Alicia's Plog

10 Ways to Earn More, Work Less, and Enjoy Your Summer

If you're anything like me, you start looking forward to summer as soon as the calendar flips to a new year. Take advantage of summer's slower pace and people's more casual attitudes and plan to not only take time off but to make some money while you do!

1. Commit to your vacation time.

If you haven't already scheduled a break for this summer, stop reading this right now and do so! Even if you don't have plans to go away or if your budget is tight, I strongly encourage you to put at least one or two long weekend breaks into your calendar now - and then make sure you do anything you want for those few days - EXCEPT work. You'll come back to your business refreshed and recharged. You know you will and you know you need it.

2. Have a summer sale.

Do you have some products or programs that you could offer a summer discount on? I'd be willing to bet there's at least one. Kick off the summer season by offering your prospects a special deal on one or more of your offerings.

3. Make a special offer to your current clients and customers.

Summer's a great time to give your current clients and customers a special deal. For example, if they've already purchased something from you, offer them a special deal for investing in an additional offering of yours, maybe at the next higher-priced point.

So, if they've already spent $50 on one of your products, offer them a $50 discount towards another of your offerings.

4. Trim your expenses.

Are there some business-related expenses that could be put on hold for the next few months, without a negative impact to your bottom line? There are probably at least two or three things that you could eliminate for the summer, and you may find out that you can eliminate them completely come the fall.

5. Create summer hours.

Start later in the day, take a mid-day break for a few hours, or end your day earlier. Take one day a week off. Work half days. Take four-day weekends. It's your choice, but by creating summer hours, you're not only giving yourself some time to enjoy the fleeting days of warmer weather, but you'll also find that you'll be much more likely to focus only on your priorities, which means you'll actually move ahead much faster!

6. Repeat a previously profitable product.

Do you have a product that when you first launched it, it sold really well? Maybe it just needs some new life and a new promotion. Don't re-invent the wheel and simply repeat what's already worked for you in the past.

7. Republish your best articles in your newsletter.

For the summer, consider giving some of your best articles (the ones people commented on, or were reprinted most often) an encore presentation in your ezine. If you've been publishing for awhile, your readers most likely will appreciate the reminder the articles will bring, while it will be new content to your newer subscribers.

8. Declutter your office.

I simply can't think when my office falls into chaos, and I'm always amazed by how much better I feel and how much more productive I immediately become once I get rid of the clutter.

Summer is a great time to declutter and reorganize. Enlist a friend to help, or hire a professional organizer to really get you geared up for the summer (and the fall!).

9. Declutter your mind.

When you started your business, did you write down your vision for it? If you haven't, or if you haven't visited your vision in awhile if you have, the next few months are perfect for reflection, dreaming, and planning what you want the rest of your year to look like.

10. Plan some fun stuff.

Even if you don't have plans to travel this summer, you can still plan some really fun things to do near your home. Having something to look forward to will help you enjoy some time away from your desk while the sun is shining.

Believe me, I know how hard that can be. I love what I do, too. But one main reason we work for ourselves is so we can truly enjoy our lives, right?

I'll be dreaming up the next iteration of my vision and planning some fun stuff to do on the dock at the lake. Where will you be dreaming up yours? I'd love to know, so please feel free to leave your comments below.

Your Free Taste Promo Checklist

One of the most effective ways of getting people to discover and try your products or services is by offering a Free Taste - which is just that, a taste of what it is that you offer.

Free Tastes come in many forms: an ezine, an ecourse, an audio program, a special report, etc., that someone can get for free in exchange for their email address.

It's a tried and true marketing strategy that if you offer someone a free taste of what it is that you do, they are much more likely to become a paying client or customer down the road.

Once you've created your Free Taste, the next step is to market it to encourage people to sign up for your list. The following are 15 proven ways to promote your Free Taste:

1. Your email signature

In your email signature (your name and contact info that you put at the bottom of every email you send out), include a link that goes directly to the sign-up page for your Free Taste or to its respective autoresponder. Entice people to click through with a compelling question, followed by the link.

2. Your website

Make sure your sign-up form for your Free Taste is prominently placed on the home page of your website, as well as on every other page of your site. This way, no matter what page your visitor lands on, you're giving them an opportunity to opt-in to receive your Free Taste.

3. Other people's ezines

Ask to be mentioned and recommended in other people's ezines within your niche. Offer to do the same in return.

4. Other people's websites

Offer your Free Taste as a bonus to colleague' in complementary niches to offer to their lists.

5. Testimonials you write

Write results-oriented testimonials for products or services you use and love. Give permission to the owner to post your testimonial to their website, including the URL to sign up for your Free Taste.

6. Articles

Write and submit articles within your niche. In the author's resource box at the end, promote your Free Taste by including the URL to your sign-up page or the email link to your autoresponder.

7. Discussion lists

Participate in discussion lists where your target market hangs out and offer your Free Taste, following the list's guidelines for promotions.

8. Thank you pages

On your thank you pages for purchases, offer your Free Taste. Your customer may not have signed up before buying your product or service and you want to give them an opportunity to do so before they leave your website.

9. Your sales copy

Peppered throughout your sales copy, give the opt-in form to sign up for your Free Taste. Most people don't buy on the first pass, but they will likely sign up for your free offering.

10. Your business card

On the back of your business card, tell people where to go to sign-up for your Free Taste.

11. Teleseminars

Offer content-rich free teleseminars and make it clear that your desired outcome is to have the registered guests sign up for your Free Taste, not to sell them anything.

12. Directories

List your Free Taste in the directories that are available to you via your membership in associations or organizations, and any directories specific to the packaging of your Free Taste.

13. Swap ads with others

Offer to promote a colleagues' Free Taste in return for promoting yours as ads within each other's ezines. Run your ad for a minimum of three consecutive issues for the best results.

14. Tell everyone

Don't forget to tell everyone on your contact list about your Free Taste. Send them the link to your sign-up page, and ask that if they cannot benefit from it themselves to please pass it along to someone who would.

15. Offer a free bonus

Offer a bonus or gift as an added incentive to sign-up for your Free Taste. A special report, an audio program, or something similar that is in a different form than your Free Taste. For example, I offer my ezine as a bonus for signing up for my free special report, along with an audio interview.

Remember: Never add anyone to your list without their permission.

These 15 tactics will help you promote your Free Taste and add significantly to your list numbers. Just implement them consistently, and you will grow an audience quickly and easily.

This is just a tiny check-list sized example of the powerful and effective list-building strategies we'll be covering in detail at my Online Business Breakthrough Workshop. This one section alone will cover your investment in the workshop 10xs over. Interested?

www.OnlineBusinessBreakthroughWorkshop.com

4 Simple Steps to Charge What You're Worth and Get It

At least once a week, a client will ask me what they should charge for an offer they're making. And as much as we both like to think that I have the magic number for them, I don't. At least not until we do some groundwork first.

Since this is such a common stuck point for so many entrepreneurs, I wanted to share with you four basic steps that will help you charge what you're worth and get it:

Step 1: Shift your mindset

Right now make the decision that just because you're going to charge more, doesn't mean you have to give more.

So many entrepreneurs struggle with this, and end up giving so much that they find themselves exhausted and resentful - which doesn't serve them or their clients.

Based on my experience with working with hundreds of clients over the years, I can pretty much guarantee that you are already giving enough - if not too much.

But here's what else I've learned. When you give too much, you overwhelm your client. And what happens when they're overwhelmed? They don't actually DO anything. It immobilizes them. What happens when you give just enough and leave the option open for more - depending on how quickly they are implementing and moving forward - allows them to do just that - to consume what you're giving them and to actually put it into practice.

Step 2: Don't decide in advanced what someone can or cannot pay

This is a common theme for most entrepreneurs and is an obstacle that comes up over and over again with my clients.

Honestly, it's one I don't have a lot of patience for. When I hear, "my market won't pay more" or "my clients can't afford those kinds of fees", you aren't serving anyone, least of all your clients!

That's what I mean about deciding in advance if someone can or cannot pay your higher fees.

I'll give you a personal example. If my mentor coach had decided for me that I couldn't afford the investment to work with her privately, she would have missed out on a boatload of money. But more importantly, had she decided for me that I couldn't afford her program, she would have taken from me the opportunity to step up in a way that made a life-altering change in my business.

I have two thoughts on how people make decisions about money:

1. People always find money for what they want, not necessarily for they need.

2. People buy based on emotion, not necessarily on logic.

So, your clients are going to spend money on what they want, what they value, and usually they spend more than they originally planned on (that's the emotion piece).

So, it's not up to you to decide what they will or will not spend money on. (Wouldn't it bother you if someone did that to you?) It's up to them.

If you let your clients make their own decisions on whether or not they can pay your fees, you're providing them with an opportunity for them to step up. When they step up financially, they also take you, the work and themselves more seriously, which creates extraordinary results. And for you, they simply make a better client.

Step 3: Focus on value instead of features

Our clients come to us for results, not features. What they're investing in is the value they will get from working with you and how that translates into results.

In any conversation with a potential client or any of your marketing copy, what you want to focus on most is the value that client is going to get, and the results they can expect if they do the work.

Here's an example: I have a lot of different exercises and tools that I use with my clients to help them figure out the value of what they do, and to determine what is the ultimate price that they should be charging for their services, products or programs. But those are just features.

It's the results of using those tools and doing those exercises that gets the client to be able to charge what they're worth, and they make more money faster. That's the result.

The difference is that the features are the steps, processes, tools or exercises. The value is the result that you get, which is charging what you're worth and getting it, so you're making more money faster.

Step 4: Make it very easy for your clients to say "yes" to your offers

There are a number of ways to make it easy for your clients to say 'yes' to your offers, and one of the most effective is in how you structure your payment options.

Most entrepreneurs give one option or maybe two, but there is a strategy to this that if you implement can be much more effective in converting potential clients into paying clients.

Here's an example: Let's say you have 12-week teleseminar series. Most people would either charge a single fee, or provide a 3 month payment plan, with the fee for the program divided equally into 3 installments.

And that's ok. But let me share a more effective option. Offer both a full-pay option and one or two other payment options. If they choose the full-pay option, they get to pay less. If they choose a payment plan, they pay a little more for the convenience of stretching out their investment. Credit card companies have conditioned us to do this, and it does make good business sense for you because you are being charged an additional fee every time a transactions is processed through your merchant account.

There are a number of reasons why you'd want to offer a savings for the full-pay option, one of them being that once your client has paid in full, they are committed and ready to roll. And they are going to get better results from that commitment.

Charging what you're worth and getting it will simply change your life and your business forever. It's been true for me as well as for my own clients.

And if you want specific help with raising your own fees and feeling incredibly confident in putting them out there, then come to my Online Business Breakthrough Workshop, where we'll be covering this topic in-depth.

www.OnlineBusinessBreakthroughWorkshop.com

8 Acceleration Techniques to Creating More Income Fast

If you're adding multiple streams to your service-based business model, where you're moving away from 1:1 services to adding more ways of generating revenue, here are 8 easy ways to accelerate your timeline to success and cash flow.

1. Put up your Free Taste and Invite Site asap.

The sooner you get that up, the sooner your list will grow, the sooner your revenue will grow. Get it out now (done is better than perfect!) and you can always revise it (and you will).

2. Make sure your Free Taste really is just a taste of your offering.

It's something you should be able to put it together within just a couple of days. Make it finite and not something you need to keep working on. For example, a mini-ecourse is a perfect starter. Then later introduce your ezine.

3. Build your list.

Take a piece of paper, write BUILD LIST on it big and bold, and stick it on your computer, on the wall next to your desk, or somewhere you will see it and focus on it every day. The quickest way to build to the point of revenue generation in your business is to build your list.

4. Find people who have some measure of buzz...

... around something they've been doing (book, radio, tv, etc.) and interview them (even if only for 10 minutes) and offer that as a Free Taste. Ask them to promote it to their list. This builds your trust and credibility factor with your target market.

5. Converge online and offline marketing efforts as much as possible.

If you're holding workshops, get email addresses. If you're sending direct mail, point the recipients to a URL to sign up for your list for your Free Taste.

6. Concentrate on building a core program.

For 30 days, intensely create a core program that answers most of those problems/solutions that your target market is struggling with. Then take pieces of that content to package in various ways.

7. Piggyback on people who are already playing in your target market...

...create a product that will be beneficial to their list, and joint venture with them to reach revenue sooner. In other words, find a problem another market is having that you already have the solution for, find the Center of Influence in that market, joint venture with them, and share the revenue.

8. Write a Top Ten article for a super-quick Free Taste.

Put it up on your Invite Site, and publish it at topten.org and add the URL to point readers to the sign up page for your list.

These are just nuggets of how to accelerate your business growth, and I'll be share loads more fast, effective, and easy techniques in detail at my upcoming Online Business Breakthrough Workshop: Your Blueprint to a 6-Figure Freedom-Based Business this September.

Which one of these tips can you implement today? I'd love to know so feel free to leave your comments below!

My Favorite Snippets from "Delivering Happiness"

Reading Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh's "Delivering Happiness" book was like reading a novel and a business book at the same time. It was so engaging that I read the entire 250+ page paperback in one sitting.

Here are my favorite snippets from the book - enjoy!

1. Build a brand from the inside out.
   
2. Without conscious and deliberate effort, inertia always wins.
   
3. Envision, create, and believe in your own universe, and the universe will form around you.
   
4. Never outsource your core competency.
   
5. Great companies have a greater purpose and bigger vision beyond just making money or being number one in a market.
   
6. Celebrate your past and current successes while carefully navigating for the future.
   
7. Be as transparent as possible.
   
8. A word is a word, a picture is worth a thousand... but a brand is worth a million.
   
9. Lifetime value of a client/customer can increase via positive emotional association with your brand.
   
10. Build trust and engagement, not buzz.
    
11. Problems are just mile markers. Each one passed means you've gotten better.
    
12. The best leaders are servant-leaders.
    
13. Make a plan, work it through to completion.

Want your own advanced copy of "Delivering Happiness"? I actually received two advanced copies of the book, so let me know which ONE of the snippets resonates with you the most and why by Tuesday, May 4 at noon Eastern and I'll choose one of the responses to send my other copy to!

5 Things You Must Have to Reach 6 Figures in Your Business

Even though I've had a 6-figure business for a few years now, it still amazes me how easy it was to create and how it's been even easier to grow.

And it's why I'm so passionate about helping other women entrepreneurs create their own 6-figure businesses. Most heartwarming to me is showing them how to break through to that seemingly elusive $100k mark for the first time, by taking them from the beginning stages of building their business all the way to creating $8-10k a month.

While raising two small children, I know that if I could create a 6-figure business and then double that amount every year since, that you can too.

Here are 5 things you must have in order to make that happen for you:

1. A Plan

When I first launched my business, I went in circles, doing a little of this and a little of that, hoping something would land and my business would take off.

However, once I actually designed a plan and put it into action, I started seeing results right away, which gave me the confidence and fortitude to keep forging ahead. In the same vein, once that plan started not working as well, I changed the plan, and that's how I broke through to the next level.

That first plan - that business model - gave me the step-by-step to get to my first 6 figures. Then I needed a new business model that matched where I had grown to, and that got me to multiple 6 figures. And I know if I want to reach 7-figures, I'm going to have to adapt my business model again.

Much like Zappos did when they had to change their existing business model of drop-shipping to a combination of drop-shipping and housing inventory in order to get over that next hump in their business growth.

This is one the first things I do with my Platinum clients. We re-design their business model so that they know exactly what they are going to offer, and in what order, eliminating confusion and creating a clear path to their income goal.

2. A Take-Action Attitude

With your plan - your blueprint - complete, all you have to do is work the plan. That means taking action by implementing what's on the plan. Consistently, constantly, confidently and completely - all while staying flexible and paying attention to what's working and what's not.

Too many people create the plan and then do nothing with it. Or worse, they create the plan and then re-create it and re-create it and re-create it. And still do nothing.

If you're not an implementor, then you need to hire someone on your team who is. Otherwise, your business will never get off the ground.

3. Being crystal clear on your IT

Do you know what you IT is?

By your IT, I mean more than just who you serve, though that's critical too. By IT, I mean what is it you're known for, or what is IT you want to become known for.

Once you're crystal clear on your It - or your doorway through which people can easily get to know you and what you offer - joint ventures, clients, and other opportunities begin to flow much more easily and are much more aligned to who you are and what your business is about.

4. A Bigger Why

Speaking of what your business is all about, you must have a bigger WHY than just making money.

Look, we're all in business to make a profit. But if all you're doing is chasing the money, you won't acheive the flow of abundance that's waiting for you until you figure out and embrace your bigger why.

5. Faith enough to take the leap

Sometimes the only thing that will get us where we want to go is a leap of faith.

If you've got a burning desire for something, that desire didn't just show up out of the blue. It means it's waiting for you to receive it. So no matter how scared you are, or how much you don't know about how to make your desire your reality, stepping forward in a leap of faith can make wonders happen.

But Alicia, there has to be more?

Of course there is, but if you have these foundational pieces in place, you'll be well on your way to creating the 6 figure income you desire and deserve, more easily and quickly than you can imagine right now.

And of course there are some specific actions you'll need to take and a plan you need to create to make all of this work seamlessly - which I'll be sharing in detail at my upcoming Online Business Breakthrough Workshop this September.

I'd love to know which if the 5 seems the hardest for you right now? Feel free to let me know below!

Is Your Business Model Working For You?

Are you frustrated by a business model that's not working?

If your answer is yes, you're not alone. One of the biggest frustrations I've seen lately is that many of you are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole with your business model, so you're getting nowhere fast and getting frustrated enough to want to call it quits.

But I don't want you to do that!

Listen, building a successful and sustainable business online is NOT difficult. It takes time, effort, guidance, and the RIGHT business model for where you're at in your business building journey. Trying to jump too quickly to a more sophisticated model is only going to make you overwhelmed, frustrated and feeling like a failure.

Here are four sure-fire ways to know that your business model is NOT working for you:

1. You're working too hard for the return on your efforts...

If the current model you're applying to your business feels really hard or you find yourself less than enthusiastic about it almost all the time, then you're probably following the wrong model for your business.

2. You're only focused on one or two revenue streams...

Regardless what your business is, if your income only comes from one or two sources, then it's not a viable or sustainable business model.

3. Your offers are a mismatch with your current market and message...

This is the one I'm seeing most often right now. If your offers are out of sync with the maturity of your business - and the business owner, honestly - then that business model is not serving you - or your market.

4. Your offers actually devalue your true worth...

On the flipside of #3, your business may have grown to a position in your market where by not increasing the level and investment in your offers, you'll find yourself stuck at the same income level until you do.

I've been in all four places, only to change models and be able to break through to the next level in my business growth.

Which one of these scenarios is your business in? I'd love to know so feel free to leave your comments below!

Is Your Website Working For You?

A question I often ask my target market is, "what's your biggest challenge with building your business online?" And one answer I get frequently is this:

"How do I make my website earn money?"

If you've got a business online, then you must have some sort of web presence. Perhaps it's a one-page 'sign up for my list' kind of site, or a full-blown brochure site with a menu of choices, or maybe your site is in the form of a blog. Regardless of what kind of site (or sites) you have, if they're not doing what you want them to - and since we're in business, ultimately that means making some sort of a profit - then it's time to make some changes.

But how do you REALLY know whether your site is working or not? Here are four strategies to test and track your pages to know what needs fixing:

1. Let the numbers speak

I'm sure if the sky was the limit, you'd hire the most expensive web designer with the fanciest tools to create the most spectacular site imaginable for your business - and someday you just may do that.

For now, though, even an ugly site can make money. I know because my own site for the past 4 years is ugly, and yet it's been a very big piece of my success to date.

And I can think of at least two other sites right now that I personally think are not that pleasing to the eye, yet I know they are raking in the bucks each and every month, year after year.

So don't get caught up in having the most polished and professionally looking site. Focus more on having the pieces in place that will bring you the cash, too.

2. Give your site only one job

Think of each page of your website as a separate entity with one main purpose. It may be to sell something, or to sign up for your list, or to get people to call you for an appointment. Whatever it is, make it clear that that one thing is the action your visitor should take from being on that page.

3. Track your numbers

Most web hosts offer statistics that you can use to watch your numbers, or there are other web stat programs that you could use as well (such as Google Analytics). However you are keeping an eye on your numbers, you should be looking for two things: how many people visit your site and how many people take the action you want them to take.

From those two numbers, you can figure out your conversion rate, which tells you how many of those visitors took the action you wanted them to - like sign up for your list. If you make small changes to your page AND watch these numbers at the same time, you'll be able to tweak things to increase your conversion rate.

4. Make one change at a time

This is a very effective way to increase the conversion rates on sales pages and sign-up pages. Change just one thing - for example, the headline - and watch your numbers. Compare those statistics to your previous ones and decide whether or not to keep the change. (You can also do this via a split-test in your shopping cart, where the software does the actual number crunching for you.)

I see so many sites that try to be all things to all people by offering everything under the sun in too small a space - a website - and all that does is confuse people and encourage them to click away. Remember, 'a confused mind always says no', so always go back to the main questions when considering making changes to your website: What's the purpose of this page? What is the one thing I want my visitor to do here? And then design your copy around the answer. Keep it simple and you'll get better results every time.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on making your website work for you. Please feel free to leave your comments below!

5 Easy Ways to Always Give Your Niche Something New

"Do I always have to come up with something new?"

This is a question I get asked often by my private clients, and the answer is a resounding YES, if you want to continue to grow your business.

Besides boring your target market after awhile, you'd get bored, too, so yes, you want to breathe some life into your business by consistently coming up with new offers. This helps keep your list interested, and it helps you stay on the cutting edge in your market.

Here are 5 easy ways for getting and staying hot in your market:

1. Be recognized...

Start showing up - in-person and/or virtually - at events that are offered for your target market. Throw your own events. Be seen on discussion lists and popular blogs where your target market hangs out. Join the conversation, offer your valuable insights and comments, ask good questions and give good answers. Joint venture with your colleagues and double your efforts with half the work. Join associations made up of your peers and volunteer to be on a committee or head up a project. There are loads of ways to build your recognition in your market. Pick a couple and start doing them NOW.

2. Be open to offering other's products...

If you've hit a creative low point, there's always the option of offering someone else's product to your list. It's still new and fresh material to them and a new offer for you to make. Make a list of five of your colleagues who each have a product offering that complements what it is that you do and start building a relationship with them now (if you don't have one already), so when you want to offer their product, they've gotten to know you and your business a bit so they may be more willing to say yes to that kind of strategic alliance.

3. Be more 'serviceable'...

Take a fresh look at your service offerings. Write down what they look like currently on one sheet of paper, including all the features and benefits. On a separate sheet of paper, write down how you'd like your services to look, including all the features and benefits. You might be surprised to find a real difference. Based on what you discover, consider repackaging your current offerings in a way that better suits you and your clients.

4. Be trendy...

Enter the conversation already going on in your client's mind to spark new ideas. What are they reading, seeing on TV, involved in right now in their world? What current event or newsy item or popular TV show can you tie into your sales copy for your offerings that will keep it fresh and make stand out in an already crowded marketplace?

5. Be occasion-oriented

Tie a promotion into a holiday or special occasion. There's hardly a week that goes by these days that doesn't have some sort of celebration attached to it. Or you could make up your own. For example, January (New Year's) and September (Back-to-School) are great months for launching new products, programs, or services that allow the client to do, be and have better.

If you want to keep your clients and customers, keep them interested. Always be offering them something new, either in the way of a new product, program or services tailored to their wants or by tweaking your current offerings to keep them fresh and make them stand out in an already crowded marketplace.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on keeping things fresh for your and your market. Please feel free to leave your comments below!

Teleseminars: A Quick Way to Cash

If you're reading this ezine, it's likely that you've participated in a teleseminar, whether it be mine or one of my colleagues. You've probably been on some that have been very good, where you got tons of really valuable information. And you may have found yourself on a few that were nothing but pitch-fests for the host's lastest product.

But I want to share something with you. Hosting content-rich teleseminars for my target market is some of the quickest and easiest money I've generated in my business.

Holding f.r.e.e. introductory teleseminars are a great way to promote your business, increase your email subscriber list, make more sales on your products, and enable your potential clients another way to connect with you. By being on the phone with you, they get to know you through your voice, adding the human touch that can be so hard to cultivate online.

In the past, I've offered a free monthly teleseminar that gave people an introduction to what I teach. From each of those calls, I got more ezine subscribers, more members for my group coaching membership, and more sales of my products.

Which is why I'll be adding them back into my marketing mix again this year.

Holding PAID teleseminars helps to promote your business and generate revenues as well. Just doing one paid teleseminar at least every two months on a different marketing topic would gross me a minimum of $2500.

Not bad for an hour's worth of work, huh?

Another way to offer teleseminars is to do "intensive" or "bootcamp" series of multi-week teleseminars. I've offered 10- and 4-week '"workgroups" on the topics of listbuilding, creating a successful business online from scratch, and search engine marketing that have been extremely profitable, upwards of $10k.

As you can see, adding teleseminars to your business model benefits both your market and your bottom line.

Here's what you need to get started:

1. The Right Target Market and the Right Topic

Here's the secret for producing and profiting from a teleseminar: It must be designed for a target market AND it must solve a problem that that target market is struggling with. If you have those two keys in place, you'll be sure to attract enough sign-ups and make money from your topic.

2. A Bridge Line

There are several good no-cost bridge lines available for you to use, but the one I'm currently recommending is FreeConferenceCall.com because you can record the teleseminar for free as well. This is a nice benefit to offer your participants and to anyone who had to miss your teleseminar for any reason. I use it as a back-up recording for all my calls. You can have up to 100 people on the line with you.

3. Recording Service

You'll need a way to record your teleseminars so you can provide the audio for people to listen to later and for you to make CDs from if you decide to package your teleseminar into a physical product after the fact. I use AudioAcrobat to record all my teleseminars, with FreeConferenceCall.com as a back-up.

4. Automatic Registration

You'll want to be able to have people sign up for your teleseminar without you having to do a lot of work. I use Aweber for all my teleseminar registrations, but you can also use your shopping cart's autoresponder service if you have one.

I'd like to invite you to start offering free teleseminars to promote your business, and once you get more comfortable with both the format and the technology, start offering paid teleseminars. Even if you only have a handful of people on your first call, it's great practice. And I guarantee your numbers will increase as you continue to build your email list, and you'll be profiting from teleseminars in no time.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on hosting teleseminars. Please feel free to leave your comments below!

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