there is a considerable amount of confusion about sales funnels because it is one of the distinguishing factors that separates the successful marketer / business person from the unsuccessful one. Have you ever bought something online or over the telephone from a TV advertisement? 

The kind of funnel that most of these TV ad-men design more closely resembles a black hole. The realize that they probably have one shot and one shot only to sell to a customer calling on an 800 number. After you have made one purchase, you will usually be given a chance to double the order, for only the (inflated) cost of shipping and handling. Then one product after another will be offered in an attempt to squeeze every last dollar out of the call. This is distasteful to the consumer, but this kind of sales funnel is common in that industry. You really do feel like sucker if you let yourself get caught in their "black hole", and buy product after product.

Just ask any typical business person, what do you do with the people who do not buy your products or services?  Most would say, well, nothing.  Well, you probably have what is called a leaky sales funnel.  This is not so easy to set up for a brick and mortar type of business, but every online business should pay attention to their sales funnel. There almost always is a significant impact on your bottom line.

Everyone knows that taking care of customers is a priority.  If any business is to survive, it is a well-established fact that you have to take good care of your customers.

Say what you will about the Internet Marketing Industry, one thing that good Internet Marketing Professionals have going for them is that they understand very well that it is not only the quality of the product you promote, but the specific design of your sales funnel that can often make the difference between a mediocre success and big success. To rephrase, a well-designed sales funnel could be the difference between losing money, merely breaking even, and making a significant profit.

Let's try to clear up some basic confusion about sales funnels using the above graphic. Most businesses think that everyone in America, or everyone in their hometown of business is a prospect. In reality, until someone walks into your store, they are only a potential prospect. In the case of online business, until someone signs up for your email newletter, free product download, webinar, or other offer, there are no prospects, only potential prospects.

Everyone outside of your sales funnel is the audience you are trying to reach.  This nearly limitless pool contains all of the potential prospects for your business. They have not walked into your store. They have not signed up to be contacted by you in any way. You don't know who they are, although you might have some idea where they hang out.  They are only potential prospects because you have no way of contacting them, until they take the first step into your sales funnel.

Once they walk into your store, or provide their email address, then they actually qualify as a prospect.  Now you can contact them and work with them to help them become a customer. Everyone wants to do more than just survive. If you want to thrive, you need to find a way to quickly determine who is ready, willing, and able to buy right now.  That should be the first step.  

I have to give Steve Rosenbaum credit for identifying this as such an important step.  He also talks extensively about leak-proof sales funnels.  This is a guy who really knows the sales process, both online and offline. As you can see from the graphic above you can see there is a step-by-step process until a prospect becomes a customer.

Also, there should be a clear method to allow customers to become what I would call loyal customers, by making repeat purchases. As shown by the arrow on the right side of the funnel, they should easily be able to become repeat customers. It may be because the product is renewable, or relies on a subscription model, or they simply like your product or service enough to purchase additional products or services from you.

There is obviously a great deal more to discuss about funnels, but I think the fundamentals discussed here are important enough to warrant this kind of post.

Related articles

Al Zibluk

Characteristics of a social entrepreneur

A social entrepreneur is someone who has decided to undertake a venture that is aimed at tackling societies most pressing problems, like famine and climate change. A social enterprise could be a nonprofit or profit business model. Two people often associated with social entrepreneurship are Blake Mycoskie, CEO of Tom’s shoes who provide a pair of shoes for a child in need for every shoe purchased and Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank, providing microfinance to the impoverished.

social media, business startup, markethive, entrepreneur

Social entrepreneurs embody most of the characteristics as other types of entrepreneur. However, there are certain traits that distinguish them.

Healthy Impatience

A social entrepreneur shows a healthy impatience with the way things are, according to Duke University, in a report by its Centre for Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship. CASE notes that socially minded entrepreneurs want to change things right away, know it can be done, and are often frustrated that bureaucracy and the lack of political will, impede on social changes that could benefit the masses.

Commitment to Improve Social Welfare

Social entrepreneurs are socially committed first and foremost. But what differentiates them from, a company engaging in CSR, is their ability to fully devote their time, energy and limited resources to make ensure they implement positive change. A business can use corporate social responsibility (CSR)  –  which entails everything from charitable donations to community work  –  to improve social welfare, but critics also point out that some for-profit entities use CSR as a public-relations tool.

Philanthropic

A social entrepreneur generally has a philanthropic predisposition. They also tend to distribute whatever profits are made to the socially disadvantaged, or reinvest the profit in the organisation. The idea is to grow the entity by enlisting more people, so more people can be positively affected, more lives can be saved, and much more social value can be created in the long term.

Lack of Megalomania

Social entrepreneurs don’t tend to have a megalomaniac personality. Their cause comes first, not their fame or finance. These entrepreneurs don’t have a problem letting others shine, especially their team members or others involved in local projects.

Reliance on people

Although most early stage businesses have pressures to conserve cash, this is even more true of social enterprises. Social entrepreneurship revolves around the concept of crowdsourcing, tapping into a team of faithful workers along with volunteers scattered around the world to solve the greatest problems of humanity.

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


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9 Nodding Strategies for Your Next Meeting

How to appear thoughtful and engaged without saying a word. 

You've got a bunch of meetings coming up, but do you have your nodding strategy ready? 

A solid nodding strategy could mean the difference between seeming like you understand what's going on and losing a job. 

meeting strategy

More seasoned professionals may think they can just nod the same way they did in their last meeting, but that's not an option  – â€Špeople will notice. Consider this: when someone's nodding the wrong way don't you immediately lose trust in them? I know I do.

To help you keep your nodding game fresh, here are nine nodding strategies you can choose from for your next meeting.

1. The Slow Nod

The slow nod is great for when someone is explaining something that makes no sense. Hopefully they'll see you nodding slowly and realize how ridiculous they sound.

2. The Slow Nod Followed by a Fast Nod

The slow nod followed by a fast nod is great to let the person talking know that you didn't get it at first, but you totally get it now, even if you still don't agree.

3. Head Shake Followed by a Fast Nod

A head shake followed by a fast nod shows that you didn't remember that thing you were supposed to remember but now you totally remember it. This is a really convincing strategy when you're on the hook for something that you never intend to do.

4. Side to Side Nod

Use this nod when you want to pretend you're considering something. It says — that could work, — while also saying it's not the best idea, and you're still waiting to hear something that'll really blow you away.

5. Let Me Write That Down Nod

This is the nod you use when you're pretending to write that down.

6. Let Me Think About That Nod

This nod will buy you some time before you have to make a decision. Put your chin in one hand, then both hands, then rest your chin on your knuckles, then repeat.

7. Nod With a Sigh

A nod with a sigh lets your coworker know you don't want to say yes, but you will say yes, because you're a professional.

8. Nodding Off Nod

This is a great nod for when you're trying to keep it together after a late night or when your coworker keeps talking beyond the point of reason.

9. The Almost Nod

This nod says, — you almost convinced me, but not quite, keep trying.

Hope this helps you find the perfect nod to fit your particular meeting situation so that no one will ever suspect you aren't really listening. If you enjoyed this, hit the green — Recommend — heart button below!

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


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Have Reports of the Death of RSS been Exaggerated?

A portrait of the American writer Mark Twain t…

A portrait of the American writer Mark Twain taken by A. F. Bradley in New York, 1907. http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/publications/siycfall_05.pdf http://www.twainquotes.com/Bradley/bradley.html See also other photographs of Mark Twain by A. F. Bradley taken in March 1907 in New York on Mark Twain Project Online. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It seems as though reports of the death of RSS, (just like the death of Mark Twain) have been greatly exaggerated.  Every since Google shut down Google Reader in 2013, the cries of the end of RSS have been repeated again and again.

Social Media apparently caused the death of RSS.  It seems that RSS just wasn't sexy enough for the age of Social Networking. The reality is that hundreds of millions of people still use RSS.

Feedly (the RSS reader I recommend) has a free version, but their paid version has gone from less than 500k users in 2013 to over 2 million in 2015.  Feedly is thriving and nowhere near death. It should be noted that an RSS reader is built into WordPress blogs by default,

So it appears that RSS is indeed alive.  There may be newer technologies that supplement or replace RSS down the technological road, but today it is still a valuable method to get information on whatever niche inspires you,  all in one convenient place.

I recommend you try Feedly.  Many RSS readers have installed advertising into their apps, but Feedly is ad-free.  I am not even sure what advantages the paid version offers, because I have been happy with the free version.  I guess I may have to check it out, now that I have written about it.

Take a look at the following links for additional information.

If you are interested in marketing for your online or brick and mortar business, see the following links.

Goldfinch Digital Marketing

Goldfinch Digital Publishing

 

Additional links:

Is RSS dead? Look at the numbers

Rand Fishkin (from Moz) — Is RSS dead?

 

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Al Zibluk

4 Ways to Spread a Tweet Beyond Your Audience

If you want to build your Twitter audience, spam isn't going to get you there. The key to connecting with potential followers is to offer something useful such as a tip, laugh, or link. If you aren't constantly talking about your product or service, you can establish a relationship based on respect rather than making a sale.

social media sharing

Twitter, like many social media networks, can be an excellent marketing tool. But reaching out to the right audience is a challenge. Businesses and professionals that are new to Twitter have few, if any, followers, and without followers your tweet doesn't have an audience—or does it?

Tweets can reach more than just the Twitter users following your account—if you do it right. And when your tweets reach more than just your own followers, your number of followers will grow, too. Here are four strategies suggested from readers at WAHM to spread a tweet beyond your audience.

1. Be conversational, not spammy.

No one likes spam—so don't produce it. Some Twitter users send automatic, prewritten messages. While that may seem like a good way to build up your followers, don't give into the temptation. It's spam. Instead, take the time to follow users that are interested in similar topics to what your business offers—you can do this by doing a hashtag search. Follow the people that are talking about things relevant to your industry, and then join in on the conversation: follow them, retreat them, and favorite their tweets. When they see that you have something interesting to offer to the conversation (e.g., not spam), they'll follow you back.

2. Use hashtags.

Using hashtags (#workfromhome, #mom, #parent, etc.) is a good way to get your tweet to pop up in Twitter searches and acquire new followers interested in related topics. But using the right hashtag matters, too. Tools like RiteTag help you see what hashtags are being used and searched the most, so you can make the most impact with a single tweet.

3. Know your audience.

Who are you trying to reach out to on Twitter? Identify your audience—for most internet marketers, that's the person most likely to buy your product or use your service. Once you've narrowed down a group of people that's likely to use your business, target them specifically. Follow other businesses that have a similar audience. Search for hashtags that your audience might use and engage in those conversations. Instead of reaching out to a big audience with no impact, you'll reach out to a smaller audience, but actually have more useful reach.

4. Make your tweets useful.

Don't think of your tweets as a marketing tool, think of them as an outreach tool. Instead of posting boring tweets about your product, share tweets that offer value, like a tip, a laugh, or a useful link. Retweet other interesting posts relevant to your industry or audience. When people see you post things that are useful to them, they'll follow you. Once you've built up an audience, you can post tweets that are directly related to your product, but you should still try to make most of your tweets as useful or entertaining, or you'll lose followers.

Twitter can be a useful marketing tool. While the platform is free to use, you do need to invest time and effort into reaching out to your audience and growing your number of followers. By sharing conversational tweets, using hashtags, knowing your audience and sharing useful information, you can expand your reach beyond just your Twitter followers. And when you reach people who aren't your followers, many of them will start following you—creating a snowball effect that continually grows your audience.

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


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Let’s make MarketHive the best Entrepreneurial Network it can be!

I sent out this post today using Pulse on LinkedIn.

 

As an entrepreneur, we often feel like everything depends on us.  Just like the hard-working woman in the image above, we sometimes can feel like our bicycle has too much loaded on it.  The whole world seems like it is on our shoulders.  In a very real sense, it is true that everything does depend on us.  A wise man once told me to pray as though everything depends on God, and work as though everything depends on you.  Sage advice I think, and words to live by.

That it why we sometimes need a group of like-minded entrepreneurs to exchange information and ideas.  There are many groups on LinkedIn where you can find entrepreneurs and do exactly that.

Sometimes you may think that there should be a marketplace where ideas, as well as products and services for the entrepreneur can be found.  Wouldn't it be great to have an entire social network dedicated to the entrepreneur?  I have been looking for quite a while for such a social network.

I have found a new Social Network that may meet my requirements for just such a place.  It is called MarketHive.  It is a fledgling network, and only time will tell if it grows into a thriving marketplace, but it seems to have good leadership with a solid core of dedicated entrepreneurs.  To find out more, simply visit http://markethive.com/jonlomb.

Thank you and good luck in all your endeavors!

Al Zibluk

The Only One Skill That, If You Have, Will Completely Change Your Life

We all look for the key recipe for the success. The secret element which will make all the difference.
The only true answer doesn’t exist. There’re plenty of skills which once mastered would change your life completely (This article originally appeared on Growthzer).

lifestyle motivation self-control

However, a skill that I believe is incredibly important in today's world, and it's something the vast majority of people lacks, is self-control.

Deeply inside, nobody wants to be unhealthy and practice self-destructing habits. But if you look around, people kill themselves every single day. The death may not come immediately, but it's going to arrive way sooner than it supposed to. Diabetes and cancer are sold on every corner. Profit is what counts to most of the companies, your health doesn't. So it's you who's responsible for controlling yourself.

People waste their most precious resource, which is time, on a daily basis and they'll never get it back.
This is caused by the lack of self-control. As a result, the urges, and today's economy is based on your urges, become more powerful than you're, so you act accordingly, instead of acting the way a disciplined person would.

Now, I'm not trying to say that being extremely disciplined would be a good thing. It definitely wouldn't. The overabundance of self-control is probably as harmful as the dearth of it.

But imagine a life in which you learned how to control yourself so that the obstacles the world throws at you become irrelevant: you just proceed with your goals.

Instead of putting junk into your body, you eat healthy foods, allowing yourself a reward in a form of eating what you want from time to time. This will have a tremendous impact on your health. You no longer have to try out fancy diets. If you eat real food instead of food-like products and you control the amounts, then you won't become overweight no matter how much you want it.

You also begin leading an active lifestyle. Instead of giving up on your New Year's fitness resolutions after two weeks, you hit the gym 3 times a week and walk a few miles on a daily basis.

After a year of controlling just these two areas: which is your plate and your lazy ass, you would already hugely transform your life, not just your body.

Now, let's take it further. We're bombarded with entertainment: Television, video games (which you can now play everywhere and every time because of smartphones), the Internet and so on. All these things can become really harmful once you lack self-control, and as you know, most people do not possess this invaluable skill. So instead of playing video games, watching Television or mindlessly browsing the Internet, which all translates to wasting your time, you read.

You commit to reading two hours a day, which may sound like a lot, but ask yourself how many hours you waste daily on the above three time-suckers. Books are life-changing. We learn through experience, but you can only experience so much in a lifetime. Owing to books, you can learn from other people's lives and apply the lessons during your personal journey. You will not find a highly successful person on this planet who would advise against books. Most of them would highly recommend you to consume them like you'd fast food or sweets.

So now a year goes by and you've been reading two hours a day for twelve months. I won't try to estimate the number of books you'd read, but there's one thing you can be sure of. It would be more than what the vast majority of people will ever read in their lifetime. They won't even read the half of it.

But reading great books without applying what you learn won't lead you to completely changing your life. You need to take action. For every single problem you'll experience in your life there's at least one decent book that offers the solution. To most of your issues, there're dozens of great reads. So now, as you start utilizing your knowledge, because due to self-control you proceed instead of procrastinating, imagine how many obstacles you'd overcome.

I'd like to take it further, so let's continue. As you read for two hours on a daily basis, you eventually become inspired to put your own thoughts on the paper. You realize that you'd love to write a book. The fact is, more than 80% of people wish to, but only 1% of them will ever write a book. And you know why 99% will fail? Because they lack the self-control to do the right thing instead of letting their urges dictate the flow of the day.

Fortunately, that's no longer your problem, so you commit to writing 500 words a day and stick to that for another twelve months. At the end of the year, you end up with more than 180 000 words of content. It may not necessarily be the piece of art comparing to the great writers, but it's definitely a miracle in comparison to what you used to be before you learned the skill of self-control.

Let's assume the positive, because why wouldn't we? Your book turns out to be pretty decent, which you've heard from a few people that you shared your work with. So you hire an editor and graphic designer to prepare it for publishing. Because of the self-publishing movement growing in power, you no longer need to cooperate with the publishing house. You can publish it on Amazon and let the readers judge your words.

More and more positive reviews appear under your name, money starts coming in. Over time, you become a recognized author and you like it so much that you continue polishing your craft. Maybe you'd even quit your job? Every year, you add a new book to your writer's portfolio.

Taking this story further in your imagination will either overwhelm you or inspire you to begin working on your self-control today. There're tons of invaluable skills to learn which has the potential to transform your life, but self-control is the key required to keep working on whatever skill you'd like to develop.

Some people would say that this sounds nice when you read it, but doing is a whole different story. It absolutely is. But why would you expect a miracle, a complete life-transformation caused by ordinary actions.

The society is mostly made of the third type. They just wonder why the heck they're in debt, overweight and miserable. Then there's the second type of people, who start to observe their surroundings more carefully as they become sick of being in the third category. They watch the high-achievers, the men of action. Some of them will eventually take a full responsibility for their lives and join the first type, also know as the happiest and fulfilled people, those who make things happen.

They know that the above scenario is absolutely possible, and the only barrier which separates you from achieving it, is you who need to finally find enough self-control to make it happen.

If you believe that my message is worth spreading, please use the share buttons.

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


 

Al Zibluk

Residual Income: What Is It and How Does It Work?

A residual income stream will earn you money even when you're not on the clock. Owning rental units, collecting royalties or investing in a savings and investment program are examples of such passive incomes.
 

residual income

Residual Income: What Is it and How Does It Work?

Wouldn’t it be nice to earn money while not working? That money is called residual, or recurring, income. It's what can happen after you put a lot of time, effort and sometimes money into a job to continue to get paid for the work months or years after it's done. (Salary jobs are part of linear income. This income is directly related to the number of hours you work. If you work 40 hours, you get paid for 40 hours of work.) Once you set up your business to earn residual income, you continue to make money while doing other things — maybe even starting a new business to generate more residual income!

Types of Residual Income

Some examples of residual income sources include:

  • Royalties from intellectual property, such as books and patents
  • Subscriptions, advertisements, donations or affiliate links from your blog or website
  • Transferring the rights to a song you recorded, a book you wrote, a software program you created or a gadget you invented to a company agreeing to pay you a percentage of each copy of your work sold
  • Purchasing an office or apartment building and leasing or renting out the properties
  • A savings and investment program that earns interest
  • E-book sales
  • Stock photography royalties

Does the Money Just Keep Rolling In?

The ideal residual income stream will produce money 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and you don’t have to personally market or interact with the business in any way. All you have to do is watch your bank account grow.

But that’s more like a fairytale. You’ll have to put in some effort to continue receiving residual income on the business you started. Talking to your managers and representatives will help them be more productive and run your business better. Marketing your online sales through social media and your network will help earn you more money. But you just won’t have to work at it as your full time job. Think of it as a part time job that can potentially bring in full time pay.

Advantages to Residual Income

  • You do have the potential to be financially independent if your residual income produces enough money.
  • Having residual income allows you to do more important things with your time. Whether that’s a hobby or another job, making money from your residual income stream won’t be the primary focus of your life.
  • No matter what, you will have a constant flow of income (however large or small it may be). This is critical if you get injured or sick, can’t work because of another emergency, or if you just want to take an extended vacation.
  • You will make money no matter where you live, unlike a linear income which ties you down to your position.

Of course, before the money starts rolling in you will probably have to put a lot of time, effort and money into the business or project. You’ll need a lot of patience and determination to see the residual income in the future. Instant gratification is not possible when it comes to residual income.

If you enjoyed this article, please use the share buttons at the top of the page.

 

Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive

markethive.com


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