Steve Oliphant’s Musings

Ok, I don’t want to turn this blog into a political soapbox, and this video is not new.

But it is powerful.

And it is correct.

please watch.

Everyone knows that one way to get search engine love is to get other websites to link to you. What people don’t often realize is that you can make this happen yourself. Sarah Paine wrote a great blog post today that caused me to realize that this is not common knowledge.

Anyway the way it works is you link to a blog with trackback enabled, and (sometimes after a few hours or days, depending on if they moderate their trackbacks or not) they will link back to you.

So, If you want high powered, high traffic websites to link to your blog or website - it is easy. find them ones with trackbacks enabled (Google for your topic + trackback) and then l ink to them and follow the link, and feel the link love coming back at you!

J.P Maroney posted the thought provoking question: What do you believe are the TOP 5 Most Common Fundamental Problems, Challenges or Mistakes Entrepreneurs must overcome in order to grow their businesses?

I posted the following in the comments on his blog:

1. Lack of taking action
2. Fear of Failure
3. Lack of technical knowledge (which is really just the same as 1. as anyone who can ready and follow directections can learn how to do pretty much anything online.)
4. Lack of focus - not finishing a project
5. Lack of ideas. (Which I think really relates to 4. - )

I guess to sum it up, lack of taking focused action is the biggest problem. Causes of this problem are fear, procrastination, self doubt, and time killers like TV.

So the question I have is: What do you do about it? How do you overcome? (And if you disagree with my 5, please feel free to post your own.)

Comments below are open.

I recently read an article entitled Why we don’t always learn from our mistakes that shows that the more we repeat a mistake the more we are likely to repeat it in the future.

This applies directly to internet marketing and growing your own business. We spend lots of time doing things that won’t help us move forward towards our goals, or that even hurt us in moving towards our goals.

These are mistakes. And unless we STOP doing them, we are simply re-enforcing them and are more likely to repeat them.

Common mistakes include:

Watching TV

Checking email every 10 minutes

Buying the latest get-rich-quick program before the time is up

Buying into the hype of easy money on the net. (It is easy, just not the way they want you to think)

Starting some guru’s program, and not finishing. (I believe this is the worst one. Almost any method for being succesful will work if followed through to completion)

Believing that because you failed at something, you are a failure. Most succesful people will have failed more times than you. The trick is to learn from your failure, not repeat the mistakes that caused it, and try again.

Doing things the easy way instead of the right way. The old adage of “if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right” is true.

On the other hand, another common mistake is not releasing a product or marketing campain or web site until it is perfect - and then never arriving at that point of perfection. Michael Masterson has a great book entitled Ready Fire Aim on how has created and expanded many multi-million dollar businesses. The main message is in the title.

But probably the most common mistake of all, and this includes most of the above, is simply NOT DOING. In order to make something happen, you have to DO. Set aside time, right now, and DO.

If you want to make money online, you have to be able to accept payment. One way to do this is through paypal. It is easy to create a “buy now” button that will let people pay you. I have gone through each of the steps with screens shots below so you can see how to do it.

Step 1. Login to your paypal account or sign up for one if you don’t have one. Then click on the “Merchant Services” Tag.

Step 2. Click on the “Buy Now” link in the Create buttons area.

Step 3. Fill out the details

Step 4. Scroll down and select options, click on “Create Button”

Step 5. Select and copy the html code generated by Paypal

Step 6. Paste the select code wherever you want. I had to choose the “non-encrypted” version of the button to get it to work with wordpress. But, yes, that button below was copied and pasted into this blog post using this method. Please feel free to click on it and donate $5.00 to me if you found this little tutorial useful!

And there you have it. Now go make your own “buy now” button and sell something!

James Brausch in his post on How to Learn has a good idea for taking notes. It involves carrying a voice recorder around with you, and then every couple of days listening to your recordings and writing them down. There is an easier way.

jott.com will let you call a number (I have it setup in my cell phone on the speed dial and with a voice command, I can dial it with 1 touch) that will record up to 30 seconds of voice, and then transcribe it and email it and (if you choose) text it to you or anyone you have setup as a contact with them.

So, no more excuses! Record your ideas! Act on them!

I used to be in lots better physical shape then I currently am. I could do 20+ pullups, 120 situps in less then 2 minutes, and run 3 miles in 19:40. I also weighed less than 180lbs and was 18 years younger.

Currently, I can do 3-4 pullups, no idea on the situps, but probably around 30, and I can walk 2 miles in about 30 minutes. I weigh over 220 lbs.

I am getting back to where I used to be, and plan to be even better.

Today I took action. There is a 1/2 mile paved jogging trail near where I work that also has pullup bars by it. I walked 4 laps (2 miles) and between each lap I did 2 pullups. I also did 20 pushups (I could have and should have done more.)

It took me about 35 minutes total. I got to enjoy the sunshine and the feel of my body moving.

Tomorrow I will repeat what I did today.

What is your objective? Is it measurable? Is it actionable?

What did you do today to move towards it?

What will you do tomorrow to move towards it?

My wife is keeping a blog at merriemelody.blogspot.com

Of course it is prettier and more entertaining than mine. Of course I may be biased.