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his might be the most important word in the copywriter’s arsenal, ranking higher than even “free,” “new” and “savings.” Do you have any guesses as to what this word is? …

We’re talking about the word “you.”

Using the word “you” gets your prospect’s attention and keeps them reading. It’s vital that your reader regards herself as the target of your message, and there is perhaps no better way to begin that process than to use the word “you.”

Your goal is to build a relationship with your prospect, as in, “We.” But paradoxically, the best way to build the relationship is to talk about “You” a whole lot more than you refer to “we.”

Think of a conversation with someone new. If you allow them to do the talking while you listen attentively, they’re going to think you’re the greatest conversationalist in the world.

But if you talk about yourself, they’re not going to think nearly as well of you.

And this goes for anyone. Imagine meeting a world leader you respect, and they show interest in YOU. How great would that be?

But if they ramble on about themselves (as you would expect they might) you’ll be happy to have met them because it makes for a great story, but you won’t be walking away with the warm fuzzies. And that’s somebody well known and regarded.

When we come to our prospects, they often don’t know us from Adam, or they only know us from some emails and blog posts. Certainly, we’ve never sat down over a cup of tea and gotten to know each other.

That’s why, if your goal is to put prospects first, it’s best to have the “you’s” far exceed the “we’s.”

It’s the “you’s” that matter to prospects. They’re your workhorse for communicating your message and include all derivatives such as “your,” “yours,” “yourself,” “you’re,” and “you’ll.”

I wonder if I can use all 6 of these in a sentence or two…

“You will love seeing how happy your family is when you get this product for yourself. You’re simply going to be overjoyed at knowing from now on, the world is yours and you’ll be able to do anything you want.”

Okay, maybe it is possible to overdo the “you’s” and all the derivatives, but not by much. When you’ve written your copy, go back and see how many you’s there are.

Then add some more, changing “we” and “I” to “you” whenever possible.

Then read the copy out loud, and unless the amount of “you’s” seems crazy, you’ve probably got it about right.

People care more about themselves than anything. This isn’t to put people down – not at all. It’s simply the way we’re wired for survival, and you can use that knowledge to get your prospect to pay attention to your message.

What else makes “you” so powerful? For one thing, it addresses your readers directly. In effect, it says “Hey you,” which is much harder to ignore than “Hey somebody.”

Say “Hey you” in a crowded room and a lot of heads will turn. Say “Hey somebody” and a few heads might turn.

Think about conversations you’ve had. When you say the word, “you,” doesn’t the other person pay closer attention? “What do YOU think?” “Are YOU going to that event?” “I hope you’ll enjoy this restaurant – what do you think of the decor?”

When people say these things to you, they get your attention and involvement. After all, they’re interested in your opinion. They’re interested in the things you do. They have something to tell you that will make you happy.

That’s the goal of you-oriented copy. Address your audience directly, personally and in terms of their interests. Be conversational and “you” will pop up in the copy naturally.

Newsweek used the exact same subscription solicitation letter for nearly two decades. This is the letter they sent out to cold prospects, asking them to subscribe.

If they used the same letter for nearly 20 years, then clearly it was effective – so effective that no control could beat it. Why did it work so well? Perhaps it’s because the word “you” was used nearly 30 times on the first page alone.

More than 100 million copies of the letter were mailed, a testament to its effectiveness.

When you write your sales copy, don’t forget things like benefits and having a great offer. All the “you’s” in the world won’t overcome a lack of a great offer and awesome benefits.

But if you have something to offer your reader that is truly beneficial, focusing your message on your prospect and using the word “you” can mean the difference between mediocre sales and a control sales letter that continues to make sales for a very long time to come.

Have you ever met someone who was an idea machine?

You give them a problem to solve, and in just a few minutes they’ve come up with half a dozen creative ideas.

In fact, you can ask them anything, and they’ll give you enough ideas to keep yourself busy for weeks.

But… wouldn’t you like to be that idea machine?

Just one idea – the right idea – can be worth millions. The problem is, in order to have that million dollar idea, you first need to have hundreds or thousands of ideas that aren’t as good.

Case in point: Imagine you never work out, and then one day you’ve got to lift a heavy object off of your own chest or you’ll die.

If you’re weak as water and can’t lift that thing, then you’re a goner.

But if you’ve been exercising your muscles, then you can throw that object across the room and go about your life.

Your brain works much the same way as a muscle.

If you use it daily, it’s sharp and ready to tackle whatever comes its way.

But if you just park your brain in front of the television all day long, it’s going to be weak as water, too.

And when you need it most, it’s going to fail you.

James Altucher says that when the gun is to your head, you either figure it out or you die.

Think of the times in your life when you hit bottom and you were forced to come up with ideas.

The worse the situation you’re in, the more motivation you have to come up with some great ideas.

But if you haven’t been using your brain much, then it’s going to be difficult.

That’s why it’s important to exercise your brain right now, because ideas are the currency of life.

When you become an idea generating machine, you’ll be able to solve any problem (almost).

No matter what situation you’re in, you’ll have a ton of ideas. If you need to make money, you’ll come up with 50 different ideas, and so on.

Here’s a process the aforementioned Altucher recommends for turning yourself into an idea machine:

Get a waiter’s pad, or any pad that fits in your pocket.

Sit quietly – maybe in a café somewhere – and read an inspirational book for ten to twenty minutes.

Then start writing down ideas. Any ideas. All ideas.

You’ve got to write 10 ideas.

Yes, ten.

Pick a subject and come up with ten ideas. Maybe it’s 10 ideas for a book you want to write.

10 ideas on how to get a better job or get a raise.

10 business ideas.

10 ideas on how to meet women (or men.)

The first 5 will be easy. 6 is a little harder. 7 through 10 might feel like they’re going to break your brain.

But… what if you can’t come up with 10 ideas?

Then come up with 20.

If you can’t find 10 ideas, then you’re putting too much pressure on yourself to come up with PERFECT ideas.

Forget perfect.

Forget trying to top the ideas you already wrote down.

Focus on coming up with BAD ideas, and your brain will relax.

You’ll have fun.

Creativity will flow, and you’ll be surprised at what you think of.

Do this exercise every day.

EVERY day.v
At the end of one year, you’ll have 3,650 ideas.

Hopefully you’ve acted on a few of them.

The point is to exercise your brain so that no matter what happens in life, you can find the solution.

But how do you act on an idea?

By taking the first step.

Here’s Altucher’s favorite example of acting on an idea:

“Richard Branson didn’t like the service on some airline he was flying. So he had an idea: I’m going to start a new airline. How the heck can a magazine publisher start an airline from scratch with no money?

“His first step. He called Boeing to see if they had an airplane he could lease.

“No idea is so big you can’t take the first step. If the first step seems to hard, make it simpler. And don’t worry again if the idea is bad. This is all practice.”

The ten ideas exercise is my favorite brain exercise, but I encourage you to do other brain exercises as well.

Choose exercises that help with memory, increase creativity, or somehow enhance your cognitive skills.

Pick what works best for you, because it helps if you like what you’re doing.

If you dread something it will never be a daily habit, and the whole idea is to be consistent in striving to reach your goals.

You have the potential to achieve great things, and to do something extraordinary, whether it’s in your online business or something else.

And achieving the extraordinary is more possible than ever before, thanks to the technologies and knowledge we have today.

However, it’s also easier than ever before to get distracted, too.

So, how do you stay focused? And how do you ensure that you are making progress every single day?

By taking a lesson from other successful people who have reached their goals.

There is a common fallacy in our culture known as the ‘overnight success.’

Someone achieves something great, and because this person was previously an unknown, people say s/he achieved this success seemingly overnight, out of thin air.

But as you might expect, it actually takes years to become an overnight success.

If you ask any entrepreneur or actor who made it big, you’ll find they worked hard for years before achieving their goals.

Think about this: You’re an actor, going up for a major role. If you get it, this will be your big break.

But you’re up against another actor for that same role.

This actor has been taking acting classes for 10 years, taking part in local theater, auditioning for every part possible, and taking every job she’s offered.

You’ve been ‘acting’ for 10 years, too, but in that time you really haven’t done much.

You didn’t take any acting lessons.

You didn’t participate in local theater.

You didn’t audition for a part unless you ‘felt like it.’

Needless to say, it’s the other actor who gets the part and becomes an ‘overnight success,’ all because she’s been working hard for a decade to get ready for this exact moment.

I’m going to share something with you right now that is life-changing.

However, since you’ve probably heard this before, you’re also likely going to dismiss this.

That would be a grave mistake.

What I’m about to impart will make the difference in a life of mediocrity and stellar success, and it’s this:

Every single day, without fail, determine the ONE thing you need to accomplish to move forward on your goal, and DO IT.

If you can only get one thing done, what would it be?

Ask yourself this question every night before going to bed, and again the next morning.

If you get just ONE thing done, what should it be?

The key here is to focus on importance, not busy work.

Contacting ten possible new clients is a step forward. Clearing your desk is not. Yes, it might be important to have a tidy desk, but how does that advance your goals?

There is the story of the professor who holds up a glass beaker in front of the class. The professor fills the beaker with large rocks all the way to the top, and then he asks the class if the beaker is full.

“Yes!” the students reply.

Then the professor pours small pebbles into the beaker that fit all around the large rocks. Again, he asks the class if the beaker is full.

“Yes!” comes the reply.

Finally, the professor pours sand into the beaker, which fills in the gaps around the pebbles.

Now the beaker is full.

But what if the professor had put the sand in first, or the pebbles in first? Then the professor could not have fit the big rocks into the beaker.

The things you need to do to advance your goals are your big rocks. You’ve got to do these things first, or they will never get done. If you focus your efforts all day long on sand and pebbles, you will always be busy, but you won’t accomplish anything.

Choose one thing per day, the one BIG thing you can do to advance your goals, and do that thing first, no matter what.

A marketers we write headlines all the time, whether it’s for a blog post, an article, an email, a sales letter or an ad. As you know, the better your headline, the more people will read your words and possibly take the action you seek.

Here are 15 ideas for headlines. Next time you’re stuck for what to write, simply refer back to this page. In fact, you might want to print it out and tack it up next to your desk.

15 Profitable Headline Ideas:

Give news using words such as “new,” “introduction” or “announcing.” “Introducing A Painless Way To Remove Skin Lesions Forever.”

Use numbers and statistics. “Unprecedented 88 Miles To The Gallon.”

Make a recommendation. “The 3 Niches You Must Be In NOW.”

Ask a question. “What Do Successful Marketers Have That You Lack?”

Tie in to current events. “How This Year’s Election Provides You With A Unique Investment Opportunity.”

Give the reader a command, telling him or her to do something. “Try This Weight Loss Snack And See If It Doesn’t Taste Exactly Like A Decadent Candy Bar.”

Use words that paint a picture. “How To Be As Muscular As Arnold Schwarzenegger In His Prime.”

Tell a story. “The Bully Laughed When I Fell To The Ground, But He Wasn’t Expecting What Happened Next…”

Create new terminology. “New Wixor Method Instantly Doubles The Conversion Rate On Your Website.”

Caution them. “How To Avoid The Costliest Mistake You Can Make In Building Your Online Business.”

State a startling benefit. “Get Your Own Virtual Assistant For Just $5 An Hour.”

Tell them your amazing offer. “Everything You Need To Make Your Own Beer For Just $29.”

Make a comparison. “Get Twice As Many Widgets For Half The Price Of Our Competition.”

Use a testimonial. “Before Taking This Course I Was Broke… Now I’m Debt Free And Financially Secure.”

Make a seemingly contradictory promise. “Eat As Much As You Want And Still Lose Weight.”

Ernest Hemingway began his writing career as a reporter for the Kansas City Star.

When he won a Nobel Prize years later, he credited his success at writing to what he learned from his cub reporter’s style book, namely:

1. Use short sentences – Easier to read, easier to understand, easier to capture the interest of people with short attention spans.

2. Use short first paragraphs – Today it would be advisable to make most if not all of your paragraphs short.

3. Use vigorous English – Use active, energetic, bold words rather than a meek, passive voice. For example, “We’re breathlessly racing to the finish line” rather than “We’re on our way to the finish line.”

4. Keep it positive – Yes, you really do catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

Hemingway also had his own tips for great writing, many of which easily translate to creating content for the Internet:

1. Write in the morning. 3 things happen when you write every morning. First, you’re writing when you’re fresh and likely to do the best work. Second, you’re getting your writing out of the way so that you can do other things the rest of the day. And third, you are creating a habit that will see you through to creating tons of great content.

2. Write while standing. When we’re seated at our computer our blood tends to drain from the brain. Activity, be it standing, pacing, knee bends, jumping jacks, etc. stimulates blood flow and brings much needed oxygen to the brain cells. Want to be more creative? Get more ideas? Feel more energetic? Then try standing when you write.

3. Love writing. You can’t force yourself to do something day after day that you dislike. But if you can fall in love with writing, you’ll find you wake up eager to rush to your computer and see what you compose next.

4. Keep track of your progress. Hemingway kept a board on his wall on which he kept a daily tally of how many words he wrote. You might keep a tally of how many blog posts, how many articles, how many pages of your new ebook, etc.. By keeping this tally in plain sight, you cannot fool yourself as to whether or not you’re doing the work.

5. Be in love. Maybe you can’t always control it or will it into being, but if you can fall in love with another person, or a passion, or simply with life itself, then you’ll find you have far more to say and you’re much more passionate about saying it. It’s as if the muses smile down on you and the well of creativity overflows – even if you’re writing something as simple as a blog post or article.

As Hemingway himself said, “It was necessary to get exercise, to be tired in the body, and it was very good to make love with whom you loved. That was better than anything.”

You work hard to get traffic to your blog or website, and you provide great content they can use. Yet you’re not getting as many of your visitors to join your mailing list as you would like, right? Be sure you’re not making any of these common conversion mistakes.

1. Not placing your opt-in form on every page. Don’t hide your opt-in form, place it on every single page of your blog or website.

2. Not placing your opt-in form above the fold. The optimal location for your opt-in form is nearly always above the fold, on the right side of the page. In addition, you might also place it at the bottom of each of your articles or blog posts.

3. Not having a strong call to action. Tell them exactly what you want them to do. “Fill in your email address and click submit.” Leave nothing to guess-work or chance.

4. Not giving them a strong incentive. Make your incentive so enticing, many of your readers would consider paying for it if you weren’t giving it away in exchange for their email address.

5. Not making your form and offer big enough. Make your opt-in form and offer big enough and bold enough that it cannot be missed, even by a casual surfer. Use colors that contrast well with the rest of your website, but don’t use anything annoying or flashing – that can actually reduce conversions.

6. Not using a testimonial or endorsement in your opt-in offer. A one line quote from an industry expert about how much they enjoy either your opt-in incentive or your newsletter can lend a tremendous amount of credibility to you and your offer.

7. Not testing. Test your offer, test the colors, test the language/copy that you use, test everything. Nothing is as important as building your loyal list of followers, and testing is the best way to be sure you’re not losing new subscribers every day by presenting the right offer in the right way.

In testing, changing some of these common mistakes has increased subscriber opt in rates by 35% or more. Put them to the test on your site and see what they do for you!

No matter what you’re earning now, you can earn more. A lot more. Six figures is very reachable and seven figures are possible; you just have to take the right actions to get there. In today’s article, I’ll share 10 ways you can start earning more with your business.

1. Get serious about making money. A lot of people have the thought that “things will fall into place” and “then I’ll be earning a lot of money.” Sorry. Things do not fall into place on their own. You’ve got to have a plan for earning money, and then you’ve got to get very busy working that plan. The only exception is winning the lottery, and you have far better odds of dying broke than you do of winning even a six-figure prize in the lottery. Focusing on the money you want to earn and then working your plan for earning it is the surest way to make the money you want.

2. Have annual and daily money goals. You want to earn $100,000 in the next 12 months? Then you need to earn $2,000 this week, and if you work 5 days a week, you need to earn $400 today. And if you miss the mark today, you need to make up for it tomorrow. Too high of a goal? Then adjust it down and work your way up. Perhaps you begin with a goal of $50 a day for the next month, and $100 a day for the month after that. Your goals need to be both achievable and a stretch for you. By stretching and meeting those goals, you’ll quickly discover how easy it is to earn as much as you set your mind and your efforts to.

3. Value your time. If you’re earning $100,000 a year and you’re working 40 hours per week, then your time is worth a minimum of $50 per hour. So are you performing $50 an hour work? Or are you mowing the lawn or playing with Facebook when you should be working? Just as you will never get this moment to live again, you will also never get a second chance to use all of your moments wisely. Before you switch on Netflix the next time, or play an online game, ask youself, “Is this the highest use of my time? Does this justify $50 an hour?” If the answer is no, then you should be doing something else.

4. Get more done in less time. Find your most productive times and refuse to do anything during those times other than work. For example, if your best work time is 6 am until noon, then lock your door, shut off the phone, block your email and do nothing but work.

Develop habits that get more done in less time. For example, lumping similar activities together can be a tremendous time saver.

And eliminate any time wasters that are robbing you of your work time. For example, don’t meet a client in person if a phone call will work as well.

5. Outsource. Anything that can be outsourced should be outsourced, whether it’s building websites, posting in forums, writing copy, sending tweets, whatever. The more you can work ON your business instead of IN your business, the more you will be able to earn. “It’s better to harness 1% of 100 people’s talents and energies than 100% of your own.” But when you outsource, you can harness both and much more.

6. Avoid the paralysis of analysis. Two of the things that stop online marketers is being pulled in too many directions at once, or no direction at all. If you’ve got 15 different ideas on what to do next, odds are you’ll do nothing at all. And if you’re afraid to take the next step – whatever it might be – you’ll suffer the same fate. That’s why you need a plan – ONE plan – and then you need to work that plan. Forge ahead, step by step, and don’t worry about getting everything right because frankly, you won’t. And it doesn’t even matter that you won’t get everything just right. The best batters in baseball only get hits a third of the time. Odds are your averages will be better than that, but it just doesn’t matter so long as you know where the ball is and you keep swinging at it with all of your determination and might.

7. Charge more. A $7 info product can often just as easily sell for $17 or $27 – it’s just that the info product seller is afraid to charge more. Add in some videos and you can charge $47. Make it a complete course and you can get $97. Remember, you don’t need as many sales when you charge more to make more. Experiment with your pricing and you might be surprised.

8. Repurpose your content. If you’ve got a bunch of great blog posts, consider bundling them into an ebook. If you’ve got some awesome interviews with experts, get them transcribed and use segments as articles, or bundle them into a course. The more use you get out of the content you already have, the more you can earn.

9. Specialize. Dan Kennedy teaches that the more specialized you are, the more you will earn. A marketer teaching brick and mortar businesses how to market online will not earn as much as another marketer teaching dentists or chiropractors how to get new clients from online marketing, and so forth. If you doubt this, think of doctors. General practitioners don’t earn as much as specialists, and the higher the specialty, the more they earn.

10. Love your customers silly. Repeat business is the easiest business of all to get – you just have to treat your customers like royalty and cater to their needs. Provide excellent customer service and by all means ask them to upgrade or purchase your next product.

Are you stuck for ideas? Maybe you’re not sure what niche you want to go into next, or you’ve got the niche, but you don’t know what your next product should be. Here are 10 ideas to get you started…

1. Use Your Job Experience. Do you have a particular skill, expertise or career experience that people would pay to learn more about? Maybe you’ve managed and led corporate teams to accomplish extraordinary things. Or maybe you were the best chef in the city. Whatever your job experiences, there might be people out there who would gladly pay to benefit from it.

2. Teach Something. If there is a topic you want to know more about, there is no faster way to become an expert than to teach it. You’ll find you learn 10 times faster when you’re teaching others, and you can do the teaching right over the Internet via webinar, podcasts or even by email. Once you’ve finished teaching your course, turn your outline and content into an info product, and add the recordings to it for an easy $97 or $197 product.

3. Take Courses. If you’re looking for fresh ideas, take a course in your niche and use it as a jumping off point to create your own product.

4. Use Your Life Experience. Did you successfully get your children through the terrible 2’s or the dreaded teenage years? Do you have some great advice to offer other parents? Then you’ve got the makings of a product. Did you lose weight? Did you get in shape? Did you go from deep debt to deep pockets? Life experience can be used to create hot selling products, and because you’ve lived the information, it’s really easy to impart it to others.

5. Write About a Process. Perhaps you built an electrical business from the ground up, or you bought a business and turned it from a losing proposition into a money maker. Or maybe you perfected a process for turning iron into gold. Whatever the process, there is a good chance others are more than happy to learn from your mistakes and take advantage of the many shortcuts you can show them.

6. Write About Your Hobby. If you’ve got a hobby you love, odds are there are others who love it as well. Do you collect baseball cards? Do you paint? Do you collect old books? Whatever it is, find a way to use your knowledge to help others with the same interest.

7. Compile Anecdotes or Stories. Choose a common theme, and then compile stories that follow that theme. Think “Chicken Soup for the Soul” and you’ll know what I mean. If you’re using other people’s stories, be sure to get permission. This can be a super fast way to create a product or a book; simply write the intro, choose a catchy title, and compile the stories.

8. Find a Need and Fill It. Ask your readers and customers what they want to know, and create a product that fills that need. For example, one lawyer kept hearing from his business clients that they wished they had an easy reference for business law basics so they wouldn’t have to call the lawyer with every question they had. He wrote the product and sold thousands of copies.

9. Narrow Your Niche. Maybe you’ve already got a topic for your next product, but there are too many competitors selling the same topic. Narrow the focus of your topic so that your angle is different from all the other products. For example, you want to write a book on growing roses, but there are hundreds of books out there already on that topic. Narrow your focus to growing roses on a patio (for apartment dwellers) or growing roses in harsh northern climates and you’ve probably got a winner.

10. Keep Your Eyes Open and Your Brain Active. Watch for things that spark your interest and ask lots of questions and you’ll find topics everywhere – you just need to learn to spot them. For example, when you’re having a conversation or listening to the radio, ask yourself “Where is the product in this?” You’ll be surprised by the variety of answers you get – often times they’re things you normally never would have thought of.

You spend an hour writing a great email and no one clicks the link. Or you create an ad of some sort (banner, Adwords, blurb for your website, etc.) and no one clicks. Now what?

Here are 13 ways to make your ads and your emails generate more click throughs…

1. Ask for the click. Tell the reader to “click here to continue” or “click here to get the details.”

2. Offer something for free on the other side. If they know they’re going to get useful information for free, rather than simply hitting a sales letter, they’re more likely to click. (You can, of course, include great info right inside your sales letter.)

3. Make it easy to visualize what they’ll see. When someone goes into a restaurant for the very first time, they may experience a bit of trepidation because they don’t know what to expect. But when they’ve been there before, they’re much more comfortable because they already know what they’ll see, what the place is like and so forth.

Ads and emails act as the doorways to your restaurant, or in this case the page you want your prospects to go to. The more you can help them visualize what’s on the other side of that door and look forward to experiencing it, the more likely they are to click your link.

4. Describe what’s on the other side of the click. ‘Blind clicks’ (those ads that don’t give you a clue what’s on the other side of the click) don’t do as well as ads and emails that make it quite clear what the reader can expect on the next page.

5. Display a picture of the benefit of clicking. Are you going to show them the secret to roses the size of dinner plates? Show them a photo of exactly that.

6. If you are offering a freebie on the other side (such as an eBook for joining your list) make sure the freebie has a great title that both entices and implies real value. “Free Dating eBook” won’t cut it – “22 Surprisingly Easy Ways to Get Dates with Gorgeous Women” will.

7. If appropriate and your email is in html, try placing a ‘coupon’ within the email. Or try placing a coupon border around the ad. These dashed lines attract attention and imply savings, thereby stimulating response.

8. Talk about the value and benefits of what’s on the other side of the click.

9. Put a benefit in your ad’s headline or email’s subject line. “How to solve your low conversion problem.”

10. Ask a provocative question, such as “Are you tired of fighting with your spouse?”

11. Ask an informational type of question. People want to know the answer to questions, so ask them something, such as “How do you put the love back into your marriage?”

12. Be direct. If you’ve got a great offer for them, don’t beat around the bush, just come straight out of the gate with it. “12 miniature roses for just $32, shipping included.”

13. Give them useful information. For example, your subject line might be, “7 Ways to Eradicate Mold.” Then inside your email you give them the first 6, with the seventh one being your link to your product. If it’s an ad, then the link goes to the list of 7, with the seventh one linking to your product.

For every big success story I hear about marketing on Facebook, I also hear several stories of, ‘Oh, I tried that, but it didn’t go anywhere so I gave up.” So does marketing on Facebook really work? Without a doubt it does – Facebook is the most visited website in the world, and getting seen can mean a big boost to your list building and your sales.

But the key is to have a game plan for how you’re going to build, brand and market yourself on Facebook. With that in mind, I’ve put together this list of tips to get you moving in the right direction.

1. Create a page. Sounds simple, right? It is – the problem is marketers get confused and they start a profile instead of a page. If you want to market your business on Facebook, a profile simply won’t cut it. Pages are meant for businesses and they are much more effective at getting your message out there.

2. Promote your fan page. First, place your fan page URL in your email signature. Now every time you send an email, it’s another chance for people to find your Facebook page.

Next, blog about your fan page. Don’t just ask your blog readers to like your page – instead, give them at least one compelling reason why they should (bribes work well, but it could be any reason, so long as it resonates with your readers.

Now, add a “Like” box to your blog or websites. Get the plugin code for the Facebook Like box. Place this code on your website’s or blog’s sidebar. You can get more details and the plugin code here: https://developers.facebook.com/docs/plugins/page-plugin/

3. Cross promote your page. By posting on other fan pages using your page’s user name, you get a visible link to your page with each comment.

4. Consider getting some Facebook ads. It’s easy, you can spend as little as you like, and you can target your campaigns to only those people who are likely to be interested in what you have to offer.

5. Promote your page on Twitter. First, place your fan page URL on your Twitter profile background. (Note: Only those using the web based version of Twitter will see your background, but this can still be plenty of eyeballs.)

Second, Tweet about your page. Ask your Twitter followers to like your fan page. Again, offering them a good reason why they should like it will increase your response rate.

6. Why should people become fans? We’ve touched on this, but it’s important: Give people a great reason to become your fan. Maybe it’s to get discounts or updates. Maybe it’s a free video, ebook, etc. Just make sure it’s something that motivates immediate and swift action.

7. Add your page URL to YouTube. Do you create videos to promote your business? Then by all means add your fanpage URL link to your videos, either at the end of the video or at the beginning of the video description.

8. Post frequently. If you forget about your fanpage, your fans will forget about you. Post once or twice a day with good info, updates and questions. Don’t make it all about you and your products. Instead, post about events, news, your industry and so forth. And whenever you can, inject a little humor into the mix.

9. Ask your fans to like your content so it gets shared on their walls. You can’t ask every time, but now and then is fine. When they like your post, more people will see it, which can lead to more fans – always a good thing.

10. Speaking of questions: Get your fans involved with your page by starting discussions about your products and services or industry news. What’s the best way to start a discussion? Simply ask a provocative question your fans cannot ignore. If you get stuck on what to ask, use the fill in the blank kind of question, such as, “If you could have any job in the world, it would be ____.”

11. Do not become a troll victim. Now that you’re starting discussions, remember to remain professional at ALL TIMES, with no exceptions. If you are perceived as quarreling with a fan, it won’t matter if you’re right – it will only matter that you lost your cool and you look like a real dope. And if things look like they may get nasty, offer the fan a private way to contact you (phone or email, for example.)

12. Forget the “I” and focus on the “we.” Much like writing a sales letter, making Facebook posts should be all about “we,” not I. For example, “We reached 500 likes today, thank you everyone!”

13. Remember to use plenty of photos and even videos. Written words are great, but videos are better and photos tend to get shared. So incorporate a variety of mediums into your Facebook communications.

14. Be thankful. This one takes a little time, but it’s well worth it. Thank each new person who likes your Facebook page. This will really make you stand apart from the crowd. After all, how many people have ever personally thanked them for a Like? You might very well be the first.

15. Relax. Facebook is not the place for a suit and tie kind of personality. Instead, be fun, be casual, be funny and make your fanpage an entertaining, inviting place to be.

16. Brand your page. That large image on your timeline needs to ROCK. It should effectively communicate the message you want to send to your fans, so spend some time getting it just right. (Size it as close to 850 x 315 pixels as possible for best viewing.)

17. Keep track. Use Facebook insights to discover when people are most engaged with your content. This way you know when to post to get the maximum effect. https://www.facebook.com/help/search/?q=insights

18. Encourage people to return. Facebook Offer Ads allow you to offer special incentives when people visit your page. Create new and compelling special offers regularly and let your followers know about it, and you’ll get many more repeat visitors. https://www.facebook.com/business/help/

19. Keep it short and sweet. Want to capture the most eyeballs? Keep your posts to 80 characters or less. Longer posts tend to be skimmed, and shorter ones tend to get read.

20. Pin your posts. I’m not talking about Pinterest here. Rather, Facebook allows you to “pin” a post to the top of your timeline. Use this to showcase something important, such as an upcoming event or a dynamite testimonial from a celeb in your niche.

Them more important tip of all: Get to work. None of this will help if you don’t get busy and use it to promote your business on Facebook!