“Back links” is a term used in internet marketing to mean links from other websites back to your own. Why are back links important? Because the more incoming links you have pointing to your website, the higher relevancy the search engines give to your site in relation to the keywords that people use for searches.

For example, if your site features information on make money blogging and people search online for “make money blogging,” you want your website to be listed in the first spot or at least one of the top ten spots, if possible. One good way to accomplish that is to build plenty of incoming links using the anchor text “make money blogging”. Anchor text means turning the keyword phrase into a live link so it looks like this: “make money blogging” as opposed to using a standard URL format like this: http://www.blogcurry.com.

The HTML code used to create an anchor text link would look like this:

<a href =”http://www.blogcurry.com”>make money blogging</a>

If your website features high-quality information, it’s possible that people will link to your site naturally, but you’ll still want to do plenty of link building yourself too. There are plenty of ways to do this, and below are three of the most popular:

#1 Article Marketing

There are hundreds of article directories online that are happy to allow a link back to your website in exchange for a quality article on your topic. Using the example above, you could write brief articles sharing tips on make money blogging, and in your author bio box include an anchor text link back to your website. If you write and submit plenty of articles, you’ll be building plenty of quality back links.

#2 Social Bookmarking

Bookmarking sites like Digg.com, Stumbleupon.com, and others allow you to post links to your favorite sites, and your own can be one of them. Even better, if other people like your site they can bookmark it too. If you offer high quality information, you could even enjoy a bit of viral linking as people pass your link around.

#3 Satellite Blogs

Beyond your main website or blog, you can also create smaller, niche-focused blogs that feature your articles and several anchor links back to your main site. Some of the better known blogging platforms like Blogger and WordPress are easy to use for this purpose.

When possible, try to create back links on websites that rank well in the search engines. A link from a site with a Google PageRank 6 will carry more weight than a link from a site with a PR 2. The more popular and older the sites you can find to link from, the better.

The idea behind viral marketing is that if you can get the product up in multiple places on the web and in front of as many eyes as possible for as little money as possible, you are doing some really good marketing on a budget. Most of the companies behind this style of promotion are smaller businesses that just want to get the word out about their product but don’t have the money to hire a public relations firm or spend money on advertising.

One of the more effective methods of viral marketing is to form a Joint Venture with another business. While you have the product, your JV partner may bring his customer content list of thousands and his marketing skills to the project. In most cases a JV will benefit both parties involved with an equal split of the profits and possibly the work.

Another form of getting your product, to race around the internet world, is to set up an affiliate program with 100s of individuals and business promoting your product. The difference between a JV and an affiliate, is the affiliate will only get paid a percentage of each individual sale personally made by them.

If you want to get into the nitty-gritty of what is viral marketing, then you should realize that it is something anyone with a computer and a little bit of technological savvy can do. First of all, using social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter or MySpace is a fairly ingenious way of getting your product or service out to the public. You can set up a site, get all of the relevant information listed on your homepage, and then add friends.

Theoretically, just adding whoever to your profile isn’t going to do you any good as they are likely looking to connect with friends and won’t be interested in your product. The best way to market yourself is to look through the MySpace groups and find those with similar interests. Say that you are a writer marketing a new book. Adding other writers isn’t going to get you a whole lot of customers, but adding people who are fans of your genre, well, that’s a different story.

Some viral marketing ideas include sending out chain letters with information about your product buried within a story that urges people to continue resending the letter to all of their friends. This is a decent idea, but if you use the chain letter to try and collect money for something that doesn’t exist or run a scam for a business, then that is fraud and is a crime. You have to be careful and make sure that you aren’t breaking any laws.

Now that you have an answer to the question of what is viral marketing, you should also know that using viral marketing plans too much can cause some problems. If people feel they are being slammed by the product, then you are going to find many of your potential clients turned off by your aggressiveness.

Just remember that you’re trying to get the word out and tell people about your idea without being too pushy and you should be just fine.

Drawing from some of the most pivotal points in his life, Steve Jobs, chief executive officer and co-founder of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, urged graduates to pursue their dreams and see the opportunities in life’s setbacks — including death itself — at the university’s 114th Commencement on June 12, 2005.

• List everything that you have spent money on, are currently spending money on, or might spend money on.

Don’t just read this and think of a few things. Take the time to actually write it all down. Review your bank statements if you have to, in order to remember and include everything.

Now go through the list, and carefully consider each item. Take the most time on the big items – past, present and future possibilities. If your timeshare on the beach is worth half what you paid, costs $1,000 per year in expenses, and is rarely used, you need to learn from that – not to punish yourself, but to have a richer life.

If you think honestly about the number of times you will use that Recreational Vehicle, and the cost, it may be $250 for each day of use. That’s okay if that is worth it to you, but maybe you really would enjoy $100 hotels more. Or maybe you can rent an RV for less overall cost, thus freeing up money for other important goals.

You see, saving money isn’t about sacrifice. We all are aware of the scrooges in life that pinch their pennies, bank the savings, and then do nothing with it. The point should be to save money in one area of life so you can use it in ways that make your whole life richer.

Suppose you notice you’re spending $8 per month on subscriptions to magazine you don’t read, or on insurance for a motorcycle you almost never ride? Cancel the subscriptions or sell the
motorcycle, and what have you lost? Is it a big deal? What will that $8 get you instead?

- Bank it for ten years, and use the $1200 to take a second honeymoon.

- Use it to pay for a day off work once a year, to spend with the kids.

- Invest it, to have an extra $50 per month during your retirement years.

- Buy six good books a year, to learn something new.

- Make banana splits for the family once a month.

- Give $100 per year to a worthy cause.

$8 per month can do a lot if used wisely. Imagine what you could do if you stopped wasting $200 per month. That’s why it is so important to discover what you really want – and what you don’t want. This is one of the most intelligent ways to save money.

Why You Should Use Personal Branding

Personal branding adds your touch to the business. Personal branding goes well beyond a sleek logo or a perfect tag line. It is a way of sharing your expertise and own set of values with your target market.

Personal branding helps a lot in establishing rapport with your clients. A sense of connection is formed leading to trust and confidence of your market to get what they need from you.

In a business world where competition is very stiff, other marketers can steal your concept, your tools, and your system. There will also come a time when your patent for your product will expire. Personal branding attaches your identity with the goods or services that you sell.

People will know it is you when they see something on the market. If they trust you, they trust what you offer them.

Tips on Building your Personal Brand

Building a personal brand is not an easy task. It does not come in a package nor is it achieved overnight.

Here are some tips to get you started in building your brand:

• Run your own blog If you want to be seen as an authority in the business, you should have a site devoted to it. You can also receive important feedback from your followers and potential clients.
• Distribute information online – You can write free ebooks or newsletter and distribute this to your list or potential customers. This can help you as an affiliate marketer in building trust with your market.
• Publish write-ups on trade publications – Print is still a very powerful medium. People can get their ideas and business sources by reading magazines and journals. You will develop the authority in your field through this effort.
• Give seminars and webinars – These talking engagements put the spotlight on you and serve as a good venue to show your expertise. You can also push for your services or products during these events.

Affiliate marketing is like standing in a crowded room where everyone is wearing a black suit, donning the same shoes, and sporting the same smile. It is a crowded business and people will have a hard time seeing you. Personal branding magnets the attention of the market to you and puts a spotlight on what you can give them.

This might seem non-sensical at first. Afterall, the client is the one paying you, so shouldn’t they have complete control? The simple answer is no, and here’s why. Quite often, clients don’t know exactly what they want, and quite often, they have no idea what kind of time or effort goes into the services you provide.

This means that if you constantly defer to the client to ask them what they’d like over the course of your project, you may find yourself giving them choices that they don’t need to be making, and aren’t really necessarily capable of making. This can turn an otherwise simple project into a nightmare.

If you’re working on an hourly basis, then clients making changes left right and center might not be a big deal since the more changes they make, the more hours you’ll bill. However, if you’re working on a per project basis, then the fewer changes and alterations you have, the better. And this means that if you can keep as much control over the details of the project as possible, you’ll end up having to deal with far less revisions.

The reality is, if you defer to the client for input on every small detail, they’ll probably end up asking for things that might be outside the scope of the price you quoted or impossible due to time restrictions. However, had you just made those decisions yourself, you’d never have had to deal with that at all.

Always make sure that everything that you’re going to deliver and all details are worked out and carved in stone contractually before you start a project. If your client doesn’t know exactly what they want, then either have them think harder about their requirements, or make it very clear to them that further revisions or changes will be billed on top of the initial price.

Some clients will try to work you to death for the least amount of money possible, and these aren’t the kind of clients you want to deal with. Avoid that problem by making sure that any time a project isn’t clearly defined from the start, that the clients understand that either a) creative control is in your hands or b) that they have the option of asking for revisions, but they will be billed for any changes that require extra time or work.