Yesterday, I wrote a post about my latest sales video… which was actually my first attempt at making a short pitch to help me sell a product. I think that the end result came out very nice, especially because I didn’t have much of a budget and didn’t physically “shoot” a video. What I failed to talk about was how to actually make it happen, which I will proceed to talk about now!

The Key Elements to Consider

When you want to relay a message successfully and convert new business in a short time span, it is important that you hit home in as many ways as possible. Here are a few elements that I have found to be key catalysts in any successful sales video:

Problem- The first step in any sales pitch is identifying a problem. This is the most significant thing you will be doing when you are trying to sell someone a new product — convincing them that they have something that needs fixing. In my video, I start out immediately by talking about how “you aren’t making any money online” and how a surplus of online products are “confusing you”… basically you need a product that works and you don’t have it!

Solution- After you suggest a problem, it’s time to come in like a knight in shining armor with your solution. The solution should obviously involve the product you are promoting, and needs to relay why exactly your product is the right one for the job. In my case, I talk about how my method has worked for me… and use a logical argument to suggest that it will work for anyone.

Support- The support is the most critical part of your sales video, because in it you can turn a person who is on the fence into a buyer… at any price (within reason). You need to show that your method works, use testimonials and maybe even visual proof of success. Support can by implicit or explicit, and in my video I do both. Implicit in my video is imagery of a private beach and people having success — things that invoke feelings of fame and fortune.  Explicit images that I use are the screenshots of my actual earnings, which is also useful to show that the method does in fact work as promised.

Sale- The final step is also vital, and it is making the sale. For me, this wasn’t a problem as I could simply say “you get all of this, for free” to make the conversion. For a paid product, it is going to be essential to make the price attractive, throw in a bonus or two, and make people feel that they are making out like bandits.

Jimvesting’s Top Five Video Editing Programs

Now that you have a good idea of what you need to do, we need the software to get the job done. There are really two ways to shoot a sales video: 1) by camera in person; or 2) compiling images/text and audio. Both methods are effective, and I simply chose option #2 because I was a bit too lazy and wanted to whip something up fast. No matter what you choose, you will need a video editing program on hand to accomplish the pitch. I have personally used around a dozen different editing programs. Based on this, these are my top five:

1. Corel VideoStudio
2. Adobe Premiere Elements
3. Pinnacle Studio
4. Apple iMovie
5. Windows Movie Maker

With this, you have all the information you need to make a high-powered sales video that will help you convince customers quickly to buy the product you are promoting and help make your campaign a big success! If you have used this post to make your own video, feel free to post a link to your sales page below — we’d love to have a look!

-Jimvesting

A few months ago on Jimvesting.com, we launched the “Build A Blog Workshop”… a 30-day program focused on helping you form your own blog on the internet (and the whole thing was sponsored with some great prizes by HostGator). The original intention of this event was to eventually package the 30-day program into a digital product that I could provide for my readers and some new business. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to complete it!

With that, I’d like to re-focus on the Thirty Day Blog system!

I’m not sure why the program stalled out on day 26, but we DO have four more days coming your way… and once we round out the promotion we can start to package what we had and turn it into an internet marketing project. However, I’ve already taken preliminary steps and have begun to work on an opt-in site focused on converting new email leads to my newsletter through the 30 Day Blog system that we created in the past.

Making A Promotional Video

One of the best ways to convince customers that your IM product is worth their while is to make a quick video compilation to throw up on YouTube and your sales page. The point? Well people like having positive reinforcement that you have put your time and effort into the product you are selling. In my case, I’m actually not “selling” anything… it’s a completely free 30-day program to help people start their own blogs. However, I will make opting-in to my newsletter as a requirement, and if I can add a TON of new leads by promoting my system it will be even more powerful than if I had charged $10 a pop.

In my opinion, having a strong user base is much more profitable long-term than trying for force sales through the system in-and-out. With that, I hope to use this video to help promote my 30 day system that I think is one of the best ones out there — not to mention the most cost effective!

This isn’t by any means a work of art, but I think it will do a good job adding to my conversion rate. Please don’t hesitate to leave your comments about the video and how you feel about sales videos.

-Jimvesting

We all know that traffic is the lifeblood of any successful online venture, but many people simply cannot figure out how to feed their hard work with consistent traffic. This is why today we are going to talk about how you can turn bread into toast using Jimvesting’s Social Commenting Method.

Why Toast is Better Than Bread

One of the best ways that I have found to instantly get a consistent (& growing) flow of traffic to your websites combines two popular means: blog commenting and social media. Most people starting out tend to focus on one or the other, which is absolutely fine… but isn’t taking full advantage of what the internet has to offer.

Bottom Line: If I have a slice of bread and a toaster, I’m not going to sit idly by and just eat the bread… no, no… I’m going to use what I have and make toast, which is inherently superior to bread in every way imaginable.

The Inputs:

Blog Comments (the “bread”)
When you want to make toast, you need a foundation. Much like a slice of bread, going around and dropping comments on blogs that write about similar topics should be a great starting foundation for seeing some traffic reciprocated to your blog. If you’d like to learn more about how to maximize your traffic using blog commenting, check out our post about the subject.

Social Media (the “toaster”)
Once we have our bread in place, we have to heat it up a little to make it taste awesome. I’d say that the social media world of Digg, StumbleUpon, Facebook and Twitter (my favorites for driving fast & lasting traffic) are a lot like a big toaster oven — they heat up content to maximize your probability of getting traffic. Again, we’ve written about the best ways to use social media to your advantage after you post new content.

Now Let’s Make Some Toast!

One of the mistakes I made when I originally started out was thinking that I could only do one or the other: commenting or social media. When I would write a post, I would use Digg and StumbleUpon on my own website… and then try to get some additional traffic by commenting around the blogosphere. This is not the best way to do it, and you need to use social media to your advantage at all times.

Three Steps to a Traffic Surge:

1. Find blogs with recent posts on a similar subject (with few/no comments)
2. Leave a constructive comment with a link back to your website
3. Use StumbleUpon and Digg to pump traffic to their blog!

Naturally, you should always try your best to move traffic with social media (I recommend Twitter and Facebook) to your own blog posts. However, I have found that using your accounts at Digg and StumbleUpon becomes more effective when you are recommending someone else’s content. Therefore, by leaving comments on other blogs in your niche area… you can drive lots of added traffic to your own website (by association) any time you Digg or Stumble their posts.

So what have we done here? We’ve taken something good (blog commenting) and made it better with social media! We’ve turned our boring cold piece of white bread into a fantastically tasty piece of toast. I guarantee you will see a notable uptick in your daily traffic if you start to pump traffic to other blogs that you have commented on, and this traffic will be mostly reoccurring and high-quality which is very nice for SEO.

Bon Appetit!
Jimvesting dot com

It’s that time of year again… MARCH MADNESS!

Each year, NCAA Men’s Basketball picks its champion by pitting the top 65 teams against one another in a single-elimination showdown known as “March Madness.” Teams are broken into 4 regions, where they compete against one another ranked #1 (best) through #16 (worst) until a champion for each region is made — these “final four” teams then duke it out amongst one another for the title of NCAA Basketball Champions!

Jimvesting Dot Com Has A FREE Contest For YOU!

This year, we are going to give you the chance to enter your own bracket free of charge through our friends at CBS Sportsline. It only takes a minute to fill out, and don’t worry if you aren’t familiar with the teams because I will tell you right now… it doesn’t help much. Why take the time to do it? Well if you know me… you know there’s gotta be a perk!

PRIZES:

• Anyone who finishes with a score HIGHER than mine will win a FREE 125×125 ad block for 30 days (value $30)
• The player with the highest overall score will win a paid plug (valued at $75) of the website/product of their choice!

That’s great for a free entry, eh? Naturally, there is a catch: I’m so confident in my picks that I don’t believe I’ll be giving anything away… but by all means try to beat the bracket king.

ENTER THE JIMVESTING DOT COM MARCH MADNESS CONTEST TODAY!
group password = “madness” || deadline = before game 1 on March 18th

Check back tomorrow and you’ll get a “sneak peak” at some of the upsets that I’ve been predicting on my own bracket. That way, you can hedge your way against what I have picked and increase your odds at the top prize! Feel free to email me if you have any questions about how it all works.

Good luck!
-Jimvesting

Come one come all… the Net Fool is now JIMVESTING!

We’re transitioning our old blog located at The Net Fool to our brand new website at Jimvesting.com! Why the sudden change? Well there were plenty of pressures pushing me toward re-branding, and I think there are going to be numerous benefits involved with making the switch. Sure, there will be an initial knee-jerk reaction to switching over cold turkey, but it is a move that needs to be made!

Major Advantages of Moving to Jimvesting Dot Com:

• “Jimvesting” is a more recognizable/brandable name than “The Net Fool”
• The added professionalism provided by the Jimvesting name will add to the overall credibility of the site’s content
• Our new theme will allow for more streamlined content, better monetization and a renewed focus on content quality over aesthetics
• A fresh new look should encourage a renewed surge in participation and interest. The old theme & brand had gotten a bit tired… and Jimvesting.com is a great solution to start things up again!

One of the biggest changes here is dropping the old theme and adding this new one. I think that I will be selling the rights to the old theme, as it seemed to be quite popular. However, I think that one of the disadvantages of that theme was that it took too long to load and see the actual content — the header was so large you could hardly see the first post when you loaded up the page!

Our new theme, based on a design from ProductiveDreams.com, lets you see the first post as SOON as you load up the page. There is plenty of advertising room to work with, and there is much more of a social media presence all across the site. As the web is evolving, we want to move with it… so while the old theme was certainly “fun,” Jimvesting’s new look will allow us to deliver a better experience and Search Engine Optimized performance. The advantages are real, and the design is still just as slick, sexy and original!

Welcome to the new website, let us know what you think below!
-Jimvesting Dot Com