How To Get To The Top Of The Marketing Food Chain

By Priya F Shah
Posted Friday, August 20, 2004

Are you tired of living off handouts from big-name marketers, earning meager affiliate commissions?

If you truly want to live and breathe the rarefied air of the super-marketers, what you need is not a change in method, but a change in attitude and mindset.

You need to start thinking like a top gun and create your own identity instead of feeding off the efforts of others. Here are some ways of achieving that goal.

1. Be Unique. Write Your Own Content

Create, don't copy. You are never going to become a top marketer or ezine publisher if you keep publishing regurgitated information from other top guns. The only people who benefit from that exercise are the top guns themselves.

Start writing about your own unique experience as a marketer and share it with others. Write your own unique website content, reports, eBooks if you want to become a "household" name in the marketing community.

2. Be The Content Creator, Not The Distributor

Instead of publishing other people's newsfeeds on your website, think about how cool it would be to have YOUR own feed published on thousands of other sites. And then DO it. Create a feed using your own content like I did here and allow others to syndicate your articles.

(http://ebizwhiz-publishing.com/ebizwhiz.xml)

3. Be The Product Seller, Not The Affiliate

The ones who make the most money out of a product are the product creators. The affiliates and resellers are always lower in the food chain because they do the selling for them.

No doubt affiliate marketing can make you a lot of money, but if you want to be at the top of the food chain and make the kind of riches that the top guns make, you do need your OWN product.

It not only allows you to pay others to promote for you, but also builds your credibility in eyes of the marketing community.

4. Get Linked To Without Linking Back

The marketing top guns have thousands of people linking to them... and they never have to provide a link back to them. How do you get people to link to you? Simple. Just use the steps I outlined earlier to -

* Write content so good that others will WANT to link to it.

* Create a product and start an affiliate program that pays others for linking to you.

* Write unique articles and distribute them with your link in your resource box.

Do these and you'll get thousands of people linking back to you without even thinking to ask for a link back.

5. Get Referrals WITHOUT Asking For Then

Now again, why would people refer your services, when you could very well be a competitor? Simply because they stand to lose far more by NOT referring you. And how would you make that happen? Let me give you an example.

A while ago, super-marketer John Reese published his "MarketingSecrets.com Newsletter" - a 17-page thumper of an issue full of excellent marketing information. I bet it also became the most well-circulated newsletter in recent internet marketing history.

Why? Because it was so good, that other publishers practically BEGGED him to allow them to pass it on to their subscribers. They felt they would be passing on a valuable resource their subscribers would thank them for.

So how do you do this if you are not John Reese? Well there are lots of ways you can create a resource that people would line up to offer to others. Some ideas -

* Create and install a useful script on your website and allow others to link to it

* Allow others to install your script on their site with a link pointing back to you

* Write useful reports or ebooks and allow others to give them away

* Create brandable reports and viral ebooks that others can tag with their affiliate link

Allow others to benefit from giving away your information and they will gladly refer you and your products to their precious lists.

6. Become An Expert In Your Field

Decide on an area of marketing that interests you. Read everything about your area of expertise that you can lay your hands on. Then write your own reports, preferably with your own unique insights and observations. Publish an ezine, and review products and services that target your audience.

Don't be afraid to show off your knowledge. Your specialized knowledge is what will brand you as an *expert* and make people sit up and take notice when you speak or write about it.

7. Be A Leader, Not A Follower

Be proactive and interactive. Take part in marketing seminars. Initiate discussions on controversial issues in your field. Start a forum and build a community of people in your field.

Infuse your own attitude and enthusiasm into the subject of discussion. Leave your imprint on the minds of the people you touch everyday. Be a source of inspiration to others in your field.

8. Be An Early Adopter And An Innovator

Be the first one to adopt new technologies and apply them to your field. Keep abreast of present and future developments. Keep innovating to stay ahead.

The ones who apply new technology the earliest become the pioneers. Follow the road less travelled and everyone else will soon be following in YOUR footsteps.

About the Author
Priya Shah is the author of "Number One In Your Niche" (http://www.NumberOneInYourNiche.com) and edits the newsletters Be a Whiz at eBiz! (http://ebizwhiz-publishing.com) and The Glutathione Report (http://www.glutathione-report.com)