I do a bit of freelancing sometimes. And when you do that, you need to be able to invoice your clients.

Of course, you could just whip a quick invoice in Words or any word processor that you use. But where’s the fun in that?

Now imagine this — invoicing is FUN (yes, apart from getting paid). I want to introduce you to CurdBee.com. That’s what I use for invoicing my clients.

CurdBee.com is an online, web-based invoicing software by a company called Vesses. I am starting to really like this company and the things they do.

I have been checking out online invoicing for some time now. I didn’t really test everything out, but I know about the others like FreshBook, BlinkSale, CashBoard, Zoho and others. But when checking these options out, I am drawn to CurdBee.com.

Why I am drawn to CurdBee.com? One is because of their generosity.

You see, online invoicing software makes money by charging you a monthly fee. But at times they still let you in for a free peek. But these free peek accounts are always limited in some ways. Well CurdBee has a free account that is limited too. But the main difference here is this — While others limit you by how much you can earn with their software, CurdBee does not.

Let me explain.

Other online invoicing software would limit your usage to their software either by these methods:

- your free trial account expires after certain period like a month, a week, etc
- you can only create X number of invoices
- you can only store X number of clients’ information
- you can only invoice up to X amount

So those limitations repel me from even signing up to their “free” account.

Then I found CurdBee. CurdBee does not do that to you. Of course there are ways that CurdBee limit its software and try to get you to upgrade. But they do it in a much nicer way. CurdBee does not “force” you to upgrade. CurdBee proves it with its superior software features.

To put it in a simple perspective, even with the free account, you can build your business to the millions and you don’t have to upgrade!

With the free account at CurdBee, you can:

- store unlimited number of clients’ information
- invoice unlimited amount
- create as many invoice as you need
- no expiring “free trial” period
- you don’t need to give them your credit card info sign-up for a free account

Like I said, you can run your business to the millions and still be on the free account. However, CurdBee does limits its software by features.

Here’s what you can do with the free account

- receive payment with Paypal & Google Checkout
- accept multiple currencies (this is important to me)
- customize invoice with your own logo
- import and export data

And here’s the extra things that you can do when you upgrade (starting at $5 per month)

- supports PDF invoice
- customize emails and notifications
- add multiple contacts per client
- supports SSL encryption
- unbranded invoice and emails
- localization
- supports recurring billing (via extended module)
- supports 2CheckOut (via extended module)
- supports Authorize.NET (via extended module)
- supports quotes or estimates (via extended module)

MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH CURDBEE

I signed up because of CurdBee’s generosity with its free account. I don’t know of any other online invoicing software that offers this. I see that other online invoicing software is a bit greedy with their offering. It’s as if like “if you make X amount of money, they must make Y amount”.

But here’s the thing — once I am inside, I am hooked!

Like I said, I haven’t tested any other invoicing software, but with Curdbee, things really feels easy. As a developer myself, I really believe they put a lot of thought and planning into the software. And it was really well-developed.

Creating a new invoice takes only 2-3 minutes. You can create items on the fly. You can also create a new client on the fly while creating a new invoice. You don’t have to go to 2 or 3 different pages before having an invoice created.

Having experienced all that inside CurdBee, I upgraded to Pro Account right away. It’s only $5 per month or $50 per year. You can pay with credit card or Paypal.

And the other extra features like estimates, recurring billing, 2Checkout integration and Authorize.NET integration is only an extra $5 each or $50 per year. So if you take up estimates and recurring billing along with your Pro Account, that only $150 per year, or $12.50 per month (paid annually).

Now how does this compare to desktop invoicing software?

There are things that desktop invoicing software cannot do what online invoicing can.

My favorite feature is the payment integration. You can send an invoice and get paid immediately via Paypal, Google Checkout, 2Checkout or Authorize.NET. I don’t think desktop invoicing software that runs in your computer can do that.

And another thing is the recurring billing feature. Imagine offering a service that people would have to pay monthly payment to you. This can be like web hosting, SEO services, or press release retainer fees. With an online invoicing software like CurdBee, you can create a recurring invoice and the invoice goes out to your client automatically every month. You don’t have to create the same invoice every month and send them out manually.

Now I deal with local and international clients. And being able to invoice in multiple currency with Curdbee is just awesome. You can set the client’s default currency when you create their data in Curdbee. For my local Malaysian clients, I charge them in MYR. And with international clients, I charge in USD.

And since Paypal supports both of these currencies, these two types of clients can simply pay me with Paypal when they receive my invoice. Alternatively, I can always update the invoice manually when I get their payment.

Oh yeah, did I also tell you about localization? This is another feature that I like. Where I am from we don’t use the term “Estimate” so much. Here we use the term “Quote”. But both are the same thing. And with localization, you change the labels on your invoice to use the terms that your client would be more familiar with. And it’s easy to do too. With their in-line editing field, you see exactly where each labels go and just click on them to edit it. When done, just hit “Save”.

I guess that’s it for my review of Curdbee. And let me just conclude, if you are looking for an invoicing solution, I highly recommend Curdbee. It’s what I use myself.

Checkout Curdbee

I learned this at a forum some time back. And I have to say that it works really great. When promoting affiliate programs, I find that I get more sales per 100 visitors than any other techniques.

It works by creating a video review for an affiliate product, primarily with ebooks on ClickBank. But it does not mean that you have to stop there. You can use this technique with any product that you are promoting as an affiliate.

But I have to tell you that this will require some money to get started.

Oh, you also need a screencast software to capture what you are doing on your computer. Camtasia can do that for you. Or you can use one of those web-based screencast software like Screen-o-matic.com or Skoffer.com.

What you want to do is choose two or three best-selling ebooks or products that you find on ClickBank. Make sure that you choose products in the same category or niche.

Then with you want to make a video review with each.

The trick here is start the video review from website that is selling the ebook. This is where you start recording. You introduce yourself and tell them that you will be reviewing the ebook they see right now (they will be seeing the website you are on).

First you review the website and tell them how convincing or not the website is. Tell them about the what information that you can gather from the website and how it affects you buying decision. Here you probably want to spend 1 to 2 minutes.

Then you scroll down and get to the order button.

This is the “big trick”.

You are going to click on that order button and make a live purchase right before your viewers.

This is something like “monkey see, monkey do” kind of things.

Of course not everybody is going to really follow you but from my experience a lot of people will.

Now you proceed with your order until you are finish. When you are done you will get to the download page or maybe some members area. When here, you review the members area. You show them what resources they will have access to, what ebooks they will get, what audio they will get to hear, what videos they will get to watch and on, and on.

Now, pause the recording!

What you want to do now is to go through the ebooks that you just bought. Read as much as you can as fast as you can.

If you have digested the video, launch a word processor or a text editor and start to write a summary or a review of the ebook in point forms.

You can have one list called, “Here is what you will learn”.

And then, you can have another called, “What I like about this ebook”.

And then another list called, “What I do not like about this ebook”.

And finally, you will want to have a conclusion, “My Conclusion”.

When you are done with your lists, continue recording again. Now you can start giving a review about the ebook using your lists.

When you tell your viewers about your conclusion, you want to tell them how you rate the content in the ebook. Finally tell them whether it’s worth buying or not.

You can also tell the viewers who the ebook is most suitable for. Is it more suitable for beginners? Is it suitable for advanced?

Just a little tip when doing your lists in the word processor, I recommend that you use huge fonts because it will be easier to read in the video.

And another thing to remember, try keeping the video in 6 to 8 minutes. People get bored if they would have to wait too long to know your conclusion.

When you are done with your video, there are several ways you can use it to promote affiliate products.

First you can upload it to video site like YouTube and in the description put up a link to the affiliate merchant using your affiliate link. Of course you may want to cloak it and redirect using your own domain.

Second, you can use the video on your own website and start driving traffic to your website. There are many ways to drive traffic to your website, and article marketing is one of them. Video marketing is also another way to drive traffic. Either way, you will have people watching your video WATCH YOU BUY the product.

There is not much to say anymore at this point. The only thing for you to do now is test this method.

Before I tell you about SSWT Elite, let me tell you a little bit about my story and how I get started. It’s all related, I promise. Soon, you’ll know why I tell you this…

I remember when I started out years ago. I swayed here and there looking for the right way to make money online. I started out with a little luck when I saw my first ever website made $13 in commission from an affiliate sale. But after that, I got lost…

Back then, you hear this phrase being chime into your ears quite often, “The money is in the list”. What that means is that you need to build yourself a mailing list. A mailing list is almost like a guarantee to a long prosperous business life on the Internet. (that is the half true though)

While still building websites for affiliate commissions, I looked into the option of building my own mailing list. By the way, back then, you were also distracted by other huge online success like Yahoo, Hotmail and the hundreds of Internet business startups during the dot-com bubble. Almost everybody has a “great” idea for the Internet. So did I…

So honestly, it was a confusing time when I was starting out. Maybe it was for you too.

But in my search for a way to make money online, I found Lynn Terry and Andre Chaperon.

Lynn is a mommy from Florida. She has a website and forum that helps people understand what it takes to make money online. That website is SelfStartersWeeklyTips.com (SSWT). Apart her technical skills with web design, her personality shines where she is caring, helpful, and just overall a nice good person. She has a really good voice too.

Andre came from South Africa and later migrated to Unite Kingdom. He got serious with affiliate marketing and info-products using paid advertising like Adwords. Andre put out some really good live case study and you can tell that Andre has a knack for business and internet marketing. He is a sharp guy and knows how to implement a marketing campaign really well on the Internet.

Lynn and Andre both founded Turning Ideas Into Dollars (TIID).

TIID is a private forum. People join the forum to bounce ideas and seek guidance on building their internet business. It’s a great place to hangout, learn from each other, network and of course bounce some ideas around without having to worry about it being snatched by others.

And joining TIID has to be a turning point in my online business career.

During the times when I was lost, not knowing what would work and what would not, I guess I did one thing right – by joining TIID. Mind you, this is when I don’t really have much to spare to join a membership site. I just graduated and just started working as a programmer in a local company.

But I guess because of Lynn and Andre, they attracted all the right people in TIID. I launched DIYMiniSite.com when I was in TIID. And the people in there offered tons of helped. I got help with editing, sales copy, design critiques, and even joint venture partners. DIYMiniSite.com is something that exploded for me. I built a huge mailing list in just a short time.

Mind you, I tried list building before DIYMiniSite.com and it went flop… embarrassingly.

Unfortunately, Andre and Lynn, at one point decided to close down TIID. I don’t really know the reason why, but I believe they both wanted to focus on other things, and TIID was taking too much time and effort.

Andre went on and got really good with pay-per-click advertising and affiliate marketing. Lynn, as you know it today is a huge blogger and affiliate marketer. I believe Lynn is more into SEO method rather than paying for traffic.

But anyway, if TIID is still around today, I would advise you to join that private forum right now. But TIID is not around anymore today. So I guess that’s the bad news.

But I do have good news.

The good news is that there’s something better that you can join.

I guess Lynn Terry is just a caring, helpful person. She has been helping people since she started SelfStartersWeeklyTips.com years ago. And I guess she realizes that some people wanted more than just a forum at SSWT. So after years of the closing of TIID (yep, it took years), Lynn Terry opened up SSWT Elite.

I guess maybe Lynn is more prepared now than before. She closed TIID for some reason (whatever that was). And I believe she needed to grow herself and sort things out in her personal life. If you’ve been following her, you know that her kids are all grown-up now, and she seems really happy with the giant great dane and she is traveling a lot more to conferences and seminars.

And I am grateful that Lynn started SSWT Elite. It’s long overdue. To me, and maybe the people from the old TIID, SSWT Elite is like the New TIID.

So if you are starting out, or you would like to be in a place where you can bounce your ideas, or you feel lost, not knowing what to do next when it comes to building your online business, I would like to invite you to join SSWT Elite, where Lynn, other members and I will be there to help you.

So what’s inside SSWT Elite?

First of all, SSWT Elite works as an extension to the forum at SelfStartersWeeklyTips.com. You become a member at SSWT and you can upgrade yourself to an Elite member.

What can you do there?

Well, if you’ve always wanted professional advice on what directions to take with your business, this is the place. Instead of paying professional consulting fees, you just pay small monthly fees. And Lynn Terry herself is very active at the forum, responding to almost every question in there.

You can start a new thread about your project in SSWT Elite. You can consider that as your personal drawing board to keep yourself in check with your own progress, while Lynn and other members comment, provide reviews, advice and also help out with things that they can.

I think this is among the best part in SSWT. Starting a “project thread” has helped many members accomplish what they set out to do. And the members also help them stay in check, making sure that you do what you set out to do.

It’s kind of like your own personal support group when doing your online business. Well, you know how it is when you set out to do something different. Your family can’t really say much except some smile and words of encouragements. Your friends, not only do not understand what you are trying to accomplish, some might even ridicule you.

It’s a good thing there’s SSWT Elite where you can always come back to, to charge up that depleting motivation battery and keep you running.

Well, I guess, I always get that warm fuzzy feeling when I am in SSWT Elite.

There’s also another thing that Lynn does in SSWT Elite. It’s the Monthly Elite Challenge. Every month, Lynn will start a new topic that you can participate or simply learn from. These challenges are like “Info-Product Creation” and it follows with some discussion on why you should get into this, guide on how to do it, case studies on how others done it and later on, other members will pitch in on how they are doing with their Monthly Challenge.

At another month, the challenge could be different like “Guest Blogging” – where you aim to get people to guest blog on your blog, or you yourself guest blog on other people’s blog and increase your own blog traffic.

This is fun to follow as the month unfolds. You will see how others are doing it and sometimes you get some really great case studies to learn from.

But on top of that the forum and group, Lynn Terry also organizes weekly live webcast for Elite members. It’s called the Brainstorming Hour. Lynn checks up on projects and comments on them. And you can ask questions, let people know where you are with your project, what you are doing and also advice others as well.

The best part is that you get feedback from Lynn and other members live.

What I like about the Brainstorming Hour, though there’s no face-to-face time, to some extend you feel like you are really getting to know the other members. When you start to feel that way, chances are others start to feel the same way about you. This will make it easy when you need to find a partner for a certain project or maybe even joint venture partners.

I try to join the webcast almost every week. So you may find me there too. But because of timezone issues, I might not be there sometimes.

I think there’s a lot more that you can get out of SSWT Elite. But I think this is all that I can put in writing. And I am sure SSWT Elite is way more than what you read here. It’s something that you have to experience for yourself.

But if …

you’d like to have a support group to turn to with your online business,

or you just want to hangout with like-minded people, who understands online marketing, the works and the things that you are going through,

or you’d like a place where you can bounce your ideas, seek feedback, opinions, reviews,

or you seek help, guidance, advise on what to do next with your business,

or you want all of the above…

Then, I think SSWT Elite is for you.

I can’t really decide this for you. I don’t know where you are with your business right now. But I want you to know that in SSWT Elite, there are pros, newbies and people who are somewhere in between when it comes to Internet marketing.

The newbies come to get started. The pros stay because they like the environment in SSWT Elite. And you, I can’t make up a reason for you.

But I do urge you to at least check out SSWT Elite. Because if you ask me, I love it there. And maybe you will too…

Join Self Starters Weekly Tips Elite

http://UPLOADnSELL.com

UPLOADnSELL.com is my latest venture. Coming from me, I am biased. But I want to say it anyway. UPLOADnSELL.com makes selling ebooks, files, downloads or any other digital products easy. All that you need is your files and a verified Paypal account. After that, all that you have to do is just UPLOAD and SELL.

Though UPLOADnSELL requires no training, no explanation, today I want to give you a walk through on how to use UPLOADnSELL.

At UPLOADnSELL.com, the first thing that you see is a some forms that you need to fill in. They are segmented into four area labeled with numbers from 1 to 4. The first one is about selecting the files that you are selling.

UPLOADnSELL.com allows up to 5 files per product and a total of 30MB per product. So just select your files one by one and once you have 5 files selected, the file select input will disappear. If you selected the wrong files, you can click on the X next to the file name of selected files and it will disappear. You can select your files again.

Now, I just want to clarify this though. When you have more than one files, five for example, you are not creating five different products. You are creating ONE packaged product which has five files in it. Just want you to be aware of that.

Next you need to tell UPLOADnSELL about your product. Basically you need to put in the name of your product, how much you are selling it for and the currency that you pricing it with. You see, Paypal accepts 24 different currencies. If this product is something specific to your country, you may want to choose that instead of the default USD.

The third area is where you put in the details about yourself, the merchant. First you put in your name or any designated contact person in your company. Then you put in your company name. After that, you need to tell UPLOADnSELL your Paypal email address. Make sure you only use verified Business or Premier Paypal account. Other type account may have limitations and may affect your sales or your customers’ buy experience. Last thing, you also need to put in your support email address, preferably the same one you put in your Paypal account (yes, you can define a different email address for your support in Paypal).

That is all that UPLOADnSELL need… just one thing left to do…

Number 4 is just about some legal stuffs. UPLOADnSELL want to make sure that it only serves good decent people. You cannot upload and sell something that you do not have rights to do so. And furthermore in the the TOS, UPLOADnSELL does allow you to use its service to do crime, or sell products in certain topics or interests, etc… you need to read the TOS to know more.

But for most people who wants to make a living on the Internet, I don’t see why you can’t use UPLOADnSELL. Just check the two checkboxes. And then click UPLOAD!

At this point, you should be able to see the progress of the upload. You can stop it at anytime if you feel that you did something wrong in the previous page. You can click on the [+] icon to see details of the upload process.

When everything is done, you are ready to sell…

Here you will see two different URLs. The one on top is your Buy Link URL. That is the URL that you use with your order button, or the one you use to send your customers to Paypal. The one at the bottom is the Sample Download Page URL. You can visit that page to see what you customers will see after they made payment to you.

You can also test the Sample Download Page and see if all the files were uploaded correctly. Try downloading each files and see if they work. That Sample Download Page will expire after 24 hours. So will the download pages that are created upon every sale.

I HAVE UPLOADED MY FILES – NOW WHAT?

Now you can start selling. All that you need to do is use the Buy Link URL. Of course, there’s many way to sell your product. You simply use the Buy Link URL with your order button at your website. You can use it by simply putting an update your Twitter or Faceback. You can even use it at forums like Digital Point or Warriors Forum by creating a new thread about your product (make sure you comply to the rules of the forums).

But what ever you do, it’s your responsibility to explain your offer. The Buy Link URL will only take your customers to Paypal so that they can make the payment.

WHAT WILL MY CUSTOMERS SEE?

Alright, why don’t we test the Buy Link URL. Simply put it in the address field in your browser and hit Enter.

First they will see the screen shot above. It’s building your Paypal Buy Button and then will redirect your customers to Paypal. And here’s a normal Paypal page…

When your customers complete the payment process, if there’s nothing wrong with their purchase, they will be taken to their download page. Sometimes problems occur with Paypal payment when your customers uses e-check, or when you are using email address that you have not verified, etc… when something like occur, both you and your customers will be notified by email. Otherwise, only your customers will be notified with his/her download info.

Here’s what a download page looks like…

The download page generally has two important areas. One, you customers will be informed again about the product they have bought. It will also tell the customers your support email address. But to protect you from email harvesters, it is an image and not in text.

Below is the list of files your customers can download. And as you can see, it also tells your customers how much time is left for download. That is actually an animated countdown, counting down by the second.

As for the download links, maybe I should also tell you that it is programmed to support resumes and download managers like Free Download Managers, LeechGet, etc. So your customers can experience faster downloads. And if downloads fail half way, your customers does not have to re-start the download.

FREE, NO REGISTRATIONS, NO SETUPS, NO FEES – WHAT’S THE CATCH?

Yes, you don’t need to register for anything, pay anything, install anything or setup anything…

As the creator of UPLOADnSELL, I get this a lot. What’s the catch? The motivation behind UPLOADnSELL is to make this dead-simple for everyone. I was teaching a class on how to sell digital products online and how to set it up with Paypal. So I released SimpleIPN back in August 2009. And I thought it was already the simplest way to integrate your ebook with Paypal, while delivering your ebooks in a secure manner. Simple IPN does not require a database. All that you need to do is just edit settings.php and then upload the whole script, with your products.

But people still faces problems. Especially when they don’t even know what FTP is… So I was thinking of “how I can make this easier…?” And that’s how UPLOADnSELL came about. Just like SimpleIPN, UPLOADnSELL is also free.

But we can’t survive and continue to provide this service if we can’t support ourselves. UPLOADnSELL.com has to be generating revenue to continue offering this service for free.

So you are right, there is a catch.

What we do is this. After you customers made payment to you, they will arrive on the download page. And on that page, we put up advertisements to support ourselves. And later, we do plan to release a Pro Account, which has more features like reporting, customizations and maybe an affiliate program. That will give Pro Account users more control and more power over their marketing efforts. And yes, the Pro Account will require a small monthly fee. We’ll get to that later when we are ready to announce the Pro Account…

So that’s how we support ourselves.

Well, I guess that’s it.

UPLOADnSELL.com is created to make selling digital products quick and easy. There’s nothing to install, no setup, no registrations, no fees … just upload and sell. If you haven’t already done so, I urge you to give it a try. If you have some reports gathering dusts, and an audience ready to buy it (a blog or a mailing list), just upload your product and create a quick campaign. See how it works for you…

http://UPLOADnSELL.com

A girl called me the other day asking internet marketing questions. And you know what, I think it’s a good topic to cover in my blog… so here it is…

I hope you really read this and take it to heart when it comes to list building…

Here goes..

The girl, let’s call her, Amanda, told me that she is starting to build her list. Well, good for her. It’s good when you are starting to take action…

And she started telling me that it’s not doing so well. She is only getting a few subscribers… and it’s a number that is really frustrating her.

Okay, you may have heard that it’s not about the size of list but rather the relationship you have with them. But then again, you have to look at the way you build your list.

I asked Amanda how she’s building her list…

She said, “Giveaway event”… OK. Not the answer I was hoping for.

Then I asked Amanda another question. What did she offer during the giveaway event?

Her answer, “Some PLR I have in my computer…”

Another answer that didn’t really feel so good about.

OK, here’s the secret to building your list.

Some may take this lightly, but when you are starting out, you could be doing the same mistake.

Yes, you can building your list using giveaway events. And yes, you can use PLR… but it has to be done right. And today we ARE NOT going to talk about how to use PLR and giveaway events to build a mailing list…

I am going to talk about the MOST EFFECTIVE way I know on how to building a mailing list…

So, are you excited? I know I am because I know this will benefit you in many ways…

HOW I BUILT MY FIRST MAILING LIST…

Years ago, when I was building my first mailing list, what I did was offered a free subscription to a newsletter.

What I did was create a 1-page sales letter and tell people the great things they will get when the subscribe to my newsletter. And it’s all for free…

Of course, my strength is the technical aspect of Internet marketing like PHP and web design. So I told them they will benefit from my skills because I am going to teach the many ways I know on how to do things online that will save them money…

And that was the truth. A lot of the things that you pay for on the Internet can be accomplish for a lot less money, but you may need to make it up in time, research and trial and error.

Anyway, I am sure you feel that it was a great newsletter. Well, it was.

But let me tell you something — it’s not a great way to build a mailing list. Infact, it’s a VERY BAD way to build a mailing list.

Even after a few months, I didn’t even get pass 100 subscribers. Talk about being pathetic…

Don’t ever do that… Unless you are already a big shot online marketing celebrity.

ANOTHER TRY AT BUILDING A MAILING LIST — THIS TIME IT WORKS

Alright, the next thing I tried was this…

I created a mini-site and offered something for free. But it had to be something great that would shock the community or the niche that you are in. And it has to be something really good.

If people are paying a lot of money for something, show them are you accomplish the same thing for free…

If people believe that it takes a week to accomplish something, show them how to get it done in a day, and give that for free.

Yep — your main offer has to have the buzz factor. It has to have that little something that can possibly make people talk about it…

And then, you create another product and offer that using the one-time-offer.

Now, when you sell something, you can give away a part of the sale as affiliate commissions. Which means, you can go out and find affiliates or JV partners to promote your offer.

When you start to get those new subscribers, work it into your marketing to convince those new subscribers to become JV partners too by promoting your site.

Now, I told you earlier that this is the method that works after my first list building effort flopped like a pizza thrown by a bad chef.

However, I have bad news…

Getting JV partners is not an easy task…

If the potential JV partner that you are approaching has never heard of you, let alone know you personally, your chances are very slim.

But I was lucky…

Prior to starting that list building project, I joined a private forum. I was an active member in that community for a few months. And fortunately, that community is very active, very cozy and very helpful…

I could bounce off ideas, seek advice, seek help in that forum. And I returned the favor by offering the same things and contribute to that forum.

After a while, I became known in that forum. I even made some really good friends in there, that lasted to this day.

Those friends became my first JV partners. And I don’t have to “approach” or “beg” people to help me promote my website.

That is a nice thing, isn’t it?

So my little website took off…

It’s the first time my mailing list grew to over 1000 subscribers. And it’s all thank to my JV partners. But I was fortunate that I have made some online friends a months before that…

So, if you want to do it that way, make sure you have some online friends that you can really rely on. Approaching somebody new is not very pleasant. That’s why I suck at MLM…

So that’s the story of DIYMiniSite.com.

And the community that I joined was TurningIdeasIntoDollars.com, which is no longer online. But let me recommend two other private forum that you can join.

These forums has similar amount of energy in the members, and are also cozy, helpful and very active.

Do check out:

• The Internet Marketing Inner Circle by Willie Crawford
  http://urlmoo.com/join/timic/

• Self Starters Weekly Tips by Lynn Terry (check out the Elite Member upgrade option)
  http://urlmoo.com/join/sswt-elite/

Yeah, I was a member of a PRIVATE forum. And it really is different from joining a public forum. What I like that most is not just the quality of members in there that can potentially be your JV partners… it’s also the fact that in most cases it’s safe to bounce your ideas with other members that you normally do at public forums.

Well, whether you do this the JV-way or now, I think joining a private forum like those two above are worth it.

But I also want you to know that there is a better way to build a mailing list where you don’t need to spend months making friends and seeking JV partners…

AN EVEN EASIER LIST BUILDING METHOD… NO JV REQUIRED!

This is the method that I use mostly now. Partly it’s because I am lazy. While I enjoy making friends, I don’t really enjoy ’s##king-up’ to people and ask them to promote my product…

I don’t even enjoy asking for it…

Plus it takes too much time and effort…

What if you can create a product and then be on your way to building your list? And not just that, you will be building a mailing list big and fast.

No JV…
No time wasted…

Did I tell you about this before?

I call it the MRR List Building.

Nope, I don’t want you go out and buy master resale rights products or ebooks out there.

I want you to create your own. And sell it!

But of course, you need to create something really good. It has to be a product that is both

• something that others would want to sell
• something that people would really buy

When you have something like that, it’s a good product to use for MRR List Building.

OK, let me just tell you the overall plan…

The plan is to get other people to sell your product as MRR. And when they sell the MRR, others will too. And then their customers will sell it too… before you know, it’s gonna go viral and reaching more people than you can do alone.

HOW DO YOU GET PEOPLE TO SUBSCRIBE TO YOU WITH THIS?

Here’s how – you put in a secret bonus in that MRR product of yours. It could be in the first few pages of your product or maybe in the manual. You can even create a PDF file that is named BONUS.pdf or something like that.

And in there, you tell them about a bonus product that they can get. The catch is, this time they need to subscribe to you. You would put a link in there that goes to a squeeze page. And that squeeze page puts subscribers into your mailing list.

And that’s it.

How simple was that?!

OK, how to get started with the initial traffic? That is easy, actually. Just sell them at forums or at marketplaces.

Sell them at WSO at the WarriorsForum.com, or at the Digital Point. And if you have a few close “buddies” just give it to them to get the “ball rolling”, get what I mean??

I did a MRR List Building project recently and it’s still bringing in new subscribers everyday to this day. And I didn’t do anything for weeks. Didn’t even touched it ever since I launched it…

How cool is that??

WHAT HAVE WE LEARN HERE…??

Hmm… it’s a long email this one. OK, let’s do a bit of a round up here… what have we learn today.

1. Doing giveaway events and giving away MRR that you bought? Don’t do that…
2. You need to use leverage to build your business

   You see, when I was building my first list, I wasn’t using any leverage. So the process was slow and painful. The result… you know what happened.

3. You need to create a buzz-worthy offer

   Create something that people would want and would talk about. Here are some examples:

   • show people how get something that normally costs
     money for free

   • show people how to do something that normally takes
     ages for a shorter time period

   • show people how to do something that is normally hard
     to do easy
4. Seeking people to promote your product for you, you need to give them a reason why. The most easiest answer is money. When you sell your product, you can offer commissions. And when you sell MRR, you create an opportunity for them to earn some money.

   OK, when I do approach people to promote my product, or when I put it in my autoresponder to get them to promote my product, money is not all I talk about. Just to get them thinking, I also talk about how good my product converts and how their readers are going to love being informed about a good product.

   But the point is this – when you don’t give them any reason to do something, they won’t do it. People need the motivation on why they need to do something. You need to give it to them…

   When they don’t see any benefits to it, don’t count on getting paid…

Well, I guess this is long enough for a blog post. I am glad that you get this far.

This is what we’ll be doing today.

As for the credit card icons, it’s from Liam McKay of WeFunction.com. You can download your own at http://wefunction.com/2008/07/function-free-icon-set/

I did this in just 10 minutes. The video below was uploaded in HD quality. Do enlarge to full screen for better view.

Click Here To Download PSD Source

[ DOWNLOAD SIMPLE IPN ]

I was running a class for my Netpreneurs Online Classroom and we got to the part where we are suppose to learn how to deliver our downloadble digital products.

I don’t want to make this complicated for my students. I want to make this simple, but at the same time offers some form security from online thefts. So I started thinking of a simple script that should be able to do the following:

• Expiring download link
• Expiring download page
• Minimum setup
• No database required
• Uses Paypal IPN
• Emails the customers with their download info
• Customizable download page, thank you page and email
• Multiple files product package
• Allows Paypal Sandbox testing
• No need to create the Paypal Button form – will generate for you
• Don’t have to understand Paypal IPN – just know that it’s more secure
• Strict verification process – verifying price, Paypal email address and currency

HOW TO USE / INSTALLATION

1. Update settings.php with your products info and Paypal details.
2. Upload the files your chosen directory
3. From your sales page, link your order button to:

   ipn.php?buy

   DONE!

4. Optionally, modify the template files to change the look and feel of the download page and thank you page.
5. Optionally, send me $10 to remove the little ads credit on the download page and thank you page. Details below.

FILES

• ipn.php – handles IPN and buy button creation
• settings.php – your product & Paypal settings
• dl.php – handles file download
• page.php – handles download and thank you page
• tpl_tqpage.html – thank you page template
• tpl_dlpage.html – download page template
• functions.php – functions required
• style.css – optional stylesheet
• sample.pdf – sample download file
• sample.mp3 – sample download file
• XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.php – generate customer info file

CHANGING SETTINGS.PHP

Most of the variables in settings.php are self-explanatory.

CUSTOMIZATION

You can customize the look and feel of the script. To change the download page, edit tpl_dlpage.html.

The following variables are available for the DOWNLOAD PAGE:

• {PAYPAL TXN ID} – transaction ID
• {CUSTOMER NAME} – customer name
• {CUSTOMER BUSINESS NAME} – business name, if any
• {CUSTOMER PAYPAL EMAIL} – customer’s Paypal email
• {PAYPAL PURCHASE DATE} – purchase date
• {EXPIRE DATE} – expired date (in unix timestamp)
• {DOWNLOAD PAGE URL} – download page URL
• {DOWNLOAD TIME LEFT} – time left in hours
• {DOWNLOAD TIME} – time set in hours
• {PRODUCT PRICE} – price paid
• {PRODUCT NAME} – product name
• {SUPPORT EMAIL ADDRESS} – your support email address
• {DOWNLOADS1} – lists downloadable files style 1
• {DOWNLOADS2} – lists downloadable files style 2
• {DOWNLOADS1|expire message} – optional expire message
• {DOWNLOADS2|expire message} – optional expire message

The thank you page is the page the customer will arrive at when the click on Return To Merchant at Paypal.com. You can setup a squeeze page there, using the following variables in redirect URL or custom fields.

To edit the THANK YOU page, edit tpl_tqpage.html. The following variables are available for you in the thank you page template:

• {PAYPAL TXN ID} – transaction ID
• {CUSTOMER NAME} – customer name
• {CUSTOMER BUSINESS NAME} – business name, if any
• {CUSTOMER PAYPAL EMAIL} – customer’s Paypal email
• {PAYPAL PURCHASE DATE} – purchase date
• {PRODUCT PRICE} – price paid
• {PRODUCT NAME} – product name
• {SUPPORT EMAIL ADDRESS} – your support email address
• {DOWNLOAD PAGE URL} – download page URL

An email will be sent out to customers after the purchase. You can customize this email from settings.php.

DOWNLOAD LIST STYLE

To list out downloadable files, you can use the following template variables.

• {DOWNLOADS1} – lists downloadable files style 1
• {DOWNLOADS2} – lists downloadable files style 2
• {DOWNLOADS1|expire message} – optional expire message
• {DOWNLOADS2|expire message} – optional expire message

{DOWNLOADS1} will output the files in this manner:

{DOWNLOADS2} will output the files in this manner

When the download link has expired, the expired message will be put out in a <p> tag, with ID "expired". Here’s an example:

You can use the ID’s “dlist” and “expired” to style your download page with CSS.

MULTIPLE PRODUCTS

While Simple IPN can work with multiple files in your product package, Simple IPN is not designed to cater for multiple products.

To use Simple IPN on your other products, copy the files of Simple IPN into a new folder and define your settings in the settings.php file.

Just like how you previously link to ipn.php?buy, do the same for this new product. Make sure you link to the right file from the right folder.

CREDITS

This script is given to you free of charge. I do however request that you leave the small ad credit on the Download Page and the Thank You Page intact.

SUPPORT

I don’t plan to spend a lot of time on support for this little script, unless you are paid user. And that also does not include customization, add-ons, feature requests, etc.

If you need help with Simple IPN, my advice to you is to first go through this page again. And from time to time, I may add updates to this page. Secondly, you may want to read the comments below.

You can also write your own comments there.

And lasty, if you don’t mind, show me where you are using this script.

UPDATE

18 September 2009 – Found that most of the problems users are facing when Transaction File is not created, is because they are using PHP4 while SimpleIPN was coded for PHP5. I changed the codes to be working with PHP4 instead now. You can download the new compilation and give a try.

Another problem with emails not being sent, it could be because the web hosting has some rules about sending email where the From email is not hosted by the server. To be safe, only use email address that is managed by the server for $support_email_address.

8 March 2010 – I found that the Thank You Page would now work if you have Auto Return turned on in your Paypal Profile. You need to turn it off, or have it disabled. Read more about Auto Return

[ DOWNLOAD SIMPLE IPN ]