relative begineer- how to learn SEO and IM?

Everything you need to know is free and available over the web...

SEOMoz and SEObook are a good source for SEO techniques, yet, we have a forum right here for it... Adsense / PPC / SEO Discussion Forum hunt about in there for a while to learn the odd technique or two.

Don't forget sites like copyblogger for copywriting techniques, smashmagazine may help from time to time, there is just to many to name.

There is also the war room here which is filled with lots of little nuggets of information, a great investment for 37 bucks .

Then look at blogs of reputable people online, even on this forum, they are also filled with tons of information!

Look for reputable members and follow what they post, information is given away daily here on the forum.

Edit: I even forgot to mention the 30 day challenge by Ed Dale and Dan Rein

(I could keep remembering more and more things but ill stop editing now .)

Thanks- could you expound on that?

Would you ever build a business on a lot if the government told you "at any moment we could, without notice, demolish your building and run a road right through this lot"?

Probably not. Then why on earth are you interested in SEO?

Never do anything that leaves you solely in the hands of someone else (SEO).

And never invest time and money into something that can be taken away from you without notice (SEO).

Focus on building relationships in the marketplace. That's how businesses are built.

I agree with Lexi that it will not be practical to have your business dependent on 3rd party like the search engine. If they want to change their algorithm, your website ranking might be gone overnight and your business will be affected over night.

It will be good that you grow your own list of subscribers. Having a mixture of paid and free traffic sources in your marketing campaign will ensure that there is multiple source of traffic back to your website and your business is still functioning.

The foundations of IM you need to learn before you move on are:

Sales copy
SEO principles
How to set up a domain with wordpress, and create content
Different types of IM - affiliate, your own product, CPA

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Then free traffic generation tactics:

Youtube
More SEO - advanced

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I suggest you read books about sales copy, SEO to start, and then go into niche selection and keyword research. This is however one way to get into IM. These skills will be beneficial in any endeavor you choose down the road in your IM career.

The two things you want to learn Are free of cost. Warriorforum consists of all popular threads and freebies about learning IM and SEO techniques.

Take one week to browse around the forum and discover how to do and tackle things the right way in Internet marketing and SEO field. I'am Sure you'll be working On your new project of IM or SEO business with lot of knowledge about the particular niches.

Stop trying, and just get to the work of running a business. I'm serious. I don't let my coaching clients use the word 'try' when talking about their online business.

If you were going to build a business as a dry-cleaner, would you say you are just going to give it a try? Of course not. You would develop a plan, and you would execute that plan, adjusting for market conditions. Do the same here.

When we use the word 'try' we have actually already created the 'out' in our minds. We can always say, "We gave it a try".

Programs, strategies, guides, etc... none of them can make you any money - they are just information. Until you commit and fully execute on that information, it will gather dust....

So develop a business model that is either based on your strengths and your interests (both would be even better), and execute that business model.

My two pennies.... sorry if this sounds too direct... I'm wrapping up a few other things and should be asleep already!

Build more than you purchase... It's good to buy tools but if you don't build something with them what good are they?

Have you built a web site? Do you have something for sale someone could buy?

To know about seo work and strategy. Seomoz is the best e-book and freely available.....

By buying all those products you are missing the main point - to keep it simple.
Formulas, systems etc...they rarely work.
You don't need to delve deep into SEO. Learn the basics of IM and take it from there.
The one thing you must do is take action.
Do you know how to buy hosting, install Wordpress, write articles etc?
Focus on the foundations and steer clear of Facebook millionaire tools.

You seem - repeatedly - to be talking about "SEO and IM" almost as if you somehow imagine that they're in some sense "equivalents", or "of equal significance" or "both essential"? They're not at all.

SEO is just one small way of addressing the "need for traffic" which is important in IM. (It's typically a bad, small way, too: SEO traffic tends to be - for many purposes - the worst-converting and most precarious and least reliable kind of traffic there is).

I'm trying to help, not to "lecture" you, but I strongly suspect from the wording of your original post that at the moment you're laboring (as many people do) under a massive misapprehension about the role of SEO in IM, and it'll help you a lot to appreciate that it's a small and optional one of questionable value to many IM business models, and not something you should instinctively focus on, as I think you're mistakenly assuming at the moment.

Try and figure out your interest first. Maybe you like to write, maybe you like to share information through youtube videos, or maybe you just like to make money on auto-pilot (that's overrated).
Once you have done this look for information online. You will find everything online, mostly for FREE. Make a model of what exactly you want to do with your business and set goals.
You are now ready to start !

i learnt from forums and blogs online, but the best way is to try new things and new ideas every once in a while. this is the best way to success online, to find things that works in generating money and just stick to them.

SEO is very easy once you test and try it on a few websites. The best way I have learned how to do SEO is to Google search "How to SEO" and you will find tons of results to help you out.

I tried SEO when i first started and it was the worst thing I could have done. And I actually ranked for some good keywords. And then I lost my rankings. And then I ranked again. And then I lost it all...

Conclusion, I had to start all over again. DO NOT start with SEO. It's not free either. People sell these lies all the time that SEO is free and you can build free backlinks. Yeah, good luck with that when your competitors are spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars on their SEO campaigns.

There are BETTER sources of traffic out there.

SEO is completely unreliable.

I'd say just create unique and compelling content, and the search engines will do the rest.

If you really want to get into SEO, pay someone to do it. It is quite time consuming, and you spend as much time finding out what the 'latest' seo ideas are as you do actually marketing, probably more. And that's probably not what you're here for.

Go here:

Adsense / PPC / SEO Discussion Forum

And start off by reading the "sticky" by Paul Myers.

RoD

The first thing you need to do is stop buying SEO products and guides.

Seriously; most of them are either scams or simply stuff you can find for free with a little digging.

I'm assuming you're using Wordpress, so I'd recommend installing a little plugin called Wordpress SEO by Yoast. It'll easily help you optimize your pages and posts for your target keywords. That should be plenty for your on-page SEO.

With that said, I also wouldn't put all my eggs in the SEO basket. It's good to have your site, pages and posts optimized for the keywords you're targeting, but that shouldn't be your main focus for generating traffic.

SEO is volatile and you're one algorithm update away from losing your place in the SERPS. And if your business depends 100% on SEO traffic, that can be devastating.

Incorporate other traffic methods into your SEO strategy, such as video marketing, social media, forums, guest posting, list building, and others.

Also, don't get into paid traffic until you've set up a funnel or a system to keep that traffic. Whether you want to sell them affiliate products or just get them to join your list; you need a system in place. Paying for traffic only to have the visitors read your articles and leave is just like throwing money out the window.

You should also have a tracking system in place to track conversions and optimize your site to see better results.

In a nutshell, diversify your traffic sources and stay away from paid advertising until you have a system set up to (hopefully) recuperate your advertising costs.

Here is the single most important piece of information I can give you.

>> Learn how to SELL.

And more importantly, learn how to sell stuff that people actually WANT.

It doesn't get any simpler than that.

You have to become a seller.

This is basically how I simplify everything in life. You either learn how to sell, or you die. Life in a nutshell.

I still don't know a lot about marketing. But I told myself a long time ago, that if I kept things simple, and just met those 2 critera (learn sales/sell what people want) I would be fine. Most marketers have a serious weakness in how they monetize their work. And a solid, well developed monetization strategy means a world of difference.

If thats not in place, you'll spend so many wasted hours/days/months trying to attract people, but since you have no idea how to sell, nobody will be interested in what you're promoting. You'll start making threads like "3,000 impressions and no clicks". Or "150 clicks but no sales".

If you really learn sales, it makes EVERYTHING you do both EFFECTIVE and EFFICIENT.

Find a crowd of people with a need that isn't being met. Learn how to sell them something they need. Then sell it to them.

Do you think it gets more complicated than that?

I can tell you that it doesn't. The only thing that complicates the process is people. They attach meaning to things that don't deserve meaning. They complicate things because they're always searching for the "secrets". "It can NOT be this easy!" you think. Even if you don't think it, you feel it. People always have to make things harder than they really are.

I'm telling you, it IS that easy.

Good luck - Red

ps. If you didn't catch the undercurrent of what I'm recommending, let me organize my thoughts better so nothing gets lost in translation.

1) Stop buying products.
2) Go research a problem, that doesn't have a solution, innovate/create a solution.
3) Microtest the market, to determine in real life, if they'd be willing to buy your solution.
4) Depending on data, you either scale the process, or start researching / testing another market.

Stop buying products.

You don't need them when getting started.

Read up, and use the search bar to find a ton of information on SEO, IM and pick an area.

Ask questions, but most of all pick an area and keep on working at it until you see some results.

Thank you all- this has been very helpful.

Market Samurai is a program for researching SEO, I found their *free* tutorials and training videos to be immensely helpful in learning about SEO.

Here is the link to the tutorials: Noble Samurai - Dojo

Go down to "Introduction to Keyword Research" and just start watching (they also include a transcript below the video, along with images, in case you can't do the video.)

Yes, a lot of it is them showing you how great their product is (and they do have a good product, no I'm not an affiliate, just had a chance to play with it and have heard good things from other customers) but at the same time, the strategies they lay out are basic for any work in SEO and can be used even with google's free "keyword" tool.

Hey biotin,
I would like to suggest to you that if you want to start learning SEO, start watching youtube videos, and sign up for the challenge.co . That will get you started with the basics.

As far as IM follow only proven industry leaders and start taking notes, and mostly take action. Find a niche or preferably one you already know about and write a ebook or create a video series to give away build your list. After you build a solid list that likes and trust you, you can start selling them products. Hope this helps