Increase Your Internet Traffic By John Reese
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on July 9, 2008 , 2commentsIt’s been a while since I wrote. There have been so many exciting things happening that I can barely take a breather!
Since the launch of our book “Secrets To Dominate Your Niche” in late April, things have been crazy (in a great way). The book became a National Bestseller in just 12 days, while competing with big names like Robert Kiyosaki & “The Last Lecture” (they were released about the same time). In 19 days it became the #1 Bestselling Business Book in Singapore.
We’ve been covered in many mainstream media. Readers are also raving about it. It was great! We have been receiving requests to conduct talks based on the book. One reader even proactively brought the book to his country (Philippines) and organised a launch there! You can read more about the exciting developments here: www.SecretsToDominateYourNiche.com
There are so many other exciting developments… but for now I’ll keep them under wraps for a while longer. Just know that I’ll be putting out more valuable content right here!
WAIT! Before I get side tracked…
The whole reason for this post, which “forced” me to write a post amidst my critical schedule, is to share with you a couple of great videos by the “legendary” John Reese.
Normally people got the “legendary” title after they’ve passed on. Like the legendary copywriter great - Gary Halbert. But John Reese is definitely a legend in many marketer’s mind, even though he is exceptionally well (and I wish him great health so he can share even more of his secrets with us).
He is the first guy who achieved the GROUNDBREAKING “Million Dollar Day” on the Internet. Since then many others have achieved that significant breakthrough and even more. BUT John was the first who led and opened the way.
Now he is back again with even better stuffs! He has just released 2 videos packed with strategies and tips for FREE… only till 15th July, when he release his new course.
Watch it here:
http://www.trafficsecrets.com/sqpromo
The videos give us some insights of his latest discoveries and ideas. I particularly liked video #2, about “owning more of the Internet”. I think you will find it useful.
He is releasing these great contents to start creating awareness for his Traffic Secrets 2.0. The great news is you can watch the videos for free, with no obligations… and still benefit massively from the tips and strategies that he is revealing. And he is going to deliver even more videos in the coming days… … BUT only for a limited time! I think when he launch his Traffic Secrets 2.0, he will take down all these free videos.
So go watch it now while you can:
http://www.trafficsecrets.com/sqpromo
By the way, some parts in video #2 I felt that the tips were covered too quickly, make sure you pause or rewind it to get the best tips. Remember to jot down your notes.
Enjoy them.
(Feel free to share the link to others who can benefit from the videos)
*** *** UPDATE On 15 July *** ***
John has released his brand new Traffic Secrets 2.0 and has pulled down the videos for now. The links now redirect to his Traffic Secrets 2.0 sales page.
*** *** *** ***
Secrets To DOMINATE Your Niche
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on April 20, 2008 , 5commentsThe past year I’ve been working on a side project with Thomas Fernandez, an award-winning, millionaire entrepreneur. We wrote a book “Secrets To Dominate Your Niche” to help business owners, entrepreneurs & salespeople to Outwit, Outsell & Outperform their competition and to generate massive profits.
Finally… The book is done and we’ve received the first copies of the book. We’re really excited about it! We’ve received incredible reviews from some really big name business leaders like Brian Tracy, Joe Sugarman and many others. (Read their reviews HERE) It will be in the stores sometime next week. Majority of the bookstores like Kinokuniya, Borders, Times, etc, have already ordered it. We even have online pre-orders and bulk orders from overseas!
Here’s a sneak peek on what’s happening:
I’m holding one of the first few copies that was literally “Hot Off The Press“. It looks great and it feels great! We’ve been getting raving compliments (unsolicited) about the cover of the book, thanks to our wonderful designer Jessie. This photo taken with a mobile phone camera doesn’t do it justice. We used matt black for the background. The title and the picture are embossed so they “pop”. On top of that we added gold laminate on some of the keywords. It is fantastic! It’s something you’d be proud to be seen carrying around.
We’re busy with preparing to mail out the books for those who have pre-ordered and to the media. Each of them are personally autographed by my co-author, Thomas Fernandez, and myself.
Walking the talk: We are giving some copies to the media for their reviews. But we didn’t want to give it to them “plain & boring”. After all, these people are probably receiving dozens of solicitations for reviews. To stand out and be different we came up with a novel idea of wrapping the book in a “money bag”. The bag is rich black and is made of “felt” material. Then we used a golden rope to tie it up. And for the final touch, we hanged the picture from our cover (that became our logo) on the rope. What do you think? We are also getting rave reviews about this packaging. But most importantly, we already have confirmed media appointments in the next coming weeks! That’s the power of being different!
Michelle and my wife, Olivia, who are largely responsible for making the packaging looks great!
The branding doesn’t stop at the packaging of the book. What do you think we will be wearing on the launch day and those media interviews? 
One of Thomas’ staff modelled the T-shirt for us. He looked so youthful and handsome… in it! (Yeah, him pretending to read the book was a blatant attempt at product placement :) )
Currently the “Hot Off The Press” mini promo is still on till end of Sunday. If you’re interested to get early, personally autographed copies you can still get it HERE. But not for long, as we’re running out of our early copies. After that you can grab it from the bookstores… but with no personal autographs from us.
By the way, this whole process is a great case study of creating a brand. We did a lot more than what I shared here. I’ll reveal more next time. Meanwhile, go check out the promo before it’s gone!
Leave your comments on the book, the packaging bag, the pretty babes, the handsome t-shirt… I mean the handsome guy and the T-shirt he wears below. I’d love to hear from you.
Urgent! Get FREE eBook For Your Opinion
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on February 19, 2008 , 21commentsNOTE: The Survey below is now closed. Thank you for all that participated. If you’re interested to get updates and money making power tips to dominate your niche, you can subscribe to my blog by filling in the form at the right.
In just a few weeks I’ll be launching a book that I’m co-authoring with a very successful, award-winning entrepreneur. The title of the book is: “Secrets To Dominate Your Niche: Differentiating Ideas To Easily Outwit, Outsell & Outperform the Competition!”
We’re really excited about it. This book is about entrepreneurship & marketing. We show you how you can create your own niche and dominate it.
We’ve sent out an early copy of the book for reviews and we’re very happy to have received wonderful reviews so far. Here are a couple of excerpts:
“Powerful, direct, clear and highly useful advice. You will definitely learn something new and important in this bold, outspoken book. I did and I’ve been a leading marketer for over 20 years!” - Michael Weissman, High Technology Marketing Guru and co-author of The Paradox of Excellence.
“I love the book! There are so many powerful and practical messages and strategies revealed. This is real life stuff! I also enjoyed all the action points, as nothing happens without action…”
- Frank Furness CSP
International motivational speaker, sales trainer and author
“This is an excellent guidebook for entrepreneurs. In it Thomas and Sant reveal the secrets to building your business for massive profit and success… strategies can literally help you dominate your niche market. If you are interested to improve your business, get the book!”
- Adam Khoo, Chief Master Trainer & Best-Selling Author, Adam Khoo Learning Technologies Group
But we need your help!
We are in the midst of tidying up the book and having the designer work on it. We have gotten 3 possible cover versions. We want to get your feedback. Which of the 3 cover designs appeals to you the most? We’re looking for something that stands out and grabs attention. And of course compels you to grab a copy.
Which one captures your attention more than others? Which one makes you want to reach out and get a copy to read? Which one makes you want to buy?
Cover 1
Cover 2
Cover 3
When you give us your opinion, I will send you excerpts of the highlights from the book.
Here’s how:
-
Please leave your opinions below as comments.
-
Please fill in your email add when leaving a comment so we can email you the ebook.
-
Only leave sincere and truthful comments.
-
Please choose the best one you like, the second best and the third. Remember, we’re looking for the one that grabs your attention, makes you want to reach for it and buy it.
-
If you have additional comments, we’d love to hear them. Please keep it short and to the point.
NOTE: This will only be available in just the next few days. I reserve the rights to take this down as soon as I think we have a good indication. So if you’re interested to get excerpts of the highlights, let us know your opinion ASAP.
Thank you very much for giving us your feedback. We really appreciate it.
Cheers!
Sant
New Year’s Evolution
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on January 1, 2008 , add a commentThe new year is here. A new fresh start. A new opportunity to set new goals… or achieve the old ones Typically now is the time when everyone who believes in making new year resolutions is making theirs.
Personally I’m a big believer in setting new goals each year. Though I prefer to think of it as new year’s evolution instead of resolution. ‘Resolution’ has the element of re-solving something that didn’t get solved in the past. While evolution means that you’re changing and improving.
It’s similar to the Japanese word ‘Kaizen’, which has become a huge management buzzword and philosophy behind popular concepts like Total Quality Management. It means continuous incremental improvements. (Side note: While the Kaizen philosophy is attributed to the Japanese due to their quality revolution while under the guidance of Edward Deming, I can’t help but find the resemblance of the words Kaizen to the Chinese word ‘Gai Zheng’. Their literal meaning: ‘Gai’ to change; ‘Zheng’ be right. After all, the Chinese had a strong influence on Japanese language when they started. Just thought it’s interesting.)
While I was thinking about the new evolution I’m planning for myself this 2008, I thought of the excerpt of an interview I watched of David Brandon, Chairman & CEO of Domino’s Pizza talking about his business philosophies.
He said, “If you’re not getting better, you’re getting worse.” There is no such thing as staying the same. And I remembered a similar philosophy of life taught by a mentor, “Either you are growing, or you’re dying. There is no in-between.”
There is something liberating about thinking and seeing things in such stark black or white. There is no gray areas. No ifs. No buts. You either do. Or you don’t. You’re either progressing towards your goals, or regressing.
As you’re deciding on your new evolutions this year, have that clear black or white mentality. Either you want to do it and go all out to achieve it, or when you catch yourself thinking “I’d like to achieve that if…” scrap that goal and let it go. You don’t want it enough to make it happen yet.
And if that’s the case, be comfortable about it and let it go. Focus on the few evolution goals that you’re really passionate and committed to. It’s always better to complete the few important things that matter the most, rather than neglect everything by trying to do everything at the same time.
One of my evolution goals in 2008: While I’ve been wanting to start my online business, I’ve been caught up too much with my offline consulting work. Now, the start of the new year is a great time for me to finally start. I’ve put this as a priority and I’ll go all out. This is my ‘Year One’.
What is possible to achieve in one year online, starting from scratch? 
What do you think? Let me know your evolution goals too. Maybe I can help.
Happy Wonderful & Prosperous New Year!
The REAL TRUTH About Rich Schefren’s Attention Age Doctrine Nobody Talks About
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on December 5, 2007 , 7commentsI’ll probably rile a few people with this post, but I think I owe it to you, my readers, to post a truthful opinion on the latest Rich Schefren buzz. Just last week, Rich Schefren, the guru’s guru of Internet Marketing released his new Attention Age Doctrine 2.
In it he describes the increasing scarcity of attention prospects are willing to give to marketers. He also talks about the overwhelming ‘new wave’ of the Internet that is Web 2.0. He states that the future is in Web 2.0 (interactive websites such as blogs, social networks, forums, etc), and that the ‘old-way marketing’ is going to be dead.
I came across Rich’s work not too long ago. And I’m a fan and I think he provides tremendous value with his reports. More importantly I respect him as a very good marketer. He has strategically and successfully positioned himself as the guru’s guru.
BUT..!
Is what he presented in Attention Age Doctrine 2 really the case? Will Web 2.0 really overtake everything in Internet Marketing? Will traditional online marketing strategies really be left for dead?
Personally I don’t think so. While Rich’s presentation on the scarcity of attention is spot on, I have some reservations about the enthusiasm surrounding the whole Web 2.0 taking over the Internet theme.
And I’m not the only one doubting this. But let’s take a look at a few revealing things…
Rich released his Attention Age Doctrine 2 via his blog and email to his subscribers. He then drives all the traffic to an opt-in page, asking people to subscribe before downloading his doctrine. That is plain-vanilla traditional marketing technique, not some fancy Web 2.0 thing.
Granted that blogging is part of Web 2.0. But how effective is blogging as a marketer’s tool? Now, before you pro-bloggers get all work up about this, let’s listen to a few prominent pro-bloggers:
Andy Beard from Niche Marketing just wrote:
I Am Disappointed
Over the last 10 months I have been quite prominent in my support of Rich, but very few of my readers seem to trust me enough to give Rich an email address to download a free report…
RSS Readers Are Not Responsive
… I am honestly quite disappointed in how poorly responsive my RSS Readers are when offered free information from a source I trust.
Another very prominent pro-blogger I follow, Yaro Starak from Entrepreneurs-Journey commented:
Like you, I’ve been very disappointed by RSS response rates too and frankly, I don’t think RSS will ever replace email as much as I’d like it it.
RSS readers just don’t engage in the content the same way they do to an email in their inbox. That’s why I started building my email list to go with my blog and emails I send out ALWAYS outperform the posts I make to my blog.
You need to have the blog of course, but use all the efforts you are putting in here to attract traffic and get people onto a newsletter.
I’ve also just met up with my friend Alvin Phang of Gather Success and creator of Atomic Blogging: Step-by-step blogging system for newbies. He too mentioned that some of his secret strategies to his rapid rise in the blogging world that he revealed in Atomic Blogging is based on ‘traditional’ strategies as they are more effective.
Isn’t that interesting? This supports my earlier findings that traffic from social networks might not be as good in quality.
Another tell-tale sign: Just take a look at how often successful Internet Marketers blog. In general they (including Rich) blog much lesser in frequency compared to pro-bloggers. If Web 2.0 is really taking over, wouldn’t all of the big names be blogging more regularly?
Now, a sensitive question: Who do you think make more money? (I know the question is not specific and hard to compare etc, but I think you get what I mean)
But that’s not all. At the end of the doctrine, Rich also promotes his products. Doesn’t this sounds like traditional viral e-books? Isn’t what he is doing more like a traditional product launch strategy? By the way, there is nothing wrong with that. In fact, it is an excellent strategy.
I think Web 2.0 is definitely an extremely important trend that marketers must pay attention to and leverage on. However, be very careful about just latching on to one idea (in this case that traditional online marketing strategies are going to be replaced fully by Web 2.0) and going to the extreme.
The ‘old’/'traditional’ principles of Internet Marketing are still working very well. This is because they are based on human nature, and human nature changes very VERY slowly, even though technology changes extremely fast. The best is to combine old strategies with new one, like what Rich has done, and not use them exclusively.
Again, I’m a fan of Rich’s work and I have a lot of respect for Rich. Just don’t get caught up with a new, ‘unproven’ idea and take it to the extreme.
Take care.
Are You Doing The Important Stuffs?
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on November 15, 2007 , 2commentsSince the start of this blog last month, I’ve implemented various traffic strategies to get my blog ranking up. Submitting to blog directories, article marketing, did a traffic challenge, etc. And within less than 6 weeks my traffic has jumped up quite a bit and my ranking is still increasing steadily.
But today, suddenly something occured to me…
I happened to flip through some of my notes and I realised I’m getting a bit too caught up with all these technology and getting swayed from my original purpose of this blog. It’s not about trying to drive as many free traffic as possible and get nice rankings. It’s about creating my branding and using it as a tool to build my online business.
I’ve unconciously slipped into focusing on the activities and missed out the big picture. It’s amazing how easy we get caught up with doing small (unnecessary) stuffs that are costing us the really important things, isn’t it?
Do you remember the story of the professor who stood in front of his class with a big glass jar and started filling it with the big rocks? (This story probably had travelled the world a few thousand times thanks to viral emailing) And when the jar is full of the big rocks then he filled it with the smaller rocks, which filled in the gaps between the big rocks. And then he poured in the tiny sands. And lastly the he poured the water in.
The moral of the story? The guy had a bad childhood and missed playing in the playground. Just kidding. The moral is that we need to focus on the big, important things in our lives (and businesses), and the small things will fit in just fine. If we focused on the small things too much, we would’ve missed the really important things cos the sand and the water would have filled up the jar.
So I’m declaring today as “Refocusing On Your Purpose” day.
Are you doing the important stuffs in your business and your life? Stop for a minute. Take a moment and take a step back. Are the things you are doing currently moving you towards your goals? Or are they moving you further away? Are they necessary at all?
Have fun and enjoy focusing on your dreams and goals again.
Join me at Facebook!
Posted by Sant Qiu in : News, Updates & General on November 4, 2007 , add a commentI’ve just joined Facebook - the fastest growing social networking site in the virtual world, even faster than MySpace (according to the latest report). In Facebook I’ll be sharing more of my thoughts and musings and other casual stuffs. You will also get to see my other friends. If you’re interested to join my entourage of friends, simply join Facebook and add me as your friend.
So why do I choose to join Facebook? While MySpace is still the biggest social networking site, Facebook is fast catching up and is predicted to take over in just the next few months. And it’s no wonder.
MySpace is not as user-friendly, aesthetically not as pleasing and doesn’t have those fun applications and games that make Facebook so popular. In sharp contrast, Facebook is well-designed, looks great, works great and have hundreds of fun applications you can use to interact with your friends online. Inviting your friends to join you is also easy. That’s why it’s so easy for people to get hooked in Facebook.
Even though at the moment I’m not a big fan of social networking sites, I believe in learning and keeping up with new developments. By being a member of a social networking site you can get in touch with a huge network of people. To a certain extend this is similar to growing your ‘list’. While most of the members in a networking site are probably there to network and get in touch with friends, there are ways to make attract your targeted audience.
For example, in Facebook you can create and join niche groups that are discussing specific topics. That way you know the members of the group are targeted audience. With the rapid development of massive applications for Facebook the potential is just getting bigger. So join me at Facebook and be part of this giant.
