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Internet Success Story Interview: Mark Joyner
by: Marty Foley
Marty Foley of ProfitInfo.com and AffiliateProfitInfo.com interviews Mark Joyner, one of the true pioneers of online marketing. Among other things, Mark was instrumental in sparking the e-book marketing craze, wrote an e-book which has been downloaded millions of times, and is responsible for one of the greatest success stories in Net history: the building of SearchHound.com on an ad budget of $0 - and selling it for millions. [Marty]: Mark, can you give us a little background on your online business operations? [Mark]: Well, I started on the Net back when I was a very young man and the Internet was then called the "Arpanet." My uncle had an Arpanet teletype machine in his house and from that point on I was hooked. In 1994, when e-commerce was just starting to happen on the Net, I opened my first business and acted as a software reseller. Now I own my own Internet software company - Aesop dot com. Our latest project is called ROIbot. With this, we started out by asking "what does everyone doing business online really need to be successful?" and we built tools that answered that question. [Marty]: What are some keys to Internet success that you've discovered? [Mark]: Two things: Testing and persistence. There is so much advice out there... Some of it's very good, some of it's horrible. To make matters worse - some of it may be good advice for someone else, but bad advice for you. So what do you do? You can test! When you test, you know exactly what's working. And when you know what's working, you can duplicate that success again and again. Try some simple math. Imagine you have a website that is generating one sale of your product for every 300 visitors. You net $50 per sale. If you get 3,000 visitors per month, you're making $500 per month in net profit. Then you test out 5 new websites and find one that gets you one sale for every 50 visitors. For the same traffic level, 3,000 visitors per month, you are now earning $3,000 per month, rather than $500. Here is where persistence comes in. You have to be willing to try out different things and accept that most of what you try will fail. If you keep trying, sooner or later you'll hit on some winners. Many make the mistake of trying out one thing and then giving up when it doesn't work. You should just assume that your first round out of your gun is going to be a dud. Accept it and keep firing! One problem with the Net is this - what may be working one day could soon become obsolete! The only thing that stays consistent is testing. [Marty]: What specific types of online tools are you using successfully? [Mark]: I mentioned ROIbot above. One of the many tools that ROIbot gives you is a detailed tracking system that will allow you to track and measure the results of your marketing - without question. I don't do any marketing at all without using our ROIbot tracking tools. I honestly can't sell a product that I don't use personally. With ROIbot it's not a problem, as it's simply an essential part of good marketing. You're invited to check out the powerful Internet marketing benefits that the collection of ROIbot tools offers by visiting http://www.roibot.com/r.cgi?IM10766_mji-1 [Marty]: That's great advice, Mark. I'm always glad to run across other marketers who appreciate the power of testing. I'm also a ROIbot Pro user and know how helpful those tools can be. As an Internet marketer myself, I've become very serious about testing, and have created a different type of testing tool; one that allows split run testing on web sites. It can be used in tandem with ROIbot, and is described at: http://ProfitInfo.com/catalog/v4.htm What major mistakes do you see Internet entrepreneurs make? [Mark]: Wow - there are so many. The biggest one is: "making your site for you rather than for your customer." So many people build sites that are shrines to themselves. Who cares, right? People in general don't care about you - they care about themselves. You've got about 2 seconds to get your visitor's interest - or he will turn around and leave! [Marty]: Do you have any other advice to those wanting to build successful online businesses? [Mark]: You bet - you're probably going to hear from everyone that you're crazy. Don't listen to this! I can't begin to tell you all of the "authoritative" statements I've heard from nay-sayers: "Your business model will never work." "It's too late to start a new business on the Internet." (I heard this early this year when I started ROIbot.) "It costs millions of dollars to do business online" (A lie perpetuated by those charging millions to set up online businesses! Doing business on the Net is cheap if you do it right!) If I had listened to any of these statements I wouldn't have nearly as much money as I do now. And those that have said such things to me are making just what they've always made. Bottom line. [Marty]: Thanks for taking the time for this interview, Mark. Related Help... Mark Joyner is the author of 1001 Killer Internet Marketing Tactics (http://www.roibot.com/kt.cgi?IM10766_mji) and creator of the ROIbot suite of Internet power tools (http://www.roibot.com/r.cgi?IM10766_mji). Also check out the resources Marty Foley offers for Internet success at: (http://ProfitInfo.com/) and (http://AffiliateProfitInfo.com/) ABOUT THE AUTHOR Marty Foley can help you rapidly grow your opt-in email subscriber list NOW with the Opt-In List Builder Service at: http://ProfitInfo.com/catalog/list-builder.htm Check out other proven resources and strategies he offers for building your low-risk, high-profit Internet biz, at: http://ProfitInfo.com and the proven, winning affiliate programs he reveals, at: http://AffiliateProfitInfo.com/programs/best.htm

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