Ask most bloggers what is the secret to blogging success and you will get many answers. Writing, posting, networking are several answers you will hear. Some even recognize that promotion is a huge factor to blogging success.

You will also hear specific tactics or strategies like commenting on other blogs, linking, deep linking, article writing, trackbacks, guest posting and many more…

Actually none of them are the secret to blogging success. And neither are any of the other answers people will come up with are the secret. OK so what is the secret? Well…

*There are no secrets!*

Yep, that’s right… nobody has any secrets squirreled away. Sure there is a period of time that a secret will remain hidden. But, eventually they all get out.

And there are a couple of reasons why.

1. There are too many blogs blogging about blogging – Hey, pretty much every method, process, tactic or strategy has been blogged about. Bloggers are so starved for original content that they will publish everything. Everybody wants to be the 1st blogger to blog about some newly discovered tip. All
the bases are covered.

2. Humans as a general rule… CAN’T keep secrets. The temptation is too great to spill the beans. Think about this; most people when they find out something new are busting at the seems to tell someone. They feel so smug that they’ve figured out a secret that it’s no fun keeping it to themselves. They have to tell someone.

3. A blogger starts to achieve great success, and people take notice. What happens next is people want to know what this particular blogger is doing. They will reverse engineer the blog to figure out the secret. It becomes a challenge to “crack the code”

*So, while some “secrets” appear to be kept*

They really aren’t kept. It’s just taking longer for that information to get spread around. Information spreads at different speeds. That’s one of the reasons why some information appears to be a secret. It’s spreading at a much slower rate.

*The real secret to blogging…*

It’s sitting right under your nose, and is come disguised as work. The key to building a blog is taking action. Stop looking around for that magic bullet. Get started today.

So, what do ya say… want to share one of your blogging secrets? Oh, wait… if you did that, then it wouldn’t be a secret anymore.

SC Marketing Education

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Copyright by Sam Carrara’s Marketing Education

• I forgot to pickup the mail
• My dog ate it (I don’t have a dog)
• My scanner isn’t working
• I can no longer upload pictures
• It’s a special day in April, being the 1st

Although I have not received this check yet… I plan to. I am taking action and working on multiple methods of traffic and improving my marketing to reach that point. That check and others will be mine by this time next year, without any April Fools jokes.

I’ll reveal a few of the methods I’ll use to accomplish this:

1. Articles- Many sites want new content and will take your articles to build up their website size. In the last paragraph of your article your have a resource box that talks a little about you and a link to get more information on the topic. The link will point to a lead generation page, an affiliate offer or one of many other methods in the arsenal.
2. Audios- Just take the article and speak the words into a microphone. Add a little editing and maybe some music and you have a podcast.
3. Video- Take the audio and add pictures and upload it to your favorite video site (YouTube, Myspace, Google, etc.).
4. Blogs- Place this information on blogs and tweak it slightly to not run into duplicate content (even though this is a myth or urban legend).
5. There’s more, stay tuned as I unleash those methods in more details.

I’m using the above procedures for building up traffic to one niche I’m working on right now. I’m also realizing that the first time I do this it takes a little longer to do, each subsequent time is quicker because I have templates and procedures in place. More for later…

Have you figured out what the new plugin is yet that I’m testing? Look at this and the previous two posts, it might help you comment below.

Happy April Fools Day,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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What is your motivation? If you feel like you haven’t accomplished much lately except check email, answer voicemail and watch the news; you’re not alone. As we continue to get flooded with communication and ads for our time we need to break thru the mess and determine what’s important.

You need the motivation to accomplish the important (and sometimes more difficult) tasks. Here are a few ways to find the motivation:

1. Lost Job or Company- If you don’t do this specific task within 24 hours you will lose your job or lose your company. Ouch, this can be serious if you like your job or company. If not, lets try one of the other ways.
2. Paycheck to Paycheck- Most people are one to two months away from bankruptcy or foreclosure if they have no income coming in. Savings is at an all time low. Here you have to look at if you don’t accomplish this task, you will be one of the people that will need to look for a new place to live.
3. Family Responsibility- For many people they have more responsibilities than just themselves. The difference being, if it was just me I can bounce back… …what do I do with my family until we get back on our feet? (Parents, friends, etc.) It may just be pride or shame, but I want to take care of my own before relying or burdening others.
4. Simple Freedom- If you must get that task done now, you’re in a fix. If you can get it done anytime, that’s much better. I’m not talking about being lazy. I mean that you can control when and where you work.
5. Goals- Not all the material fluff that will rust, mold or eventually appear dull, but real experiences. I want to spend real time with my family. Time for tickling, teaching, laughing, crying, just plain old time. Show they what it’s like to help others, life is more than just you.

The list above don’t always happen by themselves, they can fall like dominoes all at once. This is just a partial list. What’s your motivation?

What’s the word? JGID- Just Get It Done!

Take action and get out of that pit! See what Aaron Brandon has to say about this at:
http://www.aaronbrandon.com/what-is-jgid/

JGID,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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Post Titles and Links:
Customer Service- Wendy’s

http://www.samcarrara.com/marketing/customer-service-wendys/

Customer Service- Wendy’s 2

http://www.samcarrara.com/marketing/customer-service-wendy%e2%80%99s-2/

The first one looks fine, but the second looks like awful. For some reason the ‘ threw off the permalink. So what I need to do is change the post’s permalink. In the wordpress admin area I would use this box “Post Slug”:

So instead of having customer-service-wendy%e2%80%99s-2, I would put customer-service-wendys-2. That looks nicer and hopefully will stop errors. So now the link is:

http://www.samcarrara.com/marketing/customer-service-wendys-2/

The other way to fix this is to do it using phpmyadmin directly accessing your database. Use the method above, it’s easier.

How do I run into so many errors? I am taking action and getting things done. You could never have errors, but that means that everything needs to perfect and take months of review. Have errors, they are great learning experiences.

Fail Faster,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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What are your commitments? Are you really committed? Here is a short list of my commitments:

• God
• Family (Wife & kids)
• Work
• Business

Notice I didn’t put TV on the list… It has been on an unofficial list before. How much time and energy does it suck out of your life? The same can be said of many other activities- Is bowling more important than the limited amount of time you have with your kids?

Are you committed, Committed to Win? If you are, get serious, take Action. Start with this list:

• Write down your goals (debt free, more time with family, etc.).
• Assign dates to complete these by.
• Define how you will accomplish these tasks (Start a blog, create information products, sell unused items on Ebay, etc.).
• Break down tasks into subtasks to see accomplishment as you complete each subtask.
• Take action on this list.
• About a month out re-evaluate your goals (are they important) and have you been working on the tasks to get to these goals?

In It To Win It,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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I have realized that being successful isn’t about having and learning the most information. You could go broke by buying all the over hyped “Must Have Info.” I’ll add another name to the list of Hypesters, sounds like F M. He’s a butterfly guy. I know, I’ve suggested it before. Its one ok product and the rest of his products are rehashed info with slight variations.

I recently unsubscribed to his hypester emails because there was little to no content or value. They were all marketing messages. There were a few others that got the ax also, to include JC (Adsense). I won’t promote him either. Their junk mail is enough to make anyone go crazy.

Here are some great headline ideas from “Gurus”:

1. The Ultimate Product You Don’t Have
2. Why I’m Rich and You Make Me More Rich
3. Why I Am Successful
4. Give Me More Money
5. You Are Getting Sleepy, Now Open Your Wallet
6. These are all in jest, but funny none the less!

So what am I promoting?….. Read less, but take action with what you are reading! Find one or two techniques (articles, links, blog, comments, etc.) get really good at it and let it grow your business, then you can venture out and try one more thing.

Here’s a short list of started projects that never went anywhere (for now):

• OnSilverScreen.com
• GrillAce.com
• BaseballSpirit.com
• InformationStreams.com
• FamilySafetySecrets.com
• SuperAffiliateSignup.com
• Misspellz.com
• And the list goes on…

Want more? Check out what Keith Goodrum has to say about “Gurus” and Unsubscribing:
http://www.keithgoodrum.com/unsubscribe-run-away-run-away/

Get Your Time Back,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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Copyright by Sam Carrara’s Marketing Education

Focus and action is the name of the game.

Check out what Jack Keifer has to say about this: http://www.jackkeifer.com/the-distraction-attraction/

Focus,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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The first site I see is by Keith Goodrum. Why will I promote him? Because he takes Action by setting up a blog. He is part of the 2% group that takes information and doesn’t let it sit on the shelf. Check him out at: http://www.keithgoodrum.com/this-is-where-it-all-begins/

Take Action Now! I have only four more slots left and then I will be charging $200-$300 per blog to help with Alexa Rankings. If you want to get this service free go to http://www.samcarrara.com/marketing/alexa-update/ and comment with your website. Don’t wait, I’m closing this free period soon.

Be a 2% Person,
Sam Carrara

SC Marketing Education

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Slight jump in ranking, and it will continue to improve. How do you do this? Follow these steps:

1. Download the Alexa Toolbar from: http://www.alexa.com/site/download The page will automatically know if you are using Internet Explorer or FireFox as internet browsers
2. Come back to this site and post a comment with your Alexa Ranking.
3. Go to your website and surf it once a day for the next week.

Take action now! Absorb the information apply it now!

ADDED BONUS! for people who take action… The first five sites I see in the comments get a few things from me:

• I will help your ranking over two weeks time to get you started.
• Website included in a future post without a “nofollow”
• And any other promotion I think would help…

This offer expires Jan 20th, after that I will be charging around $150 to $200 for this service. Take Action!

If your site has never been surfed with the Alexa toolbar below, you will start around 8 million as a ranking.

Do It Now,
Sam Carrara

p.s. The sites must not be offensive in nature…

SC Marketing Education

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Everyone has 24 hours in the day (unless its a 23 or 25 hour day when adjusting the clocks). How do you spend it? Typically it is spent:

• Sleep- 8 hours
• Shower & get ready for the day- 0.5 hours
• Commute to work- 1.5 hours
• Work- 8-9 hours
• Meals- 1.5-2 hours

That is a total of 19.5 to 21 hours per day, leaving only 3 to 4.5 hours. That’s only the main tasks. Add in tasks like playing with kids, meal preparation, cleaning, extra long rush hour, clubs, workout, the list goes on and on; there is no time left.

So great, I’m depressed now that there is no hope… what was the point of this post?
During my commute I listen to recorded classes that teach me about marketing, language, mindset, etc. This way I take better advantage of my time- 1. Commuting and 2. Learning. Right now I’m working on learning Spanish (I’ll tell you more about that soon).

Here’s what you do:

1. Buy the MP3 player I talked about that I gave my wife in the post: New Years Trial- Exercise More (Part 2) OR one like it.
2. Then load it with information you want to learn. Watch these posts for suggestions.
3. Listen to it!

Successful People Take Action

Use your time wisely,
Sam Carrara

p.s. Was I too hard? Should I have sugarcoated this? I feel we need to just get real with ourselves!

SC Marketing Education

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