Do You Keep a Procrastination List?

It’s a pretty standard practice at most supermarkets and grocery stores. I think the only place where I haven’t seen it (yet) is Costco. You mosey your way through the aisles to pick up a carton of milk, a box of cereal, a pack of chicken thighs and a loaf of bread. These are all pretty typical items on the shopping list for most families. No big deal.

The Cheap Temptations

You make your way over to the checkout and you’re immediately hit by a variety of celebrity gossip magazines. There’s a bit of a lineup, so you catch yourself skimming through the headlines for some of the latest scandalous dealings. The line moves a little bit and you’re hit with fully stocked shelves of candy, chocolate bars and chewing gum, along with more magazines. There may be some cold beverages in little fridges there too, sold for at least double the price (on a per unit basis) of the larger packs you found back in the regular (non-refrigerated) aisles.

And I don’t know about your local supermarkets, but the Real Canadian Superstore here in Vancouver always has a deal of the day or a deal of the week. The cashier is obligated to offer this to you — it could be anything from cough lozenges to dish soap — or else you get one for free.

Why? Why do all supermarkets stock up their cashier lines with these relatively small items? Because they’re all impulse buys, designed to tempt you after you’ve already gone through all your regular shopping in the main part of the store. You see, there’s this concept in psychology called ego depletion and the idea is that your self-control is a limited resource that gets depleted the more you use it.

Enter the Procrastination List

So, what does picking up a sleazy tabloid and a bottle of fizzy drink have to do with Internet marketing and making money online? The very same mechanism at play at the checkout stand before you’re greeted by the cashier is equally applicable to how you go about approaching your day-to-day life as a self-employed professional.

When you set your own schedule and when you don’t have a traditional “boss” to answer to, the opportunities for distraction and procrastination are limitless. And after you exhaust your self-control trying to avoid Facebook and YouTube for a couple hours, it becomes so much easier to give in to your temptation to dive into some forum or fall into a bottomless pit of Google searches, and these end up being a tremendous waste of time.

Perhaps with a healthy dose of irony, I came across an interesting strategy as I was meandering my way through the Internet one day. It’s called the procrastination list, but you can call it whatever you want. Basically, you maintain a list of tasks that you are “allowed” to do when you feel the urge to procrastinate. The key is that when you want to procrastinate, these are the ONLY things you’re allowed to do.

This is a little different from the scheduled breaks you would allow yourself under the Pomodoro technique, as those 5 to 15 minute breaks should be spent away from the computer anyhow. Instead, pull in some items from your Kanban boards or your other to-do lists, items that are lighter and “fun” and could serve as a pleasant escape or “break” from what you’re normally working on.

If you write a lot, as you probably should as a blogger, then perhaps one of your permissible procrastination list items is to take pictures for a product review or shoot a video for your YouTube channel. Maybe it’s to dive into a helpful book that you’ve been meaning to read. The main thing is that when you feel like you want to procrastinate, you must pick something from your procrastination list. If you don’t want to do anything from the list, then you have no choice but to return to whatever it is that you’re currently working on.

Do Better Work

Now while some researchers have evidence that may debunk the notion of ego depletion, the lessons we can learn from the concept can still be applied to our everyday lives, both personally and professionally. Stack the odds in your favor of actually getting important work done. Always keep a procrastination list.

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Eating Giant Snails and Shrimps at OC & Lau Restaurant

For this episode of the Dot Com Lifestyle Vlog, I head to Garden Grove in Orange County to eat giant snails and hot pot lunch at OC & Lau. They also serve the biggest shrimps I’ve ever seen.

This episode of the Dot Com Lifestyle Vlog was filmed using the new Sony A7III with 16-35 F/2.8 super wide angle lens. Let me know what you think of of the setup.

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South OC Cars & Coffee San Clemente

This week’s South Orange County Cars and Coffee was full of supercars, especially Ferraris and McLarens. There was also a VW Bug (also known as a Punch Buggy) that was powered by a 427 cubic inch (that’s 7 liters) big block Chevy motor! That’s way too much motor for a bug, but it’s one way to pack a big punch into a punch buggy!

This episode of the Dot Com Lifestyle Vlog was filmed using the new Sony A7III and 16-35 F/2.8 super wide angle lens equipped with a Tiffen 82mm Variable ND Filter. Let me know what you think of of the setup.

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The Ingredients of High Converting Landing Pages

This is a great question often asked by the best bloggers within the industry. For those of you new to the world of blogging, “LP” stands for landing pages, which are often used to get visitors to opt in to a newsletter or subscription list. By having people opt-in, you are increasing the chances of sending follow-ups and building a more personal relationship with the visitor. This helps streamline your bottom line of creating conversions and profits more quickly. However, creating the right type of landing pages does take time and effort, which is why it is important you read case studies to find out what has worked in the past.

Over the years, I’ve had a lot of experience with landing pages and have tested what works compared to what doesn’t. Anyway, let’s look at a few key ingredients of a successful landing page so you can implement these into your blog going forward.

Meets the Expectations

What do I mean by this? The answer is very simple…

The visitor has arrived on your blog because they expect to find value and a solution to a common problem. It’s important that you meet all expectations when creating your landing page because this will increase the chances of getting a person to opt-in. For example, if I write content on “weight loss” and my audiences expects to find diet plans then I won’t be able to convert them with a landing page based on “automotive tips”…right? So, here is the first ingredient…

You have to make sure your landing page meets all requirements and expectations because this will help with conversions. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Remember your purpose
• Keep in mind the keywords bringing people to your LP
• Always try to meet expectations

To capture the visitor’s attention quickly, you should focus on creative headlines focused on the topic and reason they have come to your landing page.

Trust and Value

Landing page conversions are increased when you provide trust and value to your readers. There are a few ways you can achieve this and I’d like to discuss the two most valuable:

First, trust and value is achieved when you are sending loyal readers to your LP and these people are already familiar with your brand. This means they trust your content and are more likely to opt-in to your form. You’ll have different offers throughout your blog so sending a quick follow-up or popup to existing visitors is a great way to produce conversions. Secondly, testimonials and reviews have worked well for huge brands and they continue to utilize this strategy going forward. For example, if you are selling a product, then think about how easy it is to convert visitors when they know others have had a great experience on your blog. Consider how easy it is to convert visitors when they see others have found your products and services useful.

Converting is Easy

An optimal way to increase conversions is by ONLY asking for the information you need when they arrive on your page. For example, if you are offering a FREE eBook, there is NO reason to ask for phone number and address. This just complicates the opt-in process and forces people to move away. I like to keep my forms simple and don’t even ask for a name on my forms. However, the form you choose should, and will, depend on your niche and what type of subscriber the visitors are becoming. If they are signing up for a FREE trial, then you might need to ask for more information than the normal opt-in form does.

Here are a few more tips you should consider going forward:

• Keep your focus in mind when designing your landing page
• Only ask for minimum name and email (depends on type of opt-in obviously).
• Don’t be shy to split test different types of forms.
• Never forget to provide trust and value
• Keep statistics and optimize along the way

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How I Got Back On Google After Being Slapped

Yesterday, I told you the story of how Google nuked me from their search engine and how I was able to survive it. In this blog post I want to share with you how I got back into Google’s good graces and the lessons learned from it.

Since the challenge of building a blog without Google was pretty much done and proven, the new challenge was trying to get back into Google. Would Google even talk to me after I’ve made them look bad for three years?

The normal way for getting a banned/slapped site back into Google is to correct whatever got you banned in the first place and then send a reconsideration request using Google Webmaster Tools.

There is no assurance or guarantee that Google will reconsider you and let you back in. You just basically have to hope and pray.

This was something I didn’t want to do.

Instead, I talked to my friend Neil Patel. Neil told me the best way to get back into Google was just to talk to Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam team at that time. Neil told me that Matt is an extremely fair guy and would be open to the idea of letting me back in even after all those violations I pulled.

Neil facilitated an introduction and Matt and I exchanged several emails. I got the feeling that Matt must work 24 hours a day because every time he emailed me, it was after 10PM.

Neil was correct in saying that Matt was extremely fair and after correcting one misunderstanding, Matt informed me that a member of his team had submitted a reconsideration request on my behalf. The next day, I was back in Google!

There are two take-away lessons you can learn from this.

The first one is… It’s not what you know, it’s who you know!

Without Neil Patel, I would have never got an audience with Matt Cutts. Instead, I’ll be hoping and praying like every webmaster who submitted a reconsideration request. Neil allowed me to go straight to The Man and get my blog back in Google almost instantly.

This is why networking is so important to me, and why I attend a lot of industry events. Your network is your net worth!

The second take away is… Have an email list!

If I didn’t have an email list when Google slapped hit, I wouldn’t be around today. The list allowed me to survived three years with no Google traffic.

My email list is the foundation of my entire online business. Without it, I would be just another broke blogger making peanuts, instead of of a millionaire blogger living the Dot Com Lifestyle.

If you truly want to make money online and live the Dot Com Lifestyle, you MUST have a list. And you MUST start it from day 1 (that’s today).

My friends over at Constant Contact would like to offer you a free 60 day trial to test out their world class list building service.

The free trial will allow you to explore all the campaign types and features that Constant Contact has to offer. You can create as many campaigns as you want, and try out all the different campaign types available.

And, unlike other trials, you don’t need a credit card to sign up. Test it out for a full 60 days and then decide if you want to be a customer. I’m sure you will once you see how powerful the service is.

In upcoming post seris, I will show you how to take full advantage of all the unique features Constant Contact has to offer. Go set up your free trial now so you learn can along with the training. Remember, it’s free and no credit card is required.

Start Your Free Constant Contact Trial. No Risk. No Credit Card Required.

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Tomorrow’s Big Win Starts Yesterday

One of these days, you’re going to be the head of one of those newsworthy Internet startups that eventually goes IPO or gets bought up by Facebook, Apple or Google. One of these days, you’re going to be one of those big, successful online influencers who rakes in thousands of dollars for a single tweet or Instagram post. One of these days, you’ll be sipping on umbrella drinks on some tropical beach somewhere, as your autopilot online business generates consistent passive income to sustain your elaborate lifestyle.

One of these days. But you can’t today, because you’ve got to go and pick up the kids from band practice or you need to go to the grocery store to pick up some oranges or you need to catch up on the latest season of Black Mirror on Netflix. Seriously, Black Mirror is such a great show.

And then the next day rolls around and you discover another YouTube series you want to watch, another game you want to play, another cafe you want to relax at for hours at a time. Or maybe you have a goal of saving up to buy your first home or you want to launch that big blog or any number of other objectives. And yet, you never get around to getting started, because it seems like such a daunting task.

That’s the problem. And it’s a big problem, because it’s so easy to fall into the trap of putting off to tomorrow what you can do today. You put it off because it seems to scary and intimidating, so you decide that you’ll want for a better opportunity. You’ll wait until the circumstances are better. You wait until you have all your ducks in a row, so to speak.

But that will never happen. You will never encounter a situation wherein all the circumstances are perfectly aligned in your favor. There will never be a time when everything will be coming up Milhouse, as it were.

If you decide that you’ll get around to tackling these bold ambitions and these big dreams some day, then you will have to face the harsh reality that someday never comes. Put another way, there are seven days in the week and none of them are called someday. This is true regardless of the goal that you have in mind.

You might look upon people who have achieved great things, both online and off, and you might look upon them with a tremendous sense of envy. The thing is that this great success you see is only the tip of the iceberg. You see the big win, but you don’t see everything hidden beneath the surface. You don’t see the years of sacrifice and hard work that let to that “breakthrough moment.”

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was recently named as the richest man on the planet with an estimated net worth of $106 billion. The company has seen a lot of huge successes over the years, growing to become the biggest name in online commerce. But it also has not been without its share of failures and shortcomings.

Remember the Fire Phone? That was a pretty big flop. And while Amazon Prime Music and Amazon Prime Video have made positive strides, they’re still easily overshadowed by competitors like Spotify and Netflix. What we need to realize, on a more humble scale, is that the big wins are not things that will happen overnight.

It’s only when you chip away at these big goals over an extended period of time with a number of different tactics. It’s only when you endure a number of false starts, stumbly steps, innumerable setbacks, and tiny pick-me-ups that you move toward the grander vision. And at the end of the day, “lucky breaks” much more readily come to those who are prepared to meet such opportunities halfway.

Are you ready to win tomorrow?

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MOST Important Questions to Ask Before Starting a Blog – Part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of my series, where I’m exploring the important questions to ask before starting a blog. These questions will help you get a better idea of what you are trying to achieve with your business and audience. By creating an outline of your objective, you will have clear focus and this will help guide your content writing. I believe a successful business has everything to do with the ability for you to resonate with your readers. If this is clear, then you will have no problems achieving your bottom line. In part 1, we discussed the following:

• Importance of audience
• The purpose
• Why You’re Unique
• Different Content Types

Let’s jump into Part 2 and look at some other important questions to ask before getting started.

What are My Deadlines?

Blogging is very time consuming and requires enormous dedication. That’s why, before you start, it’s important to find out the type of deadlines you are working with so you can organize accordingly. From my experience, here are a few things to consider:

• How often you have to write content
• How often you should be publishing content
• How often you should research

Having a solid posting schedule and focused deadlines will ensure you keep a consistent flow of content, which is important to build momentum and brand awareness.

Do I Need to Hire Anyone?

Depending on the type of niche you are involved with, it’s important to explore your options. For example, you might be in a niche that you’re passionate about, but need to explore topics that require professional feedback. If you are writing about nutrition and dieting, then you might need to hire someone with a Ph.D. in nutrition to write content. I usually recommend people get involved in a niche they have experience, but it’s not uncommon for you to hire someone to write based on previous case studies, etc.

Whatever avenue you take, it’s important you do two things:

First, budget yourself so you’ll know exactly how much you’ll be spending on hiring people. By doing this, you are making sure you have a dedicated budget for your writing. Secondly, you can do research, making sure you hire the right people for the job. The most important thing is to find people who are experienced and actually provide value so your readers can pull substance out of your content. Once you have a handful of people right for the job, then you can continue to pay them to write content, but the hardest part is pretty much out of the way.

How Will I Market My Blog?

Before you start blogging, it’s important to explore ways to market your blog going forward. These days, you have so many options available to you so you need to find what works the best and will drive relevant traffic to your blog. For example, here are some options you might want to consider going forward:

• Social media
• PPC
• Forums
• Relevant blogs
• Banner ads
• Email marketing

Some methods will work better than others so it’s important to split test until you find the ones that work best. The methods you choose will also depend on your budget but the good news is you have free methods available like social media, forums, and blogs. Here’s the point I’m trying to make:

Before you start your blog, become familiar with as many marketing strategies so you can start implementing them right away. The more you know about them and their interface, the better you can apply them to your blog. Don’t forget to have a system in place to track results so you can optimize at a later time going forward.

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