Are You Considering Re-Financing? Part 1 in a Series

Homeowners who are considering refinancing their home may have a wealth of options available to them. 

However, these same homeowners may find themselves feeling overwhelmed by this wealth of options. This process doesn’t have to be so difficult though. Homeowners can greatly assist themselves in the process by taking a few simple steps. First the homeowner should determine his refinancing goals. Next the homeowner should consult with a refinancing expert and finally the homeowner should be aware that refinancing is not always the best solution. 

Determine Your Goals for Refinancing

The first step in any refinancing process should be for the homeowner to determine his goals and why he is considering refinancing. There are many different answers to this question and none of the answers are necessarily right or wrong. The most important thing is that the homeowner is making a decision which helps him achieve his financial goals. While there are no right or wrong answer to why refinancing should be considered there are, however, certain reasons for refinancing which are very common. These reasons include:

* Reducing monthly mortgage payments

* Consolidating existing debts

* Reducing the amount of interest paid over the course of the loan

* Repaying the loan quicker

* Gaining equity quicker

Although the reasons listed above are not the only reason homeowners might consider refinancing, they are some of the most popular reasons. They are included in this chapter for the purpose of getting the reader thinking. The reader may find their mortgage refinancing strategy fits into one of the above goals or they may have a completely different reason for wanting to re-finance. The reason for wanting to re-finance is not as important as determining this reason. This is because a homeowner, or even a financial advisor, will have a difficult time determining the best refinancing option for a homeowner if he does not know the goals of the homeowner.

Consult with a Refinancing Expert

Once a homeowner has figured out why they want to re-finance, the homeowner should consider meeting with a refinancing expert to determine the best refinancing strategy. This will likely be a strategy which is financially sound but is also still geared to meeting the needs of the homeowner.

Homeowners who feel as though they are particularly well versed in the subject of refinancing might consider skipping the option of consulting with a refinancing expert. However, this is not recommended because even the most educated homeowner may not be aware of the newest refinancing options being offered by lenders.

While not understanding all the options may not seem like a big deal, it can have a significant impact. Homeowners may not even be aware of mistakes they are making but they may here of friends who re-financed under similar conditions and receive more favorable terms. Hearing these scenarios can be quite disheartening for some homeowners especially if they could have saved considerably more while refinancing.

Consider Not Refinancing as a Viable Option

Homeowners who are considering refinancing may realize the importance of evaluating a number of different refinancing options to determine which option is best but these same homeowners may not realize they should also carefully consider not refinancing as an option. This is often referred to as the “do nothing” option because it refers to the conditions which will exist if the homeowner does not make a change in their mortgage situation.

For each refinancing option considered, the homeowner should determine the estimated monthly payment, amount of interest paid during the course of the loan, year in which the loan will be fully repaid and the amount of time the homeowner will have to remain in the home to recoup closing costs associated with refinancing. 

Homeowners should also determine these values for the current mortgage. This can be very helpful for comparison purposes. Homeowners can compare these results and often the best option is quite clear from these numeric calculations. However, if the analysis does not yield a clear cut answer, the homeowner may have to evaluate secondary characteristics to make the best possible decision.

Stay tuned for the next installment ......

Why on-page SEO is more vital than ever

This is to be the first in a series on Search Engine Optimization. And we start with on-page SEO.

What is on-page SEO? Well, SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, and it's the process of making your web pages stand out in the rankings and more search engine visible. On-page SEO is the process of optimizing your titles, descriptions, content, tags, and other factors that make up the structure of your website, to make your web pages more easily found and categorized by the search engine spiders.

In years past, this was considered to be the most important activity for online marketers to tweak in order for them to receive a high score when the search engines actually ranked their web pages. However, times change and the search engine algorithms change along with them, in particular, Google. The most recent emphasis has been towards the use of backlinks or off-page SEO.

Some SEO consultants and watchers have actually begun to suggest that on-page SEO is obsolete. Google was no longer paying any attention to on-page SEO and was totally preoccupied entirely with inbound linking (or backlinks). However, the tide shifts again, and the massive changes that Google instituted in early 2011 - their Farmer/Panda update - has swung the pendulum back to on-page SEO and those critical elements that make up effective SEO.

What Google wants to do is tackle the problem of  "junk" websites head on. They have started to look much more closely at the "quality" of page content, weeding out those with just meaningless, incorrect, irrelevant, and senseless "crap" that make up a lot of web sites. Heavily linked ad and (even) Ad-Sense pages are out. Quality content with useful information is in.

Benefits of Having On-Page SEO

The benefits of focusing on on-page SEO include:

* Control is with the website owner. With off-page SEO, onliOne marketers will have to get in touch with other websites from the same niche, hoping against hope that these individuals will backlink to them. With on-page SEO, they have greater control with their page rankings. As such, they will at least have an idea of what their page rankings are based on their efforts, unlike off-page site optimization that can be quite arbitrary.

* Less burden on the website owner. Off-page SEO can be very time-consuming and requires constant work in order for a website to have achieve and maintain page rankings. With on-page SEO, once you have optimized your pages, you can just leave these alone as long as you do SEO correctly the first time. High quality content remains high quality whatever else goes on around it!

* Your web pages become better focused. With the right keywords in the titles and the body of the text, even a single glance at your website can make both search engine spiders and site visitors understand what your website is about right away. As long as it's done correctly, your efforts in optimizing your web pages will indicate that you're an expert in your niche, making it more likely for your site visitors to trust you and even purchase from you.

* Less focus on competition. If you've ever tried off-page SEO, you know that it feels like you're running a marathon. You contact other websites from your niche to try to get backlinks, but at the same time, you're quite aware of the fact that some of these websites are actually your rivals when it comes to traffic and even sales. With on-page SEO, you become more focused on the content of your websites, and less on your competitors. This allows you to pay more attention to your website so that you can monitor and make changes that will improve your ranking.

Factors to Look for in On-Page SEO

* Content. When it comes to websites, content remains king. In fact, after the last Google update it has been promoted to Emperor! Some people may have thought that they had got away with using black hat techniques in order to get a good page ranking, but the search engines are now starting to catch up with them. While questionable strategies may work for a time, they will eventually be noticed by the search engines, and will be blocked and penalized permanently.

Focus instead on making sure the content of your website deserves a more permanent place in the page rankings. Do bear in mind that content doesn't just refer to the quality of the material in your website; its presentation is also as relevant. Thus, the design, readability, functionality, and layout also play important roles when it comes to content.

* Having a Theme. Having a theme is a big part when it comes to SEO. You can bring more traffic to your website by simply using keywords that have the same theme as your main keyword. For example, if the topic or theme of the content of your website is birthday, some of the related keywords you can include would be candles, cake, balloons, and other keywords that follow the same theme as that. As such, those who are looking for these auxiliary terms will also be able to find your website, increasing your chances of making sales.

* Keywords, links and meta-tags within the site. Do make sure that the keywords, links, and meta-tags in your website are relevant to the content. Furthermore, do check your links and tags if any are broken, or if there are orphan pages, as these can negatively affect your page rankings.
Of course, this doesn't mean that you will simply set aside all of your off-page and offline SEO efforts for on-page SEO. You will need to focus on these factors to ensure that your page rankings will remain high and will not suffer.

* Google update. Google, the foremost search engine today, regularly changes its algorithm used in an attempt to prevent fraudulent websites from getting top page rankings. Even if you're at the top of the list today, you can go down the next day because of the algorithm change. Do check the news for any updates Google, or any other search engines, will make so you can stay on top of these and make changes to your website accordingly. Google's own webmaster guidelines and their informative blogs can be of great assistance.

Here are some additional resources to learn more about on-page SEO:

Brad Callen's new Elite SEO Membership Site - Search Marketing Elite. he will teach you how to get #1 Google rankings that will last a lifetime:
http://shagmiser.bryxen13.hop.clickbank.net

The Magic SEO Book - voted the best SEO book on Clickbank - 10/10!
http://shagmiser.magicseo.hop.clickbank.net

The Total Traffic Formula - a membership based SEO course designed to teach you how to get more traffic to your site:
http://shagmiser.ttformula.hop.clickbank.net

Niche Reaper - the Ultimate Niche Discovery Tool

One of the hardest things to do as an Internet Marketer is to find a niche worthy of further exploration, a niche that is not only lucrative, but that people are actually interested in and are willing to plunk out cash for. Enter Matt Garret's new product - Niche Reaper.

However, before I go further, I must admit that there are four things you need to know about Niche Reaper.  

One - it is an incredibly clever new niche research tool that runs 24/7, constantly generating new niche and keyword possibilities.

Two - It is brilliant. If you are a niche marketer, the hardest thing is finding a steady stream of potentially profitable niches to build sites in. The trouble is that although finding niches is easy, finding the quirky ones that people are spending money in - and that everyone else isn't already doing to death - is very time consuming.

Well, not any more. Niche Reaper finds thousands of them every day - you  will never run out and you'll be constantly amazed at the gems it finds.

http://dickhalerecommends.info/nichereaper

Three -  The number that Matt will sell is very limited and well over three fourths the allocation has already been sold. This thing has been selling like hot cakes and at the rate it is going I suspect that the doors will be closed in a few more days. In fact, the last I looked, total sales had just broached 900. That's 90% gone.

That tells you something because it isn't cheap - but for people who do this kind of niche marketing for a living it will save a fortune over the several other services it replaces, and a ton of time.

One person who posted a comment estimates that what NicheReaper gives him instantly every day would take him up to 5 hours of hard work to replicate just a fraction of it by other means.

It is selling so well because it works.

http://dickhalerecommends.info/nichereaper

Four -  Sometime later today or tomorrow, depending on total sales, the price is going up. I'm not sure of the details, but indications from Matt are that the price will increase well before Friday.

He has a best seller on his hands, so I can't blame him - but if you hurry you may be able to beat the rise.

http://dickhalerecommends.info/nichereaper

PLR's - Huh?

I have been doing a lot of PLR's lately, and they are a true goldmine. But before I get to telling you more about them, I'm going to list a couple I've recently posted:

1. Simple List Building Blueprint Course - a really comprehensive viudeo course that comes with MRR.
2. Truly Raw - an eBook all about eating raw foods, raw food diets, pros and cons, etc. Comes with an opt-in set of emails that discusses the subject even further.

Plus, there are several more I am working on that are in the pipeline. If you don't know what these terms are (PLR, MRR) you need to watch Liz Tomey's short tutorial on the subject:
http://mymarketingtutorials.com/resell-rights-explained-2

Enough of the prelim stuff - let's get down to it.

Why private label is your best friend.

One of the biggest problems that would-be Internet marketers face is where to get good content to fill up your web pages or blogs. This article looks at private label as being an ideal source, if you know how to use it the right way.

Content is King, for sure. The search engines are not interested in ranking thin, content-poor web pages and are actively working to adjust their algorithms to weed out those pages that don't provide useful information. That makes it increasingly difficult for website builders because with the best will in the world, very few are ready, willing and able to continue to write an endless stream of quality content for themselves.

For many people writing is difficult to start with, but factor in the limited time that people have these days and the likelihood that however passionate you are about your niche, you'll soon run out of things to say, and it gets almost impossible.

And of course, if your web site is on a subject that you don't have personal knowledge or passion about, writing fresh content may be completely impossible for you.

All the evidence suggests, though, that the need for on-topic, well-written content is growing. The search engines have as good as said so and are now, more than ever before, looking to de-list sites that they consider to be lacking authority.

All this means that one supply of content that has gone in and out of fashion over the years, private label articles, it coming back with a vengeance.

Private label articles, or PLR articles as they are commonly known, are very cheap, but can totally transform your Internet marketing and web building.

PLR stands for private label rights and describes the license you get for using them after you've bought them.

Private label means that once you've bought them, all rights of ownership are transferred to you. You then have the rights to treat the articles as your own, as if you had written them.

Unlike other ways of buying 'information', there is no copyright on PLR so you are free to change them, rewrite them, re-purpose them, even put your own name on the top and claim authorship.

In general, you cannot resell them in an unchanged state, and many article directories do not allow you to post them, but other than that, they become yours to do with as you please.

That wide-ranging 'right of use' is a very powerful thing indeed and makes PLR one of the most undervalued heroes of online marketing. Far too few people have really understood just how many ways PLR articles (or even entire books) can be used, and how much money some people are making by using them.

Having said that, it is also important that you understand that as with many things, there is really good PLR material out there and a lot of absolute garbage.

Over the years a lot of really bad articles have been written, more often than not by people with really bad writing and language skills, that are identifiable as private label from a mile away. If you can see an article is badly written and makes no real attempt to cover its promised topic, you can bet the search engines can weed it out too. Using such trash doesn't do your site any good at all.

In fact, with new changes that Google have announced that will make it easier for them to weed out what they consider to be spam websites, using poor quality PLR can be really harmful to your business. So to that end, make sure you read what you buy and at the very least, rewrite it to correct blatant spelling and grammar errors. And if you can, add more meat to the thin articles as well.

You will often see offers online of thousands of articles being sold for peanuts. 10,000 articles for $10 is not unusual! Steer clear. The articles in these packages are almost all horrible. They have been around for many years, have been used to death and, all too often, are not PLR material at all - they have been stolen from non-plr websites. It is a case of buyer beware.

Luckily, there are many very reputable sources of great PLR articles. Some will sell you packages individually and others are membership sites that provide a steady stream of articles to their members.

Look to see examples of their work before you buy - all reputable PLR sellers will be happy to provide you with a sample or two if you email and ask - and check for spelling, grammar and language use. If they make mistakes in the articles they send out as samples, you can bet they are equally sloppy in what you'll buy.

Look also, for the articles to have a certain depth. A good article should read naturally and not appear as if it has been created purely as a keyword holder.

And when you get the articles, rewrite them.

I know I said that PLR makes your life easier, and it does. It is far, far easier to rewrite an article into your own words - just take it one sentence at a time - than it is to research and write a new article from scratch. You'll save a huge amount of time and effort, but the end result will be content on your website that is fresh, relevant, authoritative and, to the search engines, exactly what is needed.

And that is money in the bank.

BTW - the above article is a perfect example of a PLR - how about them apples?

TTFN - Till We Talk Again -
RD

Membership Sites - The Route to Residual Income

Membership sites are not a new thing. Way back in 1996, Bill Gates said that he estimated membership sites to be a $20-$30 million dollar per year industry.

Mr Gates has got more things right than wrong in his career, but that wasn't one of them. Just 14 years later and the figure is more like $2 Billion Dollars annually. Membership sites are big business and despite the worldwide recession, continue to grow in importance.

A membership site is, by and large, one that charges subscribers a monthly fee to access its website. But charging a monthly fee isn't the only game in town - another perfectly viable business model is to allow members to join for free, but to monetize the site through special subscriber offers made each time the member logs in.

Whichever membership model you choose, you will need a few things in place:

* A domain and hosting

* An autoresponder

* Membership site software

* Content to regularly post to the site

Domains and hosting, and autoresponders, are beyond the scope of this article. We will consider the membership site software you can use and the content you need to post.

Membership Site Software

There are dozens of options - from the plugins that you can add to a WordPress blog, through newbie-friendly programs like Easy Member Pro, right up to powerful scripts such as Login Frequency Marketing. 

There is software available to suit every pocket - even one or two free options.

Why are membership sites so popular?

The Internet has become synonymous with 'free'. People expect information to be available for free and sites like Wikipedia are happy to provide that service. However, people have also come to realize that with free information there is relatively little quality control. If they want good, premium content then they know that they will sometimes have to pay for it.

In addition, people like the idea of belonging to an exclusive club, and online membership sites can offer that kind of exclusivity that they crave.

Of course, no membership site can survive for long if it doesn't provide those things: great, fresh content and a sense of belonging.

The Advantages to Building Membership Websites

One of the problems with Internet marketing as it is generally practiced is that you constantly need to find new customers and make new sales. You can have a great month and sell a lot of the latest big launch product, but what do you do next month? Or the month after? The wheel has to be reinvented over and over again.

With a membership site, you remove most of that ongoing stress. You do your job of selling the memberships and then they pay you month in, month out, automatically. You don't have to ask for the money - your payment processor just takes it - and you never need to remind anyone to pay up.

Although three will be a number of people who will unsubscribe and cancel their subscriptions each month, on the whole most will stay.

The industry average is reckoned to be that members stay for about 4 months, but many of the quality membership sites expect their members to stick around a lot longer than that!

The result is that you work once to set up the site to begin with and then again to attract members in, but after that the financials of your business will be based on residual earnings - in other words, once they've started paying, they'll keep on.

Residual income is the sweetest money of all and can quite literally last for years with no extra effort on your part.

Of course, with a membership site you do have to add new content, or provide some kind of service to keep your members interested.

If you have a site based on the use of a piece of software you've written or had created for you, your ongoing input may be negligible after the initial set up, but if you are providing information, you will need to develop a routine for creating new stuff for your members on a regular basis.

Many people ignore the power of membership sites to build themselves a very useful income, but to do so is a folly. After all, 100 members paying just $9.99 per month amounts to $1000 a month and may only require you to write a new article each week.

Some membership sites are even set up so that the members themselves create the ongoing content. Recipe sites, for example, encourage members to post new recipes for all to see, and to participate in discussion forums that only members can access. The site owners can charge a nice monthly fee, but in actuality don't have to create any content at all!

Whatever your current online marketing business model, consider adding a membership site or two to your stable of Internet properties. Your residual income will skyrocket and your workload may well be lower than you ever imagined possible.

Your Internet lifestyle could be just a membership site away!

Here's an added resource that can help you along the way towards your membership site:

Membership Gold Rush To Your Evergreen Success RD