Eric Tips Lessons LESSON #1: Introduction to Eric’s Tips N.B. From me – Peter - Since even for me, famous proverbial diligence :) it's hard to do 91 hyperlinked suppose nobody will be difficult, the address of the first lesson, by changing the number of lessons in the address field of the browser, reach lesson 92 ... :) Main points: We’re going to start at the very beginning. It’s OK if you don’t know anything about online business. I’m going to show you how to build an online business from ‘A’ to ‘Z’. If you’re an experienced internet marketer, please bear with me through the basics, because I’ll be sharing all of my advanced techniques too. I have a lot of personal experience and success in online business, which qualifies me to teach you what I know. I’m a “normal” guy, and I’m going to try to avoid the hype as much as possible. Action steps: 1) White list this email address: [email protected] (put me on your “safe list” to make sure you receive the lessons). For detailed instructions, please see: Whitelist instructions 2) Make a folder to save all the emails you receive from me. 3) Commit to following each lesson. As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. Have a great day! LESSON #2: What is an online business? Main points: My personal definition is that it’s a business which is conducted primarily on the internet. A website is NOT an online business. It’s not a job. There may be risk involved, but it’s all about how you perceive it. If you’re afraid to start a business, then you need to either… a) get over your fear or b) decide to be happy with your job, and forget about starting a business Action steps: 1) Answer the following question honestly: Do I want to run my own business? As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. Have a great day! LESSON #3: Is an online business right for me? Main points: The startup COST for an online business is a huge variable, ranging from zero to millions. The good news is that it can be very cheap: less than $100 The more TIME you can devote to it the better, but don’t let a lack of time stop you. If you can only devote a small amount of time at first, that’s OK. Stop buying stuff! You don’t need it. (unless you really know what you’re doing) Stay out of debt! It’s not necessary to use debt to start this kind of business. You need to be willing to be a marketer. If you don’t have any marketing experience, then at least: a) you must be OK with marketing b) you’ll need to learn it along the way Same thing for technical aptitude. You DON’T need to be a computer expert, but you must be comfortable with computers and willing to learn. Action steps: 1) Right now, you simply need to commit to the following. a) I’m willing to be a marketer b) I like computers and the internet c) I’m willing and able to learn (and I know it will take work) Take some time and be honest with yourself (and don’t WORRY about WHAT you’ll need to learn. That’s what I’m here for, and I’ll guide you through the entire process.) If you are confident in those three things, then I’d say you meet the basic requirements for being able to start an online business, and you’re ready to move onto the next lesson, in which we’ll explore several different types of online businesses. As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. Have a great day! LESSON #4: 18 Ways to Make Money Online Main points: There are thousands of ways to make money online. My way is NOT the only way. Being able to follow a blueprint is great, but I also want you to be able to create your own blueprint when the lessons are over. I want you to see the big picture so that you can look at my business model in the proper context. Avoid the “bright shiny objects” and focus on one opportunity at a time. Some ways to make money online include (see video for details): 1) Ebay 2) Info products/Digital products 3) Physical products 4) Affiliate marketing 5) Work from home job 6) AdSense or other contextual ads (Ok here’s one affiliate link… If you really want to learn all about AdSense I do recommend my friend Joel who is the foremost expert: AdSense Secrets) 7) MLM 8] Coaching/consulting 9) Service site 10) Web hosting – Here’s a free 114 page ebook I wrote about how to be a web hosting reseller. 11) Membership site 12) Social network/web 2.0 site – maybe you will start the next facebook? 13) Freelancer – My favorite freelancer site (where I hire the most people from) is vWorker (formerly known as RentACoder). Another good one is Odesk 14) Paid Blogger – here are some blog posts listing a bunch of paid blogging sites: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 (UPDATE: The link I mentioned in the video is no longer valid, but the links here should work) 15) Domainer – my personal domain registration site is LifeDomains 16) “GPT” sites 17) Sports betting arbitrage 18) Trading (Stocks, commodities, forex, etc) – If you decide that this is an opportunity you want to pursue, I highly recommend my Trading Pro System (This is by no means an exhaustive list) Action steps: Your action step today is optional. And it’s simple: 1) look around and see how big the picture is, and how numerous the opportunities are. If you want to look around and see what else is out there, now is the time… NOT when we’re on lesson #55 and you’re in the middle of following my online business blueprint. Because once we get started, I want you to commit to following through and finishing it, because if you don’t finish it you won’t succeed with it. Now IF you do go out and research some of the opportunities I’ve just mentioned, remember what I said in Lesson #3… don’t buy stuff unless you know what you’re doing! I know this goes against the grain of what most marketers would do in my situation. I should be reeling you in and hooking you on my own idea. But I don’t want to do that. I want you to understand the scope of opportunity out there, and then choose to follow my lessons because you WANT to. Not just because you feel like its your only option. And if you’re confident in your decision to follow my blueprint, you’ll be much more focused, and you’ll be more likely to stay the course. As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. Have a great day! LESSON #5: How to Avoid Scams Main points: I believe that most business opportunities are not scams. But just because something isn’t illegal, that doesn’t mean its something you want to get into. There ARE a lot of scammers out there though. There is no limit to how far a con artist will go to take your money. So you need to be on your guard. If it sounds too good to be true, it often is. Be an educated consumer. (here is a place to start: the FTC) Don’t buy ANY business opportunities. (unless you honestly know what you’re doing) Action steps: 1)If you ARE knowledgeable about scams, don’t let down your guard. 2) If you don’t know about the most common Internet scams, do some research and become an educated consumer 3) Put your wallet away Soon it will be time to choose one business model and focus on it, but before we can do that, we need to talk about two different pathways… and only you can decide which one is best for you. We’ll talk about those two pathways in the next lesson. As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. Have a great day! LESSON #6: Self Employed or Business Owner? Main points: Self employment vs. Business ownership. For many years I didn’t understand the difference. It will be beneficial for you to understand it before embarking on this business venture. Cashflow Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki: Employee, Self Employed, Business Owner, Investor Each of these four quadrants make money in different ways. Employees… You get paid for your time. You’re trading hours for dollars. You’re working for someone else, and in return they give you a paycheck. Self employed people work for themselves. Like employees, they often trade their hours for dollars. Or perhaps they work for a fee or a commission. There are many examples of self employment, such as construction contractors, consultants, realtors, and even doctors in many cases. They’re not working for someone else, but their income is primarily dependant on themselves doing the work. Business owners use leverage to make money. Most commonly, they hire people and leverage other people’s time. That way, the business owner doesn’t have to do the work and they can scale their business larger. The benefits of being a Business Owner rather than self employed are generally more freedom and ultimately more wealth.