I myself would not hire a whole company to build my websites. I would outsource from the Phillipines, from a quality outsourcing site. But if you do decide to outsource you could pay them monthly, to also do all that other stuff you don’t like to do; like getting backlinks. And people from the Phillipines are very reliable and efficient, and make sure they finish the job. But you could also just hire them for the one job, and be done. It would also be much cheaper as well.

That got me to thinking. Offshore outsourcing for small businesses (especially internet marketing related ones) has been a growing area. Personally, we don’t participate in offshore outsourcing, although we do outsource within the United States. But as I was looking for information to reply to Trevor, I found it difficult to find unbiased information on outsourcing to another country, such as India or the Philipines. So, I decided to gather some links on the sites that I found that offered some of the pros and cons, so that if you are considering this path, you’ll have some resources to read.

Here they are, in no particular order:

Outsource2India.com— a good list of advantages and disadvantages. One advantage listed: Outsourcing can help your organization to free up its cash flow. One disadvantage listed: In outsourcing, you may lose your control over the process that is outsourced.

Lovetoknow.com—a lot of the same information as the above list but expanded a bit with more examples.

Outsourcingprosandcons.net— over 70 articles on the topic, including ones about specific industries or process. Some of my favorites: Pros and Cons of Help Desk Outsourcing, Outsourcing Human Resources – Pros and Cons, and Outsourcing Help: Pros And Cons Of Outsourcing. Please note that while many of the articles are listed under pros and cons, they neglect to mention the cons. Also, many are written by people who own, operate or promote outsourcing services.

Entrepreneur.com— a slightly older article, it still contains good information about what, when and why to outsource.

WebProWorld.com— a good forum discussion on the topic.

I’m sure there are other articles and websites that do a good job of addressing the question of offshore outsourcing from a neutral perspective. If you know of any, please be sure to post them in the comments.

I have been waiting for months to see what Kajabi was and so far it looks pretty cool to me. After watching the video, I decided to join their affiliate program so the links in this post are my affiliate links.

Anyway, they just put out a really good ebook about some of the roadblocks many of us face when trying to make money online. You can click here to download the free report.

When you finish reading it let me know which of the roadblocks have prevented you from making money online.

When you’re choosing a domain, there are a few directions you can go. You can choose a domain to brand your business, to appeal to the search engines or sometimes you can combine the two. George wrote a pretty extensive article on choosing a domain some time ago, and there’s not much I can add to what he already said.

However, here’s one thing that wasn’t included in his original article. When choosing an extension, opt for a top level domain versus a .info domain name, if it is available. While most people search for domain names typing in a .com extension, you can also be quite successful with a .net or a .org extension. It’s not uncommon for website owners to buy several versions of their domain name with different extensions. If multiple extensions are available, consider buying them to keep competitors from buying them later and benefiting from your success.

No matter what domain you choose, always have it hosted by your own hosting server. This bears repeating. Use your own hosting. Preferably paid hosting, not on a friend’s server in his Mom’s basement. You think you’re saving money by going this route, but in the long run the potential headaches are not worth the less than $100 per year you’re going to save.

Some people try another “cheap” route for hosting. “Free” website builders that offer free hosting. Usually this means you will not have your own domain name. For example, if you were with Freewebs.com, it would be freewebs.com/andyourname here. This domain name does not look professional and it is too hard for your potential customers to remember (plus you’re advertising someone else’s company every time you advertise your website). If you’re looking to save money, take advantage of the free domain name registration that some web hosting packages offer.

If you’re looking for great, reliable hosting at a reasonable rate, we always recommend Hostgator. Yes, that’s an affiliate link. Throughout the years, we’ve had our sites hosted through several different companies. Hostgator is far and away our favorite.

One more note about domains— make sure your domain is registered in YOUR name, not in your website designer’s name, not in your hosting company’s name. Even if your hosting company offers to register your domain for you, make sure that you will be listed as the technical contact. You may want to register it yourself if you have any doubts about how the registration will be handled, even if it means passing up on a “free” offer. If you ever want to change hosts or designers, you’ll be glad you spent the ten minutes and $20, vs. the hassle and potential expense of trying to reclaim a domain if it wasn’t registered in your name.

Finally, if you’re not comfortable designing the site yourself, you’ll need to find a website designer. Of course, we’re partial to MantyWeb Designs, but no matter who you choose, make sure that you ask to see some examples of the designer’s work. You may want to even find some websites you like and see who the designer of that site is.

Talk to the company before hiring someone. In fact, talk to them a couple of times. Make sure they explain things in a way you understand, that you feel comfortable talking to them and that they return messages in a timely manner. If you have an idea of the technical requirements of your website (like you know you want a blog), make sure that the company has experience with that type of site. Different designers have different areas of expertise. Just because a company makes really pretty sites doesn’t mean you want them designing your ecommerce site.

While you may be tempted to immediately go with the cheapest designer, don’t. Make sure to choose someone who can complete the project in a timely manner and who will not disappear before the project is complete. This happens ALL the time! Having to start over with a new designer just wastes your time and money.

So, those are the basics. Choose a good domain, pick hosting that fits your website’s needs and find a website designer you enjoy working with. Now, I’d like to hear from you below. Have you gone through the web design process? How was your experience? Any additional tips?

Daniel’s new ebook is called, “Ten Deadly Business Mistakes” and it’s both a very good and a pretty quick read. You can download it by clicking here and following the directions on his site.

Mistakes number 2 and 8 in his book are the biggest mistakes I have made in the past that really held back my business. Go read the ebook and let me know your biggest mistakes.

PS. Yes, Daniel is a friend, and yes most of the links in this post are my affiliate links that will pay me money if you sign up for his course.

All of the people I have known who have had a successful business online have committed to it. Many of them even quit their jobs before starting their business because they understood the importance of commitment. While I don’t recommend you leave your job, I do recommend that you commit yourself to making your business successful. Without commitment it will likely fail. Set some hard deadlines and stick to them.

2. Focus
I have talked about the importance of focus before (see this post). Until I focused on making money with one business (our web marketing and design business), success was elusive.

Now that my wife and I are running a successful business I don’t want to lose focus on that business or it might stop growing. Focus is one of the biggest factors in our success this year and it will continue to be one of the biggest factors in our ongoing success.

3. Time Management
Changing the way I managed my time has made a huge difference in my productivity. Now that I only check my email after I have completed 2 hours worth of important work, my productivity has greatly increased. I learned this and other techniques from various sources, including a very good book on the topic. If you are looking for great time management tips without spending a ton of money, I highly recommend the book, “Getting Things Done”, by David Allen. You can buy a copy at most bookstores or check it out for free at your local library.

One of the other things I did to improve my time management is to create a daily and weekly todo list. I manage the todo list with a very simple free online tool called Voo2Do. At the beginning of each week I create a new todo list with the highest priority items being done earliest in the week to make sure that they get done. In my case, that means that marketing tasks for our clients are done at the beginning of the week. You can also organize your days that way, with the highest priority items being done first and your less high priority items (like checking email) coming later in the day. I also leave some space towards the end of the week for those tasks that get bumped down the priority list by things that required immediate attention, like proposals for clients. Making good use of your time makes a big difference in your business success.

Now, there was a fourth factor that both Jill and I consider to be a bigger factor than any other factor… our belief in God. While everyone may not embrace this view, I do believe that prayer played an important role in our success.

Those were the three things that I did to have a successful 2009, what were the things you did to improve your business?

PS. This post was part of a my friend Daniel’s writing project (Daniel is one of those people I knew who quit his job before starting an online business). You can read all about his project by clicking here.

I don’t mean “change your mind”. I mean your mind has to change. Online business as a freelance entrepreneur is an example of thinking outside the box. Your personal “box” may take the form of…

• “I can’t make money in any way except a job.”


• “I’ve never tried anything like this before.”


• “I don’t know what I’m doing.”


• “This is a dumb idea.”

Maybe one or more of these apply to you, and these sorts of thoughts have to go. But before I repeat the cliche’ of “thinking outside the box”, how about a real-life example?

For a few months now, I’d been sick of turning on my television set with nothing ever being on, especially given what I paid for cable. Several hundred channels of programming, and it was all miserable. So, I did something that most people wouldn’t even consider: I canceled cable without replacing it. I no longer receive television of any sort.

Now, television tends to be a household staple even if it’s pointless. So this would be my own personal example of “thinking outside the box”. I’m saving a boatload of money, and it’s not as though I’m without distraction or entertainment with cable gone. In other words, net gain for me.

It was a benefit to me to do something most people would not consider, or at least not consider seriously. Online business is the same way. It’s a world of opportunity waiting that most would not even give thought, but it could wind up benefiting you greatly. This is what I mean when I say “First, your mind has to change”. If you don’t seriously believe you can make money online, you’re not going to get anywhere attempting it.

Yes, some things work much better than others. But there’s no magic out-of-the-box anything that you can buy and suddenly, you have a successful and lucrative business. Yes, I know a lot of products bill themselves that way. It’s an annoying bit of background noise you’ll have to tolerate if you’re trying to learn how to make money online.

Throwing money at a business without a plan won’t help you either. You can spend a lot of money and not get anything for it. It works the same way for time and effort if you’re not doing anything but expending time and effort.

But there is something simple you can do. In fact, anyone can do it. It works like this:

• First, you find a business model that works for you.


• Then, you work it steadily until you get where you want to go.

Slow and steady builds the business. A successful technique applied regularly over a period of time will make your income grow. This could be list building, making sales, your approach to earning affiliate commissions, or whatever. Not a single burst of time, effort, and money, but a steady, continuous effort. Spend enough time each day for you to actually accomplish something with your chosen technique, and keep going.

You don’t have to be a business prodigy. You just have to be like the tortoise in his race with the rabbit. Find something that works, and then just keep going.

I’ve never used mine for that reason. I use mine to remove the larger stuck twist-on lids from containers like pickle jars. As it turns out, it’s just as handy for that as it would be for an oil filter. So basically, I’m a smart wimp that reincarnated a gadget to a new purpose.

I thought outside the box, which is also a good idea in your online business. You might have old work just sitting on your hard drive. You might have a problem which, at first glance, you can’t afford to fix. You have goals you supposedly can’t meet. Any of these call for a little original thinking.

Here are some questions you can ask yourself to get started on that whole ‘box’ thing:

• Can you be doing something else with your old stuff? You did work to make it, so if you’re not using it for its intended purpose, could you be using it for a purpose you haven’t thought of yet? Freebies, traffic, and promotional uses all come to mind as good ways to reincarnate old stuff.
• Is there a cheaper way to solve a problem if you come at it from a different direction? So what if you can’t get a custom web site or blog design, for instance. There are plenty of ways around that.
• If the obvious solutions to problems are out of reach for you, try and make your own solutions. If you succeed, it might make a good topic for your next tutorial product!

If the normal things can’t help you, remember the lesson of my oil filter wrench. You can do more than the obvious when you think outside the box.

What is so natural to you that it is like breathing? What aspect of yourself, which behavior, skill, activity, talent, is so part of you that you could not imagine yourself without it?

That prompted me to brainstorm a list of answers to the question. Here is the list I came up with:

Playing with my kids
Playing video games
Playing tennis, basketball and football (when I was younger)
Being silly
Coming up with funny kids stories
Making kids laugh
Playing games
eating
sleeping
researching
talking with people one on one

I talked with my wife Jill about the list and one of the things that I realized is that there were two common skills I used in all of the things that are “like breathing” to me:

1. Problem solving
2. Creativity

I love problem solving and I love being creative. You might even say I love creative problem solving.

There were quite a few things that almost made my list because they involved creativity or problem solving but the reason they didn’t get on my list is because they also involved doing things I hate. For instance, writing almost made my list. I love writing creatively, and I love writing about solutions to problems. However, I DON’T LOVE GRAMMAR RULES! I don’t love writing about just anything. So writing couldn’t make my list.

The things that did make my list were things that when I do them I ONLY did them in a way that allowed me to be me. For instance, when I played basketball. The thing I loved doing was being creative. When I was kid growing up some of my African American friend’s might have called me “Bird”, but that is about where the comparison ended. I worked hard at emulating Dr. J’s moves and then adding my own twist. I loved to play a very unorthodox style of basketball, driving to the basket and finding the most creative way possible to score. It was fun. I would never have enjoyed basketball if I had stayed on the perimeter and just shot the ball from long range. I wanted to be creative and solve the problem of getting past all the shot blockers and scoring over people I should never have been able to score against. That was fun.

So, getting back to the list. It’s kind of funny because after I made the list I thought to myself,
“I should write children’s books.” Now where have I heard that before… hmmmm….

If you know of anyone that breathes drawing comic illustrations that would work well with children’s stories then you might want to send them my way… who knows maybe we will both breathe a bunch of awesome books to life.

For now, I am going to take some time to think about this some more, but it was a very interesting answer to a very AWESOME question. I suggest you try answering the question as well. You might be surprised what you find. I was.

First, Yaro Starak just opened his Membership Site Mastermind training program and he’s taking
students for one week only. He’s also offering some bonuses that are only available TODAY.

You can join right now by clicking here! (WARNING: it’s a long page, so watch the video instead if you don’t like long sales pages).

The next thing I wanted you to know about is a FREE video by Eban Pagan that reveals the reasons people have such a hard time selling information products.

Click here to check out the video.

1. Replace relationships
2. Provide people with an opportunity to escape from reality.

Neither of these purposes is ideal for our personal growth.

That got me thinking about the impact of social marketing and the Internet in general on our business success.

The truth of the matter is that many of the most successful websites manage to achieve the same purpose that a good tv show does:
They replace your relationships and provide you with an escape from reality.

While this is a good thing to keep in mind when trying to make a successful website, it’s also important to keep this in mind to keep yourself productive. Don’t spend all your time online. Don’t let your online activities ruin your relationships or keep you from having any. Don’t use it to constantly escape from the REAL world. Otherwise, you will never have time for the things that are really important in life.

Social media marketing is a fantastic way to drive traffic to a blog or website. On the other hand, social marketing can take up a lot of your time.

So, what’s an Internet marketer to do?

Schedule the amount of time you spend online. This is especially important for interactive time (social media, email, forums, commenting on blogs, gaming, etc), but also true of all your time online. If you want to make money online you need to focus the bulk of your time on activities that actually make you money. Checking email usually doesn’t make you money, writing a tweet about your favorite song usually doesn’t make you money, etc..

If you are working a 9 to 5 job and trying to make money online you can easily spend all of your spare time on activities that don’t make you money and don’t help you in other areas of your life. If you are trying to make money in your spare time it’s crucial that you spend most of your time doing productive activities that will lead to making more and more money online.

Life Is To Short To Twitter It Away

Jay has spent the last 25 years helping businesses make TONS of money. When I first started learning about marketing Jay’s name came up everywhere I turned because he is so well respected in the industry. In fact, he was named one of the top 5 executive coaches in the country in the March 6, 2000 issue of Forbes Magazine. I could write a full article on his credentials alone, but suffice it to say that Jay Abraham is considered to be one of the top business experts in the country.

Jay recently come up with a list of 42 different ways you can rapidly profit (and prosper) during this economic recession and he is going to share them with you for free!

It doesn’t matter whether you own a business, work for someone else, or want to find an income source that can rapidly pay all your bills.

If you want to secure your financial future, find a fresh recession income source, or help your employer earn more profits…these recession-based income strategies can provide the financial security blanket that you need to handle all the problems this bad economy is causing you.

Please don’t let fear stop you from prospering in these uncertain times.

Go sign up now for Jay’s FREE teleconference to find out 42 ways to prosper in this recession by clicking here!

You’re about to experience first-hand (for absolutely nothing) the same information a group of beleaguered real estate investors just paid Jay Abraham nearly $200,000 to hear about.

In all of two quick hours, via a convenient teleconference re-broadcast, Jay Abraham, himself, will show you 42 different ways you really CAN prosper from this recession, Right now—- not someday in the future.

None of these strategies will require one dime of capital invested on your part. None bear any downside financial risk, either and none are focused on real estate.

I just reserved my spot because I want to know how to increase my profits during these uncertain times.

Don’t wait! Click here right now, to reserve your spot on the FREE teleconference and learn how you can prosper in these difficult economic times.

The first step is to find out what keywords they are using to advertise their products and services. You already know some of them because of the previous exercise. There are tools that will tell you all the keywords they are using to advertise with. One example of this is KeyCompete.com

Next, you need to figure out what they are doing to sell their products.

Do they have a newsletter?

If yes, how do they entice you to sign up for it?

Sign up for their list and make note of often they email you, what they email, what products and services they promote.

What kind of copy do they use?

Does their website look professional or homey?

What colors do they use on their website?

How is the website layed out?

How many pages do they have?

Do they use pictures? How?

Do they use video? How?

Determine everything they are doing and compare this with all the other sites on your list. Once you are done you will find some common themes. The things each of the sites have in common are things that you should absolutely be doing!

Several years ago I compared the top ten Technorati blogs in a similar fashion. Some of the things I found were:

1. They all made use of images in their posts.
2. A majority of them had their navigation on the right side.
3. A majority of them used either the color green or blue as their main color.

etc.

I didn’t do an in depth study, but if you wanted to emulate the top 10 blogs you could do an in depth of study of them and duplicate what they are doing. You could find out how many posts per day they write, what they write about, how they market their blogs, etc. Then you would know how to duplicate their success.

Emulating the best businesses in your niche will shortcut your path to success.

Note: If you want to read my previous newsletters on this topic just sign up for my newsletter by clicking here. Then enter your name and email and you will get the entire series in order over the course of a few weeks. Plus you will get other free advice that I don’t provide on this blog.

It’ll be something along the lines of “My program is the best,” followed by “No, my program is the best,” and “Really, we’re not a scam. Plus, we’re the best.” After a while, you become seasoned enough to filter it out and go on about your business without jumping at it. In the meantime, you’re saturated by background noise.

Plus, we have that whole recession thing going on, or so everyone tells me. Everyone is saying everything is so bad, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s just more background noise. Something else that gets in my way, and what good comes of it? None.

Now, this isn’t to say you should deny reality if it’s staring you in the face. If there’s a downturn, things might get a little trickier for your business. There really is a problem if no one wants to spend as much as they did before. But I’m not telling you to ignore the truth, just the noise.

Why is that?

• Background noise will cause you an emotional reaction which will interfere with your problem solving ability.
• One of those emotional reactions could well be panic, which solves nothing. No matter how bad things get, it’s nothing panic can’t make worse. That gets you nowhere.
• Reality is what it is, and you have to handle it. Background noise, however, does not clarify that reality. It makes it seem worse or more impossible to overcome than it may actually be. Again, that’s of no use to you.

That’s why you should learn to filter through the noise. Much of it isn’t helpful, and at best, is merely irrelevant to what you should be doing to make your business grow. Handle your business based on conditions as they actually are, and don’t succumb to the noise.

I have gone through the Formula 5 preview materials, and the folks at StomperNet have created another winner. It is coming out on January 19th, Monday afternoon, so I wanted to give you my honest thoughts on Formula 5 before the doors open on the program.

For starters, they released some really good videos to promote the product. You can watch the videos for free by clicking here.

Paul Lemberg, creator of Formula 5 is a well known business coach who has helped clients create over 350 million dollars in profits. He created Formula 5 to help you increase your business revenues quickly. Formula 5 is taught over a 15 week period and includes DVDs, action plan worksheets, and a printed transcript of each lesson. Plus there is a special members only portal that I have checked out for myself. The members portal is loaded with information. It reminded me a lot of the StomperNet portal – tons of information, forums, blogs, and mastermind groups. I was a bit surprised to see them offering so much to go along with the lessons that you get in the mail. The lessons themselves are good enough to help you increase your revenue, but I suppose the extra information on the portal won’t hurt.

Formula 5 works on 93% of all businesses that try it!

That is the highest success rate I have seen for any product like this.

If you are having trouble making a good profit in your business, then I highly recommend checking out Formula 5. While you might confuse Formula 5 with Formula racing because of the speed at which you can make more money in your current business… I don’t recommend Formula 5 for beginners. Formula 5 is really geared towards those people who already run an online business. On the other hand, beginners can learn a lot from the free videos. So, whether you are a beginner or you already have an online business I suggest you watch their free videos.

My Bonus

I am about 75% finished with a curriculum for a coaching program I intend to launch later this year. One of the ebooks that will be part of the curriculum makes an excellent companion to this product. In fact, the ebook is all about maximizing your profits. If you buy Formula 5 through my affiliate link by clicking here then after you complete the 15 weeks of training, I will send you a free copy of this yet-to-be released ebook from my upcoming coaching program. It is the perfect complement for the Formula 5 training.

Additionally, when you complete the 15 week course I will give you a free 1 hour consultation to check up on your progress in the program and answer any questions you have about my ebook. All you have to do is order Formula 5 through my affiliate link and send me a copy of your receipt for Formula 5. Once I verify the sale I will send you information on getting your bonuses.

Here is my quick summary of what is covered in MBA In A Box:

1. Raise the price of your product by 15 percent.

2. Increase the perceived value of your product.

3. Sell more to your existing customers.

4. Businesses fail because:
    A. Lack of vision.
    B. Lack of strategy to carry out vision.
    C. Lack of a system for marketing and sales.
    D. Lack of a system to monetize clients.
    E. Trying to do too many things (no systems to get things done).

5. Businesses succeed when:
    A. They have a strong value proposition.
    B. Continual stream of leads.
    C. Consistently and cost effectively convert leads to customers.
    D. Have a system to monetize customers.
    E. Operate efficiently.

6. Compound all five parts of the formula together to create a huge increase in profits.

I know that Formula 5 is based on solid business success principles because my business mentors have taught me the same strategies discussed in this report (and I teach them as well).

The full report goes into more detail about implementing Formula 5 strategies, but I thought a good summary would help you know what to expect when you check it out for yourself.

So, who should read the free Formula Five MBA In A Box report?

The report is best suited for online entrepreneurs who sell products and services. It’s not really useful for people who make their living (or intend to make their living) from affiliate marketing. It’s also not something that I would generally recommend to people who are absolutely new to Internet marketing (0-3 months experience— if you fall in this category, you should check out OnlineProfits.com). However, it is free and unless you have some sort of formal business training, then you will probably learn a thing or two about maximizing your online business profits by reading it.

If you want to read all the details of the report, you can download it by clicking here.

In college, I looked into studying counseling because I wanted to help people. I took a different path, but I’ve never stopped wanting to be able to help people who are struggling. Why am I so passionate about helping you earn a living online? Because owning your own business, working online gives you freedom. Freedom to spend time with your loved ones. Freedom to set your own schedule. Freedom to determine how much money you make (and you’re unlikely to ever fire yourself). That’s why I started my online business. I wanted a way to spend more time with my family, instead of being tied to someone else’s schedule. I wanted to help my wife homeschool our children. I wanted to be with them when they went on field trips, instead of stuck at work making money for someone else. I was tired of being stressed out every time the CEO decided it was time for the next round of “workforce reductions”.

For the past several years, I’ve immersed myself in learning everything I could about internet marketing. I’ve learned many things the hard way. I’ve spent a lot of time doing the wrong thing. It doesn’t have to be that hard! For the past year I’ve been studying under a business coach to learn successful methods for helping others to overcome obstacles that prevent them from succeeding in business (and solving a few of my own problems at the same time). Now, I’m ready to help others learn the same things I’ve learned—hopefully in a lot less time and with a lot less struggles.

I want to be able to be your sounding board, to point out the pitfalls, to help you figure out what’s working and what isn’t. So, this year for my birthday, I’m giving myself a gift. I’m pursuing that long ago dream of helping others succeed.

Click here to read all about my new adventure.

Update: Due to some confusion I noticed in the comments, I wanted to clear one thing up…
I am not offering free business coaching. Get the details by clicking here.

A few years back my wife Jill told me how she wished that I would help the kids make more handmade gifts for her. So in my infinite wisdom I decided that it would be easy to make a candle with the kids and she would really like it. I remember my parents making candles when I was little and it looked really easy back then, how hard could it be? Well…

I went to the craft store (a store I never usually go near) and picked up a candle making kit that said it was “easy to use”. One night my wife went out somewhere and the kids and I started making the candle… Long story short, it wasn’t as easy as it looked on the packaging and um…

Apparently, hot candle wax shouldn’t be poured down the garbage disposal!

We did manage to make a candle, but after paying for a new garbage disposal it turned out the total cost of making the candle was around 300 dollars. My wife said that I didn’t have to make her any more crafts because it cost us too much money and next time I can just buy her a pre-made candle at the store.

I learned from that mistake and to this day have never poured candle wax down a garbage disposal again

Have you learned from the mistakes you made in 2008?

Did you try things that didn’t work and keep doing them or did you move on to focus on the things that work?

I am not and never have been good at making crafts. If I had to make a living making candles (or any other craft) I would be a very poor man. However, I am good at making money, which I can then use to buy already made crafts. That works much better for me. How about you?

Are you trying to get traffic through social media marketing, but can only seem to get it through the Search Engines? If so, why not focus on what is working (SEO) and stop focusing on what it isn’t working (social marketing)?

Are you bad at writing content, but great at designing websites? Hire someone or partner with someone who can write content and focus on designing websites.

To make 2009 your most successful year running an online business you need to learn from the mistakes you made in 2008. So what mistakes did you make in 2008 that you won’t be making in 2009?